To Do lists are easier than Doing

Woke this morning thinking about the future of the nonfiction part of my writing, about what I want to do and how to make it possible, about what I can control and about what I can't, and the fact that there is no money coming in right now which is more than a little alarming.

I also woke knowing where I was going with the project I'm doing, which is nice, because it takes away the panic part where the brain scrambles about trying to remember.

Only instead I saw the To Do list once of my favorite authors posts in her journal, and she'd updated. Because of her To Do lists on her journal, I've started keeping two erasable "white boards" (one is green and the other purple) of lists which has had the hoped for consequence that I no longer remake the same lists over and over in hope that something got done while I wasn't looking or in hope that by making the list I'll be overwhelmed by ambition and extra hours.

So I'm posting my own lists here, the Old that I just erased, and the New, which may just be rearranged Old... though I'm hoping not. Here goes:

Old List
Draft 2 Ghosts of Rag & Bone
Draft 2 Ghost of a Chance
X Finish writing Kaleidoscope Window
Write Shifting Sands
Revise Abandon
Redraft Dreamside
Write Listen
Write City
Write Southern Lights
Write Angelica's Room
Write Tet
Finish 4L&T
Finish Game Called on Account of Rain (story)
X Finish Shine (story)
X Finish Intervention (story)

New
Draft 2 Ghosts of Rag & Bone
Draft 2 Ghost of a Chance
Draft 2 Kaleidoscope Window
Novel contest information
Revise Abandon
Revise Dreamside

Write Shifting Sands
Write Southern Lights

Write Tet
Write Tet YA

Finish 4L&T
Write Listen
Write City

Write short stories (something like 12 by 11/30/09)

No problem. Just let me stall a bit more and I'll start the nonfiction for a few hours and then go do All. Of. This.

Dust and Discoveries

I am cleaning my office, and have been for about a month now. I broke it down into 10 segments (closet, closet, multi-bookcases, desk, books on the floor, etc) in hopes I wouldn't become completely overwhelmed. We live where there are still dirt lots near us, and dirt, lots of it. My office is gritty. The dirt has texture, like ... gritty velvet.

Today I'm on the next to last book shelf, leaving one if I ever finish this and the books on the floor. The bookcases take forever because they're full of Disney collectibles and action figures and so on. And in the process today I found two things, ok, three -

1. I'm horribly allergic to dust. I suppose everyone is. I want to live in a dust-free bubble!

2. A check tucked into the spine of an anthology I was dusting! Seriously, I know I love the writing for the writing's sake, but when someone sends you money, it's polite to take it.

3. I picked up two blank books that I've filled (and thus, techincally, aren't blank anymore) and discovered in one of them that I had sold every story in there except, possibly, one, and I can't remember if it's out somewhere or what I've done with it. That's probably bad. I should probably be able to remember where my stories are. It's 1:30 p.m. - do you know where your stories are?

Now I'm going through a filled book that I didn't write the story titles on the flyleaf of and then, yay, only two more shelves of this case and I shall shower. No doubt mud will flow into the shower drain. But I'm finding things, getting excited about old projects (because of course I need more projects to be excited about) and my office is becoming a pleasant place to be again, as opposed to somewhere I race into, grab what I need, trip over my shoes that are placed stupidly in the path between door and desk, and run off to work somewehre else in the house. That behavior leads to my husband asking why these things (piles of books, papers, notebooks, blank books, pens and cats) can't be in my office? So actually cleaning my office makes the whole house nicer.

Now, back to those last two shelves, she sneezed...