My Evening Ritual.

Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story...

~ Homer

(Translated by Robert Fitzgerald)

To my dearest friends and followers,

This past week has been rather eventful. To start, my husband got a new job and those nightshifts are taking some getting used to - for the both of us.

I used to be a night owl...but work and marriage changed that. I don't know why, but I always felt peaceful at night, and kind of lonely. Not in a bad way though, more so in a rainy day kind of way where I feel like I can think. I felt inspired, the muses within my mind waking up and singing their songs of creativity to me.

With my husband working nights now, I feel like my muses have come back.
Yes!! I have begun working on my book again, revising another chapter every other night. It's such a rewarding feeling, as this is the most progress I've made in as many days. I truly do think that I shall be done at the end of October of this year. XD

My nights have typically looked like this:
I decide what to eat for dinner, make whatever it is I decided, feed my fur babies, eat that dinner I made (whilst watching a 44 minute episode of a show of my choosing), clean up that dinner (if I feel like it), watch a YouTube video, interact with people on my social media and possibly even post something myself. 
Basically, after I have wasted a good deal of time, I start to take things seriously. I turn off all the lights in the house, sit down and turn on the lamp on my desk. I open the document on my computer. I then proceed to stare at it.

After a few seconds pass, I'll open Spotify and pull up my James Newton Howard - Peter Pan 2003 soundtrack. It's fantastical, beautiful, sad, dark, and magical. I once read someone describe that soundtrack as being what love sounds like. I can't remember who said that, but I couldn't agree more.
It puts me exactly where I need to be. It puts me in a magical land of fairies and men. A land of beauty and darkness. A land of love and hate.

I then light my lavender scented candle.
Finally I am able to write. To read what I have already written and retype it, polishing it as I go.

I should like to boast that I am just about at the word count that I was at the end of NaNoWriMo 2016 (gosh, was it that long ago?). XD Not finished yet, but I'm keeping motivated and I am finally almost halfway through my manuscripts current (as in, non-edited version) word count.

I know I am not the only writer who struggles to go back over their work and edit. But let me say this: don't give up. Let's make our books the best they can be. We deserve that much after all the time we've put into them.

Yours truly,
Me