No Routines This Week – and That’s Okay!

 

Photo credit: uwekern via Pixabay

 

I try to stick to the same writing routine every week: Work on my books, do things for the press (which includes reading submissions), work on the newsletter, work on my book reviews, and spend time writing something, as well as revising and editing whatever currently needs revising and editing. In between all this, I’m also responding to emails and doing anything needed for self-publishing that can’t wait for the weekend.

 

But this particular week was different. While I was able to work on a couple of books this week (only two, alas!), I mostly focused on the things that I HAD to get done this week. If there’s something I need to have done by a particular date, then I put as much focus on this thing as I can. Since I work on many different things every day, in addition to the books, I don’t spend my whole day working on just that thing. I DO spend more of my time working on it, but not all of my time.

 

And that’s what happened this week. I have an article due next week, plus the newsletter to send out, so I spent some time working on the article and wrapping up gathering things to include in the newsletter. But I also had to finish a book review by the 20^th, since that is the last day to post a review on my book review blog so that I can include it in the SPARREW Newsletter (this is true for every month except for October and December, when I try to post a review of a holiday-themed book on those holidays). The 20^th of every month is the cut-off date for gathering material to include in the newsletter, and that includes reviews that are posted on my book review blog (with an exception for those two other dates).  

 

The problem is that I got so caught up on the same routine I had in place for the week that it was hard to accept a week that was a little bit different. (My weekends are free days. No schedules and no routines.) Change is always hard for me. I know that change is good and that it’s okay if one week is different from the last, but it can be difficult for me to just go with it. I need plenty of time to adjust to the idea of change and prepare myself for it. I like my routines and I like the way I have everything organized so that I can accomplish my goals.

 

But sometimes, there are other goals that I need to accomplish too – such as meeting a deadline and sending out my newsletter. And while I try to give myself as much time as possible to work on both of those things, the week of that deadline or sending the newsletter out is when I REALLY need to focus on it and make sure both of those things are taken care of. I hyperfixate on them to the point where I forget about everything else that I normally do – such as revising a short story for an anthology deadline.

 

Which meant that, this week, I was really focused on getting that book review done. And I’ll be doing the same thing next week to make sure I get that article done and ready to submit in time, along with publishing the newsletter online.

 

My hyperfixation on getting things done sort of clashes with my need to stick to my routine, though. As much as I kept telling myself that this is only temporary and I can go back to my regular routine soon, it was hard to accept. I kept looking at those two pages of the week in my planner and feeling like I could have done more.

 

Oh, sure I could have – if I never slept. But even writers have to sleep.

 

Yes, I’ll get back to my regular schedule after my deadlines are met. The month is almost over and that means making sure I meet that article deadline AND get the SPARREW Newsletter out. And once those things are taken care of, I’ll go right back to my writing routines. I just need to remind myself that it’s okay if there are times – weeks, even – when I am not following those routines, because there’s something else that is more important at that time.

The SPARREW Newsletter Now Has Its Own Site!

 

 

When I started the SPARREW Newsletter in 2022, I had no idea or expectation that it would grow as large as it has today. I thought it would just be a simple little monthly newsletter that would exist only in a subscriber’s inbox.

 

But now, almost four years later, the SPARREW Newsletter has grown so big that not only did I need to set up an archive of past issues somewhere (which you can read here), but I realized that this mighty newsletter needed its own website.

 

In fact, I have known this for several months.

 

Lots of other newsletters have their own website. FundsforWriters. WritersWeekly. Authors Publish.

 

I realized the SPARREW Newsletter needed one too. But how was I going to make that happen?

 

I spent those months mulling over my options. I also reached out to the Tricky Edits contributor, Carolyn Howard-Johnson, to see if she had any ideas.

 

I thought about using Substack, because of the ease of organization, but I didn’t like the idea of my newsletter being posted on a site that I didn’t own.

 

No, I had to put it on a site that I owned. So I just stuck to the “dmcwriter” site I already had set up.

 

But even on there, the newsletter was growing too! It became part newsletter site, part writing portfolio site.

 

Meanwhile, I wasn’t sure how everyone I interviewed on there felt about that. Mostly, how they felt about the domain name not matching the newsletter’s name.

 

And ever since someone turned down being interviewed for the newsletter after I showed him the site the newsletter is posted on, I have always wondered if it’s because of that. (Or because my little newsletter is not so popular.)

 

That idea lingered in my brain. While I understood that the newsletter should be on a site with a matching domain name, I couldn’t figure out how to separate the newsletter from the writer.

 

Well, Life figured that out for me! It’s like Life said, “For goodness sake, if you can’t figure out how to do it, I’ll show you!”

 

So, recently, something messed up the DNS connection I had between the dmcwriter domain name and the site I had set up on another hosting platform. I am not very tech savvy, so I had a hard time figuring out what was going on AND how to fix it. And because I was using two different sites for the domain name and the hosting, I kept going back and forth between Customer Support for both sites, as well as the help guide links they sent to me, as I attempted to fix this problem and get the site I created back online. It went on for several days and I was increasingly frustrated that I kept running into dead ends, that I decided, screw it, I’ll just purchase a domain name on the hosting site and connect it with the site I created on there.

 

Plus, it was getting confusing going back and forth between two different websites just to fix ONE website!

 

So I purchased a domain name that I felt was a good fit for not only the SPARREW Newsletter but all things SPARREW, since there’s going to be some merch as well: SPARREW Site.

 

And at first, I was thinking of removing ALL of my credits as both a freelance writer and as a book reviewer, but then I realized something: What if visitors to the site want to know just who this Dawn Colclasure person is? I say on the About page that I started the newsletter in 2022. Okay, who am I to be publishing such a newsletter? I talk the talk, but do I walk the walk?

 

I certainly do!

 

I took a break from self-publishing books for a while there, but now I self-publish a title every once in a while.

 

I am an author, and the link to my books is on the About page.

 

I am certainly a reader (booklover), as my friends and followers on Facebook and BlueSky have seen when I have shared pages from my reading log.

 

I am a book reviewer, and the link to my book reviews can be found on that site, in the navigation bar.

 

I have experience working as an editor, and I share this information on the About page.

 

And, of course, I’m a writer. Proof is on the portfolio page that is also included on the navigation bar.

 

So, if people want to know if I’m the right person to be publishing a newsletter for self-published authors, authors, readers, reviewers, editors and writers, the proof is all there.

 

And you know what? I am going to leave it all there, too.

 

I don’t know what I’ll do with the dmcwriter domain name in the meantime. As it stands, while I own it, I can’t do anything with it. I tried, but so far, no luck. And that’s the next problem that I have to fix! At least I can work on it in my free time.

 

UPDATE:

New dmcwriter site just dropped! 

I Failed at My New Plan for the Freelance Writing But I Will Try Again

 

 

From Monday through Friday, there are several things that I do throughout my day. They usually fall under these categories:

 

Book Review (reading books I review, writing the reviews, posting and sharing reviews)

Writing (I try to write something new every day)

Freelance Writing (fiction, essays, poetry, articles)

Author (either writing, revising or editing a book – and doing book promo!)

Self-Publishing (rare but I do this sometimes)

The SPARREW Newsletter (gathering material, interviewing people, finding people to interview)

 

And, as Dawn Wilson, I’m usually reading or editing submissions for Twisted Dreams Press. I also try to do promo work for the press when that need arises.

 

(Note: Colclasure is my maiden name. All of my writings are published under this name. As Dawn Wilson, however, I am an editor and marketing rep. Wilson is my married name. I’m also a wife and mother!)

 

And in addition to publishing my own newsletter every month, I also publish and promote The Big Scream, which is the newsletter for Twisted Dreams Press. Unlike my own newsletter, these go out any time.

 

The work I do for both the press and my newsletter can take several hours to complete.

 

During the weekends, I do website updates, send out my latest Substack, do the book reviewing, hunt for new markets to submit to, work on my books, continue research for either a book or an article, and try to write something.

 

So, yeah, my days are pretty full. Which is why I’m not going to beat myself up too much over being unable to try something new with the freelance writing this week.

 

See, with the freelance writing, I was just submitting stuff. I hardly ever pitched any articles. Predictably, the work dried up, which was not good, given that I have recent financial problems. (A job I had my eye on to apply for won’t have any openings until September.) So, I tried to change things up a bit. With all of my market research, I was able to put together a list of markets to pitch every day of the week this week. And submit something. And write something.

 

Thing of it is, though, the stuff I wanted to submit this week was not up to snuff. They needed some serious revision! In fact, an essay I wrote was turned into an article which I needed to do more research for.

 

Another essay needs a lot of work, so that, too, was not submitted.

 

A short story I wrote also required more revision. After two rounds of revision, it still isn’t ready to submit!

 

And while I had ideas for articles and short stories to write this week, there were only so many of them which were written.

 

The reason? I didn’t have enough time in my day to do all that stuff, in addition to all that other stuff I do, along with my work for the press.

 

And I need to be there for my kids, too. And try to keep clean laundry and dishes in the house.

 

Yeah, life is pretty busy and my days are pretty full. So of course I was not able to perform my new plan for the freelance writing this week. I have been posting about my progress every day on BlueSky and Facebook.

 

Things worked out well for the first couple of days. Then things got busy! And my time with the work for the press is very important to me. In fact, I wanted to finish developmental edits on a manuscript today and thankfully, I was able to do that. And edit a short story. And read another submission. Got ‘em all done today.

 

But the new plan for the freelance writing? Not so much. I submitted a short story today, but I did not pitch as many articles or write certain stories for my book. The week started off strong but then I wasn’t able to do all the rest of the other things.

 

I won’t give up on those tasks I had planned for the week, though. I have kept all of those Post-It Notes with markets to submit to, articles to pitch, and stories to write. I’ll get them all done, too! At some point. Maybe after I get the newsletter out tomorrow – and even THAT might be going out late!