Depression and writing

Well, it's been a crazy few months in the USA and inside my head. It's always crazy, but with our new "president" [political opinion redacted, but not exactly hard to figure out], I've been pretty much dragging through molasses ever since the election. And eating.

Now that Spring is Springing here in Inland California (brag...brag...watch out for flooding), I'm hoping to pull myself out of my writing slump and my editing slump and my exercise slump and my need-a-job slump and my everything slump.

The slumps are the hard parts. I have a history of depression and this time through hasn't been as rough as some, but it still left me in despair and reading a lot of comfort reads. (You should see my list of re-reads from the last 2 months!)

I'm about a month behind in the schedule I set for myself, so need to look at my goals again.

I'm almost through an editing pass of my Big Chill not-quite-a-romance-maybe-chick-lit book and my critique partners are reading it in sections as I finish editing. I'm going to be querying a bunch of agents who have said they're interested in New Adult and Chick Lit. I spent a few hours searching for them the other day and need to get my query letter in shape.

THEN I want to edit Françoise, which is book...uh... six? Yes. Book 6 of Châteaux and Shadows. The bones are there, but it's going to take some work.

ALSO, I should be getting my galleys and then planning my publicity for the Wild Rose Press release of Mélisande, whenever that happens.

I also want to edit Harriet (contemporary romance with a beta hero) to give her more conflict (sorry, Harriet, it's just too easy). That will probably be late March.

I'm going to be giving my critique partners a workout.

April is a Camp Nanowrimo and I really need to finish Dario (Book 7, Châteaux and Shadows), then put it on the back burner to percolate for a while.

And in all this, I REALLY NEED a job. With actual income. Right now, I'll take about anything full time, preferably paying more than minimum wage and preferably not on my feet the whole time, but something temporary so there is income while I'm looking for some other thing is fine.

The writing will take more time when I get a job, but at least I have goals.

And now that the fog of depression is lifting, I can probably do all these things. Let's get cracking!