A Day Off

Every so often I get a Thursday where I don't have any children coming to my home for daycare. I really look forward to these days and usually have big plans to write for hours. Visions of word counts in the thousands dance through my mind, interesting blogs will fly from my fingers, and before I go to bed I will congratulate myself for such a productive day. It is always good to dream, right?

Then there is the reality. As much as I would love to lock myself in the office and type until my fingers are raw, sometimes other things have a stronger pull. Most days I struggle to find a few minutes to exercise and I take what I can get when I can get it -- this morning I worked out for an hour. I hardly ever do my hair. Usually it is shower, comb, move on to the next task, and maybe put an elastic in when it starts to bother me -- today I did my hair. A typical day doesn't see me leave the house very often. There are too many children coming and going at different times. That makes it hard to leave the house. After lunch I decided to go to the post office and get the mail. The beautiful fall weather proved to be to tempting to lock myself in the van, so I walked, detouring past my sister's house and the library.

I didn't follow my original plan, but I had a great day. I write in spurts most of the time, but when I have the freedom to do what I want, when I want, I think I get a little giddy. I enjoyed the visit with my sister, loved the fresh air, felt good after I worked-out, and found too many new books to read at the library (and my hair looked good the whole time). So my day off from babysitting, also also felt like a day off from writing. As I did all these things, I did work out plots in my head, decide to rewrite the whole first chapter of my book, and came up with whole new ideas. So the day wasn't wasted, I just worked differently than planned. And sometimes that is good.