(Dianne) Fox Writes

Just before I left to visit Anah, I color-coded my April calendar and sticky-tacked it up to the door of my office, complete with arrow-shaped sticky note on top for my list of goals for this month. I do this at the start of every month.

It begins with my pink highlighter pencil (Faber-Castell Textliner Dry, from Levenger) and my dayjob work schedule. I draw a pink line across the top of each dayjob workday. That way, I don’t accidentally think any of those days will be big writing days.

Then I move on to checking for upcoming release dates. I put little flags on the calendar for each release date (April doesn’t have any for me). This lets me see, at a glance, if I need to be ready to update my website with new book information or not. And also if I need to be ready to celebrate.

After that, I pencil in closing dates for any submission calls I’m interested in (Samhain has a steampunk romance call that looks fun) and color over it in green highlighter pencil so I won’t accidentally miss it (as opposed to deliberately missing it because I’ve decided not to write for it).

This month, I have a vacation coming up, so that goes in next. One whole week of plotting and plotzing with Anah Crow. Any other important dates go in at this point, too.

Then I make my goal list. I have arrow-shaped Post-It stickies for this. This month’s goal sticky looks like this:

GOALS FOR APRIL:

Trammel
One Real Thing (this is actually already done now, completed while I was visiting Anah)
Percussion

I stick the sticky (that’s fun to type) on the top of the calendar and post it on my door at eye level. The May calendar is empty (except for the release date I already know about — Tatterdemalion, May 18) and posted higher up on the door. The March calendar is on my desk, ready to be filed away in my “calendars” folder for future reference.

And now, every time I turn my head, I can see my goals and dates right there, reminding me what’s important. I won’t forget.