Word Count Wednesday

This picture is one of my very favorite's from our trip to Kenya. It sums up so much. Today I wrote about this photo for my book. I bet you want to know the story. Some day.

Today's word count: 624 words. That would be good, except that I totally skipped writing last night. Sometimes life does crop up.

Day 7 Writing Marathon

Death where is your victory?

“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”

1 Corinthians 15:55

The First of November is All Saints' Day and our church always observes it the weekend following that date. Which means that last night, in my little conservative Lutheran church, Pastor read the names of all the church members who have passed away in the past year, and one of the ushers tolled the bell for each one. It is pretty somber and always causes me to tear up. Protestants generally regard all true Christian believers as saints, hence the ceremony in remembrance of those who have gone to heaven.

As a Christian, when I hear that a believer has died, I am like - all right, way to go, another soul is in Paradise, all pain and suffering, worry and hassle is gone from their life and now it is a life of peace and joy for eternity for them. (Which doesn't mean I'm still not going to cry, I am after all an emotional, hormonal female.)

It drives me nuts when I ask patients how they are doing, and they respond with something like, "I'm still here, it's better than the alternative."

Really? Because for me the alternative is way better than what I have here now.

Lord, God Heavenly Father, grant me the patience to wait on Your call, when You are ready to carry me home. In the meantime, guide me in bringing others into Your saving grace.

Nairobi funeral home that we drove past one day while I was in Kenya

And word count for today, on my memoir from Africa, is 1049 words. Making up for some lost time.

Day 5 Writing Marathon

I am still working on the disease education and prevention seminars which we presented to the Maasai in Kenya. While doing some online research I discovered that a vaccine against malaria is right on the cusp of being available to people across Africa. How exciting. If I get my memoir done in any kind of timely fashion and you are one of the lucky recipients of an advanced copy, you will find out why this is such wonderful news.

In the meantime, I wrote 652 words today. I think. It is hard to keep track coz I am doing a lot of editing as I go, so it is hard to keep track of how many new words there are.

What has a lack of knowledge done to you?

"My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." Hosea 4:6

Just a year ago, I was pulled over by an officer of the law. "Did you know how fast you were going?" he asked.

"Umm, 45 miles an hour," I answered honestly.

"Did you know the speed limit is 35?"

"No, I really did not. This is the first time I've been on this road and I didn't see any speed limit sign." Truly, I would never lie to an officer of the law. And he let me off.

But in Africa, that kind of lack of knowledge is deadly. It is how millions of people have contracted AIDS, Hepatitis B, Tuberculosis, Typhoid and Malaria.

And that's what I wrote about on my book tonight. But alas, it required more research than I had planned on, so I only got in 314 words.

Day 2 Writing Marathon

Today I worked on Chapter 12, the title of which is "A Time to Keep Silent and A Time to Speak."

I wrote about the moving confirmation service we had the privilege to witness, the first Maasai in the area to ever be welcomed into the church of Christ. It was beautiful.

Word count for today - 549.

Want to get in on my book writing?

I just had one of those epiphanies and feel that I need to follow it. I just read on Facebook that November is National Novel Writing Month . I remember that from last year from various blogs I follow and other things I run across in the writing world. The challenge is to write a 50,000 word book in one month. You sign up on the NaNoWriMo website and post every day how many words you write and get inspiration from other writers and such. Last year 200,000 people signed up for this and 30,000 actually met the 50,000 goal.

Now, my calculator tells me that that means 1666 words a day, every day for 30 days straight. Not going to happen in my world.

But, I have a fairly good head start. At last count, I had 31,755 words on the memoir I am writing of my missions trip to Kenya in 2006. My goal the other night when I counted all those words (ok, aren't computers great; they do all the counting), was to finish this thing by the end of the year.

Well, here we go. How bout I finish by the end of November? That's only going to come up to 608 words a day. I could maybe do that. With your help.

I am going to post on my blog every day for the month and let you know my word count for the day. Hold me to my goal and I will print you out a copy of my rough draft for you to critique. (That doesn't sound like much of a deal, does it? Just humor me.)

A drum roll please... number of words for my first day 670. Yes!