Well...

Well, I made my goal of 50,000 words. I made it three days short of the end of the month. But the search for the day job made it so I actually didn't get much further than 53,700 words for a final count and I would rather not deeply discuss the outcome of the story. I didn't like it. There are elements there that are good, but, I think, somewhere along the way, I lost control of my story and it nose-dived. I only pushed through the downward spiral to make it through my goal. I made it, so there.

Now that I've made it, I have kind of been spinning my writing wheels. A lot of external factors have contributed to that. I did finally land that day job. But it's in South Provo and my wife and I live with our two kids in Salt Lake City. Or we did until just this last Wednesday when we started moving into a three-bedroom condominium. It's nice, the rent is even nicer. And the space is the nicest. But between that move, the holidays, and sickness over said holidays, my writing has suffered. I started this morning, though, new year and all, to work at re-establishing my early-morning writing sessions. I forgot to stretch though, so I'll have to remember to do that tomorrow. But goodness knows hiking the stairs up to the seventh floor with a bag of about twenty-five pounds is stretching and exercising enough.

Today I decided that I have two stories I can work on in an effort to keep the writing wheels turning. After all, according to Bradbury, through quantity comes quality. Although I did decide to re-visit David Morell's section on neuro linguistic programming (NLP) for writers just to help me get a leg up. The two stories that I will work through in this time of dearth of a passionate new idea, have been kicking around in my head for some time: “The Wraith” and an untitled one about an alien abduction. I'll see how they turn out. I wish I had an extra me, one to just read all the stuff I wish I had in my head, and then the me to take care of the problems of daily life until I get my writing career off the ground and become an author. My friend Ken Jennings said that, “...a writer is someone who has completed a story. An author is someone who has had it published.”

Here's to authorship for Ken, me, and anyone else out there who writes. But I don't write for the goal of authorship. I write because I have to, the authorship is just a side goal. But the hope is there as well. Ultimately, I write my stories for myself, and if authorship comes, the I will ride that wave when it hits me.