Tag: #Writer

  • Why I Blog, Again

    What am I doing with this blog?

    I have this thought a couple times a week. (This is the neurotic side of me, where I have to continually affirm my decisions.) I write a blog as a daily exercise to express a concise thought in, give or take, 250 words. It is one part of the three types of writing I try to do, at least, 5 days a week. The other two are journaling, which is completely free form, has no structure, and is the structural opposite of the blog. The third type of writing I try is fiction, which is combination of creative freedom, while trying to stay within a narrative structure.

    It’s a good old classic thesis, antithesis, and synthesis.

    That having been said, when I do ask myself “What am I doing with this blog,” I do wonder if I should actively try to “make” something out of the blog. And when I say “make” that word means monetize. If I work had at something, pour myself into it, then I should earn money off of it, right?

    First of all, what I like doing, and I could be wrong as I just crossed over 100 followers yesterday (Thank You!), won’t ever generate enough traffic for me to earn anything. As all of you know, if your blog isn’t unique, niche, or teaching something, then it has zero change to earn, or be sticky, or what other buzz word is used. I know only one friend who has a successful blog, and they still have a day job. Second, I have been so hard wired into believing that only earning an income off of my exertion is the end all be all justification. If I were to limit my creative endeavors to what could earn money, then I really wouldn’t be creatively free. I would be beholden to what the market deemed accessible.

    What if I just want to create and share? No strings attached. Just put it out there and see what happens.

  • Oops… No Writing Yesterday

    I didn’t meet my goal yesterday, which was writing. I was able to journal, but I didn’t complete a blog, nor did I work on any fiction.

    But I spent a huge amount of time with my kid. We made chicken stock in the morning, and read books together in the afternoon. We were able to go to the playground, and draw pictures together while drinking hot chocolate. In the evening, we made dinner, and watched “Star Wars.” It was a very fulfilling day.

    Being locked at home al the time, I get in my head that I should be making huge strides, and racking up enormous word counts daily. And maybe I should if I want to have a career.

    But I don’t want to miss this time with my daughter. I mean, I’m teaching her to read. Helping her sound out words and become confident with her ability to learn. It really is a gift to be with her at this time, and to learn how learning works.

  • New Ideas to Work On

    I am trying to stick to my plan and just get the work done that I have been journaling and thinking about. Making the time, and even having to say no to kid this afternoon, which I feel awful about. I needed to hold myself to the promise that I had made which was that I was going to work.

    And then all these new ideas popped into my head today, and I have spent the day doing research and trying to figure out when I can get to these ideas.

    The idea is to look into what became of historical locations that have disapeared. Espically around here in the Northeast, progress has bulldozed over building and landscapes in the name of progress, and where history was made, in most cases is a subdivision, or a parking lot. It is an idea that asks the question how we lost our history, and were people aware that history was being lost.

    Not sure when I will get to it, but I like the idea.

  • I Missed a Day of Writing

    So… When I started working on this blog back in July, I decided that I was going to do things differently. in the past, I wrote something when the mood hit me, which meant that this blog was rather infrequent, lots of ebbs and flows of inspiration. The choice I made in July was to write at least one blog a day during the week, with the exception of holidays. I was going to treat it more like a job, a job that I enjoyed, but it was a job that I had to accomplish each day of the week. Large or small, I had to write a blog.

    Yesterday, I missed it.

    There was a window for me to get it accomplished, but I kept letting myself get pulled sideways. We are trying to get Covid tested, and then there was making the Thanksgiving shopping list, and it was a nice day out, so I wanted to make sure the kid got lots of park time, and then I got sucked down a Twitter-hole of checking on Trump’s efforts in Michagain.

    In that same vein of thought, It has been close to a month since I have worked on any of my fiction. At first I chalked it up to the coming election, as that was and still is dominating a great deal of my mental space. But it has been three weeks, and I think it is time to admit that I have fallen off the writing wagon.

    It is a matter of self discipline. I am lacking it, and also staying focused. This isn’t meant as a pity party, but more a matter of recalibration. We are still a long way from normal, or even a normal schedule, but I have to find a way to work within this situation.

  • Rewriting is a Skill

    I fully believe that rewriting is a skill. A skill that I do not possess.

    I am trying to make a better effort this time around at rewriting. Really putting my mind to it. Making notes on the first draft, formulating an outline, crafting the words to build the story. And I just about hate all of it.

    As I get older, I begin to see patterns in my life. One pattern I see is my attraction to acts of immediacy in the arts. I love Jack Kerouac, Jackson Pollock, and Jazz. The theatre I have been the most successful at has been puppetry, which has been like pick up the puppet and go perform.

    It has been an artistic life and philosophy of, “First thought, best thought.”

    Yet, when it comes to my writing, my first thought is not the best thought. I have to work at a best thought.

    I remember a theatre professor back in college who told us that we had to learn to appreciate all the steps in the process of being an actor. Not love all the steps, just appreciate. You can’t be an actor if you hate auditioning, as the hatred of that step will come through when you try to get a job. But if you respect that step, then you will hone the needed skills that will help you audition, which helps you get to the next step.

    That’s where I feel like I am coming to. I don’t like rewriting, but I have first drafts that need reworking, and this is the next step in the process.