Image courtesy of Stuart Miles  FreeDigitalPhotos.net

     For the last four years, I’ve been “trying my hand” at this writing thing.  I know that this is something I can truly see myself doing full time.  In the first month alone, I had amassed a collection of 7 short stories and poems.  Then just a few months later, I found NaNoWriMo and I actually created a novel, something I thought beyond my abilities.

     So, after four years, I should have a nice lengthy collection, right?  I should have short stories and poems coming out of the woodworks.  After participating in NaNoWriMo three years in a row, I should have three novels complete and simply needing polishing, right?  Wrong.  I didn’t know just how wrong until I came across authonomy.com, a site created by HarperCollins Publishing that allows writers to share their work with readers, editors and publishers with the possibility of getting published by HarperCollins.  The site requires any work that you share to consist of a minimum of 10,000 words.

     My first novel was shared with fellow writers earlier this year and, after their helpful feedback, requires a lot more editing before I am ready to share it on authonomy.com.  The second novel is only about halfway written and the third is, well only a third written.  I couldn’t finish the second and third because the more I wrote them, the more I found things that didn’t work with the first or that didn’t make sense.  So with the ever evolving first novel still incomplete, I chose to sideline the other novels and concentrate my efforts on the first novel.

     Without an actual novel to share, or even a part of one that I was willing to share, I decided to compile most of my poems and short stories.  With the exception of a handful, I loaded them all, one by one, each representing a “chapter”.  I watched the number climb; 7, 10, 13, until I had a total of 17 “chapters”.  I was feeling pretty good about this.  17 poems and short stories, that’s not a shabby number.  But the number that was shabby, the word count.  Somehow, all of those works only accounted for 6669 words.  All these years and all the writing I thought I had been doing and this was all I could scrape together?

     I already knew that I lacked focus and discipline.  I just didn’t realize how bad it was.  If writing is truly what I want to do, then why aren’t I doing it?  What am I waiting for?  These novels aren’t going to write or edit themselves.  

     Time to step up my game and get serious…

     Oh no!  How did this happen?  It seems another Wednesday has crept up on me and I was caught unprepared.  I had a topic in mind for this week’s blog, but things have been so incredibly insane that I didn’t get a chance to put any real thought behind it and get it written.  So instead, I will share with you another poem that I wrote about a month and a half ago.  This poem epitomizes my “adventures in novelizing”.

Image courtesy of digital art  FreeDigitalPhotos.net



The Craft

Up all night burning the midnight oil.
Tap, tap, clickety, clack, the sound of my toil.
The screen fills with a sea of words
Ideas chirping away in my mind like little birds.


By day I don’t live up to my potential
Slowly but surely going mental
For someone else I slave away
Just to earn a meager pay


I work tirelessly to hone the craft
Unsatisfied living life in rough draft
The thought of it makes me cringe
So all night long, on words I binge

Oh my goodness, is it Wednesday already?  With so much going on, I nearly forgot to post this week’s blog.  While I haven’t been working on the edit like I should be (I know, I know, shame on me), I have been writing everyday.  So, rather than blathering on or slapping something together haphazardly, I’ll share with you a new piece that I wrote just yesterday.  

Image courtesy of africa  FreeDigitalPhotos.net


This tale is not a love story
It’s the ongoing saga of my weight and me


My weight and I, we go way back
We fuss and we fight but not matter what,
We stick together, through thick and thin
We have our ups and our downs,
But my weight, she’ll never leave me

No, really, I can’t get rid of her
I think she’s stalking me
I’m telling you, she’s crazy
I’ve tried everything I can think of
But she’s hard to shake

Diet and exercise,
Yeah that’s all well and good,
But one wrong move
And she’s all over me again

She’s a tricky little thing too
I caught her hiding in my spare tire
So I girded myself, ready to deflate it,
But when I wasn’t looking
She hopped into my trunk
Where she stayed out of sight
Until one day I noticed,
My jeans were rather tight

Hold on a second,
This isn’t so bad
She’s starting to compliment me
So how can I stay mad

Now my weight and me,
We’re on better terms
I’m still not too happy with her
And I’ll keep her in my sights
But for now she’s alright
So long as she’s got my back