January 29th was my last update? I fail. In case anyone checks this site on a regular basis, I apologize for not posting anything lately. The day job has sapped my will to live. Plus we’ve had the cold and norovirus rip through our household. If it wasn’t my turn to be sick, I was on Florence Nightingale duty. Still, you have to treat writing as a business, and two weeks is far too long.
I haven’t been completely idle, though. I’ve been writing, just not as much as I would like. I’ve mostly been editing older stuff that hasn’t found any publication love. Some of it is crap. Some of it is rough. And one of them, a novella, I think is the best thing I’ve written. Yet I always struggle with the editing process. Not because I’m afraid to murder my darlings. But because I can spend hours editing pieces and when I’m done, I feel like I don’t have anything new to show for it.
When writing a new piece, it’s easy to get a sense of achievement. You have a word count that you can post on Twitter with the hashtag “#amwriting”. When the story is done you have something you can share with the world. “Lookie what I created! An idea made whole!”
But editing? Ugh. Editing for me is a hard look in the mirror. It’s a reminder of my failures. A run in with the girl who rejected me.
It never ceases to amaze me how something I think is so brilliant at the time of its creation can read like the spawn of Garth Marenghi’s typewriter a week later. But that’s why editing is necessary.
On the upside, I think one of my stories is ready for submission. And I just may shop that novella around, finally. Wish me luck.