It’s been about eight months now since I’ve posted an update
on The Forward Path. The goal I set in
January was to do one every month. And
that tells you everything you need to know about me and New Year’s resolutions.
So, where do things stand, one year and one month after
starting my writing career?
Well, I am now back at work on the Hercules revisited novel.
I posted one brief chunk of my rough draft under the name Let the Adventure Begin!, and then abruptly took a four-month hiatus from working on the book
over the summer. Our schedules since May just haven’t allowed me the time to continue writing for the blog and work
on the book. But I’ve resumed work on
it now that school’s back in session (more on that in a bit). You may remember I set a goal to have a rough
draft done by the end of this year, and that’s still my goal, so it’s time to
get cracking on that. Should I be
worried that my track record with goals is no better than my track record with
New Year’s resolutions?
The blog remains the overwhelming focus of my writing
output. This is as it should be, because
remember, the purpose of the blog is to force me to get used to the feeling of
writing publicly, and to create some accountability in the sense of continuing
to produce new writing, and writing to somewhat of a schedule (even if it is
completely of my own making). Plus, I am
starting to see patterns in what I choose to write about that have me thinking
that eventually some of the posts could be combined into a themed collection of
essays. In short, the blog is an
absolute key to my development as a writer, and I love doing it.
Statistically, as of August 28th, 2012,
thunderstrokes has seen 13,283 pageviews since it began in July of 2011. Thanks to everyone, my great friend Rick and
my sister Kari especially, but including any and all lurkers, who have taken
time to read my writing. I’ve said it
before, and I’ll say it again: as someone who has been plagued by self-doubt
about his abilities for most of his life, I can’t tell you how important, and
how gratifying it is, to know that you’re out there, and that roughly 1,000
times a month, somebody is clicking on a page of thunderstrokes (and hopefully
reading a little of it).
The blog hasn’t generated much extra attention over the last
eight months. I confess, I’ve been so
consumed with just writing and producing new content (it feels so good to say that) that I haven’t been very active in
seeking out opportunities for publishing my work in other places. There’s been nothing published in the Arizona Republic
Another highlight was the interview I did with DorinaGroves, a woman who gave up just about everything that wouldn’t fit in an old
camper, sold her coffee shop across from the Deer Valley airport, and took off
across the country to spread the message: “If you have a pulse, you have a
purpose.” She’s an amazing woman, and I
am still receiving updates from time to time.
You can follow her continuing journey on Facebook.
I also had my first guest post during this time. Kent Yoder is a friend who has prostate
cancer, and he has taken to writing about his life during this unimaginable
trial of body, mind, and spirit. His
gift is to make the unimaginable imaginable, and I was so humbled and inspired
by his words that I asked if I could repost some of them. You can follow his continuing adventure
here.
I had something interesting happen to one of my posts. I wrote a flight-of-fancy dialogue after
seeing the blockbuster movie of the summer, The
Avengers. Now, I don’t know if was
the quality of the writing or just the fact that the title had the words The Avengers in it, but that post took
off like nothing I’ve done before or since. As of this writing, it has garnered
some 1,200 pageviews, which is about three times more than any other post I’ve
written. For some reason, people in India really
seem to like it, as they alone are responsible for about a third of that
total. Just shows you never know what’s
going to click with whom.
Because of the blog, I ended up going to Phoenix ComicCon this
year for the first time, ostensibly to meet Jeremy Bulloch, the man who played
Boba Fett in the Star Wars films, and hand out copies of my poem, The Ballad of Boba Fett, to anyone
dressed in Mandalorian armor. He posed
for pictures with me and my daughter Jessica, and signed a copy of the poem, which
I then managed to lose before we even made it back to the car.
With regard to the blog, I am contemplating a change of
focus. I think I have proven adept at
writing a certain kind of post, one that deals interestingly and even
humorously at times with a topic, and tends to run anywhere from four to eight
pages in length. My ‘manic missives,’ as
I have taken to calling them, have become so representative of my writing style
that I am considered renaming the blog “The Missive Silo.” Post-cold-war readers might not get that one.
At any rate, I’m toying with the idea of switching focus and
forcing myself to write shorter, more streamlined posts, perhaps even imposing
a time limit to make sure I don’t get carried away. In theory, I would give myself, say, three
hours to write a post. That’s three
hours to figure out what I want to say about a topic, and then write it. Wherever I am after three hours is what would
go on the blog, pretty much as is. It
would undoubtedly impact the polished nature of my writing (seeing that I
currently devote, on average, 8-10 hours per post), but it might teach me some
valuable tools for writing under a time constraint, in addition to forcing me
to focus more narrowly on one idea, instead of pursuing every butterfly I see
floating in my mind. Or to use another
internal metaphor, it might serve as the necessary Immodium to my writing
runs. I haven’t quite decided to do this
yet, but I think it probably will be worth a try, so tbf’s might notice a
change in the coming months.
Theoretically, it should allow me to post more often, and also allow me
more time to move forward with other writing projects. Whether I am capable of focusing so
narrowly, and the impact on the quality of what I’m writing are what concern me
most about the idea.
All these thoughts about reorganizing the blog have been
instigated by the fact that for the first time since I started writing last
summer, I will now have time every day of the week to write. Tbf’s know that writing time has been a
severe constraint on my productivity since the beginning, even though I’m not employed. But last week, Maria started preschool, 9-12
three days a week, and seems to enjoy it; and my mom, God bless her, has offered
to once again watch Maria most Thursdays.
This, when added to the existing four-to-six/seven a.m. shift I have
been following since last June, should give me about five to six hours a day
for writing. I’m very excited about this
opportunity, although it means restructuring a host of mundane tasks, such as
cleaning and laundry and exercise. I
don’t know how it’s all going to work, but then I don’t need to know how, do I?
And that brings me to a point I meant to mention
earlier. In looking back over my writing
for the last seven months, I can see now that there is much in what I have
written which is really a part of The Forward Path; they just haven’t been
labeled as such. Posts such as Aiming with Accuracy, Floating Lessons, Jump, and Mystic Monologue really are as much about
where I am on my journey, both as a writer and a person, than their respective
topics. I’m just finding ways of
incorporating my experience into what I write, I think, instead of writing
about it separately. Not that I’m trying
to cop-out for blatantly breaking my New Year’s resolution or anything…
Also, in reviewing my earlier posts to The Forward Path, I
realized that I had been placing a lot of emphasis on numbers, things like how
many people are coming to the blog, how many pageviews, how many members do I
have, etc. My attitude in this regard
has shifted somewhat. I’m far less
concerned now about how many people are reading because 1) I love what the blog is, and what I’m doing
with it, 2) I honestly feel it is filling its purpose better than anything else
I could be doing at the moment, and 3) I
feel like perhaps it’s meant to be part of a larger set of possibilities, and that
having a smaller audience now might turn out to be a bigger blessing
later.
Sometimes, I think I could just be content writing the blog. I love being able to pick up on whatever’s
happening in the moment and just run with it (hold the Immodium). Sometimes I feel like it might be enough if I
could just find a way to continue doing that forever. But, something inside keeps telling me this
is just the beginning, and that the joy I experience in writing the blog is
just the tip of the iceberg. There are
possibilities within possibilities calling me on, and even though I can’t see
or know them all now, they seem to be whispering reassurances that I’m still on
the path, and still moving forward…
Yay!
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