This week marks 7 years of blogging! I can hardly believe it.
Back when I started blogging, I was a grad student working on my first novel about an ostrich farm. Now, all these years later, I’m a writer still working on my first novel about an ostrich farm. Awesome.
But all joking aside, a lot has happened in the past seven years. The biggest event was the birth of our son. I remember one of my fellow grad students commented that, with a boy and girl, we had a complete set. Yep. We counted our blessings and shut down the factory (so to speak).
I went from freelancing at home to a full-time position as a content writer and online marketing consultant, to having my own office (and a 45 minute commute) as a technical writer in a well-respected engineering firm, to having a total breakdown and drinking too much, to getting my shit together and going back to freelance. And through it all, I have continued to work on my novel.
And I can actually say, with some confidence, that I’m almost done. If you follow along, you know that my writing buddy and I wrote each other $1000 checks to be cashed in the event that the other is not ready to send out their manuscript on March 15. Even though I’m feeling fairly confident, I’m also kind of freaking out.
I feel like I have so much to do to get to a draft that is ready for an agent: chapter breaks, fine tuning of language, making sure the thematic elements land just right. But mostly that’s just the panic talking. Come March 15th, I have to send it out, and that scares the shit out me.
So it’s a good thing I’ve got money riding on it. Hopefully by this time next year, I will not only be celebrating 8 years of blogging, I will also have a completed manuscript and an agent.
Hell yes.
Wow, seven years of blogging. What an accomplishment! Congratulations!
I found your bio and was hooked by the fact that you’d been working on the same novel for nearly eight years. I haven’t been at mine that long yet, but I’m definitely in the slow writer category and it’s awesome to meet another of my ilk.
I started blogging recently, and it terrifies me, so I really admire you for doing it for seven years. It gets easier, right? 😉
I love your idea of swapping cheques for $1000 with a friend, but if I did that and my friend didn’t send her manuscript out in time I’m not sure I could bring myself to cash it. Does that make me a bad friend?
Hi, A.S. – I checked out your blog. You’re off to a great start. Love the bio. And yes, it does get easier. As for cashing the check if Alex doesn’t hit her deadline, I keep telling myself that I’ll have to do it, but I kind of hate the idea. If it happens, maybe I’ll soften the blow by donating the money to a charity or something. We’ll see. I’m hoping we both meet our goal and it’s not an issue. Cheers!