A Nearly-Missed Milestone

I sat down to my WordPress dashboard to decide between working away on a draft post, or starting a new one.  Hey, said the little voice, how long have we been at this?  I did a check and made the following discovery:

I pretty much kept this going for one year.

Remember, this whole things started as a way to keep writing.  Lately the output has slowed down-a lot.  While I feel better, I felt tapped out in the ideas department.  It hasn’t stopped me from reading, and boy have I been reading.  My GoodReads goal is 42 books, basically my age this year.  As of this post, I find myself 43 percent behind.  On the bright side it’s less than 50%.  On an even brighter side, it means some long, overdue Book Talk posts.

While it’s great to hear people follow the blog, the next step is the fiction output.  Before a leaf falls off a tree,  National Novel Writing Month will roll around.  It’s a different sort of writing contest to get people writing.  The mission, if you are crazy enough to accept it, is write a 50,000 word story in 30 days.  NaNoWriMo gets me going writing fiction for now.  I know that approach can’t go on forever.  It took a long time to get some rust off my motivation.

I didn’t think I was any good.

It’s a typical story, but one I feel determined write my own ending.  The best part about keeping the blog is the fun.  I forgot how much I enjoy writing.  I enjoy talking about various topics.  Now I need to expand, to bust myself out of my own box.  When the call went out to guest blog, I took a look at the blog, then asked the author himself what topics does he usually cover.  After getting a response, once again I sat frozen.  Once again the fear of falling flat on my face took hold.  Good news-it doesn’t stay for very long.  I already looked like an idiot on more than one occasion, noticing nobody seemed to notice.  I just seemed to notice.

So, raise your imaginary glasses to the keeping this up for one year.  Now to keep going for another one.