Another Year

The year is drawing to a close, as years always do. Often around this time I wrap up the year with a post in which I take stock. Last year I didn't write one because we were in the middle of moving into our new house -- and having that excuse was a bit of a relief, because except for the house, I didn't feel I'd accomplished much in 2017. This year, I debated whether to skip again, since 2018 also didn't involve any exciting completions or successes in my writing life.

Still, I like getting an overview of the year, even for myself, so I looked back at what I've done, and it's not nothing. This eternal revision isn't over, but the end is in sight. The steady plod continues, even on days when it feels like pointless misery to so much as look at this stupid manuscript, and that is an achievement worth reporting. I can't know for sure what's going to happen at the end of this revision, but I do know that by persisting, I've turned my stupid manuscript into a far better novel than what I thought was good enough before.

While looking back, I also reviewed December posts I've made in earlier years, and there's a consistency in my reflections on where I am or am not at the end of the year and what I imagine happening in the next one. That could be demoralizing, but I actually found it kind of comforting. As long as my good fortune continues, there's always another year, and that's the best cause for celebration.

May you find reasons to celebrate in 2019, and may your dark days brighten!

Good Stuff Out There:

→ At Literary Hub, Panio Gianopoulos extols the virtues of trains as writing spaces: "Can you really get deep into a piece of writing, into anything creative, when you've only got 35 minutes? Isn't that just the warm-up? Strangely, to invert the truism, more is less. On weekends, once the children have been anesthetized with iPads and I've ducked up into our attic with my laptop, I find that somehow I get less writing done in two hours."