taking stock

Too many projects or not enough? Until this year, my routine has been to focus on one story through two drafts or until it was clear to me it wasn't working, then on to the next story. I rarely worked on multiple pieces at once, though I was and still am not averse to jotting down occasional notes/lines. If they speak to me strongly enough, they'll hang around until I get to them.

Having decided to submit some of my work this year, the whole process has changed. First, I do not believe any of my work is near publishable after two drafts. So anything I think I might want to submit needs intensive rewriting. Which is necessary and fine, but it also means I'm working on stories I've already told and the new ones still want to be heard. So I've tried to carve some time for those as well. The net result is I've probably written more on a pure volume scale than at any time since I drafted my last (terrible!) novel a decade ago. 

Every day I question the value of my work. I've had one story in circulation since February; three rejections and that's fine. (I will be the most shocked person in the world if anything I write gets accepted somewhere.) The more important question is what am I learning from the process; am I becoming a better writer? One would hope so. I don't mind submitting my work and I don't mind going through the oftentimes hell of rewrites. It's the time spent looking for markets that I find exhausting. Most of the markets I've found are way out of my league, and the more appropriate ones are overloaded. But I go after the appropriate ones anyway. I imagine building a list over time will alleviate the problem somewhat. 

The new stuff I've worked on this year, perhaps as a result of revisiting my old stuff, is not like any of my prior work. The bulk of it, for starters, doesn't even really fit in the weird/horror category where most of my stories live. Perhaps it will as it mutates (heh) but I don't think so. This writing seems to be serving two functions for me: a)helping me creatively deal with a life that has been, truthfully, rather difficult for a while and looks to continue to be for the near future and b)bringing me back to the joy I got out of writing before feeling like it had to have a purpose beyond simply creating. 

I'll be honest: at least once I day I want to burn everything I've written. At least once I day I hate my mind and myself. At least once a day I want to run away from everything. It's easier to shine if you're standing in a dimmer light, no? I figure the doubt about the validity of the work just comes with territory. I know I'm not all that talented. And maybe that's why I pushed myself to submit work this year--not for validation (seriously, the validation has to first come from yourself--everything is else is frosting on the cake), but to ensure I'm still growing as a writer. It is not a craft you master: it's a craft you continually learn, and if you plug your ears...well, your deafness will be reflected in the work.

So I plug away, like every writer ever. I'm not much given to illusions, and these days I'm not much given to dreams. But I've got these stories I'd like to tell...