Now that I’ve had a chance to get settled into my new home as well as get many of the little but important tasks done that come with moving, I’ve decided that it’s time to get back to my writing in earnest. Since moving back to the Midwest I’ve only dabbled at writing the second book in Stephen’s trilogy. Until today I’ve only managed 4,675 words over upwards of 7 sessions. Definitely not as much as I was managing with my first book and I still had a full-time job. There were days I wanted to really sit down and write but there were too many other things that needed to get done.
One of those tasks was to apply to college. Yes indeed, I am once again going to attempt to finish my first degree. It was funny (definitely funny sad) when it came time to fill out my education history. It turns out that not counting this newest school, I’ve attended a total of 6 colleges between 1998 and now. By far my most successful attempt up to now was the first one. I finished a grand total of three semesters at SIU Carbondale. My major back then was Computer Science because I thought I’d loving programming or designing computers for a living. The first year went well, but I didn’t get to take any core classes. I loaded myself down with the general education crap the first year to get as much of that out of the way as I could. So when the second year rolled around, I was excited to finally be taking some classes related to my major. Unfortunately, once I was in those classes I ended up very much disliking them. My long-time dream of a career in computers was suddenly broken and I had no idea what I wanted to do.
After my third semester at SIU, with no real direction anymore, I decided it was better to just work until I could figure out what to do with my life. It was a reasonable enough idea at the time. So now, 5 more colleges, many, many jobs, and one tour in the Navy later I have finally found something that I think (hope) I can do: writing. To that end I am returning to school for an English degree with a focus on creative writing. (I don’t believe it is necessary for any writer to have an English degree or any derivative thereof, but I’m tired to shooting for degrees that I think will get me some high-paying salary. This time I’m going for something that I am truly interested in.) I’m pretty excited to be going back to school full-time too with no other distractions. This is only possible thanks to an amazing unicorn and my Richard. 😉
Still, school is a long ways off since I’m not starting until the fall. That being the case it is my goal to get the second Shroud novel done, and quite possibly the third one as well. To that end, I will be keeping a daily writing log here as a way for me to keep track of what I do each day and maybe how much time I spend working on writing and/or publishing. At the very least it will help me stay accountable (to myself anyway) as well as give me a sense of accomplishment. This is something I did very briefly for the first book, though I only recorded the word and page count for each chapter as I finished it rather than what I did every day. I will also be tracking what kind of writing I do each day since blog posts, emails, and homework all take time and energy.
Writing Log – Day 1, Month 1
Transformation (Second Shroud Novel) – 5,728 words to date (1,053 today)
Other Fiction – 1,094 (Yesterday for the Bits and Pieces book)
Blog Entries – 638