Tuesday, May 7, 2013

Resolution Update

On January 9th, in the spirit of the new year, I posted a few resolutions. A writing friend of mine had done so and I figured if she can do it, so can I.

I've since had the day marked on my calendar. Four months have gone by now and I'm calling it a couple of days early. Let's take a look at where I stand, shall we?

Drum roll please!

1. One story per month. New work. End of month as checkpoint.

Four months equals four stories. Easy enough. January saw a complete story written and accepted for publication. Nothing new for February, March or April. Hmm.

In my defense, I've been busy-as-Hell. Of course, I've been busy-as-Hell for the last couple of years. Yet somehow, during those years, I managed to find the time to write plenty. And all under busy-as-Hell conditions. I guess I've been busier-than-Hell.

Regardless, one of four completed.

2. Edit one story from my stack of To-Edits per month. Same checkpoint.

Edited two stories, both last month and both for publication. That's 50%. This isn't looking as good as it's supposed to.

3. Resume critiquing and posting at OWW - say once a month to start.

Ahem.

4. Shake a freaking novel out of my tomes of notes.

Well, crap.

So the resolution thing has not gone as planned. Maybe I should have just resolved to lose weight or something. As a family we've seen a lot of changes this year and a fair number of out-of-the-ordinary stressors. Everything from surgeries to changes at work to military deployments and all of those things take their toll on time.

Out of eleven actionable items, three were completed. That's a whopping 27%. Sigh.

Everyday life is never going to make it easy. Oh, there will be easy days, weeks, months and maybe even years but there will be those busier-than-Hell days, weeks, months and years too. Life has a way of happening while you're busy making other plans (a barely paraphrased quote from John Lennon). You've got to pick up and keep moving. Setbacks are never a reason a quit.

The year is still young. My progress on those four resolutions doesn't fill me with pride. No.

Just determination.

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