Starting Out

This is it for me -- the world after college. I made myself promises, and now while I trudge through online lists and job search sites that try to pigeon-hole my diverse abilities into "hospitality," the call of my own writing grows louder.

For anyone unfamiliar with the process, characters do talk to you. No, I'm not crazy - well, not lock-me-up crazy. But if you foster your imagination you get all the perks (story ideas come easily) and all the downsides (characters do not leave you alone). I've been on a seesaw the passed three years after transferring from a community college to a university. The need to pay rent and get the research paper done cut into my writing time. Only, I'd already been writing so long, that as the time dedicated to it temporarily deteriorated, my characters would startle me with the abruptness of their presence in my mind. It is as if the subconscious mind suddenly screams "I'm here! Don't ignore me!" and then, "Now! Write Now! And if
you don't -!!!"

There is no empty threat in that. For me, if I have enough of this random urgent need to cement myself in front of my computer and no time to actually do it, guilt builds.

So I graduated. So I'm looking for a job. There are no excuses left. I am on the path I will be walking for the rest of my life, so I had better make certain it is the single fulfilling future I have wanted.

Eight years of school in two cities was hard work. This will be too, and here I will discuss precisely how and why I get myself to whatever point it is I am headed towards.

This week I am writing short stories. I'll admit I feel a little out of the practice. I haven't written any since Community College. I have been so enmeshed in revision of one novel the past four years, that the practical steps I need to make while progressing on said novel were ignored.

So here I go!