Note to self...

...don't publish blog posts at midnight after an 11 hour day at work.  You might get sidetracked and forget the primary reason for the post.

A few years back, I wrote a short piece entitled "One Night Only".  I was never really satisfied with the ending, but I also never really found the motivation or inspiration to fix it.  So the story sat in a folder on a flash drive, awaiting a future purpose.

Then the flash drive was lost.  It contained edits on one of my novel pieces, along with "final" versions of all of my short story work.  I was devastated - especially in the case of the novel work, where I had begun editing portions straight to the computer.  My hard copy backup didn't contain most of these edits, which were now gone forever.

Now, the losses weren't complete.  According to most people I know, I'm "old school".  I still actually write - by hand with a pen or pencil.  I typically don't hit the computer with a piece until it is completely written and has gone through a preliminary editing process.  So I had at least a preliminary paper version of almost all of the stories on the departed drive.

But apparently a funny thing happened on the way to complete backup safety.

See, a few months ago I began submitting pieces to contests and publishers again.  An opportunity caught my eye for an anthology being put together by a publishing outfit called Anchala Studios.  As I read it, I thought to myself that "One Night Only" was the perfect piece for submission, as long as I fixed the ending.  So, I dug out my folders and binders to find my paper copy.  Which somehow was missing a page.

The second page.  The original ending.

Thus forcing a complete re-write of the end of the piece.

As I type this, Anchala Studios is putting the finishing touches on the anthology, which will contain the updated version of "One Night Only".

I guess sometimes things just work out.

Pardon my dust...

No, I'm not remodeling.  Just reviving my long dormant blog.  It's amazing how much dust collects when something is neglected.  Blog gadgets that no longer function, old posts that don't seem to make sense anymore, links to sites that no longer exist - even a blog description that doesn't really fit the mission now.  So, a little clean-up, a few modifications, and...well, I suppose I actually AM remodeling,  so to speak.

A quick review tells me the last time this blog was active was about six years ago, with the last sporadic posts happening in 2012 and 2013.  Boy, has a lot changed since then.  I was still considering writing as an eventual career plan back then.  But life has a funny way of heading n a direction you didn't really set out to pursue.

Instead, I am now a college graduate (yeah, a little behind "schedule") with a career I enjoy.  Writing remains a "side project".  But one for which I still carry a tremendous passion.

So I write.  Almost every day.  Most of my work still leans toward short stories, and I've even begun submitting pieces for contests again.  It's not a career pursuit anymore, but maybe one of these days I'll actually get the right combination of inspiration and opportunity to finish one of my in-progress novel projects and make a few dollars.

In the meantime, it may not be the trip I set out upon many years ago, but my journey can still be followed here.