This is the 100th Thomas McAuley's Writing Blog Posting!!!
(And, being such, it deserves a special font treatment.)
Since this is the 100th blog posting, I thought it would be a good time to look back at the writing blog as well as the current state of my writing in general, since that has been the central focus of the blog since January of 2008.
Two Years of the Blog
First off, I've enjoyed creating -- for the most part -- thoughtful postings about the craft of writing from my perspective, my take on the writing life and hints and techniques and items of interest in relation to writing. Throughout, I've tried to add in a few items that show the non-writing side of myself as no writer is (or should be, at least) 100% a writer 100% of the time.
If I compare those earliest posts to the more recent ones, I find a certain innocence to them. Most notably, my comfort level has grown. In the beginning, it's obvious I wasn't sure what sorts of things to start talking about since nothing I talked about had been covered already. This indecision and newness probably lead to short posts as well as odd topics. Another factor in how the posts have changed over time is the type of tool I have used to create them. In the beginning, I used typical website software. That sucked. Now I use ICG Link's Build111 site building tool and posting is easier and, therefore, more frequent and usually much longer.
Two Years of Writing
When I started blogging, I had already been seriously writing for about a year and a half. I remember my eagerness in sharing everything about my experience. I started by posting about what I listened to while I wrote. I talked about what I was writing and thinking about. I pondered whether I could even call myself a writer at that time since I hadn't been published yet.
I began fit, telling anyone who would listen how important exercise is to a writing, who spends so much time in a seated position. Since then, I got fat(ish) and then fit again.
I also started in the midst of writing my head-on-a-stump novel. Since then I pretty much abandoned it and picked it up again.
Along the way, I've had spans of high energy and low, those of hope and hopelessness and times of focus and aimlessness. I have succeeded in being published but I fail to submit with great enough frequency despite Wednesdays now dedicated to the task. My writing has improved in many ways since 2006 but there's always more to learn and the obstacles, I find, rise up in a rotation. That is, as soon as I conquer one pitfall, another rises up, then another and anther until I make my way back around to the first one I thought I had conquered. Spinning plates, indeed. Still, looking back at my work from those beginning stages, even remembering some of the things I'd been told in critiques, there's little doubt I've improved. And, with few exceptions, I continue to produce words every day. Sometimes, what I write ends up getting replaced wholesale, but I'm writing and I have faith that gets me somewhere in the bigger picture.
From what I hear, this pile of good and bad alone makes me a writer. One of the first quotes that assured me I could do this thing called writing is "A professional is an amateur who didn't quit."
Amen. Here's to 100 more entries.
