. Spinning .

Sometimes, in a calm lull of the writing process, you think you really don’t care about getting published since once your first story/poem/essay has been accepted, you’ve begun to call yourself a “writer.” You think the shine is off and yet you realize it comes anew with each and every “yes” just as the “no, sorry” can still pierce the skin–though it doesn’t cut to the heart the way it used to.

There was a day this past week where two of my pieces were published, one day after another. I was ecstatic! Both were solicited (versus normal submission) which is lately what I find myself doing–just because the submission process takes me so long to decide what to send and where to send it and how to keep track of it all. And one was in a print edition (Thunderclap Press) which still, regardless of how we feel about online literary magazines and our recognition of them as equal to print, still holds that little extra thrill leftover from the early days of ezines.

What cracks me up–though admittedly with a touch of sadness–is that aside from my fellow writers, my social network friends aren’t really impressed at all. I see tweets and posts that record each play of some televised game–a ball is thrown, carried, swatted, or kicked over some boundary and makes an extraordinary number of people excited. I admit that I’m not into most sports–a ball goes this way then that way then this way then that for a couple hours and that’s about all I make of it.

It dawned on me that this is reinforced at the college level, and starts early with Little League and elementary school sports and high school athletics. We’ve held onto that Adonis dream, that exultation of the human body, the athlete we shower with scholarships and contracts and advertising gigs and money beyond almost any other field of personal accomplishment. Americans, more than any other country, hold as their heroes their sports stars, their celebrity actors and actresses. All physical–very little cerebral idols here.

We don’t complain about Taylor Swift (and I like her) making $45,000,000 a year, or multi-million dollar contracts for playing basketball for a year. Somehow, we don’t want to look closely to see our money making them rich, but feel they deserve it because we’re entertained. Reading, I guess, is not entertainment any more. Writers don’t as a standard get paid anything for short stories and poems–they’re supposed to be content with the thrill of publication alone. Most writers of published books get very little, though big name celebrities (writers, yes, but sports stars and actors and politicians as well) and phenomenons are way up there in making money off a book.

You see, we don’t have readers willing to pay to read a story whereas we’re overloaded with watchers willing to pay big bucks to see a game played, or a concert or movie. And time is a factor as well, since these days, literature of all kinds, lengths and genres are available online for FREE. It takes about a minute to a minute and a half to read a 250 word flash fiction, which evidently is too long, even as we sit two to three hours watching a ball go this way and that, this way and that.

It’s times like this that I particularly wish that I were tall or pretty instead of smart. Or maybe I’m not so smart after all.

Gone are the days when a Photoshopped Happy New Year! greeting will do on a weblog this last day of the year. Everyone seems to be listing achievements, successes, plans for the year ahead that will be both a challenge and an inspiration to bother working even harder next year.

2010 was a great year for me in the area of my writing. About 30 pieces published, including a hypertext and some images among the fiction. Might’ve even done better had I been organized enough to submit more work to more places. But the satisfaction of realizing a hope that you’re good enough to be published is both a blessing and a curse. You really need to keep up on it, not sit back and relax.

The highlight of the year has to be the coming-in-close in the Bartleby Snopes Dialogue Contest. No, wait–here’s the real thrill, winning the Eighth Glass Woman prize for “Wanderer.” Knowing so much more through Fictionaut about the writers I’m humbled to be alongside may be the biggest compliment and stamp of approval yet. These are writers, real writers. I feel like maybe I snuck in through the side door.

Anyway, my “list of literary accomplishments” is as always, on the “My Work” link. Beyond that, I wrote a story and made up an image every day for 100 days through the summer. I found myself listed in the Electronic Literature Organization Directory for the 100 Days Project of 100 hypertexts done in 2009. I’ve written a story each week for the 52/250 project since May, and will continue on that through May of this year. I wrote another 24 stories for another month-long project. All in all, I likely wrote about 150 stories this past year. Oh, and at the Tunxis 24-hour marathon in April, I produced a new hypertext piece.

Aside from writing, my other endeavors have not been as fruitful. I’ll learn, I suppose (and that’ll be a New Year’s resolution) not to keep knocking on doors that are closed to me. I’ve applied so many times for openings at a local place that they likely fear I’m a stalker. Same thing with writing; I’m learning that no, my work doesn’t “fit” at all at some venues, and why don’t I believe them? Rejections are never happy things, but it’s senseless to set yourself up for a fall when your style of writing is not only not what they want, but their literary tastes simply aren’t yours either. That’s diversity. That’s a good thing. Focus and research is the key, as every writer is told and for some reason, it doesn’t get through until the bright light pops on with the newsflash.

So there will be some dedicated focus this new year so not as much time and effort is wasted. I won’t send my resume out to places I wouldn’t want to work just to punish myself nor hit on places I’ve been turned down at a dozen times. Same thing with the writing. Organization, whether by Tinderbox software or by Duotrope Digest, will be the very first thing I do.

Projects, yes, I’m planning some projects. Personally, a new business of sorts. In writing, learning–no really, spending the time and finally learning–to more easily understand and implement HTML5, CSS3, JQuery, audio, and visuals into my work. Not written in stone, but somewhat man-made concrete: a hypertext novel; a traditional novel; putting together and marketing an anthology of short stories; an online new media magazine; and work that I love to do, am good at, and will produce some bit of income–in that order of importance. In addition, getting back into reading and reviewing my literature collection of classics on a regular basis. Though I’ve in truth spent more time reading than writing this year; hundreds and hundreds of flash and short fiction and poetry over at Fictionaut and 52/250 and many online zines. They’re really what has honed my own edge of writing as well as offered hours of delight in reading.

So I close the old year with some successes, many failures, but knowledge that promises. I will make time for old friends, make myself try some new things, spend less time on social networks and give reality more.

Best wishes for a happy, healthy, successfully satisfying New Year.