Richness of Time

Until today when a bunch of gits decided that the internet should rake in even more cash than already it does, this was a great time to be a writer. It still is, mostly. With a few bumps in the road, certainly. I mean, there are videos of baby otters chasing fish. There's Fiona the hippo at the Cincinnati zoo. You know. All of those underdog stories we love so well. Because hey, if a tiny, premature hippo can survive and thrive, surely I can finish one stinking manuscript, right?

It's a great time for me personally to have discovered that being warm and having sunshine makes me a pleasanter person. Being a pleasant-ish person makes writing easier. Strange but true. The video is the backyard on a sunny, windy day. Assuming the video actually works.

Do I pine for 'simpler times' or some golden age when everyone had it easier(TM)? Nah. Cause that's hindsight talking - all we see in hindsight are the successes - the results of all the angst and trials and failures. No matter what time you live in, you're experimenting - always trying things - always evaluating what you're doing and making minute course adjustments trying to get where you want to go - whether you're on a road trip or writing a novel. The grand thing about writing now is that I can look up anything online. I can connect with other writers the world over. I can reach out to other authors and I can learn whatever I do not know about the process, the business, the marketing, what ever. And ultimately, because of the technology available to me, I can bypass anyone and everyone who wants to tell me my stuff isn't good enough. It may be true - but I can choose to publish anyway and let the market place tell me I suck. Or that I don't.

Writers have a lot of freedom right now. It is both blessing and curse. It's human nature to want to know you're on 'the right path.' But with so many options available to us for publishing, there IS no right path. There are only choices.

But you know, the single greatest thing about being alive right now? I get to call a whole slew of people I've never actually met in person my friends because we're all connected and laughing and commiserating over this thing we love to do. It happens via email, social media, and on rare occasions in person. Sure, salons happened in earlier times. Maybe I'd have been just as happy in a Parisian coffeehouse or maybe I'd have had my throat slit in some dark alley after I'd downed one too many glasses of absinthe, but I wouldn't have had access to so many people from so many nations with so many different perspectives. From that standpoint, this, for me is the richest time in history to be a writer.