Despite not doing one of these in a while, I’ve actually been writing.

I’m nearly finished with about 50% of the third draft.

I have 2.5 chapters to go until one of the protagonist’s arcs is finished – and one of those chapters will be very short. I had wanted the entire third draft finished by the end of February. Now it’s looking like the whole thing won’t be finished until the end of March.

I’ve said this before on here but I thought writing a manuscript only got easier with each draft but it only gets more difficult. I think the work I’ve done on the third draft is far, far above the second draft. I’m just not sure it’s good enough. If you have to ask if it’s good enough, it probably isn’t.

Another thing is I’m getting so frustrated with how long this is taking me – even when I’m trying to go quickly. I have so many stories I absolutely need to write. I doubt I’ll have time to do 1/2 of them before the polar ice caps melt in a few years. Bummer.

On an unrelated note, I’m in a strange place between missing internet writing dearly and being glad I haven’t written anything in for a ‘top’ publication in two years and have been released from daily contributions to the content cycle for three.

For me, writing for an audience (even for the 1-2 people who read these) was cathartic and occupied a psychological niche. I haven’t found anything to replace that and it doesn’t necessarily feel good. It doesn’t feel bad either. It’s just a palpable emptiness where there was something. Though that something wasn’t always good. At times it was very bad. I’m relieved that my livelihood isn’t tracked to a traffic leaderboard anymore – of that I am certain.

I’m contemplating just doing one weekly post on here about whatever is floating around in my head. I understand nobody reads this site, that writing what is essentially a ‘live journal 2.0’ is really quite pathetic, and that most writing not on a publication with wide reach is often of limited value (but not always). I’d put this disclaimer on all my posts but it’d seem obnoxious.