Bloggin' Umholtz

Jonesin'

Wrote a story today for Writer's Cramp. First one in some time. I don't seem to be able to put the time together to write as often as I did last year. Part of me is hoping for a long snow filled winter. One that will chain me to the house so I can sit and write. Last year for Christmas i took about twenty of my short stories and turned them into an ebook that I gave to family and friends. I had hoped for positive reinforcement, but I got hardly a comment. I still wonder why. Am I that bad a writer? At the time I thought about making it an annual thing. A book of short stories, every Christmas. I started one for this year...but I haven't finished it and probably won't.

It's funny. I write because it makes me feel good. it gives me a sense of freedom...and yes power. A writer of fiction has the ultimate power over his charactors and story. Better then any Simcity game if you ask me.

Yet I also crave feedback, and not just positive feedback. ANY feedback. Something that tells me you were moved by what I wrote. Even if it's only to tell me you thought it was lousy. The worst is no feedback at all. Nobody cared. What a shame. Of course, no comment, in and of itself is, or might be, a comment. I failed. I missed my mark. I elicited no response from the reader, who for all I know may have put my story down after the first paragraph. If I (or we) as a writer think about it to much I'm sure it would lead to my dropping writing for another 30 years. I'm not going to let that happen. For one thing, I'd be just about 80, so odds are I wouldn't be here to start writing again. Maybe in my next life (grin) For another, I find I enjoy it to much. I don't know if it's the art of putting the words together to tell a story or what. There's just something about it that won't let go. maybe, I finally know how a drug addict feels. Maybe I'm "hooked" Maybe I'll go into withdrawal if I don't get enough of a "fix"