Inconsistency--Writers and Publishers Both

Today is an odd sort of day. I feel like ranting. Seriously ranting.....

*considers options*

Fair enough. This is my blog, after all, and I can rant if I want to. RANT WARNING! RANT WARNING! THERE IS A HUGE POSSIBILITY THAT SOME OF WHAT I WILL SAY WILL OFFEND YOU.

Another e-publisher folded today. *sigh* Naturally, this is one that I have had stories accepted by. So, this morning, out those stories went in the fruitless endeavor of trying to find a new home. I'll sit here and wait the inevitable rejections, while my laptop grows fuller and fuller....

Oh well. At least I'm positive about it.

*grin*

Inconsistencies abound everywhere. Prime example? The anthology project. Yesterday, It occurred to me that the people who have posted their rewrites are (a) the first ones to post their original stories (b) the ones who critiqued EVERY story in the first drafts and (c) the people who seem to have had the most input. It occurred to me today that since that group included the world-builders and that at this moment we are sitting at over 60k, the anthology is neither dead or gasping out its last breath. I mean, jesus h. christ! If you're going to commit to a project, just FUCKING DO IT. Five thousand words--how freaking hard is it to do?

*pauses for breath*

But, what am I thinking? It's not like I have anything to COMPLAIN about. *bats eyes innocently* After all, there aren't a lot of commitments upon MY time so it was easier for me to complete my obligation to the group. I mean, no one in their right mind would think that meeting my writing schedule, running my antiques business, going on buying trips, xapnding my antiques shop, meeting deadlines, doing rewrites for deadlines, promoting released books, buying a new house, packing the old house, recreating from memory not ONLY said anthology piece but ALSO the second book of a contracted three-book series, dealing with an angst-ridden daughter and settling my mother's estate would BE TIME CONSUMING, WOULD THEY??????

Life intrudes. That's part and parcel of being a writer. Deal with it. If you have a deadline, meet it. If you have an obligation, fulfill it. In short, if you agree to participate in something, be mature enough and respectful enough to pull your weight. Otherwise, all you're doing is holding the rest of us back. *shrugs*

It boils down to your choices, in the long run. Do you choose to follow through on what looks to be a good opporunity to get your work published? Or, do you choose to allow your own lack of discipline to hinder you in that? Do you choose to sit down for a specified time every day to write, or you do choose to allow the must to 'just come to you'? Face it: writing is hard work, and it comes with a series of hard decisions to make as well. You don't think my writing interferes with my day to day activities? Of course it does. I choose to keep to my schedule. Ten years ago, I chose to keep to my social life. Ten years of productive writing life lost to sheer laziness and a predilection for nightclubs.

That's the major inconsistency that is the theme of this rant/blog. Pick a course and stick to it. Otherwise, you're really nothing more than a dilettante, pretending to be something you're not. If you're a writer then by god WRITE. I've said before in this blog that all artists have a selfish streak, a loner streak that causes us to withdraw from the world around us while we wrestle with a problem. And....yes: even actors have it; trust me. It's not easy trying to get into Ophelia's head, let me tell you. A writer, just as much as a painter or a composer, is a solitary beast. Our creativity may be sparked from without, but it derives from within. We require solitude to pull it out of us. Along with that solitude, however, must come discipline. Once, I was compelled to write an idea down. Now I compel the idea to be written---a fine distinction, yes, but a distinction nonetheless.

My work is up and down. Sometimes it is good, sometimes it sucks. There is inconsistency within what I do.

But, at least I do it.