For those of you wondering why I haven’t made frequent posts lately, I’ll refer you to my post from June 3^rd (I can’t link to it though email, so you’ll have to find it yourself until I can get home and get online). You can’t say you weren’t warned. ;)

Confession time: I had ample free time over the weekend to (finally! (Hmm…does this count as splitting this infinitive?)) get some writing done. I played BF2 instead.

Sorry Tam.

Here’s my philosophy on my current online responsibilities – if I have a relatively large amount of time available (an hour or more) and if there are other SR guys playing BF2 and if the server they’re on isn’t full, I will join them. If any of those criteria aren’t met, I won’t play BF2. If I still have a reasonably large block of time, I plan to write. At any point where I don’t feel I have a decent amount of time, it’s JKA which, thanks to the strange way the MP community has evolved over the years, can be played in small increments of time.

I feel a little bit bad about not having a full commitment to writing, but not so bad that I’m willing to sacrifice getting killed over and over by online strangers for it. In the final analysis, when I write, I’m really only writing for myself. At least for now.

I live my online life in the company of writing greatness – or at least really goodness – in the form of actual make-money-doing-this authors. As Tammy herself recently pointed out, they no longer have the luxury of writing purely for themselves; sometimes they have to hold things back for the sake of their audience. Furthermore, they have deadlines; they absolutely must write.

I have no such absolutes for my writing. I only write because stories – or pieces of them – keep forming in my head and demanding to be let out. Sometimes they’re screaming for it; other times (like now) they’re quiet. I used to be motivated by the thought of becoming published and writing as a career. I would still like to do that, but being involved with the fringes of the publishing world by witnessing Tammy’s fortunes, I have come to realize how far from reality that idea is.

Tammy’s first book was published and did so well that it achieved a second printing. Her second book is coming out in a couple of months. Her third book is due next year. She has spent virtually every moment of her time over the past couple of years working on her writing. Yet she is making much less doing that then I am at a (relative for a 35-year old man) low paying job. If I were ever to be published, I still wouldn’t be able to quit my job (as I always pictured myself doing).

Tammy’s not writing for money or (God forbid!) fame or anything like that. She feels a need, much like my own, to transmute ideas in her head into stories. The difference between her and me, writing-wise, is that she is much less lazy – she actually sent her writing out to agents and got accepted. And because of that, she now writes from a much different perspective than I do. She has to write.

I don’t. I forget that fact sometimes. It’s true that I should spend a little more time on it, if only so that the story doesn’t become so somnolent that I forget what is supposed to happen. And someday the words will demand to be let out once again. But for now I am content to chip away at it a little at a time.

Okay, that became a bit long and rambly. Allow me to sum up:

Short Term Analysis:

Getting published = lots of work, not much return. Thrill of seeing your name in bookstores. Not all it’s cracked up to be.

Online gaming = fun.

Long Term Analysis:

Getting published = lots of work, not much return. Not all it’s cracked up to be.

Online gaming = fun.