For the past few months I’ve been experiencing a dry spell in my writing because I’ve been busy promoting my latest book Write Now! On the Road to Getting Published or How I Learned to Sell My Book. I’ve also been sending out query letters by snail mail and e-mail to a host of agents trying to convince them to read two unpublished novels of mine. Add to that, I’ve been watching the most exciting basketball team I’ve ever seen–the Golden State Warriors. Instead of sitting at my desk creating new material, I’ve been watching the Warriors on TV. What it all boils down to is I haven’t been writing. It’s time to start again.
My stepson Sol Sender owns a graphic design company in Chicago. His claim to fame, so far, is that he and two others in his company created Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign logo of a rising sun over an American landscape. I mention Sol because I received an e-mail from him yesterday. He said he finished reading Write Now! and suggested I start posting my thoughts about writing on my website. He said it would not only help writers, but that it would also help me get noticed in the writing community. “If you write something about writing each week for a whole year,” he wrote, “there’s a good chance you’ll attract people to your site.”
What a brilliant idea! If I write about writing and the writing process, it will get me out of this dry spell I’m in. Not only that, it will give me something to sink my teeth into. It will give me a goal to strive for. It will give meaning to my existence as a writer.
My good friend Heidi Hornberger once told me something about the creative process that has always stuck with me. “Start anywhere,” she said, “then take it one step at a time.”
Well, I’ve started. From here on out, once a week for the next 51 weeks, I’ll be taking it one step at a time trying to make sense out of being a writer.