Cleaning out the Trunk, and Other Musings

"Trunk" is probably the wrong word here, because the stories I uncovered today aren't really trunk stories--they're just unfinished stories that were left unfinished (and subsequently forgotten) when I let the rejections get to me earlier this year.

Looking at them now, I see a ton of what I call Bits 'n' Pieces, or a bunch of individual documents that include plot summaries, scene snippets, or entire chapters of various different projects I was working on at the time. This folder reminds me of Prypiat twenty years after Chernobyl. Some things are abandoned mid-sentence, as if my email box chimed as I was writing, and I paused to open what would be the rejection that finally sent me over the edge.

Man, what was I thinking? How did I let a few stupid rejections stop me from writing this stuff? The wonderful fantasy story that had me so excited last year is here, ripe, waiting to be plucked; the wizarding school story I wrote (not like Harry Potter, don't worry) is sitting here, almost finished, and quite slickly-written. I even stumbled across the first draft of a dragon story that's actually complete, just awaiting revisions. Oh, and there's a story called "Magic Words" that is complete, ready, done. It's even been rejected once.

What the hell happened to me? I was churning out stories and ideas like a madman. Why the hell did I stop?

This is good. This is good stuff. I'm going to start tearing into these stories, see what's worth keeping, and get the ball rolling. I was worried that I only had one (soon to be two) stories on the market--this should take care of that in rather short order.

Oh, and I finished the second draft of "The Machine" today. I'm eager to start a third draft, but it's after 5pm on a Friday, so I have all weekend to get it polished up proper before anybody would ever see it anyway, so I might as well take my time with it. But the goal DEFINITELY is to have it ready for submission come Sunday night. That's a promise I'm making to me right now.

Or not. We'll see. haha.