Maybe it is the sickness I've had for the past week, but I am extremely weary in this New Year already. The last year was a trying time, and a prevailing exhaustion weighs on me mightily in this second week of January.
My post-publication withdrawals are in full swing. While I long to move on to something new, a part of me is having a hard time letting go of Monarch. Some of that is related to the vast amount of time I invested in creating it. I certainly have no regrets in writing and publishing the story, but I am disappointed in myself for being unable to get more readers to keep up with my story and interact with me about it over the past year.
Had I done something wrong in my release of the story? Absolutely. I'm no Stephen King or George Orwell. But did I miss the mark so badly? As I assess the landscape that I traversed over the past three years, some mistakes on my part are clear, as are the road bumps and obstacles that were in my way.
I am not the man that I was when I began this journey. For better and for worse. Injuries have plagued me for two of those three years, and I found out last week that some of them may be with me for the rest of my life. And I hate lingerers. But what can you do?
The most positive part of having finished my first novel is that I don't fear doing it again. In some ways that me be my curse. I am not afraid to sacrifice my time and health to create something. While not overly religious, I believe we are measured by our works and not what we possess. If only the world might slow down in some way so I might create something in an instant, without having to sacrifice so much time.
What I have to face this year is the fact that maybe what I write isn't what people want to read. I learned a very painful lesson over the past year: Even if you write something that doesn't mean people will respond the way you hope--let alone read it in the first place.
I'm fast approaching forty, and while I have no intention to stop writing, I have begun to wonder if maybe I should. Maybe I've just been wasting my time, while missing out on certain things in life. I have heard countless times since I started down this path in the '90s that you have to stick with it if you want to find success. The desire for success was never my biggest motivator for writing. The desire to create something that people can enjoy and possibly take something positive away from has always been my purpose. I have gone to great lengths to ensure that a underlying message of hope was in all my work, no matter how dark the material.
It's been thirteen years since I moved back from the insane asylum on the left coast that is Hollywood. Where has that time gone? What is there to show for all that work that I've created? Should friends and loved ones become indifferent toward your efforts, does that mean you went astray somewhere along the way?
Sometimes it feels like I might be better served to just step away from it all. To separate and move on. The joy I felt upon completion of Monarch has been tinged by the indifferent world unto which I have released it.
I couldn't help but think yesterday that I may not have successfully put on to paper the story that I had in my head. Because the story in my head blew my mind enough to race against time and injuries to deliver it on an unmovable deadline.
Hopefully this post-release funk will fade quickly. I have other stories that I would like to write. But if I am not talented enough to deliver those stories the way that I can envision them, and nobody cares anyway, then what is the point? I would still like to get at least a couple of days of joy out of doing this. This was my joy for over a decade. I have to find it again before I can continue.
So as not to be a broken record replaying a sad old song, this will be my last post until I can again find that joy.
-aap
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