Writing Careers and Evolving Goals

www.karissalaurel.com

Probably, for most of us, when we started out as wee baby writers, we were either those who got joy from writing stories for ourselves at an early age, or those who, later in life, put pen to paper with immediate dreams of literary stardom. Or we were those who were something in between.

I think I'm one of the in between people. I can hardly remember a time when I wasn't reading, telling, or writing stories, even as a little kid. In middle school, my girlfriends and I wrote short stories on notebook paper about New Kids on the Block and passed them around (because I'm old and there was no AO3 or Wattpad or whatever back then). I kept journals of (very bad) poetry and song lyrics in high school. In college, there were more bad short stories and incomplete fiction scenes all written with the intent of 1) completing a course assignment; or 2) entertaining myself. It wasn't until well after college, after marriage, after starting to raise a kid that I took the idea of being a legit author more seriously. 

I wrote one complete novel (a contemporary romance that I have since come to understand was actually fan-fiction that was only slightly better than my earlier NKOTB fantasies) just to prove to myself I could write a whole novel. I didn't care about quality or salability. It was about showing myself I could start and finish a thing. Once proven, it was as though I had ignited a fire. Fifteen-ish years later, that fire is still burning. But where it was once a great bonfire of ambition and passion, it now more closely resembles a woodfire stove. Steady, but not blazing. Warm and cozy, but not threatening to destroy the neighborhood.

So what happened? Evolution happened, I guess. Growing up, raising a family, enjoying the privilege of a satisfying career/day-job that provided a comfortable lifestyle, a pandemic, radical political changes, another world war on the horizon... Perspectives shifted and, therefore, so have many of my goals and priorities. 

Those who know me know I tend to take up new interests with almost obsessive and compulsive levels of interest, but then, over time, I'll loose focus and drift away. I don't stop being interested in that thing, I just give it less energy so that I can make room for a new obsession (I'm looking at you, Bollywood and crochet infatuations). I bet you think I'm going to say that's what happened with my writing career, but... I'm not sure that's entirely accurate.

Writing is a part of me and has been a part of me for *cough*forty-some*cough* years. It's not going anywhere. But I think I can comfortably admit I'm no longer chasing dreams of literary stardom. There are still projects I'll be putting into the world (keep your eye out for the novel version of Serendipity at the End of the World, coming...soonish; and look for Mystery Aboard the Old Faithful, my short steampunk mystery  soon appearing in the latest volume of Brave New Girls, which should be out the summer of 2022), but I also want to go back to writing short stories with a focus on honing craft like I did much earlier in my career. I want to focus on producing quality and not just quantity, and if that means a quieter, smaller, and more circumspect future as a writer, that's okay with me. For now.

Ask me again in a few years and who knows? I might be ready to toss a log on that bonfire again.