A Feeling of Accomplishment

Aaaah, I'm done! I started a rough draft rewrite of that autobiographical piece that I wanted to fictionalize and turn into a short story today, and I actually finished it today. Of course, I have a lot of editing and rewrites to do, but the point is, I managed to get the whole rough draft done in one day. This makes me very happy. I feel like I accomplished something big today, even if some of the material was only somewhat rewritten and inserted alongside the totally new material I wrote for it.

Better still, I think I managed to capture the essence of the autobiographical piece without losing any of its power in the fictionalized setting and story. I was afraid the ending and emotions wouldn't be as powerful, but as I wrote the ending to the story just a few moments ago, I found myself smiling. Actually smiling. I'm pleased with it in terms of its conclusion, I think. And when I go back to edit and tweak, I think this could really turn out to be an excellent piece. I just hope it wins the contest. Besides kind of wanting the money I'd get for winning (it wouldn't be much), I just want to start getting somewhere with my writing.

And perhaps it's the adrenaline rush from producing something with a lot of great potential, but I feel excited about my writing for the first time in a long time. Don't get me wrong, I love writing. I always have. But for a long time now, even back before NaNoWriMo, I've been in a writing rut. Besides having trouble writing at all, or totally not liking anything that I did write, I just felt very blah, uncreative, and unenthusiastic. I'm not sure what it was, but it seems like (I hope!) I'm getting a reprieve from it now, at least for a little while.

I think I'm going to go write some poetry now. I've been producing more of that lately, although slowly, in bits and pieces. But the only way to improve any kind of writing is to write.

Today was a good day. Produced a lot. Way more than 500 words. I'm tired, excited, and happy. It gives me hope for the future, and that's something I need very much right now.