Monday, November 10, 2008

Drying up

It seems my one regular freelance writing gig may be drying up soon. While it wasn't exactly a gravy train, it was easy money. I didn't have to go out of my way to track down leads -- they were handed to me. And I knew I'd have at least two or three assignments a month. Now, my good friends and associates are being outsourced, and while I'm told the outsourcing company wants to use the same freelancers, I've yet to hear from anyone. So I'm not holding my breath.

I have a part-time job
now but I was hoping it would supplement my freelance money, not be the only source of income I contribute to the household. The significant other keeps me supplied with Chai and paperbacks, but I don't like the idea of being so dependent on someone. My part-time work gives me enough to make my car payment, buy gas and pay for my gym membership, so we do ok. But I have always wanted to be a writer. Always. In third grade I entered (and was a finalist in) the Young Authors Contest with a story called "A Visit From A Leprachaun."

It contained such literary nuggets as:
"Then I saw the leprachaun doing cartwheels up the side of the rainbow. When I saw him doing that, I gasped in excitement.

'Hurry up or I'll have to go to someone else!' he yelled.

When I got to the top, I slid down the other side and landed in a giant pot of gold.

'I've never seen so much gold in my whole life! I'm rich. I'm rich! I'm rich!' I exclaimed."
As you can see, it was genius. And it started me down a path of writing. My biggest problem is I don't like to go out an hunt down the assignments. Face it, I'm lazy. So I have to either start writing that novel that every writer always plans to write, get on the ball and find some writing gigs or give up the dream.

Inspired by Heather, I'm going to try to write on my blog more. I figure almost as many people read this as read my test drives. So what have I got to lose?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

My shining literary achievement as a child was a book involving a flying car, space travel, aliens and rescuing a kidnapped teacher. I believe it was called "A Day in the Life of Cara Montgomery." I don't know why it didn't win major awards.