What Really Matters?

Here's what really matters in the world outside of publishing: my wife and kids, faith, my family and friends and reading every book I can find, my students and teaching. Outside of that, I have very few interests, little political motivation, and for fun I read, tinker around the garden, play with model trains and work out.

That's it.

Hey, I'm a simple guy. Which has some great advantages, the equally great drawback being that life and the human existence ain't nearly as simple as I'd like it to be.

Which reminds me.

Need to spend less time on Facebook. More time here on the blog. Think if I cut down on the meaningless status-update-prattle, might have something more worthwhile to post here. Also, going to try and make the blog posts shorter. Quicker.

Daily?

We'll see.

Inside the publishing world, what matters? People you trust: friends, colleagues, publishers. Hard work. Dedication. A passion for the craft. But lately, I've struggled with this whole beast. Have a lot of passionate and perhaps misguided feelings about publishing, what it was, what I want it to be, and unfortunately what it most likely won't be anymore.

So passionate, I actually got into a snit over it with someone last week. And all I see anymore are blogs about self-publishing, print is dead, ebooks rule...and every man jack, from writers I've never heard of, to folks I respect, are all jumping the self-publishing ebook train.

Hey, why not? Especially the folks who've proven themselves. It's no longer a stigma. And if you've got pieces you're proud of...especially previously published pieces, why not? So, will I be self-ebpublishing any time soon, at least some pre-published pieces?

Naw. Problem is, none of those old pieces speak to me anymore as being representative of my voice, or being worth anything. The only pieces I like have been accepted but not published yet. And I'm under no allusions.

I'm a nobody. No name to my credit, have very little to show.

Not even a freaking novel. So, the question is: why contribute more to all the self-published masses? When I don't have anything worthy of contributing?

So, in the publishing industry...what really matters?

Writing.

And that's all. I do it every morning. And I'm hoping, that in cutting down my Facebook time - even if only to blog daily - I hope to do even more. Because in the end...when it comes to publishing...

That's the only reason why I'm here.