What's Next?

You know when you have a great initial idea, but then after you've accomplished said idea you sit in the aftermath thinking things along the line of: 'what was I thinking', 'where do I go from here', 'what's next', and so on. Still a little confused by what I mean? Here are a couple of examples of what I mean:

A week and a half after my husband, Tyler, and I got married we got a two-month-old puppy. After naming the Shiba Inu monster, Calypso, came the seemingly endless days of potty training, crate training, learning commands, and in general, just getting her to like us. And let me remind you here, we weren't even married two whole weeks yet. We threw ourselves a lot of learning curves.

For the few of you who soon after reading this go to Google and look up 'Shiba Inu', yes, they are incredibly cute, but let me tell you, they are like no other dog you have ever encountered. We might have gotten her as a puppy, but it took us almost a whole year for us to earn her trust. One of the descriptions you come across when you look up Calypso's breed is that they are incredibly 'cat-like'. Not to mention that soon after we got her, her nickname quickly became 'Calypso the Destroyer'. I lost a lot of brave little shoes in that first year not to mention all of the underwear. Yes, we know that is gross. But in that description of her being 'cat-like' means that she chooses when she wants love. She won't willingly give us kisses unless she feels like we've earned them.

Only now, five years later, will she sit next to me on the couch and snuggle while watching TV or reading. However, with that, she is incredibly smart and fiercely loyal. But especially in that first year, Tyler and I would look at each other and wonder what in the world did we sign up for.

Another example:

All this COVID business. What's next? What are we going to do to make the world safer? More considerate of others? Everyone is excited to go back to normal, but what is normal? It obviously wasn't working before so why would we want to go back to that? I don't pretend to know the solution to the issue, but it's at least something for us to think about.

My next example:

Over a year ago I published The Sea Nymph. I went through something called 'partner publishing' which is more or less vanity publishing it you take it by its roots. With a very fancily worded publishing contract, I signed on with my publisher. They outlined a very promising marketing program, but really I had on my rose-colored glasses with what they were going to do. Really outlined in the contract was that they would just put my name out there, do the bare minimum, and since I didn't go to school for Creative Writing or Fiction or whatever and learned the ins and outs of publishing industry I was at their mercy. With that, however, I should have done more thorough research, I realize that now, and I do appreciate the lesson that I learned.

But in this case, if given the opportunity, I would absolutely go back in time and change my decision. I know most time travelers would probably warn me against this, but it's hard not to wish that I had made a few different decisions. So here I am a year later, trying to backpedal a little and figure out how to turn this semi-disaster around. I hope to put my name more on the map by the time my second book in ready to find a publisher and continue down this incredibly tedious and oftentimes difficult career path.

"But A.J. isn't that why you started this blog?" My response: *hysterical laughter.*

Oddly enough the older I get the more I'm in the mentality of 'shoot first, ask questions later'. Yes, I created a blog but didn't think about the direction that I wanted to take it. I know that the appropriate time of making a blog to the first official post other than an 'About Me' post has definitely expired. But after I made the decision of publishing my blog without thinking it all the way through, I figured that I should give myself some time to get my life together.

Finally, today, I came up with a plan. That plan is that I have no plan.

I feel strongly that limiting yourself shows an unwillingness to learn and explore. Often times in the public eye, people commit themselves to a certain 'type' and that limits them later. Some examples Danny Pudi as Abed from "Community" or Max Greenfield as Schmidt from "New Girl" are both incredibly gifted actors in the roles that they played. Both characters have incredibly intense personalities, but now that I see their names popping up in other shows or movies, I can't always separate them from their previous characters into the 'normal' roles that they are cast in. That doesn't even cover the iconic roles of some movie actors that careers were damaged because they were only seen as their most famous movie.

The same thing goes for the bands that we all love that at some point change up their sounds to try something different. That means that writers and bloggers can fall into this trap as well. I don't want to be confined to one genre or topic.

Specifically, talking about my blog though, I am going to do as I wish. I'm going to write about the books I read or write, I'm going to write about whatever publishing process I'm going through, I'm going to write about topics that grab me on any particular day and dig into them. Overall, and I know that I'm repeating, I don't want to limit myself. However, if you have any thoughts or opinions or requests about what I could maybe blog about I would be thrilled to hear about your suggestions.

Please feel free to reach out and comment.

#theseanymph #whatsnext #blogging #calypso #calypsothedestroyer #writing