Mid April 2026: 7 Goals Accomplished

It's been a good start to the month of April for me, and this has been an especially fun and productive week! For starters, as referenced above, I accomplished my 7th writing goal for the year of 2026. This one's at the very tippy-top of my official notebook paper, on the right: Write 2nd Draft of Short Story (Headaches)

The short story is titled "Keeping My Headaches to Myself" and I wrote it quite a while ago. The last draft was finished July 9th of 2023. So, nearly three years ago. I had felt this was a short story... a short short story... some call them flash fiction. I had written it and felt I had completed it, and I began sending it out to publications. One at a time, getting turned down each time. Not a big deal. Happens ALL the time. I sent it to five places, and got turned down by all five. I did start to wonder, "Has it not yet found its home? Or does it need some touching up?"

I took a look at the word count first. 1,464 words. I wondered if I was selling this short story... short. It was a sci-fi/horror and I loved the idea. I felt like there was really a lot to explore with it. Sometimes a story is fine being quite short, but sometimes they deserve to have more to them.

I gave the story a read and I realized there was so much more I wanted to explore with the character and the story in general. I hadn't gone into who he was quite enough. A lot of what's happening is a mystery, but I had left it too mysterious. There wasn't enough to latch onto and take any educated guesses as to what was going on. The beginning was great though, I just needed to start a tiny bit before. And the ending was superb... I felt. I needed to give it a lot more in between those two points... as some would call it... the middle.

I took my notes on what needed improving, and then I got to editing. It came SO EASILY because so much more of the story was BEGGING to come out. And then I finished the second draft. 6,621 words.

Yup, I more than quadrupled the length. But I feel that this story is so much better now. I think I did it justice, and I am excited to start sending it out to publications once again. And I accomplished that 7th writing goal for the year of 2026. I had finished it at the end of last week, but then I had a few minor adjustments to make at the beginning of this week. I tinkered with my ideas, polished it up, and then officially finished it. And that would be enough elation and accomplishment for the week.

But then, something came in the mail. I was so confused because I wasn't expecting anything. Or was I?

Oh yeah! The Adelaide Literary Award Anthology that my story "Under the Umbrella of Success" was a part of! That was back in December and I had ordered some copies afterwards, and they finally arrived!

A lot of great stories are in this issue of the Adelaide Literary Magazine, and I am so happy to be included... and to have my physical copies. Not too many things can beat that feeling.

Oh... oh, but wait. I MIGHT be able to do just that. Because the screenwriting contest I had entered last year, the Creative World Awards, well, they were starting to announce who had moved on to the Preliminary Qualifiers this week. And wouldn't you know it, my script "Pumpkin Festival" moved on to the second round!

More rounds are ahead, and I believe the dates of notification will come in quickly. But I am so excited to have moved on to the second round with this script! I had submitted it to a few contests before and it had not gone anywhere. I did do a quick read through and rewrite a while back, and then began submitting it again. This is the first time it's moved along in a contest, so I'm feeling like the edits must have helped. And hey, moving on to the second round of a script contest is always as an awesome feeling!

It's a thriller with a few other things going on, a bit of mystery throughout, and I had come up with the idea after an experience I had. Not so many of my scripts begin from me thinking, "I have a message I want to get out there." Most times I come up with an idea and the message comes along with it afterwards. This script, this one started with the message, and then the story was built around that. I'm proud of what I created with it, so I'm happy to see it being received well.

Finished the second draft of a short story. Got the physical copy of a publication that I was featured in. Moved on to the second round of a script competition. It's been an eventful week, and I'm not even halfway through it! Oh, also, I did my taxes. So, yeah, it's been a lot. In a good way. But I'm happy to have a little break... and I'll get to working on my next goals soon enough. (Who am I kidding? I'm already working on another one.)

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