  Wow what an incredible year. It's been about that long since I decided to "put up or shut up" and I guess I've put up rather well. It was a year ago this month I started working on TCRA. I finished in August, quit smoking and got a new tattoo.
Wonder what I'll do for my 35th birthday? =) I've spent 33 years just kind of wandering through life, trying to figure myself out, my place in the world, what I'm supposed to do. I'm a quitter by nature. I'd rather not try than fail, but not this time ;-). I think I've truly amazed myself. Every time I sit down to write it gets easier. It's still hard to create but that 400 pages doesnt seem quite so daunting anymore. I know I can do it, I've done it three times. And learned the true meaning of discpline and hard work--took long enough, huh? In the last year I've completed three manuscripts, a novella, and have three other manuscripts in different stages of developement. I told a friend of mine it's like the lights came on and everyone's home. I've made some of the most wonderful friends through writing and I have the greatest crit parters =). I've learned writers are just neurotic, so get over it. We all question ourselves, and our abilities and writing is highly personal--even if it is fiction it's still our creation.
It's okay to break what other people call "the rules" and the only rules and limits that truly exist are the ones we impose on ourselves. A dream is a scary thing but I know, even if I fail, it won't be because I didn't try. It won't be because I quit. Quitters never win. Winners never quit. I am very fucking determiend. 
