Two things amazed me today. The first was that I was able to salvage a Zentangled tile from when I was playing around with brush pen markers. The second was the response I get when I re-post other bloggers’ helpful hints to writers –and artists. 

It really bothered me that I had messed up a tile. It wasn’t like I didn’t get anything out of the initial experimentation. It’s that I just left it in the raw state, looking rather plain but with livid primary coloration. The tile looked like I had taken a few colored Sharpies to it. I chalked it up to a learning experience, but the “unfinished” work still rankled. While finishing another tile that I started last night, I began to wonder if I could use color pencils to fix the mess of that ruined tile. 

Grabbing some pencils and the offending tile, I matched up some colors and managed to produce this. 

It may not be my best effort, but it is certainly a vast improvement over what the tangle had been up to about half an hour ago. I can actually live with this as a “semi-finished” tangle. It still needs blending, which will be done as soon as I can locate my blending pencil. (I think I dropped the pencil when my cat presented me with half of a lizard. It is probably under a piece of heavy furniture somewhere. I’ll find it later.)

Meanwhile, my iPad has been binging with notifications about people “liking” all the re-blogs I posted. With a single exception of one that related to art a tad bit more than to writing, all the re-blogs were about writer’s tools, writing challenges, publishing tips and considerations, etc.  I definitely get the idea that we are all hungry for information about how to figure out if our novel is too long or too short; if it needs prof spinal editing; if the topic is one that will sell in the current market; how long we can expect a particular trend to last; and so on. That means I need to start tracking down blog posts and re-blogs that relate to writing–the process, the markets, the trends, publication, and other topics related to getting published and having work sell. From the responses that other bloggers get from creating challenges and contests, it is also clear that a lot of us want feedback on our work. Not just any feedback, but honest feedback, even though we know we might get our feelings and pride hurt, no matter how gentle and helpful comments are. 

Maybe I will try to post helpful re-blogs once or twice a week. Since one of the re-blogs related to finding a writers’ group to join, maybe I should re-open an experiment I started over a year ago–maybe two years ago–for members to post work for honest criticism and suggestions. If you can, please help me figure out what we can do together. Without some feedback, I will simply try out different things and see what flies with my blog’s followers. 

Anyway, thanks for the support! 

Happy endeavors!

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