Well. Here we are. We made it out of 2020.
This doesn’t mean we’re out of the woods yet, of course. I’m hopeful 2021 will be more positive than 2020, but who’s to really say?
In the meantime, I’m going to attempt to keep moving forward. I’ve let the weight of the world hold me back for far too long.
2020 is gone
Sure, we all need a break now and then. And if I’m completely honest – I don’t have much to complain about. For the most part, the virus has stayed far away from my friends and family.
I do know a few people who have gotten sick and I also know some people who have died from COVID, though they weren’t close family and were older. It still sucks though.
I’m grateful it hasn’t affected my family all that much (knock on wood) and I’m sorry for any of you who have been personally affected by the virus. Everyone who has worked on the frontlines such as healthcare workers and grocery store workers is a blessing.
If someone told me this is how things were going to be for a while I would have never believed them. I never thought I’d ever say to anyone, “Hey, I like your mask! Where’d you get it?”
I guess the most important thing to do now is to move forward and try to carry on as “normal” as we can, right?
2021 has arrived
I’m sure you guys have noticed that my blogging has dwindled (okay, okay, totally disappeared) in 2019. I tried to get back into the habit in 2020 and then the pandemic hit and… things were just weird, to put it lightly. So much was going on and I didn’t have the mental capacity to handle blogging or too many creative things, unfortunately.
It wasn’t until the end of 2020 that I started to get my mojo back. I’m not entirely what it was.
Maybe my nearly two-year hiatus had finally reached its peak allowing me to get into creative work again. Or maybe the weirdness of 2020 got to me so much that I started craving a creative outlet once again to escape everything else.
Whatever it was, I’m glad to be excited about creativity again. I’m happy to be excited about blogging again. I’m eager to get back into my creative writing.
I’m looking forward to seeing how far I’ll grow in 2021.
So, what’s in store for 2021?
I’m going to push forward and pursue my dreams that I had planned to work on in 2019. (No, that’s not a typo, unfortunately.) And then pursue those same plans in 2020 when 2019 didn’t work out.
The third time is the charm, right?
Blog changes
First thing’s first: this blog is going to be more of an author platform. Did you know I self-published a book in 2019? That was a thing I did before going into a massive depressive episode. Well, I’m going to talk about it more. I’m going to talk more about all of my books.
I’ll still post Short Story Sunday, of course. Mental Health Monday will come back in full swing. This needs to be talked about more. I’ve learned a lot about myself and my anxiety in the past couple of years. Now that I’ve been diagnosed with depression on top of it, I’d like to create a safe space for all. Hopefully, my experiences will help others. (Maybe I can learn a thing or two from you guys, as well!)
My book reviews will also come back on Saturdays and Tuesdays as well. And yes, my book review requests are currently open.
What about “writing” articles?
Those will still happen as well, though not on this blog. This was a weird decision for me, so let me explain.
Toward the end of 2019, I discovered a website called Medium. I enjoyed the way it was set up and started writing articles regularly on there for myself as well as for publications, such as The Writing Cooperative.
I’ve decided all writing articles will be published on Medium from now on. My username is RAPoli03 if you want to give me a follow on there to keep up with my regular articles.
I apologize this won’t be all in one place, but I think making this website more of an “author platform” and a place to discuss books, promote other authors, and general lifestyle topics for myself will be a nice change of pace for me. Medium will also offer more opportunities for me in terms of publication and have the ability to dapple in various topics and such.
Hopefully, it’ll suit you guys as well and you’ll still enjoy my content no matter where it’s posted.
That’s about it for now
Trust me, I have a lot more to share, but I think it’s best if I spread it out a bit.
In fact, this post was supposed to be me explaining my creative writing goals for 2021. Then I started ranting about the pandemic and… oh, well. No going back now!
Fridays will be creative writing updates, so I guess I’ll tell you guys about my writing plans for the years next week. This will give me some extra time to figure it out, anyway.
Is that technically cheating? I don’t know, but I don’t care. I’m making up my own rules as I go along here.