Remake, Renew, Redo

2025 was a rough one, I won't lie. It's early days here in 2026 and I'm still in hunker down mode from the previous year. But looking back wasn't all bad. 

• 2023 was the year I finally stepped up and pledged to move forward with the writing hobby that I'd dabbled in for over fifteen years with only one "complete" work to show for it (more on that)
• 2024 was the year I learned how to complete something
• 2025 was the year I completed it

For all the running and rushing, and the weeks of learning, I finished 2025 with an actual paperback book in my hands, and in the next few weeks, will continue the self-publishing experiment of "going wide" with distribution beyond just Amazon. It all feels very new--it is very new--but in the looking back, and going through those fifteen-plus year of drafts, I've also overlooked a work that I put up, many, many years ago.

Just two years into my journey, I banged out a silly fractured-fairy-tale work, and spent the next couple of years kind-of working on it, off and on. I didn't have direction, or guidance, or even a strong sense of what I was doing, but it was good enough and I popped it online to share. It's been languishing since, largely forgotten, a shade of a past writer that I've hopefully grown beyond. I was proud of it, though, that first attempt to climb this creative mountain.

Being creative, and keeping busy, and learning were my tactics for getting through 2025. It was too easy to spend an hour doomscrolling instead of an hour being constructive, productive, or creative, and I tried to refocus that doom-seeking energy on building something better. If I failed that, then at least building something that made me feel good when I set it down, instead of the sick-of-the-world vibe I get putting down the phone.

In December, I finally consolidated my old original 2012 account with my shiny new 2025, putting together the two books on a virtual shelf that have at least a dozen years of growth and life between them. I'm reconstructing the old manuscript now, from an eBook download from a vendor. I'm re-reading it. It's... not bad. Not great, incredibly short, scant on detail, in need of expansions and edits and improvements... but still... not bad.

I'm adding this manuscript from 2009-2012 into the "to do" mix again, extending grace to past-me for not having it all together, and giving present-me something to work on (among all the other things I'm working on.) 2026 should be the year we break out of our doom loops, cycling and recycling regrets. Pick up those old half-done, half-loved, half-baked projects, turn off the phone, and move forward.

🧩🦏