I started my blog, “Do Not Go Gentle…” five years
ago. The purpose was to chronicle my
pursuit of two specific goals:
-
To finish in the top 10 of the USAT Age
Group Championship and
-
To get my novel, “American Past Time”
published.
Back then I was young and naïve and thought I would
achieve those goals in a year or at most two years.
In the last five years I have made it to the
Nationals twice. The first time I didn’t even finish and last year I finished
33rd about 20 minutes out of
tenth place. I’ve qualified for the
Nationals again this year and I’ve been training all winter with the goal of
this year making it to the podium.
Meanwhile, I rewrote the novel three more times. In
April it was published, but now the challenge is to find readers who aren’t
family and friends. I want the book to be read by strangers.
 |
| 2nd Place Medal |
This weekend I had a rare convergence of the two
missions. On Saturday I competed in the Elkhart Lake Triathlon. I finished 2nd
in my age group, which is an improvement from last year when I finished 5th,
but not good enough to be even close to a top ten finish in August. I still
think I have a chance. My coach has been
working on form in all segments and I can see improvements (for the first time
I finished 2nd in the swimming segment, which has my weakest leg). I
need to pull it all together and continue to train smart for the next two
months. It’s a longshot, but not impossible.
 |
| Famous author awaits his fans |
On Sunday I got to attend the Printers Row Litfest
as an alumni author of the Writers Studio of the Graham School of the
University of Chicago. Me and James Patterson and a few other notables. I
brought copies of the book to sell, but I didn’t have high expectations and I
only brought four. I didn’t sell
out. Okay I didn’t sell any. But I did
give away a bunch of post cards with the laudatory Kirkus Review excerpted on
the front.
It was fun to attend and talk with other aspiring
writers who were interested in the Writers Studio.
I have two months until the Nationals and then maybe I will need to come up with a new goal for the blog. Or maybe a retirement party. For the blog not me.
No comments:
Post a Comment