The Conferences are Cancelled, but We’re Still Writing

It’s official. Every single writing conference I’d planned to attend this year has been cancelled or postponed until next year. While it’s saving me a lot of money in conference fees, hotel rooms, fancy banquets, and gas, I miss the excitement, camaraderie, and education those conferences offer. All of my work-related conferences have also been cancelled, but I’m not nearly as upset about those.

Thanks to the internet which makes things like email, Facebook, and Zoom possible, I’ve been able to interact with other writers during the past couple of months, but it’s not the same as spending time with them in person.

My mystery group, Sleuths’ Ink Mystery Writers, is meeting in a park this month in order to social distance and still see each other. Unfortunately, I’m going to miss this first in-person meeting to be scheduled since last winter because my grandson’s birthday party is the same day. I live around eighty miles from our meeting place and can’t make it happen due to the three hours of the day I’d spend driving.

I was able to meet with my critique partners in person one at a time last month. It was so nice to see them. I’ve missed my meetings with them more than any of the others.

Since we’re judging a contest together, we should probably to make plans to meet in person again soon. We just have to figure out where. Most places still don’t allow congregating. We may be forced to have our discussion via email as we’ve done most things since last March.

The one good thing to come from all of this at home time is I’ve been writing more. I wrote three new stories and a poem for the Ozarks Writers League contests, which they’re thankfully still having, despite the conference being cancelled. I’ve nearly finished the edits on my short story collection and think I may be close to settling on a title.

I’m not alone in spending this extra time writing. My critique partners have both been busy creating new stories and polishing old ones, too. Most of the writers with whom I’ve visited have said the same thing. We’re writers. A global pandemic can’t stop us.

I’ve seen several Facebook memes going around asking if 2020 was a fruit, animal, candy bar, etc., what would it be. I think 2020 is a Komodo dragon.

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