Short on ideas and originality, the third installment of a trilogy is typically the worst, so don’t expect “The Life of a Freelance Article Writer” to be any different.
Film trilogies usually take the cake in this regard. The Ewoks made Return of the Jedi more like a Disney theme park ride than a dark, Oedipal space opera, and the final chapter of The Godfather was enough to make any viewer cringe and Bada Bing in disgust. The Matrix Revolutions paled in comparison to the groundbreaking 1999 original, and the last leg of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Return of the King, had so many false endings that it put even the most avid Tolkien fans on their last leg.
The question remains, then, how do you go out with a bang and not a whimper? First, let’s forget trilogies and set linear time aside and circle back to the beginning. Second, let’s consolidate the life of a freelancer article writer into a single day; all the thoughts, observations, annotations, and footnotes –they may or may not look something like this:
1. 5:25 am. Up with the rooster, but I don’t live on a farm nor do I have a rooster. Why do I get up so early looking for work that’s not there? An hour of email, sports headlines and entertainment gossip…
2. PayPal is not my pal. Always late and short on funds, it’s time to unfriend the pal.
3. Four solid hours of writing. However, the snail’s pace is alarming.
4. This is the 4th time I’ve had grilled cheese for lunch this week, the 15th time this month.
5. Some early afternoon inspiration: Wagner, Mozart or Chopin?
6. Migraines. Cold sweats. So many articles on medical technology I feel I need to go to the ER.
7. Watched “Days of Our Lives” and dreamed of penning lurid tales about adultery and betrayal, of mysterious plane crashes, plastic surgery and characters who rise from the ashes like the Phoenix. No, you’re not my sister. My sister died in a plane crash 20 years ago.
8. Nordic crime fiction is really “Days of Our Lives” in plastic surgery disguise.
9. You want to hire a blog writer, forget it. I’m a novelist, you hear me, a novelist!
10. Sorry, you’re right. And I could use the money.
11. 20 minutes hanging out in forums. Tried on some snark, got snarked in return.
12. Had a dream in which Dostoyevsky was cooking eggs in my kitchen.
13. Grocery List: eggs, cheese, bread, butter, beer.
14. I’ve been indoors for so I feel like Boo Radley from “To Kill a Mocking Bird.”
15. Can’t even read an entire sentence without clicking. The deficit of my attention is alarming.
16. “I’m a sick man, I’m a spiteful man, I believe something is wrong with my liver.” Dostoyevsky: “Notes from the Underground.”
17. How many words did you write today?
18. There are never enough words in a day.
The Life of a Freelance Article Writer
The Life of a Freelance Article Writer: Part II
Damon H is a freelance writer available on WriterAccess, a marketplace where clients and expert writers connect for assignments.
