Resolution

People don't seem to make New Year's resolutions like they used to. Some say that if you do recognize the need for change, why wait until New Year's to do it? Others say they'll only fail anyway, so why start?

I understand both of these viewpoints. But there's something about New Year's Day that makes me want to improve myself. Maybe it's the clear, cold weather, maybe it's turning the calendar seeing all those clean, white pages of potential, but the start of a New Year always inspires me to start a New Me.

This year is no different. Besides the vague, health-related resolutions that a lot of people to seem to make (eat less, exercise more), I've committed myself to one very specific, writing-related resolution.

I'm going to submit one play to one market each day.

It doesn't matter if that market is a theatre company, a playwriting contest or a play publisher. I'm going to submit a play to one of those markets each day.

The need is dire.

I'm good about writing. I get in my hour each day, no matter how crazy busy that day may be.

And I'm good about researching markets. I check the NYCPlaywrights blog and the Playwrightbinge Yahoo! Group regularly and spend hours each month loading all of those opportunites into a huge Excel file I maintain.

What I'm bad at is actually submitting to those opportunities. There are just so many of them that the task seems overwhelming. And I never get the free weekend I need to catch up.

So I'm going to break that tasks into bits and submit to one market at a time.

Oh, I doubt I'll be able to keep it up every day for the next 365 days. But I started early and already have 4 submissions under my belt. And even if I run out of markets or give up long before Punxsutawney Phil pops his head out of that hole, the submissions I do make may be enough to jumpstart my career.

I'll let you know on December 31 just how close I came.