As has been much documented ’round these parts, trying to make it as a screenwriter is a long, tedious slog. For anybody. And that includes me.

It is a slog into which I have voluntarily cast myself.

There has been, and probably will continue to be a lot of disappointment and frustration along the way.

It’s the nature of the beast. Nothing I can do about it.

Well, actually there is.

More on that in a minute. But first, an anecdote!

I was digging through my binder of notes and documents, some of which span back a few years.

Among them, the printout of an email from an “industry insider” totally trashing me and my idea after I’d revealed the idea for what would eventually become one of my low-budget comedy specs. There was not one encouraging sentence in this entire communique. “Give up.” “You’re wasting your time.” “You don’t have a chance.”

And that was some of the nicer stuff.

The person who sent it likes to talk the talk, but in my opinion, falls a bit short on walking the walk. I printed out the email as a reminder that if an asshole like this can establish a career (if you can call it that), then there’s no reason I can’t either.

Funny thing about me is that I’m quite the stubborn cuss. I may get annoyed, upset, distraught or even full-blown depressed about how lousy my situation may be at that particular moment, but sometimes you gotta hit bottom before you regroup, reorganize, and resume the climb, more determined than before to get a little higher.

Which sums me up right now.

I’m not there yet, but it feels imminent. While it would be great if something happened in the immediate future, I’ll remain realistic and at least work towards “something soon”.

I’d say I’m in a pretty interesting place right now. I’ve got some quality scripts to show, several in various stages of development (and much further along than expected), and a growing network of connections, many of whom are more than willing to do what they can. When more than one professional says to me “I can’t understand why you don’t have a manager/more interest in this script!”, then I guess I’m doing something right.

Even though there’s been a steady and gradual progress in “making things happen”, this is still all on me. This long, tedious slog will eventually come to a most satisfying conclusion – for the best possible reason.

So until that forthcoming day when fortune finally smiles down on me, I’ve no plans to give up and will continue to push forward. It’s getting close. Mighty close.

Up, up, and away, chums.