Writing, Writers on Medium

The Day I Quit Writing Forever

A true story of Post Viral Story Disorder (PVST)

Photo by Mohamed Hassan from PxHere (Free license)

I woke up with a hangover this morning. I’ve been drunk for a couple of weeks with the afterglow of my first mildly viral Medium story. I now clearly suffer from Post Viral Story Disorder (PVSD). [sigh]

Writing the linked article above was a blur of fingers across my keyboard. There was no time to spend second-guessing my words and sentences. I was in a hurry. We were leaving for the weekend, out of cell phone range, to celebrate my birthday on our sailboat. I wanted to get the article posted before leaving.

Here is what I thought before I hit the submit button:

1. I doubted whether the article was any good. The piece was fun to write. In fact, I laughed out loud writing it, but I seriously doubted if anyone would get my satirical point.
2. I’m a newbie. My first article posting was on June 16th, 2021, and my most significant read stat for any article was somewhere in the forties. I figured it wouldn’t matter if all twenty potential readers hated my new article. My reputation (meaning lack of) would still be rock solid.

You should know, I write on Medium for me, not solely for a publisher’s benefit, nor my followers, or…