The Midnight Writer's Journal(view profile)

About two months ago, I set out to become a serious freelance writer. Throughout my life I have actively written either letters, journals, essays, poetry, or research articles. Some of this writing was for myself or my family. Other times I assisted people who needed help writing to a company, or a bereaved loved one, or who needed a legal liaison to communicate with government officials. All this work was volunteer from my heart.

My husband, a/k/a Photo Gent, suggested that I try to write for a living to earn a little money. After all, we both want to work at some less physical activity, now that we are advancing in our years. It was my intent to someday sit down and compile all those stories accumulated in my memories from the active life that we have led.

Piles of information lies waiting for me in three storage units. I have journals; ledgers; memos; mini stories; poetry; thoughts; ideas; titles; autographs; phone books with memos; appointment calendars with memos of special events that someday I wanted to write about. I even have address books filled with notes and excerpts from fascinating people that Photo Gent and I, The Midnight Writer, have met over the years.

Did I mention the keepsakes and memorabilia that will trigger entire stories about chapters in our lives?

Well, that information has to be processed since I have saved it for over eleven years. The value is in the telling of the stories to share with my family and my grandchildren, and essentially, with the world. That is a peek into the mind of one freelance writer, yours truly.

My quest became larger than life and did not even include the "several" novels, biographies, and auto-biographies that I am currently working on. This quest took me to many new realms of the freelance writing and advertising world about which I had no clue two months ago.

Below are some of the realms which I entered and about which I will write on this blog.

Setting out to submit to the freelance magazine market.
Working with advertisers to create quality content.
Competing to become a paid blogger with the professional pay to blog companies.
How to write and submit query letters.
What is a synopsis?
Finding a publisher.
Self-editing.
Polishing writing skills for the novice and the expert.
Social bookmarking.
Social sites as a source for publishing and getting web traffic for your homepage.
Free blog sites versus paid blog sites.
Having a quality website is imperative for a writer's image.
Understanding the importance of thesauras.
Key words. What are they and how are they used?
Search engine optimization.
Building a site map.
Hello technorati, a blog listing site.
Welcome to the world of Hubpages!
Google, Yahoo, Msn, Oh My!

The Midnight Writers Freelance Quest(view profile)

Qualifying: The Race is On.
Working on blogs to get paid is really work in the beginning. I am coming to the universities and libraries to use computers, because I cannot afford a laptop. Not yet anyway!!!

That is why getting paid for blogging is ever so important to me now. You see, I would rather be sitting in a forest on a mountain gazing at a waterfall, writing a creative novel. But alas, it will take money for that kind of leisure time.

My quest is speeding forward at jet speed, for spring is upon us folks! That means fresh smelling air, the crispness of the spring rains, flowers blooming and trees budding. The grass will turn green soon along with the trees. There is nothing more glorious than sitting among fresh green grass still moist from springtime dew, taking in the succulent smells and sights, and writing what I see and feel and hear. Now that is a creative writer’s dream office. Nature!

Ahh!!! I love nature!

Now that you can see how important it is to me to get qualified for oh say forty blog sites that pay, I can concentrate on the really important stuff, like getting back to nature….and of course to finishing that first best selling novel.

I’ve got to Qualify! The Race is On!

I’ll be buying a new tent, backpack and hiking boots with the money I’ll be earning with my blogging business. Check it out for yourself. It might take you back to nature with a twist….laptop in tow!

The Midnight Writer(view profile)

A Minute After Midnight As the night advanced and all grew still around me, I still could not sleep. My mind was wandering into far away thoughts and fantasies. It is then it struck me, I could write all these imaginings on a forum to share. This is where my vision of becoming the midnight writer was born, a minute after midnight. So I adopted the pen name, The Midnight Writer, and decided to estabish an online magazine and website to share my stories. Upon further consideration, I realized that I could get paid to write. Yes, it is a marvelous idea, to be creative, to share and to get paid for doing what I love most. Here I am, The Midnight Writer, presenting my opening debut blog. Join me as the imagination wanders into unknown places, times and realities. Watch for accounts of real life news as well. That will come from the investigative correspondent journalist side of my personality. Until my first story, I'll be floating in the ethers looking for a mystery to unfold. When we began almost eleven years ago as traveling evangelists, many times we took our teenage children and toddler grand-children with us. Some journeys extended from the east coast to the west coast. The entire family piled into the 1971 Ford Pickup Truck with a canopy shell that sleeps two, while we numbered anywhere from two to five at a time. Our travels took us from spring through summer into the winter across the plains, the prairies, the hills and over many a mountain. Our travels have carried us through the wilderness, down country lanes, in the desert where we met folks who were loners or small town people, or the occasional mountain man dredging for gold in the hills. The weather never was an indicator for us that set the date for a journey. We moved onward as the Spirit of God moved us and went wherever he sent us...from town, to city, to desert, to mountain, to individuals, families, churches, to gatherings of thousands praying in the woods. We have walked, hitch-hiked, slept under bridges, in tents and in motels, people's campers and houses of all sorts. We have braved the dead of winter with wind blowing blizzards in temperatures 20 to forty degrees below zero, keeping our windshield thawed with a candle, in floods where it rained for two weeks while we slept in a tent on a hill waiting for the water to subside. We have seen hail storms, tornadoes, fires, earthquakes and all seasons in all parts of this land. This is the story of two people who met in a Greyhound bus station, were married two weeks later and who then began the journey together of a lifetime. Still we walk on our mission for Christ, together, ready to brave it all again. On these pages will unfold the stories of two people, two evangelists living for God who think of themselves as ministering angels, (messengers) and the witness of the things which they have seen and heard. We know that it is only by the grace of God Almighty that we have lived to tell about those things we have witnessed. This is the story of Cephas and Summer Breeze, Angels of The Light.