Write on Target

I go ‘way back.

I met, shook hands with and talked to John F Kennedy when he was running for President (yep, 1959). 

I used the Internet when it only connected universities and few other sites.  This was before Windows, and you entered DOS (disk operating system) commands, line by line to accomplish your goal.  And heaven help you if you made a typing error – you probably had to start over.Central computers for a company had magnetic tapes for storage, and required six to ten operators.  They had less computing capacity than present day telephones.  You would run a medium-sized report, go out for lunch, and hope it was done when you got back.  Similar reports today are finished almost as fast as you can hit the Enter key. 

Then came personal workstations in the early 1980′s, with disk storage of ten megabytes (my latest computer has 200 Gigabytes – 20,000 times more).  They had the original 640 kilobytes of memory.  In 1981, referring to computer memory, Bill Gates said, “640K ought to be enough for anybody.”  Today, desktop computers have 2 gigabytes of memory, more than 300,000 times the original, and can upgrade to more. 

And all the while, I was writing, for friends, for clubs, for school.  When I was 12 years old, I won my first writing competition.  My first book analysis in college gave me an A for my grade and forgiveness for all other writing for the term.  Every club or organization I have belonged to, I have written the newsletters and reports. 

My writing started out with pen and paper, then to typewriting (although I would compose on paper).  When computing became available, the typewriting keyboard gave way to the computer keyboard.  Research was through libraries and personal interviews (which many times led to specific books).

Every job I have ever had, I gravitated to be the official report writer for the department, the division or the company.  I spent fifteen years working for a Fortune 100 defense contractor, and became the major author for a major division’s (classified) tactical (3 year) plan and their strategic (5 year) plan.  At the defense contractor, I also participated in proposal writing for new contracts (side note- hundreds participated in the writing of proposals comprising thousands of pages, that when finished, would fill a tractor trailer). 

Throughout my life, I have seen writing evolve from typing at a typewriter, correcting mistakes with a whitening solution, to my blog today, typed at my personal computer (with the backspace key a much better alternative to the whitener).  The method of delivery has grown more refined, from delivery of typewritten sheets to electronic transfer.

The conceptualization and idea gathering has remained oddly consistent.  I still brainstorm my ideas on paper in a quiet room, asking my faithful soldiers of content (Who, What, When, Where, Why and How) to remind me of the roads I must follow. 

Expressing ideas and concepts clearly in writing is what I do best.  Since the ‘explosion’ of the Internet and ease of accessing information, I perform the majority of my research that way, but when need arises, I am still no stranger to university libraries and authority interviews.

Researching is my passion.  My soldiers of content show me the paths.  Using my researched and compiled information to express ideas and concepts clearly through writing is my pursuit.  My pleasure is my reader gaining understanding through my written illustration. 

For more years than I care to remember, I have wanted to be a professional writer (mostly of fiction).  The closest I came was publishing short quips used by a national magazine as a monthly feature.  Instead of following my personal passion, it had to take its place in the priority of my life.  I enjoy my family, and they are what they are today, because I deferred what I wanted for what they needed. As detailed above, I have not been idle these many years.  Employers and organizations, to further their ends, have used my talents as a writer, and I willingly collaborated my talents with their needs.  It kept my personal passion at bay, feeding it with researched pages that became reams of reports, newsletters, and organizational plans.  And, I suppose since I received compensation where writing was part of my job, I can consider myself a professional writer.

Now I find myself in a time when my children are grown and have their own families.  It is an opportunity for me to consider writing as more of my full-time occupation.

My biggest challenge in the Weblog area was (and still is) to define my niche.  My passion in life is research, along the lines of learning about people and the events that affect their lives.  I am an omnivore of information, always looking for more.  If I see a magazine waiting to be read, I will read the articles on any subject to increase my knowledge or satisfy my interest. 

After four months of thinking about it, I narrowed it down to four areas: 

1. financialcommand.com will show the outcome of research where the average person can understand some of the wider forces affecting our lives, recognize financial opportunities and perhaps make some capital. 

2. vitalifecommand.com (with one ‘l’) will show the results of personal improvement research and offer my take on how people can improve their lives and their state of happiness. 

3. writingcommand.com will research the art and skill of writing and become a platform for my own writing.  While writingcommand.com will be concerned with non-fiction writing and techniques to be a better writer, writingcommand.net will focus on fiction writing and techniques of storytelling. 

4. bobgreaker.com will explore my personal life and feelings, my hopes and expectations – a peek behind the blinds, if you will.  I plan to write these posts as a journey.  There will be some false starts, some dead ends, but hopefully always moving forward, perhaps sometimes by inches. 

The keyword passing through all the websites is research.  That is my passion.  I can sit for endless hours at my computer, following links and looking up the most inane subjects. 

I will, for my part, try to encourage readers to think, to raise self-expectations, as I will for myself.  And I will use this blog to develop myself as a web writer. 

You are welcome to join me on my journey.

BobG
“We get ideas every day
but our lives will not change
until we take action”