The perspective of time

I first put pen to paper in 2006, which means it has been six years since I started writing and I have nothing finished or published! If that realization isn't a motivator, I don't know what is. Of my practice novel, I've written nearly 180 pages and I'm sick to death of it overjoyed about this.

But this isn't the first novel I've attempted to write. I attempted two novels prior to this and I quit about a quarter of the way through because I either got tired of concentrating on one story for too long, or I didn't know where to take the plot. Today, I opened the ancient files and revisited those first two attempts. I came away very surprised...at how good they were! At the time of writing them I felt overwhelmed and lost in them. But reading them with fresh eyes, after a period of several years, I can see not only what they were missing, but where they need to go. If I ever finish this unimportant "practice" novel, I have the makings of two decent stories to work with and expand. In fact, I'm a little concerned that my writing years ago was better than my writing now. Is it possible to get worse over time?