Goals, Not Resolutions

I don't do resolutions, I do goals.

Resolutions come from a position of weakness: I'm not doing good enough, I need to fix something. Goals come from a position of strength: I want to make something new happen.

Resolutions aren't backed by planning. Goals are -- and in making the parameters of the goal SMART (specific, measurable, appropriate, relevant, time-constrained). The plan follows, and the plan increases the chances of success.

Here are my revised writing goals for the New Year:

Short-term: 

• ·       Develop a platform plan by March 1, 2020
  
• ·       Write/submit 5 short stories/poems/flash fiction by December 31, 2020
  
• ·       Revise via developmental edit by March 1, 2020
  
• ·       Send 50 queries for Gaia's Hands by February 1, 2020
  
• ·       Send 50 queries for Whose Hearts are Mountains  by October 1, 2020
  

 Long-Term:  

• ·       Get an agent
  
• ·       Publish my first book
  
• ·       Discuss with agent further books
  
• ·      Develop personal sales presence
  
• ·      Develop idea for next novel

Notice that my long-term goals are not SMART, largely because they depend on things beyond my control. I put them in as motivational, as a way to envision where I'd like to be. As that trajectory becomes clearer, I will be able to make them SMART.

I have other SMART goals for the year -- one is to lose 30 pounds by December 31, 2020 through eating a well-balanced 1500 calorie a day diet and exercising (the development of getting physically fit is in another goal). I will evaluate my goal every month or so and adjust accordingly if I'm not losing 2.5 pounds a month. (If I'm losing more, that's fine!)

Well-laid plans will beat resolutions every time. Unless they gang aft agley, I guess.

A small perfect moment

My aging calico cat sits on my shoulder, purring her heart out. My husband sits beside me on the couch, and we drink rich, strong vacuum pot coffee together.

This is as perfect as a moment gets.

Discovering perseverance

Today is post number 976. In a little under a month, I will write my 1000th post.

This is probably the most consistent thing I've ever done in my life. Almost every day, I've written this blog as a way to reach out and as a way to help manage writers' block. I guess I'm in it for the long run. 

I'm serious about this being the most consistent thing I've done in my life (other than things like breathing and eating). I've had a habit of being really excited by a new hobby or skill and doing it for a while, but not completing it. Gardening is a good example: I will start seeds of all sorts of edible plants in January through March, plant them, and then give up right around the time weeds sprout. My yields go to zero because I can't find my plants through all the weeds. I'm not planting this year -- I'm letting my raised beds go fallow with tarps on them to kill the weeds. 

I wonder if my blogging will help me make more habits in my life stick. One of these is eating more healthy so I can lose weight again (Yeah, I didn't stick to that too well) and maybe walking. I may have to set New Years' resolutions (although I hate those). Or maybe I just keep doing the right thing.

Back to Work

My writing time yesterday was taken up by 1) signing the contract to have my poem "Limerance" published in the Winter 2019 issue of Wingless Dreamer; and 2) replacing 56 passwords that Google said had been compromised. This took pretty much all my writing time.

Back to "no excuses but I don't know what to write" mode. I saw a flash fiction item on Submittable with the theme "Your character feels submerged but valued". Just about anything in the Archetype universe fits that category. Problem is that I think it's due today. Or yesterday. Let's see.

I'm once again not writing another novel by suggestion of an awesome editor I met at Gateway Con (an artist's conference). The plan is short stories, flash fiction, and poetry until one of the books gets picked up. 

So wish me luck.

A Case of Writers' Block

I'm back home, sitting at the Board Game Cafe, trying to figure out what I want to write.

Anything I start will be interrupted in two days when I get my dev edit for Whose Hearts are Mountains back, so I can work on fixing it. On the other hand, I feel weird not writing. Not writing poetry, not writing short stories, not writing novels, not editing. 

I'm afraid that if I take a break, I won't go back. But I have taken a break over finals week and beyond to Christmas. And inspiration has taken a vacation as well.

If I felt like starting a novel, I could turn the jam-packed short story Hands into a novel, if I could get some insight as to what Warsaw, Poland was like fifteen years ago. Boy, did I paint myself into a corner there. 

My blog counts as writing, though, as I intended it to. Warmups to something bigger for the day. Let's see what that will be.

On My Way Back Home

I'm spending my last couple hours at Starved Rock sitting in front of the fireplace in the Great Hall, soaking up the atmosphere. It has been a good vacation despite my frustrations borne of childhood issues temporarily clouding my perception. 

I need to get back to writing. This will be easily cured by a big project in the form of my developmental edit of Whose Hearts are Mountains. The frustration, though, is that I don't have any ideas on the back burner, neither short story nor novel. I don't like feeling so tenuous about my attachment to writing. 

I need to have a resolution that I will write two hours a day once more. It's been a while since I've spent that much time -- no, I take that back; I was writing/editing four hours a day cleaning up Whose Hearts are Mountains in November.

Does anyone have any story ideas I can play around with?

Christmas and the Days After

It's Christmas day, and I'm sitting in the Great Hall at Starved Rock State Park, in front of the fireplace. My husband just snapped a picture of the fireplace and some Christmas decor for us:

Despite my fretting, it has been a good Christmas. I knew pretty much what I was getting before Christmas, because that's how Richard and I do our shopping. He managed to surprise me with the chocolate in the stocking (given that I'm eating responsibly again, the chocolate should lasr me a long time.

Once Christmas is over, I'm going to need to strategize. January and February are hard for me, particularly because the weather is so bleak and the celebrations are over. I'm more prone to depression at this time. I will have to find things to celebrate and time to celebrate them until springtime comes with its sun.

But in the meantime, Wingless Dreamer wants a headshot of me so they can publish one of my poems. That's a positive.

Christmases in My Family

It's Christmas Eve, and I'm sitting in the cabin at Starved Rock writing this. There's a small fire in the fireplace, and I've just gotten done watching "How the Grinch Stole Christmas".We go to my dad's at noon today, which almost didn't happen because Christmas is strange in my family.

Christmas was my mother's holiday -- she decorated the house elaborately with red ribbons and greens and ornaments until it looked like a Victorian fantasy. She chose presents with care and wrapped them in a way Martha Stewart would envy (for my overseas visitors, look up Martha Stewart. She's a personality whose fame is based on her overly-involved home decor aesthetic).  Mom planned menus and created a spread of Christmas buffet (but no cookies; she found those too fussy).

Even on her last Christmas in 2007, she orchestrated Christmas from the hospital bed in her living room when she could no longer make it up and down the stairs. She decided she would wear her grey robe with Christmas jewelry and direct the Christmas action from her bed. My mom died of the tumor in her brain just before Christmas.

I am my mother's child, and I celebrate Christmas rather vigorously. My husband, luckily, loves Christmas as much as I do, so the house is decorated, Christmas carols play all season, and we have our yearly ritual of Starved Rock because there are few places so welcoming at Christmas as the Lodge there. But there's still that remembrance of my mother mixed up in there, and all the complex feelings memories of my mother stir up -- sorrow, joy, frustration, anger, love. 

So my Christmases are strangely textured now. I accept that, and I accept my remembrances of prior Christmases are likely romanticized. It's all part of life. 

Anticipation -- good and bad

American culture is built upon anticipation. 

The foundling nation, in its Declaration of Independence, declared that its citizens had the right to the pursuit of happiness. Not happiness itself, but the pursuit of happiness with its implication that happiness will be at the end of pursuit.

The consumerist culture of America, likewise, is built upon this anticipation. Every commercial that sells a product or service hooks the buyer through anticipation. The scenario presented on the screen, the promised emotional experience becomes the commodity anticipated; the item purchased is merely the vehicle.

Christmas, likewise, is sold to Americans through everything from commercials to Hallmark movies. There must be family, of course; a big meal; a big tree with presents underneath; an admonition despite all the focus on accumulation that Christmas is in the heart.

The problem with anticipation is that it often builds into a fantasy against which reality can't measure. The family get-together involves political divisiveness, or such lack of acceptance from parents that it's made unbearable. The person tasked with making the big dinner grows resentful at the lack of appreciation and the pile of dishes. The presents don't provide as much joy as expected. One's heart isn't feeling Christmas.

My Christmas doesn't look like the one being sold on TV. My husband and I travel seven hours to visit my relatives, who do not greet us effusively. We have no children, and we leave our Christmas tree back home. We mingle with people celebrating Christmas and Hanukkah and many other holidays. The lodge we stay at is the only thing that looks like a Hallmark Christmas.

And I anticipate this escape every year, and it doesn't disappoint me. 

Holiday Travel

I didn't write yesterday because I was on the road from the far northwest corner of Missouri to Illinois to visit my family and celebrate Christmas. I'm in town now, typing this at Jeremiah Joe's in Ottawa, IL, watching children misbehave next to the Christmas tree in the big display windows left over from when this space was Famous Department Store. 

I'm getting old. I'm talking in that way older people talk: "I remember when this was Famous Department Store ..." It's inevitable that, when one gets old enough to see things change, that one documents the change aloud. I don't like admitting I'm old; there's still that part of me that thinks younger men should be conducting courtly displays of mischievous intellectualism toward me, but I'm officially past my expiration date for that. 

The white Christmas this year will be only in our dreams, given that highs this week will be in the 40s and there's no precipitation in the forecast. I might be able to take a Christmas hike at Starved Rock State Park. I wonder if that's a thing.

It looks like my dev edit has been delayed till New Years (thank goodness; I wasn't ready for a Christmas present that would make me cry!) No, I know all of what I'm getting for Christmas, unless the universe decides to surprise me with good news about my writing. 

************
Yule was yesterday, Hanukkah starts tonight, Christmas is Wednesday. Good greetings to all of you!

Apprehensive about the dev edit

Maybe I'm a bit apprehensive about my dev edit. My new dev editor says she wrote 2500 words on the first two chapters alone. That's about half the words in the actual chapters. 

I'm afraid I'm going to be overwhelmed with the whole thing. Maybe I will go through the list and come up with short summaries of what I need to do. 

I mean it's a good thing she's this thorough. I asked for it -- in fact, I paid her to be thorough. This is what I want. But it's still intimidating, and still difficult, and still likely to make me feel like I just can't write. I'll need to close my eyes, take a deep breath, and tell myself it's for my own good.

I will be editing a bit over Christmas at Starved Rock; I always bring my laptop on trips for that reason. But the bulk of this editing will be when I return from my trip.

Wish me luck.

Looking forward to dev edit

My developmental editor has warned me that there's LOTS of comments on the manuscript she's turning in to me this week. LOTS. 

I think she doesn't want to freak me out. My only worry is that there's going to be so much to process I don’t know where to start. But it’s exciting to be able to delve into improving my work.

Note: this is going to be short because I’m typing it on my phone. I’m typing it on my phone because my cat is on my lap cleaning itself. Oh, the hardships I go through ...

Taking a vacation

Feeling a little down. That happens at the end of every semester. I think it's because I'm always in high gear to get through the semester, and then nothing. I don't know what to do with myself. I'm tired yet antsy. I suddenly have no goals. It's hard to deal with. 

Too much time to think. I suddenly have to fight a bunch of negative self-talk, I don't feel inspired to write. I get grouchy.

The solution: get up, do something. Go to the cafe and perhaps try something new. Conversely, get lots of sleep and meditation. Do something different for a change of pace.

In other words, take a vacation.

Dear Santa:

Dear Santa:

I dream of getting published by a major publishing house. Think of it as my visions of sugarplums for the season. I have no idea if my wish is overly ambitious, or if you can grant it. 

I don't know if you answer adults' wishes. I suppose if you did, you'd have to have McMansions and Maseratis in that big bottomless sack of yours. And I don't know if you answer everyone's wishes, because there are children starving and children separated from their families, and you haven't granted their wishes. To be honest, if you have to choose between me and those children, I'd prefer you give them comfort and peace and all good things.

But I still wish, because I'm superstitious. I hope that it's possible for you to hook into that ephemeral luck and catch its attention for a fleeting second so my manuscript gets a second look. 

So if you're listening, Santa ...

Waiting for the Snow

I love keeping up with weather forecasts when a winter storm is coming.

Yesterday, the National Weather Service said our area was to get 2-4 inches, then 4-6. This morning I wake up to find out we're going to get 1-2 inches. Hardly enough to justify putting the snow boots on, and certainly not enough to justify an emergency trip to the store to buy bread and milk.

I'd like some picturesque snow, enough to cover drab lawns and make for a cozy evening. But I don't want too much snow, or else I won't be able to get dug out in time to go to Starved Rock for Christmas.

I should know better than to expect the weather to conform to my wishes. I've been stuck in my house during blizzards only to watch the snow melt the next morning, driven into a half-mile wide blizzard on the interstate, snowed in for two-three days when a storm dropped 36 inches of snow overnight. 

But still, I hope the snow doesn't ruin my plans for travel.

That feeling that something's going to happen

The feeling like something is about to happen.

It feels like an itch between the shoulderblades, so deep that no amount of itching could get rid of it. Like a target is painted there and I can feel where the arrow is going to land, but it hasn't landed yet. 

Most of the time I feel like this, nothing happens. 

If anything prompts this feeling, it's the belief something should be happening and frustration that it's not. I've just got off for break, I don't go back in until the second or so week of January, and I don't know what to do with myself.

I could work (I have a poster to do) but my brain is still tired from finishing up the semester and it's Saturday.

I could rest, but that's the sort of thing that brings up this feeling something should be happening.

I could write -- I probably should write. That would likely get me out of the house, because I write better at the cafe. A short story awaits. 

My semester is over! Now what to do?

I'm on break and I already don't know what to do with myself.

I'm too bored to surf and not motivated enough to write. Or do anything that uses my brain. 

This will definitely not do. 

What I'd really like to do is spend a day or two at a spa. As I'm 120 miles from a spa, that is not happening.

So I'm probably going to go to the cafe and see how much I can get written on Kami today. 

Short note -- so sleepy, cannot brain.

So sleepy. Cannot brain.

My last final is today, and after that I've only got internships to grade, and grades to turn in, and I'm done for winter break.

I just need coffee to get through this. Luckily it's on the brew.

**********

The coffee has arrived. 

It might take two cups of coffee to get through this.

Or maybe even three.

***********

After break, stories to write. I'm a little torn at the expansion of Kami, because my writing is filling the background up -- with Barn Swallows' Dance, with its magic. I'm afraid it will be too strange for the contest I want to enter it in. Ah well, I knew I'm not that standard.

Have a great day!

Counting the words

I am trying to extend a 1200 word story into a 7000 word story for a writing contest. I've written 300 words so far; so I only have to do this 22 more times. 

I tend to like short, concise writing, even in novels. I wonder if it's because I'm relatively impatient, or whether I have a short attention span, or whether I really really can get everything I want done in fewer words. I've been told the latter by my dev editor, who doesn't want me to lengthen things. On the other hand, I have a short story that an editor would like to see as a novel. He's absolutely right, and it would make a great prequel to Prodigies, but I would have to immerse myself in Poland for a couple weeks to get the feel for it. 


So, back to the story. The story is Kami, and it's about death and afterlife. It also features Jeanne and Josh Beaumont-Young, one of my favorite couples. Jeanne at this point is 80 and has just lost her 55-year-old husband of 27 years. I like the couple because they defyour common notions of love and attraction, and because they have a chemistry despite their bookishness.

I need to take a deep breath and set myself a writing goal, and just write, then edit. Luckily I have a vacation to do it.

Pandora's FedEx Package

I have a mystery box coming to me.

I found this out via a text from FedEx. One package to arrive on this Thursday before 5 PM.  I love packages!

The problem is that I have no pending merchandise orders from anywhere. My husband doesn't have any pending orders from anywhere. And, as far as I know, the cats don't have any pending orders from anywhere.

In examining the FedEx text, I can discern the following: The package originated in Berlin, CT. The shipping path began in Northborough, MA. The package's dimensions are 20x12x4, and it weighs 4.2 lbs. It has been in package jail in Odessa, MO for two days.

What can I deduce? I'm failing. My fantasy life has many guesses: 

• A present from family? (From Berlin, CT? I have no family there.) 
• A marked-up copy of my novel with a book offer? (I'm pretty much sure that's not how it's done.) 
• A package bomb? (By FedEx? Highly unlikely). 
• A sweepstakes prize? ("Here's a grocery sack with our logo!")
• An inheritance from a long-lost relative? ("Here's a grocery sack with a logo!)

I will know soon. It will likely be something I ordered six months ago that I can't remember. But I can dream, can't I?

The semester is winding down ...

It's finals week, and after I do some wayward grading, all I have left is the finals, which are multiple choice and computer graded.  And then I will be done with the semester and get some quality time with my brain.

I wonder if I will feel possessed to write a new novel? I said I would back down from noveling because I have five I can release to the querying process. I could query -- I think it's been enough time. I could write short stories or poetry. I can't just sit around and do nothing. 

So my break will be at least partially a writing break. It will also be a research break, a class-tweaking break (most of this is, however, done). A sit and pet kitties break. A big coffee break. A sit at the massive fireplace at Starved Rock with a mug of Irish coffee break. 

I'm looking forward to it.

Something to learn

Sometime around the 2nd of February, I will have put in 1000 entries into this blog. A couple-three years or so worth of entries. This boggles my mind, because I didn't think I could stick to something for that long.

To be honest, I've never been good at sticking to things. I plant a garden and the weeds take over. I start a hobby and I abandon with a room full of supplies. A good amount of this is from the bipolar, when one gets a boost of enthusiasm and energy in mania and then heads down a spiral of depression. Some of this has to do with my ability to over-focus at times, and the subsequent burnout. Some of it has to do with my somewhat lacking planning skills. In other words, I'm a mess who can concentrate on two things well: My job and my writing. 

Maybe I have something to learn from this -- what keeps me on track on these two areas?  Influence on the outside. 

How can I use this? Provide myself with external contact points, such as this blog does. There aren't many of you, but I don't want to let you down, so I keep writing. I keep trying to publish. I keep asking for feedback.


So, if you're stuck anywhere in life, what motivates you? What is your workaround? 

The Christmas We Make

I'm sitting on my couch in a room transformed into the Christmas my husband and I never felt we had. Both of us had mothers with illnesses, especially around the high-stress times of Christmas, and we tiptoed through the house hoping not to aggravate things. So now we have stockings (hanging on a windowsill; our mantle is a fake fireplace and scaled to make the stockings look ridiculous). We have greenery and seasonal stuffed toys and a now-collectable Avon Christmas train tree that plays tinny Christmas carols. And a tree, lit like my tree in my childhood was, with little multicolored lights. (These modern lights are a bit day-glo, but I'm okay with that).

We play Christmas music almost non-stop. One thing I didn't know about my husband when I met him is that he has an ever-growing set of Christmas albums on iTunes. Right now, it's cool jazz; I'm looking forward to some classical pieces on the soundtrack.

This is where some would piously import that trees and such aren't the real meaning of Christmas. I would argue against this; the real meaning of Christmas is celebration. Let people celebrate the spirit of good that they will. Richard and I celebrate recovery from painful childhoods, among other things. We celebrate that we can make a Christmas for ourselves.

**************

I really apologize for the test note blog yesterday -- I was testing to see if IFTTT could submit a post announcement to Twitter and Facebook so I could quit the extra step of using Hootsuite to post. (Note: It can't.) Ten of you actually read the post, which is really nice of you.)

test note

Test note. Thanks for your patience!

Short Essay: Through the Years

“Through the years, we all will be together

if the Fates allow – “

I have spent Christmas surrounded by family, sitting in Santa’s lap as a young child. I have spent Christmas stirring gravy for the Friends of Christmas holiday meal for those alone or suffering. I have spent Christmas musing about some fellow I’d developed a crush on. I’ve spent Christmas estranged from family. I’ve spent Christmas sleeping on a friend’s couch. I’ve spent Christmas admitted to a private psychiatric treatment program. I have spent Christmas caroling with Mormons, sitting in silence with Quakers, performing at Lessons and Carols with Episcopalians, holding a Yule ritual on my own. I have spent Christmas trying to convince my mother she wasn’t dying and years later watching her on her deathbed. I’ve spent Christmas being snubbed by a boyfriend’s family. I have spent Christmas holding my breath on a perfectly still Christmas evening among the lights of a community park, realizing that every Christmas holds a mystery for the heart to solve.

My Muse

My muse holds a magician’s top hat in the spotlight,

busks on a street corner playing with fire,

pens sonnets in the corner of the coffeehouse.

He disappears in crowds as I arrive,

and I pursue him to no avail

through the trail of illusion, through lingering tones,

through words scattered in my path,

through his vital force imbued in the air like ozone.

My Loneliest Christmas

This is the Christmas story I seldom tell, of the time thirty years ago that I spent Christmas in an inpatient treatment facility for female sexual abuse. I was lucky to be in a facility with an outstanding program for women like me, and I credit them with turning my viewpoint from that of a victim to that as a survivor. There’s a big difference between the two.

Christmastime is not the time to have one’s husband (now ex) disclose that he had molested several children in his teens*. Especially when one is a sexual abuse survivor. Especially at Christmas. I spiraled into a depression, my promises to weather anything in my marriage warring with my promise not to stay married to a man who could relapse anytime and harm my young nieces. I was already estranged from my parents at that point; I had no support left except friends many, many miles away.

I had exhausted my long-distance friends with my anger and depression and suicidal ideations**. I had exhausted the crisis hotline worker with numerous calls on numerous sleepless evenings. My mentor/father figure and the crisis worker both urged me to seek inpatient treatment. Finally I listened.

I found a place where I could get treatment, a place called Brattleboro Retreat in Brattleboro, VT, one of two facilities my insurance could cover. I visited my PA to see if she could help me get insurance to cover the visit; she informed me that they wouldn’t pay unless they believed I was either suicidal or psychotic. I wasn’t psychotic, and we weren’t sure if I qualified for suicidal despite ideations to the effect, but she convinced the insurance company that I wasn’t suicidal yet, but I could very well be shortly. Insurance accepted me, and I scheduled my stay for the two weeks I had during Christmas break. This, the intake person at Brattleboro told me, was less than the recommended minimum of three weeks, but I knew I needed to get back to work on time to preserve my dignity.

I took the bus from Oneonta to Brattleboro carrying one suitcase as soon as winter break began. I looked out onto a grey, bleak winter which made me feel more bereft. I felt I had nothing, would not have anything ever again. I vaguely remembered the check-in procedure at the small front office, the mental status exam questions about hearing voices and whether the TV spoke especially to me.

My first impressions of the unit, my two-week home, was that of old wood in need of some refinishing, worn green carpet, in a comfortable stately boarding house in need of a little freshening up. I remember the room with bath I had to myself, the front central desk, and the white paneled doors with security alarms.

From the first day, I experienced Brattleboro as a combination of summer camp and boot camp, with my psyche being remade through stark honesty and challenge, meditation and self-soothing. Brattleboro Retreat’s program could be best described by this metaphor: You’re standing on a rickety floor, an unsafe floor, but it’s the only floor you’ve known. Suddenly, the floor is being torn out from under you plank by plank, and suddenly you find yourself falling, but then there’s a safety net catching you and tools to help build that floor up. But I cried a lot, mourning my lost relationship, feeling overwhelmed with the feelings coming up from my childhood abuse, taking the scorn of my new roommates too personally. I know now that they reacted to my academic language, my talking about recovery but not recovering, and to their own vulnerabilities which they tried to hide with tough talk while I wore mine like a suit.

On Christmas Eve, we played Jenga and Scrabble amongst the tinsel that decorated the windows, in a world of our own, as we were not allowed outside the campus until we’d earned outing privileges. Once or twice a resident acted out, using old broken strategies for dealing with feelings, and we would have group meetings to tell that resident how their actions made us feel as part of the protocol for dealing with destructive behaviors.

On Christmas, I felt lonelier than I ever had in my life, and I spent too much time on the unit’s one phone talking to my friend long-distance. But I journeyed down to the gift shop and bought myself a midnight blue sweatshirt with “Brattleboro” emblazoned across it in collegiate letters and a jar of good-smelling body cream. I rubbed the cream on myself after I soaked for a half-hour in the private tub I was allowed because I was neither an imminent suicide risk nor did I have an eating disorder.

My experience of Brattleboro, looking out the large windows of the common space at the frozen river at night and Christmas lights in the distance, changed my life in ways I am still learning. It taught me how to mourn and let go, how to seek the light, how to see myself as a survivor rather than a victim. I am who I am because of Brattleboro, because of that lonely Christmas.

* It is entirely possible (and believed by several mutual friends) that my ex lied about his history of being an abuser for obscure reasons, but I can only go on what he told me at the time. 

** At this point, I was probably also suffering from a rapid-cycling bipolar episode, but I had not been diagnosed yet.

What I've learned by using Submittable

When I went to Archon, a conference for writers in St. Louis, a few people advised me to start submitting shorter items, poetry and short stories, as the novel market has been so capricious. One person tipped me off to Submittable, a web page/app which helps writers identify potential publishers (literary journals, writers' web pages, etc.) and streamlines the submission process.

What I've discovered from using Submittable:

1) Many journals have submission fees, so submitting in bulk can cost some money. The lowest fee I've seen is $5.00, the highest fee I've seen is $30. The more "literary" or exclusive the journal, the higher that fee.

2) There are a lot of themed calls for submissions -- fantasy, horror, romance, cross-genre and more.  Some of these offer a prompt -- one of the ones I entered had the prompt "Catch up". 

3) I have a ten percent success rate, which has kept me from the despair about not finding an agent/publisher for my novels. 

I get a lot of rejections for my work, but because there's always more contests, and more hope, I feel better about trying.

On Christmas Music

I'm not tired of Christmas carols yet.

Given that it's only Cyber Monday, a designation that seems odd given the online stores have been offering sales since Thanksgiving, I haven't had too much exposure to Christmas carols this season. 

But I have my favorite Christmas albums, Harry Simeone Chorale and Sinatra and Johnny Mathis, and -- OMG, my husband just put Mantovani on (ok, Boomer)!

I have my new favorites, Pentatonix and Take Six, and -- not "All I Want for Christmas is You", which I'm tired of even though I haven't heard it yet this season. 

Throw in Benjamin Britton's Ceremony of Carols and a bit of Handel's Messiah, and my Christmas slate is filled with much music to listen to. 

If you have Christmas favorites, please let me know in the comments!

Unusual Dreams of Christmas.

It would be a nice time to get obsessed with a story, while I'm waiting to hear back from potential developmental editors for Whose Hearts are Mountains, while I'm waiting for responses for things I've sent, while my last two weeks of school are easy and the festive season gives me ideas to play with.

I'm not getting any of those inspirations at the moment. "Silent Night" in Gaelic is playing on the stereo. The artificial fireplace is crackling and I can smell fake pine scent, and I wonder why these artificial remnants of a vital, pagan culture give me comfort. Would the real things give me more inspiration? I don't know. 

I admit that I have fantasies about Victorian-style Christmas Eves (note that in Victorian Christmas, decorations were put up Christmas eve and remained till January 6, the twelfth night of Christmas.) Of course, my fantasy soon takes me off into a decidedly pagan adventure with Father Christmas, finding a way to slip largesse and joy into people's lives in the countryside. This might involve some invisible smuggling hunting of wild game for the table in a Robin Hood turn.  Or modern ones, following an elusive busker through Chicago decorated for the holidays, a search for the treasure of knowing a talented soul. 

 For not being inspired, I sure feel inspired today. 

Watching Black Friday

So we went to Black Friday at two of the commerce centers of the Kansas City area -- Oak Park Mall in Olathe, KS, and the Plaza in Kansas City. People were shopping pretty civilly; Christmas music was not nearly in the air as much as I expected. There were lots of people to watch; we bought some clothes and an obnoxious jingle bell necklace for myself. It flashes red and green as well.

Our mini-vacation is ending today; we'll drive home and put up our Christmas decorations tomorrow. A lot of people I know put up their decorations pre-Thanksgiving because a well-publicized study said that people who put up their Christmas decorations earlier were happier. We decided that after Thanksgiving was early enough.

I didn't come up with any new writing ideas over the break. I think I'm too tired to right now and should stick to my classes and grading till I get there. 

Let me be the first to wish you a happy holiday, no matter what holiday you celebrate this season. 

Thanksgiving on the Plaza

It's (American) Thanksgiving morning and I am at a Starbucks on Country Club Plaza. Given the number of people here, I have to think that not everyone spends their holiday in the oft-touted multigenerational blowout meal followed by a gender-segregated tradition where men watch football and women do all the cleanup.

If I'd gone the childbearing route, I would likely be expected to host, as expressed in the song "Over the river and through the woods/to grandmother's house we go". The song also mentions a sleigh, a rather outmoded form of transportation involving a semi-sentient horse that knows the way. Trust me, if I were Grandma, we'd be going out to eat.

Richard and I are those kind of adults who live far away from their relatives and who will neither host nor journey to those traditional Thanksgiving feasts, so we go someplace nearby that's determined to have Thanksgiving dinners for people like us. This year it's Kansas City, where we're staying in a bed and breakfast just off the Plaza and watching the Plaza lighting from the balcony. And watching people go crazy for Black Friday.

What am I thankful for? My quirky, unconventional life.

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Because our families are so far away and it's no fun to cook for two and our house is too chaotic for guests (with now four cats, as Buddy has been shunning our house for brighter prospects with his buddy the black-and-white cat), my husband and I go somewhere fun and eat turkey there.

This year, we're off for a couple days to a mini-holiday in Kansas City: Staying at a bed and breakfast on the Plaza, eating turkey at a restaurant in Waldo (all together: where's Waldo?), knocking around and watching shoppers on Black Friday. The bed and breakfast -- Southmoreland on the Plaza -- promises to be a treat, with afternoon sherry and turndown chocolates.

I started dating my now-husband on Thanksgiving break in 2005. He got acquainted to my ritual of watching Black Friday shoppers rather than shopping (much cheaper, fewer hassles). I think that's why we got married: he liked my quirk. 

So this should be a pleasant break before going back to work (I'm a professor of human services) on Monday. But there's only one week of work, then finals, then I'm off for Winter Break. That's just strange.

Practicing my query synopsis for Whose Hearts are Mountains

Anna Schmidt, a shell-shocked anthropologist, searches cross-country for the origin of an elusive folk tale in the wilds of the former United States. She holds her own secrets as the daughter of the premier cryptologist of the era, on the run by her deceased stepfather's urging. She finds tantalizing hints of the tale, threats to her life, and unlikely connections -- and a threat against humanity that only she, with her knowledge of cryptology, can solve.

Writing and the Art of Concealment

Writing is like performing magic in a way --

Writing utilizes misdirection -- sometimes a misinterpretation of facts, or an unreliable witness, or an ambiguity can draw the reader's mind away from an early conclusion.

Sometimes the omission of one sentence can conceal the plot twist from the reader. Agatha Christie does this well in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, where the narrator leaves out important actions he has performed.

A hint should not be too obvious, too direct, too revealing. In effect, they're like the baffling prophecy in Oedipus Rex, where we can't see how Oedipus is going to kill his father and wed his mother until it unfolds. 

At the same time, the misdirection can't be an outright falsehood, unless that falsehood is in the hands of an unreliable narrator or witness. The writer cannot lie; the characters can lie, or misinterpret, or make mistakes.

I was reminded of this yesterday when editing Whose Hearts are Mountains, because my developmental editor noted that I made something too obvious to readers who would have read my other work. How to make it less obvious? At one place, keeping silent. At another, misdirecting. Making things less obvious at another.

I feel like a magician when I can do this, knowing that words are as concrete or wispy as I need them to be.

Writing for Myself

I think I've passed through the other side of my dejection about not getting published. I've received enough rejections (for novels and poems and short stories, by publishers and agents and Pitch Wars). What does that leave?

Writing and improving for myself, primarily. Not letting my self-esteem be at the mercy of publishers and agents. Of course, I would like to be published (I have a couple little things published, and it's fun).  I'd like to have a novel published. I'd like to be published somewhere that people actually read.

I'm willing to keep trying, because the rejections aren't really that painful anymore. I can take more until my writing hits the right person, whoever that is. 

Wish me luck.

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I took off yesterday from writing the blog because I'M ON VACATION FOR A WHOLE WEEK! 

Ok, I got that out of my system. 

I'm a writer, though. I have things to do over vacation:

• Edit one short story for a short story contest.
• Edit a couple poems (minor edit)
• Edit Whose Hearts are Mountains, which seriously needs a developmental editor because I don't know if I'm going in the right direction
• Rethink this whole writing thing (which I do once a week).

Fangirling over TwoSet Violin

Ok. I'm fangirling over TwoSet Violin.

For the people who don't know, TwoSet Violin is a darling pair of twenty-somethings classically trained in violin, who demystify violin for a non-technical audience (of which I'm one) and entertain in a thoroughly modern zaniness.

They (Brett Yang and Eddie Chen) post videos on YouTube where they highlight virtuoso violinists, roast obviously fake movie footage, throw jokes around about practicing and overly strict Asian moms, explain musical memes, and serenade unappreciative kangaroos. 

Their videos are like potato chips -- once you've had a handful, you crave more of them. Eddy plays straight man to Brett's mobile expressions and fidgety energy. Their narration is augmented with popular culture in the form of video game noises, memes, and captions. 

In a perfect world, I would get to meet the two of them, just to say hi. But that's what all the fangirls, even the ones thirty years older, say.

Better get over this burnout quick.

My brain needs a rest.

I think I burned myself out doing 50 hours of editing Gaia's Hands in ten days. My brain definitely needed a break. Then I'm in the busy part of my semester, and have graded 45 final projects and 25 papers in the last two weeks. And put together my classes for next semester. 

I think maybe I'm a little burned out on everything. I tend to want to sleep a lot, even though I'm not depressed.  It's a good thing that I have a week off for Thanksgiving next week, then a week of finals, and then Christmas.

I'm not going to let the burnout last long. I need to think of a project -- maybe editing Whose Hearts are Mountains before a dev edit. Maybe editing a story or two for submission, or even writing a new story. Someone suggested I turn the short story Hands into a novel, but I think that would require a research trip to Poland, where I don't know the language nor what I'm looking for. 

I'm trying to find my direction forward, and it's harder now that I've calmed down about getting published. I should go back to my goals and see if I need to revise or add or just get cracking on them.

Hope and the writer

An acquaintance told me the other day that every single last one of you are bots.

It may be true -- for some reason my readership is down to ten most days. (Probably the fact that I was doing short NaNo updates, which aren't all that interesting, I guess).

I'm still writing in my blog, and I will keep writing in it for one reason: Hope. Hope is the conviction that there will be better outcomes. It's what helps us through those things we have no power over -- after I have done all the corrections, the dev edits, the query letter improvements, I hope that I will get published. If I keep publishing blog entries and advertising them on social media, I hope I will have readers.

Hope is what keeps me going in the absence of progress. 

Dreams vs goals

I've been pretty mellow lately about my writing, getting my enjoyment from editors telling me how to improve. This is my most noble self, but my sanguinity even in the face of rejections doesn't motivate me to push myself -- for example, I haven't sent queries lately. I haven't finished editing Whose Hearts are Mountains (although that may need a developmental editor). 

I still daydream about getting a novel published, even though I understand how hard it is, and I know I'm not a literary writer but a genre writer, and my stuff seems like it needs an endless amount of improvement ...

I need to set some goals again. I'll make them SMART goals -- specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time-bound.

• Write/submit 5 short stories/poems/flash fiction by December 31, 2020
• Get Whose Hearts are Mountains into developmental edit by March 1, 2020
• Send 50 queries for Gaia's Hands by February 1, 2020
• Send 50 queries for Apocalypse by August 1, 2020

Note that my goals are in terms of what I will do (submit) rather than what might happen (publication). It's not realistic for me to determine someone else's actions. 

I suspect I will be successful in fulfilling these goals -- in general I'm very goal oriented. What I don't know is if they'll yield dreams come true.

I don't know where I'm going

I know I've been writing very boring posts lately, and for that I apologize. My justification (not excuse) is NaNo and projects.

What have I been thinking about lately? NaNo and projects. Ok, that's not a good start to a blog.

I've also been thinking about my relationship with writing. On one hand, I've hit some very positive rejections that have 1) given me ideas of how to improve, and 2) have said positive things about my writing. 

I might actually be taking my writing more seriously than I have before, and with that I wonder more if I can get my writing to the point where it deserves being published. I don't know if I've gotten there with my stories, and I wonder what it would take to get to that point. 

I still have some big things out there -- I have Prodigies at DAW, Apocalypse at Tor, Voyageurs in a novella contest, a submission to Pitch Wars, and -- well, I don't think I will win any of these. And I don't know what to think about this. 

Meh again

I think I burned myself out on editing for a while.

It's Sunday, and I have plenty of time to edit Whose Hearts are Mountains for NaNo. Yet I can't bring myself to do it, even though I have nothing better to do today.

On the other hand, I've got 69 hours in between the two novels, and NaNo is a little more than half over. 

What I need is a new developmental editor, as mine has gone on leave and I really don't know what to do with Whose Hearts are Mountains. How does one find a developmental editor? 

Meh.

I took a break from the blog yesterday because I've been working on my online presence for spring classes (all done; assignments are where they should be with due dates as they should be) and working on Whose Hearts are Mountains (which isn't a total mess, but a frustrating problem with how to make more tension in the first half.)

I'm at 67k (67 hours) for NaNo, at least 50 of that going to the big edit of Gaia's Hands. I've almost quit posting time because I'm so far over my time.

Today I am going to spend as much time as I can stand on Whose Hearts are Mountains, but I don't know how much that will be because I'm feeling a bit underwhelmed. Not upset, not depressed, just underwhelmed with my writing. Meh.

Writers' Balk

I woke up this morning not wanting to write.

Actually, it's an editing day -- Whose Hearts are Mountains won't edit itself. But I am not, as they say, feeling the love.

It might be that the 50k/10 days binge edit of Gaia's Hands has taken a lot out of me. It could be because it's a week and a half  till Thanksgiving Break and I'm on break already. It could be because I'm discouraged from the latest rejections. It could be because I'm not sure why I want to get published at the moment.

At any rate, I'm staring at the draft thinking, "How do I fix this?" This meaning one of the big flaws of the first half of the book (having fixed the other two) which is pacing.

I was told there was not enough of import happening in the first half, despite the fact that she gets shot at, rammed into, kidnapped, and exposed to a virus. And has flashbacks from being captured by a paramilitary group. You can see why I'm bewildered. 

I HAVE to work on it tonight, because I'm having a NaNo Come Write Me space at the Board Game Cafe. So maybe I wait till then.

test page

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If I get published

If I ever get a book published traditionally (my optimistic friends say "when", not "if"), it will change my life in many ways. 

The money won't be a big change -- according to Derek Murphy, the average amount an author earns is the advance, which is $10k, or $8k after the agent gets their cut.  

I will have to hire an entertainment lawyer to look over the contract and see if there are any potential hitches. 

I will have to sign a contract, after which my rights to my book will be curtailed for a period of time.

I will have to consider promoting my book, which will include travel. I would likely do this in the summer, which means I will have to schedule around internship visits.

I will have to step up my social media game. I haven't done that yet because I have nothing really to promote except this blog. 

I've probably forgotten something.

Sometimes it seems more work than it's worth, but it's worth it to me. So I keep trying, keep improving, keep pushing myself.

Moving on to the next edit

Gaia's Hands is a done book. I will probably send it out for queries after the first of the year. For now, I want it to rest on my computer and I want to not be obsessed with it for a while.

Now to move on to edit Whose Hearts are Mountains. I don't have a lot to go by, as my dev editor is on leave. But what I have is daunting -- not enough action in the beginning. I thought I had enough action in the beginning, but now I have to figure out how to put in more. 

I used to be horrible in receiving criticism. Now I'm humble and take it with the belief that it will make my writing better. I've learned a lot, and I'm always learning more. 

I hope it's making me better. I hope it's making me good enough to be published. 

Not doing that again.

I'm still done with NaNo. And my brain is fried. 

Five hours a day editing seemed really rational while I was doing it, but I feel like half the month has passed without me really noticing.  (It's only one third of the month.) I've managed to get all my "work-work" done during that time period, strangely enough.

I've promised to continue doing NaNo, but only two hours a day. Maybe. If I can manage it. 

Now back to final read of Gaia's Hands, which has turned out to be far, far better than it was on first writing.

50K!

I just made my 50k words for NaNoWriMo (actually 50 hours, as I was rebelling this year by editing) in 10 days. That's 5 hours a day, which means I wasn't doing much of anything else but writing in my spare time. 

It was insane. On the other hand, I think I have Gaia's Hands to the point where, after a friend reads it, I could publish it. I think I learned a lot about editing. And focus. And feeling braindead at the end of a day.

I will finish a read-through on it, and then, I will probably start on Whose Hearts are Mountains. Only 2 hours a day, though. And it's going to take a lot more work, because it has structural problems in the first third. 

Time to pass out now.

Day 7 NaNo

Another boring post. 35 hours. 

It's really interesting finding out how long a good edit takes. I'm 35 hours into a book and not at the end. 

I promise more content after I've made 50k.

Day 6 NaNo

I'm not going to have the brain work to write entries until I'm at least at 50K on NaNo. Which, at this rate, will be Monday.

30 hours so far.

NaNo day 5

25 hours (25K words) on NaNo. I'm very lucky I have the time to do this (aided greatly by the fact that I don't watch tv and I have an excellent attention span.) I wish I could find those excellent graphics that NaNo offered us!

The hard part comes ahead -- so far the path to revision (including adding material) has been easy, with some of my best writing happening. Now I know things that are going to happen but not quite what to do there. Wish me luck!

Day 4 NaNo

20.000 words. I'm really pushing myself on this because I want to be done (which means still working on the project but done with NaNo hours) before Thanksgiving. Phew!

Third Day NaNo

Yesterday I was at 20 hours, equivalent to 20k words. I also got schooled on how I really should proofread better, because a submission of mine had a wrong name at least once in the 1000 words.

I'm still getting more rejections and wondering if it's me or the stories. And if it's remediable. I'm getting inspired by editing since I'm seeing possibilities opening up with Gaia's Hands.

😒 Wait. I have emojis! I just discovered this! 

Second Day Nano

Can't find the cool picture today.

Edited 4 more hours for a total of 10 hours. I won't be able to keep this pace for long But it's sure fun to try. 

First Day NaNo

6000 words (or more accurately for a Rebel, 6 hours).

It's November First?!?

I'm sorry for not writing yesterday -- I was pretty sick.

I've been fighting a cold or something over the past two weeks, but yesterday morning it went supernova -- I ached so badly I couldn't move, I coughed constantly, had a sore throat -- so I stayed home and slept for 20 hours. 

Only to wake up on November 1st and realize -- OMG, it's NANO TIME!

So today, as promised, I have to spend at least two hours today editing*, something I have been avoiding up till now. Two hours. When am I going to do this? When?

Deep breath. I have time after 2 PM today, being that it's a Friday and all and there won't be any meetings today. And I have a place -- the Board Game Cafe.

All I need now is the initiative.

Oh, by the way, I had a poem make Submittable's Rejection Horror Stories 2019. (Mine is the poem).


***

* I'm a rebel this year, doing some much needed editing instead of writing something new. On NaNoWriMo, I'm lleachie.

Sorry for the Debbie Downer

I got a big rejection last night -- CRAFT's first chapter contest. It would have provided lots of opportunity and support toward publication of a book. It was a long shot submitting, because I think they favor literary fiction and I write genre/literary crossover. 

It was worth a try. I'm trying to analyze whether the effort I spend writing and improving is worth the results. Whether the money I invest (in dev editing, in reader's fees for short fiction, for writers conferences) is yielding enough return on investment. Whether staying in writing because I've invested so much is just the sunk cost fallacy in action. 

I keep going back to writing, fancying that it will be my retirement career. But for it to be a career, I have to go someplace with it. I need to be published; otherwise it's just a hobby.

I really have to figure this out.

Snow. In October.

Snow. In October.

We had flurries last night here in northwest Missouri, just enough to notice, not enough to coat the ground. I wouldn't complain about that, but we are getting a freezing rain/snow of up to three inches precipitation tomorrow, just in time for Halloween. 

Between the unseasonably warm weather and the snow, we have had about two weeks of autumn. I demand an explanation.

There's an old adage that cautions against complaining about the weather, but snow. In October. I think this is an extenuating circumstance.

The snow will melt, leaving our lawns drab, sodden leaves and dun grasses. Because this is Missouri, home of the four seasons in one day, we may even see temperatures in the sixties -- or, who knows, the seventies -- before December. But the damage has been done. November will be a child of winter, not autumn, and we will be tired of snow before the year is out. 

Halloween is Thursday, right smack in the middle of the snow. Maybe I should go as a snowman.

Feeling the need for inspiration.

I'm wrestling with the whole writing thing again, which I understand is part of writing.

In my mind, the struggle manifests itself as a lack of inspiration, a general blah. I've written five novels (and need to edit two but have lost my dev editor), which is a big accomplishment. 

I think what bothers me most about not getting published -- when I accomplish something (a novel), I want a stretch goal, and getting it published is a stretch goal. Otherwise, once one has written one (or five) novels, what else is there?  I'd like to be published so that I feel that the goal isn't totally unattainable.

Lately I've written some short fiction, which gives me something to enter on Submittable for a feeling of accomplishment, and hopefully publication. I have nine items in review, another nine waiting (I think I've said this before). I still wish I felt motivated toward editing/writing the longer stuff.

 Oh, yes, my flash fiction, Becky Home-ecky, now can be found in the A3 Review Volume 11, found in finer bookstores somewhere in the UK. 

I just hope I get out of this slump soon.

On Second-Guessing My Ability

This picture has nothing to do with today's topic.

I second-guess my writing talent all the time. I live with a constant critic who has no trouble getting into my head (as it is already in my head) to tell me that my writing isn't enough -- not interesting enough, not good enough, not publishable enough. The voice insists that I am writing the same stuff I wrote back in sixth grade.

Despite this, I'm not adverse to critiques. In fact, I relish getting better. But I'm still afraid I'm not good enough.

I hear this is not uncommon to writers, that most writers feel a constant sense of doubt, and that we wouldn't want to meet one who doesn't. But I need to shake this sense of self-censure (and self-censorship) for my long-overdue re-editing of Gaia's Hands. I have to believe in the book to make it better.  

So, how to believe? Cognitive journaling might help -- counteract all the mind-reading ("the critics hate it") and fortune-telling ("I'll never get published") and name-calling ("I'm so talentless!") and awfulizing ("my stuff sucks"). 

I joke about a magic spell, because I feel like my writing career is cursed. Of all the things I pooh-pooh in my life, curses are not one of them. I half-way believe in curses, even as I suspect they're an externalization of one's failure scripts. I'm looking at how to break the curse.

I suspect, though, I will have to live with it and create despite it. And someday, when/if I get published, I will celebrate all the harder.

Another Homecoming and the Words that Come With It

The leaves have finally turned, orange and red and brown, dazzling the campus for Homecoming. I remain convinced that Homecoming is the remnant of a pagan ritual that captures parts of the harvest festivals and part of the sacrificial king (in the guise of a football game.) This would make pumpkin spice latte a sacrament, and I'm not sure I want to go that far.

It's been a long time since I've thought this way, of the seasons of the year yielding a mythology we live by. I had no reason not to think this way, given that both Quakers and Episcopalians can skew romantic about the seasons, and rare individuals of each even call themselves pagan. In fact, the liturgical Christian traditions follow a liturgy of seasons, and mystical Christian traditions offer a glimpse of the movement of the year as well.

When I was younger, I was what I called a kitchen witch, making my own rituals in solitude, following the seasons of the year. This faded with my years as a professor, even though my religious life didn't give me the hands-on relationship with life that I wanted. (Correction: Membership in the Religious Society of Friends did, but I've been 90 miles from Meeting for 21 years. The Episcopal Church put me too far from the feeling of sacredness.)

We need our rituals, whether dressed Wiccan or pagan or Christian (or one of the many other religions we profess). Those who have stripped ourselves of rituals because they're "pagan" lose our moorings to the seasons and to the earth. Those without rituals that speak to them frantically try to rip rituals from others by brandishing the word "Satanic", or create a mockery of ritual that worships hatred, bullying, and totalitarianism (MAGA rallies, I'm looking at you.)

I think about what Autumn says to me -- golden and bittersweet, rejoicing at the leaves and wrapping up against the chill. Saying goodbye (Les's death still resonates) and hugging the last of harvest to my arms. Snuggling with cats -- always snuggling with cats. 

Hoping it makes for good poetry now that I vow not letting work become everything.

Elegy (For Les)

Cells expire,

Molecules cleave,

Life departs.

Your atoms scatter,

We breathe them in,

We breathe your love in,

We breathe your magic in,

Your last communion.

Loving and Nurturing my Story

I'm struggling to get back into writing. No, I'm writing poetry and short/flash fiction pretty well. I'm having trouble getting back into editing Gaia's Hands.

Gaia's Hands is my problem child, as I have said before. What do you do with a problem child?

My friend Les, who we memorialized last weekend, would say we love and nurture our problem children.

So, how do I love and nurture the story? I need to go back to the characters, because without them the story would not exist. I probably need to converse with them again, to get back into the game. 

The editing will be my project for NaNo, so I have time to get back into it. 

Time to nurture my problem child.