Decking the Halls

The halls are decked! Well, actually, my husband decked the living room and left the hall alone. I'd get pictures of the living room, but the coffee table is a bit cluttered as always. No House Beautiful home here.

On the bench next to me we have a display of Christmasy stuffed toys -- a vintage Coca Cola stuffed bear, two Ty Monstaz (Holly and Tinsel), Velveteen Rabbits male and female, Hello Kitty with a Christmas present, a sloth wearing antlers and a scarf, and Plum Puddy. If Christmas is a holiday for children, I want to indulge my inner child a little.

I'm working from home for the rest of the semester, with a dead week followed by online finals. So having the house decked out and Christmas music playing helps. Right now "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas" plays on the stereo and, well, it is.

Our Christmas celebration, constrained as it is, may be just what we need right now. The pre-Christmas winter celebrations heralded the passing of the longest night and the slow return to the bright days. The Christians held onto many of the customs, knowing that they needed a celebration to get through winter. We hope for a vaccine for COVID in the New Year, so we turn to the brighter days just as our ancestors did. 

Grateful to write again (short entry)

 I think I have fallen in love with writing again.

I hadn't written for a while, instead editing several works I have that I haven't been able to get traction on traditionally. (I still have one that I need serious editing on, given that it was my first novel. I'm lost with that one). But I needed a writing project for NaNo, and I needed a sequel to The Kringle Conspiracy, a Christmas romance. 

So I wrote the sequel I'd been imagining for a while, Kringle in the Night, and I'm editing now. And it has been so fun! I'm writing again, creating something tangible from my fantasy and my memory and my ear for dialogue and all those good things. 

It feels good to create again. 

Our Inner Child and Christmases Past

Do we as adults look for touchstones to our childhood Christmases?

My husband and I spoke about this while we were listening to Little Drummer Boy (Harry Simeone Chorale, 1959 version), the harbinger of Christmas in my childhood. I was born in 1963, but the trappings of those late 50's still lingered in my house, as we listened to the album (33 1/3) on a 1957 Magnavox Continental console. 

This is the exact make/model of our old stereo. I wish I had it because a restoration would be lovely.

My husband grew up in a town smaller than mine that still managed to have a Christmas parade, unlike mine. Both of us remember captivating displays in local businesses. He remembers church choirs, while my childhood was more secular. 

We both remember Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer complete with the GE tie-in commercials, and we watch that and How the Grinch Stole Christmas and other children's Christmas TV staples, and we still watch those every year. 

We remember the iconic outdoor displays of our home towns -- me, the industrial pipe frame-and-lights tree on top of the Nabisco carton factory, and he the star on top of the grain elevator. I remember a whole era of my life where I could look out the dining room window and see the tree lit in green or red across the neighborhood, waiting for my father to get home from his job 30 miles away, waiting for Rudolph to come on TV, worried about my father traveling through the snow.

We've made our own traditions -- one of those being going to Starved Rock State Park in my hometown area to visit my dad and my sister's family every year. Starved Rock Lodge was also a piece of my childhood, a massive log construction that existed since the 1930's. To me it's the epitome of Christmas, which its Great Hall sporting Christmas lights and families getting together there to open their presents. Again, a part of my past. We will not go there because of COVID, and I will miss that.

This makes me wonder if other people have this sentimentalism for the past when it comes to Christmas. Are we touched by our childhood Christmases and clinging to the traditions to keep our adult selves buoyant? I wonder this especially for this year, when we can't have those big gatherings because of the contagion, when we put our Christmas trees out early for the colorful lights of hope. 

The Relief

I finally have a break! I'm tearing up with gratitude.

This has been the most exhausting semester I've ever had. Not necessarily the hardest, although teaching both live and on Zoom at the same time was somewhat difficult and gave less than stellar results. But long and exhausting, waiting for students to drop in on Zoom, sitting in a empty office, scuttling from office to restroom with my mask on. 

The sunny days out the window seemed so distant from where I sat, even though I have the best view on campus out my window. Then the leaden skies came, and at least they matched my moods.

There was the constant threat of COVID. There was a point where 9 out of 60 students were out over either isolation (COVID positive) or quarantine (contact with a COVID positive). The virus swept through peer groups and Greek life, and although I taught social distanced and masked, the random trips through hallways and in bathrooms worried me.

I focused on the task, knowing that thinking about any of this, much less all of this, would break me. And so I became an automaton, checking off each finished class session, each office hour. Not waiting for break, because that seemed too distant. 

Now I'm here, at break, and I want to cry. After this week, I have a week of waiting for students to ask questions over Zoom (and they never do too much of this) and finals week, where their exams are essay and take home. I will be at home, comfortable, during all of this. So, in effect, I have survived the semester.

And I feel like crying. 

 American Thanksgiving is fraught with a misleading mythology. In the great American myth, the first Thanksgiving was a dinner held jointly between Native Americans and the white settlers, bringing them together.

There are several problems with this scenario:

• It assumes the Native Americans had no thankfulness rituals, when indeed they did.
• It assumes that the white settlers and Native Americans lived happily ever after, when in actuality the Indians were systematically killed and driven into successively smaller parcels of land, all in the name of Western expansion. 

Americans are indoctrinated into the myth at an early age in our schools. We cut out Pilgrims and Indians and learn about the myth  of the First Thanksgiving. Although that dinner actually happened, we are kept away from its aftermath. We are told (or at least we were in my time) that the Indians don't really exist, but we are not told why.

The myth and its originals are personal for me. I am a child of the white settlers and of the Native Americans. I count Michel Cadotte and  Ikwesewe of the Lake Superior (now Lac du Flambeau) Ojibwe as ancestors. Mostly white but for the stories of my family, where we remember ancestors with long black hair and almond-shaped eyes. 

For me to celebrate Thanksgiving, I have to separate the thanks-giving from the mythology, and at the same time remember the thanks that my ancestors gave to their Maker. 

Stages of Writing

 I have just gone through the first proofreading pass of the second book in the Kringle Chronicles, Kringle in the Dark. In the book, Brent Oberhauser, self-professed nerd, falls for Sunshine Rogers, who keeps the books for Yes, Virginia, a Christmas charity. Her boss, Jack Moore, receives blackmail letters in the mail and Sunshine finds significant mysteries in the paperwork buried under the category of "miscellaneous". In a clash of wills, Sunshine and Brent break up to avoid heartbreak later. The two must find a way back together to try to stop the blackmailer and solve the puzzle of Yes, Virginia.

Right now, I rather like the book, being amazed that I could produce something that good in less than 30 days (aka NaNoWriMo project). But that's just a stage in my writing. Here's the stages of my writing:

1. Beginning: Look how effortlessly I write!
2. After a quarter of the way through the book: I'm just slinging words onto pages. This book is going to be a mess.
3. Finishing the first draft: Thank goodness it's done.
4. Proofing the first draft: This book is actually good!
5. Finishing the first draft: There has to be something wrong and I can't wrap my head around it.
6. Receiving document back from my in-house editor (i.e. husband): No, look it over again. What's WRONG with it?
7. Second draft: This book is a mess.
8. Fast forward to book in hand: This is MY book. Don't you hurt my little book!

I guess this means I'm a writer. 

About Time

 

Maryville, MO is under an emergency order which limits gatherings to ten people or less and enforces the mask ordinances because of an upswing of COVID. (It does not shut down local businesses or enforce shelter in place.)

And it's about time. Many residents of the town have proven that they can't comply with the existing mask ordinance, thinking that their legal rights are being impinged upon.

Hint: No, your rights are not being infringed upon; you're being asked to do what's good for America and your fellow human beings. Don't you want to do what's good for America and your fellow human beings? Then we'll make you wear the mask because the governor is calling the National Guard out to help in the overwhelmed hospitals and morgues.

It's not like I'm not suffering as bad as the anti-maskers are. I will not be spending Christmas with my family. I will not be in Kansas City for Thanksgiving to watch the lights. I have ZOOMed my entire semester of classes. I feel lonely and would feel more lonely if I wasn't married. But I adhere to the rules because I don't want to be responsible for contagion. 

I'm angry right now at all the people who should have refrained from meeting in large groups with strangers, who have gone about without masks and with a bad attitude, who have ruined Thanksgiving for all of us because they kept the contagion going.

Thankful for my Burdens

I make a habit of being thankful for the adversity in my life as a way to make peace with it. This year is no exception:

• I am thankful for the social isolation I've faced with COVID-19, because I have had to learn to be patient and to wait for those vacations and writing retreats to be scheduled in an unforeseen future.
• I am thankful for my bipolar disorder because I've had to learn to take care of myself.
• I am thankful for my learning disability (the inability to visualize) because it has made me work harder on my writing.
• I am thankful for every argument I've gotten into with my husband because we've both learned from them.
• I am thankful for not being rich because I haven't lost my sense of perspective.

I know that it's an odd thing to be thankful for adversity, but to me it's more powerful than to be thankful for one's blessings. I have many, and I could go on about those. It always feels to me, though, that being thankful for one's blessings is rubbing it in to others who don't have those blessings. It's easier for me to be thankful for my burdens. 

I guess I'm busy.

 I ordered eight paperback copies of The Kringle Conspiracy to sell after my book signing party requested copies. And do you know what? I lost the list! AAAAAAAGH someone threw out the piece of paper I'd written them on. I can't believe it!

So now I'm asking my Facebook friends again who ordered copies. I think I've found most of them anyhow. Just missing two or three. 

I feel like such a flake sometimes! Maybe most of the time, but with all the stuff going on (teaching, grading, writing, rewriting, emotional meltdown over Trump's scary refusal to concede the election.) maybe I can't be blamed for being a bit flaky.

What is left to do before January 1st:

• Grade Case Management final case files
• Grade exams in Case Management and People Money and Psych (in a couple weeks)
• Meet with classes Monday via Zoom
• Edit (first round) Kringle in the Night
• Set up my pitches for PitMad December 3
• Narrate 8 presentations for Personal Adjustment (i.e. Positive Psychology)
• Finish setting up Personal Adjustment, Case Management, and People Money and Psych for spring classes
• Get those books out
• Rest (I don't do that very well)

I guess I am busy. Busy is not necessarily a good thing if it stands in the way of accomplishment. Perhaps I need to learn to do things more efficiently. If I had time, I'd study that.

But today is Sunday, and I've finished grading a major assignment. Now to edit another chapter of Kringle. Ahh...

COVID Thanksgiving and other plans

Before COVID, we had plans for Thanksgiving. We had reserved a room at the Southmoreland on the Plaza in Kansas City, and we were going to brave the crowds to watch the Plaza Lighting Ceremony . We were going to window shop the Plaza for Black Friday and soak up the holiday atmosphere. (We live hours from our families and we get very little time off at Thanksgiving.)

And then COVID came.

Our Thanksgiving this year will be at home, where we are cooking an India-inspired Thanksgiving meal of tandoori turkey breast, mixed greens, sweet-potato and lentil dal, raita, chutneys and naan. And our local baker's macarons for dessert, which are not Indian, but will have to do. 

We'll put up our Christmas decorations on Black Friday and start through our list of Christmas season videos (we have about 10 or 12 to view over the weeks). We will get quality time with our four cats. I will not be grading homework till maybe Sunday. 

Maybe I need this this year. It's been a year where my life's been turned upside down by COVID, where I've had at least two mini-breakdowns to work through between COVID fears and post-election fears (and I didn't miss a lick of work from them), where my retirement goals were put into turmoil by a change in university policy with health insurance. 

 Philosophically, maybe this is the year I need a break for Thanksgiving. Even though it's just three more days of isolation (given the current COVID rates in Missouri, this is a good thing) it's three days of festive and restful isolation to ready me for the last weeks of the semester.

The Owl in the Christmas Tree

 This week in the US News, a story unfolded that is just too cute for the Christmas season. A small saw-whet owl rode two hours from Oneonta, New York to Rockefeller Center, New York City.  The tiny and photogenic creature is now living in a box in Saugerties, New York until it can be released tomorrow.

I have a special fondness for this story, having spent five years in Oneonta. Oneonta is a small town sitting at the foothills of the Catskill Mountains, known for its university (SUNY Oneonta) and its summer little league baseball tournaments. It's a charming town of old houses and a park full of evergreens; it's a quirky town with an eclectic mix of stores in its downtown.

Oneonta is a place where there should be Christmas stories. Nothing quite as virginal as a Hallmark Christmas movie, but maybe a Lifetime movie with its more complicated line set to a white Christmas. 

So fitting it is that a tiny owl in a lopsided tree would venture forth from there and find itself in the big city. 

Someone will write a children's book about this. I wish it would be me, but I don't write children's books. I hope it's an Oneonta native, for there are many artsy sorts in the foothills of the Catskills. I would read that book, and possibly try to get it signed with my other autographed children's books.

This post wouldn't be complete without a picture:

NaNo winner!

 I did, finally, finish NaNoWriMo today with 50,600 words. Now what?

Now comes time to edit. I plan on running this book through my best editing efforts, after which I will send it to a developmental editor to make it the best romance I can send out.

The name of it, if I haven't mentioned, is Kringle in the Night, and it's a sequel to The Kringle Conspiracy, which is out right now on Kindle. 

Right now it's really rough. It needs a little more Santa magic, and a little more of the noir feel I wanted it to have for the sake of the title. It needs some better word choices, and the little details need to be checked for consistency, and it needs to be checked for passive verbs and redundancies and overused words and maybe even words that are too big. 

It needs a lot, but that's okay. NaNoWriMo is not about writing a polished product, it's about writing a first draft that will need more work to get to the final product. That's what December and beyond is about, and I will live with this book daily during the Christmas season editing one chapter a day.

Deep breath. It's done! For now.

NaNo Winner -- almost.

 I'm almost done with NaNo. 48,300 words as of this morning. 1700 words to go.

I can't believe I made it. I haven't written a novel in a year or two, choosing instead to edit the ones I already have. I'm writing a romance novel, and despite the fact that I've got a romance novel published (A shameless plug for The Kringle Conspiracy), I still feel like I don't get romance novels.

And then there's the pandemic and the election, and our current president acting like the supreme leader of a banana republic (which I suspect is unfair to banana republics everywhere), I felt stressed enough to quit a couple times. But I didn't.

But it's nearly done, and then I will edit and edit and mercilessly edit. There are things I want to add, and probably a couple places I want to condence. I think promising myself ten pages a day should help the process.

Ahh. I never thought I was going to finish this one!

More COVID in the Neighborhood

We're having a worsening bout of COVID here in Missouri at the same time the state has loosened its restrictions on classrooms such that the classroom doesn't have to quarantine if everyone wore masks. Kansas City has gone back to restrictions in public places, and it would be a good thing if Maryville, with its booming rates of transmission among the students, followed suit. At least we've renewed our mask ordinance till January.

Our students will be off campus for the last couple weeks of the semester and will take their finals online. I hope this reduces the contagion we've seen.

Planning for Spring semester, I will be teaching the way I did last Fall -- through in-person and online at the same time. It's hard to do this, and I don't feel as effective a teacher as I have been. This whole year has been hard. But it's been hard for everyone, and I don't mean to gripe. 

I guess I can't wait till Winter Break.

Bad spells

 I'm sitting here trying to remember back to my absolutely harrowing mood of a week or two ago and I can hardly do so.

My brain confounds me. My body confounds me. When I am in a bad state the two are one and the same -- my stomach tightens up, my bowels loosen; I feel cold flow through my veins; my adrenaline ramps up and at the same time I cannot move. I cry, I shriek, I say nothing and the crushing horses' hooves keep advancing.

What turns the tide back to normal, I don't know. Was it the news? That good cry? The 12-hour sleep? The cognitive exercise? All and none of these? The passage of time? I don't know, but if I did that would be my sacrament.

Maybe it's a good thing that I remember my bad spells only vaguely. Maybe it preserves my self-esteem not remembering how helpless I felt, how utterly agonized.

Today, then, is a good day.

Major undertaking

 

We're replacing the tuner for our stereo system today. It's only 15+ years old, but it's hardly top of the line, and it's started making unpleasant buzzing and popping sounds. Cue in Mendelssohn's "Wedding March" -- "DEE dee dee ZZZZRRRRRPPPZZZZZT" 

We bought its (used but newer) replacement through Facebook Marketplace the other day for $100, so today we're going to install it.

I got Richard at the right moment to agree to install it. Otherwise it could have sat on the couch for weeks. We have a habit around the house of getting a new gadget and letting it sit. And sit. There are so many life-changing gadgets in this house that are not, in fact, changing my life. The air fryer is not frying, nor is the instant pot potting. So I really want the tuner tuning.

The replacement of the tuner requires more work than I had apparently considered. I just labeled a bunch of wires 'front center', 'front right', 'front left', 'right surround', 'left surround', 'active subwoofer', 'passive subwoofer', and 'passive-aggressive subwoofer'. The latter is probably the one making ominous popping noises.

My task in all this is to label things and stand back, because this is RICHARD'S STEREO. And I'm fine with this, because my concept of a fancy stereo is one of those all-in-one bricks that Wal-Mart sells, the one with the two breadbox-sized speakers and nothing that looks like a subwoofer. 

The old tuner is out, and I am eternally grateful Richard's taking care of this project because there are entirely too many inputs for my comfort.

For some reason I'm really hungry for a plate of barbecue, Kansas City style. I have no reason why. 

Now What?

I've accomplished everything I wanted to accomplish and experienced everything I needed to experience by self-publishing the book. 

I wanted to have a "book-signing" party. I wanted a listing on Amazon. I wanted to sign books, even if it was just among my friends. These are all shallow goals vs making big sales, but I'm pretty sure that Amazon is so glutted that making sales is a pipe dream anyhow.

If I'd have known it was this easy to settle that howling need, I'd have done this sooner.

What are my stretch goals? I don't know right now. I've been too busy with writing for NaNo and grading to think about it. It's going to be something about advertising, though. I need to make that into a SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time-bound) goal.

2323232323232323232323232323232348eu4444444444e (I'm leaving the above typo here, as my kitten Chloe had something to say).

Friday the 13th

 Friday the 13th. It's a good thing I'm not superstitious.

Or maybe I am. I throw salt over my left shoulder when I spill it. I don't walk under ladders -- though there's a good reason there; walking under them tends to upset them. 

I don't open umbrellas in the house, mostly because my mother gently told me that open umbrellas in the house were bad luck. I instead go through an awkward dance of opening the umbrella while it's sticking out the door and I'm still inside. 

I don't break mirrors. Who does? They're a silvery bitch of a mess to clean up. 

Black cats are welcome in my house. In fact, I have one. I sometimes consider her bad luck, especially when she accidently trips me. 

I whistle indoors, but very poorly, so I may only be summoning mediocre luck instead of bad. 

Truly, though, I don't think any of this makes a difference on Friday the 13th. We are all victims of confirmation bias on this day, infusing the random occurrence as bad luck in solidarity with the millions of others who do the same. Strangely, I don't hear people blaming a dire event on Friday the 13th

The superstition behind Friday the 13th, in my opinion, a mass celebration of the stupid little things that happen to us. And that, with a little superstition, I can get behind. 

emerging

 I don't know how many of you are out there, nor do I know most of your names, but know I appreciate you. I think I'm crawling out of my prickly stress coccoon, which I picture as being something like a datura shell I curl inside of, hoping for peace. 

The truth is probably not as dire as I paint it, and eventually Trump will leave office. The country will start to recover despite a deadlock in the government because thank Goodness there are things like executive orders and Trump set the precedent of using them right and left. The vaccine for Corona may be ready by mid 2021, and we will be able to hug again.

I'm writing. I'm still writing, breaking a NaNo streak of failing every even year since the 2016 election. That's only two NaNos worth of failure, but I was pretty steady before then. I think I remember what I like about writing, and I think I'll be able to continue it. 

I also remember that I may have to put the big books, the fantasy books, out there again to traditional publishers. If I get my self-promotion game going, I may be able to put them out using that route.

I feel like I'm coming back to myself, someone who does better at doing than being. Thank you for listening. 

The Best I Can Right Now

Note on caption -- I have not had COVID yet, so much of this diagram is not in play. But the lockdown and psychosocial stress is real. Also, WHAT DOES THIS DIAGRAM EVEN MEAN?!

I'm really sorry I haven't been talking to you for a while. I'm in a rough place right now, and I don't want it to get rougher, so I'm focusing on what's necessary until my brain can catch up with what's extra.

This is a part of my life. My moods can go smoothly until I hit a patch of extreme stress (COVID rates rising plus the presidential election and its batshit crazy aftermath) and then my sleep goes off, my mind is a fog, and my emotions are all over the place.

It takes me a bit to recover. Usually I manage it without a tweak to my medication, and usually I don't go into the hospital to manage it. I know what to do to keep myself functional -- go to work even if my mind doesn't think it can, get the important things done, go home to rest. Make sure I'm not avoiding emails. Take bubble baths, do cognitive exercises, not fault myself for not promoting the book.

I will get through this. I always have. But if you're not seeing as much from me as you have, understand that I am doing the best I can.

Thoughts on the election from a disillusioned American.

 I haven't written in a few days. As the world knows at this point, Biden is projected to win the election, which is to say that there are dribbles of votes to be counted which look like they're going to be predominantly toward Biden. Yet I don't feel hope.

There is an ugliness in this country. We saw it when Obama won the election, and we see it now that Trump has lost. For that matter, we saw it when Trump won. A leering mass of exhibitionistic radicalism calling itself conservatism.

It doesn't seem that radical to me to believe that people of color should not have to face institutionalized racism, and that structures built to favor whites should favor no race in particular. It doesn't seem that radical to me that all people be allowed dignity. 

I don't see European countries as hopeless hotbeds of Marxist-style communism. I consider them, and us, to be the center: noone should starve. The homeless should be homed. Noone should die of an illness that could easily be treated. If the poor had options to gaming the system, they would likely take them.

There's a 2% or so of people who would game the system, but we see them at the highest echelons of the social class scale as well, and we allow the richest their plunder as if it were admirable.  

I don't know if I believe in the inherent greatness of the US anymore. The spew of obscenities spilling from the mouths of the most virulent MAGAs does not mark a great country. 

I can't believe I haven't written in a couple days. It's been terribly busy:

•  My virtual book signing party went off very well on Sunday, despite my jitters. About seven people showed up, but that was a fine number to interact with and about the number I expected to show up if I went live. 
• I started NaNoWriMo, and I'm struggling because I haven't written a book for a while, trying instead to edit what I already have. It's time to write, and this book is going slow. 
• It's been a bit of a challenge to find time to write because of the fact that it's a crucial project time for my students. 

In addition, I have a sense of existential dread over the (US) elections. I'm not by any means alone. 

So I'll do my writing to the best of my ability over the next several days, meditate, take deep breaths, teach my classes, and pray for the best and most compassionate outcome.