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Month: December 2018

The Not-Fun of Traveling

By the time you read this, I’ll be visiting friends outside New York City for a week at Christmas. Lucky, lucky me. This is not, alas, a post how awesome a time I’m having in NYC. I am (wisely, IMHO) writing this before I leave home. Which means, this is a post on what a pain in the backside it is, prepping to cross the country for one flippin’ week. I love traveling. Let me rephrase that. I love having traveled. I love being in a new place, exploring, finding cool stuff, seeing new things–but I do not love having to travel to get to new places. I do not love commercial airlines, two-hour pre-flight security check-ins, measuring my bags to see if I have the right size luggage or need to go buy something, flying Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve to save myself (a heckuva lot of) money. I do love car trips if there are cool things to see on the way and I can pull over and look closer if I want to. I do not love “you’ve got four days of vacation, three nights at awesome place NOW GET THERE IMMEDIATELY AND THEN GET BACK FASTER.” I don’t love packing. I don’t love peacekeeping between frazzled travel companions forced into close proximity for long periods of time. I don’t love the stress of being in charge when things (inevitably) go wrong. But I do love exploring new places, and to do that you have to…

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Putzing About

Oh, friends, my November was gloriously productive. It was so productive I’ve gotten cocky. No doubt that will be a mistake later, but for now, I am reveling in it. So, the time goal worked out really well. I got a ton done. So I’m continuing that for December, though I’ve lowered it to 30 minutes because Holidays and so forth. So far, so good. I’m actually ahead for the month. Aside from that, I’m still working on drawing/shading/coloring classes. It’s been very interesting, though we may be getting to the point where I should stop doing classes and actually start working on projects.  I’ve also started doing some vocal skills classes. It’s been a long time since I’ve had any sort of instruction on the matter–probably high school. All the choirs since then have just assumed you know what you’re doing and left you to flounder if you don’t. So hopefully that will be useful in the future. Right now, so far, it’s been pretty basic, and also I have a cold and singing makes me cough. AND I’m sewing again, making presents for Christmas, as well as putzing around with other random projects (including patching the pile of clothes that need patching). My mother and I went to Goodwill Outlet last week (where you can buy clothes for about $1/pound) so I now have stuff for other projects should the Christmas presents go well. It’s a creative monstrosity over here. No doubt eventually I will have so many options of…

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Real Life Strikes Back (Again)

Two months ago I told you about my annual writing retreat and how it felt. I also shared some strategies that I was working on to keep that retreat feeling going… set up a room in my house that has NO clutter and is used for nothing but writing, reading, and other Internet-free pursuits (not a pipe dream, I’m actually working on this one) set up a writing schedule (I had one, once upon a time) — not for product, but for time spent on the process Predictably, Real Life struck as soon as I got back. Strategy number one still needs work (I am pecking away at the clutter, one itsy-bitsy step at a time) but I’ve made some progress on strategy number two. I signed up for National Novel Writing Month as a “NaNo Rebel” — doing the challenge on my own terms. Like Kit, I set a time goal for myself. My goal was 25 hours. I made it to 9. Not exactly great. But also, not bad. It got me writing for solid chunks of time again, and pushed me to do more than I would have otherwise — not a lot more, but small gains are more sustainable anyway, right? I worked a bit on the novel that Kit and I are writing, but spent most of the time wrestling with an edit of the short story that I pounded out in less than a week during the retreat. (Okay, that was first-drafting vs. editing.…

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A Thousand Lifetimes

A Thousand Lifetimes by Kit Campbell   The pathway was long and dark, spiraling into trees that stretched on forever. Snow dusted leaves and grass. Adelia pulled her cloak closer around her shoulders, taking a deep breath, trying to ignore the crunching of running footsteps behind her. “Wait!” Her brother, Charles, slid to a stop, just outside her range of vision. “Please, don’t do this. I don’t mind, really. Come home.” She couldn’t turn to look at him, or the thinness of this place would be lost. Without answering him, she dug into her bag, pulling out a heavy key, blackened with age. Charles sucked in his breath, but he didn’t reach out for her. Adelia reached the key straight out in front of her, holding it steady. Then, she turned it. The door—and it was a door, though she had expected something less definite—swung open without her touching it. Adelia replaced the key in her bag and squared her shoulders. Beyond the door there was more darkness and hints of whispers. A breeze stirred her hair as she took a step closer. “Please,” Charles said, though now he sounded more distant. “Don’t do this.” But she had to. Her brother—her town—depended on it, and she would not allow his sacrifice. Not to the darkness. Not to the madness. It would not be enough. Though she wanted to look back, to assure him that she needed to do this, she knew the rules. And you never looked back. The darkness…

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