Random March Post

This post will be random and rambling. I'm warning you because I've had two good glasses of scotch and I haven't had scotch in at least two year, so I'm pretty drunk about now. Obviously not drunk enough to throw grammar and spelling out the window, but then, the moment I'm so drunk that grammar and spelling go out the window, you need to lock me in the shed out back...

ANYWAY... I'm sitting here drunk because I am very unhappy right now. There's shallow unhappy, like I had a shitty day, and I hate my job, I don't have enough time to write all the things I want to write and UPS didn't deliver my package that I paid extra to have delivered today, unhappy, and there's deep unhappy, like I still miss Di, I shouldn't be sitting here missing her because she ought to be alive, instead of half the worthless souls who are still walking within our realm, unhappy. And I'm sorry, I know she's *just a horse* to most of the population, but she was a lot more to me.

But shallow or deep, the fact remains that I'm unhappy. Blah blah blah.

There's not point in whining. What is, is what is. All I can do, is to write. Sometimes, I write better drunk. Who said that? Hemingway? Write drunk, edit sober? It's good advice. You're free when you're just enough tipsy to not give a shit about the consequences of saying wha you feel.  Now, maybe you're going to say something in your ms now, and then later when you go back to edit, you're like WTF was I thinking? And you change things- usually for the better. But I think you know what I mean. You get so much more in touch with raw emotions when you're not worried about what anyone is going thing of you for revealing those raw emotions. Like I said, maybe later you go back sober and edit things, but there's something to be said for offering up your most raw emotions.

And on that note, I'm off to offer up my most raw emotions on a new WIP...

Di's Poem For 2015

3:00 Am on March 2, 2013 I lost my beloved Di. On the anniversary of her death 2014 I wrote a poem for her. This year, it just felt right to continue the tradition, and I plan on doing it for the foreseeable future. So here is Di's poem for 2015.

Marrow Lost

The world somehow faltered, when she went away

All the bright allure began to go to grey.

From dawns’ firsts breaths to darkened gloamings

No solace found, in midnight roamings

She walks no more with a mortal’s stride

Just a shadow now, on the moon’s tide

Silent are the mountain hollows, and empty stand the trails

No hoofbeats echo long, to race the rushing gales

Fallow lie the fields and lanes, and haunted are the glens

The world now seen always, through a shattered lens

She walks no more with a mortal’s stride

Just a shadow now, on the moon’s tide

A void remains within, where once she held much sway

A dark forsaken corner, in a heart so fey

Always will it be, the soul against long sorrow

Sundered from the pneuma, of her closest marrow

On Things That Are Uncomfortable

So, it's been a struggle recently. A struggle pretty much in every way, even though I'm very aware of how 'not really that bad' things are. Funny how knowing that things could be so much worse than they actually are, doesn't do anything to make you feel better about the things that also aren't great at the moment.

Writing has been hard. It's not a matter of not having any ideas, but rather, not being able to settle on any of them. I'm like a deranged trout trying to swim upstream in every directing except right through the rapids where I need to go in order to get anywhere. Catskin is officially 'dead' for the time being. Yes, it's with an agent, and a small publishing house. But they obviously aren't *incredibly excited* over it, or they're so busy that even if they love it, they don't have the time to address new clients at the moment. That's fine, and also totally understandable. Maybe something will come of it, maybe it won't. At this point, though, I can't afford to keep dicking around with it (and I'd be wrong to) and since I'm not making anymore changes without professional guidance, I'm shelving it.

My current projects run the gamut of fantasy, to contemporary, to contemporary/paranormal/ghost to something dangerously futuristic/post apocalyptic. The problem is that in an industry that's currently undergoing a glut of self-publishing and independent publishing (good things, and cheers to those who can utilize them) I have no sense of direction, so I'm finding it exceedingly difficult to actually finish anything new. I'm perpetually second guessing myself and which project is more worth the time and might stand more of a chance at being successful. The recent largely publicized celebrity book deals haven't helped, just because on a purely emotional level, they're rather depressing to hear about. Especially the ones that don't bring anything new to the ring, or that involve 'authors' who never intended to actually write books, and were just writing 'for the fun of it'. I hold no grudges against them, but it's agonizing to have shaped my entire life around the goal of becoming a published author, and then see opportunities handed to people who DON'T WANT to be professional writers, but whom the publishing houses see as an 'easy moneymaker' for at least one or two books. Those not-really-writers will have the time of their lives, and if nothing else comes of it, fine. But meanwhile there are thousands of people like me struggling daily to attain that dream who have, essentially, maybe lost out on a chance to make it because a huge amount of money was tossed at someone else. Never mind the established very hard working authors who are literally just scraping by, and then are being brushed aside by these flash-in-the-pan deals.

Which brings me to my current emotional state. It's not an entirely happy one. While Mom is doing super well (YAY, omg, so grateful to the powers that be, still praying, but I'm so grateful) there have been a lot of other stressors. Mostly, the fact that I'm still not over the farm. I know, I drone on about it so. But it's the truth. It's a fight, trying to find the sort of happiness I had at the farm, when I'm no longer at the farm, no longer anywhere near it. I've got the scraps of two separate memoirs in regard to it, but they've been harder to write than I could ever have imagined. One of them focuses entirely on Di. I thought that I had at least acclimated to the fact that she's gone, but the more I work to write her story, the more I realize I'm not adjusted at all. Dwelling on her can send me into the closest thing I've ever felt to depression, or what I imagine depression is like. It takes a toll on me. So, of course, I only work for the briefest times on it, then stop. Which, really, only makes things worse, in some ways, because then I'm back to feeling as though I haven't gotten anything meaningful done on any manuscript. It's a vicious circle, but I'm still motoring around it determinedly.

Here's the thing about me, and things that are uncomfortable: I'm really good at dealing with them, if I know there's going to be an end to it. But when I can't see an end, I feel like I'm lying to myself, weaving untruths about how things are going to turn out just so I'll make it through. I've always been one who would rather face the harshest truth, than the kindest lie, so this floating around making up shit about how someday I'm going to be a real, published, writes all the time writer just sucks the life out of me. I don't want a handout, I just want a freaking chance. And now, I'm not even sure how to go about pursuing that chance, since at least the two memoirs are entirely different balls of wax than the YA that I usually write. Which, I don't even know if I should be spending time on those manuscripts. They are books that I want to write, and at least the one about the farm will have the local interest angle, along with my twin sister's photographs. Commercially, that one is the strongest simply because their aren't many memoirs written by one identical twin, photographed by the second twin, and revolving around a local historical estate. But what do I know? Sometimes, I feel like I'm just grasping at ideas, turning it into a spaghetti toss to see what sticks to the wall. I don't even know anymore.

Now that I've sufficiently blathered out my woes for the time being, I'll leave it open for opinions (I think you can leave comments, though I'd tried to turn them off at one point) and tell me what you think.  And know that I AM grateful for all the good things in my life, the fact that *so far* everyone is healthy (well, besides me, hello, shingles for the THIRD time in one year, but I'll live) and all my Christmas shopping is done. Tomorrow is Christmas with my sister, niece and brother in-law. Then Mom, Dad and I will have our Christmas on Christmas day, and go up to my aunt's for the family hoopla. It'll be a fun time for sure.

Long Ago Gone

It's been far too long since I wrote a blog post. Every time I write one, I feel as though I swear I'm going to 'get back into the swing of things' and start writing posts on a regular basis. But now some folks are saying that blogs are dead anyway, so I don't know that it matters much. So I guess I'll just try to write now and then.

*I will be participating in a blog tour about the writing process in March, so there's that. And I'll be throwing my hat into the ring for Pitch Madness (which you can read about here) with a newer project, Ravina of the Twains, a YA fantasy.

Otherwise, however, I suspect it'll be hit or miss with my blogging.

I've just been distracted by other things, things like writing, and family, and getting more exercise which is something I've missed dearly since leaving the farm.

And most recently, I've been distracted by memories. Specifically memories pertaining to the black pony mare, Di, whom I lost last March 1st-2nd. I still miss her so very much, and keep finding little ways to keep her memory close.

With the anniversary of her death just having come and gone, it's left me aching, mostly in the ways that tend to spill out onto paper. I wrote so many little fanciful poems about her when she was alive, I haven't written a single one since she died. Then in the wee hours Saturday night - the time last year when I was standing in the darkness with her while Death slowly pried the two of us apart - verses started wheedling their way into my mind. I wrote them down, but it's taken me a couple of days to get it together enough to be able to post them without blubbering. Here they are.

In the dark of the night All Hallows' Eve
When across the earth, all spirits weave

I seek out but one through all of the throng
Her form most plain, her ears too long

Eyes shifting brown like liquified earth
 Stout little legs but most impressive in girth

Little black mare so skittish and wild
Under my hand your temper turned mild

Down through the wood and up in the vale
On the seas of the wind together we'd sail

In the dark of the night, we waited alone
As Death crept close to take you back home

He rested his hand upon my cold brow
Forgiveness to beg for the loss I bear now

Then off you did go, with gentle Lord Death
Left me standing alone still struggling for breath

Onward I've trudged through time never-ending
Afoot now I am, no black pony needs tending

In the dark of the night All Hallows' Eve
When across the earth, all spirits weave

I seek out but one through all of the throng
A cherished black pony, so long ago gone.