these winds they are a-changing

I have always considered myself a positive person. But optimistic? Yeah...not so much. Not that I don't believe in good things and good people and (mostly) happy endings, it's just that the scope of my life's experiences from a very young age have taught me that while it feels good to hope for the best, I should mostly get prepared for the worst. I hope that doesn't sound too negative, because--like I said--I'm a positive person. I guess you could call me a realist? But a realist in the worst sense of the way because deep, deep down inside I believe whole-heartedly in dreams coming true and Wheeeeee!!!! Isn't this circular logic FUN?! :)

ANYWAY, this is just a post to acknowledge the good things that are starting to take shape in my life and God's direct hand in them. Like a really good pencil sketch still waiting for some color, but you can begin to see how it's going to turn out, and it's beautiful. I feel like I'm almost back to the point I was in January before this happened. I've sort of  been waiting for my new year to start ever since then, with each month bringing with it some new weighty trial or disappointment. But thus far, April has been nice. Really nice.

I didn't get into the MFA program, but I did finish up the 56 page poetry manuscript I'd been coddling for the last 3 years (and really, the last 13 years). It's almost perfect. I'd say another 6 months and I will be ready to start sending out query letters. For now, it's in an actual PDF with a title and an order and a table of contents and everything.

I just put my resume together with the help of an incredibly talented Communications guru niece of mine. Since I don't have much work experience beyond owning my interior design firm, she helped me to highlight the "scope" of my experience: skill sets learned in the various volunteering, interning, and freelance projects I've done (and am doing). Even the ol' blog got a section devoted to it!  It shows I can stick to something for a long period of time, regardless of pay, and that at least a few of you care to read it. I'm in a great spot to score a possible summer internship with an amazing Marketing/PR firm in town. Next to writing, that's the job that I would want the most.

At the beginning of the semester, I had 27 BIG books I had to read. Now...I have 4 left. I've been prepared for every class, every day of every week, every time. Thus far, even taking 25 credits, I'm pulling a 4.0. My graduation robes are purchased. I'm done in May. :)

I've made some really great new friends, at the same time I'm watching old friends settle happily into their new married lives. 

I checked another item off my "To Do Before I Die" list when I got to play tambourine for one song along with the incredibly talented Al Deans of Quasi-Stellar Radio (yes, I can play other instruments too, but the tambourine just holds some mysterious power over me! :) )

Although Spring is still dragging its heels, we've enjoyed a few warm days. My landscape beds are waiting for their flowers to fill in. My garden waits for a good tilling. The strawberries are starting. I've gotten in a few hikes and trips around the block on my longboard. The birds wake me up in the morning with their song. It smells like rain outside all the time. It makes my heart smile.

The book I publicist for, Volt by Alan Heathcock, got a glowing review from the New York Times, and was a NYT Editor's Pick. We're currently in our third printing. **That is an incredible experience to be a part of!**

Of course, my dear boys are still my delights. And they're healthy. And happy. And never fight....really, hardly, almost, practically never :).

I'm just happy to be me right now. Not that I've ever not been. But it feels particularly true right now.

(I am knocking every available wooden surface at this point. Including my teeth. Ha. That was an obscure George Washington joke. 2 points and a thumbs up if you 'got' it.).

I think this post would be best wrapped up by the little ditty I wrote to console myself upon not getting into the MFA:


I have drank with a prince and danced with a homeless man. Saved an old woman from a burning house. I have stumbled out into a Paris street at sunrise after spending all night in a disco not understanding a single word spoken to me. I have been forced off a bus by an armed South American militant. Survived the illness that killed Mozart. Once, in an antiques store, I licked an old necklace made of bones on a nickle bet. I have known terrible cruelty but choose to be kind. Known lies and deceit and flippant evil but choose to believe in the inherent goodness of others. I never need sleep because most of my internal organs have been replaced with robotics. And all but the second half of that last sentence is true. That...that is the reservoir of a writer you passed up.

Yup.


Hope the winds in your life are blowing favorably, too :)