I took a new job in late December that rapidly grew in responsibility and hours. For about a month and a half I had two jobs at the same time, and had suddenly been launched into full time work for the first time in fourteen years. Thus the silences and slacking. I'm exhausted, but happy, with the new job. My house is a mess. However, I took a partial day while the kids were at school to get one floor of the house clean. It's amazing how good it feels to have that one truly clean space. Not to say my house is filthy--my husband and I have done some consistent, but piecemeal, cleaning. But there has not been a big, thorough cleaning that leaves the whole house spanking clean and spotless.
I had two more publications come out since the last post. One was a surprise. It was due out in May. Turns out, the magazine is closing, and they're opening a slightly different one in its place, so they gathered their final stories and put them out in this earlier edition.
Don't Cry to Mama is a horror comedy anthology and Bloodbond Magazine focuses on monsters.
In the midst of everything, I also still had two volunteer jobs, one of which involved putting on a half-day miniature writing conference with six speakers. We happened to get a massive snowstorm the night before, which led to the cancellation of one speaker and many attendees, and yet it turned out to be the most financially successful, so far, out of seven years of having the event. I think that's mostly due to the attendees coming through for us, which was wonderful. And we managed to fill that speaker slot at 7 AM the day of the event!
I now have books consigned at three different locations, two of them local, which is exciting! Plus, I finished a short story and got in some much needed editing time.
My mom also had to have surgery during all this business. She had an abdominal hernia. My dad has ALS, and she's his full time caretaker, so my brother and I helped where we could. Luckily, the VA provided a daily respite worker and two CNAs to get him out of bed and put him back to bed, which took a weight off my brother's and my shoulders. We filled those roles last time mom had surgery. Happily, her surgery went well, and she's healing up, though she still can't lift him or do anything strenuous. And I got to hear my dad's machine voice for the first time (it's his voice recorded while he could still talk consistently, but it still sounds like a robot voice that kind of sounds like him...) I ended up posting some amusing interactions with the respite workers. Some of them were quite odd. The respite workers, unlike the CNAs, did not have to have any sort of certification. One was from Jamaica, but could not swim. One never stopped talking. I'm not sure she ever breathed. One thought I was offering her dinner when I gave her the food to feed my dad. One was racist. One wouldn't put the fork all the way in dad's mouth and expected him to lean forward for the food--he can't. So on and so forth. And then we have the VA provided house cleaner whose boss came to check up on her. The woman stood there petting the dogs on my dad's lap, and jumped when she realized she'd been treating my dad's legs like a table. She didn't know he was there...despite the fact that he's on a noisy bipap machine that breathes for him. Fascinating folks and plenty of story fodder.
I was a bit sad that I simply didn't have time to do fun things for Women in Horror Month. I did end up having a bump in sales, which was nice, but I wanted to enjoy the month and do some stuff with the blog. Next year! However, I did get to participate in a group reading for National Tell A Fairytale Day up in Denver at the BookBar, so that was fun.
In the midst of all this, I switched out the meds I'm on for PTSD, which means I've been randomly napping (not a thing I do unless pregnant, feverish, or apparently dealing with anti-depressants/anti-anxiety meds) and have been making that adjustment.
We did squeeze in a family overnight trip to Great Wolf Lodge (which is right here in our lovely city, but they don't do day passes, so you have to stay at the lodge in order to visit the water park). The stay was comped for a past issue with a stay, and they gave us a cabana for free one of the days. I feel like I experienced a bit of what rich people get to have, with a private cabana at the water park, a TV, outlets, a table, free drinks, and a waiter that came by every once in a while to see if we needed anything. It was pretty cool! I felt spoiled. I can definitely recommend their customer service.
Don't forget that WRiTE CLUB is going on now! I'm one of the slush readers. Check it out if you haven't before! It's run by DL Hammons.
I'm sure I'm forgetting a billion things, but that's okay. Next time!
Have you heard of WRiTE CLUB? Are you participating? How has the beginning of your year been? Are you getting some writing done?
May you find your Muse.
