What’s Going On

Good question. What IS going on? Someone asked me that the other day and my response was, “Same ole crap, new week.” Which basically sums it up, I guess. Nothing brand spanking new to report.

I am writing, working away, trying to stay more focused on the creative side and less on the business side for the time being. Although my brain is always jumping ten steps ahead of where I’m at so to say I’ve been entirely successful on that account would be a lie. Currently I’m planning on entering two manuscripts in one contest. One completed manuscript to give it another shot at an editor I’m interested in, and a new manuscript that has a first draft completed and could use some outside feedback. The new manuscript I’m also going to put in a couple of other contests next month as well.

Once the contest entries are completed, I’ll continue plugging away to get this ready to ship out to agents and editors, which hopefully will be ready to do by September-ish. That leaves me October to brainstorm my NaNo mss (a planned revamping of Juicy Lucy and her Big Bat – my brother’s title, not mine) and fire off query letters.

I am not going to Nationals this year. I made that decision early on and I don’t really regret it, much as I enjoy the experience. I felt there wasn’t anything new to sell at this point, whereas next year I should have four finished products to sell, possibly five. And, if the writing gods smile upon me favourably, maybe I won’t have to sell anything in Nashville, maybe I’ll get to promote something that’s sold instead. Fingers crossed.

Meanwhile, in every day life, I am working hard to maintain my optimism and keep my stress levels down. I am successful some of the time, and a walking disaster at other times. Sometimes the battles feel epic and the war never-ending, but I feel my old optimism creeping back and slowly gaining the upper hand. My mother will be happy to hear this. She said over the past few months my eyes looked dead and I had stopped laughing, which, for anyone who has spent any time with me knows, I spend a large part of my day laughing. Or I did. And I’m starting to again. So boo-yah on that.

The weather has not been cooperating with my plans to get my yard and gardens ready for summer, but that appears to be turning. I got a little done by taking an afternoon off work on a sunny day. Hopefully tonight I will get a little more done. Bit by bit I will conquer the dandelions and get my gardens cleared and replanted…

Eating right and working out have been a struggle the past few weeks. Once boot camp ended I think I fell off the wagon hard. I’m getting back on it this week, at least workout wise. The eating…well the meals are healthy but the snacks are killing me! So today I have called a bit of a moratorium on that. I don’t want to undo all the good I’ve done to date. I’m hoping by late fall I will have saved up enough to hire a personal trainer to push me that last little bit.

And that is about all that is going on here in Crazy Town.

Ooohhh Right… Optimism…

Optimism: (noun) – a disposition or tendency to look on the more favourable side of events or conditions and to expect the most favourable outcome; the belief that good ultimately predominates over evil in the world.

I am an eternal optimist for the most part. I pride myself on having a glass half full kind of attitude and strongly believe that regardless of the circumstances, if you can find something in it to laugh at, you can live through it. This last one makes me a questionable invite to most funerals however, but hey, what can ya do?

Anyway, in the past six months it seems I’ve been hit with one bad thing after another between lay-offs at work, illness, stress, control freaks, the whole puppy thing, feeling like my writing had stalled out, etc. It was almost as if there was no time to come up for air when another wave came along and sucked you under again. And every time you thought, there has to be an end in sight, it was all just a ruse. I stopped even believing things would take an upswing. That’s so unlike me.

I was feeling unmotivated to do anything, include eat (which anyone who knows me knows – that is a nearly impossible feat). I kept telling myself I had to snap out of this, but I didn’t even feel motivated to do that.

But then I started seeing these little signs. That sign mainly manifested itself in the shape of Michael J. Fox’s new book popping up everywhere. Now, I’ve always been a huge Michael J. Fox fan right from the first day Alex P. Keaton showed up on the scene. I’ve followed his career, his illness, his activism and can honestly say if I had to make up a list of heroes he would land squarely in the Top Ten, probably the upper half too. After all, anyone who can get the diagnosis he did, at a time in your life when you’re just getting your life underway and still have the attitude he does…well it’s pretty impressive.

So, feeling somewhat beaten down and exhausted by life, and knowing I needed to track down my normal optimistic mojo, I decided who better to turn to then him. In keeping with that, yesterday I went out to the bookstore and picked up his book: Always Looking Up, Adventures of an Incurable Optimist. And last night I stayed up to watch the special he did on ABC.

Now I’m not going to claim that a one hour show just turned my life right around and I’m all better. But I do feel a bit better. Before yesterday I felt like life was kicking my ass and I was letting it, too tired or overcome to even bother trying to put up a fight any more. That's changed. Now I’m going to start kicking back.

I’ll manage the things I can, and just roll with the things I can’t and make the best out of them. After all, it really is all a matter of perspective. I can’t control a lot of what happens out there, but I can choose how I respond to those things. So thanks for the reminder, Mike. I needed that.