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Another Year Bites the Dust

12/31/2013

And I say let it die. The more agonizing it's demise, the better. I know a lot of people had a magnificent year, and for them I'm happy, but for me it was a bag full of crap. I shall escort this year out with my foot, if necessary. Come midnight, it WILL leave.

But before that, let me pause to wish our male sun conure, Zacchaeus (Zack), a very happy birthday! Our little sunshine is 14 today! And before the obligatory "good Lord!" flies, conures can live up to 30 years. So this little ball of energy isn't even middle aged yet, and he doesn't feel (or act) a day over 2. Happy birthday, sunshine! We love you!

Of course, Zack's birthday is New Year's Eve, which is a day people typically think about the year past and resolve on how to do better next year. This is something I've been considering for a while. You know 2013 was a tough year for me if you've been following this blog, and yesterday's Facebook post that the anger and depression circling me has to go is probably no surprise to most of you. But the question remains, how did it get to be this way? And to discover that, I have to take a look in the mirror and consider two things: what did I do wrong to backslide, and what have I done right that I can build on?

I think the cause is simple: there was a lot of change in 2013, and I was overwhelmed by it. I just didn't realize it at the time. I had the attitude that "I've faced worse, so this is nothing," but that wasn't necessarily true. I wasn't honest with myself or with others. Honestly, I was as scared as everybody else by everything shifting around me. I put on a brave face, but perhaps, I should have sat down for a moment and considered that, no matter what I've seen and what I've experienced (whether better or worse), I really wasn't as boldly confident in facing things as I acted. In other words, I underestimated myself. So one lesson learned in 2013: you can slay the dragon, and still die from a wasp sting, so to speak. Facing down bit monsters and getting around huge mountains doesn't guarantee that you've got the smaller stuff whipped. In fact, you may still be reeling from those big battles so much that you don't have as much left in you to face them the way you faced things last time. So there was the pitfall. I was too confident and not honest with myself. lesson learned.

As for the anger and depression thing, well, with change around every corner it's natural to wonder "how's life going to punch me in the stomach today?" but I don't have to accept that. I don't have to be a victim of circumstance, or of other peoples' decisions. I need to get back to slowing down and really looking at things and situations to mine the opportunity out of it. I haven't done that, and because of it I've become fearful and my outlook on the future has been downcast. I don't want to be that way. So I need to get back on track, to thoughtfully act with wisdom and consideration instead of reacting, and I believe that will help my overall outlook. I know you can't help everything that happens to you. In fact, there's a great deal you have no control over. But you can take your time to evaluate things and consider the best course of action. I haven't been doing that, and I need to get back to it. I'm not going to allow life to kick me in the rear anymore. Everybody else has been doing what's best for them, and I have a right to do the same. And so I shall.

The anger thing has been resolving itself over the past few months. It's been a journey, and not flattering in places, but I do see now that all that's happened and all people have done has wound out for the best. Things take time to settle and once again, my frustration in the tidal wave of change caused me to slip in discernment here and there. I'm sorry for that and while it might be too late in some circumstances to make things better and to admit to gaining perspective, well, I can say here that I was too hasty in some of my words here and there and I do realize now that it was all for the best. I also realize that discernment is always the way of wisdom. So I brush myself off, get back up, and resolve to learn from those mistakes and to more thoughtfully consider words, actions, and reactions to questions or inquiries in the future. I tried, there were some places where I failed, so I have to face it, learn from it, and move on.

It seems that the key to a better 2014 (and beyond) is to:

Be honest with myself, and

Take time to prayerfully and thoughtfully consider all things, big and small.

Yes, I brought a great deal of this on, but that doesn't mean that I have to stay down. I underestimated myself, my reactions, and my emotions this year. I slipped, thinking that I had defeated bigger things and let smaller things undermine me. Lesson learned. I shall be more prayerful, diligent, and thoughtful from now on. And I don't have to wait for the fireworks to go off at midnight to start it, either. I can do it right now. I've come too far to fail now, and I need to renew my commitment to protecting and building on the blessings I've worked so hard for.

So all in all, that's my resolution for 2014: to do better. It might sound vague when you boil it all down to basics, but it covers a big journey through 2013 and what I hope to take forward from it. And no doubt, that journey will show when I start writing the sequel to Move in the next month or so. In fact, it's a large part of what's inspired me to go back to that story and do more with it. Stay tuned for progress on that one. I'm excited about that journey!

Happy New Year to you. Stay safe, and enjoy it.

Bye!

Another Christmas Gone

12/29/2013

Well, it's official. We took down the Christmas decorations today. Amongst much squawking and objection from the parrots, we packed up the trees, the stockings, the decorations, and the holiday nick nacks. There will be no porch lights coming on at dark. There will be no switching a tree on. The house is back to normal, and Christmas 2013 is officially past.

It's always sad, and a bit of a bummer. But, as I pointed out to Chloe as I stashed away the last few items in the cedar chest, it's part of the natural cycle. We have Zack's birthday, a chance to start anew on New Years Day, and a season of winter rest. Then spring will come, along with her birthday, and the flowers and trees will bloom. Then summer comes with Ollie's birthday and the nice, long, warm days. Then fall with it's beautiful colors and golden sunshine and cooler temperatures. And then it's back again - Christmas, in all it's glory, will be back before you know it. They'll get excited again as we hang the stockings while grumbling "it seems we just put these away!" Christmas always comes. That's one thing you can count on.

These slow days between Christmas and New Year might seem like a bummer, but I think they're a great opportunity to decompress from the year past and prepare for the year ahead. No doubt, we've all seen and been through a lot (for better or for worse - or both!). We need some slow time to process it all and to determine where we go from here. It's not all bad, and maybe the natural tendency to hibernate during these short winter days gives us a great chance to get back to basics and to really and truly see what matters most to us. What do we want to see grow in our lives? What seeds do we need to plant to help our hopes and dreams to see the sun? What do we want to keep and nurture? What do we need to let go of? It's so easy to blindly jump back into the same old fray without considering how we've changed and grown in the past year. Let's not be so quick to do that this time. Let's take these last days of 2013 to make wise decisions on how to move forward in 2014 and beyond.

Yes, the last week of the year is a somewhat weird place to be. But that's ok. We need to break the cycle every now and then to decide if it's a cycle worth continuing, or if it needs some updating and tweaking to work better.

That's all today. Take care and have a great week.

Bye!

What I've Learned

12/27/2013

So the big question remains, what have I learned from the past year? I believe two very important lessons come to mind in reviewing my last entry of the highlights of 2013:

1. The importance of persistence. Sometimes, people are too quick to give up. Things get a little hard and they don't have time for that. But here's the thing: anything that leads to blessing or reward is going to get a little sticky now and then, and you have to commit to seeing things through. If you're brought to it, the best way to deal is to go through it. Even if you get around that mountain and you still can't see what good it did or what the point was, there's no denying that you probably took some valuable knowledge, skills, or lessons from it that will be greatly beneficial in the future. People are too quick to run when things get hard, and then they wonder why things never seem to work out better. It's because they get caught in a cycle of mediocrity, when getting through that one big, huge, awful thing was in itself the key to a better life. Yes, hanging in there can hurt like hell, but the only way to get to better ways and better days is to work through the pain and defeat what's trying to defeat you. You never win if you give up. Sure, there are times when it's best to gracefully walk away, but they're usually tied to things we went into in error or that are damaging to us, which leads to the second big lesson of 2013 which is ...

2. The importance of discernment. It's so easy to get bogged down in the tunnel vision of your own perspective and to forget that not everybody sees the world or experiences life the same way you do. People by and large fail to pull back and consider a "big picture" perspective of things. I know I fell in this trap, and it took going to The Grand Canyon and literally leaving everything familiar 2,700 miles away to realize that the world is a lot bigger than I realized, and that the situations probably were too. We get too comfortable, even with our problems, and fail to see solutions or things that could be extremely valuable and beneficial with us.

So basically, I learned that it's important to take the long view and to not give up, because it's all bigger than we realize. Does hitting a butterfly outside my house make it rain in New Zealand? I don't know, but it's certainly possible that even the smallest thing can cause waves and ripples far beyond anything you realize or know. A careless word or action can change how somebody thinks of you forever; just as a carefully planned, wise response can be the building blocks to blessings more amazing than you can imagine.

It might not seem like much, but they're significant realizations that have shifted my paradigm. So how about you? What has 2013 taught you? And how will you take those lessons into 2014 and beyond?

That's all today. Have a Happy Friday and a great weekend.

Bye!

The Holiday What's Up Letter

12/25/2013

What's Christmas unless somebody sends you one of those AWFUL CHRISTMAS LETTERS where they detail every pit stop and rest stop in their life over the past year? Well folks, here's your digital edition. I'm proud to present to you, on Christmas Day 2013, THE HOLIDAY WHAT'S UP LETTER!

Don't worry, I'll summarize. Maybe.

First up is family. Overall, they're all doing well. Rick and I have caught every darn virus going around since he had to start working with student iPads at his school. It takes a while to build up an immunity to that crap, and it seems we'll both have to do that. As you know from recent social media posts, he also got an infection in a root canal he had in 2000. They had to go in, clean it up, clear up the infection, and then go back in and redo the root canal. They finished that on Monday and gave him a clean bill of health - finally, after 2 months of struggling with that.

The birds are doing well. Zack got an upper respiratory infection in September, but that cleared up quickly. He has a birthday coming up next week - he'll be 14! And before you blurt out the spontaneous "holy crap!" that's not even middle age for sun conures. They can live to be 30. Chloe is 10, and Ollie, our budgie, is 3. We hope that youth being on his side will help him. Ollie got a kidney infection in October that caused nerve inflammation in his left leg. We got the infection cleared up, and then he took a tumble earlier this month that caused a strain in his groin muscle - so now he has 2 leg injuries! After 4 visits to the vet and 2 rounds of antibiotics, they finally sent us home with a "make him comfortable and settle in for a long ride." Nerve inflammation takes a while to heal, and they said it could be spring or summer before he completely recovers. He also seems to be a slow healer (poor fellow, just like his mommy!), so this has been quite tough on me and Rick. It's hard to see him in pain and be able to do - nothing. They've given him a couple of anti-inflammatory shots and those really helped, but the problem is that they don't want to keep doing that because he's so small and it's very easy to overdose. So we're back to toughing it out. As I said, it's not easy, but we're committed to his healing. It's possible, and we want to give him every chance at living out his maximum life expectancy.

Mom and Dad are doing well. Dad cut back his work schedule to three and a half day weeks late last summer. He's thinking about retirement, but I don't think it's gone much past the thinking stage at this point. He's half owner of the company, so it's not a simple matter of "sign here and enjoy your retirement." It takes a bit more planning when you're an owner. For now, he (and Mom) are enjoying the shorter work weeks. Mom's very glad he's home more. People who work in the Engineering field put in some long hours. Even at part time, he still averages about 7-8 hours less per week than I do working full time for State Government!

My brother and sister-in-law, Nicole, are doing well. Stephen is still working for State Government as a CPA (different department than me), and Nicole is still doing medical transcription for the hospital. She has changed her schedule to work half her time at the hospital and half her time from home. She actually liked the change. She said working from home all the time was a bit confining, and it's good to get out. I don't know. It seems that would be a sweet deal to me, but I guess it's not all it's cracked up to be. She's happy with the change, though, and that's what matters. We saw them yesterday and they were happy and in very good spirits.

The in-laws (Rick's family) are about the same. His dad's dementia is like a yo-yo, which is pretty standard for dementia. They always joked that he never had a bad day in front of me, but that's changed in the past 7 months. He gets "fixated" on things, and he does get quite confused. It can be frustrating and difficult because he has spells where he's not "with us," and we can't figure out where he's at, mentally. Thankfully, I've heard that the kind he has generally doesn't lead to losing recognition of people, at least until the very late stages. In other news, our oldest niece will be graduating high school in the spring. She's considering either Auburn or Clemson. She wants to be an Engineer, and I can vouch for those both having great Engineering programs.

The reason I can vouch for where the great Engineering programs are at is because I had to fill in as the program assistant for that Board for 11 months. My counterpart on that Board moved on to another position in the agency a year ago. We split the duties amongst the staff, but my boss (at the time) wanted me to handle the Board, so I got to take that over. Wow, it was a shock. The Engineering Board is HUGE compared to my landscape architects (5 members with about 650 licensees), and soil classifiers (5 members with about 50 licensees). They're an 8 member board with around 17,000 licensees. One of the members resigned in January to take a post on another board but still, it was a shock. I made it, and I learned A LOT in the process. It was stressful. This was compounded by the fact that my boss retired in June and the first replacement we got for the position resigned in July to return to her former job in her family business. Lots of transition in the workplace over the past year. At one point, I called 2013 "the year of resignation," but I realized how awful that sounded. I understand people "doing what they gotta do" and would never begrudge anybody an opportunity to improve themselves or their lives, but you have to understand that people live in a community, and when one member leaves, it causes waves through the whole system. And when three leave, well, it's a period of a tidal wave there. Not easy, but by the grace of God we made it. All of the vacancies are now filled and everybody's been trained and taken over their duties, so we're settling back in. But we do miss those that left us in 2012-2013.

Writing wise, it was my best year yet. I self published Feathered Frenzy and Move through Smashwords in February, and Splinter was released through Whiskey Creek Press in November. All of these books were big efforts, and I was happy to publish them. In fact, I'm starting the brainstorming and research for a sequel to Move now, and I have a sci-fi novella titled Incursion in progress now. It seems I've gotten into working on two projects at a time, which can be challenging sometimes. The key is to make sure each one is at a different stage of progression. The sci-fi novella, for example, is ready to edit and finalize when I return to it in January, whereas the sequel to Move is, as I like to say "on the drawing board" (it's in the planning stages now and I probably won't start writing until late January or February). I've also written a few short stories and articles, and I continue to write for a mystery newsletter and to promote my published works as best as I can.

Church is also making good progress. We finally called a new pastor after a year and a half without one, and he's starting in January. Rick continued to serve on the technology committee at church even though his term on church council ended last year. I didn't do any committee work this year with the church because of my extra job duties and having so much on me with my writing, but that bothered me. I liked being more involved in church, so I've rejoined the technology committee for 2014. My role on that committee was mainly administrative before and the new chair has that covered, so I guess we'll see how else I can contribute to it when I return. But it's good to be back and to get involved again. I really did miss it. But I think taking the year off from volunteering helped me to see how much it meant to me and where I felt I really fit in. I'm excited about it.

Rick and I had a fantastic opportunity in late February and early March. My landscape architect program sent me to Scottsdale, Arizona for a conference. We decided to take advantage of our time out there and took a couple of extra days to drive up and see The Grand Canyon. I'm glad we did. Pictures can't do it justice - it's absolutely amazing. The whole trip was great too - you can click back to March 2013 for an entire entry on my Arizona trip. Historic Scottsdale is a great place too. It was kind of neat to be there where it was 80 degrees, and seeing posts from back home that it was cold and windy (I tried not to brag, but it was a nice break from winter!). Arizona is just a great place. The whole trip was a once in a lifetime experience, a

There's been a lot more that happened in 2013, but this entry is long enough and the excess is just that - minor things that really didn't amount to a hill of beans. I believe this hits the high points, and if I think of anything else, I'll add it in another entry.

That's all today. Thanks for reading and for supporting this website and my writing. You're all great friends and I wish you all the best, now and forever. I hope you all have a Merry Christmas!

Bye!

Signs That I'm Losing It

12/23/2013

I think we all have those signs that let us know we're completely burned out, and it's time for a break. Oh certainly, there are little warning signs here and there: you forget things, you mix things up, you make mistakes, you don't sleep enough (or you sleep too much) - but there's always that one, defining thing that finally smacks you hard enough to finally "get it." For me, it's strange dreams. But understand that they'd all be strange by a standard definition. So what do I call strange?

This time, it was being trapped in an episode of Arrow. Yep, I dreamed I was stuck in a TV show, and it only took watching Oliver Queen come running out in that green hood to wake me up and say yea, this 2 week break came at just the right time. I had it Friday night.

So yea, when I start dreaming of fiction becoming reality then I know I'm done. It's rare, but it happens when I'm at the end of the proverbial rope. I've dreamed Rick and I were stuck in an episode of Supernatural. I've dreamed of being stuck in a car with the main characters of Blurry (my YA novel) and Lex Luthor from Smallville. I think even The Avengers turned up once. Odd stuff. And while it's not unusual for that line between fiction and reality to blur in a writer, for it to invade your subconscious mind, well, it's still a bit much.

It should get better now, at least. Rick's root canal was finished without incident this morning. The infection is cleared up and the procedure is now complete. So finally, at last, after nearly two months of struggle, we have some resolution there. Thanks be to God. And we're both off work until January 6th, so hopefully we'll get some rest and get back on track over the next couple of weeks. I obviously need to!

And in the meantime, the ideas for the follow up to Move are still coming. This story is really forming and I think I'll be ready to write it come the new year. We'll see where that goes. Hopefully, I don't dream about it, at least. But I probably will. A writer's mind never stops creating, it seems, even when we sleep.

That's all today. I hope you're all doing well and that you have a safe and Merry Christmas!

Bye!

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Another Year Bites the Dust

Another Christmas Gone

What I've Learned

The Holiday What's Up Letter

Signs That I'm Losing It

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