Entries Tagged 'Navel Gazing' ↓

Tomorrow I’ll be creating an email list for those who want to be notified of the book launch. My editor was kind enough to shoot over a jpg of the cover. I thought some of you might be interested.

Eek!

I look like I know what I’m doing.

You have to click through for the full version, sorry.

Don’t be fooled, I missed the shot.

Thank you for the pic, Dave.

I’ve spent the past few days in Las Vegas, a surreal version of life. There’s a whole lot of glitz, sparkle, and glam but don’t look too close or you may notice the veneer, and the carefully placed marketing.

Does that take away from the fun?

Heck no. I’ve enjoyed seeing fancy hotel suites and being treated as though I’m a VIP, but it’s not real. I get that. Do I mind the occasional free drink or schmoozing? Not one bit, it’s fun.

This list isn’t complete, there are several more names I need to add, as I internally match names with contact info, but so far I’ve had the pleasure of meeting or catching up with:

Angel Djambazov

Annabel Candy

Brent

Dave Griner

Dave Taylor

Howard Greenstein

Jeffrey Powers – who says I have a familiar face. Uh huh

Jordan Cooper aka NotaProBlog

Kelby Carr

Lucretia Pruitt

Ryan Hupfer of iSocket (on a side note, my kids call my sister Aunt Teppy)

Ryan Wynia

Shawn Christenson aka The Canadian

Srini Rao

There’s still a lot of fun to be had, sessions to attend, and people to meet and then time to kill in the airport. Hopefully I can squeeze in another trip to In and Out.

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, right?

So why, when someone imitates, or it appears that they have, do I get that “Eew, copy-cat copy-cat” feeling?

And just to toss out how big of a hypocrite I can be, it’s entirely possible that I accidentally did it to Mom101 when Ivy and I first started Home Ec 101.

I had an amazing time in Asheville. It wasn’t the not cooking or cleaning, having my work already done. Those things were nice, but that wasn’t what made my time there as great as it was.

I learned something this trip.

It’s not really the kids that get me down.

It’s those stretches of time where I don’t talk to intelligent people for days on end. Tim comes home from work and falls into bed. By that time, I’m also too tired to articulate anything coherent, but at least he has co-workers. This isn’t a post about my marriage, don’t try to read between the lines, there’s nothing there to see. We have our ups and downs, we’re human, fallible, but generally forgiving.

I miss people outside of this house.

I’m tired of fact families and phonics, where saying, “wipe your nose”, and “flush the toilet” are the bulk of my human interaction.

My sanity is held in check by a few Skype contacts and the promise that it’ll get better. I know I’m not the only one and I know my situation isn’t at all dire. It’s just frustrating. I hate that I hang on hoping for an hour or two where I might get to see adults where the conversation moves past the social niceties.

So many of my local friends have left, if not physically in practicality: Jared, Janet, Dan, Don. It’s like one by one the people are packing up and moving on. The ones that haven’t left yet, seem to be making plans, Nathan, Chris, Greg, Matthew -see above about fallible- is it true?

If I’m down, it’s because coming home means heading back into the isolation I accidentally created for myself. I’m trying to break free of it, I’m just not sure where to start.

For now I escape into podcasts. I think it’s because I can at least fool myself for a little while that my world isn’t really as quiet as it has become.

Over the weekend I got to spend time with women I consider my mentors: Aliza Sherman, Wendy Scherer, Kelby Carr, Deb Ng, Alli Worthington, Megan Jordan, just to name a few.

Each one is a bit farther down the road than I am.

I’m trying to be brave.

A few years ago, I wouldn’t have even tried.

Photo Credit: Alli Worthington

I thank you for the example.

I’ll get there and maybe, just maybe I’ll learn that choosing to be remarkable is a good thing.

31 was amazing.

There were low points. Can you say strep three times?

How about having the tonsils yanked?

There were amazing highs, flying to New York City and back in a day. Spending three days in New Orleans for Jazz Fest.

Nashville, Asheville, Minnesota, too.

Blissdom, TypeA, CREATESouth, I don’t know that I could have been any busier.

But I was.

In April of 2009, just after CREATESouth I told Dan Conover, that it would be the year of the book, but then Ivy hit bottom and took her leave. She’s 10 months clean and that is worth more than anything, but as her world crumbled. I set the book idea aside, I was just going to dig in and try to make Home Ec 101 work or find out if it was time to let go.

Just before I threw in the towel, I received an email, the one I thought was a scam, only it wasn’t.

Now the book is done, it’s all in my editor’s hands. All I can do is wait. I’ve closed the chapter on writing a book, as well as another year. I have no idea what’s in store, but I can’t wait to see.

The rough draft of the book is done. I still don’t know how I feel about the prospect of actually having the book printed. It scares the pants off me to actually put it out there where it’ll be judged as is.

That said, I sit down to start officially working through the editing on Monday.

I gave a presentation at the Charleston County Library on Thursday, the turnout was light, but I think it went well. The people seemed to have a lot of questions and I believe some of them walked away with useful information.

Other than that, it’s business as usual here.  Busy.

I have to share.

Home Ec has had over 1 million unique visits according to Google Analytics. Sure it’s been bumpy, but the general trend looks good to me. I’m hanging on.

4 chapters to go.

I’m on the downhill run, but this one chapter has me stumped and frustrated. It’s a concept that is hard to explain to the general, disposable world public.

Heidi knows I’ve been struggling and sent me this TED talk by Elizabeth Gilbert. Different tiers, but the same concept. Tonight I’m going to bed early and tomorrow. I’ll show up.

Flashback to the summer of 1994, I went to pick up the schedule for my senior year only to discover the front office had it mis-filed. It wasn’t really their fault, I had skipped my junior year and with thousands of kids in a school, how high should our expectations be? After a stressful couple of hours everything was straightened out and I was placed in the right homeroom and given appropriate senior privileges.

Ever since then, before every major milestone I am plagued with dreams of having to go back and retake my senior year.

The end of the book is in sight, just a few more chapters and I’ll be working on rewrites and edits. Naturally I am spending my nights trying to find my locker, trying to make the kids behave as I take notes, and wondering why we look so old.

When I was a little girl, I used to think that becoming an adult meant the voice in my head would change. I must have read too many coming of age novels, where the phenomenon was stark, always a before and an after. I assumed the essence would change.

Sure the voice is a little wiser, can grok bigger concepts, and has a little more patience and courage, but the old one lurks just underneath.