thinking about family

Over the weekend, I read Neil Gaiman's blog entry on the death of his dog Cabal. I wept. What really got me about Neil's blog entry is that he wasn't able to be there when Cabal passed. And that made me think about my family, and how far away from them I am. New York City is 2,485 or 2,894 miles away from Eugene, Oregon, depending on which website you look at. Regardless of which answer is correct, that's quite a distance. I see my family once or twice a year, depending on money and weddings and babies and etc. And that blog entry made me wish I were closer to my family. It made me wish I could see them more often. It made me homesick for my family. And not just my family by blood, but my family by choice. I miss them all a lot, and most of the year I get by on phone calls and the occasional email. I'm not saying that I'm considering moving back west or anything . . . I don't really know what I'm trying to say. Maybe that someday I'd like to live closer to my family again. Something to think about.

i denied it all so long

Happy New Year, everybody! I know I'm a little tardy in saying that, but the new year really started with a bang for me. Party, then hangover brunch, then right back into work and freelancing. So, first, a loose end from last year. I did read two more books, to round out the year at an even forty.
39) The Chains That You Refuse by Elizabeth Bear. Stunning short story collection. Everything she writes is brilliant, as far as I'm concerned.
40) The Umbrella Academy by Gerard Way. This was a fun, interesting graphic novel. Different than a lot of the stuff I've read. Very gray area, not so black and white. I can't say that I was completely sucked in, but I was definitely intrigued.
Okay, onward. I've rejoined band for the season; there's some serious wind ensemble music happening, and some good Broadway songs. And it's nice to be back around other musicians; it's a good community, and I enjoy making music with other people.
My New Year's goals: To work less. To write more. To take better care of myself. I suppse I could break that down into monthly goals and whatnot, but that's a lot of effort and I'm fine with the vagueness for now. I will say for the writing, I didn't manage to finish my draft during staycation. So I'll finish it in January. My goal is to revise again in the second half of February, then submit in March. Then start writing something new in April.
And that's that. I wish I had more to share right now, but I don't. I'm just busy wrapping up prior commitments and playing with Zoe and being overly social.
Tell me about your New Year's goals!

settling in to staycation

I'm not surprised it's been basically two weeks since I've blogged. Like I warned you all, life was really busy for a while there. Yesterday was the beginning of staycation, but to be fair, I spent most of it running errands. So today is the first day of really just relaxing. I slept in, had a tasty homemade brunch with my partner-in-crime (Polish hunter sausage = YUM!), got some laundry happening, and have made a grocery list. My plan for the rest of the day: balance the checkbook, buy some groceries, do some writing, play my instruments. Maybe be social in the evening. That's about it!
I missed blogging about Yule this year, sorry about that. I was busy at work that day, and then was out for the evening. So we did ritual last night instead, with two friends, and that was really lovely.
One book to report:
38) The City's Son by Tom Pollock. This was really, really good. I felt so bad for Pen, she was put in such an awful position over and over again. I loved Beth's guts and determination to see things through. And I adored the magic elements thrown into urban London: The railwraiths, the scaffwolves . . . I can't wait for more books in this series. The writing was gritty, the story intense and fast-paced, and the way the urban fantasy element took everyday urban things and just turned them on their sides was great!
Tomorrow we've got some afternoon/evening Christmas Eve plans, and then we're spending Christmas with a friend's family. After that, a whole unscheduled week of staycation still stretches before me. I'm loving the mellowness, the unplanned natured of my days right now. It's so different for me. Maybe I should give myself this kind of time more often.

holy water cannot help you now

I'm in the thick of the preholiday rush right now, so blogging will be short and sweet this week and next. Today I just want to say: I can't wait for staycation!! My plan for every day is to sleep in, write, make some music, read something, and watch something. Specifically on the writing end, I will finish the second draft of my novel. Beyond that, I'm flexible. Anybody have good suggestions for my reading/viewing time? What are you all doing for the holidays?

i'm bulletproof

At least, that's what I'm trying to convince myself. Pursuant with my previous entry, I am still working through the commitments piled high on my plate. I do need to get those things taken care of before I can really refocus on the things that are important to me. But I'm making steady progress. I'm hoping to have enough wrapped up by January that I can really start getting back to my arts. And don't worry, I won't be doing any freelance during the week between Christmas and New Year's. That week is for sleeping, for watching movies with my partner-in-crime, for writing and making music and baking and going on walks and writing more. Not for working.
Books:
35) Days of Blood & Starlight by Laini Taylor. Just . . . wow. Really. Laini consistently blows me away with the depth her characters show, with her stunning use of language, with her creativity. This is just as good as Daughter of Smoke & Bone. And these two books have put Laini on my top-five list of authors. They're just brilliant, both of them.
36) Nowhere Girl by A. J. Paquette. This was a great little read about an American girl born in a Thai prison, and what happens after her mother passes away. I know that sounds depressing, but the story is actually quite uplifting. It's fascinating to watch Luchi interact with the world on her own for the first time, without the safety of the prison to return to. She's a strong, curious girl and this is worth a read to see what happens.
37) Black Swan Rising by Lee Carroll. I also enjoyed this one quite a bit. It's an urban fantasy in a market full of urban fantasies, true, but this one has some great qualities that set it apart from the crowd. While there are vampires and fey folk, the approach to them is a little different than the norm, and there are some other great fantastical elements mixed in. I believed Garet every step of the way, from disbelief to unsurety to reluctant belief. This book is set in New York City, which also makes for a lot of fun. I haven't been to all of the locations used in the book, but some of them, yes. I'll definite be getting a copy of the sequel to this one.
That's really about all I've got right now. I've been burning the candle at both ends a bit, so I've been struggling to remember any dreams. This weekend is going to be a busy one, but after that life will slow down substantially. Next time I'll talk about my writing projects, and maybe even give you a sneak peek or two. Blessed Be!

the moon holds the light

Briefly, as this is supposed to be writing time. Earlier this week, I had a moment. I could be cliche and call it an epiphany, but I don't think I'll take it quite that far. Anyway. A moment. I had a moment in which all of a sudden I knew, with stark clarity, that I am not doing what I should be doing with my life. And I don't mean specifically my job or anything. I just mean that my focus is off. It's been off for a long time. And yes, I've had this realization more than once over the years, but this is the strongest it's hit me in a long time. I'm treating my life as though work is the most important thing, when it's not. The creative act, any creative act, is more important than how many hours I worked today. In the end, will I care how much time I put in at work? No. Will I care how much time I put in on any of my artistic endeavors? Yes. So I'm trying to work through all of my commitments quickly so I can have more of my time back. I want more long walks, more writing, more reading. More music. More collaging. More experiencing life. I didn't come to New York City to work fifty-to-sixty-hour workweeks. It's miserable, and I don't think that anybody else really wants to do that either. And yes, this is part of the ongoing unfucking my life process. I really need to get my focus turned around. Less work, more everything else. But it takes a while to turn long-term habits around, so please, be patient with me. And wish me luck.

but in shadows it grew

I've been having a lot of strange dreams lately. I've always been a heavy dreamer, and my dreams often have narrative arc to them. butt he last couple of nights . . . Well, the night before last there are two I only remember flashes of. One, my sister J liked a boy with sandy blond hair. He looked like Riley from Buffy. All I remember is a flash of his face and then her telling me to leave him alone because she likes him. Two, I just remember Wil Wheaton following me around trying to be cuddly. (I know, I'm weird.) the third dream last night, I was staying at a boarding house in some northern town (in Alaska, maybe?) where there was often a lot of snow. The house was built backed up to a steep hill. I was friends with a boy who was boarding there, and he had an attic room. When the snow was bad we could climb out through his window onto the snow-covered hill. In the dream I was looking for him, but couldn't find him, and was blowing off a meeting or something to keep looking. The people who ran the boarding house were much older, and were shouting at me in quavery voices to hurry up and find him because I had things to do. At the same time, I was seeing a story about a mother and her son who were traveling to this town to live there, and partway there the son's dog ran away, and he was despondent about it. But then a couple weeks later the dog showed up and everyone was amazed. And hey, I just remembered dream number four from that night! I was at a gathering in this big house. (Yes, I dream about things happening in houses often.) I don't remember a lot, but I realized I was there because it was a cult ritual focused around girls who'd just had their first period. They would bring them to this house and take their virginity with a ritual tool for that purpose. For the girls it was a badge of pride to lose their virginity in this way. They were always decked out in particular jewelry for the ritual, etc. It was a big deal for them. I think I was there tying to learn more about it.
So, that was the night before last. Last night I dreamed about wrathful angels with swords (yes, this one definitely came from the book I'm reading right now). I don't recall what happened in the dream. What I recall is waking up terrified because I was sure an angel was in my apartment, and was there to kill me. When I finally fell back to sleep, I was at a partially destroyed house out in the woods. My sister R was there (in my dream she was older than me). She was wild-eyed, her hair was a thatchy mess. There were red stains on her shirt. I was trying to scrounge edible plants, etc., from the woods around us. R had a shallow Tupperware tub partially full of ground raw meat and was running her hands through it. Finally she called out, "We could cook some of the cat, but I think it's starting to go bad. It reeks." And she kept playing with it. (In the dream, this didn't bother me, but thinking about this morning really grossed me out.) I told her I didn't want any. Then a man (I was definitely still a child in this dream, so to me he seemed much older, but he was probably only around thirty) showed up and took me away from my sister. He took me through the wilderness and taught me much more about what plants were edible, how to find water, etc. We came upon a camp of people he'd met before, so they let us stay with them for the night. In the middle of the night, I woke up next to the blond man I was traveling with. There was another man standing over me. He was short, and wore a bowler hat. He said, "So beautiful" and reached for me. The blond man woke up and the short man pulled a knife. As they strained with each other over the knife, I pulled out the blond man's gun (which in my dream was more like a tube of toothpaste; you squeezed it to shoot it) and shot the short man right between his legs. And woke up. And saw a boy in a button-down and shorts sitting on the wood stove in my bedroom, and a tall slender man in a short-sleeve plaid button-down standing in front of him, gesticulating as he spoke about something. They faded after a few minutes.
Needless to say, I haven't been sleeping well.
Books: 33) Uglies  by Scott Westerfeld. this was a fun read, but honestly, I don't think I'll read the rest of the series. I just didn't get that into it. I know a lot of people love this series, so I had high expectations going into it, and it wasn't quite as good as I hoped/expected. 34) American Gods by Neil Gaiman. LOVE this book. This is only the second time I read it, and the first time was the year it was released (eleven years ago, I think). Long enough that it was only a hazy memory in the back of my brain. I love everything Gaiman does. I just think he's brilliant.
And now, I really need to put my head down and get some work done. Things in the office are so busy. We're all just scrambling to get caught up. Blessed Be!