The grassy hill above the Faire is warm and drowsy with sunlight. The elves are busy below, constructing God-knows-what in the groves between the trees.

“What are they working on?”

“Don’t you know?” Balthazar asks, amused.

“Rarely,” I reply. “This whole creativity thing is bailing wire and duct tape.”

“You could work on that,” Darzee says. She has a leaf, shaped like a delicate spade, and a sketchbook. She is sketching with her finger, and it marks on the paper like graphite. It reminds me that I downloaded a drawing program for my iPod so I could practice drawing whenever I wanted to.

“I could?” I ask. I lay back, too lazy and weary to take her very seriously. The sun is warm and nice, and baking in it is much more pleasurable than thinking.

(more…)

Lori and I went out for breakfast, and she told me these things:

• When talking to TBC, try to stick to small future steps and be more lighthearted.
• Relationships are about having needs filled. Love is about others reflecting the love that you are back to you. Both are equally important and require clarity.
• Building structure around creative tasks should intice one to fun. When trying to figure out how I should best work on my novel, “How can I make this more fun” should be a question I ask.
• Keep checking in with my own intuition. (Hear that Ishmael, Oracle?)

Today is a damn fine day.

My day was full of illusion, yet I have learned a thing or two. I learned that trekking poles make hiking easier. I learned that climbing a mountain is a great way to dissipate a bad mood. I learned that the universe is always working, slow and steady, on your behalf and mine. And somehow I am coming to understand that getting what you want most of all is never a direct path, because the leap between where you are and what you want is often too big to just hurdle yourself across.

Perhaps some day soon I will learn how to be grateful for the experience of the backbreaking work of building that bridge across the chasm. Some day. For now, I just know what I have to do. Have to not because I am trapped and without choice–I could just walk away from this chasm. Have to because it is the surest, simplest way to what I really want.

Aeryn: I can’t do this again.
John: And I can’t let the one thing I love fly away in a crappy little ship.
Aeryn: You once said it was as if the fates meant for us to be together.
John: And I believe that.
Aeryn: Well then if it’s true we will be together again.
John: Running away is not fate, Aeryn. Running away is running away.

The only way out is through. I thought I had learned what that meant. It seems I am still learning. Wish me luck…

In the mornings, I try to sit down and meditate for a short bit. I also like to pull a “faerie of the day” from The Faeries’ Oracle.

Lately the question in my mind when I pull a card has turned from “Which faerie would like to help me get through the day?” to “Which faerie would like to help me have fun today?”

This changing your focus thing? More and more it works. Insidiously, my brain is now looking for sources of joy and life, not proof of more misery. Also, chanting mantras to Ganesha (Remover of Obsticles) and Lakshmi (goddess of wealth and fortune and all-around goodness) has *really* helped the focus.

I hodgepodge my spirituality, but it still works.

Because when you loose yourself a little, or maybe even a lot, the good sort of love believes in the you that you misplaced for a little while. If you’re smart, you’ll remember that the you that love believes in is really pretty great.

And just like that, with sneakish simplicity, you’re found.

Finally I have time to come back to this image.

On Monday I met with Lori and she did a process with me. Her processes generally involve her asking me questions about a subject that is making me uneasy that I asked for help dealing with. The point of the asking is to listen inwardly for an answer.

My answer to one of the questions was this:

Two figures on a plain. One is a woman warrior in full plate mail. She doesn’t have a helmet, and she has long blonde hair. The other is some sort of monster. Most of the monster is outside the image, and all that I see of it is three or four tentacles. They are fighting each other. They are dirty and exhausted and both spattered with blood.

My unconscious is, if nothing else, creative.

(more…)

Just got back from a session with Lori, my life coach (have I mentioned that she coaches over the phone if you are not local [and sometimes even if you are]). She said so many great things I have to share them and also make sure I have this stuff banged far enough into my own brain to make some real change.

(more…)

O, poor Hamlet, so confused and overwrought. I feel your pain. Perhaps I myself should write a play…..

Anyhow.

I am at complete loose ends this week. Updates….*stares blankly* um…..

I am loosing weight still! I seem to have found the magic combination that works wonders for me. The Wii Fit and I still get on wonderfully together, and I love getting on it everyday and working out. Throw in some fancy water, a smoothie, and some sort of reasonably balanced meal, and I’m loosing a steady 1/2 – 3/4 of a pound a day. If I chuck the diet to the four winds for a day and eat what I please, I seem to generally gain 0.2 pounds back, which just really isn’t enough to cry over, because the next day I get back on track and the numbers keep sliding down. When I first started wii fitting, I set my goal as the maximum that they would let me; to loose 22 pounds, I believe. Well, I am now 7.5 pounds away from that goal.

I think that just might be cause for a huzzah.
(more…)

I haven’t updated about the fitness plan/solution/whatever in a while. Since last check-in I gained about 0.4 pounds, plateaued for a bit, and am now on another downswing. I’ve kept up the wii fitting well enough, and the diet I started breaking in little ways. TBC suggested taking one day off a week, to be able to go out with friends without worrying about it and to keep the metabolism up, and I think that’s a smashing idea. So it continues to work, I just wish it were a little more….steady and predictable.

Then again, I’m sure most people want their entire lives to be more steady and predictable, so what are you going to do.

While I was setting this site up in January, I put together the list of the short stories I have published. Most are not available to read anymore, because their online issue has come and gone, or the print issue is sold out and the press has folded. I was sad about it, because two of my best stories in particular were only seen by a few people for a very short amount of time.

At which point I thought: well, the copyright has now reverted back to me. I can re-publish them.

Muah! And so that is the plan. Toward the end of March I shall release a short story collection though Lulu.com and make it available in e-book format or as a hardcopy trade paperback, as I know many people still prefer to read books Away From the Computer. I’ll put out more information as the time gets closer.

(There is “away from the computer” anymore? A great jest, that…)

This is Ava:

(The patiently long-suffering boy who was clearly done in by Ava’s incredible cuteness is a neighbor, and a gem of a young man who pulled Ava, and then Ava and her best friend Natasha, around in the wagon for at least half an hour.)

Ava had her third birthday party yesterday.

Ava’s aunt is a good friend of mine, and rather out of the blue this friend decided I needed to get out of the house and be with people for a bit, so she asked her sister if she could bring me to the party.

There were ponies (as in the rented kind that circle your yard for a hour or two for children to have pony rides upon. One pony was named Cowboy, and the other was Teddy Bear). And princess dresses, and Disney princess sing-a-long music, and a huge white and pink and purple cake, a piñata, and bubbles. There were also hamburgers, hot dogs, and freshly-made lumpia.

I can’t even describe to you how wonderful it *felt* to be at this party. The adults were actually from very different areas in Ava’s parents’ lives, so no one really knew each other but everyone was very chilled out and relaxed. The weather was sunny and just over 70, and we all just sat around and chatted leisurely and watched this crowd of 3 – 5 year-old boys and girls have an utterly perfect afternoon. There were no major mishaps or tantrums, no one got in trouble. And those children–especially the little girls–were so unabashedly happy and secure in life that they threw out such joy and contentment that *I* felt joyful and content just getting to watch.

I’ve never really given serious thought one way or another to having children, but if I get to feel that happy just watching a bunch of stranger’s kids, then all of a sudden the scale is nudged closer to maybe yes.