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Showing posts from 2015

Happy Holidays!

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  Hello Friends!  I hope this message finds you and your loved ones well during the holiday season. It's been a busy time for us as we've started a remodel of our home, succumbed to winter illness, moved a few blocks away (because of the remodel), and slowly settled into our temporary housing.  Somehow, in the month of November, I decided it would be a good idea to write one poem each day, experimenting with new (to me) styles and topics. Some of these, as you might imagine, were utter disasters. Others are... er... pretty okay? At the request of a few of you, I've decided to try and be brave and post a few of these experiments here, as a gift of thanks for all of your support over this past year, and a lead up to my first ever published poem in Mythic Delirium Magazine. (Arriving soon!) First, a few short notes I'd like to remember about 2015: One Saturday, my six year old son woke up and said, "Mama, I'm going to publish your book!" He

Virginia Hills

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Hi Friends! Well then. Whew. I just had an *adventure* in the autumn hills of Virginia. I'd like to tell y'all about it, but before I start, I feel the need to say a few things: A great deal of this trip (and every trip) was spent marvelling at how lucky I am to get to spend time with kindred writerly spirits in a beautiful setting. Life could be different. Life could be, and has sometimes been, much harder than it is now. News headlines and letters from loved ones remind me constantly how fragile all of human experience is, and how troubled so many lives are. Sometimes I feel like I shouldn't run off on adventures when this is true. Fear and sadness do their heavy work on me. And yet, I'm blessed with opportunities, many of which originate from the good people I know and love. I know that to sit these out, and miss these connections, because of the horrors of the world isn't the thing. The thing is to try to live well and wisely. To try to help when I can and

Sirens 2015: Rebels & Revolutionaries

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I recently attended my third  Sirens Conference and am happy to report it was another powerful and life-affirming experience. For those of you who may not have read about this conference here before, Sirens is a small boutique conference for and about women in fantasy literature. This year,  Darian and Lola (my dear writer-sisters) traveled with me to Denver, Colorado. I’d been volunteering a bit for Sirens over the course of the year and though I knew the conference had been planned carefully, I still worried that it would somehow not live up to my hopes and past experiences. I need not have worried. Warning: This post is long because it is primarily for my own records and for other curious Sirens attendees. Certainly, if you’re interested, feel free to scan and browse. This post doesn’t need to be read start to finish, but I highly encourage you to click on some of the links to the wonderful presenters and Guests of Honor who attende d this year. Thursday: We arrived,