Sunday, September 25, 2005

 

I'm writing again! It feels good. I'm working on 2 projects at once, although the novel has been put on the backburner for now. I'm working on a non-fiction project. There are 13 chapters planned and 2 finished. I'm hyped about it.
The best news about it? I already have a publisher that is interested! I've been kicking the idea around for 3 years, but was very unsure about doing it and how to get it published. Then I had the opportunity to meet this publisher several times and finally pitched the idea to her. She wants to look at it! I'm hoping to have it done (maybe still in the revision stage) by my birthday in about 2-3 weeks. It really shouldn't take long. Those 2 chapters I have finished really only took me a day a piece.
Anyway, and my novel is historical, so I e-mailed my college history prof and I'm awaiting her answers to several history questions. Which is why it is on the back burner at the moment.
Oh, and this publisher might publish my fiction work as well. She's not really sure about it because they've done one fiction work already and it has not done well. I still remain optomistic about the situation. :)

Dawn posted this at 10:53 PM.

Saturday, September 03, 2005

 

Hurricaine Katrina has left me host to an entire gamut of emotions. They came to a climax yesterday and today and has left me feeling quite numb.

At first, I felt quite blessed. Our power went out for about 4 hours, our phones went out only over Monday night. We lost 1 or 2 shingles off our roof (it is a pre-reqisite in the last few storms we've had. The church building's phone was out for about 3 days and that was quite annoying as people who were using the building for shelter would knock on our door to use the phone as well as having other's call here to leave messages for them. But the building itself received minor damages. Just a piece of roofing here or there, not like what Ivan had done.

But as I continue to see pictures at the fox news website, read various news articles from here there and yonder, I began to lose my joy and thankfullness. At first I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but as the tears continued to float out to the surface, I finally put a finger on the emotions I was feeling.

This morning as I sat down to breakfast and looked at my plate of sausage and eggs with water, I felt guilty. Guilty that I had good food to eat, water to drink and an excellent house. I have a family who is here together and not separated by not just miles, but the shortage and rising prices of gas. Families who also have no more source of income, no bank with their accounts in it, no more family photos of weddings, births, birthday parties, christmas', vacations. No more kid's toys to trip over and threaten to take away as punishments. Nothing, nada, zip, zilch.

We've e-mailed and let it be known that we'd keep a family in our home for as long as it takes. Hey, we've had a family in our house for 6 months already this year. It'll be a piece of cake.

I've been so absent from my journal this year that I haven't mentioned it. When Abby was two weeks old, some friends of ours got burned out of their apartment building. The apt below them burned, damaging the floor of theirs and smoking up the place. They were forced out with no where to go. Both of their parents live within ten miles of here and neither of them offered to take them in! So, they stayed here. The mom and dad in Abby's room on the guest bed, the baby in the baby bed in Abby's room and the two kids in the living room. It wasn't the most pleasant of situations since they have marital problems and we tried the best we could to help them, but, well, tempers will flare occasionaly.

Anyway, they had bad credit and difficulty finding a place and it took about 4 months. Then we found a cheap fixeruper house and helped them fix it up for 2 months. They moved out almost exactly 6 mo. to the day they moved in. In some ways, I was sad to see them go. I had so hoped to help them be a better family. Maybe one day what we did for them will have an impact, but for now they don't seem to be changed by the experience.

In other news, I am back to my writing and thought I had an excellent plot with very few snags. I began writing and read a bit of research and realized, again, that I have more snags than I thought. I think it is still a workable plot though. We'll see.

'Nite world. May God bless ALL those Katrina refugees in need.

Dawn posted this at 12:03 AM.