Year of Suck and Glory
I don't usually do year-end posts, but this year needs to be buried deep with a stake in its heart and rock salt over the--er, memorialized. Because parts of it were actively awful, but enough were good that I'm optimistic about the year ahead. And the parts that were bad maybe gave me either skills or intestinal fortitude to cope with bad stuff in the new year.
Both the bad and the good were tied up in this being a year of casting off the old and facing, often forcibly, the new. Nearly everything I tried that had been successful before fell short, sometimes a little, sometimes a whole lot. Mainstays of the old order just weren't there any more, or if they were, they just barely came through at all. Keeping the farm was at times a very difficult proposition.
Still is actually, but part of the problem was that I spent the first half of the year in a state of paralysis. Not knowing what to do or where to turn. Brain empty. Nothing coming to fill it.
Except one thing. After years of blockage, the writing genuinely came back. It was and is slow. It wasn't the easy gallop it had been before. The novel I worked on (and worked on and worked on) was much later than I had expected it to be, but it was also about half again as long, and then needed some fairly major revisions, which explains a good part of that. It's much better for those revisions, oh boy is it better. I have hopes for it. Which may fall short, but one has to gamble that they won't.
And that was the lesson of this difficult Change Year. That no matter what I might try to do or be, what I apparently am supposed to be is Writer Person. Writing new work, not just getting old work back into (e)print. That's what, however slow or interrupted, has not fallen short. It's what I keep being pushed toward, no matter what I do.
Of course, one has to find a way to make a living at it, because horses gotta eat, and one of the things that shed itself was the boarding business that paid most of their monthly hay bill. It needed to go; it was causing friction in the herd, and finally Pooka took a (literal) stand that injured his back. He's fine now, but point was taken. Herd wants to be its own self without outsiders.
So there was stress. And more sloughing off of the old. And more shiny! new! that isn't a sure thing yet and who knows if it will be. But if it's writing new stuff, I have a feeling it will be a surer path than anything else.
And that's where it sits on this last, windy, blustery, storm-coming-in day of 2014, that awful year with bright shiny bits in it. I've taken a brain break during the holidays, after a lovely Camp Lipizzan over the Solstice and a lovely family time over Christmas. Still in it actually, but turning the oversized starship of said brain out of resting mode and into writing mode. Because writing seems to be where it needs to be.
I don't do New Year's resolutions. I do do an ongoing conception of where things need to go, and that's toward fulfilling the Solstice Kickstarter by writing two (possibly three) short novels, and delving into the Sekrit Projekt, and contemplating a number of other TBA's having to do with writing new stuff. Along with more backlist because that's a nonspectacular but steady contributor to the bottom line, and some editing because likewise. And, beyond that, riding more and training more and giving myself permission to enjoy the horses rather than just struggle to keep them fed. Some of them are in the late twilight of their years; I want to enjoy the time they have. Some are heading into early twilight, so likewise. And the young ones are more than ready to step up and be the go-to riding and Camp horses.
People say, Well, you have too many, why not sell them. Because half of them are aged out of the market, a couple quite severely, and the other half are the future for me and for Camp Lipizzan. They're core staff. Can't do it without them. In a lot of ways, it's all about them, and most of what I do is for them. And I'm good with that. I need to let them give me joy--so maybe I have a resolution after all. Even if I don't Do resolutions.
So that's the year ahead, which one hopes will be a great improvement over the one just past. At least I go into it with a sense of where the path lies, and how I can make it work. That feels good.
I get to write! Yay! And ride! Yay! Yes! I can do this!
Both the bad and the good were tied up in this being a year of casting off the old and facing, often forcibly, the new. Nearly everything I tried that had been successful before fell short, sometimes a little, sometimes a whole lot. Mainstays of the old order just weren't there any more, or if they were, they just barely came through at all. Keeping the farm was at times a very difficult proposition.
Still is actually, but part of the problem was that I spent the first half of the year in a state of paralysis. Not knowing what to do or where to turn. Brain empty. Nothing coming to fill it.
Except one thing. After years of blockage, the writing genuinely came back. It was and is slow. It wasn't the easy gallop it had been before. The novel I worked on (and worked on and worked on) was much later than I had expected it to be, but it was also about half again as long, and then needed some fairly major revisions, which explains a good part of that. It's much better for those revisions, oh boy is it better. I have hopes for it. Which may fall short, but one has to gamble that they won't.
And that was the lesson of this difficult Change Year. That no matter what I might try to do or be, what I apparently am supposed to be is Writer Person. Writing new work, not just getting old work back into (e)print. That's what, however slow or interrupted, has not fallen short. It's what I keep being pushed toward, no matter what I do.
Of course, one has to find a way to make a living at it, because horses gotta eat, and one of the things that shed itself was the boarding business that paid most of their monthly hay bill. It needed to go; it was causing friction in the herd, and finally Pooka took a (literal) stand that injured his back. He's fine now, but point was taken. Herd wants to be its own self without outsiders.
So there was stress. And more sloughing off of the old. And more shiny! new! that isn't a sure thing yet and who knows if it will be. But if it's writing new stuff, I have a feeling it will be a surer path than anything else.
And that's where it sits on this last, windy, blustery, storm-coming-in day of 2014, that awful year with bright shiny bits in it. I've taken a brain break during the holidays, after a lovely Camp Lipizzan over the Solstice and a lovely family time over Christmas. Still in it actually, but turning the oversized starship of said brain out of resting mode and into writing mode. Because writing seems to be where it needs to be.
I don't do New Year's resolutions. I do do an ongoing conception of where things need to go, and that's toward fulfilling the Solstice Kickstarter by writing two (possibly three) short novels, and delving into the Sekrit Projekt, and contemplating a number of other TBA's having to do with writing new stuff. Along with more backlist because that's a nonspectacular but steady contributor to the bottom line, and some editing because likewise. And, beyond that, riding more and training more and giving myself permission to enjoy the horses rather than just struggle to keep them fed. Some of them are in the late twilight of their years; I want to enjoy the time they have. Some are heading into early twilight, so likewise. And the young ones are more than ready to step up and be the go-to riding and Camp horses.
People say, Well, you have too many, why not sell them. Because half of them are aged out of the market, a couple quite severely, and the other half are the future for me and for Camp Lipizzan. They're core staff. Can't do it without them. In a lot of ways, it's all about them, and most of what I do is for them. And I'm good with that. I need to let them give me joy--so maybe I have a resolution after all. Even if I don't Do resolutions.
So that's the year ahead, which one hopes will be a great improvement over the one just past. At least I go into it with a sense of where the path lies, and how I can make it work. That feels good.
I get to write! Yay! And ride! Yay! Yes! I can do this!