In The Afterglow

 I am a writer! I am many other things as well and this entry may be about some of those things and it might be about Christmas. But to begin I want to stake my claim on being a writer because I want to get down to the business of writing as January approaches. Writing like  most other things we accomplish takes effort, commitment , focus and passion. We have to want to make it happen. I am proud to say that I did just that to see eleven books reach publication. But 'resting on our laurels ' as they say will not write another book. The finished product is a good goal to aspire to but even more than that I love the process. I love the unfolding, the unravelling, the rethinking and envisioning of how to tell a story. In my writing journal today I jotted down what I call tub thoughts ( one of the many reasons I love a bath) and then asked myself what the story really is in my WIP. Good question to ponder. I think I know but will continue to search out the answer as I craft it. I love that part. So why wouldn't that be motivation enough to get me to my desk every day. That is a good question as well and sometimes being the other things I am such as wife , mother, grandmother, friend and binge TV watcher keep me from the writing. I have a lovely ,quiet solitary writing space these days and I am very thankful for it and will attempt to truly appreciate and use it during the winter months ahead. What better gift to the writer in me and ultimately to all the other roles as well. On this day I bask in the afterglow of previous work as well as the afterglow of another Christmas. For forty four years I made Christmas happen in whatever home we were in. Now I realize I didn't do it single handedly but for the most part the effort, commitment , focus and passion came from me. Each one of those Christmases looked different from the one before and Christmas 2021 certainly did too. I will not even begin to list those differences. Many of the wonderful parts of the celebration remained the same and for that I am so grateful. I won't list those either but I hold them in my heart , my memory and my journal so they will not be forgotten. The afterglow and on we go. We head toward a new year stronger, wiser and richer for the love we shared and the lessons we've learned.