I’m sorry about neglecting
this blog for so long. My excuse? There isn’t any good one, but there are some.
Yes, I did go through a major move. Unfortunately, I wasn’t smart enough to
hire a moving company that packs everything; I didn’t hire a moving company at
all. I’d carted most anything that would fit in my small SUV to my new condo in
south Alabama during my many trips back and forth. After all, I planned to keep
both places for a few years, using the condo as a get-away place until I
decided to make Fairhope my permanent home.
My definition of insanity is
putting my house on the market before I was ready to see if there was any
interest in the property, thinking it would take months to sell. It sold the
first day it was listed. And the buyers insisted on closing in precisely one
month. I went into a tailspin. A cousin was pressed into service, helping me
transport multiple loads of treasures to any place that would take them. She
and a friend also helped me pack, pack, and pack some more. As the deadline
approached for closing and the chips were down, there was nothing to do but
hire a rental truck and driver to take everything else from the house (and
there was way more than any of us thought) to a rental storage unit in my new
town. The driver transported it all on the first Saturday of March 2020. Does
that date ring a bell? Yes, it was about a week before Covid became an issue,
and we all went into “stay at home” mode.
It should have been an easy
decision to get my condo organized, unpack all that was there, or perhaps go to
the storage unit to go through things there and make more complicated decisions
on what to do with all the extra stuff. Shoulda, coulda, woulda, or whatever
that saying is. But none of that happened. I went into Covid mentality of “it
can wait until tomorrow since I can’t go anywhere anyway,” so I didn’t take
care of any of that.
Fellow writing friends all said
it might be a good time to write a lot. But I found that very few did. Although,
in my defense, I did read. A lot. My library card was gold because I could download
e-books without venturing from the sofa. Since my brain was more or less
addled, I often selected cozy mysteries because they were a faster read than
some of the heavier non-fiction. I fell in love with the characters in the cozies,
just as I had some years ago, to the extent that I’d attempted to write one
myself. As things began to lift, I finally pulled out that old manuscript
determined to clean it up and publish it.
I took a workshop, “How to
Publish Your Novel for $100.00,” at the senior center. After all, I’d already
done most of the work, right? Wrong. Editing is one of the most tedious jobs in
the world. But I had to do the preliminary work before turning it over to
someone else to do the final edit.
Covid exposure caught up with
me. I have not had it, but my friend tested positive, and I’d been around him
several days that week, having dinner together, riding in the same car, and
sitting together talking at my house. I immediately went into self-quarantine
and canceled all upcoming social events. This time I decided to use the time at
home for something other than sitting on the sofa. I’m happy to report that the
book is being formatted and will be ready to download for publishing soon! I
hope I’ll let you know soon – before the end of summer because it might be a
good read for your trip to the beach.
