All in a Day's Ride

Upon completing his EPIC bike ride from the coast of Antarctica to the South Pole, cyclist DAN BURTON said of his experience: "Every day was the worst day of my life."

I LOVE this quote ... I heard it on the news last night.  The serious truth from someone who sounded happy to have done what he did and at the same time, happy to be done doing it.

Life as a House

my husband, setting the new wall between our basement office and the furnace room

Life is so much like a house. 

There's always something to fix or change, redo or update.  Like the basement my husband and I have been remodeling for the past year.  Replacing walls.  Pouring concrete.  Sheetrock and insulation.  Tile.  We're old pros, to tell the truth; this is the fifth house we've remodeled together.  We've done it for so long I swear we could build one from scratch.  (Well, my husband could.  He worked construction in his twenties and admittedly, I'm no good with a jack-hammer.)  By the time we're done with a room I love it passionately; I've cleaned every inch, painted every corner, given away everything we no longer use.  Refreshed space has awesome karma.

If you've ever remodeled a house, you know the process is one of endless surprises--pockets of space someone else boxed off for no reason, crooked walls, ugly fixture choices to correct, bad wiring and plumbing to update.  There's always something old to rip out, something to fix.

Remodeling houses is a lot like building a great life, but it's also a lot like writing.  Which says volumes about why I love to write.  I love how stories evolve.  How something seems right one day and has to be trashed the next.  I love how my characters come alive and speak to me, how their story feels so important to me when it's being written.  Once I've spent a year or two or ten writing a story I'm so in love with it, it's hard to decide I've finished.  I don't want to let the characters go.

Until I start the next story . . . .

Kindle Freebie!

cover revealed!

Hi y'all!  I've just finished posting Choosing Change, my little self-help book!  It's available on Kindle, with the paperback version coming in a few weeks.  I would love to get a few early reviews, so I'm offering free Kindle copies to the first twenty people who send an email to: info.mechelle@gmail.com. 

a Super Cool quote

I came across this quote today while doing homework :-)  It's deep, and I'll be pondering it for a while.  Thought you might enjoy it:

"Once and for all we must reject the notion that self-expression is any sort of justification for art.  The best art is a by-product of self-transformation.  Then, in a very much more potent way, it will also be self-expression."  -- Bill Jay

strange karma

It is the strangest thing.  This afternoon I was on my way to my photoshop class, thinking only how nice it will be to improve my excruciatingly rusty design skills, when I pass a flyer for: CHICKEN CLASS.


Déjà vu, my friends.  Déjà vu.

Not only was this a sign for 'beginner's' chicken class, such as the one I took, but an ADVANCED, MANAGING YOUR FLOCK chicken class.

I had to stop and ponder this.  A FLOCK?  Really?  In the back yard?

You would think people in my area would notice the landscape, currently dotted with little chicken coops and their glowing red windows, and think to themselves Thank God I Don't Have Chickens.  I mean in the dead of winter we're talking 24/7 care.  But no.  People are signing up in droves, eager to acquire a flock of their own.

I'll state here that YES, chickens are interesting in that YES, you get beautifully colored, albeit salmonella covered, eggs.  And of course the plumage is divine, granting that other chickens in said FLOCK have not pecked each other bald in an effort to rule the roost.  BTW, there's nothing nice to be said about chicken legs.  Hideous.  Ugly.  Prehistoric.  Dinosaur-like.  Seemingly too-large for the bird.  Icky.  But I'm digressing.

Gentle readers, If you happen to be among those considering raising a brood of your own, be forewarned.  Chickens are fiercely peckish high-maintenance beasts who happen to leave the occasional, edible, calling card.  It is SO much simpler to buy eggs in the store.

GAH!

monsieur gah

So I decided to take a class in multi-media graphic design.  Just to bring my skills up a bit -- but GAH!  As part of the course we have to create a tumblr account where we post our assignments and discuss the required reading.

May I say here: give me blogger any day.

I'll be spending my night figuring out tumblr rather than writing, my attempts interspersed with swearing, cursing, hair-ripping and tears.  Still, come May, my graphic design will have come up a notch or two.

mired oxen

my daughter's science fair project: test subject barley

Have you ever had one of those days when numerous of your oxen wander into the mire?  If so, then you can completely relate to my weekend.  I had planned to post my book, finish up the interviews for my blog tour, blog every day and do the laundry.  Here's what I got:

Friday night, 1.3.14:  The sheet rock guy shows up at 5:15 to tape and mud our basement.  He brings his cute, easy-going kid along to keep him company.  We have a super-small house (about 1800 feet), so my daughter barricades herself in her bedroom to avoid interacting.  9:25, the sheet rock guy leaves.

Saturday day, 1.4.14:  I'm psyched to blog and write only to learn my husband has to work and therefore I have to cover various things in the basement with plastic.  I cover said various things only to learn my daughter has not started on her science project powerpoint presentation.  So I help her go through her data and begin said presentation.  I'm just finishing up when the sheet rock guy and his cute, easy-going kid show up to sand and do the second coat of mud.  Said daughter vacates to her room; I cook dinner.

Sunday, 1.5.14:  I'm psyched to write, only to find out that said sheet rock guy is coming at 10:00.  The entire house fills with dust; that stuff can creep around anything.  My husband and I spend five hours vacuuming, mopping, cleaning, etc.  Said daughter helps by shoveling snow off the deck.

Tomorrow is another day . . . .

2014, at last

A New Year's morning in Idaho

Maybe it's just me, but it felt really good today to write '2014.'  I spent the morning doing paperwork and so I wrote the date a lot.  And every time I did it felt fabulous, as though my fingers could control the sunrise.

I don't consider myself a suspicious person (unless we're talking finding pennies) but there was something about last year's date that weighed heavy on my mind.  It was a good enough year.  It was busy.  But overall, last year seemed long, exhausting and a bit stressful.  Last year was, in many ways, difficult. 

But this year feels like flight, like it can only bring good things.  I look forward to what I've planned--and to what has yet to present itself.  This year will be awesome ... and I'm going to enjoy the ride.

a New Year Stealfie

New Year Greetings from Stealth

Greetings from the fabulously cold clean air of Idaho.  We've been out walking today and Stealth couldn't stand being left behind.  Once he endured my husband treating him as a stuffed snowball he settled down, snapped a Stealfie, then tucked himself into the hood of my daughter's coat.

Ya'll should know, Stealth has plans for 2014.  Intense, world-dominating plans.  (His 2014 mantra: To Heck with the yet-unborn Xavier, The French Bulldog.  Je suis ici et maintenant.)  Anyway, the Stealth project I like best is his graphic novel.  I mean, who knew a stuffie could draw? 

So as soon as I post my little self-help book, which goes up on Kindle tomorrow, I'll help Stealth with his plans (if this thing had audio you'd hear him humphing zut in the background).  Be patient, my dust-bunny-hunting friend!  Fine art takes time . . . .

In the meantime, Happy New Year to all!