Left Behind

What good’s a life that leaves nothing behind, not a thought or a dream that might echo in time?
— Trans-Siberian Orchestra

We build our legacy piece by piece, and maybe the whole world will remember you or maybe just a couple of people, but you do what you can to make sure you're still around after you're gone.
— David Lowery

My legacy is that I stayed on course... from the beginning to the end, because I believed in something inside of me.
— Tina Turner

What will you leave behind when you’re gone?

The hubby and I had our wills finalized recently, and it’s a real process, I tell you what. Amongst a lot of crap we had to deal with was the creation of our bequest lists. These were the lists of items we want to go to specific people.

I have a lot of stuff, and I love my stuff. And I really hate the thought that no one else is going to care about my stuff like I do. That when I’m gone all this stuff I’ve lovingly collected over the years will just be disposed of without a thought to how much it meant to me.

But it’s also unreasonable to expect someone else to takeover everything. I remember when we had to go through my aunt’s house – she collected antiques, but I only saved things that had sentimental value for me. As much as I would have liked to save more, the things that meant a great deal to her, I just didn’t have the space.

So I spent a lot of time thinking about my various collections – dragons, teapots, books – and picked out a couple of items from each collection that meant the most to me. Then I thought about who might appreciate these things the most and bequeathed the items to them in my will. Now maybe this will make the beneficiaries happy, and maybe it won’t. But I’ll be dead and if they want to donate/sell their bequests that’s fine by me.

My books are still an ongoing process. I’d like the various collections to be kept together, but a lot of my books are out of date or have a limited audience. Like my reference books – I have several sets of reference books that I bought through Time/Life Books – Time Frame series (history), the Enchanted World, Mysteries of the Unknown, Planet Earth – and a couple of sets I bought at book sales. While I still find them useful – the Planet Earth series was especially helpful with my Elemental book series – most people prefer looking stuff up on the internet.

Which brings me to my writing files. My vast array of writing files, both paper and electronic. My great body of ideas and unfinished stories/novels. My unpublished works that, if printed out, could probably paper the earth. Or at least the moon. Not to brag, but a lot of this stuff shows promise and it would be a shame to let this promise go to waste. On the other hand, who’s going to finish all this if not me?

And there’s my motivation to get off my lazy butt and taking my writing seriously again. If I don’t do it, who will?

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WORDAGE REPORT

Yes, that’s right. I skipped my Monday post again. Quite frankly, I don’t do that much (besides grocery shop) outside of the house, and my life can be somewhat uneventful. I had a bunch of routine medical appointments and no one really wants to hear about that.

As for other writing . . . it appears I’m still in my slump. I’m getting my ten-minute words done, but that’s pretty much it. I keep hoping that will change, but really, nothing’s going to change unless I just suck it up and change it.

NEW WORDS:
Blog Posts – 1104+841= 1,945

Total words: 1,945 words

Three minute words – 102+113+78+77+93+92+93=648

Goals For Next Week:
Finish the Christmas story.

EDITING:
I actually did take a fresh look at Magickal Mayhem. Or maybe that’s going to be Magic and Mayhem. I haven’t decided yet. But in any case, in an effort to pare down the wordage, I cut a whole bunch of description and now it looks like I need to put at least some of it back in. It’s times like these that makes me wonder if I know what I’m doing in the first place

Goal For Next Week:
Edit Magickal Mayhem.

MARKETING MONDAY:
There are a lot of markets for flash fiction out there. And a lot of contests. And the one thing they usually have in common is they have a specific theme they’re looking for. And while it’s all well and good to have my stories categorized by length, it would be more helpful to have them categorized by subject, i.e. horror, fantasy, mythology, etc. So that’s what I’m doing

The poem I sent in last week was returned with the request for a really minor edit, which I agreed to and as far as I know it will be included in this really cool local project that I shouldn’t really talk about until it’s a done deal. And then it might be worth a post all on its own. :-)

Goal For Next Week:
Submit two stories and one poem.

TECHNO TUESDAY:
So far I have not been doing well on Techno Tuesdays. This time I had a zoom meeting with my stitchery group in the morning, and then in the afternoon I was inspired to work on my stitchery.

Goal For Next Week:
Set up Paperwhite

CRAFTING:
I am waiting for some embroidery transfers I ordered to arrive, so I’ve put the granddaughter’s dress on hold until they get here. Hopefully this week. And hopefully they’ll have something in the package that I can use on it.

When I haven’t been hitting the dollar stories and craft stores for more crafting supplies, and then organizing them so my hoard doesn’t get away from me again, I’ve been working on embroidered squares for a baby quilt.

Goal For Next Week:
Finish baby quilt. Start the embroidery on granddaughter’s dress. Figure out how to finish embroidered tote bag (that I started many years ago).

WHAT I’M READING:
I’m still reading Where the Crawdads Sing, by Delia Owens and I’ll probably stick with it until I’m done. And I confess, I read Whiskey Beach by Nora Roberts last week, but I made it last the whole week instead of a single day. So I guess that’s progress.

On the Kindle. I finished The Merman’s Kiss by Tamsin Ley and really liked it. These characters had a lot of issues to overcome, and you’re kept wondering if they’d be able to be together at all. Plus I really like the author’s take on merfolk. Now I’m working on Curse of Christmas: A Collection of Paranormal Holiday Stories, by assorted authors.

Goal For Next Week:
Finish “Crawdads” so I can pass it on, and otherwise keep taking it easy on the reading so it doesn’t take over my life.

GOAL REVIEW:
My goals always seem so reasonable, I don’t know why I have such trouble sticking to them. At least as far as the writing goals go. The crafting and reading goals seem to be doing okay, although I do spend more time on my crafting compared to anything else. But then again, I do most of my crafting (needlework mostly) in front of the TV at night. At least it keeps me away from the games.

Happy writing.