All or Nothing

We must stand firm between two kinds of madness: the belief that we can do anything; and the belief that we can do nothing.
― Alain

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
— Mark Twain

If you limit your choices only to what seems possible or reasonable, you disconnect yourself from what you truly want, and all that is left is compromise.
— Anaïs Nin

I’m stuck in an all-or-nothing rut. I’m not altogether sure how I got here, but I know it’s a rut that’s hard to get out of – I’ve been here before.

Now, when I say “all-or-nothing” I don’t just mean the cognitive distortion, although I suffer from that too, I’m talking about the mind-set that is currently keeping me from getting things accomplished.

I’m a big, fat, procrastinator. I put off doing things – even things that give me pleasure – as long as possible, and when I finally get around to them I do them to the exclusion of all else. For example, needlework. I’ll put off doing it as long as I can, but when I pick it up to start working on it I’ll immerse myself in it, doing nothing else until the project is done. Or I burn myself out.

So when I’m in the all-or-nothing mindset, I won’t start something unless I’m ready to immerse myself. Furthermore, when I am in an all-or-nothing mindset and I’m working on something, if I’m interrupted, breaking the flow as it were, I seldom go back and finish what I was doing. Which is kind of counter-productive and why I have so many unfinished projects lying around.

I need to re-train my brain, alter my thought process, to accept that if I do just a little bit of a bunch of things every day, I can more accomplished than if I go full tilt at just one thing at a time. Unfortunately, my brain can be pretty stubborn, so good luck with that.

Now the cognitive distortion “all or nothing” is a little different. This is where your mind gives you two options – success or failure – without any middle road. This is a faulty thought pattern that makes someone more prone to negative thoughts and conclusions. It manifests in a decrease in self-esteem and confidence, an unwillingness to take risks, less resilience, and feeling like a failure.

This thought pattern leaves no room for balanced perspectives. You have difficulty coming to a compromise – everything is win or lose. Black or white. It’s an unrealistic and rigid way of thinking.

Someone trapped in all-or-nothing thinking has a hard time seeing the positives in a situation. Small mistakes can make you feel like a failure. Unless you feel you can do something perfectly, you don’t even try.

So . . . what can be done about it?

Well first you need to recognize the problem. Labelling this kind of thought process can help pull you out and back into a more reasonable frame of mind. You don’t need to beat yourself up about it, just recognize it.

Find a different way to look at a situation. Don’t focus on your faults, rather recognize your strengths and realize that setbacks happen. Find the positive in a situation and don’t dwell on self-defeating thoughts.

Don’t let mistakes define you. Everyone makes mistakes, even the most successful people in the world. Instead, accept your mistakes and learn from them. Think of them as opportunities for growth.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

You know, one of these days I’m going to surprise everyone and have something other than blog posts to report in this wordage report. This is not that day.

It was just one of those weeks where nothing seemed to go right. I had a couple of social obligations – a morning with my stitchery group and an evening with my poetry group – both of which took more of my energy than I expected. And we had quite a bit of snow, which put me in a reading mood.

And to top it off, when I went to do my installment for my serial, I realized I’d jumped the gun the week before. I had it ending with a tragedy, but it wasn’t supposed to happen yet. So then I had to create one that fit the story line.

NEW WORDS:
1856+350+235+652=3,093
UP – 236 words from last week

Goals For Next Week:
Get all of my blog post up on time.

EDITING:
0 pages
I cannot tell a lie. I didn’t even so much as crack the file open on Elemental Spirit. Or any other file that needs editing.

Goal For Next Week:
Start work on An Elemental Spirit.

MARKETING:
Yeah, nothing new here.

Goal For Next Week:
Set up author page on Amazon; update book page on blog

TECH & TRAINING:
Nothing new here, either.

Goal For Next Week:
Install software for inkjet so I can print to the colour printer.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
Not only did I come up with a new form, I actually like the example I wrote for it. Trust me, that doesn’t always happen.

And I got a poem written for my poetry group that hit all the points in the poemwork – it was written in couplets, one couplet per month, and offered some words of advice for dealing with each month. Too bad there were only three of us at the gathering to hear it (snow storm prevented the others).

Goal For Next Week:
Find another new poetry form to share.

CRAFTING:
I did actually go to the store to look for the bins and table for my craft migration, but the bins were either too expensive or not the right size, and since I didn’t get the bins I didn’t bother with the table either.

As I mentioned above, I spent a morning last week with my stitchery guild, so I got a few more rows done on the afghan. It would be nice to get it finished so I could start working on something else. NOT an afghan.

Goal For Next Week:
Work on the afghan – the person it’s for has a birthday coming up. Finish craft migration.

WHAT I’M READING:
Finished reading Brazen Virtue, and went on to Sacred Sins and Come Sundown as well, all by Nora Roberts.

As a rule I’m not a fan of autobiographies, or even biographies for that matter, but I couldn’t seem to put Spare, by Prince Harry, down. There was a lot of detail without him oversharing, and it made for really interesting reading.

Goal For Next Week:
Maybe ease up on the reading some.

GOAL REVIEW:

Thanks to a trip to Ripley’s Aquarium for the granddaughter’s birthday, I had something interesting to share for my Monday post. Not sure what I’ll do about this week though.

Once again I did no editing, no marketing, and nothing techy. It is what it is and I’m not going to beat myself up about it.

The one bright spot last week was poetry. I found an interesting form to share and quite liked my example poem. And I did the poem I needed for my poetry gathering. Go me!

While I didn’t do any work on the craft room, I did get several rows done on my afghan. I really need to step up the pace on it. I’ve been slowing down because I’m tired of working with this pattern (fourth time in a row). But I can’t move on to something else until I’m done with it.

My reading sped up last week, which is why this post is a little late. Blame Prince Harry, I found his book hard to put down.

This week I really want to make an effort to get back to my lists. I think lists will help me stay focused on all the things I’d like to accomplish. They help me stay organized, and remind me of my priorities.

Plus who doesn’t like crossing things off a list? :-D

The Pond - Part 23

Neither Izolda nor Nikolai had felt it necessary to keep in touch with their respective families after settling down, but news from their homeland did filter down to them from time to time. Shortly after the birth of their second son, Dmitri, word reached Izolda that a great flood had struck her village. Her entire family had been swept away – father, brothers, aunts – all gone.

Though she had hardly given them a thought over the past few years, it was still a bit of a shock. It was disconcerting to think of her aunts, her grandmother, all that power, gone. Did they have no warning to prevent such a tragedy? Could this have been what her dreams had been about, a fore-warning? It did not feel right, but it was the only explanation she could come up with.

The image of the pond stayed with her, until finally she left her children with the nursemaid Nikolai had hired to help her and went to the pond in the woods. It was easy to find, there was a path that wound through the woods, made by the feet of all those who had gone before her.

At first glance it was just a picturesque setting, perfect for picnicking or trysting, She studied it from the shelter of the trees, noting the flattened grass where someone had sat for a lengthy period of time, reading perhaps. There was a white towel hanging from a branch of one of the trees, obviously the forgotten remnant from a swimming party.

But there was something about the pond itself . . . Sure she was alone, she tried looking with her second sight. There was a faint overlay, but try as she might, she couldn’t figure out what was causing it. It did not seem malevolent, but neither did it seem healthy. Unsettled, she returned home, still without answers.

A few weeks later, several children went swimming in the pond, and came home screaming. They claimed they saw a woman there, just floating with her hair all spread out and tangled in the water lilies at the far edge.

Nikolai and several of his strongest workers went to the pond to search, but, much to their relief, they found no trace of a body anywhere. The whole incident was put down to youthful exuberance. In all likelihood the children had mistaken the early-blooming water lilies and weeds below the water for a body.

Izolda, however, felt a chill when she heard the children’s story. She believed them. Believed there was something inhabiting the pond, but without proof she could do nothing about it.

A little more than a week after that, a couple who were courting down by the pond caught sight of a woman, naked as a jay bird, walking slowly along the far edge of the water. They called out to her and she turned and started towards them through the water. She walked steadily until the water covered her head and they waited, but she never resurfaced.

“And did you have anything to eat or drink while you were at the pond?” Nikolai asked.

“Cheese and bread, and a bottle of wine from the grapes pressed in the fall.”

“And how much of the wine did you have to drink?”

“We—” The couple exchanged a glance. “We drank the whole thing.”

“As I recall, last fall’s pressing made for a very strong wine. What you thought was a woman was no doubt an animal entering the pond to slake its thirst.”

It seemed more plausible than the idea of a naked woman walking around the woods, and the incident was soon forgotten.

But Izolda did not forget.

Burtonelle Poetry

This week’s poetry offering is more a style of poetry writing than an actual poetry form. The Burtonelle was introduced by Wilma W. Burton, who wrote a poem a day in this form in 1976 for the American Bicentennial. She ascribed to the belief that all aspiring poets, and established poets for that matter, should write a poem a day for good poetic exercise and practice.

This is a free verse poem, written in two columns with a pause (caesura), in the form of a uniform space, between the columns. It’s read horizontally, with a slight pause between the columns. Punctuation, capitalization, and meter are up to the poet, and if there is a title, it should also have the space in it.

I'd like to add that while I enjoyed writing my example poem, I did NOT enjoy formatting it to show the spaces in this post!


Fleeting                      Words

They come to me     the words
catching me              unprepared –
they dip                     and swirl,
bob and                      weave,
distracting me            from whatever
I’m doing,                  teasing me
into believing             a poem is
in the offing               and so
I write them               in invisible ink
in my head                 in an attempt
at keeping them         from escaping.
But the ink                 of my mind
is not indelible          and too often
I am left                     with nothing
but the faint               echo of
what might                 have been.

Here’s An Idea . . .

Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas.
— Joseph Stalin

Ideas are like slippery fish. They seem to have a peculiar knack of getting away from us. Because of this, the creative person always has a pad and a pencil handy. When he gets an idea, he writes it down. He knows that many people have found their whole lives changed by a single great thought. By capturing ideas immediately, he doesn't risk forgetting them
— Earl Nightingale

If you run out of ideas follow the road; you'll get there.
— Edgar Allan Poe

Sometimes I have a clear idea of what I want to talk about in my Sunday posts. A lot of time I just start typing and hope something will come to me. This is one of those times and I gotta tell you, I got nothing so far.

One might wonder, why even do a post today then? Well, because even a little, do nothing post is better than no post at all. And I feel like I’ve been such a slacker lately that I can’t bring myself to have another zero in my wordage report.

I keep saying I work better from a list, but so far I haven’t done much in the way of making any lists. I have a very specific process for list making, and every time I get up with the intention of going to my office to start my master list something distracts me, or I see something else I need to do first, and then I forget what I got up for. So then when I sit back down again at my lap top I remember what I got up for in the first place and figure, “Oh, I’ll do it later.”

Later. There’s always a later, isn’t there? Especially when you’re a champion procrastinator like me. Add to that having all the time in the world (AKA, no outside job to go to) and you’ve got a very dangerous combination.

Never put off till to-morrow what you can do the day after to-morrow just as well. ~ Mark Twain.

Words to live by, eh?

Well, they’ve been the words I’ve been living by lately, anyway. And it really has to stop. It’s appalling, the amount of time I waste doing pretty much nothing. I need to put on my big girl underpants and start spending more time in my office. Any time in my office!

Maybe it’s not as comfortable as sitting in my easy chair in the living room, but that’s a big part of my problem. I’m too comfortable in the easy chair. I can rock, or recline, and if I’m lucky one or more of the kittens will come and pin me down, usually lying on one of my arms so then I only have one hand free. Since I can’t type one handed, I’m forced to play mindless games on the laptop.

My office is a nice room, and it’s got all my stuff in it. I guess it’s like getting up in the morning to go to the gym. I just have to do it without thinking about it. Of course going to the gym is easier than going to my office. I get up in the morning and throw on my workout clothes, and I’m halfway through my first set before my body realizes what I’m doing.

But then I come home and have my shower and breakfast, and I’ll sit in my recliner checking my email and Facebook while I’m eating said breakfast. And then I never seem to get around to leaving my recliner. Because, you know, comfy.

As much as I hate to break with routine, maybe I need to start eating breakfast at the dining room table, like a normal person. And when I’m done, avoid the recliner and go down the hall to my office. Even though it’s still dark out. And cold.

And even if I start out just spending my mornings in there, sooner or later my mind will reset itself to realize this is where I’m supposed to be, and I’ll start getting some actual work done.

Hey, miracles do happen. Today is the start of the Year of the Water Rabbit. Anything is possible!

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

Well . . . we did start out with some sun last week, but it took two days before my solar batteries were fully re-charged, and then it was back to the doom and gloom. One more day of sun and I might actually have accomplished something.

I dug out my compression gloves to see if they’d help my aching hands. They did for a while, but only somewhat. I don’t know what else I can do about it. It’s not like I can halt the march of time. But I gotta tell you, getting old sucks!

I did help a friend organize her poetry chapbook, or at least tried to. What seems easy to me is apparently not so easy for other people. Add into that her partner, who’s heart is in the right place but really seems to be determined to make things harder than they need to be, and you’ve got lots of frustration on the friend’s part and an unfinished chapbook.

NEW WORDS:
1526+0+626+705=2857
DOWN – 93 words from last week

Goals For Next Week:
Try to get my blog posts done earlier in the week.

EDITING:
0 pages
Still trying to get Elemental Spirit organized. There are going to be journal entries (kind of) at the beginning of each chapter, just like in Elemental Fire and Water, and I’m taking way too much time to decide whether I should writing them ahead of time, or just as I go along.

I can’t remember what I did for the other two, but I know they were a pain in my ass and I spent as much time on those two little paragraphs as I did on the whole chapter they headed. Still, I’m leaning towards writing them as I go along. Or maybe add them in after . . .

Goal For Next Week:
Start work on An Elemental Spirit.

MARKETING:
Yeah, nothing new here.

Goal For Next Week:
Set up author page on Amazon; update book page on blog

TECH & TRAINING:
Nothing new here, either.

Goal For Next Week:
Install software for inkjet so I can print to the colour printer.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
Yes, I totally cheated on the poetry post. I used a form from 2009 – the Sestina. An oldie but a goodie. I did have a form I pulled out to try, but left myself short on time for the example. So maybe this week.

And I’ve made no progress on the poemwork for my poetry group, which meets this Wednesday. Guess I need to get on that, it’s not a short poem. We’re supposed to do a couplet for each month of the year, sharing our words of wisdom on dealing with each month’s challenges.

Goal For Next Week:
Share a new poetry form; work on my poemwork.

CRAFTING:
I need to buy a couple of medium sized bins to move my fabric stash from downstairs to upstairs, and I need to buy a (folding) work table. And deal with the toys I have kind of piled up where the work table is going to go.

The spare bedroom had originally been set up for the granddaughter’s use – night light, music thingie to help her sleep, books, toys – but other than a few naps when she was little, she’s never used it. Who knows, maybe we’ll both use it for doing crafts.

No progress to report on the afghan. *sigh*

Goal For Next Week:
Work on the afghan – the person it’s for has a birthday coming up. Finish craft migration.

WHAT I’M READING:
Still on a Nora Roberts kick, unfortunately. Just can’t seem to help myself. I re-read The Liar, and I’m working on Brazen Virtue.

The daughter and I are both curious about Prince Harry’s book, Spare, but not enough to actually pay for a copy ourselves. So I talked my father-in-law into buying it, and we can just borrow it from him. LOL

Goal For Next Week:
Continue making a little time to read every day.

GOAL REVIEW:

When you spend the previous week alternating reading and playing mindless games, there’s really nothing to write about in a blog post. Add to that the weather was spectacularly uninteresting, and there was nothing else going on, so I just didn’t have anything to say for my Monday blog post last week.

Tuesday we had just enough freezing rain to cancel the school buses, so I had the granddaughter for part of the day. But that’s still no excuse for not being able to present a new form on Wednesday. At least the poetry post was up on time though.

No editing as such, but some strategizing on Elemental Spirit. Not even a passing thought to marketing or tech. I have the installation CD right here, waiting for me to install the other printer onto my laptop, but it means having to dig out my external CD drive and that borders on having to, you know, actually get up off my lazy butt and do something.

At the very least, if I’m going to recycle a poetry post, I should write a fresh poem to go with it. But we’re talking Sestina here, and they’re kinda long. And hard. So I used my original Sestina. It is what it is. Going forward, however, I think that would be only fair – that if I use an old post I should at least write a fresh example poem.

I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get any work done on my craft room. I really can’t do any more until I get the table and bins, and I kept putting it off, figuring I’d do it on the weekend, forgetting of, course, that I was invited to go to Ripley’s Aquarium in Toronto to help celebrate the granddaughter’s 8th birthday.

Which is why this post is so stupendously late. Normally I write it on Saturday, or at least the wordage report part on Saturday and then the rest early Sunday. But I got none of it written yesterday, and then I dozed my morning away today. Oops!

But today is the first day of the Year of the Water Rabbit, and I firmly believe that better days are on their way.

Or at least more productive ones. :-)

The Pond Part 22

For the first time in her life, Izolda wished for another woman to talk to. But not just any woman, a woman with power. She cast the bones, both the bones she had gathered herself and the bones that had once belonged to the witch Varnya, but the bones told her nothing.

Something was not right and she could not figure out what it was. It was not an impending attack, not a reversal of fortune, not trouble in her marriage. She was not sure what it was, but there was something . . . something . . .

She loaded Mikhail and Nikolai with charms of protection. She set up wardings around the house and the saw mill. She invoked every guardian spirit she could think of, but whatever was causing her feelings of foreboding lingered.

A year later, when Izolda became pregnant with her second child, the nightmares returned. Once again they began with a nameless darkness, but this time it wasn’t just approaching, it was settling in. Again, there was the vague shape of trees and a pond but this time instead of a figure standing on the shore, it appeared to be rising from the water.

This time the dreams ended with the birth of her second son, Dmitri. The relief she felt made it easier to ignore the feeling of dread that followed in their wake, but it was still present. Izolda tried to voice her concerns to Nikolai, but he brushed them aside.

“You worry overmuch, my wife,” he said with an indulgent smile. “Women tend to do so, new mothers worry most of all. Be happy! We have two fine sons.”

“You think I am just being moody?”

“The midwife has said it is to be expected,” he assured her, not noticing her narrow-eyed stare.

But Izolda was not to be placated. “I know you have little faith in my foresight,” she began, it being one of the few skills she felt safe to share with her husband.

“In business, your foresight is invaluable,” Nikolai said.

“But not when it comes to the welfare of my family,” she said, temper simmering. She could cast a small spell, easily changing his mind, but pride prevented her from doing so.

“I think you worry overmuch,” he said, bending over and kissing the top of her head. “It is because you care so much, and that is an admirable thing. But everything is well within our kingdom. The sawmill has more business than ever, the village prospers, and our family is healthy and flourishing.”

“Yes, but—”

“You must let go of your fears. It is not healthy for you or our sons. Now get some rest, you’ve earned it.”

Izolda sighed and let go of her anger as he left to return to the mill. He had no magic, indeed, no one in his village had magic, unless they kept it hidden. He could not understand. If they’d been in her old village she would have only had to mention the negative feelings and everyone with the sight would be interpreting them for her.

She sighed deeply. But they were not in her old village, and as far as she knew she was the only one for miles with any kind of magic. She needed to get to the bottom of this feeling of foreboding.

The negative feelings seemed to be an extension of the dreams she’d been having. Thinking about them now, she thought of the images – trees, water, a figure. As soon as she was able, she’d investigate the pond set back in the trees.

It was a quiet, peaceful place. The water was deep enough for swimming, but shallow enough that it was warm. It was a place where lovers would meet for a secret rendezvous and children would go skinny dipping in the summer.

But before she had a chance to explore, word came to them of a tragedy.

Sestina Poetry Form

The first time I ever heard of this form was during the Writer’s Digest PAD (poem a day) challenge back in April 2006 and anyone who was reading my blog back then will remember how much I loved it (not!). It’s not really as bad as it looks, in fact the form can be kind of fun.

The Sestina, created by French troubadour Arnaut Daniel, consists of 39 lines divided into 6 sestets and one triplet, called the envoi. It is normally unrhymed - instead, the six end-words of the first stanza are picked up and reused as the end-words of the following stanzas in a specific order. In the envoi, one end-word is buried in each line, and one is at the end of each line.

Lines may be of any length, although their length is usually consistent in a single poem. The six words that end each of the lines of the first stanza are repeated in a different order at the end of lines in each of the subsequent five stanzas.

Since there is no rhyme scheme or syllable count, there’s no point in a schematic, but the pattern of word-repetition is as follows, where the words that end the lines of the first sestet are represented by the numbers "1 2 3 4 5 6":

1 2 3 4 5 6 - End words of lines in first sestet.
6 1 5 2 4 3 - End words of lines in second sestet.
3 6 4 1 2 5 - End words of lines in third sestet.
5 3 2 6 1 4 - End words of lines in fourth sestet.
4 5 1 3 6 2 - End words of lines in fifth sestet.
2 4 6 5 3 1 - End words of lines in sixth sestet.
2 end words - Middle and end words of lines in envoi

Possible formats for the envoi are: 1-2, 3-4, 5-6; 1-4, 2-5, 3-6; 6-2, 1-4, 5-3; or 6-5, 2-4, 3-1

It might be easier to follow along with an example. The six words I used were:

1 truth, 2 grave, 3 life, 4 night, 5 death, 6 stone.


Night Dweller’s Truth

In every breath there is a truth
that overshadows every grave,
a truth not found within a life
that shines its beacon into night,
a knowledge brought about by death
and graven into hardest stone.

A thought that’s carved in precious stone
contains what we perceive as truth,
unsuppressed by certain death,
as cold and alien as the grave,
deep and dark as empty night
just before it bursts to life.

If I’d but know how sweet is life,
not just a pathway strewn with stone,
perhaps I’d not embraced the night
that fills me with its awful truth
and takes me far beyond the grave
out of reach of even death.

And what is that which we call death?
Perhaps another way of life,
the end is more than just the grave,
a fresh turned mound that’s capped with stone.
Perhaps we’ll never know the truth
before we pass into the night.

Come and share this sweetest night
where we can stand abreast of death,
and we will seek the perfect truth
of what is that which we call life
that gathers round us like a stone
and leads us blindly to the grave.

You look at me with visage grave -
accept my words, accept the night,
accept that fate’s not carved in stone.
Turn away from Lady Death,
her promise of the after life,
and know what’s in my heart is truth.

We’ll find our truth without the grave
and make our life within the night,
then vanquish death with shattered stone.

Rainy Days and Mondays

You can't escape the thoughts on a rainy day: In the spirit of the gloom there is a talisman that keeps people from having fun and invites them to the world of thoughts!
― Mehmet Murat ildan

People who have never dealt with depression think it's just being sad or being in a bad mood. That's not what depression is for me; it's falling into a state of grayness and numbness.
— Dan Reynolds

It is very hard to explain to people who have never known serious depression or anxiety the sheer continuous intensity of it. There is no off switch.
— Matt Haig

Studies have shown that high humidity lowers concentration and increases sleepiness, and I can verify that because not only was last week super grey, it was damp as well. Sunlight also has an impact on our energy. Long, bright days can energize you. But short or cloudy days have less light to encourage you to stay awake, so you may feel sleepier than usual.

Atmospheric pressure changes with dark, rainy days, and can affect the body’s pain levels by causing pressure in the nerves and joints. Anyone who has arthritis will tell you it’s more painful on damp days. This higher pain level can lead to a lack of motivation and energy, contributing to symptoms of depression. Changes in barometric pressure can also trigger or worsen migraines.

According to one study, nearly nine percent of people feel angrier and less happy on rainy days. Another study found that there were more negative posts published on Facebook during rainy weather. In areas where it rains a lot, especially if heavy rainfall is not usual, the more it rains the more aggressive people can get.

This is due mainly to the dip in serotonin levels brought on by the lack of sunshine. This lack also contributes to cravings for comfort foods and carbohydrates because they give your serotonin a boost. But in the long run, giving in to these food cravings is only a temporary solution to combat depression.

Our brains have complex responses to the length of the day. The human circadian rhythm is geared so that we wake when it gets light in the morning. We eat, and are more active during the day. When the sun goes down your brain receives the message that it’s time to rest. We eat less and slow down.

Cold weather gives your body the signal to slow down, to “hibernate,” which results in less energy during the winter months. But ironically, although warmer temperatures can boost your mood, it only works up to about 70F (21C). After that your energy can start to ebb again. You might start feeling tired and have the urge to escape the heat.

SAD (seasonal affective disorder) does not just happen in the darker months of winter, some people also experience it in spring and summer as well. There is also a link between aggression and higher temperatures. Conflicts can rise, as well as violence.

There’s not much we can do to combat the weather, but instead of hiding away during the dark, dismal days, turn on the lights. Studies show that light can raise your serotonin, which will lift your mood. And even if it’s cold and rainy, take a walk outside. Even the smallest exposure to UV rays can help regulate your circadian rhythm and boost your mood.

You might also try light therapy, where you’re expose to a light (on a daily basis) that mimics natural light. Or perhaps it would help to talk to a therapist, or undergo cognitive therapy. And in severe cases, your health care giver may recommend an antidepressant.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

Still no sign of the sun last week. Even people who aren’t usually affected by the weather were starting to feel it. Someone said it has been more than a month without sun. Friday surprised us with a snow storm – still a grey day, but at least it wasn’t rain. And somehow the greyness is easier to take when it’s due to snow.

But the damp weather we’ve been having has had one disturbing side effect. My hands have been getting progressively more painful. The joints of my fingers are stiff and a little swollen. Kind of makes it hard to type. Or use a pencil and paper. Or pretty much anything that requires using my hands.

We did have a full day of sun yesterday, but I guess the humidity was still high because my hands were only slightly better. I can only hope the weather, and my dexterity, improves for the coming week.

NEW WORDS:
1535+480+394+541=2950
UP – 292 words from last week

Goals For Next Week:
Try to get my blog posts done earlier in the week.

EDITING:
0 pages
I opened up An Elemental Spirit, and discovered it’s not as bad as I thought it was. It’s still going to take some heavy editing, and the beginning needs some serious re-writing, but it’s something that I can work with.

Goal For Next Week:
Start work on An Elemental Spirit.

MARKETING:
I fully intended to do the book promotion and get it sent in by the weekend – I had until the 15th to submit it. However, it was rather lengthy and included the opportunity to share up to three author links. I don’t have three links. So I deferred it for 6 months and in the meantime I’ll get my author’s page on Amazon made, and update my book page on this blog.

Goal For Next Week:
Set up author page on Amazon; update book page on blog

TECH & TRAINING:
I got nothing to report here.

Goal For Next Week:
Install software for inkjet so I can print to the colour printer.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
I found an interesting new form to share and even had the post up on time. Unfortunately, I have made no inroads on my poemwork. I really need to get on that – time’s running out.

Goal For Next Week:
Share a new poetry form; work on my poemwork.

CRAFTING:
No progress on my craft room, but I binge-watched The Witcher prequel mini-series on Netflix last Sunday, and got several rows done on the afghan. And I got a couple more done at the stitchery meeting this past Tuesday. Only one more colour and I’m at the halfway mark.

Goal For Next Week:
Work on the afghan – the person it’s for has a birthday coming up.

WHAT I’M READING:
I had a really bad day on Wednesday, so I took comfort in Undercurrents, by Nora Roberts, followed by The Obsession. I did not include them in my Goodreads update because I’ve read them several time before so I figure they don’t really count

Goal For Next Week:
Continue making a little time to read every day.

GOAL REVIEW:

I may not have got any extra words yet, but I did get all my blog posts done. And they were all up on time. AND I didn’t have any super late nights to produce them.

I was pleasantly surprised when I opened up An Elemental Spirit. It wasn’t in quite as bad shape as I thought it was. It needs a new beginning, and because it was a NaNo novel it needs a lot of padding removed and more thoughtful, relevant detail added.

I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get the marketing form filled out. Nor did I make the time to check out the links they included. Part of the problem is, you need to recommend 5 books that are similar in theme/topic to a book you’ve written. Frankly, I try not to write a book that’s similar to anyone else’s, so that was a little hard for me. Anyway, they said I could put it off for 6 months, so that’s what I’m going to do.

I really need to get my act together and start working on one of the many courses I’ve paid for but never accessed. And I need to start figuring out the technical gadgets I have lying around. So much to learn, so little motivation to do so. *sigh*

I have to admit, the poetry form last week was a pretty easy one. And I’m running out of those, so I’m not going to get off that easy this week. Which means I’d better start it earlier.

Although I made some good progress on my afghan, I’m kind of at a stand still for the craft migration – I need a table and a couple of bins. And despite the stack of new books, when I’m feeling crappy I need some comfort reading.

At least it’s better than comfort eating.

The Pond - Part 21

It was fortunate that Nikolai was a born leader, because Izolda had ambitions where her husband was concerned. And though Nikolai was eager to start a family, she wished for comfort and security before she would allow that. Still, life was good to them.

At her urging they travelled west, claiming a large tract of forested land. In the years that followed, the name of Nikolai Antonovich became synonymous with luck and profit. Everything he touched seemed to turn to gold. He bought more and more land, Izolda having advised him that land was a security to their future.

Within five years of marrying Izolda, Nikolai had built a sawmill and a small community sprang up around it. Families settled nearby. Naturally, they looked to him as the leader.

“You are my good luck charm,” he told Izolda.

She smiled indulgently. If only he knew that luck had nothing to do with it. It was consulting the bones for guidance, and the judicious use of her magic. A suggestion here, a nudge there – they actually worked well together. She seldom had to use her magic on her husband. Clearly, they were meant to be.

As the wife of the headman she had her own share of responsibility. The women of the community often came to her for advice and a few recognized her as a ved’ma, a witch. Soon they were coming to her for other things as well, cures and potions and simple magics. Of course they had no idea of her true power. No one did. But they respected her nonetheless.

Nikolai built his wife a house, set back in a pretty piece of land surrounded by an old growth, mixed forest. There was a pond set back in the trees, that was perfect for cooling off in on hot summer days. Izolda was content, for the first time in her life.

When she became pregnant, Nikolai was overjoyed. He lavished her with gifts, not that she didn’t already have everything she needed. He hired a woman to help with the cooking and cleaning. He had delicacies brought in for her to dine on. And when their first born child was a boy, the whole village celebrated with them.

For Izolda, it was one of the happiest times of her life. The pregnancy was an easy one, as was the delivery. The baby was perfect, strong and healthy. But the night Mikhail was born, she began having nightmares.

At first they were formless, a sense of impending darkness that had her waking filled with dread. Gradually she began to see shapes – trees, the pond, a figure standing at the water’s edge. And always the same feeling of impending doom.

The bones, when she consulted them, told her nothing. The potion she drank to help her sleep did not prevent them. She was at her wit’s end when the dreams stopped as suddenly as they’d started.

But though the nightmares ended, she still could not shake the feeling of doom.

Cento Poetry Form

According to my research, the Cento, a type of found poem, originated in the 3rd or 4th century A.D. The name is a Latin word meaning patchwork, and like a patchwork quilt, the poem is made up from lines taken from other poems.

In other words, to create a Cento you take lines and phrases from the poems of other poets, and patchwork them together into a whole new poem. The pieces can be taken solely from one poet, or can be taken from several different poets.

There is no rhyme, unless you’re a glutton for punishment and ferret out lines that rhyme, and the rhythm depends on the lines you’re borrowing. You can use this form to showcase a particular poet, to make a statement, or to create a satire. The fragments used should be no longer than a line and a half, and no shorter than a half-line.

I found this example on Wikipedia, and couldn’t resist sharing it because there’s no way I can pull off a rhyming example myself. This one is by Dave Morice:

I only know she came and went, (Lowell)
Like troutlets in a pool; (Hood)
She was a phantom of delight, (Wordsworth)
And I was like a fool. (Eastman)

No, you do not have to cite the poet on each line, that’s just the way it appeared on Wikipedia. But you should keep track of your sources, giving credit where credit is due. For my first example, I used multiple sources, a line from each of the poems featured on the Writer’s Digest article, 10 Best Love Poems Ever! The second example I used only works from William Wordsworth.


How do I love thee,
when you are old?
Love alters not
whatever a sun will sing,
the sunbeam flaring.
Having looked too long upon the sun,
it will blind you with tears
in age after age, forever.
How softly Eros walked –
this place could be beautiful.


A sight so touching in its majesty
beside the lake, beneath the trees,
the elements of feeling and of thought,
have forfeited their ancient English dower
felt in the blood, and felt along the heart.
My heart leaps up when I behold
travellers in some shady haunt
apparelled in celestial light.
Old, unhappy, far-off things,
surprised by joy.

Writing With Purpose

You should write because you love the shape of stories and sentences and the creation of different words on a page. Writing comes from reading, and reading is the finest teacher of how to write.
— Annie Proulx

One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.
— Jack Kerouac

Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depth of your heart; confess to yourself you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.
― Rainer Maria Rilke

Sometimes looking for quotes for my Sunday posts can be a little frustrating. I know they’re out there, but finding them is a different story. And it doesn’t help when my favorite quote site now triggers the Windows Defender and then all kinds of warnings start up and I have to reboot my computer. But I digress.

One of the most common pieces of advice given to writers is to write every day. We all know this. But I find myself lately questioning this advice.

Last year I started out doing what I called a three-minute word every day. I’d pick a word at random and write whatever came into my head, triggered by that word, for three minutes. And I did it every day.

This kind of segued into an online serial called the Cave, but I was still writing every day. I would take the week’s worth of three-minute words and combine them into an installment, which I’d then post on Fridays. This lasted until the story was finished, after which I fell back into my old, sporadic writing habits.

A couple of years ago I did something similar, only I was picking a random prompt and writing from it. It was great for filling up my writing journal, but most of them weren’t real stories, not even flash ones. Which kind of brings me to my point.

What good comes of writing every day when it serves no real purpose?

The cave story will probably never see the light of day. Each daily segment was written around a random word, which took the story in some very weird directions. The prompt stories are really just snippets of stories with no real point. Meanwhile, I’d do these things and pat myself on the back for writing every day, and my real writing would be totally ignored.

It got me thinking, do other writers do this? I have to tell you, I feel like I’m kinda wasting my time on this stuff. Stephen King advises us to write every day, but I’m pretty sure when he writes it’s on an actual story or novel. Did Nora Roberts become so prolific by wasting her time with meaningless prompts and exercises? I’m betting she didn’t.

Ernest Hemmingway is quoted as saying: “When I am working on a book or a story I write every morning as soon after first light as possible.” But you notice that he specifies working on a book or a story. He doesn’t say anything about writing just for the sake of writing every day.

So is writing every day good advice, or bad advice?

While I don’t subscribe to the belief that you have to stick to a schedule where you write at the same time every day, I do think writing every day is a good idea, but it depends on what you write. If the writing serves no real purpose, what’s the point of it? Writing from a prompt or doing a writing exercise can get the creative juices flowing, but they’re only beneficial if they lead to other writing. – your book, a story, even something non-fiction.

So write every day, by all means. But write with purpose.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

It wasn’t a super busy week last week, but it was a very grey and dismal one. A continuation of the grey and dismal we’ve had since a couple of days after Christmas when the temperature started to go up and the rain started to come down.

I’m one of those people who don’t do very well without the sun. Over the last 10 or 11 days we’ve had a total of maybe 8 hours of sun. As the week progressed, I could feel my energy ebbing and my depression rising. My thoughts were scattered every whichway. And next week doesn’t seem too promising either – we’re scheduled for a whopping 12 hours of sun spread over the seven days, with two of those days at 1 hour, and two at 0 hours.

So needless to say, I didn’t get a whole lot done last week, especially writing. I started my poetry post days early, which is the only reason it got done. The serial post . . . I started it, ran out of steam, and never finished it. The good news is, there will be no problem finishing it for this week. And if we get some sun (which rumour has it we’re supposed to) I might even get an installment ahead.

NEW WORDS:
1958+431+269+0=2658
DOWN – 650 words from last week

Goals For Next Week:
Try to get my blog posts done earlier in the week.

EDITING:
0 pages
No editing. No thought of editing. No energy for it even if I had thought of it.

Goal For Next Week:
Start work on An Elemental Spirit.

MARKETING:
Not only did I not give my Amazon author’s page a passing thought, I didn’t get that promotion form finished, and I got a reminder from them. I have until the 15th to get it back to them or I have to wait another 6 months.

Goal For Next Week:
Get the book promotion form finished and sent in.

TECH & TRAINING:
No Dropbox, no external hard drive, no online classes. My brain was not functioning at a high enough capacity for any of that stuff. SAD sucks!

Goal For Next Week:
Start backing up files to Dropbox. Set up external hard drive. Check out online courses

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
Well, at least I did something right last week. I found a new form to share and started it a few days early, time I needed to get it done. But I made no inroads on my poemwork.

Goal For Next Week:
Share a new poetry form; work on my poemwork.

CRAFTING:
No crafting, but I’m just about finished the Great Craft Migration. While the weather was not conducive to getting anything creative done (things that required mental acuity), things that required physical energy were a tad easier.

I cleared most of the stuff from the large craft closet and moved it upstairs, and filled the former craft closet with stuff from the dining room so we could set up the cat tree. The cat tree was a genius idea – the kittens love it and have abandoned my lap for their tree, so I can’t use them as an excuse for not getting anything done any more.

Goal For Next Week:
Finish the craft migration and set up sewing table; work on the afghan.

WHAT I’M READING:
I finished Unnatural Creatures, a volume of stories selected by Neil Gaiman, and read Happenstance and Too Hot to Handle, by Tessa Bailey. I’ve just started Bad Girl Reputation, by Elle Kennedy and hopefully I can make it last more than a couple of days.

I also updated my Goodreads account with the three books I’ve read so far this year, and a goal of 50 in total. I have no idea how many I read last year, I believe I pledge to read 52, but stopped updating in May (at 29 books). I think it’s safe to say I surpassed my goal last year.

Goal For Next Week:
Continue making a little time to read every day.

GOAL REVIEW:

Well, I wasn’t just late with my serial installment last week, I missed it altogether. And sad to say I got no writing done, other that the remaining blog posts. The year is not off to an auspicious start.

I don’t know why it is, but I always start the new year with all these high expectations, but I started out late and then everything just seemed to go cattywampus.

I did start my new writing journal, but I didn’t like the new personal journal I ordered from Amazon, so I’m waiting for a new one from Chapters. I’m hoping to do a better job keeping up both of them this year.

I feel like 2022 is still hanging on. The Chinese Tiger just doesn’t want to let go. But on January 22 it will be the Year of the Rabbit. Perhaps it will be a kinder, gentler year for all

Dizain Poetry Form

Let’s start the new year off right with a brand new poetry form.

The Dizain comes to us from 15th century France, becoming popular later with the English poets. In Old French, the word dizain means tenth part, so as might be suspected, this is a ten line verse. It’s usually written in iambic pentameter and the ten lines are rhymed ababbccdcd.

Here’s the schematic:

xxxxxxxxxa
xxxxxxxxxb
xxxxxxxxxa
xxxxxxxxxb
xxxxxxxxxb
xxxxxxxxxc
xxxxxxxxxc
xxxxxxxxxd
xxxxxxxxxc
xxxxxxxxxd

An accepted variation of this verse is written with eight lines, written in iambic tetrameter (8 syllable lines), with a rhyme scheme of ababcdcd.

Though never as popular in the way that sonnets or ballads were, several well-known English poets, such as Philip Sidney and John Keats have used the traditional form. I have to admit, a few of the lines in my example have 11 syllables, but this is acceptable in iambic pentameter and it was necessary for the rhythm.


Hope Renewed

The New Year has started all fresh and clean –
new slate to write on and plans to be made
with pledges to fill and new dreams to dream –
the good and the bad have been carefully weighed,
the stress of the old year has started to fade.
We look to tomorrow with hope that is pure,
the New Year beckons to us with a lure
unsullied by failure, no sign of distress –
we choose our path wisely, feeling secure,
we inhale our hope and exhale the stress.

Happy New Year!

Most of us look forward to the start of a new year as a clean slate. We reflect on the past 12 months, take stock of where we are, and make new resolutions about how to improve in the coming year.
— Mazie Hirono

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any one thing.
— Abraham Lincoln

The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective.
― G.K. Chesterton

Just as Christmas caught me unawares, so too did New Years. In other words, I’m totally unprepared. Traditionally, the week between Christmas and New Years is spent tying up the loose ends of the old year and contemplating the ins and outs of the year to come. Unfortunately, I did neither of those things. I was still busy trying to catch up to Christmas.

But while I didn’t spend a whole lot of time navel gazing, and contemplating life, the universe, and everything, I did come up with a short list of things I’d like to focus on.

1. Start things
2. Finish things
3. Develop better writing habits
4. Take charge of my health.

1. Start things – I need to put on the big girl underpants and start marketing my work. What good are all these books and stories and poems if no one else ever gets to read them?

I need to start being more active promoting myself as well, which is much harder thing for an introvert like me to do. And I need to start learning more by taking advantage of the online classes I paid for but never used.

2. Finish things – this should go without saying, but it seems to be a problem for me. After six (I think) years, I finally finished Magical Mayhem, the final book in my Moonstone Chronicles, and it was a good feeling. And even though writing new stuff is a lot more fun, I need to start finishing all of the “almost there” books I’ve written for NaNoWriMo. I tend to get to my 50,000 words and then stop, whether the novel is finished or not.

First on the list will be An Elemental Spirit, which I wrote for NaNo three years ago. It’s one hot mess, but it’s a starting point. And it’s really only the first third that’s really bad, the rest of it is a little more cohesive.

I’ve also been all talk, no action when it comes to doing up a volume of my poetry. I’ve written hundreds of poems, surely there’s enough decent ones to fill book of verse. And what about my stories from last year’s NaNo when I did a story a day? Maybe it’s time for a proper anthology, rather than just a wire bound volume.

3. Develop better writing habits – this is something I think I include every year, and the resolution that seems to fizzle out the quickest. But when you think about it, it should be the one that’s easiest to achieve . . . if you have a little will power.

I need to write every day, which is basic advice. I started out strong last year doing the three-minute words, but that kind of petered out after I finished my cave story in the summer. By writing every day I don’t just mean fiction, I could include non-fiction as well. This could overlap with my first resolution of starting things, like an on-line course.

Another one of those writing habits to start is to write more in my office. I mean really, that’s what it’s there for. And while it would be nice to have regular office hours, that isn’t always practical, so maybe I need to have a set amount of time in my office, even if it’s a couple of hours in the morning and a couple of hours in the afternoon.

4. Take charge of my health – in this day and age, we all need to be more responsible for our health. When I was diagnosed with cancer two years ago, it wasn’t because the doctor figured it out, it was because I listened to my body and knew something was wrong.

I’m also type II diabetic, and a poor one at that. Which means, my blood sugar has been high for the last year. I joined a gym to get more exercise, but that only helps if I actually go, which I only did a handful of times in December. And it certainly doesn’t help when I keep eating stuff that I know is bad for me.

So not only do I need to up the exercise – maybe add in the weights or bike at home, or even go for a daily walk – I need to take a more active interest in what I’m eating. And I need to find healthier alternatives to some of the quick and easy meals I tend to gravitate to. And if I happen to lose a few pounds along the way, all the better.

So there you have it. Four little goals/resolutions to start the year out right.

Let’s see how long they last. :-)

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

Well . . . it was another busy week, starting with my car dying last Sunday (and having to wait until Wednesday to have someone look at it), and ending with the start of the great closet/drawer/shelf reorganization.

This week’s distractions were a back log of laundry, catching up on my journal (which I hadn’t touched since the beginning of the month), a visit from the granddaughter, baking a Scripture bread for my sister, driving to Hamilton to visit my sister, and another visit from the granddaughter.

I was super late with the serial post. I didn’t get it done ahead of time and the first chance I had to work on it was early afternoon on Friday. I really have to start working on it earlier in the week.

And I know I’ve always said that if we had snow at Christmas then it could be spring on New Year’s, but I didn’t really mean for Mother Nature to take it so literally. This time last week we were still under a winter storm warning because of the high winds, and this week we’re under a flood warning because of the warm temperatures and the amount of rain we’re getting.

Come to think of it, we’ve had rain for New Year’s the last couple of years, including the year we went to Niagara Falls to ring it in.

But when all is said and done, I don’t care. I got my white Christmas finally. That’s what really matters. :-D

NEW WORDS:
1523+697+339+750=3,309
UP – 148 words from last week

Goals For Next Week:
Try to get my blog posts done earlier in the week.

EDITING:
0 pages
I thought about many things last week, but editing was not one of them. I really need to get on with this though.

Goal For Next Week:
Start work on An Elemental Spirit.

MARKETING:
I made no inroads in making an Amazon page (to be honest, I forgot all about it), and I’m sure it’s easier than I think it is. Nor did I start filling out the paperwork to be included in the book promotion site. Bad Author!

Goal For Next Week:
Look into developing an author page on Amazon, work on the book promotion form.

TECH & TRAINING:
I did not look into doing anything with Dropbox. It keeps getting lost in the shuffle of the minutiae of life.

Goal For Next Week:
Start backing up files to Dropbox. Set up external hard drive.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
Once again I cheated on the poetry post last week by recycling an old poem. But if I hadn’t, you wouldn’t have had a poem at all. And it was from 12 years ago, so the chances are no one remembered it anyway.

I didn’t get a chance to start working on the poemwork for my poetry group, but I really need to get on with it.

Goal For Next Week:
Share a new poetry form; work on my poemwork.

CRAFTING:
No crafting, although the kittens had fun hiding toys in my crochet bag and then digging them out again. But I did start the Great Craft Migration, where I’m moving the craft supplies from the main floor hall closet to the double-wide closet in the spare bedroom so I can get to everything easier. So far I’ve filled the chest of drawers (that I moved into the closet last week) with supplies for Christmas crafts. This is going to make it much easier to start making my ornaments earlier in the season. Maybe even year round – a few at a time.

Goal For Next Week:
Continue working on the craft migration, work on the afghan.

WHAT I’M READING:
Read a couple more of the Christmas romance anthologies - One Starry Christmas, which included Stormwalker’s Woman, by Carolyn Davidson, Home For Christmas, by Carol Finch, and Hark the Harried Angels, by Lynna Banning; and Jingle All the Way, which included A Bright Red Ribbon, by Fern Michaels, The 24 Days of Christmas, by Linda Lael Miller, Santa Unwrapped, by Theresa Alan, and Maybe This Christmas by Jane Blackwood.

Goal For Next Week:
Continue making a little time to read every day.

GOAL REVIEW:

Once again I got all my blog posts done, although I was seriously late with my serial installment.

No editing, or marketing, or tech and training. I seriously need to carve out an hour each for these things. Even an hour a week would be better than I’m doing now.

And once again I cheated with my poetry form and you know what? I don’t care. I’m not saying I’m going to start recycling poems every week, and I actually did rewrite the post part for this form, but I’ve written so much poetry over the years that maybe I could get away with it once a week.

I did start the craft migration, you know, yesterday. It might go faster if I wasn’t reorganizing all my craft stuff at the same time. I bought a few smaller bins to go in the shelf of the spare bedroom closet, and they work great. And I used medium and large zip lock bags to keep all the loose stuff together. It’s really going to make things a lot easier.

But the problem with starting it, is that I have to finish it ASAP. I actually started it to make room in the old craft closet for the bins in the corner of the dining room where the cat tree I ordered from Amazon is going to go. It just kind of snowballed from there.

So . . . I have a busy week ahead, but it kind of fits in with my new motto: Finish what you start.

What’s your motto for 2023?