Short Stories | Order of the Good Write

‘Hitting Water: A Book of Stories” to be published December 2014

Happy Sunday ‘Good Write’ readers!

The final proofs are in! My forthcoming book “Hitting Water” is finished and ready for publication. It looks amazing! I’m so proud of these short stories about the brevity of life and how we embrace the people – flawed and all – who enter it. It’s a small book, but it packs a punch.

Maybe you are a writer and can’t find the time to write. Are you a writer who feels they have a book in them? Do you have a day job that takes up your time, yet makes you feel too exhausted at the end of the day to sit and write? That was me. I was the person who always wrote articles on blogs and hoped to have someone notice my work and give me a publishing deal. I’m one of many who felt they had a novel in them, but pushed it aside out of fear. Laziness, perhaps – but in essence, Laziness equals Fear. But I learned it doesn’t work that way. So, there I was, a writer who didn’t write. A writer with a day job in the media that was really dead end, where I would just go home, go to sleep and wake up again to a job that wasn’t even paying bills. You become dead after a while. However, to be fair, I work at a film/television studio in Los Angeles. I’m so lucky because my bosses are fine with me writing when I have down time, Yet, there are busy days where I steal away during lunch to write, or create notes after work for the next day. You do what you can. It’s so satisfying to accomplish the goal a little every day. Then when you see writers publish books or get an article in The New Yorker, you’ll no longer feel the creeping icky feeling of jealousy, like I did. You’ll no longer feel anger because you know you can write, but don’t even try – because now – you are trying. You’re a writer writing! Best feeling in the world!

How did I get out of my writer’s funk? After having a major medical ordeal that made me re-think my life, I felt that 2014 was going to be different. This was the first year where I made a New Years resolution and stuck with it. I would write at least 500 – 1000 words each day. And I did it. I did it because I was tried of relying on a corporate job to allow me to exist. I was tired of letting my personal ability to create go to waste when I knew I could make it into something real. I don’t expect to be a millionaire here, but I don’t expect anything really. Who knows? How exciting to stimulate the universe and generate the energy flow toward a goal. How exciting to see where it will take me!

But this book? I just know this is the first step in the right direction toward creating something to inspire others to feel a little, to write a little to find a way to self publish a little. “Hitting Water” is me, planting my stake in the world of written word to say – HERE I AM. This is the first of many books I have in the works. “Hitting Water” is my debut.

I hope “Hitting Water” will inspire people like me, who didn’t think they could ever get their writing in gear and publish – even self publish – to get down to business and do it. It can be fun! It’s daydreaming made real! You place yourself in imaginary worlds that come from you, allowing others to read and share your vision. I love that. I hope others with aspirations to see their writing materialize will be inspired by this book and the writer behind it. “Hitting Water”may not change the world (yet), but it’s changing mine in so many ways.

I’ll be uploading the final version of the completed cover this week, prompting Amazon to provide me with a publishing date. “Hitting Water” will also be on Kindle as well. So, watch this space for the official release date.

The way things are going, it looks like the book may come out on the week of my birthday. What a lovely thing!!

“Hitting the Water: A Book of Stories” hitting Amazon, November 2014.

This has been a very strange week. A rash of lay offs at work has made the energy a bit strange. I’m standing secure, on dry land, while a few of my colleagues set sail for new adventures – thanks to a pink slip. I’ve only worked at my current day job a year and a half; yet, saying goodbye to people whom I’ve only known a short time has affected me more than I thought. I’m used to changes and moving on. I’ve said goodbye to so many people in my life that I’ve grown detached at the thought of goodbyes. Besides, the entertainment industry is a small one. We’ll all meet again.

This week has also been slightly stressful (in a good way) on a personal level. My book of short stories entitled Hitting the Water is finally developing as an actual, tangible book! As I pull together the final editorial touches before sending it off to my editor, I’m feeling drawn and quartered by all the work that goes into the self publishing empire I plan to create in order to rule the world!

Kidding. I plan on publishing my work so I can express the human condition, perhaps inspire others to lend a voice to the human race by encouraging them to self publish their work as well – or to even make them pursue their own destiny. So many of us have families and lives to support, that we tend to get lost in the day to day work grind. Some people are lucky – their forty hour a week job is a daily pleasure. For most of us, we end up losing sight of our dreams in the name of the dollar. We tend to banish our talents and aspirations as a fruitless journey, impractical, something to do when we retire. So, we end up going through life in a hamster wheel routine until one day we look at ourselves and do a David Byrne:

“Well? How did I get here?”

Four years ago, I saw my parents live out the rest of their days in a nursing home. During my lifetime – the chapter in their lives when I came into picture – they seemed to live unconsciously, waking up from time to time to live out their passions in music and travel, but only to fall back asleep into the day to day comfort zone. They were wrapped up in survival, keeping a roof over our heads, food on the table, and giving me a better life than they had as children. For that, I’m forever grateful. It’s in their death, that I see a life I need to honor. They gave me the world, yet throughout my adulthood, I took life for granted – living unconsciously in the name of a pay check and health insurance. I never found a husband, and never had children — so I am free to live, to honor life, to understand death, and in some way — to live fearlessly. In doing that – I’m thanking my parents for everything.

After so many years of dreaming of writing a book – I finally doing it. I’m writing. Seriously. Everyday – like it’s a job – because it is – or at least – will be officially soon. At the start of 2014, I challenged myself to write at least 1000 words everyday. As each successful (and not so successful) day turned into one story after another – ideas flowed forth like a river. It was awesome. Not only did I have a deep long list of short stories and essays – I also laid a ground work of projects to come. It’s profoundly gratifying. Something I never feel when I answer a phone or take a message for the boss. I’m still writing everyday, planning ideas, laying down outlines for books – and – touching up Hitting the Water. The writing is ongoing.

Hitting the Water is a nice, short read. The stories touch upon mental confusion, absence and loss. Perhaps there’s a bit of life affirmation within the sentences. I’m hoping people will find it touching. As I select my cover photo (which you partially see in the featured image to this post), have the interior formatted, have the marketing elements in place, get the copyright and all the legalities done – I’m lost in words, ideas, thoughts and generally just – freaking out.

I’m freaking out that I’m actually creating something. It’s the first step toward a new journey.

And on this Friday of a week where the axe has fallen at work – I could use a nice, stiff martini.