Friday, December 1, 2017

All Is Not Lost


December 2017 Blog
All Is Not Lost
Although the future is never guaranteed, at least the illusion of it appears with the possibilities of redemption.

Saving Grace: A Haiku

E’en as this year is
Weighed, found wanting, the next looms
On the horizon.


Besides surviving the year (so far), on my very short list of accomplishments in 2017 have been the posting of my daily Haiku daily and the posting of my monthly blog monthly.
     As 2018 looms, I feel the need to plan for a much brighter year with a far longer list of finished projects.
    Perhaps the new year will be my “year of the charts”. Maybe such visual reminders will help me focus. I might even get some of those tiny star stickers they used in schools to reward students for their good behavior. (We were such suckers for those little gold stars.)
    In addition to making charts and schedules this month for use next year, I need to finish the manuscript for this year’s NaNoWriMo ( https://nanowrimo.org ). I managed 54,000 plus words and another WriMo win. Now, during NaNoFiMo ( http://nanofimo.net ) I’ll write another 30,000 words for a good-sized novel I can edit in January and February for publication in the spring.
    Hopefully, 2018 will usher in a kinder, more gentle world, but I hold little hope for that. 2017 has seen an incredible amount of inhumanity among humans – both toward themselves and the other inhabitants of this Earth. Actually, we haven’t been very kind to the Earth itself, and Mother Nature has taken us to task for it.
    Climate change deniers aside, even believers are not doing enough to right the wrongs we are daily heaping upon an Earth that is nearing the tipping point. Once past that, it is my understanding that nothing we do will reverse the damage we have done.
    In my lifetime, the world has gone from the brightest of all possible futures to the bleakest of all scenarios – from unlimited riches available for all industrious peoples to a dystopia where there is no hope for the future of the world or its angry, angry populations.
    We have managed (in the span of seventy or so years) to send an Earth that has survived for millions of years into a tailspin that will leave it desolate and uninhabitable for any form of life. Thankfully, I will not live to witness its demise, but future generations (and not too distant future) will experience the ravages of the sun and the storms that we have only begun to feel.
    This is starting to sound like a dystopian novel. I’m starting to get an idea. I need another sequel to “The Chronicles of Acqueria”. I’m sure I can work in a lot of mayhem and destruction. After all, the not-so-dead volcano its inhabitants are sitting on has hinted at its own resurrection. I could have a few villains help it along.
    Oops, there’s that shiny object distracting me again. Gotta love all those shiny objects, but they do take a toll on my plans and objectives.
    I need to find a way to incorporate all my new shiny ideas into my charts, plans and schedules so I don’t have so many loose ends out there. I keep tripping over them. Then I fall down and have to start all over again.
    Distraction, thou art mine enemy. But really, where would a writer be without new ideas? I simply have to develop some discipline to keep progressing and actually finish some of these myriad projects I have started.
    So far, for next year, I can anticipate to continue my daily Haiku and look forward to publishing at least three collections of same.
    I also look forward to continuing my blogging on a regular basis. See, I have developed some sense of discipline. I must also release my darlings into the world and let them live lives of their own in the hearts and minds of my readers. My favorite people in the whole world. The people I love to share my ideas and my stories and characters with.
    I must remember that I write not only for myself, but for my readers, too.
    Oh wait, the characters in my head have just reminded me that I write for them – to give them life and being outside of myself. They are becoming very vocal. So before I’m accused of being schizophrenic, I better give them their own lives. There, that should keep me on track.
   But then, there’s…
  Until next month, I welcome your reactions and responses to my current blog. I love to hear from my readers. Also, here are links to my Twitter and Facebook accounts, if you care to share your thoughts with me there:



Wednesday, November 1, 2017

Write Away


November 2017 Blog
Write Away
Today is the first day of the rest of my writing life.
Write Away: A Haiku
NaNoWriMo reigns
Supreme, demands I fulfill
Declared prophesy.

Today is November 1, 2017 – the first day of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month – https://nanowrimo.org) for this year. I will be participating for my seventh year in a row – at least. Could be longer, but that’s as far back as their records go.  Every November since 2011, I have penned at least 50,000 words, literally, since I still write with pen on paper.
I’ve written an odd assortment of novels, some finished and published – some not. Actually 50,000 words is not enough for a full-length novel. So I try to finish in December for NoNoFiMo (National Novel Finishing Month – http://nanofimo.net).
There has even been a NaNoEdMo (National Novel Editing Month) in March. Not certain that one still exists as my attempts to access it give me an unsecure site warning and tells me I do not exist.
Writing 50,000 words in 30 days requires at least 1,667 words a day to finish on the 30th.  I try to finish by  November 28th , which is my birthday. Kind of like a present to myself.
I find it requires a good two-and-a-half hours of dedicated writing to accomplish. I seldom split the time up, because I don’t want to lose my train of thought and have to go over what I’ve written. I reserve that for the first few minutes of my writing session.
I pretty much isolate myself as I don’t like distractions. For background noise, I listen to classical music. I can’t have regular TV on or any music with lyrics I can understand – my mind will start to wander.
I love the idea of getting lost in my story. I find it’s the best way to write. Also, it gives my characters the chance to jump in and maybe tell me something about themselves I didn’t know.
     I usually start with an abbreviated outline of where the story should go, But I have no problems taking it elsewhere, if my characters tell me it needs to go there.
The year I wrote “The Chronicles of Acqueria: Blood Moon Treachery”, my main character, Sentia told me she had a younger sister, Petra. The sister became an integral part of the story and is featured in the sequel on which I am still working.
My favorite novel so far has been “The Seasons of Sam Rock”, a 1940’s  Hollywood detective novel that does not follow the detective genre rules, but becomes a horror showcase. In this noir novel set in sunny Southern California, I commit two of the novelist’s cardinal sin by killing a little old lady and a cute little dog. The culprits? A murder of ravens, controlled (or not) by a red-headed French woman named Marie Delacroix whom Sam Rock does not find hard to look at.
My favorite heinous killing come from my Western novella, “Black Oak: Town of Joy”. It’s a woman on woman axe murder, and I smile every time I read it.
Okay, so by now, you know I’m an introverted psychopath who loves to write horror, although I also write in the science fiction and fantasy segments of genre fiction.
This year’s NaNoWriMo will be a sequel to the Black Oak novel. If I stay on schedule, I should be able to publish in late spring. Although, the best laid plans of mice, men and writers oft gang awry. We’ll see if I can stick to that schedule.
Actually, I might be able to better it, since a novella can be around 43,000 to 50,000 words, so I might be able to publish early spring.
I find myself looking forward more to NaNoWriMo than to the holidays. I ‘ve never been much of a holiday person (any holiday) but writing in November is something special I do for myself, and of course, I love sharing my work with my loyal readers.
I will do my best post excerpts from the day’s writing on Twitter, so my readers can see what I’m up to. Maybe a sentence or two. Maybe every couple of days. Wouldn’t want to give too much away.
In the meantime, I will keep writing and posting my daily Haiku on Twitter and on Facebook, and I will endeavor to publish my next collection of Haiku before the end of the year.
Hopefully, with my computer problem behind me, I will get back into some sort of routine and start the New Year on a more productive note. Yep, I’ve pretty much chalked this year up on the non-productive side. I don’t know where it went; it just went, and I know there’s no do-overs for time gone by. It’s just gone.
So, here’s to NaNoWriMo and here’s to my mascot for the month.


And here’s a big salute to the coming year – a year of frenzied productivity.
Now y’all, don’t laugh too hard. It is possible, you know.
Until next month, I welcome your reactions and responses to my current blog. I love to hear from my readers. Also, here are links to my Twitter and Facebook accounts, if you care to share your thoughts with me there:



Sunday, October 1, 2017

Stagnation


October 2017 Blog

The year is now three-fourths over and I am dead in the water.

Stagnation: A Haiku
These feet, mired in the
Muddied waters of life, long
To dance on the air.

Stagnation: #WritersBlock and #LifeBlock

Only in forward movement is there life worth living. I should think on this more often. I’m certainly not living it.

It has been a year now since publishing my “Life's Lemons and Lemonade: A Collection of Haiku: Volume One: One for the Book” (http://tinyurl.com/zuayqu8).



I should have another novel out and at least two more Haiku collections. But I don’t.

And there’s no one to blame but me. I have fallen into the rut of living day to day and expecting there to be a tomorrow, even though I know there are no guarantees.


Maybe I’m thinking that if I keep living in expectation of tomorrow, it will always come. Now, I know I’m not that delusional, but it does lend a certain rationality to my behavior (or lack thereof).

Three-fourths of this year gone. One year since my last release date. An actual dead line staring me in the face, and a nap is the best thing each day I can look forward to. I need to find the energy or at least the fortitude to start cranking out some more works I’ve had in progress way too long.

There are three months left in the year.

I’d like to see the sequel to my paranormal western “Black Oak: Town of Joy” (http://tinyurl.com/hohuhce ) on the market.



The sequel is already written. All I have to do is the final edit, format it and hit publish.

I’d also like to see two more Haiku collections hit the market. They will take a little more work. I’ve got three subjects I’m currently gathering material for. One is on writing – hopefully with all kinds of helpful hints to overcome writer’s block or lend inspiration to writers who might need that extra boost I seem to constantly need.

The second one is about our Universe and this planet Earth that we are so badly using. It is to be called “Global Warning” and I hope it serves as such, although I fear it will be but another voice “crying-in-the-wilderness”.

Another is a collection of Haiku and other poetry to be called “Dark Horizons” – a compilation of the darker side of me, the side that is closer to Anne Sexton, Sylvia Plath and Virginia Woolf than even I care to admit.

Gee, talking about them almost makes me want to stop writing this and get to work on them, but then, I’ve left writing this blog to the last minute again, so I’d best keep at it. I would like to keep this year’s blog record intact. This will be my tenth month in a row to post it on time.

So I’ll keep writing this while I’m catching glimpses of the latest episode of the Ray Donovan show, which appears to be all about the right-to-die and/or assisted suicide.

I am surprised that they did this so openly. I don’t think it would have been possible to get it aired a few years ago – even on HBO. It is surely a topic that needs to be addressed. As morbid as it may seem, it is an important subject. Something that we need to legitimize along with all the other personal rights that should be a given by now. But these rights, it seems, we have to keep fighting for over and over again.

And while I’ve gotten off topic, why does the greatest nation on Earth still not have Universal Health Care?

Really, it’s one of those things I thought we’d have before I died, along with a woman’s right to choose, racial equality, and justice for all.

I guess some things will have to wait until my next incarnation.

Until then, I welcome your reactions and responses to my current rantings. I love to hear from my readers. Also, here are links to my Twitter and Facebook accounts, if you care to share your thoughts with me there:



Friday, September 1, 2017

Best Laid Plans


September 2017 Blog


Best Laid Plans: A Tale of Gross Procrastination


Okay, the year is two-thirds over. My only accomplishments so far are my daily Haiku writing and posting my monthly blog. (And that only barely).

Best Laid Plans: A Haiku
Having spent so long
On the dreaming, I must be
About the doing.


Time groweth short, and I’ve not nearly done enough for a person whose life is waning at an ever-more alarming rate with each passing day. Maybe it’s my way of defying the inevitable. If it is, I really don’t think it’s going to work.
Okay, so I haven’t died yet. Truth be told, I’m not even prepared to die. There’s so much more I need to do. My ducks are in total disarray – and that’s all of them – my writing ducks and my life ducks. They are scattered willy-nilly across the surface of an ever-shrinking pond. They aren’t even paddling anymore, they are just floating on the surface.
I have lost sight of the admonition to “Do what you need to do when you need to do it, whether you feel like it or not!” I don’t even remember where I heard that, but it stuck with me. Too bad I haven’t embraced it. I could be a prolific (if not best-selling) author and the person who (if she dies tomorrow) exits this earth leaving a plan behind.
Were I to write an autobiography or a memoir at this stage of life, it would be well-titled: “How Not To Live Your Life.” Maybe it could be a self-help book. I really, really know how not to do it. Not sure at this point I’m ever going to get it right.
I get the feeling that I can’t go on as I have been, knowing that if I do, I will rejoin the stars of the galaxies with my song unsong on this Earth – not even a footnote in the annals of time.
What do I do to recover (if I can)? I need to make lists – a plan for even such a limited future – without making the plan my goal and my only accomplishment. I must plan and I must execute it.
However, I have gone down this road before and gotten lost on it. I could go without the lists, but the older I get, the less that works. I even need lists to do the little things I need to do in a day. I forget a lot, or I get distracted by shiny objects.
The only thing it seems I don’t need a list for is to take a nap. I can do that at the drop of a hat or the sight of a soft place to snuggle up on. I think it’s the fault of my dogs. Seems I’m emulating them. They love to have me take naps with them. Not sure anymore who the bed belongs to. I think it’s theirs – at least I think they think so.
But even here I digress. Back to my lists. I need one to get all my daily, weekly, etc. mundane stuff done and I need one to get my writing, editing, publishing and promoting under control. Maybe a chart that I can check off with dates (if not deadlines) on it. Oh, and I need a decent filing system. Okay, I have one, but it doesn’t help if I say “I’ll file it later” and then never do.
Have I used the “P” word before? Procrastination? I am the High Queen of Procrastination. If there is a deader-than-deadline, I will push it. I’ve always been that way. Not sure I’m going to overcome that in this stage of my life, but I’ve got to find some kind of answer, some kind of work around.
I’m even discouraging myself writing this. I hope I’m not discouraging my readers. Not sure what I’m trying to accomplish here – maybe just think out the situation and see if I can come to some kind of answer. You know, it was a whole lot easier to effect change when I was younger and closer to the sharpest tack in the box.
My points and my will seem to have dulled a little over the years – either from disuse or (probably not) from overuse. So, it seems, I need to find a way to sharpen my wits and plunge ahead.
There’s still one-third of the year to go. Surely I can accomplish something more. Of course, there’s always next year… Wait! That’s not true! There are no more guarantees. Guess I better get that file out and start – like now!
Until then, I welcome your reactions and responses to my current rantings. I love to hear from my readers. Also, here are links to my Twitter and Facebook accounts, if you care to share your thoughts with me there:



Tuesday, August 1, 2017

Heatwave Still Goin' Strong


August 2017 Blog

Heatwave Still Goin' Strong

I'm still melting and about to go down the rabbit hole. Before I do, I need to accomplish something, so I've set a concrete goal:

Writer's Prayer: A Haiku
As words may fail me
At the hour of my death, let
Them speak for me now.

I will publish my second collection of Haiku (Life's Lemons and Lemonade: Volume Two: The Write Life) on September 1st.

That will be followed hard upon by the third volume – Global Warning (not a typo).

I will be spending a lot of time in front of the fan working on the formatting for the print version. Also this time, the Kindle edition will be properly formatted to retain line breaks and actually look like poetry. (I believe form is as important in poetry as content.)

At the same time, I'm still finishing the Sam Rock sequel manuscript, and I'll be editing the 2nd Black Oak novella.

Hopefully, the weather and my heatlh will cooperate.

It somehow always amazes me at the end of the month, that I have not reached my goals. It's time for that to stop.

Actually, I'm posting this late on the 1st of August because I almost forgot to write it.

So I guess I'm going to have to make lists and then actually look at them. There's just so much I want to accomplish before I can't accomplish anything anymore.

I frequently lose sight of the fact that I'm on the waning end of my life. The majority of my days are behind me and what days I have left are rushing past me at an alarming rate.

Another problem I face is that I'm not the sharpest tack in the box anymore. Technological advances are impossible for me to keep up with. So I guess I better get things done before I lose any more brain cells or social media passes me by completely.
I love my Facebook friends but I hardly know how to connect with them anymore. I spend way too much time on Twitter, but it is a little easier to work with (although they make changes and upgrades frequently).
I've got Instagram, Pinterest and other social media accounts also, but I have no idea what to do with them.
 In addition, I spend any more time on the computer, I won't have enough time to write. And my computer is already on life support. I have an external fan blowing on it this summer (don't tell me it isn't getting hotter out there).

As I write this, I'm listening to Al Gore on CNN talk about The Climate Crisis. He's much more intelligent and knowledgeable about this stuff than I ever realized.

I write many of my Haiku about climate change. I'm a firm believer, and I'd like to get my third Haiku collection about Global Warming out before the end of the year. I'd love to be able to change some reluctant minds with it. I'll be satisfied to persuade a few more people to entertain the idea that we need to do something about climate change now, before we reach the point of no return.

Haven't written much about the nuts and bolts of writing this month and for that I apologize.  My mind has been wandering in the heat. Hopefully the temperatures will subside so I can feel more like doing things and spend more time outside writing which is my very favorite thing to do in the whole world – that and watch the squirrels and the birds cavort in the trees. Amazing what you can learn about their habits. Squirrels do actually play. Some of them are braver than others. They build nest in trees, too. Almost grown boat-tailed grackles chirp their little heads off and wait to be fed by their daddies, even when they are grown enough to fend for themselves.

What a shame it would be to lose all this nature to climate change disaster.

Better type this up now and get it posted before my midnight. Next month, I plan to post my September blog and announce in it that my new Haiku book has been published.

Until then, I welcome your reactions and responses to my current rantings. I love to hear from my readers. Also, here are links to my Twitter and Facebook accounts, if you care to share your thoughts with me there:

https://www.facebook.com/ann.wilmerlasky

Saturday, July 1, 2017

We're Havin' a Heatwave!


July 2017 Blog

We're Havin' a Heatwave!

No shiny things this month, only dull, tarnished and rapidly deteriorating and draining things to distract me.

Disregard! A Haiku
The populace lights
Another scathing fire; the
World sweats its ice off.



This is the first day of the seventh month of the year. 2017 is already half over, and I am no where near completing my goals. I have been melting all mont.

The title could have easily have been the only line of my blog this month. It is so hot that I have an external fan blowing on my computer to keep it from overheating (which it has done on occasion).

It is so hot that I can't think straight. I'm even walking around the house with a towel on my shoulder so I can wipe away the sweat. We've broken several records – all over 100 degrees so far. May shatter last year's record. We'll see.

Not much has been written this month besides my daily Haiku. Too bad I'm not writing about drifting asea on that ice floe – maybe  that I could concentrate on.

I'd like to have a few words with "Climate Change Deniers" about now:

Are your brains melting? What about this planet Earth are you not understanding? In your heyday (when you lived in caves) the Earth was sparsely populated and the worst man could do was strike a fire and cook his dinner. (Which probably amazed his neighbor – whose basic response was to bop him over the head and enjoy the rest of the meat.

Now I understand the lifetime carbon footprint of one human on Earth is something like 900 tons. https://www.lavc.edu/gogreen/Carbon_Footprint_101.pdf  (Thank you, Bill Maher –  https://twitter.com/billmaher  –  who suggested we might want to reproduce less.) In addition, crime and war are rampant upon the entire planet. There is no innocent little hidey-hole anymore.

We are a hot, unhappy and for the most part hungry world, with no respite in sight.

Why am I even writing inane novels anyway? Why? Because I'm a writer and maybe my writing will bring someone a little joy. Maybe take them out of the real world for awhile and entertain them with some murder and mayhem that at least isn't real.

I've been pondering why I write mostly horror. That may be a big reason. Maybe if I capture it in a story, it will cease to exist in the real world. (Sorry, indulging in a little fantasy there).

Then, there's the idea that life itself is filled with horror, and it's been a long time since I've had a Pollyanna attitude about anything. I have difficulty writing the happy endings that so few of us know in real life.

We start dying from the moment we are born and the path from the cradle to the grave can be a devastating one. It is, I would garner, for over half the population of this Earth, and the rest of us are doing little to make it better for the least of us – which most of us seem to be becoming. (And that is a #Truth Bomb!)

I take issue with the people who say "It's all part of God's plan" and "Let go and let God..." People of Earth, if there is a God, he is either weeping for or laughing at the creatures he set upon this Earth as its stewards. We are not executing our stewardship very well. We have made an angry mess of this planet, and we will pay dearly for that and for our hubris – that we can do whatever we want and the Earth will heal itself.

That's not gonna work, my friends. Like the Wicked Witch of the West, we are melting – the diminishing ice cap is a symptom of our imminent demise. That is our curse, unless of course, we blow ourselves up simply because we can and must prove whose is the biggest.

"The biggest what?" you may ask. Well don't – I might tell you, then this will be an x-rated blog.

Okay, I'm two-thirds of the way through this blog now, and I feel so much better – for the moment. Soon I must get back to real life and shop for this month's supply of medications. It's amazing how, within the last six months, (since Trump took office, I might add) the pharmaceutical companies have raised the prices again and again and again and… It's exhausting, just checking online for the best prices you can find, and some so those are astronomical. By the way- Kudos to GoodRx –   https://www.goodrx.com/ for providing an amazing service to people who can no longer afford to simply go their local pharmacy and expect their meds to be reasonably priced. I hope they are making money for the service they provide (Good RX that is) because they certainly deserve it.

Thank you, my friends – writers and readers – for allowing me this opportunity to share with you some of the trials of life a writer deals with, besides not writing. Not certain what next month's blog will bring. Hopefully, good news of the pending release of my next two Chapbooks of Haiku – on life and on writing .

Until then, I welcome your reactions and responses to my current rantings. I love to hear from my readers. Also, here are links to my Twitter and Facebook accounts, if you care to share your thoughts with me there: