October has arrived with insistence, and yet summer fights to hang on. Sound familiar? Letting go? Or trying to? Relationships, friendships, like nature itself—the trees, the flowers, the plants-- all have their seasons. Some come back. Others fall away into something else. And some become memories.

When traveling recently, I looked down from the plane onto cities and vast expanses of land, and I wondered just what makes us think so much. What makes us worry so much. Are we really anything more than anything else? Do we have a soul? Are we mere energy? You know, the standard crap that makes us human and keeps us up at night, thinking and worrying and contemplating. Sometimes, I wonder why we can’t just live, instead of hurting each other, insulting each other. Our insecurities are larger than anything below the sky, and we’re so infinitesimally small, aren’t we?
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I also realized that some people are small in other ways too. Their insecurity is so high, they must belittle others who are just trying to live their best life. If this is all we have, this one life, wouldn’t it behoove us to treat each other better? But it’s hard if we feel poorly about ourselves. When I see someone trying to stomp on others—their creativity, their voice—I realize: They are projecting. They are projecting their self-worth onto others. So when someone tries to trample your spirit, it’s because they haven’t found their own. They are the leaf that falls before it had time to discover the meaning of their own lives. They wrinkle too soon…for “whenever men are right they are not young.”
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Let me be young and wrong, then, and give me a world of Octobers of letting go of all that weighs me down to an early death. It’s not that we won’t die. It’s that we have to decide to live first. And blossom. Our own way. In bright, beautiful colors. Step outside of the square. Do your own dance. Twirl like a leaf in October wind. And smile, knowing, you’ve discovered, you can leave the trees that try to fixate you to a spot you don’t want to be. Be red. Or orange. Or yellow. But never be what someone else has said you must be when a world of Octobers exist. 

We all have flaws, perceived or otherwise, that have plagued us since youth. Or at least we just simply always remember worrying about them. I’m not smart enough. Or my legs aren’t long enough or I’m too introverted. Whatever it may be, it is something that probably weighs us down.

Where did it come from? Did you wake up one morning and simply think it or feel it? Or most likely, did it stem from something someone said once. Maybe we remember EXACTLY when it started, the exact moment someone said something that stuck with us. Or maybe we’ve blocked it out, and just somehow think it’s some universal, unconnected truth that just is, as if it’s a fact.
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I’ve written about my legs before. I can remember an exact moment in a car when I was about 13. I was squished in with a few friends coming back from the movies, my brother driving us. It was summer and hot and we all had shorts on and windows down. I looked to the left to one of my best friends, her leg pressed against mine, and I had two thoughts, thoughts that always seem to pop into my mind, like it was yesterday. One was that her leg was so much skinnier than mine. I couldn’t stop looking at it. The second was how tan hers was next to mine. I felt pasty and unattractive and what probably really makes this memory stick is that my brother commented on it. That my legs were too big for us to pile in the back and all fit. He never said fat. They weren’t. They were just—bigger. Muscular. And too short. Always too short.

And it makes me wonder: Does everyone feel that? Do even the most happy, the one most smiling, the one who seems to have it all, feel those things too? I never thought about it much until I was older, until I actually spoke to my brother about such things, him aghast that such a small comment that, to him, meant nothing but a silly joke, could leave such a lasting impression on my psyche. Because to him, it was such a non-issue; to him, in some strange way, he was complimenting me on my hard work.
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I think the things that stick with us the longest or the most come from people we love or trust who let us down. I often wonder, had a stranger said that if I would have given it two thoughts. Maybe. Maybe not. But it’s the people closest to us that can hurt us the most. In love. In friendship. Anyone we let in. And maybe that’s why it’s easier to keep people at a distance. The rocks of words can’t hit as hard far away. But up close, they can leave scars. 

In case you don't follow me on social media and missed my Facebook post, I'm sharing it here as well...
Out of the blue, I lost my best friend and PA. I'm not sure where I'll go from here...

It’s taken me a day to get over the shock of my beautiful friend and PA’s death and write something myself. I’m still in shock. Words just can’t express the overwhelming sadness I feel. 

Mandi Calder was not only my PA, she was my sister by choice. There wasn’t a day we didn’t speak, except for rare vacations or days where we’d shut down to recharge. She did so much for me as a PA—just because she wanted to, not because she had to. She shared my work daily into groups before I’d even be out of bed, she ran the NuR Twitter feed, and she found the most beautiful ballet images for me. She had my back. She was my springboard for ideas. She kept me organized. She let me vent. She made me laugh. She made me feel special. But mostly, she kept me from not giving up. Her motto was always: “Positive thinking, hunni,” especially when I needed to hear it most. That was her. Without thought or obligation. She was just…kind. And giving…and smart! God. She was so smart. And I can say that we told each other we loved each other often. For that, I have no regrets. She knew. And I knew.
I hear her now. As I write this. “Positive thinking…” And I’m really trying to listen. It’s just almost impossible to wrap my mind around the idea that she’s gone. That she was taken from us so young. And I don’t think I can make sense of it. Not now. Maybe not ever. So if I’m quiet for a while, it’s because I don’t know of any other way to be. Even my tears are quiet. I keep wondering if they’ll stop. And I’m not sure, exactly, how I see my future here or in the writing or publishing community without her. She’s been with me from the start. I've never known a writing life without her.

She was and IS a beautiful soul. So I’ll remember that. I’ll feel that. I’ll feel her soul. And let it guide me, bit by bit. Day by day. Because a soul like hers, doesn’t die.

Saying goodbye to someone or something you love is never easy. But it happens all the time in life. It doesn’t mean the love is gone. It just means it has changed or morphed or outgrown a heart’s size for myriad reasons. And for now, I am saying goodbye to something I love.

It is with a heavy heart that I am closing The Nu Romantics’ Facebook group. It doesn’t mean The Nu Romantics are completely disappearing. Not now. Maybe not ever. But there are reasons why I no longer could put all my time into supporting a group at the expense of myself. It sounds selfish saying that out loud, but if there’s one thing I’ve been taught from writing—writing of ANY kind-- is that when we stop being honest, we have nothing to say that’s meaningful.

I put my heart and soul into creating a group for writers and readers to come to explore and grow in a safe place. It was a place I got to fulfill so many of my creative urges. For anyone who knows me, they’ll tell you, my mind rarely shuts down. There is a creative side to me that’s almost a monster, gnawing at me, sometimes so voraciously, I completely lose myself. I’m constantly stopping to takes notes of ideas, writing, creating…and sadly, second guessing. I think a lot of us are like that. I’m not the exception.

Without getting into too many details, I don’t think people realize the extent of work that goes into making a really successful group, and I’m not a half-assed person, about anything, a curse and a blessing. Some do realize it. Some joined us on the administration staff, only to realize how much work and dedication was required. At the expense of my own work and projects, I continuously put NuR first. Trying new things. Inventing new posts to engage people in an almost 1000-person group by its end.

But I found when it came time for reciprocation, it just wasn’t there in the way I always dreamed. We, and our incredibly industrious PAs, were sharing and making graphics for people across all social platforms and commenting and encouraging people’s writing daily. We published two anthologies with no monetary compensation up front—collecting, editing, creating covers, editing, making graphics, editing (have I said editing?), and promoting and promoting and promoting. But The NuR family often remained silent during these times and the support only seemed to consist of a handful of people who really seemed to care or support those endeavors or understand the time and effort that goes into such things. To those people who were always there supporting the people in the group, and there are many, you are always a part of me and my growth and everyone else. And I thank you. You have marked me in the best possible way for life.

That may sound bitter. It’s not. Please don’t take it that way. It’s a reality. NO ONE HAS MORE THAN 24 hours a day, that includes me and other admins. It’s not that people didn’t want to support (at least I hope so), it’s that none of us has that kind of time. We have lives. We have friends. We have families. We have lovers. We have full-time jobs. We write full-time too. A third full-time job? How? And yet, we admins were often expected to find time to support everyone all the time and when we didn’t, our inboxes would sometimes let us know.
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So after months of debating and fighting with myself, it was time to take a break. I want to be creative. I want time to write. I want to support others. I, too, want support. And so starts a new chapter of how to balance the idea of success with that of support, especially when I have new releases or takeovers, how to balance creativity and time, and how to balance expectations with reality. The state of affairs in the world right now, especially in the US, won’t allow me to live on some cloud in the sky anymore. There is shit to be done. Work to do. And until someone devises a way to make more than 24-hours in a day, the reallocation of priorities is mandatory. Goodbye isn’t a word. It’s a feeling. And sometimes, goodbye feels right, but it’s never without sadness.

There’s been a bit of…hmmmm…I’m not really sure what to call it. Nastiness? Drama? Controversy? Whatever you call it, I’m not being a part of it. Perhaps you’re wondering what I’m talking about? And I took a long time today deciding whether or not I should write about it. Am I just adding fire to the flames by writing my whole response this way? I don’t think so. I have every right to voice my opinion. And I believe there needs to be more support in the indie community rather than in-fighting. I'm tired of it.

Let me say this: If you’re an author/writer/poet, and you think putting down other authors publicly is fun, or you think you’re one hundred times better than other writers, or you can’t have a conversation or healthy debate about writing but turn to name-calling or worse, have others do it for you, I’m out. I’m not here to do that. I’m here to raise and lift others, write, share my work, and celebrate the written word with readers and fellow authors. If I don’t like another author’s writing, that’s that. I don’t read it. Or support it much or at all. (If it is abuse or something nefarious, that is different. I’m not talking about that.)

And if you enjoy being involved with authors who do that as a reader or as their fan club, and if I see you being a part of that or a leader of it, jumping on a bandwagon to verbally assault other authors, I’m out of there too.

No one likes dishonesty or being fed a crockpot of lies. No one. But in this indie community, if readers can’t figure that out for themselves, it’s not my job to take care of it. That shit takes care of itself. Watching authors act like petulant and jealous competitors is not my jam. I like to stick with those who support others vying for a chance. I like the underdogs. I love the indie community and the authors I’ve met along the way with the same mentality. I have too much going on in my flesh and blood life to worry about people typing anonymously behind a screen, suddenly so brave, who believe it’s okay to attack and ridicule others. If we can’t have a conversation like adults, if you’re here to make waves to sell books, good luck drowning. I won’t be there to lend a preserver. I’ll be long gone by then.
 
Peace.
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I have written ad nauseam about intuition and my love/hate relationship with it. I like to think it’s not my intuition that rules my actions or thoughts but my background in research. If I follow the crumbs, they lead to the bread from whence it came. But what is it that started you on the trail in the first place? What makes the crumbs so readily available to me or you or anyone else? Why are we looking for them? For more times than not, they’re not there without our pursuit.

Sometimes we call it a hunch. But again, those “hunches” come from previous experiences we’ve had, right? And oftentimes, it’s the people who burn us or betray us or let us down that stick. For all the love we may have or had, all the loyal friendships, all the good reaped upon us always seems to be overshadowed by the bad. That one experience of broken trust, for instance, is the one experience that makes us cautious, tip-toe into another relationship, slow down our chance at trust. And if it happens more than once? Well, it’s easier to think anything good will soon turn sour. Given the right amount of time, most people disappoint us.
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I don’t like thinking this way. But call it what you will—a hunch, past experiences, intuition, common sense—if we ignore the crumbs, we’ll fooling ourselves. How many times have all the signs added up and we’ve tried to explain them away, not daring or wanting to believe them? Going to that extreme isn’t good. That is a live-with-your-head-in-the-sand kind of existence. No one wants to live the buffoon. But what if you’re the opposite? What if your lack of trust is so strong, you often go searching for the crumbs, crumbs that may not even be there? A sort of paranoia? Again, an extreme. Both lead to a sense of out-of-control mania, even obsession. Blind trust vs. no trust? Both, in my opinion, are bad. And many of us fall into one camp or the other.

The thing is, when you don’t trust, and you start looking, and you start to see something, then what? What if a friend sees it for you? Or vice versa, you see it for a friend? What then? Communicate? Go straight to the person? Ask them? Well, sure, you could…except if you’re this kind of person, you won’t trust their answer anyway, and search will continue, the pursuit ever stronger. And sometimes (okay, who am I kidding—OFTENTIMES), I’ve found myself to be this kind of person. I follow. I research. And when and if I find the conclusive evidence, then I communicate. Or perhaps you may call it confront. I wait. Then watch them lie. Then I’m done. Because I know.

I’m not happy that life has been a series of events or people or experiences that have molded me to be this way. I’m working on it. Being in healthy relationships helps. But I’ll be damned if I’m the last one to know that I’m being fooled.

And even writing this, it feels like a pride thing, maybe even that paranoia. “No one is going to pull the wool over my eyes. No sir-ee!” Or--"Ha! I knew it! Caught you, ya bastard!"

Perhaps the real answer is to get to a place where you love yourself enough to love others fully and with trust. Because really, it says more about you than it does about them when you’re always looking for disaster or dishonesty. Life will be a series of disappointments. People lie. And it won’t be the last time they lie to you.

​The question is: Do you think that is reason enough to never open yourself up to another human being? Maybe. Maybe not. So that is why loving yourself makes it all worthwhile, doesn’t it? For if you must say goodbye to someone you love, you’re never alone. ​

Do you ever feel like you don't exist? Like you don't matter? It hurts, doesn't it? 

Today, I share my thoughts from a few recent trips I took and an event that happened. As I traipsed the city of Minneapolis a few weeks ago, going out to different parts, exploring as I often do, the scooter my best friend, I realized how the United States has failed and continues to fail on the issue of homelessness. Some cities seem to hide it better than others, painting a false perception with a simple police baton, or some, like Portland, go in the opposite direction, even embracing it as a separate subculture. It's no secret we have a serious issue here, so I won't bore you on what we already know. That we need change. That we need more social programs. That we need governments who make it a priority. That we NEED. But in NYC a couple weeks ago, the problem was even more prominent. And I still wake up some nights with that sinking feeling that we must to do better.

But this woman wasn't being ignored. Instead, people cared. They cared, not about her, but about her cat. That was the sticking point. I heard murmurs: 'OMG. That poor cat.' And yup, stupid me, I started to cry. Maybe I was exhausted. Maybe I was hormonal. But the point is, no one cared about her. She wasn't important. But her cat? Her cat was important.

And the hardest part of all this reflection is that while food and hunger and shelter and all that is vital, it's the emotional part that keeps us living. I know. I have a dog that wasn't supposed to live through a week and with love and care, is going on 14! And I also know first-hand what being ignored feels like. It's awful. It kills self esteem. It can make us have moments of the darkness of feelings, of self-loathing. Imagine that feeling every day? Now imagine that feeling times 50 or 100 or 1000. Imagine being ignored by EVERYONE. Every. Single. Day. 

Yes, America. We MUST to do better. ​

It's funny. My dad always loved that song from Fiddler on the Roof, maybe one of the earliest memories I have of musicals, a love of mine. And though I often hear people talk about the sunset and all its beauty, I rarely hear people talk about the sunrise. So today, I want to talk about the sunrise, something I haven't witnessed in a very long time. 

When I was younger and camping with my family, my dad loved to wake us up wherever we were to see the sunrise. He'd poke my brother and me, and we'd begrudgingly crawl out from under the warmth of our sleeping bags, remove the pillows from our faces that blocked the very sun we were about to revere, and either walk, or scramble into the car, to go see the sunrise at some ungodly hour before 6 am. As I grew into a teenager, I often "passed," my dad going it alone, decreeing: You only live once.

After he passed, I often warmed at the thought of all those years ago, the thermos held tightly in my tiny hands full of the coffee he'd make I couldn't drink but loved to smell like I loved to smell his Old Spice. And this morning, I felt myself right back there.

Have you heard people use the term “love of my life”? Have you used it? And what is it really? What constitutes using that phrase? Can it happen more than once and therefore, an overused, trite phrase? Is it really “love of my life right now”? Or worse, do you only know that because it was someone you let get away? Someone you wish you hadn’t? Or have you yet to meet the “love of your life,” and are you still waiting?

To me, this means someone you love wholly. Someone you don’t want to change, and someone who doesn’t want to change you in any way. It’s that someone who fulfills you--emotionally, sexually, intellectually. That person who makes you laugh. Who “gets” you. Who finds you beautiful even when you know you’re not. It’s acceptance. It’s that someone who makes you love yourself, even when it’s very hard to do. It’s someone who looks into you, at your scars, both figuratively and literally, and loves you anyway. And it’s symbiotic.

To me, it doesn’t mean a perfect love or a love that is superficial. It is deep, fulfilling. It is a love that challenges you on occasion. A love that is passionate. A love that transcends anything you’ve ever felt before. It’s poetry really. It’s beauty but not in a physical sense. Not at all. It’s about souls connecting in another dimension of living. It makes you feel as if you weren’t living before. And it’s never jealous.
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Is this “love of my life” real? Fleeting? Just another romantic fantasy? For those of us who have been there, it’s the very reason for existence. 

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
E.E. Cummings

Friendship, true friendship, is rare. Can you find it even with people you haven’t met in real life? Do you have friends online that you feel closer to than some in your physical world? And if so, do you think there’s something wrong with that? That there is something wrong with you? Must you be with someone in the flesh, in the real “touching” world to be close to them? To have a real relationship?

I used to think I had the answers to those questions. But I don’t. I have a life outside of online social media. A full life. Sometimes too full to be honest. But this online life of mine feels every much as real. Am I fooling myself? Is this as fleeting as the online internet provider’s connection?

When I lost my aunt in December, my cousins asked me to rifle through pictures to see what I had, and it reminded me of so many things. There is something lost now, isn’t there? With our phones and our i-pads and our video capacity. We seem to lose so much, and one would think it would be the opposite, but it really isn’t. There is something special about those old photographs, much like old letters or postcards we’ve kept over the years. There’s something about holding them in our hands, touching them, running our fingers across the front, flipping them over to read the back, see the year, maybe the place. My mother was forever marking up those photographs. And everything looks so…I don’t know, pretty and nostalgic, especially when in black and white, like some of my mom’s baby pictures or first communion I came across. They somehow feel alive. They feel as if they're breathing right there next to us.
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The same is true of old letters or writing. There really is nothing that can replace handwriting. I remember holding Emily Dickinson’s work once in the basement annex of Amherst College, wearing gloves, being watched as if I might steal them. Smart. I wanted to. I regret the love letters I tossed or the notes from friends during class. I had a best friend and she and I wrote old-fashioned letters to one another in middle school, professing our “friends forever” in black-ink promises, only to be tossed as I moved or aged. Not enough space. Oh, the regret!

A new study I read recently stated that this generation (is that me?) is losing living in the moment. That everyone is so Instagram-ized, trying to take the best pictures possible – oh, look at me eating this; or oh, I just saw this magnificent sunset; or oh, look at my dog being silly—that we’re no longer really living in the moment, or even enjoying it, or even REMEMBERING IT at all later, but instead, living for the moment to take a damn picture. How sad if that’s true! What will become of our memories or experiences if we’re so hung up on taking the picture, not for ourselves, but instead for someone else to say: Oh, isn’t Rosemary the coolest cat ever?  

When I came across some of the pictures, it reminded, too, of my childhood and a scene in Edge of Torment I took from my own life, where Patricia, Annabelle’s best friend, has displayed a photograph of the two of them at Patricia's brother Billy’s wedding. It’s two best friends in a pool wearing funky glasses, and I remember exactly the moment I stole the idea from. It was with my cousin, my favorite cousin still to this day, and at the service, I asked her if she too remembered those days in the back yard at 4 or 5 or if the memory was only because of that picture. She remembered it just as I had and, though sad at where we were presently, we smiled and laughed and hugged, poured some wine afterwards, and sat down to reminiscence. That’s what photographs do for us. And I’m grateful I still have boxes upon boxes of them even if I’ve lost so many of the people in them. They are engraved somewhere inside my heart’s mind, far from being lost. And that brought me comfort.

​Today I am admitting something: I am not perfect. Not. Even. Close. Ha! Not so much a revelation, huh? Feel cheated? Tricked? Well, I have another confession. And I hope we’re still friends after it. I’m about to do something I thought I’d never do, that I thought was silly and trivial and narcissistic. And here I am. About to do it.

“What?” you may be asking? You sitting down? I’m about to bite the bullet and go to a salon with one of my besties to get…No. Not fake boobs. Not Botox. Or something similarly appalling. But something else unspeakable...fake eyelashes! Why? Good question. And I’ll try to answer without seeming like…a boob myself!
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As a Christmas gift, I got a gift card to my favorite salon, filled with all kinds of goodies from facials to massages and to now, it seems, fake eyelashes! I’ve secretly always wanted to try them. But thought: I am not that superficial. Who does something like this? And here I am, about to take the plunge. Tress up my eyes. Ditch mascara, maybe for an eternity!
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We all have our insecurities. Right? Who among us REALLY likes the way we look. There are certain things I will just never like about myself—the length of my legs, the way I overthink things, the way my two front teeth seem to come out maybe a little too far, how much smarter my brother is than me…and… I could go on, but you get the idea.

But my eyes have never been one of them. I don’t mind them. I like the way they change color. I like that I have 20/20 vision (even though I occasionally wear fake glasses. Dear god. I’m a mess!). So why the eyelashes?

Well, why the hell not? That’s the best answer I can give! I've got nothing profound here. 
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I work hard for a living. I earn my own money. And as I age, I find it harder and harder to find anything that doesn’t irritate my skin, mascara or eye liner often one of them. So why the hell not? It might be fun. I might have more confidence. Maybe I’ll become less shy. Maybe I’ll feel, for just a moment, that I am glamorous, that maybe, I’ll blink my eyes and feel the weight of luxurious eye lashes against my skin, and for once, become comfortable in my own skin.

Highly unlikely. But at the very least, it will remind me never to judge why people might do what they do, cosmetically or otherwise. It’s not my business or for me to decide. Sometimes, we just feel the need to try something new, have an adventure, crawl out of our comfort zones to find the comfort and acceptance we all crave. And this 2019, I’m no longer going to worry about what other people think of me or my choices, or question why I have the urges I do, but instead, sit back, and say: Damn it. That was fun. And then maybe wink with the best damn eyelashes a girl could ask for! ;) ​

~Robert Frost

We talk of New Year resolutions this time of year, something we use for fresh starts, new outlooks, and perhaps ways to organize our lives, reflect on what is working and what isn’t. No life is perfect, and sometimes it can feel as if it’s spinning out of control. The start of a new year gives us hope. Hope to right the rails, hope to plod through the storm, hope that we will take our lives back. I’m fortunate that I get a long vacation this time of year after the madness peaks and explodes. I am never a rash person. And I never make decisions under duress. Ever. When things settle, so do I, and I think. And this year will be a particularly pensive one, especially when it comes to writing.

This year I will rethink my journey. I’ve traveled near and far all at the same time. I’ve written my dark fantasies far removed from my world and I’ve written my autobiographical truths into them. I’ve written sweet romance in distant tales and turbulent ones that mirrored my own past. I’ve taken leaps I never thought I would into new writing territory, some long, some short, and I’ve stayed in the same place with dear friends and goals, honing my skills to be better. And I’ve bled my soul into verse, reaching new depths, publishing a collection, and continually doing so every day, challenging myself to grow, steady on the course.

Today I ask: Would you rather be with your best friend and have adequate sex for a lifetime or be with a passionate lover filled with angst and torment but incredible sex? You can’t have both! Of course we’d all say we want both, that we’d choose our best friend and exquisite lover, but how many of us actually can find that? How many of you have? Is that an allusion fed to us? Is it really possible to have the lover of our dreams AND our best friend? What if we find it but only after we’ve already made a commitment to someone else? How many of us settle, picking the easier life, the life that keeps us from possibly being alone?

Why? Why do we do this? Are we that afraid we can’t “have it all” and so follow like sheep and do what society expects of us? Is it really the best we think we can get? It makes wonder if that is why so many couples cheat on one another.  Sit here and say how wrong it is all you want, but it is as common as breathing. And we all know it. Just look around.
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And so this leads me to my real question of the day and my #ThursdayThoughts. Are open relationships something we should all be striving for? Is that possible? I have mixed feelings on this issue and I realize as I ponder this how very selfish it is. I think about myself. And I think about how truly spectacular it could be to have the liberty to have the best of both worlds, openly. No lying. No cheating. No deceit. No hurt feelings. Just an open understanding that monogamy is a bit far-fetched perhaps. That we find our needs fulfilled by different people at different times, much like friendships. Some days I need a break from say, my childhood best friend, and need to be with my best friend from work, who understands me now, not the Rosemary of middle school or high school. And other times, I want to revisit an ex-boyfriend, now friend, because he may understand things about me without me having to spell everything out, because he was a part of making me who I am.

I wonder if this is a topic that can be discussed AFTER the commitment or if it would destroy it if the other person isn’t on board. What is wrong with me? Aren’t I enough? What is missing? And so on…I think someone who has a need for BDSM elements who chooses a vanilla partner might struggle with this…and chooses, chooses to decide on that first question I posed—best friend or best lover. But would an open relationship keep the trust in loyalty intact? Is it healthier? Or would it destroy it?

I often wonder about my writing. Where it came from. Why. I particularly wonder about why I feel compelled to write erotica and erotic romance with BDSM. Why it has dark themes. Sometimes dub-con. Why alpha males? Why damaged males? Why happy endings? What is it that turns me on about such themes? Have you thought about this if you write? How about what you read? Have you ever been judged because of it? And if so, do you hide it? Behind kindles? Or behind pseudonyms? Do you ask yourself why you’re drawn to what you’re drawn to when it comes to the erotic? Or romance? Is there a formative experience you can pinpoint it to? More importantly, have you been able to answer it?

I think I can understand it for myself…somewhat. My formative years. The boyfriends I had and the age. The poet with tough family life whose middle name was "Angst," who was sent away, later joined the military, and went AWOL. Perhaps, because I wanted to help him, “save” him from his past disappointments and couldn’t. Perhaps I like to see those happy endings in my romance books that may reflect what I wish I could have done. Keep the juicy angst but be able to fix it all in the end. I don’t know. I’m still thinking about that. I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t much care about the whys anymore. It just “is.”

A few have criticized my choices in my “fiction" as a result. Recently, a “friend” who claims not be judgmental in any form (let me clear my throat), stormed “off the set” because of some of the contents on my books, unfriending, saying nasty things about MY  'character' because of the “characters” in my “fictional” books. Did I say “fiction”? Good thing she’s not judgmental, huh? And I see it happen to a lot of authors. It's not just me. 

There’s so many varying forms and levels of sexuality from heterosexual to bisexual to pansexual to homosexual and everything in between. I’m heterosexual. And yes, this may sound silly, but sometimes, I almost feel like THAT is a bad thing to be writing about these days. I certainly felt that way with my previous publisher. I couldn’t care less which way you wave your flag. Love. Lust. Fuck. Kiss. Sleep with whomever you want. But how come traditional roles of love and relationships, conflict and resolution, falling in love and marriage is somehow bad, uninteresting, not important anymore? Says who? It’s what I, personally, enjoy reading in this genre. And it’s what I enjoy writing. I won’t apologize for it. Just as someone who wants to write about transgender relationships or gay sex or bisexual untraditional tropes. Go for it. 

What's more, and maybe this is the rub, this genre, this trope, this story, is STILL quite popular among many romance readers, readers in general, that even in our changing world of more and more acceptance of non-traditional roles, the majority still like the trope of boy meets girl, they fall in love, and live happily ever after but not until there is a helluva lot of angst and conflict first. So what? Live and let live. I wish the judging would stop. On both sides of this coin. What difference does it make if it’s well-written and makes a reader feel? Find your audience. And keep producing what both you and they are looking for. It’s really that simple.

​Today I ponder happiness. Is true happiness attainable? If I were to ask you this very moment, “Are you happy?” What would be your answer?

Sometimes I wonder if happiness exists, wholly or truly. Many will say that in order to feel happiness, we must feel the pain of its opposite. That THAT is one of life’s great paradoxes. The myriad colors of emotion. I hear that sort of reasoning often. But I can honestly say that I know feelings without their opposites, love without hate, for instance. And so, that theory doesn’t often hold up, even though it’s comforting and makes perfect sense to me. Is it just a way we keep ourselves from going rogue or crazy or off the deep end? That we must always come up with plausible explanations for things that often can’t be explained.

I can’t think of a time I’ve ever “hated.” I’m being quite sincere here. Maybe it is because our parents always told us NEVER to use that word: “Rosemary. You may dislike something but you never say you hate.” Sound familiar?
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I’m starting to think there is no lasting happiness, that maybe from a young age, we've been sold a bill of goods, and maybe that’s the thing. Maybe nothing lasts but we have glimpses of it. Does it mean I’m unhappy? Or is it just another word. Sad. Disappointed. Unfulfilled.  Bored. And are they only moments, like every moment is? No moment lasts, and therefore, no feeling lasts? Like this one, right now, already gone with each stroke of my keyboard. Poof. Like childhood, gone. 

​Today I have many questions and they all relate in some way (sure they do) to the same topic: Cheating in fiction. First, how do you feel about your main heroine cheating? Not on the hero (or in this case, anti-hero), but cheating on a former boyfriend, the minor character, sort of by chance, a man she really is not fulfilled or happy with? Further, and this is more of the question, must she fess up to it? Tell him? If someone cheated on you in real life, would you want to know if you were already broken up? What would it do for you to know except hurt you? Is “the truth” the most important thing? Or are the feelings of another? I hope you’ll indulge me to read the whole, blasted post.😊

As I edit EDGE of TORMENT (which often means rewriting certain sections as I read back), I come back to a topic that seems to disturb people. Cheating. But I’ve asked you that before. So it doesn’t end there. The novel has elements of cheating in it, but it’s more a tale of self-discovery, a woman staying in a safe relationship, because she thinks it’s what she must do, that she is obligated to do…that is until she meets someone who opens her up to a world of sexuality she’s sort of been waiting for her whole life…she just never knew it. It took him to unlock her deepest desires. And she follows her "bliss."

The issue isn’t that she should follow her heart, her bliss, and pursue happiness (at least I hope it isn’t. I would vehemently disagree with you there), it’s that she acts before she’s left the other man, albeit a bit spontaneously. And some readers get downright upset and angry with me for that. I thought of changing that…that perhaps she could be broken up with the former first. But the whole story line would change. And I rather like it as is, all angsty and imperfect. What say you? Should I rework a bit of the sequence? Or should I say: Fuck it. These are the realities of relationships, life, choices, and sexual discovery. I sort of made my mind to just leave things where they are. Annabelle is not perfect. None of the characters are. Why should they be? But…

You’d think summer would be my favorite season, having months off to write and swim and sleep late and eat the best of garden veggies, and it is, but there is something about fall that brings waves of nostalgia like I can’t describe. Fall makes me feel, as does each season, but fall is in a class all its own.

It might be that it always makes me feel like I’m still young. I’m still the teenager Rosemary. School starting. Back-to-school shopping and tights and sweaters and UGGs. Halloween afoot. The colors and smells of pies and apple picking and pumpkins and cool, brisk air that lets you know you’re alive. Maybe it brings me back to days of first loves and leaf fights and innocence and innocence lost. Bonfires and football games and cheerleading and back-to-school dances. Maybe it’s because I teach and those things haven’t changed all that much.

I really don’t know why, because it’s this strange feeling I get when fall is on the horizon. It’s such a strange emotion, I can’t even describe it. It’s an anxious excitement. It’s not all good, and yet, I clutch at its strength, its power. It’s like every sense is reawakened somehow and every emotion on the spectrum. Maybe that’s why. Maybe summer is too ‘easy.’ Maybe there isn’t as much meaning in easy. Maybe it reminds that I don’t like standing still. Maybe it reminds me of how easily I get bored.
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But often, and probably as long as I live, it will remind of my mother and the difficult relationship we had. (CLICK HERE to see a former BLOG about my mother.) It’s not only because of the anniversary of her death, but it’s remembering our “fall” fights.  We fought the strongest during those early fall months. We couldn’t agree on clothes or hair or make-up. Dance classes would start up again, and the insecurities blossomed bigger, the pressure ever heavy, even as I needed to dance just as I needed to breathe. We loved each other under the most complicated of terms right up until her death. But it was love. 
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Maybe falls reminds me that some days, I wish I could do a redo. And maybe every fall reminds me that I can’t. I CAN, however, do right now…and I better start figuring out what RIGHT NOW looks like. Maybe I need to let go of what others think I should be, and instead, let all my worries and inhibitions fall, a leaf from a tree that realizes when it's time to let go. Maybe  “to every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose” is true. And maybe,  I need to start living as I was meant. Me. My season. The purpose I divine. 

I asked a question on my new author page: R.B. O’Brien: Up Close and Personal last week, and now I pose it to you: Do you think orgasms beget the desire for more orgasms, like sugar or carbs, like a craving, especially in the form of masturbation, or is the opposite true—that the more orgasms we have the more we can go in between without having them and therefore, crave them less?  What say you? What has been your experience in regards to this? But that’s not all I'm asking, so please, continue reading. I tried to see if I could find any evidence one way or the other, more than anecdotal, to answer this question, and sadly, I found out something I didn’t know, never being able to answer the question I was searching for.

We all know orgasm-“ing” 😊 is an important part of life and health and happiness. Yes. We know this already. It’s true. The research is there. Orgasms are healthy in many ways. We all have read this by now. We’re less depressed, will live longer, orgasms relieve stress, help us sleep better, curb over-eating, and on and on and on. It’s not a revelation there. Why masturbation was (and still is) so taboo for women is a mystery.

But what I didn’t know is that some women can’t orgasm. Not just during intercourse. No. Some women cannot orgasm. AT. ALL. The percentage is startling. And it could be hereditary! In an article in the UK mag Independent, it stated: “15 to 20 per cent of women are physically unable to orgasm, which is known as being ‘anorgasmic’.” This isn’t because their partners are clueless or they haven’t discovered how their bodies work yet or something happened traumatically to make them loathe such experiences. These women can’t climax, PERIOD, never mind the very large percentage (some studies as high as 70-80%!!) of women who say they’ve never orgasmed with a partner, or struggle to, something you can find in multiple sources. And the research states that this could be hereditary!

This is absolutely new news for me, the idea that a woman may live her entire life and never experience the gift of orgasm. I cannot fathom a life sans orgasm. My. God. What would that be like? It makes me sad that this is a problem only affecting women, that while men may suffer performance issues, they have no problems when it comes to masturbation and climax. I find I absolutely benefit from orgasm as the studies state above with stress relief and sleep. They even help me concentrate. But, I suppose, if there's any downside, they can, sometimes, distract too…and occasionally (ahem), I am unable to do my best work until that little nagging…thing…you know that thing that has a mind of its own is taken care of…and sadly, without any research but anecdotal, I think more begets more…like anything that you crave, this is no different. And while I feel bad for those who can’t experience such release, I suppose, you can’t miss something you never had, right? Having it and then no longer having it would be far worse…I think. And selfishly, I, luckily won’t have to find that out. ​

My post today comes from a conversation I had with an old ‘friend’ from my past the other day. I wasn’t going to write about it, but it’s gnawing away at me, so I must. You know when you think you know how you feel about something or what you believe and then someone challenges that, and you may change your mind or at least THINK about things differently? Yes. That.

Do you believe in Karma?
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Whenever I get up to my lake house after a school year ends so I can exhale among the stars, my mind often goes to philosophical ideas. It’s hard not to when surrounded by the beauty up there and the quietude. There’s just so much about the universe we don’t understand, CAN’T understand. And why do we have to? There’s so much written about being in the moment, but of course we can’t just BE in the moment, because it’s too fleeting. The next moment has already started before we can be in it and ends before we can take our next breath and so it goes, over and over.

Call today's post my closure on my mom’s death, something I think I had been avoiding…but have somehow found this weekend in a cloud. Yup. A cloud. All kidding aside. Nature does that to me. It speaks to me in this very strange way. I’m not sure if it’s because I stare a lot at it--a tree, the sky, the earth--but my mind goes “limp” in a way. It relaxes, like being in a hypnotist’s chair and being told to stare at a spot or a dot on a paper. It serves the same purpose, but it’s more organic. It’s us reflected in IT. I somehow have come to believe that. Maybe Emerson’s “Transparent Eyeball” really does exist. I certainly felt that way this weekend, and that poem came out above.

I’m sure there’s not one of us here who hasn’t lost someone to that crabby and persistent dude called Death. It’s really just a fact of life. Like light and dark and good and evil and pleasure and pain and any other opposite, so too, we have life and death.

But here’s the thing. Are they opposites really? What happened with my cloud was supposed to be a bad thing, but talk about opposite! Do you think death is a bad thing? A sad thing? It hurts, because we’re living still, especially if we loved that person, and they’re not. It’s almost a selfish thing when I think about it.  That’s where the pain is. In our void. That we still have to live without them. We also don’t like to talk about death, and yet we must. We must plan for it. For everything else we plan for--retirement, saving money, etc.--death is really the only sure thing. Have you thought about what you’d like your funeral to be? Do you want to be buried? Cremated? I know. Morbid. But why does it have to be?

I’m always looking for a good television series to sink my teeth into, much like the books I read (and write for that matter), stories that are slow burns, that last, that reveal bits of characters and their pasts piece by piece, slowly. I don’t like short stories very much or quick-to-rise, rushed action. Some people do and that’s fine, but it’s not my taste to read or write that way. I often find myself upset, lost, and sad when a series I love ends, regardless of which medium it’s being told in.

When I begin a television series, it’s easy to give up on the first couple episodes. People rave about it, while I’m at a loss to like it. However, I find that really good series are slow to catch and the same is true for the novels I love. Of course, some never catch, the flame burning out to gray ash before it can be inhaled, and you decide to move on; it’s not worth it. Life is too short, and fiction and creative stories too plentiful to waste time on, time that is so elusive as it is. But I always give my novels 100 pages and my shows three full episodes before I give up. Oftentimes, I’m so very glad I did as they turn out to be some of the most thought-provoking and provocative of tales, tales that make me think and question and reflect.

It made me think of my parents and the glimpses they let me see of them, but made me question, like these characters, if I really knew them at all. I began to see that my perception of them is very much that of Mom and Dad, a narrow, myopic view, like many roles or hats we wear in life. The sister or the writer or the teacher, but that those things don’t begin to explain who we are, not truly, not the essence of our spirit or being, but only labels.

I’ve realized that though I had glimpses into my Mom’s past and her extremely tragic and difficult childhood, I didn’t really know it or understand it much; certainly, I never gave it much credence or weight. She was my mom. The stoic. Likewise, my dad, too, though I knew of his tough upbringing, a mother that didn’t want a boy, who relegated his sleeping to an attic without heat, causing health issues to plague him throughout his life from severe illnesses he had developed, he was my dad, my rock, my hero, whose threshold for pain is probably one of the reasons he died so young. Had he been diagnosed earlier who knows. But he was used to pain. And I realize there is so much I didn’t know about either of them. Glimpses only go so deep.

And the show has also opened up some memories that I had buried, that I hadn’t thought about in years and years, much like the characters themselves had. I talk of my dad a lot, how he was my hero, and he was. But make no mistake, he, too, was flawed; he was no saint. He may have seemed that way with me, but he had a dark side, and it’s interesting how this show has somehow caused certain memories to resurface, things I had forgotten, by choice or otherwise, I’m not sure.

​We often like to put our parents on pedestals, especially when they pass, remembering only the good in them, trying to engrave their legacy into our minds in a way we think they’d want or how we want to immortalize them. But they were people long before they were our parents with stories and dreams of their own, some realized and some not, triumphs and failures. It is those things who “make” people who they are, who they become, and it’s disconcerting to think how little we actually get to know of them. 

We read. We watch visual representations in the form of movies and television shows. And we choose those we relate to. We do so because it’s what makes us vitally connected as humans. Not as our professions or our roles in life, but as people first, people connecting and thinking and hopefully reflecting. I can only hope my readers can feel the slow burn of my stories, not giving up early on, but watching the fire grow with each turn of the page to discover that things are not always what they seem, where the pasts of my characters are exposed to be as much a part of their present and their future…just like our pasts are.