Thursday, February 14, 2013

Lack of Inspiration Forces this upon Us All, Again

I’ve been wanting to write for a while but for the past few weeks I’ve been pulling my poetry together into a collection as well because I plan to edit a lot of it and expand my original Chapbook into a full-length book.

Now that I’ve collected them all in one place I find there are ninety poems I’ve written from 1989-present. That’s a lot of poetry. Most of it doesn’t need to be edited as I’m happy with the way they read but I’d say the vast majority of anything before 1995 needs a serious overhaul.

But I’m just not in the poetry inspired place right now either. So I’ve been kind of flailing about and just spending a lot of time reading over the past week or so.

When Ginger took one of the meme thingies floating around Facebook and completed it on her blog I could hardly resist asking for my age. I was desperate to blog! Then I promptly let her response sit there for days. Turned out I wasn’t all that enthused to write about myself either. That’s when you know the outlook is pretty bleak.

So today I decided to just sit down and do it. Conveniently the age Ginger gave me is from a time I wrote a lot of poetry and so maybe doing this will help light some kind of spark for editing all that stuff that came out too predictable and rough when I was younger. Enjoy. And if you want an age just tell me in a comment, I’d be happy to spread the meme all over the internet.

My age then: 21

I was dating: A guy who was younger than me. My family thought I was nuts and most of them couldn’t stand him but I was in some kind of love because we stayed together for about five years. Moved in together and everything, though not until a couple years later. He’s one of the reasons I love the song Fighter by Christina Aguilera. I will never forget that he taught me not to trust the wrong people with my heart, to never let anyone spend all my money again, and that sometimes even the most haunting memories can still bring a smile to your face if you choose to see them in the right light.

I lived: In a couple places. Most notably would be at Williams Street with the best roommate ever, Keith. I also spent some time that year living with a very wealthy family in Brookline, Massachusetts as the live-in Nanny of their two kids. That was one of the toughest jobs I’ve ever done in my life and a major factor in why I stopped thinking about having kids of my own.

I worked: Before the Nanny gig I had my first stint in retail hell as a cashier and Assistant Manager at a record store. Sadly it wasn’t at Newbury Comics, that would’ve been cool. Instead I worked at Coconuts. My favorite part of that job was that we had a concert ticket machine in the store and I got some amazing seats for lots of great shows while working there. Not to mention the awesome discount on music and believe me I spent the better part of my check in that store every week. I also loved to close the store because we’d lock the doors, crank up Howard Stern and laugh our asses off as we counted money and swept floors. Come to think of it that place actually was pretty cool.

I drove: A 1974 Buick Apollo. I’ve written all about my love for this car before. In July when I went to Nanny I got a Buick LeSabre. At least I was sticking with the Buick family.

I feared: Nothing that I can remember. Generally speaking I was pretty happy and a go with the flow type of person back then. I just kind of always knew things would work out and they always did.

My goal: To move to southern California.

My age now: 39

I am dating: My husband. Also younger than me. It’s been a life-long trend. Though I must say the dating part of our marriage hasn’t been up to snuff lately. Probably time to change that now that we’re pretty well settled and needing to learn our new area.

I live: In a house we own in Phoenix, Arizona. One of the best things about owning my own home is that I can play drums or music or movies as loud as I want and unlike those days on Williams Street I haven’t seen the cops show up once. Of course we’re all older with jobs and responsibilities now so Happy Hour generally only runs into the wee hours of ten o’clock at night so I guess that could have something to do with it.

I work: as an Author, blogger and Owner of my very own small-press publishing company, Writesy Press.

I drive: A 2006 Toyota Corolla. For the first time in my adult life I’m still driving a car that is fully paid off and I hold the title to without having to take it to the mechanic every other minute. I love this car. I baby this car. I will drive this car until the wheels fall off if I get my way. Even if I become a rich and famous Writer.

I fear: Being stung by a scorpion because even though they all say ‘it’s no big deal’ I’m pretty sure it would be a big deal to me. If I live here the rest of my life and avoid that happening I’ll be a very happy woman.

My goal: To complete two-four more books in the Shaw McLeary series of suspense novels, land an Agent, and sell the series to Hollywood to be optioned into a television series.

6 comments:

Christine said...

Scorpions. ::shiver::

I used to worry about the brown recluse spider, but now I don't because I was bitten by one, and all it did was give me a rash for a month. Big deal. Apparently, I'm mostly immune to them. And I worried all that time for nothin'!

Karen Goltz said...

I've lost count of the number of former nannies and preschool/kindergarten teachers who told me they changed careers before they completely lost their desire to have kids of their own!

For others, it just confirms something they already kind of knew.

I'm glad your life seems to be going pretty well right now. But I do strongly recommend a regular date night. Especially with a new city to explore!

Launna said...

Jenn... I love your goal now... I would like to see that happen for you.

I have seen this on Facebook but I think I write about myself enough in my blog... lol.

So, I spent 13 days in the hospital... still recuperating but at home now... thank goodness. The food was nasty... the nurses were so amazing. I have been catching up on my blogs and I finally across one of yours.

I hope you are feeling better yourself?

Joan said...

How things change. Which is as it should be. :)
You mentioned.. go with the flow type of person. That is one thing I do think I was better at in my younger years. I need to let go more. :)

Almost Precious said...

As life rolls on its merry way, we experience it, we live and learn but most of all we change . . . usually it's for the better. We become wiser . . . or at least we'd like to believe that we have.
I love your goals and I know you'll see them come to fruition.

Suldog said...

Scorpions? Oog. I guess there are some things to be thankful for when living in a colder clime. And I think a lot of folks who have kids would have made the world a better place if they had taken care of somebody else's kids before they decided to have some themselves :-)