Poem from Robot Scientist’s Daughter up on Autumn Sky Poetry and Busy February

Thanks to Christine at Autumn Sky Poetry for featuring a poem from The Robot Scientist’s Daughter up today! (Click here to order your signed copy of the book if you haven’t already! The release date is a mere ten days away!)

So, besides getting ready for a book to launch – updating mailing lists, sending out postcards, updating Amazon and Goodreads author pages, arranging readings, setting up summer conference and residency teaching gigs – I’m still trying to find a dentist who is not afraid to work on my fillings (two hopeful new options – one holistic, the other a high-tech dental type, neither of whom can see me til March), trying to buy and sell a house (going from a two-story townhouse to a one-story regular house), and working at starting up a business of writing, editing, and (spoiler alert) PR for poetry book services with Kelly Davio. Oh, and I’m applying for low-residency teaching jobs and a couple of writer’s residencies, too. (Finding a writer’s residency to accommodate someone who needs a kitchen because of multiple food allergies and can’t do stairs/ladders? More difficult that you might think!)

My friend Kelli had an excellent post on the dangers of being over-busy, of figurative and metaphorical crashes. I think that often we writers, being freelance, struggle with saying no, with giving ourselves boundaries and not feeling like we have to do and be everywhere because we don’t have offices we check in and out of – we are basically on the clock all the time. This problem becomes compounded when things like health, family obligations, etc., start stacking up commitments we can’t get out of. I looked at my last two months and saw “too much” time being eaten up with stuff that doesn’t really matter to me and isn’t any fun, and “too little” time (I’m putting quotes because really, we’re the ones who decide what is too much and too little) doing the stuff that does matter – visiting with loved ones and friends, writing, sending out work, celebrating small joys. So no wonder I’ve felt cranky, uninspired, and isolated. That is the result of a life of complications and commitments, of digesting bad news and spending too much time doing things you have to do and not enough time doing things you want to do. Yes, we all have obligations we can’t get out of – but we have to try to prioritize doing things that give us happiness and comfort too.

So here’s to a better balancing act, starting now, in a year of commotion, change, celebrations and starting new adventures.