My Dress Code for 2012

I haven't been silent about the suck-ass year 2011 was for me and my family.  My employer went bankrupt, laid me off and closed and still owes me back wages.  I was unemployed for six months and we barely made it through, before I found another job.  I believed this job was the answer, and instead, it only compounded the problem and skewed my whole family dynamic.  I ended up working unconventional hours and undesirable days, an agreement I still don't remember making at hire.  Nevertheless, I enjoyed the job....at first.

It soon became clear to me it was harmful to my children for me to be away at critical hours of the day, namely nights and weekends.  My Mum HATED the job and even though I loved the people working under and with me, I grew to as well.  She fervently begged me to leave it and I began to consider doing that, mentally.  I just wasn't there yet.  I wanted 2011 to be over.

Even though last year was my break-in year, those two books I published through Astraea Press were a small island in a huge ocean of crap.  That being said, you know now why I am hanging my star on 2012.  And its starting out great so far.

I begin a new job on Monday.  A job, I just know, I will excel at and is smack in the middle of my wheelhouse.  I have no less than three new publications releasing this year.  Digital at first, but if I make the sales threshold, I'll see them in print.  Everspell (YA, Astraea Press) in January, The Detention Demon (Middle Grade, Musa Publishing) in Feb and Waterdancer (YA, Musa Publishing) in September.  I also have three (maybe four!) manuscripts-in-waiting that I am writing and am super-excited about where the storyline is headed.

I bought my daughter new dresses and my son a new baseball glove yesterday.  I shouldn't have, but didn't care.  With all the times I had to say "No" last year, it thrilled me to say "yes".  And I wouldn't trade the looks on my babies faces for anything.

So, please forgive me my personal pep talk.  I am happy.  Happier than I have been in a very long time.  Many people have said it, but now I can really believe it.......2012 is my year.  Welcome to my own kind of debutante ball.  My own coming-out, absence only the prom-style dress.  Tapping away on my trusty Toshiba, I'm more comfortable in pink fuzzy slippers, thank you.