Heads up, dear readers …
I am changing the post format to personal newsletters from now on.
But why this change?
Well, the move (back) to ShadeoftheMorningSun.com is over, so I felt that this might be a good time to make some other changes.
And a big one will be to have more socializing along with the storytelling.
It’s just something I have been thinking about for a long time—if I should give it a go. And now I will do just that 🙂
The Home Front
It’s been a relatively quiet time after a winter with a mini-pandemic of flu and other respiratory nasties here in Copenhagen. I guess I should feel relieved but to be honest I also feel rather exhausted. I’m grateful that I’ve had the wherewithal to write something, though, and to work a little on my upcoming collection (in print).
The latter project is very tedious — i.e to prep for print, but I have had some very good help from Vania Margene Rheault who checked for instances when I didn’t get the US English quite right, and will help me set things up for at the appropriate print-on-demand services. (Vania runs a really insightful blog on self-publishing, which I heartily recommend.) Hopefully I can finally get this one out in April and then you will be the first to hear about it.
But of course, there have been other distractions from writing than family life …
I’m talking about the world news, of course.
Some days, I’m deeply affected by all the bad news, while other days, I manage to shut it off completely. Suffice it to say, it would be lovely to focus solely on life as a special needs family (or writing) without the constant barrage of bad news—mostly from the U.S., of course, but also Ukraine, which is only a day’s drive away from here.
And yeah … Trump is rattling his sabers about Greenland again (or is that his Diet Cokes?) and I for one am pretty pissed about that, and not just because I have family connected to Greenland.
But there’s a lot of things to be pissed about, I guess, both in the big world and in my own small world, and to be honest the only real cure when you are just little me is to try to calm down and be mindful about it. (Easier said than done, I know.)
To that end I have found that I enjoy nature videos, especially Nature Relaxation Films on YouTube. It really makes me feel as if some kind of lasting peace in my life is possible, when I watch these videos and listen to the ambient music or nature sounds.
I have even bought a subscription so I can have it run ads free during bedtime, which helps me a lot to sleep (if nothing is going on with J – my autistic son). I don’t get any commissions for plugging this one, I just wanted to recommend it, especially to other special needs parents.
But the little tricks I use to stay sane doesn’t change the fact that beneath my daily routine as a special needs father, there isn’t much space for writing. Pff… what else is new?! ;-p
Even so, I remain cautiously optimistic about what I can accomplish this year—despite a rough start, both personally and in terms of the troubling news that has occupied so much of my mental space.
That’s it for now. Take care out there.
Chris
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