changes

This month I am leaving my comfortable job working for the good people of Vermont in a positon in State Government…

… and I am moving to a very different entity: A year round mountain resort – skiing, golf, alpine slide, performing arts center, etc… The potential is incredible and I am so excited for the change, but there is a whole lotta fear about leaving the comfort of a relatively secure job, one that I can do with fairly little stress and one that is so close to home.

But I am doing it. We’re doing it as a family. And with every major change comes certain fear – the fear of uncertainty. But like my brilliant wife said,  maybe shaking things up like this every once-in-a-while isn’t such a bad thing. I know it is the right decision.

So I’ll be working on the highest mountain in all of Vermont, but damn, I’m still going to miss days like this and the view from my current office (photo taken today):

**When I came to my current position in State Gov’t, that old stapler pictured above was sitting on my desk awaiting me. It is awesome!

Dear Kurt,

You died 17 years ago today. I remember when I found out about it. I was in my dorm room in the middle of Pennsylvania, my freshman year of college and I was so pissed off at you, at your weakness and selfishness, for taking your life and music and future away from your family and from the world, that I played your nemesis Pearl Jam really loud and sat on my bed with a beer, cursing the spirit of Teen Spirit.

Of course I’m still mad that you took your life, I was a huge Nirvana fan, but now I know a little more about depression and suicide and understand that it’s less of a decision you made and more of a real and significant disease beyond your control.

So Kurt – not that it matters, but I’m sorry man. I’m sorry that on your worst day, I was like the millions of others who thought you took the easy way out of your fame, your pain. And maybe you did, but I’m sorry for thinking so shallowly about things I didn’t know about and will never fully understand. You were a rock star making kick-ass music and I was just a New England kid dreaming of being a rock star and a writer. And I never said thank you.

And in your life, you did at least one thing right  - you made the music and wrote the songs you were meant to create.  I can’t imagine a world without Nirvana. You didn’t stand around waiting for things to happen to you, for opportunities to fall into your lap. You made your choices and lived your life and with your art, you changed and inspired the teenaged kids of the world who needed inspiration the most right then. Not many of us can say the same thing. Cheers to you for that.

Guilty…pleasure or pain

So I’m in the middle of reading this book, a novel which has won some of the highest honors in fiction and has received incredible critical acclaim and I could not wait to finally read it and yes, I loved the first chapter…but honestly, I’ve sort of lost all interest in it at this point. The unique writing style, the characters, the pace and setting…well, they’ve all just sort of the lost the magic they first held for me and maybe it was my fault for reading all the critical acclaim in the first few pages, but it’s gone and now I’m feeling super guilty for wanting to put it down and begin my latest Paul Auster book, a novel by my favorite author sitting unopened on my  bedside table and one I know will inspire my own writing (as always).

Should I let the self-inflicted guilt control me and struggle to finish my current book, or should I just move on and not look behind? 

It all seems pretty clear to me after writing it out. And I am PSYCHED to begin the Auster book tonight!

(Funny, that sentence in bold up there is what I ask myself all the time with regards to my current novel, which I am now more than 5 years into, and the constant question I ask myself:  do I put it away for good in order to beginning something new…or do I keep working on it? But it’s not the same as the book I’m reading, right? There’s no clear, easy answer and the responsibility – or guilt – I feel for my own novel is unparalleled.)

Opportunity…withdrawn

It seemed I finally got an opportunity. My submission was one of just 50 that would be judged by good readers and a literary agent in an online contest over at this blog for writers. Those are decent chances. I’ll take them anyday.

And then I saw that the submission requirements had changed since I first planned my submission. The rules changed mid-game. It was not for my genre anymore. But my piece was still accepted…what do I do?

Well, no matter how much I trusted my story to get some attention, no matter how badly I wanted my story to be reviewed by an agent, what I didn’t want was to break the rules and be THAT GUY. So I gave permission to have mine replaced by someone’s who’s was in the right genre. I gave permission to be deleted. I gave permission for the agent to never look at my writing.

My head is in my hands and I am super bummed. This might seem totally minor, but when you’ve seen as many agent rejections as I have, and you believe in yourself and your writing as much as I do, and you’ve put YEARS into just one story, this is pretty huge.

Ok, I’ve vented I’m letting it go.

Back to editing.

erased

I had to delete the post that was here because I just don’t trust destiny and coincidence enough to let me keep it there.