Reflections

Scrolling through the book offerings on various publishing sites, searching for something new to pique my interest, I’ve noted the abundance of novels with the word ‘library’ in the title. Curiosity tickled, I Googled sites that listed 388 current or recent novels with the words library or book as part of their name. (https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/164830.Books_with_Library_in_the_Title) Wow! And most of those titles sell very well with the public. I’m not surprised. The

For reasons I’d like to think are beyond my control, I find myself very, very busy this year. Many opportunities to share my writing life with the public have dropped into my creative lap. I consider these messages from the universe, so I tend to respond in the affirmative when they appear. But is busy the way to go? For me, at this stage of my life and writing career, the answer is YES! These days a writer faces an uphill climb in publishing. The sheer volume of work availab

Every time I sit down to balance the checkbook, I cringe. I want everything to balance perfectly, an occurrence that is roughly akin to the total eclipse scheduled for April of this year. It isn’t that I’m not responsible about entering deposits or expenditures, but there are two of us in this household scribbling numbers on those skinny lines, and, once in a while, we don’t get it quite right. Receipts help to keep me honest. Carrying that piece of responsibility from the co

(Imagine music playing in the background…) The Echo on the counter flashes blue when I speak a request to Alexa. Her soothing voice responds and in less than a minute, Classic vinyl on Sirius spools into the heated kitchen. I hum along as I knead the dough for Grandma Jenny’s specialty pastries or poke cabbage leaves into thumbprint rolls filled with ground beef and pork, a New Year’s tradition. Later, I sort through the collection of holiday CDs, play them all in batches, fi