That Alone Is Heaven Enough

 A couple cool things coming up for me in the next while.

Karen McElmurray will be co-editing an anthology due out from Ohio University Press this coming spring.  Thanks to Karen (and to Chris Offutt for sending my name along to her) I'll have an essay called "Dangerous Stories" in that anthology.  There's a lot of great writers who'll be in this one, and I'm always happy to be included in fine company.  I'll be talking more about this as the time gets nearer to publication.

Another essay of mine called "Thanks, Breece" will be published soon (not sure when the next issue is out) of Mad Hatters' Review.

This one is close to my heart for two reasons.  One, because Pancake is the one, for me, who said it was okay.  And, two, because MHR was the brain child of Carol Novack.  Carol and Ryan W. Bradley remain the only two people in the indie lit community who I've actually spoken to IRL, as they say.

Carol and I had been exchanging emails, etc. back in 2008 over the course of about two weeks when she called me one day at the newspaper where I worked.  I'm still not sure how she pulled that one off.  She didn't spend time with small talk but, instead, went straight into talking about whatever the last thing was we had emailed about.  It was this bold, strange, and surprising thing that happened.  It was totally a Carol moment.  I'll never forget that.

So, happy on two levels, yes.

I don't know, it feels like there's more going on than that, but I guess it's just an overall good feeling for me lately.  That's probably the thing I'm thinking of.  This month will make six months, a half year, that I've been sober.  This one is off the charts cool because it's had a hugely positive impact on everything for me.  I've been more clear-headed, more productive on every level, happier, more content, reading more, writing more, loving more.  Just everything.  It's amazing.

I've posted a few things on Facebook about my sobriety and want to take time again here to thank everyone who responded and said kind things or offered any words of encouragement or shared stories with me one-on-one about their own struggles.  Can't tell you how much I truly appreciate that.  It's a shitdog of an existence, being a drunk.  Things are better now.  This alone is heaven enough.