Tell me:

What are you leaving behind in 2023?

What are you going after in 2024?

It's gonna be a good year, friends.

Out of context gothic liminal space in my weird century old house.

I sort of love that I'm more or less doomed to spending my life wandering from one strange, history thick place to another.

This is Red Dog mine. It is the largest producer of zinc in the world. It also produces a crap ton of lead. It's also the reason Kotzebue, my mother's hometown, which is majority indigenous, is the most toxically polluted town in the US, according to the EPA.

Now you know.

Me: What are you doing?
Teen. Drawing the cover page for my new bullet journal
Me: Cool! What are you drawing?
Teen: Oh, you know, girl things. Hearts.

The hearts:

I'm probably late to this game, but friends? Tracking my word count like this has been such a game changer.

When I'm unmotivated and I've only written 200 words, putting them in and watching the word count for the next 6 weeks drop is so exciting. Seeing the total word count, not only this week, but for the whole future if the project rise? Also inspiring.

This is the last year's log of short story submissions.

Red is rejection, green is acceptance, and blue? Blue is for waiting and hope.

The green is wonderful, but if there's no green? You can always make more blue.

Behind every success is a long history of failure. Let's keep going. You can't get it if you don't ask. The worst they can say is no.

I'm absolutely delighted to announce that I'm now represented by Laura Cameron and Amanda Orozco of the Transatlantic Literary agency.

It's such a delight to wrap up this year in writing with such a banger of a plot twist.

Tomorrow, I get to tell you stuff.

Not all the stuff, but some of the stuff.

It's going to be cool, friends.