Once upon a time I wanted to be a writer when I grew up.

I fell in love with the written word early. From the time I read about Dick, Jane, Sally and Spot all on my own I was absolutely addicted.

I was a lonely kid, largely isolated outside of school, books (along with food but that is a whole other issue) became my closest friends. Sometimes it felt as if they were my only friends. It didn’t take long for me to journey from Fun with Dick and Jane to Goosebumps to devouring Stephen King novels like candy.

So it wasn’t really a surprise that I wanted to be a writer when I grew up. Or any surprise that I wanted to write horror.

I started carrying around 5 subject notebooks and I wrote, and wrote and wrote and wrote. I filled up so many notebooks with so many snippits and stories and ideas. And everyone in my age group ridiculed me because of it. Just one more thing to be bullied about. Because kids are cruel.

My Daddy knew I wanted to be a writer when I grew up. He supported me in that I COULD, but that I probably would never make a living off of it.

But he still supported me.

I grew up poor, but somehow Daddy paid for a correspondence course on creative writing that I remember nothing about, he paid for me to be in not one but TWO vanity press poetry collections (which at the time I thought I had gotten in them on the merit of my writing skills, bless his heart for never telling me any different) and he bought me an electric typewriter.

I LOVED that typewriter. It was used and abused. Everything I scribbled in my notebooks I typed up.

I wrote hundreds of stories. I wrote one I thought was good enough to be published and I got a pretty nasty rejection letter in response.

I didn’t quit writing, but for 30something years from that point I didn’t submit anything for publication. Instead I started a series of blogs on which I shared my writing for free. I never gained a following on any of them

But I grew up. I met a man. I moved to a different city.

Along the way I lost my typewriter. Then in 2012 I lost my Dad. And somewhere in between I quit writing.

Real life is hard and adulting is expensive. So I did what most adults do. I got a “real” job.

I never quit wanting to be a writer when I grew up. I just quit writing much other than dribbles and drabbles and failing at NaNoWriMo year after year. That was just more proof for me that I would never be a “real” writer.

In 2023 I wrote I story I thought was good. I thought it was VERY good. So I found somewhere it fit and submitted it.

Four months later I got my second rejection letter. But this one was full of praise. They gave me the exact reason it was decided against (which had to do with an underlying theme I hadn’t noticed when writing it and had nothing to do with my writing itself) and encouraged me to submit to them again.

Knowing that my story didn’t suck, when another chance to submit it came up, I took it.

This time it was accepted. Someone paid ME to be in their anthology instead of me paying to be in it. And it has reinfected me with the “I want to be a writer” bug.

I’ve been telling everyone at my “real” job that my story, “Being the Eldest Daughter” was accepted into an anthology called Books of Horror Community Anthology Vol. 4 part 1 and it is alongside people who are new like me, but also people with full writing careers of their own.

I’m starting to look for other anthologies to try my hand at being in, and I think one of my stories might have what it takes to be a novella.

I have never felt more like a “real” writer in my life. Of course I wish my dad was here.

I mean, he would absolutely hate my story (he never understood my obsession with horror) but I’d like to think he’d be very proud of me.

Dear Self,

When I said stop, I didn’t mean STOP stop. I mean, slow down. Yield if you will.

Dearest Wildlings,

You’ll notice that after my last post I kind of disappeared for 2 months. Yeah, sorry about that.

And I really wish it was because I was taking my own advice, slowing down and working on my hobbies and such. I really do. Though I did try hard to participate in weekly crafting videos on youtube, mostly I did absolutely nothing.

This year has not been kind to me so far. My physical and mental health are both out of whack, my work life has gone beyond out of what and into sinking ship territory. Early on I stated that this was not going to let this become one of the ‘woe is me’ blogs like all my others that I have started, whined on, ignored, then abandoned. Yet here I am, starting and ignoring this one. I’ve managed not to whine though, so it has that much going for it still.

For most of the past 2 months I’ve been thinking about what I WANT to do. Then I’ve been going online and watching other people do it. That is a bad habit for me.

Okay, that is NOT a bad habit for me. That is my old pal Executive Dysfunction rabidly waving hello while their best friend Overthinking is right there cheering them on. The rest of the Depression/Anxiety/ADHD cheer squad is sitting behind them, waiting to take their place when they get tired.

So instead of doing, I’m just sitting and watching. Scrolling… scrolling… scrolling.

Ya’ll know how that goes, right.

And we are also all smart people who know that if you keep doing the same thing, you are going to keep getting the same results.

I’ve just got to pull myself out of this facebook/instagram/tiktok scrolling rut and start implementing some of my wants.

This should be FUN!

Hello my Wildlings, I have a challenge for you.

A few days ago I was scrolling facebook, as I spend way too much time doing. I found myself in the reels, and since I’m a craft addict the algorithm decided to feed me crafting videos. Of course, the crafting reels it gave me was for diamond painting. That is a craft that I don’t do (yet) and I almost scrolled past, but I was kind of interested.

It was showing me a tool for diamond painting. The tool was a wheel that let you lay down a long strip of little gems all at once. Looking farther into it, there are all kinds of tools that let you put more than one little gem down at once. Which is all well and good if you want to get it done in a hurry so that you can move on to the next one.

I thought that diamond painting, kind of like adult coloring and cross stitch and paint by numbers, was a craft that you did when you wanted to take some time doing something. To immerse yourself in the craft. I didn’t think it was a “wow, I did that quick, lets do another one!” kind of craft.

I could be way off on that. Like I said, I haven’t tried diamond painting yet. I’ll allow that the different size tips for diamond painting could be like different size brushes for paint by number. Though I usually size down, not up, for that.

But the diamond painting wheel reminded me that the world is so very much about moving as fast as you can at everything you do.

I’m reminded also of an Animal Crossing group I’m a part of.

If you are not familiar with Animal Crossing New Horizons, you play a person who is in charge of taking a deserted island and turning it into a community. You build furniture, decorate the island, and you build your own house from a tent to a multi-room house and decorate it. The game itself is very chill. I’ve been playing since it was released and I still spend a lot of time every day fishing and hunting bugs and digging up fossils and rearranging my furniture. It’s a very cozy game, and the most dangerous things you encounter are wasps, spiders and scorpions, and all they do is send you back to your doorstep if they get you.

In the ACNH group I’m part of people will often restart their game and when they do they are in the group asking for furniture and bells (the game’s currency) and complaining about how long it takes to get enough bells to do things like expand their home and build bridges and inclines and such.

Without donations from other players it could take weeks or months to get it all done the old fashioned way.

But again, I thought that was the whole POINT. The fishing and bug hunts and fossil digging is supposed to take time. It’s supposed to be fun and relaxing. You’re not supposed to terraform and cover every inch of your island in a day.

Too many people approach their hobbies the same way they approach their entire lives. Hurry, hurry, hurry.

I am not excluding myself from this. I often try to do so many things at once that nothing at all gets done.

So I challenge you, my Wildlings, and my challenge is this:

Find a cozy Hobby. I don’t care what, but find something chill, and make time for you to do your chill hobby. And FOCUS on it. Don’t just do it, but enjoy the doing of it. Don’t just rush through doing the thing so that you can do the next thing. If you don’t enjoy the doing of it, try a different hobby on for size. There’s LOTS of hobbies out there.

Tell me, what cozy hobby do you want to slow down and do? If you don’t know what you might want to do, come back and see me again. I plan to have a series on different cozy hobbies to give a try.

Hello my sweet Wildlings. I hope your day was filled with wonderment and awe.

I’m sitting here just now, trying to wind down from a typical work day. I also kind of forgot how bad apple juice tastes just after having eaten some coffee, but that one’s on me.

When I first got home I turned on my tiny little tree. The lights have different settings. Usually I make them blink. Tonight I just let it be on.

I didn’t stay in the room to look at them, but can see the glow of them in the hallway as I walk past. Babysteps towards enjoyment I suppose.

You’ll notice a lack of “normal” ornaments. I have a lot of butterfly picks on it. And you can’t really see them well, but there are some semi-rustic looking metal stars. They are also lights by I didn’t turn them on. Towards the right you’ll see a little green alien dude. Front and center a rocking-horse zebra, and at the bottom left is Zombie Merle from The Walking Dead (my husband put that one on there..)

I wanted to keep it a more rustic and feral goblincore vibe, but in the end the tree was really too small. And I think, maybe, I would like a tree full of ornaments handmade by friends and family. Of course I’d have to get my friends and family to actually make and give me ornaments, but I guess that will be a next year project.

But, if you notice one thing, look at the top of my little tree.

There is not a star or an angel at the top of it, but a cardinal in the spot of honor.

Why a cardinal? The bird in and of itself has no special meaning to me. Some people say that seeing a cardinal means you are being visited by a loved one from heaven, but I never held that belief. And the only memory involving real cardinals is when my best friend and I were going for a walk and found a dead cardinal by the side of the road and she insisted we give it a proper burial, so we took some sticks and dug it a shallow grave in the ditch beside the road where we were walking.

But I have a memory of another red bird on another Christmas tree. It might be a false memory, since my brain is a tricky, tricky thing, but false or not, it is how I remember it.

I don’t remember very many of my childhood Christmas trees. I do remember having them, just not any tree in particular (except for the last one I remember having in the house, but that’s another story). But when I think of childhood Christmas trees, I think of a little red bird and how I wanted it at the top of the tree when we put the ornaments on. It could possibly have been a cardinal itself. I don’t remember that. Just that it was a little red bird.

I don’t remember if we had a star or an angel or not, maybe one of my brothers could tell me, but I do remember how I wanted that little red bird at the top of the tree. I coudln’t tell you now why I so badly wanted that little fella up at the top, but I did.

So, when I decided to get my little tree I knew I was going to get a little red bird to go on top of it. And, being the time of year that it is, the most prevalent little red bird you’re going to find is a cardinal.

(On a side note, did you know that only the male cardinals are the iconic red and black? But on most cardinal related holiday cards and decor you only ever see two red cardinals. Sometimes, but rarely, there will be one of the duller brown females, but usually it is two male cardinals. I’d never thought of that before, but a random tik-tok video made me aware of it and if I had known I’d be writing this post I would have saved the link for it.)

So, in a fit of nostalgia, I have a little red cardinal at the top of my little goblinesque tree. And if I do upsize next year to fit more odd ornaments, I’ll probably put it at the top of that tree too.

Because, that is where my little red bird belongs.

If you have a holiday tree, what is at the top of your tree?
Leave me a comment and let me know!