The Move and More

The biggest change is that we’ve moved from our quiet, wooded, rural acre in East Texas, back to the windy, treeless, small town bedroom suburbs of the DFW Metroplex. No need to explain why, but suffice to say it was by mutual agreement, and there is no turning back at our age. I’m sure I’ll occasionally comment on the frustrating challenges we experienced trying to coordinate and monitor construction of a new house from 150 miles away. That project will be remembered for the rest of our lives, but not with fondness. The best thing about the move so far is the lack of scorpions and black widow spiders around here. They are native to this part of the state, but I’ve not seen any and I hope it stays that way. There are several candidates for the worst thing…like wind, noise, clay soil, higher prices and traffic, but mostly I miss my coffee drinking buddies at Pop’s Café. Small town East Texas had some great people that I’ll never forget.

I don’t know if any readers of this blog are visitors to my other blog/journal that documents the trials and tribulations of rebuilding a sixty-year-old, extremely rusty Plymouth. I’ll assume not, but if I assume incorrectly, please bear with me if I repeat a few things from the other site. However, instead of a play-by-play record of progress, I’ll just hit the high spots if and when they occur.

I've been asked about my novel-writing efforts. The last I posted was about a year after In Dreams was published in 2011. Success was about as expected for a typical work of fiction by a new author, meaning sales tanked after a short period of modest sales. Most buyers chose the downloadable versions i.e. Kindle. Writing that one novel seemed to sap all my creative energy, so except for a few feeble attempts to ignite new interest, I’ve done little in the writing department. The story I had in work fizzled when the plot became too weak to continue, and while I hated abandon the 25 thousand words I had on paper, it was no used beating a dead horse. Recently, I found myself creating a plot in my mind and while that’s the way the first book started, it remains to be seen if thoughts will ever translate to words on paper.

Family-wise, my wife’s granddaughter stayed with us for the better part of a year, but finally got her own apartment near Dallas. I’m too set in my ways to have houseguests more than a few days, so it’s good that she got a job that (barely) pays her rent. The Maltese puppy she acquired shortly before moving out is still living with us, as her apartment doesn’t allow pets. Thankfully, she and the pup weren’t together long enough to really bond, so we now have a new furry child to terrorize our two older dogs. Gracie has a very sweet, energetic personality and provokes many more laughs than scoldings.

National politics continues to drive me nuts, and this year being a presidential election cycle makes it especially frustrating. We still have a country, but for how long? An amicable divorce between unbending regional political philosophies looks better with each passing day.