It also resulted in my re-discovering this drabble. I remember writing it back when I first learned what a drabble was (in 2007!) and it was actually my second drabble ever. It falls into a third category ‘Cute, but not really worth revising’. It is worth sharing here though, I think, because it made me smile, hopefully you’ll have the same reaction.

A Long Day

Jack cursed himself for the third time and stomped angrily around the clearing.

If he returned to the ship his crew would know what a fool he’d been and wouldn’t respect him anymore. He should have brought one of them with him to help, they could they have carried the darned chest instead of he, and done the digging too.

Swearing once more Jack dropped to his knees and began to dig in the soft sand; it was going to be a long day.

“What kind of barnacle sucking, bilge-brained pirate goes to bury treasure without a shovel?!” he screamed.

On a related note, there’s nothing that’s humbling in quite the same way as reading some of your old work, is there? It’s inspiring though, to look bad and see how much I’ve improved in the past 4 years because it makes me excited to see how I’ll be writing in 2015

*posts before she can no longer resist the urge to start editing*

I also have a short story at Flashes in the Dark today. You can read Dive just by following that link, and Flashes in the Dark is one of those cool webzines that will let you leave a comment if you feel like it. A little bit about this story, but cut because here there be spoilers:

I had a tough time with Dive. It was inspired by a story a friend told me about his partner. One of her children died, but then to make things worse a couple years later their basement flooded and she also lost all the pictures of him. How heartbreaking is that?

So that is where the idea for Dive came from, though of course I changed pretty much everything about it, coupled it with the flood of New Orleans, and then tried to write it from an usual point of view. I think it’s a story you either like or hate. I hope you don’t hate it.

*shrugs* Can’t win them all I guess.

Write a bestseller.

Just like that, easy peasy.

Now why didn’t I think of that?

In other news, it’s not a bestselling novel but I’m the six word memoirist of the day at Smith Mag today. That means my picture and one of my six word stories is featured on their front page at http://www.smithmag.net

I do have some news I can go into details about though. My funny little flash piece, Swapped, is included in the current issue of Mississippi Crow Magazine. Rumor has it you can get a copy of the .pdf for free, if you check it out I’d love to hear what you think

And please, send good thoughts my way re: agents and staying sane.

I’ve got two pieces in this month’s issue. If you were to judge them based solely on their titles it might seem as though they were similar, when in fact, they aren’t. Not even close.

The first, Sheltered, is a reprint of an amusing little flash which was originally published by the Mennonite Publishing Network last year.

What?

It really was.

The other is a sad poem I wrote entitled “A House Not a Home“. My great-grandmother was a poet and she wrote a poem after her beloved husband died which compared herself to an empty house; lonely and alone. Not so long ago my own husband was out of town on business and I saw a writing prompt that included a picture of a decrepit house. My loneliness, my great-grandmother’s poem and that picture all combined to inspire this short poem.

I hope you have time to check them out and let me know what you think

My head got squished. No really, it did. I don’t know what it is about this headshot picture I’ve been using, but more often than not when it gets used on e-zines, it ends up quite squished. Today is no exception. Perhaps it’s a sign that I ought to take a new picture…but then I’d have to try and remember where my make up is, and that doesn’t seem likely to happen.

Anyway. Yes, as you may have gathered from that convoluted paragraph, I’ve got another piece published in an e-zine. Two of them, actually. Firstly, my flash fiction story, Denouement has been reprinted by Laurie Notch of IdeaGems. That’s where you get to see my squished head I’ve also got a rictameter in this issue of IdeaGems, Writing is about, you guessed it, writing. I’m pretty sure this is the first time its seen print.

Enjoy

Athabasca Falls. You need to experience it to understand it. You need to feel the spray on your face, hear the thunder of the water and see the insane rapids.  I’ve had more than a view nightmares about it ever since I first visited it, most of them involving my daughter. That was the dread that eventually evolved into my flash fiction piece, Athabasca Falls, which is now online at Apollo’s Lyre.

That story, Denouement, appears in this month’s issue of Cautionary Tale. I hope you enjoy it