#31: June was some pig, but now it's July and there are good things
It feels like there should be a newsletter update fast forward button. Instead, since I've had this little box staring at me for a month, a numbered list of things, in order of general importance.
1) Hemingway the Cat died last month. He'd been not himself and on medicine for quite a few months now, but also enough himself to pull my hands when typing, insist on the expensive cat food, and lay behind my head purring while I watched TV. Hemingway had a big personality to go with his enormous paws. I was away at the Superman Celebration, where I had a transcendently happy time and then arrived home to Christopher letting me know Hem had taken a precipitous downturn that day as I drove home from Metropolis, Illinois. I gathered up Hemingway in my arms and it felt like he was still there, hanging on, just to say, "About time you got here. WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?" We rushed him to the emergency vet and said goodbye. Usually, I want to write about losing a pet right away. This time, the month just kept coming, and I wasn't ready to face it. I had my first good dream last night in which Hem showed up, and so it felt like him grabbing my fingers again, telling me to get back to it, silly human. Kitty friend, there's no tribute I can give you here that would properly appreciate your inimitable 15 years on this earth, 13 with us, so I'll just cry a little again and then come back to finish this later...
2) We had an incredibly inconvenient car crash that was not our fault. A kid in one of those giant trucks that the people are so fond of decided he didn't want to wait behind a car at a stoplight and so cut out into the next lane to swoop around and right into us. My teeth and bones were rattled, but we weren't hurt seriously. And this incredible angel of a girl Carmen showed up while we were waiting for the cops and asked me if I needed a hug. I said yes, and hers stopped my bones and teeth from shaking. As she and her mom were walking away, I had a thought and asked if she was a reader. She loves books! And so we signed a copy of Supernormal Sleuthing Service #1 to her. I left this entire event feeling as if all would be well. We met Carmen, after all, clearly so special, and we were unharmed. Our insurance would pay for repairs, then shake down the kid's insurance and that would be that.
Except a couple of weeks after this, the week after Hemingway died, the insurance decided to total our little Honda Fit, the first new car either of us ever owned, and give us a pittance for it. Probably a fair-ish valuation on some scale, but not on the 'we don't have a car payment' or 'hoped to drive this car for another 100K miles' scale. It was going to be difficult to get another decent car as it was, but then the...
3) Air conditioning went out. I know, right? Who cursed us? BUT SERIOUSLY. Our 25 year old unit (which outlived its expected life, and whose installation was before out time) died and so haha that was expensive and necessary to repair.
4) AND we spent two weeks or so waiting to iron out an effing paperwork issue (as in, I didn't know I was supposed to get a piece of paper in the mail when we paid the car off and had to get a new one -- adulthood has so many things to learn!) and I was on deadline and we were car-less in the south. Which is not a fun thing, let me tell you. Christopher could fill you in on how crappy the bus system is, our only public transit here, which is no surprise because it's only used by the poor or those with no choice. He took it back and forth to work for that time (as he did when I had a day job, so a familiar suck that added an hour or more to his day each way...when we live five miles from the bookstore). We did rideshares when we could and my parents acted as savior chauffeurs several times, including to help me figure out the car and house me and the doggos while sorting out the HVAC stuff with Christopher gone at a workshop. GOOD PARENTS ARE THE BEST.
5) Anyway! We were able to afford a scooter once we got the insurance check and found a sweet barely ridden 2003 Honda Metropolitan which we snapped up and have been sharing as transport since. That's our stopgap until we can plunk down for a new (er new old, probably) car. Christopher's going full time at the bookstore during August to help out with that and get benefits (adulthood!).
(I say it's named Krytpo, but I think of it as Zippy!)
6) SUPERMAN CELEBRATION was incredible. I met Margot Kidder! She signed my copy of Fallout first edition and asked me about Lois as a teen and I got to tell her I wouldn't have the career I have now without seeing her as Lois Lane as a kid. So that was pretty damn great.
7) Somewhere in all that, Christopher got in a second car accident -- he is fine and so was Zach, the driver, giving him a ride home after work -- and someone ran a light and turned into them. I swear. June was some pig, but in a really bad way. A nasty hog, I should say. But then...
8) July! Birthday, friend houseguest(s), and Christopher's short story collection, Telling the Map, which has been picking up raves right and left came out! The Chicago Tribune says: "Rowe is endlessly inventive in presenting us worlds that are often dystopian, sometimes funny, but always original — and completely his own." Get your copy from wherever you like getting books! Seriously! I'll wait!
9) I sold a project I thought was dead to an exciting new kind of company and I think it's going to be a perfect fit. I'm working on the story bible and such right now. Yay.
10) I'm writing a new book but not talking about it until I'm another 50 pages in. At least. Only Christopher has seen and read it. I've spent a lot of time to get to the right story up front, so I'm hoping the writing of the rest will be quick. He gave me the thumbs up on my revamping of the opening and such and now it is on with the show.
11) I had a birthday and I changed my hair and I'm off to teach at Shared Worlds this week! Next time, I'll include all the newsy links that were missed and more writing talk (am reminded how much better life is when I get writing done, even if it's throat-clearing; and how everything you love can also make you miserable, and that's okay). And it will not be a month from now. Promise!
Probably!
Voila, the new hair!
I hope you guys are having a much less cursed summer. Mwah!
(And don't forget the Patreon, where I plan to start posting again daily during the week now that I'm novelizing on the daily!)