Living in Hawaii So Far

So we've been living here in Hawaii for about two and a half months now. It has been a ginormous adjustment. But most of the challenges we've had to deal with would be challenges no matter where we moved.

Par for the course, moving is hard.

Leaving behind friends is the biggest challenge, for myself as well as my children. But my kids seem to be doing okay, as well as can be expected considering they've only been here for a couple months. As with all things time will help.

Isolation is definitely a huge aspect of such a relocation. All of our friends and family are so far away that I do truly feel cut off from my old life. The time zone doesn't help matters. Suddenly I'll feel like I need to talk to someone only to realize that with the time difference it would be terribly inconvenient for me to call right then. Days will go by and missed opportunities, and that in itself is sad.

Life here is beautiful though. There is sun everyday. Really hot sun. And the ocean is always cool and refreshing. With Thanksgiving approaching it is bizarre for it to still be in the high 80s. It's really weird, it just doesn't feel like Thanksgiving. It feels like summer break. I think the holidays will be a new challenge for the kids, I think they will be missing noisy extended family celebrations... (and how on earth will I cook a turkey for six hours in this heat?)

With all this isolation comes a new closeness in our family. All we have is each other and so we spend more quality time together, exploring our island and just being together. It's really nice. I have such a wonderful family. I am truly blessed.

Being haole is not necessarily an easy thing. Sometimes it's a non-issue and then other times it is uncomfortably obvious that we are outsiders. I love Hawaiians. I love their sense of ohana and their fierce self worth (only the Hawaiian way is right). I love the way they speak, even though I can only catch every third word or so. Sometimes I truly feel like a foreigner.

The beaches are amazing here. We have been exploring the waters on all sides of Oahu. The ocean has become our playground. Surfing and paddle boarding and snorkeling are our favorite pass times. I love the way my children have already gained a new appreciation for the ocean and the creatures that live there. And how so easily they've become comfortable in the sea. This is what I've always wanted, an ocean lifestyle. I look forward to our mastery of spear fishing and shore fishing. (Although I'd much rather capture them on film.) I hope to learn to surf with grace. I hope to find a cute little house somewhere a little cooler than Kapolei and slowly renovate it inside and out. And to garden, oh to garden, here where everything grows and it's summer forever.

Insomnia

I've had insomnia since I was a kid. Back then I used to stay awake for most of the night rehashing arguments that happened that day or creating little dramas in my head. It always frustrated me that I always could come up with such a witty retort to some affront in the protection of my bed...

So I have had a lifetime of poor sleep. And man when you don't sleep the world is a different place. Sometimes I wonder why I can't just turn it off, my brain that is. After I got married (at the ripe old age of twenty) I discovered how easily my husband could fall asleep- how he could simply press a button and be out like a light. How is that possible? How does he do it? Doesn't he have things, worries in there nagging to be resolved? How can one simply lay their head down, close their eyes and sleep?

It's not as if I am a worrier. I'd like to believe it's just my creative nature. I do have a tendency to think catastrophically. I create the worse case scenario in my head, creating dialogue and drama until my heart is pounding out of my chest, but I do this all the time, (I like to believe that if I think it, it couldn't possibly happen) that's not crazy right? Well maybe a little, huh?

Ambien.

For the last 5 years I have slept. I have slept and it has been wonderful. It is amazing how 7 or 8 hours of sleep (I won't say uninterrupted, I am a mother after all) can change so many things. Depression. Gone. A need for anti-depressants. Gone.

For the last 5 years I've slept. Until now. It's been 12 days without medication. 12 days of very little sleep. 12 days that that little girl in my head continues to whisper her story to me. And I have to listen.

Finding the Darkness in the Light

Spent the day snorkeling with my family out at Electric Beach. The water was so amazingly clear this morning, fish were everywhere, my son tried out his spear fishing (luckily they all got away-- because catching fish means cleaning fish and I wasn't really looking forward to that). Our sea turtle friend even made an appearance. The kids are so comfortable with him and he seems vastly indifferent about us. It was yet another day in Paradise laying on the beach in the sun... warm sand between your toes...

So how do I go from that place, to the dark, dark place that I am currently writing about?

How do you find the darkness in the light?

Well right now it's easy really, especially easy knowing that I took my last Ambien Saturday night and that I have many long, anxious, sleepless weeks in my near future...

And there is always the job situation, or the lack thereof. And the irksome feeling that I am vastly under qualified for nearly all the positions I seek and that at 38 with a degree in English Literature and years of education experience and retail experience, I pretty much have very little to offer an employer... (And I know that's the unemployment talking, see what a layoff does to your self esteem...)

And there's the anxiety about this move... and our financial security... and the kids in school... and a future that is so unknown...

Oh yeah, I can find the darkness in the light, easy peasy. Now leave me alone. I need to write.

Being Beat Up by Mockingjay

Don't you just hate it when you finish a great book?

I just finished Mockingjay, (I know, I know about time, right? But hey I've been a little busy moving my family across the Pacific Ocean and all).

Anyways, I am currently suffering that post-partem depression that sometimes hangs over me when I finish a great book.

I'm not sure what it is exactly, whether it's the fact that I feel like I've become part of their story and then suddenly I am left all alone, my new friends having deserted me?

Or that is it simply that the story is over?

Especially those books that you have been anticipating for so long-- I mean I had Mockingjay pre-ordered like 4 months in advance! So you wait so long and then finally it's out, you buy it, you devour it (in like 2 days) and then it's all over... and then what?

The Blahs.

Is it some dissatisfaction with the ending?

No, I don't think so.

I think quite possibly it is just assimilating back into the real world, where things aren't quite so adventuresome that put a pallor on my mood.

Extracting myself from the adventure...

This is why I try so hard to pace myself, relish the words, get lost in the experience.

But then I find myself curled up on my couch at 2 in the morning, realizing I blew my wad, and it's over.

It's put me in funk, given me a case of The Blahs (which is a hard thing to do when you live in Paradise).

This feeling is a sure sign that the author has done their job, and very well. After all why else would I feel so beat up, and damaged, and left all alone?

Ah... the glories of a great book!

Settling In

Well we've made the move, the BIG move.

We packed up our things and moved ourselves to the beautiful island of Oahu.

My husband is settling in to his new job, my daughter is adjusting to High School Aloha Style, my Middle School son is in a delayed holding pattern (we seemed to arrive at the end of his Track's first semester so he has another couple weeks of summer) and I, I am trying to find my groove again as an author and mother. And a middle aged woman looking for employment.

I received a phone call today that snapped me back into things. A phone call commenting on my writing that helped me realize that my vacation is over and that I need to get back to work. More than anything I really just want to get going on my next project, a story I am really, really excited about.

The thing is, before I can move on, really immerse myself in this new great idea I need to take advantage of what I've learned and the connections I made during my SCBWI conference. So I am currently making a few tweaks to my manuscript (like my main character's age, I had no idea what a difference a year makes to a publisher! Congratulations Reese you are now 12 instead of 13!) and I am sending off all those queries and manuscripts to publishers and editors that are usually closed to submissions but are open to those of us who attend their presentations. Yay! And thanks to Deborah Halverson I am editing in a new way. (Although eventually I will just send it to her and utilize her services.

So I was realizing today that I need to get on the ball for two reasons--so I don't miss out on the opportunity to utilize my conference information AND so I can dive into THE DARKNESS my next novel. In the crazy hectic few weeks of packing and unpacking a household across the pacific ocean, I've lost a valuable part of my day, my writing. And though I've gained the beach and the sand and the surf and the turtles and the fish and the warmth, I still need my writing. And this story I have in my head right now, this girl, she really wants to be heard. So she will.

Moving to Hawaii

Aloha.

Unpublished is on hiatus while I relocate my family to the beautiful Hawaiian Island of Oahu.

Stay tuned for more information on this exciting adventure.

SCBWI Conference Day Three

Day Three was the best yet!

The morning began with Why Narrative Nonfiction is Hotter than Ever by Susan Campbell Bartoletti, Deborah Heiligman, Elizabeth Partridge, Tanya Lee Stone and Ken Wright. It was very informative and I gained some valuable tips in case I change my focus. I also was very pleased with the possible marketability of the new writing project I am going to have my kids work on! Yay! Family writing project!

Carolyn Mackler the author of The Earth, My Butt and other Big Round Things presented a keynote entitled For Richer or Poorer: Writing Through Good Times and Bad.

Justin Chanda did a workshop entitled Simon & Schuster: The Not So Distant Past, and the Really Fast Approaching Future. This was another very informative workshop. He shared that Middle Grade is on a downtrend right now--(Boo) Teen is out selling adult and blasting at full force, and that those poor picture books are hardly in the picture at all. Apparently the classic picture books, Goodnight Moon, Suess, etc, out-sell new picture books 2 to 1! He suggests that if you want to sell a PB it needs to be shorter, younger, sweeter, funnier and quirkier! Part of the issue with Picture Books lag in sales is that kids are reading older books earlier these days. Mr. Chanda believes that part of the reason that YA or Teen is flourishing is because of the adult crossover. More and more adults are reading YA as a guilty pleasure. YA is the new Romance genre! He also believes that the "Harry Potter" generation have grown up into voracious readers and are causing the boom. (I think that Stephenie Meyer chick has something to do with it too!) Books from the Blog-O-sphere also contribute to the Teen frenzy.

The Golden Kite Luncheon & Awards Presentation: John Parra for PB illustration in Gracias Thanks, for non-fiction, Ashley Bryan: Words to My Life's Song (sweetest man ever), for fiction Sea of the Dead by Julia Durango, for Picture Book text, The Longest Night by Marion Dane Bauer. Congratulations.

But the best workshop of the entire event so far has definately been Deborah Halverson's The Ultimate Checklist for Submitting to Publishers: 10 Tests a Novel Must Pass to Prove it is REALLY Ready for Submission to Publishers. Now I have to admit, I was a fan of Team Halverson before I even got here. I follow her blog Dear-Editor and love, like, everything she says. But her workshop was incredibly awesome and so incredibly practical and helpful and useful that it is by far my all time favorite. (That's a lot of incredibly) I took copious notes, and learned tricks (10 of them!) that will make my novel even better! And Deborah is even more awesome in person and I couldn't have been more pleased with her workshop. She is the author of Writing Young Adult Fiction for Dummies which will be in stores June of 2011. And I got my copy of Big Mouth autographed for my son Cy! I hope to use her editorial services in the near future. Awesomest of awesome.

Gennifer Choldenko's keynote was Kill the Bunnies: Writing Novels for Today's Kids. I love her book Al Capone Does My Shirts and she has a sequel Al Capone Shines My Shoes and a third book to wind up the trilogy will be out next year. Her newest book No Passengers Beyond this Point will be out later this year and is apparently groundbreaking. I can't wait to see what she's done.

The final keynote of the day was by Rubin Pfeffer and David Diaz, they discussed the future of publishing with the advent of the e-book and what that might look like in the publishing world. Exciting, and ultimately (possibly) more lucrative for the authors.

Another full day at the SCBWI Summer Conference. Only one day more to go.