Rayne's Ramblings: What camp will you be in?

Blogs are strange beasts, each as individual as the blogger themselves. You can’t run a Google search without finding a blog on your chosen topic. Blogs are freedom of speech at its best – and sometimes, worst.

With Google alerts set on a variety of topics, I’m treated to a handful of new blogs every day. Some days I simply can’t take the time to read any of them, but I generally look at one or two when I have a quiet moment. Lately I’ve noticed an uncomfortable trend in blogs – bashing.

The Internet is populated by only twelve people and eleven of them have a gzillion screen names each.  I wouldn’t kid you about that. It has to be. I must be the only person who represents myself as only the writer and the “real me.” That’s all the multiple personality disorder I can do. The other eleven people are taking over all the bandwidths.

Okay. I’m being silly. My point is that the Internet provides a never before enjoyed anonymity to everyone. So…does our anonymity give us permission to post truly hurtful things about another person? I think not.

Things blogged about today will live on for no one knows how long. The Internet grows new storage every day. Five years. Fifteen? Fifty? It’s anyone’s guess how big the cloud will grow. The dregs of thought and spirit, and the enlightened and wonderful reside side-by-side. In a hundred years, what will future generations decide most realistically reflects those of us blogging today?  The nasty or the delightful?

I can’t speak for you, but I know which camp I want to be in.

Rayne Forrest

http://www.rayneforrest.com

http://www.twitter.com/rayneforrest

A Bridge Just Far Enough

We passed a milestone this past week. Thursday marked six years since my partner's last major cancer surgery. Coincidentally, the day also marked six years since his last cigarette. I'm not sure what to say about a man who smoked his last cig in the parking deck of Johns Hopkins moments before he stepped inside for them to remove half his liver. Tough? Strong? Stupid? Contradictory? Let's go with the last one. It applies to all of us, doesn't it? 

If my partner had any special feelings about the day, he didn't voice them. Well, not in words, anyway. He called and said he was fixing dinner and I should come straight home and not "bee-hop" around town shopping. "Bee-hop" is a good local expression which means go from one location to another much as the way a honey bee goes from flower to flower to flower. 

Dinner was a quiet affair, with no mention of the significance of the day. If that seems strange to you, I will tell you it did not to us. We said all we needed to say eight years ago when the doctors said, "inoperable" and "give him a little extra time." Never have I been so grateful for a cadre of doctors to be so wrong. Trust me when I tell you after hearing those words meatloaf, mashed potatoes and gravy, corn and green beans is a celebration feast. 

All this got me to thinking about bridges. Whether physical, or metaphysical, bridges carry us from one side to another, safely above whatever danger lies below. We encounter them every day, recognized or not, and we step across them to the other side. Sometimes we move with confidence, sometimes with fear, but we go. And frequently, what we find on the other side is something wonderful for us. 

I passed this little bridge one day on a quiet country road and was unable to resist its charm. I hope the owner didn't mind that I took a moment to walk across it, and back again. It looked so perfect I had to learn what it had to say to me, and what perspective it could show me. 

I think this bridge is waiting for someone else, maybe for the person who placed it there, and that's okay. It was enough to share its creek for a few moments before I moved on, looking for the next bridge, the one waiting for me. 

Rayne
website: http://www.rayneforrest.com

Life this Labor Day

This Labor Day weekend is a mixed bag for me. I'm grateful to have a job, but concerned what will happen in 2011. I see changes on the horizon, that like this weekend, are mixed.

Being a holiday weekend, I stacked a few vacation days before and after so that I have six days in a row for rest and relaxation. HA! What rest? So far this mini-vacation I've met with my financial advisor, stacked firewood, weed whacked for my neighbor (I gotta get me one of those battery-powered things!), spread mulch, helped re-lay a walkway made with pavers, been to the grocery twice, tackled laundry, went on a bike ride, and in between it all, I've written (blogs count, right?).

This is rest?

The folks will be here this afternoon for a nice grilled dinner. Maybe I'll get to rest tomorrow. HA!

Don't be fooled. I am blessed. I have great health and energy, and I have family and friends around me, and they are basically healthy right now. I have two great jobs - helping people and writing. If the day job gets shaky in 2011, and we go to a four-day work week, that will give me more time to write. My home is paid for, and it won't hurt me to embrace a more minimalist lifestyle. I am truly blessed.

Not everyone is so lucky.

This Labor Day my thoughts are with those who work hard for a living, who save when they make enough to do so, who live modestly, and through no fault of their own have lost their jobs. Do the big boys with all the money who manipulated the rest of us into this crisis feel their pain? I don't think so, and that makes me angry.

Too many good people are struggling this Labor Day. I look at my own fears for the future - will I be able to continue to enjoy all the things I've worked for my entire life? Will I be able to actually retire some day? Would I be able to financially weather a health crisis? When will I have saved enough to be able to replace my eleven year old vehicle?

If I experience these fears, from my little sheltered tower, how much worse is it for those in the trenches? I can only imagine.

The future is clouded for a reason. In my life, I think it's to encourage me to live in the now. To embrace what I have. To let go of worry and to trust that a loving God will, indeed, see me through.

It ain't easy, but I'll continue to work hard at it.

To serve the future best

It's been a long, hot summer. Is that an understatement? Depends on where you live. It's almost September, and it hasn't cooled off. I begin to think the snows of last winter are preferable. The heat sucks the energy out of a person, leaving the body listless but the brain overactive.

I've been grappling with what is a serious issue in a writer's life: What do I need to do to continue in this business? A straightforward question, but one with multi-tiered implications and few pat answers.

"They" say to be successful in epublishing you need to maintain a current Internet presence and promote. Let's face it. You can't spend your time on the Internet sucking up to everyone and still have time - and energy - to write something. Maybe I shouldn't mention this, but I've been a few places on the Internet that exhibit a decided lack of maturity, and therefore are not a good way to spend valuable time.

It's been a long process, but several of the epublishing houses have accomplished what I always knew would happen. The cream is rising. I have a very short list of houses I would allow my name to be associated with, which brings me to the thorniest consideration of all: The Name.

It's well accepted among authors that name recognition can run a course, and when that happens, it's okay to start over with a new pen name. Perhaps that has some merit for the Rayne Forrest name.

"Rayne" didn't know much when she started out. A smidgen of talent got her started, but she made a lot of mistakes. Her voice is stronger now, more confident. She has matured along with the epublishing industry. So how best to step into tomorrow without letting go of best things of the past? Those best things being a readership that appreciated the Rayne Forrest brand.

Thorny, yes? Insurmountable, no.

As the industry moves forward, so will I. Blending a past imperfect with plans for the future bright is something we all do every day. The past is a road map that shows us what works, and those pitfalls we stumbled into. Yes, it's too bad the map stops abruptly at our feet without showing us the next proper step, but that's what makes it interesting.

Have I allowed this internal debate to interfere with moving forward? Has it stopped me from taking that next step with fears of a misstep? Sadly, I think it has. But the need to share my thoughts tells me that a decision is at hand. I only wish I knew for sure what it will be.

All I know is that in my own personal life, the decision will come in the midst of doing something else. It will simply be there as if it had always existed, and I'll know it's the right thing for me.

Rayne