Where There's Smoke

Writing is fun. It's cathartic and exciting to explore the stories in my head and see what all those voices are talking about. It's a tumbling, nerve-wracking journey down the rabbit hole that lets other people see just what level of crazy I have to deal with on a daily basis.  But most of all, it's just fun. Being a writer, on the other hand, is hard. It's business. It's queries and submissions and carefully considering the commercial viability of what I'm doing. It's a tumbling, nerve-wracking journey down the rabbit hole of all my insecurities, neuroses, and fears. Most of all, it's just hard. Making the transition from writing to being a writer is frightening. What if my stories aren't nearly as engaging as I think they are? What if I'm not nearly as good a writer as my friends and family tell me? Worst of all, what if no one cares about what I have to say? I'm in the process of moving from just writing to being a writer. It's f

"... lovin' you whether, whether times are good or bad, happy or sad..." A new tradition was born last night, about 10:00 pm Winter Springs, Florida time. Mrs. Smokey and I were cleaning up after our dinner of home made split-pea soup (first attempt...didn't turn out too bad) and listening to Seal's new " Soul 2 " CD.  Great soul classics, beautifully done. When the former Mr. Klum's cover of Al Green's classic, "Let's Stay Together" came on, we spontaneously began dancing around the kitchen, me staring deeply into her hypnotic brown eyes, falling all over again under their spell, while she giggled at me.  I didn't even bother trying to sing the lyrics...I just told her to imagine it was me singing.  That made her giggle even more. After the song, we decided that we had a new tradition.  Every New Year's Eve, sometime prior to the dropping of the ball in Times Square (mainly because we usually don't make it to m