Waking up

 So my "exile" is over, I am once again fully connected to the web but our relationship will be better, much more balanced.  As I said, I achieved a lot of things while off-line, tidying, tossing out and cleaning up and am so glad I finally got around to these lingering messes... tossing papers from 2005, for example!!! 
  I also re-started two projects that have lingered a LLOONNGG time:  years ago (maybe 15?) I received an Emily Farmer miniature Teddy Bear kit which I started and then put aside.  That poor bear... well, I once again have him out and on my studio table and his legs are already finished!
  Dearer to my heart, I have blown the dust off my novella.  Wow, it's been 10 years since I last really looked at it and last night I went to a "Getting Your Book Published" panel discussion with my novella in mind.  Years ago, we had travelled so far as to actually have the attention of a small press, only to have that small press radically change its mission and decide it would only publish poetry.  So we lost our publisher, and I have to admit after a pile of rejection letters I was rather disheartened.  Well, time has passed and the whole publishing thing is SO different now:  I can self publish and hearing the authors on this panel speak, R. J. Anderson, Terry Griggs, Ruth Barrett and moderator Deborah Cooke (a.k.a. Claire Delacroix) was inspiring!  (Check out http://stratfordauthors.ca for more about this growing group).
  Of course, at this time, blogger is having issues with uploading photos... gesh ("Chrome" works though, if you have it.)  Couldn't have happened while I was off-line, of course.  ;}