Goodbye 2010. Can't say I'm not happy to see you go.

It's New Years, and I'm sitting here with my daughter making thank you cards for all the people who sent her gifts. I feel like I should write something profound or important, something poetically beautiful about what I've learned in 2010 and how 2011 is a new year filled with promise. Instead, all I can think to write is...

Goodbye 2010. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

Not my best writing, but it shows precisely how I feel.

I usually get the blues at New Years, but they seem particularly bad this year. It's been a particularly difficult year. So much happened and so much more is on the horizon and 99.9% of why I'm so tired and defeated is due to grad school. If I had know just how hard it would be, I doubt I would have gone back to school. Instead, I should have just gotten a job at Starbucks and worked my way up to shift manager. I have a friend who's worked for them for 20 years and she loves it. But no! I HAD to go back to SCHOOL. And in doing so I let my press suffer, book sales drop off, my health go, my house go and my sanity go. My daughter is depressed, my hubby pissed-off and I'm so stressed I jump every time the neighbor chops wood. 

It's almost over though, and that's why I'm excited about 2011. I graduate in June. All done with school. I have no idea if I'll get a job or not but I will be done with school. I'll be able to have a life.

And part of that life is Medusa's Muse and writing. The thing I'm most excited about in 2011 is putting energy back into my press: writing more, updating the website, attending more conferences, working with more authors, finishing some projects of my own... indulging my never ending hunger for more books. 

Thank you for hanging in there with me, my friends. Thank you for keeping the dream of Medusa's Muse alive. She would have become a dusty pile of old books and tax forms sitting in my bedroom if you all hadn't kept the faith. In the new year, I wish you all much happiness and more creativity than you ever thought possible. I want to read those stories, hear that music, listen to your words. The world is filled with inspiration. Go out and find yours.

Wow, I managed to write something vaguely poetic. Perhaps I still remember how to write after all.

I want to end this last post of 2010 with the song that helped me when I was feeling at my lowest. I taught it to myself in October and whenever I felt overwhelmed and miserable, I'd start singing it. And I didn't care who heard it. They probably all think I've gone crazy at the grocery store.

Happy New Year!