Figure Skating in Stolen Moments

For the last few weeks, I've been too busy. School started for my three kids. Tuition payments came due. My spouse boarded a big, gray, high-tech, tin can and floated off to points unknown. They're still not really sure where they are going. Okay, let's have a pity party for dej, one, two, three, AWWWWWW. I had my pity party the day he left. Hopefully, I won't get too maudlin during the deployment. Having been married "to the Navy" for 10 years, I should be used to this by now, right? I've reached apathy in record time.

At any rate, I've been working my fat behind off... would that there was actually less of it! I still have deadlines coming out my ears. I've been doing a fair amount of design work, a good excuse to upgrade Adobe InDesign soon... and the I'll need a faster computer to run it on. Oh wait, let's step back from the pipe dreams, shall we? I suspect you're all wondering what in God's Green Earth this has to do with skating. Well, two things.

First thing, before summer, I dropped $600 on a new pair of custom Klingbeil figure skating boots. I have these horrible, wonky feet that have problems from the tips of my toes to the middle of my back. I had two surgeries when I was a teen to correct the deformities. That's what effectively ended my skating career... my feet never quite flexed the same way again. The upshot being that I can't even put my feet in stock boots.

Anyway, I got these figure skating boots, and it is now October and I have yet to be able to spare the $100 to get them mounted onto the skate blades I have on my old boots. So they sit. It's beginning to chafe me that they are just sitting after I paid so much for them. And then of course, there is the fact that my darling middlest daughter is home mornings now, so I get very little work done. I can't really condone spending my work hours at the skating rink. I must figure this out.

Second thing, I am chugging away at Fall from Grace. For those of you who read my figure skating serial On the Edge, this is one of the future books in the series based on that serial. It's kind of complex WHICH book it is, so let me digress a second. For people who bought the ebook, this is the second sequel to that book, Book 3. But after I pulled the ebook On the Edge from the market, I chopped it into pieces, hoping that a shorter length would make it more attractive to agents (nibbles but can't set the hook). First, I chopped it in two: On the Edge and Desperate Times. But Desperate Times was still too long.

So then I cut it in three: On the Edge, Desperate Times, and Unlucky in Love. Unlucky in Love needs a bit more work because it's on the short side, only 45K words. Following that is Unison and Counterpoint, which took 6 months to start and 2 months to finish--separated by three years of misery and writer's block. Book 5, which I am not nearly finished with, is Fall from Grace. For those who know me best, Unison and Counterpoint used to have the working title Fall from grace, but then I changed it. Fall from Grace really fits this book, though it is not as vicious as this section of the serial was. Jen Bigley (of Designs of Greatness) once described it as "Okay, let's see how much Elayne and Alexi can hurt each other."

Now, if everyone's not totally confused, I'll continue. I finally finished chapter 7 (of 8) of Fall from Grace (or FFG as I often call it). For fans of the serial, the last section of FFG ch7 is the scene based on (and largely lifted from) A Seat at Finlandia. Except that it no longer takes place in Helsinki, conveniently rearranging the embarrassment of sending Elayne and Alexi to a competition that doesn't even have pairs. Since the books are significantly different from the serial, the fight is about something totally different, the uh... figure skating is still about the same--hot enough to melt the ice. So, I started rewriting it, because the fight scene just didn't have enough venom. And I got stuck. Stuck stuck STUCK! I wasn't blocked, I just didn't know what to have Elayne say next. What the heck do you say when the man you love accuses you of trading your ex-boyfriend sexual favors for figure skating lessons? So anyway, today, I figured it out. I'll probably rewrite it twice or three times more before I am through.

So what does this have to do with stolen moments? I guess just that I've had to steal the moments I get to work on the novel. But finish it, I will. Not sure what I will DO with it when I finish it. But I will finish it. On the Edge (the short one) has been with various agents for over six months now. That's called rejection by ignorance. If they ignore it long enough, maybe I'll go away. So, there are two ways I can go. I can self-publish the book, assuming I can come up with a couple hundred bucks... or I can start querying publishers. Six of the seven big YA publishers still take unagented books... but the turn around is measured in years. I am not sure that I want to leave the whole series sitting for that long.

And then, of course, there is the problem with Kadie's Choice. KC is the book I sold to Scobre Press... which offered me an appallingly terrible contract which I am trying to negotiate into something I can live with. Eventually, I hope it will get settled. I have a reason to see it get settled, you see, if KC sells like their books tend to sell, I will be able to write my own ticket in NY, pretty much. I could probably walk into any decent agency and say "This is Kadie's Choice. It sold 40K copies. This is On the Edge. I'd like you to represent me." It's so much easier to get agents to display enthusiasm about your unpublished manuscript when you have a blockbuster (40K for a YA is a blockbuster) under your belt. So potentially, if I hung OTE in the closet for another couple years, I might be able to sell it into the big time.

Wait. Don't wait. Wait. Don't wait.

As Alexi says at the end of FFG ch7, "I don't know."

Figure Skating Blog Welcome

For reasons beyond my ken, I have joined the blogging revolution... or perhaps that's evolution. I've always maintained that I don't read blogs and would never write one. Despite being a professional writer and journalist, I haven't the faintest idea what to write about figure skating.

It's even more ironic since over the last seven years, I've written literal volumes on all things figure skating. I've hung with the RSSIF regulars and written about figure skating. I'm active on SkateFans where I discuss a lot of stuff on figure skating--and make smartass (or dumbass) remarks (depending on your POV). I'm even on the SkateFAIR PR and Policy Committee, though I'm not sure that I'm accomplishing anything. I am a control freak among much more forceful and competent control freaks.

Anyway, the purpose of this figure skating blog is still unclear to me. I'm a very private person, so the likelihood of me spewing almost anything that might be sensitive about myself is nearly nil. But then, I do get the urge to rant about this or that occasionally. Sometimes, I like to reminisce. I am hoping—though I make no promises—that maybe I will start actually skating again. I have a pair of very expensive custom boots (bad feet) reposing in a box in my office, waiting for me to have the small amount of money needed to mount them.

It comes down to money. I'll be honest about that. Some people who see this might wonder how I can represent myself as a happenin' journalist and still be so broke all the time. The truth of the matter is, I make "eh" money freelancing. Freelancers in general, especially ones whose "full time" keeps getting eaten into by motherhood and military-spousehood, don't make a whole lot of moula. I have 3 kids and pretty much every penny I make goes to keeping them in private school, day care, and music lessons. There isn't much left for luxuries like ice skating... or even roller skating for that matter. We live a decent middle-class life... but I'm one of those kind of moms for whom my kids come first. If I get to skate, it's because I've snuck off from work in the middle if the day.

But still, the ice beckons.

Okay, I officially HATE Blogger now. This is the second time that it's selected something I didn't want and then when I typed over it wouldn't freaking undo!

I'm done for today. I'll tell y'all more about how I came into figure skating next week.