Looking Back to Move Forward

In every religion there is a grain of truth.  The Roman god Janus was often depicted as having two faces, one facing backwards and the other facing forward as he was the master of time.  January is named in his honor, which is fitting as it is the beginning of the New Year.  These next few days many will devote to setting resolutions, if they haven't already.  Many of which they will not keep.  It is a time for both beginnings and also endings.

Before I start looking forward to 2014, I want to take just a few paragraph's to look back at 2013.

The first half of the year, was pretty bland as I remember it.  I downloaded my novel from me email towards the end of April and was overtaken with the writing bug again.  It felt really good.  And all I did was read through the rough draft and decide that I like it, except I had to change the ending.

At the end of July, my partner of almost five years kind of sort of proposed to me.  We had an argument about marriage the weekend before my vacation from work and that next Monday he bought something on EBay...and of course since my birthday was approaching, I tried twisting his arm to get him to tell me what he'd bought me.  He said it wasn't anything for any of his vehicles, but that night he passed his phone to me and said, "Ok, go to my EBay app..."  He had bought wedding bands!  One of the few times in my life I was speechless.  Until I said, "Are you serious?"

Which he was.  And since he didn't care about when it was done, I had things arranged and by that weekend in August we were married.  Like I told a friend, "We've been together for almost five years...why piddle fart around?"  We did get some grief for marrying "so quickly" but I was happy with the day, and he was happy with the day and that's all that really mattered.  Neither one of us wanted a big church wedding.  Or any kind of big wedding.  We had a reception a few weeks later.  We actually had two receptions, one for our local family and one for our New York family.

And then in September, I made the impulsive decision to self-publish my novel through Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing.  A few weeks later I published to CreateSpace.  And afterwards realized I had no idea how to get the word out and market it, or myself.  Which is what led to this new blog.  And my emerging presence on Google+, Twitter, Pinterest...and yes, to some degree Facebook.  I had over a thousand free downloads on Kindle, and a handful of real purchases.  I've even sold a few paperbacks.  And released to Nook as well now.  It blows my minds a little to think that there are over a thousand people out there with my work in their hands...or on their Kindle which is pretty  much the same thing.  And that was a worldwide event!

And in November, I was able to go to New York City for the first time in my life.  That alone could have made the year!  Finally I was able to see the Statue of Liberty with my own eyes!  I got to look down from the top of the Empire States building!  I got to walk the streets that I see so often in CSI: NY!  I loved the sounds!  The traffic is everything they say it is, although I didn't drive in it.  The subways were pretty cool in my opinion, even when it was 5pm and crowded!  I loved the little bit of lights before we left.

December has been a month of winding down.  Much needed after the exciting few months we've had.  As much as one can wind down during the holidays!

Tomorrow, I will take a few paragraphs to 'look forward' and dream a little.  Because after all the good things that have happened in 2013, there is no telling what is going to happen in 2014!