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Doing Battle With Social Media During a Book Launch

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  When I first wrote about Blue Roses I discussed my reluctance to publish a book with a happy ending.  There is certainly more to say about that.  The second time, I wrote about the main character of Blue Roses , Pamela Miller-Townsend, and the truths of a midlife coming of age experience.   With this third post, I want to talk about the nuts and bolts difficulties of launching my new novel while doing battle with the nightmare technology of bookseller sites, website platforms and social media companies.   As writers, we’re told over and over again about how important it is to maintain a social media presence, to have an active website, to keep our digital identity fresh and exciting.  We’re not told how the heck we're supposed to do that when these sites all seem designed to drive you insane, force you into dealing with AI and robo-staff, leave you feeling broken, disoriented and helplessly enraged.  (Is it even possible to be “helplessly enraged”?)...
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To All the Fatherless Women on Father's Day

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Sad Little Girl Sitting By the Window by DmitriM                                                           You know who you are.  Those of us who begin to feel a deep kind of sadness surface as Father's Day approaches, who realize that the sadness is always there, deep within, every day of our lives.  He can be alive somewhere, or he can be gone, but he was never really there.  At least not for you.  You were invisible.  Or disappointing.  Or simply too unimportant.  He's the reason, the therapists tell you, that your relationships with men are largely and often completely fucked.  Why you chase the unavailable man, or the man who judges and shames you, the one who disregards you, and tells you it's all your fault.  He's the reason you find it hard to trust anyone, or believe in yourself.  He's ...
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The Role of the Artist Empath

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                                                                                              It is ten years since Other Likely Stories , my first collection of short stories, was published. For the last several years, I've been working, on and off, on a new collection of short stories, which from the very beginning I had named Crossing the Line .  This is because, from the very beginning, I thought of these stories as character studies of individuals who, at moments of crisis in their lives, went too far in one way or another, driven by emotions like despair, anger, sorrow, fear. They were all individuals who "crossed the line" in ways that made it impossible for them to return to the identities or t...
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Exploring the Rule of Three

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                                                  The number 3 has powerful significance in spiritual practices, in mathematics, in psychology, even in business.  I came across a reference to the “Rule of Three” in a book on magical practices, which is where I first began this exploration.  I plan to write on this a bit more, exploring other aspects of the idea.  The Rule of Three is a simple rule – that whatever you send out into the universe (through your actions, behaviors, thoughts) will return to you three-fold…or in some cases it is phrased that it will return to you “three times three”.   There is a poem, which I’ve tweaked a bit, and share with you here:   Ever mind the Rule of Three Three times thy gifts return to thee This lesson well thou needs must learn Thy wilt be blessed, but...
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The Coming of the Great Dissolution

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  "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." The sad and failed state known as The United States of America is facing a time of reckoning.   The country is unable to live up to even the preamble of its constitution, let alone the body of laws contained within the constitution itself.  First, there is no “we the people,” in The United States, and there is no hope of a “more perfect Union.”   I’ve spoken and written for some time about the ways in which the so-called “United States” was not at all united.  I’ve watched over the course of my whole lifetime – over six decades now – at how this country has fallen more and more completely into the grip of some of the most base...
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Six Ways to Say Goodbye to 2019

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                                            For most of us 2019 was an extremely difficult year.  This has been true on a personal level for many of us, and it certainly has been true on a global level.  In beginning the new year, and looking forward to a really wonderful 2020, I thought it might make sense to share some thoughts on a process that allows us to gain the most from the experiences of 2019, and then to let it go so that 2020 can begin with a fresh and revitalized energy. Where to begin? You Review It . Pay attention, read deeply, learn, find your way through the events and inform yourself. Go beyond the cable news networks and the mainstream press. Why?  Because they all have an agenda.  Try your best to see their agenda, and to incorporate it into your understanding of the ways in which the “news” is packaged and presented.  Read b...
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~~Medicare and the Dongatta Breakthrough~~

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                                  Where to start? I guess with the fact that, for years, because of my excruciatingly low wages as a professor hired on adjunct contracts, I was unable to afford the obscene costs of the for-profit medical insurers in the U.S.  So, I went without health insurance; on the rare occasion when I needed a doctor (which was all of about twice in the last decade), I paid out of pocket.  Then, the Obama campaign came along, promising to reform the horrible medical system we had.  He promised a public option where citizens could opt into the program that, up until then, was offered only to seniors – the Medicare system. But once Obama was elected and the healthcare “reform” was underway, what we were told immediately was that the public option was no longer on the table.  It was claimed that the reformed system would work, instead, by forcing through la...
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