I came, I saw, I signed

"Is this the real life?

Is this just fantasy?

Caught in a landslide

No escape from reality

Open your eyes

Look up to the skies and see"
---Freddy Mercury

So it happened, and went well enough. Do I dream of a line snaked around the block waiting for my book? Sure. But what actually happened is way more important. Good friends, a local independent book store, getting to chat with so many book lovers, that is what today was about. As it should be. Was I panicked last night? Definitely. That is the quintessential dilemma self-published authors face. Constant promotion going hand in hand with constant self-doubt. I signed up for it, I'm good, but it's hard sometimes. It's quite surreal. On the one hand, every writer dreams of being discovered by Oprah's book club and catapulting to fame and fortune. On the other it's enough to just realize that, Holy  fuck, you wrote a damn book! Who does that?

Writers do that. Not always well, not always on point, but we do that. And we keep doing it. It is is who we are. Our kids get it, hopefully significant others do as well, but that's often not the case. Still, everyday a writer writes. We cannot help it. For me, it comes naturally, if not coherently. What is mind-blowing is when you've managed to pound out a book, that is literally a body part you must then shop around and gain the approval of others for, well, then it gets dicey. I am so very grateful for friends, family and readers who continue to hold me up, support me and read what I write. "Is this the real life?" It sure isn't what I could have imagined, but for now, I will take it.