Friends and the Road to Sanity.

I have found that the only real way to keep sane, is to

surround yourself with real friends and like minded people.

You may be thinking, 'Duh, that's a given.' But in reality it

can sometimes seem harder than you think.

The only reason is this: I had a good friend come over

tonight and after a very tasty bottle of 2005 Palazzo Red

we just started talking about her book and mine (both

the first one and the sequel I am currently working on) and

I felt like we had a complete melding of the minds.

We worked on concepts on her story and ironed out

details and she brought out valuable questions for my story

that made me think and solidify my own details which are

still yet to be written. In the end we both ended the evening

feeling great and having a well thought out game plan as to

what direction our stories were going to take. And at one

moment I realized something very important...I felt sane.

Somewhere between all our pontificating and questioning

of each other the details worked themselves out and sanity

once again reigned in our worlds. It was awesome!

In the hours that passed, we drank our wine and threw

ideas out at each other like rogue snowballs, I realized that

my friends really do keep me grounded and sane. Without

them I would probably be bouncing off a padded cell at Bellvue

drooling all over myself and singing, Mary Had a Little Lamb,

over and over repeatedly.

For this reason, I have infused a little bit of my close friends

into the heart and soul of my characters. I find that I like

to mix and match traits. I take a little sarcasm from one friend

and mix it with the charming naivete of another and a super

character is born. At least in my mind it is because those are the

traits I relate to when I think of the friends I took them from.

I feel this is why I become emotionally invested in my story

and the people that live within it. Because they embody all that

is great about the people I know.

Okay on a side note, there are those people that I don't

care much for and in the true fashion of vengeance I act out my

frustration towards them by maiming or killing them off in

stories. But it's my own way of keeping my sanity intact and

not taking them too seriously. And it's a lot less

destructive in the end, both emotionally and physically.

So to all my friends out there who have supported me,

laughed with me, cried with me, and listened to me ramble...

THANK YOU for keeping my head on straight and believing

in me. You are truly priceless in my book. XOXO

Pages written today: 5

Day 6: Rejections: 5 Queries Still Out There: 6

Request for more material: 1

Songs of the Day: Sade, The Moon and the Sky and

Nine Inch Nails, The Hand that Feeds