This morning I woke up at 6:00 a.m. and attempted to go back to sleep by doing my relaxation/breathing exercises. This sort of worked. I ended up having a very vivid dream before I woke at 8:00 a.m. Place was integral to this dream. There was a house, and a rolling expanse of green lawn. A horse pulled me across the lawn – I was sitting on a bottle cap. There was, nearby, we discovered, an inlet, which lead to a larger river. This larger river has been in previous dreams.

We were going to rent this place. This was the downside. The upside was that I liked the place – and this is what stayed with me after I woke up. I woke up with pain in my neck and side of my head. I have no idea how long this will last when it happens. It disappeared at about midday of a very busy day.

Sometimes I feel when I’m at the literacy center like I’m a part of a reality television show. People come and go – and they have no connection to one another. Admittedly, it was one of those days in which I wanted to be alone, so that I could give further thought to my dream. And of course, there was a lengthy list of ongoing characters, the first being a representative of the Anchorage Literacy Project. Lots of uncertainty here – their funding is being cut, which means less money for us.

I also wanted time to obsess about tomorrow. I am very nervous about how it will go – the Alaska Junior Theatre troupe will be on hand to entertain children, and I’m now sure if there will be any children on hand. I also do not know exactly where they will perform. I don’t like having to deal with this sort of uncertainty. Well, if this falls through it will not be the end of the world. The world is flat, and life will go on.

It was a good day after all, with appearances by Cathy, the artist in residence, and Colton, the boy genius, and book donors. There is, I realized, upcoming uncertainty – I do not know how the Alaska State Fair plans are going to go since Kid’s Kupboard will also be pulling the cart.

I decided today to deal with this uncertainty by focusing on what I have to do, which is going to be to get my books and newspaper boxes in order, and line up some story tellers. I’m going to do this soon, and in this way do my share in moving the cart along.

Now, certainty. I did not want to work on my book – I hit a stuck point of sorts, due to my weeklong non-writing hiatus. But last night I forced myself to work – all this did was reacquaint myself with my shitty chapter on forging partnerships. Tonight I worked on that chapter some, then had a breakthrough. The forging partnership chapter is going to precede my final chapter, which is going to be about getting the Center for the Book award. I am going to write about my 30 minute award presentation and talk about how writers need to be more pro-active when it comes to promoting literacy related projects.

And I thought, as I was working, well, I probably have not published to the degree that I’d like to have because it has seemed to me that writing a book and publishing it is much like running a four minute mile. Possible but impossible for us mere mortals. I am thinking that I’ll finish this. And then move on to a like project. This right now feels like it is certain.

Next: 201. 7/25/25: Rain, Rain, and More Rain