This was what I wrote this morning, at the tail end of an email. It made sense then and it makes sense now. Far better than writing sputtering along, which some days is a truism.

I had a list of phone calls to make this morning, and I gave myself an hour to make them. If I was playing cards I would have called the hour a good run. I don’t often have days in which I get so much positive feedback.

I first called Title Wave Books. We will be getting eight boxes of books on Wednesday. Then I called the head of the tribal council in Old Harbor Village. Looks like there’s scholarship funds available, so that we can bring students from there to here for Summer in the Park(s). I still will have to find funding to bring a chaperone here.

Next, I called the City of Palmer development person. It took two calls, but I will meet with him next week, on Monday, and we will confer about the Summer in the Park(s) program. It’s a good thing that I thought of and am taking action on this. The city people would not like me not asking permission.

Then I called Jeremy, the editor of Porphyry Press in McCarthy. He answered the phone – he’s a staff of one – and I wound up and gave a strong pitch for Shelf Life: A Book about an Overabundance of Books. I must have done a good job because he did not say no, he is not looking at proposals at this time. Rather, he said that he would not be publishing any more books until next year. I told him this would be fine with me – that I’d keep working on Shelf Life.

Now Jeremy may decide this book is not something he wants to publish, in which case I will attempt to publish it elsewhere. What I liked about our interaction, and I hope future interactions, is that this is a door swinging open. So tonight I began work on the proposal.

Now, three hours ago, I was at a loss for how I might begin this. Constructing something from nothing is daunting. But I gave myself an hour and worked 1 ½ hours. I have a good start.

I forgot to mention that when I came downstairs in order to tell Pete all the good news, he had good news of his own. He told me that he had just gotten word from the New York Times that they’d published his letter. We both went to their website and there it was. And tomorrow it will be in the print edition. If this is the international edition, his letter will go worldwide. It’s going national is quite enough. We aren’t greedy.
But already we have gotten a donation for $500.00. And in a few days, we’ll get the newsletter and 2025 annual report out.

It was also a good day with volunteers – one in particular is going to be our Headstart coordinator.

Lastly, I gave thank you cards to Lee and Mike at Big Cabbage Radio, Maryann at Fireside Books, and a staff person at The Palmer Chamber of Commerce. Giddy up indeed.

Next: 13. 1/13/26: Go Figure