Tina Haapala, Excuse Editor

Excuse Editor began when I stepped back and started paying attention to the dialogue going on in my own head about all things “Writing”. I was shocked at the misinformation, false conclusions, and all-or-nothing rhetoric I was feeding myself. It was like my mind was taken over by a political super-pac in an election year.  Problem was, like an ill-informed voter, I was making decisions about my writing life based on this nonsense. I had to take a critical view of all this fluff, make myself a fact checker of my own superstitions.  And sometimes I had to laugh. Because struggling through the writing life can be full of a lot of baloney. Bunch of Baloney Bullet Points: Writing is a Job Killer o    For years, I told myself that I could not write and hold a non-writing job as well.  If I held a title from 9-5, I argued with myself, that’s who I was. I couldn’t try and be something else. Writing was something I would have to do AS a job in or...

I recently survived 5 days in the French Quarter. I say survived because I thought I would burst at some point from the rich food, the tasty drinks, and the just plain fun of the whole experience.  I was overloaded with lots of music, and quite a bit of history, too, since my friends and I took in a few museum tours.  This was my fourth trip to the area, and when I am there, I am just bombarded with evidence of creativity that’s all around us, but especially in places like this. I attempted to tweet some of what was going on around me, but I found the multi-tasking a little too difficult. I just wanted to experience the moments. And by the time I made it back to the Inn, I was exhausted. I am not discouraged though. Just because I couldn’t get all the thoughts and ideas running through my head down right then doesn’t mean they haven’t set up camp somewhere in a corner of my mind, biding their time until they’re needed.

You're not getting any younger! As the sun poked through my bedroom this morning, I was reminded that today was the beginning of another year for me. Now, that has been true every other morning, as well, but since today is my birthday, I get my own personal ball-dropping dose of reality. I've been hanging around this planet for a whole 38 years, and I'm still not finished with my first novel! Or my second! And what about all of those magazine articles I was supposed to write? I'm not going to beat myself up about it: It's my birthday, after all, and I have a strict no-self-flagellation policy on such occasions. I am, however, going to use the opportunity to reflect and celebrate. Would you like to come along? "May the fourth be with you, too!"