Well, I'm Back

Well, I'm back.

I'm graduated now. I have a degree in physics, a piece of paper that says people should think I'm smart. {Not that I am smart, but that they should think so.}

I have a boyfriend. Four months and counting. He's great. He surpasses every romantic interest I ever dreamed up. And yes, we have a years-long story of unrequited affection worth its own adorable book, someday. He has the same fancy piece of paper I have {two of them, actually}, so people should also think he is smart {they're right; he is}.

As noted in December, I'm not pursuing graduate school. However, that non-profit isn't off the table. I'm currently a little bit in limbo at present, but my dream right now is a part-time job {preferably at the non-profit, which will mean formally moving to Austin to live in an actual apartment for which I pay actual rent} and filling up the rest of the time with writing.

I still haven't given up on writing. Yes, I find myself in a weird state. I haven't written fiction in months, and the thought of it is daunting. I don't want to return to this long-lost friend and find our conversation stilted and awkward. If I keep myself busy with not-writing things, then I don't have to.

Other potential writing ventures have captured my interest. I'm not leaving fiction, but I have an idea for a non-fiction book, which I'll call Pages for now, for which I've already written over 5000 words. The Boyfriend and I are also attempting to write a nonfiction physics textbook supplement. It's difficult writing a book with your boyfriend; you get distracted gazing into each other's eyes.

Writing this blog post means a little bit of accountability. I hereby promise to work on fiction, Pages, and/or the physics book in the coming days. I also promise to post updates. So I better do something worth updating about, yeah?


When I Grow Up

Well, hello.

Yes, I'm still alive. I'm one semester away from graduation, and I'm still alive. I've been to Germany and back. I've been in a chemistry lab and answered my chemistry professor's questions about my book, all the while verifying that I'm wearing safety goggles, pants, and closed-toed shoes. I've made it through what I think will have been my hardest semester and still passed all my classes. In May, I will be college graduate with a degree in physics.

And I still want to be a writer when I grow up.

Yep, that happened.

Oh, I considered grad school. Considered it hard, especially since I wanted to go back to Germany and make solar cells, because making solar cells is what I did all summer, and it's fun.

Then I realized that grad school meant, um, more school, and I'm done with that, thanks.

So I started thinking that I would staff at a nonprofit in Austin, a nonprofit that has more or less been my home base while I've been at school here. But every time I planned out what that life would look like, there was one thing important to me: How much time will I have to write?

Until I decided: I'm going home. I'm going home, and I'm pursuing writing, because that is the risk I choose to take. Not-writing is what I will regret most if I choose some other path. {Of course, I will mesh this crazy leap with something like a job. Don't freak out.}

It was over Thanksgiving that I came to this conclusion, over Thanksgiving that I sat down to see what I had in my writing arsenal after no writing for months. Turns out, I had a three-book "trilogy." I've written parts of it over the past 2 years, but this was the first time I realized...I have something here. While I've been turning in homework and serving organizations, I've also been creating.

I tell people that it's a book about space aliens. "The Space Alien Book," I tell them, so that they know which one I'm talking about. But it's not really. I mean, there are space aliens, but it's not their book.

It's a book about a rebel heroine named Mara Wade.
A city looks to her for hope. Now it's time for her to leave.

Yeah, I'm just a little bit excited.


Wonderful Curious Peoples



Yep. I don’t know how many books I’ve sold.








That was cool.
