The writer I am now differs from the writers I’ve been in the past. The writer I am now wants to reach back to the others and say, whoa, chill, take it down a notch, don’t worry so much about making something happen, just do what you do and let it flow.

The writer I am now prefers to write with my feed up, my notebook or iPad supported by a pillow. My preferred writing chair is by a window overlooking the hills across the valley. In the mornings, the trees are many shades of green, soft and fresh from their night’s rest. On misty foggy mornings, the clouds hang low and the hills disappear. Sometimes I write for five minutes only. Sometimes I write until my stomach insists on breakfast.

The writer I am now is aware and grateful to be living each day as an uninvited guest on the unceded territory of the Okanagan/Sylix people. I am at last at peace with my Scottish, Irish, Icelandic settler ancestry.

Even with the turmoils of the world looming larger and darker, I refuse to relinquish the calm of my days now. I am enjoying the backside of my life’s rollercoaster ride, relishing the space of time I have these days for being alive and massaging sentences and putting words together until something cohesive emerges. It’s so different than it used to be, with all those past internal and external pushes, the insistent need to get something out there, to write for others. Now I write for me. Most of it will stay for me. The rest will find its way to here.