I did it: I spent five hours on Sunday working on my dog ebook! It felt great. I once again plugged into memories, revelation and syntax, smoothing out the paragraphs and fleshing out details. I felt grateful that I didn’t have children, pets or even a husband to distract me from this work. I’ve created the life I want with exactly what I want in it, and these days that’s generating income, reading fiction and writing my dog ebook (it’s a memoir about my experience as a first-time dog owner and it’s not your typical how-a-dog-changed-my-life happy ending).
My goal is still to self-publish in 2014, but I’ll finish this third draft and send out some query letters before I get down to the business of turning into an epub document. The story of my first time as a dog owner becomes more nuanced as I get farther away from it. I was a wife and dog owner and now I’m not. Now that I’m completely out of that household and am done with that experience I can see things more clearly and have more courage to write about them. I never again want to go through anything like the year and a half I spent with Ozzie the mutt (and Bob the husband), so I’m determined to wring all the lessons out of it I can. The best way for me to do that is by writing about it. I love writing.
People have been bewildered by my willingness to spill my guts and let everyone know just what I’m thinking. I put things on this blog that others would never dream of letting their family members or co-workers or spouses read, and my ebook will be the same. My dog ebook will include themes of mental illness, family, being a Mexican American, pets, marriage and terrible self-esteem. Yes, I’m willing to let everyone I know read this. Aren’t you glad there are people like me? If there weren’t, no juicy memoirs would ever get written.