I have experienced several times in my life what people sometimes call transitions, where I ended something I had worked on hard. The one that stands out strongest was when I finished my Masters. While I was working on it, because I needed the money, I had a full-time job despite having two kids and a husband. My first year (30 hours) I could do part-time. My last ‘year’ (September – May) had to be done full-time. So I just knuckled down and did it (probably was how I learned to eat elephant!) I just never got more than 4 hours sleep a night. When I finished I celebrated being done and I felt free. I had a little sense of oddness at not having to have every single minute of time filled being busy at something, but it felt good. But the oddness of not having my book to work on is very different. It is more like missing a friend whom I loved to spend time with who is no longer there.

I have filled the time. I have done a little more of the research on Book Two of my series. I mailed out two manuscripts to friends/reviewers, which felt pretty good…but I am still missing my book, the intimacy of constant contact. Don’t know if other writers/authors feel this way, but I do, and I didn’t expect it. And maybe I should have. Whenever I have read a book I really loved I have always felt some regret when I finished it, some emptiness at not having reading it to look forward to. This feeling is close to that but is even stronger, of course, because The Call is heart of my heart, bone of my bone. What an interesting journey! So glad I took this trip!