Published on
December 31, 2009.
I’m going to try keeping this brief, because there’s not much good to say about two thousand and nine. I’m sure that, many years ahead, I’ll look back upon this year and have kinder words for it: character building, challenging, a turning point. Right now the pain is too close to analyze.
I believe the next year will be a turning point. There are many fine tendrils weaving their way towards good things. A brilliant, talented wife that tolerates my eccentricities with grace and snarky comments. Many fine people, met or imagined, that I now call friend. Writing that improves with each passing day. A job that, despite some rocky months this past year, continues to give me the freedom to craft my own future.
I’ve set many goals for the next year, personal and professional. Getting debt from the divorce paid and forever behind me. Getting personal finances in order. Deciding where we want to live and finding a house. Writing and editing many stories. Submitting said stories. Get more physically fit. Start walking again. Maybe take martial arts again. Things I, more or less, have control over. No more stressing over the things I don’t.
In like a lion, out like a lamb. A pretty apt description of this decade. Ten years ago I was working in New York City, a consultant for NBC. Working New Years Eve, armed with a special security badge (which I still have somewhere) allowing me into the building on the eve of the new millennium. Y2K fever spread rampantly, with security precautions and stockpiling. Much ado about nothing. Follow that with 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina. As we bring this decade to its close, this era of ineptitude, insecurity theater, underwear bombers, Jon & Kate, and the Octomom, I say good riddance. Bitterly. Let’s have some forward progress and substance in the next ten years, eh?
Published on
December 28, 2009.
Jeanne and Spider Robinson need your help.
Earlier his year a brilliant surgeon, Dr. Andresz Busczowski, helped Jeanne Robinson beat back a rare and virulent form of biliary cancer. But it’s so rare even he can’t say how much time he‘s bought her, how soon it might recur—and her latest blood tests have been so discouraging they’ve now decided she needs to start chemotherapy as soon as possible. Besides the prescription drugs to counteract the chemotherapy, she needs special therapies and supplements, counseling, and extensive diet and lifestyle changes, to reduce her stress level and the strain on her liver to as close to zero as possible. All those things are expensive…and like many artists today the Robinsons were already running on fumes financially.
The Robinsons are good people. I met them, briefly, at the Heinlein Centennial a few years ago. Like me, they are big proponents of paying it forward. Now, in their time of need, it’s their turn to be on the receiving end of good will. Friends held a benefit auction and concert, We Dream of Jeanne, but it’s not too late to contribute via check or Paypal. Also, by way of Mathew Sanborn Smith, all proceeds from the sale of Lord Dickens’s Declaration, an eBook by Larry Santoro, will go to Jeanne and Spider. Hurry, though. The last day for this is December 30th.
Published on
December 27, 2009.
I’ve been posting under the nom de plume “Stone Table” for the better part of fifteen years. As my writing career begins to bloom I’ve realized that a more professional web presence would be prudent. Not that I have a problem with my moniker but having to introduce myself as an inanimate object at conventions in order to be recognized as that guy from the Internet is kind of awkward and not the kind of impression I want to leave with people. More so when you want to be recognized as a peer and professional. So, after years of regrets followed by nail-biting, I am happy to announce that AdamIsrael.com is now mine.
From this point forward, I will be blogging under my own name. The stonetable.org domain will remain online for archival purposes and I will be phasing out my other uses of my nickname. Change is always uncertain but I’m excited by what’s to come.
