Rebecca M. Douglass, Author

  Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds! Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writer - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting! Let’s rock the neurotic writing world! Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG. The awesome co-hosts for the October 5 posting of the IWSG are Joylene Nowell Butler, Chemist Ken, Natalie Aguirre, Nancy Gideon, and Cathrina Constantine! Be sure you drop in

  Title: A Quick and Easy Guide to Asexuality Author: Molly Muldoon and Will Hernandez Publication Info: Limerence Press, 2022. 72 Pages. Source: Library digital collection Publisher's Blurb: Asexuality is often called The Invisible Orientation. You don’t learn about it in school, you don’t hear “ace” on television. So, it’s kinda hard to be ace in a society so steeped in sex that no one knows you exist. Too many young people grow up believing that their lack of sexual desire means they are broken – so writer Molly Muldoon and cartoonist Will Hernandez, both in the ace community, are here to shed light on society’s misconceptions of asexuality and what being ace is really like. This book is for anyone who wants to learn about asexuality, and for Ace people themselves, to validate their experiences. Asexuality is a real identity and it’s time the world recognizes it. Here’s to being invisible no more! My Review: I picked this book up because I have recently had my attenti

In Part 1 of this account , we outlined the project and covered our first two days, hiking from Mels to Elm (and taking transport to Braunwald). Part 2 took us on to Klausenpass and to Altdorf, home of William Tell. We resume the tale after taking a nice Thanksgiving break, with  Day 5: Altdorf to Engleberg We started this day with a fairly lengthy bus ride which took us a lot of places before dropping us at the base of a very small cable car, where we were to ring the mid-station when ready to go. Happily some other hikers with more German were there and got it all going. At the mid-station we paid for the trip, and continued on to the top at Brusti, about 5200'. That still left us a more than adequate 2500'+ climb to the Surenenpass at just over 7500' .  With the day heating up right from the start (did it ever cool off?), we were happy to skip the climb from 1500' Altdorf, and to jump right into the alpine scenery and alpine temperatures.     Ready to begin. Note th

This is my "Writer's Wednesday" post, coming a day late to give the final wrap-up on NaNoWriMo. If you've been a "Nanner" this month, please chime in and let me know how it went for you. I set my goal absurdly high at the beginning of the month, matching the reality of an 80K-word standard for novels in my genre. I talked about the project way back in the last IWSG post on Nov. 2.  Tonight I reached the end of my day's writing energy, and then some, at 72,032 words. That's the most I've even done in a month, and I have some thoughts about that, and about life and its relationship to writing. First, I figured out tonight how to adjust my personal goal, so I dropped it down to 70k for a "win." That doesn't actually change the fact that I'm going to spend the next two days in my artist's retreat trying to finish the book. So here are five things I learned this month: 1. Go ahead and set your goals high. Whatever "high&quo

The rush and fun of Thanksgiving with my family is over, and I am back at my retreat. I've fallen pretty far behind my NaNo writing goals, and will be skipping the WritePhoto prompt this week, and may in fact not do any posts before Friday, when I do hope to get back to my photo travel posts!  I hope you all had a great holiday, and don't tie yourself in knots preparing for the next one!  

To all  my US friends, have a happy Thanksgiving. I hope you are celebrating with someone you love, be they friend or family, or family of your heart. Because of the holiday, and because I'm celebrating with my family, including out-of-towners, my Friday Photo post will come... sometime other than Friday. Find the little things, and let yourself be grateful for them when you can't find anything big to celebrate. Deeply grateful for the multiplicity of chocolate desserts to be had.

Visitor – Image by KL Caley   Participating in the weekly #WritePhoto challenge at KL Caley's New2Writing website. I am excited and honored to be in residence at Holly House/Hypatia-in-the-Woods for a couple of weeks, decompressing and focusing on my writing. That helped give me the idea for this very short story. Very short in part because I'm still trying to get that novel drafted, and have fallen a bit behind the last few days.  Here you are, in just over 300 words. The Visitor The squirrel came to visit on the first day of Cora’s solo meditation retreat. Squirrels, she realized, were always around. She didn’t pay it much attention the first time it came and sat on the fence, watching her doing her yoga. But the big-tailed rodent continued to visit every afternoon, so that she quickly came to look for it when she was on the deck.   By the end of the first week she was calling it “The Visitor,” and making entries in her jo

In Part 1 of this account , we outlined the project and covered our first two days, hiking from Mels to Elm (and taking transport to Braunwald). One nice feature of this hike, like many in Switzerland, is that you can often shorten or ease hikes by using buses, trains, and lifts to cut out extra mileage or hills (up or down) that are just too long, steep, and/or tedious, and we did so whenever possible. Thus our third morning found us enjoying the stunning views from out hotel in Braunwald, and preparing for a much easier day. VA Day 3: Braunwald to Klausenpass First light touches the Todli. As usual, I awoke early to catch the best light. Happily, I had to move no further than my balcony to take the photos. Panorama from my balcony, looking down the valley below Linthal, as well as across to the Todli and at the nearer Ortstock. A hearty breakfast sent us off in a good mood, and since we'd dealt with the climbing yesterday (mostly on the funicular), we had a pleasant walk with onl