Many of my fans ask me “Gee, Katie, Now that you’re not blogging what are you doing with your life?” (No one has really asked me anything, ever.) Well, non-existent fans, let me tell  you….

1. Duh Buffy, writing shit. Clearly no one is going to publish my short stories and the stuff I’ve written about autism is too dense and tragic. No one likes that garbage. So I started writing a screenplay.  If I’m going for rejection, at least it will now be by vapid, young, Hollywood people. I’m 60 pages in and so far it’s been a lot of classes, reading of books and screenplays and navigating final draft.
2. Travel! I did a lot of death travel (more on that later) and went to Seattle for the first time which was equal parts amazing and depressing. Made me want to blow up Amazon. Wehad Big FUN at the Women’s March in DC where I performed a wiccan ritual which I believe caused the sinkhole at the White House because it was very close to where we did our ritual.   My husband and I went to Atlantic City to see Jeff Ross and was fortunate enough to meet him the next day at  The White House Sub Shop which is the perfect place to meet Jeff Ross. I had a madcap weekend in NYC, camped at Mohican State Park, spent a few weeks in Richmond, VA and had a lovely  long weekend at the actually fabulous Pearl Hotel in San Diego. 
3. Animals! This year in animal sightings was mostly marine life. I saw gray whales and a few seals in the Puget Sound, saw seals in SD and lots of pelicans, vultures and a few Eagles on the Delmarva peninsula whilst traveling for work.  I did have a very odd encounter which is still disturbing months later; I saw a bottlenose dolphin skull attached to the spinal cord on the beach by my house. Now, I can spot anything on the beach, dogs, stoned people, one sock….but I almost stepped right on this skull. It was horrifying. I spend a large amount of time looking for dolphins in the Chesapeake Bay (there are lots of them where I am) so I kind of love Dolphins. It was weird, I’m still creeped out by the experience.
4.  Nightmares! Lots of them…sometimes every single night. Dreams about being a kid and knowing that I’m going to be shot, dreams of talking people out of shooting me, dreams of large underwater flesh eating plants. You know, fun stuff. I woke up my husband by screaming ALICE just last week. I also kicked him so hard that he stayed in the couch a few nights. I’m blaming this nighttime distress on my old mattress and am buying a pricy latex mattress this week  because they feel amazing and have a ridiculous lifespan but if they don’t stop my nightmares, I’m going to have a large and possible illegal latex fire in my backyard=]
5. Death! My mom died this year. She was 89. We had a complicated relationship, everything was a competition. A competition with me, with my friends, the whole world. Aside from having my kids, I don’t think that she liked anything that I did which isn’t so horrible, there are a lot of kids out there not worth liking. I spent most of my life navigating her moods and as an armchair psychologists, I have diagnosed my mom as autistic. A very capable autistic woman, but she did not handle change well…like at all…like ever.  She also had tremendous self image issues as she was born with a hematoma on her upper lip and the surgery to correct it did not go well and she was left with a scar that she always hated.  40 years after her surgery, a hole formed in her lip where her surgery had been and to repair the damage, she needed plastic surgery that included sewing her lips together for a few weeks. She was such a pathetic creature with her lips sewn shut. Someday I’m going to deal with these lingering feelings but right now my family is just very traumatized by her last few months.  I worked with elderly people with dementia and a variety of mental health issues as a case manager and have seen people really suffering. My mom really suffered. Every day for at least 6 weeks, we prayed that she would just die. I burned candles, chanted, dedicated yoga practices to her death which came when a doctor in the psych ward finally had pity on her. It was not fun.
6.  Money! I don’t think I’m lower middle anything anymore. Because I have a daughter with a disability who will need support for the rest of her life, I don’t think I will ever be upper middle anything either. But I have a savings account, I bought a car this year for the first time ever because I wanted one, (and not because I had some tragic expensive repair) and I saw Hamilton AND another play on Broadway so I’m not lower middle…those aren’t lower middle things. I can live with this. I really can.