Good News, Bad News, Best News

Yesterday was a challenging day, in terms of keeping my usual good mood and sunny optimism.  I often have trouble sleeping as Sunday night moves to Monday morning, so I'm always a bit sleep deprived.  But yesterday's challenges were a bit deeper.

We started with a meeting of an education committee for a local chamber of commerce.  We've been raising money for scholarships for local high school students, and yesterday we found out that the chamber is thinking of changing some of that money for other purposes.  They are still educational or in the support of education, but that's not what we've been telling people who come to the money raising events.

I have hopes that the Chamber will make these changes, if they go ahead with these changes, going forward, not with the money raised in 2018.  Then people can make their own decisions about whether or not to contribute. 

It was also depressing because the meeting had a very small turn out.  We do a lot of work to get ready for these meetings (room set up, which involves moving the coffee pot, sugar, creamer, cups, stirrers, etc. upstairs) and cleaning up.  That meeting took the better part of my morning.

At midday we got news of some restructuring.  Our Executive Director who has been overseeing 2 campuses will now only oversee one, my campus.  I like him, so this news isn't the bad news that it could be; I'd be stressed if we were getting a brand new Executive Director.  But restructuring of any kind makes me uneasy, even as I know it may be for the best.

And then I got an e-mail about my book length poetry manuscript.  I'd done some revising and started sending it out again.  I got the results about one submission:  while I didn't win, the manuscript was a semi-finalist.  I've submitted to this publisher before and gotten positive feedback, but never a semi-finalist or finalist position.

So, while I was depressed, I was also happy that my revisions haven't damaged the manuscript and may have strengthened it.  And then my mood crashed again.  I realize that having my book of poems published won't likely change my life, even if it should become a best seller.  But I'd still like that kind of affirmation.

Happily, I don't rely on that affirmation.  It would be nice, but I know what really matters:  to have a creative life that nurtures me in a way that nothing else can.