musings, life lessons & poetry from Theresa Jarosz Alberti

Tag: divorce (Page 1 of 6)

Poetry Challenge Day 5: “After-Days”

I didn’t follow the prompt for this one, so looked around in the Notes app on my phone where I sometimes write down snippets that could turn into poems someday. The first line of this poem had been sitting in there quite a while. Can any of you relate to the topic? I hope not!

After-Days

What do you do with old, worn-out dates,
once celebrated, now fading to gray?
They’ve been an automatic reflex for so long,
anniversaries marking the calendar
like tombstones so solid
I keep stubbing the toe of my heart on them
as the months pass by.  Continue reading

Remodeling… My Life

I’m sitting here with an itchy nose from extra dust flying through the house as loud sawing, drilling, and other power-tool vibrations rattle through the house (really unsettling for Loki-the-cat who hovers around me needing more reassurances and soothing). The construction workers for this current project– a major remodel of the main floor bathroom– started two weeks ago.  We are in the Messy Middle: a few months of living with one upstairs bathroom, workers in and out of the house every weekday, noise, dust, and random inconveniences (like the water being turned off for most of a day). It’s a hassle, exciting to see dramatic changes, frustrating, hopeful, all of the above. On the other end will be something a lot better than what was there, so it’s worth it. Continue reading

The Bear Awakens

Greetings from the doorway of my cave of hibernation. That’s what it’s felt like for the last many months, hunkered down in my house, Okay, maybe I wasn’t really sequestered in some self-imposed solitary confinement or sleeping the winter away, but I was definitely going through some big shifts that kept me from poking out my head much on social media. I was still staying social by zooming with friends and seeing family, running some basic errands, but the winter was kinda brutal and I stayed home a lot, grateful for my youngest son living with me and being around to talk and hug.

Spring wasn’t helping much either. Instead of being a hopeful time of new greenness, we had so many cold gray days that it felt like a continuation of winter. It’s only been the last two weeks where we’ve gotten some sun and warmth (YAY!), and in that all-or-nothing climate-change way, of course it jumped right into the 80s and even 90 last week. Sheesh! But this post isn’t really about the weather. My own internal weather is more like it. Continue reading

Exciting News … and Vulnerability

Have you ever had such a swirl of emotions that you don’t know how to take the next step, or what to say? That’s where I find myself now, contradictory feelings battling it out. I’m excited and afraid, proud and full of doubt, brave one minute and whimpering the next. I’m standing on the diving board, stalling, and the time has come to jump.

I’ll tell you the easy and exciting part first. I have spent my pandemic so far writing a book, and I’m putting it out into the world today.

For a long time, I’ve wanted to try publishing a book on Kindle Direct and see what that’s like. Self-publishing has always appealed to me, and I know that authors earn a 70% royalty on books in a certain price point in Kindle. I’m so curious about the whole process– promoting and selling my book, learning the ins and outs of how to do that well, how to design the cover and format the book. I’m very proud of myself for working towards this goal, step by step, and now it is here! I am putting the book up for pre-sale orders today.

And now comes the vulnerability part. This is a book I have felt compelled to write, but the subject matter is not an easy topic for me to talk about. I believe it’s important and needs to be written about. Continue reading

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