My Year in Review

Once again, it’s that time of year when I find myself busy with any variety of tasks. For 2023, these tasks include holiday shopping, job searching, calendar making, book publishing, novel writing, and the usual year-end self-reflecting.

2023 was an interesting year, neither my best nor my worst. In some ways, I treaded water, but in others, I achieved important goals. Here is a summary:

Travel

I made a triumphant, three-week return visit to my old stomping ground, Mexico City, in April. This CDMX trip was sandwiched inside a longer, six-week trip that saw me traveling by car from my home in East Tennessee to Chicago and back, with stops in either direction including Fall Creek Falls State Park, in Middle Tennessee; Louisville, KY, which enjoys a nice setting along the Ohio River; and my alma mater in Central Illinois. I visited relatives and old friends and marveled at how the Chicago suburbs of my childhood have changed, and how – in the case of Mexico City – impressive enhancements with the city’s public transportation network notwithstanding, the megalopolis of some 22 million people is, gosh darn it, the same as it ever was (which is mostly a good thing).

You can read more about that trip in my previous blog post. Later travels in 2023 were decidedly less ambitious. I visited Cleveland in October, where I took in the fall colors at Cuyahoga Valley National Park, a lovely gem of a park that was built around the small canal towns south of Ohio’s biggest city. I took a few muddy hikes and snapped about 800 pictures, including several of waterfowl living in the marshes formed from the canals, which are no longer used for industrial purposes. (The infamous Cuyahoga River Fire of 1969 – the 13^th such river blaze, believe it or not, was instrumental in the passage of the Clean Water Act of 1972.) Cleveland is something of an underrated travel destination; I was ignorant of all that it had to offer until press related to the money former Cleveland Maverick LeBron James poured into the city suggested that it’s much more than just an industrial city on the shores of Lake Erie. An unexpected job interview ensured this would be a short trip, but I promised myself I’d return during warmer weather to take in a Guardians baseball game and ride the roller coasters at nearby Cedar Point Amusement Park. I *did* manage to grab breakfast with my fellow blogger William, just two weeks prior to his permanent move from Cleveland to Mexico City, and I made time to check out the lauded Cleveland Museum of Art. Its contemporary art collection is nothing to sneeze at, and I was so engrossed that I extended my stay in the area to spend a second day at the museum!

My only other sightseeing of note this trip was a stopover on the way to visit Kings Island Amusement Park, just north of Cincinnati. Do you remember that classic “Brady Bunch” episode in which the Brady kids joined Mike, Carol, and Alice on a trip that had Mike presenting architectural plans to the park’s owners, only for the blueprints to get misplaced? I do, and I’ve always wanted to ride the park’s classic, dueling wooden roller coaster, The Racer, ever since. I did – once in the blue car and once in the red car, and it was another bucket list item checked off. Even better was two rides on Orion, the park’s thrilling giga coaster, which features a 300-foot drop and your favorite blogger riding with one hand in the air and the other over the pocket holding his cell phone and car keys. I found a terrific online deal that included park admission, parking, select dining options, and access to the park’s seasonal fright fest, The Haunt, for $79.99. If not for that, I almost certainly would’ve tabled a visit to the park for next summer (along with Cedar Point); Cincinnati, like Cleveland, offers plenty to do, much of which is more enjoyable in warm, sunny weather. That being said, if you like amusement parks, know that this enthusiast ranks Kings Island somewhere in the top ten theme parks around the world. I had a blast.

I did manage my usual hiking trips to Panther Creek State Park and Great Smoky Mountains National Park. At the time of writing, I’ve done four of the five trails to Mount LeConte, the prominent peak in the Smokies. I knocked off two in August courtesy of the epic Rainbow Falls-Bullhead Trail loop, and saw a black bear on the way down. I returned to the area in late October to check out the fall foliage on one gloriously sunny afternoon, but did so on day when seemingly everyone else on the eastern seaboard had the same idea. The photo below is of the John Ogle cabin, surrounded by autumn leaves in all their beauty. The Ogle cabin is just one mile by car from the Rainbow Falls trailhead, but traffic was such that I dared not drive any further. I turned around to grab a bite to eat in Pigeon Forge (a drive of over 90 minutes despite being just ten miles away), and saw another bear.

Aside from a quick trip to Asheville, an artsy small city in North Carolina’s liberal southwest corner, perfect daytrip distance from me, my only post-Halloween travel was a four-day trip to visit my sister and her family in Memphis. I’m hoping against hope at this late date that I might make it to New York City later this holiday season, but that is entirely dependent on last minute mileage award availability. I have friends there whom I haven’t seen since 2011, and as cliched as this may sound, I have yet to see the Big Apple at Christmastime. One of my NYC-area friends called me a glutton for punishment by visiting during the holidays, but what can I say except, “Hey, I resemble that remark?!”

Career

I suppose I should qualify my desire in the previous paragraph of wanting to visit NYC over the holidays by saying that such a trip is dependent on finances and, with New York being as expensive as it is, my friends there offering a couch to fart crash on. You already know from my last post that my position as a call center supervisor was eliminated one year prior. I’ve been coasting by ever since on severance pay, savings, and monies earned performing some freelance editing for academia. I can never thank the friend who set me up with the freelancing gig enough for sending that work my way.

But now, it’s long past time to find another job. I don’t fancy the idea of restarting my career yet again, and its been daunting to discover that no less than five promising jobs I applied for had their funding pulled. I won’t see any money on my upcoming novel (more on that in a minute) until next April at the earliest, and since I’m too old to successfully pull off an OnlyFans account, I will almost certainly run out of money before then. That being said, I’m not going to be a Debbie Downer. Thanks to a career counselor that my former employer was thoughtful enough to set me up with, my résumé is as polished as can be. I know I will land on my feet, just as I know my worth. Meanwhile, I can say I’m appreciative of this time of change and self-reflection; while I shouldn’t speak for those of you my age who have worked nonstop since graduating college, I know that career breaks, whether planned or unplanned, can be liberating. And no, saying that doesn’t make me lazy. It makes me grateful.

The Book

It is finished! “Displaced – Part One” is a time travel/coming of age novel – or half of one, anyway – that represents nearly 2.5 years of my life’s work. The ebook version is now available for purchase on Amazon here, and the hardcover version will soon be available as well. Those of you who are Facebook friends of mine should know that I’ve created a FB author page that is meant to be professional, with most of the off-color humor I’m known for on social media limited to my separate, personal page. The author page includes (or will include) character descriptions, snippets of cover art, and information about upcoming projects. While my intent was always for “Displaced” to exist as a single novel, printing costs and page count limits necessitated it being split into two books. Yes, it’s that long. (And no, that’s not what she said. Sigh.) Rest assured, it won’t be another 2.5 years for Part Two. If all goes well, it’ll be closer to 2.5 months. I’m waiting on cover art…and that’s about it, basically.

What’s next for my aspiring career as a writer? I’m working on a horror novel, something quite different from “Displaced” and something that is inspired by actual events, albeit in the loosest possible way. I have at least two other novels planned after that, although they are still in the “idea” stage. With discipline and luck, I hope to one day be able to support myself as a writer; I’ve been working since I was 14 to make other people wealthy, and to paraphrase an oft-circulated meme, 10/10 do not recommend.

I found success using WordPress to host this blog site since 2012, and started using them a few months ago to host my author website, here. The content is extremely bare bones at the moment, but in the long run, I hope the site will include ordering information, sneak previews of upcoming works, and tips and tricks for aspiring authors. (But now I’m getting ahead of myself.)

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Thanks for following my travels, my employment travails, and my author struggles. Shameless plug, with apologies: if you like stories about time travel, the 1980s, coming of age, and dystopian adventures, I hope you’ll purchase “Displaced – Part One” – now available on Amazon – and its conclusion, coming in early 2024.

Happy holidays!