Dear Me

Written for "Dear Me: Official WDC Contest"  using prompt: write a letter to yourself and tell you what your goals are for 2017!

Word Count 1832

Dear Me,

There are a number of things we will accomplish this year. Admittedly, most of them probably at the last minute, but nonetheless, we will accomplish them...so long as we don't forget to refer back to this list. (We are using the 'regal' 'we' because it will take all three of us to accomplish this list--Me, myself, and I.

1. We currently have about 9,600 points in "Retired Founder, Rising Stars Program" . We will make it to my 18,000 required points. We will NOT let our sponsor, Sssssh! I'm not really here., down! This is a great honor and we will not squander this opportunity! For some reason, some of these people see some modicum of talent in us. This is terribly exciting, if not terribly inaccurate. lol However, so long as they are willing to teach, we are willing to learn. We REALLY want to be a better writer!

2. Following along with the first item, we will take two classes with "Invalid Item" , beginning in January. These classes will help us become better writers and reviewers. There may be a fair amount of work involved in taking two classes, but it's a temporary stressor for, hopefully, a lifetime of knowledge. Plus, we slacked around during that bout of depression, etc. and didn't do anything, so now is a time to catch up. Consider taking three classes, but don't overwhelm yourself. There are other opportunities for points in Rising Stars. Though the more we do now, the less pressure there is later... Actually, just checked the schedule and we only qualify to take two, so two it is--The Grammar Garden and Comma Sense. Comma Sense says there are thirty different uses for a comma and advertises itself as a hard course, but we can do this! And Paul D will be excited to not have to correct so many comma errors! Now IN the Comma Sense class and there are 30 rules and 13 exceptions for comma usage! Well, we're now in the class AND learning, so check this one off the list. lol

3. We will give a MB to each person in "Invalid Item"  It makes folks happy and it's not a large group, so this is a great idea! Though there is some overlap with our most recent MB-a-thon, so we have to wait, but soon, my pretty, soon...

4. We will give a MB to each person in "The Witch's House"  Again, it's a small group but we have to wait because of overlap, blah, blah... We should be SO grateful we got so many GPs before we lost our Army career! Life would be so sad if we were broke in real life AND online! Of course, one day the two will probably coincide, but for now, ENJOY! Besides, what good are GPs if you can't use them to make other folks happy? (Is this too far off topic? TECHNICALLY we don't recall the rules saying it had to be strictly about writing...just saying...)

5. We will submit more poems for publication. Several places we were interested in weren't accepting poetry at this time. We will submit poems to at least two more places.

6. We will send at least two poems to Mike in Hawaii for their newsletter update. He specifically asked for some. We fear they will forget us in HI, so this is a great way to remind them that we were there!

7. We will send at least poems to Carolyn at MHICM for their newsletter. She specifically asked for some, so we can't let her down.

8. We will FINALLY finish our Christmas cards! Everyone who sent us one will get one in return! So few people send them out, it's the least we can do! Remember when we'd send out 60-80 and get maybe 10 in return? Don't be like those other folks! Be like those 10 that sent them back! The VA still had cards out, last we were there. Perhaps during the next appointment...

9. (This list is getting long, but it's still quite achievable, we think) We will finish "Hook to Book, Round 3-Sheriff Sam Rabbit" ! That should probably go higher up the list, but technically this isn't in any order, except the order that it comes to mind. lol But this story is one we really enjoy reading. (More than writing--amusingly--thanks to the brain injury, we can't remember EXACTLY what happens, so we enjoy rereading it. lol) This story was also really well received within the community and won "Invalid Item" . We had two members say they wanted a copy when it was published. Which brings us to 9 1/2--getting this ready for publication...then 9 3/4. submitting it. But those aren't separate numbers in case that's biting off more than we can chew. But we can TOTALLY complete it. We have the whole thing basically outlined in the last chapter already, so we just need to fill in the words that describe what happened. Easy peasy!

10. (...and this one is an icky one...) Finish "All the Light We Cannot See" and do the book review on it. Yes, we don't care for reading, but we need the points! We REALLY need the points! We can complete Rising Stars if we do everything offered! Completing this book review will actually put us over the half-way mark! Wait...We have 9,650 points and need 18,000. We're already over the half way point. Well, math was never our strong point. Anyway, we still need to do this! It's 2,500 points! That's big points in RS! Besides, we're mostly done with the book. We can do this! It's been a challenge and writing the review will be a challenge too, especially since we didn't write it while reading as we have other book reviews. (In our defense, this book didn't lend itself to that as much with each chapter being about a different set of characters and the different sections switching back and forth between two different time periods. It was hard to follow for those with memory, sequencing, and concentration issues.) We can finish it this book and finish this review! Actually, technically, they will both probably be done before this is due. Actually, they HAVE to be done before then, so the time tables say. We got this!

11. (Does anyone else have this many on their list? Well, we always were an overachiever. lol) We will at least put cover images on all of our folders! We now know how, so we can do it! Plus, it's almost sort of fun-ish...except the part where the computer crashes and we have to restart it 2-3 times per cover image...wonder what that's about. Anyway, we can easily do cover images for all the folders! Though we should probably get started on that after the book review. Once the New Horizons classes start, we'll be super busy, especially since we have to read through the doctor's report still and make notes/questions and submit those to The Amen Clinic. Plus, we have some travelling to do this year, especially in the early part of the year. This is starting to sound harder already. Well, it's okay. They say, "Shoot for the moon and even if you fail, you'll still land among the stars!"

12. We will update "Contest and Challenge Checklist"  and enter at least five contests we have not yet entered. This is something we started on several months ago and a few people looked at it and were excited. We owe it to them and to ourselves to keep working on it! Also, someone suggested we make all the links clickable so they can see the contest or challenge too. Great idea, but a lot of work. That will become 12 1/2 so as to not be too discouraging if we do not do that. Perhaps we can just do five per week...or at least five per month. That's not hard. We feel good about that!

13. We will finally figure out how to make those things that other folks have when you open their portfolio and see, usually three, items at the top. We will figure out what they are called and how to do that! We will put three up there too--One short story, one poem, and one to be determined...maybe Sheriff Sam Rabbit. (We just love that story!)

14. We will continue working on "Bible Verse Quilt" . We will, at the very least, get through Psalms and record every verse we feel can translate well to a quilt block...that we WANT to translate into a quilt block. This is not only good for the "Dear Me" list, but good for the soul! We need to spend more time with God. He spends lots of time with us. It's only appropriate that we give Him some time as well! Plus, some folks commented that they thought this was a cool idea, so we should keep working on it to inspire whoever might stop by and see it. Also, we totally dug the quilt we made for Brian and have wanted one ever since, so this is the first step!

15. We will rework "Highland Hospital Haunting" . This is an interesting story that should be fleshed out better. It was going to work out nicely, but then the power went out and we had to finish it on our phone with few to no notes. That's what we get for procrastinating! It was "Game of Thrones"  and the story was due at midnight. It was like approaching eleven o'clock when the power went out, so panic ensued. Well, we didn't win, but we did get it turned in, so we got points for our team. That's what really matters!

16. We will make at least one word search, one madlib, one crossword puzzle, and one quiz. We haven't done any of those, but seem like fun. Plus, it will give a bit of whimsy to our portfolio. We can even use them to further our agenda of bringing awareness to the plight of critically endangered farm animal breeds. (See https://www.LivestockConservancy.org.) We love roaming around their website. This is a perfect opportunity to discover a new breed we've overlooked.

17. We will do at least one poem for "Poetry Readings" . We will include the words of the poem on the video. We also get a MB for this!

There is more we'd like to add, but this is quite the list already. Let's be moderately realistic! Actually, we hope to have a by several before the deadline...we'll see...well, AT LEAST by number ten, the book review! It's due by January fifteenth! Maybe we will have two done by the time we turn this in. We can hope.

Alright, Schnujo! We can do this! It's all stuff we're interested in doing (minus the book review, but we can't have everything). It's all doable! We wonder if there is any prize for succeeding in the whole thing at the end of the year...there should be. And No, just completing all this doesn't make us a winner! Though it might make us Super Woman! We got this! We survived G.o.T. when we weren't even two months old here. We can DEFINITELY do THIS!