{"id":3310,"date":"2012-09-01T13:43:08","date_gmt":"2012-09-01T13:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/?p=3310"},"modified":"2012-09-01T13:43:08","modified_gmt":"2012-09-01T13:43:08","slug":"gratitude","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/gratitude\/","title":{"rendered":"Gratitude"},"content":{"rendered":"

As a writer, it\u2019s easy to fall into the habit of focus\u00ading on what\u2019s miss\u00ading, on the goals you fail to accom\u00adplish, and to take for grant\u00aded the vic\u00adto\u00adries you do have.<\/p>\n

In my own case, I\u2019m in the mid\u00addle of a major vic\u00adto\u00adry. My char\u00adac\u00adters of Dako\u00adta and Svet\u00adlana are mak\u00ading it pos\u00adsi\u00adble for my wife and me to go to a place I\u2019ve dreamed of for over twen\u00adty years. I\u2019ve want\u00aded to go there since I was 19 and read Hemingway\u2019s A Move\u00adable Feast<\/em>. The place is Paris.<\/p>\n

We leave in one week.<\/p>\n

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<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It was always a ques\u00adtion of time and mon\u00adey. When we had flex\u00adi\u00adble jobs that gave us the time, we didn\u2019t have the mon\u00adey for such a trip. When we had the mon\u00adey, we couldn\u2019t get the time off from work (we were too busy earn\u00ading said mon\u00adey).<\/p>\n

Final\u00adly, this year, time and mon\u00adey came togeth\u00ader. I write full-time, so my sched\u00adule is wide-open. Alexas works for a ter\u00adrif\u00adic employer\u2014Vassar College\u2014that let her take a full two weeks off. And we have the money\u2014from mas\u00adsive sales of A Real Piece of Work<\/em><\/a> back in Feb\u00adru\u00adary and March. (Thank you, read\u00aders!)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Of course we\u2019ll be see\u00ading all of the major sights (e.g., Notre Dame, the Lou\u00advre, Ver\u00adsailles, etc.), but we\u2019re also going to spend a lot of time sim\u00adply walk\u00ading the streets and tak\u00ading in the real<\/em> Paris. To this end, we\u2019re stay\u00ading in an apart\u00adment in the cen\u00adtral\u00adly locat\u00aded Latin Quar\u00adter.<\/p>\n

But this entry isn\u2019t about the specifics of our trip. It\u2019s about grat\u00adi\u00adtude. My best friend helped me real\u00adize this as we drove to Sarato\u00adga the oth\u00ader day to play the ponies.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

When I com\u00adplained about the recent slow sales, the dif\u00adfi\u00adcul\u00adties of find\u00ading a new lit\u00ader\u00adary agent, and the rejec\u00adtions I\u2019ve received from mag\u00ada\u00adzines and lit\u00ader\u00adary jour\u00adnals for my short sto\u00adries, he was quick to remind me that I am one of very few writ\u00aders who has actu\u00adal\u00adly earned sig\u00adnif\u00adi\u00adcant mon\u00adey from his own writing\u2014enough that my wife and I can go to Paris com\u00adfort\u00adably for two weeks (not a cheap propo\u00adsi\u00adtion).<\/p>\n

He fur\u00adther point\u00aded out that if I always look at what I don\u2019t get, at the goal I don\u2019t reach, I\u2019ll miss out on the many good things I do get in the present, and the trip to Paris is one of them.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So is com\u00adplete free\u00addom of time; I report to no one. So is com\u00adplete free\u00addom of sub\u00adject mat\u00adter; I write what\u00adev\u00ader I want to write. So are my health and Alexas\u2019s health, my fam\u00adi\u00adly and friends, and a grow\u00ading read\u00ader\u00adship.<\/p>\n

He was right, and I\u2019m tru\u00adly grate\u00adful for all of it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Yes, I hope this will be the year that I get one of my sto\u00adries into a major mag\u00ada\u00adzine or lit\u00ader\u00adary jour\u00adnal. Yes, I hope the Dako\u00adta Stevens Mys\u00adtery Series (excuse the brand\u00ading) will be picked up by a tra\u00addi\u00adtion\u00adal pub\u00adlish\u00ader so I can sign copies in book\u00adstores next Decem\u00adber. And yes, I hope I\u2019ll return from Paris with enough mate\u00adr\u00adi\u00adal for two books and a dozen sto\u00adries.<\/p>\n

But in the mean\u00adtime, I\u2019m deter\u00admined to be grate\u00adful for things like this trip, and to enjoy every moment of them.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Thank you again, Dear Read\u00ader, for help\u00ading to make this trip pos\u00adsi\u00adble.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As a writer, it\u2019s easy to fall into the habit of focus\u00ading on what\u2019s miss\u00ading, on the goals you fail to accom\u00adplish, and to take\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,30,7,11,12,32,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-a-real-piece-of-work","category-chris-orcutt-books","category-personal","category-dakota-stevens-mysteries-series","category-the-rich-are-different","category-travel","category-writers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3310"}],"version-history":[{"count":44,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3310\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3389,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3310\/revisions\/3389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}