I am starting to think that I’m going to publish every other week.

On the writing front.  I’m working through all the feedback from two friends who are doing the Beta Reading for me.  The first challenge was the opening scene.  It had to go.  It took me most of a week to figure out how to start the story.

At first, I thought the dream sequence was the problem.  It was not. The problem was that I tried to get too cute, and it lost her.  When we talked it was obvious where I made the mistake. I pulled the original scene out of the trash.  But, like and old love that walks back into your life, this too was not the same.  I fell out of love with the scene for a reason.  The reason still stands.

I wrote a full new opening and I hope this one is better.

Memorial Day is a day to remember.  I remember the first coup d'état when I was about seven or eight years old.  The next time I walked to school, I could see the pieces of the buildings where the bullets hit.  I remember wondering why people would do that.  The attempt failed, the government remained and regained its power.  It was four or five years later that we left and moved to the US.

I remember family left behind.  I remember friends that I never saw again.  I remember the awe in coming to the US and seeing the stability that went back to the end of the Civil War, and before that to the first president.  We had a Junta that dissolved in the first few years, and it took a long time to learn to govern ourselves.

I remember those I lost along the way, and I give thanks for how they helped me become the person I am today.  Memorial Day is the day to remember, without sadness, our ancestors and what they gave up to let us be here, today, thinking back on what they did.

Not a single one of my ancestors was perfect.  They made mistakes.  They had all of the human frailties.  I’m sure every one of them thought, at the end of their lives, I wish I had done things differently.  I also want to think that they also thought that they had made a difference.  Maybe it was a small difference, to a small group, but it was a difference.

I hope you all have a great Memorial Day and that you find time to find the good things.