Niteblade Blog Train – What a Difference

…a year makes.

First of all, let me just say Happy Anniversary to Niteblade. I volunteered to be a part of the blog train to celebrate the magazine’s fifth anniversary because I love what they publish and think they fill a lovely niche in the speculative market. Yes, they published me, but I’m not biased, I swear 🙂

You should also check out the person the blog train right before me, Alexandra Seidel. 

I thought it would be difficult to come up with a suitable post topic to tie into Niteblade in some way. However, I took a look at the calendar and realized that I was published by this magazine almost a year ago. My story, Maribelle Remembers Ice, appeared in the September 2011 issue. It was one of my first acceptances after seriously committing to W1S1. It was a story I wrote in the middle of the night in a fit of insomnia. And I realized I’m such a different person now than I was then. Well, I’m the same in that I’m still Brenda. I don’t have black hair anymore, but I still listen to Daft Punk when trying to get work done. I still go to Starbucks way too much and I still fan girl over Doctor Who regularly. But still, I feel different.

It probably has a lot to do with the fact that I’ve spent the majority of this year pregnant. If you’d told me that would be the case this time last year, I’d have laughed at you. “Me? Pregnant? Pshh. That’ll never happen.” I never painted a future for myself with kids in it. Never saw myself as a mother. Never even thought I’d be able to rise to that challenge. I’m too broken. My brain doesn’t function like everyone else’s. I’m not cut out for this.

And still, here I am. And I’m happy that I’m here. Yes, my writing has tapered off a bit in the past couple of months, but there will be time for finishing novels tomorrow. Today, I’m about to embark on the biggest change in my life ever. Thanks, Niteblade for reminding me of where I was and where I am. Things are different. I’m different. That will likely reflect in my writing. But there’s one thing that will never change. I am a writer.

Now let’s see where I’ll be a year from now…

Be sure to check out Kaolin Fire, who’s on the blog train tomorrow.