Britt Skrabanek

Britt’s in the Bloggerhood

Hide your valuables and lock your doors, because this gal’s all over the bloggerhood lately!

This past week I’ve been popping up at some beautiful blogs and I wanted to return the hospitality with a little shout-out to each of them.

Be sure to stop by each blog home below, have a warm drink, and cozy up for a bit. If you’re not following these neighborly fellows, you’re missing out.

Fun Character Interview at Back on the Rock

Roy asked me to collaborate on a fun project where I had the pleasure of interviewing one of his main characters. I played the role of a journalist from 1970, grilling Tess on everything from love and fears to feminism and Occupation during WWII. Tess of Portelet Manor is a fantastic read, so be sure to check it out. (My review is here if you so desire to read it.)

Wowza! Gettin’ Quoted at Walking on My Hands

Pamela left me stunned (and blushing) when she opened her recent New Year’s post about sankalpa with a quote from yours truly. Though my sankalpa revolved around a positive intention to love in the new year, Pamela professed her desire for more quiet. In a world as noisy as ours, I can’t think of a better intention. A beautiful writer with lovely stories, this Pamela’s a good one to keep up with.

Life Enthusiast Nod of Approval at Harvesting Hecate

Andrea gave my new series, The Life Enthusiast Chronicles, an awesome shout-out while listing some of her fave posts of the year. Always keeping things interesting and inspiring, Andrea’s blog is totally worth your time.

Hope you’re all having a super amazing 2014 so far. And for those wearing five thousand layers of clothing like me…keep those tooshies warm. Now back to my editing cave with the cats!

Intention to love in the new year

Here we are again. That time when we reflect on all that has happened and wonder what comes next.

For many of us, myself included, the coming of the new year carries some anxiety along with it. Did I live 2013 to its fullest? Will life be less awesome, as awesome, or more awesome in 2014?

The thing is, as long as we love we are living life to its fullest and life will be awesome. The rest of it – goals, money, things – they are radically insignificant.

Have dreams and do your best to soar, but don’t forget what’s right here on the ground. The family you don’t get to see enough, the spouse you are lucky to wake up next to, the friends you can share a ridiculous laugh or a magnificent cry with.

In 2014, I have a few bullet points I’d like to hit.

Publish my third book.
Get another stamp on my passport.
Continue a healthy life, including more meditation and Yoga.
Keep my closet clean.
Stop trying to do everything at once.

None of these are my resolutions. They are simply things I will work on throughout the year. Some will come easily, some will take a lot of work, and nobody will offer me a big, chintzy award for doing any of them.

Rather than a smattering of resolutions this year, I’d like to make a sankalpa instead.

A whaty-what?

Sankalpa is a Sanskrit word meaning “will, purpose, or determination”. While resolutions often channel a reprimanding energy toward ourselves – drink less, exercise more, (you get my drift) – a sankalpa is a positive intention.

When I look at my bullet points up there, I see that they are not particularly self-loathing, but I know I’ve made some tough love resolutions in the past. And, I’m sure many of you out there are struggling with the same right now.

So, I say…to hell with the tough love!

Let’s set a sankalpa together to love more. Your family, your spouse, your friends, and don’t forget yourself while you’re at it.

If we love more the rest of it becomes a little easier, the unattainable becomes attainable.

I always wonder what the world would be like if we all had the same intention, to focus more on love. I don’t know. It could be very awesome.

I would like to ask all of you to join me in this sankalpa to bring in the new year.

Chime in with some love in the comment section below. It can be anything you want, in any language you want: a famous quote, your unfamous quote, a list of people you love, a way that you can show your love more.

Thank you all for your beautiful support in 2013. You’re all lovely. Happy New Year.

The Urge to Dance

Once upon a time I called myself a dancer. I danced my whole life until the end of last year when quite suddenly…I stopped.

No more teaching, no more leotards, no more performances. Just like that.

Such a monumental transition in my life was very hard for me to swallow, and most of 2013 was spent figuring out who I was beyond the dancer. When you’ve been doing something for over twenty years, it has a way of becoming a part of you.

I wrote I Found Some Change, which some of you may remember, when it all happened.

Recently Mr. H was out of town and I had this crazy urge to dance.

It was dark, the cats were asleep, and uncharacteristically I felt lonely. So I threw on jeans and a tank top, some music, and filmed this in one shot.

It wasn’t about choreography or perfection, it was simply about moving.

Mr. H threw in some nifty video effects after he saw it. So even though we were apart when it started, we came together to create something in the end.

The video is silent, due to music rights mumbo jumbo that I didn’t want to mess with on YouTube. But I realized that the silence itself was beautiful, because when I move everything becomes still and quiet. The music, even the sound of my own breath.

This project taught me that entirely letting go of something isn’t always the right thing to do. The dancer is still inside and I’m OK with it being right there.

2nd Draft…BAM!

It all began in August, the dreaded second draft.

The first time you read the work you poured your heart and soul into can be a frightening thing. A damn frightening thing.

Is it shit? I mean, is it complete and total shit?

Well, it might be to other people but I dig it. And at the end of the day, amidst subjective opinions on all things artistic, if I dig it, then that’s really all that matters.

This second draft and I are war buddies.

Over the past four months we stuck it out together, on Sundays for a chunk of time and usually on Wednesday nights when I was ready to keel over from day job and Yoga teaching repercussions.

I worked over a couple of paragraphs, folded some laundry, then parked it back in my chair and continued. My dinner got cold on the table just so I could sneak a page in. Headphones blocked out everything from Sunday football to my guitarist wannabee apartment manager on the first floor (we live two floors above him, we often want to chop our ears off and be done with it), so I could manage an entire chapter.

Last weekend I trudged through the final pages and finished. Bam!

If it hadn’t been so arctic outside, I probably would’ve screamed out my window: “Second draft, you were my Everest. And, I conquered your ass!”

But, I refrained. And my neighbors shall continue loathing our noisy manager rather than yours truly, the dorky writer with too much enthusiasm.

I had to share the excitement with all of you guys though.

There’s still a long road ahead, including the next stage which I call “The Serial Killer Phase”. Nope, I don’t write about serial killers. However when it’s time to reference the serial killer notes sitting on my bedside table, that’s the phase I’m talking about.

Writers, you know the notes. Random thoughts and dialogue, groovy sentences from authors who know a thing or two, and of course, the crazed scribbling that happens in the middle of the night or first thing in the morning.

Obsession with a splash of insomnia. Hence, serial killer notes…

Lastly, there will be more editing, reading, editing, reading…until I can’t stand looking at it anymore. That’s where my in-law editors come in for moral support, right before I chuck the dissected, stitched, scarred draft promptly in the garbage.

Long story short, my vague release date for The Bra Game is set for late Spring 2014. So, yay for that!

The Life Enthusiast Chronicles with Letizia

Life. The word itself astounds me. It encompasses too many beautiful things all at once and often I find myself staring at the word whenever I write it, too mesmerized by its brilliance. A life enthusiast is one who recognizes life’s simplicities and extremities, and loves them without fail.

Last month Jessica over at Notes of Nomads kicked off my new monthly guest series…The Life Enthusiast Chronicles. In these posts, lovely individuals share what makes them all gung ho about life.

Today we have Letizia, a blogger pal of mine over at Reading Interrupted. Letizia is one of those beautiful soul kinds, where everything she brings to the table is peppered with grace and good. Her love for reading inspires the rest of us to not only continue being awe-inspired by stories, but to marvel at the books themselves with their perfectly tattered beauty. All of this makes Letizia a shining example of a life enthusiast.

Connect with Letizia at Reading Interrupted on Twitter.

Take it away, Letizia…

Home is where the books are.

When Britt generously asked me to write about an aspect of life that makes me enthusiastic, I immediately thought of reading books; it’s one of the greatest passions of my life.

And as I gazed at my bookshelves for inspiration, I thought of how many of those books had traveled with me throughout my life and through my many international moves. And I also thought of those books that didn’t quite make the cut.

Those of you who have moved an extensive library know that there’s always a culling process that occurs: books you don’t know why you own in the first place, books you mysteriously own several copies of, books you think you will never reread or miss (I tend to regret getting rid of these, searching for them months later in a sudden realization that I must reread them at once). You offer them to friends, you sell them to the secondhand bookstores, you donate them to the local library.

And all of the others? These are packed in cardboard boxes and taken away with the furniture to be placed on great ships that will brave the open seas.

Here is one of my childhood dogs, getting ready for a move. I wonder if one of those boxes contain books?

And then the wait begins. Wondering where the books are now, wondering when exactly they will arrive.

And then they do! Of course, I’m happy to see the furniture, but …. the books… where are they?…. There they are!

Opening those boxes is like opening all of your favorite Christmas presents from the past years in one sitting: every item is so familiar and loved yet new and exciting at the same time!

My childhood copy of The Otter’s Tale by Gavin Maxwell:

My university copy of James Joyce’s Dubliners worn from rereading over the years:

Rediscovering all my books reminds me of how much I love to read but also grounds me. Each book is like a snapshot of my life, reminding me of memories past but with each new reading creating new ones.

The books make each new house a home. It’s hard not to get enthusiastic about that.

Thanks for reminding me of this, Britt.