Fun fact: A teetotaler looking for tea shouldn’t get Jagertee while on top of the tallest mountain in Germany. It’s not tea but a mixture of rum and black tea with approximately 38% alcohol. Not a good place to get tipsy. Fortunately, the drinking age there is 18, and my daughter can hold her liquor.

Expression

After being home from Germany for one day, we drove off to officiate at a 4-day swim meet. Suffice it to say that I felt like I was holding my breath the whole time. A presidential candidate could almost get assassinated, and it would only warrant a blip of distraction.

I got three days home after that before flying to St. Louis for my maiden attendance of the Realm Makers conference. Again, I didn’t expect much. This time because I was too tired. But nothing could have prepared me for the enormity and affinity that I found there. Hundreds of Christians geeking out on speculative fiction like it was the norm? I wouldn’t have believed it without experiencing it.

I gained invaluable advice from other authors on writing, editing, and publishing. Outward differences faded as we engaged in our shared passion. And I learned to maim and kill with discretion and a minimum of blood splatter—in my stories only, of course.

The awards banquet at the conference felt like the Oscars for our niche market, with many attendees opting to wear costumes. Reticent me who had disdained cosplay dressed as a character in my book, sat with strangers, and glibly pitched my book like an old hand. Later, I wondered if I had somehow gotten drunk and didn’t know it (Jagertee in the tea?). But maybe it was the answering call of expression among likeminded creatives. The evening sparkled with fantastic otherness. But we didn’t have to be luminaries to enjoy the glow.

Fun Fact: I flew home one day after the Crowdstrike Outage without any trouble. A few weeks before the conference, I’d changed my return flight to get in a few more sessions on Saturday—from American to Southwest Airlines. I wasn’t thrilled about it at the time because the flight was more expensive, and I didn’t like Southwest. When the implications of the empty airports and amazingly short TSA lines finally sank in, I thanked God and revised my opinion of Southwest Airlines. There is a place for low-tech companies.

Exhalation

The balance of the summer afforded time for reflection and acceptance. Winds are blowing in another season, and it’s easy to go maudlin over the close of such delightful days. But an end is just the other side of a beginning. Why not honor the one by seizing its momentum into the other? Maybe, instead of slumping in nostalgia, the sky could be the limit for the future.

Fun Fact: In that vein, perhaps you will see a pivot in the blog next time, a flash of something new…