Inspiration is, um, Inspiring?

Now that I'm finished temping, I'm spending just as much time in front of the computer as I did when I was working full-time. It's so different, though. I'm working for myself, writing poems, looking up interesting things on the Internet, indulging my latest rock and roll crushes by examining related web sites.

We had the first meeting of our new "Kick in the Pants" Writers Group last night. We had a long discussion about inspiration, where it comes from, how it translates into your work. It's funny the things that stick in your brain when you're writing about them, how they change, and then morph into something completely different. A slight gasp of an idea suddenly becomes an entire poem that feels so personal--even though it's got nothing to do with real life, but the vivid imagination makes it feel so alive. Maybe that doesn't make any sense.

I've got really good news to share on the job front, but mum's the word until I know for sure I can spill the beans. Now, it's back to editing my kids books. I got the comments back from Sterling, the NYC publisher that I'm working with for two books in their "Classic Starts" series. I've abridged Frankenstein and Robinson Crusoe.

Little Women, the first one I wrote about eighteen months ago, is now for sale. Aren't they wonderful? They're such beautiful little books and it's really rewarding that a lot of kids that may have never read the classics will now have the chance to with this series.

Ah, editing--it's the bane of my existence. Funny, it's strange that I'm a writer who hates editing her own work. Happiness (read, ahem, perfection) is an impossible thing to achieve on the first draft though, and you'd think I would have realized this by now...