Rock and Roll October

October started out well. I was wrapping up a trip to Europe and spent the first few days of the month in the Dolomites of northern Italy and Innsbruck, Austria.

I love travel. Except for the travel part. On my flights home, I had high anxiety during both connections because they were too tight (no time for even a restroom break).

While I was overseas I set up accounts for Amazon and IngramSpark in order to upload my manuscript and felt maybe it’d be possible to publish my book while I was over there. But I decided to wait because I needed the comfort of my own desk for final publishing steps, as everything had to be perfect and in order.

I decided, too, that I was ready to have my basement finished - a kind of ten year happy anniversary for how long I’ve lived in my home. A more practical time would have been to wait until the first of the year until after the holidays, but why not take the plunge and get that going?

The week of October 7 was rock and roll.

Monday, the 7th, I’d been home now for two full days, and … poor me … suffering from jet lag, working on tech related stuff for my book and starting a basement project. Although I’m a planner and tend to be very organized, I told my basement guy I haven’t had a chance to think much about it and that I’m winging it. We set the bathroom door here, the pantry over there, and storage areas here and here. My brain was on spin cycle.

With a lot of intimidation of tending to book publishing tasks, and a little back and forth with my dear designer to get things right (you want the outcome Successful vs Error), I finally was able to uploaded my manuscript on IngramSpark. Then there’s a few days turn around for them to do a final approval and another few days for me to approve their approval.

Last spring I had been invited to join our community’s grant review program. Sure, I said. So happened, their in-person training occurred a few weeks ago while I was in Europe, so I watched the recorded Zoom training instead and then proceeded to review grants. It felt like homework, mainly because it’s all new to me. I read through eight grants and scored them as best I could.

Last August, before leaving for Europe, I’d started making plans for my Book Launch party, taking a wild guess at when my book might be published. I set a date, made invitations, and had them sent to me. The date I set was a big unknown. I didn’t know how much time it’d take for the final steps of my book. What I did know, was that I didn’t want my party to be too near Thanksgiving or Christmas, a time when people are usually overbooked with activities. So I set the date for October 26.

On October 9, I addressed and sent out invitations to my party. The rest of the week I reviewed grants, managed my basement work, and forced myself to deal with tech related stuff for my book. I worked - happily — my typical fifteen hours/week at my part time job, plus was asked to pick up an extra shift over the next few weeks. My job was a break from all the stuff going on at home.

The week of the 14th was rock and roll as well.

Monday, the 14th, with a lot of grace for myself, it looked like I was out of time and that I would not have books ready for my party. I told myself it was okay, I would celebrate anyway. I accomplished as much as I could and was at the mercy of how much time these final publishing steps were taking.

“Happy Book Birthday!” read the subject line from the IngramSpark email I received at 6:00PM. What a thrill! So cool! I am partially published. (I still have eBook and print versions to publish on Amazon.)

At 4:00AM the next morning I woke up with an urgent thought: I have to order a bunch of books and have them delivered. MAYBE I WILL HAVE BOOKS FOR MY LAUNCH PARTY!

I ordered forty books. To be sure there isn’t some major flaw, it’s a good idea to order just one before ordering several, but I did not have the luxury of time and forty felt like a safe enough number. I expedited printing and delivery (my wallet taking notice) and crossed my fingers.

On the 16th, I entered Chat with Amazon. An ant facing an elephant trying to see why I’m uploading my manuscript successfully but when I hit Publish it spits out an Error notice. I confirm some formatting details with my designer and have a second Chat with Amazon. No success. My third Chat yielded a “review” sent to Amazon’s tech team. The next day this: the lower case y in my last name on the third interior page was straying beyond the text border. Oh, the crime!

On the 17th, I got notice that my eBook was live. Cool! This was after the days-long “They approved it and then I approved their approval” process.

My designer adjusted the y in my name.

On the 19th, I uploaded my print version on Amazon again. Success!

Like summiting Kilimanjaro, I am feeling joy, full-on joy. After four and a half years, I have written and fully published a book.

More joy: my forty books were delivered on the 22nd, four days before my Launch.

October ended well. On the 26th, friends came to my house for my Launch and we had a

GRAND CELEBRATION