2013 in One Word? Unbelievable!

Not unbelievable in the sense of the word many people might quickly assume, “incredible” in a positive way or simply “surprising”, but one of the literal meanings: ” so great or extreme as to be difficult to believe; extraordinary.”

My 2013 was extraordinary in the extremes of life and living that occurred, but perhaps not so unbelievable considering my past in general, which often has a brutal whimsicality and sometimes dangerous edge.

On the other hand, perhaps 2013 was perfectly ordinary, indicative and representative of how the journey of Red Haircrow continues. And we hope it continues, of course, though pain definitely reminds you that you’re still alive….

There are the professional highlights and accomplishments, the achievements:

• Walking the red carpet with Johnny Depp for the Lone Ranger premiere in Berlin, Germany, as I covered the event for Indian Country Today Media Network (see photos & commentary at their website.)

• My article Germany’s Obsession With American Indians Is Touching–And Occasionally Surreal  in Indian Country Today Media Network’s last print edition.

• Global E-Book Awards Winner 2013 Best LGBT Fiction- A very personally satisfying & special win for my novel, The Agony of Joy, which was also a finalist for Best LBT Contemporary Novel in the 2013 Rainbow Awards.

• Contributor credits for poetry in Sibling Rivalry Press Assaracus Magazine and short non-fiction in Sword & Saga American Athenaeum Magazine.

• Besides the many music, art & venue reviews for bands and individuals like, which also includes photography & videos.

• I graduated from Columbia Southern University with a bachelor’s in Psychology, and after 4 years study declared I was totally done with school only to find myself applying for a graduate program with Montana State University a week later…

• I regained enthusiasm for my indie publishing & multi-media company Flying With Red Haircrow, setting submission guidelines, revamping my logo and reopening its doors. Alternatively, Red Haircrow Review is on extended “vacation.”

“The word unbelievable describes something that is beyond understanding like the idea, until the Middle Ages, that the earth might actually be round.”–Vocabulary.com

For personal, dearly, painfully, and most prominently, was the fact that September 2013 marked two years that my son and I had been apart, which has been the single defining situation in my life. No words, no amount of them, can ever express how terrible this was for both of us, as it affects you on all levels ever second of the day.

You can have good times with others, and I did, and was privileged to meet a wide variety of people, a few of whom have come to be tremendous friends for whom I have great affection, but at the end of the day, you come home…and you are alone. A poem I wrote for my son in April, Spring Lament. On December 4, 2013, he returned to Berlin, and I feel I can finally breath again.

Those in literary circles, review groups, social media, forums or websites such as LibraryThing, Goodreads, etc. will have noticeably seen my absence, if they even noticed at all. For except for Twitter and Facebook, where I do my own promotions at times, as well as for a few clients, I stopped interacting elsewhere.

I had no interest or energy to expend towards the competitive posturing and pettiness that too often laces the writing world, the cliquès and so forth, and I found those who really wished to continue contact with me did so.

In combination with  the separation from my son, I had huge health challenges in 2013, having developed a hereditary blood disease that runs in my family, causing moderate damage to heart, lungs, liver and other organs, and needing specialized treatment for the rest of my life. It makes life tough, but hey, that’s life. Priorities straight: my boy, my friends and the People.

I go into 2014 not knowing what it will bring. No one does. I do have some appointments already scheduled, a couple of projects in the works, and definitely things I want to see happen, and which  must happen, but I’m okay enough. That should be my new catch phrase and quote. You ask me how I’m doing & that’s it: “I’m okay enough.”

I won’t stop writing, working and fighting. That’s what warriors do, and I come from a warrior people, where the word means something different to us than it does to other societies that associate it with warfare and aggression because that is what their history is full of: subjugating, conquering and brutalizing other cultures for their own gain.

To us, the originals of the Americas, the Native Americans, to be a warrior means to help those who need help, to do for others whatever needs to be done, to sacrifice themselves if necessary, to help the community and world as a whole. In 2014, I will continue to do so because that is what needs to be done.