Throughout the last year I've had some intense happy and sad moments. Opening my dream bookstore, closing it, moving to Australia and and then moving home. Anyone that's followed my blogs or Facebook posts can tell me and anyone else that the move was not an easy move. We went through a lot. What do I remember? The good stuff.
Let's look at the bookstore. I have always wanted a bookstore. Its been a dream of mine for a long time, and seeing "You've Got Mail" only made me want it more. And then my dream came true. For a full year I loved sharing books with customers. I loved the selling, picking out books, meeting new authors, and just being among my books. If you know me, you know I love books. I loved the fact that it was part of my job to know what books were about so I had to read the books. I could pick one off the shelf and read it. That's one thing I've missed since I closed. As we closed the store, I had a customer tell me he didn't know where to go to get books anymore because I could tell him which books were good and he didn't get that service from anyone else. Wow. Best compliment ever.
I look at my store with fond memories. Dates stick out even now for when we had author signings and other events. I've ticked off the events in my mind as those date have passed this year. For instance, today was the last time Brandon Sanderson and Dan Wells came to my store. The week before Thanksgiving, I had thirty different authors come, which was amazing.
With all those wonderful memories, I've forgotten the stress. I've forgotten the many hours I spent at the store and not with my family. I forgot how many times I saw the totals for the day, knowing that there wasn't enough to pay even a third of the bills that were due. The tears that were spilt when I decided it was time to close. I've forgotten how many thousands of fliers I sent out, the newspaper articles, the Facebook events and all the different activities in the store that I did to bring people in. Only to have very few people show to any of those events. Its not until I stop and choose to remember those bad times that the memories come flooding back.
The same thing happens when I think about my move to Australia. I miss the beach. I miss the animals there. I miss the people I met. I miss the trains and areas we traveled to. I missed the cities I couldn't pronounce but that I fell in love with anyway. I miss the food and I even miss walking to different stores. I miss the cute little cottage where we squished eight people into a two bedroom house.
Never mind that every house had mold, my kids got sick, we got sick, we searched for houses nonstop for 4 1/2 months and never once unpacked until we got home.
How does our mind do this? How can we look back on events in our lives and only remember the good things? I think all of us are essentially optimists because the good is so much better to remember. Think about the obituaries you see. How many times have you ever seen "that person was the most spoiled rotten trouble maker I've ever met?" I don't think I ever have. You remember the good things - or sometimes at least you pretend to.
The things I'll remember most about the last two years are the things I loved about living two dreams I never thought I'd live. I love my bookstore. I'd do it all over again if I could - only this next time it will be when my kids are older. And I always wanted to go to Australia. I never thought I'd live there and in essence, it was really just a long vacation where everything that could go wrong did, and where Steve worked and we looked for houses. :)
So I choose to remember the good things in life and let the bad pass me by. Onto the next dream. What's that? I want a book published. And quite frankly, if it weren't for those two last adventures, I would not have the guts to even try. After all, I've sat on a book I wrote 15 years ago because I was too afraid to send it in. Wish me luck!! I will do my best and we'll see where that leads me.
