#templeofares

[valerie]

after winter break

09 January - Jeudi So yesterday might be considered a bad day. Our shower backed up and we had to get someone to come out. Easy solve. Then we got the call-- 60 day notice on our rental. Cue el estrés aka THE STRESS. It sucks when it's time to move but not because you want to move. Oh well, it'll get done. I don't look forward to the moving. https://flic.kr/p/59eT2s But yesterday wasn't all bad because I pushed off my reality a bit by reading a story my friend wrote. AND IT IS SO GOOD. I missed her writing so much and this story of hers, wild as it is and IT IS WILD, just dropped me back into that world of the Temple of Ares. She always wrote the BEST stories and always inspired me to write my own. I love that it's long and I can just forget the world by being in her world. It helps that Kiari (my character) makes an appearance. LOVE that part a lot. Beth, the way you write Ares is perfect and I can totally see and hear him whenever he's on the page. Such a gift. https://flic.kr/p/2kvqNsi I'm reminded of a story I started writing called The Gods of Your Dreams. I wrote/played Kiari as a lesser goddess then immortal back in the day and I got it in my head to write Kiari facing down a demon (what?!) and calling up Ares (makes sense) and Thor (makes no sense at all). I wrote a bit of it (about 2k words) and abandoned it. Every time I think I want to write Kiari and Ares, I look back on the start of the story and wonder why Kiari is facing a demon. What fandom was I drawing from? If only I could remember. Then maybe I could continue the story. https://flic.kr/p/2qEvQH7 The story I'm writing right now is called Worst Way (working title). It's about a former baseball player now police detective who's caught the eye of a high school teacher former forensics technician. I like to think y'all can figure out who is playing the MMC. (You do know, right?) It's a romance (of course!) and I do like writing with some spice so there you have it. ;) Hopefully I finish it soon because I still have my November novel to maybe finish too. 12 January - Dimanche https://flic.kr/p/2qF4VMJ I ended up finishing Beth's story and OH MY GOODNESS, it was so good! I couldn't stop reading it. I haven't felt that way in the LONGEST time and I feel so lucky to have been one of her readers. I love that whenever Ares was on the page, I could hear him and see him. (And lo, I miss him!) Oh, and the other gods! It was soo good to "see" them again. Hades! And Kiari was here and there and I love that she made appearances. (The benefits of being an immortal.) I feel like there could be more to the story and if Beth writes more, I'd be down for reading it. https://flic.kr/p/2qF4gFQ Earlier this week, I was alerted by comments to some old posts at my IG, all of my friend Greg. When I read the comments, I was utterly delighted! My friend's daughter found me on Instagram and commented on the posts I made of her dad? How cute is that?! And oh my gosh, what did he tell her about me? Also, how sweet that he trusts me enough to let his daughter say hey to me. Awww! It made me think of my Xena convention days and those good times with my friends. Ahh, such adventures!

We're watching Silo right now and so I'm distracted from finishing this post. I'm also thinking of what to write next for my story and when I should start packing and the fact that it's Sunday night and back to work tomorrow I go. The weekends are always so short... https://flic.kr/p/2qEnx7w Read the full article

[valerie]

Journey well into the next...

I will have other words about another passing but I am taking this moment to think about my friend, Kimberly Dull. She departed this world today. From the bits I'm reading here and there on her FB, it seems she had a short battle with cancer. And now she's gone. Kim was one of my favorites from our Hercules/Xena convention going days. It seems we didn't actually meet in person until the Pasadena 2000 convention. But we were friends long before that, via our love of Kevin Smith, the New Zealand actor who played Ares on the aforementioned shows. We "met" at the message boards in a section called the Temple of Ares. We wrote stories of our personal characters interacting with the show's characters, a sort of role-playing fun. Some of us had our particular favorites. Hers was Karl Urban then a bit later Patrick Fabian. (Mine was/is still Erik Thomson as well as William Gregory Lee and many others.) We were both delightfully crazy about our fellas but as the years went on, we found that we had other things we mutually loved. I don't remember Kim writing long stories like some of us did but I do remember the ditties she'd write for our birthdays. I remember the one she wrote for my character, Kiari. The details are fuzzy but I remember something about a cake, a kitchen counter, and Ares wishing his priestess a happy birthday in his own special way. Good times. We corresponded via email for awhile but as time went on, those messages turned into comments on social media until it was just glimpses into each other lives with the occasional like or quick hello here and there. I loved when she shared her adventures on her page, her smile always at the ready and merriment lighting her eyes. I can tell from the messages on her FB now that she was so very loved and that she will be missed. You can add me to those voices. It hurts knowing that her light is gone but even through these tears, I think of her with love and joy in my heart. When I think of Karl or the St. Louis Cardinals or the Niners or the Temple of Ares, she will be there too. I was so lucky to know her. I hold this truth close. Journey well into the next, my friend. The memory of you will always make smile... https://flic.kr/p/2ond6Ci Read the full article