Pay Dirt

It’s like an obsession. I can no longer walking into my closet without reaching up and flipping over books and pushing aside envelopes and cards and pulling out an old notebook that looks like it might be the one. Well, last night, it was the one, and it held two stories that I had been looking for recently – one that (if I spin it correctly and get to work on it like, now) could be submitted for a call that ends tomorrow and the other looks good for a couple of “Best of” calls and I also have some other partials in there that I could use at some point.

So, I added that one to the stack of old notebooks that I just can’t throw away because it holds something that could potentially be something. I have boxes and shelves full of those and I keep saying that one day I’m going to just type up all those partial and those little notes and get rid of all those damn notebooks… If I didn’t know better, I’d think I was a closet hoarder.

Still, on impulse, I brought three more notebooks yesterday. Two are really cute, really sturdy flip top ones. And they say they’re “perfect for left handers” so hey, a leftie has to get her perfect notebook where she can, right?

I had an overnight date night on Friday with the hubby – dinner and a bar (with karaoke!) and an impromptu going away party for him on Saturday. It was a really low key Sunday of shopping for last minute necessities and packing, which brings us to this rainy Monday.

He leaves in two hours. 😦

ok…

…just seeing if this RSS Feed thing on Author Central is going to work.

Yes, I’m doing Author Central now on Amazon. Don’t know why I never thought to do it before.

I absolutely have to get better at promoting myself.

They will come.

And for a while, I was certain I would have to literally build it… the story, the words, force it from somewhere it didn’t seem to want to come naturally.

But no, I was simply laying across the bed browsing vehicles on the internet (not just any vehicle… my Jeep Wrangler that I’m getting in March!!!) and I went from that to looking for this story you’ll remember me saying I lost several months ago. I had already looked on the hard drive on my laptop, but I had exhausted all other possibilities so what the hell, I looked again.

Sidebar: My reason for still looking for this story was because I wanted it as a back up to submit in case I couldn’t come up with anything new.

And nope, it still wasn’t there.

But, that isn’t even the point. I’ve cried all I can cry about that particular story… literally… call me dramatic but I damn near die when I do shit like that…

My point is, I was watching my husband get in the shower and thinking (because I’m always thinking) about the tumultuous back and forth that has been our relationship and I opened a Word document and started typing.

It started with the word differences. Differences might actually become the title. When I was writing it last night, it was going one way, but as I continued throughout the night and into this morning, it’s gone another way completely.

And, oddly enough… the story, it’s different. Different from what I’ve been spending a lot of time on over the past several months, year… okay years.

It’s a story, not an escapade. It’s well developed with well rounded characters and I’m loving the storyline and the story could stand on its own with or without the sex, but in this case, since it would be for an erotic anthology, I think we’ll keep the sex…

But, I’m just really happy that I’m working on something that isn’t so to the point… that doesn’t have this pre-established intended purposes, that I’m not sitting here thinking… Okay, what positions, techniques, tools haven’t I used in the last six-eight stories?

I was worried it wouldn’t happen. I was already considering the fact that maybe it wasn’t/isn’t in the cards for me to contribute to this particular project, but they, there they were… the words.

Yep, I’m happy.

Last Night

I dug up an old notebook looking for a story that I started more than a year ago because I somehow, for some reason, felt that I could do something with it now. The notebook I pulled out was the wrong one, but it did have the handwritten version of Reasoning in it and almost a complete erotic story about fishing (which was/is pretty damned good if I must say so myself) and some other tidbits and doodles.

At the table flipping through the notebook and drinking wine, I actually read a passage that made me cry. And in true Tenille fashion, I left the thing at home so I can’t even print here exactly what it was… but anyhoo…

I looked around in some kitchen drawers for the other notebook with the other story, the one that I was originally looking for. Didn’t feel like going deeper into the closet though I’m fairly certain that’s where it is…

The rustling and fussing would have made too much noise. Someone might have lifted his head and looked at me, but of course, not said a word.

I refilled my wine glass before heading to bed. No television, just darkness and silence. I wrapped myself in a cocoon of comforters and quilts and apparently drifted off to sleep.

Quiet. Not even a snore or a shift in position.

Could have been home all alone for all I knew. Was all alone as long as my eyes were closed.

Except I wasn’t.

And I wasn’t particularly sleepy or wishing for a quiet evening. But that was what I got.

I’m pretty sure I will always be amazed at the fact that I can feel absolutely alone with someone living and breathing, laying right there next to me.

This is me, having a moment.

I’m at that all too familiar place where I’m working on several things at once and feeling for the most part optimistic by everything I have going on, still, I’ve yet to tie up any loose ends over the last week or so. Then I think on the things I have out there in limbo… some I’m pretty confident about; some that I sent out on a whim, none of which I’ve heard back from. Even though it is still a bit early as far as submissions go, I check my email hour after hour and it’s bone dry and I think back to those times when I’ve had a response in a week or two and then those ones that took a month or more and the answer was a resounding thanks, but no thanks…

No matter how many times I’ve been published, no matter how much praise I’ve received for my writing, there can’t always be a hit and that’s the harsh reality of it.

So, yesterday I started feeling bummed out about not being as promotion savvy as I could/should. I mean, I’ve, for the most part, let my work stand alone, and yes, the reviews, the excerpts, the praise, it came, but then I sit back and wonder, what if I had participated readings or tried to be interviewed more or traveled and made appearances or not let my website go or blogged more… then what? Then where would I be? Would I still be waiting/wishing/hoping for the day that I’m the one editing my own anthology; I’m the one touring for my own novel or would I actually be doing just that?

So, there. It doesn’t happen as much anymore, but yes, it does happen. I have my moments. Good to know I’m still human.

On the upside (what? there’s an upside?) I am over 2k words in on Looking for Lewis, the work in progress for the super huge project that I would be ecstatic to be a part of if all goes well. And, well, quite frankly, it depends on this story. It’s got to be a hit. It’s got to reach the masses. It’s got to be another Midnight Letter to Fran (which is ironic because I think I’ve gone on to write far better stuff) but anyway… it’s got to be that type of good, so the pressure’s definitely on.

Sigh. My mind is all over the place.

And just to sum it up – ugh.

I spent the better part of the weekend sick in bed with a nasty bug – fever, vomiting, chills and the whole bit. I guess my hubby said it best when he told the kids, “Mommy has the cooties.”

Feeling much better now and excited to get back to some super exciting things I have going on like the book review and in a few days to a week I will be interviewing an amazing writer on my blog for her blog/book tour.

I also received five novels in the mail recently which I’m just psyched to dig into. All gorgeous; all delicious; all by the beautiful Ms. Fiona Zedde.

So, yeah, things are looking up.

Am I Kinky?

It’s something I never actually considered before when reflecting on the subject matter of my work. Admittedly, the bulk of it reflects the real me: traditional, vanilla, submissive – well, sorta… A little – ok I’m working on that part – but almost absolutely not kinky. I don’t enjoy more than a slight smack on the ass and I have no desire whatsoever to be tied anywhere, to anything. Call that the control freak in me, but still.

But as I was browsing the net and having more Google fun I saw that the bulk of the stories of mine that receive praise and/or get highlighted in reviews are the kinky ones, especially spanking.

This is funny to me because it took sometime for me to come out of my shell in the way of writing erotica. It took me a while to move my characters out of the bed, out of the bedroom, let them use stuff other than own bodies to give and receive pleasure. And it was a bit uncomfortable for me. So uncomfortable in fact that I tended to throw in an element of humor in the story to lighten it up a bit. At the time I didn’t consider that if someone were reading about BDSM and enjoying it, then maybe I didn’t need to lighten it up.

So, I began writing these stories with more confidence, began implementing tools and scenes as if I KNEW what I was talking about, as if I, myself had been there, done that. And maybe it works.

But as I lay in bed this Saturday morning working on a story of sex so intense that mirrors are broken and vajay-jay’s are sore, I’m wondering… Is this my forte? Am I ignoring my niche by attempting to stay on the safer side of sex?

Or…

Am I simply denying the obvious? Am I kinky?

Reading begets Writing?

I used to feel that if I were reading, then I wasn’t being productive enough, wasn’t dedicating enough time to my own craft. Time spent caught up in someone else’s creation could be time spent creating my own stuff.

Then recently, I took on a small project where I’d have to read a book, an erotica anthology, and write a little review. Yes, I have to write a review, so I actually have to read the book and finish it, not like the stack of dog eared paperbacks on my nightstand and headboard.

I’m having a good time with it, though, better than I ever could have imagined. I’m flipping through the pages and seeing familiar names and smiling and becomeing enraptured all over again because these are names I knew from way back when… way back when I was crouched on my full-sized bed thinking, “Man, I wish I could do that or say that,” or “I hope that can be me one day.”

And, though I am still a bit removed from it all (it still tickles the hell out of me to see somewhere that Tenille Brown is one of the top erotic writers – say what?), I know that after all these years, I have accomplished just that, that maybe somewhere, someone is holding another book, an erotic anthology and becoming excited at the sight of my name.

While you’re just writing, submitting and in the end just hoping for the best, it’s hard to stay excited. It’s hard to remain that real person who remembers the excitement of reading a new story, a different story and not turn into that story producing maching.

So, yes, reading, for me, helps in my being able to create new/better/different stuff. As I was reading these stories I was so excited to get back to my own writing and see what I could do and say differently, how many more ways I could get my point across, what other point of views I could use… could I say this in five-hundred words or less?

I think that when I’m in that write, write, write mode, I forget to spend the time thinking of how the reader is seeing, what that readers might want to see, might want to know.

So, now that I am the reader… I get to decide if the story satisfied those questions… not a bad idea… see it from the reader’s perspective…

Anyway… almost done with the book… almost done with the review.

Ready to write.

The Joy of Googling Yourself

What I do now and again is Google myself to see how often my names pops up in reference to writine and publishing. I’m almost always pleased at what I find because the more I look, the more new places I find that mention my names and my stories in review, mostly to the positive side.

I did this last night and here are some of the newer ones that I came up with:

My bondage story, Reasoning, from Best Bondage Erotica 2011 is now on Google Books.:

My reprinted spanking story Lonnie’s Licks is mentioned here:

Zaji’s “Lights on a Cave Wall” combines Caribbean spirituality and mysticism with pulsing, sensual descriptions, while “Lonnie’s Licks” by Tenille Brown and “All Day” by Asha French are probably the best bets for turning on the ladies.
From

Reasoning was also excerpted here:

Reasoning, Tenille Brown. The point was, Ray was trying to fuck her to death. This story was such fun. The only way the heroine could get her guy to shut up and listen was to force him. So, Carlotta had said “No,” just like that, and it hadn’t really felt bad at all. It had felt damned good, in fact.

Reasoning was mentioned on Erotica Revealed as well:

““Reasoning” by Tenille Brown is a stand out story of a woman simply fed up with her boyfriend’s behavior.

My story Speed Bumps from the anthology Fast Girls is mentioned here:

“Speed Bumps” by Tenille Brown, our girl is addicted to the life of motorcycles, and the fast-paced danger and unpredictability that her and her partner enjoy surrounding the motorcycle lifestyle – she doesn’t want to change that lifestyle but her partner does.

So, needless to say, that made my night/morning, and I scribbled many, many words on a new butch/femme erotica story before going to bed. I feel appreciated. I feel accomplished. It feels really, really… nice.

Big Dreams

A common theme in my dreams have been animals, oversized animals like big ass squirrels and snakes chasing me through a pasture of high stalks of either wheat or corn. In one dream in particular, a huge, black snake jumped on top of my head and wrapped itself around it like a turban. Snakes are not my friend, therefore I woke up in a panic and reached for hubby… this was a week or so ago.

Last night, I dreamed that my pet turtle (yes, we have one of those) started gaining all this weight and was getting too big for her tank. Not only that, she kept snatching all this jewelry out of my hands that people had given to me… gold, pearls, all that stuff. In real like, I refuse to actually touch the turtle, so in my dream, I was afraid to take my jewelry from her. Hubby to the rescue in my dreams.

Also, I was wanting to wear a strand of red-tinted pearls, oversized pearls, of course, to an even with a sexy red dress.

In real life, I own pink pearls… they are my favorite set of jewerly as a matter of fact, but I do not, under any circumstances, wear red. I won’t even purchase a red vehicle.

I looked up the meanings of the things that stuck out, and here’s what I came up with:

Big
To dream that someone or something is bigger than normal, indicates that you either have an inflated opinion of yourself or of someone. You may be expressing a desire to be more dominant in some situation or relationship.
To see a big figure in your dream, represents authority and power.

Squirrel
To see a squirrel in your dream, indicates that you are involved in a loveless, pointless relationship or an unprofitable business project. You are pursuing empty and fruitless endeavors. Alternatively, seeing a squirrel in your dream, suggests that you are hoarding something. You are holding on to too much and need to learn to let go. On the other hand, a squirrel means that you need to reserve your time and energy.

Snake
To see a snake or be bitten by one in your dream, signifies hidden fears and worries that are threatening you. Your dream may be alerting you to something in your waking life that you are not aware of or that has not yet surfaced. Alternatively, the snake may be seen as phallic and thus symbolize temptation, dangerous and forbidden sexuality.

Turtle
To see a turtle in your dream, symbolizes wisdom, faithfulness, longevity, and loyalty. It also suggests that you need to take it slow in some situation or relationship in your life. With time and patience, you will make steady progress. Alternatively, a turtle indicates that you are sheltering yourself from the realities of life. You are putting forth a hard exterior and not letting others in. As a result, you are feeling withdrawn.
To dream that you are being chased by a turtle, indicates that you are hiding behind a facade, instead of confronting the things that are bothering you.

Jewelry
To see jewelry in your dream signifies status and your own sense of self worth and personal value. It is also symbolic of knowledge, identity, or whatever qualities you hold precious in your life. Jewelry highlights the importance of spiritual and psychological riches. If you dream of a specific piece of jewelry that you own, then it symbolizes aspects of a waking relationship.
To dream that you receive jewelry as a gift indicates that you need to acknowledge and incorporate those corresponding qualities within your own self. Consider the type of jewelry and what it is made of.

Dress
To see or wear a dress in your dream, represents a feminine outlook or feminine perspective on a situation. You are freely expressing your femininity.

Red
Red is an indication of raw energy, force, vigor, intense passion, aggression, power, courage, impulsiveness and passion. The color red has deep emotional and spiritual connotations. Consider the phrase “seeing red” to denote anger. Alternatively, the color red in your dream indicates a lack of energy. You are feeling tired or lethargic.
Red is also the color of danger, violence, blood, shame, rejection, sexual impulses and urges. Perhaps you need to stop and think about your actions.