Gratitude

It's too easy to catalogue trials and woes — those that exist or those my imagination conjures for me daily in relation to Rosa Mira Books. So here's what I'm grateful for today: sun at last; the smell of dinner cooking as I work on (and the unstinting support the cook has offered me all year); the lively, gritty, life-affirming novel The Glass Harmonica; the interested, listening ear at Creative New Zealand this morning (might I be able to gain some funding/time/help?); Jason of meBooks to whom I've consigned the latest formatting puzzle; Dani who's sending out our NZ media releases tonight; Hugh who patiently added details to the website while cooking an Indian meal for hordes; friends who have been patient, encouraging, soothing and, never least, playful.

This month I'm determined to edit a story a day towards the collection of Slightly Peculiar Love Stories; that's my peculiar delight amongst many routine details — sampling again the particular flavour of each — this afternoon the slant, piquant tale of a man looking out through an office window in (it might be) Buenos Aires at a boy washing the glass six floors below. Oh, and that makes me think of another thank-you: to my Facebook friends who are there online, chatting away — a quiet background buzz in the home office, and who tonight flew to save me from a translation conundrum.

Dinner's ready and here, I've said grace.