Shelli Stevens

Sunday:

I woke up pretty much exhausted and a little sad that the conference was over, but ready to go home.

I missed my kid and I knew she was missing her mommy. Oh and not to mention she’d be demanding her souvenirs I’ve accustomed her to getting.

So after one last breakfast with some Divas, I hauled butt onto a Super Shuttle and arrived at the airport.

My vision of writing another 5 pages like I did on the flight down died quickly as many a Seattle RWA chapter members and Northwest area writers got on my plane. After that it was chat, chat, chat!

I sat in first class (again since I’ve got friends in airline places) with Jane Porter, Julia Quinn, Serena Robar, and my conference chair Julie Revell Benjamin. That was just first class. The rest of the plane had a ton more writer friends–we did indeed take over the flight. And I knew our flight would be safe..for fate would never deem a plane to crash with Jane Porter and Julia Quinn on it.

My daughter and my parents met me at the airport. My daughter ran into my arms, squeezing the life out of me…and I realized how much she means to me. Love the little gal so entirely much. Almost as much as she liked her souvenirs! Home again…for another year.

Being a writer is a bit like being a fish out of water. It’s scary, it’s isolated. But we survive through little droplets of water throughout the year. Droplets being: im’ing with other writer friends, local RWA chapter meetings, writer forums, local conferences, the conversations on the phone. But once a year we have this conference, and we all get to swim in the same big pond. And when I’m in it, it feels so darn right. So much peace and happiness. This year was no different (though I will say the social scene wasn’t as big as it has been in the past. I think the crazy expensive prices put a kink in that.)

It was another great conference, and now I wait for another year to go by and survive on droplets. Yes. I am random much.