I always seem to procrastinate with these newsletters. My goal is to get at least one out a month, and I'm always down to the wire. My self-imposed deadline. Which has me thinking about deadlines in general. Life's deadlines.

Remember that maddening question from job interviews, performance reviews, or that one friend who marinates in existential dread—

Where do you see yourself in five years?

I used to shudder from it, the way you do when someone chews corn chips with their mouth open—wet crunches, little flecks launching from their mouth‑hole. The future always felt like a fogged‑over window, a dull gray cloud that swallowed any clear image of who I might become.

I never dared say what I fantasized in my five‑year flash‑forward: me on the veranda of a mountain mansion, sipping coffee on the morning of the Academy Awards, a double nominee for writing and acting. I used to sit there watching winners tell us unknown artists to keep going, keep dreaming, keep clawing toward the impossible. It was intoxicating, the way they spoke down from that glittering summit, as if their belief alone could haul the rest of us up the mountain.

But I digress.

Deadlines in life can take many shapes:

A deadline for naming your work—what are you? A lawyer? An accountant? A mother? How do you define, or sum up your existence?

A deadline for changing direction. The five-year thought, once again. If you aren't where you want to be in life, a five-year evaluation may redirect you.

How about a mental health check-in? Has your overthinking paralyzed your decision-making? Are you unable to forgive someone for something that happened years ago? What's the deadline for healing?

The biggest deadline may be - have you become the person your younger self hoped you'd be? Not perfect, of course, but recognizable?

Updates on my acting and writing projects. Two book festivals coming up in May—Nashville and Knoxville bound.

Writing keeps all my deadlines honest. It drags whatever I’m wrestling with into the light by letting my characters say and do the things I’m not always brave enough to articulate. It’s the cheapest therapy I know, and it spares me from a monthly counseling bill. There’s a reason so many mental‑health professionals push journaling: getting the noise out of your head clears just enough space for you to overthink something new.

The cover for the new book is locked in (see above), and ARC (advanced reader copies) prints of the book are in the hands of a dozen readers for review. I want to thank Jennifer Welch, for devouring the book last weekend and giving me very detailed, thoughtful critiques that I have used to rewrite and refine a few passages, the kind of precise course-corrections that make the whole thing stronger.

I hope to have a firm release date for The Maroon Candle by next newsletter, and I'm so excited for you to read. I am very proud of this story and the professionally polished pages.

Now it’s time to turn toward the next story and start untangling all those past‑due deadlines waiting in the wings.

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