Jolyn Young

It’s finally fall, my favorite time of the year. My entire immediate family has birthdays in the fall, starting with mine in late August (which is close enough to fall to count) and ending with my daughter’s in mid-December. It’s nonstop discussion about wish lists, party invitations, and pinatas for three months.

In the midst of wrapping presents, baking cakes and forgetting to buy candles, I’ve also managed to reach the halfway mark on the rough draft of my second book. I started plinking away at this project almost two years ago while waiting for my first book to publish. The book will finish in the 80,000-90,000 word range, and getting the first 40,00 words down is the hardest part. Now I’m on the downhill slide and the words are flowing, so hopefully it won’t take another two years to finish the manuscript.

It currently lacks a working title. This is driving me crazy, but I haven’t been able to come up with a catchy, succinct name for my latest literary work. Maybe that’s the part that will take another two years.

In addition to taking care of my own offspring and writing a book, I also volunteered to feed and maintain two leppy calves. Because if you’re not so busy you look forward to a day off, are you even living the prime of your life right? Take a look.

My nine-year-old son has appointed himself in charge of cuddling the calves. The big one’s pretty feisty, but the little one is snuggly. He’ll lay down in the dirt with her for the better part of an hour, then come in the house beaming with happiness because “Patty licked me!” She probably thinks he’s a scrawny, hairless calf at this point. Or maybe an animated salt block.

In order to balance all the busyness and help regulate my autonomic nervous system, which struggles on the daily due to postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), I’ve also taken up Pilates. At first I thought it was a boring waste of time, but I made myself do the exercises anyway in hopes of alleviating my symptoms. I’m happy to report it’s working! Maybe boring is better after all. That will definitely not be the name of my next book.

Here’s my latest blog over at Western Horseman. I was surprised to see that many readers missed the memo that it was satire and wondered why my husband stays married to me. One commenter told me to grow up. I was like…Nah. Don’t want to, can’t make me. Good talk, though.

I hope you have a wonderful fall day and thanks for reading!