Whoa, where'd that monkey go?

You know that feeling you get when something big in your life ends?

I cried during the last episode of "Enterprise," not because I cared about the characters, but because it was the end of an era.  We didn't think there would ever be anything Star Trek again.

And I cried on two different occasions when "Revenge of the Sith" came out, for various reasons, but also because the era was ending.  I grew up on Star Wars and Star Trek.  A big chunk of my life was closing in behind a door that would never be reopened for future generations.  (At least with anything new.)

Granted, I've been proven wrong in major ways.

But still, there's that ending feeling that just makes it feel like part of you has been locked away behind doors blocked with heavy, Marley-esque chains.  A door you can never access again.

Well, that's how I feel whenever I end a project.  When I finished my novel, titled A Rose by any Other Name, it felt that way.  (A novel which, by the way, will take far too much work to make saleable.)  I felt that way when I finished my chapbook for my last  poetry workshop.

And it's how I felt yesterday when I wrote the last words of Oracles Promise.  Yes, you read that right.  I wrote the last words.  I finished.  After 8 years, the monkey is finally off my back.  I feel like Steve Young when he led the 'Niners to a super bowl win.

Q4U: Do you feel similar feelings when you finish a first draft?  When you got your agent?  When you got your book deal?  (Or do you think you'll feel that way when some door closes on the past journey you've taken?)

Don't forget that there's still time to ask me a question!  I'll answer them all during Footloose and Fancy-free Friday!