James Doohan is dead.

The world at large knows him as Scotty.  He died a few days ago, of pneumonia and alzheimer's.  My brother knows him more as one of the funniest and most good-natured purveyors of quotes and stories who attended DragonCon.
That's saying a LOT.

It isn't just because of him that I say the following:
This year's DragonCon is going to be different.  Quiet, you.  I mean that this year's DragonCon is going to be MORE different.  That's no Strongbad quote, it's a statistical analysis term.  With the line of expected DragonCon as a median around which the surprising events of the con orbit, this year's events will be more distant than in previous years, at least for me.  There's a whole lot happening those four days, and some people are gone who have been there, and others will be there who have never before attended, and that's all part of the line, but...
I've played Magic: The Gathering once, just once, in the year since I last attended.  I won't be playing it at the con.  I won't be watching Sparky win at whatever he plays.  I won't be
Heh.  I've had this song stuck in my head since I conceived of this post.  It's entitled, "Kick in the Ass."  Until I followed a link from Valkyrie Yuuki to the DragonCon webpage and found out about James Doohan, that was going to be the title of the post.  Here's why:
Today I found out that my current position is finally being replaced.  I can apply for the replacement position, of course, and will have a good chance of getting the job if I want it.  Like jobs of its kind are expected to do, it pays well.  It pays "I could afford a mortgage" well.  It's full-time accounting, calling people to check the status of invoices, data entry, a few things I would need to learn as well, but nothing I couldn't handle.

I wouldn't mind the work.  Not at first, for certain.
I don't like working full-time.  I don't like it.  That would be problematic for me.
My pride...that's one of the big scares.  I don't know if I could handle being an accountant.  I could handle doing some of that work.  I already do much of that work; that's why I have such a leg up on anyone else who wants this job.  It's not what I'd be doing.  It's what I'd be.
An accountant.

I am a writer.  Wings open wide and I am on a rocky crag bent like a beast, face obscured but for white eyes, flames behind me.
That is the image of how I feel when I am defending my decision to be a writer.  Can you hear my voice, darkening the sky with its ferocity, when you read those words that I have written: I am a writer.
I bought Writer's Market again today.  I don't know why I suddenly thought of it when I finished Midori no Hibi.  Perhaps something about the importance of honesty with oneself and the need to express those feelings by taking action got to me.  Maybe it was merely the first bit of free time I gave myself after work.
There it is, he said, pointing.  I'm calling the job that's getting money for me "work."  I'm doing a job to make ends meet and I haven't been pushing towards my dreams, my ideals.  I haven't even been pushing toward them in my way, the slow percolation that leads to the sudden outpouring of a seemingly unprecedented complete cuppajoe.  That style of work always bothered my friends in college, and now it haunts me;
My friends don't know when to encourage me.  I give no sign when I am in trouble with my work that I am in trouble.  Nothing comes out for a while and they have no way to know whether it means I am or am not working on it.  I feel vaguely resentful when I am encouraged and am already working on it, because it seems a lack of faith, and I can't keep that resentment from showing just a bit to friends who really do pay close attention when they're talking.  And so I've trained the people I want encouragement from not to say a thing when I do nothing.

I'll be studying Writer's Market this weekend.  I'll start making a list of the publishers I'd like to publish my work, agents I'd like to sell it to them, etc.  I'll write a cover letter.
And I'll come up with a better title.  Rachel's Faerie Tale doesn't feel right.  It's too basic, and more importantly, the story isn't her faerie tale.  The current frontrunner is "Witches, Faeries, Truth."  But when I read it aloud it sounds less like a title and more like a tag line.  The main characters' names really shouldn't be part of the title of this work.  It should be something central to the novel as a novel.  It may be that I simply need to finger what that is.  Witches, Faeries, Truth is pretty good for targeting the central themes.  Perhaps central events, or concepts that were developed for the novel specifically?
"Truth Magic" is kind of tangential.  Most of the titles I think of that use the words "Faerie" or "Magic" give the wrong impression, either misrepresenting the book as being aimed at a different audience or as being about something totally other than what it is.
This story is about people who make a mistake, have to grow up quickly to deal with the troubles that ride in the wake of the mistake's direct consequences, and eventually must confront themselves and the power they've attained to fix their problems.  That's what it's about, long-term, as a novel.
That's the first time I've ever managed to say it in a way that made any sense at all.
"Visitors and Tourists."  That one's damn close to perfect.  Rachel gets stolen, but in a manner that lets her enjoy her visit to the faerie realm.  When she returns, creatures from the faerie realm tag along with her and cause more trouble.  When the story comes near conclusion, the whole cast heads to the faerie realm.  If it's just "visitors" people will immediately think space aliens, which are in this story but not even close to central.
The one flaw there is that one of the two visitors from the faerie realm is in the real world on business, and when the cast heads to the faerie realm they're also doing so on business.  Tourist doesn't feel right for that, even if the title scans fabulously.
This is going to take a lot of my weekend.