So this is what having a life is like...

On Saturday, I did something I hadn't done in two years...cleaned my house.

I know you're like - Damn P!

No worries. The house had always gotten clean, just not by me.

For the last two years I've split my time between family, coaching and writing - oh and there's that little matter of my full-time job. So pardon me, but cleaning simply wasn't a priority. But with my Del Rio Bay series finished (the ARCs arrived Saturday as if to signal that this is the end for real) my mind is free and clear of voices and more importantly, I'm free of deadlines.

Right up until my publisher passed on my option book - sorry kiddies, Flipping The Script, will be me and Mina's swan song - I kept my head in writer's mode. Because there is a certain "place" you've got to stay to write books. It's an odd sort of limbo where you're partially of the real world and partially of the world you've created.

It's blissful and painful.

Liberating and frustrating.

Rejuvanating and exhausting.

Once they passed and I knew I didn't have to straddle two worlds, I let go.

I slept like a baby Friday night and since I didn't have to get up early and steal some writing time while the house was still quiet, I slept in while everyone else got up and about their day. Woo Friggin Hoo!

You have no idea what a big deal that was.

At some point, I'll let my mind go back to the hole. I'll climb back down and create a whole new cast of characters to play with. Probably sooner rather than later. Already the voices are whispering and faces and places are lingering in my head. I'm taking notes now and then, but I'm also ignoring some of it.

I know ignoring it can be dangerous. You never know when you might sleep on a mighty gem of an idea. But I've come to realize that the ideas truly worth pursuing never leave you alone.

For now...do you hear that? It's the sound of my sanity creeping its way back home.

I'll miss spending my nights with Mina and the clique. They're a big part of my heart. Like every good parent, I did the best I could to raise them right. But now they belong to the collective mind of my readers and my mind is free to be silent. I took a certain level of comfort in vacuuming and tidying up my abode, on Saturday. It actually got me thinking about this chick, sixteen years old - she's half Korean and half Black and she lives in this big old suburb with this best friend who...uh-oh.