Originally posted Thursday, January 04, 2007:

Sitting here, typing away with freshly cut hair. The comfy pyjamas I was talking about are in the dryer, getting themselves ready for tonight.

Feeling really good today – very lucky. Got up and the first song I heard was, “Don’t You Worry About A Thing,” by John Legend. Went to the mall and got even luckier. Received a free bottle of lotion for a muck up at the salon, hair feels so good now it’s devoid of split ends and even lucked out with finding my sizes in the shops.

But check this out:
A few months ago, I realized that I would soon have to part with a beloved pair of boots. I don’t like boot shopping (I’m the size of a 10 year old – a SMALL 10 year old, so most boots don’t fit at the leg part), and I really loved these boots and didn’t want to have to give them away. So, I put it off, figuring I would find something during the Boxing Week sales. Right.

By the time I got to the mall, there were no boots to be found. Well, there were boots, but not the kind I wanted. I was starting to feel desperate and expecting a phone call from the publisher (this was a little while ago), the boot shopping started to take on a mythic quality. I couldn’t find the boots I wanted, in a shop or even online. And when the publisher phoned yesterday, telling me they’d passed on my novel, I thought (very glumly), “Well, I expected the rejection. The boots told me.”

But thanks to all your wonderful words, I feel rejuventated. Not just for the writing, but the searching of the boots. I went to the mall today, determined. I was going to find a pair of boots! I was going to be daring, adventerous. Go into shops I don’t normally frequent. Quiz clerks. Ask strangers who I see and whose boots I like, “where did you get those?”

The first shoe shop I walked into (which I never walk into because their prices make my credit cards cry) was the last shoe shop I walked into for the day. Because there, standing in all its glory, were none other than my boots. My boots! The ones I had to replace, the ones that the shoemaker couldn’t fix. There they were – but not just there, there with all sorts of delicious add-ons: it was a little more bronze in colour, tiny studs by the heel (which sounds tacky, but looks nice), and a tiny, high heel that will probably cripple me, but damn won’t I look good!

*sigh*

My boots. Just like I had wished for, even better than I had hoped. It feels like a sign, people. An omen from the gods.

“You’ll have to do some walking,” they seem to say. “Keep writing, keep querying. But here are some fantastic shoes to do the walking in. And because you’ve been such a good girl, we’re going to give them to you for 20% off. That’s right. Do the math. Remember what you set your budget at? These boots are half the price. And to further dazzle you, look to your right. See that purse? The super cool, sort of lime green but still sort of grown up purse? Take it, it’s on sale as well. We’ll give you a pair of super-cool boots and a brand new purse, all for the price you set.”

Damn.

Luke Skywalker may have had the Force, but I, I have the Writing Gods who speak to me through shopping. Do they love me, or what?!