Warrior Poet

A beautiful blanket of snow is slowly covering the city. I have no less than 4 articles and 3 proposals due in the next two weeks. 1) an article on birth choice for KC Wellness magazine 2) an article on workplace safety for KC Small Business 3) an op ed piece for the Kansas City Star on birth options 4) an article for the Maternal Child Health Coalition newsletter on our first African-American lactation consultant (take a bow Ms. Valtra Brown) and 1) a proposal for a Conscious Woman presentation on the relationship between lactation and infant mortality. Check out the conscious woman website. They feature national high quality speakers that you can hear without leaving your home. I'm very excited to be working with them. Meanwhile the local CNM (certified nurse midwife) group denied my proposal on homebirth for their upcoming conference (no shocker there, they prefer to go in the other direction toward medicalized subjects-maybe I just wanted to annoy them) However, they will be showing Ricki Lake's new movie the night before the conference- so I'll attend that, see and be seen, and chew that fat with some of the new midwives graduating from our local CNM program as well as some of the more established midwives who are cordial to me. I also have two other proposals due by March 1st, 2) to the ADA (American Dietetic Association) and 3) to the professional nursing education conference on the topic of blogging as an education tool for student nurses. I must really be turning into a writer/speaker. Elsewhere on my agenda: I'm rejoining a second Toastmaster group, the Earlybird Toastmasters who meet at the crack of dawn on Monday mornings, and I'm joining a nonfiction writer's group who meet on Tuesday mornings. I met with the earlybirds many years ago and got my speaking chops there. I can't wait to join them again as the group has grown and features many professional speakers who I hope to have mentor me. The writer's group is new to me and I'm just hoping to get some encouragement to grow some gonads to get this book published. I'm not sure what will happen once the book is out there, and I just want to keep it close to me still- crazy huh- like being pregnant and now wanting to let go of the prenancy and give birth. I actually get this way with all my pregnancies, I always hope I'll be pregnant just a little longer... Anyway- plenty of writing to keep me busy and off the streets and running around saving birthcenters and such. I got all pumped up watching GI Jane last night and stangely enough, I do feel like a warrior- a warrior poet. Will I draw blood or just rhetoric?