SEEKING INPUT and OPINION:

I have to create a greater online presence, I think, in order to build what agents and editors want an author to have: that is platform. Platform is the network, connections and contacts that a writer brings to a book deal. No matter how great your non-fiction book is, apparently your platform is more important.
I have connections and contacts across Canada but they don't amount to a great big bunch of "followers" (does anyone else flinch at the idea of being a "follower"???); I don't have a network and definitely not online. Writing columns for my weekly newspaper is fine but it isn't reaching many people. Leading classes, hosting workshops, and giving presentations is very limited to me because of where I live, because of saturation (small province with a lot of writers trying to grow their own platform), and because I'm busy writing and submitting articles. So I'm having to read and consider ideas for building my platform instead of sending out my query letter and book proposal.
I'm in serious need of a direction sign right now.


So my question is, if I were to develop an online location for myself as a writer, would it be better to do it through Facebook or through a website? Where would you rather go? Where would it be easier to find me these days? Please provide your insight and opinions through comments.

GREATLY APPRECIATED.

Sometimes I run out of the house in the morning shouting, "The sky is pink, the sky is pink."
Because it is. Because you want to catch the beauty before it fades or dulls to grey as the rain arrives.
And yes, we have two osprey poles now. 

 

It's a gorgeous day today, my half-day of work, so I should be taking advantage of the lovely weather to let the chickens roam the yard and to start cleaning up the gardens but instead, I'm being "kidnapped" (in quotes because I ain't a kid anymore) for a drive to Moncton.
Apparently, mention the phrase "Fisherman's Paradise" and Dwayne's in. So supper is settled.
Then Mum pipes up: "Chapters."
And I say: "Michaels."
"Chapters. Michaels. Fisherman's Paradise. Where else do we need to go?" Dwayne says and I can tell by the look on his face that it's not a rhetorical question. He looks too excited for a trip to Moncton with his wife and mother-in-law.
"You want to go to Better Buy Sports, don't you?"
The grin told me I was right.

This is all otherwise known as Procrastination. My query letter is written, the book proposal is done, I'm even thinking of a brilliant writing website I could start -- and since I don't think along those lines, it's freaking me out how excited I am by the idea -- and Mum has okayed my opening pages so the time has come to start querying agents.
Ick.
I can't bring myself to start because this feels like IT. Now or never. Do or die. Shit or get off the pot. If I can't get an agent's interest who will get me a publisher, I'm going to have to go to Plan B.
And I don't have a Plan B.
Well, perhaps I do. Plan B is going to Moncton.

This may be why it's not a good idea for us to live together. Too much togetherness, methinks. Thank goodness Dwayne is out in the garage refurbishing his 1955 tractor.
I'm in the bathtub when Mum hollers.
"You'll have to come in. The radio's on. But the curtain is closed."
So in she trots to the bedroom (which is on the main floor with our bathroom ensuite) with a phone message for me. We chat about that for awhile, me in the tub, Mum in my bedroom, then she hears a buzzing coming from under the lampshade in the bedroom.
"You have a fly," she says.
"You have two flies," she adds.
My mother is obsessed by flies. Particularly with killing them.
"I'll give you two toonies if you kill them," I say. That's the price of one way through the toll booth on the Cobequid Pass and I know she's going to Truro tomorrow.
But she doesn't need the incentive.
"Don't look behind the furniture," she says.
"Don't YOU look behind the furniture," I answer. "But I need to see the corpses for proof."
"Oh, I have two bodies," Mum says. "I've just killed another fly for free."

When this kind of stuff happens, I think, "Why not get another dog? We should have three dogs. Maybe even four!" Then they get off the couch with a big, long stretch and I hear their toenails scraping against the oak floor, which was laid last summer but now looks like we've had it ten years, and I know that two dogs, four ears, and eight legs are enough.

 

Fern doesn't count as a dog -- and don't let her hear me even think that she might -- but she certainly fits in when it's time for supper:

 

I found a photo of my sister and me in our Holly Hobby dresses!

Original post linked here. 

And now I remember the details: December 1976, Christmas party at Barnum House near Grafton. This photo was taken in the living room of the apartment above our funeral home in Cobourg. We were 4 and 6 years old. And totally rockin' the shawls. 

Tweeting is not writing. It does seem like a conversation, however; one-sided, of course, but conversational.
This from Anne Lamott's Twitter feed:

"Here is how I'll write: not beatifically, not with great self-esteem, not with any real sense of what I'm doing. But I'll do it because I get to."

I love writing. Writing is the only thing that takes my mind off all the other shit (like people obsessing about us instead of seeking psychiatric treatment for their own inability to be happy) and when I write, I feel free.
It's like swimming. I don't bump into walls and coffee tables and buildings when I swim. In the water, I am graceful and fluid and strong.I don't sink like a stone because I suck at small talk, I don't drown because I'm socially awkward. When I write, I am a fish in water. Where I belong.