Anastasia’s Back Story (Almost) On “Making Violence Obsolete”

Update: Podcast Anastasia's "Making Violence Obsolete" Back Story.

I’ve so much to tell but so very little time, especially this week.

I wanted to start sharing more and more of what it is that is behind the New Horizons Small “Zones of Peace” Project, this week in particular, especially as it relates to the vision I had that birthed this project. And how that story reflects my journey from blindness to recovery from blindness. After all that is what the headline, under this site’s title, "Anastasia The Storyteller," promises to provide.

But, of course, even the single project of “Making Violence Obsolete” is a long and complex story. I have given you hints of the story that I am trying to modify here for a blog format rather than hardback books. 

But I do want to do more than intimate my more completed message and the stories and rationale that has formed it. 

However lately I have even been thinking that if I could really master the design of blog postings to suit my objectives, I think I might just be more content with simply writing online rather than authoring full-length books. 

The six books I now have in progress, including my three still unpublished Random House books that I call my “Random House Trilogy” have their own back story. But I am weary of holding on to the many behind the scenes tales I have to share as teachable moments while depending on editors and publishers etc. 

I find myself these days wanting to simply be Anastasia The Storyteller along with my several other public faces: Anastasia The Super Sleuth and The Wise Woman of Elk Mountain and whatever else people identify me as. 

I guess my summertime slowing down gave me a hint that I might kind of get to enjoy that more relaxed pace. Then Labor Day came, quickly drawing me back again into high gear as our new projects; the "Making Violence Obsolete" and the Counterculture Community Development Experiment, began to take hold. So now I am not quite sure which pace I prefer although a balance would be nice, I think.

Nonetheless, as I prepared my notes for this coming Saturday’s “informal” launch of New Horizons new “Making Violence Obsolete” seminar – discussion forum event I had reams of personal and professional anecdotes prepared to share. Then, for that venue, they seemed a bit top heavy. So I cut them down, almost to the quick, deciding instead to translate my notes, in small doses, into this blog site. But that doesn’t quite fit yet either.

So for now I think I will just merely be checking in here in brief with my back story tales. And let you know that I think that if you are able to join us Saturday, October 1 for New Horizons “informal” launching of our two new parallel projects, “Making Violence Obsolete” and “The Counterculture Community Development Experiment,” do it!

Maybe you and I – and the others involved – can get to what I believe might best further our shared goals, breaking bread, hangin’ out and sharing our stories back and forth in real time. Don’t you think that would be nice?

The words below of Jada Pinkett Smith, the actress and singer-songwriter, posted on Facebook, speak volumes to me of a similar intent.

“Maybe it's time we pull back our resources and we put them back into our communities, and we make programs for ourselves that acknowledge us in ways that we see fit, that are just as good as the so-called mainstream." 

With hoped-for opportunities for storytelling, in the flesh, and other face time occasions in the planning works ahead, maybe I will just let myself a bit off the hook for today about giving you the whole parcel that I want to share. And just let myself be reassured that, at least, some of you out there that are my readers want face time opportunities as much as I do. 

So maybe we will make that happen sooner or later. 

Saturday, October 1 in Frederick, Maryland, not far off the Capital Beltway, could be a good time for us to get started! I promise, even our getting to see one another by itself, would be worth your trip.

Please, do attend if you can!