It's New Year's Eve. I'm sitting in my office in the house.

It’s New Year’s Eve.  I’m sitting in my office in the house. There are two windows in the room and I’ve covered them with venetian blinds because the sunshine in the morning is so beautifully invasive that I can’t see my computer screen. 

This room was originally a bedroom.  It was the Jill part of what developers like to call a Jack and Jill set up.  I sleep in the Jack part across the hall from the bathroom.   This room is located inches to the right of the front door and in the early days (I was still tolerant) when carousing co-workers needed a place to sleep I would tell them to come in the door, make a sharp right and just get in the bed. I never locked any of the doors even though my house is only one block from a main road and the Railroad Station. (I was tolerant and crazy.)

With the arrival of my first dial up internet connection I made the bedroom near the front door my office and moved the bed upstairs. This became the room where I re-invented myself as a publisher and purveyor of digital books that I learned to build and upload to Amazon.  I also created a rudimentary blog and began posting simple ideas that seemed brilliant in the shower. In this room I've received good news and disappointing news.  I’ve cried in here several times. (Not recently,)

Here is some of the good news I’ve received in this room over the years:

1.  Can you come in to town, I think I’m starting labor?

2.  Can you come in for the award luncheon?

3.  I’ve been asked to work on a show.

4.  Grandma, it’s me.  Can I come over?

5.  We got the house.

6.  Consuela, I read your manuscript last night.  It’s wonderful. (This from my devoted agent who never in twenty-five years has gotten my name right.)

7.  “Daughters is the best book I’ve read this year.” (Daughters has received 119 5-star reviews and 47 4-star reviews.  One reader gave me four stars because she was mad when it ended.

8. One Hundred Open Houses does not sell well but when someone buys it and connects - aaah! “I loved this book.  Now, how did the author get into my mind and pick out every thought I’ve ever had, do have and will have and get it all together in this book?” This is my personal favorite.

9.  Hello, Ms. Baehr.  This is Rachel from Fast Company Magazine. We’d like to include you in our Kings of Content article if you’re willing. Do you know anything about me, I asked?

10. We’d like to publish Thinner Thighs in Thirty Years as a Kindle Single.  Ok. 

2013 was a good year.  I got rid of a couple of bad habits. (Well, almost.) I did not lose a single pound although I was sure I would lose about five every single day. (Oh, you have to stop eating? Who knew.)

What I liked best were the e-mails and comments from people who read The Repurposed Writer.  The post goes out with a little click and the next morning readers weigh in.  I’m always surprised.  Who knew these good times were waiting for me?  Thank you. Thank you.

Happy New Year!