For me year’s end stirs up guilt and gung-ho. I’m at once celebrating another year of reasonable health and productivity, but kicking myself for not enough of either. Some wise French guy once said that we are inclined to two basic instincts: one to habit and one to change. I want to write more fiction in 2010 if I can kiss off the habit of writing less! If only I could be more Alcottish, as in Louisa May of course, the subject of an inspiring (at least for me) docudrama I watched last night.

Alcott, who died at the untimely age of 56 (and most untimely as it is also my age) wrote prolifically (and ambidextrously!) for the adult and juvenile markets. Fabulously wealthy from the sales of her literary and pulp fiction, she was once paid a fine sum to merely stand on a stage and rotate 360 degrees for her audience’s viewing pleasure. No Heidi Klum, but no less and maybe more iconic.

No Klum or Alcott here, but I’m inclined to change this new year, to increased productivity, to writing stories, (even novels?) of the hearth and home and dogs, like my pup Scout.

I’ll title the first LITTLE PUPS.