What's Chava Possum Up to Today?

A REBEL WRITER’S weekly BLOG

Image credit: Possum Mood, go check out their online store here!

Yesterday, I posted my commentary on Nancy Brown Diggs’ In Search of Appalachia, which was quite emotional to write, surprisingly. When I picked up In Search of Appalachia, I was prepared for a fairly dry read, as most local histories are, but it really got me thinking about my Scotch-Irish heritage in a critical way. I returned to An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States to help me express my disappointment that Diggs’ history missed an opportunity to confront the fact that many Appalachians’ ancestors— the Scotch-Irish— were forces of violent colonization in early America. Appalachia was my home, my parents’ home, and my grandparents’ home— it’s a magical place to me. But, I’m not blind to its shortfalls either. If you’re Scotch-Irish, I hope you’ll give my commentary a read, even though it might be a tough one.

The sketch of the possum that I’ve been using in my daily blog posts is really just a place-holder; I’m expecting to receive two similar sketches that I had custom made very soon and I can’t wait to share them with you all! Both sketches are “of me” in Possum-form and they are adorable (obviously way more adorable than I am in real life!) You’ll be able to see the sketches in my upcoming “What’s Chava Possum Up to Today” posts as well as on my About page.

I haven’t talked much about my novel lately, but things are moving in the right direction. I’m making real progress on my research. The stack of books I need to read and digest before outlining the rest of my novel felt so impossibly tall last year, but after some careful planning and the last few weeks of practice, it seems that I’ll be able to get through my research this year! I don’t like rushing the research process, because I recognize that I have SO much to learn. But at least now, with a schedule, I can keep myself on target without feeling overwhelmed. Alongside my research, I’m slowly playing with a skeleton of an outline as well as character profiles. All told, things are moving forward and maybe— just maybe— I’ll have a draft done by 2022.