So many things are changing I hardly know what to write about.  Life changes, career changes, and all around me the world changes.  Some things never change, but somehow those are the ones we pay the least attention to.

 For starters, I'm acting and soon to be actual Vice President of the Horror Writer's Association.  This is good and bad, both for myself, and for the HWA.  I will work hard.  I will do anything and everything I can to make it a better organization, to bring back some of the professionalism that has slipped, and to see if I can't help to make the dues a worthwhile investment.

 The goods and bads, though?  Still there.  I will have less time for writing, less time for a lot of things, because I have to give some of that time to the organization.  I could, of course, give very little and get away with it.  Traditionally, the VP isn't an over-worked guy.  That isn't my style.  I will no doubt be tempted again and again to plunge into things I should leave to others.  The good, for me, lies in the accomplishments I hope to achieve, and in the slight boost that the position and visibility can give to my own career.

 For the organization, though, there is more food for thought.  When I joined, people like Dean Koontz, Jerry Williamson, and Joe Landsdale were officers.  The membership included names that people recognize - not horror fans, but everyday people.  The awards were just as messed up and controversial back then, but they meant more - still.  Active membership in those days meant a sort of camaraderie with the likes of King and Clive Barker.  Not their money, of course, but still.  There were a LOT of people making money in the horror business then.  The mid-list was thriving, foil-covered covers abounded.  Big hands and skeletal heads stared out from every supermarket shelf.  None of that is true now.

 What am I getting at?  Though I have several novels out, and a large pile (still growing) of professional story sales, I am nobody.  I have no recognition.  Even among those in the field, I am a small ripple in the pond.  I am not sure that having me as Vice President will help the organization - not the way a bigger name might.  I'm not sure that the organization CAN be helped unless we can draw back those big names.  Certainly the big anthology sales hinge in some part on the names we can bring to the table.  My name, for the record, isn't worth spit in that arena.

 And yet I have hope.  There are new avenues of publishing opening up.  There are new ways and old ways running parallel to one another.  Traditional publishers are coming on board slowly with new lines of horror, branching out into dark fantasy and thrillers, and the eternal undead still have their niche.  Meanwhile, there are more and more independent publishers tossing their hats into the arena, and the work they are producing is both high in quality and very satisfying on a creative level.   Print on demand and the web are providing outlets and markets that did not exist in the past.  The number of professional rate markets, in my own estimation, is up, not down, from a few years ago.  It is a good time to be in a position to help the organization.  It is a good time to be involved in horror, as a whole.

 For me, it is a year and time of new beginnings.  Despite their roots in bad times and hard times, the months to come promise to be the best of my life.  I have someone to share them with that actually shares them.  I have LOTS of kids to influence, and that alone is scary (or should be to the rest of the world).  I have publishing opportunities and words to write, a home to build and a new life to launch. And hey!  I have this column where I can rant, and rave, and nobody can talk back without giving me the option of CLICKING the delete button in e-mail.  Gotta love the net.

 I could go on and on.  I could comment on the upcoming presidential race, but I won't.  I can't find a thing to say about either idiot that hasn't been said, nor can I find a new angle that changes the fact we are stuck with one, or the other of them, for at least four years.  I could comment on the once-great Olympic games that are now just another commercialized professional wrestlingesque nightmare.  I could comment on the bookshelves at Barnes & Noble and Food Lion that are stocked with yet another set of covers for the same old books by the same old people as those of us on the "out" side write and write and bang our heads collectively to no end.  I could comment on editors who keep your work for over a year and don't respond.

 Instead, I believe, I'll drink a toast to Karl Wagner's Ghost and move on.  Horror isn't dead, and even when it is, you know it's coming back.  I will leave you with an inspirational little ditty from one of the old masters you don't hear enough about - and the thought that from such roots, our genre has grown.  Where to next, I wonder?

That foul Loch Ness shall be no more a cairn,
Nor nightmare for the wives of sturdy men,
Nor used to fright the dickens from the bairn,
No, not a cairn, that hellish pit's a den,
For that most fearsome beastie, sliding deep
Within those darksome keeps of mud and slime
Awaiting only time, a chance to seep,
Up from the gloom and shadows, slowly climb,
Upon the surface, breaking like a wave
To claim as nightmare brethren all who see,
And those unlucky few we cannot save,
Killed, or eaten? Merely ceased to be?
My eyes bear witness to that hideous beast,
And thankful not to be part of its feast...

Attributed to Angus William  Griswold - rough translation

From the Shadeaux,

David Niall Wilson