Full circle: a nurse coming back to writing

 Hello everyone! 

It's been a long time since I posted here and I have some exciting updates!

Since we last spoke, I have gone to nursing school and am now working as a registered nurse on a cardiology floor. Doing an accelerated nursing program in the middle of a pandemic was intense, so that's part of why I've been quiet for so long. Now, I am coming back to writing, but my focus is going to be a bit different from here on out.

I am pivoting from book blogging to freelance writing. With my newfound expertise and passion for health and medical writing, I am focusing on cultivating freelance work in these areas. However, I am still a book lover at heart. I also still have all my experience from my time working on this blog and interning in publishing, so I am taking book-related content and editing jobs still too!

If you have book or literature-related content, copy, or editing gigs, I do still hope you will reach out. 

I anticipate continuing to be fairly quiet on this blog, but I wanted to leave some other ways you can find me.

Linkedin: Howling Turtle Media

This is my freelance-focused Linkedin (I have one that is more geared towards my nursing career too). I have decided to keep the Howling Turtle name in this new phase of my writing business. I will be creating a Howling Turtle Media freelancing website soon and will update this post with the link to that once it is live.

Twitter 

I'd love to connect with you on Twitter! I'll be sharing my published projects and thoughts on writing and healthcare.

Email:

I still check the email for this blog, so if you'd like to reach out, send a message to:

howlingturtle19@gmail.com

I hope you all have been well and that you'll join me as I set out on this new phase of my writing life.

~ Larissa

Original Poem: A Romantic's Take on July 20, 1969

I'm always trying to put more original content on this blog, but it's often tricky time-wise for me.  I was going through some things I wrote for my creative writing class last year though and came across a few pieces I was proud of, so I'll be posting those within the next few weeks.

A Romantic’s Take on July 20, 1969 by Larissa Banitt

A girl in a cotton dress and cat eye glasses

sits cross legged on the floor,

a copy of Jane Eyre clutched across her chest.

She’s staring at the moon

Through her grainy, rabbit eared television

and thinking of the trope in stories of lovers

torn apart from each other by fate

who look at the moon and find solace

knowing wherever their beloved is,

they have the same moon to look up to.

She wonders if the families of the men

On her screen have that same solace now.

Knowing that if they look up to the moon,

Not only will they know their loved ones

Will be looking at it too (between their feet),

The families will be gazing right at them,

though their distance makes the men

smaller than specks of dust.

Her parents start when her book

Thumps on the floor, Her hands

outstretched on the carpet behind her.

They ask if she’s ok, but she only nods,

Too embarrassed to say she suddenly felt

Like she had peering into the

Grand Canyon last summer,

As tiny and insignificant as a grain of sand

Next to the expanse of the ocean.

She lays in bed that night,

With moonlight casting shadows

across her quilt and decides

That love stories would be much more tragic

If they took place among the stars.