For years, I’ve longed to go to Venice. I’ve been to Europe several times, but for some reason Venice has always eluded me. I thought I’d spend my honeymoon there, but then I never wound up getting married. So I’ve relegated Venice to my bucket list, to do before I die.

Should we really wait for death to present as a possibility before we act on our dreams?

If I’m to be completely honest, I have to admit that the main reason I haven’t just gone to Venice by myself is the often-precarious state of my mental health. Travel is always hard for me, not just because of the inherent stresses of packing, planning, etc., but because of the time zone changes. They wreak havoc with my medication and my sleep schedule, both of which must be rigorously maintained when one has bipolar disorder.

I know this all too well, because years ago when my first book Manic was published, I traveled to Florida for a writers’ conference where I was booked from sunup to long past........

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