Using journals and diaries as inspiration...

You are tapped out - your mind has left the ring, nothing new or fresh remains. It is more than writer's block - it is a vast partition separating coherent thoughts and imagination. The dead zone of creativity has arrived.
Ok, maybe that is a bit dramatic. (My drama queen of an eight year old has me in that frame of mind. A sore throat is ending her life - she clearly doesn't have my double G alleled red-headed gene!) But seriously - it is bound to happen to all of us - the creative pit of nothingness.
So - what is the cure? I have found that stepping away from conjuring characters and plot lines from the air and traveling back in time tends to do the trick. How, you ask? I open old journals - snippets of the past that are often forgotten. An antidote of a child, a skirmish between spouses, an odd dream penned to page - whatever it may be, it sparks the fire again. Sometimes it isn't that simple. Let's face it, interlacing the personal details of our lives into the fictitious characters we create can reveal more than we care - naked prose. But - how about non-fiction?
Yes, it is still a genre of writing and, better yet, narrative non-fiction is fed from both the imagination and true life. Presently, I have been pouring heart and soul into this often forgotten genre of writing. There have been opportunities to submit samples of creative non-fiction to magazines - ones that demand truths and savor literary grounding.
With a lifetime of experiences, where does one start? Again, the journals. If you aren't the type to adhere to the structure of keeping them, try closing your eyes and bringing yourself back to a place in time. Are they closed yet? (Bad joke - how do you read with shut eyes?!) You are a child again, maybe twelve or thirteen, detaching yourself from childish things and discovering a new world of prospects. How did you feel? Were you the kid who was counting down the minutes until you could drive a car or were you the one who hid in the closet with dolls, pretending you were still young? Imagine the time you were most excited or afraid. Go there in your mind and write out all that you remember. Don't sweat the small things, the dialogue can be created true to the times later.
Today, I submitted a piece for a literary travel magazine. The topic was a place revisited, holding sentiment of the heart. I wrote about my return to Sequoia National Park - twenty-eight years, two months, and twenty-six days between the two trips. How different our experiences are as we mature - from height perception to the feelings invoked.
Like Barbara Streisand says in her concerts, "Talk amongst yourselves - I'll give you a topic." But instead of butter (yes, she gave the topic of butter :O), how about memories?  The challenge is on!

Penning past the pain...

I don't know about you, but life can really smack me down. Hard. Whether it is personal…health issues, relationship dramas, an unwanted diagnosis in a child… or someone close to us who is dealing with a hailstorm of trials - blind-siding pain and the butt hits the floor. While we are digging the gravel from our knee caps, frantically finding the right-sized bandaids to cover the bleeding, and trying desperately to get back up again…How do we write through that? (I suppose that might even be helpful if you are writing about something similar, but a comedic dialogue? A poignant scene between a mother and young daughter? Hmm, not so much!)

That has been me, for the past few weeks. Personal and someone(s) close - double whammies. I haven't stopped writing, but I do find the pain of life to be very distracting, to say the least. For example, I have started to blog no less than 5 times in the past few days and…yep, not happening. So, when I opened up the post page today, I just decided to write about this - penning past the pain. Maybe it should be penning past life, but me and my darn love of alliteration, right? ;)

Sitting on the lanai today, staring at the sand around the lake - sand I didn't even know was there until the water dried over it - I found myself checking my weather app, hoping for rain. With so many wildfires in FL, we truly need it right now! Upon closer inspection, however, I also discovered large rock formations under the water, right beside the sand. Shaped smooth from the lake's moisture, they formed what almost appears to be a stairway leading into the depths. I would have never known this hidden beauty if there wasn't a drought. Hmm. It doesn't take a large leap to link that metaphor of writing in pain or struggling distractions. When life knocks us flat on the ground, extinguishing our energy…if we open our eyes and look around, what might we discover from that perspective that we wouldn't see standing up-right? Every uncomfortable moment, unwanted drama, unwelcome chaos - all of it - is an opportunity to expand our portfolio of life experiences. To actually experience something is better than imagining it (albeit, we might prefer to just conjure, instead). There is truth…a raw reality that makes us acutely aware of what it is to feel something - how it affects all the senses in such a tangible way!

Although I may be still digging gravel from my knee caps today, I am taking new notice of it's texture, the colors it leaves, how it smells, the small ridges it leaves on the skin…I will be standing again, soon enough.

Rainy Days...

I live in the Sunshine State - Florida. True to it's name, when the snow is falling, blanketing the North/West, we have sunshine and warmth. Usually, the the rain we experience arrives on summer afternoons - just enough to lower humidity and temperature to that "not too hot" level of enjoying the back lanai and lake views. (Lanai - I laugh at the fact that I am officially used to the term. It is, what I refer to, as the pretentious name for a screened-in porch!) Needless to say - waking to a May morning of dark clouds, followed by a rapid down pouring, is not usual! (I am penning this a couple hours later, with the sun shining again - so much for the "rainy days" title of this post - but, at least, it did start as one.)

As long as I didn't have to drive or run in and out of the storms, I have always enjoyed them. It is like a heavenly stamp of peace, rest, and reprieve for me. Yes, even if the lightning flashes wild and the thunder sends shivers down the walls of our home, I enjoy it. Although it might not be some people's ideal of peace, it is mine. It is the "stay inside and watch the wonder," the inspiration of the pen…there is something about the chaos of wind whipping leaves and branches around, waves glistening on the lake, birds scurrying around to find retreat - all of it - that I see stories. Actually, for writing, my most ideal "weather" is a storm. Maybe it is because it keeps me at home (if I can help it). With eyes glued to the horizon, the imagination runs as wild as the clouds outside.

My mom (I must give her credit for this phrase and did request permission to use it) texted me something this morning. "I can almost hear the gulps and sighs of the earth giving thanks to God." What a poetic line, Mom! It is true, there has been a need for rain here. Rocks, those we didn't know existed, have been exposed in our lake - it has been too shallow. Perhaps the lack of rain and storms have caused a similar draught to my imagination…as I have trudged through the dry sand of creativity these past couple of weeks?

I probably should have titled this blog, "Weather of Creativity," or something of the likes. It is the point of today's ramblings. It also raises an interesting question: Does weather affect your writing? Do you thrive in the sunshine or rain? Cold or heat? Waves or calm seas? I suppose that what you are writing would be affected, as well. It is easier to write catastrophe in chaotic weather and pen happiness in the sunshine. However, if you had to pick a climate that most inspires you, what would it be? For me, I realize this day, it is a storm.

Making use of useless moments...

This past week. It was one of those well-planned, fine-tuned, sequence of days that ended up in a flat, chaotic chord. Meals were planned, lists were made - even lists for each list! Groceries purchased, laundry done, bulk of cleaning complete…all ready for a week of company, arriving Monday evening. The only things left on the lists were setting up rooms - you know, fresh sheets on the beds, candles burning (to cover any unwelcome scents), newly laundered towels hung in a clean guest bathroom…Instead of greeting my company, playing hostess-with-the-mostest, on Monday night, though - I was laying on a very uncomfortable hospital bed with an IV in my arm, admitted, and ready to roll to my "room." Although I did get out of the hospital while our company was still visiting, beach and pool trips were replaced by doctor's and diagnostic appointments.

Lovely, huh?

Company plans aside, it felt like the entire week was a series of useless moments - a waste of time and energy where I could get absolutely nothing productive accomplished. (Unless you count racking up medical bills, steady strides to hitting that out-of-pocket insurance max, and reading the first page of "War and Peace" at least 10 times as being productive? (By the way - "War and Peace"doesn't mix well with anti-nausea and pain medications, especially being the first page does have a decent amount of French mixed into the English!)

But…were they really useless moments? Every life experience, each new venue visited, all of the new faces gracing the characters around us…all of it can be used in writing. Although I would never attempt to include this past week in personal memoirs (the memories are too hazy and laced with emotion to be accurate), I can make use of the setting, the personalities, smells/sounds/tastes, the emotions - all of it, in any scene that a character might be hospital bound. I suppose I have entirely too many hospital memories, with all the above accompanying them. However, no two were ever alike. (Unless you count the three times in the hospital while having babies - those were fairly similar, only the players looked different as the years passed.)

I penned this today, before beginning a self-made writing assignment. I do this - write out what may only be useless words, strung together…but, occasionally, they end up gracing the pages of a story, as well. :)

           Blinking in and out of a hazy consciousness, she could hear the syncopated screeching of the monitors attached to her chest. The scratchy fabric of the hospital gown fell loosely around her frame, an open-back reminding her that modesty was not a commodity where she now lay. Nausea mixed with hunger as she reached towards her aching stomach.

            “Try to hold still,” an unseen voice instructed.

            She felt a pinch in her arm and the taste of stale saline entering the veins of her right arm. As warmth encompassed her body, she shut her eyes again, pretending to be anywhere but there. Hospitals were like prisons to her. Locked behind the key-card doors, strapped down by IV poles and heart monitors, incessant noise and lights bombarding the senses.

It says "Beauty", pulled through the white with charcoal, accompanied by a dead dragon-fly. I suppose it my "artistic" way of making use of what might be useless - a re-used canvas and bug that my daughter found outside on the ground.

A journey into the writing world...

So - here it is - nearly a month since my last posting! To say life has been crazy would be a gross understatement. Some of it has been my choosing, but mostly - not so much.

This sums it up - head in the dinosaur's mouth?!

I have been waiting for one day, ONE day, to pass without some sort of drama - whether injury, sickness, trauma, or emotional upheaval - ONE day to come and go without something derailing life. Today is already shot - but maybe Thursday will break the 29 day streak? 

Enough complaining - onto the crazy of my choosing! Writing. Deadlines. There were many. Honestly, though, what should have been a foreboding forging of words, finger strokes on the keyboard, ended up being a much needed refuge from reality. Leaving the chaos around me, I could slip into another world, alive with characters requiring creation and settings to observe. For those hours (or moments - unfortunately motherhood doesn't come with a "pause" button, rendering children independent and without some constant need), I could travel far away from the disaster bombs exploding around me. 

All that (finally) leads me into the topic titling this blog entry - A journey into the writing world. I have plans to discuss publishing in an upcoming blog, so the journey I speak of isn't about that. It is the oftentimes slow process of getting to that point. I have discussed editing, extra readers' eyes and ears, and a plethora of other things concerning writing - but this is about "putting it out there." Blogging, for instance. It is a bare display of our thoughts and words - the way we say things. I have been writing since I was old enough to hold a pencil and poorly spell words, but I rarely showed anything I wrote to others. I suspect some of that was due to privacy and the desire to freely put pen to paper, without fear of who might read or judge. As a child, poor topics and designs can be chalked up to being, well, childish. But for the adult? Not so much. I had no problem with sharing thesis papers in college - they were topical, focused, with a purpose. There were criteria that had to be met, specifications. Creative writing is very different, though. It is what comes from the soul - all mistakes, misconceptions, quirks, and the likes included. Again, bare. Blogging was my first attempt to step outside my comfort zone, revealing words and thoughts to an unknown audience.

Next, the world of writing competitions and submissions to magazines. Those were the deadlines I mentioned. Two poems, two short stories, one narrative non-fiction, and one novel, to be exact. Being these only accept unpublished stories, I decided to submit something different to each one. I truly enjoyed the challenge and flexing my mental muscles of creativity!  

If you are interested in finding out more about upcoming competitions, the Poets & Writers website is a great place to start. Their calendar link is: https://www.pw.org/submission_calendar

Blogging, competitions (with obvious hope for catching the eye of some readers), and publications in magazines, even small ones, all create a writing portfolio - more importantly, a public one - something that will be a useful tool for publishing!

So - are YOU ready to step outside your comfort zone?

(Sorry, Shane, but this was the best picture with a skeptical challenge look that I could find! :) )

Getting stumped on the title...

I had planned about blogging about something else today, but titles are on my mind.
Whether penning a short story, poem, or novel, giving a title to the piece you have just poured your heart and time into can turn into more of a creative cramp than writing itself! Sometimes, they are easy - simple, on the nose, clearly there…but sometimes, well, they just aren't. In all honesty, it is the latter that ends up being the case for me.
Take today. I am submitting a short story for a literary magazine. The piece is complete - grammatically dissected, other pairs of eyes have read, edits are finished - but the title? Nope. My original title just doesn't seem to fit the piece, so now I am back at square one. You wouldn't think coming up with a title  wouldn't be that complicated, right?
But titles are important. They can be that "something" that jumps out at you, making you want to pick a book off a shelf. I must admit - a captivating title either inspires me to take a look or pass right by, especially if I am not looking for anything specific.
I had a great title for my first novel…but ended up ditching it. Although the title "A Life Undone" is part of a line that the protagonist utters during the climax of the story, it felt too obscure. Instead, I ended up titling the book after the novel's catalyst - "The Last Journal." If perusing the shelves of a store, I don't know which you would select, but the first insinuates things coming apart (which they do) and the second suggests a type of mystery (which there is). I opted for the second, even though I did like the idea of the title coming from the climax, unbeknownst to readers, of course.
So, here I am…procrastinating putting the final touch to hours of work - the title. Although, as I write this, more ideas come to mind, I am no closer to the completion…so, I better get to it!
Have a wonderful weekend and don't forget to turn those clocks forward Saturday night! :)

Introducing the Grammar Nazi...

First off - to anyone who might be offended by the title of this blog post, my apologies! It was a nickname given to me in college, which is why I use it here. Also, albeit this post is about grammar, my blog-writing style is far from "academically and grammatically correct,"- it is informal. :)

While in college, at Appalachian State University, I was an English major, with a minor in history. (That later was reversed, when I transferred to NC State, but that is a whole other story. While in those beautiful Boone, NC, mountains, I was an English major.) I have racked my brain, trying to remember how it all started, but twenty-years is a long time ago for this mommy-fogged brain to conjure up those memories. However it happened, within two months of my freshman year, I earned the reputation as "the person to edit your paper if you want an A." It started on my dorm floor, but random strangers asked, as well. Sometime, during that first year, someone must have referred to me as "The Grammar Nazi," because one of these random strangers approached me in the lobby of my dorm and asked, "Are you the grammar Nazi?" What?? "You know, the girl who edits papers that get As?" Oooook! I told him that I would only red-line what needed correcting and could give suggestions to make it better, but I didn't guarantee anything. (An aside, my roomie suggested I charge for these edits - $10 a paper went a long way to support my coffee addiction!)

Here's the thing - a type of irony, one might say - the papers I edited would get higher grades than my own! What?! I started reading what I wrote out-loud, which helped quite a bit. I find that I still have to do it for any writing that adheres to the academic world. My words of caution to even the best of the Grammar Nazi's out there: when writing your own book, short stories, etc. - chances are high that you will miss some of your own grammatical errors. When we read what we have penned, we read what we meant to say, which means our eyes can glaze right past the obvious comma errors! This is why it is all the more important to have that other pair of eyes to read your drafts. (All about these "other pairs of eyes" is in a previous posting, by the way.)

So - how do we know when we should employ those grammatically superior people? First of all, identify your purpose. Is it informal, like these blog conversations? Then, no. If you write a novel in a very personal or free-flowing manner? Not really. (By that, I mean sentences consisting of one word. One. Word. That's it.) If you are sticking to more formal writing, then it really should be edited as such. Simple slips, like putting the comma outside the quotation marks, are easily missed when reading one's own work.

How about tenses? While homeschooling three kids, something that I have noted lacking in many of the language arts classes (that they take virtually) are the basics, like keeping verbs in the same tense. If you are writing all in the past tense, don't accidentally insert a sentence like: The melody that she sings caresses my ears. Flipping tenses is not just a grammatical car wreck, but also confusing to readers!

Homonyms. For a brush up - words that sound exactly the same, but their varied spellings give them different meanings. They're/Their/There, your/you're, too/two/to, sea/see, and the likes are all homonyms. In writing, I think the biggest two are they're/their and your/you're. All little details that we hope our other pair of eyes will catch, but we should first. When in doubt, write out the contraction and see if it makes sense. (I will go to they're party. I will go to they are party. Nope! I will go to their party. Perfect, even if it is a boring sentence.)

The poetry of it all….

Most of my posts have been about fiction - but this one is a shot out to all the poets out there!

I have written many poems - MANY. I have a drawer full of them. Some are handwritten, some typed, some in cd and thumb drive forms. There's my thick portfolio from my college "creative poetry" class, a notebook that was started when I was about 10 or 11, another from what I label "the darker days" in high school. Again. Many!

I don't write as many poems these days, mostly because my head is lost in the clouds of fiction flying from the recesses of my mind. However, I still do write them - sometimes even to practice figurative language in a more free form environment.

(As for those who passed their literature classes years ago - figurative language uses figures of speech for impact and color. Alliterations simulate similar sounds in the sentence. (See what I did there, with the "s" sound?) Similes use the words "like" or "as" to compare things. (Ex: His breath smelled like the ocean had spit out its dead.) Metaphors serve a similar purpose, but without the use of "like" or "as." (Ex: He was a breath of fresh air.) Personification gives human qualities to something that isn't. (Ex: The tree reached towards the heavens, holding its leaves for the sky.) There are many more types of figurative language, but I will stop there.)

The use of poetry is an excellent tool for any writer to utilize when stuck in the muck and mire of the mundane. (Sorry, I just can't stop myself!) It helps remind us to bring color to our pages - even the most technical of dialogue can be spruced up with a touch of figurative language.

The Boy

Little tuff of light blonde hair,

He's only four years old,

But leaves his tired mother's side,

Ignoring what he's told.

Shamelessly and there to shock,

He wanders to the street,

And right before our very eyes,

Lets his pants fall to his feet!

The embarrassed mother runs to him,

As the crowd all laughs inside,

Her naughty little boy just runs,

With butt bare, he tries to hide.

But when she caught him in her arms,

Of that I won't forget,

She covered him with kisses,

Not saying what she might regret.

(An example of what popped onto a page when I had a writers block, years ago…this ties in, a bit, to writing the antics of children (previous blog post), I just imagined what an observer may have thought about a scene with my son and I. It worked, too - wrote me right into novel land!)

Writing what we know, and don't know...

"Write what you know." I can't remember how many people have said that - teachers in classes, authors, and the likes. I really did try to stay true to that…at least when I began writing.  (I suppose that is obvious from the previous post?) However, if we only "write what we know" - aren't we limited to characters that only do/say what we would (or those who we know personally enough to write as another voice)? What about subject matter? Also, to add another wrench into this pitiful pot, we would only be able to write how WE perceive life. So, how about the reactions and responses of other points of view? A left brain vs. right brain? An extrovert vs. introvert's take on a situation? Man vs. women? Let's face it - no two people are going to act or respond in the same way…most of the time.

Of course it is easier voicing off personal experiences, but what about writing a scene or subject matter in which you have no personal experience - nothing to pull from while penning?
Let's say you are a twenty-something year old writer who wants to base a novel during the Great Depression. Well, obviously, you didn't live it and neither did your parents. Maybe your grandparents did, though? So, how do  you go about making a believable story, set in a time in which you have no personal experience? Research! If one of those grandparents did live during that time period, talk to them about it. (Two for one with this - find out more about your family as a whole, that specific family member, and be inspired by the way the tell it- their voice. I guess that is a four for one when you add in getting the information that you need.) Biographies, primary sources (like newspapers from the time, interviews, etc.), and other sources (like government sites with statistics and information - on-line sites that end with  .edu, .gov, etc.), are all great places to start and gather more. Avoid movies and Hollywood glorified fiction - those are great at romancing eras, but not necessarily telling raw truths.

Bottom line - when writing what you don't know - be INTERESTED and INVESTED in it. If you don't do your homework, you can lose your credibility. There will always be a historian out there, picking apart the frayed edges of your fiction. Of course, that concerns the setting. When it comes to topics - subject matters that your book might hit on, but you know little about, do the same. Does one of your characters have a mother with Alzheimers and you know nothing about the disease? Find medical websites, forums where children of Alzhiemers patients discuss issues, etc. - KNOW it, don't guess it. Please, please, please don't guess! (An aside - I will not name the tv show, but I was watching a series once and one of the character's donated bone marrow for his son. Great dad! However, the same day the father donates, the kid gets the transplant and they both leave the hospital the next day. What?! Ooook - first off - donation/transplant usually don't happen at the same time. Secondly, pediatric bone marrow transplant patients are generally in the hospital a minimum of 45 days - sometimes as long as 6-8 months! The first 13 days before transplant are all about massive doses of chemotherapy and radiation to kill the patient's bone marrow before the transplant can even occur. So - I could keep preaching from this proverbial soap box, but will stop there. Obviously, this subject is more personal to me, so trivializing a bone marrow transplant got under my skin. But it wasn't just that - not with this specific situation or when I reading - it is that a writer clearly was not invested in being credible in their writing!)

A warning to writing what you don't know, though - it will take longer to complete a project, assuming that you want to be credible. In fact,  you may spend more time in research and digging than you do writing your book! I have an ongoing project that I am writing that covers the Western, Pacific, and Home fronts of WWII. The characters are based off combined individuals, most of which I am related to by either blood or love. However, since some of these people are no longer with us, I have had to spend hours combing through military logs, databases, translations, records, etc. I want to honor these people 100% by getting every possible detail correct. I spent 4 hours one afternoon locating which prisons and camps housed prisoners of war from the lower ranks of the Royal Yugoslavian Army, who also came from the Serbian area of the country. I wanted to discover which were near to Belsen Bergen the year that it was liberated and who liberated them. Needless to say, it took a lot of time to translate Serbian and Yugoslavian documents to finally find what I was looking for! BUT - it was worth it! I discovered where my beloved Chicko Bronko had been held, the unit he was with, and conditions that he suffered - all details that will be readily employed in that section of the book!

So - there you have it! Write what you know and research what you don't! You've got this!

The spark of creativity...

Back in the day, when bangs were sprayed two inches high, anything neon was the color of choice, faded blue jeans graced most lower bodies, and fanny packs weren't only for the elderly, I was hiding in my closet - pen and floral patterned journal in hand, writing out my deepest secrets. For a nine year old, these weren't exactly dark, more like how I snuck a call to my friend without asking my Mom or what boy I thought was a little cute. Pretty deep, huh? When I was ten, I was diagnosed with Acute Lymphocitic Leukemia while on vacation in Southern California. A month later, back in our hometown of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, I was writing even more. Prednisone cheeks, a rapidly balding head, and poor immune system (not to mention many trips to Vanderbilt clinic for treatments and procedures) freed up lots of time to read and write. It was then that I penned my first short stories. Understandably, many of these had to do with kids who had cancer.


One of my longer short stories, Hope, was completed around the time that my Mom's best friend's father came for a visit - published author, Joseph Gilmore. I came to him one evening, hands trembling, holding my story's manuscript. He graciously read it and critiqued it for me that very night. I came across that copy while unpacking some boxes recently and the memories that evening came flooding back again. I highly doubt he ever knew the impact that our conversation had on me or how it would encourage me to keep writing. He told me I had talent! Whether or not he was just being nice to that bald little girl or truly meant it, I will never know. Still - I believed him and continued to pen things onto paper for all the years that followed.


One of my favorite "cancer" books was Erma Bomback's book: I want to grow hair, I want to grow up, and I want to go to Boise." It holds many stories and antics shared by kids with cancer of all kinds. It also inspired me to start writing some of my memories. I never knew what I would do with them, but they were therapeutic to write.


So, without further ado - here is one that I penned right after I turned twelve. (Note - I did clean up the spelling and grammar a bit and my writing style has changed a LOT since then, but I was twelve! :) )


 You Want Me to Swallow That??

After living a sheltered life of liquid antibiotics, liquid Tylenol, liquid decongestants, and basically liquid everything, one can only imagine how my eyes about popped out of their sockets when nurses brought in my first set of pills. All I could think of to say was, "You want me to swallow that?" I figured that either they were playing a really mean trick on me or else my sheltered liquid existence had presently come to a screeching halt. Sadly, it was the latter.

Apparently the extent of knowledge that nurses acquire goes beyond basic medicine, and includes dabbling in the art of creative pill-taking. When it became evident that I wasn't going to be able to swallow those pills, a nice solution was presented - ice cream! Actually, it was sherbet, to be exact. Slip those annoying little suckers into a spoon full of lime flavored goodness and down they glide. This concept worked great until Prednisone.

My dad called it the "pregnant zone," sort of like the twilight zone, only involving an unnaturally massive appetite. Prednisone causes one to become a regular eating machine. All I wanted to do was eat everything in sight! I suppose that was a good thing since we were told that if I didn't eat whenever I was hungry, I could have developed an ulcer. Our doctor told my family about a two-year old who had polished off a dozen hard boiled eggs and still wanted more! The flustered, and somewhat worried, mother called the doctor, wondering what to do. The doctor, completely not alarmed, asked if she had any more eggs. Since she did not, he suggested she make a run to the store!

Back to the sherbet...one of the many downsides of Prednisone (the drastic mood swings and weight gain wont be discussed here) was that it tasted terrible!!! Even if I swallowed it in one gulp, the taste of the pill merely touching my tongue was unbearable! My dear aunt, we will call her "Aunt L", provided a wonderful tip. She suggested coating the pill in butter, so it would glide down easier and not taste so bad. So, I bet you can guess what I did everyday at pill-taking-time. I would sit down with my glass of 7-up, a butter tub, and a handful of pills.

One day, I was doing my daily ritual of pill taking. I had buttered my pills and taken all of them, except the Prednisone. Well, unfortunately it was one of those dreaded days that I didn't swallow it fast enough. Gross! I made a fast run to the refrigerator and grabbed the first thing that I saw, the sweet pickle jar. I opened it up and took a big swig of the juice. As disgusting as it may sound, it took away the taste instantly! From then on, along with my glass of 7-up, butter tub, and pills, was a jar of pickle juice.

Chemotherapy experts know that not all pills are as small as others. Take Methotrexite, for instance - even though I had to take twelve of them in one sitting, they were so small that it didn't really matter. (I did, however, sing the chorus of "Mary had a little lamb" and other such juvenile tunes in between pills to "clear my passageway" for the next one. It was, of course, only pointless stalling.)

The first "big" pill that I had to take, which really wasn't all that large, I took in my initial hospital stay. It was the Colase pill - one of those red, gel-capped ones that are supposed to easily slide down. Well, in my pill-phobic mind, that pill was going to get in my mouth, turn sideways, block my throat, and make me choke to death! It didn't occur to me that I was in the hospital, the best place to choke. So, starting at 8pm, I held that pill, rolling it and squishing it, trying desperately to make it smaller. My dad was with me that night and was being extremely patient, waiting sitcom after sitcom for me to take it. After three hours, I still couldn't take that scary red gelcap. Eventually, I just wimped out, so they brought me in the liquid. "It has comes in liquid?" I wondered why they didn't just start with that option! You may think that would be a miniature glimpse of heaven to me, which is what I thought, as well - until I had a drop or two. Those drops of blue fire burned everything they touched. (One of my friends in the "clinic gang," which I will tell more about later, called it hot juice. No kidding!) The nurses improvised with a plan C. They poked a hole in the pill and drained its inside liquid into a large cup of chocolate ice cream with whipped cream, chocolate syrup, and chocolate chips. Although it might sound tasty, it was awful!! A tip: Never put these types of medication into chocolate, it just isn't an efficient cover for the bad taste.

The saga of the Colase pill didn't end with that night. The following night, my grandmother stayed with me in the hospital and she helped talk me through taking it. It was a much easier task, since, for once, the liquid solutions were definitely not options! When I finally swallowed the monster, I was so excited that I nearly ripped my IV out in my plunge for the telephone. I had to tell mom and dad that I had swallowed that dang pill!


 
  

Hearts and Shamrocks (with little to do with writing)...

                   
                              

In the span of a month and 3 days, we have two holidays dedicated to Saints - the only two on the American calendar.

Hearts - February 14th - A day of celebrating St. Valentine's with overpriced flowers, chocolates, and Hallmark cards - that special day, set aside because of?? If I polled 100 random American's, how many would know anything more than, "It is named after some saint?" I had assumed he was some martyred man, who was canonized and made the patron saint of something to do with love, but wasn't sure, so...I looked up St. Valentine. Martyred, yes (beaten, stoned, then decapitated). Patron saint of love, yes (also of young people and happy marriages). However, there were two of them - both men named "Valentine" who were tortured and beheaded by Claudius II in Rome. Although there are stories about both, according to the catholic websites, there is little known of either. There are stories to justify the connections to love and marriages, but lack of proof. (Clarification - I am a curious historian, not a cynic. To set aside a day specifically to remember our love for one another is wonderful.)

A portrait of St. Valentine

Shamrocks - March 17th - A day of celebrating St. Patrick by wearing green, sporting shamrocks, and spotting lucky leprechauns while drinking green ale- that special day, set aside because of?? Again, I had the assumption that he was some martyred man, who was canonized and had something to do with the Irish, but I wasn't sure about the rest, so...I looked up St. Patrick. Martyred, nope (poverty and suffering yes, but no martyrdom). Patron saint of the Irish, yes. But he wasn't Irish - he was British, taken by raiders to be a slave in Ireland. So, why canonized? After he escaped and returned to Britain, he dreamed the Irish were calling him back. He became a priest and returned to Ireland, bringing Christianity to the people. The Shamrock? He used it to explain the Trinity to the people. That, I must say, it pretty cool!The green, the shamrock, the Irish...but the green ale and leprechauns? For that one, I am still lost.

A portrait of St. Patrick

Of the over 800 canonized saints of the Catholic church, St. Valentine and St. Patrick were the only two celebrated with American holidays? Why that is, however, is a question that I can not answer - yet. Happy Valentines, everyone!

Beginnings and endings...

So - what happens when your three-year-old American Bulldog breaks your charger, the computer is dead (read: you can't access those handy auto-saved passwords), and the kids keep bringing in viruses faster than the previous ones are exterminated? As my elongated absence may have tipped you off to that answer - no blogging! Alas - such is life. (On the upside, we are 4 days into a week without stitches, broken bones, emergency chiropractic visits, chipped teeth, and/or antibiotics! Go Roses!)


All that being said, I have been thinking about books - specifically their beginnings and endings.


I get obsessed about the order of a book - where to put what part to keep it interesting, but still make sense and flow. I tend to be drawn towards stories that are told, at least a little, out of order. Whether it flips from past to present to future or something completely different, like changing whose point of view is doing the telling - I prefer it. It is, most likely, this bias that inspires me to write in that fashion - making order out of the chaos. 


Prologues. I have yet not to include them - using snippets of something to come that grabs attention, answering questions posed in the first chapters of a book.  I fail to remember the name of the series that I loved as a teenager, but they always started with a prologue that occurred in the characters' distant future. It was like an answer to a question that I would inevitably have at the end of the book, something that brought a semblance of sense to the finale. (I suppose I should research the names of those books, for sake of my avidly reading 13year old daughter.)


Epilogues. I must say that I often use these, as well. They are like a beloved television show's series finale, set sometime after the end of the story, glimpses of what will be. They are closure. The same holds true to some books. Maybe the girl and the guy finally get it together at the end of a story, but what about their futures? Will they get married, have kids, stay together? Seriously, I want to know!


Points of View. To spice it up a bit - reading a novel that tells the same story, but from different points of view, is also appealing. If written in first person, the reader can only guess what other characters are thinking or feeling. However, if who the first person is changes through out the novel, that makes for an insightful difference! Even when written in third person, a change of focus is always refreshing.

Pet peeves of the pen…unbelievable resolutions...

"That is completely unbelievable!!" What?!?!

This is a plot related pet peeve of mine - writing oneself into a corner so tight that only an unbelievable resolution would dislodge it. When the only possible resolution is reliant on the supernatural or unrealistic scenario is the only way out, we have a problem!

"Surrounded by flames on all sides, billows of smoke clouding any possible helicopter rescue, I am going to die by fire in these woods." (Wait, that character is in the next part of the story - he can't die!) "Is that a ghost I see before me or an angel to mysteriously lead me through the half-mile of burning trees and underbrush?" (Or, even better) "Look, is that a horse I see, coming towards me - one that I might ride through the fire to safety?"

Ooookey! Instead of making the fire completely surround the character without a plausible way of escape, why not make the fire almost trap the character, leaving a clear point of exit? No, no, no - that wouldn't be dramatic enough - drama over realism. Blech!

I suppose that this type of pet peeve can't be applied to certain genres, though. Fairy tales and certain science fiction and fantasy stories are based off the unbelievable. Take Sleeping Beauty, for instance. In reality, there is no way that the entire kingdom would still be alive, let alone still looking as young as they once were after 100 years passes and the prince delivered the magical kiss. But, that is the beauty of a fairy tale. I exclude those from this rant and aim it primarily on stories based in realism, our reality. Take that same story and put it in the present, saying Aurora was in a coma. Setting aside the fact that no one has been kept in that state for 100 years, even if it were fifty years later when she awakes, she wouldn't be the same petite blonde that fell into it - she would have wrinkles and most likely gray hair, not to mention muscle atrophy!

With all that said - write reality…pen plausibility…create credibly, please!

I believe this all could have been avoided had the three bears, Mr. Green, and Mr. Red just told Mr. Blue to find another sock instead of merely suggesting he get something from the undergarment drawer!

(I meant to post this over a week ago - you know, when stockings and Christmas were still going on? But a house full of sick derailed that intention…big time! Happy New Year!)

Pet peeves of the pen…predictability...

Oh - the predictable pen, how I dislike thee!

Let me assure you, I am not suggesting that a book must be a mystery wrapped in a bewildering enigma. Starting a novel and knowing that it has a happy ending, for instance, probably creates more predictability. However, every scene, choice, and relationship along the way need not be. If I always know what will happen next, I lose interest in turning another page. Maybe it is because I prefer to be surprised, or at least desire books to need effort in solving the plot steps of the story! If I am led to believe that a plot is going in one direction, but deviates instead to another...I like it all the more. The "Whoa! I did NOT see that one coming," effect is appealing. (Unless it is unbelievable (another pet peeve I will be hitting on sooner than later), then I just feel like I have wasted the previous hours in the pages of nonsense!)

I believe the preference to being surprised is because life is full of them. When is life ever predictable? I highly doubt that you cleared your schedule in preparation for a week of bed rest the last time you got the flu. Or, reflecting on a previous post about writing kid antics, I would never have left my eldest create quietly in her bedroom after that day's nap had I known what would await me upon opening the door! So, when you write - please be creative and avoid the cliche and predictable choices for your characters, scenes, and plot! :)

Don't be like Mr. Blue, who kept putting his head in toilets - be it in a real one or the doll house's commode!

Pet peeves of the pen - the one dimensional villain...

As for today's pet peeve - the one dimensional villain rant, beginning now…

I am talking about the villains who are created to fully and wholly despise.  For clarification, I am not referring to the "bad" characters or even the horrible ones, those who perform the most heinous of deeds. I am talking about the villains who are completely devoid of anything other than evil - they are created to hate. At every bend in the road, they choose to proceed in ways that infuriate the reader/viewer. There is no reasoning behind their negative choices, no past events leading to their decisions or actions, and absolutely nothing that gives viewers/readers any reason to empathize with them. At. All. Perhaps a character isn't redeemable in the story, but all I am asking is to give us something to unveil their humanity, making them difficult to completely hate!

The flip side of this pet peeve is something that I truly admire in a writer - the ability to take a villain and humanize them to the point that I am conflicted about who I want to "win" in the story's scenario. When the hero prevails and I sympathize with the villain's loss, I know the author has created a very three dimensional character!

I have to admit - I don't create many "villains" in my stories. Most of this has to do with the protagonist being their own antagonist (character against self, for all of you who may not have had these terms reviewed via their middle schoolers in the recent years!). All the same, when I do write them, I try my best to sketch humanity behind their darkened eyes.

"Mr. Blue" - one of our mischievous Christmas nutcrackers - is considered to be the "villain" of the bunch, but with antics like getting stuck in the same tape he was using to secure his buddies to the wall…we can't help but feel a bit sorry for him when…

He ends up in Christmas jail!

Happy first of December!