Post-Thanksgiving

Hello again !

As usual, it's been much too long since my last post. Thanksgiving has come and gone, and the turkey-coma is starting to wear off. We went to my husband's cousin's house for T-Day and had a lot of fun. It was a nice day ... I enjoy hanging out and laughing with people that I'd love even if they weren't family!

I finished my writing workshop a couple of weeks ago. It was money well spent, although it wasn't quite what I was expecting. There wasn't as much feedback and writing critiques as I would have liked - but the exercises were good. They kept me writing every week.

There was one other woman in the class that was as chatty as I was and we struck up a great cyber-friendship. She and I are going to start a writing partnership and have agreed to keep each other motivated and working on our (separate) projects. We can bounce ideas off of each other and lift each other's spirits when we get discouraged.

There's a writing contest called NaNoWriMo - short for National Novel Writing Month. My new partner and I will begin our own committed month of writing December 1st. We've decided to name it LiLoWriMo ... Linda and Lori's Writing Month.
Like it?
I do!

It's going to be tough at times - writing at least two hours every day for a month no matter what - especially during December when there is so much going on. But if we can stay on track during that month, of all months, then there is hope for us yet!!

Onward and upward !!

Cheers !!

Workshop

Hello again - I know it's been weeks since my last post. No long, drawn out explanations this time - just many apologies!
I've just started a workshop for writers and thought I'd post my first submission here as well. Our subject for this was fears and phobias.


I admit it. I'm unusually afraid. Of lots of things. Call me a scaredy-cat if you like - I prefer to think of myself as cautious. And even though I may prefer the safer, more well-lit path more times than not, I do not live in a rabbit-hole.
Today I am facing, dealing with and up to my elbows in one of my all-time worst fears.
I am sitting in the waiting area for the Regional Justice Center to pay a 7 month old traffic ticket. I am doing this today because there is a three day moratorium with late fees waived. I would rather pay a $350 fine than $897. The money is not the issue today - nor is the government office. What is making me so uncomfortable is the large crowd of people taking advantage of the same gift from the city.
I am surrounded by a whirling mass of people; walking around, talking, grousing, snoring, and sneezing. I found an empty cold, metal chair in the middle of this organized chaos and pulled out my notebook. Now I can list my fears, phobias and superstitions as they happen.
Hopefully this will freak out the big construction worker that lumbered over and sat next to me and has been blatantly reading over my shoulder.
I know at this point I sound flip and snarky and totally in control but believe me it is just a defense mechanism employed to entertain me and keep me from bolting for the door.
I have to keep adjusting my pen because it's sticking to my fingers from the nervous sweat. I've already got red indentations on my fingers from gripping the pen so tightly, and my handwriting has become almost illegible due to my shaking hands. Sorry, construction guy.
I'm staring down at my lined white paper - trying to shut out all the noise and people around me. I wish I could jam my iPod ear buds in my ears and pretend I'm somewhere else ... but I'm afraid I'll miss my number being announced. Whoops, there's another fear.

Back to the original topic. When my fears creep up on me, the shaking hands and thumping heartbeat are first to appear. I can't get away from or turn off those symptoms. In fact, they've simply left the door open to allow more uncomfortable feelings to barge through. Now my underarms are sticky, and the back of my neck feels hot and damp under my hair. I got so nervous about coming here this morning that I forgot to eat breakfast. Now my stomach is growling for food - but I don't understand why it doesn't just eat the butterflies that are bumping around in there. I think that would make us both a little happier.

No one else looks as nervous and panicky as I feel. Actually, they look bored, indignant, confused, pissed-off, sleepy, etc ... Can they see I'm having a little nervous breakdown right now, right here in this chair?

There is only one person in this room right now that I envy. Yoga Man. He's got a track suit on and looks as if he has 0.01% body fat. He's sitting there, calmly with his eyes closed and the back of his hands resting on his knees.
No iPod for him. He can shut out the world with the power of his mind.
Wow.
Maybe I should pack up my wrinkled notebook, sticky pits, sweaty and shaky hands and damp neck and go sit by him. Maybe his Zen will rub off on me.

Ommmmmmmmmmmmm

Howdy

I really like being a stay-at-home-mom - but I've started to notice little things about my day that are just plain weird. New little "quirks" that I've become aware of, you see.

For instance - I think I spend the majority of my day walking around the house turning off lights and electrical gadgets that "someone" wandered off and forgot about.
It's the strangest thing. Yes, I know it's good for my power bill and probably helps Mother Earth somewhat not to waste power ... but for heaven's sake !! Who am I ?? And why do I sound like my Grandma when I holler (to no one in particular) that the bathroom light was left on again.

I won't even begin to count the amount of time I spend with my other facinating habits ... the list is interesting enough ... Ha !

"Such as?" you may ask. Such as hanging up wet towels left on the beds or bedroom floors after "someone" takes a shower ... letting the dog in and out 84 kazillion times a day (she's old and has a bladder the size of an M&M) ... flushing the toilet after someone else uses it and then darts off to resume whatever he or she was doing before that urgent call from nature ... and I may as well change the toilet paper roll while I'm in there. I seem to find them with only a wisp of tissue left, or else someone just dropped the new roll on the back of the tank.

I have always loved and admired Erma Bombeck for her writing ... I just never thought I'd understand her so well. The really shocking revelation is that I always thought she was making it up ... or exaggerating a lot.

Erma Bombeck is my new patron saint.

Cheers!

Here I Am ...

No, I didn't fall off the face of the earth. The last few weeks have just flown by so fast I got lazy and stopped blogging.
The kids both had end-of-the-school-year awards assemblies in which each of them got multiple awards (yes, I am bragging) as well as the usual class parties, sleepovers and fun stuff like that.
The good news is that even though I let the blogging slide a lot over the last month I have been trying to stay very diligent with my book.

Probably the best unexpected motivation came last week when my 200 pound black Labrador stepped on my bare foot. I ended up limping by the next night and then spent the next few days with my foot wrapped, elevated, and iced.
It's at this point in my story I have to confess something ...

I am not a good patient.

There - I said it. Somewhere my husband is sighing and rolling his eyes. But hey, I admitted it.
They say that's the first step ...

O.K. ... I am a whiny, cranky, pouty patient.

But my foot is better now, and I finally checked my email for the first time in about a week. And what do I find there? Only a snarky little note from my sweet little friend Kathy nagging me about falling behind in my blogs.

Was I offended?
Was I deeply hurt?
Where big fat teardrops of agony falling on my keyboard?

Nope!

I laughed out loud, posted her comment for all to see and got myself busy with a new blog entry. You see, dear friends ... nothing can spur on the fragile ego of a new writer as well as feedback like that.

Holy Cow !! You mean someone besides my mom actually likes this?

Now, that is not any sort of snide remark directed at my mother ... but Moms are supposed to like their kids' work - no matter how old they get. (The kids - not the moms. I just KNOW that my mom is taking that last sentence as a senility joke.)
I just didn't think anyone else would like the blog ... let alone check back for updates! Whoo-hoo!

One last thing - there is one last reason for my absence from the blog.

FOOTBALL PRE-SEASON STARTED AUGUST 13TH .............. YIPEEE !!!!!

Go 49ers !!!!

What a week ...

Last week was a roller coaster of happy and sad days.

I got to go with my daughter's fifth grade class on a field trip to the Hoover Dam. (Boulder Dam for us natives) It was tons of fun, except for the heatstroke. Kidding ... but only slightly.
July is not the ideal time of year to drive 45 minutes (each way) in a school bus with iffy air conditioning and crammed chock-full of sweaty kids and a handful of chaperones.

During the tour of the Dam, I obsessively counted the kids in my group about every 30 seconds. Unfortunately, by the end of the trip my brain was broiled from the heat, and trying to keep an eye on all 6 of the kidlets didn't help much.

By the afternoon, I noticed I wasn't even speaking complete sentences any more, I just kept mumbling under my breath ... repeating my day-long mantra ... one, two, three, four, five, six ...

But I'm much better now.

We went and saw the new Harry Potter movie Wednesday night, and then on Saturday we went bowling. I bowled a 150 in my first game ... and then my luck or skill or whatever that was went directly down the toilet. But it was a blast.
On Sunday, with the sore muscles not yet recovered from bowling, my hubby and I spent a few hours moving furniture and cleaning the family room to make way for the HUGE big-screen t.v. that my dad gave to us. We cannot wait for football season ... whoo-hoo!

Spoiled, yes. Unappreciative, absolutely NOT!!

The saddest part of our week was the passing of a very close friend's father. He was an amazing person with a memorable life and even though I only met him a few times I liked him very much. I think my sadness comes from my friend being far away, back where she grew up, and I can't do anything for her. All I can do is send her text messages or emails letting her know we are thinking of her and miss her. I don't want to call and bother her - she has way too much on her plate right now. But she'll be coming home soon and for that I am very happy.

O.K. ... now that I've done my warm-up and flexed my creative muscles I am ready to go write for a while. I got blocked this weekend and it almost killed me. I had just plotted myself into a corner and couldn't turn around. The story arc had gotten off kilter and I was lost. By the evening, I got so desperate I asked my hubby to "shake me like a rag doll and knock the words loose." Luckily - he didn't take me up on it. His casual reply was "It's no fun if you give me permission."

(And yes, those are direct quotes. I wrote them down right away. Writers are scavengers ... we're always collecting words, sentences, conversations.)

So I laughed, and stopped worrying about the block. And wouldn't you know it ... a few hours later the solution popped into my head from nowhere.

He gets me. What a lucky girl I am.

I didn't write one dang word this past weekend. But that's OK, because my son's 7th birthday trumps that easily. Besides, even though I wasn't actually sitting at the computer and typing doesn't mean I wasn't still writing in my head. In fact, I got two good ideas from random comments somebody made - so good I had to dash off and find my scribble notebook and jot them down before I forgot them.

Speaking of random thoughts ... I love the fact that I can stare off into space like a dork and if someone (that knows me) asks if I'm OK I can answer "Yeah, just plotting." The amazing thing is I have no control over it. I just start on a thread and have to work it out. I hold the fates of these imaginary people in my hand and head, and sometimes they won't go away. At least I'm usually home when that happens!

One aspect of this new career that can be tricky is distractions. There are two new ones in my house that I have to be very, very careful of. One is a little electronic game my daughter bought while we were buying her brother's birthday presents at the toy store. (She's wiley, that's for sure.) It's a game called 20Q (for 20 Questions) and I can very easily waste a lot time goofing off with it. The other is the Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix game for Playstation. I am not adept with the controls at all but I make a very good backseat driver when my husband or the kids are playing. The puzzles and tasks are loads of fun! So far none of my dear darlings has told me to take a hike - or shut the heck up - when I butt in ... but I know it's coming.

Well now, the kiddos are in bed so it's time for me to get something done for today. I love to write at night when the house is quiet ... and it helps with the spooky, gothic atmosphere in my book.

Did I just say MY book ?!?!?

Will I ever get used to saying or writing that phrase? I hope not.

Cheers!

Goofing Off

O.K., I'm dragging my feet a bit this morning. I've been playing on the computer instead of writing. But, oh well - you know what they say about "all work and no play", right?

Anyhoo - I found a fun little quiz I had to share. On Biography.com there's a game called Celebrity Soulmate. You answer a few questions and it matches you with a living or dead celebrity.

My three "eligible bachelor" choices were the following:

Vincent Van Gogh, Edgar Allen Poe and Leonardo da Vinci

I just don't know what to think about that!

I can't help but ponder the fact that Vincent and Edgar were not known for having long, happy love lives, and I don't think I'm Leonardo's type.

Bummer!

Today was a good day. I only got a few pages done but they were hard-earned ones. For every two words I wrote - I had to go back and change one of them. The difficult days wear me down because I don't feel I've "produced" enough. Especially if someone asks, innocently enough, if I got "a lot done today." I want to punch them in the face, and then cry. But I don't. Why? Because it's probably someone I love asking, and they have no idea how that slays me on the days where my brain just won't kick in to gear.

Then, late at night when the house is quiet and everyone is asleep, I reflect on the day. Usually, I end up feeling I've actually accomplished more because I didn't just toss up my hands and walk away during a rough paragraph or passage. I kept slogging through the muck.

Some days the right words just flow and it's effortless ... it's as if a little muse was sitting on my shoulder, whispering the story into my ear. Some days I can't type fast enough. Those are heady hours - the world around me just fades away. I don't even hear the phone ring; I'm so engrossed. The "buzz" those days give me makes up for the "clunk" days.

The "clunk" days are days I feel like I have to dig and search and reach for each and every word; I feel like I'm translating a language I barely understand. On one of those memorable days not long ago I actually had to use my thesaurus because I couldn't think of a better word than cool. (And I don't mean Fonzie-cool ... thank you very much. I mean not quite cold.) That is pitiful!

That's not exactly writer's block but it's damned shameful, that's what that is.

But today was a good day, so I am happy. And now, I'm off to spend some more time with the family before the kids' bedtime.

Cheers!

"Faith in Springtime" - Ludwig Uhland

Sweet breezes have awoken
Day and night they stir and whisper;
Everywhere they are at work.
Oh fresh perfume, oh new music!
Now, poor heart, fear no longer,
Now, all things must change.

The world grows more beautiful each day,
And what may yet happen, one cannot tell.
The flowering will not end, and
Even the deepest, most distant valley is blooming.
Now, my poor heart, forget your pain.
Now, all things must change.

First Day

My grandparents used to have a plaque in their home that read, "Today is the First Day of the Rest of Your Life" ... and I never really got it until now, and the age of 37.

Here I am. I have quit my career of 18 years. One day I woke up and realized that I couldn't go back and live that life one more day. I was physically sick at the thought of it! I didn't like who I was when I was there - it was a person I didn't even recognize. It wasn't anything huge or tragic ... I was just so unhappy. I had fallen out of love with my job, my career, all of it. And I was starting to really hate the woman that looked back at me in the mirror.

So there goes that identity. I have worked in the medical field all of my adult life. Now who am I? Now what do I do?

The puzzle pieces fell into place in such a smooth order it couldn't be anything but karma, or serendipity ... or whatever you want to call it. The opportunity presented itself to me when I was at my lowest point ... I could actually quit my job, spend every day with my husband and kids, and work full time as a writer.

You see, I won my first story contest at age 10 (a blue ribbon, I might add) and was hooked. I have written almost constantly ever since - in everything from dollar-store spiral notebooks to fancy cloth-covered journals. Then all of those events above came about, and my husband asked me what I would do if I could have any career in the world. The words popped out of my mouth before I thought about it ... but I really didn't have to. I want to be a writer ... for real. I want to put "writer" in those little boxes for occupation on forms. I was always proud of my job before and I loved talking about my work ... but it was always work for someone else. Especially making money for someone else. I want to work for ME!

I want to be a published author ... and I want to make just enough money so I can keep right on writing. I'm not looking for or expecting to become rich - comfortable would be just fine with me.

So off I go into my new life. I get to get up with my kids in the morning and get them off to school and then come home and write for hours on end. Or I can go to the library and do research if I want. Then I go pick up the kids, help with homework, do all the full-time Mom stuff I never could do on a regular basis. And if I get a great idea in the middle of the night, I can get up and write as long as I want and not have to worry about it affecting my patients in clinic or (worse still) surgery the next day.

This is so cool!