Clouds that Form a Hurricane

It'll storm later today. A spring rain. April showers and all that. The dark clouds are moving in. It feels a little like dusk although it's 6 o'clock in the morning. 

For some reason this week, I've been seeing a lot of social media posts about how little people read. (BTW, thanks for reading this; readers get so little recognition these days.) This has me thinking about how difficult it can be to carve out time to read and to write. The pressures on daily survival surmount my best intentions to give writerly pursuits the time of day. And, yes, it doesn't help to see posts about how few of us take time with a book. Why bother writing one?

The last book I read literally was blown from my hands. A few weeks back, I downloaded an ebook on my phone to pass the time on a two-hour plane ride. The story -- a whodunit detective story with a female protagonist -- was kinda outside my normal genre of choice (literary). I'll come back later here and put the name of the title and author (Unbreakable Bond by Gemma Halliday and Jennifer Fischetto). I was impressed by the hooks. Good character development, an intriguing storyline, not too heavy of a subject, and no grotesque violence. Then the plane hit turbulence -- my phone flew up out of my hands and landed in the aisle one seat behind. It was the kind of turbulence that has a person clutching your seat mate's hand without the benefit of introductions. It was terrifying and was an exclamation point to two very difficult weeks.

I'm not a praying person, but that didn't stop me. Wouldn't it be a shitter if life had come to a screeching halt just then? Leave my parents and kids behind? Shudder to think. When I got off the plane, I literally looked white and wanted to fall prostrate on the tarmac (we actually walked across it to get to the terminal). I'd like to say that the experience shook me so much that I re-evaluated my entire life. It didn't. People do that, you know. Have life-changing experiences from trauma or fright. What I've found is that it isn't one event that turns me. It's the clouds that gather and eventually form a hurricane. 

Lately, there are just so many clouds. The world is fraying, and the uncertainty and cruelty and disconnect turn my stomach. Sad situations on every channel. What is the answer? To do something inward? Make peace with yourself, cultivate Zen? Or make an outward motion? Run for office, raise money for charity, hell, start a charity. What I should do is go back to writing. I have no conceit that it makes anything better except that it does. It does with me. And I'll give money. To people and animals. I'll continue to love. My family and friends and cats and sweetheart. And, I'll write, plant seeds of hope and identity, here and elsewhere, and tell it like I see it.

Advice for Becoming a Writer

Looking back in the 10-year rearview mirror, here are some lessons learned about writing fiction. If you're new to "creative writing" and want to make a name for yourself or switch careers, let me clue you in:

• If you're not reading, you won't make it. Not only must you read in your genre and good books in general, you should be reading ABOUT your genre and WHY books are good. Not only must you keep learning how to write better, you should be practicing what you learn. Not only must you market, you should be dedicating time to marketing, because in a larger sense, that's the only way anyone will ever see your work.
  
• Don't bank on making a living by writing fiction exclusively. Despite that statement's negativity, it's realistic. If you put that kind of pressure on your creative life ("I must be a bestseller by XYZ or write the Great American Novel before I'm 30"), you will find all kinds of stresses will invade your psyche and take the joy out of creativity. 
• Keep earning a steady source of income, even if it isn't writing and even it if cuts into your writing/creative time. Having resources for food, water, shelter gives you the headspace (and physical space) to write. If you love writing enough, you will continue to write regardless of having a day job, and your writing will reward you in ways other than financial. Can you make it "Big," whatever "Big" means to you? There's always a chance.
• Break the rules, but know what they are first. This goes back to the advice: Keep learning.
  
• Just because you write it, doesn't mean they will come. Readers and sales don't flop in your lap.
• Your work isn't for everyone. That's okay. In fact, if it was liked by everyone that would be an anomaly the likes of an asteroid hitting Earth. Carve out a niche for yourself. If you want to be market-savvy, then hyper-focus on trends and popular tropes in your genre. Or, if you're like me, experiment. There's richnesses in following your own muse.
• Your creative life is yours and yours alone. You don't have to live it any way but your own. If you find success with one piece and like the success enough to repeat it, then follow that path. If you never want to write another story like it again, then don't. You're the master of your spirit. Follow your spirit.
• Have some FUN in your creative life! Do something that puts you out in the world (virtually, these days, of course). Make people smile, and the act will reciprocate.
  

Birthdays Last Forever

This post is six in one. I'm one of those rare people who, as she ages, appreciates her birthdays more and more. They are a happy, motivating force. So, I've been writing short essays for my Birthday Week on Facebook the last few years. Here's the 2019 set. Enjoy!

Not Sucking

The day she removed the note from her refrigerator door reminding her not to suck—a note that met her each morning as she pulled the creamer carton from the clear plastic shelf knowing she would feed the cats first—she decided that “not sucking” was far too low a bar to set. The opportunities for an employed American woman with a low mortgage interest rate and a high credit score afforded her options much sweeter and exotic than surviving the day without feeling like she owed someone something or had screwed up that one important Thing-I-Will-Do.

No. She was not sucking. Not anymore. She was ! so ! not sucking that the conceit of the idea suggested a need for pity. Sure, she’d had her challenges: a dead husband, a steep learning curve into single parenthood, a stuttering career that had placed her in late middle age skating along the edge of under-employment. And her lovelife. Yes, the men. Sigh. How could she truly discern which of them didn’t suck, the few who had brought a minor twinkle to her eye. Hell, all she wanted was to be held and told “It’s not all going to suck.”

She was going to have to give the not-sucking pep talk to herself. No one else would do it less-sucky. It needed to come before her coffee. Before the cats. Before the shower for work. Before she dealt with the kids. Before she kissed the next man. Before she wrote yet another essay in third person. Before she opened the chapter to another year of not sucking. “No, my dear, you’re not sucking. Everything that could possibly suck, has. Now, get on with it. You’re fabulous.”

Dear Hands

Dear Hands:
Where have you been all my life? In front of me, that’s where, like a guiding, driving force. Can you remember holding anything for the first time? My mother’s finger in your tiny baby palm? And what about a Cheerio or your first ice cream cone? Mouth loved those so much.

Did you think holding Dad’s hand was special when you needed to get up and walk for the first time? Feet were always one step behind you. They would never hold a Crayon or shuffle a deck of cards.

And, then, one day, you wrote! It was you and Brain from then on—attached at the hip (haha). You were Brain’s tool. He told you what to write and when and how, and in your wish to comply, you wrote all those long handwritten letters to your great-great long lost aunt whom you never met and to your Gramma Mimi and to your cousin, whose letters you stuffed into small white envelopes and sent with God knows what inside.

You learned to write a lot of big words and to erase a few, too. No one was really looking at you or the rest of us either. It didn’t matter much whether we got any attention, and it didn’t make any sense to complain. It was easier to go to the cupboard for a cookie.

But, then, the typewriter!

Who was our first typing teacher? Maybe Mrs. Lane, a large Nordic-looking woman who gave us spiral-bound practice books to complete mindless exercises. Ff, Jj, Kk, Ss, and did you know there were so many other sentences that used the entire alphabet other than “The quick brown fox …”? Me neither.

You really were a showoff, Hands. You knew how to fly across those typewriter keys and kick the hell outta QWERTY. The IBM Selectric was a goddess of a machine. Maybe after her we just didn’t care for pencils anymore.

And then you got really snotty in college as the typesetter for the student newspaper. But Brain wouldn’t have it. He wanted YOU to write, not just decode everyone else’s writing for the weekly rag. Did typesetting feel like second-class citizenry? Never mind, because you turned into a journalist. Yet, come to find out, you weren’t quite fast enough at note-taking. The tape recorder took over your scribbling job. You spent years afterward as a glorified transcriptionist. Don't worry, we appreciated the effort.

Your dexterity came in handy later. When the smartphone showed up. Lord, what would we do without Thumb?! The master of all texting. A savior. A god.

Let me say, all that transcribing and gophering for Brain hasn’t quite been the pinnacle of your life. In fact, those things you wrote were third-string compared to the important stuff.

You held my babies and never failed.
Cuddled their precious new skin.
Nestled hunger against my breast.
Stroked tufts of hair freshly washed with Johnson & Johnson.
Delivered electric love with a fingertip on a teary cheek.

And wasn’t THAT something?
Something worth writing about.

(Thank you, Nina Hart, for inspiring Dear Hands!)

This Lil Monster Love

(Last year, after posting some of my Birthday Week essays, several friends commented that the pieces seemed kinda sad. That wasn’t my intention when I wrote any of them, and I assure you I’m not sad writing any this year. So, please don’t worry. I’m okay. I am. If anything, I’m 100% human. Always agitating for more. 😎)

The word—get—is not my favorite. It’s guttural and sounds like it’s picking a fight: Get XYZ. I need to get XYZ. If I don’t get XYZ, I’m coming to get you.

But, we don’t always get what we want, thanks Rolling Stones. Beyond food, clothing, shelter, the necessities, getting what we want all the time, all the way, just doesn’t happen. Let’s call those our Lil Monster Needs.

Lil Monster Needs will keep you up at night.

These Lil Monster Needs could fill a garbage bag a week. If you believe in religion, you might advise us, the keepers of the Lil Monsters, to go in peace. Peace be with you .. and your bagful of Lil Monsters. Drop them off along the street corners, maybe, in black Hefty garbage bags where they can slump next to the other bags o’ Lil Monsters in the neighborhood, forming rows of holes to be filled. Then, the garbageman might come along on his Monday route and find that he can’t fit all the Lil Monsters in the back of his dumpster. Where will they all go, still calling out to their owners, who can hear them quite crystally clear from their dining room tables next to the picture windows with the blinds closed?

One need in my bag calls out particularly strong from its pre-final-resting-place at the bottom of my driveway when I place it there each week. Its voice could travel a hundred-thousand miles or from a dirty ditch three counties over and be flattened by bulldozers five times a day and covered by a layer of dirt, but still I’d hear.

‘Feed me love,’ it says. And not just any kind of love, but an expansive, immortal love for which there may be no source. It is a hungry, greedy need—this Lil Monster Love—whose teeth have some mighty sharp ends. It knows how to get me. And maybe you, too.

Bury it where you’d like. It’ll find you anywhere you go.

Ghost Riders

Two years ago this week, I decided to reaquaint myself with bicycling. I’d been off my bike for about 15 years. Bicycling had become something I’d do at the beach or on a special outing. When I lived in Portland, the biking capital of the U.S.A., even then, I hadn’t been a serious rider. But I wanted to make a lifestyle change and contribute to Asheville’s shift toward becoming more bicycle-friendly.

It took a leap of faith to overcome my fears of biking in a hilly town where there aren’t a lot of bike lanes. Asheville’s population is about 91K and is surrounded by the Smoky Mountains, so it still has a lazy feel to it compared to Portland or Austin, Texas, cities that are often considered its contemporaries. Biking has been slowly taking hold here, and I’ve started riding at a time when a small but growing band of others are, too. In many respects, I see this as my effort to “be the change you want to see in the world.”

What I didn’t anticipate when this adventure started was how biking is both a solo venture and a ride-along. Not that I’m commuting with a bunch of folks or organizing group rides to promote the culture here. My companion riders aren’t really real. They’re all people—living and dead—and memories, just a few ghosts that tag-along in my head.

I’ll admit, the number of streets I’ve been on continues to expand and so do my ghost riders. Here’s one: my 12-year-old self, who used to ride from Franklin Street in Clinton all the way to Artesian Park for swim team practice. My old high school friend (now a ghost rider), Maria, and I made those trips together, and once I ran into the back of her bike and flattened her back tire. Her dad called me Crash Fulford after that. Thank goodness I haven’t lived up to that name. But pre-teen me is frequently on my rides.

One of my first ghost riders, obviously, was Daryl. He’s most vividly with me when I’m on a trail. There’s a short urban trail about a mile from my house, and almost every time I’m on it, I think of his last ride. He was mountain biking near Portland when he passed away. He became short of breath and stopped to rest. He sat down at a wooded spot and lost consciousness from heart failure. A friend, Ethan, was with him. He rides with me, too. For Daryl’s funeral, friends marked the spot on the trail by nailing a bracelet that Daryl had made to the tree he was near. It’s simply engraved “LIVE.”

A man I never knew, Ray, rides with me because I inherited his bike. He was a friend of a friend and a rider in Asheville, way before me, and he died not too long ago. I’d been searching for a commuter bike when I was told his family wanted to re-home his. I met his grown daughters shortly after his death. They had that look about them that I had when Daryl passed, stunned resignation. I was thankful for the affordable option their dad’s Diamondback gave me, and it’s been a solid bike on the street and gravel. Thank you, Ray. I appreciate the loaner.

Another tag-along, my daredevil side, also rides along. Darn it if I can’t shake the desire to speed. I always do my best to stay safe, but the thrill-seeker in me can get a little itchy. I ALWAYS wear a helmet and almost always a safety vest and carry lights in case the sun goes down. So, there’s that.

My teenage kids ride with me, too, in spirit, as do many friends, co-workers, and acquaintances who often want to know about my riding adventures. Riding a bike is an adventure for people who don’t. I always see something I wouldn’t if I were in my car. Just a few days ago, I saw a public mural I’d never noticed on a building in the middle of town. How could I miss it? Because driving just does.

I’ve been on hills and trails and sidewalks and bike lanes and neighborhoods and parks. When I’m in my car for other commutes, almost always I’ll drive down roads that I’ve now cycled on. My cycling has criss-crossed the city and its bumps.

One street in north Asheville passes by the location where Zelda Fitzgerald, wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald, spent time in a home for mental health patients. It’s a scenic and hilly spot and not a place that anyone would necessarily say, “Let’s ride there.” It’s off the beaten path. And I always think: Wow, she lived here. She slept and ate and maybe wrote here. Though her husband earned the notoriety, she was also a tremendous writer and, from what I’ve seen of her work, had an incredible knack for words and story. Unfortunately, she also died in the institution during an accidental fire in 1948. I can’t help but wonder if maybe her ghost is sweeping across the grounds when I ride by. Out of deference, I nod my head occasionally. One free-thinking woman writer to another.

A Master

It's late and dark out, and I owe myself an essay. Not you, me. I want to write Birthday Week Essay #5 because it compounds the doing. Here’s where a self-reminder helps. The product of this week is not in the numbers—the word count or the days in a row that I can dash off something worth reading. I tend to become wrapped up in the product, the outcome. What do I have at the end? Something I can sell? Something I can point to of publishable quality in the competitive world of literary works? Something that drives my friends, family (you!) to buy one of my books? I’m not writing any of these essays for those reasons. I’m writing because of the love of the doing. I celebrate my life by doing this thing I love.

I’ve taken enough writing classes and practiced to a degree that I understand doing is good in and of itself. This is not the same as mastery. At one class years ago, with a best-selling memoirist (I may have the details wrong), the message she drove home was: the only way to become a master writer was to write for 10,000 hours. Where she got that figure, I don’t know. That comes out to be about 20 years of 40-hour work weeks. At that rate, I’ll never be a master writer. I’ll always be a doer.

In retrospect, what do we ever master when the bar is so high? For me? Naturally, there are a few things. Some good, some unfortunate:
Worrying, that evil energy-suck.
Breathing, thank God.
Eating, the great necessary indulgence.
Sleeping, though losing the skill to age.
Failing, this essay, perhaps.
Wanting, always always.
Caring, about my family, friends, the planet.
Hoping, never caving to the dark.
Learning, by the doing.

I’ll keep doing this, if you promise to keep doing the thing you love. What do you love? Go do it.

WWJFD

Remember that craze in the 1990s that had millions wearing rubbery bracelets marked with WWJD? The What Would Jesus Do? message essentially was: do good works and act morally as a demonstration of Jesus. I never quite caught the fever. But in the last few years, as I’ve navigated solo-mom duties and faced a lot of consequential decisions alone, I’ve come up with my own coping mantra: What Would Jack Fulford Do? Or, for short, WWJFD.

Jack Fulford, my father, happens to be salt-of-the-Earth stock whose moral and intellectual compass closely matches mine. I guess that shouldn’t be any surprise. All bias aside, I’ve come to understand that practicality and common courtesies are a little scarce these days. The world isn’t such a nice place on the other side of my front door. Now, you’re probably thinking: ‘She’s paying tribute to her father because that’s what a grateful daughter would do in some fashion once they meet a certain age.’ True, to some degree, and as I celebrate another birthday, my age does instill a smidgen of perspective.

Yes, I love my father. He’s a decent man with decent morals and a sense of wonder and a little bit of compassion that hasn’t been killed off by cynicism. But, he is human. He’s got his faults, too. He’s sometimes slow to motivate, more of a plodder than a sprinter on decisions and actions. He deliberates occasionally with the speed of Chicago rush-hour traffic. You just gotta wait it out. That isn’t to say that he doesn’t have his share of bright ideas that, when executed, tend to look a little impetuous to an outsider.

For instance, on a recent flight of mine into KC International Airport, he showed up in an old Honda Acura, having just bought it for the visit. It was an impulse buy, by most standards, out of convenience. Rather than haul me and his grandchild around Missouri in the cramped cab of his Chevy pickup with our baggage thrown in the truckbed, he’d opted for second-hand luxury. Family required a trunk and a backseat, so we piled in (albeit, after we stood for a good five minutes in the parking garage trying to figure out how to turn off the car alarm).

A year ago in July, Dad and I went on a two-day, two-night excursion on an Amtrak train across the West. We’d cooked up the idea after my first train trip earlier in the year. We both reserved sleeping berths that included meal service in the dining car. And from Denver to San Francisco, we basically spent the entire time talking. It was an unbelievably precious 48 hours. In those two days, we commiserated about the past, about politics, about books, about people, and the funny and tragic circumstances that glued our family together. We watched incredible scenery roll by and passed through historic locations (site of the Donner Party) and natural wonders (the Salt Flats). Pauses in our conversation, when we had any, were always a segue to a new subject. We smiled and laughed a lot and wondered with grave concern what the future would bring, for us, for our families, for our country. We met some interesting characters on the train, people we would have never encountered elsewhere (a young man who sang in the San Fran Opera and his artist girlfriend), and left each other with new stories to tell. Storytelling is a good skill to hand down. It centers you to your people.

Obviously, my gratitude for that trip is immense. For those of you who’ve lost your father, I am so incredibly sorry. This includes my own children, who will not have the opportunity to spend time with their dad in adulthood. For those of you who do not have a relationship with your father or parents, my well of sympathy runs deep. I am fortunate. Looking ahead, there are still plenty of blindspots. There’ll be more days of decisions that are tough and that I’ll feel ill-equipped to handle. But, I’ve got my backup. WWJFD.

~end~thanks~for~reading~

A Theory of Life and Death and Writing

This is my theory. It is unproven. It is not dogmatic. It is not based on any religious theory. It makes semi-logical assumptions. It speculates about life and death. And, for me, about why writers write.

Zero is the moment of birth. The Positive Finite Years begin at birth. These are the years of knowing. We learn how to live. We become self-aware. We become other-aware.

Then, we die.

The Negative Infinity Years are the years of not knowing. They are the ultimate unknown. We do not know them. We are not self-aware. Nor are we aware of anything. Death erases knowing.

But, let's go back. Here's what we know about the Positive Finite Years:

We must survive. As part of survival, we must learn skills. We must work. We must learn to interact, to be with others. There is suffering involved. There is love. We must process pain and rejection while also experiencing joy and the mystery of the unknown, aware that these years are precious and finite.

Here's what we know about the Negative Infinity:

In the Infinity, we are not required to survive. We do not need people or skills. There is no suffering. There is no love. We are not required to process pain or contemplate mystery. These years go on unendingly.

Expressed in another way:

Finite Years = Survival + Suffering + Love
Infinite Years = No survival + No Suffering + No Love

Which is nirvana?

Fear plays a factor. We FEAR in the Finite Years. We fear everything:

• lack of resources
• bodily harm
• betrayal
• rejection
• success
• failure
• the unknown

But, there is no fear in the Infinite Years.

How do we take fear out of the Finite Years?
Some use dogma and creeds, hence religion.
Some use reason, hence intellect.
Some use science, hence research.

Our blindspot is always fear.
Fear, I believe, can be defeated by wonder.

What if ... ?
Wonder is our asking, what if?

What if ... we lived forever?
What if ... no one ever starved?
What if ... racism didn't exist?
What if ... I could play the piano?
What if ... we could travel in space?
What if ... my neighbor and I got along?
What if ... there is life on another planet?
What if ... the Infinite Negative doesn't exist?

What ifs take away some of the unknowing and fear and replace it with wonder. I know I must use my mind now. I must maximize the what ifs. And I do this, partly, by writing. I write by asking what ifs. Not large, existential questions, like in this post, but smaller questions. What if one person loved another in this story? What if it didn't work out? And, then again, what if it did?

The Moment I Knew

I don’t remember my first kiss much. Or my first date. Or that boy with dark wavy hair in seventh grade who played the saxophone during band class. Okay, maybe I remember him a teensy bit. But I do remember the first time I wrote something and it gave me a thrill.

Let’s call it The Moment I Knew.

The Moment I Knew didn’t seem like any particular moment at all. At least, it didn’t at the time. In fact, it could have happened in sixth, seventh, or eighth grade. Some of the finer details are a little fuzzy now. What I do remember is locking myself up in my bedroom in Clinton, Missouri, pop. 3,600, and writing a story about a woman who had grown up without electricity. I had interviewed the woman to write an essay for a contest. The Rural Electric Cooperatives of Missouri were offering students the chance to win a trip to Washington, DC. Didn’t that sound special? To a girl from pop. 3,600 Clinton, MO, it sounded more than special.

I asked my parents and friends of my parents for ideas about whom to interview. Several of them suggested a woman who had a warm reputation in town, Mrs. Vansant, who was somehow related to the local funeral home owners. This seemed a strange detail to remember, but not when you’re a kid from pop. 3,600 Clinton, MO. In small towns, folks were known for their strangeness, as if they had a patch on their sleeves that they’d wear about town—to the grocery store (Country Market), the only burger joint in town (Mr. Swiss), and the roller rink (that played ‘60s music). Oh goodness, I never saw Mrs. Vansant at the roller rink. She was in her eighties.

I called and made an appointment to interview her. She lived only a few blocks from my house in a neat duplex. When I say neat, I mean well-kept and tidy, not neat as in cool. Cool as in hip, not cool as in cold. Hip as in … oh, you get the idea. I vaguely remember taking a tape recorder to the interview. It might not have worked. We talked for an hour, and she imparted the story of how in her youth, at about my age, electricity first came to her home and neighborhood.

Admittedly, the details of her story take a back seat to mine. My memory doesn’t include so much her story as the sheer joy I took in writing an essay about her that eventually won the contest. I probably waited until the night before the deadline to write the essay. Hey, I was still a kid then, not a writer. There’s a recollection of a stern look or two from my parents. But once I committed to the page, the words flowed.

Not mine, though I wish it were.

One word in particular stands out in my memory. My first dictionary at my side, I decided to look up a different word for “resident.” It sounded too pedestrian (that’s another way of saying normal). In my newly induced writer’s zone, I found a beautiful fresh word. Denizen. Look it up. I had learned a new word, and it made me fall in deep like with language.

The rest of the essay came together, probably after a first, second, third draft. Back then I had a crummy electric typewriter that didn’t have proper erasing capabilities. I recall a few smudges, perhaps a tiny eraser hole in the paper. But my most distinct memory is the joy of the process. It was The Moment I Knew—that I knew writing was a gift of mine. That whatever was causing such a great ah-ha was darn cool by me. It was thrilling, no exaggeration. The weaving of the story, the typewriter ribbon, and the clackity-clack-clack of the keys on the platen (that’s the name of the black round cylinder in an old typewriter), every part of it made me happy. Could the hum of a writing machine and the ease of crafting a story be so wonderful?

This euphoric epiphany (look it up) didn’t dawn on me until much later in life. The Moment I Knew has had time to grow in grand scale to what it actually was. It was fun. Plain. Simple. Fun. And here I am, still clackity-clack-clacking away, thirty-five years later, searching for that next cool word.

Your Writing and the Snowflake

All the words have been written before. All the great lines have been published. The killer plots have been monetized and made into movies. DNA will be mapped. Clones, mass produced. Droids will replace the workforce. Stop now. It's no use.

Except, the snowflake.

Ollie and snow.

How can it be that one snowflake can never perfectly match another? (And I'm not talking about this snowflake.)

Snow forms by falling through the air and is determined by the path it takes to the ground. Water vapor is susceptible to its environment. So, you humanists out there, take heart that environment is more important that pre-determined factors about the source of the water vapor.

My writing, your writing, develops like the snowflake. No one else can write your story because no one else has lived through what you've lived through. You might make mistakes in style, technique, plausibility, wordiness, grammar, but the story is all yours. You might bore everyone by pg. 6, but it's all your boringness, and no one else's. (Congratulations, you're a bore!)

If we writers put our computers away and never write another sentence again, because we think we can't sell our stories, or because we do, in fact, bore people, what do we have left? Would it be like a world without snow? Now that sounds like the interesting start of a good story.

So, I write this blog for me and say that I write it for readers who have an interest in writing (or who know who I am or want to know more). But, mainly, I write it for me. Because I don't feel like a snowflake. I try to convince myself, "Yes, yes, you are meritorious in your pursuit," when a sense of futility weighs more on the scale.

Even famous, prescient writers felt this way. Octavia Butler often wrote notes to remind herself of her standing as an accomplished writer. She needed personal affirmation, even as an award-winning best-seller.

Who am I writing for? A commercial audience or myself? Does it matter? Maybe, like a snowflake, my writing is a singular, floating, temporary entity. Just me.

The Eerie Similarities Between My 2016 Writing Goals and the Election

My goals for writing in 2016 could apply to the presidential campaign.

It all ends up as wrapping paper.

• Don't go negative.
• Honesty is good but is also isn't pretty. Or particularly uplifting.
• Wear better clothes while working.
• A lot of people think they want this job. They're kidding themselves.
• Polish up the body armour. You're gonna need it.
• Where did all the money go?
• You'll know who your friends are when the shit goes down.
• Never let them see behind the curtain.
• Don't trip.
• Hey, if Trump can bluster...
• Make them wonder. Make them love you.
• Keep your eye on the finish.
• Remember, no one ever makes money doing this. You have to be a little crazy.
• You're better off playing the lottery, but it isn't as much fun.
• Gray hairs are a friendly reminder your time is short. Get crackin'.
• If you don't get what you want, become an environmentalist and make an Academy Award winning documentary. It worked for Al Gore.

Seriously, love yourself. I'd hug you if I had the chance. 

Why We're All Zombies and Nobody Plants Trees Anymore

Somewhere along the continuum of human evolution, inertia burrowed its way into our genes. Advocates of XY&Z movements (environmental, social justice, organic food, you name it) fight against inertia and have systems for it. For example, tree hugging organizations send me free mailing labels. Does this make a lot of sense? How we fight complacency, apathy, call it what you will, sends us down all kinds of incongruent paths.

Jonathan Franzen is on book tour for his new novel, "Purity," which received a decent review in the NYT. In an interview on Fresh Air, he spoke of writing in a journal. This is a practice many writers undertake to keep the words flowing, to flush the mental crap away, to discover, to weep, to just write SOMETHING. I've tried it with fleeting intentions. (Let's not make any comparisons here between my journaling and blogging habits. For public disclosure, I'm a better blogger.)

He was talking about journaling because he's used it through difficult spells of noveling. By writing in the journal, he saw patterns of thoughts, so similiar that sometimes he'd write the exact words, months apart. Where did this take him? Perhaps nowhere mentally, but in the physical act, maybe somewhere, 50 pages. Or flip that, maybe nowhere physically, because he couldn't use the material in a book, but mentally he might have come to a place of ahh, that's what's bugging me. That's my take on his state of arrival or non-arrival.

I often feel myself circling around and around my thoughts and never inching out of the wagon ruts. The inertia is maddening. It's endemic though. I think it's why zombies are popular. We see ourselves in the walking corpses, not advancing, not thinking, not feeling, not really living, just gobbling up fragrant shit placed within whiffing distance (my slam on the media/advertising); and it's why we don't think planting a tree really accomplishes anything. What difference can one damn tree make? Ha, I tell you, ha and ha and ha.

Recently, I had two dead spruces removed from my yard. They were brittle ghosts of themselves, waiting for a good bolt to go out in a blaze. It was the right thing to do, to remove them. But. Now my yard is less two trees. Days after or before the trees left the property, The Arbor Day Foundation sent me a "free gift voucher." If I fill out a Survey Questionnaire (redundant, no?) and send in $10, I'll receive 10 free trees. I'm flabbergasted to think this actually makes the organization any money. A survey and $10 covers the expense of the trees and shipping them to me? How can this be?

Okay, so maybe the info they'll learn about me in the survey is invaluable leverage to use for future solicitations. I get that. However, I'm tempted to see if this really works. Would it move me a little off my inert butt? Make me a committed environmentalist? What if I awake one morning to find 10 tree starts on my front door? Wouldn't that be something? Would it be worth the flood of solicitation mail that would eventually follow and the zero net-gain of planting the trees? How many mailing labels can one tree negate? How many of the 10 will survive?

I'm probably better off recycling the solicitation and buying my own trees. Maybe I'm better off not journaling and wasting the paper. Maybe I'm better off saving the electricity instead of blogging in circular fashion about whether my carbon footprint can be improved. But then? Where would my inertia place me? With the zombies.

Writing As Its Own Inspiration

Writers write for different reasons. If you're good enough and lucky enough, you make money. The powerhouse gatekeepers in publishing will say, luck has nothing to do with success. Hard work and talent determine a writer's career. I tend to agree with them. And ignore the hell out of anything they say, including how to succeed as a writer, detriment be damned.

I'm tired of advice. Right? I hear you shaking your head. Everyone's got advice for writers. There's money to be made on giving advice to writers -- about how to write, what to write, fixes to write, salves to write, addenda addenda addenda. Maybe I'll patent The Writing Patch. Slap it on your derrière and you'll be bound for literary fame and fortune in no time. I'd make a bucketful of money. Now, not all writing advice is snake oil patches, but there are too many people giving advice, (hey, look, I'm one of them) and it all bleeds together and not in a beautiful Monet delicate-brush way.

I don't really count myself as one of the advice-givers. I'd count myself as a wandering seeker. My path is forged from trying out a new passion. Novel writing is a special brand of high. I'm not a stoner (although on one of my stray index cards around the house, this title hit me recently: One Nation Under Pot. Air lick it as one book to write), but creating a story is its own kind of inspiration.

Wait, you say. Advice about writing and inspiration are two different things. Yes, and no. If you're learning the craft, you still must take advice in good humor. Advice can have the tendency to induce writer's block. There's plenty of time (most likely a lifetime) for you to revise your work and improve. But if you let stinging or overwhelming or too-close-for-comfort advice keep you from writing, you'll never write enough to produce something good.

I don't have to go looking for advice. Of course, I study techniques and try them out. But the act of writing gives me all the fluffy cloud inspiration I need to blissfully (maybe just contentedly) keep going. Go to the page. Pour some words on it. Stamp your feet in the puddles. I'll meet you outside without an umbrella.

Not Your Ordinary Writing Prompts

One of the beauties of blogging is the chance to write unfiltered. Here, I simply let myself write, almost always without the benefit of my interior or an external editor. Take that for what you will, because so much of the advice for writers, especially new ones who may be thinking of self-publishing, proclaims you must, without fail, throw resources at good editing. How many times do I see in my Twitter feed each day a link to a post that urges and extols the beating of a manuscript to within inches of its spine by proofers and Beta readers before publication? Far too many.

I absolutely agree with the essential idea behind this well-meaning advice. Don't put out work that hasn't had good, professional editing. There's too much poorly written, poorly edited tripe on the Amazon marketplace. It makes it excessively difficult for unknown writers (particularly self-published writers who are craft, not quantity, focused) to earn a purchase. The major assumption is that books aren't good without a publisher and its systemic filters. You haven't found a publisher? Then forget reading you.

However, I think this belief that publisher=good is an insider's argument. It bounces around mainly in the echo chamber of writers' circles. I don't know too many readers on the street who decide to buy or read a book based on who publishes it. Of course, there are always exceptions. But readers find words and books any number of ways, and once they find a writer they like, they read more of that writer's work. It makes little difference who publishes it.

Full circle. Why is writing without a filter important then? And in public? On a blog, in my case? Because a writer must have some freedom to experiment. I believe blogging is a good place to start. I get a kick out of blogs where writers run their books by friendly readers as they draft them. See Kenton Lewis or WattPad (a psuedo-blog place), for instance.

This idea of unfiltered writing may run counter to the idea that a blog must also be a "platform" for the writer to build audience. Yes, I agree for the most part, but the act of writing should be a source of joy, and sometimes when a project mostly hinges on consumer-potential (commercial viability of your manuscript, screenplay, self-help tome), the sheer joy of writing to write may turn into purely writing to sell. That's a shame.

I write here to discover my opinion, to wonder, to find ways to express myself, to imagine something I haven't imagined before. To soapbox and be silly. To write without an editor waiting to slice up my work. If I find a few readers in the process, all the better. I want people to buy my books. LOTS OF THEM! But here is where I take a break from the [do it like this] mentality. May I suffer for it? Only if I think about it too much.

Now, here's what I really wanted to put out today but haven't yet. I started writing notes to myself several years ago on stray paper (I've graduated to index cards) of thought prompts. I've blogged a few of these before, and it's fun to go through my stack on occasion and give them an airing. Here are a few from the past months or so. Feel free to use as a prompt or to ponder.

Do terrorist suffer bad karma?

Be maniacally vigilant of your ...

To write a good line of fiction, you must think like a poet.

When do I deserve peace? When do I earn it?

The irony of countering the work of another writer it that mine must also include salacious details.

Death is an ordinary grief. (which evolved into a blogpost)

A peaceful heart

If you write long enough, you are eventually going to get somewhere.

Everything comes into question when a life revolts.

Beds are not for making,
They're for snuggling, they're for praying
Playing footsy with your lover
Finding warmth beneath the covers

Book idea: a writer of pulp crime who decides to commit his own heist (probably already been written)

People don't like people who tell extreme truths.

You never get rid of the face.

The consolation amid the mess is liberty.

Anguished good-byes

Croutons, kale salad, cantaloupe
Crunchy carrots, add the crackers

Gifts

The Valley of Write

Whenever you are sad, write.

Whenever you are lonely, write.

Whenever time cracks open, write.

Whenever you need strength, write.

Whenever the voices take over, write.

Whenever the stars need praise, write.

Whenever you are whole or part, write.

Whenever your cup runneth over, write.

Whenever you need to remember, write.

Whenever you need to access peace, write.

Whenever all places are a foreign place, write.

Whenever the rain drowns your parade, write.

Whenever the troubles of others flood in, write.

Whenever black and white don't contrast, write.

Whenever the headache is really heartache, write.

Whenever you can't tell the difference inside, write.

Whenever the nerve of every nerve is frayed, write.

Whenever someone hurts you and you hurt them, write.

Whenever you cannot walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, write.

Write, for yourself and the wonder.

Write, for all will be well.

Write, for purity.

Write, for grace.

Write, to know.

Write, because.

Write and feel.

Write.

-----
A collection of poetry from my years living in Portland, Ore., is available in paperback this month. This poem isn't in it. Many in the collection are light-hearted. Hope you find the book amusing and inspiring.

Letting Go of Nonsense

The firsts end today. A friend in Portland has gently reinforced this idea since last March. This is supposed to comfort me. The first year without Daryl ends tonight at midnight.

My last visual memory of him is from Portland, from the window of our house. Standing in the living room, I watched him lift his mountain bike into the hatch of our Subaru. He had on a ratty t-shirt and shorts, ready to get muddy. We didn't say good-bye. Unusual. He didn't come in for a quick kiss. Again, unusual.

This post was unplanned. I'm just letting it come out.

Our youngest daughter had been invited on the bike ride. She decided not to go. This troubles her now. It was for the best. He rode with a friend up a trail in Forest Park. He became short of breath. It was a beautiful day and the trail was green and perfect. They stopped to rest on the side of the trail, and the friend called me on my husband's cell at about 5:30 p.m. Daryl had punched my number, handed it to his friend and said, "You better talk to Jennifer."

For all I know, the last word my husband uttered was my name.

I didn't hear him in the background during the call. I didn't talk to my husband, only the brave friend. Words were quickly exchanged about Daryl's shortness of breath. I told the friend to call 911 and waited to hear back. Frantic stuff happened on my end. I had no car to go to the trail and didn't know where it was. By 8 p.m., a man in black arrived at my door. Yes, he was literally dressed in all black.

Daryl had slumped over as soon as the friend ended the call. He had died on the trail, probably instantly. His heart, which had suffered a mild heart attack the year before, stopped.

I never saw him again. It was too painful to go to the morgue.

I had no intention of writing this, like this. But this morning is different. It is the last of the firsts.

Death stories have a voyeuristic quality. People want to know what happened. I told the death story probably more than a hundred times in the first week after his death. Friends. Family. I tell it now whenever anyone asks. Maybe not all the details, but the elevator speech. It has become an elevator speech. I usually don't cry. This is considered normal.

Death changes life. It changes people. It changes circumstances. This isn't always negative. But it readjusted the interior timepieces. I tick differently. It just happens.

I'd like to say the hard part is over. I cannot assure myself it is. That's because of the strong feeling of arbitrariness this event has imposed on my directions. Plans are wonderful, aren't they? It's good to make plans. Make them. They comfort us and give us goals. I have made some plans and kept them this year, but ... always the "but." Where does death fit? It doesn't fit into plans. It makes nonsense of them.

I've only recently begun to write a little about this major event in my life. I know it is a huge bummer. Why would anyone want to come back to a blog about a subject no one really discusses in public? Or wants to hear about? That's okay. I'm working through it.

She Grows

One helluva masterpiece.

The ruler used to be my measurement. A door jamb and a ruler.

Her eyes, encircled in dark mascara and eyeliner, sparkle at me. It finally comes to pass. Three states, six schools, and countless boxes of macaroni and cheese later, her skirts are shorter, her tights are tighter, her ambitions, grander.

The day she came home, long ago, my head ripened with thoughts of firsts. First night of unbroken sleep (please soon), first bite of real food (mush), first word (no). The days widened and narrowed. She walked and talked. I followed and worried. I watched my independence give way to parental obligation. I left a job; she threw a ball; I took less and less notice of the news and more and more notice of her schooling. She grew and my world shrunk.

You throw yourself into something or it’s not worth doing. I would teach her: Quitting left everyone unhappy.

“Take that soccer ball and KICK it!”

“Read or there’s no TV tonight!”

“Play with your sister or else!”

“And, for God’s sake, share!”

There’s taking in the act of giving. If there’s no receiver, giving doesn’t work. Her young hands and open mind took from me. The good parts mostly. But, also the guilt. Have I done enough? And, the resentment. You take too much.

Her nose touches mine without her standing on tiptoes. I pretend to shrink and use a cane today, in my best granny voice, joking, “Don’t worry about me, my pretty. Just hand me my shawl.”

She looks away now more than looks up. She’s taller by an inch and a half. It’s a mountain to me, a skyscraper of “I hope...” and “I dream...” She uses her assertive sense of self as a metaphysical yardstick. Her eyes reflect words she doesn’t speak: “I’m done taking from you.” But, me, knowing, can see the marks I’ve already made.

Every birthday of mine growing up, my dad used a ruler to measure me against the door jamb in the kitchen. Pencil in hand, he’d stand up my brother and me and lay the ruler flat on our heads to the back of the wood. There, he’d mark the spot and write our age, making a scritch-scratch of lead on the wood.

I look him in the eye today.

How to Be a Writer

You've come here with hopes of learning how to be a writer. Isn't that my unspoken promise to you, as a writer and a blogger? Show you the wisdom? There are plenty of blogs saved on microprocessors at remote servers, housed in large manufacturing facilities, sucking up the AC and the electricity that will tell you: Here's How. You do this, then you do this, then you try this, and suddenly, you hold the brass ring and you are making money and you are happy and fulfilled.

Sorry. Wrong place.

Here's a funny story. I've recently acquired a cat. He is now half of my animal holdings. My dog and my cat have come to terms with each other. They are, despite their species, very much alike. We have negotiated a routine. I sit at my computer every morning, trying to work on something productive, and they watch me. There's no delusion on my part that they watch because I often eat my breakfast at the screen. Yogurt. Cereal. Today, a bagel. They are rapt because of my bagel. The aroma of toasted wheat and melted butter, who doesn't have a little chubby for bagels? I wave it over their heads and they follow this potential treat like a god-head. They follow it with their instinct, eyeing it as it circles in their sky (hey, I can tease, I feed them), and they flick their tongues, purr and wag, and believe the bagel will drop from on high and life will crack open into nirvana.

Worshiping at the Bagel Goddess

You think the same thing about reading blogs about writing.

Here's what I know. No bagel will do it. Bagels are too easy. You think like an artist. You are. But writing for commercial gain is a business. At some point, you'll find yourself making decisions based on forces that are counter to what brought you to the writing table in the first place. You will recognize creativity is good; the commercialism, at best, is annoying. Maybe you'll find nirvana by not thinking about either; you just write to write; or, alternately, you just write to make money. Very few do both.

My best advice? I have none. Maybe it is one of the reasons I blog, because I come here and try to figure out this path. Here is the dumping ground for my head junk -- on the page (more accurately, remote server) rather than the un-air-conditioned manufacturing plant of my brain. Lately, I've been focusing on reducing distractions: the chatter of world news, the infinite worries of parenthood, the price of bagels. Distractions suck the life out of writing.

So minimize them. Go write. Wallow in your creativity. Butter your bagel, snarf it down, and get back to me about how it went.

No One Ever Told Me I Could

No one ever told me: You could be a novelist someday. No one ever told me I couldn't, either. The prospect never presented itself in my formative years.

What the hell are formative years? I'm still forming, and I understand less now than back then. I know more, but understand less.

Did anyone ever say to you: You'd make a good helicopter pilot. Which, truth out, happened to be one of my dreams. Helicopter pilot or coast guard.

No one ever told me I could be a helicopter pilot. I decided the academy sounded too rough for a girl.

It's rough for a girl who never considered writer to be a career choice. Not that I didn't have good, caring English teachers. I heard from one of them this week and thanked her for making an impression on me. All of them made an impression on me, but it wasn't the kind of impression that would lead me to consider writing as a career.

Writing for a living is hard, hard work. You must have discipline. You must love it. You must love it in a way that you get nothing more from it than the writing itself. The writing itself must be the end-all. Forget money. Forget fame. Forget fans. Forget recognition. Forget making minimum wage, because you won't make it wanting money and fame and recognition. Some writers earn those prizes. Some are marketing phenoms. Some make money writing books about how to successfully market books to those of us who never will.

Then, there are the writers who are so damn good, you read their books and fall in love with them. Their love of writing shines through laser-true.

Yes, I suppose I want people to fall in love with me. With my writing. That's all I want. Too much to ask?

If nothing else, I shall be awarded the Messy Desk Prize.

My Portland Writer Friend, Sally Lehman

Sally Lehman was one of the first writers I met when I moved to Portland. We shared a lunch table at the Willamette Writers Conference, held here each summer. I'm sure I had an air of desperation as I introduced myself to her, because I was new to Portland, new to serious fiction writing and needed to find an editor ASAP. My first book was in the hands of an agent, who wanted me to work with a professional editor. I wanted to sell it, and Sally was kind and showed me the ropes of how to do a face-to-face pitch at the conference with an agent. (The first time was terrifying; now, I could pitch a book in two minutes without breaking a sweat.) She was signed up for about nine pitches that weekend. I had signed up for one. Since then, we've become crit partners and literary discussers at Stumptown Coffee. She has self-published several books, and she's on the verge, I think, of finding the right house to publish her work, which is edgy, close-in, dark-themed and impeccably written. Here's a glimpse into her writing life:

Why did you start writing novels?

I started writing novels to see if I could do it. I’ve written poetry since I was 8-years-old, and, at about 38, had started sending poems out to literary magazines and getting acceptances, so I wondered if I could write a book.

I had the idea to write a novel following a soul through the process of reincarnation, going into several different lives and deaths, until I got to the twentieth century and my current life. When I finished writing that novel (which will likely never be published) I saw there was a class for short story writing at my local community college, so I took the class and started writing short stories as well. My first teacher was a lovely man named C. Marcus Parr, and I credit him with being the first person to give me the courage to start sending out stories.

Now, it’s about 10 years later and I’ve completed five novels (including that first one) and had several poems and short stories published. I’m currently trying to sell a novel called The Last Last Fight.

Are you a pantser or a plotter? My impression is that you let the story take you where it goes.

It’s funny, because that first novel was totally planned out and researched. The names given my poor little soul were looked up to indicate special meanings, the living conditions were studied, it was very outline intensive.

My second novel came from my second writing teacher, Tom Spanbauer, who read a short story I’d written and pointing out a two word sentence – “Mom’s depressed.” – and told me to write from that. The story sort of flooded my brain, unfolded all over the place throughout a ten week write-a-palooza which got me to the first draft. I’ve been a committed seat-of-your-pantser ever since. I mockingly balk at all outlining now, although I do use index cards taped to the walls around my desk at times to organize events.

You have some dark, violent streaks in your books. What's up with that? Because you are a very gentle person, from what I can tell!

LOL, I suppose I am an gentle person, although I could hold my own against my three older sisters when I was younger.

I have a violent imagination. Then I put myself into the bodies of my characters and I make myself go through what they go through – especially my narrators, since I tend to write in first person. When I go through the stuff my characters go through, it’s like living those moments myself, and it teaches me stuff I wouldn’t have a chance to experience otherwise. I mean, my narrator kills someone, and I can’t really go out there and do that (I suppose I could but it would make my life a lot less cheerful). Living vicariously through the people we invent is one of the perks of being a writer.

Do you set writing goals for yourself? How do you keep track of your output? Do you?

I have critique group goals that keep me sending out pages on a schedule. There are also the deadlines for submissions if I have a piece that I want to submit. For my novel length works, I tend to focus on getting the story out of my head and onto the page, because once that story is found it drives me crazy until it comes out.

For novels, I don’t tend to set goals until I’m near the end. Right now I have a Daruma doll for The Last Last Fight – Daruma is a Japanese god with no eyes, so you fill in one eye and make the god a promise that you will reach a goal, then fill in the other eye when the goal is reached. I’ve got Daruma watching me to make sure I get that novel published.

When you write, you also have a second screen open. Tell me about your method (or madness).

I tend to write in chunks, so I end up with multiple documents with different pieces of the story in each. Add to that the different revisions that are created when my critique groups have input, and I have to have as many as 10+ documents opened at one time. By using two screens – my laptop screen and an extra monitor – I can grab a paragraph from one screen and paste it into where I’m working on another screen. It really saves time.

The second screen also comes in handy when I’m blocked and want to play solitaire for a while.

Who are your first readers?

My first reader is my husband, Bob, unless I think it’s a novel he simply won’t enjoy reading (he would read it anyway because he’s a really good guy, but why torture him). My sister, Audrey, because she’s good at being honest, even if she hates it (the first time she read my novel she was relieved that it didn’t suck). And my writer friend and first editor, Debbie Wingate, who is the only person other than my husband to have read that first novel about reincarnation. I got to return the favor with Debbie since she’s recently published a children/YA novel called Truthfinder, which I got to be a first reader of.

You've had some specific influences on your style, so which has been the most important?

Originally, my influences were primarily based on the teachers I was working with. I was in Tom Spanbauer’s Dangerous Writers Workshop for four years, and a lot of what I wrote then had a distinct Spanbauer vibe to it. Leaving his class, I started to look at other influences in my life for the voice I needed.

Now, I think the influences depend on the story. For my novel The Last Last Fight, I went back to my rural Oregon roots and the way we sort of drawled out words as kids; this worked for that book because it was set in rural Oregon in 1975. Currently, I’m writing from the perspective of a young teenager in the 21^st century, so my daughters have influenced the language, which has led me to use phrases and words in everyday life which are totally not age appropriate. The next work of fiction I plan to work on will be from the perspective of a 10-year-old, so I have to find my inner child and become her voice.

What is your dream goal as a writer?

I’m almost afraid to say anything for fear of jinxing myself, but here it goes….

I want to be published by a big house and have my books in stores worldwide. I want Jennifer Aniston and Jennifer Lawrence to play the lead characters in The Last Last Fight. And I want to be able to write books full time and make a living at it. (Yikes!)

Ok, so realistically speaking, I would like to find an agent and/or a publisher who likes my book and wants to publish it. I want to have people read my stories and feel something (even if all they feel is scared). I want to read at Powell’s Book City someday.

What keeps you motivated?

It’s like when I wrote poetry as a kid – I don’t try to do it, the words just have to come out. When I find that little spot in my brain where a story lives, the events have to be told or I feel like I will simply go crazy. I don’t even know where these stories will go until about halfway through the first draft, but I know where they start and I know that they need me to go through them in order to feel like I’ve done that person inside my brain justice.

What three most influential books have you read in the last three years?

Dora – A Headcase, by Lidia Yuknavitch because it gave me permission to be the obnoxious teenager I wanted to be.

The Year of Magical Thinking, by Joan Didion because it taught me so much about how to encounter and survive writing about the death of a loved one.

The Ocean at the End of the Lane, by Neil Gaiman because it taught me that the ending of a story can be the very best part of it, even if it’s not what you were expecting it to be.

What would you like to see change about the publishing business?

I’d like to see some regulation or grading system set up for self-publishing, because I honestly feel like some people are putting really bad books out and are therefore giving the rest of us a bad name. I mean, I’ve self published a short story and two novels, and I don’t want to feel as though they’re crap just because they don’t have a “real” name behind them. And I know others who have put their heart and soul on the page, and they deserve to be taken seriously too.

I’d also like to see the book industry (and the movie industry, for that matter) at least try to look for something new and original. They are remaking old movies, they are recycling “classic” literature with fancy new covers and art work (how many copies of Alice in Wonderland does a person really need?), while there are some seriously interesting and unique books out in the world that Penguin wouldn’t touch. Too many wonderful books are being consigned to Amazon print-as-you-order and Small Press sections of bookstores. I think the big name publishers underestimate the reading public.

Thank you, Jennifer, for this opportunity. You’re amazing and I can’t wait to read your novel when it comes out.

Thanks, Sally, Love ya. 

My Oregon Writer Friend, Marjorie Thelen

Everyone in my circle of writer friends approaches their work differently. I'm a sucker for insider info about writers' attitudes and practices, and this year, I want to share a few of their stories on my blog. This thread is as much for me as anyone. I need encouragement, and knowing about their writing lives helps me to stay the course.

I asked my friend Marjorie Thelen to go first. We latched onto each other a few years ago after meeting at a writers conference, because sometimes you just click with a person. She lives many miles away from me in ranch country near Burns, Ore. We email regularly, sometimes talk by Facetime, and try to keep up with each other's projects. I admire her seriousness and also her motivation. She's published five titles, some mystery, some cozy romance and one space opera! But I'll let her tell more.

Marjorie Thelen, Writer

  

Q: You've been writing fiction for more than 10 years. What on earth possessed you?

A desire to follow my creativity. Most of my career I worked in business in marketing and finance and had to follow the rules. Writing let me out of the box. I saw an artistic career in my retirement, something to keep me engaged.

Q: What was your reaction when you wrote THE END on your first novel? Terror? Elation? Relief?

Excitement. It was a romance novel set in Galveston, Texas in the 1840s, a novel that will remain forever buried in my file cabinet. But it was only my first draft. I was naïve. I didn’t understand about the endless re-writes.

Q: How do you manage your writing life? In other words, describe your process, from inspiration to book published. This obviously will take you more than 140 characters.

I am notorious for writing on a schedule with a goal. I write mornings, five days a week, and my present word goal has advanced to at least a thousand words a day. I don’t know how else to write a long work of fiction. I get an idea, maybe from a place I visited since I like to write mysteries and set them in exotic places, or from something I read or someone said. Like my next book will be based on a watercolor of a cowboy my friend Dona Townsend painted, entitled “My Heroes Have Always Been.” Then I plug along on my daily word count till I have the first draft. I don’t outline, I just write the story chronologically as it comes. I don’t edit much with the first draft, only reviewing and revising the previous day’s work before beginning on today’s. Inevitably about half way through a book, the little voice inside says, “No one is ever going to read this sh*t.” I get over it and tell myself, “Just write something, no matter how bad. Just write something.” Somehow in the end it comes together and doesn’t read as bad as I thought it would. Then I re-write until I have what I want. Then I give it to one or two readers who understand my work to see what they think. I try to write one new book a year. Since I have a backlog I also edit and publish at least one book a year. In the last two years I published two books a year.

Q: The top three reasons why you keep writing:

It entertains me, it entertains me, it entertains me. When it doesn’t anymore, I will give it up.

Q: The top three challenges of being a writer:

1. The lack of understanding on the part of the general public of how hard it is to write a novel or write, period. Everyone (I kid you not) seems to want to write a novel but only one percent ever do. At least, that’s what Jane Kirkpatrick told me.

2. Having to market one’s work after going to all the trouble to write and publish it. One never earns back all the time and effort it takes to write, publish and market a book. Unless you hit the big time.

3. Stamina: writing requires stamina, perseverance, and focus and sometimes it is hard to hang in there. Having an IPA with a writer buddy helps.

Q: Where do you seek inspiration to keep at it?

Myself, mainly. One has to develop a belief in oneself as a writer to keep going. I must admit I have been known to flounder. Then, too, I try to keep in touch with other writers through conferences and meet weekly with a local writer group, who cheer me on. A writer needs that sometimes. Jennifer Fulford is a pretty good cheerleader, too.

Q: What would you like to see change in the publishing industry?

Not so much emphasis of literary fiction in awards and contests. Literary fiction doesn’t usually sell a lot of books. More acceptance and recognition of indie publishers and reviews of their work without having to pay for it. Literary snobbery annoys me.

Q: Tell us about the project you're most proud of. 

The Forty Column Castle, my mystery set in Cyprus, is my favorite book. I’m not sure I ever think about pride when it comes to my work, but this book always puts a smile on my face. I like all my books, even though I’ve heard literary types say they are never satisfied with their work. I am.

Q: Name three writers, all living, who you wouldn't mind being stuck on an elevator with? We'll arrange for a conference later.

Jennifer Fulford who would be very funny about the whole experience and would figure out how to get us out. Jayne Ann Krentz, who writes romance and lives in Seattle, and who seems like a pretty savvy and successful writer. I want to know what she thinks about the industry today. Brian Greene, theoretical physicist, who writes cool books like Fabric of the Cosmos. I want him to explain in detail why we can’t go faster than the speed of light. Stuck in an elevator might be the time. Actually, I’d prefer the opportunity to sit one-on-one with any of them, have a beverage and talk over the writing life.

Find Marjorie's work on her website and on Amazon. Thanks, Marjorie. I owe you several IPAs.