I Believe

As we grow up and reach puberty the world opens up and everything becomes possible. With youth comes the belief that a world where everyone has enough and money is not an issue. It's a simple formula. Everything that needs to exist or can exist needs only vision and workers. No one needs to be a slave because we are all together. We are all humanity together.

It isn't until we come face to face with bureaucracy and costs and the brick wall of the haves and have nots that the terrible truth sinks in that the cost is higher than imagined. Politicians learn this lesson quickly and they compromise faster than a drugged out whore needing money for a fix. Down to their knees they go. Let the bargaining begin.

Some politicians decide to try another path. They will compromise but only long enough to get enough power and money and backing to force the system to its knees where they are in charge and all others must obey. Take that!

Instead of fixing the system or finding a way to eradicate the system so the utopian dream becomes reality, other paths call to us and like a fat wo/man every method - new or old or simply reworked - promises the end result of the perfect body and no more problems with weight loss. The dream of building and living in Utopia is the siren call that ends with dead dreams, anger, frustration, and the descent into madness and compromise.

Some find solace and a safe place in writing and reading books set on fantastic worlds and universes where Utopia becomes possible again. It's all an escape. If we can't have it in our own reality we will find a reality where it exists and to hell with the world where roses have thorns and carry poison in its glorious aroma.

And then there are drugs, the ultimate escapism. Sex falls into that realm.

The point is that Utopia is real and it is obtainable, but first we must throw off the masters enslaving us with bureaucracy, broken promises, and the ultimate carrot on a stick -- wealth.

Driving around the country I have seen vast fields where a house sits abandoned, windows broken, and the detritus of years of abandonment piled up in the corners and empty rooms where drifts, hoboes, and transients squatted for an hour or a day or a few weeks. A way station on the road to nowhere from nowhere in particular. I often thought that the empty house was a waste left to rot and return to the earth from whence it came. Why not let whoever want to maintain the house live there? Who would it hurt? So what if they planted a garden or harvested a few bushels of food from the land (although one might consider not doing that since Monsanto and various poisons meant to help plants grow and kill weeds and vermin were likely used and every bushel comes with a death sentence) and live happily in peace. Water and electricity could be provided, the water by a well and the electricity to run the pump to move the water could be provided by tapping into the utility poles and taking what one needs. Solar panels could provide electricity too. The house wouldn't rot and return to the earth and the rooms would be filled with people living their lives instead of providing a place to shoot up and tune out.

Is it really all that difficult to create a society where no one has to steal from anyone else to live? The wealthy would not have to give up their wealth because there would be no banks and no coins and no money exchanged anywhere. Buildings would still be planned and go up. Services like phones, power, water, food, clothing, and everything else needed would still be available. People would still work and do what they did before the need for money was tied to the stick as the carrot to motivate people to keep moving forward. No one would enslave anyone else and doctors and medicine and professionals of every stripe and class would continue to do what they chose to do. The only thing we wouldn't have is a master -- anywhere.

It wouldn't be like an all-you-can-eat buffet where people eat too much to take advantage of the deal because it doesn't last. In a world where everyone has enough it wouldn't be necessary to take more than you need because you might not ever have the chance again.

I had watched a movie where people could go into huge warehouses and take what they needed without checking out or paying anything. Walk in. Get what you want and need. Walk out. The inventory would be replenished and more would be available for the next person(s). The goods would still be manufactured and distributed and taken and the engine of the world would continue to work. People would still sweep the floors, stock the shelves, and remove the products from the shipping containers, disposing of the packaging. Food would not be wasted. People would continue to work. People would continue to pick up what they needed and garbage men would dispose of the trash. No one would need to advertise their product over anyone else's product. Quality would be maintained and no bureaucracy would need to exist to make sure no one tampered with things. Less waste would need to be disposed of because no more advertising or fancy packaging would exist. The world would be simple. People would still go into every kind of business from building and sewer and garbage to preparing and producing food. Once there was no need to compete for money and the only goal is making the product or service the best it can be, there would be no need for bureaucracies or people deciding what does and does not need to be done. The only competition would be within ourselves.

Builders would build houses. Resources would be provided to build the houses. Workers with the special skills needed to build the houses would still show up to work. People would show up to move into the house and movers would help them move. Those who wished to keep house, scrub floors, take care of children, babysit, plan parties, and everything else would be available to do the work because there are those who choose that form of work, not for a paycheck but because it is how they want to participate. There is a job for everyone and everyone gets a job. There is room for people to try different jobs until they find the job that fits.

Philosophers and artists and artisans and protectors would still exist because people would still need guidance and help with figuring things out. Nothing would change except greed and shaming and bullying. None of that would be needed. Admittedly, it would take time to get to the point where the nastier facets of personality would fade and disappear, but it's worth working through to get to a better place.

It seems naive, but it's really a simple way of life. Some people would take advantage at first as they learned that their struggles and fight to have everything would diminish with time. It isn't necessary to gather up everything when so much less is needed. So what if you don't have the latest model car or boat or plane or clothes when what you get is the best that can be made and manufactured? When there is no need to hedge the bets and cut corners to lower costs since there is no cost, the need to get the best deal fades with time because every deal is the best. Made by the best. Offered to everyone without restriction and made to last.

There would be no need for socialism or governments stealing from the rich to give to the poor because there would be no poor. Everything is available to everyone without restriction. Without cost. It would be Star Trek without replicator technology. Everything possible is made possible by someone with a dream and someone willing to make it happen.

That is the world we all want to live in an its the world we dreamed of when we were younger before we sold out or were forced to realize that even a piece of a dream will cost our souls and our integrity because compromise and money are the name of the game. I don't know about you, but I would prefer the world wake up and realize it is within our reach as soon as we decide that money is not the obstacle. What stands in our way is learning to cooperate. Not compromise, but cooperate so each person can have their dream and help someone else have theirs. When no one loses, there is no longer any need to step on anyone else to get ahead.

That is all. Disperse.

Back into the Creative Stream

I begin to think it is inevitable that I finally follow my heart -- to live a life full of creativity and art. I am not the only one in my family to choose to follow the artistic path as I found out a couple of days ago. My brother has gone back to school to become an architect, a fact which Hoity-Toity finds a bit baffling as he began his academic pursuits during the time he was fixing the home he had shared with his ex-wife and the state of which Hoity-Toity blames on their two daughters, both adults (or barely adults in the youngest's case). The house was trashed and much was left behind because it smelled bad (likely like cat urine given the evidence). I'm not willing to cut the Mushroom's ex slack because she is the parent and was living in the same foul-smelling sty and did nothing about it except decamp when it became obvious the Mushroom would no longer pay the mortgage since his obligations ended when the youngest was of age and child support ceased. Oh, well, that's a nightmare tale for another time.

At any rate, my brother, the Mushroom, has indeed gone back to school to study architecture and has completed, or is completing, his second semester, quarter, whatever, a fact which escapes Hoity. She has not decided to pursue further studies having gotten out of high school everything she needed and moved on into adulthood sufficiently equipped for life. My brother evidently feels differently since he also is pursuing another line of academic studies on his way to becoming an architect, something that would probably be just as adequately served if he had chosen engineering instead of architecture. His reason for going back to school isn't a love of art -- as it is with me -- but the need to be able to draw projects, likely building projects, in blueprint form. I know of engineers who do the same thing, but his choice and his path.

I recently discovered art classes at Craftsy.com when I was searching for some other classes on cooking and baking and a whole new world opened up for me. I began drawing in the 4th grade when I was panicked about the last day of school when our teacher told us we would be drawing the last day of school. I had never drawn anything in my life and, being the studious type, didn't know what to do? How could I fail the last day of school to produce anything? I didn't know how to draw.

Mom suggested I try drawing. I picked up the first thing with pictures -- my piano book -- and tried copying what I saw. My fears diminished as I produced nearly exactly copies of the simple drawings. I could draw.

Possibilities, endless possibilities, lay strewn before me like a king's ransom of jewels. But was my drawing ability limited to the drawings in my piano book? Could I draw other things? I ventured onward as any good scientist through more experimentation. The comic pages in the daily newspaper gave way to colored comic pages in the Sunday paper which gave way to sketching things around the house, from toys to knick-knacks and finally out into the wide world where I sketched the people around me. I've always gravitated towards people and there is where I found myself happiest -- drawing, sketching, painting people.

In later years after a gift of oil paints and an easel, which I took to the spare room behind the garage when I was 16, I labored for days over an oil painting of Mark Lindsay, the cutest guy in the band, Paul Reverd and the Raiders. The painting was done on paper for oil painting and turned out quite nicely considering I had no instruction and no idea what all the solvents, oils, etc. were used for and how to paint with oils. As with everything in my life, I followed my instincts.

I took art classes and learned to do quick 1- and 5-minute sketches with charcoal and pencil and did very well. My teachers praised my work, but did little to explain how to effectively employ oils, brushes, palette knives, etc. while bestowing praise, As, and scholarships for advanced classes in pastels at the Columbus Academy of Art and Design's Saturday classes for talented beginners. I took to pastels and soon excelled in the class, but still had no idea of what the various techniques (gesso, impasto, under painting, etc.) meant and happily floundered my way through classes, even to taking a few life classes at OSU while still in junior and high school. I worked in clay and carved tiles for block printing, earning a lovely scar I still carry when a blade scooped out a hunk of skin along with the carvable section of the tile I worked on. Blood-spattered and continuing on blindly I explored the still nebulous and mysterious world of art, taking my As and praise in stride as I strove to go as far as possible in the art world. I painted Beanie, my youngest sister, several times, and even took her to school with me during summer school (honors class) while I painted her in acrylics directly onto a 24 x 36 inch canvas, which Beanie now owns since Mom gave it to her when she died. I couldn't be trusted because I would have destroyed the canvas; it wasn't good enough, the product of an untutored artist with little or no direction from my teachers. I've done better -- and worse -- over the years, but Mom used that as one of her prize possessions where every visitor (no matter how close and familiar with the piece) must be taken to see and praise her for my meager accomplishments because she was the one who saw talent in me and supported me without question.

I continued to dabble in paints, eventually doing an oil rendering of the first (and only) school pictures my ex-husband sent me when the boys went to live with him. I gave that painting to AJ who claims he doesn't know what happened to it. I wish now I had kept it, carting it with me as I've carried my medical transcription reference books and my Andre Norton books wherever I've gone. I've sketched interesting face (interesting to me) from time to time and my skills have not exactly diminished with time, achieving a level of facility and ability conferred by time and mature years, though it wasn't until very recently that I picked up what I had put down more than 20 years ago -- the path of artist. My skills have somewhat diminished from lack of use, but my eye remains fairly good. The artistic eye, of course.

My supportive mother told me years ago I couldn't make a living as an artist -- or a writer for that matter -- and should focus on something that would ensure a stable income -- data processing, computers, IT. Anything but art or writing and in spite of my many awards and certificates of achievement, along with my meager skills. I have since turned that creative temperament and ability to hobbies, like cross stitch, but not for sale. Simply because the arts feed a need that is as much a part of my DNA as my grey eyes. And I have returned to the creative arts, specifically drawing, in the form of colored pencils. I have a set of pastels around here somewhere in the box where they were packed, but I'm exploring colored pencils for now with the same single-mindedness I have always shown when it comes to art, limping along and finding classes to help me learn the use and extent of possibilities inherent in the medium.

My work desk has become my drawing and sketching desk and I'm exploring more classes and different kinds of colored pencils to find the one that suits me and my rusty style.

I am not alone. Many people who have reached -- and passed -- their middle years have gone back to pick up where they left off or unpacked a long held dream and followed it in their twilight years as I have done with art -- and specifically portraiture. My parents are dead and I make a decent living with medical transcription, but nothing fills me with the joy or feels my soul the way art does, and I'm finally discovering the bedrock of art that I should have learned many years ago when teachers patted me on the head and sent me to honors classes on scholarships without really giving me the grounding I needed in the mechanics and uses of the media they passed quickly over. I'm really learning now and I have the tools to delve as deeply as I wish -- and all the classes I can afford to take.

I won't waste time thinking about what I've lost over the intervening decades or bemoan the unrealized abilities that could have been part of the dust of my decomposing corpse had I not reached this age (60 for those of you who prefer details to dreams) with the ability to reach back and take what was once mine. I'm not going to worry about what I can and cannot do, but simply reach for more and take to my soul all that I can as I venture back into the creative stream to capture the world as I see it without the struggle (sometimes fruitless) for the right words and constructions that will take me from the first fire of discovery in a novel or story through the doldrums of the middle and the elation of the end of the tale. At least with art, I need not worry about critics and complaining readers, but do what I will with the tools at hand and render the life around me as my hands and talent allow. I have no one to tell me no and no one to browbeat, bruise, and cudgel into a more lucrative and acceptable form of work. This I do for myself and the devil take the hindmost.

That is all. Disperse.

Knock, Knock, Knock

This weekend I tried to get back into a more normal sleeping rhythm as mine was disrupted by working back to back full time jobs last week, without sleep for 3 days, and cranky as a wet hen, and just about as aggressive, though there is no one here to benefit from it or be hurt by it. UPS doesn't deliver on weekends and I didn't have any visitors.  At least not so you'd notice, though I could swear...

When I lived in the cottage in Colorado Springs I had several instances where I would be deeply asleep, heavy into the REM/NREM phase, and I'd hear someone knocking on the door, waking me abruptly from sleep. I got out of bed and went to the door and there was no one there and no sign anyone had been there. The same thing happened this morning, or rather very late last night. At 2:30 AM to be exact. 

I was deep into the REM/NREM sleep and 3 loud knocks on the glass front door woke me immediately, dragging me from whatever dream I was enjoying at that moment. (And that seems to be the only similarity; I'm always dreaming something really good.) I woke to darkness and listened for another knock. Nothing. No sounds outside of the furnace and the lack of wind howling outside. No shuffling. No sound of the suet cage banging on the back door -- because all the birds were asleep and not feeding for a change. Nothing. Even the usual stirrings, creakings, rumblings, and crackings were silent. I got up in darkness, leaving the light off, and walked boldly down the hallway. The front door glowed with light from the big pole light in the driveway, a blue glow that lit the way adequately. I peered through the front door glass and there was no sign of anyone have been there since yesterday afternoon when UPS dropped off a small package in a plastic bag. His footprints were nearly filled in from the snow that had since fallen. Nothing new. No sign of new tracks in the driveway and the old tracks were also covered with newly fallen snow. I went to the back door and there were no signs of anyone have been there either. The bird tracks were covered with new snow and there were no tire tracks in the driveway in any direction.  I went back to bed.

When I was fully awake this afternoon I got online and searched the Net for answers, as I had done the first couple of times it happened and I decided I had not missed anyone at the door. The explanations ranged from dream interpretation (important news or financial collapse) to UFO visitations (3 knocks akin to a hypnotist snapping his fingers to wake the hypnotized from sleep) to awaken the abducted from their drugged trance to some sort of neurologic disorder. 

It wasn't sleep apnea or even obstructive sleep apnea because there has been no snorting, gasping, feeling of being hag-ridden, someone sitting on my chest (cats stealing breath) or other signs of choking or loss of oxygen. I do tend towards sinus and nasal congestion, but that has more to do with changes in atmospheric pressure (better than arthritis and bunions for telling the weather) than with sleep apnea. And there were no signs of other physiologic disturbances. 

I suppose I could go with some apparition or spirit trying to get my attention because Kevin had stopped by some time this morning, about 8 AM, but I thought that was my imagination at the time. How do I know it was Kevin? The prints of his heavy duty snow boots outside my front door and new tracks in the driveway going in an out when I got up. Kevin didn't knock and he didn't say anything, but I did hear noises at the door, probably Kevin trying the knob and finding it locked. He knows I don't lock the back door, but it was evidently not important or he would have come into the house across the brand new welcome mat I put out to keep his wet and muddy boots off my living room carpet.   None of that had anything to do with the 3 knocks on the door.

When I lived at the cottage in the Springs the knocks sounded on a wooden door. I have only 1 wooden door here; all the others are glass. The knocks I heard this morning were 3 knocks on a glass door. I know my mind keeps working when I am asleep (it has to keep the body running [digesting, breathing, pumping blood, etc.] even though I'm resting). I do think my mind is sufficiently advanced to be able to differentiate the sounds of knocking on wood and on glass, but that would take a level of sophistication that seems like shooting fish in a barrel with a Howitzer. Too much effort for too little return. Something else is definitely going on. 

Being me, the first thing I imagine is a warning that someone is coming to force me out of my house or tell me someone is dead. Neither is the case, but my default setting is always trouble and always my fault or related to me. Yes, me living in a me-centric universe. It has to mean something, but for the life of me I cannot imagine what. 

Knowing what I do about alien abductions (yes, I've read Whitley Streiber's books and watched the X-Files. Like Mulder, I sort of believe, but not for the reasons you might think), believing that there is something in my brain or DNA to interest an alien to abduct me many times over the past 7 or so years, and probably the reason for my wanderlust and constant moving about for the better part of my life, even if I have to discount that my father was in the Army and we were deployed to various bases around Europe and Central America as well as the United States since I was 10 months old. Maybe that is where the books and stories I've written in my head have disappeared to. That's another story for another ride into the depths of the abyss that is my mind. 

Or maybe it is my clairvoyance, specifically my precognitive abilities, surfacing to let me know something or someone is coming. And it had better not be who I think it is because he will not get a better answer from me now -- or ever. 

Whatever is going on, if anyone has any suggestions, other than the ones touched on above, let me know. I'd like to know. You know what I always say: Knowledge is wasted when it isn't shared. 

That is all. Disperse.

Mementos of Dreams

There's something special about an old letter found in a shoebox or trunk or between the pages of  a book, like the letter from my grandmother to Little One Finger Jo. It's not a nickname I ever remember Gram calling me, but the letter was to me, as were several other letters written to One Finger Jo. I assume it was because I was always pointing when I was a baby, right index finger held up for silence or pointing to whoever was in my sight while I laughed or spoke as babies often do. Pay attention. This is important stuff.

I treasure those letters and the letters from my father to me when he was stationed overseas without my mother and me or waiting until we could join him in Germany or Panama or any of a dozen places where we followed him. The letter I treasure most is a letter that in some ways launched my writing career -- my professional writing career. It was a letter from Amelia May Connolly to her children. I originally called the story I wrote about that letter and what it meant to be adopted, Anna's Seeds, and that was my first major publication. It wasn't my first professional publication. That honor went to a story about a photo I treasured of my father writing a bucking bronco, hat flung high and legs clapped tightly to the rearing stallion and how I found that same furious rearing stallion when my new husband and I traveled to Utah when we were on our way to his next base in Utah.

We had stopped just inside the Colorado border at a little spot off I-70, got out, and walked around. I was tired and our son was fractious, so a walk was the only thing I could think of to clear the cobwebs and get out into the fresh air. As I walked down a street toward a tourist trap, there it was, forelegs pawing the air, muscles locked in mid jump, and a line of fathers and brave teens waiting their turn to ride the bucking bronc. I knew my father had worked in a circus and a rodeo at some time in his early years, but I thought he had ridden wild stallions in the ring. Not so. He had ridden a stuffed stallion for a photo op and yet, to some childlike part of me deep inside, my father was still a hero and the wild bucking stallion he had ridden for that creased and dog-eared photograph was the real thing and not the tourist attraction I had found.

Looking back over the years there were many old letters and photographs that have sparked stories and articles and more paper journal posts than I can remember. Each one is capture in print, the emotions and thoughts still raw as I read them now and then. As letters and photographs capture the thoughts of emotions of the moment, so does writing illuminate those frozen bits of life and time, and writing is all I ever really wanted to do, besides read. The letter from my adopted mother's grandmother reminded me that I was a part of a family where writing and words were important and that by my desire to write I was part of a much bigger family, a family as confused and dysfunctional as any nuclear family, a family of writers.

I can trace my origins back through Shakespeare, Michael Montaigne, Jacqueline Susann, Stephen King, and Alexander Dumas, among others. I am one of generations of writers that stretch back to the beginnings of storytelling and the spoken word, and there are more coming as the dream of telling stories and putting life into words is born in a new generation of writers that will create their worlds with words rearranged and reworked and published in new ways we have yet to dream or realize.

Photographs and letters, mementos from the shadows of time and space, spark memories and dreams, create legends and become legend, as long as there are people that care enough to stop and become immerse in a moment held still and taken out of time's endless stream. A photograph became the basis of the cover of my next novel, Among Men, a sequel to Among Women, and the beginning of a series of books drawn from life and photos and letters that begin with me and become something more on the page, rather like the photograph of my father riding a wild stallion. It is the dream that comes from the image and the memories we create and send on leaves of paper into the winds of change and life that become books and stories, the truth of which is not always in question because they become a truth of their own, mementos of dreams.

Dream a dear little deer for me

Ever have a dream that seems to be saying something, but you're not sure what? I had one last night.

There was a doe wandering through my dream. At first it just wandered through the living room while I was up in the loft. I looked down and there it was just passing through. The next thing I know I had come home, unlocked the door and walked in to find the same doe lounging on my sofa. It wasn't frightened when I walked in and it seemed as though we knew each other. I laid down on the bed near the sofa and the deer got up and came to me, lying down next to me. A friend came in and asked what the deer was doing there. I explained it was there when I came home, inside my locked house. The doe got up and let me run my hands along her body because my friend asked if the doe was pregnant. She was. Once I ascertained her gravid state, I stroked her from head to belly once again, she nuzzled me, I hugged her and then she walked out the door as though she were a guest leaving.

There was such a sense of calm familiarity in the exchange as if deer appear in my house while I'm gone all the time and lie down beside me unafraid and as naturally as though it had happened many times before. It was surreal and at the same time as natural as if the doe had been a person, a friend.

According to the dream dictionaries I checked this morning, deer symbolize "grace, compassion, gentleness, meekness and natural beauty. It has feminine qualities and may point to the feminine aspect within yourself." Deer can also symbolize someone who is 'dear' to you, except I don't know anyone who is pregnant. Deer could be naïveté and gullibility or vulnerability. I don't get that sense from the dream.

Many years ago, Don told me that every aspect of a dream is a facet of the dreamer. In other words, I am the deer, the sofa, the door, the key, the other people in the dream, the bed, the loft, everything, right down to the clock on the mantel and the pictures on the wall. He said I should say, "I am the clock and that means...." He came up with an interpretation of a dream where he was himself (in the dream) and the woman to whom he was making love. Uh, no. Not for me that kind of dream interpretation. I feel like there is something else going on here and I don't think I'm a pregnant doe who can pick locks and will patiently wait until the tenant comes home. Nope, definitely too weird for me.

Anyone else have an interpretation? Where is Joseph when you need him?

That is all. Disperse.

In the Darkness There is Danger

The latest box of books to review from Authorlink came on Friday and I decided to dive in with Ted Dekker's latest thriller The Bride Collector. It was a bad choice for bedtime reading, which is my favorite place to read and my favorite form of sleep aid. Can't sleep? Read. Works every time, not because the books are boring but because they relax and transport me to a place where my body, a usually tensed wirespring of emotions held in check and muscles cramped from over or under use, can let go and float on a puffy cloud of alternate realities and wondrous prose. Not last night.

I knew from the cover, a bas relief picture of a bridal veil hanging from a rusted, bloody, oft-used meat hook, and the title that it was a thriller, but I usually don't have problems sleeping after reading books with graphic violence or horrific scenes. Every one in a while . . . This was one of those once in a while times.

Eyes drooping from fatigue (I haven't been sleeping through the night, harking back to some newborn state I avoided the first time around, probably emotional or mental colic), I bookmarked my page, stacked the book on top of the others and turned out the light, composing my heavy limbs for sleep. It didn't take long for Morpheus to gather me in his arms and whisper sleeping thoughts in my ear before I was yanked out of the bliss and into a world of darkness and terror where I was hunted by a family of throwbacks intent on playing Operation with my not so vital parts until they could dig out the vital parts with a rusty, bent spoon.

The leader of this homicidal group had his smirking, eager brothers hold me while he prodded between spine and right kidney with a thin lead rod, increasing the pressure until I writhing in their grip, biting my lip to keep from screaming in terror and pain. How I got away I don't know, but get away I did, running up a flight of stairs that appeared out of nowhere with the happy howling hounds on my trail. At the top of the stairs were two shovels, one point and the other flat-bladed, and I turned, grabbed the pointed shovel and stood my ground ready to swing at the first head within reach, except the shovels were chained to each other and to the banister. It was a trick and a trap. I started to run and catapulted out of the nightmare into drowsy wakefulness unable to free myself from the grip of the nightmare or wake fully. The struggle continued with the hounds hot on my heels, having grabbed my dream state to reel me back in and back in I went, fighting for consciousness and being dragged back inch by inexorable inch until finally I broke free, still sleep heavy, and tried to change the dream until at last I was saved by a full bladder near to bursting. It's the first time I was glad for nature's call.

That wasn't in the book and I hadn't finished the second chapter.

Dekker's writing is so visceral and evocative and the killer so insidiously dark that it set my mind to creating a nightmare all its own. I've decided that under no circumstances will I ever read a Ted Dekker thriller that close to bedtime, nor will I read him in bed unless there's plenty of daylight. Nope, reading Dekker will be cut off a minimum of six hours before bed while there's still plenty of light and a chance to purge his prose with frothy musicals, tear jerking romances and plenty of time to get it all out into my paper journals. His writing is far to suggestive to my overactive and very creative mind.

The last Dekker book I read and reviewed, which was also my first, was Green, the last and the first in a cycle of four. Once I started reading the book I was drawn into the story and quickly immersed. I resented needing to sleep; I wanted to finish it all in one sitting. That didn't happen, but the world and the ideas on which I gorged myself were a banquet for the senses and I enjoyed every moment, returning to read as soon as I finished work. Luckily, I work at home, so it was a short commute. I curled up in bed and flew away to the worlds of Dekker's imaginings and in spite of the religious themes, which were seamlessly woven into the overall narrative. This book, The Bride Collector, is a different Dekker than the one that fascinated me before. This Dekker knows the deepest darkness of the human soul wherein lies the joy and the insatiable need to warp the very fabric of reality and refashion it in its own image. This Dekker weaves nightmares and taps the instinctive and deep-seated fears in all of us, and especially, obviously, in me.

I highly recommend Ted Dekker's books. I must finish The Bride Collector in order to review it -- two chapters is not enough -- but I will read it in the daylight where nightmares can't drag me back into the abyss. Then I'll get Boneman's Daughters and read that in daylight, too, but I will read it. I suggest you do the same. Make sure it's daylight and keep your loved ones close; don't go to bed alone and, under no circumstances, read Dekker's thrillers in bed.

When Characters Take Over

It seemed to be an isolated incident when John Logan, one of the background characters in Past Imperfect, then called Out of the Past, followed me into my dreams. He nagged me for days before I finally gave in and listened. I had to get some sleep or I wouldn't be able to write anything. So I listened and he changed the course of the story and my writing life. He was right.

John Logan had taken on a life of his own and, even though it trespassed into my life outside writing, I am glad he nagged me until I paid attention. The novel that resulted was much better than the one planned in my head and the ending surprised even me. I was just along for the ride.

I'd heard about characters talking back and refusing to be pushed around and maneuvered like pieces on a chess board, but I didn't really believe it until John Logan. From the moment I listened to him, writing changed for me. It's also likely why I write more nonfiction than fiction; I get to write what I want and the characters don't make cameo appearances in my dreams. Not usually.

A lot of my writing is done in my head before I put fingers to keyboard or pen to paper. Scenes, dialogue and exposition play out in my mind, the words arranging and re-arranging into more pleasing shapes until, like the ice Kai must arrange into a word in The Snow Queen, they spell out the story. The good thing about writing this way is that I can write anywhere--in the shower, while doing housework, driving and grocery shopping. The bad thing about writing this way is that I write anywhere and any time--in the shower, while I'm working, watching a movie, reading a book . . . and sleeping.

The more I write, the more my writing affects other aspects of my life and now spills over into my nonfiction. Last night, or rather early this morning, is a good example.

After waking up at 3 a.m., I fully intended to go back to sleep for another couple of hours, but something switched my mind into writing mode. I couldn't sleep. I tossed. I turned. I used my relaxation and breathing techniques. And in my mind, I rearranged the words into a story that has been on the edge of awareness for weeks. No rest would be had this morning, not until I got up and put down on paper or on my computer the words that slithered and slid and rearranged themselves in my mind.

This time it's not a character but a story I've been trying to write about a great love. The deadline looms and so I will lose sleep until what's in my head is on the page and safely sent to the publisher. But characters will follow since I'm finishing rewrites on a finished novel, except that one thing I've learned is that no novel is every really finished. There's always more to do and more I want to do even when the book is in print.

Characters jostle and play hide-and-seek for a while, but eventually, when they begin invading my dreams, I know they're ready to find their way to the page and they won't let me sleep until I give in and let them have their way.

The one goal I've worked toward for so long is being able to quit my day job and spend all my time writing, but I'm beginning to wonder if that's such a good thing. Characters barely recognize the boundaries now. What will happen when I have nothing else to occupy my mind but writing? Will I disappear and the characters take over, using my body to give their dreams and realities life? Probably. And yet that doesn't seem like such a bad trade-off.

When the author disappears and the characters take on a life of their own it's magic. What's a few sleeps nights when the results is the creation of characters who are living, breathing, nagging, dream invading magic?

Telemarketers, zombies and spiders

What's the deal with retailers and vendors these days? Everyone emails and calls for reviews and ratings. Here's a hint, folks, if I buy from you again or buy the same thing again, I liked it. If I didn't return it and didn't call to complain to you, I liked it. I do enough writing every day that I shouldn't have to be hounded at home when I'm relaxing with demands for ratings. Keep it up and I'll give you a rating you won't like.

It's like telemarketers calling at the most inopportune moments. Once upon a time I couldn't listen to the phone ring and ring and ring. I can now. Telemarketers have taught me how to live with the ringing. I also turn the ringer off on occasion when I really don't want to be bothered. Yes, I have Caller ID, but I don't always use it. When I'm too busy to answer the phone I let it ring and the voice mail pick up. If you want to get hold of me, leave me a message. I so can't wait for vacation. I need to get away from here.

Yes, I'm cranky this morning. You would be as well if every time you fell asleep and got into a really good dream it ended up with zombies trying to eat you and some wacko woman determined to get her philandering husband by infiltrating his organization and infecting them with arachnid-based parasites that bond to the host when wearing a silver jumpsuit. The things I saw. Luckily, I was in the bathroom when everyone was listening to the motivational speeches and putting on their silver jumpsuits. I snuck outside only to be tracked by some massive automated turn screw that I thought was sighting in on me and wasn't. I tiptoed over the huge tubes sending some kind of gas into the building and headed to my car to wake up. After the second dream, I decided it was time to get up and stay up. The bathroom was my cue to wake up and empty the reservoir. I so need a vacation.

The thing is that I've been in some of these places before back when things were nice and it was fun to go see a show in Vegas or go shopping for beds, but something twisted them way out of shape and into nightmares. Couldn't be something I drank since I only drank water before I went to bed . . . unless the city is now putting hallucinogens in the water. Great! Just great!

I hadn't planned to write anything so cranky, but there you have it. Lack of sleep and invading nightmares will do it every time, turn my usually pleasant dreams into the stuff of Tales from the Darkside. Yeah. I'd go back to bed if I didn't think the zombies and arachnid parasites would follow me. They probably would. It's going to be that kind of day.

That is all. Disperse.

Beyond the sidewalk

Cold darkness surrounded me all night and getting warm was an elusive dream. The furnace blew overhead and sucked all the moisture out of the air and my body until restlessness turned to counting breaths to fall asleep. Huddled in the meager covers that once were more than enough to cocoon warmth and comfort, sleep played tag with mind and body until the faint light of coming dawn heralded the end of the night. It was a rough night in some ways and not so rough in others with peek-a-boo glimpses of other worlds and lives, some of which were familiar.

Have you ever wandered in dreams and recognized places you returned to over and over? People are often the same and they grow and evolve with time, sometimes a safe haven and other times the pits of nightmare. I spent several years going to a university and graduating on a faraway world that existed as shadows and mirages away from the stone and marble edifices of learning. That's fancy for a misty, barely realized world away from the university buildings, a wash of colors like the shifting radiation of the Aurora Borealis next to the sidewalk. That's the thing about dreams that seem so real, there's always some unreality attached to it. It reminds me of parents who invested all their time, attention and resources into their children without ever realizing that one day the child would leave despite their best efforts and the relationship they ignored -- their marriage -- is suddenly all they have.

One friend and his wife handled the empty nest syndrome by having another child, a girl fast approaching the time when she will be off on her own. They're good people, but their daughter has been a buffer and an excuse for lack of intimacy. In three more years, she will be gone and there will no longer be a buffer or an excuse.

Another friend and his wife only had one child late in life and she has recently gained some freedom by getting her driver's license. She is gone as much as possible, intoxicated by being able to go where she wants almost whenever she wants. Her mother isn't handling it well at all. She lived for her daughter and now her daughter is fighting to get free of her, struggling to become independent. Mom insists that when the time comes for college, the daughter live at home and go to college locally. The daughter isn't having any of that. She can't wait to get away and nothing but shackling her to a stake in the front yard will keep her from bolting for the far horizons. Mom has suddenly been faced with hours of empty time that once were filled with shopping, visiting and watching television together with her daughter and all that's left is her husband who, for the past 17 years has been nothing more than the National Bank of Dad. He was left to his own devices and now he has a pal tagging along after him, following him to his workshop and home office, always wanting to know what he's doing. She invites him to watch TV and sit and talk to her and he's a bit nervous about it all. It's what he wanted, or at least what he said he wanted: having her pay attention to him, to see him. It's not quite what he thought it would be like. It's a bit creepy if truth be told and the glimpse of their life together after so many years of neglect and outright animosity is a bit frightening.

Picture a bear that hibernates a lot or concentrates on the cub until she wakes up and begins ripping into her mate with sharpened claws and a ravening hunger that sends everyone and everything fleeing before her suddenly without a cub and unable to bear more making nice with her favorite meal. Gives me the shivers just thinking about it. That's where things stand for them now. Mama Bear is baby bearless and Papa Bear will have to do. Just think, the waning years filled with a needy and tetchy Mama Bear while baby bear goes to college and finds a life of her own.

That's the thing about empty nesters, they seldom realize until it's too late that building their lives and dreams around their children is a dead end, especially when they've spent little or no time nurturing the one relationship that will sustain them in the empty nest years -- their marriage. They began together, but somewhere along the way forgot who brought them to the party. In a way, it's funny to watch couples who have grown apart attempting to find some common ground, unaware that time and tide have worn away the connecting edges until there's no connection left.

Single people are a little more prepared because they know what it's like to be left alone. For them, it's a new lease on life and a chance to find someone with whom to spend their late afternoon and twilight years. Being single doesn't look so bad any more, not when couples that seemed solid from the outside turn out to be nothing more than shifting colors and light on a frigid night when sleep is elusive and hard to catch, and icy fingers steal the warmth from the body while the roaring furnace sucks the moisture from the air. It's like walking the halls and sidewalks near the university buildings so solid and sturdy on the marble foundations while the rest of the world exists as a dream beyond the sidewalks.

Making the American Dream

The day has finally come and it has been a long time coming. This week my 200th book review for Authorlink was posted.

I started work for Authorlink as a horror book reviewer in August 2002 and quickly branched out to all genres and nonfiction. What can I say? I'm a voracious reader. In the years between 2002 and 2007, I reviewed a few books each year, but then went into over driver in 2007 and most of the books I've read and reviewed fell between 2007 and now. Last year I read and reviewed 44 books, 68 the year before. Last year was a slow year and that total does not include the books I read for pleasure or books I reviewed that came to me directly, and there were a lot of those. I keep the files, but I don't keep track of the numbers on a monthly basis. No need, except for times like this when a hallmark has been reached, like 200 reviews. Time to hit up the boss for a raise.

Since being off work this week to lower my stress levels and take it easy so my back doesn't seize up on me any more, I find that strange thoughts traipse through my mind at all hours of the day and night, although I have been sleeping better (got a whole uninterrupted six hours last night). Last night, I couldn't get Snoqualmie out of my head, and Snohomish followed closely behind in lock-step. Neither word, names of cities in Washington state, had anything to do with the movies I watched, the books I read (I'm reading three right now) or the stories I tinkered with. Two random words that seemed to come from someone else's head and wandered through mine. I did find them on someone else's journal this morning, but it makes sense; she lives in Washington and visited Snoqualmie recently. I didn't. It's not the only strange occurrence recently.

Uncle Bob called me yesterday -- I was asleep at the time -- and left me a message. He received (finally) the box of books I sent and had sent the book meant for someone else to them that day, having received his copy from North Carolina that morning. He called to tell me I owe Mom royalties on my story in Chicken Soup for the Soul: All in the Family, the one I wrote about my ex-husband's mother who was late for her own funeral. It was called "On Esther Time". "Sounds just like Annabelle (Mom's middle name and one she despises), except for the dead part," he said.

"No," I agreed, "she not dead yet."

He really enjoyed the story and, he reminded me, even though he doesn't read fiction, he's going to read my novel and give me some pointers about romance and sex. I can't wait. Yes, I want to hear about sex from my uncle. Ewwww. He's kidding. I hope he's kidding.

As we usually do, Uncle Bob and I ended up talking about life and being happy. He asked me if I was going to get strange when I'm rich and famous and start wearing necklaces and rings on all my fingers and toes and bracelets covering my arms. "No, Uncle Bob, that's just not me. I have one necklace I wear all the time. I'm not a big fan of wearing jewelry." He was talking about Mom and Hoity-Toity, both of whom would cover every square centimeter of their bodies in jewels, gold, platinum and silver (if they can't get gold and platinum) if they could afford it. I think of them as dragons wearing their hoards. That's good then," he said. "But you're happy." It wasn't quite a question, more of a cautious statement. "Yes, I'm happy. Not as happy as if I could write full time and not have to work (except for this week and my upcoming vacation), but happy."

"That's good. Thats good." He seemed pleased with my answer and he said he never doubted I would keep my head on straight. It made me wonder if he was happy and if he'd spent his life doing what he loved.

"When I started in the machine shop, I hated it. Didn't want to get up every morning and go into work, but I had a family to feed and clothe. Took me a while to get my mind right. I didn't have much education and it was a good job, so I decided to get my mind right. Then I looked forward to going to work."

"Would you rather have rehabbed houses for a living?"

"No, that's just another part time job with a different boss." He meant his wife, Aunt Lois.

"So, you don't like taking old houses and making them look good?"

"Not really."

The more we talked, the more I realized just how amazing my uncle is. He came from a wealthy family who had everything during the Depression when most people had nothing. He decided to make it on his own and, after one hitch in the Air Force, which he didn't like, he got a job in Columbus in a machine shop. He owned a house, a little two-bedroom stucco ranch on five acres out in the country north of Columbus, but not much else. He worked on cars and did all his own maintenance and he put in a huge garden on the five acres every year that was canned and frozen for the coming year until new crops could be sown and harvested. His house was right across the road from a dairy farm and he got all his milk in milk cans fresh from the cow. I can still remember Uncle Bob sitting in a chair in the kitchen and talking while he shook a car full of cream until it became butter and the smell of fresh milk every morning when we took the lid off the milk can.

My uncle took that little house and turned it from a pink stucco block into a wooden dream house with four bedrooms, a finished basement, a three-car garage and a breezeway he sold for ten times what he paid for it in the 1950s. He sold that house and bought a rundown farm that he rehabbed into a beautiful home, sold it at a profit, bought another farm house, rehabbed it, sold it for a huge profit and built the house he always wanted just across the road from where he started. He had 30 acres and a much bigger garden yielding even more food to be canned and frozen for the coming year. He's added to his real estate binges with a house on Lake Erie he sold to his oldest daughter Laura, a house on the Muskingum River and several houses in Florida, one of which was on Pine Island opposite Sanibel in the Gulf. He's slowing down and now has only three houses: the house he built, a house on the Muskingum River and a little place in Florida on the Gulf. He loves to fish.

He told me if he had to do it all over again, he'd buy old house, rehab them and flip them, taking the profit to buy, rehab and flip more properties. He has the magic touch with building, construction and carpentry and Aunt Lois is a talented decorator. "I wouldn't put so much work into a house to flip, not like I put into my own homes," he said. He puts a lot of love and work into each of the houses he's owned and rescued from entropy and age. You should've seen the first old farm house he renovated. It was a dump, and it was worlds away from five kids and two cousins sharing the same bath water every night.

Uncle Bob's happiest moments are when tax time rolls around and he owes the government money. "It means I made lots of money that year and I look forward to paying." It's not a popular thought, certainly not in these political times when everyone wants the rich to pay to carry the rest of the country who are less fortunate. By those standards, my uncle is very rich; he's in the top 10% of the country in terms of earnings -- and he's retired. He's rich in other ways, too. He has a huge family he loves and cares for and a life that continues to include his gardens and rehabbing and travel from Columbus to the river to Florida and back in his yearly circuit, and he still pays taxes with a big smile every year.

When I think of the American Dream, I don't think of wealth and owning a home, but happiness. For my uncle that happiness is in work, hard work, and paying taxes, raising his family and enjoying what he does. That's the American Dream for me -- enjoying what I do. I enjoy writing and I get to do more of it every year. I'll have to pay taxes this year, too, but, following my uncle's lead, I'm looking forward to it because it means I'm getting closer to my dream -- living on writing alone. I don't need to be wealthy, although I wouldn't turn it down either. I don't need to be famous, although I wouldn't walk away from it as long as I didn't have to make personal appearances. I don't need much, just the freedom to live the way I choose instead of the way I must. In some ways, I am like my uncle. I do my best at the job that pays the bills. I don't like it, but I do get some satisfaction from being at the top of my profession in terms of quality of work. Without this job, I couldn't pursue writing, so I'm glad to have a job that gives me that freedom. I've written over 200 book reviews for one company, hundreds of articles and short stories, edited millions of words and seen my own stories and books published, and all because of a job I didn't choose, but took when it was offered. It's not my dream job, but it's getting me where I want to go, just as being a machinist gave my uncle the money to raise his family and help him pay for the materials to rehab his home, sell it and set him on the path that led him to realize his dreams, and that's what it's all about.

The American Dream is what you make it.

Impromptu verse and impatient organs

'Twas the night before the night before Xmas and all through the house
not a creature was stirring, just the mouse.
The stocking was hung on the doorway with care
in hopes that the neighborhood kids wouldn't dare
fill it with sticks or coal or contempt
offering me a present of silence instead of trying to tempt
me to get my shotgun or sell them for rent.
A very happy holiday full of joy and warmth.

Just a little impromptu something I wrote for a good friend, but it's a good segue into the important stuff, like why I am plagued with erotic dreams when I am tired and worn out from too many hours at the keyboard. Must be because my resistance is down and I'm diving into the deep waters I stay so carefully away from lest they swamp me.

Last night's dream, or maybe it was this morning's before my bladder rescued me with an inordinate amount of "I can't wait any longer" pressure, was about a presence, a ghost of sorts who could corporealize, coming after me. He had ravaged several willing young ladies; I was not one of them.

He had information to impart and I had successfully avoided his firmer offerings, until someone attempted to lock me in the basement with him so he could have his wicked way. I turned the tables on her and locked her in the basement anteroom, made it up the stairs and locked the door on the entity before he could catch me. Someone let him out and he appeared in the bedroom to accost me, offering different shapes and races for my erotic delectation. When he appeared as a well endowed, light, bright and nearly white black man, I burst out laughing. "I've had better looking and darker men." He backed away as I accosted him, protecting himself from my laughter as I controlled the situation, and then he disappeared just as my fella came to save me. The best defense against such demons it to confront the spirit and laugh him away. Then, just as my fella was heating my erogenous zones and synapses before engaging the field of play, my bladder threatened to spill its guts.

So here I am feeling groggy and not a little irritated at being interrupted, typing away like an idiot when I should be back in bed pursuing my dream lover, or at least embracing the sandman an hour or two more before I must get up and pound the work keyboard to make my bread . . . milk, eggs, cheese and meat. Oh, well, I'm never very mentally together when I haven't had much sleep. Maybe if I hurry up and finish . . ..

And so it begins

I've been busy lately adjusting to a new work schedule and having some difficulty with it, but tonight's events put things into perspective.

I had my first radio interview at Blog Talk Radio with Gayle Johnson and Miriam Mimi Jacobs. The ladies were wonderful and had actually read Past Imperfect so that was good. The best part is that they both loved the book. I'll see if I can get a copy of the podcast and post it. Beanie and Ants surprised me by calling in to the show and saying hello. I heard Ants in the background say, "I love you." Beanie said how proud of me she and the boys are. That was definitely worth hearing in such a public way.

The other event this evening was a pre-interview with Toni Quest of Screaming Woman over the phone. We had a lovely conversation and found a lot in common, including our ages. TQ told me she doesn't usually read the books of authors she's interviewing, but after talking to me she had to read the book before Monday. I sent her a PDF review copy and I look forward to the interview on Monday night at 8:30 p.m. EST. I may even get used to all these interviews and chats my publicist, Linda Barnett-Johnson has set up for me between now and April 2010. At least I get to talk about my favorite subject -- writing. You thought I was going to say me. Ha! Fooled you!

Adjusting to a new earlier work schedule and working out the kinks has had me on the ropes, but the holiday has saved me. I love this time of year from Halloween right through to New Year's and Valentine's Day. It's not for the candy or the romance or the gifts, although I do enjoy that part, but because of the way it always makes me feel: happy, joyful and as excited as a kid trying to sleep Xmas Eve. The scents and sounds of the holiday get under my skin and make me feel like singing, but the best part is baking candy and cakes and cookies to give out and hearing how my gifts are received. One person, who shall remain nameless for now, opened her gift ahead of time, but I forgive her. It didn't arrive with the gift I got for her son and new daughter-in-law, so it's not really her fault. I also sent out holiday e-cards to everyone on my list and those were well received. Even if the gift is nothing more than an e-card, I always live in the expectation of shining a momentary brightness into the receiver's world so they hopefully feel what I feel -- happy to be alive and thankful for another year of friends, family and dreams coming true. That's something else I got from tonight's interview, that feeling of possibility and the knowledge that I am living my dream by writing and seeing my books published. Even though I can't live completely off the proceeds, it's coming and coming soon.

If you take away nothing else from this rambling post, take this: The holidays are a time of joy and happiness, a celebration of another year lived and a the brightness of love and possibility at a time when the earth is at its farthest from the sun. As we swing away from that bright glowing ball of gases and light and solar winds, it's temporary. After the 21st of December, midwinter day with the shortest day and the longest night, we swing back toward the sun and warmth and another year of possibilities and dreams waiting to be realized and lived. Out of the darkness, we come into the light. That is the promise of this time of year. Inside those dead looking trees, is life asleep and waiting to be awakened, and so it begins again.

If you do nothing else, be grateful for every season and enjoy it to the fullest. Don't waste it because although the season will come around again, it won't be the same one as last year or next year. Each one is unique and wonderful on its own. Celebrate your dreams and your families and friends, but most of all celebrate yourselves. This day will never come again. Make it a special memory.

For me, I'll be baking cookies and cakes and candies and finding people who need a little sweetness in their lives to enjoy them. After all, everything goes down a little easier with a sprinkle of sugar -- the natural kind of course.

The morning of surprising adventurers

Surprises first thing in the morning are the best and I had a great surprise this morning. However, I'm not going to tell you what it is, except to say that I haven't smiled this big this early in the morning since I couldn't tell you when. About the only morning surprise that would be better . . . well, best not to go there in order to keep this work safe and me from going completely berserk.

For some unknown reason I have the best dreams in the morning after I've been up for a while and gone back to sleep, like this morning, and also the strangest. I cannot understand how I can get into REM so quickly and so completely.

This morning was visiting day in jail, although it was an unusual jail since men were allowed to visit for short periods of time and actually come into the area with the rest of the inmates. I had three visitors, all men, one of whom was so worried when he heard what happened to me that he came without putting on a shirt and wore only a wife beater. His arms were full of books, my favorite gift, and the other two visitors were a little jealous when I hugged him and fussed over him because it was the dead of winter and 20 degrees outside and he'd gone to the store to buy the books for me without getting dressed. I don't know how, but I saw him shaving and then rushing out half dressed when he heard I was in jail. I smoothed the others' ruffled feathers by hugging them, too, but I was still worried over the first one.

One of the deputies, dressed in a nurse's uniform, brought over a tray with something that turned out to be a pitcher full of red juice and a stack of dirty cups. It was the "good stuff". I went to ask about clean cups and noticed that the door to our section of jail was open and the nurse was the only one about. She said there were no clean cups and that I'd have to wash them and one of my visitors insisted that he wouldn't drink out of anything that had just been washed and the staff would just have to provide clean china or crystal for us to use.

Then the matron came back in and she said she was surprised I had not joined the rest of the group outside in the sunshine where, she intimated, fraternization was allowed as long as we were discreet when we went into the woods to fetch the animals we had shot. Guns were involved. I felt quite left out because no one let me know and because I had the whole area to myself and could have indulged in a few kisses and caresses without any problems, except choosing which one.

I was quite drawn to my half-dressed visitor who looked remarkably like Josh Hartnett, but my heart belonged to the one who looked like Indiana Jones and I was quite fond of Indy's very proper dad, Henry Jones, Sr., aka Sean Connery.

I don't know what woke me, but I do know that I'm not very happy about it since this dream is now lost to me and the REM window is closed. Chalk it up to a weekend of watching The Black Dahlia and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Sexy, strong, adventuring men do it for me every time.

And, no, that wasn't the surprise this morning. The surprise was better than a dream.

That is all. Disperse.

Beggar's Night

Tonight, tonight is beggar's night. Don't be stingy and give them a bite -- or two.

I added the "or two" and changed it to them, but that is the rhyme Dad taught me when he took me out on my first Halloween a half-century ago. Sounds like a long time, but those memories are still as fresh as the night we dressed up and went on our first rounds.

This year I didn't buy candy because last year I ended up with too much candy and quite a few caramel apples when no one came. My porch light was on, but I haven't seen a single ghost, goblin, ghoul or princess since I moved here, or anywhere in the neighborhood since I moved to the Springs. Parents take their kids to shopping malls and schools to do their trick-or-treating or to parties where I doubt they still bob for apples; they don't take them around the neighborhood. How I miss that.

Someone sent me a Halloween gift, a coffin from the vampire club, and I'd like to thank them. Whoever you are, thank you. You made my Halloween brighter and a little bit more special.

As the moon rises full and bright in the dark sky and passes towards the far horizon, the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead thins and ghosts pass into our world. Treat them gently and feed them well, but let them go before the morning sun rises to dispell the dream. They are only here for one night. When we feed the apparitions who come to the door, we honor the dead and feed them.

Tonight I honor my father who loved Halloween as much as I and imparted a joy and happiness every day of the year with his stories and jokes and his ever present smile and laughter.

Happy Halloween, Dad.

He gave me music

Someone reminded me of how music connects us to each other and to the memories of the past, so I went back in time and pulled this from my memories.

"If music be the food of love, play on. Let me have surfeit of it that I may sicken and die." ~William Shakespeare - Twelfth Night

Music and love, interconnected. Informing and reforming. Music of the spheres -- celestial and human.

He gave me music.

Whenever our paths crossed he offered a new song, a new offering of love. We were in the moment, the heat of love and desire where it's hard to see or think. Thwarted desire clears the vision and let's you see the truth hidden in the lines.

Music swirls through your mind and heart, firing emotion and kindling desire. The meaning of the words are colored and distorted.

In disappointment you shed tears of loss and loneliness and sing the words while the music wraps you around with memories of thwarted love. Through the tears and pain the words take on a new meaning. You see the truth.

They weren't for you. They were words of his pain, his loneliness. They were meant for someone else. He offered them to you because he wanted to feel those emotions, feel that fire again. But it was a lie. You were a substitute. It was never meant to be.

The music was a gift, an offering of love, a remembrance and a plea to save him from loneliness, a dream of the past when love was innocent and young, new as the first crocus that pops its head above the snow with the first blush of color. A promise of the bright fire of living summer and the blazing death of autumn fighting for the last moment of sunshine and warmth.

Youth and innocence can be remembered. They cannot be recaptured. Experience and life change the color and music of innocence. Pain and loneliness mark innocence and youth. It is in the eyes, those deep windows to the soul. It's in the music when you listen. Desire and memories are in the music, too.

He offered me his heart, scarred by disappointment and loneliness, lost love and hope. It wasn't for me. We had changed too much. Innocence was gone. Time and tide battered our souls on the rocks. We needed understanding and were caught up in need and desire. It was an illusion, a mirage. An image of desire in the heated desert of loneliness. Reaching toward the soft shimmering shapes of our heart's deepest desire, we forget the desert, the relentless heat of the burning sun, the dry taste of defeat. It isn't in us to give up until we have been so battered by the pitiless sun and crushed by the waves of chance and circumstance all hope is gone.

Through the tears and pain I finally saw the truth. I was his first love. She was his last and still held his heart hostage. He didn't see it. He was caught in the mirage, the memory of innocent love past.

It's hard to forget your first love. Time softens the hard edges and mutes the glaring colors. It's harder to forget your last love because it's imprint is fresh and deep, hard and harsh and blinding. We look away from the glare toward the softer light of innocent love, first love. Last love, mature love leaves an indelible mark on our soul. It's there in the words wrapped around with pain and music.

He offered me music -- her music. He offered me love -- the love she spurned and he still carried like a torch in his heart. I kept the music and returned the love. It belongs to another. I still have the first love. She has the last. And I have my last love, mature love, the one I have waited for all my life.

Pain sweeps away innocence and leaves you scarred and raw. Pain also remodels your heart and makes you ready for the future. Pain opens the deep places where true love will take root and flourish. You can't plant the seed until the earth is wounded. Raw and bleeding it accepts the seed, nourishes it and gives birth to life, a flush of color that deepens and blazes with time until it produces seeds and roots to bring it life again and again until there is no more nourishment in the soil or the life giving sun of regard.

I remember the innocent love. I cherish the last love...mature everlasting strong and resilient true love.

Tarot: Dream a dream and work

After reading zombie stories, it was inevitable they would creep, or rather shamble, into my dreams, waking me up with a pounding pulse and a need to get away. The disorientation lasted a few seconds before sleep claimed me again, adding weights to my eyelids, body and limbs so that I was dragged back into the dream, but I was prepared for them. I changed the dream, shifting people and monsters, going down different roads and heading for more familiar territory until the dream was behind me. It's called lucid dreaming.

Dreaming can be a release, for writers a way to work out plot points and get closer to their characters (whether they want to or not) and a way for the unconscious mind to surface and pick up threads from every part of the conscious mind and memories to weave a fantastic tapestry of people, places and events that can heal, relax and scare the bejeezus out of the dreamer.

And dreams are a way to reach for more in the waking life. Dreams are also a place to start, but not a place to linger or end.



Asleep under a tree, the young man is dreaming, completely unaware of the full cups beside him or the full cup right in front of him. He's more intent on his dream than on what he already has or is given. The squirrel in the tree and the mouse in the grass are more curious about what's in the cups than the dreamer. The mouse and squirrel follow their instincts, but the dreamer is locked in his dream, dreaming his life away.

The young man is a romantic who is looking for something better to come down the road toward him or to find something better over the next hill, around the next corner, instead of seeing what is right in front of him. The Four of Cups symbolizes a quest for order and stability in a perfect world; it does not exist. The Four of Cups shows a disdain for reality, someone who is unwilling to see the gifts he has in plenty and more gifts offered, but keeps looking for something more, the ideal, ignoring the happiness he has and could have because he cannot see the difference the connection between his gifts and realities. There are no guarantees and expecting or demanding a guarantee will guarantee that what is right in front of you will disappear either because they were ignored or because someone with sense will pick them up and take them away.



Blind Justice has no power to harm, but holds the balance of karma in her own hands. Justice stands on the fulcrum between past and present, a guide, not an active force.

Past actions determine the present, but present actions can change the future. You cannot change the past, but you can change course and walk into a brighter future by what is decided at this moment, and this moment, and the next moment. The future is changeable. The past is fixed.

Look to the past to understand what created the present situations and take responsibility for your actions. Use that knowledge to make better choices for a better future. Learn from the errors and make choices based on the lessons of the past to realize and make a happier future a reality.



The Ace of Pentacles is the gift of resources: money, raw materials or time. Use skill and determination to make use of the available resources given and be grateful. Do not give in to the temptation to under value or squander the resources. Some resources are best used when they're offered. Don't hoard them or save them for a rainy day or when you have more time. There is no time like now.

Resources and gifts may seem mundane or not a true gift of the universe, but there are no coincidences and no accidents. As Einstein said, "God does not place dice with the Universe." The Ace of Pentacles offers a straight forward message: the riches of life are yours if you have the good sense to take them and use them. Don't waste time or money or the raw materials of talent or the earth because you only waste your own happiness. Remember the lesson of the weasel, take what's offered and don't look back.

* * *

My mother has always called me a dreamer and my quick response was that without dreamers she would still be huddled in a freezing cave gnawing raw meat from a sated lion's kill terrified of the snarls and growls just outside the cave entrance. Okay, it's a little more descriptive than I used to say, but not by much.

Yes, I'm a dreamer, but, even when it takes me a little while, I do make my dreams come true. I've walked the wrong paths, looking for something better, when I had everything I needed within my grasp. Luckily, I figured it out before I died.

* * *

Daria is a fortunate woman. She met an English duke who fell in love with her and offered her the world, and his heart. She cared for him deeply, but wasn't sure if he was the one. Still, she said yes to his proposal and followed him to his estate in England in the heart of the country where legends of Merlin are still told.

A great oak tree of massive size, centuries old, dominates the landscape. It is said that Merlin still sleeps within and waits for a woman willing to sacrifice everything to free him.

Daria and her duke have an argument and, as she has so many times in the past when happiness was within her grasp, she considers breaking off the engagement. Still angry and in tears, she takes a walk and ends up under Merlin's oak where she decides to sit and figure things out. Falling asleep, dreams of Merlin creep into her imagination and whisper that she is the woman who can set him free.

Awakened by workmen laughing and joking about cutting into Merlin's heart and seeing if the old oak bleeds, Daria begs them to wait until word can be sent to the duke. Daria refuses to leave the tree and convinces the foreman to send one of his men to find the duke. As she waits, it occurs to her that breaking off the engagement would seal the tree's doom and ruin any chance to free Merlin, so when the duke arrives she agrees to patch things up if he will give her the old oak as a wedding gift.

In order to save the oak, she must sacrifice her dreams and marry the duke, giving up any chance to free Merlin right away.

How do you think the story will end?

While you ponder the story and your own dreams, consider returning next week to see what stories the tarot cards will reveal. Until then, don't just dream it, be it.

Tarot: A sword divides past and present

The past and the present are tricky. Spend too much time in the past and waste the present. Spend too much time dealing with the present and ignoring the lessons and experiences of the past and life becomes one-dimensional. There has to be a balance, but how do we find that balance?

Today was an unbalanced day for me, but I finally managed to get it together and concentrate on today's tarot post. I am not surprised that Mercury is in retrograde because communications have been on the fritz. It was so much easier in the past, but it's best not to dwell in the past and risk losing what is available in the present, although it's nice to have the option. Or is it?



The Queen of Cups is intensely sensitive to others' feelings and can seem like she's reading their minds. In a way, she is a mind reader because she pays attention to the details. Don't let her romantic looks and the far away look in her eyes fool you. She is focused on a dream and, although she seems slightly tragic and moody, thinking about ill fated princesses in fairy tales, she is deeply concerned for the welfare of others. That is what gives her insight. She has been down those roads and knows what it feels like to be poor, in pain, loved and lost. She has done and felt it all.

The Queen of Cups' heart is engaged with deep concern for loved ones and her own emotional well being. She knows that things aren't perfect, but sees the sensual beauty of the life around her. Her message is simple: Look to the needs of the heart. Don't be bewitched or swayed by emotion and don't let emotion overshadow the truth or reality until the truth is no longer visible.

It's one thing to be concerned about people and another to be so arrogant and controlling that people are no longer allowed to make mistakes and learn from them. That is how people learn, but making mistakes and fixing them. It's a heady feeling playing god/dess, but it's not so heady for those who are smothered by such overly attentive care. Remember the butterfly struggling out of its cocoon. Help it and it dies. Let it struggle and it will be strong enough to feed itself and live to procreate.



In the garden of childhood, before Pandora came with her mysterious box full of hardship, woe and illness, children played in verdant fields and filled their cups with flowers and animals. It was an enchanted time. In the foreground of the Six of Cups is a cat. It is clearer and more real than the idyllic scene behind it. The cat is the present and the happy, laughing children are the past, a memory of happy times.

Memories are tricky. Memories can evoke happiness, warmth and security when life was young and innocent, inspiring us to share the nostalgic, romanticized remembrance of things past. Too much time spent reliving and remembering the past can cause profound sadness and disappointment with the current situation, fraught with the ills and evils that flew out of Pandora's chest of gifts for mankind. In memory, the past is always better than what is available now, but was it so wonderful? Were things so much better? Were there not problems to solve and people and situations that broke the heart?

The Six of Cups reminds us to pick and choose our memories careful and remember that time and distance, and current desires, have a tendency to color the past in soft, water washed colors. The way to deal with the past is to remember the good, accept the bad without question and balance it all with the needs of the present, use logic and reality to show the best path forward. If the past controls all actions, the path will never be clear and life will slip out of control. It's a matter of balance. Isn't it always?



A sharp sword cut through the Gordian knot and solved a riddle; it was the keen edge of intellect and the rational mind, the sign of the Ace of Swords. But with power comes danger. The Sword of Truth will cut through the toughest problems with ease. It is the tool of the complex mind and the mind is the key to controlling reality.

The Ace of Swords is the symbol of communication and the weapon of communication are words, words that can hurt as well as heal. The sword bring the gift of thought, a gift that grants the ability to see the world clearly, communicate effectively and create a happy and healthy environment, a stable reality. Sharp words spoken with unguarded thought can destroy it all. A clever wit is a blessing, but it can be a curse if it is used to hurt or destroy. With the Ace of Swords, the Sword of Truth confers the desire for honesty, and that is its guard and guide in order to know where and how to strike. It's in your hands.

* * *

A man sits at a bar drinking a glass of soda. He doesn't drink alcohol because he likes to remain in control. His world is about to spin out of control.

A group of men come up to him and address him but name. He doesn't know them and it turns out they don't know him. They've made a mistake. Someone with the same name is scheduled to appear and give a talk, but no one knows what he looks like. It's a subject with which he is familiar, and speaking to the group will make it possible to drag himself away from the edge of the abyss of despair and depression. He agrees to talk to the group and has such a good time an idea occurs to him.

His name is common and a quick Google search provides tens of thousands of men with the same name, many of whom are the same age, so why not try on their lives for a while, see what it's like had another path been chosen, and possibly find a life that makes him happier than his own. Research will provide enough background and he can relive his youth when anything in the world was possible before he chose the wrong path and ended up miserable and trapped in a marriage with a wife who doesn't respect him and controls his actions. He had a chance at love, but waited too long to take it. If he can't have love, he might as well have a little adventure . . . as long as no one gets hurt.

No doubt, my mood affects my creative vision today, but it happens. Best not to dwell on it. I still have next week and three new cards to tempt the muse. Where will the muse take you with these cards?

A painter's tale

Carolyn called me last night in tears. She is upset over her sister-in-law again.

Carolyn's SIL, Adele, is a woman who has it all -- great house, money in the bank (loads of money in the bank), a job she loves and is really good at, a husband, five well adjusted and happy children, a loving family and a lot of good friends who adore her -- but she is bored. Carolyn is a widow and has one daughter who has had to struggle a bit and is finally making a success of her life. Carolyn has had one dream her whole life, to have a show of her paintings at a gallery. She finally got her dream a few months ago and her show sold out.

Carolyn has been painting her whole life, but never thought she could be an "artist," yet she kept at it, giving up clothes, vacations and even little luxuries to buy canvas, brushes and paint. She leads a small life, but it's a valuable life and she has struggled for so many years to get where she is today. She deserves the success she has finally achieved.

Life has come very easily to Adele. She has had the support and backing of her very wealthy family her whole life. She has had everything she has ever wanted and really doesn't know how to struggle, but she's bored with it all. She has been heard to say that she could paint better than Carolyn, but she can't. She doesn't have the gift. She just wants what Carolyn has because Carolyn has finally become a success.

Adele is dissatisfied with her life, but Adele's biggest problem is jealousy. She has always seen Carolyn as beneath her. Carolyn isn't as smart and beautiful and socially acceptable as she and Adele has let her know in no uncertain terms. She considers her husband, Carolyn's brother, as the only worthwhile member of a degenerate family, and has watched Carolyn struggle for years, refusing to lend a hand or allow her husband to help financially, even though he has been very successful and has his own money. Adele cannot stand to see Carolyn succeed and she wants to put Carolyn in her place.

What is it with people who have so much that they cannot stand to see someone else get a taste of success, especially when they've given up everything to make it happen? Don't they already have enough? Why do they feel the need to ruin it for everyone else?

Jealousy.

Carolyn and I have been friends for thirty years and we have been through some very difficult times together. She has been married a few times and finally found a man who loved and respected her. They had a happy life for just two years before he was killed in a convenience store robbery when he went in for coffee one morning. Carolyn was devastated and I didn't think she was going to be able to handle his death, but she did, and she did more than survive, she lived.

She encouraged me when I had almost given up the idea of having my books published, and she refused to let me give her a copy of my novel. She wanted to buy a copy. That was a very easy dedication to write. She didn't even chide me when she saw I had acknowledged Louise and not her because she said she didn't really do anything except listen. When I dedicated my book to everyone who has ever wanted to rewrite the past, I had Carolyn in mind, and so many others, and she understood. So, how could I not be there for her now?

I didn't have any magical solution to her dilemma, but I did have a smidgen of advice. Even though Adele has used her influence to get the same gallery to show her paintings, and no doubt her loyal friends will buy a few, she cannot take away what Carolyn has achieved. No one can. Adele would be dissatisfied no matter what she does because there is always someone else's thunder to steal to make sure she always stands in the spotlight center stage. All Carolyn can do is keep painting from her heart and forget anything but enjoying her own life. To worry about what Adele will try to co-opt next would only make Carolyn miserable; she'd always be looking over her shoulder instead of ahead. Her first show was a sell-out and the critics raved about her paintings. No one can take that away from her, not even Adele.

The reason Adele is so unhappy and jealous is because she's never really worked for what she has. She doesn't know what it means to sacrifice everything to achieve success. It has all been handed to her on a platinum tray. She wouldn't be so bored if she actually had to suffer or to struggle for something, and she wouldn't like it either. She wasn't made to suffer. Beautiful, privileged people seldom are.

I told Carolyn to think of it this way, if she wasn't such an amazing and talented person, Adele wouldn't deign to notice her. It's a mixed blessing, but Adele, for all her beauty, wealth and advantages, will never have the sense of peace that Carolyn knows. That only comes with achieving something after working hard. It's called sweat. Adele doesn't sweat. Too bad, a little sweat can be sweet.

Tarot: Drunk on the moon

One of the questions most writers are asked is "Where do you get your inspiration?" I usually respond by asking, "Where do you not find inspiration?" Maybe it is peculiar to writers, but everything I see, hear and read provides inspiration. Today, it's the tarot cards.

Nice segue, don't you agree?



"O, swear not by the moon, the inconstant moon, that monthly changes in her circled orb." Juliet, in Romeo and Juliet chided Romeo not to be inconstant like the moon who shows first one face and then another, much like most men believe women do. The moon -- and women -- are constant, although the light shines on them in varying degrees, sometimes in shadow and sometimes in full light. The moon reflects the sun's light, playing hide and seek with the sun, its opposite, behind Earth.

The moon speaks to the soul, stirring our deepest fears and haunting our nightmares. The moon also shines a light on our best dreams. It is a shining beacon in the night that inspires us to romance and changes the way we view the world and ourselves. Thomas Harris, through Hannibal Lecter, asked an FBI agent if they had seen blood outside under the moon. It's black, he said. Fresh blood is shiny, liquid night under the moon's glow. On the nights of the full moon snow is blue and the world is faintly tinged by blue light, a much smaller arc of the full spectrum of light that the sun provides. You must be careful when viewing anything under the moon's glow or listening to whispers in the night, they are shadowy messages that might not hold up in the full light of day.

Some believe the moon brings on madness -- lunacy (lunar madness) -- and some believe the moon calls forth the savage nature inherent in the soul. We can be certain of nothing under the moon's influence. It shows only half the story, half the truth, but where there is light, there is truth, and even a half truth can be more satisfying than a lie.

The card shows the moon above a clockwork chronometer that measures the movements of Sun, Earth and Moon, ticking away in measured movement. Yes, the moon shows us a different face every night, but it is the same face that a lunar month from now it will show us again. Everything that goes around comes around. As above, so below. What at first seems like deception and inconstancy is just the face of the moment, that point in an ever changing cycle that has at its heart a regularity by which clocks and stonehenges keep time.



Beneath the bloody light of dawn, a man kneels, hands clasped, grief clear upon his face. He is grieving, mourning a loss. Is his loss connected with the contents of the three cups that lay empty and on their sides next to him? Why does he not see the full cups behind him? He has not lost all, although the loss seems greater than he can bear. He is so sunk in despair and grief that he is oblivious to what he still has, to what he has always had.

When I look at the Five of Cups, I think of a man who has a good life. He is successful and he has been successful in his life, although not without sacrifice. He is a knight of middle years who has no doubt seen death and destruction, often at his own hands, through many wars, and he is still alive and well. Three-fifths of his life is gone and it seems he can see nothing but what is over and done. He cannot see that he still has two-fifths of his life to live, years full of happiness and joy, cups full to the brim that will satisfy his thirst and his needs. He is too sunk in misery to care or to see, concentrating on what he does not have instead of enjoying what he does have.

If his grief continues, he will waste his life in mourning, prolonging the drama and the grief until it is little more than a bid for attention, a minor melodrama blown up to the proportions of tragedy when there is no tragedy. Yes, he has lost someone or something dear to him, but so much more remains. The long night is over. The moon has set and there is daylight coming up over the horizon. Will he look up at the new day , drag himself up out of his depression and pick up the life remaining to him or will he choose passive suicide and deny himself the comfort that lies waiting within his reach?



There is no way to look at the Three of Cups and not be filled with excitement and laughter and pure joy? Three dancers dressed in bright colors celebrate the bounty of life and love. Blue is the color of the swords, the color of the sky, the element of air and inspiration. Green is the color of the bountiful earth, lush and fertile and full of life, the symbol of the pentacle and success. Red is the color of fiery passion and emotion, the symbol of the wands.

The cups overflow with golden waters, a fountain of youth and vigor, full of life and joy. This fountain of golden cups stands in the endless sea from which the depths of emotion flow. Emotional experience binds the past, present and future, giving birth to and nurturing inspiration until it becomes the achievements that bring joy and happiness. However, it takes time to celebrate and appreciate achievement, whether yours or someone else's, and attention must be paid. Acknowledge your own achievements, and do it with joy and true happiness, but don't forget to celebrate the achievements of those around you without rancor or jealousy. We are all connected, like the fountain of cups that support the graceful dance of air, earth and fire among the waters of eternity. To celebrate another's success does not lessen your own unless you ignore their pleasure to hoard what you have. Like seeds in a dank and cobwebbed cellar, nothing grows that stays in the dark underground. Seeds need light and warmth and water while they lie in the earth before they tap the energy at their heart and send forth tiny tendrils to seek out nourishment and the sun. Sitting on a dusty shelf, the seeds like dormant, their energy and life untapped, their potential wasted.

Don't focus on your own problems, no matter how pressing they may seem. Practice gratitude and reach beyond yourself and you will soon see what develops.

As I chose the cards for today's column, the overwhelming grief of the knight in the Five of Cups and the Moon card provided a strange sort of inspiration. I envisioned a man who had lost the love of his life. Kneeling by the deathbed of his lover, he swore to never see the sun again. He leaves her and sets fire to the house, the flames licking high in the blackness of the night toward the faint sliver of light on the night of the dark moon. It is a night of dark omens as he sets out in his limousine and orders his chauffeur to drive west, following the path of the moon. His driver keeps pace with the dark, shadowed orb above, chasing down the moon.

The man is wealthy, beyond wealthy, and he can afford to chase the moon. By plane, by ship and by car, he follows the moon around and around the globe, sleeping and eating when the demands of his body get beyond his control, but never seeing the sun again. Under cloudy skies or clear, always under the moon, he sails in the shadowy world of waxing and waning moonlight, a slave to his grief, trying to outrun the dawn. He knows deep in his mourning heart that if he fails and the sun rises, then his lover is indeed gone and he must go on without her. As long as he follows the moon and never lets her out of his sight, he is safe. The night will never end and time will forever stand still.

The waning moon, not far from full, filled my head with dark thoughts and, under its influence, I dreamed of shadows and grief. How do today's cards and the moon inspire you?