Let's play 20 questions

Actually, it's Common Ties that is now devoted -- for now -- to 20 questions. They have suspended all poetry and essay submissions until further notice. If you're into art and would like to submit something for the Orphans they have quite a few waiting. Orphans are stories that have no art. CT even offers descriptions to give artistic creativity a boost. Looks interesting and if I had the supplies I would give it a shot. I might consider putting together some friends and acquaintances and doing a little photo shoot -- if I can find the time between now and Yule week since I'm going to be out of town and incommunicado for a week or so.

I did check out the questions and came up with eleven answers this morning. Since I've published with them before I have a very good chance of having a few of my submissions selected. The really hard part was telling a story in 50 words or less. Talking about paring down prose.

After a few weeks of dithering and letting the creative juices flow, I've decided to try a bit of flash fiction since there is a wide open market and the chances of being published are greater than with full length fiction and novellas. It's also a great way to make a first sale to a tough market as long as a story can be told in 500-1000 words (sometimes even less) and still retain the descriptive impact and flow of the story. I have a couple of stories kicking around in the back of my brain that have been nudging me and telling me they're flash fiction. I guess we'll see. One more thing to add to my writing to-do list during my vacation.

I have found that making up a To-Do list with deadlines, subjects, etc. is a great way to kick start the creative engine by giving me deadlines. I only put paying markets on my list and most of them are high paying markets. It's the high jump of writing and publishing, but you never get over the high bar without quite a bit of practice and perseverance, and the list provides that. As it nears the end of the year (I started the list a few months ago), I have made more submissions in the past six months and sold more stories than I have in a long time, so at least it works for me. Now it's time to get back to the reading. I have more reviews to write this weekend and I might even come up with a couple more submissions for the 20 questions.

That is all. Disperse.

Let it snow

A little fell last night and now it's snowing again, soft bits of down and sugar sifting out of the sky and covering everything. It's about time. I've waited for this for a couple of months and I'm glad it finally arrived. I'm definitely a swan when it comes to the cold.

For the first time in two years I'm getting comments about the newsletter. There were two corrections -- I can always count on those coming in first -- and more positive comments about the latest issue. It's a big one at 42 pages, but that's only available through E-mail and as a download on the web. The print version is a much smaller (only 12 pages and two are throw aways) issue. One ham wrote to thank me for cleaning up his grammar and making the article flow. It's what I do. I clean up everyone's articles, even the president's monthly column. These are hams (engineers mostly) and not writers so their command of written English is not up to par -- at least not on my course -- which is why the newsletter has won national awards and recognition over the past two years. Nice to know someone is reading it outside the city and the local ham club group. From what I've been told, there are more people downloading the newsletter than ever before, probably to see what I'm up to each month. I stayed in the background until recently and have written more articles and profiles and have begun writing a monthly column to let readers of the print edition know about the changes and differences between print and online versions, and also to make some much needed points about volunteerism, responsibility and recognition. One comment mentioned my inciteful and insightful editorial, writing that what I wrote needed to be said and couldn't have been said better. Nice to know someone was paying attention.

This month will be a month of birthdays and deaths once again. Beanie's oldest boy turned 21 on the 2nd, the same day my granddaughter, Savannah, turned six. The 21st is Beanie's youngest boy's birthday and he will be 17 and already more than a handful. will celebrate her birthday on the 17th and I don't want to forget her or a one-time friend who moves deeper into 40-something territory. Any birthday, even a frenemy's birthday, should be celebrated and remembered, especially in the wake of the alternative.

My brother-in-law, Tommy Baker, just 68 years old, died yesterday and I got the new by email. I haven't seen him in years and probably the last time was at a funeral, which seems to be the only time our families get together any more. Tommy's death leaves his brother Jerry the only one of their family still around. Tommy was the good one, the smart one, and Jerry was, well, Jerry. Tommy will be missed and it's sad to know so many of my family are falling prey to time and tide this year.

As the snow sifts silently down and covers everything in a hushed white blanket of cold, it is a reminder that at another time and in another place it would be life giving rain nourishing crops and providing drink. The water is locked in delicate crystals but will eventually change beneath the sun's warmth and become water once again, swelling rivers and creeks in a rushing white wake that will take it back to nourish field, flock and folks where it will be recycled over and over again as rain and eventually as snow, ever changing and ever living, a prism to reflect the light in colored arcs or white field struck with gem bright sparks.

We don't need you...

...and we're not sure we need you either.

An old friend mentioned something yesterday that made me stop and think. He said more and more women are staying single because they don't need men to support them. I guess you could say that marriage is a buyer's market and the buyers have changed. Too bad men haven't changed, and that may be the whole point.

Women have put men through their paces since they became financially independent and the whole women's movement in the sixties seems to have disenfranchised men in a lot of ways. What it all comes down to is that men probably aren't much different now than they ever were and women are willing to put up with less since they don't need men to support them, making women the buyers instead of men. Once upon a time, men were the buyers choosing which women would give them the best chance of propagating their species -- or continuing their line, if you prefer. Rich men wanted not only a good breeder but a woman who looked good, a beautiful ornament for their arm or their table. Now the tables have turned and women want someone who looks good, a beautiful ornament for their table or on their arm, and a good income sweetens the pot. They also want men who make them feel good and don't give them too much trouble. Kind of puts things in a different perspective.

Since divorce is not only legal but fairly easy to get, it's like the sword of Damocles over a couples' heads and hovers dangerously over the head of the weaker partner in a relationship, except the weaker partner isn't always the one with control of the purse strings. Makes an interesting situation, no? Definitely something to think more about.

That is all. Disperse.

Tin Man Lacks More Than Heart

I'm a little behind in my TV watching but that always happens when I'm busy and it's only part of the beauty of downloading shows to my laptop because I can watch them when I have the time. I'm not chained to a network schedule. Anyway, I watched part one of Tin Man this morning before the first yawn of doom dawn. The show is interesting but lacking.

Tin Man turns L. Frank Baum's Oz on its ear and unzips its head, metaphorically and actually, that is, if Oz actually had an ear or a head. Dorothy Gale has become D.G. and the familiar trio of companions (scarecrow, tin man and cowardly lion) have become a head case, tin man and basket case. The basket case sees the past and the future, a hairy psychic. D.G., played by Zooey Deschanel (yes, her name is actually Zooey) has the emotional range of someone on Thorazine whose face was recently injected with Botox. She's active and physical in a mousy way, but her facial expressions and vocal range of emotions are barely perceptible and blunted. She is pretty and petite, but looks aren't everything, especially in this role where someone with real presence is needed. She is not, after all, playing a patient in a mental ward strapped into a strait jacket in a padded cell and shot full of Thorazine, or at least she shouldn't be.

Other than that, the landscape, characters and props are worth watching, especially Richard Dreyfuss as the Mystic Psychic, aka the Wizard of Oz.

That is all. Disperse.

Unraveling patterns

It is said you never realize what you truly have until you've lost it. That's not necessarily true. I knew even before I took my laptop in to be fixed what I was about to lose and the least of it was just the computer. It was the familiarity and the comfortable feel of the keyboard, the weight of it on my lap, the heat from the CPU on my left leg just above the knee and knowing where everything is. It's smaller than the loaner and some of the decals are worn away from all the typing I do, but it's mine.

I crave change -- shaking up the ant farm as my ex-husband would say -- and am not comfortable doing the same things the same way and at the same time every day, and yet I am a creature of habit like everyone else. I fall asleep reading a book in bed and wake up in the middle of the night, still half asleep, to turn off the light, sometimes still dressed. There is something almost alien about getting into a bed that is made that makes me feel like I'm a guest in someone else's house. I don't wear my contacts unless I'm going somewhere. If I'm going out, I wait until a couple hours before I have to leave to take a shower. I go barefoot most of the time but will put on shoes and socks to go downstairs to check the mail. I live alone so there's no one else to accommodate but the reluctance to shake up the ant farm and move away from the comfortable and familiar is obvious because it imparts a sense of being in the right place, and it's amazing how even the most difficult and uncomfortable situations can feel safe and familiar.

Take prisoners who have been incarcerated for a long time. Once the routines that define their limited lives is gone prisoners feel lost and out of place. It's hard to establish a new routine and many freed prisoners will find a way to either get back inside or develop relationships with controlling people in order to get back to some semblance of what they consider order. Even captives fall into this same mind set called the Helsinki syndrome, but it's just a human need for familiarity.

The reason this is on my mind this morning is because of a pattern I recognized and talked about with Beanie yesterday. She shares the same pattern and for the same reasons, and all this was stirred up by a post written by one of my LJ denizens. If I were in therapy, this would be called a breakthrough. I begin to see that therapy is a directed probe designed to spotlight patterns so they can be changed if they're destructive and reinforced if they're positive. Writing and talking with others is my therapy and I see all kinds of things to change, enhance and accept.

Breaking out of the pattern, shaking up the ant farm, is a good thing, sort of like spring cleaning when you move all the furniture, take down the curtains and drapes to wash them and dust the woodwork they've hidden, clean out closets and throw away anything that's not useful or doesn't fit, dust the ceiling fan blades and root out the cobwebs wherever they are.

Yesterday, I broke out of my pattern and stopped downtown at Poor Richard's. As I walked up the street I recognized someone coming from Poor Richard's, Tommy from Mountain Mama's deli. "I know you," I said as we walked closer to each other. "Yes, you do," he said.

"I have something for you and Robin."

He told me he had forgotten when I said I was coming in on Tuesday that he was off that day, so what a pleasant surprise to find him when I had the books I was loaning him and Robin in the car. We walked back to the car and I gave him two of the books, showed him my address label inside and told him he could swap the books with Robin when he was finished and give them back when I came into the store. He was pleased with the books and I'm glad I could share them. When I got to Mountain Mama's I gave the other book to Robin and told her I had seen Tommy downtown and explained about the books, and all because I changed my pattern.

The beginning of the month I pick up the ham club newsletter at the printers, park near a mailbox, put on the labels, stamps and mailing disks and put them in the mailbox, drop off a few copies at Mike's house, go to Mountain Mama's to pick up a few things, to the grocery story to shop and then home to put everything away. Yesterday, I went from the mailbox to pick up my laptop then downtown and then to Mountain Mama's, but the changes didn't stop there. I did not go to the grocery store and I stopped off to get a bacon cheeseburger for a change of pace before I went home. It seems like a small change, but any change is a good one if it clears the cobwebs.

Even though my life little resembles a rut, I can get stuck in patterns that don't seem like patterns from the outside. They are still patterns, but at least I know they're there and can change them when I exert myself, something I am often unwilling to do since the familiar feels comfortable and safe. Just like forgetting where the delete button is on my laptop and reaching for where the delete button is on the loaner that I had to use for a month, it's easy to get into a rut, form a habit even in such a short time as four weeks. It will take a few days before I no longer have to stop myself reaching for the wrong key to delete something and the old pattern settles back into place. Learning to type without looking at the keys or stopping to think where a certain letter is on the keyboard is a pattern, one that has been reinforced daily for nearly forty years, like the 20+ years I spent keypunching on machines where the numbers were in a certain sequence and using the keypad on computer keyboard that is upside down. I have to stop and remember (just for a nanosecond) that the 1-2-3 is at the bottom and not the top before hitting the keys, overlaying muscle memory developed by decades of daily use. It slows me down and I am not comfortable at slow speeds, at least not where typing and keying are concerned -- or even reading.

Most of the books I review are fluff and I receive very few literary novels. A literary novel forces me to slow down to savor the dense imagery and word play when I am more used to racing through the pages and writing my review shortly afterward. What usually takes a few hours or even a day becomes a whole week with a literary novel. It's like wading through mud as opposed to skimming over a hard-packed, well traveled trail and can be daunting, the difference between literary and fluff posing as literary patently obvious. I enjoy a good literary novel but I am glad to get back to the familiar fluff when I'm finished because I don't have to work as hard or think as much, and I'm not sure that's a good pattern yet. Maybe I need more fiber in my diet and fewer literary calories taken from junk food books, and yet the junk food tastes so good.

That is all. Disperse.

In passing

Yesterday, I received an email from someone I didn't know and almost deleted it, but something told me to read it -- probably the subject: Benson Wolman. The email was from one of Benson's colleagues at the ACLU in Columbus, Ohio. He died yesterday. I was contacted because I interviewed Benson for an article about a case he had coming up before the U. S. Supreme Court. He was defending the Ku Klux Klan. What was most surprising to me is that Benson was Jewish. The time I spent interviewing him was delightful and we ran well over the 30 minutes he originally offered, neither of us willing to end things. He was my first professional interview, but not my last, and the newspaper ran the picture I took of him in the conference room at the Columbus ACLU in front of a poster of the American flag.

Benson was in his late fifties at that time and had decided to go back to college to get his law degree. He retired and wanted to do more with his life, so he studied law. He made Law Review and was hired by the ACLU, making his dream come true. I asked him why a Jew would consider defending the Ku Klux Klan, especially considering the Klan's stand on where Jews fit in the scheme of things, and he told me what his rabbi told him.

The thing about democracy and freedom is that it entitles everyone to their own opinions and politics. It is the most aggravating thing about democracy and freedom of speech, but it's also the most wonderful thing. Freedom of speech means everyone is allowed to say what they want, whether you agree with them or not, and only in a country like ours will you find people at opposite ends of the political spectrum defending each other's right to speak.

Benson Wolman was a remarkable man and a champion for freedom and justice. I am proud to have known him and to have interviewed him.

I had no idea Benson Wolman had kept up with my writing or that his colleagues at the Columbus ACLU read my articles, stories and books. Now I know.

Nothing matters

Everybody gets angry but it's what you do with your anger that makes a difference in how it affects you and the people around you. It's all right to get angry. It's just an emotion after all, like love, fear, excitement, lust, etc. It's no worse or no better than any other emotion; it's just another emotion, and emotions are like power, neither positive or negative, neutral until you use them. Like everyone else, sometimes my emotions control me -- and then I get smart. Reading Ayn Rand reminds me of what is and isn't important. In this case, it's emotions.

Whether or not I publish another story or book or even get paid for my writing, I am first and foremost (and will always be) a writer because I write. I was a writer when I was eight years old creating stories and writing books based on the world around me and on the authors I read. I was a writer when I wrote essays and won prizes in my pre- and adolescence. I was a writer when I kept a diary and wrote in it every day. I was a writer when I stopped putting my thoughts on paper and kept them in my head like screenplays of dreams. I am still a writer and I will always be a writer as long as I continue to write. Nothing and no one can change that, not even being a successful writer whose stories and books are bought and published. Everything I do that pertains to writing makes me a writer -- even my dreams where characters use my unconscious state to their advantage and tell me where I'm wrong and right and where I need to go to make their stories real. Sometimes I forget and lose sight of these facts, allowing others to determine how I view myself when they attack out of anger and I become angry in turn.

Anger, like fear, comes from a feelings of inadequacy, jealousy and not wanting to be discovered as a fraud. Anger is a protection mechanism, a drive to fight or flee in order to maintain the status quo. In a metabolic and physiological sense, anger and fear serve important functions. They accelerate heart rate, fuel adrenalin secretion and provide the energy necessary to fuel the actions of fighting or running away. When anger and fear are turned inward they poison the waters like the seeping gases of a volcano unable to erupt and vent heat and gas to avoid total destruction. It's like putting a cork in an anus when you have explosive diarrhea; the result is never good and inevitably damages more than if it had been allowed to run -- metaphorically and actually. Pent up emotions, even love and lust, always create more problems when they're unleashed, especially for the one who's holding them in. Look around and you will see daily examples in every walk of life, and even in your own household. Controlling emotions instead of feeling them is never a good idea, which is not to say that dumping your feelings on whomever happens by is a good idea either. Emotions are meant to be felt and used in constructive ways, but they are meant to be felt and used.

In the past, I've allowed other people's opinions matter to me. They don't. The only things that matter are what I think of myself and what I achieve with my talents and skills as I learn and grow. It's hard not to allow negative opinions and the slings and arrows of jealous and angry people bent on protecting themselves to affect your life, but it can be done. And it should be what everyone does. It takes courage and turning a blind eye to ill-wishers, and that's not always easy. It gets easier with time and practice, like anything else worth doing and learning. In the end, nothing else matters.

It's nice to get a pat on the back from people who admire what you do and it can hurt -- if you allow it -- when others criticize and demean your work and you. Opinions are strictly subjective and are personal, but they don't have to be taken personally.

For instance, I read and review a lot of books. Some of them I don't like and feel are poorly written and I say so, but it is ultimately only my opinion. Others will disagree, including some of the authors. That's not the purpose of a review. A review is like sticking your toe in the water to check the temperature. If you have a fever, even warm water will feel cold. If you're freezing, cold water will feel warm. A review is one person's opinion and the fact that I get paid for my opinion doesn't change the fact that it's still just one opinion and is related wholly to my own experience, education and expertise. I don't understand some kinds of art, but that doesn't change their value or their intrinsic worth. The same is true for my detractors. Their opinion is completely subjective and based entirely on their own views and personality. In the end, the only thing that matters is the work, my work, and my vision and how I express that vision.

Roark tells Ellsworth Toohey in The Fountainhead that he doesn't think of him even though Toohey has gone out of his way to destroy Roark's work in the public's eyes. Roark can't get work and no one in New York City will hire him even though he is undeniably a genius and the most talented and innovative architect around. Toohey revels in his power to destroy Roark's professional life, but Toohey only has the power Roar is willing to give him, and Roark doesn't give Toohey any power. Men and women who can think for themselves and are not slaves to Toohey and his kind go out of their way to find and employ Roark to build for them and eventually Roark is back in New York City with a thriving business at the top of his profession. He never gave in to Toohey and narrow-minded people who follow him in worshiping mediocrity.

Professionally or personally, genius and talent and ability will, like cream, rise to the top as long as fear and anger aren't allowed to gain a foothold. The person may not be liked or even accepted, but they do not exist for the masses or with the rest of those wallowing in mediocrity. Genius and talent, real talent, will not be denied.

Being liked is nice. Staying true to who and what you are is better. Using your gifts without regard to public or private opinion is all that matters.

I keep The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged on the shelf and I reread them every couple of years to remind myself that no one and nothing matters except the work -- for me, that's writing. What I have accomplished and continue to accomplish is out there for anyone with eyes and a mind to see and my work will stand the test of time. Fame and fortune are nice and bring with them comfort, but the real power comes from the work, the writing, and being who and what I am. As long as I keep that in mind, nothing anyone says or does can touch me or destroy me. Nothing else matters as long as I can write -- on paper, on a computer or even in my head. I write, therefore I am.

That is all. Disperse.

Do you really know me?

Uncle Bob called again yesterday and we talked. He wanted to thank me for the stories I sent him and to let me know what he thought of them. "This one story sounds a lot like your mom with the migraines."

I knew which one he meant. "It is Mom."

"Sounds just like her. I was just rereading the story about Brandon. I didn't cry when Mom and Dad died because they were old; they had lived their lives. When your mom called and told me about Brandon I broke down and cried. Reading your story took me back there."

He meant, The Phone Call. I wrote the story about Beanie's first child Brandon who died of SIDS. It's a story I haven't sent my mother because she still can't handle talking about Brandon let alone reading about him.

Uncle Bob and I talked about Dad and he said he wouldn't have stayed with Mom fifteen minutes and that Dad was a special man. "There will never be another Jim Cornwell," he said. He's right. Uncle Bob told me about how he never changed a diaper or bathed any of his kids. "I babysat but I told Lois I wasn't changing any diapers." And he didn't. He's not that way with his grandchildren and he's changed a few diapers since then. He has mellowed with the years. "Jim bathed you kids and washed and curled your hair. Virginia called and said she hadn't bathed any of you."

Knowing my grandmother as I did, I wonder how both of her children could have failed to learn how to or want to care for a child since she was so nurturing and loving. Then again, Gram did everything for her children and didn't make them learn what she knew. That is a shame.

I didn't know Mom didn't bathe us or shampoo and curl our hair. I did know Dad did all those things because I remember sitting still while he curled my hair around his thick, work roughened hands making banana curls like Shirley Temple. I can still see him changing Jimmy's and Tracy's diapers and walking the floor singing and talking to them when they were teething or colicky or just plain fussy. I knew Mom burned water when she boiled it because both my parents told me about it -- so did Grandma -- and that still surprises me because Grandma was an excellent cook.

We talked about Grandma's cooking and Uncle Bob told me how he called her one day to get her recipe for beef and noodles and asked how she made the noodles, which she always made from scratch. When his kids got home from school and found dinner on the table they asked if Grandma had been out. "No. I made dinner." His kids didn't believe him so they called Grandma and asked. "No," she said, "your dad made dinner. I wasn't there."

"I never saw Mom look up a recipe. She kept them all in her head," Uncle Bob said as we talked about our favorite recipes and finding we had several in common: lemon meringue pie with golden peaks piled high over a sweet-tart lemon filling, creamed chipped beef on toast and her pies. "Mom used lard in her pie crust. Said it made them flakier," he said. Gram's cooking wasn't heart healthy but it was filling and better than ambrosia of the gods, which she made.

By today's standards, Gram's cooking was pedestrian fare but when I think of holidays and crave comfort food, it's Gram's food I want. One of these days I'll perfect her peach cobbler and I think I can do it now. What's missing is lard for the double crust and it's something I never considered before. My brother Jimmy bakes a good peach cobbler and even makes it in a cast iron skillet, but it's not the same. The crust isn't right. Now I know why.

I remember Gram picking green beans and tomatoes from the little garden plot she had in the back yard wherever she lived. She grew beans and corn and tomatoes, radishes, green onions, and peas in the early spring, planting them as soon as she could push a seed into the frozen ground. We strung beans with newspapers on our laps sitting on the porch and we talked. She taught me to pit cherries with a bobby pin and how to make grape jelly from the grapes that grew on the arbor in the back yard when we lived on Terrace Avenue in Columbus. I learned to strip corn off the cob, can tomatoes and preserve the harvest in freezer and jar and I learned to love simple food that lingers in the memory long after I can no longer taste it on my tongue, food that takes me back to the warmth of Gram's kitchen and the joy that comes from making jelly rolls with leftover pie crust she gave me to practice on.

At times like this, I long to return to familiar places and times, but most surprising is what my uncle said before we said goodbye last night. "You should move home and be close to family. If something happened to you who would take care of you?" After losing so much of our family, I understand his concern, but there is no going back for me or for any of us. The people who held our family together -- Grandma May and Dad -- are gone. They were the homemakers, the nurturing warmth that welcomed and cheered us and we miss them. I miss them. I miss talking to my uncle, too, but we are no longer the close-knit family we once were. We have grown up and moved on and out and we miss those familiar golden times when we gathered together at holidays or for a Sunday dinner and shared our lives and our food. I am blessed because I can remember those times and keep them alive in the stories I write and the food my grandmother taught me to make. I have surpassed her in some ways and fearlessly tried new foods and recipes, but I always return to what she taught me for comfort and to honor her memory, but most of all to bring back those times with the scent and taste of home.

There is much about my family I don't know and much they don't know about me, but at least they are willing to read my words and get a little closer, sharing their memories of the people and places I write about and teaching me what matters to them and what they keep close to their hearts.

The count is in...

I still have a few more thousand (or so) words to write, but it is official. As of 9:42 a.m., Sunday, November 25, 2007, my count on
NaNoWriMo 2007 was validated as 92,453 and I am a ...












I feel so good about getting so much done in spite of a harrowing work schedule and writing articles, reviews and editing a much, much meatier newsletter that I am going to start on another book for December, one I will finish during my holiday retreat. Who knows? I may do what a friend once told me I could do -- write a book a month. Anything is possible right now.

That is all. Disperse.

And then came the rains...

After two years of slogging uphill alone, people are finally starting to catch on and send in articles and requests to write columns for the local ham club newsletter. I have beaten the bushes for two years and managed to buttonhole only a few people and now the flood gates are opening. I have two new columns in the December issue and a new format for the web version that has been applauded as innovative. I don't know why they're surprised since I mentioned changing things months ago. All I needed were the articles and features that would work well on the web and I finally found them. Editing a club newsletter is nothing like editing a magazine and dealing with professionals who at least know how things work. It looks like my article about free lunches and keeping the lights on had an impact on people and they realize how close they came to having to find someone else to edit their newsletter. Sometimes it takes a wake-up call and a blast of cold water in the face when asleep to make people realize what they could lose.

The up side of all this is that I've managed to dissuade the club members from buying my Xmas dinner at the annual party or giving me a plaque or award. I think they finally understand I don't want recognition but input because that tells me they want to be involved. It's so easy sometimes to sit back and let someone else do the job, especially when the job they're doing is so good no one feels like they have anything to contribute, but if there is one thing I think I have proven it's that everyone has a story to tell and that the story can be interesting and enlightening. The readers have seen how something they thought was insignificant can be made significant and give people something to think and talk about. If this trend continues, I won't have to write too many more editorials and can stick to interviews, profiles and articles.

Out of all this hassle came a couple opportunities to break into completely new markets. A staff writer on the Wall Street Journal suggested I send my work to him to give to his editor to be published. He said I am a very good writer with a flair for profiles. Not too shabby considering it was his article that got me asking questions of one of his profile subjects and getting a different take on the story, but my focus was ham radio and Morse code and his was only peripherally so. He told me he was impressed. Not too shabby.

I also offered a longer version of the article, with pictures, to QST which is the ARRL's magazine and I'll get paid for that, too. One of the things I love most about writing is how accessible some stories can be if you change the slant just a little. I've gotten quite a bit of mileage out of an idea when I turned it around just a little bit or took some information and dug around in a different direction.

I thought about sending some of my articles to QST but ruled it out because I didn't have the time, but I found out it didn't take that much time. So, I'm going to profile a few more interesting people, like the guy who backpacks with his goats when he takes his radios into the field, and the mini-keyer that went to St. Peter's Island on a DXpedition (that's long distance radio expedition for the uninitiated). I have found yet another avenue to market my work and expand my base audience doing what I do best -- writing about people. And that's just one of the things I am so grateful for having, not just at Thanksgiving, but every day.

In many ways, it's like a crab venturing out of a cramped shell in search of a bigger, roomier shell and finding it no longer needs the shell at all and has evolved past the need of confined quarters.

That is all. Disperse.

Green-eyed vision

I just read an email from NaNoWriMo from a writer that suggests jealousy is a good writing boost. In some ways, she is right and jealousy does motivate people, but sometimes the green-eyed monster can do more harm than good, especially when it comes own to deciding who had an idea first and who helped whom.

Make no mistake, the baser emotions -- hate, jealousy, revenge, etc. -- do have their place but in moderation, as in all things. What usually happens though is that the person who is jealous can take things to extreme, even to the point of claiming someone else's work and ideas as their own and, depending on the forum in which the claims are made, can cause strife, bad feelings and, in some extreme cases, bloodshed. But let's forget about the bloodshed and concentrate on some lesser forms of devastation -- credibility.

Anyone who claims another's idea as their own is a very low form of life on a par with parasites and sycophants. It is possible the only thing worse is making the claim in such a way so that the thief cannot be called out or called to account because the person whose ideas and work have been stolen would end up looking like a liar and a whiny bitch, neither of which are good looks on anyone.

Example 1: Nick is new to a job and he wants to make his mark and show his enthusiasm and abilities. He starts by asking the same questions everyone new to the company asks and gets the same answers. A colleague, Maria, has been with the company for a couple years and has turned her department around. No one tells her she's doing a good job and the few complaints made loudly when she first began the have been silenced by the great work she has done. Nick sees Maria as the person to challenge because she hasn't been with the company long and seems to be a safe target. He attacks, couching his questions and suggestions in such a way that he appears to be merely the messenger and not complainant. Maria, after answering the first few questions begins to see Nick's agenda and she suggests he take the time to go back through the files and read what has already been documented about his frequently asked questions. Nick takes offense and continues to challenge and harass Maria who decides to let the big boss decide whether or not the job she has done merits such scrutiny and abuse, and she offers her resignation if her work is not up to par. Nick, seeing that he is on shaky ground when some of the other department heads descend on him and tell him to pick another target, tells some of the people around him he's going to quit his job, but he fails to tell the boss or his supervisors. Instead, Nick spreads rumors and sloughs off his work, letting other people take up the slack and leaving his department in the lurch. He blames Maria and her offer of resignation as his reason for quitting even though he never actually quits, preferring to stir up discord and spread more rumors. The big boss talks to Nick directly and asks him why he hasn't offered his resignation in writing and Nick says that he has no intention of resigning and doesn't know how the rumors got started.

In a show of seeming conciliation, Nick sends a memo to everyone in the company and to the stockholders to let them know the truth behind the rumors, naming Maria's offer of resignation as his reason for considering quitting. He also goes on to say that he was acting at the behest of other people who had asked him questions about the value of Maria's work and how it benefited the company and the stockholders and that he had suggested several changes, including changes Maria had already planned and implemented before his memo, changes that had been in the works for months before Nick was hired. Nick's revenge is nearly complete. He has hung Maria out to dry to preserve his own back stabbing, Machiavellian tactics and taken credit for her hard work and ingenuity, and Maria cannot say anything because it will only come out looking like she is whining and out to discredit Nick.

Nick has sown the seeds of discord even though he took the time to mention that Maria could not be replaced and that the company would suffer if she resigned because no one could handle her job with the same quality and abilities that she brings to the work and he has held Maria up to ridicule for being the cause of his desire to deliver himself up as a sacrifice even though he takes his job and his position very seriously. Most of the people who read his explanation had no idea anything was going on because Maria kept the situation in-house and only informed those department heads directly involved, but now the stockholders and the rest of the company have a much different picture of what has gone on in secret without access to the memos, discussions and double dealing in which Nick has engaged. There is no way for Maria to win and no way to salvage her credibility. She's boxed in with nowhere to turn and even those people who know the truth cannot say anything because of the manner in which Nick offered his explanation of events.

Example 2: Two very close friends, Jim and Martin, have shared the ups and down of their work and their lives until Martin gets an idea for a new package design. Jim is excited about Martin's design and even though they work together and are friends he wants to see Martin succeed and get ahead. Jim helps Martin fine tune his design and helps him put together the proposal, making it better and more salable. Jim even suggests offering the design directly to the client instead of going through the usual channels because Jim believes that Martin's design will blow the client away.

Martin takes Jim's advice and goes to directly to the client who is excited but has to check with his board of directors first. The new design is cut from the board's agenda because not enough board members are present for a quorum. Martin gets antsy and wants to pull the design and go somewhere else, but Jim tells Martin to hang in and wait because he is certain the board will approve the design. Six weeks go by and Jim keeps bolstering Martin's confidence but Martin prefers to be negative because nothing good ever happens for him and he's going to be stuck where he is forever. Jim tells Martin to wait a couple more weeks and Martin reluctantly agrees.

One week later, the client comes back with a contract; the board approved the design without question. Martin is ecstatic and rushes to tell Jim he was right. Throughout the contract negotiations, Jim offers his support and suggestions but Martin begins to feel that Jim is trying to control him and is jealous of Martin's success. Martin has forgotten how hard Jim worked with Martin to help him succeed. Jim, feeling that Martin needs some space, backs off and goes on with his own work while Martin tells people that he never thought his best friend would ever be jealous of him and starts pulling back from Jim and spreading stories about him -- not about how much Jim helped him but how Jim wants to take credit for Martin's work. Things come to a head and Martin ends his friendship with Jim.

Over the following months, Martin's design goes from drawing board to public debut and he seems to be making friends right and left. He credits his success to some of his new friends and doesn't mention Jim or how supportive and helpful he was when Martin first had the idea for his design. He publicly thanks people who had nothing to do with those early days of collaboration and emotional support and starts spreading stories about Jim and how jealous he is of Martin's success. The stories get wilder and more absurd but Martin enjoys the limelight and how everyone rushes to his defense when anyone with any real knowledge of the events leading up to the board's acceptance of the design calls Martin to answer for his deceptions, omissions and outright lies.

In the meantime, Jim shrugs it off and works on his own designs, each one more successful than the last. Jim racks up several successes and his career takes off like never before and Martin, seeing Jim's designs and mounting contracts, is jealous and angry, reviving old stories and embellishing them to cast Jim in a bad light. Jim is oblivious to most of it until mutual acquaintances point out how Martin has publicly slandered and libeled Jim. Jim doesn't care. He wishes Martin well and wants Martin out of his life so Jim can concentrate on his own work, but every time things get quiet Martin stirs things up. Martin's jealousy of Jim is so strong he can't enjoy his own success. Martin's jealous has taken on a life of its own that slowly and systematically destroys his happiness and his relationships, none of which have really be more than superficial acquaintances, but which Martin believes are deep friendships. As people begin to see Martin's rampant green-eyed jealousy and begin to fall away, Martin blames Jim.

What can Jim do? He can't tell what really happened since Martin poisoned the well. Jim would end up looking like a jerk because his credibility is gone in the wake of Martin's jealous and vicious tirades. Martin doesn't owe his success to Jim but he does owe everyone the truth and that Jim was instrumental in getting his design seen and accepted. Martin will never give Jim the satisfaction and Jim doesn't care because he has his own success and recognition for all his hard work and talent. Still, there will always be those who believe Martin's story because they don't see Martin in the wee hours of the morning when his conscience is plaguing him so much he has to seek out Jim's designs and reread all the press about his successes.

When you get right down to it, both situations are bred in the hearts of people possessed of the feeling that they are somehow less talented and less important than those they have attacked. Their jealousy has poisoned their ability to think and act rationally and instead of owning up to their own feelings of inadequacy they attack those they fear the most.

Jealousy in moderation can be an excellent goad to keep you reaching for success or to help you realize the value of friend, family or lover, but rampant, unchecked jealousy is a destructive force that makes a person miserable and those around them even more miserable. Misery does not love company. Misery needs to see suffering to equal its own and will destroy the very things they once cherished the most. Jealousy is one of those emotions that, like some spices and herbs, must be used with discretion and care.

That is all. Disperse.

Feeling expansive

Last night I went to the grocery store to pick up a few last minute items. When I walked out the door and down the front porch steps a few flakes of snowy down drifted past my face and I smiled. More snow. There was a little accumulation on my windshield and I smiled all the way to the store, reveling in the possibility of more snow.

It's a small thing, snow in the late fall and winter, but it's something I love and part of the reason I moved to Colorado. I also smile when it rains, sometimes going outside to raise my face to the clouds and spin around and around arms out to feel the splash of raindrops. I didn't know until recently it's something I have done since I was a very small child just learning to walk. My mother told me I used to run outside to spin and dance in the rain, a child of the elements. Some things never change.

I miss the rain that loomed like a dark curtain rushing at me from the horizon every day when we lived in Panama. Winter is the rainy season, but it rains all through the year because it's in a tropical rain forest. It wasn't something I controlled, but something I wished I could control, bringing rain to make everything glossy and green and alive. One thing I have learned is that even when you think you're in control, you're not, least of all when dealing with other people.

As a writer, one of the most important things is communication, not just in my writing but with the editors, publishers and other writers. My livelihood and writing depend on things being sent and received on time. There's nothing more frustrating than being told a contract or writing assignment has gone astray even though it was sent in plenty of time. It's even more frustrating when dealing with friends and relatives who swear they never received what was sent or, worse yet, never knowing if what you sent was even read. In part, it's about control, and it's about instant gratification, but mostly it's about being seen, even by email.

When I send out proposal packages, contracts, manuscripts, cards and letters by snail mail I always spend a little extra to get the delivery confirmation. When someone tells me they didn't get what I sent, I can go online, enter the confirmation number and see how long it took and when it was delivered. I cannot, however, be sure what I sent was read, but I know it got there and I have proof. It's more difficult with email because you can never be sure of anything when you send your words and files out into the cyber ether, that is until I found out about email tracking.

It costs a few dollars, but it's definitely worth the expense. I tried it and I liked it so much I bought a year's subscription and I use it for nearly everyone I email, even family, except, however, for Beanie since we talk on the phone as much as we email. She is the one person I know I can count on to respond and she never leaves me hanging in the middle of an email conversation with questions asked and not answered. I can't say the same thing for anyone else.

One friend reminds me how annoying it is to have our emails tracked so that I know at a glance when an email was read, how many times it was read, whether or not to was forwarded, etc., but it is preferable to being in the middle of a conversation and hear nothing for days or weeks on end. It's the cyber equivalent of being in the midst of a conversation and the other person goes to the bathroom and doesn't return. Yes, it may be annoying to them, but email tracking has saved me countless hours (and much paper and ink and long distance charges).

I don't tell everyone I use the tracking program, but I have told a few and they have responded with anger, annoyance and surprise when I tell them I know when they received my communications and how many times they read it. Obviously, I don't tell everyone and keep that information to myself, but the program has been invaluable in showing me who is and isn't being honest with me and exceptionally helpful when proving that contracts and work have been received.

To some people my actions seem like I'm trying to control them or spying on them, but those people are usually hiding something or don't like the idea that someone other than they have a modicum of control, but it's really not about control; it's about communication and information. It's about not being left hanging and clueless. It's also about peace of mind because I know without doubt that my message has been received and read and it doesn't matter so much the other person didn't respond. It's comforting.

One thing about the tracking program is that the receiver can't just click the button to not send a notice and make it go away. With some features, in order to read the email the receiver has to acknowledge receipt or click a link to read the email but there are less intrusive, more invisible features that are activated when the email is opened and read. I prefer the invisible features and use the more intrusive features only when necessary or with someone who needs proof as much as I do, and I have calmed my fears and doubts and confusion with the knowledge I'm not being ignored.

Even when the rain and snow don't come, there is comfort in knowing it's out there and will visit one day and my prayers have not been ignored. There is no comfort or peace in silence or ignorance no matter how annoying the need to be sure seems to others. And it's not about trust either, although trust is a factor with some people. In knowledge there is peace even when the news isn't always good, at least it's more reliable than some people or expecting snow in the desert.

That is all. Disperse.

In the scheme of things

Since I have four days off, starting tomorrow, and tomorrow is going to be full of food, fun and friends, I've decided to wish you all a happy turkey day and slip quietly off into dawn for a few days, most of which I plan to spend finishing my novel, which is about to go over the 100,000 mark. When I get done, I've decided to strike while the iron is hot and work on a novel I've thought about (and finally ready to write) for a very long time, more than ten years. All I ever had was the first line and a general idea of what the book was about. Now I have the plot points, the characters and a conflict that will drive everything forward. It's almost ready to write itself, so I'm going to climb aboard and let it take me where it's going. A friend got me thinking about getting it down on paper, so that's where I'll be, and will probably finish it during my vacation at the end of the year when there's nothing but me, my laptop (I'll be so happy when it's home) and the solitude.

I'm nearing 100 reviews for Author Link and that's a good thing. I've written more reviews within the past year than I have the whole 4.5 years I've worked for them, but it takes time for these things to happen. Like raises -- which I have been given again, effective January 1, 2008. Now that's the way to start a new year.

It's so dark right now in these last few minutes before dawn and the sound of cars swishing by gives me a tingle of excitement. I washed the car yesterday while I was out spending money on food and it looks like my idea worked. There must be snow or rain or a mix of both out there. Just what I wanted for Thanksgiving, and I got it. I love it when things work out the way I want. Boosts my spirits and and confirms my faith in the weather elementals.

When I was at Mountain Mama's yesterday, I stopped at the deli to get some green coconut curried vegetable soup and talk to some of the denizens. One of them, a lovely young woman who is always friendly, told me I motivated her to get back to writing. She doesn't have Internet access at home, or a computer, and keeps a list of URLs to visit when she's at the library, but she took my advice and started writing longhand and she's been writing every day. She hasn't been to NaNo, but the young guy I spoke with has been and he's working hard on a novel right now, one it looks like he'll finish before the end of the month. She said I motivated him, too. Makes me think I should take the school board up on their offer to join their artists in residence program and teach a couple of classes on writing. I don't know if I want to go back into the work-a-day world because I'm so used to working at home and not having to deal with weather, traffic and politics, but it might be worth the effort just to mingle with children and maybe help them get writing. There can never be enough writers, as far as I'm concerned. I could use some of my writing for good for a change instead of for evil -- like posting here. It's something to mull over.

That is all. Disperse.

Food, glorious food

Since the moment of conception I have been dieting, or at least that's how it seems most of the time. Living in a family full of balos con pelo (sticks with hair), I was made acutely aware that I was different: taller, bigger, more muscular and, at least to my mother, fat, (pictures forthcoming), so I was denied food, which made it that much more important to me. I love food. I like the way it looks and smells and tastes, the way it feels when handling it to make something special (even not so special), and the way it makes me feel -- no longer hungry. I go into paroxysms of joy over sizzling medium rare steaks, onions and mushrooms sautéed in olive oil, salads full of vegetables and fruit, and fresh fruit and vegetables, I dream of luscious desserts and fantasize about simple snacks. In short, I love food. Yes, I know I already said that, but it bears repeating. What's not to like? And I love to cook and bake. Anyone who knows me well has been party to my cooking and baking jags. For me, baking and creating new desserts and meals is therapy for depression and sadness, always perks me up. But I also keep my weight in mind and I do have a tendency to gain weight quickly.

The thing is that I gain weight when I starve myself or my food budget is under funded and I am stretching my reserves of cash and food to the limits. It's a well known fact that most people who are overweight (like Sumo wrestlers) are mostly malnourished and oftentimes don't eat all the time but rather in spurts, activating their survival genes to lay down a supply of fat to get through the lean times. The more lean times, the more fat laid down when available. After years and years of starvation or near starvation diets I have evolved a coping mechanism; I make lists. Lists of recipes, foods, menus, and ingredients culled from food magazines, cookbooks, and tinkering with old reliable recipes to make them healthier.

For some people, reading and rereading cookbooks and food magazines and going through old recipes makes them hungrier, so hungry they can't resist a trip to the kitchen or the nearest restaurant to sate their cravings; it has the opposite effect on me. It quells the hunger pangs and takes me to a place where anything is possible, a place where the foods of the world are at my fingertips and I have an unlimited supply of ingredients. I am -- for lack of a better phrase -- in hog heaven with a world of food at my fingertips in glorious color.

I sometimes spend hours making lists of weekly menus, checking and rechecking ingredients and making substitutions in recipes I want to try out to see if they taste as good as I think they will. Most of the time, my substitutions come up roses and sometimes they come up dandelions -- edible but not good enough for gift giving.

Right before payday when the food budget is stretched the thinnest, I pull out the magazines and cookbooks and make my lists. Then I go through the grocery circular and check for sales, adjusting my list to reflect what is available and least expensive. I mix and match and come up with some pretty good recipes and menus that are pruned and pruned again when I add in the necessities: toilet paper, Kleenex, shampoo and conditioner, soap, toothpaste, new toothbrush every three months, etc. The list is pruned again when I have to buy gas for the car which, luckily, only happens every other month (I work at home and most things I need are within walking distance), but the list takes the hit.

Every once in a while I go off the list to buy pots and pans and bakeware, adding stock to my nearly empty cupboards, but that requires making a new list to reflect diminished funds, knowing the items will reappear in later lists when I buy the ingredients that will require the new cooking utensils.

For me, lists are a great way to diet because they keep me from eating and keep me focused on the delayed gratification of a slimmed down recipe in the future. Hours pass quietly while I nibble on celery stuffed with chicken liver pate studded with pistachios and rich with organic chicken broth, Marsala and sautéed shallots or sip a cup of cocoa made with almond milk, 85% cacao and agave nectar. Butternut squash soup sprinkled with toasted pumpkin seeds and made with organic vegetable stock and coconut milk instead of cream is soothing and delightfully warming. I made big pots of soup and freeze individual portions, stock up on unflavored almond milk and organic vegetable or chicken stock when they're on sale. I hoard sugar for months for when I make cheesecake for special occasions, keep a few bottles of organic key lime juice and buy pumpkin puree (or make my own when pumpkins are in stock and on sale) for the future. The foods on my lists aren't always bought when I want them but they are bought eventually and as long as I have paper and ink, I'll keep making the lists and culling magazines and cookbooks for the future. For me, it's a great way to deal with food and my weight. Unfortunately, it hampers getting out and walking a couple of miles, but there's always a trade-off. Walking makes me hungry. Cookbooks keep the hunger at bay.



Beauty shot



Bouldering in the Black Forest



My German gang -- I'm the one with Mohawk hair



Everyone's a clown but me and my dog, Rinnie



Girl Scout fashion show with Debbie Nelson in the lead in her paper towel dress held together with staples and me in my hillbilly garb peeking out from behind



Opening presents with Beanie at Gram's



As you can see, I was very much in need of a ton of diet pills and a case of anorexia.

That is all. Disperse.

Catch-up

This is the first day for a couple of weeks I haven't had to get up at 3 or 4 a.m. to work. Instead, I woke up at 5:30 and I feel positively lazy. When I looked out the brightening windows I was awed by a cooling molten copper sky stretching between the peaks. Across the horizon, the copper was hot and blazing, cooler as it rose toward the peaks and spilled over the craggy facade touching everything with fire and lighting the shadows. It's been a long time since I've looked out the windows of my office and enjoyed the sunrise; I've been too busy with my nose to the grindstone -- and it's paid off.

I'm ahead at work but that won't last long. I've completed more than 50K words for NaNoWriMo and I still have some to write; I have a whole four-day weekend next week to do that, three if you don't count Thanksgiving since I'll be celebrating with friends and cooking at least part of the day. The rest of the cooking will be spaced out between now and Thursday, a little bit each day because I'm also working on Yule gift trials. I've decided, since it was so well received last year, to make food baskets and give them as gifts to my close friends. My family, however, will have to be satisfied with more mundane gifts since the food baskets won't travel well and would cost a fortune and I plan to use that (small fortune though it is) for my winter retreat when I hope to have my laptop back in my hands and on my lap.

This week has thrown some curves and offered a few disappointments but nothing serious and nothing I can't manage -- like my laptop not being fixed. Well, it is partially fixed. They replaced the CPU fan but they did not install a new CD burner/DVD drive. I had a bad feeling when Scott told me they fixed the fan. I asked about the drive and he said it wasn't on the work order. The bad feeling moved to my stomach. I asked him to check the drive and he did. It wasn't fixed -- and that was the whole reason for letting them have it in the first place. So, I didn't get it back and I'll have the loaner for two more weeks. They only send service jobs out on Monday and I had missed the miniscule window of opportunity so I have to wait two more weeks. Lovely. At least I finally figured out where the WiFi switch was on this laptop and got it working. I downloaded my shows after downloading some programs to download and play the shows and I was back in business only two days later than expected. I also discovered a faster download program (uTorrent available at MiniNova) and that made the whole snafu worthwhile. You don't get rainbows without rain.

I surpassed my own goals at work and discovered a new level of stupidity in management. I had an inkling there was a deficiency but I wasn't sure it wasn't just a fluke and me not explaining things sufficiently. It wasn't a fluke and I explained the situation the same way to people who don't work with medical records and they got it right away, so the fault is in management. Nothing like brains at the top.

I broke 50K with NaNo and was surprised I had so much left to say -- and write. It's like an adventure to a place where I thought I knew the contours and found there were hidden springs full of fresh, untainted water, dens, and surprising glades and depths. That's what happens when allowing something to evolve and let the characters take over even when it's based on fact. I love journeys like that and they are always worth the trip, especially when they encompass other stories and possibilities, like another foray into Alzheimer's territory.

Two nights running I have been nagged and plagued with dreams of a three-generation story centered around Alzheimer's and the quality of memory. The real shock came when I asked what two of the women feared about the disease. There were the usual fears about losing control of bodily functions and actions, but the real deer in the headlights moment came when deeper reasons came out under questioning. The story is still evolving and I'm making notes, but it looks like it's going to be a rich and engrossing journey into the hidden places behind the fear with a side trip into wonder and delight. That's always a good place to be.

In the meantime, there's lots to do: laundry, cleaning, dishes (I hate that part) and cooking, lots of cooking. I'm making pumpkin cheesecake with gingersnap cookie crust studded with finely chopped bits of crystallized ginger. I'm still undecided about trying a cheesecake version of my sweet potato-pecan pie, but it's worth more than a thought. I still have to figure out how (and when) to apply the glazed pecan topping so that it doesn't sink into the semi-liquid cheesecake while it's baking and I may have to opt for the last few minutes of the baking while the cheesecake is cooling for the usual sour cream topping. I do so love experimenting with food, but that one definitely won't be ready for T-day -- maybe Yule.

That is all. Disperse.

A little Saturday night ramble

I'm way ahead of schedule on NaNoWriMo and have finished the books I planned to review this week so my mind has been flitting around like a butterfly and keeps landing on the same subject: vampires. I know. It's pretty much a given that vampires are in now and will be out later and will come around and be popular again in a year or two -- or do they ever really go out of style? I blame my ruminations on Ray Bradbury and reading his short stories (I got a new book: One More For the Road), which always send my mind following thoughts of all kinds, and we're back to vampires again.

Part of this is also due to the new prime time vampire show, Moonlight. The two stars aren't even American, but they do great American accents (Sophia Myles is British and Alex O'Loughlin is Australian) and they are very nice to watch. Sophia isn't a stick insect and Alex is delectable.

The show also has *gasp* an American playing Josef Kostantin who is a very young (25) vampire over 400 years old who is the dark force in the show, except that he does have morals and rules and is very adamant about keeping a low profile -- or as low a profile as a multi-billionaire vampire who loves fast cars and beautiful women can have. He is also Mick St. John's friend and employer on occasion (Alex O'Loughlin). There is also the lovely and bloody-minded Coraline (Mick's ex-wife who was killed in a fire -- Alex killed her for kidnapping and trying to turn Beth (Sophia Myles) when she was a child) who is a dyed-in-the-wool evil vamp, in all senses of the word. The actress playing Coraline is also American, and until last night was seen only in flashback. Okay, back to the subject that has been on my mind -- vampires.

It occurred to me when Josef asked Mick when he was going to stop hating himself and wanting to be human again that there is definitely something wrong in the ocean city (LA) and everywhere you look where there are vampires. They are either demons with souls who dream of being human after a centuries-long run and hate who they are or romantic demons doomed without the love of a human woman to rescue them from hell and despair. What's up with that? There's also the whole afraid of crucifixes but not other religious symbols, but that's a whole other subject for another time. Considering humans are writing about vampires, I guess there is no other way to see them except as fiends, demons and evil with a hidden potential for good as long as they loathe who and what they are.

I get the whole killing and feeding on humans angle and how that can be disturbing, but in a very real sense isn't that what humans do to animals? Okay, most humans are not comfortable with the idea of being nothing more than an animal to feed another species, but I'm sure elands and zebras don't particularly care for being chased, killed and eaten by lions and hyenas and jackals either. It's all a matter of perspective (where have I heard that phrase before...?).

Despite seeing vampires as more of a religious construct designed to bring people fleeing back to church (in the Xian sense) to save them from damnation, and the idea that a soul can be lost, sold or bartered, vampires are just another species, another step on the food chain, predators who prey on humans to keep the population down -- and to give lonely women a visceral thrill. Vampires are a symbol of wish fulfillment, a chance to live beyond the short years granted us by nature (and degradation of the genetic code) and be more in the world than we as human with our blunted senses can be. Vampires are beyond the usual constraints of work, responsibility, duty and the humdrum everyday life. They are rebels that don't have to apologize for being different, except if a vampire longs to be human again, taste a steak and eat French fries, and get off a perpetual liquid diet (that alone is enough to make a vampire want to be human -- or at least bite something someone), to sink their teeth into something solid that just happens to be a human. Of course, rats, puppies and kittens are also on the menu when times are tough or food is scarce.

Vampires are another evolutionary step in Nature's whimsical --and possibly darker -- plan. After all, Nature created the platypus. Like so much of history that historians and archaeologists and scientists will remake in their own image, vampires are cursed, not with the loss of a soul or providing housing for a demon, but with humanity's idea of them as fiends and romantic figures that but for the want of love and a soul would be better, would be human. And yet we long for their powers to see more clearly, feel more deeply, experience the world more fully and be above and outside human laws, to be able to ignore Death's touch (unless there's a stake, fire or loss of head involved) and to remain ever young drinking from Countess Bathory's bloody Fountain of Youth while sneering at Time. It's no wonder we paint vampires in such clashing colors since we cannot reconcile our own feelings of love and hate.

Are vampires Nature's agents preying on humans to keep our numbers in check? Are we any better than the government being paid to decimate and eradicate the only check on over population, like the planned hunt of gray wolves in the northern Rockies? Do we need, and would we accept, vampires as another species instead of cursed agents of evil? Or do we need to see ourselves in a more honest and realistic light?

It keeps getting better

I periodically check email when I'm downloading jobs to type. It's a habit. It's a way of passing the time that is too short to do anything other than go to the bathroom, and I don't have to go that often. So, tonight, I checked my email again and found another contract.

The story I sweated bullets over, the one I had a hard time putting down on virtual paper, the story that just wouldn't come out has been accepted by Cup of Comfort for their Alzheimer's anthology due out in October 2008. I didn't have to wait months to hear about that one, but I did push the deadline a bit.

When the story was finally written I had a good feeling about it and it made me cry. That's always a good sign. Looks like my mojo is working. That makes nine books coming out next year and it makes the sweat and the bullets and the worry that I didn't have anything positive to say about Alzheimer's worth the effort. Into every life a little rain... It's a good thing I love the rain.

If there is anything I could say to writers struggling with a story or a book or wondering whether what they have written is worth sending out, it is this: Keep writing and submitting your work because it is worth it. It's not always easy getting a story just right and sometimes it feels like it just won't come. That's when you need to apply butt to seat and just write. It may not be good and it may turn out to be the best thing you've ever written. You won't know until you forget all the critics, naysayers, jealousy and doubt and just write.

That is all. Disperse.

Oh, the webs, the broken webs

I have a little time since I have to download another copy of MS Word onto the loaner laptop since the original expired several months ago. I have to have the files in order to do the labels for the ham club newsletter that I'm picking up at noon today, stamping, disking, labeling, and mailing shortly thereafter. I don't like the loaner laptop and I want my own back, but the fan died and the CD player had to be replaced because it was defective and I found it extremely difficult getting any work done since I had to shut the computer down every 15-20 minutes to keep it from overheating and shutting down on its own. Made getting the newsletter out last weekend difficult at best. I don't mind not being able to download my shows this week because it gives me more time to write, but having to use Works instead of MS Word to work on my new novel is the pits. They're not really compatible. The keyboard on the loaner is nice, but some of the keys aren't where I'm used to them and that slows me down, turns my AK-47 typing into more of a stuttering Winchester repeater. Oh, well, into every life a little rain...

The trial file is humongous and is taking forever to download, but at least it will make it possible for me to finish the job and get back into the swing of things. That's one thing to be considered at least and I am so looking forward to getting back to cruising speed. Oh, for an easy day for a change.

I'll take a little time off to help put together a big Thanksgiving party I'm helping to host here in our little corner of Old Colorado City. Several of the people who were here last year requested my presence and my cheesecake. It's going to be busy since a couple of very old friends are flying and driving here to spend the holiday with me. We've been friends forever and I miss seeing them as regularly as we once did since I moved away from Ohio, but to think they're coming all the way here to spend Thanksgiving just goes to prove that a good friend is always there when you need them and when you don't. Another old friend, Tyra Ray, called, having tracked me down through the Internet and my writing to say she wished I could come back there for Thanksgiving and spend the day the way we used to do. We had a pot luck every year and my sweet potato pecan pie with brandied cream was requested year after year. Sometimes I had to split my holiday into three days just to spend time with friends and family, but spending the day with Tyra, her family, and all our friends from work and play was the highlight of the season. Sometimes I miss those days, but not so much this year or last since we started our own tradition here. I've decided to try something completely different this year. Instead of a plain or key lime cheesecake, both of which are big hits with everyone, I've decided to make a pumpkin cheesecake with gingersnap cookie crust. I'm still working on the recipe, but if it turns out as good as the key lime cheesecake (that was an experiment, too) it should be another winner.

I also ordered some bakeware since I finally got the IRS to come off the money (some of it anyway) they have owed me for the past three years and it will be here in time for the holidays. Maybe I can make some individual cheesecakes in ramekins and add a nice souffle to the pot luck dinner we're having. I miss being able to make the kinds of foods and desserts I love and to have enough of the right utensils to do it right. I didn't have enough room in the car when I went back to Ohio earlier this year or I would have brought my kitchen stuff. Books, old journals, and clothes were a little more important and I wasn't about to give up the sewing machine either.

Yesterday I received a "letter" from my mother and a whole mess of old pictures of me. I had forgotten about some of them but there I was sitting and standing and playing in a group of friends, most of whom are still close friends, smiling and laughing and having a really good time. I've made good friends since I moved to Colorado, but with work and writing I tend to spend most of my time alone -- that is until they come banging on the door and dragging me out of it shortly thereafter. It's no wonder I turn the ringer off on the phone when I'm working or writing because I'd never get anything done. And I only put the door chime in the outlet when I know for sure someone is coming, partly because it goes off when any nearby door bell rings and partly because I need to be able to focus on work and writing. I have a huge stack of books to review and a pile of manuscripts to edit, writers who know or have heard about me through other writers whose books I've edited. There just aren't enough hours in the day sometimes.

One thing I do know is that although I love being around people, especially creative people of all kinds, I prefer a small group of close friends. Popularity is pretty cold sometimes and it's hard to weed out the friends from the hangers-on and sycophants. Traveling as much as I have during my lifetime, I have made a lot of friends and most of them are still around. People come and go and even the worst of them have something to offer even if it's only a cautionary tale. I find that as I get older close friends and family are pulling closer as if they miss the way things used to be. It's as though all the things that seemed important aren't quite so important any more and lasting friendships, the ones that have survived decades and trials by fire and ice, are the one thing that remains true. I've never been the kind of person who has a friend and trashes them at every opportunity to anyone who will listen and then turn around and go back to the trashed friend like a dog going back to its vomit just to repeat the process over and over. I don't hide my feelings from my friends and they don't hide them from me. We've learned that passive-aggressive is not the way to go and that the air is sweetest when it is free of the scent of lies, innuendos, and BS. The "he said, she said" game gets really old really fast and it never ends well. It's always best to go directly to the source. Games are a waste of time and energy and provide nothing more than a breeding ground for future problems.

It's hard sometimes for people to be honest with each other but like one friend said: A white lie is just an excuse to get away with being dishonest.

That is all. Disperse.

2396 and typing

I intended to write something short to say I would be off the reservation for a while because I'm participating in NaNoWriMo again this year with an old idea and a new format for a book. Writing true stories seems to work best for me and I finally found a hook for this one, so I'm going to concentrate on that all month. I may be able to finish before the end of November, but this book is the focus of my attention for a while. I'll check in occasionally, but only when I have a free minute that's not devoted to writing or working or editing (not for NaNoWriMo), so those among you who are writers, join me, and those who just read, cross your fingers and send good wishes our way.

In the meantime, ponder this. I found it when I did my morning rounds this morning and found it interesting. I hope you feel the same.

A MESSAGE TO GARCIA
written by Elbert Hubbard
February 22, 1899

In all this Cuban business there is one man stands out on the horizon of my memory like Mars at perihelion. When war broke out between Spain and the United States, it was very necessary to communicate quickly with the leader of the Insurgents. Garcia was somewhere in the mountain fastnesses of Cuba - no one knew where. No mail or telegraph could reach him. The President must secure his co-operation, and quickly.

What to do!

Someone said to the President, "There's a fellow by the name of Rowan will find Garcia for you, if anybody can."

Rowan was sent for and given a letter to be delivered to Garcia. How "the fellow by name of Rowan" took the letter, sealed it up in an oil-skin pouch, strapped it over his heart, in four days landed by night off the coast of Cuba from an open boat, disappeared into the jungle, and in three weeks came out on the other side of the island, having traversed a hostile country on foot, and having delivered his letter to Garcia, are things I have no special desire now to tell in detail.

The point I wish to make is this: McKinley gave Rowan a letter to be delivered to Garcia; Rowan took the letter and did not ask, "Where is he at?" By the Eternal! There is a man whose form should be cast in deathless bronze and the statue placed in every college in the land. It is not book-learning young men need, nor instruction about this or that, but a stiffening of the vertebrae which will cause them to be loyal to a trust, to act promptly, concentrate their energies; do the thing - "carry a message to Garcia!"

General Garcia is dead now, but there are other Garcias.

No man, who has endeavored to carry out an enterprise where many hands were needed, but has been well-nigh appalled at times by the imbecility of the average man - the inability or unwillingness to concentrate on a thing and do it. Slipshod assistance, foolish inattention, dowdy indifference, and half-hearted work seem to be the rule; and no man succeeds, unless by hook or crook, or threat, he forces or bribes other men to assist him; or mayhap, God in His goodness performs a miracle, and sends him an Angel of Light for an assistant. You, reader, put this matter to a test: You are sitting now in your office -six clerks are within your call. Summon any one and make this request: "Please look in the encyclopedia and make a brief memorandum for me concerning the life of Correggio."

Will the clerk quietly say, "Yes, sir," and go do the task?

On your life, he will not. He will look at you out of a fishy eye, and ask one or more of the following questions:

Who was he?

Which encyclopedia?

Where is the encyclopedia?

Was I hired for that?

Don't you mean Bismarck?

What's the matter with Charlie doing it?

Is he dead?

Is there any hurry?

Shan't I bring you the book and let you look it up yourself?

What do you want to know for?

And I will lay you ten to one that after you have answered the questions, and explained how to find the information, and why you want it, the clerk will go off and get one of the other clerks to help him find Garcia - and then come back and tell you there is no such man. Of course I may lose my bet, but according to the Law of Average, I will not.

Now if you are wise you will not bother to explain to your "assistant" that Correggio is indexed under the C's, not in the K's, but you will smile sweetly and say, "Never mind," and go look it up yourself.

And this incapacity for independent action, this moral stupidity, this infirmity of the will, this unwillingness to cheerfully catch hold and lift, are the things that put pure socialism so far into the future. If men will not act for themselves, what will they do when the benefit of their effort is for all? A first mate with knotted club seems necessary; and the dread of getting "the bounce" Saturday night holds many a worker in his place.

Advertise for a stenographer, and nine times out of ten who apply can neither spell nor punctuate - and do not think it necessary to.

Can such a one write a letter to Garcia?

"You see that bookkeeper," said the foreman to me in a large factory.

"Yes, what about him?"

"Well, he's a fine accountant, but if I'd send him to town on an errand, he might accomplish the errand all right, and, on the other hand, might stop at four saloons on the way, and when he got to Main Street, would forget what he had been sent for."

Can such a man be entrusted to carry a message to Garcia?

We have recently been hearing much maudlin sympathy expressed for the "down-trodden denizen of the sweat shop" and the "homeless wanderer searching for honest employment," and with it all often go many hard words for the men in power.

Nothing is said about the employer who grows old before his time in a vain attempt to get frowsy ne'er-do-wells to do intelligent work; and his long patient striving with "help" that does nothing but loaf when his back is turned. In every store and factory there is a constant weeding-out process going on. The employer is constantly sending away "help" that have shown their incapacity to further the interests of the business, and others are being taken on. No matter how good times are, this sorting continues, only if times are hard and work is scarce, this sorting is done finer - but out and forever out, the incompetent and unworthy go. It is the survival of the fittest. self-interest prompts every employer to keep the best-those who can carry a message to Garcia.

I know one man of really brilliant parts who has not the ability to manage a business of his own, and yet who is absolutely worthless to anyone else, because he carries with him constantly the insane suspicion that his employer is oppressing, or intending to oppress, him. He can not give orders, and he will not receive them. Should a message be given him to take to Garcia, his answer would probably be, "Take it yourself.

Tonight this man walks the streets looking for work, the wind whistling through his threadbare coat. No one who knows him dare employ him, for he is a regular firebrand of discontent. He is impervious to reason, and the only thing that can impress him is the toe of a thick-soled No. 9 boot.

Of course I know that one so morally deformed is no less to be pitied than a physical cripple; but in your pitying, let us drop a tear, too, for the men who are striving to carry on a great enterprise, whose working hours are not limited by the whistle, and whose hair is fast turning white through the struggle to hold the line in dowdy indifference, slipshod imbecility, and the heartless ingratitude which, but for their enterprise, would be both hungry and homeless.

Have I put the matter too strongly? Possibly I have; but when all the world has gone a-slumming I wish to speak a word of sympathy for the man who succeeds - the man who, against great odds, has directed the efforts of others, and, having succeeded, finds there's nothing in it: nothing but bare board and clothes.

I have carried a dinner-pail and worked for a day's wages, and I have also been an employer of labor, and I know there is something to be said on both sides. There is no excellence, per se, in poverty; rags are no recommendation; and all employers are not rapacious and high-handed, any more than all poor men are virtuous.

My heart goes out to the man who does his work when the "boss" is away, as well as when he is home. And the man who, when given a letter for Garcia, quietly takes the missive, without asking any idiotic questions, and with no lurking intention of chucking it into the nearest sewer, or of doing aught else but deliver it, never gets "laid off," nor has to go on strike for higher wages. Civilization is one long anxious search for just such individuals. Anything such a man asks will be granted; his kind is so rare that no employer can afford to let him go. He is wanted in every city, town, and village - in every office, shop, store and factory. The world cries out for such; he is needed, and needed badly - the man who can carry a message to Garcia.

That is all. Disperse.

Enter at your own risk

There are witches in my mailbox.
What am I to do?

I found them there this morning,
doing things they shouldn't do!!




How the witches got there,
I haven't got a clue.

But they won't be there much longer
because I'm sending them to




YOU!!!!!!

You've been Witch Kissed!




Before the warts begin to spread,

pass the kisses on instead!





HAPPY HALLOWEEN

For the eco-conscious

That is all. Disperse.

Serendipity

I am constantly amazed about how a chance comment or meeting can result in finding something you've looked for or just a new friendship.

As part of my Monday morning ritual, I read the posts about alternatives religions on About.com and today there was a link to an article about the Kabbalistic symbology in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. The rabbi writing the article pointed to the last part of Indy's journey when he must pass three tests to get to the cup of Christ (holy grail) to save his father's life. The rabbi had it almost right, but he mixed up the first trial with scenes from the first movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark when Indy has to race for his life as darts/arrows fly out of the walls. I emailed the rabbi and explained the first trial in Last Crusade was flashing blades that Indy avoided when he knelt. The rabbi immediately emailed back and we began discussing Joseph Campbell's treatise on the Hero's Journey and how Indiana Jones, and indeed Star Wars, is based on that concept.

That discussion led to Maureen Murdock's The Heroine's Journey and then The Tree of Life in Kabbalistic tradition to Tree of Life in Native American culture to Yggdrasil (the World Tree) of Norse mythology to something I have researched for years -- the serpent as a messenger/go-between man and deity, which is also symbolized in Norse mythology as the Midgard Serpent. That's when he told me about a little known Midrash, or commentary on the Tankh/Torah where the serpent is a messenger from Yahweh to Adam and Eve who urges them to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil that they might leave Eden and "begin the spirit quest that would become humankind." I find that interpretation of what Xians call "Original Sin" more in line with what I've learned from studying other mythologies and religions. Even the Mormons (LDS) believe that Adam and Eve had to disobey in order to become the progenitors of mankind. I may just be closer to writing that book after all. I've been stumped by the Xian interpretation for years and couldn't reconcile that with the premise that all beliefs/religions use the serpent as a symbol of wisdom and a conduit/messenger between man and deity. But I digress...

At any rate, I would not have had the chance to exchange ideas with the rabbi or get another piece to a puzzle I've been working for years had it not been for that one mistake in his article. I'm glad I'm a curious person. They say curiosity killed the cat, but they always forget that satisfaction brought it back. No wonder a cat has nine lives, especially if the cat is as curious about everything as I. Then again, I'd need more than nine lives, maybe that's what reincarnation is all about. Ya think?

That is all. Disperse.

Cowards and Victims

A few years ago, I read an interview with Linda Lovelace about her autobiography where she claims her husband forced her to perform sex acts at the point of a gun. This is a very different tale than the one she told when she was riding the talk show circuit wave in the wake of her debut film, Deep Throat. She was certainly cashing in on that success. I remember her telling Merv Griffin and Dick Cavett, among other talk show hosts, how she learned to do the deep throat and how much she enjoyed not only performing in the movie but the adulation and acclaim from her 15 minutes of stardom. When she couldn't sustain her acting career and no one cared about her or knew who she was any more, she made her claims of sexual abuse and harassment, even though she divorced the man who made her famous as soon as she got the money in her hot little hands.

I have little patience and no sympathy for cowards and victims. They sing one song when they're on top and another when the spotlight moves to someone else, anything to stay in the limelight. And it's not just celebrities or celebrity-wannabes. People want to be victims, to be seen as sinned against rather than sinning. Give me an unrepentant sinner every time. At least I know I can count on what they say and believe them. I certainly don't believe the victims and cowards. They remind me of what Judge Roy Bean said, that there is none so righteous as a redeemed sinner. Of course, he was talking about soiled doves who married and became ultra respectable to the point of obsession and mania. He knew what he was talking about because he saw it happen when his little town went respectable and all the saloon trollops and bawdy house whores turned on trollops and whores when they became respectable. It is said that hell hath no fury like a woman scored, but she has nothing on the repentant, reborn, sinner who has seen the light. Those kinds of people never learned about moderation or about honesty, but they sure know how to keep the spotlight on them even if it means denouncing who they were and what they once espoused with their whole being. Just like Linda Lovelace and countless others in the not so public eye who justify their past by denouncing who and what they were and why they did the things they did. After all, the public loves self flagellation no matter how they cringe at the act, as long as it isn't themselves they are flagellating.

Were you a thief who became a security consultant? There is no one more adept at catching a thief than a thief because they think alike, but don't get too close or the reformed thief's zealotry for protecting people will make you ill from the sugar shock or drown you in their crocodile tears of remorse. Do you constantly remind your spouse of their one-time infidelity and play the heartbroken and disappointed victim when you come back from a rendezvous with your second or third lover this year? After all, if you don't get caught then you aren't an adulterer. Did you hate and fear your spouse when they were alive, but now that they're dead do you loudly and publicly mourn them on the anniversary of their death? Don't forget to keep the hankies handy. Or how about anonymously stabbing someone in the back and playing the concerned friend when you'd rather see them broke, unhappy, unsuccessful, and alone -- or bet yet, dead?

There is nothing wrong with taking a different path in life, but at least own up to your previous life and how much you enjoyed stealing, sleeping around, or reveling in someone's downfall. It's a whole lot more honest and less cowardly. I know it is more fun to play the victim with people rushing around doing their best to comfort and support you, to forget about whatever is going on in their own lives to focus on you. It's not honest, but it has become the national past time. Everyone wants to be a victim -- well, not everyone, just the cowards.

Yes, give me an unrepentant sinner every time. At least he's honest.

That's all. Disperse.