The name of a man is a numbing blow from which he never recovers. ~Marshall McLuhan Do you like your name? Have you changed your name from the name your parents gave you? Are you burdened with a nickname you hate? I’m creating characters right now. Well, a couple of the characters have been walking around with me for several …
Team Kaelyn
Some of you who follow my posts on Facebook and have been following this blog for a while know I have a great niece named Kaelyn who was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia the week before Christmas last year. She’s undergoing treatment at St. Jude’s and has 91 more weeks of chemo. She’s a beautiful little girl and when she …
Writers Groups and Book Fairs
I had a great weekend of writing events. Friday I got to meet with a writers’ group and talk writing and books. Is there anything more fun than talking books? Oh yeah, reading them. This group had lots of great questions. Some about the Shakers. More about writing and the process of publishing. These writers knew some about publishing because …
Bears and Books
I’m a day late with this because I’ve been running into bears. Well, that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but I have been out of touch and internet deprived for the last few days up in one of those cabins perched on a mountainside slope in the Smokies. And I did see a bear. Right on the front …
The Gift of Time
Time is free, but it’s priceless. You can’t own it, but you can use it. You can’t keep it, but you can spend it. Once you’ve lost it you can never get it back. (Harvey MacKay) That’s a great quote for a day when we were gifted with an extra hour. Of course most of us slept through our gift …
Be Encouraged
“Correction does much, but encouragement does more.” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ~~ See this tree out on that rocky point. The lone cypress is one of the highlights on the 17 Mile Drive along the coastline between Monterey and Carmel. The brochure stated that the tree had survived on that open rocky point for over 250 years in spite of …
Home Sweet Home
It’s a long way from Kentucky to California and a long way back. Glad I wasn’t walking the way the pioneers did or perhaps jogging along on a horse or in a covered wagon. One thing though, I’d have gotten a lot better look at the country that way. I watched out the planes’ windows (I had window seats all …
Writers’ Retreat and Fun in Sunny California
No picture and I’m a day late. I’m doing my Wednesday blog on Thursday. Not only Thursday but Thursday in California and that means I’m even later. But it’s not every time you can sit on your veranda watching and listening to the ocean crash against the rocky beach in your fancy hotel supplied robe and write back home to …
Naming Characters – What’s in a Name?
I know this picture doesn’t have a thing to do with naming characters. Or then again maybe I need to look deeper. The open gate, the roads running together speak of possibilities. I took this picture last week at the Shaker village near me. My new characters might walk down these very roads in my story. They will be facing …
Enthusiam and Yeast in Fiction
“You can do anything if you have enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is the yeast that makes your hopes rise to the stars.” ~ Henry Ford I came across this great quote on Facebook the other day. I started to repost it, but then I wanted to say more than the FB police let me say. I always want to say more than …