Confessions of this Married Writer by Robin Janney

My first confession is that I've been a slacker this week.  I haven't posted on my own blog, and have put off working on this post until today.

The three day weekend last weekend had a lot to do with it, because my husband had all three days off.  And let me tell you, there is no getting any writing when he is home.  Not because he bothers me, just because I set it to the side so I can spend time with him.

Clare Dunn opening for Parmalee

Saturday, we decided to go to the Kiwanis Wyoming County Fair even though we knew it meant sacrificing our grocery money for the week.  Thankfully, it didn't matter because we had enough already so that it wasn't an issue (although I did have to end up using my change to buy a loaf of bread). My husband has such a good heart; one of his co-workers has been down in the dumps so my husband decided to invite him to go with us.  I walked waaaaay too much on my foot that won't heal, even sitting down on benches here and there.  But I got to eat Triton pizza and later had homemade ice cream.  We ran short on time after the concert, so we missed out on funnel cake this year.

One thing I like about this fair is that their concert area is in this little bowl in the land.  They fill the bottom part with chairs, but they let people bring in their own chairs and sit on the side of the banks for a cheaper price.  It used to be $5, but this year it was raised to $10.  Still a good deal.  Three years ago they had the Roots and Boots Tour: Aaron Tippin, Sammy Kershaw and Joe Diffie.  Unfortunately, there was a bad thunderstorm that blew up and rained us out an hour into the show. :/ That didn't happen this year with Clare Dunn and Parmalee. While it sounded to hubby and me that their sound was off (screechy) we still enjoyed the songs.

Parmalee

The second coming?

Oh, there they are!

Sadly, sitting on the bank means that the pictures my phone will take are less than stellar.  But that didn't stop me from taking them.  :)

Which leads me into another confession I guess.  I love taking pictures.  Which is something my husband finds amusing, unless I'm trying to take a picture of him.  The handsome lad doesn't like his picture taken because he thinks he's ugly!  It's far from true, but sometimes how we view ourselves isn't anything close to how others view us.  Neither view is 100% accurate, is it?

But as long as I'm not aiming at him, he doesn't care.  In fact when we were in the fair's southern field, about five minutes too late for the Big Cats show, he laughed when I pulled my phone out to capture what pics I could of the gorgeous animals.  "I knew that was coming out!" he said.  Even though we missed the 'show' we still got to see animals we'd never seen before. It was quite exciting.

Meow Meow

Meow

Meow Meow Meooooow!

What can I say?  The majesty of these big cats speak for themselves. Though caged, they still have this regal bearing that says: "I'm only tolerating this because you're shoving chunks of meat through the cage to me."  I can only hope that when they're not on the road being shown, that they have a bigger home than the cages we saw.  Part of me hates that they're caged, but another part of me recognizes that without the cages, I would never have been able to see them.

Well, that covers day one of the three day weekend, you say.  What about Sunday and Monday? you ask.

Sunday, I still wasn't feeling well from a stomach bug that had been bothering me for over a week and from overdoing it at the fair (I didn't even mention the Tough Truck Competition because I didn't get pictures).  So I pretty much bummed it.  All I really remember doing is a lot of reading.

Which leads me into confession number three.  This should be no surprise to any of you readers out there.  I have more books than what I know what to do with, but that doesn't stop me from buying more.  From the library last week, I picked up two paperbacks for fifty cents a piece (and am eyeing more): The Stand by Stephen King and The King of Torts by John Grisham.  I've never read any of Grisham's books, and while I've read some of his short stories, I've never read a King novel either.  I'm usually hesitant about trying out authors I'm not familiar with, but I've been feeling the need to expand my horizons recently.  For fifty cents, you really can't lose.  AND, while at the fair, I picked up two more!  The Green Mile, another Stephen King, and Vision In Death by J.D. Robb.  I love love love the book stall at the fair! :)

And that's not all.  I recently bought Breathe of Dawn by Kristen Heitzmann.  I don't read Christian fiction much anymore unless I want something light to read because much of it lacks a certain energy.  What I've read of Kristen's has that missing energy other works seem to lack. I've been trying to read that at the same time as reading The Shadow Rising by Robert Jordan, but Shadow has been demanding my full attention.  Sucks me right in, every time.

Mage Ciera without her armor

Monday...well, uhm, see this is a hard confession.  I'm not the level of gamer that my hubby is.  Not much for Xbox, although I can play a decent game of Halo Wars (better if he's on too giving me 'orders') and I like Hexic (think Bejewled Blitz).  But I love the online role playing game RuneScape.  Monday, hubby was on his account and well, I can't exactly let him get too far ahead of me now can I?

Sitting in the same room, on separate computers, it's not uncommon for us to ask each other "Where are you?"  We had our characters in different places in the beginning, but ended up in the same dungeon room killing zombies and crawlers. And picking up whatever loot the other players let go.  I leveled up my Herblore almost ten levels by cleaning the herbs left behind by other players' kills.  They snooze, they lose.

Just like in real life, somehow I ended up making sure hubby, or rather his character, had enough to eat.  Those critters fight back, and if you're not paying attention you can kick the bucket.  And then he needed bowstring for a bow he wanted to make and he was going to buy it from the games "Grand Exchange" and I'm like, "No, no, no!!  I have some I can give you!  Don't buy any!"  Apparently he's forgotten where the flax fields are and how to make bowstrings.  Just a silly game, but it's fun and relaxing (except when others don't play nice).  As I was reading the Wikipedia article I linked above, I was amused to discover that there has been three fantasy novels written based on the game.  Why not?

Tuesday is a bit of a blur.  I didn't do much of anything fun.  Dishes.  Which is five minutes on my feet, and ten off, which can make doing dishes quite the ordeal if I've let them pile up like I did over the weekend.  I'm so bad.

Today, my mother and I went on a road trip of sorts.  My foot doctor has ordered Orthodic inserts for my shoes and the place he sent me to is in Johnson City, New York.  It's roughly an hour from my home, traffic and road work permitting.  Road work did not permit today and I was about fifteen minutes late.  :|  For an appointment that maybe lasted fifteen minutes.  If that.  All he really did was take down my info, look at both my naked feet and them make impressions of both in blue foam.  I get to go back in three weeks.  Praying that my insurance covers it, because otherwise that'll be a nice bill of $420!!  Yikes!

After that, I decided to splurge a little and take my mom out to eat.  I found a Friendly's to stop at.  Which the booth mom and I sat at had mirrors behind my mom, so out came the phone again to take pics.

Trying not to laugh too hard at me

My mom...I <3 her...

Food was good, the sundaes even better!  They give you these huge plates to make you think you're getting a lot, but you're not really.  You're just getting a normal portion.  I can't say the same about the five scoop sundaes we had.  Those were niiiice...

Those are the best confessions I can come up with.  Not exactly earth-shattering, or entirely shocking in same cases.  But enough to let you know what this crazy writer has been up to recently.  I'll be getting back on the ball tomorrow and back to proofing book number two.  I'm getting so itchy about wanting to release it!  But I can't yet, not until I weed out as many typos as I can find!  And touch up a few weak spots.  Once I've finished my present going through, and have made all the corrections, I'm going to upload the file and get my proof copy and then read through that one to make sure I've gotten as much as I can...again!  I'll never be 100% satisfied, but I'll reach the "confident enough" level after I've done that much.

But I'll leave you with a teaser of the cover as I ask you, "What did you do for Labor Day?"

Coming soon, I promise!!

Let's Discuss Life and Writing By C.P. Stringham

I had planned on visiting Cornell Plantation, located on the Cornell University campus, this past weekend and using the experience and pictures captured for this week’s blog. The trip had to be postponed. My friend, Debbie, an avid bird watcher and nature lover, was going to join me for the trip, but she had a family emergency come up last week. Her sister-in-law, Sherry, has been fighting for her life inside the ICU of our local hospital. Family comes first. As a community, we’re all pulling for Sherry to overcome her illness. She’s proved to be one tough cookie, surviving a surgery only one in two-hundred could do. Due to her extremely low blood pressure, they can’t administer pain medication and she’s conscious—that’s right, she is aware and feeling everything. If you get a moment today, send out positive energy, healing prayers, or even good juju (if that’s what you’re into) in Sherry’s direction to help fortify her strength. The ladies of Broads of a Feather offer their thoughts and prayers to the entire Yale/Learn family during this time and hope Sherry gets stronger with each passing day.

The cover came together quickly. The butterfly represents
life changing from one phase to another; a sign of hope.

So… What should I blog about today? My latest work-in-progress? I guess I could. My partner, Robin Janney, blogs about writing and, since it’s a blog about writers, I may as well give it a shot. With Rest In Peace being released a full six weeks past my original date, it has put Overcoming Sarah behind. It was my hope to have the novella available at the end of June, but even with hitting a word count of 2,000 words a day, I’d still be cutting it too closely for my taste. I find that when I force the words, the story, my voice, falls flat. It’s too hollow sounding. Due to the subject matter, the suicide of a college youth, I really want to explore the characters’ emotions and methods of coping while bringing light to the sensitive subject of depression and suicide.  As you can imagine, it has been an emotional story to write. While I don’t want to bog it down in the depths of human despair, it is important to accurately portray what life is like for those left behind. The story is told from the mother’s perspective, a role I understand all too well. My oldest graduates next year. Any good psychiatrist will be able to read Overcoming Sarah and say, “This author is working through her own separation anxiety regarding her daughter leaving for college.” Yep. It’s pretty transparent. My friend, Tina, is one of my test readers. Like me, she has a teen daughter. Courtney just finished her first year of college. I have been killing Tina’s emotional resolve with each new chapter I send her. The “what ifs” can shake a mother to her foundation. With that said, I’m hoping to draw awareness to teen depression, signs to recognize for those at risk, and also to show the evolution of a family after they experience the unthinkable. Hence the “overcoming” part. Proving that life does, indeed, go on.

While the manuscript of Overcoming Sarah started forming, I found myself seeking council from my friends, Jenn and Lisa, as we did our daily workout on The Matterhorn. Both of them have teen sons the same age as my oldest daughter. The three of us have known each other since our kids started kindergarten together. Lisa and Jenn offered some candid insight while I poured out my literary heart to them. Writing comes from the soul. To be good at it, to move your readers emotionally with your work, you have to walk in your character’s shoes. I immerse myself into each role. While writing, I leave my own reality behind and become an observer inside the world I’ve created. In doing so, it allows me to describe what I see and hear and feel. What better way to peel away my own emotions, like the layers of an onion, to get to the core of the character? Immersion like that takes a toll on me both mentally and physically. It’s another reason why I can’t force myself to write. I may not be feeling it. This side of creativity can’t be turned on or, as I’ve found out during many a sleepless night, can’t be turned off either. Like a surfer, you have to ride the waves when the tide is just right. With that being said, it’s time for me to get back to work. I have one week before the girls are out of school and I need to take advantage of my final week of quiet, undisturbed mornings.

Here’s a little snippet from Overcoming Sarah:

Set in Elmira, New York, I visited Woodlawn
             Cemetery while working on Overcoming Sarah.

I made the short trip, knowing I could have closed my eyes, and arrived at the spot since the smell of freshly turned soil grew stronger with each purposeful step.  And there it was.  Musty dampness permeated the air as the image of my daughter being swallowed up by the silky, black darkness of the dirt made me feel as if I, too, was under its weight and suffocating.  My shoes were perched an inch from the perimeter.  A temporary grave marker was already in place and provided her full name, pertinent years, as well as the name of the funeral home.  They told us that once the ground was through settling, usually within six months, her permanent monument could be installed.  Per our wishes, the only flowers left behind was the casket spray Eileen designed with delicate pink tea roses, rich green ivy, and white snapdragons.  It was easily a five-hundred-dollar arrangement and very time consuming to put together.  Cost and time were an afterthought to my shop employees.  They’d do anything for their Sarah-Bear.  I knelt down and pulled a tea rose from the arrangement.  I’d press it inside my family bible.  A keepsake that would forever represent life turning into something brittle and faded.