Two events in the writing world have caused a bit of pain in the past weeks. The first was that for many of us our Genesis results were less than we anticipated. Or, in my case, they were about what I expected, but I still wished they’d been better. That’s not a very big pain in the whole scheme of things, still I interacted with several others who were feeling the same disappointment. I have to say that it took a bit of “bucking up” for all of us to digest the information, decide how much to take to heart and how much to take with a grain of salt and then decide to use the critiques as part of our learning process. We had to make the decision to turn the pain into something valuable.

The other issue came up on the ACFW loop. A writer gave her opinion that Christian writers should make more effort to cross over into the secular market and further, Christian writing is still not up to snuff or it would be winning more awards. You can imagine how well that comment went over on the Christian writers loop. Whether or not the judgment is accurate, it was bound to hurt a little bit.  I watched closely to see how the conversation played out. After all, when we get hurt, we bleed and we may want to retaliate. The feelings ran high and there were lots of responses about purpose in writing and winning and quality of writing and more.  There were some very thoughtful comments and for the most part everyone refrained from rolling in the mud. I’m glad.

I just finished writing seven devotionals on forgiveness. When we feel offended, Christian or not, we’ll feel the urge to defend ourselves and possibly get a dig in at the offender too. But if we want to serve Christ and reflect His life in ours, we’ll find a way to express ourselves without hurting back. It was encouraging to see the two writing situations play out with grace. Well done, writers.

Indian cuisine and the women of the home often had morning meetings with their cooks to

discuss the spices required for the day’s cooking. Spice merchants were important and

often wealthy businessmen of the community. One of the main characters in my work in

progress is a spice merchant who has contracted leprosy. The 1870′s through the 1890′s were

a significant time period in the development of treatments for the dreaded disease. Leper

colonies were formed and various treatments including chalmoogra oil were used both topically and as injections. This

and other ayurvedic treatments were used with some success in treatment of leprosy until sulfa drugs were available in

the 1940′s I’m finding that the research required to write about India in the 1800′s is just as much fun as writing the

story.

The school year is winding down in India. The temperatures soar in April and May and for that reason those months are the equivalent of our summer vacation. Lots of children’s groups are held during those months and this year one of my friends in India is training and feeding about 100 children for four days. There will be songs and games, stories and a nice lunch. The stories will teach about a God who loves people, not the gods they are used to hearing about who deceive people and play tricks–gods who demand gifts and offerings with no regard for the well-being of the giver.

These classes will bring life to the children. My little $15 will go into the pot that supports this work and 100 children will hear about Jesus and get a nice meal for four days in a row. It’s hard to understand the impact those four days may have on a child. They will be loved and nurtured. They’ll have fun and their tummies will be full. They’ll get a glimpse of a better way to live and they’ll begin to understand love and forgiveness, mercy and grace and hope. Sound interesting?

You can read more about our work in India at www.onehandfulofrice.org

So, here’s a bit of the swirl I’m dealing with right now. My mother, who is 89, fell two weeks ago and broke her hip. That sent us into the emergency room and hospital swirl: long hours of waiting, trying to answer questions repeated every minute or so with no answers in my own head. Then the sterile, but somehow beautiful environment of hospital trays, schedules, medications, routines I don’t understand, and the eternal hope of a doctor visit. Then on to the dismal world of rehab where broken bodies try to mend in the midst of dark hallways, nasty smells and harried-looking aides scurrying around. The days are full of questions, but answers are in short supply.

A few more concerns to round out the days: where to place my mother when she can leave rehab? What to do with her beloved cat? When to find time to pack up all of her life and distill it down to what can fit in an 8′ X 9′ room?

In the midst of family life, I have my writing. I churn out the assignments, but seem to run dry on my “real writing.” I’m a bit numb, I guess. But compelling writing comes out of struggles and the realities of daily life, doesn’t it? Of course it is sometimes grander than real life, but it’s grounded in the inner turmoils and demands of circumstances that are uncomfortable, even harrowing–that’s what real writing is made of. So there should be words in hard times. I know they’re out there and I just need to grasp for them, fight for them, subdue them.

This morning, after a really horrible night’s sleep, I sat here in my office drinking my lovely, dark coffee and out the window to my left I caught some movement. Well, a lot of little movements. There was a flock of the fluttery, busy, inch and a half-long bushtits who come for visits in the spring of the year. Is it spring? Nearly. You have to pay attention to bushtits, because their visits last only seconds. They peck and hop around and eat whatever it is they find on fir trees and then they’re gone before you can count how many.

And just like that I determined to reach up into the swirl and catch a few of my words and set them down because that’s what I do. I write.

Maybe you’re not interested in becoming a published author, that’s fine. But how about leaving your “Satchel Story,” the biggest, most important story of your life, or several of your “Steamer Trunk” stories, the ones that tell a lot about you and the person you’ve come to be.

My husband was taken in as a teen by a wonderful loving family. They had five children of their own but found room for one more. The loving mother of this family spoiled my husband rotten by doing things like baking him a whole pie for himself, and in so doing let him know he was loved. She wrote down some of her stories and published them just for the extended family. What a treasure that is and how fortunate we are to have a copy.

Joy DeKok, the author of Your Life, a Legacy, shares some of her own stories and explains why they were important in her personal growth. She speaks about the roadblocks that may get in the way of your efforts to write–roadblocks we all face when we set out to do something new. Are you self-critical or do you allow others to discourage you before you even begin? Do you compare your writing skills with professionals and find yourself wanting? Well, join the crowd, and then put all that aside and just start writing.

Joy outlines some great ways to organize your memoir. You can write about various family members and tell each of their stories. You can organize chronologically by years or decades, or you can collect the sayings that came to mean something in your family or your life. You can tell about the marriages or the weddings in your life, the sad episodes and the exciting happy ones. The choices are endless and it’s your story to tell.

If you’d like to buy Joy’s book, look for Your Life, a Legacy on Amazon.com. It’s also available for Kindle and Nook. You can meet Joy on her websites: www.joydekok.com or www.booksbyjoy.com. Then get busy and write your story!

Recently I had carpal tunnel surgery on my right hand. The incision is nicely healed if a little painful still. The instructions I was given when leaving the hospital included massaging the scar with either 1) cocoa butter or 2) bag balm. Now I don’t know what you would have done, but when I went to the pharmacy I went straight for the vanilla-scented cocoa butter. I didn’t ask if bag balm was on aisle three, I intentionally chose to buy the product that had the image I was going after. I think I made an intelligent decision and I’m pleased with the result. Don’t bother to tell me if the bag balm would have done a better job. I wasn’t in the market for cow stuff.

In 2012 I want to make good decisions. My success will rely partly on hard work and partly on the way I interpret the information given to me. Can I accept honest critique? Will I apply the good advice given me and can I work with editors who want some revisions? And…..do I have a healthy perspective on my writing life, complete with the right to make the decisions I feel best for my current level of expertise? Well, yes, I think I do.

Last night I gamely took my first chapter of Prema’s Journey to Randy Ingermanson’s critique group. There I sat in the rarefied air of those in the know and plunked down five pages of writing. I had been ruthless in editing out omniscient point of view. In so doing I quickly rewrote some paragraphs and BOING! I bounced right up against cause and effect problems. I’ve read about those. They don’t scare me quite as much as point of view did. But wait…

I also have a tragic flaw in my overall story. My main character is merely a victim at this point and doesn’t have a goal large enough to hold reader’s interest. The illustration given was the shapely misses vying for the Miss America banner and tiara (which never sit straight and always make her look drunk, but that is another matter). Miss America hopefuls always say they want “world peace”– a lofty, but unmeasurable and vague goal. My character wants to find the meaning of life and hopes there’s some good stuff in there somewhere. Bummer.

But, and here’s the important point for today, I’m really thankful to be in a critique group where there are knowledgable people willing to help me with my writing learning curve. I have a lot to learn. How better to learn these elements of strong fiction than to bump into them and wrestle with each one until I can master them?

Yes, I’m stumbling a bit and whacking away with my pinata stick without hitting paydirt yet, but honestly, I’m beginning to peek through the blindfold and–don’t tell anyone, but I can actually see a little bit.

Camille’s writing reflects her deep faith in a God of second chances and sacrificial love. Through Savanna’s struggles with underlying motives and mistakes of the past, the reader gets to take a peek at his or her own foundational beliefs. In this day of chasing success through career goals and “positioning” the story takes a fresh look at basic values of trust, honesty, and real-life love.

This little gem is debuting on December 3rd as an eBook. Go to http://ow.ly/7rAvQ.  It’s available the whole month for just one little dollar.

I’ve been a little discouraged about my writing for the past few weeks. My feelings are all wrapped up in trying to learn to write fiction, and realizing that I’m rather lazy in my old age. I successfully did Novel Track in the month of October and I’m proud of that.

Now in November I’m having wrist surgery which is a definite challenge to writing. Don’t know if I’ll be able to prop up my wrist and keep going or not. And I can write with my left hand, sort of…

Anyway, I never have to look very far to see others in more trouble than I am–the people sitting at the bus stop on a rainy, nasty day, the people crossing the street to shop at the dark convenience store, the people at the doctor’s office with heads bent and walking with walkers. And so on.

So I prayed a prayer of  “thank you’s even though…” and the list was long until I found myself dropping the ‘even thoughs’ and just thanking. I have so much to be thankful for.

And then yesterday and today I sold three different articles. Wow. I needed that. Thanks, God, for the mercy.

This goal-setting with accountability method works well for me. Otherwise I just let the days slide by and don’t work much on the next places my character and plot are going. That’s because I’m out of my comfort zone–flying by the seat of my pants in fiction.

Luckily I’ve found that there is a whole world of seat of the pantsers out there in the writing world. I know that the editing process will require that I just about start over as I learn more about fiction writing, but at least I have my main character going places and doing things. This is hard work for me and I hate to admit it, but I’m a little bit lazy in these retirement years.

So, whatever works. For now I’m cranking out some work and maybe one day it will all be stitched together into a nice, little book. And then, of course, they’ll ask where my sequel is. Okay, just shoot me now.