Quick Update

Hi all! I'm so sorry for the long absence. Had some family medical issues after my grandma's death, so real life was pretty busy. I was all ready to come here and let everyone know how well my family was doing and then I got word that my grandpa fell and broke his hip. Plus, I've just received word of a new, huge project at work that's going to take up a lot of time. Goodness!!

Anyway, even if I'm not here much, please know I'm thinking about all of you and keeping up with your entries. I am still available as admin. if you have any problems posting or for new authors to be added. Just send me an email.

To keep this writing related, I've been taking the "Write Fiction Like a Pro" class (of course, I got a bit behind this week but will catch up. Hi Stan's Student!). Great class in terms of learning how to truly structure a story idea. Anyway, I thought this link would be of interest to all:


Developing Memorable Characters http://character-development.suite101.com/article.cfm/developing_memorable_characters
The more you know about your characters, the better you'll create believable characters who live and breathe on the page and in their own fictional world. Here are 45 questions to help you create your characters.

Hope everyone is doing well. Let us know how you're doing (and latest writing classes/projects) in the comments or with posts!

Question about writing classes

I know a few of you mentioned on the class discussion boards that you were going to take more writing classes. I thought it might be interesting to hear which classes people are taking and why. Or what about classes you've taken in the past...is there any class out there you've taken that you would recommend (or not recommend)?

Starting September 17th, I'll be in "Writeriffic: Creativity Training for Writers." I decided on another, more beginning-type class because I feel I still have a lot more work to do regarding discipline in writing and also editing. I'm taking baby steps here in hopes that I'm building a strong foundation for good writing in the future.

I thought about...

Seeking submissions!!!
I want to put together a compendium of really funny one-liners because I love them and I can never remember them. To get the group started...here are a couple:
1. I thought about being a pessimist, but I figured it wouldn't work out.
2. If everything is coming your way, get in the other lane!

I'm sure you know some too...maybe we can even write some new ones!

Overview of things to come

This might not be a good idea, but in order to answer the questions in response to my creative piece in the class, I'm going to try to answer with a minimum amount of details.

The piece was actually chronologically the 7th of 25 chapters in my story of stories, but is the first chapter in my book. Although this was submitted as a creative piece, the creativity is only in the telling. The stories themselves are as true as the breath you are taking. No..not the one you are exhaling..the one you are about to take..no..wait..okay, you need to keep up with me here! :-)

After telling us we were adopted, Mom told us about our dad being a crooked man, threatening my mother to the point she got scared and left - but left my sister and I with him. We traversed the country avoiding capture by the authorities, "hooking up" with his new girlfriend and our now believed-to-be-mother, and eventually he was arrested by the FBI and removed from our lives. This was a traumatic event for me (age 4+ at the time), which caused me to lose memory of everything prior to the day he was taken away by train. The rest of the story deals with discovering the whereabouts of my birth mother, discovering a brother, losing that brother again, our decision, disappointments and whole process of adoption of our children and much, much more.

I'm finally back!

Oh dear! Work exploded all over the place with writing of grants, mission-driven strategic plans (I know all of you are jealous over that one), and a couple of unexpected twists including starting to outline and lead a task force which will present a analysis/report to the governor about the impact of Alzheimer's Disease on our state. Mmm-hmm, lots of creativity : )

Anyway, I've scrambled trying to catch up with class and get my assignments posted. I've started to leave some comments on classmates' final pieces and everyone did such an amazing job! I'm a bit upset, to be honest. I really didn't spend enough time on my 500 words but I went ahead and posted what I had. But, I'm also a bit excited as I know there's a lot of work for me to do, but I really feel like I have the tools now to keep improving it and, with our blog, I'll have the perfect place to post and get critiques.

I hope to spend so more time tomorrow catching up on comments here on the wonderful works everyone is posting and catching up in the discussion area for class. Also, I'm going to finish adding the links Ann provided for our class so we'll have them for our use as we continue writing.

And, in the best news, somehow my email stopped being crabby and let Robyn Kim in, so we should have her added as one of our authors soon. Welcome, Robyn!

Writer's are like redwood trees!

Weak analogies here we come!

Beginning Writers are like redwood trees. Individually, our roots are shallow, and we can be pulled from our foundation rather easily. However, when we cluster together, we grow together. Our roots will inter-twine, and provide each of us the support we need to grow tall in our endeavors and shade our communities of influence with leaves of creativity and enlightenment.

Rejoicing at life.

(No quality writing here...simply a rant!)

Sometimes when we think about issues, we take a very narrow perspective based solely on our own experiences and understanding. Is it helpful to take an opposite approach in our minds, if not on paper, to find flaws in our thinking? Personally, it is helpful for moral issues. The following is an example that can be loaded with emotions on all sides.
Do you think that if there is a higher power, however it is embodied, that higher power cherishes little children? Are those little children that are so young they don't have the capacity to think and decide for themselves bound for Hell before they make their own decision which will lead them elsewhere? I've always held them "Heaven-bound" until they make the conscious human decision to "bite the apple". Certainly infants and younger would be covered in the protective hands of that higher power, which I know to be, and will heretofore call, God.
If a woman dies while pregnant in a car accident, and the baby also dies, won't that child go to Heaven? I believe so...we don't know about the mother...but God does...and the decision will be made based on her life and decisions.
If a baby of a pregnant mother dies in an accident, will the baby go to Heaven? Will the mother? What if the mother took steps to cause the accident to happen knowing the baby would die and she wouldn't, and no one else would be the wiser. Will the baby go to heaven? Again, I believe so. Would the mother? Depends on the events that would follow. Would she be "judged" by God? Yes, but she can also find forgiveness, right.
Whether the rest of the world knows about such a thing or not...the baby will go to Heaven, and the mother (and father if involved) will be judged by God appropriately...and possibly eternally. Left to humans, the mother and father might not receive the appropriate judgement and penalty. In any case...the baby who dies, is safe for eternity.
This makes we wonder, and I've not yet cemented in my mind, whether the amount of money, energy and effort that we as a people put forth trying to permit, outlaw, control things such as abortion really have an eternal payoff - or are they strictly to make US feel better about US.
If "Susie, Sally, or Jane, and Fred, John or Marty" make a decision to abort a child before it is born, and no one in the world knows but them...the baby will go to Heaven. Whether WE think it is right, wrong or indifferent makes no eternal difference! God will judge each and everyone of us based on the lives we've lived.
One additional question that plagues me is...what if 'we the people' decide the baby can not be aborted and we force them to give it birth to this world. There are no guarantees that the child will be safe and secure for eternity, for the parents and the child's eventual choices and decisions will play a major role.
So my point is not that abortion should be legal or not, or that any other moral issue should be left to my discretion. Simply stated, let God decide what God should decide...and let the rest of us concentrate on living a life worthy of the judgement we hope He'll make about how we lived - NOT how our neighbors lived.
Did I just open a can of worms?

My Brain Hurts

Oh my goodness. I am pulling my hair out with this short story. SF your killing me here. lol. Is this a payback for my last post to you not wanting to make the changes Ann had suggested? If it were, then I wouldn't have to look so hard at my writing. So you see that would give me an out.

I think I am getting way off track. I need to go back to when this all came to me and make it better instead of changing it all up. It was truly a gut wrenching piece that brought some healing to me about some things. I think I am losing the power of it in the revisions. I don't know anything anymore, except this is hard work, but I am up for it, as long as I know if I am doing it right or am I all wrong. I don't know. Everyone has an opionion of what they like, no one person can gear their writing for everyone to like it, that just isn't possible. I just want to know I am writing it in the best form it could possibly be. Does any of this make any sense to anybody? I am trying to cram 40 years into 500 words. I think its a good start for that book, but I can't help rememeber the words in our last lesson, " All writers love the sound of their own words. This is natural. Wow, I read that and thought, well that explains it, its not like my singing, I know I sound bad singing, so the measuring bar is different. How will I know if I suck at this or not? Because honestly the first 50 reads I usually like what I write very much, a day or two later maybe not so much. Well, that's all I wanted to say. I am going to bed now. My brain hurts....