Some Monday Musings…

I had a rough day yesterday. My grandson celebrated his fifth birthday, and I wasn’t able to be with him. Again. Never mind that I get to see him in two weeks, I missed him in that moment, and it made me sad. It didn’t help that one of the first things I saw on my Facebook feed was my post from last year, with an adorable picture of him, and me saying how much I wished I could give him a birthday hug in person.

Another thing I saw, soon after, was a post by a young mother explaining how busy she was and therefore wasn’t able to spend time with everyone in her life. I don’t know the story behind her post, but I thought I’d share with her a different perspective, from someone who knows how it feels to be the one wishing for more time with a busy family.

I certainly wasn’t rude or judgemental. I basically said that I too was once a mother of three active boys so I understand how busy she is, but one day she’ll also be a mother of grown sons, and she might wish for more time with them, despite knowing how busy they are. I finished by saying if a relationship is important, a person finds the time to be together. If it isn’t, they don’t. Simple as that.

Rather than acknowledge my comment, this young woman, who is more than a casual acquaintance, deleted it. My first impulse was to think ‘how rude’, but, hey, it’s her wall, and she was obviously looking for agreement and commiseration, rather than open conversation. I’ll be sure not to give her cause to snub me again.

And this is my blog, so I get explain the point I was trying to make yesterday, without the risk of being deleted.

It’s a simple point, really, but maybe not an easy one, if it’s not what a person wants to hear. Yes, lives are busy. Yes, to save our sanity we must pick and choose what to do with our time. But we must choose wisely. Is it so important, for instance, to surf the internet, spending hours on Pinterest and other such sites? To some people, it might be. However, in so doing, are we neglecting something or someone else because we no longer have spare time or energy?

If the relationship is important enough, you find the time. You find the time! This is a lesson I’m still trying to learn. Time is finite. We all only have so much of it, and none of us know exactly when it’ll run out. So, while it’s easy to say, “I’m too busy”, what you’re actually saying is “my relationship with you is not important enough”. And maybe it isn’t, which is fine. All relationships have varying levels of importance.

But if it’s someone you love, or more importantly, someone who loves you, who loves your kids, you should really find a few minutes in your busy life to call, visit, whatever. Let them know you’re thinking about them and you care, even though you’re busy. Pinterest will still be there tomorrow, but your loved one might not.

EDITED October 3, 2015: To avoid future overreaction and further negativity, I’d like to clarify that my above comments are not directed at the person who deleted my comment on Facebook. I’m speaking in the broadest of generalities, to all of us who live busy lives and might be inadvertently ignoring loved ones. I thought that was clear in my original post, but if it wasn’t, hopefully it is now.

Okay, now that that’s off my chest, let’s talk writing.

The 2015 RONE Awards were announced on September 19th, and It’s Complicated, which was nominated in the Sweet Contemporary category, didn’t win or take honourable mention. Naturally I was a little disappointed, especially after the incredible review that set the nomination in motion, but the book isn’t on the market right now, so I couldn’t even have used the award to promote sales. I was very fortunate to have won a RONE with my first book, and I was fortunate to be nominated with my second. Because I only received a three star review with my third book, I won’t be up for an award next year. That’s the way it goes.

I’ve spent the month of September working through both Show No Weakness and It’s Complicated, doing a few cosmetic changes to get them ready to resubmit to a new publisher. Because Show No Weakness is an older book, it didn’t represent my current voice, so hopefully I’ve improved this. I was also able to fix a minor continuity problem between the two books, as well as a couple of pesky typos that drove my perfectionist personality crazy.

Besides the typos, which can slip by even the most careful editing, I was shocked to discover several instances of missing words, especially in It’s Complicated. Usually ‘the’ or ‘at’ or other short, commonly used words. Prior to publication, I read the manuscripts over and over and over. My editor read the manuscripts at least two or three times, then they were read by a proof-reader. How the heck did all those missing words get overlooked? Boggles the mind. I now have a text-to-speech function on my word program, and it’s beyond incredible at finding these occurrences. I can listen to the words being spoken as I read along, which really makes problems jump out at me. Not only missing words, but also repeat phrases and awkward sentence construction. It’s such an invaluable tool, I’ll never send off a manuscript again without putting it through the program first.

Both manuscripts are now finished, and Show No Weakness has been submitted to a new publisher. I have no concrete timeline for when I’ll hear whether or not they’re interested. Meanwhile, I’ve taken my first look at my editor’s notes on Visual Effects, which will be my next book out with The Wild Rose Press, sometime next year. For the most part, they’re the no-brainer type of edits, and I can quickly and easily make the fixes. There are a couple of places where I’ll have to do some thinking first, but I’m confident I’ll come up with an idea or two in short order.

Probably while taking a shower… Or in the middle of the night…

Where Did July Go?

I can’t believe it’s the end of July already. Half the summer is over and I don’t know where it went. My life continues to go at warp-speed, and happily (I think), it’s about to get even busier. The contract hasn’t been officially signed yet, but it appears that my latest submission has been accepted by The Wild Rose Press. Which means I’ll soon be immersed in edits. Yay! Okay, that might’ve been a little tongue-in-cheek, but I seriously am excited that another of my babies will be published. Maybe just not as excited about the editing part.

This was the story that didn’t want to end. It was a massive beast, which I painstakingly shortened by several thousand words. Several thousand words! And it was still too long when, on the request of my editor, I had to go back and add about three hundred more to up the heat level in a certain scene. So now my dear patient editor and I will have to roll up our sleeves and see if there’s any fat we can cut without damaging the storyline. Because I love this storyline. It’s emotional and moving and very dear to my heart. I’m not the sort who out-and-out sobs when I read something touching, but sometimes my eyes leak, and this story does it to me every time. Every single time. I sincerely hope it touches the hearts of my readers as much.

While waiting for the first round of edits, I’ll continue on my hamster’s wheel. My mom recently moved into an independent living centre and I’m spearheading the work on her condo to get it ready for market. My little Roxy needs her daily physio on her mending leg (as I do on my shoulder). I have a short visit with my oldest son and his family coming up (oh happy day!!), and later in August, Hubby and I will finally be taking our much-anticipated, twice cancelled, trip to Vancouver Island. And whenever I can, I’ll squeeze in some writing on my slow-moving wip. Oh, mustn’t forget having some fun. Hubby and I hope to resume Sunday Funday – biking, hiking and kayaking long into the fall.

After having the company of some fellow authors these past several weeks, Monday Musings will go back on hiatus for the month of August. I wish everyone a happy, productive and safe remainder of the summer. See you all in September with lots of beautiful photos to share from our Vancouver Island trip.

Wondering If It’s Jinxed

For the past few months, I’ve been working on an old manuscript, trying to salvage it for publication. I’d initially written this story back in the late 1990’s, so it needs a lot of work, both because it’s outdated and because my writing style has changed. Improved, I hope.
It was after my first book was published in 2012, that I pulled this one out of the mothballs and started to revise it. At some point, I decided the improvements needed were too vast, so I abandoned it in favour of the story I’ll next be publishing, Dare To Risk All. Then I wrote and published It’s Complicated, and have now gone back to that old manuscript.
It’s been rife with problems from the onset. The first thing I did was read it, start to finish. I continually laughed in disbelief at the story and my writing. OMG, the female character is a bitch, plain and simple. And the male character is a player. Cute and charming, for certain, but shallow and conceited as well. Neither character very likeable, I’m afraid. So I set about fixing them – and the story.
As I worked, I kept saying to myself, I thought I’d fixed this part already. About five chapters into rewrites, I came to one particular scene where I distinctly remembered changing it. Totally confused, I went back into my old computer files. I had an initial (and hilariously bad) version of this ms labelled #1. Then I had one labelled #2, and the current one labelled #3. When I opened version #2, I immediately saw I had a serious problem.
This was the version I’d worked on back in 2012 before abandoning it. Oh-oh. But I had already put in some seriously hard work on the first five chapters of the third version. How, why, I had them misnumbered, I still don’t know, but rather than beating myself up about it (or beating my head against the nearest wall), I set about looking for a solution.
What I came up with was painstakingly slow and methodical. I printed all 200+ pages of each manuscript and set them side by side on my desk. Then I opened both files on my computer and started a new file labelled current. Working my way, word by word, line by line, I compared each printed copy to the other, then copied and pasted on the computer the version I wanted into the new file. Talk about tedious.
I quickly found yet another problem. If I’d liked part of a scene or a snippet of conversation from something I didn’t plan to keep, I’d used it somewhere else. So there was the danger of having the exact same words used twice in two different places. Yikes!! Lucky for me, I have a mind for such details and I believe (fingers firmly crossed) I caught every instance of this. But boy, did it add spice to my frustration. And I still couldn’t find that one scene I knew for sure I had written.
So I turned to my binder of notes. Yes, I have a binder of notes. I know. But as I said, I’d originally written this story over fifteen years ago. I’d always intended to go back to it one day, I just didn’t know how many years that one day would take. So, whenever I got an idea for a scene or a bit of dialogue, I’d write it down in this binder. I have separate sections for each of the books I’ve written.  Somehow, I’d ended up with nearly twenty pages of chicken scratch just for this story. Twenty entire pages!  Some of the stuff was written in the middle of the night, when inspiration stuck, and not only the writing was barely legibly, so was the idea. I do tend to make things hard for myself.
As I began wading through the pages, crossing out this and that, I realized I’d never make sense of so many notes unless I put them into some sort of order, so that’s what I’ve been doing. I started a new file on the computer, made categories and have been typing the notes into whichever section they seem to belong in. As I worked my way farther along, lo and behold, I came across that scene I knew I had written. I wasn’t crazy, I hadn’t dreamed it. I had literally written it down – on paper, rather than into the actual ms.
I also realized there were potential problems with the technical aspects of my characters’ careers. Lots had changed in that side of the film industry since I had originally written it, and after a few discussions with my youngest son, who coincidently happens to work in that same profession, I came to the horrified conclusion that I had many, make that most, of my facts and the jargon wrong. The vast majority of people who read the book would never know. But I would. So I’ve been continuously picking my poor son’s brain and reading blog after blog on the internet, trying to get a realistic handle on the details. And some scenes aren’t plausible, so will need to be drastically changed or eliminated. That’s the way the cookie crumbles, I guess.
With all the bad writing, complications and snafus, I’ve been tempted, so very often, to just give up on this one again. Maybe it’s not meant to be. Maybe the story is actually jinxed. Maybe I’m an idiot for even trying. But I don’t quit easily and the bones of the story are good. I think. We’ll see. If I manage to keep my sanity long enough to finish it.

Lots of Research and Some Fun in the Sun

I have a good reason for being late with my weekend blog post.  I was off doing research in Vancouver.  It was a whirlwind trip, packed full of activities, and I’m so very glad to have finally got it done.

This was a multi-purpose trip, but the main thrust was to scout out locations for my current wip, It’s Complicated.  My youngest son moved to Vancouver last year, so we took the opportunity to deliver the last of his stuff.  The timing worked out well, because he is currently staying with us while doing prep work for a movie he’ll soon be shooting in the Okanagan.  He house-sat for us while we stayed at his bachelor pad in Kitsilano.

When the sun shines in Vancouver, it’s arguably the most beautiful city in the world.  Lucky for us, the sun shone all weekend.  Because I’m me, I took tons of pictures and if I can find the time to download and edit them this week, I’ll share the beauty of our trip with you next weekend.  (Jump to that post here) In the meantime, I have lots of notes to compile.  I might not have gotten any actual writing done, but as any writer knows, the research is equally important, and I’ve done plenty of that lately.

Definitely Not a Hip Young Urbanite

I think my title explains my problem. I’m not quite old yet, but I admit to being rather old-fashioned. (I mean, does anyone even say ‘hip’ anymore?) My main character in my current wip (work in progress) made several appearances in Show No Weakness and I thought I knew her really well. I was wrong. Maggie is twenty-seven years old. She’s single, has a career, grew up in the city and is modern in every way. Totally the opposite of me. Why do I do this to myself?
How can I channel my inner girlie-girl when I’m pretty sure I was born missing that gene? I might be female, but no one can accuse me of being girlie. I’m a bit of a peacock and love girlie colours; my wardrobe is full of bright colours, especially pinks and purples of every shade. I enjoy wearing casual dresses, but am much more comfortable in pants or capris. Shoe shopping is an exquisite form of torture for me. I love looking at gorgeous high heels, but please don’t ever expect me to actually wear them. I don’t even like shopping for runners or casual shoes, or—gasp—clothes and purses.
When it comes to hair and makeup, I’m next to useless. Part of the reason I don’t wear makeup is because I have so many chemical allergies, I usually just end up getting a headache from it. Another part is simply because I can’t be bothered. I know many, many women would never leave their home without their makeup carefully in place and that’s fine, if it works for them. But why should I have to paint my face if I don’t want to? I can practically hear all the horrified gasps from here. And that doesn’t bother me a bit.
I also confess, I consider going to the hairdresser almost on par with a trip to the dentist—not that I don’t have a lovely hairdresser, I do, I just find the whole process frazzles my nerves. And I can never get my hair to look the same as when I leave the salon. I’m deadly with appliances and limit their use for my own good. I have started using a straightener recently, but only on days when I have a serious attack of the frizzies. Otherwise, it’s wash and wear for me. And if a certain style is all the rage, I refuse to wear my hair that way. I’m anti-trendy in almost every way.
See, I’m definitely missing that girlie gene. No wonder I’m struggling to write a character who epitomizes the term girlie-girl. But it goes even deeper than that. Maggie is a career woman, she loves her job and she loves the big city and although she also loves men, she’s happy being single at this point in her life. I grew up in a city, but I married at twenty, moved to a small town soon after and started a family. By time I was Maggie’s age, I was a stay-at-home mom of two small boys. No experience with a career or city-life to draw on. So I struggle.
I also have a nine-year-old girl in this wip. I’d rather write about a teenage boy any day. I understand boys, I’ve raised three boys and now have two (adorable, bright, inspiring) young grandsons. When I married my husband thirty-five long years ago, he was still pretty much a boy. Yes, I know I was once a nine-year-old girl, but that was a couple of generations ago. Life was very different back then.
I’ll figure it out, I generally do. But fair warning to all the hip, young female urbanites in my life—to borrow the words from Sting—I’ll be watching you. 🙂

Furry Paws Pattering Down Memory Lane

I recently got an email from a dear friend telling me they had to put down their beloved yellow lab, Buddy.  He was 12 years old, and along with his grieving owners, he leaves behind his little pal, Hunter, who’s going to be lost without him.

R.I.P. Buddy.  We’ll miss your enthusiastic welcomes and your late night visits to our bed.

Anyone who owns an animal will likely have to face this heartbreaking scenario at some point in their pet’s life.  For me, an avid animal lover, I’ve been there, done that, far too many times.  The most recent two months ago, when we had to say goodbye to Sweetie.  It never gets easier.  My friend said it sucked and he felt bummed out.  I agree completely, it really sucks and you feel totally bummed out.

I have a framed collage on my wall leading downstairs.  In it is a photo of almost every pet I’ve had the pleasure of sharing a part of my life with.  Some shared many years, some much less, but they all hold a place in my heart and my memories.  I’ve decided to take a fun and furry walk down memory lane and every weekend I’ll shine the spotlight on one of my beloved pets.

Let me introduce them from top left, across and then down:

Pepper 1965-1976

Spooky 1979-1981

Minet 1980-1991

Titan 1981-1982

Brandy lived with us for the portion of her life between 1983 and 1988.

Oliver 1990-2002

Simon 1991-1996

Sweetie 1997-2012

Roxy 2003-for very long time still, I hope.

All the above names are links to a post about them. Please join me next weekend as I reminisce about my childhood pet, Pepper.