Happy March!

Day 60 of 2022. In like a lion.

Okay, not a lion. But floofy!  

  
We've had winds the last two weeks that have been wild. My mother always used to say, "In like a lion, out like a lamb." I'm hoping. 

Yet, happy, I say. 

How can I say that, knowing what's happening in Ukraine? Aware of the fear some folks are experiencing in Texas because of certain new laws. I am praying and doing what I can. But I have hope. Why? Because I believe God is good. I am thankful that, like many people before them in many places around the world, the Ukrainians are fighting their Russian invaders. I feel for the people of both countries. What governments want, people rarely do. 

For me, March is happy because it is the month of the birthday of my 2nd born child. My beautiful boy, my angel baby. He will be 29 this year. Later this year, I'll be 60. But for a little while, after his birthday, we'll be 39 years apart. I like that. Our ages will both end in 9. I adore him and he is a blessing to me every day of my life. 

So, no thanks to our current administration (I am not a fan), restrictions regarding masking mandates are being lifted around the country. People finally realized that while dangerous, like the flu, COVID will be with us for the long haul. It is weakening itself because viruses that kill their hosts can't last and that is the understated goal of any virus, to live, to continue. It isn't a conscious goal, but in the words of Ian Malcolm, "... there it is... Life finds a way." 

This, in part, stopped me from not posting for two years. Sorry about that, if anyone is out there reading. I hope you are. I've been working hard, harder even, on my "Sons" WIP. The story of Mikkayl and Rykko Arrayn's beginnings will come your way soon. 

Like many of you, I suspect, this time of pandemic, untrustworthy media, war and looming war, of confusion and disheartenment, has been very difficult. Understatement, I know. I hope that you have found comfort. For myself, I've found comfort in the words of my lord, "I'll never leave you nor forsake you." That doesn't mean my life will be perfect, or even good, all the time. It means that when I'm afraid, or stressed, or depressed, as I often have been over these last four years, he is there with me. I hope you've found that comfort. 

The reason for this post is that Facebook reminded me of a memory and I wanted to save it here.

When I was a child, my father worked as a firefighter. A first responder, he became Fire Chief. But this memory is about a little gadget that sat on one of the four dividers in our front hall. The dividers separated the two rooms and hall from one another in an open floor plan. One was the "good" living room (reserved for guests, bible studies, and hymn sings), the other was the "comfortable" living room. We weren't to play in the fireplace side, but in the comfy side where we had built-in toy boxes and, of course, a TV. 

The gadget was called a Plectron. It produced a stream of voices and noises and it was right there, so close to where I played, to where mom ironed clothes. Important on its elevated height. Firefighters communicating, letting one another know the state of things, and letting us in the household know that they were there, ready and able, standing by to help.

Whenever the tones would sound, we'd hear the siren outside too and my mother taught us to gasp, "Huh!" And then say, "A fire!" I believe she did that to distract us, making certain the loud tones did not scare us. Clever, my mother. 

As soon as those tones sounded, we knew my father was on his way to help those in need. I didn't know of a better man to have on his way to help than my dad! That was also the cue for mom and me to pause and pray for the safety of the firefighters and the folks they went to help. I know now that it comforted her, too, maybe more than me. I was safe! I didn't know the potential danger my father was in. 

It looked a lot like this!

 What a clever idea this little machine! To let the firefighters know where they needed to be and when as quickly as possible. 

It is an excellent memory for me. I am thankful for learning from my mother that scary times are times to ask for God's blessing on those ready to go into harm's way to help. 

I'm especially thankful that my father lived his life as the sort of man who would help when needed, anytime, day or night. It is a characteristic and a heartfelt need he passed on to me. I don't know if that's genetics, but I do know that life finds a way, that God is in control, and that good people will always do what they know is right. 

As spring comes on, may the heart of the Lamb not only guide us out of a roaring start to March, but dwell in us richly, according to his good purposes. 

Steel Wool People

Everything connects to what I write. People who advise those of us who write (some writers themselves, others just...you know... "experts") suggest that writers should "write what you know."

Shelly feels for my lack of genius... ;D 

I'm experienced, but no "expert." I know a lot of stuff. Not "blow your mind" stuff. (Without mucus your stomach would digest itself!) Not "know everything" stuff  (like that guy over there). Just, average, ordinary, common sense stuff. Let me illustrate.

In response to the Great Chicken Soup Boil Over of 2014, I rolled up my non-existent sleeves, got out the ol' elbow grease and cleaned the gas stove in the apartment. When I say stove, I mean it. I did not clean the oven which supports the stove. Don't look at me like that. Contrary to popular belief, I'm not insane. No, my mother did not have me tested. I just *know*. Anyway, my subconscious pushed me to shame over how the stove looked. The schmaltz was dry, so it didn't smell like chicken soup any more but really, it looked, ah, untidy. Yeah, let's go with that. Seriously, the oven was of no consequence to me. I have writing to do!

Moving on. Other than the stove-top itself, there are three parts to each burner that can be removed and scrubbed to within an inch of their cast-metal lives.

I call these:

• The Grate Thingy -- on which we put pots and/or pans--not at the same time. Generally. I call this the "Catcher's Mask". We'll refer to that as the "Grate" from here on;
• The Round Thingy -- the cap that prevents (I think) the gas and flame from going "due up". Technically, I believe the proper name is The Flat Round Thingy, but for the sake of simplicity, let's call it the RT;

and

• and the Flame Dispersal Unit (FDU) -- you know, that Thingy which supports the RT.

I removed the initial offending Grate (front burner on the right side - okay, my right side while I'm facing the oven, not the oven's right side). I tried to clean it with a dishcloth. HA! I tried the sponge wrapped in nylon. Not even close! I set the first Grate down and moved on to the second Grate. Same problem. I set them both in the sink and tried to clean the first RT. Better, but still... not enough. 

Light Painting looks AWESOME!

I knew then it was time to get out the best abrasive object known to kitchens since abrasive objects were known to kitchens: Steel Wool. If you're not familiar with it, Steel wool, "also known as wire wool or wire sponge, is a bundle of strands of very fine soft steel filaments. It is used as an abrasive in finishing and repair work for polishing wood or metal objects, cleaning household cookware, cleaning windows, sanding surfaces, and to produce sparks while burning in light painting." Is that cool or what??

I use the kind with the pink soap in it. Smells awful when you get it wet. Like iron supplements when they get stuck in your throat cause they're not manufactured for consumption by ordinary humans. Mutants, maybe. But baby, steel wool works.

I wet that sucker up and went to scrubbing the first RT. It didn't take long, either. You have never seen an RT shine like that! I took off the other two Grates and put them in the sink (they're the biggest things so I saved them for last) and scrubbed clean all the RTs. The FDUs are a little harder. They've got bumps on them for allowing the dispersal of the flame and those things can be pointy. I scrubbed them until they annoyed me and rinsed them and the RTs off. Lovely! Well, certainly "acceptable". 

Then I tackled the Grates. The Grates and the FDUs could be cleaner. But honestly, for that I needed protective gloves. I don't like them. I can't feel things when I'm wearing them and they make my hands sweat. I might as well have my hands in the water cause they don't keep them dry! They might protect me from the pointiness and the nasty steel wool fibers (there's a whole story about my oldest brother in the Navy and steel wool, by the way. That's for another day, too.) but I'd be dropping things constantly. So, no gloves. My fingers still hurt. 

I scrubbed up the stove top, too. Wiped it all down and put everything back together. None of the burners would light. I could smell lots of gas, but the spark wasn't catching. I realized that I hadn't dried things off enough. 

Now, I'm a funny sorta bird. When I picked up one Grate to move it and dry the RT and FDU under it, I left it on the drainboard. I put the next Grate over the dried Burner Unit and dried the next one and so on until the first Grate wound up on the last burner. Somehow, I think it helps spread the wear and tear, but I don't do it on purpose. Didn't. 

All clean! 

Well, except for the oven. Another day, another blog post.

Steel Sponge!

By now, if you've come this far, you might wonder how this relates to writing. I know I'd be wondering that about now. Fact is, in my life I have Steel Wool People. These are not the cuddly ones, the encouragers, the smilers. These Steel Wool People are the abrasive ones who get under the grease and grime I let myself sink into. Present and past, they get under the dirt and scrub me clean again in a way that the soft scrubbers, the huggers and encouragers can't. 

Don't get me wrong. I love the huggers. I'm a hugger. I'm a weird mix of hugger and steel wool. I don't have a name for me. My mother, though, she was the best sort of encourager. She hugged me every day. She told me how smart, how valuable, how loved I was all the time. She showed me how to love others and her words of love could fend off the words that bully even when she wasn't around to see that happen. She was the first person to tell me that the opinions of people I didn't know, who didn't love me, didn't matter. I got through a lot of teasing that way and held my head high because I knew she loved me all the time, no matter how grimy I got, metaphorically speaking. (If I needed a bath, then she pulled no punches!) 

But I'm talking about the other folks, like my Father. He hugged me too, and loved me, there's no doubt, but he was a straight shooter. He was The Steel Wool Man, for sure. The truth-sayer, the drill sergeant. He was the one who said the hard things in hard ways because he knew when I needed a push to shake off the bad habit or the self-indulgence that left me dull and less efficient to the task at hand. Like steel wool, he scoured away the old -- the self-pity, the depression, the fear of not being good enough -- and left me ready for the lavish love my parents together bestowed. He was not unkind to me, ever, nor rude. He did not pick on me, or make fun of me. He got to the root of the problem and helped strengthen the me within fighting her way out. And when I shined, he pointed to how bright I was. 

He told me two things about my first novel that make me "shine" even to this day. He said, "I didn't know my little girl knew so much about war," and "there's too much sex." Honest, loving and abrasive. (No, you won't see that novel anytime soon. ;D Maybe someday. Minus the sex because if there is another thing I've learned from my Steel Wool People when it comes to writing, it's that less is more.)

I had a teacher in high school who was a Steel Wool Man in some respects. When one assignment had us choosing poems by our favorite poets, I choose Kipling. What? I was 17! I had a sore throat, so when I had to read my poem, I apologized. I introduced the poem and he said, "We'll forgive you for Kipling." I didn't know then what his objections were. I understand now and I look back on it as a very Steel Wool comment. 

My writing partner, Robin, is Steel Wool for me and my writing, through and through. She knocks off the rough, gets down to the bare metal and the result is brilliant.

These people, the huggers included, inspire my writing, I try to give my characters some Steel Wool People in their lives so that the hero is never really standing alone, even when the Bad Guys think he is. The heroine is kicking butt and taking names because within her soul she has the steel of such people embedded. It keeps her grounded and keeps her moving. 

They keep me moving. My husband is a Steel Wool Man and I love him for it more every single day. He polishes me and doesn't let me sink into those defeating habits which can drag me down. He makes me shine so that I can paint the world with the light I create. My sons and daughter tell it straight, too, and my daughter's help with my tales is invaluable. Thanks to them, I'm no where near done giving off sparks. 

Who makes you shine? Who are your Steel Wool People?

Veteran's Day 2011

It is still November and so it is still NaNoWriMo. I am typing on an external keyboard attached to my laptop which is perched on a board held up by two drawers so I have room for my hands - otherwise I'd bash my knuckles or have to hold the external keyboard in my lap. My Lenovo is only two years old and I've dropped it three times so a few of the keys won't work, like the quotation mark/apostrophe. Vital keys for novel writing, I tell you.

While I am struggling to write tales of fantasy heroes, I thought I'd take a moment out and talk about the man I consider to be my hero, My father.  William Henry Jennings 3rd was born on July 4, 1922. He was a trouble maker from the start. Demanding, handsome, taking all his mother's attention. By the age of 12 he was something of a bully and a vagabond, wandering the farms of South Jersey with an eye toward earning money so he could hang out with his gang of friends, buy beer - if the tales are true - and be a nuisance. He was a lover of books, as I am, but not until he was older and much calmer.

He met my mother, Dorothy Jean Runge (she preferred "Jean" to "Dorothy" or Dot and always relegated the Dorothy to a "D. Jean" when writing checks) during their high school years. He attended Woodrow Wilson and she West Collingswood. He played on the baseball team and she was in the Drum and Bugle Corps. When they first met, at a ball game, he told her, "I'm going to marry you." She was a year older than he was and thought he was tall, too young, much too arrogant and annoying, but ... oh, so handsome. Blond, blue-eyed, it wasn't long before he won her heart and took her home to meet his mother. One look at Mom and Grandmom called her "an angel" because of her pretty face and beautiful blond hair.

The story goes that when the U.S. joined WWII in '41, Dad joined up but to get married to my mother he needed his mother's signature on the license. See how young he looks in that picture! Smug, too.

He did his stint, proud to serve in the Navy while his brother, my uncle Bob, served in the Army. Years later, Dad told me stories of being chosen to sit behind the pilot and take reconnaissance photographs. Before the flight, he cut JEAN out of paper, wet the letters and stuck them on the plane for a photograph. He carried that picture in his wallet for years, even after Mom died. During the flight, the plane was hit and he and the pilot bailed out. The pilot was shot as they descended and got caught by his chute in a tree. Dad managed to climb up and cut him down, but he was already dead.

Many, many times, my father could have been killed in those years. But he wasn't. He told me how he became the reluctant Light Weight Boxing Champion of his ship. The other guys didn't give him a choice. They had money riding on the fight and the guy who was supposed to fight was out of commission so he'd better win. Dad stepped up and won the fight. I think it was the only fight he fought, and it wasn't easy, but - he told me - it was better than being beaten up by his crew mates. God was good to my father and had plans for him. Unlike many other servicemen, he got to come home and to come home whole. He had seven kids with Mom, saw all of them grow up, most get married. He even got to see me, the youngest, get married and have three beautiful children. Though, when my grandmother, alive to see my oldest born, said that he was a "beautiful boy," Dad said to my son, "You tell her, Marc! You're not beautiful! Girls are beautiful, boys are handsome. You tell her that you're handsome!" I have that on video.

He had a strong work ethic. You went to work unless you were dying or someone else was. You did your job, you were loyal to your employer and in turn your employer did right by you. He served our hometown as police officer, Police Chief, fireman and Fire Chief for many years. I still remember when I was in kindergarten and he brought the big, red Fire Engine to our school to talk about fire safety. All the kids in my class were absolutely stunned and incredibly impressed. "He's your father??" I thought I'd burst with pride.

I'm still bursting with it. He never, ever let us go hungry no matter how hard or long he had to work. Seven kids, a wife, a house - part of which he built with his own two hands, all of which he maintained year after year without complaint. We never lacked for clothes to wear (even if they were hand-me-downs) and the house was never so cold that a sweater couldn't take the winter chill away. He taught Sunday School in our church. He became shop steward when he worked in a manufacturing plant after he left the Fire Department. He was respected, listened to, looked up to and never once did he expect to be given anything but a fair day's pay for an honest day's work. He knew how to save, how to be disciplined and how to mete out punishment appropriate to misbehaving children with a fair and loving hand. We were never punished by a smack on the behind if talking solved the problem. If we couldn't be reasoned with, we were put over his knee but he never, ever beat us. A firm swat on the behind and it was over. We were quite clear about what we had done wrong and even more clear that having to punish any of us hurt our father's heart far more than it hurt our healthy backsides.

I loved him so much, was so proud of the kind of man he was, that the mere thought of disappointing him, let alone doing something worthy of a swat to the bum, rarely entered my mind. To see that broken-hearted look on his face even once was enough to make me never want to hurt him again. He showed me what knowing God was all about because he exemplified Christ-like behavior in how he dealt with me. I was loved and cherished and he never failed to let me know it.

The only time he ever let me down was when my mother became ill in 1984. He tried to pull away from her, because he was terrified that she wasn't going to make it.  She wanted him to sit and talk with her, to be with her and he couldn't let her see him cry so he left the house as if he were angry. I went outside after him and found him crying. It was so frightening to see my strong, tall, wonderful father cry. "I can't watch her die," he told me. "I love her so much!" I asked him why he didn't just tell her so and held him as he sobbed. "She needs to hear it, Dad. She needs you." He felt guilty that he couldn't be the man she wanted him to be, that he had failed her by leaning too much on a woman at work. Even then, it wasn't me he'd let down, it was Mom. Even in his mistakes, I learned from him. He showed me that I had to look to God for perfection and that forgiveness was only a word away from any of us, at any time.

He was so very lost the night Mom died. The family had all gathered together, our pastor was there, talking about how very loved Mom had been. But after a while, Dad couldn't take the mourning of his children and their spouses, the clutter of people in the kitchen he had built for her and he cried, "This is an empty house!" I've never heard such anguish or seen such love demonstrated in loss. I will never forget the look on his face. Though he remarried seven years after she passed away, he never loved anyone the way he'd loved my mother.

Dad passed away the last day of July, 1996 from a small cell prostate cancer that was discovered in February of that year. It moved so fast and it frustrated him so that he was sick because of something he couldn't see. "Kris," he told me near the end, "all my life I've been able to fight my own battles." As I listened, and I fought back tears, I thought of his battles over the years. The battle to win my mother's heart, the war, the battle against crime and even against the devastation of consuming fire. He'd fought politics and corporate management for fair treatment for workers. "But," Dad went on, "I can't fight an opponent I can't see. I don't know how."


Cancer didn't fight fair.

Though he's been gone fifteen years now, I still think about what he would do when things go wrong, when friends need help, when people need to be loved. "Time to act," he'd say. I am still humbled by the pride he had in my ability to write and I am grateful for all that he taught me.

Thanks for your service to our country, Dad. I miss you, but I know I'll see you again.



Hey, thanks for reading. I have to get back to making my word quota, so I'll just point to some marvelous other blogs you can read to get tips on excellent writing: Look at the list to the right near the top of the page. In that list, you will see Kristen Lamb, Robin Lythgoe and Jody Hedlund, all with lovely ideas to improve the work you're doing on your NaNo or other exciting WIPs. Read, enjoy and remember to thank a Veteran or active duty member of the military today. There is nothing like what they do for us, fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, spouses... soldiers.