"We're all just fragile threads, but what a tapestry we make." – Jerry Ellis

Archive for the ‘writing’ Category

Family Sands of Time

In the writing course I’m taking right now, we are encouraged to open ourselves to writing in genres we might not have previously considered. The lesson was on writing for the non-fiction market, which I have never given much thought to doing. I’m much better at coming up with a fictional story with made up people than actually researching a subject enough to become an expert in the field. I love stories about people, their personalities and relationships, so telling a story that happened with some creative embellishments is more my forte. But the assignment got me thinking.

Part of the assignment, if we’d even ever vaguely toyed with the idea of non-fiction, was to share what would we write about it, and what kind of marketing plan we would use for our idea. Lighthearted Dragonfly Readers who know me personally know that I grew up in a family that owned and operated a sand business on the Missouri River, so I started doing the “bubble method” technique of brainstorming to try to come up with enough ideas about sand that would sell a book. Sand alone doesn’t seem that interesting to me, but the story of how my grandfather got into the sand business is. Again, like my blog, it’s not something I could make a living with writing, but the fun I would have! I would love meeting with my uncles and cousins for lunch and recording the family history. We’re not the Busch family of Bitter Brew (thank goodness!) so this would lack the drama of a family tell-all, but what a great heirloom it could be for future generations.

My Grandpa, with only an eighth grade education, had a very good head for business. It was right after World War II and construction in St. Louis was booming. My favorite tale that I remember hearing was about how he borrowed money from my grandmother’s relative. The uncle was very suspicious of banks, so he kept all his money—cash, mind you—in cow manure piles on his property. My grandmother was embarrassed to go to the bank with the cash because it smelled, or so I’m told. From what I know about that relative, he would have his own chapter—he was really a character.

So I have yet another idea bubbling around in my brain that loves churning out ideas, but lacks the time to devote to another unpaid hobby.  (Insert sigh here.) What about you? How do you balance your love of writing or another interest with a limited amount of time and energy? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.

Category:

balance, family, family history, growing up, home, writing

A Literal Story of Taking Writing Out of the Box

About four years ago, I started writing a romance story by accident. It began with a scene in my head that I kept developing until it became a draft about 100 pages long. In fact, I called the file on my computer “the scene in my head” because I didn’t know what I wanted to call it. I spent hours each day working on it. I dreamed about the characters and the story. I researched drugs, gunshot wounds and police protocol. I cared about these fake people I’d created. And then I just stopped writing.

It wasn’t a purposeful decision to stop. I read and re-read the parts I loved, like I would when reading a favorite book. But my story was never a complete draft. It had holes I didn’t know how to fill and when I tried filling those holes I didn’t like my story anymore. What would I do with the draft anyway? I didn’t even let my husband read it, except for when I had questions about cars and needed his input on a scene. (He only got to read that part.) And really, the premise was pure cheesy romance. Who, besides me, likes cheesy romance novels these days? My characters weren’t believable and I was just a mediocre writer. So I got discouraged and believed all the negative critics in my head. And I gave up.

Writing resources always say that it’s best to put a piece away for a time, even if you’re satisfied with it, to read it with renewed perspective. I thought if I did that, I could return to the draft and re-write it and complete it someday. I put it all in a binder, along with my research notes, my scribbled up notebooks and my books about writing and stuck it all in a box. I unsubscribed to all those writing websites. It felt like it was what I needed to do. There were bills to pay, a house to clean and my family that needed my attention. The box got shelved out of sight where I wouldn’t see it and be reminded of my silly attempt to write a novel.

I had failed.

But I didn’t forget about the box or my story, especially the characters. I’d see an actor on television and think of how he reminded me of one of my characters. Or I’d read a romance novel and think how my story had a premise just as good. Even with the job and the house and the responsibilities, I found a way to fit writing back into my life. I started remembering how good it feels when the words just flow onto the pages by themselves. How I love words and grammar and when a paragraph turns out just the way I want it to sound. Last week I found the box and I had the nerve to open it. And for the first time in four years I thought about taking out that story and looking at it with those fresh eyes I should have by now.

In the short time I’ve been blogging I’ve learned something. What I post might only get read by two other human beings besides me, but I’m a happier person for having written it. My brain works better when I have a creative outlet. In the case of the draft of my romance story, it’s not all about success or failure with writing; it is the process, and I genuinely love it, even those times when I think I don’t. Do I like having an audience for my writing?  Of course.  But while I enjoy when other people like what I write, I need to remember that it’s the actual writing part that makes me a “writer”.  Not how well it’s received or by whom.

Will I ever finish this story of unrequited love that now sits in the box in my office? I’m still not convinced. But I now think it might be time to dust off the binder and at least take another look and decide. It’s time to take my writing out of the box and back onto the computer.

Category:

writing

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What Makes a Great Person

I asked each of my children when they were younger, “What makes a great person?”.  While none of them gave me great insights into their psyche, I did get an impression of what a great person isn’t—a bully.  They preferred people who didn’t hit them or do mean things to them.  Surprise.

 My mother-in-law, Karen, had to write a paper in college on this topic, and it got me to thinking, too.  What does make a great person?  One hundred years from now, if all we have to look back on are the likes of US Weekly or TMZ, we might think it has much to do with a person’s claim to fame, Hollywood romance or their stylish red carpet attire.  Of course, Hollywood’s greatness gauge is probably not the same as an average person’s, either.  In our modern media, we may run across a great philanthropist or scientist who discovers the cure for a horrible disease.  Truly these people are noble, and maybe even “great”.  Yet, when I think about it, I’ve known a lot of great people who will never be remembered in a magazine or newspaper article, yet their lives have impacted mine with undeniable, unique greatness.  Using my kids’ method of deductive reasoning to determine greatness, great people are not necessarily famous or well-known to others outside their circle of family and friends.  So since I know a little about what greatness isn’t, I decided to give this matter of what greatness actually is some thought, and I’ve come to these conclusions:

Great is a generic and overused adjective.  Sounds cynical, doesn’t it?  But we have to put this out there straight away.  Apparently I was a “great friend” in junior high and high school.  My son brought up some of my yearbooks and reminded me of this fact.  Many of these same people also thought I was “sweet” and even “2 good 2 be 4 gotten”.  Imagine that, I was a legend of greatness in my own time and didn’t even know it.  I also didn’t actually remember a lot of those who held this opinion of me in junior high.  If a great person doesn’t remember those who thought she was great, does the greatness cease to exist?  Hmmmm….

 Greatness, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.  To the struggling entrepreneur, a successful, self-made businessperson could be the role model for greatness.  Likewise, to the woman in the throes of raising young children, the woman who raised seemingly happy children into responsible and respected adults may be her hero.  People who fit the description of how we wish our future selves to be are “great” on an individual level, without question.  After all, who wants to aspire to mediocrity?

 Greatness comes from within.  In my limited experience, those I’ve thought of as great have similar character traits.  These people are a mixture of men and women, thin and not-so-thin, tall and short, high school drop-outs and holders of multiple educational degrees, businesspeople and homemakers.  Amongst their traits in common?  Generous, patient, compassionate, self-sacrificing, have empathy for others, kind-hearted, energetic, willing to learn from, as well as teach others, and truthful.  There are more, but these seem to re-surface time and time again in people I believe to be great.  Almost any person can demonstrate one or more of these characteristics to some degree.  But great people are consistently great, and usually in more than one area.  Think “good” person, times 50,000.  Incidentally, the greatest also tend to be humble about it. 

 Those who surround themselves with greatness can’t help but to absorb it themselves.  No, I’m not talking about those who ride others’ coattails to make a name for themselves.  But greatness can be contagious!  Think of that one person (you may be lucky enough to have more than one) who brings out the best in you, the one who makes you try harder and not give up.  How do you feel when you spend some time with that person?  Energized and ready to do more to make the world a better place?  A truly great person wants you to be great, too.  This is also something to keep in mind when that little green-eyed monster rears its ugly head when your best friend gets that promotion or loses that last twenty pounds!

 Greatness makes a difference.  A person doesn’t have to organize a world-wide rally for peace and ending hunger to make a difference.  The person in rush hour traffic who lets you get over into the left-turn lane that you missed because you were distracted won’t be getting a shiny metal, but they could make the difference between whether or not you get to your daughter’s kindergarten graduation ceremony in time to see her get her diploma.  Small differences matter, too.

 Clearly, greatness is hard to define, and can also be confused with other noteworthy attributes.  Yet it still can serve as a benchmark for behavior.  Does a particular activity serve a greater good?  While that question may be answered more easily with what behaviors are not great, taking the time to define for oneself what it means to be great can make a good person an asset, maybe even a great asset, to this world.

Category:

family, writing

Technical Competency Thoughts of a Newbie Blogger

I like to think that I’m technically proficient.  Sit me down in front of a computer program, and I can navigate my way through it eventually.  Then, when I want a program to do that really cool thing—you know, the one that automatically does ____, I will spend hours trying to figure out how to do it, normally through trial and error (lots of error).  In the process, I tend to learn more than I ever set out to about how to do other really cool things with a software program.

At my job as an Administrative Assistant, I use Excel spreadsheets a lot.  Over the past year alone, I have learned to manage and maneuver data more than I thought was possible.  Sometimes the reason I’ve discovered how to do something was out of sheer laziness.  For example, I didn’t feel like typing the same thing over and over again, so I learned how to write macros.  At other times, I learn something out of desperation. (Why is this spreadsheet merging all these cells on the bottom of the page I’m trying to print?)  Either way, I’ve come out smarter than I was before—although I like the luxury of learning because I want to, not because a report is due to the boss ASAP.

Setting up this blog has been kind of a mixture of both.  WordPress is not really difficult…I’ve just never done this before.  The closest thing I’ve done like it is setting up a little yolasite for my Girl Scout troop—an effort I abandoned after only about a year because I found out parents never checked it anyway.  And the good folks at WordPress have tons of helpful tutorials and such to help out a newbie like me. Problem is, I just don’t really know what it is I even want to ask at this point!  But I’m learning.  I’m learning because I accidentally deleted a change I made and I wanted to find it again.  I’m learning because my daughter, looking over my shoulder, pointed out that the picture I chose first was not very flattering—couldn’t delete that one fast enough! 

I feel very comfortable at this point experimenting, and it’s so much fun to do that anyway.  The demon every writer knows all too well is that inner critic.  She’s very cruel and stifling.  Writing to post to a blog is so different from anything I’ve done before.  I don’t really have to answer to anyone but my own momentary whim.  It is so freeing.

So I’m hoping the enthusiasm on my honeymoon with my blog continues. Of course, I’m hoping that six months from now I’m looking back on this time as a more experienced blogger.  But not as a tired,  I-gotta-post-something-this-week kind of gal. I want to be like the kindergartner who looks back on her pre-school days as “when I was a little kid”.  Happy blogging!

Category:

family, writing

Life in My Head

I think I read too many books and watched way too much TV growing up.  I have a very romantic view of how the world should be, how every problem has a clear cut answer that is reachable in a half hour to two hour time period (depending on sitcom or movie).  Experts say that people in my generation do suffer from that.  We want forensics teams like the ones on CSI to tell us every detail, even the thought process of the murderer, and give us not only the undeniable proof of who is guilty, but why they committed the crime.  Personally, I also want every rift in a relationship to be settled, and by settled I mean all hurts forgotten, at the end of the day.  Ah, wouldn’t it be grand!

Alas, we live our lives in the real world, where there are no scripts and no safety nets.  Feelings get hurt. People have agendas. Procrastination rules.  Clothes need to be laundered.  (Have you ever noticed that in movies and TV no one ever has to do laundry except if it takes them down to the laundry room where BAD things usually happen?) In the real world, we have the everyday task of just living life.

I think that’s why I do live my life in my head at times.  Not always—there’s enough reality in my life to keep me grounded–but in my head, I’m not that middle age Mom walking into the grocery store.  I’m the glamorous, but cool-under-pressure undercover cop who knows the butcher has a secret I need to bust wide open.  And that guy at the gym?  Well, he didn’t always bench press like that—he started working out to get into shape after his girlfriend walked out on him for his ripped ex-best friend.

Yes, I realize that makes me sound a little crazy—or a lot like a Walter Mitty (the book, not the movie).  What’s funny is that, in real life, I hate dramatic scenes because I’m actually pretty boring—you might say a stability freak.  I’m glad I’m happily married and don’t have those roller coaster emotions of young love.  And don’t get me started on confrontations!  So for me, making up outrageous little backstories on the usual suspects is my way of spicing up life just a little.  It’s why I love “real” ghost stories, where some paranormal phenomenon occurring is explained by a story of what happened 100 years ago.  To this day she roams the hallway in her long, wedding dress, mourning the loss of her groom…

I suggest you try it sometime, if it isn’t something second nature to you already.  I’ll warn you though—it’s kind of addictive.  Endless possibilities—and you get to make the ending whatever you want.   I’ll bet it even wards off dementia in those later years.  So the next time you’re driving down the road and at the stop sign that hawk turns to look you straight in the eye—was it really a bird?  Or could it be the long departed soul of the warrior searching for his young, Indian princess bride?

Category:

family, writing

Welcome to The Lighthearted Dragonfly Blog

It’s 2014 and I’m finally blogging! After much internal dialogue (and debate), I’m putting “it” out there. You see, “it” was what all the debate was about. What do I have to add to the internet that’s not already been blogged, tweeted and posted by ten thousand other people already?  Maybe nothing new, wild and crazy, but perhaps that’s not the point.

I love a lot of stuff.  That is, I enjoy a lot of stuff.  Stuff like being a wife and Mom, my friends, running, writing, my dogs, trying new recipes, wine, exploring and deepening my faith, being in a Book Club, experiencing the curve ball in life of aging parents, hanging out at the Lake, finding ways to avoid housework, finding ways to get excited about housework.  You get the idea.  I especially love connecting with other people who enjoy a variety of things too.  I like hearing their thoughts on all these things and the feeling that there are other people out there that have a single, fragile thread of a commonality with me.  That someone might read something I’ve written and think, “I know exactly what she means!”

So why The Lighthearted Dragonfly? I have always loved dragonflies and how beautiful and delicate they are.  Especially the blue ones. They apparently like me, too–they seem to land on me often.  When trying to think of a blog name (not as easy as I thought it would be) I found a website that talked about dragonflies and their meaning.  It said they symbolized transformation, joy and lightness of being.  I latched onto that.  How inspiring to envision the slender, iridescent dragonfly, full of lightness and joy, perched on my shoulder as I blogged away.  At least that’s how I envisioned it.  I have found dragonflies spark my creative muse.  And they make me happy.

So thanks for taking the time to visit my blog today.  Hope you return often and chime in on a topic now and then.  Until next time…

Category:

book club, dog lovers, faith, family, Girl Scouts, nature, recipes, running, writing