We live in a fast-paced world where everything is tightly scheduled and there is no room for deviation. Children no longer go outside to play after school or on the weekend. They are too busy being chauffeured to their various sports activities, music lessons, and the tutoring that will hopefully get them into a better university after graduation. Even pre-schoolers have scheduled “play dates”. No one sits on their front porch anymore, waving to their neighbors as they walk by, inviting them to stop and chat over a cold drink. Most don’t even know their neighbors’ names. Children no longer play kick-the-can in the growing darkness until their mothers holler out the back door that it’s time to come in. Dad’s in one room reviewing departmental reports while mom is in another preparing for her big morning presentation in front of the Board. Meanwhile, if by chance the children are actually done with their homework, they are on their computers either perusing their social media accounts or deep into a multi-player video game, stopping only long enough to answer a text from their friend who probably lives right next door or across the street. None of them, parents included, can even sit down for a family meal together without their cell phones right there within easy reach. Ask them an hour later what they had for dinner and I’d wager a bet most of them couldn’t tell you. Did they even taste it? We live in a world of texts written in indecipherable shorthand, tweets of 140 characters or less, and emojis.

While I would say I’m better than most, I am guilty of taking phone calls, reading emails, and answering texts during a meal…unless in public or at dinner with friends. Luckily, this doesn’t happen very often. Nonetheless, I do feel the loss of connection with other people. I do often choose email or texting over phone calls. When was the last time you received or wrote a letter? I’m talking about a traditional letter, the kind that comes in an envelope delivered to your box by the US Postal Service along with your bills, magazines, and advertising flyers.

I have one friend, Virginia, who writes me regular letters. She always encloses copies of interesting articles, short stories, and poetry that she’s read. She’s a marvelous poet who lives back in New York State, and belonged to my writers’ group there for years. I can’t tell you how much I love seeing that fat envelope in our mailbox. Sometimes it’s hand-written, sometimes typed, but it always feels like she’s right there with me as I read it. I can even hear her voice. We learned early on that we share a birthday. This year she will turn 90. (I will not.) How fast the years go by.

I know that it won’t be too many more years, if even that long, before the letters stop coming. It makes me sad. I’ve attempted writing to other old friends now far away and they don’t respond. I guess they’re too busy to take the time to do more than quick well-wishes in a store-bought birthday or Christmas card, and some not even that. For a while I wrote long letters to everyone in my old writers’ group but I’ve fallen into the habit of emailing with two and only writing to Virginia. Sad thing is, the fourth woman does not have email so I tend to just say, “Pass this on”, when I email one of them. I will make an effort to write them more “real letters” from now on. And I will continue to try and reconnect with others in this manner. I don’t want to get to the day where I can never again look forward to a letter in my mailbox.

If you don’t already, do me a favor and reconnect with someone through pen and paper. Let’s not allow this wonderful old tradition of letter-writing to come to an end. Without letters preserved, what will future generations have to look back and study when they talk about us?

Two weeks ago I wrote about my plans to “shake things up”. Well, this was the week and I’m calling it a complete success! I’ve spent the last three days on Ft Myers Beach, just me and my notebook on the beautiful Gulf shore with hundreds of my closest friends. . .but that added to my success. I sat in the warm sand and listened to the surf and the gulls; watched small children play in the water (LOL), retired couples walk hand-in-hand (smile), and parasailers soar overhead (bucket list!); and I wrote. I wrote and I wrote. Drafting in long-hand, as hoped, opened up my creativity. I wasn’t tempted to go back and edit, the way I am when I’m on the computer. I wasn’t confined to writing where there was an electrical outlet and no damaging sand and water. And note paper doesn’t have that sun glare problem! I could go anywhere. I wrote on the beach and poolside. I wrote in my room. I wrote sitting at an outside table of a little Greek restaurant while enjoying one of their delicious gyros. My notebook and pen went in my beach tote every morning and followed wherever my wondering feet led me. When I was inspired, when a plot question resolved itself in my mind, all I had to do was find a place to sit and write.

Each of those three days I wrote one chapter. Today I will write a fourth and tomorrow a fifth. I estimate a total of 40-50 pages completed by the end of my trip. To some writers that might be a set-back, but for me it was very productive. After all, I needed to leave time to walk, shop, and read; time to allow the tropical sunshine to recharge my half-frozen northern brain.

I’m currently at my son’s house, but they’re at work leaving me alone with the cat (Panda’s hiding). No beach distractions but plenty of time to write while sitting on the lanai. Saturday’s plan is the Naples Zoo and then Sunday morning it’s back to Wisconsin, with the cold and snow that goes with it this time of year; but the fire that fuels my story has been lit and I will continue to write once home.

When I retire I’ll be able to spend more time on the beach, that’s the goal. In the meantime, I now know I can, indeed, write anywhere. All I need is a notebook, or two or three, and a handful of pens. Warm beach sunshine and white sand between my toes is the cure when the familiar winter cabin fever sets in.

My next novel, “The Healing Heart”, is set in Wisconsin, 1918, against a backdrop of WWI and the Spanish Flu pandemic. My research of that time has been both fascinating and horrifying.

It came to be called the Spanish Flu because Spain was where all the initial cases were being reported. This led many to believe Spain was ground zero. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t, we don’t know. It was interesting to read that at the time the Spaniards called it the French Flu. The United States and allied countries had put a moratorium on negative press. All efforts, all funds, were put toward the war first. Any news that might frighten people and lower their morale was banned. So why was Spain free to report the rapidly spreading pandemic? Spain was neutral in WWI so there was no censorship of the press. But there were cases already occurring here and abroad.

The first wave struck the United States in February 1918, with initial cases being reported from Haskell County, Kansas. It’s believed that soldiers returning home on leave, or moving freely between camps, were bringing it with them. Soon twenty-four of the thirty-six largest army camps had the flu. Thirty of the fifty largest US cities, most adjacent to military facilities, reported an epidemic of flu cases by spring. The second wave, an “explosion”, hit nation-wide in September and continued through that winter. October was the worst. A third wave hit in December and lingered into spring, affecting many schoolchildren.

Symptoms were nosebleeds, coughing up blood, bleeding from the ears and eyes, coughing so hard it tore apart the abdominal muscles and rib cartilage, headaches that felt like someone was hammering a wedge into the skull behind the eyes, body aches like bones breaking, vomiting, skin color changing to anything from a light blue tinge around the lips and fingertips to a spreading blue so dark it looked black. Sufferers writhed in agony and delirium. It was a viral disease with no known cure other than time, rest, and prayer. It could kill in two ways: a quick and direct death with a violent viral pneumonia so damaging it was compared to burning the lungs; or more slowly and indirectly by stripping the body’s defenses, allowing bacterial pneumonia to invade the lungs.

Public gatherings were forbidden. Schools, churches, dance halls, movie theaters, bars and saloons, all closed. Posters warned against spitting, coughing, and sneezing. If even one member of a household was ill they were all put into quarantine; no one was allowed to enter except the physician, until at least four days passed without fever. Some communities allowed funerals with family only. Others, like Philadelphia, experienced such an overwhelming death toll that burials were in mass graves with no coffins. Steam shovels dug the pits. There were no funerals, no graveside mourners.

Not everyone contracted the flu. Not everyone who did ultimately died. In fact, despite the high death toll a majority of people survived. There’d been another flu pandemic back in 1889-90, with recurrences through 1894. A million people worldwide died in that one. Those who contracted and survived that strain were less likely to contract this one. And, like anything you might come in contact with today, some people had a natural immunity or were lucky enough to contract a weaker version and had the strength to pull themselves through with rest.

It’s estimated that as much as forty percent of the global population was infected over eighteen months. Anywhere from twenty to fifty million died worldwide. That’s more than the seventeen million killed in the war. President Wilson was struck down in April of 1919 while in France negotiating peace. He survived but his mind was affected; he became paranoid, erratic, and confused. Just four months later he suffered a stroke that may have been linked to the illness. His wasn’t the only report of lasting brain injury.

Not the kind of backdrop where you’d expect to find love, you say. I’d argue that love and happiness can be found anywhere; that it’s love that gets us through those hard times. It’s love that will keep Alice strong when tragedy and heartbreak threaten to crush her spirit.

Here’s a little ditty from 1918, a children’s skipping rhyme: “I had a little bird, and its name was Enza. I opened the window, and in-flu-Enza.” (author unknown)

I’m ready to start my second novel. I want to start my second novel. Unfortunately, my brain doesn’t seem to want to go there. My heroine’s voice is not coming to me as easily as it did with the first novel and I realize that’s because Mary Bishop was older. She was a mature woman who knew her back story and could tell it to me with ease, even the most painful parts. I only had to lead her through her current story. But Alice is only eighteen and doesn’t have that more complicated back story. She’s led a quiet childhood with only her girlhood dreams to tell her what life is all about. She has her plans, but doesn’t know that those plans are about to be changed in a dramatic and, in some cases, tragic way. It’s up to me to tell her this and I’m not having much luck. So it’s time to shake things up.

With “Mary Bishop” I just sat down and started typing. I knew bits and pieces of where she was going, but not how she was going to get there. Because she knew where she had been, and was able to tell me this so clearly, I was able to see her future…even if she couldn’t yet. I was able to be a pantser, writing by the seat of my pants. With “The Healing Heart”, Alice’s story, I’m going to need to be more of a plotter if I don’t want the story to get lost as it runs wildly down all the wrong paths.

I’ve been spending time this week reviewing my notes from @CandaceHavens regarding Book Mapping. Last October she outlined for us each step you needed to cover in order to map out the direction of your novel. This doesn’t mean every little detail, but knowing your benchmarks and when you need to hit them in your story. I will be following her directions as I map out “The Healing Heart” before I even start writing. (Yes, I already wrote the prologue, but it’s the body of the story that’s eluding me.)

Then, after I finish mapping my book, I’m going to draft this one by hand, not computer. For a long time I did all of my first drafts this way. It’s what I was used to since I’m not a part of the generation that grew up with computers. Over time, though, I taught myself to draft electronically. But I think I need to shake up my process in order to jump start my creative process.

According to a May 2016 article by Nancy Olson on www.forbes.com, handwriting with a pen positively affects the brain in three ways: it “increases neural activity in certain sections of the brain, similar to meditation”, it “sharpens the brain and helps us learn”, and it “forces us to slow down.” The act of writing by hand is creative; whereas, typing on a keyboard is analytical in nature. The hand movements used to create letters plugs into the regions of the brain tied to thinking, language, healing, and memory. This could actually lead to more creative thought as we are forced to slow down and our brain rests. I’ve learned that quite a few authors still draft this way.

And an extra benefit for me, it may stop me from constantly going back and editing rather than moving forward. This constant editing can, and has, brought entire projects to a dead halt. Editing as you go is so easy on a computer. It’s not as easy on paper; on the contrary, it’s rather messy. I want to train my brain to free-write. I want to be able to ignore the editor in me and just enjoy the creative process. With this in mind, I am packing my book map, my research and character notes, and a composition notebook in my suitcase for Florida in a week. I can’t think of a better place to sit with pen and paper than a warm sunny Gulf Coast beach.

This will be training for when I someday want to try Candace Havens’ “Fast Draft” method, http://www.candacehavens.com/index.php/workshops/. I was originally thinking I’d do that with this book, but it’s a rigorous write-your-book-in-two-weeks program that my brain is just not ready for and I want to do it right. Perhaps by book three my brain will be in shape to make that kind of commitment.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. I am addicted to the written word. The written word is a powerful thing. String them into sentences, the sentences into paragraphs, the paragraphs into stories, and you will be transported.

Other worlds. Other times. Heroes, heroines, and mystical beasts. What are you in the mood for: a mystery, political suspense, a good scare, or maybe a romance to make your heart race and your temperature raise a little, or maybe a lot? They’re all just waiting out there for you to pick up and read. And what better time is there than a cold winter night (or day).

Books are my addiction of choice, both fiction and nonfiction. I can’t own too many. I can’t pass a book store, or even a book display, without having to stop and browse. . .and, inevitably, buy. With my Kindle I can have a new book, or two, or three, at a touch of a button. No going out in bad weather. No waiting in line. No waiting for the post office to deliver. Click…and I’m ready to read. Yet, I still can’t help but buy traditional paper books, as well. In fact, I have two being delivered today and a third will ship next week.

Of course, it depends what kind of reading, and the planned location of said reading, that determines e-book or paper. For historical research I like traditional paper. I want to be able to highlight, write notes in the margin, study photos and maps without straining my eyes because they’re too small, and flip back and forth to refresh myself on something read earlier. The end of this month I’ll be going on a last minute trip to the sunny shores of Ft Myers, Florida. The first three nights will be spent staying at a resort on the Gulf. I’m certainly not taking my Kindle out to read on the beach…all that sand, water, and sun glare make it impossible to enjoy. Thus, the three traditional books I’ve purchased. I also don’t take my Kindle with in my bubble bath. That’s a catastrophe just waiting to happen.

And, have you ever had the thrill of a rare books room at a library or museum? Heaven! Old written words! The dusty, musty, smell of old books, letters, diaries, official records. The words written by all those people who came before us! When I was pursuing my history degree at SUNY Geneseo back in the ‘90s, I had the privilege of writing an undergraduate thesis that required me to spend many hours in the Rare Books Room of Rush Rhees Library, Univ. of Rochester, NY, mining knowledge from the official records of the old Rochester Orphan Asylum, now Hillside Children’s Center. (The 116^th anniversary of their tragic fire was just this week, January 8^th, 1901. Twenty-eight residents died that night, twenty-six of them children. Those small souls are buried under a monument in Mt. Hope Cemetery.)

My Kindle also holds a dear place in my heart. E-books are great when you’re traveling and don’t want to, or can’t, carry enough paper books with you. E-books are great when you don’t want anyone else to know what you’re reading. If you’re like me, e-books are great when you’re reading in bed. I have a habit of falling asleep when reading in bed. With my Kindle I don’t have to worry about losing my page. It falls asleep shortly after I do and when I wake it next it will be right where I left off. (Well, except for that time on a plane when I apparently kept touching the screen, turning pages, in my sleep. It was a little tough finding my way back.)

What books did I order for my trip to Florida? “The Girl On The Train” by Paula Hawkins, “The Light Between Oceans” by M. L. Stedman, and “Enza” by Kristy K. James. Oh! I just received notice that the first two await in my mailbox! Which one to read first? I’ll take your suggestions.

My name is Jane, and I’m hopelessly addicted to the written word.

Life doesn’t always go the way we want it to, despite all our best laid plans and wishes. Sometimes life disappoints. This week I received my third rejection for my novel, “Mary Bishop”. They’ve all been encouraging; they’ve all spoken highly of my writing skills and research. The general consensus seems to be that it reads more like women’s or historical fiction with romantic overtones than a true “romance”. That’s all right. They’re not saying it’s a bad manuscript, just that I haven’t yet picked the perfect publishing fit. So, I have sent it out again. And after this, if necessary, I will send it out yet again. I will continue to resubmit it until I do find that perfect publishing house for me. It’s out there.

I suppose I could throw up my hands and cry, “Three strikes, you’re out!” I could carry on about what a horrible writer I am and wonder aloud to the heavens whatever gave me the idea I could write a book. I could toss the manuscript in a drawer or box somewhere; I could get really upset and destroy it. I could even decree the problem is with editors who don’t know a good read when they have one. Why don’t I do one or all of these things? Because writing is my passion. I’ve wanted to write a book for as long as I can remember. Not just write a book, but publish one. I believe!

We’ve been seeing a lot in the news over the last few months about young people (mostly, but not entirely) who have never been taught how to accept disappointment, who have never learned what it feels like to fail and then have to pick themselves up again. That’s too bad because at some point things won’t go their way. They may not get into their first choice college and they might have to take a class over because they just didn’t quite catch on the first time. They will have to start at the bottom of the ladder at their first job. It may be years before they can buy their first home, let alone the home they’ve been dreaming of. Few young lawyers win their first court case and none make partner without long hours over many years of practice. Doctors, even experienced ones, occasionally lose a patient.

You know where I’m headed with this. When life takes you back a step, don’t flop down and cry. Don’t give up. Pick yourself up and find a new path to your goal. That’s what I’m doing. I know the day will come when I can announce a release date for “Mary Bishop”.

Here’s to 2017! A new year with unlimited new paths.

While we might have trouble remembering the words to this traditional holiday song, we all recognize it when it plays and stumble as we try to sing along. The debate that rose at this year’s Christmas Eve party was just what does the song mean? Are the twelve days of the song leading up to or away from Christmas Day? That question got me thinking.

On the website www.christianitytoday.com/history I found my answer. Advent, the fourth Sunday before Christmas, begins the count-down to Christmas Day, which is then followed by the celebration of the twelve days of the Christmas season, and ends with the feast of the Epiphany on June 6^th. This was the traditional Christian celebration of Christmas, as opposed to our modern celebration which begins sometime in November and ends abruptly on December 26^th.

Additional research taught me the song is probably of French origin first published in England in 1780 as a chant or rhyme without music. It may have been a children’s memory game. The tune we use today came about in 1909. It’s an arrangement of a traditional English folk song by Frederic Austin. He was the first to introduce the elongated “five golden rings” we all belt out with exuberance to show everyone else that we at least know that line.

Personally, I don’t think I’m up to an additional twelve days of Christmas celebrations. I feel like I’ve been preparing, and then celebrating, for long enough. I look forward to the quiet of winter after the New Year’s celebrations are over. I don’t care for the cold, and the snow is at its best when viewed through a window with a glass of wine (or coffee) in one hand, a book in the other, and a roaring fire in the background; but I do love the quiet. Other than this blog, I have not had time to do any serious writing in weeks. I’m anxious to get back to my next novel.

I’m even looking forward to the day I discover all the tins of Christmas cookies empty…and that’s saying a lot…because clearly knowing I shouldn’t eat anymore is not enough to stop me from eating more.

Happy New Year to all of you and I’ll see you again on the other side of all this holiday madness.

Christmas is almost upon us and I’ve been busy baking cookies and making fudge. Sweets are a big part of Christmas, always have been. Who hasn’t read over and over, “Visions of sugar plums danced in their heads,” from Clement C. Moore’s poem “A Visit From St. Nicholas” published in 1823? (Better known today as “Twas The Night Before Christmas”.) And there’s the beautiful dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies in Tchaikovsky’s ballet “The Nutcracker” composed in 1892. While not as popular as they once were, sugar plums can still be purchased online.

My grandmother always had a bowl of mixed traditional Christmas candy, including the ever popular ribbon candy. I was never sure how to eat those as they were so big. It was too much to eat at once and it quickly got too messy to set down to save for later. The small candies were easier to handle but I always thought them too pretty to eat. And since they weren’t individually wrapped it didn’t seem to take long before they were fused together in one big lump of sticky colored sugar, partly from being touched by everyone else as they dug around to be certain they saw all their choices.

Ribbon candy goes back centuries in Europe. It was originally shaped by wrapping around the candy maker’s thumb. It was the 1800s before a mechanical finger-like crimper was developed. It took three candy makers to achieve this classic shape. The first made the candy, the second spun off a ribbon and fed it through the crimper, while a third stood at the end and cut off the individual pieces with scissors. It worked well, but was slow labor-intensive work. It wasn’t until the 1940s that a single spinning roll was developed. By carefully tending the candy batch it was found the middle job of hand spinner could be eliminated, speeding up the process. A bottleneck in production still existed at the cutting end, but with the invention of an air activated cutter by Sevigny Candy, a process still used by F.B. Washburn Candy today, the brightly-colored ribbons could now be mass produced.

Perhaps the most popular Christmas candy is the candy cane. It originated 250 years ago in Germany and started out as a straight white sugar stick. There are many legends of how the candy cane took the shape they are known for today, but they probably aren’t true. The earliest record of candy canes goes back to about 1900 when red stripes were added and they were flavored with either peppermint or wintergreen. Around 1920, Bob McCormack started hand-making canes for his friends and family. As they became more and more in demand he started a business, Bob’s Candies. It was his brother-in-law, Gregory Harding Keller, a Catholic priest, who invented the Keller Machine that made turning straight candy sticks into canes automatic.

Some have given Christian meanings to the parts of the canes. The shape can represent either a shepherd’s crook or the letter “J” for Jesus. The white stripe is the purity of Christ and the red the blood He shed on the cross; the peppermint flavor representing the hyssop plant that was used in Biblical times for purifying. The three thin red stripes supposedly represent the Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

No matter what candy is your favorite at Christmas, may you have enough this holiday season to satisfy your sweet tooth without making yourself ill or rotting your teeth.

Merry Christmas!

I love poinsettias. Red, green, or white, it doesn’t matter; although I do prefer the red. This year I have a small red one as a center piece on the dining room table, as well as a large floor plant.

Poinsettias are not native to the United States, but originate in southern Mexico and Central America where they “flower” in the winter. Actually, they aren’t flowers at all, but special leaves called bracts. The Aztecs called the plant cuetlaxochitl and used the flowers to make purple dye for cloth and cosmetics. They made fever medicine from the milky white sap we know as latex.

Joel Roberts Poinsett is credited for originally bringing poinsettias to the United States in 1828. Poinsett was appointed the first US ambassador to Mexico in 1825 and shipped the plant back to his plantation greenhouses in South Carolina where he began growing the plants and sending them to friends and botanical gardens as gifts.

One of those friends, John Barroom of Philadelphia, gave a plant to his friend, Robert Buist. Buist sold the plant under its botanical or Latin name, Euphorbia pulcherrima, which means, “the most beautiful Euphorbia”. Once it became known in the mid-1830s that Ambassador Poinsett was the one to introduce the plant to the country, people began referring to it as a poinsettia.

One version of how poinsettias became linked with Christmas can be told through an old Mexican legend: “There was once a poor Mexican girl called Pepita who had no present to give the baby Jesus at the Christmas Eve Services. As Pepita walked to the chapel, sadly, her cousin Pedro tried to cheer her up. ‘Pepita,’ he said. ‘I’m sure that even the smallest gift, given by someone who loves him, will make Jesus happy.’ Pepita didn’t know what she could give, so she picked a small handful of weeds from the roadside and made them into a small bouquet. She felt embarrassed because she could only give this small present to Jesus. As she walked through the chapel to the altar, she remembered what Pedro had said. She began to feel better, knelt down and put the bouquet at the bottom of the nativity scene. Suddenly, the bouquet of weeds burst into bright red flowers, and everyone who saw them were sure they had seen a miracle. From that day on, the bright red flowers were known as the ‘Flores de Noche Buena’, or ‘Flowers of the Holy Night’.”

Another interpretation, one I’ve heard many times over the years, is this: the shape of the flower represents the Star of Bethlehem, the red color the blood of Christ, and the white leaves purity.

For more fun facts on Christmas traditions, go to www.whychristmas.com/customs.

Christmas is a time of traditions. As I decorate our home this week I am reminded of one many of you have probably never heard of: the Christmas Pickle. The story is that this is an old German custom. You hang a glass ornament shaped like a pickle on the tree and the first child to find it gets an extra present. In our case it was something small, like a bag of M&M’s. If parents couldn’t afford to purchase an extra gift, that child was allowed to open presents first.

Actually, the origin of this tradition is rather murky. The ornament may have first appeared in the United States in the 1880s. Woolworth stores were importing glass ornaments from Germany in the shapes of different fruits and vegetables. It’s possible a pickle was among those ornaments. The thing is, most Germans have never heard of this tradition.

There are two other possible origins of the Christmas pickle, both equally odd. The first goes back to the American Civil War. A soldier who was born in Bavaria was taken prisoner. Starving, his last request was to have one last pickle before he died. The guard granted his request and presumably this pickle so buoyed the man’s resolve that he had the mental and physical strength to live.

The second is linked to St. Nicholas and takes us back to the medieval tale of two Spanish boys. The boys were traveling home from school for the holidays. On their journey, they stopped at an inn for the night. The evil innkeeper murdered the boys and hid their bodies in a pickle barrel. However, St. Nicholas stopped at the inn that night, found the boys’ bodies in the barrel, and brought them back to life. There is a different legend of St. Nicholas saving two boys from a barrel, but that barrel held meat for pies and not pickles.

No matter where the tradition began, I know it was something my children looked forward to every year. They’re adults now and I still get asked about the pickle!

Oh, and in case you were wondering where the Christmas Pickle Capital of the world is located, it’s Berrien Springs, Michigan. They hold a Christmas pickle festival in early December every year.

For more fun facts on Christmas traditions, go to www.whychristmas.com/customs