The Gratitude Dance

It's a bit of a steal from Where the Hell is Matt, but it's also cute:

Feeling Blessed

I'm off to feed the hungry and hand out hampers at St. Mary's today. I am feeling especially blessed in my life. Even though God knows my shortcomings and sins, he still loves me. Today the pastor spoke about three things to remember this Christmas...

1) BE a Christian (don't just go to church but live a joyful, fulfilled, blessed Christian life),
2) Be extraordinary (don't hide your light),
3) Forgive (even yourself).

It may sound silly to say that I'm looking forward to feeding the hungry today, but I am, I'm hoping that I receive as much blessing as I can and I give as much blessing as I can.

Feel the Fear and Write it Anyway...

Just found this post from the Word Strumpet and I found it very relevant. Especially this part:

I'm so used to the feeling of being nervous that I rarely even notice it anymore. Ratchet it up to terrified (say, book deal) and you'll get my attention, maybe. Meanwhile I go about my business being happily scared half out of my mind, doing it anyway: boarding the plane and hoping some kind gentleman will volunteer to lift my heavy laptop bag to the overhead compartment, meeting the new client, and opening up a new page to write on the computer or the spiral journal.

I'm finally beginning to realize that if you're not scared, you're not living. If you're not putting your nerves on the line on a regular basis, it is time to dial it up a notch. This is true in garden variety living life, and its true in writing.

Fear is the flip side of creativity. But you can--and must--harness it. Maybe there's a creative person somewhere on the planet who doesn't experience fear, but I don't know where that someone is.

Go on, read the rest...

Twitter - Great Resource for Writers

I've run across some writers that don't know what Twitter is, or look down on it as a crazy time-wasting energy-suck. And surely it can be... you can even track how many hours you've spent on Twitter with Tweetwasters.

But for writers looking for sources, subjects or media/PR, there are very few other sites out there that can beat the instantaneous nature of Twitter.

Here are some Twitter people, aka Tweeps to follow, other than ME of course:

http://twitter.com/BreakingNewsOn
http://twitter.com/skydiver
http://twitter.com/prnewswire
http://twitter.com/CopyrightLaw
http://twitter.com/InternetLaw
http://twitter.com/BlogSquad
http://twitter.com/readersdigest
http://twitter.com/Reuters
http://twitter.com/ckrewson
http://twitter.com/msnbc
http://twitter.com/cnn
http://twitter.com/foxnews

I use an application called Twhirl that pops up the “tweets” every few seconds. Because I follow a lot of other writers and media types I tend to know where the great blog posts are and if something is relevant to my current writing, I can include it… plus I try to never forget to tweet my own blog posts and I get more comments and my site hits go up. I’ve noticed my ad revenue go up as well.

There are some netiquette rules to follow of course, just like any other online tool. You don't want to break them, but it's ok if you make a few mistakes... just get out there and try it!

Freelance Writer's National Anthem

Ok, Off topic, but....

I laughed my stinkin' butt off at this video... George W. Bush can MOVE QUICK!

Life is Good

Sorry peeps, didn't mean to make it sound all doom and gloom the other night. 1 am will do that to you. In the morning light, everything looks a bit brighter I think.

We had a snow storm yesterday, not the big horrible one they were predicting, but a good hefty dump of snow. Everyone acted shocked. Snow? What? And yet it's mid-December here in Canada and we'd been headed straight for a brown Christmas yet again. It might be kind of nice to have a Christmas with snow once again.

So remember we adopted two cats? Yeah, they are awesome. Every morning they are happy to see me, that's more than I can say for my kids who want to sleep in! ;0) But these two wind their way around my ankles, purring and meowing (or m-ow-ing as E would say). On mornings like this when I get to sit, ensconced on my couch, the big one tries to lay across my laptop. He succeeds in pinning down at least one arm and I almost don't want to make him move because he's warm and sweet.

The best thing at the moment is.... drumroll please.... my book is up on Amazon! (And Chapters in Canada!)

What do you think of the cover? I love it, love, love, love it! From what I understand, the cover illustrator entered in into the annual for the Society of Illustrators and was accepted.... now I don't know much about that but my publisher seemed really excited!

Unfortunately it won't be out in time for Christmas as it has a Spring release date, but I'm thoroughly excited to see it OUT THERE.

Late Nights

If there is one thing that defines me as a writing mother, it's the night. I don't mean anything ethereal about the night and the magic of it or anything, I mean, pfft... I mean most nights I sit here until far past midnight. Writing or editing or trying very hard not to procrastinate on Twitter or Facebook or LinkedIn or wherever else I can go to forget that Oh My Gosh Am Worst Writer Ever Why Do I Try.

(See, that never goes away.)

But here I sit, almost every night with the laptop and heavy socks and my feet up and a coffee or tea at my side. I usually make a list of what I need to get done and I keep working at it until my neck hurts or my eyes start to feel like they've been poked with hot coals.

And then when the alarm goes off at 0600, I try not to ignore it. Except today, apparently, I did. I'm supposed to be at work at 0730 and I looked over at the clock and it was 0708. Whoops. With Major Man working nights, he doesn't get off work until 0700 so I'm the one responsible for getting both kids up, ready and out the door. That's an hour minimum.

I admit that I wonder why I do this. I wonder if I can do this. But then I just put one foot in front of the other and one word next to another . . . and just one night after another.

Things That Are Old

When we moved into our house we snickered a bit at the old things that were in it. I mean, not the people, but the things. The wallpaper from the 70's, the original 1960's stove, oven and fridge. The minty green decoration in the bathroom.

They left us a few things: dressers, a bed, some artwork, wine glasses.

My most favourite leftover has been a radio that is quite likely older than I am. They left it on top of the fridge. At night when I am doing the evening dishes I turn it on and listen to the local Christian station. They have good sermons on. I know, I'm turning into my grandmother.

But that's the thing . . . it sounds *exactly* like grandma's radio. Which sat on the top of her fridge. And this radio works great! It's a heavy one, not like the cheap plastic ones you get now with the wimpy little antenna that never works. There isn't even a smidgen of static, just a strong signal.

It makes me think of the cliche, "they don't make things like they used to", which, of course, is only a cliche because of the truth of it. But that's the thing with this house - it is full of older appliances and fixtures that all work beautifully because someone has cared for them. When the stove broke after 20 years they didn't buy a new one - they fixed the old one! Imagine it! When something breaks I'm jumping up and down because wheeeee, I get to buy something new.

I'm turning over a new leaf - looking at my furniture, even the rag-tag, mix-match things I have, I am ok with keeping them around for a while longer.

Okie dokie, need to take a bit of a break from the typing tonight - the kitty is climbing all over my laptop, chasing my fingers. But he's so cute I might keep him around, too.

Well now I'm reallly a writer...

... because I have the obligatory cats.

Two to be exact. Zorro, a three year old male and Ziggy, a three month old male. Both very cool individuals adopted from the Humane Society.

I'm so incredibly pleased with myself because the kids are loving on these cats and the cats (for the most part) are loving on them. Zorro is sleeping in Army Girl's bed and Ziggy with Army Boy. You wouldn't think that cats would voluntarily stay with a seven year old or a two year old. But they did. Both of them were purring like crazy and looking like bliss personified when I left them - the kids were still awake but content to sit and be happy with their new kitties.

Zorro, the older, fluffier cat is the ultimate writer's cat. He climbs up on my desk and curls himself around the mouse because he knows that's where my hand rests.

I've missed having animals in the house. I'm glad they are back.

My Vices

I have a couple of vices. I admit it. I am not perfect. My family will die of shock right now. Fer shizzle.

One. Books, yeah this is no surprise. I have 700 or so books. The problem is that I haven't read them all. I buy them to HAVE them. It's wrong somehow - I know that. There are people in this world, probably kids in my own city that have no books and here I am, hoarding them. But reading a good book is something incredible. It's like if our life is one massive house, each book is a window or a door. I tend to look for God in every book I read, even when it's not overtly a Christian book.

Two. TV. Yes, I get caught up in all sorts of shows. House. Criminal Minds. Grey's Anatomy. ER. It's been going on for a long time, every since I had a crush on Mighty Mouse as a child. Then there was Little House on a Prairie, which was really the first show I felt I Could Not Do Without. Oh how I loved the story of Laura and Almanzo. It was the first romance I really felt I could believe in. Of course he was a stubborn man and Laura was headstrong, so it probably set the tone for my future lovelife. Nice. Thanks Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Thursday and Sunday nights have always been my night to watch TV. And yet now Mr. PVR has come into my life and everything has changed. I can save up all the shows I want until a night where I have finished all my work and the kids go to bed sweetly (or are at grandma's, like tonight) and I get to sleep in tomorrow. Now I can watch oodles of Criminal Minds and House and the movies I've saved. I love it!

How does this have to do with writing?

Like any vice, the call of it can be almost overwhelming. I'm actually irritated when I'm missing one of my shows or I don't want to start a writing project because a SHOW IS ON IN FIVE MINUTES. Sometimes I just push back my project (aka procrastinate) or I try to do both at the same time (never effective).

But now? Now I can put my vice on hold! And it's like a carrot! Finish work and watch shows guilt-free!

Newest gadget for every writer: PVR. (I think it's called TiVo in the States.)

Dealing with Loss

How do you deal with loss? Isn't that a question without an answer? I think so.

Last weekend we lost a friend.

At work today - and all week - so many people are sad. Some are angry that he's gone.

Some hardly knew him. Some knew him for over a decade. Some were in the inner circle. Some hung about the outer rim.

I posted his obituary to Facebook tonight, wondering as I did if those who were closer to him might get offended. All day we have been preparing for his visitation tonight and sometimes I felt so wrong planning who I was going to carpool with or who was going with whom - it felt like planning a social event. I wanted to make it stop. Make us not have to check in with each other (time? your car or mine? how do you get there?) in the same way we'd plan a party or a night out.

But I realized that everyone has their own way of dealing. Just read his guestbook. Some are private, and close their office doors and honour him the way they know how, by doing their jobs well. Some talk about it, make jokes and remember how much fun he inspired. Some are silent, not revealing their emotion at all.

I'm choosing to talk about him. I'm choosing to tell people who didn't know Jim Haigh that he was important and special. You didn't know him? You missed out, buddy.

You missed his laugh, that I hear so loud in my head that I think I could actually open my mouth and it would come out. You missed a passion for his job that was the fuel for a small, just $100 million, empire. You missed watching him talk about "the business" and get so excited that he'd rock forward on the balls of his feet like he was going to launch himself into the crowd. You missed him pacing at the back of the room during the National Sales meetings, listening intently. You missed the empty coffee pots he'd leave that would make you shake your fist and call down the hall "this is how I know you're in the building, Jim! Empty coffee pots!" You missed dimples. You missed inside jokes and goblets of wine. You missed vision. You missed a mentor. You missed a friend.

You missed Jim.

And so do I.

The Power of Words

On Monday I learned:

People make choices we may never understand - we still love them.

When there is true pain it can block out everything.

We can never know when the words we say to someone may be the last time we speak.

Strong people may not be so.

Crying is never a sign of weakness.

A wish for what you might have said to make a difference can be turned into action: say what you mean today to those you love.

Some friends you choose, some choose you and sometimes you get lumped in and learn to love each other.

There is never any need to compare pain with one another.

Some people leave - but they never leave us.

~~

Words have always been my strength. I rely on them and they always come through for me. But this week I learned that the words I hold in will lose their power. It does no good to think thoughts about someone's well-being and not express them. We often fear that we'll be seen as inappropriate or nosey. We worry if things are our business. We through about the words "how are you?" without even an expectation of a real answer.

Words, whether written or spoken, matter. They matter almost as much as touch. Almost as much as a hug. God, I hope that you gave me this gift of words for a better purpose. I promise that I will no longer keep that gift inside. I've used words to make money, to put food on the table, for my own selfish desires.

But what about blessing others? What about glorifying God? What about changing lives . . . or even the possibility of changing lives? What about delivering comfort? What about lifting spirits? What about telling someone that they matter?

I will do better.

Slackers-Not-So-Anonymous

There's a great group of writing mothers that you might of heard about: The Writing Mothers. Lately, the list has been quiet. Which I'm convinced is because *I* have been quiet, except that would be giving myself a few more powers than I have (the sum is currently zero in the power department). But a very good discussion was sparked today and it seems like there are a few others out there who are also feeling frustratingly quiet.

I recently finished book #2, which will be released before book #1, so technically it will be my first book. Anyhoo...

This book was much harder to write than the first one (book one, which will be book two) because it had more technical info in it. There were certain topics that I knew, but I didn't know them to the depth which I needed to know them. Ya follow? For example, we all know that too much CO2 being released into the air is bad, right? But can you explain (with humor, wit and clarity please!) how much is too much? How many ppm is really bad and how many ppm is super-duper bad? Why is methane worse than CO2 and what's the difference between the concentrations and potency in our atmosphere?

So there was learning involved. And did I mention it was about 85,000 words?

The sheer size of it terrified me. But I did it. I finished.

And immediately I felt like I didn't want to write again for a year. I wanted to be just a mother, hanging out with my kids in the evening instead of rushing to the computer after I'd put them to bed. I wanted to catch up on all the shows I'd PVR'd without feeling guilty. And why did I feel guilty? Because every moment I wasn't writing, I knew I should be. Every moment I was writing, I felt like I should be with my kids. Every moment at my Day Job I felt like I should be either writing or with my kids, knowing that whichever I would choose I'd still go back to feeling guilty about not doing the other one.

What kind of craziness is this that I am afflicted with?!

Since I finished the book and finished the edits, I haven't written much. I've hardly blogged, I hardly email. I had one column due (yesterday) and I finished that (yesterday). But still I have been feeling like much less of a writer than I am used to. Because each time I sat down at the computer, I felt a certain amount of panic at what I had to accomplish. You don't know how many blog posts I started and then deleted because I'd get a paragraph in and think "this is stupid".

I think part of it was going through the edit process. My editor for this last book was wonderful. There were a lot of great comments on the manuscript that helped me to see where I needed to fix it and where I could improve. But as wonderful as the edits were, there's still that niggling voice that says "look at all the mistakes you made!" and my inner perfectionist comes out to perch upon my shoulder and make insinuating eyebrows at me.

So I started to not really want to write, I started to avoid it. Sure, I had things I wanted to write, but I didn't HAVE to - like blog posts. I started to let that procrastination habit creep back in. Then something happened. My friend Karen passed away and a package that I'd made up for her was still sitting, unsent at my office. I had procrastinated my way into a place I'd never been before, I actually missed a deadline (absolutely no pun intended on that one, though it would probably have made Karen smile) that I couldn't recover from.

Part of me just wanted to NOT do anything. If I didn't commit to anything, I would have no deadlines to miss. I embraced my inner slacker. Don't try so you don't miss anything.

But guess what? That's not me. I'm a driven person. I like to DO things. I like to take on scary projects that find me over my head. I think that it might even be the way God created me - willing to take a step or two on faith rather than leaning on my own understanding (or rationale). Willing to say "sure, I can do that" when I'm not sure if I can or not.

So here I am, Heather Cook, a reformed slacker. It was a dark moment, a quick foray into the unknown world of slackerdom. But I'm back.

Finding my way back

I don't know how we writers continue to do this. Some days I look wistfully across the playground at another mother and think "what's it like to have just one job?" Then I smack myself for being so judgmental because who the heck knows what another mother has on the back burner.

But having completed two manuscripts now, I'm learning for the second time that there's this weird, foggy, grey period after a manuscript is finished. I'm tired, so tired. (There was also the moving and now the unpacking.) But I've yet to go to bed before 11 pm because - get this - I feel guilty if I go to bed early because there's still much work to be done. Then I drag myself off to work in the morning. I work at 7:30 am, and I live really close to work, so some days (like the days when hubby is taking the kids to their respective drop-offs) I actually don't get in the shower until 7, and then I'm at work right on time. I just can't seem to get out of bed. Uh, gee, wonder why.

But slowly I'm finding my way back to writing again. I'm jealous of those that are writing right now, free and loose, able to find all the words they want. Me? I'm feeling, not stuck, just bored and tired at the same time.

Words aren't coming easily. I write at work, I type many emails during the day. But I'm not a "writer" at work. So many mornings I sit down to work and think "oh I could blog right now". But I like my job and want to keep it... and so writing while at work is out.

In short, sorry I've been away... I'm coming back now. I'm finding my way back to the safe spot where I can write and be happy. Because if a writing mother isn't happy, no body's happy.

This is a writing blog, really!

Not so much with the writing around here these days. Pictures, sometimes. Writing? Yeah, not so much.

Do you know what I've discovered? I've discovered that writing and editing are hard to do at the same time. It's hard to switch hats. In fact, I have to physically switch locations just to write this post. All night I've been editing. All weekend I've been editing. I've been to Starbucks and McDonalds and now (surprisingly) I know why I'm getting so fat.

Eat. Edit. Eat. Edit. Latte. Edit. Cheeseburger. Edit. Chocolate Chip Cookie made by hubby. Edit.

But please, please stay with me. The book is due on the 16th. I should be sane shortly after that. I'm moving on the 18th and then, well, then I will feel totally renewed with a new office space, a new room to sleep in. Maybe even a new bed.

But for now, I edit. I ignore the packing, I stumble around the boxes littering the living space. I ignore the carpet that required vaccuming and I just edit. And, apparently, eat.

Coming soon: weightwatchers meetings. Yes, really.

365 Photography Project - Day 5

October 5/08

Picture 5

I know I should take it away from her. We have one last bottle of the disposable inserts and I can't NOT use them. The only thing worse than using disposable inserts would be to buy them and not use them and THEN throw them out. After E hurt her tooth a week and a half ago, the dentist said that it would actually be good for her tooth if she drank from a bottle because it would keep it forward, not the smashed backwards position it was in after her epic fail with the floor. But I'm not a bottle fan. No, I'm a boob fan. I just went on a work trip at the wrong time and weaned her. :(

365 Photography Project - Day 4

October 4/08
Picture 4

This is my "other" lover.

Coffee.

365 Photography Project - Day 3

October 3/08

Picture 3
This is my city. Part country. Part civilized.
Wouldn't have it any other way.
When I moved here, this whole picture would have been fields.
But now it's a mix.
City/Country

365 Photography Project - Day 2

October 2/08
Picture 2

This is my son. Army Boy. He's high up in a tree, high enough that I had to get the zoom lens out to take the picture. Well, not the BIG zoom lens, but the medium one. :) He's always been what I call "risk averse" ... which sort of makes him sound like an investor. But he's cautious. The thing is, he is only cautious until he is confident he can step out and DO. This is the way he learned to read, actually. Little baby steps, unsure, cautious... and now he's reading like crazy. Last night I caught him reading in his room with his little light on. Warms a writing mother's heart.