The World of Dragonfly

I just finished reading The Shack by William Paul Young.  Mind you, I’ve read it in bits and pieces during lunch, so forgive me if I get some things wrong about the plot.  There’s been a lot of water under the bridge over the past two weeks.

The book starts out by explaining a little about the background of Mackenzie Phillips.  He’s the son of an abusive father who called himself a Christian.  Mack soon leaves home, grows up, marries a wonderful woman, graduates from seminary somewhere along the way, and then raises four children, including a young daughter, Missy.  At the age of six, Missy is kidnapped and murdered.  The Great Sadness then descends upon Mack.  Four years (I think) after the murder, God, or Papa as Mack’s wife calls him, invites Mack back to the shack where they found Missy’s torn and bloody dress.  Keep in mind that her body was never found.

Mack takes the bait.  Without telling his wife, he heads up and comes face to face with the Trinity.  Papa, in the form of an African-American woman, Jesus, a Middle Eastern carpenter, and Sarayu, an Oriental woman who is the Holy Spirit.  Throughout most of the novel, he is forced to confront the issues encompassing his life.  His past as an abused child.  The murder of his daughter.  His anger toward the murderer.  The need to seek forgiveness and to forgive forgiveness.  His ideas about the character of God and who he thinks God really is.  Though some plot exists, this is a mostly psychological book where Mack works through his issues with lots of dialog.

Here are some things to keep in mind.  First, this is a work of fiction.  Second, the author wrote this novel as an attempt to understand his own painful past.  Guideposts published an article by him recently.  Third, he never intended this to make it as a bestseller.

I know that a lot of people have issues with the theology presented in the book.  I’ll leave the theological debate up to others, as that is way out of my league.  I’ll discuss other aspects.

Plot.  The plot at times was tough for me to read, as it’s more of a psychological plot than anything else.  I could pick it up and put it down without much problem and not lose my spot.  I loved the way that each conversation seemed to address a different point of Mack’s pain.  I also saw deep echoes of the author’s own painful past in the plot as well.  He struggles to answer fundamental questions.  Who is God?  Why did this have to happen?  Can I trust Him?  Who am I really?

Characters.  The characters were interesting.  They challenged me.  And the imagery was incredible.  Wisdom as a woman, which is the image used in Proverbs, really struck me.  I also believe that he had great character development in Mack, who went from being oppressed by the Great Sadness to understanding that he is God’s child, as was Missy.

The writing itself wasn’t as smooth as many published authors, but again, it’s important to keep in mind the intent of the book.  It wasn’t meant to be published but instead was meant to be a way to convey to his children, wife, and friends, what had happened to him and how he worked through it.

So overall?

4 bones out of 5.

Next up:  How Sweet It Is, by Alice Wisler

I’m a writer.  And before I was a writer, I was a big reader.  And as a writer, I firmly believe that you need to be widely read, not only in the genre in which you write, but also in other areas, be it books for research or simply to widen your horizons.

And it recently came to me as I thought about all of the recommendations I get and the way that I discover new authors to read (new to me, that is), what a better way than to share recommendations than in my blog!  So is the birth of My Take.

Some things to keep in mind about My Take.

• I’m no expert. I’m not a theologian, a PhD in anything, and not even an English major.  No, my major was physics.  What I’m trying to say is that I’m simply a good reader who wishes to pass on my take.
• Everyone is different. One book may produce a thousand different reactions by the thousand people who read it.  This is because each person is unique, and novels and nonfiction may speak to each person in a unique way.  So just because I may like or trash a book doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s good or bad.  It’s simply my take on the book.
• I’m not trying to push ideology on anyone. Yes, I’m a Christian.  But that doesn’t mean that because I rave about a book about my faith that I’m trying to push my faith on anyone.  However, God uses any way He pleases to reach people, and if someone reacts strongly, defensibly, to something I say, take heed.  God may be working in your heart.  But remember first and foremost, this is my take.
• I accept recommendations. If someone has a book suggestion, feel free to post in the comments.  I may or may not take you up on that read.  I’ve already got a backlog, but I’m happy to add to that backlog.  It just doesn’t mean that I’ll get to it any time in the near future.

So here’s my scoring system.

• 5 bones out of 5:  Awesome book!  I loved it, and not only will I strongly recommend it, but I’ll probably read it again at some point in the future.
• 4 bones out of 5.  It’s a really good book.  I’ll recommend it, but most likely, I’ll tuck it away on my shelf somewhere.
• 3 bones out of 5. The book is okay.  There were some issues, but overall, a decent read.
• 2 bones out of 5.  The book is not good and really not worth a recommendation.
• 1 bone out of 5.  I didn’t even finish the book and would never recommend it to anyone

First up?  The Shack by William P. Young

It’s a New Year again.  And this year, I had one resolution - to not have any resolutions.  The reason?  I never keep them.  Instead, I wound up getting frustrated about not keeping them and instead rebelled against the reason why I made them.  Take eating healthier.  Very vague.  A nice, vague resolution.  And easy to break.  Which I did so quite nicely and instead went the other direction.

So this year, I have some goals.  Not too many because I don’t want to get overwhelmed.  One?  Get the three novels I have ready to go out on the street by writing query letters for them.  Another, run the Patriots Olympic Distance Triathlon in Williamsburg.  Big goals, I know.  A home run.  And impossible to achieve by just stating that goal.

The key to reaching those two is to develop a series of smaller goals.  So, with a lot of thought and more to come, I’ve done that.  For the writing goals, the steps are baby steps.  Tonight, I drafted a query letter for one of my novels.  Tomorrow night, I’ll revise it, and this weekend, I’ll revise it again with the hope of sending it out to one agent on Monday.  And after that?  I’ll send it to other agents.  Regarding the triathlon, I’m planning on entering at least two sprint triathlons, maybe three, with one of those being in a tidal river.  I’m still working on the smaller goals to reach the sprint triathlons.  All of these?  Base hits.

Maybe, after 38 years of living on this earth, I’ve realized that God works in our lives more by base hits than home runs.  So I’m hoping that these are base hits that will help me reach my goals.

It happened again last night.  I had the whole night free to work on editing, and it didn’t happen.  Why?  That dreaded thing that writers hate.  Writer’s Block.  Better known as The Block.  Okay.  So having the Internet right there and handy didn’t help.  And yes, the evening was mostly a lost cause because of having it, but once I finally, finally started writing, the words began to come quickly.  At least until I had to go to bed.  O for a day when I don’t have to get up early!

So how does one beat The Block?  Here’s what I’ve learned.

• Don’t fight it.  Fighting The Block only makes it worse because it gets me totally frustrated.  And the more frustrated I get, the more I get my emotions bound up in that frustration.
• Do something else.  Turn your mind away from writing.  For me, that meant playing around on the Internet a little.  I checked e-mail.  Looked up the music video for Toby Keith’s “American Ride” and Jason Michael Carroll’s “Hurry Home.”  Both are great videos, by the way.  That and getting the video player up and running since I recently reformatted ate up most of my evening.
• Completely walk away and come back later.  This has always helped when I’ve gotten frustrated.  In college, it was when I was trying to solve physics problems.  Now it can pop up with something at work or during writing.  So The Block is nothing new.  What do I do?  A change of scenery helps.  Or just setting it aside until several hours go by.  I set my mind other things, and ideas for writing pop into my head.  Sometimes, these ideas even come in the shower.

So don’t let The Block block you from writing.  Instead of fighting it, embrace it by filling those frustrated moments with other things.

Well, I guess you could say that Labor Day starts a new fiscal year for me.  No, it’s not the State Fiscal Year, which starts on July 1st.  Or the Federal Fiscal Year that starts on October 1st, but to me, it’s still a new fiscal year since school has started or will start soon for kids all over the nation.  Though I don’t have children, it seems as if a lot does start over.  They move up a grade in school.  At church, classes switch, and the kids move up a grade.  A new year for everyone.

And in some respects, it’s a new year for hubby and me.  We just moved a couple of months ago to a new place.  It’s nice.  Closer to family, friends, and church, and still close to work.  So it’s almost like starting up life again after a rushed and hurried summer.  And where, exactly, did summer go?

Now, I look forward to life easing back to “normal.”  Well, as “normal” as life can get.  And that includes continuing my writing, and, I hope, keeping up with this blog a little better.

Happy 2009!  I can’t believe that 2008 is already gone.  It seemed to fly by, and now I’m sitting here at the end of the first full weekend of 2009 contemplating the following year and the other thing that seems to stalk everyone’s mind this time of year-resolutions.  Oh, I’ve made and broken my share of those over the years.  Eat better.  Yeah, right!  Take Moes away, and maybe that will happen.  Get more sleep.  Hardly!  Though that’s an admirable goal.  Exercise six times a week.  Again, an admirable goal, but the second it doesn’t happen, resolution broken.  Matter of fact, my husband and I jokingly call folks who sign up at the gym “resolutionaries” because most of them won’t last beyond March.

So as I was waiting for my tea to brew a moment ago, I was wondering why we make resolutions.  To better ourselves.  We want to improve something (sleep time, eating habits, exercise).  How do we measure it?  By some quantity, like “I resolve to get eight hours of sleep a night.”  Or like earlier:  “I resolve to exercise six times a week.”  Or “I resolve to eat five servings of veggies, four of good carbs, etc.” Unfortunately, the second we slip up, we moan and say, “I’ve broken my resolution!”  Discouragement sets in, and then we give up and flop back onto the couch to watch another television program.  It’s easier to give up because we’ve broken a promise to ourselves.

Now, I’m not saying that goals aren’t a good thing.  They’re a great thing and are the drivers for bettering ourselves.  I’m just suggesting that rather than make all of these declarations at the beginning of the New Year in the form of resolutions, look at what you want to do as goals.  I think then, when something goes awry–life is that way–we don’t give up.  Sure, we may throw our hands in the air, but we generally don’t give up.

So this year, I’m making no resolutions.  I do have goals.  Yes, I’d love to eat better.  Yes, I’m planning on doing some triathlons this year, hence the need for exercise.  Yes, I hope to get on a better sleep schedule.  But none of these are resolutions because I know that most likely, I’m going to get busted on them.  I’m already busting that sleep goal.

But if I did make one resolution, it would be to live boldly and day to day.  Not to worry about the future.  To paraphrase Christ in the Book Matthew, each day has its own troubles, so don’t be anxious about tomorrow.  May you endeavor to do the same.  Happy New Year.

How many of you have read the Book of Ruth in the Bible?  If you know the story, then you remember how Ruth met Boaz on the threshing floor in a match made in heaven.  It took me a long time to realize just what a threshing floor is.  If my memory of reading commentaries serves me correctly, the threshing floor in ancient times was located on the top of a hill where the breeze would be almost constant.  The farmers would harvest their fields and bring the wheat stalks to the threshing floor where they would break the heads of wheat open (this is where my knowledge gets fuzzy).  Then they would toss the wheat into the air.   The breeze would catch the chaff and blow it away, allowing the grain to fall back to the threshing floor to be collected.

Monday evoked that picture for me.  The entire nation and world was caught up in events beyond their control, tossed about like chaff in the wind.  Now, I’m not going to go into the whole root of the financial situation.  That’s the topic for another blog, and I’m sure many people with more expertise than I have already obliged.  No, yesterday exposed in me something that required God’s discipline.  Fear and doubt.

You see, my husband and I are considering buying a house.  Now, some people may raise their eyebrow and ask, “In these economic times?”  To which I’ll say, “Well, no time was a good time for Noah to build an ark.”  We’ve prayed about it, and God has given us the vision to have a house that can be a place of refuge for both missionaries who are Stateside and refugees who need a place to rest before continuing on their journey.  Both my husband and I share this vision.

So when the markets plummeted this week, I sank into despair.  Fear took over.  And worse, I began frantically thinking of options that could only echo the Wall Street panic.  My husband and I began praying about it, and in the end, we both heard and felt the same thing.  “Hold the course.”  We decided keep on like we had.

So what did I learn?  Well, lots, which was brought out in a Bible study on Deuteronomy.  In the last half of Chapter 1 (vv. 19-46), Moses recounts how the Israelites were preparing the first time to go up into the Promised Land.  They had some concerns, some doubts.  When they asked for spies to go into the land ahead of them to spy it out, God obliged.  Moses appointed 12 spies.  They came back with the bounty of the land and also with stories of how formidable the people and fortifications were.  All spies but two were afraid.  The people began murmuring against Moses.  God got angry and decreed that the people would wander in the desert for 40 years as a form of discipline until the present, doubting generation died away and those who remained truly trusted God.  Of course, no one liked that, not one bit.  So they decided to go up and fight anyway, without God’s blessing.  It was a rout and one that wasn’t in their favor.  So not only did they get routed, but they still wandered the desert for 40 years.

So why am I rambling like this?  Because doing that lesson and talking with my husband made me realize several things.

• God gave us this vision.  We’ve walked with Him on each step so far.  If this is the plan He has for us, it will come to pass.
• Fear is not of God.  If fear is not of God, then it means that we’re trusting in our own weak flesh and strength, not His strength.
• We need to move boldly when everyone else thinks we’re crazy.  When Noah started building the ark, I’m sure everyone thought he was crazy too.

God gives us the desires of our hearts.  The key is that it takes extensive prayer for our will to align with His.  He is a loving Father, and He delights in giving us our desires, so long as they aren’t selfish.  Hence the need for prayer.

So as I lay first in bed crying as I felt His gentle hand disciplining me and then on the couch so I wouldn’t keep Hubby awake, I came to the realization that I had no choice but to trust in Him during this time.  He’s provided financially for us before.  There were times I thought I couldn’t pay the rent.  He provided.  Then when I thought we couldn’t pay our bills after first getting married.  He provided.

So we’re holding our course.  Waiting.  Knowing that if God is for us, who can be against us? Check it out in Romans 8:28-39.  I hope that in the future, I’ll be the wheat that falls at the feet of God instead of the chaff that gets blown about in winds of uncertainty and worry.

I know it’s been a long time since I’ve posted something.  I could say that life got into the way, and that’s partly true.  But it also seems like too wimpy of an excuse as well.  I’ve committed to a blog, and now I need to to it.

The Tag Line on this Blog is “Learn More about this writer’s life.”  I’ve covered the life part pretty well, but I realized that I haven’t talked any at all about my writing.  So from now on, I’ll try to occasionally bring up a writing topic.  So for my first one?  Characters.

My principal genre is Christian fiction, also known as inspirational fiction.  I tend to go into two sub-genres, romance (no, sorry, not the bodice ripper types) and suspense.  So what, exactly, does this mean?  It means that I write from the worldview created by my faith.  Some folks may say that writing from that worldview results in boring characters.  I disagree.  We’re all imperfect.  It doesn’t matter who we are or what are faiths are.  We all have strengths.  We all have weaknesses.  We all are human.  That’s what makes creating characters so fascinating.

Why are they fascinating? Creating characters lets me explore human nature.  One thing that I do before writing a novel is to sit down and create why I call a character profile.  In this profile, I use an outline to draft up everything that I can think of about the character.  What do they look like?  What is their personality like?  What are their interests?  What food and music tastes do they have?  What are their strengths and weaknesses?  What types of books would I find on their shelves?  What do they keep in the trunks of their cars?  (Yep, this can reveal a lot about a character.)  What is their past romantic history like?  What is their faith history?  This may seem like a lot of work, and it is.  But it pays off in creating characters that can come alive.  If you’re an aspiring fiction writer, I highly recommend this exercise.  After you complete your profiles, you’ll be very surprised at how your characters come alive.

My current favorite male character is an antagonist.  He’s brilliant.  Devious.  He takes no prisoners and lets nothing get in the way of completing the missions set before him.  Yet though he’s on the wrong side of the law, he’s got a compassionate side that can pop up at the most unusual times.  I’ve enjoyed writing about him so much that I plan to have him in four novels, three part of a trilogy.

And then there’s my favorite female character, a heroine.  Though she’s a heroine, she’s got her own set of weaknesses.  She yearns for her father, who was never part of her life.  This yearning is a huge weakness that is exploited by the antagonist mentioned above.  Yet she’s got a strong, gritty side to her as well.  She doesn’t mind locking horns with the antagonist.  Before she becomes a Christian, she’s well-versed in the less polite forms of the English language and had a lifestyle that isn’t the best.  And becoming a Christian doesn’t mean that she drops all of these characteristics at once.  No, gradually, she relinquishes some of them, but other traits like her grittiness and strength remain behind to be refined.

Okay.  So I’ve talked about how I create characters.  It’s no secret of mine, and I hope that aspiring writers will endeavor to make their characters come alive.  For my next writing post, I’ll discuss ideas.

As they say in the South, I’ve gone done lost my mind.  Well, not really.  That just sounds kind of cool to say and can leave non-southerners scratching their heads.  Anyway, some people make think that.  You see, I’ve signed up for a triathlon.

Now let me explain.  I like to work out.  And yes, I don’t mind sweating.  But the problem is that lately it’s become easier to rationalize not going to the gym.  Excuses such as “It’s too hot” or “I got out from work too late”  or “I just don’t feel like going” have gotten to be way too commonplace for me.  And because of that, I hadn’t worked out for almost two weeks.

Also, my husband has gotten back into doing triathlons after about a 20-year hiatus.  Three weeks ago, he ran the Bandits Triathlon up in Wilkesboro, NC.  For those of y’all not familiar with the great state of North Carolina, that’s up toward the northwestern part and getting into the mountains.  We left from Winston-Salem, where we’d overnighted.  We got up at 4:45 and left by 5:15–and that’s AM and not PM.  The energy when we got up there was infectious.  And it was cool, the mid 50’s to be exact, and all of the triathletes were more than ready to get into the 80 or so degree water.  What with the crowds gathering, the milling around of people, and the loud music playing at 6:30 in the morning, the energy just started zinging around.

That got me to thinking, “Well, maybe next year I’ll do one.”  Then Hubby egged me into signing up for one in two weeks.  Okay.  So it’s not international distance (almost a mile swim, 20-something mile bike, 10k run) or even spring (half that distance), but it’s a good, solid start.  It’s called Dash for Divas and has been billed as a way to get women interested in the sport since it’s for women only.  It’s a 250-yard swim, 7-mile bike, 2-mile run.  Short, I know.  But hey, I’d already done those things separately, so why not string them together?

I did just that yesterday as a test run, just to make sure I could do the whole thing.  Boy, the adrenaline was pumping in my body!  I fumbled a bit getting ready to start.  But then I did.  Of course, I started out too fast and had to order myself to slow a little on the swim.  Then came the transition to the bike.  That went well.  Then came the run.  Ouch!  My leg muscles had been so used to the bike that the transition was a little on the difficult side.  But I did it.  I know I can do it.

So what’s going to drive me to finish this?

• I know I can.
• I’ve got an encourager since one of my friends is going to do it with me.
• I’ve got groupies.  My husband will be there and also my friend’s husband.
• It’ll be fun.  Okay.  So a different, weird kind of fun.
• It’ll be a start to something bigger.

You see, I’m hooked.   While I may not have the body of a cheetah or move like one, I think I’m going to actually enjoy this.  So in two weeks, I’ll drag myself out of bed, most likely at 4:45 AM and head out to do what I once thought was impossible.  And that will be my reward.

Who is a hero? I think we all have definitions of who they are. Most of us can readily identify a hero as someone on the battlefield who saves the lives of his comrades by paying the ultimate price. To some, a hero may be a superstar in a sport like basketball or football. Or someone who saves a life such as a fireman or a doctor. Yes, all of these people are heroes in their own ways. But I think that too often we have heroes right in our vicinity and don’t even realize it.

One of my heroes is my mom. For years, she’s known that she’s needed to have knee replacement surgery. You see, she likes to be active. To keep that quality of life that she so desires, she finally decided to go ahead and have one of her knees replaced.

The surgery went well. But as her doctor said, the surgery was the easy part. The rehab to get the knee functioning again has been the hard part. She’s had a lot of pain, as is expected. A whole lot. A lot more than most people can imagine. She’s also had to spend lots of time with a device called a passive motion device, which meant many hours lying on her back and letting the machine do its work. She’s endured physical therapy, which as many of your physical therapy veterans may know, is no walk in the park. Now it’s starting to pay off. She can see the light of the tunnel because the pain is finally beginning to diminish, and little glimmers of how her knee will be when it is completely healed are beginning to show.

I’m proud of her. She’s a quiet hero. She knew what she wanted, and she knew it would be tough. But she’s not given up. She’s stayed on course with her therapy, and soon, her life will be better.

So look around you. Who are the quiet heroes in your midst? The ones who are enduring under tough circumstances? The ones who are facing incredible odds? Maybe it’s the neighbor who’s the single mom with two small children. Or someone you know who’s battling cancer. Or maybe it’s someone who’s finally beat an addiction. Whoever they are, like the heroes who are obvious, they won’t brag about their valor. Instead, they’ll live their lives as they are–the quiet heroes.