Vocation

A preacher, or maybe it was a Sunday School teacher, once said that Jesus was a preacher, a teacher and a healer, so if you wanted to be like Jesus, you should choose the ministry, teaching, or doctoring as your vocation. I had always had an interest in teaching, so that was the course I took.

However, I do read the Bible daily, being raised as a Christian, and lately I have found many interesting parts of the Bible that I’ve underlined. Someone wrote those parts. I looked it up because who could have written Genesis?, and it said Moses wrote it.

I have a Bible now that has a description of the Bible books and their authors, and I find it fascinating to read who wrote the different books and why.

But you know what? The biggest “take away” I’ve had is that writing, or being an author/writer is also a worthy vocation.

I’m sure everyone’s job is important. I can’t think of a job that we’d be better off if someone wasn’t doing it. (Excluding criminal activities) But I think the preacher, or Sunday school teacher was not correct. Without the Bible, where is the guide for some people’s lives? There are also written books for other religions.

If you’re writing, you’re doing something worthwhile. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

On A Roll

I got up this morning and the first thing I did was to proofread Chapter 3. As I read it, I wondered how I could have been so blind? Maybe I should retitle my story “The Blind Woman”?
No. I will not continue to accept blame for other people’s mistakes. I was too trustful. I was gaslighted. It’s like I was in an alternate universe where nothing made any damned sense.
Well, I’ve gone back and taken a look at more chapters and have proofread through Chapter 5. Chapter 6 will need heavy editing, so I stopped there.

All this sounds very self-involved to me as I write it. This blog is for giving tips or help to other writers. I am showing how The Blindman, if the book ever gets published, came to be.

When I’m “on a roll”, I continue to work past what I intended. I had intended to edit one chapter a day. I had problems after Chapter One and took three days to return to the manuscript. I had some bad dreams last night after editing Chapter Two. This morning I thought I’d do Chapter Three first thing, even before breakfast, so maybe I could forget the words by bedtime. I’ll see how that works out. BUT, I was doing so well with the editing that I continued and got through Chapter Five.

Chapter Six is written in various colored fonts which tells me it’s piecemeal and I’ll have to work on it awhile. Breakfast sounds more appealing right now and besides, I did three more chapters than I’d intended. And it’s Sunday and I shouldn’t be working anyway, but my “ass is in a ditch” so to speak, so I did. Christians will know what I am talking about.

I work at my own pace. I work at various times of day. When I was working fulltime and sometimes brought work home to do, I wrote whenever I had a few minutes here and there. Sometimes it was the middle of the night; other times it was early morning. But now I’m retired and I try to figure out the best time to write for the project I’m working on and when I’m “on a roll”, I don’t stop.

Now I’ve beaten this dead horse to death, so I’ll go fix some breakfast for my dog and me .

Chapter Two of The Blindman Book

I see it took about three days for me to come back and proofread chapter two. This may not be my best proofread book, because I may publish it as soon as I finish this first run through. So far it’s reading well to me. I can see the action. I can remember it all too well . . .

Chapter Three appears completed and when I get over what I just read in Chapter Two, I will return to proof Chapter Three. Let’s hope I am alert and catching all the mistakes. Maybe if anyone reads it, they will let me know if they find any grammatical mistakes and I’ll send them a bookmark or something?

My best friend sent me the sweetest bookmark a couple months ago. I don’t know how I would have gotten through the Pandemic without her. We haven’t seen each other during this whole time, but we communicate by email daily. I have moved away from the area where she lives now, but if this Pandemic ever loosens its clutches on the world, I hope to go see her as soon as it does. Meanwhile I have her bookmark and it is perfect and the sentiment written on it warms my heart.

But even she doesn’t know about the Blindman. Unless she purchases a book, she never will. I can’t talk about it. I can write about it. I guess in therapy I talked about it.

They say “talk is cheap”, or seems like I heard that somewhere. I wonder where? My talk is expensive. I can tell you jokes all day long and that is cheap for me to do, but to tell you this story? I can write it down and you can read it while I’m not looking and maybe some day something can be done to change situations like this one.

Oh, well, if I continue, I won’t sleep tonight and I need my beauty rest, ha, ha. That’s for sure!

I haven’t lived in this location for a year yet. I wonder what the spring will be like? I keep telling the beautiful plants I had on my porch last summer to keep living! Just keep living so I can put you outside and let you dazzle the neighbors with your blooms. They’re getting weary being inside.

Flowers are beautiful. The Blindman was the ugliest beast I ever saw in my life, and I’ve seen more than my fair share.

As Expected

As expected, the Blindman Book has me up in the middle of the night. Some memories are best left not remembered, while others are impossible to forget. The events in the Blindman Book will never be forgotten, although I’ve tried hard to forget them. I wrote them down to get them out of my mind – many times as they happened. It didn’t work, but it did create the book I hope to self-publish next.

Memoirs. I could write a million of them it seems like at times, but this one needs to be written.

I woke up with an idea about the acknowledgement page and wanted to write it down while I knew exactly what I wanted to say.

I glanced at the second chapter after I finished that. It’s done. I remember that chapter. I will not read it today. Not this day when I’ve been wakened in the middle of the night with thoughts of the Blindman. I’ve worked on the book this day, January 5 at 4:00 am and I will either proofread Chapter Two tomorrow, January 6, or I will draw pictures for the Bully Bird picture book. When I was going through a box of things from a storage unit, I found an old book I had about identifying birds. I can use that book to remind myself how the various birds involved in the story look as I attempt to draw them. If there are any previous students I taught who read this and laugh, I will now admit to you that I deliberately drew things badly as I was trying to show you how to draw your illustrations for projects, because as expected, my reluctant artists would always say, “I can draw better than that”. Ah, yes, you could and you did, but what you didn’t know was so could I. All those stick figures that you giggled at, as I illustrated my examples, served their purpose as you delightfully drew better than that.

So my mind has traveled from what woke me up to what cheered me up as I taught children to try to do things they might not think they could do because we learn nothing without attempts.

See you tomorrow, if you come back, and I’ll let you know how the Bully Bird book is coming. The day after I’ll return to the main story.

The Blindman

Goal for 2022 is to publish the Blindman book that I have worked on for over 20 years.

I was pleasantly surprised to see I had already started uploading chapters into the kdp/createspace format. I proofread the first chapter and made a few changes. I have no idea how many chapters are already uploaded, but most are probably written.

This is an emotionally draining book for me and I will need to take a break from it once in awhile. I have written a children’s book titled Bully Bird and it just needs illustrations. Long story to explain, but I’m going to try to illustrate it myself. That will be my “take a break” work.

That book is only 16 pages long and is written for children who are learning to read. I am a Reading Specialist and worked with many children over the years helping them learn skills that led to better reading abilities.

I also have an interest in the hi/lo market and plan to publish some books for them, if I live long enough.

If my ex-husband is reading this, the Blindman book is NOT about you. Chill.

For the rest of you, I hope I get it published this year and I hope I can endure the work preparing it for publication will take. It’s a story important to many and I want to tell it.