Man vs. Piggy

Adventures / Pets

I bought a pretend guinea pig last night.

I think its name is Skittles or Scuddles or Nibbles or some such thing. What can I say? I’m a sucker for the little critters and with the remaining balance I still had on the gift card I got at the pretend baby shower last year, Nibbles (or Wiggles) was actually free. Took the critter home to the castle and set up the cage. I have to admit to being a little disappointed. The ad seemed to indicate that little Wiggles could be held by my pretend daughter, Willow. At the very least, *I* wanted to be able to hold the little fella using some cute gesture. Nope. Poor thing just sits there, stuck to the side of my hand or motionless on the floor unless he’s in his cage. Then he scampers about and is cute as all get out. As long as Puddles (or Piddles) is happy, as happy as a pretend guinea pig can be, then I’m happy.

The real guinea pig I have isn’t much more affectionate than the pretend one, mind you. Plus I have to feed her and clear her cage. She’s the childhood pet I was never allowed to have as a child. My cousins had guinea pigs but I was never allowed. My dad never liked ‘rats’ as he called them. So, five years ago I decided to treat myself. Nona Bologna (Nona for short) makes noise, too, particularly when she hears you in the kitchen opening the veggie drawer and rustling plastic bags. It’s her subtle way of demanding her morning grape. Once this requirement it met, along with a few pieces of carrot and a handful of timothy hay, she’s quiet. Rare is the moment she deems you worthy of petting her on the head and nose, but when she does – it’s so damn cute. Nona is five-years-old now and sadly, though she still seems very healthy and active, her days are numbered. Her companion, Mina Louise, passed away last year. Nona doesn’t seem to mind being alone though. All the more grapes, carrots and hay for her.

When Nona leaves us Jim wants a dog. I’d prefer a cat. It’s one of those mixed relationships. Kinda like one person being a Republican and the other a Democrat only different and a lot less stressful. I’ll likely not get any more guinea pigs. It was fun and it fulfilled that little kid part of me that always wanted them but I’m ready to be pet-free for a while. I have Jim now instead.

JIm doesn’t squeal when I open the veggie drawer or rustle a bag, but he certainly lets me know when he needs feeding. One of these days I WILL rap his hand with a wooden spoon when he steals from the cutting board while I’m trying to cook. Either that or he’s going to get a finger chopped off. And, I can cuddle and hold him using a cute gesture. I haven’t tried just setting him on the floor to see what happens. I imagine, much like the pretend guinea pig, he’d just lay there motionless for awhile. Unlike Nona. Jim can (and usually does) clean up after himself. That’s a definite plus! Nona doesn’t cook nor does she even make the slightest effort to do the dishes.

Yeah, I think I’ll keep Jim around long after Nona Bologna goes to wherever guinea pigs go when they die. Nona never built me a pretend log cabin as a wedding gift and I’m pretty sure she has no interest in dressing up as a pirate and sinking navy ships or going to karaoke. And I know for a fact, she’ll never sit at my feet on the sofa and sing me to sleep.

In the battle of Man vs. Piggy,  Man wins.

Sorry, Nona.

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Messin’ Wiff Yer Heads Tuesday!

Book Promo

I’ve started a word game over on my FB Author Page. It’s called ‘Messin’ Wiff Yer Heads Tuesday”. I’ll be posting a line or two from chapters of either my latest release “Blood of the Scarecrow” or from my current work in progress, “That’s What Shadows Are Made Of”. It’s up to you to figure out from which book these lines originate. So, hop over to my FB Author Page, LIKE! it and start playing. 🙂

Don’t have “Blood of the Scarecrow” yet, you say? Well, then you need to go to Pamela Morris Books and get one!

Over the weekend I finished up the first draft of Chapter 19 of “That’s What Shadows Are Made Of” featuring a drunken undertaker who gleefully shouts, “The Butler did it!”  and a dish-to-pass gathering of witches!

With the promise of warmer weather and sunshine blooming on the horizon, my thoughts stray to that laptop that wants to be mine. It’s gonna be a fine, fine day indeed when I can sit outside at my picnic table under a big-ass umbrella and write. At my current rate, “That’s What Shadows Are Made Of” should be done by August then my arduous journey of publisher searching begins.. or maybe I need to hunker down and do some serious agent searching instead. Or both. Either way, I can’t let the business end of this get me bogged down. In the meantime, I hope you’ll grant me the small pleasure of Messin’ Wiff Yer Heads a bit.

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Do-do-do Looking Out My Back Door

Fresh Air & Sunshine / Mental health

Sat outside on my porch for a few minutes this afternoon. It was the first time I’ve done so this year what with the freakin’ white shite and cold refusing to go away. Watched the honey bees bopping around the purple and white crocuses for a spell. Decided to make my first jaunt around the yard to see what sort of clean-up was in order. Looks like A Whole Lotta Rakin’ will be going on.

Around back is the herb garden. Chives are coming up as are the Egyptian Onions. I’m sure the Chocolate Mint will make a roarin’ come back as well. The rest, the rosemary, cilantro, camomile and basil remain a mystery. I think I’ll be adding some parsley this time around. No sage or thyme though. There will be a lovely little beer pool set up for the slugs, too. They do so love their cheap beer and I am happy to oblige them that indulgence.

Over in the rock garden there was a lot of odd damage. A couple of statues were toppled over and a Shiny Thing was in an odd place. Not sure who to blame on those. Deer maybe. Not sure what the deer would want with a plastic blue beaded necklace though. That part of the yard seems to attract the deer. Maybe it’s because of the sheltering pine that hangs over the whole thing. T’is a fine place in the summer. The tree combined with the forsythia bush offer the only decent bit of outdoor privacy and shade in my yard,

The rest of the yard mainly needs only to have a few small, fallen tree limbs hauled to the campfire pile. Maybe we’ll actually have a campfire this year. Didn’t last year and I really missed doing that. My clothesline needs re-stringing, too, especially now that my 20+ year old dryer bit the big one last month.

I hope this doesn’t sound like a lot of whining. It’s just the opposite. I’m tired of being inside day in and day out. I don’t consider myself an outdoorsy type, but damn… I’m sure getting tired of exchanging one set of four walls for another.  My front, kitchen and back doors are begging to be left open. My bedroom window yearns to be raised. I want fresh air!!! FRESH AIR!!!!!!!

The sun is setting now. The warm sun that graced my front stoop has yielded to another chilly night buried under a heap of blankets and cuddled up next to my honey in search of warmth. Which, come to think of it, really isn’t such a bad place to be. 🙂

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Written In My Tears

Mental health / Writer's Life

Every now and then I go in search of clever quotes by other writers. Usually I am looking for a simple sentence or two to express what I’m feeling on the subject on that particular day. Sometimes something silly attracts me. Sometimes it’s more serious. Today was such a day but instead of finding something simple I found a rather lengthy passage that brought me, well, let’s be honest here – to tears.

I’ve only come across this sort of thing two or three times in the past, a passage or experience that speaks to me on such a spiritual level that it’s like I could have written it or said it myself. Maybe it’s the knowing that I am not alone feeling as deeply as I do about writing. Someone recently asked me for some advice on writing and how I continue even in down times. What drives me to go on despite the struggles of a blank page? I told her that I simply cannot NOT write. It’s as much a part of me as breathing. If I stopped breathing, I would die. When there comes a day when I can no longer write, I may as well be dead.

And so, without further adieu, I present you with this quote by Rainer Marie Rilke:

“Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.

This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple “I must,” then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse. Then come close to Nature. Then, as if no one had ever tried before, try to say what you see and feel and love and lose…

…Describe your sorrows and desires, the thoughts that pass through your mind and your belief in some kind of beauty – describe all these with heartfelt, silent, humble sincerity and, when you express yourself, use the Things around you, the images from your dreams, and the objects that you remember. If your everyday life seems poor, don’t blame it; blame yourself; admit to yourself that you are not enough of a poet to call forth its riches; because for the creator there is not poverty and no poor, indifferent place. And even if you found yourself in some prison, whose walls let in none of the world’s sounds – wouldn’t you still have your childhood, that jewel beyond all price, that treasure house of memories? Turn your attentions to it. Try to raise up the sunken feelings of this enormous past; your personality will grow stronger, your solitude will expand and become a place where you can live in the twilight, where the noise of other people passes by, far in the distance. – And if out of this turning-within, out of this immersion in your own world, poems come, then you will not think of asking anyone whether they are good or not. Nor will you try to interest magazines in these works: for you will see them as your dear natural possession, a piece of your life, a voice from it. A work of art is good if it has arisen out of necessity. That is the only way one can judge it.”

Write on, my friends! Write on.

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That’s What Shadows Are Made Of

Barnesville Chronicles / Book Promo

Though I am still working on the first draft, I’ve reached a point where it’s time to give you all a sneak peak of what’s heading down the literary transom. Submitted for your approval, I give you… the unofficial blurb for “That’s What Shadows Are Made Of” the newest mystery-thriller now in the works by yours truly.

Funeral director Dan Walden finds himself in a very tight place; bludgeoned and suffocated in one of his own display caskets.  But who would want such an upstanding member of the village of North Valley dead?  His son stands to gain control of a thriving family business. The owner of the new funeral home on the other side of town could benefit without the competition.  Maybe his invalid wife really did cast a spell that created a supernatural accomplice powerful enough to kill.

None of this should have anything to do with the coven in nearby Barnesville until Nell Miller, the High Priestess, starts seeing things and when family and friends all begin reporting they are experiencing unusual dreams and visions as well.  To darken matters, a pendant from beyond the grave appears at Nell’s place and her new kitten Familiar won’t go near it.

As the skeins of truth begin to unwind, the Coven members become convinced they must act to find and stop whatever devilry has been unleashed and in the process aid the authorities with their case. No one doubts there is a killer on the loose, but whether it be one of shadow or substance remains to be seen.  Even on the brightest of days, shadows, like some secrets, always seem to remain.  In this case, however, they have also turned deadly.

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The Death of the Love Letter

Family & Relationships / Handwriting / Writing

“I wake filled with thoughts of you. Your portrait and the intoxicating evening which we spent yesterday have left my senses in turmoil. Sweet, incomparable Josephine, what a strange effect you have on my heart!” ~ Napoleon Bonaparte

Lewis Carol did it for Gertrude. Beethoven did it for his ‘Immortal Beloved’. Bonaparte did it for Josephine. It’s been said that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. If that’s so then maybe the way to a woman’s is through a love letter. Call me old fashioned.

I’ve been writing letters for as long as I’ve been able to write. My grandmother’s got me started. Though we lived less than twenty miles apart, we wrote to each other all the time. It was the highlight of my week to get a letter from Nana Jean. When my Gramma Daniels spent more time in Florida than next door, she too would write to me on an almost weekly basis. Even my best friend since the fourth grade and I exchanged letters, and still do!  I think I had my first pen-pal around that same time.  Her name was Yaffa and she lived in Israel. Our letter writing only lasted a year or so but I still have the few that she sent me. There was a pen-pal in Virginia, too as well as in Georgia. By high school, I was writing to six people (all male) in the U.K and one in Germany. It was always a thrill going to the mail box and finding that air mail envelope waiting for me. It never got old. One of those Brits would go on to become my first fiancee.

Then along came email. It was the beginning of the end for the hand-written love letter.  As it became easier, faster and cheaper to send things via email, with the exception of holiday cards, there were no more air mail envelopes in my mail box. There was still hope though!  I could get a reply within hours of having sent something out. Oh, how I loved it back then! It still lacked the personal touch of seeing the way someone would write my name or sign theirs. I pine nostalgic.

Technology stepped it up a notch and gave us Instant messaging and online chat rooms and cell phones and texts. Faster ways to communicate indeed but along with that speed there has also been a huge decline in the quality of the content of those messages. The thought, the eloquence, the emotion that went into the letter writing of my youth has been completely sucked away.

And now with all the talk about doing away with teaching cursive writing to children, I am utterly horrified! My father has the most beautiful handwriting I have ever seen. It’s as much a part of who he is as what he looks like and the way he speaks. It’s a pity we are so willing to give up something as personal as our handwriting just to save a little bit of time. What’s the big hurry anyway? Is there some sort of race going on I am not aware of?  In the end, we are all going to end up in the same place, the grave, and quite frankly I am in no rush whatsoever to get there. Maybe if we all slowed down a bit and took some time to look around at what we’ve been doing, things would be better. When you rush too quickly into any situation the chances of screwing it up on the way through increase. We’ve all gone mad trying to get too much done in too little time and for what?

When it comes to love it’s also a good time to slow down and consider. That’s what writing love letters can do for a couple. It gives each person time to sit back and think, to open up in ways that maybe they can’t face-to-face. I know I am horrible at face-to-face communication. By writing I am able to stop, breath deep, think it through and write it down slowly and carefully. It not only helps the one I am writing to to better understand me, but it helps me to better understand myself, my own wants, goals and dreams.  Maybe if couples were required to write each other love letters once a month there were be less misunderstandings. It would open an avenue of communication that seems to have been lost lately. I’ve even heard that writing love letters to yourself can be very therapeutic. Why wouldn’t doing it for the one you love have the same effect?

It has been said that when Love is not madness, it has not Love. Let’s write each other love letters again and spread the madness.

My dearest,
When two souls, which have sought each other for, however long in the throng, have finally found each other …a union, fiery and pure as they themselves are… begins on earth and continues forever in heaven.

This union is love, true love, … a religion, which deifies the loved one, whose life comes from devotion and passion, and for which the greatest sacrifices are the sweetest delights.

This is the love which you inspire in me… Your soul is made to love with the purity and passion of angels; but perhaps it can only love another angel, in which case I must tremble with apprehension.

Yours forever,
Victor

(Victor Hugo to Adele Foucher, 1821)

 

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I Think I’m Haunted

Haunted / Murder-Mystery / Poetry / Writer's Life

Last year was an incredibly active year for me as far as writing poetry is concerned. Oh, I jotted down a wee bit of fiction here and there but poetry was off the chart. With poetry I am able to convey more intense emotions and the whole business of falling in love swept me away. It was also about getting over the crap in the past that I still struggle with now and then. The stories and poems I write often help me get through those struggles in a safe and legal way.  What with all these new gun debates, rules and regulations, I get the feeling society might frown a wee bit on me shooting someone that has done me wrong. And besides, I really am a peaceful person.

However, I can have one of my characters kidnap, tortures, shoot, stab, dismember or what have you another character who might – kinda sorta – resemble either physically or personality-wise folks I’ve developed a certain dislike for, shall we say? On the other hand, there are also characters based on the people in my life I am very fond of. Thank God there are more of those than the other.

The aspect of all this that surprises me the most are the characters that appear like a ghost out of thin air. How they approach me varies. One may give me its name first. Another might tell me what it looks like. Others are more emotional. There was one who told me its occupation long before it ever had any of the other things. The real tough ones are those that don’t let me know much of anything about themselves and just leap at me with a story to tell. If I’m lucky I’ll at least have a first initial to work with. It’s a little like ghost hunting.

In the past couple weeks a new character has started to get brave enough to present herself to me. She was actually introduced to me by my boyfriend while I was visiting him out in Texas. In passing he mentioned that the name “Liberty Hill” would be great for a character in a book. It’s the name of a very small, central Texas town we passed through on one of our jaunts. I agreed and didn’t give it too much thought after; back burner stuff. I already had two novels in progress and didn’t really want to put any energy into thinking about who this Liberty woman might be. Recently, Liberty has had other ideas about that.

I bumped into her in a book store about six days ago. I think she did it on purpose. At any rate, we’d not been in the place five minutes before this phrase flashed before me – as if I was looking at a book title. Liberty was quick to inform me that that’s the title I needed to use when telling her story. As I always carry a small note pad and pen with me, I immediately got both out and wrote the title down. It was rather hard to concentrate on browsing after that. My first thought about the title was that it wasn’t very good for a murder-mystery.

Come to find out, Liberty’s story isn’t a murder mystery. It’s a ghost story. I was only told that yesterday.

I don’t think I’ll be writing much poetry this year. Liberty & Choice, Nell & Lydia, Clint & Bea and Grace & Eric all have other ideas about how I should be spending my time in 2013. Each one is going to nag at me ruthlessly like the ghosts that some of them are, until I tell the world about them and put them to rest – hopefully between the covers of a published novel.

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20 Terrible Covers Not To Judge By

Reading / Writer's Life

20 Embarrassingly Bad Book Covers for Classic Novels

This makes me really appreciate the cover art I have been able to get for my book. Unlike the authors I have spoken to about the topic and what I’ve read online, I actually had some say in what went on my cover. Years ago I went to a book signing. One of the books offered depicted what appeared to be a Native American shaman whipping up some magic. He was shirtless and looking pretty shmexy. The book contained two short stories by two different authors. Neither story had anything to do with Native Americans. Go figure.

Right now a cover is being created for a potential, self-published eBook. It’s a collection of short stories and poems I have written since 2000 and finally got around to putting together last year. It still needs some editing work. Again, I am blessed with the presence of someone who cares enough to ask my input on the cover. I have a very clear idea in my head of what I want to convey with it and he’s doing a bang-up job of bringing that vision to life.

I know we are all told not to judge a book by its cover but there’s also that whole thing about trusting your first impressions. Oh the things in my life that would have been so very different if I’d followed that rule. Ah well.

I’m not sure why publishers seem so uninterested in the author’s opinion of what they want for cover art. Maybe they think that because we write we can’t possibly have any sort of artistic sense when it comes to visual art. I dunno. It’s always seemed grossly unfair to me. That’s our baby they are messing with. Seriously. I understand they want to sell books and maybe putting a scantily clad, buff Native American man on the cover of that book I bought inspired me to buy it but it disappointed me when he wasn’t actually in there. And to be honest here folks, I don’t remember what the two stories were even about, just the mismatched cover.

I bet the authors of those stories would much rather I remembered what they wrote than the judgment I passed on their cover.

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The Voices In My Head Assure Me That I’m Sane

Just Plain Random Weirdness / Writer's Life

I’ve had first hand experience with a lot of crazy people. Family, of course, was first. Everyone’s got a few crazies in the bloodline. Best a person can hope for is that you’ve been spared. Sometimes crazy doesn’t hit you until you get older. That’s scary. I think I’d rather be a long-term crazy than to suddenly snap one day and lose it. “She’s always been that way.” just sounds better to me than, “One day she just went nuts.” I dated a crazy person for awhile. Not sure what it says about me if I add it took me a good number of years to realize this. Everyone else seemed to notice. Maybe they were crazy not to have given me a little but of a nudge. “Hey, Pam, you know, he’s crazy,” may just have been the push I needed. But, love can be pretty darn blind (deaf and mute, too) and I probably wouldn’t have listened to them anyway.

I’ve been called crazy. Who hasn’t? I’ve heard it a lot but I think the sort of crazy I am comes from being creative. The Muse can get some pretty funky ideas when she’s on a roll. All my life I’ve been able to visualize things in my head. I close my eyes and things start to happen. People I’ve never met start to show me places I’ve never been and tell me about themselves. They introduce me to their family, friends and enemies. Never a dull moment. The voices in my head assure me I’m sane and will remain so as long as I tell their stories. Once their stories are told, they move on. It’s a lot like ghost hunting, I suppose. They haunt me, poke me, and keep me awake at night until I figure out what it is they want and tell someone.

The problem(?) is as soon as I get one story told, another one appears. More times than not they overlap and I have to pick who to give my attention to. The most powerful voice wins out. The best I can do is write down what they tell me as quickly possible, hope it comes out making sense to anyone else who might read it and to do so in a way that is entertaining and satisfying. I told someone once to sit down and watch a movie they have never seen before with a pad of paper and a pencil and try and write down everything that happens; dialog, action, scenery. That’s what it’s like for me. Sometimes it’s really hard to keep up!

The most common question a writer hears is “Where do you get your ideas from?” From speaking with other writers and reading interviews of those more famous than I, we all have the same spin on it. On some level the story is already there. The blank page to a writer is like the block of wood to a sculptor. Ideas are everywhere. You may overhear a conversation in a coffee shop that sets the Muse to muttering. She does that a lot, by the way. A dream may do it. The other day I was wandering around my favorite local new and used bookstore and something leaped out at me and gave me an awesome title as a springboard. Thank God for a title. I’m over a third of the way through writing my second murder mystery and I’m still not happy with the title. The darn thing has already had three!! Titles, they are all part of the craziness.

Edgar Allen Poe said, “I became insane with long intervals of horrible sanity.” I think I get where he was coming from there. In order to keep my sanity, that part of me that functions day to day, the one who gets up every morning and stumbles around until coffee has been ingested, who goes to work and pays the bills, that every day me everyone sees, I have to listen to the voices in my head. I have to do what they tell me and write down all they show me of their own lives. I’ve enjoyed those voices all my life. They’ve made me who I am. I’ve always been this way. I hope I always am.

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