"...The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep."
--"Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," Robert Frost (1923)
Happy One-Year-and-a-Day-Since-I-Last-Blogged!
Robert Frost is possibly my most favorite poet. Every time I hear the finishing lines of the poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," I picture an exhausted person who, despite wanting to pause a moment longer, realizes that he or she must continue to move forward because there are people somewhere counting on him or her to keep a promise.
This poem--and the final stanza in particular--continue to creep to the front of my consciousness lately, and I think it's because I, too, have promises to keep.
I have made it known to many people that I have dreams of becoming a published author. Despite the fact that many of these people have never seen any of my writings, many of them have still been very encouraging and supportive of me, and some have even made me promise to pursue my dreams. Just like with this blog, though, I've often used many excuses for why I haven't tried harder to pursue this dream or transfer my ideas from brain to paper: I'm too busy; my kids need me; I'll do it over the summer; I have grading to do; I have lesson plans to write; there are other more important things going on that I need to take care of first; investing that much time in something I want to do for myself is selfish; maybe someone will make fun of me; maybe I'll get rejected; maybe I'm not any good. But despite all of this, these amazingly supportive people in my life continue to push me forward and encourage me to pursue my dream. I'm not really sure why, but they are all good people, so I guess maybe I owe it to them to try.
I always figured that someday I would finally sit down and make myself write on paper the novel that has been floating around in my head for years (since high school to be exact); however it wasn't until recent years that I finally realized that the time to start should probably be sooner rather than later. Like many people I've told myself that I have an entire lifetime to complete all of my goals and follow all of my dreams, but I, better than some, should know that we aren't guaranteed any certain amount of time on this earth, as I've seen many people I've known and loved leave this earth entirely too soon. Also, something about hitting the age of 30 the other year made me feel rushed, as though a significant portion of my life had passed me by already, and I should probably get to work on that bucket list of mine. So, when several seemingly serendipitous events occured within this past year, it made me think that maybe there's a driving force pushing me to pursue writing and publishing a lot sooner than I would have pushed myself, and perhaps it's time I listen.
In the spring of 2016, I heard news that John Rhys-Davies was being booked as a special guest at a local SciFi convention. As a huge Lord of the Rings fan, I saw this as a perfect opportunity to geek out and meet somebody whose work I had admired. The price was reasonable, the venue was close, and I had my sister and my husband to tag along with me. It seemed like a no-brainer. So, we purchased our VIP passes to go meet him, get a photo, get an autograph, and hear him speak at a panel. Be still my geeky heart.
First up, was our autographs. We made sure to get in line very early, and even got to see him round the corner and walk through the hallway right past us to enter the room where he would set up shop at his table and await his eager fans. When I finally got the chance to go up to Mr. Rhys-Davies, my mind raced a million miles an hour trying to think of what to say, as to not sound like a complete and total numpty. So, as I handed him the photo to sign, he talked to me and the brief conversation ran as such:
JRD: “What is it you do?”
Me: “I'm a teacher.”
JRD: “And what do you teach?”
Me: “7th grade English.”
JRD: “Ah, yes, teaching English. I did it myself for a while. It’s for people who are no good at maths and too lazy for foreign languages.”
Me (laughing): “Sounds about right.”
There may have been a few more words exchanged. I seem to recall a comment about my Game of Thrones t-shirt ("Ah, yes, Game of Thrones! I believe we have some of that stuff here!"), but by and large my personal encounter with this mammoth of a man was quite short, mostly due to my own brief answers as I stood paralyzed in nerdy awe.
Next up was my sister, and when he asked her what was she did, she stated that she was a student in college as an English major. When he asked her what she wanted to do, she told him that she wanted to be a writer (why didn't I say that). He went on to talk to her for quite a bit of time (I'd say a solid 5-10 minutes). I was actually quite impressed at the amount of time he spent talking to each and every person that came up to meet him, and I have heard that he is always this kind and personable to his fans. During their conversation, he offered my sister some sage advice for writing and told her that, no matter what, if you are trying to write a book, you should write three pages every day: no more, no less. His reasoning was that three pages a day keeps you on pace to finish a book ("If you write three pages a day for 365 days, by the end of the year, you will have a book!"), but it also keeps your ideas fresh because forcing yourself to stop can build the same kind of tension and excitement as stopping at a good part of book that you are reading. He feels that this stopping forces your mind to think about the book more before actually writing the next day, potentially causing newer and better thoughts to emerge. Doing this also gives you a chance to start fresh every day. Makes sense. Somewhere in there, he gave an example of how one can build on a story and pointed to my husband behind her in line and said, "For example, this young man, he has the heart of wolf!" We got a kick out of that.
I wish I could remember the exact words off the top of my head (I believe my sister wrote them down as best as she could remember and has them stowed away somewhere), but this was the general gist of his motivational pep talk he offered to my sister (who, by the way, is currently researching and writing her first book, as her college sought her out her freshman semester to write a brief history of the college; I want to be like my little sister when I grow up). Although this advice was intended for my sister, I continued to stare and listen and take the advice to heart myself. I left the convention with the renewed passion for wanting to put my words down on paper. I WOULD write those minimum of three pages every day, and I WOULD have that novel written at the end of the year! I would! I would! But... this was just the beginning of summer, and as a teacher, I had to go back to work in the fall. So, those dreams and motivations, once again, lost momentum and got pushed to the back burner, as such lofty goals often do.
John Rhys-Davies and me, reveling in my geeky glory, as he flicked my ear to make me laugh/smile for the picture.
Later in the fall, the school where I work had invited published and celebrated author Marc Tyler Nobleman to visit and speak to the children about his journey to become a writer and how he overcame difficulties along the way. I'm sure his speech was meant to inspire the students and help them see the importance of learning, writing, exploring the world, and seeking the truth always; however, I, too, was inspired at the end of this speech. Once again, I sat in awe of this person who was living my dream and wondered, "How can I make this happen for me?" After the assembly I went to the front of the auditorium and spoke very briefly with Mr. Nobleman and asked him if I could e-mail him with some questions I had about publishing. He very graciously agreed that I could contact him, and that I did.
Marc Tyler Nobleman, inspiring people everywhere to find their own inner super hero (Picture Source: Scholastic).
Check out his latest children's book The Chupacabra Ate the Candelabra.
I always try to have a back-up plan for everything, and as such, I am always trying to think of what job I could do if, for some reason, I could no longer teach. I talked to a couple people about freelance editing from home. I had heard that it could be a viable career if a person can motivate oneself to work as/when needed, be flexible, and meet deadlines. I thought to myself, "I could do that. It will probably be less stressful than teaching, and perhaps, if I am working from home, I will have enough time to write that book I've been thinking about for decades." It seemed like the perfect plan. When I discussed this and several other questions I had with Mr. Nobleman, he responded by saying, "Couldn't say if freelance editing work will help with writing. Probably, but unless you would be doing it more for the money, why not instead use that time to write?" I never thought of it that way before. Why would I spend so much time editing someone else's writing when I could be spending that time doing my own and pursuing my dream? Maybe I never valued my own dreams of writing enough to even think of this as a possibility. These words really got me thinking and reignited the flame that had been simmering since my summer encounter with Mr. Rhys-Davies--a flame that had been ignited as an elementary school student who had unwittingly won 2nd place in a poetry contest (read more about that in my first blog post here), a flame that had continued to burn as an angsty teen who wrote poetry in junior high, the flame that surged in high school as a novel idea (there's a pun there) crept into this young girl's mind and latched on, like a parasite, that would not release its hold until it had exited her brain via paper and pen. And, it has been this flame and the echoes of promises that have continued to gnaw at me ever since.
I am not really one to believe in coincidences. In fact, as strange as it will sound to say this, when my idea for my first novel popped into my head, it almost didn't feel like it was my own. It felt like the idea had been uploaded into my brain by the universe, which was telling me to share this story with the world. I felt this obligation, this burden, to share this story, and this idea has continued to pester me ever since. In fact, for a long time after this thought first popped into my mind, I couldn't even begin to think of another idea for a story. It was almost as if my brain needed to release this story before it could make room for a new one. Now, there are three of these ideas floating around in there, and truth be told, it's getting kind of crowded in my head, so I think it's time to get some of these people and their stories out of there. So, when these events began occurring, seemingly, all at once, it felt too serendipitous to be anything other than the universe elbowing me angrily in the side while saying, "You have GOT to get a move on! How many more years are you going to wait? You'll never be done if you don't even start. These ideas will die with you if you let them."
One would think that all of this should be more than enough to push me, but there is another BIG promise that is motivating me now more than ever, and that is a promise, or more like a pact, that I made with my mother years ago. She would probably not be too thrilled to know that I am talking about her on the internet, but I feel like I need to explain. At a young age, I discovered that I liked writing and that I was at least mediocre enough at it that maybe I could make a career out of it or at least out of teaching it. As much as I wish I had other great gifts to share with the world, I have just never had any other standout talents that really made me go, "Yes! I need to do that because I'm so, so good at it!" Writing and language have always been the things to which I came back. I don't know when I realized that my mother wrote, too, but somewhere along the line, I realized that she had been keeping notebooks and notebooks of ideas and writing that she did not share with anyone. I called her out on this at some point and made her promise that, if I were ever able to get anything published, then she needed to try too. She agreed. She probably did so to help motivate me, but also because she knows better than anyone how I am my own worst enemy and the world's worst procrastinator, so she probably felt pretty safe putting herself out there like that. I, however, plan to force my mother to make good on her promise. This desire, more than any of the others, is what is truly driving me because, in this way, writing and attempting to be published becomes less about me attempting to achieve my goals and more about me trying to help force her to pursue hers. And that is a promise that I truly intend to keep because, if there is one person in this world who deserves to have her dreams come true, it is the woman responsible for helping so many of mine to come true already. So, Mom, you're probably not reading this, but I have promises to keep, and so will you because... this book... it's happening.
(Ignore the horrid punctuation error. Unfortunately, internet memes and graphics are not held to very high standards).
