Ramblings and Musings From The Faithwriter's Conference

I wanted to start this post with something brilliant, witty and of course, incredibly memorable. *sigh* Obviously, this was all my poor brain could spit out. The past week has been a whirlwind of reality and murphy's law at work, a stark contrast from the most wonderful weekend of the year-spent at the Faithwriter's Conference in MI. But before I further scramble my brain (and possibly your own as well, my apologies, dear reader!) I'll make a short list-the extent of my brainpower at present-and possibly attach several tags of randomness to them. I should also add a disclaimer somewhere, right? LOL. Simply my opinion from the first night of screaming/squealing greetings, bouncing in my flip-flops everywhere I had to run, eating brownies and playing games until the wee hours of the morning. This is my take on the 2009 Faithwriters Conference, and again, apologies for being less…formal, than usual. Rock on!

On a slightly personal note, I took the digital family camera along, only to find it dead on the first night of the conference. A very special THANK YOU, to everyone who was kind and gracious to take not just one, but several different photos for and with me. It meant so much to know that I really would have some of the shots I wanted-for keeps! (and it was great proof to have that y'all were real. Lol)

And so, without further rambling, here's my conference list of…whatever. ^_^

Lynda Schab looks just like her avatar. She also has very pretty toenails-lol-I am jealous of the cutesy happy, smiling sun on them. Props to her daughter for being super-creative. ^_^ She also graciously autographed a FW anthology for me, on the margins of the story titled "Set the Toilet Paper Free" Ah. Fun memories.

Sunny is…um, sunny. LOL. She laughs. So I laugh. Then we're all laughing, just because…Sunny laughed. ^_^ If you were at the conference and didn't meet her, I'd say to think again, because you probably did-you couldn't miss that mega-watt smile and voice. The ability to say something hilarious with a straight face? Sunny's got it. Not to mention when I couldn't eat my pizza in a paper napkin, I got a carboard box top. Ahh, Sunny!!! <3>

Vonnie! (Yvonne Blake) never gets tired of giving hugs or my constant bouncing up and down on my toes. She's also shorter than I'd expected and it was so fun to watch her play chuzzle. And she understands a lot. *smile* 3rd "FW hug" of the day.

JJ (Joanne Sher) really has curly hair. LOL. And it's dark brown. And she looks just like her avatar and is soooo incredibly amazing-and doesn't stop smiling at all. Oh-and yeah, she's taller than me and let me stand behind the book table even though I wasn't doing anything at all there.

Peej is just as tall as JJ. She seems so serious, but is so random, you can't help but really, really like her. And she likes to play chuzzle and let me play it for a few minutes on her laptop. I now know what chuzzle is. LOL.

Josh is incredibly gracious and understands the need for chocolate NOW-when he allowed me to cut in front of him in line during an unfortunate brownie emergency. ^_^ He's also quite fun to watch when he's in game mode against Scott playing "Things". Very funny.

Cat!! (Catrina B.) was also on my team for "Things" and is soooo very funny-and didn't mind my randomness at all-and she does look like her avatar-only nicer in person! ^_^ I feel blessed to have met her in person and to have her wonderful personality to tag to her name.

Scott is um…shorter *ducking* than I expected, and WAY more fun. He was really good at "Things" and just has a knack for making everyone feel welcome and happy. He also autographed my conference program for me. Props to Scot!! (I also love his new netbook.)

Lisa M. does not look like her avatar-she has nicer hair in person. She was the first FW "hug" that I walked into, straight out of the airport and into the arms of a friend. ^_^ I wish I'd had more time to spend laughing with her, but she was amazing to meet in person-especially to get a voice to match to her face.

Speaking of voices, Beffy (Beth LaBuff) sounds like Indian Movie star, Rani M. and does look like her avatar. She also doesn't mind talking about virtual farms and houses. I quite possibly chewed her ear off, jabbering on about barns and mansions. LOL. Love you-Beffers!!! (and glad I got to meet Tilman!)

Aunt Jan (Jan A.) is amazing in real life-she sounds just like I thought she would-and she graciously autographed a piece of um…exceptional…writing for me. ^_^ I wish I could had more time to spend chatting with her as well. Some day, right?

Leah Orcutt and I could pass each other on the street and walk right by. LOL. Well, we'd do a double take now and then turn back and exclaim at the same time. Leah was the recon member of my 'welcoming committee' and the second "FW hug" of the day. We passed each other going back and forth in my airport adventure and well, she's just plain awesome. Love her sense of humor too…see, there was this joke about-oh wait, you don't want to hear it? Oh all right. Ask her then. :P

Dee looks (Dee Yoder) just like her avatar-and is SO sweet! I bet she got tired of everyone telling her that, lol, but really, she IS! Her voice, smile, hugs and accent! I also loved every moment spent with her and was glad I also got to meet Arlen and Joseph. ^_^ What a neat family!

Hally and Mari are long lost twin-sisters from a um…hold on, I'll think of something brilliant…tomorrow. LOL. Marita T. & Laury H. were wonderful!!! And they are really very much like twins and didn't mind my hyper-self, talking about nail polish or just being silly. And they do look like their avatars. Same great smiles. ^_^

Sonya L was not at all like I'd picture in my head-but I must say I like the real-life version a whole LOT more! I wish I could have spent more time visiting and hearing a few of the interesting stories, I know she had with her. ^_^ Thank you sooooo much for taking a picture with me, Sonya-and making me feel so special. You are truly a gem! <3>

As for Amy (wiley), I was waiting to see exactly who this behind-the-scenes-mastermind was and Amy is WONDERFUL! She's probably tired of hearing people say how sweet she is and what a great personality she has, but I have to repeat it. I had so much fun at lunch, visiting with her! I wished I could have snuck her home in my suitcase-to be the sister I never had. <3>

I absolutely adore Deb, who graciously gave me autograph and also included me in a few of the group photos. I also really, really liked her accent. *dreamy sigh* I am SO glad I had the chance to meet her in person. Noel-who kindly let have a picture with him and took the time to chat for a few minutes. I was so amazed when he said he actually recognized my name and knew who I was on FW. ^_^

David Ian had an extremely enormous reputation to live up to, after hearing about him through the FW boards on the threads from the last conference, I wanted to see if he really was like that in real life. Long story, short? He is! I was laughing right along with everyone through his sessions and during the game night. What a truly wonderful, creative person, who gives credit to God and is still down to earth enough to chat with a new writer. Truly a wonderful memory now stuck in my head.

Ohhh and Shari Armstrong-who really isn't as redheaded as I was expecting, but still was so much fun and had such a wonderful smile! It was such fun to sit next to her during David Ian's workshop and running into her at various moments throughout the conference.

Pat Turner-my airport buddy-lol. It was such a pleasure to meet Pat in person and to share lunch with her at Applebee's. It was wonderful to finally put a face to the name on the comment boxes. (and thank you, Pat for being my 'airport buddy'.

Allison really does LOVE ladybugs. And I do mean it with the capital letters. I did see her famous ladybug PC set up. So adorable! I don't know that I could be that dedicated with my favorite "thing". Allison was also a ton of fun and looked exactly like her avatar!

I also had the pleasure of meeting the wonderful Karlene J. who graciously ferried me back and forth to the airport. It was such a pleasure to put a personality to the face and wonderful writer within. Karlene was also one of my first FW hugs! <3>

Kathy Bruins does not look like her avatar. Lol. (as you can tell by now, my brain was in overdrive matching up all the avatars to the actual, current person) and was the wonderful person who rescued us starving people (Leah, Pat, Kim Russell and myself) to Applebee's on that first afternoon I arrived. She has such an interesting voice! (and is a really good driver!)

Sheri G. is a really amazing person in real life. And though she did not look like I picture her (it was kind of hard with an eagle for an avatar...I had to use my imagination, lol) but she did sound just as I'd expected. I really loved getting to chat with her for a few minutes.

Kim Russell-a great lunch buddy and also an extremely interesting person! I loved just listening to her talk and hearing so many different stories!

Stephanie(crankycow) does not look like her avatar. LOL! But is just as vibrant as her writing. It was fun putting a face to her name. ^_^

Chely-Michele R. gave me a moment of deja vu. When she was introduced as "shelly". I was completely not expecting her to look so um, normal. *ducking* By the time it really sank in who it was, I was so excited to think that she was sitting just in front of me! I wish I'd had more time to chat and visit with her as well.

Linore Burkhard-who graciously autographed both of her novels(truly wonderful books!) and put up with my questions during her workshop. An amazing writer-I learned so much from her workshop and am loving putting it into my writings.

There were a lot of August birthdays. We could've had a cake somewhere. Lol. Loved the fact that everyone sang "happy birthday" with such joy and enthusiasm, it was truly beautiful!

Where writers travel, so does Chocolate. The best food break was the Chocolate afternoon snack with everything chocolate possible. I was floating on cloud nine with the best brownies I've had yet. (such lovely thick frosting!) and chocolate milk. And nearly everyone I met, had some form of chocolate close at hand or in their room. I tried several chocolates I'd never heard of before and also enjoyed the sweet treats during the game night. I was amazed at the simple appearance of chocolate-and the rate at which it swiftly disappeared. Certainly a writer thing, yes?

Now, I'm going to end here, mainly because it's almost 1 AM and I can't get my brain to recall much more. I had such a wonderful time at the Faithwriter's Conference, it was truly the best event of the year. I am sure I will never forget what an amazingly exhilarating experience it was. If for some reason I've forgotten someone-I really didn't! You're in my head somewhere and fairly close to my heart as the wonderful "FW Family" is. It's just 1 AM. That's all. ^_^

Thank you for reading my belated rambles, my apologies if half of them do not make as much sense as I seem to think they do. I'll edit it-maybe-someday.

P.S. Acck! I did NOT forget, Cori! (Cori S.) I didn't really! It was 1 in the morning...lol. Cori is the unsung writer you don't really hear much about. But when you do-WOW, she can write! And I did mean the wow with the capital letters. Such an amazingly versatile writer, and an excellent speaker. I especially loved chatting with her, getting her autograph on a FW anthology-and a picture! So blessed to have met her in person-Cori, you're awesome! ^_^

Dreaming of a musical moment

Ever had a musical moment? You know, when time freezes for just long enough for the tune to stick in your head, for you to memorize that voice, to disect every lyric and then for your heart to decide that you've connected with something special? I had one of those today, a time when I needed it. Lots of crazy things going on right now, yet in between of everything, there's the time and the moments just like this that sort of sneak up on you and capture the essence of what makes life worth living. Well, instead of just dragging this post on, I'll get to it.

Thriving Ivory's "Angels On The Moon" played on the radio today-the line that stuck in my head was not to mention if he was dying, because if he can't see the sun, then maybe he should just go. I got to thinking about it (as usual-duh.) and I started wondering, that's like waltzing through life and not caring about any eternal results, you're just kind of there, floating, existing, but nothing beyond that, and if-or when you finally get a glimpse of something more, you see that there's SO much more to your life than you've ever known or realized, how does it make you feel? What do you do after something that earth-shattering? How do you go on? Should you go on? Or should you just kind of stay there?

The second line that made sure I wouldn't forget this musical moment was when I looked up the lyrics to see who'd sang what and the line of just having a sunburn to know that you're alive-wow. Think a little deeper about that one. I can't quite put into words what it's got swirling through my head right now. Well, I'll give it a try anyway-as if you're just rushing through everything, the traffic, familiy, the noise...everywhere, and God just reaches down and touches you , so you remember and realize that He's there. And then He touches your heart. You're alive.

That's my musical moment. Cheerio.

Blue Fingernails

Ever had one of those really, really bad days? You know, the kind that's worse than the worst day of your life, ever. It makes you feel really crummy. And lousy. And insignificant. And oh boy, could I go on. Yesterday was like that, it was just plain awful, no two ways around or about it.

Want to know the surprising thing?

I survived.

Believe me, I wasn't quite sure I would, at least not at the very moment the whole day was spiraling downwards, but just because I don't want time to move, doesn't mean it stops. The amazing thing about bad days? The day doesn't stop, it keeps on going, which means there's a new day and new hope to come when it does. It doesn't make you feel stupid, it actually makes you feel a happy.

In my case, that can be a rather strange kind of happy. As I've mentioned before, my two extremes are the opposite sides of the spectrum for happy or awful. In this case, I attempted to look for something-anything, this morning to make today better than yesterday.

Guess what happened? I was rushing around as usual (generally, I am rarely ever sitting down, still, I mean, unless I'm writing and even so, my fingers are almost always flying) and as I was about to go flying out the door, I paused to grab my knapsack. It's a small little blue thing and I throw everything inside of it, gum, notebook, water bottle, etc. As I picked it up, I noticed a rather odd stain on one corner.

My first reaction was simply, "Oh, that's odd." and began to sling it over my shoulder when I heard it rattle. Now, technically, knapsacks aren't supposed to rattle, but this one did. It was enough to halt in mid-sling and open it to investigate.

Turns out a favorite necklace of mine, was now missing a strand and there were about a hundred little red beads swimming around in the bottom of the bag. Lovely. In the midst of this sea of precious red beads, guess what? There's a nice little tube of red lipgloss. And now, here's how you get blue fingernails.

Retrieve the red lipgloss only to notice blue smears on fingertips.

Act puzzled.

Rub the smears on your fingers to see if it really is blue.

Become horrified when it spreads and refuses to rub out.

Throw lipgloss away. Root around in bag to find the cause of this crisis.

Find blue pen leaking blue ink.

Touch ink to see if it is dry.

Bemoan your fate when a big glob of blue ink is transferred to BOTH fingertips.

Panic.

Rush to the bathroom sink and pump soap vigorously into hands. Lather thickly. Rinse. Repeat. Frown at hands. Rinse. Repeat.

Panic some more.

Look at the clock.

Realize you can't be late for work.

Rush to the kitchen sink.

Use dishwashing liquid to wash hands. Scrub dark blue stains until they become light blue.

Root in the laundry room for Germ-X. Pump generous handfuls over blue fingers. Rub and wash out until both hands have a strange, light-blue quality to them.

Be relieved that most of it is off.

Rush to work.

Arrive at work. Look at fingernails. Realize you now have a Blue French Manicure.

Sit down. Think. Laugh about it. Write a blog about it. Smile. Laugh some more. Wait for comments to roll in.


^_^
And that is how you get blue fingernails...for free! (No hammer involved) Have a great Thursday. Cheers!

I'm Free!

I'm Free!

Those were the words that tumbled out of my mouth today when someone asked how I was doing. I couldn't help laughing after that-and throughout my entire explanation of why "free" was exactly how I was feeling. Needless to say, that was a very, um, interesting conversation. Why am I free? School's out of course...

The title pretty much explains my attitude towards the wide expanse of summer before me. It is weeks and months of glorious time, empty in a sense, for use. There are memories to be made, outfits to be worn, dozens of silly pictures and stories to be created and of course, cake. I'm seeing all the wonderful things I want to do, can do and probably will eventually do. The treat I am most looking forward to, has nothing to do with writing or other productive things. I just want to sleep.

^_^  For the past few months, the main wish has been for more sleep and more time to sleep. Now with finals over and done with, I have a chance to relax-possibly and enjoy the most favorite, yet elusive past time of all. Simply doing nothing. Do you know how hard it is to do that?

I finally figured it out one day when I was watching a Winne The Pooh movie, where Pooh and Christopher Robin were just talking and hanging out and Pooh wanted to know what they were going to do. CR simply laughed and said. "Nothing of course. That's the best part Pooh, you see when grown-ups ask you what you're going to do. You can say, nothing. And then you just go out and do it." As he's talking, CR and Pooh walk up to the great big tree on the hill and sit down, side by side, before CR adds one little note. "Of course you can't do it to often, then it isn't special anymore."

That particular thought has stuck in my head for awhile. I guess maybe it's just my own interpretation of it. Thinking, still...wishing. I think today, I'm going to do...Nothing.

Have a great weekend and Happy Mother's Day to every mom out there. You're s special bright start in the hearts of everyone close to you.

An Easter Break

Happy Easter!

I do hope you all are enjoying this weekend as I am. In honor of Easter, I ate a cadbury chocolate creme egg. LOL. Whether you believe me or not, that was actully only the second time I've eaten one. Thanks to a rather persuasive and very good friend, I went on a hunt to find and try this and the experience was quite enjoyable. Obviously Easter is more than candy though and since I'm trying not to do a specific "Easter" post as I could pretty much be here all day doing that and there's so much more inside my head to get out, not to mention to other things I do want to mention. I'll just mention that my family celebrates the "Feast of Unleavened Bread" and this morning has been an interesting debate in what to cook and bake. I've been having a wonderful time so far, and enjoying some of the more creative solutions. For instance, there are quite a bit of sweet things to make that do not require any "leavening" of any sort. I think I'm dreaming, as I haven't had so many home-baked goodies for the entire year!

Of course now that the month is evening out, I have some extra time to write and relax. The relax part, being the most fun. This month, April is ScriptFrenzy(http://www.scriptfrenzy.org/) and I've been having a blast so far. The idea is to write 100 pages of script during the month of April. Last year's project was so very fun, I've been looking forward to this year since last May!

I use the scriptwriting program Celtx to take the headache out of formatting and have just been letting my extra creative juices flow into there. While I currently have 15 pages, I plan to significantly boost that page count by tonight, as I've been playing with several new twists inside of my head and well, I figured I'd give y'all a quick summary of the story. It's titled "Housemother Anne" as an alien woman who takes in troubled, orphaned children and helps them work out the wrinkles in their lives. The twist to this story is from the very beginning, whenever any child enters the house for the first time, they must give her a handshake, which is when she reads their minds, and then a hug, which is where she offers a full-body healing. This automatically creates some drama and of course, puts Housemother Anne on a more leveled playing field to reach these "unreachable children".

If I'm up to it this month, I might post an excerpt. The story has been fun, since scriptwriting is bascially blocks of dialog with descriptions and props inserted here and there. Those of you reading my sister blog, Fiction Fusion, may have noticed my unintentional overflow, where the current serial of "Raising Rachel" has had several long blocks of simply dialog. My apologies! I've got scripting on the brain. ^_^ That, and I quite want to whack Rachel over the head for being such a dork. Oh well. I've done stranger things, I suppose.

Anyway, thanks for reading through my ramblings. My mind is a creative explosion at present and I only just realized it's been quite near a month since my last post. My original aim was to post at least once per week, but my life has a way of turning me upside down without warning at any given time. It's been a wild ride, but things are calming down enough for me to breathe. Two rather bittersweet songs come to mind, one of them being Steven Curtis Chapman's "Cinderella".

Happy Easter, God bless!



P.S. Prayers during the TN Tornado watch yesterday were very much appreciated. Thankfully, my family and I are all well and safe and it appears there are no serious damages, just lots of brush and branches in odd places, along with our missing garbage cans. Thank you so much! ^_^

Running

I love to run, most of the time. When my feet don't hurt, where my head can't hurt and where my heart doesn't even enter the equation. It's a blissful feeling where helplessness doesn't quite register and there is nothing closing in or on over you.

It's a feeling I can never quite get enough of.

It's also the easy option when bowling-ball types of things come hurtling down my section of life. I don't have the energy to jump over them, I don't have the will to avoid them, I just want to run so far away, that they will never, ever find me. And if they just crash on through the lane, knocking down all the pins, that seems to be fine with me, because I know I just have to stop and pick them up again, whenever I stop running.

Lately, the only thing inside my head has been the need to run somewhere. To get away from everything (even technology! With this spring break, I made a specific attempt to cut down on internet use and try to sort through the little memory fragments I so dearly love to hoarde) and sometimes, everyone.

Memory fragments are kind of twisted together with the impossible bits and pieces of our impossible dreams. They kind of pounce on each other and then stick so tightly together, that you know there is no hope of ever separating them, because doing so, will take a whole lot more than you've got to give at that point. I have a bunch of those fragments floating about in my head and in general, giving me a headache. Things I don't want to think about, things I don't want to do, things I know I will have to do...someday.

Personally, I'd rather run. Run as far and fast as I can, to get away from it all. To run to the hill in my mind, where the earth meets the sky and there is nothing there. Just a peaceful emptiness, warmth and love of a heavenly kind. It's a place where there's no distractions and no prying eyes or oversized ears, somewhere where I don't have to speak, because a story is being told with every beat of my heart. Where every tear I cry carries meaning. A hill where this is all so special, because it's just me and my heavenly Daddy. No one else. Nothing else. Just somewhere where I can feel Him, without a doubt.

It's a lovely day outside...I guess I'm running...

Turning Pages

Wow. I can't believe February is over. Not because it seems like I still have a bajillion things to do, but because it marks the second month over in 2009. Wow. It seems as if time has been flying, in spite of the few excruiating days that linger just long enough to register.

February was a little hectic in terms of school and my stubborness is wanting to take on the month-long challenges I did last year. February was FAWM (as mentioned in an earlier post) and I was determined to start and finish it, with at least the very same amount of "zongs" as I had last year.

This came out in the form of an almost finished composition notebook with rather illegible scribblings all over the pages (and even on top of each other-yikes!) and my trying to decipher it out at thirty minutes to midnight last night. If that doesn't qualify as possibly insane, I'm not sure what does, considering I was about eight songs short...and wrote them right then and there.

While the lyrics are not as deeply-soul-searching as last years, I found that I could lighten up my writing, and it was okay to make a few silly ryhmes. Because I was pushing for an end goal, I was able to loosen up a little bit and have some fun. There was an entire song on Goldfish-with just nonsensical ryhmes and a silly tune inside my head, talking about what a nice snack they were. That is definitely me being 'random' at who knows what time of the night.

I made the deadline. (obviously, lol) and I learned a small something. Last year, I did FAWM as a project completely between me and my heavenly Father. This year, I was all set, gung-ho if you will, on doing the same thing and having another 'awesome experience'. I suppose I ought to mention right now, that He had other plans for me and this particular challenge. Last year, I struggled quite a bit with writing anything vaguelyl 'songworthy'. And everytime I hit a block, I was praying so hard to get through it, that I felt each time He literally halted my life, pausing to write lyrics on my heart. It was awesome.

But this year, between a hectic class schedule and other elements of life, I spent more time fretting over what I wasn't getting done and reserved my FAWM enthusiasm for the weekend, during the morning hours when I was fast asleep. I pretended I was listening, I waited, exasperated for the 'brilliance' of last year, but the lesson He meant to teach me came in the back of a car riding home in the rain last night. I did specifically ask him, to "Pull me through this month, regardless". I should know by now, when I ask something like that, His sense of humor shines through and He does exactly that-in His own way.

I was pulled through this month, maybe that's why it seems like such a blur, but when it's half an hour to midnight, you start thinking a lot deeper into a lot of things. He wrote those eight songs I couldn't cram last night, He helped me write in the back of a car where I couldn't see the pages, but I could feel Him right next to me. The words streamed into my head and the moment was, well, beyond amazing. When I reached about eight, I had to stop, because I wasn't sure how much more I could take.

The moment I was home, I typed like crazy to have the songs posted before the deadline. This morning I woke up and the full impact of it, hit me right in the head. Wow. That's pretty much all I can say.

And of course, I'm turning pages again this month. Guess what? It's NaNoEdMo time...National Novel Editing Month. 50 hours of editing in the month of March. Last year was crazy, but I'm not even going to think in that direction. I'd like to think I learned something from this FAWM experience, so we'll see. In the meantime, I'm going to get something to eat. Strawberries, I think...and Kiwi, with whipped topping. (after all, why on earth would I be grocery shopping at midnight, if it wasn't for something as scrumptious as this to eat today?)

Have a great day and enjoy the rest of your weekend!