Archive for February, 2007

February 28, 2007 @ 4:19 pm | Filed under: Uncategorized

"Grown don’t mean nothing to a mother. A child is a child. They get bigger, older, but grown? What’s that suppose to mean? In my heart it don’t mean a thing."

~Toni Morrison, Beloved~

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I’ll never forget the day I knew.

It was early morning and I was lounging in my corner of the couch, with my first cup of coffee. Down the hall, I could hear the shower running in the boys’ bathroom, and knew that Jorge was getting ready for school.

Eyes still heavy with sleep, I barely gave it a second thought as I heard the bathroom door open. Even in the semi-darkness of the living room where I sat, I could make out Jorge’s figure as he walked across the hallway to his bedroom.

I don’t remember a lot about that morning, or that day, or the days that followed. But I do remember the panic that seized my heart in that one, fleeting moment, and the image of my son and the immaciated figure he’d become, will forever be burned into my memory.

Because we were in the middle of the winter months, it had been a while since I’d seen his legs and he very rarely, if ever, went around the house without a shirt. In hindsight, I realized that he was always layered, usually wearing his gray hoodie, even over pajamas & t-shirts.

This particular morning, Jorge had no idea that I was up, and certainly didn’t know that I sat a few feet away in the darkness, with an open mouth and a pounding heart. Clothed in just his underwear and towel, I glimpsed the legs, the ribs, and the collar bone of a virtual stranger. Certainly not my son.

In that single, fleeting moment…I knew.

We were dealing with an eating disorder.

This ugly monster that invaded our home, our tranquility, became my worst enemy. It not only did its best to take over my son’s body, but it infected his mind and his emotions as well. As we traveled to the doctor’s visits, endured various tests, and tried our best to reason with Jorge, it became obvious that - although he conceded that he’d lost some weight, he didn’t see it as a problem. Even when he stood on the scale at our family doctor’s office and the nurse announced that he’d lost 60 pounds in the past ten months - nothing. No emotion. No shock. No nothing.

As I’m sure most mothers do, I spent so many hours beating myself up for not seeing the signs earlier. How could I not have KNOWN that my son - this boy that I gave birth to, that I nurtured, that I still hugged and kissed good-night - had become just a shell of the boy he’d once been? What kind of mother would miss clues that could very well make the difference in their child’s health? In their future?

• turning down food he’d always loved before
• not wanting to eat with the family
• reading the labels on everything
• dressing in layers
• taking showers right after eating
• fine, downy hair on arms, neck, and face
• being constantly cold

These were a few of the signs that I’d noticed off and on, but had never stopped to add them all up. While I certainly knew that eating disorders were not confined to girls alone, I’d never stopped to consider that my own teen-age boys could be potential victims. In hindsight, I should have seen the writing on the wall. But the truth is, that this is a silent, deadly enemy that slithers in and takes over before a parent can even take guard.

Our journey to recovery was slow in coming, and in future posts I may write about it. But for today, the concentration is on healing. As you know, healing has really been on my mind lately, and Jorge now knows firsthand the healing touch of The Promise Keeper.

While the recovery may have been slow in coming, the healing - once begun - happened very quickly. I wish I had words of advice for other parents out there that are facing similar things with their own children. If I could, I’d list the do’s and don’ts of handling this very vicious, very hateful disorder.

But the truth is that Jorge was healed. One Wednesday night in church, during a song, I saw our pastor walk off the platform and straight to where Jorge was seated with the Youth. Worn and defeated by the long weeks of battle, I could only hang my head and allow the quiet sobs take over. I didn’t watch, but I knew that our pastor was praying for Jorge, pleading the blood for his healing.

The road to health was slow in making a full return, but I do know that from that next morning until now, the process has been steady and sure. While his body eventually regained some fullness, it took his emotions and his mind a bit longer. But he began to open up more, to talk, to share. Today he is once again the picture of health, a bright, busy boy making college plans for after graduation.

I realize that our family is blessed and I almost feel guilty at times for even sharing our story because there are so many other families who are still held tight in the grip of an eating disorder. At the same time, I would be doing an inservice if I didn’t give glory to the God that still heals. My Promise Keeper. While I don’t know if our story will ever be able to help another family in crisis, I know without a doubt that this healing experience is one that Jorge will remember all the days of his life.

And me? I’ll never forget the morning I knew we had a problem.

But, even more importantly…

I’ll never forget the Wednesday night I knew we had a solution.

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This photo was taken of Jorge during this difficult time.

February 26, 2007 @ 6:07 pm | Filed under: Soul Food

I haven’t been sleeping well lately. This usually happens to me when I’m right smack in the middle of a first draft of a story. There are so many questions I’m trying to work through, situations I’m trying to meander, and emotions to which I’m trying to lend some credibility.

Credibility is essential to me.

Without it, a story lacks that glimmer of hope that I want to impart to my readers. The words may be fabulous, and the dialogue intriguing, but if the story lacks that depth of truth that only comes via credibility, then I haven’t really produced the story I intended.

Faith’s story is a difficult one to navigate right now. It deals with illness and with healing. I won’t disclose how the healing comes about, or what type of healing - physical, emotional, or spiritual - takes place, but I will say that the writing of this story has made me stop on more than one occasion and close the manuscript and shake my head in what could only be termed defeat.

And yet I can’t ignore the fact that I’m meant to write the story. This evening I went back into the Finding Faith file to see just when I’d created the first notes for this story. Tuesday, September 2, 2003. Three-and-a-half years ago this story was laid on my heart. On that day, the verse for the book came to me:

These have come so that your faith - of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire - may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.                                                                         I Peter 1:7

In those same notes, I jotted down this statement, words that would eventually serve as the purpose of Faith’s story: To show that faith - when tried - can reveal a beauty and joy that would have been missed without marching through it. God’s promises are true, if we can only find the faith to persevere.

I have to admit that as I took the time to go back and read over these thoughts that I wrote years ago, it was merely yet another distraction - something I could do instead of the actual writing that I NEEDED to be doing this afternoon. And yet - minutes later - I felt my heart begin to melt with the truth that God was once again whispering to me.

His promises are true. Does that mean that prayers are always answered, or that healing always takes place?

Oh, if only that were true.

Yet the deeper issue for me is seeking security in those promises, even when life takes turns and twists that I’m not expecting or maybe not prepared for. That’s the point in this story where credibility is a must and I know that in order for me to handle this with care that my heart has to be in the place where God can speak through me.

And the truth right now is that, after a week of watching a family in our church lose a husband and a father to an illness that we all despise with a vengeance, I am reminded that sometimes our path to God’s promises wind a very uncertain and painful path. And I need to be okay with that.

But sometimes I’m just not.

After closing the manuscript today, I opened another file to finish up some paperwork on an upcoming ladies’ meeting. The title jumped out at me: "Security: Finding Refuge in God and in Friends." How very like God that is to once again use my own words to nudge me into a deeper realm of consciousness.

His promises are true.

And at the end of the day, or at the end of a life, isn’t that all that really matters?

                                                                                                                                                                                          

February 25, 2007 @ 9:24 pm | Filed under: Family

"What’re you doing, Nana?"

Carter and Kendall spent this weekend with us and, as always, they left me with a lot of great blogging fodder.

This particular moment Carter had walked into my office where I was taking a Government quiz online.

"I’m doing my homework, buddy."

"Huh?" He wrinkled his nose and came to lean against me as I swiveled around in my chair. "Why do you have homework?"

"’Cause I’m in school, remember?"

"Do you go to B*** (the name of the school where he’ll be attending Kindergarten next year)?"

I try not to laugh. "No, I don’t go there. I’m in college."

His big brown eyes light up and he stares at me with something close to awe. "So you play <gulp> FOOTBALL?"

Okay, I’ll wait while you all finish laughing and pick yourselves up off the floor at the mere thought of "Nana" playing football! You have to remember that with, both, a Pops who went to college on a football scholarship and a dad who played football all the way through school, Carter has heard all the stories about the good ‘ol glory days of college. It’s too bad that he’ll have to one day realize that college includes a tiny bit of schoolwork too!

But, hey, I’m all for letting him keep his innocence for a few more years! In the meantime, he can go on thinking that his Nana weekly suits up in shoulder pads and helmet as she "tackles" yet another day on campus…

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This is a picture of Kendall after she is dressed and ready for church. Isn’t she a total cutie?

February 21, 2007 @ 1:49 pm | Filed under: Uniquely Me

***Update:

Congratulations to Amy Wallace, the winner of the drawing mentioned in this post! Amy is a dear friend of mine, as well as a long-time (SIX years now!) writing critique partner. Amy’s debut novel, Ransomed Dreams, hits bookstore shelves this spring. Amy, a secondary character in Finding Faith will be named after you.

A huge shout-out to all of you who took the time to participate. I appreciate you all!

Being in school full-time while writing a novel is kind of like raising two or more children. You love them equally and try to give both an equal share of your time and devotion. But it rarely works out that way, right? Undoubtedly, one will require much more attention and focus than the other during any given week, only to switch places the very next.

That’s the way it is with my school work and my writing now. I try to give both the attention and focus that is required for success in each area. But - without fail - one always seems to draw more of my energy and time while the other languishes on the side, waiting for my return.

But more importantly even than these two things are my relationships. With God. With my husband and children. With my family and friends. It is only within these relationships that I find the purpose and the strength to fulfill these other roles in my life.

Crazy exams, paper deadlines, and required readings seem to have absorbed most of my time these past couple of weeks. Regrettably, my word count had to take a back seat while I studied, read, and prepared for classes. When a major dental ordeal, senior graduation stuff, and generalized craziness was thrown into the mix, there were days when the manuscript for Finding Faith was never even opened.

In an effort to catch up on my writing schedule, I am taking the next several days off from blogging. I’d love to have you help me with something during this time though! My publisher and editors like to see that I have traffic coming through here. It shows that I am establishing relationships with my readers and that those said readers check in every now and then to see what’s going on in my world.

I know how much traffic filters through from my site statistics, but I don’t always know how accurate that is. I have friends who I know "hit" me two or three times a day, while still others visit but don’t leave a comment or name attached. I’d like to do a five day period where my visitors leave a note saying they’ve been here. You don’t have to have a Typepad account to leave a comment. You can merely click on ‘Anonymous’ and then leave your comment in the appropriate field. If you’d like me to know your name, you can leave it in that field or you can just cruise through without signing your name. The main goal is to get a more accurate count of actual visitors in any given time period.

I have to admit, a part of me (the part afraid of rejection) is cringing right now! I’m facing the possibility that there may not be as many readers as I think and, if so, I’m still so very happy with all of you!!! But, for the sake of my editors and all the future stories I’d sure like to sell them, PLEASE leave a comment and let us know that you visit Glimpses.

To make it a little more fun, for everyone who leaves a comment on this post between now and Sunday at midnight, I’ll enter your name into a contest. The winner will have a secondary character in Finding Faith named after him/her!

Thank you so much, and I’ll *see* you again in a few days!

Now I’ll return you back to your regularly scheduled life while I get back to Faith and Marshall…

February 21, 2007 @ 5:59 am | Filed under: It's a Girl Thing

***Update on the Update:

I bought the bag on eBay! It is coming from Hong Kong but should arrive on Thursday. I’ll post a picture of the real thing as soon as possible! Thanks to all who either posted a comment here or sent me private emails regarding my hunt for The Bag. I can’t believe you all went to your local malls in search of it and spent your precious time googling it online for me. Your friendship overwhelms me!

***Update on The Bag:

As of this morning, Friday @ 5:58a.m., I’m now bidding for The Bag on eBay. Seventeen hours, thirty-three minutes left. What time will that be, anyway? (This simple computation involves math, doesn’t it? Y’all know I don’t *do* math. Who knew I’d have to do math in order to get The Bag? Ah…the sacrifices…)

I’m one of those women who resist fashion trends and changing fads, opting instead for more classic styles that flow from one season right into the next. But on those rare occasions when I see something I love and finally decide that I must have it, inevitably…it’s too late.

I went to buy The Bag yesterday afternoon. For those of you who’ve been following my infatuation with this Coach purse, you know how much thought I put into this upcoming purchase. I weighed the pros and cons and staged a fairly lengthy debate with Me and Myself on whether or not a handbag was worth the kind of money tagged on this one. When all was said and done and all of your comments were factored in, I knew this was a purchase that I would treasure for years to come.

In an effort to make it feel more like a reward I opted to wait for this quarter’s royalty check. My final deal with myself was that if this check was a certain amount, then I would, indeed, spend a portion of it on this purse. Last Friday the check was in the mail and, let me just say, I did my own little happy dance all the way through my house, waving it in the air.

For we writers, payday comes but twice a year and those little tell-tale sales reports that come attached can sometimes mean the difference between future publication and "well, let’s wait and see how sales are next quarter before we release another." Thanks to YOU, my very faithful friends and readers, this past quarter was the best I’ve seen yet. The numbers just served to further buoy the renewed burden and excitement that I’ve experienced these past couple of months.

So, with the allotted money in the bank, I walked into the department store yesterday, already anticpating walking back out with my precious purchase. I walked around and around the Coach section, searching every shelf, every nook and cranny. The sales woman approached me and I’m sure she glimpsed the concerned look in my roaming eyes.

"Can I help you find something?"

"Yes," I turn to her, but in the pit of my stomach I already knew the answer, "I’m looking for the Coach signature medium tote in the blue…"

Her expression said it all. "We are sold out. From what I understand all our stores’ inventory of that bag is depleted."

"Will you be restocking?"

She shook her head as I tried to wrap my mind around the fact that The Bag would not be coming home with me tonight. "That was our Fall ‘06 version. Our Winter version - the bag in punch color - is already sold out as well. Right now we’re awaiting our Spring signature bag. Maybe you’d like to check back?"

Uh, no.

I want the bag in blue.

I went on eBay last night and, wouldn’t you know it, it seems as though I’ve waited too long there as well. Where as a month ago, there were three or four listed there, last night there was only one. It is in Hong Kong.

HONG. KONG.

Somehow, after the shipping and insurance and all that - I’m not feeling the Hong Kong transfer so much.

This morning I remain the woman who always manages to try to catch the fashion train right after it has pulled from the station. My plea to you is this. I’m putting out an APB on The Bag. If you happen to catch a glimpse of it anywhere, will you let me know?

Oh, you want a reward? Okay, let me think. How about this? The first person who can locate The Bag that leads to my ultimate purchase, I will send you a box of premium chocolates and you will hereafter receive a FREE copy of each of my new releases.

Sirens on. Lights flashing. Let the search begin…

February 15, 2007 @ 1:45 pm | Filed under: Books

Brilliant men are often strikingly ineffectual; they fail to realize that the brilliant insight is not by itself achievement. They never have learned that insights become effectiveness only through hard systematic work.
—Peter Drucker
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I’d like to believe that I’m fairly intelligent. Certainly not brilliant, but more than capable of absorbing, retaining and putting to use the various avenues of information that come my way.

So I get the day’s headlines from my MSN homepage rather than the black-and-white print of the Daily News. What can I say? Put anything in colored, vibrant fonts and you pretty much have my attention. Once you have it though, I learn a lot.

Oh, and I stay current with pop artists and legendary greats, alike, by flipping through an occasional issue of People. Guilty pleasure? Sure, but I also live in a world that is ruled by standards set by the entertainment and political industries and this keeps me abreast of changing cultures, moods, and gives me a "heads-up" about the world my kids are about to enter as adults.

I listen to, read about and - eventually write on - subjects that fall at both ends of the spectrum in today’s headlines. When it comes to literature I like to read, well…that ranges from biographies on political figures to the latest chick-lit published in the CBA world to an occasional suspense drama. I’d like to say I’m well-read.

Just like I’d like to say I’m intelligent.

But I had an experience last summer that made me wonder…

I joined a few writer friends over a year ago in a book club adventure that we were *sure* would be an eye-opening experience for us. It was, just not in the way we expected.

As you probably know, Oprah’s book picks concentrate on the great classics. Last summer she chose three of William Faulkner’s works for the months of June - August. These were her words: Dear Reader, I’ve always believed that you cannot call yourself a real reader unless you have read some of Faulkener.

She went on to say that "his brilliance makes you feel more brilliant." Wow. What high commendation…

Wonderful, we thought. It just so happened that all four of us had managed to escape all of our collective literature classes without having ever cracked open a Faulkner book. So it was with great anticipation that Nathan and I made the trek to the book department at Wal-Mart and purchased the three-book collection. (Note: thank goodness we purchased it here for a mere $19.97 - you’ll understand why later)

Back home, I could hardly wait to tear away the crunchy celophane wrapping and then lovingly finger the three-volume set. I love the feel of new books.

As I Lay Dying, The Sound and the Fury, and Light in August.

Three masterpieces just waiting for my reading pleasure. And to top that, not only would I be reading great classics, but I would absorb so much literary knowledge from one of the great literary minds of the turn of the century.

Right? You’d certainly think so. Hope so…After all, Oprah said…

I began to read As I Lay Dying that very afternoon. After one hour of solid reading it was clear I was in big trouble. I’d been prepared for the challenge - reading the masterpieces are always a bit challenging. They inspire you, provoke you, nudge you into a new and higher realm of thinking and reasoning. But this book just puzzled me. Not only could I not keep up with which character was doing what and when (by the way, no publisher would allow this type of writing to sit for ten minutes on their desk today), but I also found myself horribly depressed by the subject matter.

In a nutshell, this book is Faulkener’s harrowing account of a family’s odyssey across the Mississippi countryside to bury Addie, their wife and mother. The book opens with Cash, one of the several sons, constructing the casket that would house their mother’s dead body.

After she died, of course. For the time being, the sick and ailing Addie sat in a window, scarcely two feet from where Cash worked, watching as her son prepared for her demise.

I continued to read, but I have to admit, I was no longer sure about this book I’d been so excited about. Still, I read on. I mean, how could I admit to my other writing friends that …I didn’t get Faulkener? Wouldn’t that be a blatant admission of ignorance? Or, at the very least, an indication that maybe I was a bit spoiled to easier reads?

I finally confessed. I couldn’t stand it any longer. I either just don’t "get" this classic, my email admitted it all, or maybe I’m just a dunce.

I was flooded with relief as the emails began to drift back to me. No one else got Faulkener either. This made me sigh in relief. And really made me think about brilliance and about each one’s definition of that term. As one of my writing friends said, "Don’t you just have to wonder if maybe the people who say this is brilliant don’t really get it either? LOL It’s like one person said it was brilliant so we all have to agree."

Oprah had told us Faulkener was brilliant. And I don’t argue that he was for his time and his place in the world. But I learned an important lesson on that summer afternoon.

Don’t set your intelligence level according to what Oprah claims is the norm.

Faulkener himself said this: "Read, read, read. Read everything–trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You’ll absorb it. Then write. If it is good, you’ll find out. If it’s not, throw it out the window."

Now that, folks…is brilliance!

February 14, 2007 @ 7:50 am | Filed under: It's a Girl Thing

"Love works in miracles every day: such as weakening the strong, and strengthening the weak; making fools of the wise, and wise men of fools; favoring the passions, destroying reason, and in a word, turning everything topsy-turvy."          —MARGUERITE DE VALOIS

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FUDGY FONDUE

4 1 oz squares sweet baking chocolate, chopped

4  1 oz squares semi-sweet baking chocolate, chopped

2/3 cup light cream

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1 tsp. vanilla extract

Combine chocolates, cream, sugar, and vanilla in a heavy saucepan (or your fondue pot!) over low heat. Cook and stir until melted and smooth. Dip fruits, cakes, or marshmallows for a sweet, romantic treat!

(Um…no calories, no carbs:)

February 12, 2007 @ 8:00 am | Filed under: Books

But not by TV.

This week is scaring me, and it’s just now 8:30 on Monday morning! I have three major exams this week: Psychology, Am. Lit, and Texas Government. If you overlook the part where I’m two chapters behind on my reading in Psych, one chapter behind in Government, and have about half a novel to finish before Thursday for my Lit class, then it’ll all probably be okay. But factor in this very prominent truth and…well, I’m scared.

BUT…

I was up at 4:45 this morning, drinking a cup of half-caff and making a detailed to-do list for today. I know it can all be done, including the word count, if I’m diligent and focused. So I’ll try to ignore the rain and the way it makes me just want to go lie down somewhere and I’ll sit and read, write, and study, knowing all the while that in five short days (’cause come on, aren’t they getting shorter?) this crazy, crazy week will be history.

And hopefully I’ll have a few A’s and a nice word count to show for it.

I’m posting the current word count for those of you who have asked in the past week or so. You’ll notice the pace has slowed. This tends to happen as I "lose" some words as I go back and rearrange some scenes. I’m anxious to see the number begin a steady rise again!

I’m off to begin The List. If you miss me this week, just know I am memorizing parts of the brain and Erikson’s stages of development, finishing the last few remaining chapters of Pudden’head Wilson, spending some time with Faith & Marshall and the whole Finding Faith gang, as well as lavishing some attention on my guys here at home.

Have a great week, friends!

February 9, 2007 @ 8:52 am | Filed under: Uniquely Me

February 8, 2007 @ 12:49 pm | Filed under: Family