Archive for January, 2008

January 27, 2008 @ 4:42 am | Filed under: Friends

“The ornament of a house is the friends who frequent it.”

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

____________________________
We sat around my dining room table - The Planner, The Initiator, The Encourager, and The Entertainer - and I listened to the sound of my friends’ animated chatter and their infectious laughter.

We had finished our dinner of shrimp cocktails and Mojo grilled chicken salads and now our plates were pushed back and our individual calendars lay open before us. We tried to move quickly through the months, penciling in important dates, events, birthdays, trips, and church group activities, but, invariably, each thing penciled in would prompt a new thought, a new idea, or a new tangent of conversation.

At one point I settled back in my chair and just listened.

Listened to the sound of friendship.

I looked around this small circle and thought how lovely it was to have this group of girlfriends in this stage of my life. I’ve never known such complete selfless love and genuine affection as what is felt and seen and known in this group. I can only think that this particular group dynamic works so well for one reason and one reason alone. We are four distinctly unique individuals who share a deep love of God and a deep commitment to our individual talents and abilities. Never do we try to cross into one another’s territory, but we, instead, are one another’s biggest and loudest cheerleaders EVER.

The Planner is the woMAN with the plan. You want to throw a party? You wanna go on a trip? You want to figure out how to wear a different outfit to church for three months straight using only 6 pieces of clothing? NOT a problem. All you need is a good plan, and she can be counted on for that.

The Initiator is the go-to gal once that plan has been established. Affectionately dubbed Cheguyver by the group, she can quite possibly create, fix, or alter - anything - with just a piece of gum, a hair pin, and some double-sided tape. Her quiet nature belies the hilarious comedy that ensues as she calls out for tools she needs and we scramble to dig them up and pass them off to her. The Plan would be nothing without The Initiator.

The Encourager is the gentle force that keeps the entire group moving forward. She is, both, quiet and ferocious, loyal and biased, sensitive and headstrong. She defies labels. She is the first to cry and the first to laugh. She is the supplier of All Things Chocolate and the official Bringer of Kleenex to girl’s night in. She thinks The Planner is the bomb and that The Initiator is the original Superwoman. We think she is irreplaceable.

The Entertainer is our rejuvenator when spirits are tired and energy is low. She is a slow, quiet force that catches you unaware and then delights you with a humor that is all encompassing and infectious. She’s the one who prays away the calories from our food before it ever passes our lips and she is the first to break up an overly solemn moment with slapstick humor. She is our laughter, even on days when we don’t feel much like laughing. Our lives are merrier because she’s in them.

Each of these women are strong and independent and whole on their own. Together, they are women warriors. The results of this phenomenal friendship ripples over into the lives of the men they love, the children they raise, the work they do, and the roles they play.

They never stand alone. Behind each one is…

A plan.

An implementation.

Encouragement.

Laughter.

The four together?

They are the sounds of friendship.

January 25, 2008 @ 8:29 am | Filed under: The Writing Life

As a Christian writer, what do you write about?

This was the recent question posed to a group of writers, all writing under the banner of “Christian” fiction. The responses were varied and it was obvious that some had a clear understanding of what, and why, they wrote while, still others, floundered while searching for their answer.

For me, this became a question that I really wanted the answer to during the writing of Waking Emma. I’d had two previously published novels and had experienced a near perfect relationship with editors and the publishing staff. But those stories, while I’ll always love and treasure these first efforts, were following the “recipe” that had been carefully layed out for me. A step-by-step guide to what the apostolic fiction reader will accept. It was okay for the stories to have some conflict, but the responses of the characters had to follow carefully dictated roadmaps.

During those days, I was eager to please and eager to be published. But, at the same time, I had to wonder about the fact that I (and many more like me) were putting out stories that implied that if we, as Christians, lived each day always knowing the right thing to say and when and where to say it. If, God forbid, a human emotion crept its way in and influenced one of our decisions, well…

That’s just it. I wasn’t supposed to explore that.

I couldn’t escape from the fact, though, that life is just not that simple. It’s not a cookie cutter process where you always have the right ingredients, in the right increments, with the perfect heat and the perfect wrappings. Life is beautiful and messy and delightful and sorrowful. It’s a journey - and there are all kinds of stops along that journey. We appreciate joy because we’ve tasted sorrow. We appreciate light because we’ve huddled in darkness.

I wanted to write about the real things in life.

I don’t write about the light bulb, I write about what I see because of the light.

The result is that I now have stories that resonate deep inside of me. Stories that speak to me, that teach me, that inspire and convict and motivate me. I think we can reflect Christian (or Apostolic) values in the same way by what we talk about, what we focus on, what we leave in and especially by what we leave out.

For me, I have an almost desperate desire to convey the message of a relationship with God more than I’m called to impart one certain message or lay out the plan of salvation or point fingers or preach a sermon. What I want more than anything is to somehow be able to bring the message through on a level that speaks to the heart, where the same old words are bouncing off an increasingly hard-hearted and hostile world. I want to convey my own experience and what amazing, heart-changing things can happen as a real woman (or real man) develops a relationship with God.

There are some days, and even some weeks, when the writing process is lonely and tedious. There are often times when I wonder just how many more of my stories will see the light of day, because I don’t write old-fashioned “Apostolic” fiction and I also don’t write straight “secular fiction.” I am in the mix somewhere in between, still believing that people want the truth. Sure, fiction is entertainment. But if God uses my characters to teach me important life truths, I must have faith that He has a plan for them to teach others as well.

Like I always say though - if I am the only one who learns a little more about faith and hope and about real life at the end of a very messy day through one of my stories, then…

it’s still a story I’m honored to have been a part of.

January 19, 2008 @ 1:15 am | Filed under: The Writing Life, Uniquely Me

“Hey, I know you. I know you.”

I jumped a bit as a hand reached out and grabbed mine, squeezing it exuberantly.

I had been wandering around the room for a while, making sure to keep my friend and her mother in my sight in case they should need anything. I talked with the few people I knew, admired the pretty arrangements, and then tried to stand by as unobtrusively as possible. At this particular moment I stood near the front pew, quietly taking in the room. I was vaguely aware that two elderly women sat just to my side, but - quite honestly - I’d not paid them much attention.

Until one of them reached out and grabbed my hand, that is.

“I know you, I do. Now…where do I know you from?”

I looked down into a face softly, but very definitely, lined with years. I would have placed her to be about seventy, but the enthusiasm in her spirit and the grace in her carriage immediately clued me in that this woman was just a bit special.

“Now, what is your name? I know I know you.”

So I introduced myself.

Warmth - deep, genuine warmth - shone in her brown eyes. Gleaming salt and pepper hair was carefully slicked back into the most elegant of chignons on her lower neck. She wore a smart suit, appropriate for the night but yet wildly younger than her years. On her feet she wore a pair of the most beautifully stylish and chic three-inch stilletos that I’ve seen in a while.

In the brief moment it took for her to grab my hand and begin to try to remember where in the world she may have seen me before, I was able to take in this wonderfully delightful woman. There was a strength in her hand that far belied her age, possibly every bit as much as her clothing and appearance.

I was instantly captivated.

“I don’t know. Maybe a ladies conference…?” I would have given anything at that moment to have been able to pinpoint where we might have met before, to give her that, but…I just couldn’t place her.

I was sure that this was a woman I would have remembered.

“Mmm. Maybe…” She studied me and then shook her head. “No. No, something else. Something else.”

She repeated my name over and over again, just slightly under her breath. My hand was still tight within her grip so I began to scramble for a way to change the subject. Do you go to church here? Are you friends of the family? I really like your shoes. Anything.

But before I could decide on a topic,

“Books! You write books! I’ve read your books. You do write books, don’t you?”

You could have knocked me over. And, I promise, nothing at that moment could have thrilled me more than knowing that this petite, energetic elderly woman before me was one of my readers.

We settled in for quite a visit. I learned most of her life story in about a twenty minute period. The time flew by and I was her very willing, very captive, audience of one. In three days she will turn eighty-one. It was obvious to me that the years have been both kind and harsh to this tiny slip of a woman. But I was continually moved by the grace and charm and energy that she carried within her.

As I sat with her, listening and absorbing, it wasn’t lost on me that this was a perfect opportunity for me to learn a thing or two from this pilgrim. She’s not only gone before me in the things and work of God, but she’s faced life as a woman and as a mother and had stories that particularly resonated within me and with my life at this particular junction.

I saw in her the same fire and passion that burns within me.

I had come there that night to try and be a help.

I left knowing that I had been touched by one of God’s own.

My new friend and I have made plans to meet up at the next ladies conference.

It was one of those moments when - in the midst of all that I’ve been thinking, feeling, experiencing lately - I caught a glimpse of the woman I want to be “when I grow up.”