Blogging's Ravenous Appetite for Words

“If you love writing or making music or blogging or any sort of performing art, then do it. Do it with everything you’ve got. Just don’t plan on using it as a shortcut to making a living.” (Seth Godin)

This is my 544th post on One Writer's Journal. When I started this blogging adventure in January 2008, I only posted once a week. Here's the very first paragraph I blogged.

"Hi, everybody. I'm just a country girl who's been writing forever. I hope to share some of what I've learned about writing over the years and some about being a country girl through and through."

And the last paragraph in that first blog: 
I'll tell you more about growing up in the country next post. Wouldn't want to give away all my secrets the first day. These blogs have a ravenous appetite for words.
 
Boy, was I right about that ravenous appetite of blogs! Words, words and more words.  And by now, if I had any secrets, you probably have had a chance to read them all. It's a good thing I like journaling as I told you in Post 2.

I'm figuring out what exactly I want to write about in my blog. I've been a journal writer forever, but that's writing to myself. Now this may be writing to myself too, but it's like leaving my journal open out on the kitchen table where anybody can read it. That might be okay. I've done some of my best writing in journals. How about you? Are you a journal writer?

Since then I started posting twice a week and left my journal open on a lot of nights. I want you to know I've appreciated each and everyone of you who has taken a peek. I've also needed to remember this bit of advice from Liz Strauss. "The Internet has no eraser.”Once something is posted, it's out there. It's hard to grab back and completely make it disappear. 

So I've tried to remember to share encouraging words and fun stories. And now I'm letting Jocie from my Hollyhill books do her own blog once a week. Hollyhill Book of the Strange. The picture up top is the one I have on that blog. It's me a long time ago when I was only beginning to scribble words in notebooks to make stories. I've scribbled and typed and word processed millions of words since then. And hope to have another million or two in my fingers. 

Some of that million will be here on One Writer's Journal where the great thing about blogging is this from an anonymous (no doubt blogging) writer. "Blogging is not rocket science. It's about being yourself and putting what you have into it."

"Blogging is to writing what extreme sports are to athletics: more free-form, more accident-prone, less formal, more alive. It is, in many ways, writing out loud.” (Andrew Sullivan)

Writing out loud. That's a good way to look at blogging. 

So what do you think? Do you like to blog? Read blogs? What advice would you suggest to make my next 500 plus blogs more fun to read?

The Girl in the Picture

Some things are keepsakes that can't be gotten rid of even though they have no real value other than sentimental attachment. This picture is one of those things here at my mother's house that my sisters and I would never be able to throw away. When we were children, the picture hung in the corner of our aunt's living room. It was painted by my great aunt, Herve, who had a flair for creativity. She had a rock garden in her backyard that was a wonder, and when she decided she needed new flooring in her house, she simply painted her old linoleum gray and then dotted it with a variety of bright colors.  

I don't know when she painted this picture, but it was my aunt's house. Aunt Herve added plenty of personal touches, including my aunt's cats and dogs. She carefully planted the flowers in her picture the same as they were in the yard, if perhaps coloring them a bit brighter. She added plenty of bright birds too. Then there's the pasted on picture of the girl holding a cat. I always imagined I was the girl in the picture, but it most likely represented my older sister since I can't remember when the picture was painted and given to my aunt. But I wanted to be the cute little girl in the picture and so I imagined I was. 

Maybe that was the beginning of me putting myself in a story. That's a question I often get about my writing. How much of this or that character is me? Since I did use my hometown background in my Hollyhill books, readers ask if Jocie is me. And the answer is no. And yes. She isn't me, but she's the girl I imagine I am in the story. A writer has to get inside the skin of her characters, especially her viewpoint characters. And while I have several viewpoint characters in Scent of Lilacs, Jocie is the beginning character, the one the story rotates around. Things happen to her that never happened to me. She does things I would have never had the nerve to do. She is not me. But in a way, I am the girl in the story the way I was the girl in the picture. How? Imagination. 

Actually most of us are the girl in the story or the guy in the story when we're reading. That's why reading is such fun. We live their stories without getting all the bumps and bruises. We laugh with them and cry with them and share their adventures right in the safety of our favorite reading spots. I'm hoping some of you will imagine you are Jocie in Scent of Lilacs when the book is available again in March. Before that, I hope you'll drop by Jocie's blog to get to know the people of Hollyhill. Jocie or one of her friends will be sharing something every Monday for a while. Just click on the tab up at the top of this post or go to www.hollyhillbookofthestrange.blogspot.com. Remember too, if you leave a comment on either this blog or Jocie's blog before March 1, you'll be entered in a blog only giveaway for an autographed copy of Scent of Lilacs. I'll draw three winners and each time you comment, you'll get a new entry. Then maybe you'll be reading and imagining you're the girl in the story.

Thanks so much for reading my journal too.

Inviting You to Hollyhill

It won't be very many more weeks until Scent of Lilacs, my first inspirational fiction book will be available again for readers. The book has been out of print for several years, but in March it will hit the store shelves with a brand new cover. Some of you have already read my Hollyhill books and I thank you for that. There are three of them. Scent of Lilacs, Orchard of Hope and Summer of Joy. 

 I appreciate the many kind comments I've gotten about the stories. Scent of Lilacs got a starred review in Booklist with this review. Thirteen-year-old Jocie Brooke prays God will send her a dog and wishes her senile aunt would stop quoting scripture. The setting is semi-rural Kentucky. The story revolves around Jocie's dad, David, a newspaper editor and the "interim" pastor of a little Baptist church. Where is Jocie's mom? She left seven years ago, taking Jocie's older sister with her. David's strange marital status explains why he's always "interim" and also why he's so sad. Jocie gets her mutt, the onslaught of Bible verses is ameliorated, and real drama emerges as Jocie explores her family's secrets in this universal tale of growing up. 

I call my Hollyhill books Small Town, America stories because I  pulled so much of the background for the books from the little town here in Kentucky where I grew up. All the characters are completely made up - and none of you hometown friends are going to convince me differently. Well, maybe there were a few minor characters I might have pulled a bit of this or that from someone I remember from years ago. Maybe. The thing is, all my characters in all my books probably pull a little of this or that from people I've met or read about or imagined over the years. That's where characters spring from - that mysterious well of experience and imagination in a writer's head. 

I did enjoy writing about Jocie Brooke and her family and friends in Hollyhill. I especially liked it when Jocie and Wes, who was a grandfatherly figure to Jocie, got to talking. In Scent of Lilacs, I have them thinking about writing a book called The Hollyhill Book of the Strange. 

So guess what? Jocie and Wes are writing it now to celebrate the re-issue of the Heart of Hollyhill series. Once a week I'll be visiting Hollyhill and let Jocie or Wes or who knows who in Hollyhill tell us what's going on there. I started to just substitute the Hollyhill posts for my regular Wednesday night posts here on One Writer's Journal, but a name like "The Hollyhill Book of the Strange" simply cried out for its own space. So here's the Hollyhill link if you'd like to go over and see how Jocie is introducing her new venture. With a little help from Wes, of course. 

If you grew up in a small town or community, I'd be glad to hear the "strange" things you might remember about your towns. Who knows? Jocie might suddenly remember something along the same lines that might have strangely happened in Hollyhill. :) Small towns are great places to grow up, but they are also hot beds of interesting and unique characters who give rise to some entertaining if odd stories.  Maybe even a little strange.

Let me know what you think. Either here or on the new blog. Leave a comment here or there before March 1 for a chance to win an autographed copy of Scent of Lilacs. I'll give away three copies and your name will go in my hat twice if you comment both places. Thanks for giving Jocie's new venture a try. Happy reading!