Sunny Sunday: Thanks for the bad times

Here's my Sunny Sunday kickoff to Monday's Project Perk.

(don't forget to check out Suzanne Young's blog and Robin Mellom's blog for more "perky" posts on Monday!)

I was trying to find something to post about today on Sunny Sunday to kick off to Monday Perks Project.

Considering my recent milestone in obtaining an agent. I thought I would write about being grateful and acknowledge how grateful I am for everything I have in my life.

My family
My friends
My health
My life
My passion
My mind
My heart
My willingness to grow
My strength
My hope
My love
My joy

Mostly, I am grateful for the path I am on. For my ongoing journey in this crazy life. No matter how hard and frustrating, everything scene leads to the fantastic reel of my life.

Then I started to realize that sometimes we forget to be grateful for the hard things in life. Sometimes we forget to love the rain, the storms, and the dark clouds as much as we love the sun and clear skies.

I think it is important to be grateful for all the hard times just as much as the good times. Not only do they teach you lessons but they get you to where you are today.

So thanks for the bad times. The hard times. The crappy times.

The pain
The sickness
The sorrow
The frustration
The failures
The fear
The fights
The struggles
The obstacles
The tears
The broken hearts

Today, I am grateful for the downside of life.

Because it makes the upside even sweeter.

=========================

A Poem of Gratitude

After a while you learn the subtle difference
Between holding a hand and chaining a soul,

And you learn that love doesn't mean leaning
And company doesn't mean security,

And you begin to learn that kisses aren't contracts
And presents aren't promises

And you begin to accept your defeats
With your head up and your eyes open,

With the grace of a woman,
Not the grief of a child

And you learn to build all your roads on today,
Because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain for plans
and futures have a way of falling down in mid-flight.

After awhile you learn that even sunshine
Burns if you get too much

So you plant your own garden and decorate your own soul,
In stead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers

And you learn that you really can endure...
That you really are strong
And you really do have worth,
and you learn and learn...
With everything you learn.

- Shoffstall

Sunny Sunday: Rebirth - The Joy of Starting Over

Here's my Sunny Sunday kickoff to Monday's Project Perk.

(don't forget to check out Suzanne Young's blog and Robin Mellom's blog for more "perky" posts on Monday!)

Today, my thoughts are around rebirth. Rightly so.

I have been working through suggested edits that totally changed my book's direction. When I first got the feedback, I was petrified to go back to the drawing board and changes some key things in my book.

But I realize that writers don't need to be afraid of starting over. It is not the death of a book or your writing, it is a rebirth. Something new out of something old.

Sometimes a rebirth is necessary.

A renewal of hope.

So with that in mind, here is a poem I found about that summed it up for me:

"Starting Over" by Denis Martindale:

OK, why don't you start again?
Just give it one more go!
What happened was beyond your ken,
Perhaps you'll never know!

But try to make it work out right!
And fix things if you can...
You'll suss it soon with some insight
And then fulfil your plan...

When things go bad, when things go wrong,
You've got to end the doubt!B
e resolute! Be firm! Be strong!
And sort the problem out!

Adapt, update and pray like mad!
Then strive for all you're worth!'
Cos when it's done, you'll feel so glad
Your joy will fill the Earth!

Happy Easter!

Writers Anonymous: A 3 Step Program

Marketing Muse
I thought this study was interesting.
Social Media Marketing: Time Trap or Opportunity Magnet?
New Study Reveals the Answers
To read about the study: http://tinyurl.com/c4ggux
To download the free PDF report: http://tinyurl.com/dcz4ep


Writers Anonymous: A 3 Step Program (by Quentin Huff)
I came across this poem and fell in love with it. I am sure we can all relate. Happy Poetry Month!

[Step One: Resentment]
Hi, My name is Quentin.
I'm a write-a-holic.
I can't control it,
can't curb the urge to write.
I need help.
I want my life back.

[Step Two: Commitment]
I write poems on fast food napkins,
with toothpicks, using ketchup for ink.
I jot ideas for poems
on my arms and legs. When I run out of space,
I use my shoes.
I make motions
similar to Michael Jackson's moonwalk
when I need to erase.

I make up stories
while making love to my wife.
She left me.
Who needs her?
She was suffocating my creativity.

I await submission replies
like an addict, hands trembling,
head shaking in disbelief.
Not another bout with rejection!
I'm manic depressive.
I'm happy to be here.
No I'm not.

I live for revision.
Instead of sex, I have poems.
I eat feedback.

[Step 3: Contentment]
As a recovering write-a-holic,
admitting my problem
has provided a much needed catharsis.
Joining this nurturing group has
taught me to reconcile my past and move forward.

(Excuse me,
but are you going to throw away that paper cup?
That's good paper!)

Poetry Friday: Ode to Librarians

Special announcement:
Eternal Grand Prize Giveaway Package: in celebration of the Feb. 10 release of Eternal (Candlewick), author Cynthia Leitich Smith is giving away several prize packages, some including signed copies of the novel, tie-in T-shirts, finger puppets, stickers, guardian-angel tokens, and more! See details here.

Marketing Muse
Create an online Media Kit
An online media kit makes it easy for anyone to access information about you for interviews, articles, or reviews. Every published author should have a place on ther web site where people can download information. Include your photo, pic of your book, any reviews, links to interviews or podcasts, book exerpts or summaries, and bios.


Ode to Librarians
As some of you know, Feburary is Library Lover's Month. I remember going to the library when I was little=. In my small town of Vero Beach, Fla we did not have any book stores. I remember how much I loved the smell of old books.

Here is a poem I came across that touched me. hope you enjoy it and thanks to all the librarians for their dedication to reading.

Ode to Librarians by Hans Ostrom

Imagine you can consider all ideas
And images represented by all words
And numbers in all libraries worldwide.
Open the book of this consideration.
Touch the paper. See the illustration
Of you, reading, when you were ten
In your local library. Turn
Several pages. Now read how you
And that other person ignited romance
In, of all places, the stacks, third floor,
In quite a different library. Snowflakes
Brushed against dark glass as you two
Stood between PQ and PR.
Now go to the index. Find “possibility.”


Look up from the book. The librarian
Who looks away was watching you.
She knows how to phrase the question
You want answered.


Librarians know where wisdom’s stored.
They catalogue the countless forms
Of silence and tell people what they
Didn’t know they wanted to know.
They treat the mentally fractured

As if they’re whole, the dull as if they’re
Sharp, Winter as if it’s Summer.

A band of sunlight angles through high
Windows, brightens shoes of a librarian,
Who knows the patron in the gray enormous
Coat will steal a book about sex or wiccans.

She knows some Christians will steal books
Deemed Satanic, ignoring a commandment
And the homeless person sleeping in a chair.
She knows some atheists treat Library as
Church, so when she moves into shadows,
She does so quietly. She worries for books.


For the librarian knows books are easily burned,
Recycled, or digitized, reduced to oxygen, carbon,
Silicon, and such basic elements as hate and
Budgetary cuts. She wishes presidents of
The United States would consult librarians
Before going to war. It would save so much time,

So many lives. She knows exactly which references
Know how badly any war will go and how soon
Citizens come to loathe their leaders. She knows
How to find stories about all the libraries
Wiped out by war. She knows patrons who’ve
Been harmed by war. Sometimes they set off alarms.

Someone asks her, “Can you help me find out
If I’m related to Napoleon? ” Yes, ” she answers,
“Come with me, please.”

All libraries may now gather inside invisible
Electrons. After closing time, books in Sweden
Send emails to maps in Chile. A librarian in Topeka

Posts a reply to one in Tokyo, adding to a blue thread
Wrapped around the globe.


As sincerely as librarians worry for books, for shelves,
For catalogues, buildings, and best practices,
So should we worry for librarians, for images and ideas.
At a table in a library, a circle of light
Lies on a book. The hand not writing turns
The page, and something important happens.



Remember to come back Monday for our Marvelous Marketer -
Krista Marino - Editor at Delacorte!

Shel's POV

Point of View by Shel Silverstein

Thanksgiving dinner's sad and thankless

Christmas dinner's dark and blue

when you stop and try to see it

from the turkey's point of view.

Sunday dinner isn't sunny

Easter feasts are just bad luck

when you see it from the viewpoint

of a chicken or a duck.

oh how i once loved tuna salad

pork, lobsters, and lamb chops too.

til I stopped and looked at dinner

from the dinner's point of view

Kidlitosphere Poetry Friday - My Road Less Traveled

I am trying something new!

Kidlitosphere

I just joined the "Kidlitosphere" world where I am hoping to make some new blogging friends and begin building a followship for my blogs and join a community of fellow blogging children's writers.

Can't hurt right? It's like going to school and wanting to make friends. I don't know any published writers and I don't really have any writer friends (except my great critique group) and I love to talk about writing. I have found that now I am blogging, - I want people to visit me. I want them to read my thoughts and love to read theirs.

Anyway, Kidlitosphere has a theme every so often and members blog about it.

At first I thought - Poetry - maybe this one is not for me.

But then I remembered, I started writing poetry when I was about 8. I filled a whole book with my poems and my favorites.

My Favorite Poem

I always loved Robert's Frost's The Road Less Traveled otherwise known as The Road Not Taken http://www.bartleby.com/119/1.html. Somehow it has ended up being a theme of my life. "I took the one less traveled by,And that has made all the difference."

I started out on the "The Road Always Taken" and it was a corporate one. I climbed up the ladders of Accenture and became a VP at Bank of America. I always knew I was not truly happy but I made alot of money so I felt I had nothing to complain about.

Several years ago, I found myself pulled into a political windstorm that eventually led to the death of my corporate career. At first, I was devastated but I soon remembered praying for a way out, a new life, a clean slate. I found myself at a crossroad.

Did I take the one with "grassy and wanted wear" and revive my corporate career of mileage points and buzz words in Ann Taylor suits and great shoes?

OR

Did I investigate the "one bent in the undergrowth" by creating stories and using my imagination all while sitting comfortably in cargo pants and Payless flip-flops?

I chose the "Road Less Traveled".

My Published Poem

And Ironically, the first published piece I have is that one of my poems was chosen by Editor Andrew Karre at Llewellyn for the Deluxe Edition of Laurie Faria Stolartz's Blue is for Nightmares. http://lstolarz.livejournal.com/ (whose boosk are a great read). I thought I would include - my first published work :)

a student in life, a witch at heart, a legacy in magic, spells ala carte.

nightmares so real I can feel a breath, whispering warnings of imminent death.

white lilies line a jagged path, showing the way to evil’s wrath.

cards reveal the ace of spades, dooming a friend to live her last days.

words on notes strewn in red, ghosts from the past fill my head.

following intuition deep in my heart, flames of betrayal flickering in the dark.

finally escaping the pain of one less friend, yet knowing the nightmare may never end.

I guess my new journey along an overgrown path has begun. I know I will find my way and have a great adventure. I know it will an exciting and fullfilling one (I cant even imagine what it will be like when I get published:) ......

And I know it is on "The Road Less Traveled".