I think it was Dr. Phil who introduced me to the term “defining moment.” Sorry, Doc. I’m borrowing your term for my blog. My definition of a defining moment is an occurrence in your life that ultimately changes the course of your personal history. The funny thing is most of the time you don’t recognize those defining moments until years or decades later. I can think of two big ones in my life. The first one was going after a job at Lowry’s Western Shop. At the time, I had been out of high school for a year. I was working as an EMT at the local ambulance service, a job that paid just a little more than nothing. My mom kept hounding me to “get a job.” Lowry’s had recently opened a real store after operating out of the family’s basement for years. I became one of their very first employees who was not a family member. What made this little retail job where I spend most of my earnings right there in the store a defining moment was the guy who came in and picked up the sales girl (me). With...

I confess. I’ve been suffering burnout. Not so much with my writing, although I think it’s probably suffered, but as a yoga teacher, I’ve been burnt out. Life in general has had me burnt out. Spending a couple hours daily sitting with my dad in the nursing facility drains me. Fizzled vacation plans all summer built resentment toward friends and family who did get to escape. Then last weekend I attended that yoga workshop and surrendered my role as teacher, caregiver and fixer-of-all-wrongs and allowed myself to be the student. Just being the nurturee instead of the nurturer helped refill the well of my spirit. I managed to get some one-on-one time with my teacher over Mexican food and she cut right through all the crap. I try to hold up the entire world on my very stiff lower back muscles. I need to learn to say “no” without explanation or apology. I need to…well…get in touch with my needs. And fill them. I came away from the weekend feeling rested. I had new material to share with my ...

I’m still digesting all the wonderful stuff I picked up last weekend at the yoga workshop. One of the assignments Judith Lasater gave us was the practice of Sympathetic Joy. We’ve become all too familiar with the feeling of dread that seems to envelope the world today. Turn on the news and you’ll hear all the horrible things that mankind visits on itself. You walk away feeling tired and sad and doubtful that there’s any good left in the world. You absorb in other’s pain and become depressed as a result. So why not use those empathetic abilities to drink in the joy in the world. It’s there. Oh, probably not on the news. Turn the darned TV off. But if you look, joy is there. Think of the feeling you get when you look at a baby and he smiles at you. THAT is Sympathetic Joy. The party that I attended to celebrate the launch of Rebecca Drake’s new thriller was one example. I called it living vicariously through a friend’s success, but it’s the same thing. She was happy and all of her friend...

I had quite a busy weekend. Judith Lasater, one of my favorite people in the world, came to Pittsburgh to teach a yoga workshop. And Rebecca Drake , a friend and fellow Sister in Crime launched her first published thriller Don’t Be Afraid at a big bash at Mystery Lovers Bookshop. The party was great. Elbow-to-elbow attendance, lots of food and drink and conversation. What could be better? Oh, yeah…and she sold out. Not to worry, more copies are on their way. Here's a shot of me and Rebecca. The rest of my weekend was devoted to yoga. If you are at all interested in yoga and you ever get a chance to study with Judith Lasater , grab it. She is wise and funny and generous. Not to mention a darned good yoga instructor. I admit to having a couple of AH HAH moments, both in my practice and in my ways of thinking. Judith offered us a number of challenges to try in our daily lives, the simplest of which is to simply pay attention to the person you’re talking to at the moment. If your husb...

I hate shopping. Okay, several of my family members, avowed shopaholics, have just fainted dead away. Not to mention my friend, Glamgal , who no doubt thinks I should be committed for making statements like this. So let me explain. I hate shopping for things that you HAVE to have. Groceries. Household supplies. I mean, you spend all that money and next week you have to go out and do it again because the cupboards are bare. But then there’s what I call Sport Shopping. No, I don’t mean going to Dick’s Sporting Goods, although for some, that might qualify. I mean Shopping for Sport. For fun. Alas, I don’t have the funds to do a lot of Sport BUYING, but really the shopping is the fun part. I think we all have our favorite stores for Sport Shopping. Here are a few of mine: Macy’s. Admittedly, I have a love/hate relationship with this store. I love the clothes. LOVE them. Hate the prices. I have Porsche tastes on a Kia budget. There is a Ralph Lauren jacket that I visit every time I go into ...

In my lifetime there have been three major events that I can vividly recall where I was when I heard the news. When I was quite small, my mom and I were sitting in our car waiting for my brother’s bus when a radio across the road blared the report that President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated. Years later, I was wandering through a local shopping mall when I encountered an ashen-faced friend who told me in a trembling voice that the Challenger had exploded. And then there was September 11, 2001. Five years ago, I taught yoga on Tuesday mornings at the Millsop Community Center in Weirton, West Virginia. So while the nation lost its innocence, my students and I were blissfully unaware. When I came out of class, Lucille, who worked the front counter, told me of the planes crashing into the World Trade Towers and the Pentagon. I waited with a stupid smile on my face for a punch line that never came. During the half hour drive home, I listen aghast to the radio. During that half hour...

The Word Watcher Challenge is winding down with this Sunday being the BIG DAY. So far one of our participants has already reached her goal (YAY, Betty!). A couple of us are close. And a few have gotten so overwhelmed by the catastrophes dumped on them by life that they only see the pages not written. Or they see the success that others have experienced—the progress others have made and they feel like failures. There are no failures here ! I think what we need to focus on as we gallop toward the finish line (my novels are set in the world of Thoroughbred racing, you know) is what we have accomplished, not what didn’t get done. Okay, so you pledged 50 words and only wrote 5 because family and health disasters crashed down around your ears two days into the challenge. You know what? You are now five pages further along than you were before this thing started. THAT is the point. Any progress made is just that. Progress. Don’t play it down because others did more. I have a yoga class with a...

The Word Watchers Challenge is entering its final week! So how is everyone doing? We’ve all been busy. We’ve all faced various distractions, some more serious than others. But hopefully, we’ve all put some words on paper (or screen), which puts us further ahead than when we started. So let’s check in, folks. Paula? Betty? How’s it going? Jaye, you wanted to get 40 pages done? Any progress? Darlene, you’ve been swamped, I know. Did you get any writing done in between everything else? And how are you doing, Ruby? I realize you were very hesitant about committing to any kind of numbers, so any added pages will count as progress. Hey, Joyce, are you approaching you 175 page goal? Debby? Kaylee? How about it? Okay, I’ll start. My goal is 150 pages. I am now on page 107. I figure I will need to produce almost eight pages every day until next Sunday to reach my goal. It’s do-able, but I’ll be struggling, like the rest of you, to get those words down in spite of other obligations. The only thi...

Okay, so it wasn’t the vacation of my dreams, but it did involve escaping the daily routine and changing the scenery for a few days. The old truck and camper made the trip to Presque Isle (Erie) and back without incident. Even with me behind the wheel. All in all, it wasn’t bad. As you can see, the sunsets at Presque Isle are gorgeous. Hubby and his broken foot were stuck at camp most of the time. He’d soak his foot, which has developed into quite a work of art…purple and blue and green and yellow…and I’d ride my bike. We went on the pontoon boat tour out into the lagoons of Presque Isle together on Thursday. Here is a shot of some turtles in the lagoon, taking in the sun. Yesterday, we explored downtown Erie courtesy of a new shuttle service. The rides are free and the buses look like old trolleys. The remnants of Hurricane Ernesto caught up to us last night, but we’d planned on coming home this morning anyway, so we weren’t officially “rained out.” I’d love to tell you I got a ton o...

I seem to have fallen victim to Murphy’s Law. I had my entire day scheduled with little in the way of free moments. Tomorrow, we leave for vacation. Four glorious days at Presque Isle on Lake Erie. Camping, biking, reading, eating out and, thanks to my laptop, working on my novel. What I hadn’t counted on in my tight schedule today was my husband taking a bad step while putting the cap on the truck and twisting his ankle. All plans for the morning were cancelled. Instead, I drove hubby to the urgent care center a half hour away. I’ll have to sing the praises of this place in a future post. In and out in an hour sure beats a minimum of five hours in an emergency waiting room. The news was not good. He has a broken bone in his foot and needs to see the orthopedist. He is in a splint and on crutches with orders to NOT bear weight on it. Needless to say, the camping trip is on hold. Indefinitely. If there is any good news here, it’s that we got an appointment with the man I consider to be ...

I hear so many writers complain that they aren’t getting any writing done because their muse isn’t showing up. Contemptuous beasts, these muses. They tease us and flirt with us, whispering beautiful prose in our ears one day and then crawling under a rock and refusing to come out no matter how hard we beckon and plead the next. So how’s a person supposed to get anything longer than flash fiction completed when the fickle muse refuses to play with us? If your muse is present at this moment, stick your fingers in his (her?) ears, because he (she?) won’t want you to know about this. You can train your muse . Yes, it’s true. They may act like feral cats, but with some patience on your part, it is possible to have them behave and come when called. Okay, so maybe I’m a little tongue-in-cheek today, but only a little. Years ago I learned to meditate as part of my yoga practice. Meditation is hard! You sit and tell your brain to shut up so you can listen to the quiet. But spinning out thoughts...

I’m never going to meet my goal in this Word Watchers Challenge. Have any of the rest of you been singing this lament? Every day I look at my calendar, searching for an hour I could steal to work on my manuscript. Unfortunately, this week, it seems to be going the other way. Stuff comes up and I’m “borrowing” time designated for writing to tidy up the house because I have a friend coming for a visit on Wednesday for lunch. Tomorrow, I have to spend the morning taking my mom to a doctor’s appointment. Maybe I can take my laptop and get some work done in the waiting room. In the midst of preparing for company and going to doctor’s offices, I need to get the camper cleaned up and stocked for our upcoming vacation. So, yes, I’m whining about too much to do and no time to write. Okay, everyone who is taking part in this Word Watcher Challenge, time to leave a comment and let us know about your progress or lack of it. Feel free to whine. Or gloat. As for me, I’m on page 82 (Goal: 150). Not b...

How is it that now that we’ve set these goals and given ourselves a deadline, that life starts exploding around us? Happens every time. Doctors appointments crop up, major appliances go on the fritz, a new assignment comes up in our day job that requires hours of our precious writing time. Or it could be that old friend calls and invites us to lunch. How in the world are we supposed to meet our writing goals when life throws all these obstacles in our path? I figure there are a number of ways to deal with this. If you’re already stressed to the max and ONE MORE THING is going to send you into a tailspin of depression, then by all means, blow off the deadline! That is, of course, assuming that you don’t currently have a contract for this novel and the deadline is self-imposed rather than editor imposed. I’m big on forgiving yourself. We tend to be very nice people who can forgive others in our lives, but turn around and beat the crap out of ourselves over some little thing. Let it go. M...

Back on August 1, I posted about my personal goal of reaching 150 pages by September tenth. Several of my writing friends latched onto the idea and “pledged” goals of their own. Before I quite knew what was happening, the Word Watchers Challenge was born. Here’s how it goes: Leave a comment stating your writing goal to be reached by September tenth. It can be anything writing related from pages in a first draft, to revised or rewritten pages, to finishing a smaller writing project you’ve been putting off. One gal wants to get her character charts completed. That’s fine. As long as it’s something writing related. No, you don’t have to post your writing efforts. You can, however, comment on your progress. Or lack thereof. I’m keeping this as simple as possible. You don’t even have to come forward and post your goal. But it’s a lot easier to fudge on a promise that no one knows about. That’s why I put my intension in print two weeks ago. We’ll all hold each other’s feet to the proverbial...

I’ve put off writing this post. Almost decided to write something different instead. Then decided I needed to write it. Consider this post as my therapy. Please bear with me. I had planned on this post being about my weekend at the horse races. My friend had two horses from her barn running…DC on Saturday and Rocky on Sunday. I expected to able to write about an enjoyable couple of days trying to pick a few winners and cheering on the horses I know. As a mystery writer, when I create a twist in my story that throws the reader for a loop, I feel quite smug and pleased with myself. I love it when a reader tells me, “I never saw that coming!” But sometimes life throws a twist at us that leaves us stunned and drained. Saturday went pretty much as I’d hoped. My husband and I met up with our friends and tried unsuccessfully to pick some winners. I had my favorite snack (nachos). DC was in the last race and the nerves built to a fever pitch by post time. DC broke slow as is her habit and trai...

I would say that I recently celebrated my forty-seventh birthday, but “celebrating” isn’t really the right word. It came, it went. I received a few funny cards. My husband took me out to dinner. That about covers it. I don’t feel like I’m getting older. Thanks largely, I suppose, to yoga, I don’t have any more aches or pains than I did ten years ago. If anything, I’m more flexible than I’ve ever been. Okay, I really don’t like the fact that my metabolism has slowed to a crawl and I have to work twice as hard and eat half as much and the numbers on the scales continue to creep upward. But what is beginning to bug me more than any of that is the conflict between my vision and modern technology. Last week, my old handheld tape recorder died. Too much time left in the console of my sun-baked car, I suppose. So I splurged and bought a tiny digital recorder. I like gadgets. At least, those that are useful to me. I haven’t ventured into the realm of I-Pods yet. I don’t even know what one is. ...

I have made a goal for myself in regards to my newest work in progress. I intend to have 150 pages completed by September tenth. There. It’s in print for everyone to see. The problem is, 150 pages by September tenth is totally unrealistic with everything that’s going on in my life. I spend four afternoons a week visiting my dad at the nursing home. I have to run my mom to her appointments and to shop. I have a program to prepare for one of my writers’ groups. I have a vacation trip to plan. Not to mention actually going on vacation. The reason I picked September tenth is because that is the end of all my vacation time. Not that teaching yoga a couple nights a week takes much time away from writing, but it seems like, since I’m cutting back to one night a week during August, that I should have more time to write. Illusion. The three hours that I would be in class will not (most likely) be used instead to write. Read, yes. Write, no. The reason I picked 150 pages is because I knew how un...

Last night I had the pleasure of attending a book signing at Mystery Lovers Bookshop for Laura Lippman’s newest Tess Monaghan novel, No Good Deeds . Laura is one of my top five favorite mystery authors and closer to number one than number five. She is also a wonderful speaker…entertaining and informative. I love these author events. If you have never been to one, I have two words for you: WHY NOT? If you are a reader, meeting the people behind the words and characters is fascinating. You get to learn about the birth of a story and why a character behaves the way he does. And most (99.9%) authors love to meet the folks who read their books, so they are very giving. If you are a writer and don’t attend author events…well, I just don’t know what to say to you. Except SHAME ON YOU and GO! Why should you spend your precious time going to a book signing, you ask? Let me count the reasons. 1.) Networking Part 1: Have you not heard about the time I mentioned that I was a mystery writer to a bi...

One of the lessons I’ve learned from my yoga practice is the power of silence. And the rarity of it. Think about it. How much time do you spend in silence each day? Most of us are constantly bombarded by noise of some sort. Maybe it’s the kids yammering. Maybe it’s the background sounds of life in the office or the city. Often, even if we have a chance to experience silence, we turn on the radio in the car or the TV at home. Years ago, encouraged by my yoga teacher, I experimented with driving with the radio OFF. At first it was a shock to my system. Then I started enjoying this quiet time. The practice continued at home. Was the TV on because there was a show on that I wanted to see? Or was it simply for some sound to block out the stillness. So I did my housework without the TV, radio or CD player blaring. And you know what happens? My characters speak to me. And I can hear them. I remember my mom saying, “I can’t hear myself think,” when the world was exploding around her. In the si...

The biggest news at the moment is my website . It’s up and running and I love the look of it. I’ve appreciated the comments of those who have visited and since two issues keep coming up, I thought I’d address those here. First…there are no pictures of my book cover because it isn’t published yet. No links to let you buy it for the same reason. I do hope that when it does find a publisher and is out in print, everyone who’s asked about it will come back and buy it. Believe me, I will make it accessible for purchase when the time comes. Second…there are no large, current pictures of me because I don’t like any of the ones my hubby has taken lately. I have lots of excuses here. He’s been working a lot of overtime, so by the time he gets home, he’s tired and I’m tired and neither of us feels like taking pictures or having pictures taken. Then there’s the heat. Don’t know where you are, but here in southwestern Pennsylvania, it has been miserable. Hot and humid. I want my picture for the we...