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I live in the city of Colorado Springs. But, I like to think that I am a bit of a country boy. My first memories were of living in the country outside of town. The place we lived in was near an apple orchard and had an irrigation ditch running along the front. Located North of Colorado Springs and South of Monument, the place provided plenty of room for very young kids to play. (Though, since we were preschool age, it probably wasn’t as roomy as I remember.)

When they began construction on the U.S. Air Force Academy, we had an increase in the number of rattlesnakes on the grounds. I remember my mom killing one, maybe two, near the area we regularly played. Our dog, Princess, was bitten by one once and would bark and raise a ruckus when she saw one. Not long after that, we moved into town so I and my brother could start school.

The next year we moved to the Westside of town. Behind where we lived was a big open field, where one of my brother’s friends kept horses and a donkey. They allowed us to ride them, and we spent some fun days riding the horses and trying to ride the donkey. My best friend at the time lived across the street. His family had chickens and rabbits, with the occasional goat. They taught us to milk the goat, and we drank the raw milk.

Those things and many others made it feel like we lived in the country until we moved again when I started Junior High. From that time on, we lived in town. So, I might think I am a country boy. I am a city slicker. But I still enjoy the outdoors, animals, and seeing nature. This year has brought many of these opportunities. Nancy Lewis Park,Nancy Lewis Park | Colorado Springs, near our house has a pond. Yearly ducks and Canadian Geese spend the late spring and summer there.

This year, two sets of geese raised goslings. The geese are excellent parents, keeping the goslings near them until they mature. You can often see the gosling walking, or swimming, single file between the parents. This year, one set of goslings comprised just two. One hurt its leg somehow and could hardly walk, but it seemed to grow and develop, just at a slightly slower pace. My wife was anxious about the ‘poor thing’. We don’t go over there every day; one day we went there, and the geese were all gone. I assume they flew away, but I don’t know.

Ducks parent differently. The drake has little to do with raising the ducklings. The hen watches them closely when they are young, but the ducklings get more and more adventurous as they get older. Swimming all over the surface of the pond. They are fun to watch swimming, walking across the lily pads, or walking in the grass. It is always pleasant to hear the peep-peep sound they make while they swim. This year three sets or ducklings grew up on the pond.

In town, there are a lot of fox squirrels that were imported to the area and have replaced the native gray and Ebert squirrels. Though they are an invasive species, they are fun to watch. Until we had to remove one, we had two mature trees in our front yard. I like to watch the squirrels run around and play when I sit and drink my coffee in the mornings through our front window. Bailey likes to watch them too, and they sometimes tease her by running along the fence in the backyard.

This year, though, I saw something different. Sitting on the sofa, I saw a hummingbird near the trunk of the Sycamore tree. It was dive bombing a squirrel on the tree trunk. It chased the squirrel off the tree, then flew up into the leaves. I thought it was odd and couldn’t figure it out. A couple of days later, I saw the incident repeated. Over the next few weeks, the hummingbird chased a squirrel, and on one occasion, two squirrels off the tree. One morning, it was dive bombing a squirrel in the middle of the yard. I still don’t know why it did this, but my thoughts are the hummingbird had a nest in the tree and chased the squirrels whenever they got too close to it.

If you know why the hummingbird would chase the squirrels, leave a message, and let me know. If you enjoy the blog, sign up using the pop-up box and receive notifications when I post new content. Thank you for your time.

I have had difficulty determining a topic, so this blog is later than usual. I had hoped to ask for beta readers by this time. But editing and rewriting take longer than I expected. However, if you read this and would like to be a beta reader for my novel, please leave a comment, making sure I have your email address so I can contact you when it is time.

I am returning to one of my favorite topics, out dog, Bailey. I have written several blogs about our dog. She is the most affectionate dog we have owned.

When I let her out of her kennel in the mornings, she insists on several minutes of petting and close contact before she leaves the room. She enjoys physical contact and reassurance. She often comes and leans on me while I am sitting at the table or on the sofa. In the evening she wants me to get down on the floor with her so I can pet her, particularly her belly. After a few minutes, she moves away to lie down, content.

She has gotten much better with other dogs once she gets to know them. If they approach her too quickly, she may snarl to set boundaries. But after a few minutes and time to get to know the other dog, she is friendly and wants to see them again whenever we meet.

This happens regularly at the local park where we walk, and we have a regular group of dogs that get together on Saturday mornings. When we get to the parking lot, she whines, knowing her friends are probably there. Though at five years old, she is not as energetic as some of the younger dogs; she is still the fastest dog in the group. Upon meeting, they will run and chase for a few minutes, then Bailey will calm down and stay close to me or beg for treats from the other owners. Several of the other owners have known her since she was a puppy and understand how she has changed from a very fearful pup to a confident, mature dog.

She does not wrestle much with the other dogs, making her feelings known if they get too rough. This was a real benefit when she met one of her newest friends, Sage, a toy Australian Shepherd. Sage is tiny and looks like a puppy, though she is nearly fully grown and likes to play but cannot take the physical play of some of the other dogs.

Unfortunately, the same does not hold for me. If I get down on the floor to exercise or relax my back, Bailey thinks it’s playtime. She wants to wrestle with me. She takes my hand in her mouth or puts her paws on me to hold me. If I react, she gets the zoomies and runs around and toward me, barking and growling. She has excellent bite control, so she never hurts me unless I hit her teeth or move wrong with my hand in her mouth.

If you enjoy reading about Bailey, let me know by leaving a comment. Please sign up to receive notifications of new postings using the pop-up box. I hope to delve more into my book soon, so sign up. Please use the contact tab to leave messages or feedback. Thank you for spending a few minutes with me.

Writing Up-date

April is a month of milestones for me. As I have mentioned before, one year ago on April 2^nd, 2021, I retired from working full time. I am enjoying retirement and have settled into a routine that helps keep me out of my wife’s hair. She has said she thought it might be difficult having me around all the time. But the decision to treat my writing as a job and devote my mornings to writing keeps me from interfering with her daily routine.

Writing is more work than I anticipated. When I retired, I had written approximately half of my first novel, and thought I would have it ready for publication by the end of the year. Little did I understand the amount of work required to edit and rewrite the book once I got to The End.  Now it seems it will be at least another year before the novel is ready to publish.

Rewriting the book based on the input provided by my local critique group is in process. Once I am happy with the manuscript, I need to send it to a developmental editor for a high-level review by someone who understands manuscript construction. Someone who can point out things I miss in the normal editing process. Then I will rewrite it again before it can be formatted for publication.

Based on the information I’ve garnered from various sources. It looks like I will try to self-publish the book. Though I may incur higher initial costs, the reduction in lead time to publish is significant, particularly at my age. Some estimates show it could take four years before a manuscript is published even after it is accepted by a publishing house. By self-publishing, I might be able to have three, four, or more books published in that time frame. I am learning many things about the business side of writing through the writing group I joined and various web-based seminars I have attended.

Please pray for me to be able to navigate and afford the process.

Dad’s Fish

Fifty-five years ago, on April 1^st, 1967, my dad caught an 11-pound-five-ounce German brown trout out of Eleven Mile Canyon. I remember the day vividly; it was warmer than normal for April and there was no snow even in the canyon. Like so many days on the river, we separated. He dropped me off upstream and I fished down. He would drive down and fish up until we met. That day I was fishing down the river and when I needed to climb to the road to get around a rock, I saw several cars parked along the road downstream. As I walked down the road to get to where I would go back to the stream, I saw people standing along the side of the road outside their cars. I walked down to see what they were watching, and when I came close, my dad let out a long yell. He was standing across the river holding the fish. The people along the road cheered as dad sat down on the rock holding the fish.

 The river that day was flowing lower than normal and allowed him to cross above the hole where he caught the trout. We took it to the general store in Lake George and weighed it on their scale. The store owner took a picture to put on the store’s wall and we went home. We didn’t fish any longer that day. When we got home, since it was April Fools Day, we told my mom that I caught it. I still haven’t caught anything that big, and today with the increased fishing along the river, there are fewer fish that size.

Birthday

Finally, this year is one of the occasional years when Easter Sunday falls on my birthday. I think I am happy to be a year older, but I am extremely thankful for the event the holiday represents. It signifies the crucifixion, death, and resurrection of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. My relationship with Him adds so much to my life and I pray you may have that same kind of relationship with the one who died to pay the price for your sins. God Bless You.

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ProWritingAid

On a couple of occasions, I have talked about the tools I use as a beginning writer. These include various books, web articles, software, and writer’s groups. Perhaps the best tool I use is the local critique group. This group helped me understand how difficult it is to write well. Approximately once each week, I send off a section of my manuscript (2500 words maximum) to the critique group. The group distributes the section to the other writers who have also submitted that week. They read through my section and provide feedback to me. In return, I read their submissions and provide feedback to them.

When I first started using the group, I received a lot of feedback on very basic grammatical errors. Unfortunately, there were so many errors, I don’t think they could concentrate on the content. One critiquer suggested I try some editing software. Honestly, I did not know they were available or how they worked. But I researched them and tried some. All of them reduced the number of grammar errors in my submissions. Free versions of the software are available online, but I eventually purchased a license for ProWritingAid. (ProWritingAid: The AI-Powered Writing Assistant)

This enabled those critiquing my submissions to concentrate on the content, characters, pacing, etc. in my writing. Now I need to learn how to insert emotion into my writing by showing, not telling. I need to learn how to provide enough descriptive information without providing too much. Also, I need to create tension in every scene. There is still a lot for me to learn, though my grammar is better.

Fantasy Writer’s Week

The ProWritingAid software provides more than just grammar editing and suggestions with various tools and reports, which I won’t cover here. However, one benefit of the software that I didn’t expect came last week. The company sponsored a four-day webinar, Fantasy Writers Week, (ProWritingAid Presents: Fantasy Writers’ Week) with presentations from successful writers, editors, marketing experts, and complimentary software providers. Topics included, Story Types, World Building, Author Platforms, Magic/Science, Writing Scenes Not Chapters, Finding Fantasy in the Real World, Marketing, Writing Romance into Fantasy, and others.

Participants could also join the ProWritingAid Fantasy Writers Facebook Group which provides opportunities to expand their connections and opportunities. The free webinar was as professional as any I have ever attended. It provided a lot of good information I will use as I continue to write my second manuscript and edit my first.

The one downside to the week was that most of the successful authors doing presentations appeared to be in their mid-twenties to mid-thirties. At seventy, soon to be seventy-one, they made me feel old, but not too old to continue with my stories.

R.I.P. Dad

I’m going to change topics now since this blog is read mostly by friends and family. Thirty years ago on March 13, 1992, my dad passed away after a battle with cancer. He was my hero and I have so many fond memories of the time I spent with him. I was reminded of times spent on the river in Missouri during our family vacations with my uncle Bill Anderson who turned 93 this month. We got up early and seined for crawdads to use as bait, then went to one of the many rivers around Springfield. We waded in old clothes and tennis shoes because of the warm water. We caught smallmouth bass, largemouth bass, and goggle-eye.

My aunt Betty made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. The sandwiches were made on buttered bread. The butter melted while the sandwiches sat in the hot vehicle as we were fishing. I can still remember how good those soggy sandwiches tasted. I miss those days, and I miss my Dad.

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I love science fiction. Most of what I read is science fiction or fantasy. I enjoy being transported to another time or place and taking part with the characters in overcoming their imperfections. Whether it is long, long ago, or in a galaxy far, far away, or in an alternative universe, I become a part of the story because I identify with one or more characters. I am Captain Kirk, saving the universe from destruction and overcoming the no-win situation; or I am Luke Skywalker or Obi-Wan Kenobi using the force to defeat the dark side; or I am John Carter, saving the beautiful Martian princess from a fate worse than death with my unbeatable swordsmanship.

One problem I run into is that a lot of the available science fiction has inappropriate sexual content for Christian readers. This can turn an otherwise intriguing story into something I need to put down and not read or slog through. It would be nice to find more science fiction and fantasy novels written without this type of content. Fortunately, much of the classic science fiction was written before the sexual revolution and is, therefore, free from sexually explicit content. Finding Christian sci-fi and Fantasy novels is difficult, but there are some out there.

This difficulty may be because some Christians find it difficult to accept the idea of alien life-forms or other worlds or realities. Even if that is the case, fiction is something that is imaginary, invented, or untrue. Fiction is a device for putting characters into situations where they must overcome difficulties, even catastrophes, to reach their goal. Whether it is a story of romance, mystery, or fantasy, fiction uses imaginary circumstances to draw us into the story.

The great thing about fiction is the idea of it being imaginary, invented, or untrue. For the science fiction writer, this allows for alien races, travel to distant planets or galaxies, and ships capable of faster than light speed, FTL. And to achieve travel over immense distances. (In fact, the distances require travel speeds many times greater than the speed of light.) This is accomplished through ‘warp drives’, singularities, stargates, or other methods with varying degrees of scientific probability. But it is fiction, so it doesn’t matter. One of my favorite Christian sci-fi series is The Lamb Among the Stars series by Chris Walley, (Chris Walley’s site » Lamb Among the Stars) which uses a type of stargate.

Science fiction allows the writer to create new worlds or times. Time travel can be forward or backward using machines like H. G. Wells used in The Time Machine, or through other supernatural methods. One method I like that the Christian author Stephen R. Lawhead used in the Bright Empires series is Ley Lines. (BRIGHT EMPIRES | Stephen R Lawhead (stephenlawhead.com)) These are areas of supernatural energy that provide a means for certain individuals to travel through time or to alternate realities.

I have two novels in progress. One is a space travel novel that uses a gravity drive to create the singularity that allows almost instantaneous travel between points in space, and the other is an alternate reality novel that uses ley lines to transport the hero to a different time and place. I hope you will enjoy reading them when I complete them.

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Those of you who follow my blog, know it has been over a month since I last posted. I feel like I am in a creative bog. Ideas for new posts are not coming to my mind. This time of year, the cold and snowy days limit the outdoor activities I can do. The lakes are iced over, and I am too old to climb around on the rocks along the river. All I need to do is fall and break my hip. I don’t even walk the dog as often or as far as when it is warmer.

When I was working, I never seemed to be bothered by Seasonal Affective Disorder. (NIMH » Seasonal Affective Disorder (nih.gov)) But now I am home most of the time, and it is affecting me. My wife has been struggling physically for some months with various issues which puts a little more stress on me. Enough so, that she told me I need to take a couple days and go fishing, even if I have to go South where it is warmer. I really appreciated the thought, and though I can’t go right now, it did help my mood.

Until this week, my writing had slowed as well. As Ernest Hemmingway said, “the only kind of writing is rewriting.” (Quote by Ernest Hemingway: “The only kind of writing is rewriting.” (goodreads.com)) Currently I am in the middle of rewriting my first novel. Half of it has been submitted to my critique group and it looks like it will be several months before all of it is critiqued. Each week I edit and rewrite a section for submission to the group. This usually takes a day or two. I try to rewrite one of the critiqued chapters each week as well. That leaves about one day to work on something else.

In November when I posted my last update, I mentioned starting on a new novel using the Snowflake Method. (How To Write A Novel Using The Snowflake Method (advancedfictionwriting.com)) This is progressing. I have my character definitions and an outline with scene summaries. This week I also wrote the first draft of the opening two chapters. Though I did have to rewrite the first chapter when I decided to change to a first-person point of view instead of the original third-person point of view. The first-person seems to fit the story better, though I will have to modify my outline and change some scenes.

I found the Plottr outlining software, (Plottr – Plan Your Books Like a Pro), to be very helpful and am happy with the progress. My writing seems to be improving with fewer grammatical and style errors. Though I still struggle with punctuating dialog tags.

With the continuing critiques and rewriting, it looks like I might have a second draft of the first novel ready this summer. Once it is ready, I still need to format it and get it ready for beta readers. I will be looking for individuals to be beta readers. People who can read the completed manuscript in a short period of time and provide feedback. If any of you would be willing to participate as beta readers, use the comment form to let me know.

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So, this is my third attempt at writing the latest blog post. I keep changing my mind on what topic to cover. Initially, the topic was that this is the first time I can remember when my wife and I have been alone on both Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day.

All three of our kids are grown with kids of their own and some of those kids are grown as well. For Thanksgiving, our two daughters and their families went to Kansas to be with one of our granddaughters. My son and his family planned to go to Nevada to be with another granddaughter, but one of them got the covid virus and they stayed home. Then for Christmas, there were other plans to travel with one daughter spending Christmas in Durango, so we could not all get together again. We held the family Christmas on the Sunday before Christmas Day.

The next topic concerned the week before the family gathering. There was a severe windstorm on Wednesday of that week. It blew a large tree limb onto the roof of our house. With wind gusts of more than 90 mph, it also downed trees and powerlines around the city. Just after the branch fell on our roof, we lost power which meant we were without heat. We managed to spend the first cold night at home but went to a hotel for the next night. Fortunately the power was restored Friday morning.

However, my daughter who lives two blocks away still didn’t have power on Friday. She was scheduled to host the family gathering but could not. My other daughter graciously agreed to host, and we had a great time. Though I think my son was still without power. I wrote two blog posts based on the events of that week but scrapped them.

Today’s post is about Christmas. I love Christmas. I do enjoy Christmas music just not nonstop for weeks on the radio. Fortunately, one of the Christian radio stations in the area interspersed Christmas songs with their regular contemporary Christian music. This year the Christmas song that stuck in my head is “This Baby” (“This Baby”: Steven Curtis Chapman Christmas Video – YouTube) by Stephen Curtis Chapman.

Though it is not a new song and I have listened to it many times before, this year it stayed with me throughout the Advent season. The chorus says, “This baby had come to change the world.” This baby was the fulfillment of the promise given to Abraham thousands of years before this baby’s birth. God told Abram, (Abraham), “and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” (Gen. 12:3 NIV)

CHORUS
But this baby made the angels sing,
And this baby made a new star shine in the sky.
This baby had come to change the world.
This baby was God’s own son, this baby was like no other one.
This baby was God with us, this baby was Jesus.

Later during Jesus’ adult ministry, he told Nicodemus,” For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3:16-17 NIV) This baby came to give us hope. The hope of a restored relationship with our loving heavenly father.

After the death and resurrection of Jesus, Paul wrote to the Philippian church, “Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross!” (Phil. 2:6-8 NIV).

I am grateful for all the blessings God has provided me this Christmas season. I am grateful for homeowner’s insurance to cover the damage caused by the tree falling; I am grateful for the financial provision that we might be warm in a hotel when the power is out; I am grateful for my family and that they have grown and matured, and that they are still fun to be around. But most of all I am grateful for “This Baby”, Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior. May you be blessed the remainder of the holiday season and have a happy and prosperous New Year.

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Today, it is exactly eight months since I retired. During that time, I settled into the routine I established. Most days I spend my mornings writing or editing my first novel. The current word count is roughly 77,000 for the first draft, which is basically complete. Now I spend most of my time editing and rewriting. Approximately one-third of the first draft has gone through the local critique group, ACFW Colorado Springs (acfwcosprings.com).

Once the editing of the first draft is complete, the second rewrite will start using the suggestions from the group. My original hope of completing the book this year is no longer realistic and next year may be difficult, but I plan to persist until it is complete. When I complete the second rewrite, I will need to decide how to proceed. Do I submit the manuscript for additional critiques? Do I use beta readers, or do I pay for a developmental/substantive editor? Perhaps the local writer’s group can help with that decision.

In the interim, I started outlining a second novel. When I started the first novel, I wrote strictly by the “seat of the pants” method. But about halfway into it, I got stuck. I needed help and purchased Writing Fiction for Dummies,Amazon.com: Writing Fiction For Dummies eBook : Economy, Peter, Ingermanson, Randy: Kindle Store, by Randy Ingermanson and Peter Economy. This helped get me unstuck, and some tools helped to keep me on track. Randy Ingermanson’s Snowflake, Advanced Fiction Writing, By Randy Ingermanson, The “Snowflake Guy”, method intrigued me, and I used some of his techniques to organize my thinking. But, since I was so far into it, I didn’t fully use the method.

So, when I started outlining the second book, I decided to try the Snowflake method from the beginning. To do this, I purchased Plottr, Plottr – Plan Your Books Like a Pro, software which has outlining and other developmental templates for the Snowflake method. When I have downtime from editing or rewriting the first novel, I work through the Snowflake method on the second. This has provided me with the start of a good roadmap with the characters and plot.

Some of you may ask, why would I dilute my time by working on another book when the first is incomplete? One of the tips, I picked up from the writer’s group I joined, is if people like your first book, the first thing they will do on finishing it, they look for another one of your books. If you don’t have another, they will move on to someone else. Every writer’s dream is to be a best-selling author, even if he is an old dog learning new tricks.

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