Creativity in the Kitchen

     

Welcome to the first Wednesday of the month. You know what that means! It's time to let our insecurities hang out. Yep, it's the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog hop. If you're a writer at any stage of career, I highly recommend this blog hop as a way to connect with other writers for support, sympathy, ideas, and networking. If you're a reader, it's a great way to peek behind the curtain of a writing life.

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG. The awesome co-hosts for the November 6 posting of the IWSG are Diedre Knight, Lisa Buie Collard , Kim Lajevardi, and JQ Rose!

November 6 question - What creative activity do you engage in when you're not writing?

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Most of my creative energy goes into my writing. It's where my imagination plays best--making up stories and romping about with imaginary friends in the wordscape. 

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I've been told often enough that I'm a creative person--usually by someone who is trying to find a nicer way to say that I'm weird or strange. Even I can tell that my brain doesn't work like other people's brains. 

But it's really only stories, poems, novels, etc. that I create. 

I don't paint or dance or write music, for example. I don't make fiber art, origami, or jewelry. I don't do woodwork, pottery, or collages. I might show a little creativity in my house design choices, and DIY projects, but those don't feel original to me in the same way. 

I have acted and sung in the past, and played a couple of musical instruments, but I don't pursue any of those activities with regularity right now. I'd like to get back into the playing the piano though. It's challenging with my arthritis, but it brings me joy. 

So I guess the closest I come to having another creative outlet in my life is in the kitchen. Sure, I'm following recipes in there (at least the first time I make something), but I'm definitely also creating something--something yummy!

I'm especially fond of baking, though I also take pleasure in making new dishes for dinner. I'm happiest if a new recipe requires me to try something I've never done before--a new technique, ingredient, or kitchen gadget! 

Treats from my kitchen in the past few months. 

How about you? What are your creative outlets? Are there any you wish you made more time for? I'd love to hear about it in the comments!

Can I quote you on that? An open book blog hop post

  

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

Do you have any favorite quotes about writing? 
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I love reading about writing. It's always interesting to me to learn about what processes other writers follow, especially if I admire their work. So, there are a BUNCH of great quotes about writing rattling around in my brain, but I'll stick to just two of them for this post: 

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Toni Morrison wrote some of my favorite books. Beloved broke my heart and scared me at the same time. I also loved The Bluest Eye and Sula. But you know what? She never wrote about Menopausal Superheroes and I wanted to read that, so I took her advice and I wrote it. At the most basic level, this is why I write what I write: I am my own intended audience. I'm writing what I want to read. 

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EM Forster might be best known for the opulent Merchant Ivory films made of his books: Howard's End, A Room With a View, A Passage to India and the like. They are fascinating for the way they capture a moment in time, and encapsulate class issues and explore humanistic themes. 

I don't remember where I first ran across this quote from him, but when I read it, it was like lightning in my brain. "Yes! Just like that!" I thought. Story is my major coping and processing mechanism in life. Whatever I'm going through or thinking about, writing is going to be part of how I pull myself through and get to the other side of it. This quote captures that feeling for me of needing that step back, that opportunity to listen to the still, small voice within, and dialogue with my own subconscious on the page in order to clarify my thinking and understand my heart's desires. 

So there are two of my favorites. What quotes have you run across that speak to your ideas about creativity? I'd love to hear about them in the comments! 

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What do ghosts read? An Open Book blog hop post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

Stolen from an X (Twitter) post: Which genre do you think ghosts prefer: mystery, thriller, horror, fairytale, or magical realism? 
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What a fun question! 

The answer might depend on your beliefs/philosophy about ghosts themselves and what exactly they are. After all, fiction gives us quite a range of ghosts. 

• Some of them are basically the same person they were they were alive, just transparent and unchanging now. In some stories, they don't even know they are dead. 
• Some of them are more like an echo of who they once were, trapped in a small moment, reliving it over and over. I'm not sure they can even interact with the world. 
• Some of them are malevolent--poltergeists, vengeful spirits, and the like. 

I'm thinking that the only types of ghosts who read are that first type: the ones that are still who they always were, just dead now. And for those guys, I bet they read whatever they liked when they were alive. Though it is fun to imagine that, once freed from the limits of the mortal coil, like a need for sleep or to earn money, a ghost could just wander the library reading anything and everything. 

Heck! Maybe this is my chance to actually read everything in my TBR!

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Ghost Story Time! An IWSG bloghop post

    

Welcome to the first Wednesday of the month. You know what that means! It's time to let our insecurities hang out. Yep, it's the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog hop. If you're a writer at any stage of career, I highly recommend this blog hop as a way to connect with other writers for support, sympathy, ideas, and networking. If you're a reader, it's a great way to peek behind the curtain of a writing life.

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG. The awesome co-hosts for the October 2 posting of the IWSG are Nancy Gideon, Jennifer Lane, Jacqui Murray, and Natalie Aguirre!

October 2 question - Ghost stories fit right in during this month. What's your favorite classic ghostly tale? Tell us about it and why it sends chills up your spine.

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I adore ghost stories. I could probably list a top 10 and still have dozens of favorites left to list. But the one that lives in my heart is Jane-Emily by Patricia Clapp. 

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I first read this one when I was pretty young, an older child or younger teenager, so that's part of it--books that you read at that age imprint on your soul differently because you don't have wider experience and so many things get to the first one of their kind in your life. 

I've read it many times since, and it still delights me every time. 

It's got everything: an atmospheric old house, mysterious family history, an evil child, and even romance. Honestly, this book explains a lot about me. To this day, I am suspicious of gazing balls in gardens. This is probably why one of my upcoming projects is a Gothic romance, too. 

How about you? Do you love to read spooky stories? Tell me about them and add to my spooky season TBR! 

Seeing my Stories Through, an Open Book blog hop post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

How did you decide that you finally wanted to write your stories?
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I've always written--poetry and journals as a child; poetry, journals, essays, and stories as a young woman. But I was really haphazard about finishing things and seeking publication. I always let something else take precedence. I poured my creative energy into teaching, raising my kids, and building a life. And I wondered why I was feeling burnt out. 

For me, the moment of decision came when I was 42. Anyone who has read Douglas Adams's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy knows that 42 is the meaning of life, the universe, and everything, so I took that as my cue from the universe to get off my duff and take my writing life seriously. Stop playing at writing and do it for real. 

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"Doing it for real" for me meant committing to a daily writing habit and forcing myself to stay focused on a single project and bring to completion before allowing myself to chase the shiny new idea that flitted across my brain when the going got tough. It takes discipline to move from playing at writing to bringing your vision into a form where it can be shared with others. Discipline and bravery. 

I say it takes bravery because sharing your creative endeavors with the world is a highly vulnerable act. You'll meet with a mixture of responses. You may find love and support, you may find vitriol, or you may find indifference. Most of us find a little of all three.

So, that was what did it for me: I turned 42 and decided it was now or never. I chose now. 

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Words I Love, an Open Book blog hop post

  

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

What's your favorite word in the English language? Any other language?
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I love words. 

That's probably no surprise given that I'm a writer, but I'm a real word nerd who loves collecting unusual words and am thrilled when I run across a word "in the wild" that I've never seen before. I was that kid who actually liked the etymology assignments. I did a series of blog posts about evocative words back in 2014 for the A to Z Blogging Challenge. 

My first writerly love was poetry, in part because of the words. 

I am, however, bad at choosing favorites. You'll get a different answer from me every time you ask me that question, I'm sure. 

I love collective nouns for animals. There's so much whimsy in them: 

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But here lately, I've been intrigued by old vocabulary. Phrases that have fallen by the wayside over the centuries. I follow several different word-nerd social media accounts just for the delight of exposure to these words.  Things like: 

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And: 

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I also used to teach Spanish, and I learned to love place names like Tegucigalpa and Guadalajara for the way they feel when you speak them aloud. My favorite Spanish word is my favorite because of mouth feel. The meaning is rather mundane: We were speaking. 

Trabajábamos

(click here to hear it pronounced)

So, there are today's answers. Ask again another day and I'll have a new favorite. I'm fickle that way :-)

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The good bits of publicity, an Open Book blog hop post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

Many of us are frustrated by publicity. It's our least favorite part of writing. But what's your favorite part of publicity?
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Talking about my imaginary friends can be a delight, so I enjoy in-person events more than any other kind of publicity-seeking. Over the years, I have gained a lot of comfort with vending at a table and having one on one conversations with readers, and I really enjoy it when the pace is good (neither overwhelming nor lonely). 

I've got two of these events upcoming: 

Bookmarks Festival and Splatterflix Movie Festival, my next two vending venue

I also enjoy being on panels with other writers at conventions, bookstores, library events, or the like. That's half networking/socializing with other writers and half engaging with readers. It's a great opportunity to get to know other writers and build community AND, especially when the other panelists are generous with their support, a way for us to help one another reach new audiences. Someone might attend because they know one of the other writers, but stick around to hear about my work, too, just because we were paired on the panel. 

I'll be a part of one of these through Horror Writers Associations in November: 

Here lately, I've been enjoying doing panels and interview for channels on YouTube or podcasts, too. It's nice that geography doesn't have to be a limiter for a taste of some of that camaraderie. 

So far as online publicity, I enjoy blogging or writing articles about some aspect of my writing life (like this blog hop, for example!). I get a kick out of choosing pull quotes and making little images to highlight them. 

The Menopausal Superheroes, as drawn by Charles C. Dowd

For me, this doesn't feel as yucky as "buy my book" types of online marketing. It's more about trying to be clever or cute and highlighting what's cool about my story and the people in it. 

I have the best time, when I look at publicity opportunities as time to engage with other artists and the public and let go the pressure to sell a lot of books. When I feel too much pressure to sell well, the interactions get tense and weird and I don't enjoy myself (and probably neither do my potential buyers). 

What about y'all? When you have to promote something, how do you like to go about it? Or when you're receiving the promotion, what's the least annoying/most engaging? I'd love to hear from you in the comments!

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