Read about my 30 Day Writing Challenge here!
9. Your feelings on ageism.
Hmmm … I really don’t have any. Since I’m a relatively young buck, does that make me ageist?
Month: November 2015
30 Days – Day 8
Towards the tail end of October, The Writer’s Circle posted a photo on Facebook that contained a 30-Day Writing Challenge. I liked the questions and I liked the idea of sharing a little bit more information about me (as opposed to my strange Internet reading habits), I decided to join in! If you’re participating – go ahead and leave a comment with your links below!
8. A book you love and one you didn’t
One of my favorite books is Tregaron’s Daughter by Madeleine Brent (a pseudonym for British writer Peter O’Donnell). It’s a book that came out of a box of books my dad bought at an auction when I was a kid. Tregaron’s Daughter was published in 1971 and is a gothic-type mystery/romance set in Cornwall. I cannot tell you what brings me back to that book, but I typically re-read it every year. There’s something about the setting and the characters that keeps me coming back, like visiting with an old friend.
A book that I didn’t love … I tried to get into J.D. Robb’s “Death” series (and again – Robb is a pseudonym for Nora Roberts, who I typically adore). I couldn’t get past the first few pages of Ms. Roberts’ futuristic suspense novel. I’m a sci-fi fan, but that’s something I’d rather watch than read, I guess.
30 Days – Day 7
Read about my 30 Day Writing Challenge here!
7. What tattoos you have and if they have meaning
I have a tattoo on the big toe of my left foot. Supposedly (and I say “supposedly” because anytime you get any kind of symbol or character that is in a language that is not your primary language, one may need to have their head examined) it’s the Japanese symbol for “strength.” I got the tattoo in college when one of my fellow reporters for the student newspaper interviewed the owner of a local tattoo parlor.
Even though I’m closer to 40 than I’ll ever be to 20 again, I love my tattoo.
Friday Fare: The 30-Day Version I
Today’s post is a weird mashup of my Friday Fare feature and the 30-day writing challenge I’ve been participating in during the month of November.
Normally, I wouldn’t make things so complicated, but I’ve read some cool stuff this week that I want to share. So, without further ado, here are the articles / vids that made me a better person this week:
- I’m not going to lie; this video of Fred Rogers made me weep. I’m glad that I grew up in a world where Mr. Rogers’ kindness shaped my childhood.
- Color me shocked as hell, there’s supposedly a link between coffee consumption and creativity. (sigh)
- This article, about the nuances of “Midwestern nice,” just killed me.
- The Dixie Chicks covered Lana del Rey’s “Video Games” and as you can imagine, it was beautiful.
- Speaking of things that I’ve been listening to, I discovered this song on my borscht trip to St. Paul.
- I recently downloaded a copy of Elizabeth Gilbert’s “Big Magic” and wow. I’m already thinking about getting a hard copy so I can highlight the pertinent pages and go back and read her words over and over again. Living a creative life is scary – Ms. Gilbert is trying to give people the tools to get beyond the fear and capture the magic.
6. Someone who fascinates you and why.
Wow – this is another one I’d love to skip. I actually scrolled through Facebook to see if this person is anyone that I already know. I thought of a couple authors that I enjoy (J.K. Rowling, J.T. Ellison, Stephen King, Deborah Harkness). And then it hit me: For someone who does not watch television anymore, I know way too much about what is going on with the Kardashians and the Duggar family because I read too much celebrity gossip. Why do these families fascinate me? I think that old adage about not being able to avert ones eyes from a train wreck comes to mind …
30 Days – Day 5
Read about my 30 Day Writing Challenge here!
5. A place you would live, but have never visited
Vermont or somewhere in the Pacific Northwest.
30 Days – Day 4
Read about my 30 Day Writing Challenge here!
4. Ten Interesting Facts About Yourself
1) I took voice lessons for about five years. I can sing. But I don’t really like singing solo in front of people. I will turn into a tomato with hair if I do. Seriously – I hate singing in public.
2) Added bonus to all of the years of vocal lessons and choir practice? It has helped me with foreign languages.
3) If I was exiled from America tomorrow, I’d go back to the Netherlands. I spent a week there in 1999 and it felt like home.
4) I did not like college. I prefer the paycheck and the “logic” of a regular job. Although I was blessed with so many wonderful experiences and made some lifelong friendships in college, my life took off as soon as I took my first job. I’ve never really doubted my place on this earth since then.
5) I’m a firm believer in back-up plans – especially when it comes to employment. It’s not uncommon for me to have a back-up for my back-up.
6) I am a voracious and a very fast reader. The caveat to my speed though is that I tend to skim passages. It’s one of the reasons I’m very happy to read books over and over again. I’m always catching stuff that I missed.
7) Speaking of books that I’ve read over and over again, here’s a brief list: The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova, Bag of Bones by Stephen King, The Stand by Stephen King, A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness, the Mercy Thompson series books by Patricia Briggs, and Tregaron’s Daughter by Madeline Brent. I would cheerfully read all of these books again and again.
8) I’ve held an awesome variety of jobs: I’ve worked at gas stations, worked at an amusement park, as a reporter and editor in the newspaper industry, at a cab company, and currently at a software consulting company. In my adult life, I’ve always worked as a writer. Surprisingly, one of my favorite jobs out of all of those was the three-year stint I had as a dispatcher at a cab company. It turns out that truth IS stranger than fiction.
9) I still have a couple of jobs on my bucket list … barista and bartender. I figure those will be great to explore in retirement.
10) I honestly believe that I am one of the luckiest people in existence. I do work hard and I have taken some lumps, but at the end of the day, my life is extraordinarily blessed. I try not to take it for granted.
30 Days – Day 3
Towards the tail end of October, The Writer’s Circle posted a photo on Facebook that contained a 30-Day Writing Challenge. I liked the questions and I liked the idea of sharing a little bit more information about me (as opposed to my strange Internet reading habits), I decided to join in! If you’re participating – go ahead and leave a comment with your links below!
- Your first love and first kiss; if separate, discuss both
Ugh. Can I just take a pass on this one? I’m talking about the first love part, not the first kiss. My first kiss wasn’t that bad – that counts for both of them, the first grade snow bank snuggles and then making out with one of my brother’s friends behind one of the buildings at my county’s fairgrounds.
So there you go on the first kisses. They were both sweet.
My first love? Eh, not so much. I’m not much of a late bloomer (he-llo, first kiss was in first grade … go me!), but I was pretty late to the game when it came to acquiring my first official boyfriend. I was in my mid-20s and was working as a reporter in Wisconsin when one of my co-workers offered to set me up with a friend of his. We met, we dated, we nearly got engaged, we crashed and burned … and that was in less than six months.
While it took me a little bit to recover from the whiplash I got from that emotional experience, I moved on. And to be honest – karma has been good to me. My husband is gorgeous, he’s my best friend (and not in the sappy “oh I married my best friend” sense. I did marry my best friend … one of my college drinking buddies.). Even more attractive – we split much of the housework and he’s a better parent than I am. Insane bonus round? We made really gorgeous, intelligent children. And although there are certain facets of my twenties that I would GLADLY skip, I wouldn’t be the person I am today without that really craptacular dating experience from when I was in Wisconsin.
As I’ve pondered this writing prompt, I had another realization: When I think about my “first love,” I don’t think of my ex very often. I actually think more about some of the guys that I grew up with and knew in high school – some of those old crushes I had. Unrequited love (or lust) is a real bitch, but I’ve adored and I’ve befriended some incredible guys over the years. I think of those guys and I think about how they treated chunky, awkward, teenage me … honestly – I knew some exceptional guys who grew up to be pretty decent men. And other than the toads I’ve encountered on this journey, I feel pretty lucky to have had my heart temporarily abducted by some of these men. It’s all a part of how amazing and nuanced my world has been.
30 Days – Day 2
Towards the tail end of October, The Writer’s Circle posted a photo on Facebook that contained a 30-Day Writing Challenge. I liked the questions and I liked the idea of sharing a little bit more information about me (as opposed to my strange Internet reading habits), I decided to join in! If you’re participating – go ahead and leave a comment with your links below!
- Your earliest memory
I’ve been the mother of boys for three years now and the longer that I’m at this parenting challenge, the clearer a particular memory is for me. In this memory I am probably three or four years old, it is naptime, and instead of sleeping I am fascinated by the sound that my hands make as I sit on the floor beside my crib and push at the carpeted floor by the doorway. The sound that I’m creating … it sounds like footsteps coming up the stairs! My memory ends as I was scooped up off of the floor by my poor, beleaguered mother.
What I like about that particular memory is that I actually remember the thought process that was going through my head at the time. How astonishing it was that my hands were creating such sounds! I don’t remember being scolded when my mom busted me, I don’t even remember feeling dismay … I just remember the wonderment.
I think that memory comes back to me now because of my own children. Because of some of the astonishing things that they do. They make no sense to me, but they are world building … the sounds that they make, the things they see – it’s everything to them right now.
30 Days – Day 1
Towards the tail end of October, The Writer’s Circle posted a photo on Facebook that contained a 30-Day Writing Challenge. I liked the questions and I liked the idea of sharing a little bit more information about me (as opposed to my strange Internet reading habits), I decided to join in! If you’re participating – go ahead and leave a comment with your links below!
- Five problems with social media
1) Um … it is the vortex where all ambition goes to die? Maybe that’s a little harsh, but seriously – I’ve had plenty of moments where I’ve planned to just take a quick peek at my Facebook page and come out of my trance 15 minutes later (erm, probably more like 45) totally disoriented as to where the time went.
2) My Twitter feed is currently capped at 2,000 followers. It pisses me off and at the current time, there’s not an easy solution. Darn you Twitter!
3) Internet trolls and their adoration of the comments section. After 37 years of life and at least most of the past seven years spent with social media in my life, you’d think that I’d know better than to read the comments that people leave on posts. But no – I click. I read. I get depressed at peoples’ stupidity and at how they think they are all superior to everyone when they can’t even spell.
4) Too Much Information (TMI). And I’m not talking about the time that there were two of my family members fighting on the Facebook and one of them posted something totally raunchy about their sex lives. (Yes, that happened. I’m from a small town and I swear that everyone I graduated with saw that particular post. It was terrible.) I’m talking about the fact that before Facebook and other social media, I probably didn’t know the political leanings of 75% of people that I know. Then I go on there and see a former teacher of mine saying something disparaging about LGBT people. COME ON TEACH! If I was a queer student and I saw the Bible verse you just quoted, I would know damn well that your class isn’t a safe environment. That’s the kind of thing that kills me.
5) I admire my husband and his staunch refusal to have a social media presence. (Other than the forums that he participates in to track his board game stats … yes, I love that man and his nerdiness.) I’d like to think that I could just go dark and leave Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest behind. (Pinterest and Twitter probably wouldn’t be too much of a challenge …). But I keep reading stuff about authors cultivating their social media presence and how agents look for that sort of thing.
I like social media. I appreciate the ways that it brings people together. As an author, I love the idea of how it will allow people access to my books, my thoughts, etc. But I like leaving it behind on weekends. I think that it’s something best consumed and experienced in moderation.
michellekubitz 