Look what showed up today!
I love receiving mail. I particularly love mail that reminds me of good things, such as a contest win.
Back in 2011, my story, Becalmed, won First Place for Strong Romantic Elements in the Catherine Contest in Toronto, Canada. Those lovely folk from the Toronto Romance Writers became my new best friends. But somehow the certificate never made the mailbox. Until now.
But good news and fun gifts are always right on time:
The View from Here
It looked like a mountain range instead of clouds as the run rose this morning over the Outer Banks. I can’t resist capturing the sight, though it’s never quite the same as that first moment of joy at the waking day. If you click to enlarge, you’ll see it in better detail.
This is the same view, slightly to the left (and off the balcony instead of the ground), taken a few mornings ago. How different the sky, the ever changing glory of it. Most of the time, I stare down at the computer screen. And then I look up. And smile.
And here? If I turn all the way to the left and look back toward the head of the creek, this is what I see. The harbor docks are almost underwater at high tide.
A Little Inspiration from Inspire-A-Fire
How A Little Can Change A Lot
Originally Posted by Jessica on Oct 23, 2011 : http://www.inspireafire.com/940/
When my brother traveled to the Sudan he had an encounter that changed his life—and as it ends up, mine too.
He stood in Darfur at an orphanage filled with children leftover from the genocide. There were over 800 children, and during the night wild dogs were dragging them off and killing them.
My brother already felt shell-shocked from the travesties he’d witnessed in Uganda.
The day was hot. The sun beat down upon him. His camera had nearly been ruined from all the dust. He’d barely slept. His gear was heavy. Yet his conscience was seared by the numbness he felt, so he turned and confessed to a Sudanese pastor.
“We shall pray right now that your heart will be opened,” he was told.
Not long after that prayer three young children approached Joshua and started to follow him. After a bit, his father nature kicked in and he stopped and sang Father Abraham. It didn’t take long before the four of them were dancing and going through the motions.
When they finished, he asked the children to tell him how they came to be there.
The oldest, a girl, answered. “The soldiers came and shot my mother and father, so I came here.”
The two other children nodded in agreement. “Me, too.”
He was grief struck, but it was what transpired next that tore my heart. “Do you have a Mommy?” The little girl asked my brother.
“Yes,” he answered.
“And a Daddy?”
Again, his answer was yes.
“Oh,” she said, her voice hinting at a strange intermingling of numbness and grief.
Her question stirs me still. For I believe it came from her soul and revealed the thoughts of her heart. She didn’t want to know what his country was like, what kind of food he ate, or what he did for a living. She had her own bullet holes leftover from the genocide. Her world consisted of this single question: Who still had parents and who didn’t?
In her questions I heard her worry and fear. Imagine being trapped in a war-torn country, a land of famine, drought and disease. Imagine trying to survive it as an orphan with death threatening you every hour. No matter how much she’s endured, at the end of the day, she’s still just a little girl. And all she really wants is her Mom and Dad.
I imagined my daughter living as an orphan in the Sudan. If I were shot and dying, it would be my hope that my brothers and sisters would care for her. But what if her aunts and uncles were killed too? What was it then, that her parents hoped?
As members of the body of Christ these children are not alone. They have aunts and uncles. Multitudes and multitudes and multitudes of them. Talk about staggering! These kids are our nieces and nephews! Mine. Yours.
So who, I wondered, within the church has the responsibility to step in?
I didn’t like the answer that came. Earlier that week I was shocked to learn that globally I was one of the richest people in the world—even though as an American, I’m pretty poor.
Like it or not I was the rich aunt. I had knowledge of the situation. That made me accountable.
I wasn’t comfortable with the knowledge then, and I’m not comfortable with the knowledge now. But I am determined to do something. Anything.
That day Joshua had in his possession a picture book that someone had asked him to give to someone in the Sudan. It was a children’s book with a story about how we have a Heavenly Father who always loves and cares for us. Joshua read the book and gave it to them.
An American woman took it upon herself to raise the money to build shelter. Every person who donated, even a dollar, helped to create a place where the little girl now sleeps safe from wild dogs.
When Joshua told me he’s going to start a branch of Watermelon Ministries called Media Change, a non-profit encouraging Americans to give up a portion of the money spent on entertainment to serve those fighting world hunger and thirst, I wanted to support it.
For seven years he’s helped non-profits raise money that serves the “least of these.” He’s seen the impact a small investment can have. This is a brand new initiative. He’s not quite ready to launch, but you can sign up and be kept updated at www.mediachange.org. His first goal is garner the support of 10,000 people who are willing to give $10 a month. I’m number #3.
This is only a blog post, but who knows what one blog post can do.
What if the task of helping others isn’t as overwhelming as we make it?
Jessica
Jessica Dotta, Sr. Editor of Inspire a Fire, has earned the right to wear the title of: Social Media Specialist, Consultant, Publicist, Brand Manager, Editor, Writer, Social Activist, and Business Manager. But the only titles that matter to her are: Called – Redeemed – Beloved – Known by the Father – Daughter – Accepted. . . and Mom. Her life has recently undergone a shaking—one that uprooted nearly every trace of her former life. You’ll have forgive her unconventional posts, as she’s still trying to work out her perspective. She knows one thing though. The most humble and worthy person she ever encountered lived in near obscurity—but sent ripples of change into the world. All because he took the time to care about each hurting person he met. He wasn’t Jesus, but he followed the Great Shepherd and left a legacy. She wants to follow that path.
Grateful for the Pain
Yesterday, I thought about recovery from pain. I remembered one of the bigger rejections in my life, the one that forced me into the new and frightening role of Single Mother. I thought my world destroyed that day, my years of clinging to faith a mockery. It took some days and months and years before I could look up and declare a true thank You for the pain, one that I actually meant. The first thanks had been obligatory: one is supposed to praise, no matter what. To say, “Thank You,” before one feels the truth of it.
Have you ever been there? Been at the place where all you can do is question why? Felt unlovely, unwanted, ignored, cast out? Hurt physically or mentally beyond what you thought you could endure? And wondered what celestial game had tossed you out with the garbage?
What did you do about it?
Some of us dump God. Or church. Or men or women or friendships or…. The list goes on. We find anything and everything to blame.
And some, some few, grab the hem of His garment and hold on. Stand at the Red Sea, as it roils in front of us and that Egyptian Army gathers behind, and we say, “Thank You. Praise You. I trust You in the middle of this mess.”
And something happens. Maybe not immediately, but one day something happens. We may have to walk through days where failures abound and the world’s tilt leans away from us, but one day we do wake to find the pain easing, the hurt less, the heart full, and the New Plan unfolding in our life.
I’m living another New Plan now. But if I hadn’t faced the pain of that rejection, if I hadn’t become a leftee from marriage, I might never have known the joy that the Father had in store for me. A new day, a new life, and a best friend of my very own.
That best friend took pictures out our window this morning. Here’s one of them:
Deep POV
I know many of you are busy writing your masterpiece with NaNoWriMo. Those 50K words haunt you.
But I’d like to challenge my writer friends to come over to Wayside’s Blog and show off. There’s a picture there of a man feeling something, thinking something, involved in something. But what? Can you spend just a few minutes to create a moment in time and show us, using deep POV, what is happening to that man?
Then, using your input, I’ll write another post.
BECALMED: First Place in The Catherine!
A few days ago I received an email from the Coordinator of the 2011 Catherine Contest.
“I’m thrilled to tell you that your entry, Becalmed, placed first in the Strong Romantic Elements category of the Toronto Romance Writers’ 2011 The Catherine Contest! The competition this year was tough, congratulations!”
Becalmed’s characters introduced themselves to me as I wandered the streets of Beaufort, NC, and then let me write about them from on board Sea Venture, while we sailed the Sea of Cortez. They grounded me in home, reminded me of small-town South as I laughed with them and helped them ease past their angst to find joy.
BECALMED
When a southern woman with a broken heart finds herself falling for a widower with a broken boat, it’s anything but smooth sailing ahead.
With her days chock full – designing jewelry for the shop she co-owns with her best friend, sailing her sharpie, and hanging out with girlfriends – Tadie Longworth barely notices she’s morphing into the town’s maiden aunt. When Will, a widower with a perky daughter named Jilly, limps into town in a sailboat badly in need of engine repairs, Tadie welcomes the chance to help. Her shop becomes Jilly’s haven while Will hunts boat parts, and Tadie even takes the two of them sailing. It’s the kind of thing she lives for, and it’s a welcome distraction from the fact that her ex-boyfriend Alex, aka The Jerk of Jerks, is back in town. With his northern bride. Oh, and he’s hitting on Tadie, too.
Those entanglements are more than enough, thank you very much, so it’s almost a relief when a hurricane blows into town: at least the weather can match Tadie’s mood. When Will and Jilly take shelter in her home, though, Tadie finds herself battling her attraction to Will. Even worse, the feeling is mutual, tempting them all with what-ifs that petrify Will, who has sworn never to fall in love again. Mired in misunderstanding, he takes advantage of the clear skies and hauls Jilly out of there and back to his broken boat so fast, Tadie’s head spins.
With the man she might have loved gone, and the man she wishes gone showing up on her doorstep, Tadie finds herself like a sailboat with no wind; becalmed, she has to fight her way back against the currents to the shores of the life, and the man, she wants to have.
I goofed OOPS
For an editor and proofreader, I didn’t do too well in reading the instructions on that letter I mentioned in a deleted post. If any of you got hold of it, please keep mum. Sorry about that! I wasn’t supposed to say a thing for a few days!
My Latest Award Certificate — and CHECK!
The postman brought this lovely certificate today, along with prize money. Oh, my, what fun. Granted, the check may only pay for one dinner out, but I am grateful indeed for this lovely suprise. Thank you, Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers!
I’ve been rewriting this story and having a grand time doing so. Perhaps this time, it will find a publishing home. (From my fingertips to these words to God’s ear!)
Having Fun with Contests
I should have entered contests earlier. This is my first year at it, and so far each of my stories has at least made it to the final round somewhere. Sailing out of Darkness is the latest to have this honor in the Colorado Rocky Mountain Gold contest.
From the critiques of non-winning or non-placing stories, I have gleaned many insights and certainly learned that what one group likes, another may hate. The folk in DC loved one that here received a mediocre score. The folk in Toronto preferred another. The Wisconsin people lined up with the DC judges on their choice for a finalist (in DC Heavy Weather won the Marlene), but agreed with the Colorado judges on the second. This was my first time to submit Sailing out of Darkness (I think–sorry, I’ve been busy lately; hard to keep up with contests in the middle of so much editing), so I don’t really have any other point of reference for it.
The judges in each contest have obviously worked hard. From their comments, I can tell they spent a good deal of time pondering what to say. One or two had the courage to leave their email address so that I could ask questions. I used these to thank them, which was much nicer than writing to a generic Judge #00. I’m trying to be faithful in giving thanks. The year I judged a contest, no one took the time to respond.
So, for all those judging and honoring my efforts with your time and thought, I also thank you publicly. I appreciate the affirmation this has given me. So many have written to compliment my writing, to wonder why my fiction has yet to see a publisher’s stamp on a book. I haven’t a clue, but I do know one thing: timing is everything. With each critique, I’ve learned something. And with each opportunity to revise, I think I’ve improved my work. I hate to imagine how I’d feel if my early efforts had achieved publication. So, I’m grateful for the time. Grateful for the wait. Grateful for the opportunity to learn and strive to be the best writer I can be, to craft the best stories possible.
I remember when I first tried my hand at fiction. What a huge learning curve lay ahead for this former non-fiction writer and editor. But the Bible says we’re to do with all our might whatever our hand finds to do. For me that has meant learning and studying and practicing this thing called writing. And, oh, haven’t I had fun!
Becalmed is a Finalist!
A couple of days ago, a lovely voice at the end of the phone line announced that Becalmed, Book 1 of my Beaufort stories, is a finalist in the mainstream division for The Catherine with the Toronto Romance Writers. So exciting!
Now, I’m busy tweaking the submission for the final round of judging.
We’ll see!
Submission Time at Wayside Press
Come see what’s needed and what the process for submission is at Wayside. An empty slush pile means you’ll get read now as opposed to later. But come conference time next month, the pile will fill…
You know what that means!
Click on the link below and come learn more about us.
Still talking hats: Wayside Press
I’ve been waiting to post about this new hatted position until the website was up and running and I could send you to it. But we have postponement.
I feel a bit like an astronaut whose flight was aborted, but this is another test in patience. Still, I’m going to put up the ready-to-go post and then link to the new website when it releases.
Some very talented people are working on a logo for us. Can’t wait to see what comes out of those creative minds. In the meantime:
NEW EXECUTIVE EDITOR FOR WAYSIDE PRESS: C’est moi!
Wayside Press is the newest imprint of Written World Communications, 
and I’m Written World’s newest editor. (Though that news flash may already be dated, as it looks as if Kristine has also hired someone for Timeless, the magazine/imprint for the over-fifty crowd.) Until Wayside’s launching, WWC had a place for everyone except the rest of us. Christian writers could craft fantasy or romance, speculative or young adult. Even children’s writers could make a dent, and poets found their work on the pages of one of WWC’s three magazines.
But for those who write crossover works for the general market? Nope. No room at the inn.
That has now changed, and I get to stand at the helm as the change emerges. If I were younger or more nimble, I’d turn cartwheels.
Why did Kristine Pratt, WWC’s CEO, invite me to head up this line? Probably because I’m the pickiest editor she knows. My husband calls me a grammar nazi, and I suppose I am. I began editing professionally back in the 1970s, which, I’m afraid, does date me. But don’t worry. I read eclectically and always have, so I doubt you’ll scare me, even if I am older by decades.
I know you’re out there, lurking, hoping for a home for your literary fiction that forgot to start with a bang, but whose language compels a thoughtful reader forward; the cozy or even uncozy mystery that is all about story; the romance that hangs on the romantic and not the sexual; the humorous, the satirical, the sublime, anything that makes me smile and forces me to sit up and take notice…all because you have something wonderful to say and your writing sings.
Why does the publishing world need another general market line?
Now, I grant that this is merely my opinion, but I think a lot of writers feel left by the wayside. Their work isn’t steamy enough or violent enough or sweet enough or prosthelytizing enough to fit in the CBA or the ABA. They’ve searched the Indie publishing market and found few outlets for the sort of thing they write. And, to be truthful, many of us are disappointed with the quality of works on the shelves.
We at Wayside want to change that. I’ll be looking at submissions soon. In the meantime, leave me a comment and tell me what you’re working on that might fit into Wayside’s line. Let’s make a difference together.
For a sneak peak at some of the changes going on over at WWC, read what Kristine has to say on Facebook.
Harry Potter, A poker hand, and a whole slew of bookstores….
The Hat. Watch the Hat.
Another hint:
This is the hat that goes with the picture that’s on the new website that tells the story that links to the news we’re about to disclose.
(I know. It’s a tad more formal than my sailing hats. At least I’m smiling. I was when this was taken in October [she waves at her darling daughter], and I am now. This is a hat for good news, as well as for a different kind of fun.)
Have you guessed? (If you’re part of the advance team, shhhhh…)
Think Hats
These have been my hats of choice for years:
Sailing California
Walking Ensenada’s Malecon
Sailing Sea Venture’s dinghy off Isla Carmen in the Sea of Cortez
At Sea Venture’s helm
And lunching in Mazatlan
Hats define my workplace. I sail, therefore I wear a sailing hat. In Mexico, the hat was often bigger, floppier, hiding more of my pale skin from the sun than the caps of San Francisco and North Carolina. I’ve sailed and played and written from my big boat-home, Sea Venture.
Now, at least temporarily land bound, I’m about to don another hat for a new job. I’ll keep the old and enjoy the new.
Stay tuned.
Big News Coming!
Stay Tuned Here — The press release should be out by Monday….
Oh me, oh my: I WON!
Michael phoned from Grand Cayman to tell me I should open my email. So I put down my chopsticks (we were eating sushi), left my mama perched in front of the BBC’s Emma, and toddled upstairs to the computer.
And, oh, my, there it was, with “Drumroll Please” in the subject line.
One of my stories won first place in the Marlene Awards for women’s fiction.
I’m still fanning myself and grinning. Perhaps I’ll share some of the judges’ comments later. At the moment, I’m hugging them close.
(Yoohoo, Marlene judges, thank you soooo much!!)
A Different Kind of Easter Sunday
It used to be that Easter meant hats and new dresses, cherry blossoms in the city, bunnies. Then I learned Who made Easter, Whose resurrection we celebrate, and Easter became a joyous proclamation of Life and promises kept. We attended church. We sang and rejoiced. Sometimes we stood in the dawn and shivered, imagining in our praise the empty Cross.
This year I waited. Waited for my beloved husband to make landfall. Waited for the next stage that begins when we meet again. And while I waited, I dealt with hurtful words. With the meaning of the Cross and the empty tomb, with its applications to this life I inhabit. The hurt has found a pattern and continues; it creeps into innocuous moments and makes my stomach roil. And it comes from a loved one. A fellow believer. Family in more ways than one.
So the Cross must intervene. The risen Christ and His promises must become so real to me that none of the rest matters. That false accusations fall at the foot of that Cross and die there, covered by His Blood.
He forgives. I must also, always and continually.
And so I rejoice and am more grateful than I can say.
Fun tales from Sea Venture
My husband the engineer became my husband the writer again today with his radio email sent from the Caribbean. Our boat is en route home, present destination Grand Cayman.
May I suggest you wander over there and take a peek?
Women’s Fiction Finalist
The nice folk from Wisconsin just sent me a lovely badge to place on my blog, but, being technically challenged, I can’t seem to make it sit anywhere permanently. I tried using an Image Widget. Nothing. So, here it is, taking center stage in this post.
I love the title of this contest: FabFive. I don’t write romance, but they very kindly had a category for women’s fiction that let me sneak in under their umbrella.
The purple goes well against this black background, don’t you think? (she asks, fluttering her fingers so you’ll notice the new polish, dyed to match. [And, no, I never wear nail polish. That's my alter ego, the one who peeks from behind the pillar to see what's going on over in RWA-land. My permanent writer self plunks down on the sofa -- either at home or on board SV -- in her jeans and turtleneck, imagining worlds and watching tides.])
Voice
My favorite comments from the latest contest judges concerned my writing voice — hugely encouraging. But they got me thinking about voice and how we learn it — or if we learn it at all. Is the cadence of our writing bred into us like the language of our tongues?
I don’t pretend to have an answer to that. I write, I’ve always written, the way I hear language. Yesterday I spent some hours revisiting an old story with Maryland’s Eastern Shore as the backdrop. There I heard a different tone from my Beaufort stories, a different word patterning. The cadence of the South, which permeates conversation and thought as well as observation, fixes itself into the words of the Beaufort folk. Does that mean I as author see things differently when I’m in different places?
I think it does. I think the me who wrote from Mexico had images pressed into my mind that were slower, drier, perhaps friendlier. They held whiffs of deep sea and large expanses of open water and empty land, of mountains plunging toward the sea and whales cavorting off our bow.
The me who writes here in NC feels more confined to place. I’m no longer surrounded by the lilt or clip of foreign tongues or by the lazy days at anchor. Here, the world seems populated with issues that need to be solved, tempers that must be assuaged, emotions that must have reason…if only I could plumb deeply enough to discover them. Here, I’m awash in a world of care, which must translate somehow into the words I use to craft stories. (Or the ones I pluck from the moment to write on this blog.)
What are your thoughts on voice and writing? Do you think you’ve learned the voice with which you write, or is it merely you as you’ve always written on paper (or screen)? Please post a comment and let me know.
Contests and busyness
Life sometimes presses in on us, full of the mundane that must be accomplished before we’re free to roam where we wish. I have so many words longing to find access, but they are pressed into hiding… until someday.
A few days ago I got word that one of my stories had made the cut and was a finalist in a writing contest. In the midst of the busyness here, I’d forgotten all about submitting there, but, as you can imagine, the email thrilled me. (The comments on story number two, which was closer to my heart, were less happy.)
And then yesterday…was it yesterday? I think so…I returned home to find that both of those stories were semi-finalists in another contest. Of course, I’m up against seventeen other writers (or maybe that’s sixteen), many of whom probably write much more to the specs than I do.
So, to me and to all those other finalists and semi-finalists in both contests: May we each glean from this what we ought. May the one who most needs to win do so. May the one most deserving of accolades receive them. And may the rest of us find so much pleasure in the process that nothing else matters.
Please, Lord, make that so for me. Let the doing suffice… and help me grow in the process.
Sorry for the silence
I’ve been storing up memories instead of writing.
My mama and I journeyed to Panama to meet up with my husband and Sea Venture for the canal transit. So much fun. Soon, I will write of that on our sailing blog.
For now, though, I’m catching up on life at home. So, please be patient, those of you who care whether or not words show up here.
Update: Saturday. What’s the next best thing to writing something new? That’s it: tweaking an old story into new life. I’m taking the day to do that and having so much fun!
Sleepy Creek Snow
By morning, the sky had cleared, lending contrast enough for a photograph or two. Here is the snowfall as seen from the porch door. I have not yet ventured forth.
Now, it’s two hours after I took those pictures, and the sunlight sparkles on the crystals, like diamonds winking at us.
I’m glad I was here to see it. What a beautiful gift from the heavens.
New Website, New Blog
I’ve moved my blog and turned pieces of my former website into pages here. I hope you’ll find the navigation easier to perform. You can still link through either www.normandiefischer.com or www.writingonboard.com.
It’s been a hectic week. Fine, a hectic autumn. I’m grateful for busywork like this, because it occupies the brain without requiring the higher function I would need as wordsmith. Which, my friends, is why I’m not going to attempt profundity of any sort and will offer instead merely an explanation of the change. I hope you’ll have patience with me as I slog back into the writer mode. I will say this: I’ve had a great time using my editor’s cap for various other writers…anything to allay the guilt I feel as I stare at the same paragraph and the same chapter in my WIP and long to center my thoughts there.
Soon.
A bit of sailing south. A little time with chartplotters and watch-standing.
And perhaps in the meantime, good news will flow this way. The Lord has graciously answered a number of prayers. Surely, this one, a little encouragement in the waiting game, will flow in my direction.
ACFW
Hartline Literary Agency
My Agent's Blog
North Carolina Writers Network
Wayside Press
