Love in Any Language

Our beautiful daughter was born to us on September 21, 1988. Twenty-six years ago we had no idea what joy and pride she would continue to bring into our lives. All we knew was that as we held her in our arms, she was the most beautiful thing we had ever laid eyes on.

Since that day, much has changed in our lives. Lauren was joined by a sister Heather, and a brother, Nathan and years after that their

father and I divorced. Many more joys and sorrows came and went, along with new people, and new loves, but one thing remained consistent; the love and commitment we had for our kids. 

So today, I have created a video tribute to Lauren--my beautiful daughter who loves music, art, culture, history, languages, travel, and most of all people. In all her studies and travels abroad her goal has always been to connect with people in order to better understand them and seek ways to build bridges to peace and to a better world for us all. 

Writer's Discouragement

I admit it. For the past several days I have been caught up in a funk of discouragement. I learned not too long ago that another novel with my book's subject has been published through a big house publisher. And although it appears from the previews and the reviews that have already been posted on Amazon.com that it doesn't even come close to matching the quality and depth of research, writing, or story-telling that mine does, because it is through a legacy publisher and not an independent, in the less-than-two months since its publication, it has already surpassed mine in sales and number of Amazon reviews. That's the advantage of a legacy publisher: Marketing. An author who is picked up by a big house publisher is guaranteed a mass market that an independent doesn't have access to.

Yet, if I were to try and get mine published through a big house, I would have to find an agent and then I would be subject to all the cuts, maximum word count requirements, and changes that the publisher would demand and then my story would be little more than a cheap paperback romance novel--just like the one that's getting all the marketing and crappy Amazon reviews. I won't compromise my standards to meet  some publisher's bottom line demands.

Damn, it's discouraging to be an independent author in a niche market stuck out in the middle of nowhere with few connections. Just damn.

For the Love of It

It is no secret to anyone who knows me that I am a lover of Mozart's music; better-put, I'm a lover of Mozart, period. I've had an obsession with him since I was a toddler and my parents played LPs featuring his piano concertos and symphonies on our stereo. When I went to college and majored in vocal performance, my favorite operas were by Mozart, and later, when I went on to graduate school, I did my master's thesis on Mozart's original Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, Anna "Nancy" Storace.

It was while I did my research for that thesis that I unearthed some amazing information about their relationship (which some of the most respected Mozart historians of the past suspected was more than a warm professional association), that piqued my interest so much, that after I completed my thesis, I continued on for 8 more years of in-depth research into Nancy Storace, her life, her family, her career, and her relationship not only with Mozart, but the 20 year relationship she had with the English tenor, John Braham. After I met Steph (who is a retired orchestral conductor and Mozart historian), we combined our research on Mozart and Nancy Storace and out of all that research was born a novel series entitled So Faithful a Heart, which contains two books entitled The Love Story of Nancy Storace & Wolfgang Mozart and When Love Won't Die.

One of the greatest challenges we have faced as independent writers/authors and publishers is the marketing of our work. With the explosion of online print-on-demand self-publishing and electronic books has come the accompanying explosion of self-published books in every genre imaginable. We see this as nothing but positive, except that it means more books than the consumer can wade through. Therefore, the average
consumer still looks for "brand names", or in other words, books that are listed on the bestseller list and/or

are published through the traditional method through a big-name publisher. Marketing a book under these conditions is a daunting and often frustrating task. Your biggest market is usually friends and family. Beyond that, you've got to find other ways and give a lot of freebies and sometimes pay big money to companies that will market your book for you. Either way, if you expect a huge return for your efforts, you're doomed to be disappointed.

I finally had to come to the hard realization that I had a choice here; a) Rewrite my book and make it "marketable" for the big-name publishers by limiting the word count and following the "rules" of making it more plot-driven and less character-driven, and leave out parts that I consider essential but that don't necessarily "further the plot", or b) Write it the way I want it, using all of the rich descriptors including adverbs and adjectives, develop the story around the characters rather than the plot, and use as many words as I deem necessary to tell the story. I chose "b", and I don't regret that, but it's still hard to swallow that there are infinitely inferior books in my book's genre that have big name publishers that are selling at ten times the rate that mine is.

All of this is to say that being a writer is hard. It's hard work and often thankless work. But in the end, I will never regret what I have written purely out of love for my subject and out of the love of telling a good story.

My Religion is Kindness

One of my most vivid early childhood memories took place when I was six years old. As I sat in the backseat of my parents car, riding home from church one Sunday, I asked them a question pertaining to something I had just witnessed during the service that morning.

 Mom and Dad were Southern Baptists; staunch Southern Baptists, and because of that, we were in church every Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night. My parents both sang in the choir and I was active in Sunday School, GAs (girl's mission group), and our church's graded children's choir program. I liked going to church and I especially liked the music and following along in the hymnal while the lady I sat with every Sunday pointed to the words in each hymn as we sang. I credit my earliest musical education to our graded choir program, and between that and the private piano lessons that started when I was in the first grade, I was reading and singing along with the alto line of the hymns by the time I was in the second grade.

 On this particular Sunday morning, however, I was puzzled by something I witnessed that took place towards the end of the service. At the end of every Southern Baptist worship service is what they call an "invitation" or alter call. An "invitation hymn" is sung and during that time, people in the congregation are invited to come forward and make public declarations of faith, or renewal of their declarations of faith, or share decisions to go into mission service, etc. The people who went forward would register their decisions on a white card that they would hand to the pastor who was standing there to greet and counsel with them. Most of the time they had counseled with him previously, but sometimes the decision was spontaneous. After the invitation hymn was concluded, the pastor would invite the congregation to be seated while he shared the decisions that were made by the people who walked up front. Then, after the service was concluded, everyone in the congregation would file up front and hug and congratulate those who came forward during the invitation. It was all very warm and very welcoming. Sometimes people would cry, but they almost always smiled at the same time. Everyone seemed very happy when people went forward.

 That particular Sunday morning, we were beginning a revival service. The preacher that morning wasn't our pastor. I loved our pastor who had a gentle, soft-spoken, and kind way about him. Because I grew up in a college town, our church was filled with university professors who were educated and generally didn't prefer the country style fire-and-brimstone preacher that was found in the more rural churches and in smaller towns. Our pastor had a PhD in theology and he smiled a lot and spoke of Jesus' love. I thought Dr. Peterson was next to Jesus himself. This preacher, however, wasn't like Dr. Peterson. This preacher yelled from the pulpit.

He pointed his finger at people in the congregation and paced back-and-forth and shouted angry words like "hell" and "wrath" and called people "sinners". After he was done preaching, we stood to sing the invitation hymn and suddenly a man (I actually think he was a teenager, but to a six-year-old, he looked like a man), went running down the aisle weeping. He went up to the preacher (not Dr. Peterson) and leaned into his ear and spoke to him. I couldn't see what went on after that, because I was too small to see over all of the adults standing in front of me. After the hymn, Dr. Peterson stood in front of the congregation and introduced the young man and said that he had just asked Jesus into his heart. I wasn't sure what that meant, but I was more concerned that he had been crying so hard that his eyes were swollen and he didn't look happy at all. He looked sad. He looked very sad.

So I asked my parents about it. Why was that man crying? Did that angry preacher make him cry? And if so, why did he make him cry? Dr. Peterson never made people cry. Mom and Dad explained to me that the young man had just asked Jesus into his heart and that's why he cried.

"But I thought Jesus made people happy", I protested.

 "He was sad because of his sins and that Jesus had to die on the cross because of those sins," Mom replied.

I thought for a moment and then persisted in my line of questioning. "Do I sin?"

 "Yes, you do," she answered.

 More thought.

"But I don't have to go up the aisle, do I?"

"No," mother answered quietly. "You don't have to go up there."

Silence.

"Will Jesus be angry like that preacher and send me to hell if I don't?"

I don't remember my mother's reply. I only remember that on that very same Sunday night, I walked up the aisle and as I did, the angry preacher started moving towards me. But when I shied from him, Dr. Peterson, moved around in front of him and took me by the hand. He sat me down and spoke to me softly and asked me why I came. I told him that I wanted to ask Jesus into my heart and that I was sorry for my sins. What sins a six-year-old girl could commit, I wasn't sure, but they must have been very bad for Jesus to have to die on the cross so that I could be forgiven for them.

 I'm nearly 54 now and I am no longer a believer in that Jesus. Too many angry preacher-men and too many angry followers of Jesus have convinced me that love isn't something that is exclusive to Christianity, and that

having religion and "correct" doctrine is no guarantee that you know anything about love. I've met many loving and kind people who weren't Christians and many angry and unkind people who were. I still look back at that little six-year-old girl and believe in the Jesus that she believed in, and the Jesus that Dr. Peterson believed in, and I can be thankful that the Jesus we know loves everyone, no matter who they are or what they believe.

 My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness. --The Dalai Lama

Looking for balance in the Age of Extremism

I'm having a really difficult time finding my place in this world, I admit it. It seems at every turn I'm hemmed in by the extremes.

-You can't be a liberal Christian, or even spiritual but not religious; it's either extreme fundamentalist Christianity or Atheism.
-You can't be a political moderate. You either have to be a right-wing tea-bag, nut job, or a pinko commie socialist.
-You can't be a mostly vegetarian who enjoys meat once in a great while; you have to be a vegan.
-You can't be middle class anymore; you're either poor and living off the government or you're a millionaire (or on the extreme fringe as a billionaire).
-You can't be for reasonable gun control laws; you're either with the NRA or you want to take away the right of every citizen to own any gun.
-You can't enjoy a glass or two of wine every evening; you're either a teatotaler or you're an alcoholic.
-You can't have a healthy, shapely body; you're either obese or you're a diet fanatic with washboard abs who spends every spare hour you have in the gym.

I think you get what I mean. It's hard finding your balance in a world that seems to be bent towards the extremes in life. Something can't just be good, it has to be excellent. I remember the day when a C average was just that, the average, and to graduate with a C average was no disgrace. As and even Bs were the exception and only the highly exceptional (the egg brains), graduated with better than a 3.5 gpa. So my question is, if everyone is suddenly outstanding, how are they standing out?

Balance. Harmony. Moderation. Those seem to be dirty words in our society, yet it seems that until we can make our way back to these concepts, we're going to continue to struggle with the polarization that invades every aspect of our lives and relationships. Even our poor planet has been subject to our extremes, and now struggles to bring her ecosystem back into balance so that she can survive. Hopefully that won't mean that she has to shed some of her creatures in order to do that--namely human beings. Or perhaps, if we don't get our shit together, and allow the extremists to continue to shape our dialogue, policy, and spirituality, we just might do the job for her. I really hope it won't come to that.

Admitting the truth isn't admitting defeat.

I was born in 1960, when Dwight D. Eisenhower was President of the United States. In November of that same year, when I was just a little over 4 months old, John F. Kennedy was elected president, and three years later, almost to the date of his election, he was shot dead by an assassin's bullet. I remember that day. I was only 3 years old, but I remember my father (who was a Republican and not a Kennedy fan), rushing in through the garage entrance of our home where I sat playing in the living room floor with my doll, and shouting to my mother to turn on the television, that the president had just been shot. I remember my parents' grief , for although they didn't like Kennedy as a president, they still had respect for the fact that he was the president and that he had been elected by due process and by the voice of the American People. They respected the office and what it represented, and any man (women were not yet so ambitious or liberated to try yet), who could get elected to the office, deserved at least the respect that it commanded.

People like my parents were what made America great. They both came from lower working-class families with limited financial resources. They both finished their basic education and got married on June 1, 1952 the day after my mother graduated from high school. Dad spent 2 years at the University of Tulsa, in pre-med and served for two years in the Naval Reserves as a medic on a destroyer (all of this during the Korean conflict). After his two years at TU, dad was accepted into both medical school at The University of Oklahoma and veterinary school at what was then, Oklahoma A&M, but by the time he finished veterinary school, was Oklahoma State University. They worked hard getting dad through school, mother working as a secretary in one of the departments at the university, and dad working as a taxi driver. They were poor students, but they never described themselves as "struggling". Fortunately for them, they weren't saddled with mounds of student loan debt, for then, paying for college was possible by getting good scholarships and working while going to school. Our country had not yet become corporatized and our state schools, while still relatively expensive, were still reasonably cost-efficient. Soon after dad graduated, they bought a practice in northwestern Oklahoma, in a little town called Cherokee. I was born there, three years later.

I grew up in the tumultuous and tragic decade of the 60s and came of age in the late 1970s. I don't remember a day until I was about 12 years old that the news wasn't plastered with images and footage of the Vietnam war. The generation just ahead of me was emaciated because of it. I remember the war protests, hippies, flower children, The Beatles, the campus riots, the massacre at Kent State, the civil rights movement,  the Charlie Manson murders, and all the fear and confusion the era brought with it. I remember the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and later of Bobby Kennedy, and I was mesmerized while watching his funeral on television and impressed with the fact that they sang Handel's The Halleluia Chorus from Messiah. I sat in front of my television set in awe and wonder as Neil Armstrong set foot, for the first time, on the moon. I worried and fretted with the rest of the nation as the crew of Apollo 13 narrowly escaped death on their ill-fated moon mission, and I cried in fear and confusion as I watched Nixon board an Air Force One helicopter for the last time, in shame and defeat over the Watergate Scandal.

I grew up believing that America was the greatest country in the world, and that feeling wasn't due to some false, overblown sense of nationalism, it was there because at that time in our history, despite our failings, and despite our growing pains, we actually were the greatest nation in the world. We led the world in the economy, education, technology, exports, telecommunications, science, math, space exploration, and in freedom and democracy. People from all over the world flocked to this country for its standard of living and because here, even a poor person had the opportunity to make something of their life. But somewhere between Nixon and Reagan, that all began to change. Somewhere in the 1980s our values began to change when the "Greed-is-Good" Wall Street values of profit over people began to take hold of us and our soul began to be sucked out of us. Racism has reared its ugly head once more, women are finding themselves fighting again for rights they thought they had securely won decades ago, among developed nations we rank 27th in education and our imports far outnumber our exports. Our manufacturing jobs have been shipped off to China, our children are committing suicide in record numbers, the war on drugs has failed, we've been at war in the Middle East for over 10 years now, and people are mortgaging their entire futures when they get sick. We blame the poor, the elderly, the sick, homosexuals, Latinos, African Americans, and women for all of our ills, and 47 percent of our nation is written off by a wealthy presidential candidate as too lazy and dependent on the government to have the desire to make anything of their lives. Pardon the expression, but WTF?

Are we still the greatest country in the world? Hell no, we're not! Are we too far gone to return to the abundance and greatness that we once enjoyed? Again, hell no! We can, once again, be the bastion of freedom and idealism, though far from perfect, that we once were. America has two black eyes right now, but we can heal from those and become the beacon of hope that we once were, if we can return to the ideals engraved on Liberty's tablet: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shores. Send these, the hopeless tempest-tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the Golden Door."
It is my hope that we wake up and work towards achieving the ideals that our forefathers had for this country, and that this great experiment in democracy will be the success that they envisioned.

The following is a clip from the opening scene of the pilot episode of the HBO series, The Newsroom.

It's none of our business

Am I the only person out here who believes that Tiger Woods doesn't owe anyone a public apology? Since when did his fame make him accountable to me, to his fans, or to the rest of the world? This is about his personal life; HIS marriage, HIS family, and how it affects them. It doesn't affect me in the least. I'm not a golfer or a fan of golf but even if I was, it's none of my business. Why do we seem to have such a need to make gods out of our celebrities and then when they prove that they are only too human, we crucify them?

Perhaps the public owes Tiger Woods an apology for putting him on a pedistal that he never asked to be put on in the first place, robbing him of his humanity and of his right to make mistakes. Perhaps we all need to examine ourselves and ask if we were in the same position, with the same pressures and temptations, would we do any differently?

The only bad thing about vacations...

...is that they have to end.

I have had two, four-day weekends in a row and I've so enjoyed them that I dread getting back into the routine. These last two weekends have been filled with nothing but lazy indulgence - going to bed late and sleeping-in late, hot tea and biscotti with Steph at 3:30 in the afternoon, endless games of Scrabble while listening to our favorite classical music station, playing around on Facebook, blogging, finding new and interesting videos on YouTube, and relishing every last minute of our quiet time spent together.

Back to work tomorrow...sigh...

Getting into the spirit!

This weekend is homecoming weekend in my hometown, so I'm getting into the spirit of OSU, the university from where I obtained my graduate degree.  GO POKES! BEAT MISSOURI!

Growing up in Stillwater, I never really appreciated the uniqueness of my hometown until I became an adult and lived in several other places all over the country.  It wasn't until I moved back here in 2000 that I realized what a great place, Stillwater was/is.  I remember this time of year and how OSU homecoming always fell in October, just before Halloween, the walk-around on fraternity row, Theta Pond all lit up, marching in the Homecoming parade with the Stillwater High School marching band, (always right behind the OSU Marching band!), and the sound of the OSU marching band practicing on the lawn near the Seretean Center.  Now I live only blocks from the Seretean Center and on a clear morning I can hear the OSU drum line on Saturday mornings as they practice and the ringing of the library clock tower every fifteen minutes. These familiar sights and sounds are appreciated now so much more than they were when I was child. It's funny how we seem to come back around to the place where we began.

Love thy neighbor

In the last several weeks I have joined the millions of other Americans working with President Obama in the effort to reform our broken health care system, and in the midst of the debate I am amazed and appalled by the lack of compassion exhibited by so many Americans for the plight of others, their friends and neighbors who lack health insurance, have insufficient health insurance, and those who don't have access to even the most basic health care because of a lack of insurance and/or the means to pay for it.  How could we have allowed this to happen in this great nation?  And why are so many so reluctant to do anything about it?

I found the following quote from a poster on YouTube last night and it pretty well sums up my feelings on this issue.

Incredible, absolutely incredible.  How can America ever be great again when it's people are so ready to let their fellow citizens perish?  If this is derailed under the auspices of cost, the U.S. as a world power is toast.  The U.S. dollars that so many of you are so greedily clenching to your chests will be about as good as toilet paper once the inflation from dealing with the economic effects of an unhealthy, uneducated populace really starts to set in. Human rights aren't negotiable.

The Eight of Cups: Severing links with the past

A turning point, a severing of links with the past, which have become outdated. A turning away from established relationships and objects of affection, to facilitate progress to newer and deeper things.

Although I know that the changes that are going on in my life right now are only clearing the way for newer and better things, I can't help but feel some saddness for what I leave behind. Along with this move, my last "chick" is leaving the nest. Last night, as Heather and I sat on her bed and watched America's Got Talent together, I began to tear up at the reality of my soon-to-be empty nest. I didn't think I would go through empty nest syndrome like this, but I think that with the upheaval of the move and the financial stress it is bringing, along with the fact that I'm right in the big fat middle of menopause, it's all a bit overwhelming right now.

I'm entering a new phase of life, now. It's hard not to look back and grieve over what may have been wasted or lost, but at the same time, I know that regret only keeps me from seeing the opportunities that are before me. So, as in the picture on the eight of cups, I turn away from the past, and begin my journey into the future, which I know to be full of tremendous promise.

When it no longer matters

Nine years ago, Steph got me for my 40th birthday, a 1 ounce bottle of Chanel no. 5 in the classic, square, crystal bottle. It was a very meaningful and lovely gift and I have nursed that bottle of purfume along all these nine years until I am now down to a fraction of a fraction, perhaps only about a week's worth, left. A couple of years ago, I vowed that once I got down to the last of it, and used it all up, that we would be wealthy enough to comfortably replace it without having to go without a week-and-a-half worth of groceries in order to do so. I've made a ritual out of repeating this vow each time I pull the crystal stopper out of the bottle and brush it across my wrists, forearms, and behind my ears. However, when I sat down this morning to perform the ritual, it suddenly flashed through my mind that although I have enjoyed this extravagant little luxury all these years, I no longer have the need to replace it. I realized that after nine years, and so many ups and downs, joys and sorrows, that the giver of the gift was still here with me, and her love and devotion for me, as well as mine for her, has only increased, as the perfume in the bottle has decreased. I suddenly realized that it no longer mattered if the perfume could be replaced, because what it represents is priceless, can never be replaced, and will never be used up.

Operation Clean Sweep

Over the last several weeks I have been confronted with some attitudes, beliefs, and ideas that have crept into my life over the years that I realize have not been serving me well and need to be swept from my life before I can be open and receptive to the wonderful things that the universe has waiting for me. As I've been meditating they're being revealed to me one by one, so that I may confront them and clean them from my life.

1. Unworthiness - I've been taught to believe through religion, society, and the system that unless I play by their rules and believe the "right" things, do the "right" things, and live my life according to their dictates, dogmas, and doctrines that I am unworthy of prosperity and success. That is a lie from the pits of hell, and I will no longer buy into it.

2. Fear - As Steph has so beautifully put it: The opposite of love is not hate, it is fear. Am I operating out of love or fear? Today, and every day I will choose to operate out of love.

3. Naivete - Deficient in worldly wisdom or informed judgment. I was raised in a rather mysogenistic environment under the idea that women were to be protected and sheltered from the world by their husbands. After I was divorced I wasn't prepared to meet the world around me and live in it on my own, therefore I have been rather naieve about life and the difficulties that it can and does present. I am a kind and loving spirit, and I have operated under the illusion that everyone else is the same. I've had to learn the hard way that this simply isn't so, that there are people around every corner who will pretend to be your friend and then turn around and stab you in the back. I must remain as innocent as a dove and sly as a fox.

4. Greed - This one was really a hard one for me, for I don't want to admit that I have slipped into its icy grip. But here I am. It's really easy to do in our society. You're told by the media and everyone around you that you're just not worthy or successful if you can't keep up with the latest trends in fashion, technology, homes, cars, etc. Living with financial struggle for the last ten years has taught me some valuable lessons about what is necessary and what is not. I have learned that the love of famiy and friends far exceeds anything else to which I could aspire, and that all the "toys" that are deemed necessary simply are not. I will learn to be frugal, yet generous, and I will display gratitude for everything that I have been given.

There are probably others, but these four seem to be the ones that have risen to the top and for now, are the ones that need my most immediate attention. So here I am with a broom and a dustpan ready to clean them out, so that my channels will be open and receptive for all the wonderful bounty that the universe has in store for me!

In Memory of Grandma Goss: The aroma of percolating coffee

I've never been much of a coffee drinker. I'm not particularly fond of it, and if I drink too much of it, it gives me a headache. However, I've always been rather partial to the aroma. I love to walk by coffee shops and/or cafes and take in the delicious aroma of all the various brews. I most especially like the smell of coffee when mingled with the aroma of eggs and bacon frying in a skillet. It always triggers something in me that leaves me feeling warm and content. One day I sat down and tried to figure out what it was about these aromas that were so appealing to me and it quickly came to me that they brought back some very pleasant childhood memories.

My maternal grandparents lived on a large farm near Bowden, a small rural community just between Tulsa and Sapulpa, Oklahoma. Their house was a large Victorian, built a few years before statehood, (that was in 1907). It was two storied with a creaky wooden stairway, a front parlor, a dining room, and kitchen in the back, with a squeaky wooden screen door that locked with a metal hook. It had a huge wrap-around porch with a gigantic oak tree in the front. Grandpa hung a tire swing from one of the branches for us to swing on. I'm not sure how many acres he had, but it was quite a lot. He had cattle & chickens, two large ponds that he kept stocked with catfish, a big wooden barn with cats, a huge vegetable garden laden with lettuce, tomatoes, squash, peas, green beans, carrots, sweet potatoes, and corn, fruit orchards with peaches and pears, red & green peppers of several varieties, blackberry & raspberry bushes, and a flower garden. There were streams and meadows, and lots of places to run and play. It was a childhood dreamland.

One of my fondest memories is waking up early in the mornings to the smells of bacon and eggs frying in Grandma's cast iron skillet, and freshly ground coffee perking in the percolator, (this was before automatic drip coffee makers). I would try to sneak down the creaky wooden stairs in my footie pajamas, down the hallway, through the dining room, past the huge gas stove, to the kitchen doorway. I'd hide for just a second and then I'd jump out, shouting, "BOO!". Grandma would always jump and pretend to be startled. "You SCARED me!", she would exclaim, although I knew she was kidding because there was no way that she couldn't have known I was coming, between the squeaky stairway and creaking floorboards.

Years later, the aromas of bacon frying and coffee brewing always bring these happy memories forward and I am reminded of how very blessed I was to have grown up with such experiences. As a child I didn't understand that it wasn't like this for every child, and that one day I would cherish these memories, and even long for those early mornings at Grandpa and Grandma's farm.

My father just called about an hour ago and informed me that Grandma passed away. She's home now, with Grandpa and Mother. I'm sure that both of them are happy to see her.

Difining, Critical & Pivotal: The road less traveled

I'm home today recovering from this intestinal flu, so I thought it might be interesting to do this meme that Steph created from a section of one of Dr. Phil's books. These are going to take some real thought!


10 Defining Moments:
In every person's life, there have been moments, both positive and negative, that have defined and redefined who you are. Those events entered your consciousness with such power that they changed the very core of who and what you thought you were. A part of you was changed by those events, and caused you to define yourself, to some degree by your experience of that event.

1. Growing up in a devoutly religious, evangelical Christian home - Although in many respects this was extremely positive for me, as it forced me to develop a keen spiritual awareness and a deep sense of morality as well as solid spiritual foundations, it had many negative affects upon my self-esteem, my life choices, and my sense of who I really was/am.

2. Discovering my musical talent as a child - From the time I was a small child I can't remember a day when I didn't love music, when it wasn't a part of my life and who I was. I have always believed that it was directly connected to my purpose in this life.

3. My first trip to Europe - When I graduated from high school, I went on a musical tour of Europe with a choir of young people from Oklahoma. We visited the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. It expanded my horizons and awakened me to the understanding that people are people no matter their language or customs, no matter what religion they do or don't follow, and no matter where they call home.

4. Going to College - This was another horizon-expanding time in my life when I learned that the world was a much larger and more complicated place than I had been taught to believe. I began to learn that life was not defined in simple black & white terms. I met people who had different life experiences and who challenged my narrow beliefs of what life was about. The most influential and defining course I took was Western Civilization in which I studied the history and literature of Europe from the Medieval period to the modern age. Studying the development of the Catholic Church, the Crusades, and the Reformation began my questioning of the Christian beliefs that I had been taught from infancy, and led to the eventual rejection of those beliefs years later. Education is the key to everything.

5. Studying and experiencing the music of Mozart - Some will probably laugh when they read this and some of my family members, (if they read this), will continue to worry that I have fallen off of the deep end, but from the time I was a small child, the music of Mozart has touched a place in me that I cannot even name. Every time that I have heard, studied, sung and/or experienced Mozart's music, something deep inside of me glows. As a young voice student, the music of Mozart spoke to me and there was a sense of familiarity about it that I couldn't explain. It has remained a constant force throughout my entire life.

6. Living in several different areas of the country - After I was married we moved to Louisville, KY where we lived for a few months before moving to Cincinnati, and then back again to Kentucky. After my husband graduated from seminary, we moved to Florida and lived on both coasts, for a period of time. My three children were born in St. Petersburg, Florida. Then we moved to Montana where we spent three years in the Billings area and Billings proper. Living in various parts of the country, again, expanded my horizons even further--meeting new people, gaining new cultural experiences, opening me up to new and different ideas and beliefs.

7. Being a mother - The experience of motherhood has been one of the most fulfilling, yet terrifying experiences of my life, but through it I have found in me a deep well of wisdom and a loving, caring, compassionate nurturing aspect of my personality that would otherwise not have been developed.

8. Getting a computer and being hooked up on the internet - Talk about your horizon expanding experiences! All of a sudden the entire world was open to me. I could talk to people all over the world! I could comb the web for more information about Mozart or any other subject that I wanted. I could travel the entire span of the globe in a matter of seconds, see pictures, watch videos, hear music that I'd never heard, go places I'd never been, hear languages spoken that I didn't even know existed. It was probably one of the single most important and defining events of my life.

9. Questioning the religious teachings of my youth - As my world expanded, so did my worldview and the old doctrines and dogmas no longer fit my vision and/or concept of my expanding universe and/or god. As painful as it was, I began to separate from the conservative Christian teachings with which I had been raised and in which I was nurtured for my entire life.

10. My divorce - For the first time in my life, I was free to make my own choices, to live my life as I saw fit, and free of the ties that held me back. I had lived my entire life for someone else. I made choices to please others. I said and did all the right things so that everyone else would be happy. Finally I did something for me, for my own personal well-being.


7 Critical Choices:
There are a surprisingly small number of choices that rise to the level of life-changing ones. Critical choices are those that have changed your life, positively or negatively, and are major factors in determining who and what you will become. They are the choices that have affected your life up to today, and have set you on a path.

1. Choosing to marry instead of pursuing a career in music - This choice defined the direction of my life for nearly twenty years and eventually brought me into such despair that after 18 years, I nearly committed suicide. The only thing that stopped me was the thought of my children coming home from school and finding me dead on the floor. I had come to a place in my life where I felt I was good for no one, but I believed that my children were better off with a broken mother than a dead one.

2. Marrying into the ministry - This is one of the choices I made to please others. I did this out of the desperate need for my parents' approval. They were so proud of my missionary brother but always criticized my desires to be a singer/actress as vain and ungodly. I thought if I became a minister's wife that they would be as proud of me as they were my brother.

3. The decision to go to graduate school - When my children were all old enough to be in school on a full time basis, I decided that I wanted to go back to school and get a master's degree in vocal performance and pedagogy. I ran up against the resistance of my husband and the church where he was pastor. It was the beginning of the end of our marriage.

4. Asking for a divorce - I was the one who wanted the divorce despite the fact that no one, not even my family supported me. I had no money, no lawyer, nothing to my name to speak of, but I was at the brink of such desperation that I would have done anything to get out of that marriage. I didn't care at that point where I went. I just wanted out.

5. Falling in love with and living in an open relationship with Steph - Some call this choice courageous, others rebellious, and yet others sinful, but it was one of the best choices of my entire life.

6. Gaining custody of my three children and raising them with my same-sex partner - Talk about a bold choice! A former Southern Baptist minister's wife moves back to her home town in Oklahoma with her lesbian partner and then gets custody of her three children and defiantly raises them in the same town where she grew up and where her parents were active and well-known members of the community! I don't know if that was stupidity or guts.

7. Choosing to be featured in Mozartballs thus coming out about my beliefs in reincarnation and about who I was in a past life - As if things weren't complicated enough by the fact that I left my husband for a woman, left my Christian beliefs altogether, but then I came out about my beliefs of who I was in a previous life. It's a choice I will never regret, however, for the making of the documentary turned out to be a vision quest, a spiritual journey the likes of which I will probably never experience again.

5 Pivotal People:
These are the people who have left indelible impressions on your concept of self, and therefore, the life you live. They may be family members, friends or co-workers, and their influences can be either positive or negative. They are people who can determine whether you live consistently with your authentic self, or instead live a counterfeit life controlled by a fictional self that has crowded out who you really are.

1. My parents - for good or for ill, they tried to mold me into the person they thought I should be.
2. Mary Beth Treat - my sixth grade teacher who saw more potential in me than anyone else.
3. Steve Maison - my high school vocal music teacher who encouraged me to follow my dreams.
4. My brother, Monte, who still loves me despite his fear of the direction in which my life has taken me.
5. Steph, who is the love of my life, my twin soul, and who handed me the keys to unlock my cage.

On knowing God

The best way to know God is to love many things. ~ Vincent Van Gogh, 1853-1890

Square peg in a round hole

Have you ever had one of those days where you looked all around you and felt that you just didn't fit in? That was the kind of day I had yesterday--one of those irritating, disconcerting kind of days when I was left feeling like a misfit, the proverbial square peg in a round hole. Thankfully the mood passed as soon as I came home and found the one I love sitting at her computer, looking like a nerd in her black "Buddy Holly" glasses and Hawaiian shirt, working on a client's website. I realized then that there was one place where I fit perfectly.

Opening up a vein

I've been hold up writing all weekend and it has been a really fulfilling as well as emotional process. Steph says to really write well one has to "open up a vein" and write from one's own experiences, both good and bad. Write what you know. Write what is in your heart. I learned this weekend that writing can sometimes be like weeks of therapy rolled into one session. Painful & exhausting.

You become what you think

I forgive myself for having believed for so long that... I was never good enough to have, get, be what I wanted. ~Ceanne DeRohan

A case for the other woman

The love story between Mozart and Nancy Storace is the classic tale of the "other woman". The great Mozart historian, Alfred Einstien, (first cousin to Albert Einstein), stated that Nancy was the only woman for whom Constanze had any cause to be jealous.

Between Mozart and her there must have been a deep and sympathetic understanding. She was beautiful, attractive, an artist, and a finished singer, whose salary at the Italian opera in Vienna attained a figure at that time unheard of.

He continues by stating that after Anna's return to London in 1787, she and Mozart continued their relationship through correspondence by letter:

But he remained in correspondence with Anna Selina. What happened to these letters is a mystery. Anna Selina certainly treasured them, but perhaps before her death, which occurred in Dulwich in 1817, she destroyed them as not intended for the eyes of an outsider.

The challenge I have facing me as a novelist is the fact that since the advent of the film, Amadeus,there has been a crop of Mozart "fans" who are entirely sympathetic and devoted to Mozart's wife, Constanze. They've made Mozart into a deity and Constanze into the Virgin Mary, creating a distorted and false picture of their relationship and marriage, as well as of the people themselves. I must, therefore, create a case for Nancy and make an audience, who can be quite hostile towards her, sympathetic towards her. Not an easy task, especially when dealing with the sacred cow of Mozart. I must remain within the realms of historical accuracy, but give myself some creative license when it comes to filling in the blanks where cold, hard, historical fact leaves off.

Writing a novel, especially when it involves the lives of real, historical persons is quite complicated. One must be an historian, a researcher, a psychologist, and a diplomat all at the same time.