Hadn’t I told a room full of homeschooling mothers just a few days ago that “I don’t have time” was just an excuse; that we all have to take the time for the things we want?  Television, Facebook, excessive shopping or ‘going’ were some of the time suckers I warned against.

That speaking engagement was particularly enjoyable because I was talking to a room full of women who are the ones I want to reach the most; moms with children, moms who might be putting off using their own talents while they raise children and homeschool.

Don’t wait, I advised, and then I shared with them, through a power point presentation, the creative endeavors of a woman who had been raising ten children in poverty; a woman who made rag rugs for the peeling linoleum floors where her children walked with bare feet. She made little jumpers from her old skirts, teddy bears and Raggedy Ann dolls from scraps. Later, this same woman drew pastel portraits of her husband and herself, her children playing in an alley, her daughter sitting with her back to her. This woman made beautiful quilts, lovely paintings on barn boards, and wood carvings.

This woman was my mother, and I can think of no better example of a mother who utilized her talents in her everyday life. “Nourishing the Creative You,” I’ve titled a similar presentation for a women’s retreat and luncheon in April.

(an early pastel by my mother, Irma Potter)

(more recent work, painting by mother mother, hanging in the Breitbach’s restaraunt in Balltown Iowa)

In between my regular couponing column and an article for the local newspaper, I’ve been working on an article that I thought would be easy to write; a piece for a contest with the topic “The Most Quotable Woman I Know.”  I’ve spent hours rifling through my mother’s papers, looking for a direct quote to use in the piece. She hinted and implied many times in her notebooks of her desire that her children use their talents. It is no coincidence I now impart that same advice upon young mothers.

My mother died sixteen months ago.  In the ensuing months, I have begun writing for the local newspaper, attending Chrsitian writer’s conferences, conducting couponing workshops, writing a weekly column on couponing, been published in three Chicken Soup books, and soon, will have portions of my blog detailing the months of grief (and creativity) following her death published in an anthology.  I’m now doing public speaking (and loving it!) and will soon be holding an all-day writing workshop for the local community college.  And all this, I attribute to the muse and the memory of my creative mother.

Still, to write about her for this contest entry, I wanted her exact words.  A few days ago, I found this written in her Memory book: “Our main purpose on earth is to save our soul and try to do the will of God in all things. That also means using the talents that God gives us and using them for good.” 

Tomorrow would have been my mother’s 83rd birthday. I often brought Mom a can of coffee and some chocolate for her birthday.  A pan of lasagna, and once in awhile a cake. My gift to her this year?

I will continue to follow her footsteps, in all things creative, and hopefully, all the way to Heaven.

“Watch your big head, it might not fit through the door,” my father said when he slid back the door to the van. A sharp stab of pain went through me. Was he making fun of me? Then I glanced at his beaming face, noting the warmth and amusement in his eyes, and the hurt immediately disappeared. My father was proud of me, but unaccustomed to giving praise; he could only make a joke.

My parents didn’t attend school functions. My father, a casualty of World War II, had a difficult enough time attending the tight confines of the pews at church; he wasn’t about to set foot into a darkened auditorium for the many plays and speech contests I participated in. My mother didn’t drive, and she rarely went anywhere without her stoic life’s partner. So my siblings and I had gotten used to having parents who did not attend the various art shows, plays, or even awards nights we were a part of.  That was why I was astounded during my attempt to hitch a ride with a fellow Thespian to be informed by my mother that I should put the phone down because they were taking me to an awards program! Even when I’d had the lead in The Wizard of Oz  I hadn’t expected them to go. Why were they both attending something as insignificant as an awards ceremony? As it turned out, the little awards night would be anything but small for me. I would find out later that my drama coach had called my parents on the phone to plead for their presence because he would personally be awarding me with several awards, including the prestigious and coveted “Honor Thespian,” an award he had never before bestowed upon a sophomore. I didn’t walk across that stage just once or twice that night, but several times, and my parents were there to see it. I left with an armful of awards, ribbons, and medals, along with a dozen yellow roses, proud parents on either side of me. I couldn’t have been happier than if I’d won the Miss American pageant.

I was 16 years old when my father told me I had talent for both speaking and writing, and I should always use both for good, not evil. It was my father who asked me to always use my maiden name in my writing so everyone would know I was related to him, long before I dared imagine ever writing for publication or even getting married. I would remember those words later, when Homeschooling From Scratch was published in 1996, too late for him to see. My mother often said something similar, in her admonitions to her children to use their talents. She wrote these words in a Memory book I cherish since her death in 2010:

“Our main purpose on earth is to save our soul and try to do the will of God in all things. That also means using the talents that God gives us, and using them for good.”

When I picked up yesterday’s Dubuque Telegraph Herald newspaper from my porch, and noted my own smiling face on the front page, I felt two distinctly opposing emotions: joy and despair. While I was delighted by the advertisement of my new column displayed on the front page, there was that pang of sadness because neither of my parents was here to share in my coup. Even fifteen months after the loss, I still reached for the phone to call my mother.

As a Christian, I struggle with the sin of pride. I have worked very hard in my writing to get to the point where I am now. I am a late bloomer, with my greatest successes in both the writing and public speaking arenas coming to me just in the year following the death of my greatest muse, my mother. The writing profession as a business requires a certain amount of self-promotion, and in fact, the most successful writers and speakers in today’s world are those who have learned the art of “tooting their own horn,” something that doesn’t come naturally to most of us. Posting links to our books, our articles and our workshops seems uncomfortably self-serving, and yet it is the best way to advertise the product we must sell in order to make a living; the products of our words and talents. On the one hand, the Bible tells us in Matthew 5:14-16 not to hide our light under a basket, yet Proverbs 16:18 informs us that that pride goeth before a fall.

My husband David is very proud of my first couponing column; he went out and bought three extra newspapers to send to siblings who would not see it otherwise. My own siblings lauded praise upon my accomplishments on our family website. The praise and adulation pleases at the same time it humbles me. “I’m just using my God-given talents like our Father in heaven desires and our parents encouraged in us,” I want to protest.

It’s a fine line to walk; keeping humble in serving our Lord, and still taking pride in our talents. I think I can handle it. Yesterday, in the very moment that I reached for the phone and realized that my mother was not there to call, the words of my earthly father echoed in my head,

“Watch your big head, it might not fit through the door.”

As for the couponing workshops, I have so much fun presenting them, I forget I am being paid to do something so exciting!

What does it say about me that I later fed Jacob a Weight Watchers meal, piping hot from the microwave?

What kind of grandmother serves her grandchildren frozen Weight Watchers meals and keeps a stash of fig bars for their snack times? Where is the cookie jar full of homemade oatmeal cookies? The casserole dish of homemade macaroni and cheese?

The apron?

I pondered my failings as a grandmother while Jacob and Becca spent a few hours playing at my house yesterday.

When my first grandchild was born, I was the mother of a three-month old. Yes, the youngest of my eight children was born just three months before my daughter gave birth to her first child, our first grandchild. I was too busy being mommy to a newborn to ever treat Becca like a granddaughter. Elizabeth and I shopped together all the time with our babies. Our relationship seemed more like that of girlfriends than mother/daughter; not something I regret or begrudge, but unusual nonetheless.  At the check-out we’d take turns holding each other’s baby while the other one wrote out a check. Our babies were each other’s best friends, and they remain so today; aunt and niece playing together for hours. The incongruous look on their faces when reminded of their familial relationship says it all. How could Abby be an aunt to Rebecca when they are just little girls? The very notion sends them into fits of giggles.

When Jacob was born, I was the mother of a two-year-old toddler; still too busy as a mother to serve as much of a grandmother. Then Elizabeth and Ben moved from the country house that was less than a mile from our rural Dyersville home to town twenty-five minutes away. I saw less and less of my grandchildren. Our weekly excursions became once a month visits. I was happy to move to the same town four years ago, just one block from my daughter and her husband. I babysat for Becca and Jacob when Elizabeth was in labor with our third grandchild. It was little Joseph, also known as Jo-Jo, who would experience the most grandmotherly actions from me, though I still didn’t hold him as much as one would expect, mostly because I’d been mothering newborns for so many years myself I didn’t have the overwhelming urge to hold a baby again. Frankly, I was glad for the reprieve I was finally experiencing. There were no long, drawn-out sighs at the sight and smell of a newborn’s soft fuzzy head or laments of missing nursing or rocking a baby. I was still too close to having spent the past 25+ years doing the same to miss it at all. I might still be missing out on the best parts of grand parenting if it wasn’t for Jacob’s cancer last year. Due to his lengthy cancer treatment, I’ve had the chance to spend a lot of quality time with Jo-Jo; reading him books, making him lunch, rocking his and holding him for hours one day when he was ill with a fever.  While his energy level can quickly zap my own, I have felt blessed to share a time with Jo-Jo that I might not otherwise have had. When he sees me now he calls out “Grandma” with a delight in his voice that thrills me from my toes to my scalp each time I hear it.

But Jacob and I didn’t have that time. Instead, he and his mother spent days at the hospital during his treatment. He and I have even gotten a bit shy around each other. So when he chose to be with us yesterday, despite the fact that I couldn’t assure him I was cooking him anything better than the goulash his mother was serving, I was secretly pleased.

Jacob played happily with the girls for quite a while, and then wandered over to the couch where I was working on my laptop. He picked up some library books that were piled on the cushion near me, and flipped through some of the pages aimlessly. It occurred to me he might like some attention.

“Do you want me to read to you?” He shook his head no, but I wondered again what kind of grandmother I was. Shouldn’t I be reading him a book? Spending some quality time with him?

What kind of grandmother am I?

I continued working on my laptop, thinking about the time my daughter Elizabeth had been complaining about the chores she needed to get done around the house and my granddaughter Rebecca blurted out, “How would you like to be Grandma and have to write all the time?” Even my granddaughter notices I spend a good deal of time writing.

When David turned on the television, I put the laptop aside and sat next to him. While I don’t care for many television programs, David will watch several each evening and I enjoy sitting next to him. Jacob quietly turned the pages of a book for a few minutes, and then got up and brought a blanket to me, silently climbing up onto my lap. I covered him with the blanket and put my arm around him, unsure how to hold him. Would I scare him away if I brought him too close to me? Did he like an arm around his back? Did he want to cuddle, or just sit and watch television? I was disappointed when he jumped off my lap just a few minutes later, bounding back and forth in the living room. Had I held him wrong?

Then I noticed a cartoon animal in the television commercial doing the same thing. “Look, there’s Jacob on television,” I pointed out to David, and Jacob shyly smiled and with a renewed effort, zipped back and forth in the room with a zest that would normally warrant a warning from David to slow down. Instead, my husband reached for my hand and whispered so quietly I almost didn’t hear him, “Just think, a year ago we weren’t sure he was going to make it.” We both watched him take another leap in the air to the chair, and then off again. When the commercial ended, Jacob headed back to my lap, and this time I didn’t hesitate to bring him close and kiss the top of his head. We stayed like that for another half hour, watching television in companionable silence before it was time for them to go home.

What kind of Grandmother am I? One who rarely bakes cookies, never wears an apron, and who feeds her grandchildren the novelty of a microwavable meal in a red box. A grandmother who spends an inordinate amount of time writing and working on her computer.

 I’m a grandma who will gladly wrap her grandson in a soft warm blanket and hold him on her lap, reveling in his presence.

That’s the kind of Grandma I am.

I remember this kind of weather one other year in my adulthood. It was 1981, and both my husband David and I were college students at UNI, living in married student housing with our young son, Danny. This is a photo of me taking little Danny for a walk on the UNI campus. It was January, and I remember marveling to my husband that I could get by with just a sweater on a January day.

I remember a lot of things, looking at this photo; the jeans I wore were too long and they skimmed the sidewalk when I walked, fraying at the edges. The sweater was a cotton blend but still itched a bit, the brown purse a cheap plastic. I couldn’t know it then, but Dan would be one of the few of our eight babies who would leave his hats on when we pulled them onto his little round head. Our second child, our daughter Elizabeth, was also a compliant baby and toddler in this regard, even submitting to the donning of a soft fur hat with large fuzzy balls on the ends of the ties and a matching fur muff to cover her hands.  Dan also eagerly stuck out his little chubby foot for shoes and socks whenever he heard the word “outside,” which he did almost daily that particular winter.

Yesterday morning, with Iowa temperatures in the balmy range we’ve all gotten used to, the weather forecast was startling in its predictions; 3-6 inches of snow, wind, sub-zero wind chills. We were bound to get this at some point. In fact, we expected it. Perhaps even anticipated it?  For despite the agreeability of a mild winter, there is no denying that tiny thrill at the first snowfall.  I woke up this morning long before everyone else, wanting to see what had transpired outside while we slept. It was obvious it had snowed; I could see the white garage roof on my way down the stairs. But how much? Would it be enough to use the snow blower my husband had bought me for my birthday? Would it be snowman snow? Snow-angel depth?  This was the view from my front door; the white stuff covering the sidewalks and road, a view that includes my son’s house across the street.

The forecast is for continued snowfall and blowing winds. It won’t be long before that little boy in the stroller in the photo, now 31 and refusing to wear a hat most winter days, steps outside his door to clean his sidewalks. I’ll be outside, too, trying out the new toy my husband bought to save my back. (Since we moved to town I have volunteered for the snow-shoveling chore, relishing the fresh cold air and the excuse for some good physical labor, but last year I hurt my back in doing so) Maybe we’ll call out to each other across the street, lamenting the abrupt arrival of a long-overdue Iowa winter. Despite the fact that I am aware of how eager Dan is to break free from Manchester, I relish living across the street from my firstborn and seeing him on a regular basis, having a son as a neighbor. He’s a hard worker; he often pitches in to clean an elderly neighbor’s driveway.  I might see him out the window later today, pausing from the exertion of shoveling snow.  He’ll look up to the sky, wondering how much more snow to expect.  He’ll spot his mother’s face in the window and wave.  I’ll wave back, not seeing my adult son, but instead seeing that little boy in the stroller, laughing the boisterous, contagious laugh he has retained.

And I’ll remember that long-ago winter, the last winter I remember like this, the winter of 1981.

Love to see my bookshelves? Other than our own homeschooling books and a large educational reference section, I only owned copies of my favorite adult fiction books, books that were neither sought after by my customers or valuable. I didn’t keep any of the wonderful children’s books I found at library book sales. I couldn’t afford to. I hoped someday to begin collecting old children’s books for myself. Getting on the Internet as a bookseller made that idea even more remote, considering my need for income. I didn’t jump on the Internet bandwagon until 1998. The first thing I did was check out the website I’d been hearing about in hushed whispers at the book sales I’d been attending: eBay. When I typed in the search box to see what some of the books I couldn’t keep in stock were selling for, all of a sudden the recent behavior of one of my best customers made a whole lot of sense to me. This woman from New York had taken to calling me every month with her orders, to get a jump on the other customers. Not only that, but she’d started offering me more money if I’d become her personal shopper. “I’ll give you $15-$20 for every Janet Lambert you can find for me, and even more for the Maud Hart Lovelace and Lenora Mattingly Weber books you can find. We needed the extra money, and for a month or two I’d allowed this customer the heads-up advantage to my other regular customers. As I scrolled through the offerings of these books on eBay, I could barely take in what I was seeing. The same books this woman had offered me $25 for were selling for $250 on eBay! At that time, it was simple to discern a seller’s e-mail address just by clicking on their user name. Sure enough, one of the top sellers on the auction site was, in fact, my homeschooling New York mother, the same mother who’d told me the month before that she’d put her children back in school because she’d started up a home business that was taking up too much of her time. Apparently, a home business that involved re-selling $200 worth of books every month from me for ten times that amount on the Internet. The Lois Lenski books I’d hoped to own someday? They regularly sold for anywhere from $50 to $200. All except Strawberry Girl and Corn Farm Boy. I allowed myself to keep those two titles, and everything else I got my hands on went either on my mailing list or posted on eBay. Unfortunately for that New York customer, her rich Iowa source of books dried up, but so did the easy access to that type of book. Everyone who sold books was looking for the same titles, and most of the nearby libraries had already gotten rid of their supply of discards. There were a few golden years of eBay selling when certain authors and titles were so highly sought after, I couldn’t believe that I’d sold the same books for less than $10 on my mailing list. How fickle the world of book selling is. Now, when I do a search on eBay, some of the books that sold then for $250, can sell for as little as $5.00. But during the heyday of children’s book selling, I soon had to rely on the occasional garage sale and thrift store finds to make any decent amount of money through eBay sales. Once I was on the Internet, I stopped doing a mailing list. I missed the regular interaction with book-loving homeschoolers, the bartering, and mostly, dealing with all the books. We moved soon after I discovered Internet selling, and for ten years I lived in the country, occasionally selling on eBay, but mostly finding other ways to make money. I never stopped attending book sales, though. And occasionally, I would find a gem that I could rationalize keeping on my own shelf, until I’d filled one shelf of a bookcase, and started on another. I think about those days sometimes; the heady rush of finding the perfect book for one of my customers and the thousands of books that passed through my hands to find a new home; a home that wasn’t my own. It is only in the past few years I’ve started to stock my own selection of children’s books. As a little girl I imagined that only rich people could own books, and now I have bookcases bulging with books. As a homeschooling mother trying to stay afloat by selling books, I imagined someday owning the books I unearthed at sales and sold so easily. I carted home literally thousands of Childhood of Famous Americans volumes and sold them as quickly as I found them. I haven’t seen any of those for several years now. The Landmark series books were the same. I’d pick up dozens at each library sale. Now I only see one or two a year. And the Lois Lenski books I reluctantly sold to my customers? I regularly check their prices on eBay and while they don’t sell for $200 anymore, I still can’t rationalize paying $50 for a children’s book just to fill my own shelves. But I am picking up children’s books here and there, now and then. I do allow myself that luxury, the luxury of owning something that brings a smile to my face every time I pass my bookshelf.

I check the “Under $10” cart of nostalgia at the HalfPrice bookstore every time I shop there, too. Sometimes, I’ll buy one of the books that speak to me, like these two books that I found on the marked-down shelf last time I visited.

 The beauty of their covers fills me with a joy that far surpasses their $5 and $7 price tags. I even occasionally stop at the library in the small town where I grew up. I worked there as a teen, and then again in 2002 for a few months. Usually, I won’t find any books I want on their sale shelf, but last week I not only found a couple Vera and Bill Cleaver books I remember reading as a teen, but I unearthed an unexpected bonus. They hadn’t removed the card pocket or the library card yet, and there it was; my name, written on the top line in May of 1977. My little sister’s name was down at the bottom of the card. She’d checked the book out more than a year later.

I pointed this out to the librarian when I brought the book up to the desk to pay for it. She seemed a bit disgruntled that the card hadn’t been removed yet, and before I could stop her, tore the card pocket out of the book. I gasped out loud, and before she could tear it in half, I blurted out that I’d like to keep the card. She cocked her head and looked at me a little funny before handing it over. I would have had a difficult time explaining exactly why I wanted it; how looking at it was like taking a swift trip back in time to my teens.

Kind of like the feeling I get every time I hold a copy of a much-loved book from my childhood.

A couple of days ago, I wrote down these words from Mary DeMuth’s memoir, Thin Places:

“I have this little idea that worms its way through my head, that perhaps God is redeeming my father’s writing through my pen. He’s completing my father’s genius in me, but He’s doing it through my own frailty. I’m no genius. I’m a mess half the time. But God’s great work of redemption spans the generations. When I put words to the page, I wonder if my Dad can see me. Does he smile?” (page 70)

I have wondered something similar since my mother’s death. My mother had many talents; among them woodcarving, sewing, painting, and drawing. The writing that she did later in life held the promise of talent as well. I never pictured her as a writer until after her death, though surely anyone who spends months on manuscripts is, indeed, a writer. That she did not live long enough to perfect that talent saddens me. In a couple of weeks I will be teaching a course for a community college, Writing for Publication. While interviewing a woman in her 80’s for the newspaper, I discovered she had written down pages of information in anticipation of our meeting. Without thinking, I gasped at the sight, “Why, you’re a writer!” The woman blushed with pleasure, and told me she had filled notebooks with memories for her children. “Mom writes down everything,” her daughter interjected, “I don’t know what we’ll do with all of it after she is gone.”  I told the daughter I owned a trunk full of my mother’s writing, and I hoped to do something with it someday. Even as I spoke, the image of my mother submitting to publishers and editors was vivid in my mind, and I felt like crying. She had so little published, but she stubbornly persisted. While I’d thrown out one notebook of carefully transcribed rejections, I kept the tangible proof of her continued submissions; the carefully typed drafts that had been mailed out to such places as the Chicken Soup publishers, the ones I have recently had three essays accepted by. My mother possessed the very stubbornness I saw in this woman’s face as she confessed she’d hoped to have something published someday. Her daughter seemed taken aback at this admission; she must have thought her mother’s scribbling had only been intended for the family’s posterity.

“Someone should give you a writing class for a Christmas gift,” I said then, with a meaningful glance at the daughter.  A week later, the woman called me on the pretense of complimenting my article, but the true meaning of the call became apparent when she blurted out, “I’m going to take your class.”  I could literally feel my mother’s smile when I assured the woman it is never too late to get published.

The day after I read Mary DeMuth’s Thin Places, an e-mail arrived in my inbox with a New Year’s challenge from the author. “If God were to give you a picture this year in anticipation for 2012, what would it be?” she asked, and then she shared her picture. It didn’t take me long to come up with a picture to frame my year. In fact, I would have to be blind not to have seen the obvious choice. What photo was on the front of the journal I’d written DeMuth’s quote in? What picture was on the personalized stamps I’d used on two letters that morning?

Where had I been writing most of last winter and early spring? I’d grieved, I’d dreamed, and I’d been inspired at the very table and in the very house where most of my mother’s creativity had flourished. On one of my many trips to my mother’s empty house I’d snapped a photo of my private writing retreat, and the memories of those writing sessions will continue to sustain me in this journey of faith I am taking. For it takes true faith to follow one’s passions and believe there is a future in the world of writing words. “Don’t quit your day job,” I’ve heard as advice given to writers, but writing is my day job. Income from writing, teaching, and public speaking is crucial to my family’s well-being. And as much as I know my hard work in writing and promoting has paid off in filling a 2012 calendar with deadlines, classes, and public speaking, I truly believe none of it could have happened without my faith. I believe God has a plan for me, and I am excited to see where he takes me this year. This photo will be my chosen guide this year.

Because with each article published, with each success, I can look at this photo and know HE is a part of it. HE is with me, and maybe, just maybe, my mother is too.

What do you picture for your life in 2012? Do you have a photo that inspires you?

It has been more than a year, and my heart still aches with thoughts of her.  I miss her.

None of the people I interviewed had a photo to submit, but one had a Christmas card he hoped would be included in the article, sent in 1944 from the ship Grayson.  I flipped through many photo albums looking for a picture of my mother at Christmas. 1950s photos weren’t appropriate for the 1930s theme, but I did find a photo of my mother as a little girl, standing next to a doll on a rocking chair.  I had no way of knowing the truth of the statement I submitted along with the picture to my editor, but I cannot tell you the thrill I got seeing my mother’s cute little girl facing staring back at me when I opened the newspaper yesterday. Normally I would skim my article to see how it reads in print, but this time I didn’t even care about what I’d written; my joy was in seeing that photo.

Consider this: I’ve had several essays included in Chicken Soup books in the last few months, but it is the short memoir that will be included in the February-released So Long: Short Narratives of Loss and Remembrance from Telling Our Stories Press that I am even more excited about. Why? The short memoir includes essays about my mother’s cancer diagnosis, her subsequent death, and the months of grief that followed. When sample galleys were sent to me to review, I immediately scrolled through the pages until I spotted the photo of my mother that was indeed, going to be included.  I smile every time I think of it. My mother would be pleased.

Much of my writing has become a way of honoring a creative mother who encouraged me to use my talents. It is only fitting, then, that I occasionally include her in my essays and articles.

Even when I sneak a photo of her into an article on Christmas memories. The dolly and rocking chair may very well have been homemade and a Christmas gift. Or not. But that cute little face? It definitely adds something to the column.

According to my calendar, it has been five weeks since I returned home from the HACWN Writer’s Conference, and I still haven’t had time to process everything I learned. I do know I would highly recommend that writers attend conferences. This was only my second conference ever but both were amazing experiences I won’t soon forget and hope to repeat in 2012.

So, what exactly did I learn at these conferences, and how have I implemented the advice and inspiration I netted?  These are the five main areas I, and every writer, needs to work on in the coming year;

#1 Writers, especially non-fiction writers, need to build up their platform.  I’m working at this one, so that by the time my book is sold my platform will be broader and stronger. I have couponing workshops set up in the beginning of 2012 as well as a new column appearing in a larger newspaper. I’ve also got queries out to some national magazines for articles on my subject of interest.

#2 Non-fiction writers should make themselves an expert.  Not only have I started a second blog that centers on my book’s subject, CrazyCouponer.blogspot.com, but I will soon be writing a regular column for a larger newspaper on the subject of couponing. I have several upcoming couponing workshops set up, as well.

#3 If God opens a door, walk right through it.  I love this advice. God has been opening many doors for me this past year, and while initially, I was somewhat hesitant to discover what is on the other side of the door (public speaking, coupon workshops, interviewing people for feature articles) I am finding that I love all of it! After I did my first coupon workshop and the coordinator was walking with me to the parking lot, she mentioned sending the check on the 16th and I blurted out, “Oh, yeah, I forgot I get paid to have this much fun!”  When a newspaper editor e-mailed me, as a coupon expert, and asked if I would meet with him, I didn’t know what he had in mind, but I didn’t hesitate at all. I was eager to meet with him, and that meeting might well develop into a regular column for their paper.

#4 Don’t hide your light under a bushel. This is a bit difficult for me. It doesn’t come natural to me to toot my own horn but I need to be able to promote my writing and my classes.  Why should anyone take a  coupon workshop or a writing class from me? If I can’t tell them, who can? So I write the class description that includes my qualifications, include a glowing bio along with my essay submissions, and hand out business cards and learn to talk about myself and my work. It is getting easier, and I remind myself; if God gave me the talent to write and talk, why would he want me to hide either? I also remind myself to always use those talents for good, not evil.

#5 Keep your blogs updated; twice a week or more.  I’ve done pretty well on that front for the last couple of years but now my time is torn between two blogs and I’m afraid I’ve sluffed off recently. Certainly I can get back on track after the holidays. One workshop presenter suggested posting a photo or a favorite saying during those weeks when you can’t seem to get a decent post written.  I’ve dug in my files many times for articles and essays I’ve written that were never published, and used those when I am low on time and inspiration, but haven’t resorted to a simple photo or quotation too often. I’ll likely have to consider doing so as I get even busier.

After last week’s lament about not getting my Christmas letter written, I could have posted the final product for those not on my list.  Perhaps I’ll do that if my inspiration well runs dry the rest of this week.

“What’s up? You always have your Christmas cards out by this time every year.” a friend asked recently, speaking a truth that weighed heavily on my own mind. Even the year my husband went through cancer, and last year when I lost my mother in November, I had my Christmas cards addressed and sent by St Nicholas Day. Last year I’d even gone through my deceased mother’s address book, adding her Christmas card list to my own, still finishing up by December 6th.  http://marypotterkenyon.com/2010/12/01/odyssey-of-an-address-book/

But this year the writing of the Christmas letter seemed too much.  Every time I pulled out the cards and the paper, I found myself uncharacteristically moping a bit, and everyone knows that a Christmas letter is meant to uplift and cheer, not become a litany of complaints. Surely, the events of the past eighteen months had finally caught up with me; the loss of my husband’s job in July, my mother’s death in November, my grandson’s December cancer diagnosis and subsequent surgery and chemotherapy treatment.

Up and down, my emotions went, causing me to wonder if I was experiencing an as yet undiagnosed mental disorder. The highs and lows had been frighteningly more frequent since Thanksgiving, until I realized that for all I was doing for my writing career in the way of designing a new blog, sending out queries to magazines, and networking, the one thing my life was lacking was actual writing. My husband noticed the difference. For several days I was blissfuly happy while I worked on an essay with a December 31st deadline. Of course, I had no time during those joyous days in which to work on my holiday letter. The funk hit once again, shortly after I pushed that “Submit” button. I could not bear to interview a local person about the lap robes they made each year for residents of a nursing home. Just the thought of something called a “lap robe” was depressing. I e-mailed the editor of the newspaper and asked if someone else could do the interview, using the valid excuse of the death of two close friends and my need for grieving time. The editor, unaccustomed to me asking for an “out” on anything I’d agreed to, swiftly responded that it would be no problem. One less stressor, but still that letter would not come.  I got up early every morning, put on my favorite Christmas CD and willed it to appear, to no avail.

I must be depressed, I told myself, even as I wondered how I could make that work in an article.  We writers are not very nice people; we take the pain and anguish, despair and despondency, of ourselves and others, and work it in our minds until we can put pen to paper and describe it in excrutiating detail. We mean well, but standing in line at a wake yesterday, I hated myself for wondering what words I could use to describe the crumpling of the face and the sobbing of the woman behind me.

“It is no use! I will just send out cards without a letter this year!” I exclaimed to my husband this morning, and he nodded his head and shrugged his shoulders, likely wondering what difference it made. He does not understand the burden of the writer who must put words to everything, including another year’s passing. I got out the boxes of cards and the address book, but decided to check my e-mail first, the ultimate in the writer’s procrastination arsenal.  An e-mail from the newspaper editor informed me that our county historical society wanted to feature one of my newsaper interviews in their promotional materials. My breath quickened, my heart leaped in excitement, and I jumped up from the desk chair to share the news with my husband, who smiled broadly back at me as I shared this good news.

And then it hit me. I was happy! I was most assuredly excited! Life was good. If I were so inclined, I could sit down right at that moment and crank out a grateful and inspiring Christmas letter.

I reflected a bit then, on the busy days since Thanksgiving. When had I been the happiest? Being alone with my husband brought contentment, as had the few quiet contemplative moments I’d managed to grasp.  When working on that essay I’d surely been happy, but also every time I got an e-mail or an acknowledgement of my writing; the book signing at Barnes & Noble for the two Chicken Soup books I was featured in, the e-mail from the newspaper editor who wanted to speak with me regarding my “expert” status as a couponer, the e-mail from a Chicken Soup editor regarding the acceptance of an essay…

I wasn’t depressed.

I’d become a writing junkie, needing the “fix” of a good writing session, the “jolt” of an acceptance, or the “drug” of accolades for my writing in order to feel good.

And we all know there is only one antidote to that kind of desperate need:

Keep writing.

Even if that writing is in the form of a Christmas letter.