Happy Birthday To Me!

I don't ordinarily draw attention to my birthday.  Today, though, I've given myself such an extraordinary present that I just have to tell you about it.

Most of you know that I've been unemployed for quite some time.  I've sent out dozens of applications, had a few interviews and still haven't found a job.  The past couple of weeks I've really beat myself up over it.  I had decided that I had to find something if it was no more than cleaning motel rooms.  Hey, I'm not proud, I cleaned and delivered portable toilets for a while.  You don't go much lower on the desirable jobs list than that.

Yesterday, depressed and out of sorts with myself, I had resolved to get out there and take the first job I could find, no matter what it was.  I just couldn't make myself do it.  Somehow, deep inside I felt that if I did I would be letting myself down by settling for less than what God had in mind for me.  Even so, I had no idea what He intends for me.  I spent the entire day wrestling with it.  At dusk I went for a walk.  I do some of my best thinking while walking.  It didn't take long.  I came up with the same conclusion I have on other walks, but this time I had the details.

I remember coming home from such a walk a few months ago.  Sweetie asked what I'd found out.  I told her that I felt that I was focusing too much on the problem and not enough on the solution.  Quite frankly, I had no idea what that meant.  This time I came home understanding quite certainly.

Most of you know I have a flood-gutted basement that has been so for three years.  I've had that troublesome problem hanging over my head all that time.  I had set out the fix it myself.  I even added to the problem by moving the stairwell and rearranging the rooms down there.  Much of the stuff we had down there is still stacked in the carport, rendering it useless for its intended purpose.  We've been slowly going though all that intending to have a yard sale.  Every free moment I've had has been overshadowed by the monster down stairs.  Every decision seems based on recovering from that disaster.  Too often I've had to choose between good and best as I've tried to move on with my life.  Too often, rather than choose, I've caved in to the overwhelming volume of the task and done nothing.

As I pondered these situations and my less than stellar response to them, it occurred to me that I might be barking up the wrong tree.  I remember Stephen R. Covey suggesting that we sometimes climb the ladder of success only to find it leaning against the wrong wall.  I began to wonder if that was it.  Covey also says that energy comes from oxygen and interest.  I had to admit that I had neither.  I'd quit working out and worse, I had no passion for anything I was doing.  That is except my service at the Detention Center.  I dared to begin to ask myself if there was anything out there that I was passionate about.  I dared imagine doing something I could hardly avoid doing because it inspired and motivated me so much.  I began to think about writing.

I've dabbled in writing most of my life.  But, most of my life I've been busy with work and other demands and seldom found the time to really develop my craft and thoroughtly discover my voice.  That is where my passion lies, that is what will get me out of bed in the morning.  That it is something that could make me want a prolonged and productive life.  Money, even enough to pay the bills just doesn't motivate me any more.  Life has got to have more meaning than to just plod through mundane tasks for a paycheck.

I began to understand what I must do.  I talked it over with Sweetie and received the best Birthday gift she could have given me - Whole-Hearted Support.

So today, on my 60th Birthday I am no longer unemployed.  I am a writer!  That is my job!  This new job has some pretty stiff requirements and it won't be easy, but I am on fire!  I am absolutely going in the right direction!  I can feel it in the depths of my soul.  I have finally given myself permission to pursue my dream.  The basement can wait or be worked on after work and on the weekends.

 I have an investment I can liquidate which will sustain us for a couple of months.  After that we'll just have to see.  I wrote a couple of days ago about seeing with the eye of faith and then going forth and making that vision come to pass.  I am willing to do that.  It will require a lot of discipline, at lot of courage and a lot of faith.  I hardly slept last night for excitement.  Yet I knew that my new job requires me to show up on time and to labor with integrity.  So I got up at six and did my morning routine so I could be showered, shaved and dressed for work on time.  I've been self employed before and I'm pretty scared of my boss.  He's quite the evil task master.  It'll take some getting used to.  I'll need to recalibrate my daily patterns to fit my new obligation.  But hey, no more shift work.  No more working on the Sabbath.  I should work out just fine.

Now, I have a few of favors to ask.  First, I'm fully aware that pulling this off with require a miracle.  I also know that the miracle is not likely to come until after the trial of my faith.  If you believe in what I'm doing, encourage me, please!  If you don't, please try to keep quiet.  I know how foolish this may sound to some of you.  There will be days when it will sound foolish to me.

Second, when I succeed, please help me to stay humble.  I don't want to ever be found taking credit for a miracle only God can perform.

Third, eventually, and hopefully soon, I'm going to have make some money with my writing.  You can be of great help with that.  Please visit my blog and its peripherals often and when you find something that genuinely pleases or inspires you, would you just forward it to friends and family who might like it.  That little gift alone will likely make all the difference.  I'm not yet prepared to send anything to a publisher, but developing a reputation will most certainly enhance my possibilities and broaden my prospects.

Now, skeptic or fan, I've laid it out there.  You are free to judge me as a fool or a visionary.  All I know is that for the first time in a long time, I feel like I'm working on the solution instead of the problem.

Book Review - Fighting Ruben Wolfe by Markus Zusak

Markus Zusak is one of my favorite authors.  He's young, off the wall/Australian and very interesting to read.  I keep wondering where he gets his insight as much of his most important work was written in his late teens and early twenties.  Maybe I should read his biography......BRB.....Wikipedia didn't have that much to add.  Disappointment.  BTW, Zusak is a master of the one word sentence.  Emulation.

Since I spend a lot of time working with at-risk youth, this book was a prize for me.  It was a realistic chance to get inside the head of one of them and get a better understanding of how the wheels turn in there.  In fact I plan on including it in the library at the Detention Center because I think it would help many of them understand their own motivations and frustrations.

Conclusions:  People need a purpose.  I can relate, I need a purpose.  It was exhilarating to see the change in Ruben and Cameron, the two main characters, brothers, when they moved from hanging around with nothing to do, to having a sense of purpose, albeit a rather shady one.  Their motivation level went through the roof and the rate of personal discovery and maturity did too.

I was stunned to discover that assurance of winning took a second seat to the hunger and insecurity of mere fighting.  To learn that being a fighter with heart captivated the fans far more than being a dominant sure-fire victor.  It also captivated the fighters and in the end raised each, as well as their family to a higher, more courageous, more comfortable place.  It somehow becomes a whole new twist on enjoying the journey as well as - perhaps instead of - the destination.  It's about living life rather than achieving or dominating it.  A big part of the thrill and most of the reward in life lies in, not in spite of its intrinsic uncertainty.  I love that.  Success and satisfaction in life are far greater in an environment of opposition than in one of certainty and security.

I used to read a lot of self-help books but none of them teaches like a truly great novel.  Thanks to Booklogged, I hardly waste any time on less than great books anymore.  It is always such a serendipitous moment to discover priceless gems in quite unlikely places.  This little book was replete with them.  Thank you Markus and Booklogged.

Four stars.

Book Review - The Spyglass by Richard Paul Evans

This morning I taught a lesson at my church meetings at the Detention Center.  Again, as I often do, I read this book to them.  Its message is profound.

A visitor comes to an impoverished and run down Kingdom.  Everyone is depressed and discouraged with their little beat up corner of the world.  The visitor lets the King look through his Spyglass wherein everything he views looks as it could be.  What a marvelous kingdom he beholds through the glass.  The visitor allows the King to keep the Spyglass for a couple of years.  For those years he lets his subjects look through the glass and see what might be with a little elbow grease and determination.  The Kingdom is transformed.  When the traveler returns for the Spyglass the King is reluctant to give it up.  Only then, under the tutelage of the visitor, does he come to realize that all he really needs if faith.  Nothing starts without Faith.  The Spyglass helped them to have Faith that desirable results will  come of their efforts.  Now, they were ready to envision their own futures and go forward with Faith in promising results.

Years ago, when I found this great little book, I longed to have a spyglass of my own.  I searched and searched and one day I found one, on E-bay.  A Spyglass very nearly identical to the one on the cover of the book.  It isn't magic, though it is wonderful with 150 year old optics that amaze me.  I keep it on a shelf to remind me that I too can accomplish what I envision through Faith.  My own Kingdom has become run down and in disrepair, just as Evans' fictional Kingdom did.  This week I almost gave up on the vision of putting things right and coming back to the (unappreciated) splendor of the past.  I looked through my Spyglass for the first time in a long time and found it to be a lot more magical than I expected.  I am going to make it so.  I am going to repair the basement.  I am going to write my books.  I am going to go back to Newfoundland.  I am going to find a way to help our kids stay out of Detention.  I've never stopped dreaming of these things, I just lost faith in their accomplishment.  Today as I looked through the Spyglass I saw with the eye of Faith.

Book Review - Frankenstein - Lost Souls, Book 4, by Dean Koontz

Somehow I thought Dean Koontz's Frankenstein Series was a trilogy.  So, you can imagine my surprise when my daughter presented book four to me for Father's Day!  I was thunderstruck!  I guess that's better than Victor Frankenstein's monster who was lightningstruck.  Or is that the same thing?

Koontz's style becomes ever more breezy as he matures.  But the content remains full of depth and meaning.  As the legacy of Dr. Frankenstein remains, in the current time frame, Dean examines what it means to be human, to be flawed, to be influenced by love and fear.  It is easy for me to wish for perfection and power, until my favorite author explains the hideous ramifications of such a misbegotten dream.

Michael and Carson are still at it, as is Deucalion.  Heroes in the fight to stop Frankenstein's diabolical and ever more modern assault on humankind.  And, this book is but the beginning, the most recent battle has just begun.  I'm happy to report that there will be more Frankenstein in my future and hopefully yours.  Of course, while I am very excited to have made this discovery, I hope Dean is devoting at least a little time to more of Odd Thomas.  Though it wouldn't surprise me if Odd showed up and kicked the mad doctor's butt in his own humble way and showed Carson and Michael that there really is more than one way to skin a cat.

Book Review - Louise Penny's Chief Inspector Gamache Series

I suppose I'm cheating by reviewing these novels collectively.  I can't really help it.  They were so captivating that I couldn't stop to review them but had to hurry on to the next installment.

Booklogged has been working on me pretty hard to read these and I wonder why I ever resist her suggestions.  She and I traveled to Quebec three years ago this month.  I found the graves of some of my ancestors in a little town called Sutton near the Vermont border.  We fell in love with the place as well as nearby Knowlton.  These books are set in the same general vicinity and the charm of Penny's village of Three Pines and the wonderful people who live there take me back to that priceless journey.

Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, our main character finds himself visiting Three Pines all too frequently if you judge a village by the number of murders that take place there.  But, he (who resides in Montreal) and the locals are such a delightful combination I found myself disappointed that the fifth volume wasn't centered in Three Pines.  That is until I actually read it.

Penny artfully uses her mysteries to examine human nature.  Her insight is magnificent and delightful.  Great writers teach us about ourselves and so it is with Penny's work.  As she examines the hearts of her richly developed characters she gives me a view into my own heart and motivations.  Inspector Gamache is set up to be the bench mark of character and wholeness.  We measure the others and ourselves against his qualities we are all wont to emulate.  As they, and we spend time in his presence we grow in honesty, candor, integrity, peace and surety.

Here a couple of quotes that impressed and inspired me:

Our secrets make us sick because the separate us from other people.  Keep us alone.  Turn us into fearful, angry, bitter people.  Turn us against others and finally against ourselves.

Attachment masquerades as love, pity as compassion and indifference as equanimity.

She looked at him.  She often felt foolish, ill constructed, next to others. Beside Gamache she only ever felt whole.

I can't think of a thing I'd rather have said about me than that last quote.  It would be so grand to be so confident and comfortable with one's self that you only ever spent yourself lifting others.  It is interesting that while Armand Gamache spends his time catching murderers, he accomplishes much more by helping heal broken hearts and souls.  His chief weapon?  An attentive, listening ear.  I need to spend more time with Armand Gamache.

The next novel in Louise Penny's Chief Inspector Gamache series is set in Quebec City, another favorite place of mine.  There are hints that Three Pines, still plays a role, however.  It is called Bury Your Dead and is expected out in September.

I've often dissed on book series', but this time it occurred to me that it is a very efficient method considering that characters need not be introduced more than once.  In this case, I have such a fondness for several characters, I look forward to spending more time with them.

People say Quebec is not a very welcoming place and that they despise Anglo-phones.  Such was not our experience.  We spent a day and a half in eastern Quebec and never found anyone who spoke any English.  Still they treated us with kindness and were most pleasant in their efforts to assist us despite our language and cultural differences.  If others have a different experience my guess is they took the disharmony with them in their own luggage.  I suspect Louise Penny would say the same.

A joyous five stars!