What inspires you?

Where do you find your writing inspiration? When a reader asked that recently, I had to think, and the more I thought, the more multi-faceted the answer became. Here are a few sources I rely on.

Stories to Tell - If an idea keeps hanging around, whether it's in my face or hiding in the weeds, of it keeps making itself known, that's inspiration. The idea for the novel I'm writing now (historical fiction roughly based on my grandparents, circa 1914) has been with me for a good 50 years. I couldn't ignore the story anymore.

Butt Glue - "I write when I'm inspired, and I see to it that I'm inspired at 9 o'clock every morning."-- Peter De Vries, American editor and novelist.   What I've learned is that if I sit down to write--and stay there, regardless--I WILL write. Someone referred to this source of inspiration as 'butt glue.' I buy it by the barrel.

Deadlines - Every two weeks, I meet with my writing buddy. We've each committed to having copy for the other to critique for every meeting. My years as a public relations counselor serve me well. If there's a deadline, I meet it.

Mighty Forces - Barbara Robinette Moss, author of Change Me Into Zeus's Daughter, signed my copy of her book, "Be brave, and mighty forces will come to your aid." I didn't know at the time what those mighty forces might be, but there have been many. My mother, for one, kept telling me I could write our family stories. She believed in me and kept telling me that until my memoir was finally published. Along side my mother were writing teachers, writing buddies, readers, family, friends. All, mighty forces.

Nature - The beauty of the outdoors always inspires. Bursts of spring flowers. Gale-force winds. Snow drifts blanketing the landscape. Steams trickling and floods raging. That's why you see me blogging so often about my prairie, which is both teacher and inspiration.

On any given day, one of these--or several--may come into play at just the right moment. And isn't that the way of inspiration?

There are more sources that inspire me. In fact, I'm already thinking of several. I could go on. But these are a good start.

And now I ask, What inspires you?

Old dog, more new tricks

"Maybe I can retire before I have to learn this." That's a thought that actually ran through my mind in the 1990s when the Internet was new and I was struggling to figure out the brand new technology. 

That memory popped to mind this past week as I struggled to figure out Twitter. I signed up for Twitter because I know social media is critical to effective book marketing these days.

From a book marketing workshop run by Melissa Foster, I learned that effective tweeting requires posts a dozen times a day! And your Twitter effort can be accomplished in 30 minutes a day. Ha! Ha!  Just thinking of a dozen worthwhile things to say in a day boggles my mind. Melissa provided tips and tools (Tweetdeck) and a community (World Literary Cafe) to help make the task doable.

Right now, I'm bordering on overload. I spend more like an hour and a half a day on Twitter, which does not count the time I lay awake in the middle of the night trying to think of ways to fit my normally wordy self into 140 characters or fewer. Egads!

But, I did learn to use the Internet and from there, I set up my own website - a must for any author. Then I learned Facebook. Then blogging. With each new platform came new vocabulary and new skills. Now Twitter. I must believe I'll learn this one, too. And still find time in the day to write my novel.

I've always said that everyday that I learn something new is a good day. I guess this has been a really GOOD week!  Now that I have the Internet, I could no more imagine living without it than live without breathing. And that's hardly an exaggeration.

Will Twitter be like that? As I prepare another round of Tweets, I can only hope so.  In the meantime, I'd be honored if you followed me on Twitter - @CABodensteiner

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Melissa Foster is a best-selling author of several books, including  COME BACK TO ME. She founded World Literary Cafe, a supportive on-line author community,

Doing laundry with a brick

This morning, I went to the laundry room and propped the brick back against the dryer 'on' button. It began to whir. This was at least the 5th time I'd propped the brick back in place for this single load.  I heaved a heavy sigh - laundry is SO difficult. 

Then, as I sat down with my cup of coffee and the morning paper, I realized it is Monday morning and I had the good sense to laugh at myself.

Monday was always laundry day on the farm. All the dirty clothes went down the laundry chute to the basement where Mom sorted everything into piles, pulled the washing machine and rinse tubs out from the wall, filled them with water and began the all-day task of doing the laundry.

In summer, she carried baskets of wet clothes outside and hung them on the clothesline. In winter, she hung each item from lines stung along the basement ceiling.

Laundry took much of the day and it wasn't light work. Yet, Mom had it easier than her mother who took in laundry to support herself and her daughters and used a hand-cranked washtub to do it.

Our dryer is temperamental. The only thing wrong with it is that the 'on' switch doesn't stay on, despite my husband's diligent efforts to fix it. We've devised the brick as an interim solution until the day when we both throw up our hands at the same time and agree it's time to replace the machine.

This Monday morning, as I prop the brick in place and think about laundry day 50 and 100 years ago, I believe I will try not to feel quite so put upon. Wishing you all a modern laundry day!

HNY to you, too

HNY, a friend signed off her email. HNY? What's that? I wondered.

Since I traded my office as a public relations agency executive for an office in my house where I write in relative solitude, I often feel completely out of it when it comes to the latest trends. My writing genre choices don't help - a memoir about my childhood in the 1950s and now historical fiction set in the early 1900s.

These days I spend my time trying to put my head in an era without electricity, a time when horse and buggies were the most common conveyance, a time when a 'glimpse of stocking' was something shocking. It takes a concerted effort to strip away all allusions to electricity, air travel, and sex. Actually, sex is all allusion, so that's a different issue.

One of the things I always enjoyed about working in the public relations world was being on top of the current pop business phrases - "tipping point" and "at the end of the day," for instance.

Alas, I find myself slipping further and further behind. The 2012 Banished Words List actually includes words I still like and use, like "Amazing!" It does not help that I don't use a smart phone. I have a cell phone, but I seldom use it. My texting ability is limited to 'ok.' And I sometimes get that wrong.

Perhaps Twitter will help. I'm trying it out - @CABodensteiner. For someone who is challenged to write short blogs, having only 140 characters forces me to abbreviate.  Twitter demands I keep one toe in the 21st Century.

Hence my problem with HNY. All of a sudden, people are signing off seasonal messages with HNY. It took me an embarrassingly long time to figure out that meant Happy New Year.

Oh well. HNY to all of you!

A trip down tractor lane

Just being around certain things will trigger strong memories.  I know that's how it is with farm kids and tractors. Boys or girls remember the first tractor they drove.

The Midwest Old Thresher's Reunion gave both my husband and me plenty of opportunities to remember our first tractor experiences.  My 'first' was a Farmall H.  I got to drive it for the hay wagon while my dad stacked bales. My fervent prayer was that I wouldn't 'kill it' when I let out the clutch.

My husband's 'first' was a John Deere 730. He remembers it was his first time working the clutch - much easier than the Farmall clutch, I understand. He also has fond memories for the Deere 430 he had on his acreage. Wishes he still had it.

Whenever I talk with groups about my memoir of growing up on the farm, and ask if people remember the first tractor they drove, smiles break out, heads nod, and stories start flying.

Each day of the Reunion, they hold a parade of power. People drive horses, traction steam engines, and gas-powered tractors past the grandstand. I was tickled to see kids driving tractors, with their dads standing right behind them. I just know those kids are going to remember their first tractor.

The right tools for the job

August came, and right on schedule, so did the tomatoes. We've been waiting for this. Our cupboards were bare. But dishpans full of tomatoes to can every third day can be daunting.

Through a serendipitous occurrence a few years ago, we were forced to turn on the old gas range in the basement - the one that came with the house, the one I never anticipated turning on. Our kitchen remodeling was supposed to be done well before August. Instead, the kitchen was torn up throughout the entire month. And tomatoes don't wait.

Fortunately, we had that old stove. Fortunately, it worked. Now I see that the old stove in the basement is perfect for the canning task. Far better than the solid surface electric range in my kitchen. Also perfect are the pans I inherited a few years ago from my mother who canned hundreds (I'm not exaggerating) of quarts and pints of produce every summer for 60 years.

I've canned a couple of dozen jars of tomatoes and salsa each summer over the years, but I've always cobbled the process together from my regular kitchen pans. It all worked but it wasn't easy. Not like using Mom's pans, which all miraculously seem to be exactly the right size and perfectly suited for every canning task.

So now when I start to carry tomatoes into the house, I also pull out Mom's pans. I marvel how much easier having the right tool for the task makes things. When I use her pans, I feel as though Mom is right there with me helping.

That old stove, those old pans, Mom and me. Canning again. It's all just right.

Stepping back in time

I always enjoy a walk down memory lane. One reason is you never know where the walk is going to take you.

Yesterday, I joined a friend and her mother in Boone, Iowa, where her mother grew up and where my friend had many memories of her grandparents. We circled each house and they recalled the rooms behind each window, the trees in the yard, games played in a lot that was vacant 60 years ago and remains vacant today.

Going back home releases memories from deep recesses. As we drove past churches, the park, the library, 'Mom' talked about games she played, boys she dated, the man she married. Boone is also the birthplace of former first lady Mamie Eisenhower. And what do you know? Mom had a story about her family connection to Mrs. Eisenhower.

When I asked about electricity and in-door plumbing, she said yes, she'd had all that growing up in town in the 30s, but she recalled visiting her grandparents who lived outside of town in a railroad car. With an outhouse. That really smelled.

My friend had never heard before about her great grandparents who lived in a railroad car. I'm sure that's a story they'll talk about again.

Those old stories are just waiting to be told. If we trigger the memories. A trip home can really let the memories flow.

Going out with a bang!

This is our last night at Le Macine and what a night it is. Thunder. Lightening. Wind. Electricity out … on … out. Torrential rain. Hail. As I write, it’s been going on for an hour and a half. We thought we’d walk up the hill for one last bite of gourmet pizza before we left. Maybe not.

The stream that has burbled so pleasantly by our kitchen window has turned into a raging river. We’ve taken pictures to mark spots on the wall of the foundation opposite us. Each time we look, the stream is inches higher. It’s whitewater. Literally!

As a writer of memoir, I know that we are more likely to remember the unusual or the painful than what happens as a mundane part of every day. This storm will ensure we remember our last night in Massa Macinaia.  If it had just been another beautiful day in paradise, what’s to remember about that?

We won’t forget this night. Mary had left her bedroom window open – she had hailstones on her bed and a river on the floor.  Water is coming in under the kitchen door and the doors where I’ve sat all these days so blissfully writing have streams of water running down the grout lines.

We took glasses of wine out to the covered front porch on the east side of the house to watch the storm. Wind and rain drove us inside. We saw water pooling under the kitchen door – wind was driving it in from the west side. It’s coming at us from all directions!

It may or may not clear in time for us to walk up the hill for pizza. History says yes; storms pass quickly here. But as they say in the financial world, the past is no predictor of the future. We hope we get supper.

Meanwhile, we pour another glass of wine, eat the last cheese in the house, and spend a memorable last night in our beautiful home in Italy.

Ciao!

Who tells your story?

A maxim of the public relations business is ‘tell your own story or someone else will tell it for you. And you may not like what they say.’

Anyone who has written a memoir has chosen to tell his or her own story. Readers make their own interpretation of those stories. I couldn’t help but think of memoir writing as we walked through Tuscan cemeteries this week.

Each grave is a small bit of personal history – some attempt to tell a story. These graves are all above ground vaults, each decorated with large, fresh, floral bouquets and often an eternal flame. The names and dates of those interred are engraved on the top of the vault. Frequently, religious statuary also tops the grave.

The stories cemeteries tell are cultural, familial and personal. The most personal aspect of each grave was a framed picture of the deceased. It’s these pictures that had me thinking.

Almost always the faces reflected the person near the age that they died. So there was the incongruous image of a 40-year old man with his 70-year old wife. This would not have seemed so unusual except that the images had been merged – not Photoshopped, but very close to it - to appear as though they were taken at the same time. The result appeared as though the man was posing with his mother.

Sometimes, the pictures depicted people of like age, even when the death dates would have indicated images quite different. I imagine the person who chose the pictures – the surviving spouse or the children? – wanted to remember a time when the two were alive. Together. And younger.

Some graves also departed from religious icons. One replaced a religious statue with a set of organ pipes. The picture showed the deceased playing an organ. His story of a life love of music is clear.

The statue on another grave was a bust of the man deceased. His bust looked exactly like his picture. The grave commemorated him. But what about his wife? He had one. There was a small photo of her.

I could not help but recall the graves in my hometown cemetery for Ed Black who was the editor of the local newspaper for 50 years. His tombstone includes his full name and dates of birth and death. His wife’s tombstone is smaller and says simply: Mrs. Black.

The power of place in writing

When I wrote my memoir, I discovered the power of place on writing. I hadn't been on the farm I grew up on in years. Standing in the barnyard, soaking in the familiar sights and smells, caused a rush of memory as powerful as a tidal wave.

Each day after that when I sat down to write about my childhood, I had only to put myself back in that place mentally to see the land, smell the animals, hear the voices, feel the emotions. The result was fertile ground for the stories I would write.

Triggering memories happens differently for different people. Smells - like fresh baked bread. Music - Satisfaction and Brown Sugar - or a singer - Patsy Cline or Frank Sinatra. Photos - my grandmother holding a rooster by the leg. A particular type of flower. A raised voice. Or a very quiet one. Any of these might bring back a person or an event.

One memory leads to another. Once you start remembering, it's hard to stop. And you may be surprised where the memories take you.

I'm thinking about the power of place today because I'm headed to Italy this weekend for a month of writing and touring. I can't imagine the impact looking up each morning to see the sunrise over Tuscan hills will have on my writing but I'm excited to find out.

I'll be blogging about this adventure, so when I know, you'll know. Ciao!

Italian flag photo courtesy of FreeFoto.com
 

A week spent writing

I just returned from a week at the Iowa Summer Writing Festival. Reveling in the energy and inspiration of spending an entire week with people who think about writing, talk about writing, love writing, and actually write.

The workshop I attended was provocatively titled, "I met my old lover on the street last night." This fiction workshop channeled the tensions of interpersonal relationships to create scenes that hold the reader's interest. Using prompts provided by our workshop leader, we wrote every night and read our writing in the next day's class.

Another treat of the week was hearing my writing buddy Mary Gottschalk read from her memoir Sailing Down the Moonbeam at Prairie Lights bookstore.

The opportunity to focus on my writing for an entire week is an amazing gift. In addition to adding chapters to my novel, I came away with starts on several essays to work up. What a great week.

One New Idea Every Day

When I published my memoir, Growing Up Country, my goal was to implement one new marketing idea every day.  With marketing I was finally in my comfort zone! After 30 years in marketing, I knew that even the best product in the world wouldn't sell one unit if no one knew about it.

I was reasonably successful with that lofty goal and book sales showed it.  Now that I've had books in hand for over a year, I've backed off demanding 'one new idea every day,' but the week doesn't go by that I don't think about getting in front of people with my book somehow.

My latest marketing approach is to look for opportunities to write about childhood or farm memories. As we Boomers age, nostalgia is a natural and more media are responding to this interest. My book mention comes in the descriptive author tag.  Just last week, I wrote such a piece for the Des Moines Register's fiftysomething insert.  Titled "Playing in the sky," my recollection was about Dad and Mom helping us kids build and learn to fly kites. 

Whether this piece will result directly in book sales or not remains to be seen.  But what I do know is that having my name and book title in front of my target market pays off over time.  A gentle reminder.