I DO BELIEVE

IT'S TIME FOR THE

INSECURE WRITER’S SUPPORT GROUP BLOG DAY

The first Wednesday of each month, members of IWSG announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG Day post. These questions may prompt you to share insight or a personal experience or story. Remember, the question is optional. IWSG was founded by Alex J. Cavanaugh and is a forum of writers who gather to talk about writing and the writer's life.The awesome co-hosts for the February 5 posting of IWSG are:  Lee Lowery, Ronel Janse van Vuuren, Jennifer Hawes, Cathrina Constantine, and Tyrean Martinson!

February 5 question – Has a single photo or work of art every inspired a story? What was it and did you finish it?

I have posted before...

About things that scared me while growing up...

Like watching Bela Lugosi in Dracula on TV.

Many nights with my head under the covers.....
I believed Dracula was going to morph into a bat...

Fly in my bedroom window...

And turn me into a vampire...
So I kept my window open just a few inches in the summer.

My dad would always come in and open it wide...

“No, daddy,” I’d squeal, “don’t open the window all the way.”

“But it’s too hot in here.”

“But I’m afraid a bird will fly in.”

(Yeah, I wasn’t thinking bird, I was thinking bat)

Reluctantly he’d close it.

But bats and vampires...

Weren’t the only things that scared me.

My parents had quite an interesting  library...

And even before I could read...
I’d peruse the illustrations in those books...

Like Milton’s Paradise Lost

And Dante’s Inferno

Both book illustrations influenced my first book, Azael’s Lot that included angels, fallen angels, and demons

But there’s one illustration... 
In Eugene Field's Poems of Childhood...

That even today gives me the shivers...

It's "Seein' Things at Night"...
Illustrated by Maxfield Parrish.

And why you ask...
Does it still give me the shivers?
Because ghosts...
Are in my “Realms of Possibilities”

Of things that do go bump and boo in the night. 

And you?

Did an illustration or photo ever influence you?

Always,

Em-Musing

POE, ET AL

It’s the

INSECURE WRITER’S SUPPORT GROUP

BLOG DAY

IWSG was founded by Alex J. Cavanaugh and is a forum of writers who gather to talk about writing and the writing life.

The first Wednesday (2nd this month) of each month, a question is posted that members can answer in their blog post. These questions may prompt you to share insight or a personal experience or story. The question is optional.

January 8 question: what started you on your writing journey? Was it a particular book, movie, story, or series? Was it a teacher, coach, spouse, friend, or parent? Or did you suddenly just “know” you wanted to write? It’s all about connecting

The awesome co-hosts for today’s posting are T. Powell Coltrin, Victoria Marie Lees, Stephen Tremp, Renee Scattergood, and J.H. Moncrieff!

First...
Happy New Year! And congratulations to the winners of the DecemberWEP + IWSG Writing Challenge!

Now me...
My love of writing all started when I was ten...

Influenced by two men: Poe and Rathbone...

I often feigned being sick to stay home from school..

I did it so well...

That my mother believed me...

And, I got a free pass...

Well, not so free...

My mother insisted I stay in bed all day...

And I don’t know whether she wanted to teach me a lesson...

Entertain me...

Or scare me to keep me from doing it...

But no sooner had the school bell rung...

Out came the phonograph...

And a stack of 33 1/3 albums.
Often it was  Mussorgsky’s “Night on Bald Mountain”

And then Basil Rathbone narrating 
"The Raven".

I listened to Basil so many times...

That I knew every word of that poem...

And every inflection of his performance.

I actually performed “The Raven” in school one time for extra credit.

And oh, how I inflected.

I guess no one was surprised...

When doing voiceovers became one of my vocations. 

At ten I also started reading Poe...

I loved all his somber, foreboding literary tones:
 "Masque of the Red Death,"Annabel Lee," "The Telltale Heart", etc.

Years later...
I channeled all those dark stories into my teenage angst...

Writing dark poems and short stories.

Continuing on to adulthood...

Stephen King satisfied my need to be creeped out. 

(currently reading DOCTOR SLEEP. LOve it!!)

As for me and my writing?

I have written Supernatural Thrillers...

But...

Ten years ago...
Something in me shifted ...
And I moved on to writing  humorous women’s fiction... 
I know! Go figure, right?
If I had to choose just one genre I love to write...

Hmm?I couldn’t!

Love then both!

So?

How did your writing journey start?
And how many turns have you taken, if any?

Always,

Em-Musing

WEP ENTRY DECEMBER '19 WRITING CHALLENGE

This is a monthly critique blog. I welcome any serious critique using these codes.                           
                                     Full Critique Acceptable: "FCA"

Minor Points Acceptable: "MPA"

 No Critique, Comments Only: "NCCO"

Story Word Count: 560  - Critique codE: FCA

 For more information: https://writeeditpublishnow.blogspot.com/p/the-critique.html

                                 I HEART CHRISTINE

No footprints. How could that be? 

     Earlier, my sister and I had been walking the beach in Malibu. The breaking waves of the Pacific, the cresting sun over the hills, and the architectural array of beachfront homes were a blurred reality compared to our painful conversation. Her breast cancer had returned. “Why does God allow diseases and other bad things to happen to people?”

      I had no answer. Does anyone really? Me? I’ve always accepted that—what is, is, because somehow I came into this world with a “knowing". Oh, I didn’t have everything figured out when I was younger; awareness came to me bit by bit and sometimes through hard life-lessons. That morning though, I wasn't sure my prayers would be heard and I’d be given the answer to my sister’s question.

       We continued walking, discussing her treatment options. I searched for words to give her comfort and hope, and she confessed her doubts about our Christian upbringing. Was it even necessary to believe in Jesus anymore?

       Finally, our walk took us back to our shoes we had left neatly side-by-side. Before we reached down to get them, we were surprised by a big heart etched in the sand next to them. Inside the heart was written: John 3:16. We looked at each smiling as if we expected the other to fess up that they had done it, but that wouldn’t have made sense; we’d been with each other the whole time. We contemplated if someone could have heard our conversations and then sneaked over and made the heart with the bible verse in it while we were gone. Our husbands? A passerby? No. We were the only ones on the beach that early morning except for a few runners. But even if it had happened like that, it didn’t explain that there were no footprints in the sand. We walked around the heart analyzing if someone could have jumped to the spot then jumped back. But there weren’t any footprints for at least fifteen feet in all directions. Had the heart been there when we left our shoes? No. We were both clear on that.

       “Do you remember what John 3:16 says?” my sister asked.

       “I do. ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.’”

       Neither of us knew what to say. This distinct message in the sand was an answer to her questions and an answer to my prayer.

       We returned to her house and our waiting husbands and told them what had happened. After their doubtful and joking comments, my sister and I let the subject drop. We didn’t want to hear anything negative; we needed to ponder more on the message given to us.

         Though there were no human footprints in the sand that day, we both knew someone in the spiritual realm had been there. At least that’s the only explanation we could come up with.

       My sister accepted this mysterious “message in the heart” that day and renewed her acceptance of Jesus. As she traveled the remainder of her destiny, she took comfort that whoever left her that message would be with her to guide her into her next reality. I have no doubt that it did. And I have no doubt I will see Christine again..