With most in-person author events still on hold indefinitely, I'm devoting one blog post each month to an author interview.

Today's guest is Donald Levin, author of seven mysteries in the Martin Preuss series, as well as the novel The House of Grins (1992) and two books of poetry, In Praise of Old Photographs (2005) and New Year’s Tangerine (2007). 

The latest book in the Martin Preuss series, In the House of Night, officially launches Tuesday, October 6.

And second, I get bored easily (the polite way of saying the same thing is, I have always been intellectually restless) so I’ve always wanted to be as versatile as possible. This not only helped me find work because I could do a lot of different things, but having all those different kinds of jobs kept me learning new things and figuring out how to explain them to other people. That’s one of the things I most love about writing: I’m constantly learning new things. ​

​So when I started the first Preuss novel, I had planned (or hoped, I should say) that it would be part of a continuing series. As I’ve written the books, Preuss has sort of unfolded himself to me as a character, and I’ve gotten to know him better and better—and my readers have, too. 

Another important aspect of writing the Preuss series for me and my readers is Preuss’s son, Toby. Toby is multiply handicapped and lives in a group home, but he is an integral part of Preuss’s life. Indeed, the relationship between Toby and his father is, in my humble opinion, at the heart of the series. Martin Preuss loves his son fiercely and cares for him with great tenderness, and Toby returns the love unconditionally. One reviewer called their relationship “a touching element that’s a constant in the series”; another reviewer noted, “The complexity of the main character and especially his deep love for his handicapped son draw the reader into the story in a way that few other mysteries do.” 
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Toby has profound physical and cognitive disabilities, but the character is sweet, loving, joyful, and everybody’s favorite character in the books. (Also one of the few rounded, sympathetic portraits of handicapped characters I’ve seen.) Toby is based on my own grandson Jamie, who sadly passed away a few years ago; writing him as a continuing character in this continuing series gives me a chance to keep that wonderful young man alive for me and everyone who knew him.

As I mentioned in the last question, the pandemic quarantine made me rearrange my writing schedule a bit. And it’s played havoc in connecting with readers in books fairs and exhibits . . . they’ve all been cancelled this year. It’s made me rethink how I connect with readers.
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I always hold book launch parties for each new book with music, refreshments, readings, and so on. This year, out of concern for bringing people together, I’m organizing a virtual book launch for In the House of Night. It’ll be on my Facebook page (and Youtube, if I can figure out how to do it) on Tuesday, October 6, from 7 till 8 p.m.

These challenging times can be both stimulating and stifling to creative types. Some writers and artists I know have found comfort in their work; others have been unable to summon their muses and have turned to other activities for solace. I say, whatever works! These times are exceptional, and as I recently read in an article a friend sent me, “During this extraordinary time, we have to realize that everyone now has an additional part-time job that might be called Citizen of the Covid-19 Pandemic,” and we need to give ourselves credit for the time and energy that extra work takes.

City Center Arts in Muskegon offered me the opportunity to be the featured artist there  from September 1 to October 10. The gallery has been very supportive of me, my nature and landscape photography, as well as another project I am working on called The Gratitude Project By Lakehouse Photo. Originally we were going to feature The Gratitude Project. However, the rest of the exhibit will honor essential workers. We felt that gratitude, while a worthy topic, might seem insensitive to those that have sacrificed so much. We thought about postponing the featured artist wall or displaying my landscapes. But I felt like we were missing the opportunity to do something meaningful. The year 2020 has been challenging. The pandemic, racial tension and rioting, and a divide that grows deeper daily in our nation weigh heavily on my heart. I just kept thinking, this is a time to heal, not to fight amongst one another. When I proposed A Time To Heal to the folks at City Center Arts, they quickly agreed to the project.

​I asked everyone I knew if they would participate, and then they asked everyone they knew. I posted requests for participants on my Facebook and Instagram pages and even contacted local social justice organizations.

Most of the participants were referred through the gallery or Facebook friends. Of the 17 participants, I knew less than one-third personally.

I received a lot of non-responses to emails and phone calls. However, those that expressed an interest in the project showed no hesitation about participating. Everyone felt like it was an important project and wanted to be involved.

In a nutshell, we need to get to know one another. The project gives folks from various backgrounds the opportunity to share their journey with people that are generally not a part of their community. Once we find common ground, it will become easier to communicate about and resolve tough issues.

One example from the project would be that there has been immeasurable conflict related to wearing a mask to keep COVID-19 from spreading. There are many reasons stated, but I believe the biggest factor is that folks don’t know anyone that has had it, and therefore, it does not seem real.

Three of the participants of the project have had COVID-19. Though all three have recovered, they struggle with ongoing health issues. One person caught the virus from a man that did not survive. Another worked in one of the hardest-hit hospitals in the Detroit area. She witnessed countless deaths every day. All three encourage everyone to wear a mask.
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Once you know someone that has had the virus, you will likely not question whether mask-wearing is right or wrong. 

Healing begins one person at a time. Hopefully, healing begins with one person, then a second and a third, and multiplies and impacts a whole community, a state, a nation, and beyond.

Healing can be hard work and take years. But it can also be quite magical. Have you ever had a rigid belief about a thing and then learn one new fact about it, and it shreds everything you ever believed? I do hope that folks will find a few magical moments from the exhibit and blog posts.
 
I don’t believe my project alone can make a profound change in the world. I do think that projects with the same or similar intentions are popping up all over as a reaction to the dysfunction we are currently experiencing. I hope that collectively change can and will happen.
 
Lastly, I will admit that there was a moment during the early part of the project that I became disillusioned. Not all of my friends or family felt the project had merit. They thought that the result might create greater divisiveness versus the desired outcome of healing. I shared with one of the participants that my heart was a bit broken by the response. I asked her earnestly, what if the only heart opened or healed was my own. Her response was: Well, then the whole project is worth it. I am grateful, and I cherish her words.  

Now and then, social unrest led to demonstrations and rioting. In the ’60s, the issues were related to civil rights, the feminist movement, the Viet Nam War, and the gay liberation movement. Today, we face the same problems and more, but the war we are fighting is with one another.
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Also, in the ’60s, people still had faith in our government, that our voices would be heard, and that real change could happen. Today, we have lost faith in leadership and our government, that our voices, no matter how loudly we cry, fall on deaf ears, and there is little hope for change. 

​The commonality would be the need or desire of the participant to tell their story or to be heard. All felt that in doing so that it might, in some small way, make a difference.

First, I had no idea if I could pull off this project. I had two months during a pandemic to find people willing to be photographed, to share their stories, and translate them into an exhibit of words and images.

Initially, I thought I would display one photograph and a few keywords of each person to convey the story. However, I could not come up with a smart way to show the words. In the end, I decided to label the images more traditionally. Each piece has a name and just a little information about the participant. Hopefully, viewers will become curious enough to read more about the participants on my blog.

Then, as I selected and edited photos, I realized that for most participants, a single image left the story incomplete. I began mounting three to five images into a template with a plain white background. The stories were coming together, but still, something was lacking. One day, I accidentally placed one of the photos behind the others. It was fabulous!! I reduced the grayscale of the background image (made it lighter), and it became part of the story. In some cases, I had to backtrack to find and photograph backdrops that would complete the story.
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Lastly, I initially had a narrow concept of who should participate. The expansion happened naturally and felt right. 

Deeply and on so many levels.

There were many days that I felt hopeless. The division between people feels as if it grows larger every day, and I did not feel as though I was working fast enough or hard enough. But I came to believe that I am doing what I can to be a positive force for awareness and change. I will, in some way, continue the work that has begun with this project.

I am honored and humbled that complete strangers would take the time to share their life experiences with me. Their words forever change me.

The most life-changing aspect of the project is related to racism. I have never considered myself a racist. But, I have become more aware of the cultural bias that I carry with me. I listen with new eyes and ears, and feel with a heart more open. And, as those old untruths pop up, I look them over and toss them away.
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We have so very much to learn from one another. I am a forever student, and can barely wait for my next teacher.

I hope that hearts and minds will be changed, that we will become a more unified people, even if we disagree, and as a result, create a better future for our children. That is a pretty big hope, isn’t it! I am not sure if it is realistic at all. But, in the words of John Lennon, “You may say I'm a dreamer, but I am not the only one.”

I hope others will be inspired to start projects that promote healing and unity.

Find Gail and her work online:

• Facebook – Lakehouse Photo
• Blog – Living At The Lakehouse
• Photography Website
• Instagram – Living At The Lakehouse

• Facebook – The Gratitude Project By Lakehouse Photo
  

With in-person author events still on hold indefinitely, I'm devoting one blog post each month to an author interview.

This month's interview is with Sharon Dukett, author of the memoir No Rules. Desperate to escape the stultifying life she saw ahead for herself in the early 1970s, and entranced by the California hippie scene, Sharon ran away from home at sixteen. No Rules details her precarious journey through the counterculture, an experience that would  mold her into the strong woman she became. 

I was miserable with the prospect of what was ahead for me if I didn’t go. My mother seemed so unhappy, as did my older sister. Leaving wasn’t just for me. It was as though I was breaking out for them, too, demonstrating it was possible to live a different life. Plus I had my older sister with me when I left, which made me feel protected. The catalyst for that leap was being dumped by my first real boyfriend, which left me feeling empty and hopeless. 

​As I read writers like Mary Karr and Cheryl Strayed, I saw that what made their books shine was the honesty. They had great stories, and I knew I had a good story, too. But it would be empty if I didn’t share my deepest thoughts and feelings, good or bad. My success and sense of accomplishment in my career and my personal life as I grew older made me strong enough to share my story regardless of others' reactions.

​It quickly transitioned as I got caught up in the memories of the times. I had always wanted to write a book, but when I was younger I never knew what to write about. Once I began writing about this, I didn’t want to stop. But until I had a personal computer, the idea of using a typewriter was overwhelming. If the personal computer had not been invented, I would have never been able to complete a book.

I found one of the most challenging subjects was writing about falling in love with someone that I later came to despise and recognize as a con artist. I had to recapture the naïve innocence I felt at the time and block out what I knew would come later. It was difficult remembering being attracted to him as he later repulsed me.

​There were some parts that just flowed out of me like they were already written, and I was just the conduit putting the words on paper. I cried through writing the scene with Cindy after she finds Jesus. And the trip across Canada could have been an entire book alone. It was much longer in the original draft. Reliving those memories were like re-experiencing the trip. 

Because this was such a momentous time of my life, much of this was deeply ingrained in my memory. I even believe I recall some exact dialog. I did write the entire first draft in the 1990’s when it was all fresher in my mind. I have some photographs from the time that I used for reference. For example, I have a group shot of those on the ride from Patterson, NJ to Ohio, and photos of our room at the A-House in Provincetown. I also found the more I wrote, the more the memories would overtake me. When you are writing memoir, you take up residence in that time and place and the images and experiences flood back at you. I also played music I listened to during that era, particularly if it was music I don’t often hear. 

Despite some of the bad things that happened, we were all part of a larger community. No matter where you went, you could easily connect with others because they looked like you. I learned so much from all these people because our backgrounds were highly diverse. It didn’t matter what socio-economic, ethnic or religious background you came from—no one cared, and no one typically asked. I don’t think that has ever happened in America before or since. You can’t live through a time like that and not recognize the common humanity in all of us. Once you’ve seen it, you can’t un-see it. 

​I spent several years in the writers group. I don’t think I was always open to the input from some of the members, probably because of how it was presented. But generally speaking, even those that came across as being overly critical had truth I could learn from. In time we modified our process for critique so we had to start out with three or more positive comments first before any negative comments. This was better for all of us because writers need positive reinforcement of what works along with knowing what to improve. It was fairly time consuming as there were four or five of us turning in lengthy chapters for review every two weeks. I know my chapters tended to be 7,000 or 8,000 words each. They were all cut a lot when I revised later on. I stayed in that group until I put the work aside in 2000.

​I want readers to experience what it was like to live in those times, and the transformation that came about as a result of discovering feminism and growing my own strength. 

By writing this book, I have completed a goal I had for years, and often wondered if I would ever reach. By doing so, I was able to preserve a unique time in history that no longer exists and will always be part of who I am.

I am currently working on a thriller novel that takes place in the near future when climate science has been declared to be illegal propaganda in the US, and activists are detained and disappear. 

​One of the greatest experiences of being a writer that I never expected, particularly now because of social media, are the wonderful writers I have met and connected with online. My new tribe is made up of writers who are supportive of one another and offer support and information. We inspire each other and help one another reach our goals. I have discovered I am once again part of a larger community. 

With in-personal author events still on hold indefinitely, I've decided to devote one blog post each month to an author interview.

I'm kicking off this new feature today with a Q&A that tells the remarkable story of a young writer's devotion to his grandmother and her literary legacy. For reasons you'll understand as you read on, it wasn't possible to interview Barbara Mahase Rodman, author of the recently published novel Olas Grandes. Instead, this interview is with her grandson David Kuhnlein, who edited and published the book after the long lost manuscript was unearthed.

For the most part that’s true: the manuscript sat in her trunk since 1979, full of potential, charging up like a battery. Barbara Mahase Rodman (my grandmother, known by her grandsons as Babbie) got many rejection letters in the 70s and 80s, due to a couple factors, one of which was her animosity towards the editing process. Another was her interest in larger publishing companies.

I hadn’t heard of Olas Grandes, or at least I’d forgotten about it, until I read my great grandmother’s autobiography My Mother’s Daughter – a testament to growing up as a strong Indian woman in Trinidad. My mom told me that I was mentioned in the back of the book where Anna Mahase Snr. wrote about the family. So, of course, that’s the first place I looked! Sure enough I found mention of me, but more rewarding was a typo – it said that Babbie had published two books: Love Stories for All Centuries, which I had read, and Olas Grandes. My mom, uncle, and I quickly searched Bab’s house for the manuscript, and hidden in a massive wooden trunk, brimming with so much of her writing, we found it. 

Well, first I wanted to read it. There’s something incredible about reading a book written by an elder like Babbie who, at the time I found the book, suffered greatly from dementia. The manuscript's weight in my bag became a talisman, and as I walked around with it I felt like I was hanging out with her, aeons ago, in Trinidad.

After reading the first few chapters I took a train across the country. I didn’t want to take the only copy of the book on the trip, so I let those early chapters linger in me. I talked to my friends Adam and Katie a lot about the project. Even speaking of the project excited me, and it was in the tangle of conversations -- and questions I asked every reader and writer I encountered -- that I decided something had to be done with this book.

​At the time, I was writing a series of lyric essays on illness and a recent surgery I’d had. But while writing them felt important, it also made me physically sick. Focusing my energy on transcribing Olas Grandes was a way to keep writing, while also taking a needed break from my own project. Gail Kuhnlein, my mom and Barbara's daughter, is also a writer, and lucky for me she agreed to help edit the book. I couldn't have done it without her. 

Honestly, her reactions depended on the day. In the two years before Barbara passed away, my visits to her house increased, and I began to help informally caretake. Because of her memory, we had certain conversations regarding Olas Grandes over and over again, to the point where I observed patterns and ways to create shortcuts around them.




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​For instance, sometimes she’d tell me that Olas Grandes was not a novel, but a story, and it was already published. So I’d have to preface a conversation about her book by showing her the physical manuscript and explaining that it’s different than her other book. But other times, like magic, she knew exactly what was happening and was thrilled.

​“Never could I have imagined,” she once told me, “that this darling, darling little boy would be helping me publish my book.” She was 90 when I re-discovered Olas Grandes, and the project took roughly two years to manifest. She was involved peripherally. I would read passages to her that I didn’t understand, either because of her diction or place names, and asked her to explain. Cultural words, fauna, flora, and Trinidadian myths stayed with her, and she usually had no problem giving me details or stories associated with these passages.  

It was easier than I thought it’d be. I have a knack for imitating other writers, and have a lot of fun impersonating. I think of it like a painter trying to paint . . . oh anyone, to use a Trinidadian example, M.P. Alladin, by sight. (A more accessible example perhaps is how musicians “cover” other songs, which is not a rip off, but a compliment, a head nod, perhaps even an advertisement.)

​It’s a fantastic exercise to let go of the ego that writers so often cling to around their work, and this release opens up a unique freedom to explore the architecture of language from a new vantage point. Also, I hadn’t written much fiction yet (that’s changed significantly since then), so perhaps I had a leg up there. 

​At heart she’s an island girl fortified with the blood of a princess. She was born and raised in Trinidad, where her grandmother Rookubai (a princess escaping an arranged marriage) arrived around 1887, a stowaway on a ship from India. I mention India because many Indians held onto Hindu traditions – celebrating Diwali and the belief in reincarnation – even though Canadian missionaries attempted to convert all the Indians on the island to Christianity.

Although Hindu themes are peripheral in Olas Grandes, I think that Barbara’s interest not only in Hindu customs, but also her interest and study in the occult, was nurtured by island life. She called the Caribbean “the perfect background for dreaming.”

One of my persistent, and unanswered questions I posed to Barbara, was: who is the character Ma Becky based on? Many of her characters are fictionalizations of family members, usually adorned with pieces of herself. Ma Becky is the only character I could never see clearly with this template. Bab knew some Trinidadian witches when she was growing up, who lived on the beach, but part of me thinks that there’s quite a bit of herself in Ma Becky.

​Babbie always loved fairy tales, fables, and myths, partly because of their appeal to both children and adults. She stayed rooted to the Caribbean landscape because it’s where she spent her youth. She had also recently and tragically lost her son, David Rodman, in 1977, just a couple years before writing Olas Grandes. I think that writing the book was a way for her to enter an alternate reality, in which Davey was a young boy again, and she was living in an idyllic gothic romance in her home country, but that’s just a guess.

Did working on Barbara’s novel give you any new insights into her life? 

​The review copy for her book arrived twelve days before she died. The same night we got the first full box of Olas Grandes copies was the night she passed away. Seeing her hold the book and flip through it was an incredible moment of this journey. With people still reading and buying and reviewing her book, that journey continues.

Between my mom and me, we read Babbie about seven chapters before she died. She didn’t remember writing the book, but at the end of each chapter she'd say, “I like this story, keep reading.” Usually when I'd read her the Detroit News she’d get burnt out listening about half-way through an article. Not so with Olas Grandes. I can only imagine what went on in her mind, listening to her grandson and daughter read words to her that she wrote some forty years ago. There was some magic there for all of us. 

My uncle Ken and I sat at the kitchen table for hours, discussing the project. When we decided that we were going to independently publish the book for temporal reasons, as well as “sweet romance” not being as salable as some of the more hardcore stuff in the romance marketplace, we decided that he’d paint the cover. I gave him some ideas, and we read some passages from the book aloud to give us a sense of voice and place. But Ken was born in Sangre Grande, so he knew what the coastline looks like better than I do!

One funny thing about the painting was that he started painting these tiny waves, but since olas grandes translates to “big waves”, my mom suggested making the breakers a little bigger. It was a Homer Simpson moment, I think he even smacked his forehead, “D’oh!”.  

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​Love Stories is a magical little book weaving together love stories across three continents, the common thread plucked from a dreamlike vapor, the mist of eternity on which every story’s loomed. It’s her first book, published in 1985 by the International University Press and printed in an underground style. I’m biased but I think it’s an exceptional project. She mingles famous love stories with her own; lovers meet in and out of dream worlds, recognizing one another by their eyes, and it’s all built on the history of Trinidad, India, and Spain – her spiritual home.



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Babbie would say to me, “I don’t believe in reincarnation. It’s not something I have to believe in because I know that I’ve lived another life in Spain.” Reading her books and articles in the Detroit Sunday News Magazine, which used to come folded inside the Sunday edition of the Detroit News, it’s clear that for Barbara, death was not a barrier but a reprieve. She concludes one of her many articles by writing, “I am a dreamer living in my own world of dreams. I hate reality, but Life is reality, therefore I compromise and leave my dreams alone for a while, as long as Life lasts. After Life, I can have my dreams and all the things I love all to myself.”

This entire project revolves around a sense of duty. Not only to my grandmother, or our family, although that’s a large part of it, but there was also something more elusive, and larger.

I have a few practices I perform religiously. One is writing. Another is listening. Longstanding systemic health and social inequities disproportionately affect Black people in the US – and the coronavirus pandemic is highlighting that fact. It’s important to know where our money’s going. The decision to donate to Detroit Will Breathe is just one way to support the amazing anti-racist work being done right now, as people continue to march, and people continue to buy.

I just finished my first novella – it’s a work of literary fiction about the notorious Austro-Hungarian vampire Béla Kiss. I’m still waiting to hear back from a few of my favorite small presses. I’m also continuing to write flash fiction, film reviews, and poems.

Much of my own recent writing is forthcoming or published in online lit journals, and easily found if interested. (davidkuhnlein.wordpress.com) Also, sitting in my “to-do” pile are three more of Babbie’s full length manuscripts, two of which I’ve read, and are fantastic. I’m not promising anything, but if they get transcribed and edited, I’ll update the Olas Grandes fans on our Instagram, which I’m most active on @olasgrandesnovel.

​I absolutely love your blog, Nan, and I’m so honored. Babbie would have been ecstatic. Thank you, from all of us, for the interview.

​In this week’s blog, you’ll meet Mark Andrews, one of my favorite West Michigan photographers.

Born and raised in Newaygo County, Mark got the travel bug early in life on trips with his family. He went on to work in the travel industry, for airlines and tour companies, including a stint in Barbados.

“I started with photography in the 80s with an old film camera and fell in love with taking pictures,” says Mark.  “I worked for Kodak in the early 2000s as a sales rep selling digital cameras and had some training over the years with them. Most of what I’ve learned has been over the internet and practice, practice . . . ”

Mark is especially fond of photographing places that evoke a sense of the past – Cuba and old Route 66, for example.

Keep your camera sensor clean. Nothing messes up a trip like having spots on all your photos when you get home, and editing is so much simpler when you start out with a good photo. I traveled on a couple trips not knowing I had a problem. Thankfully, it was on the side, and I could crop the spots out some of the photos. Others . . . 

​Your local camera store can clean your camera’s sensor, send it out, or sell you what you need to do it yourself.

​Find a good spot and hang out there for a while. Come back to the same spot at different times of day to see how the light and the activity on the street change.

I took this photo in Havana, Cuba. LaFloridita was one of Ernest Hemingway’s favorite places to drink. Just to the left, of out of the shot, is a stop light. I would hang out on the other side of the street and just wait for a cool, old car to come, and I would get my shot.  I had it all framed and ready to go. I went back several times at different times of the day. At night the sign is lit up in neon and very cool.

You can do this in other locations, not just on the street. Find a good spot and shoot it at different times of day or on different days.

​If you don’t plan on shooting something in particular, you may shoot nothing. When in a city, I’ll shoot “Doors and Stores,” for example. I get up early to shoot and just wander around the town. There are fewer people on the streets, and I can take advantage of the morning light. I’m always up before most of my fellow travelers, and that habit lets me take my time and relax while shooting.
 
On my first trip to Cuba, I shot mainly cars—more than eighty percent of my shots. When I got home, I went through my shots and told myself, Next time I need to shoot more things. The following year, I gave myself an assignment: street photography of people, stores, food. I came back with a much better variety of subjects.

​I took this photograph in Ireland.  An overnight rain gave a shine to the street, and the sun coming through gives it a cool look and feel.  

Whether it’s doors, stores, people, food, or cars, think of something you’d like to shoot and make a point of going out in search of your assignment.

​Try to get up early and shoot during the blue and golden hours.

Golden hour is half-price beers at the bar, and blue hour is when you miss golden hour. (Kidding—that’s a little photography humor.) Actually, golden hour is the time of day just after sunrise or just before sunset, when the light is softer and more glowing than when the sun is higher in the sky. The blue hour is the twilight time just before sunrise or after sunlight, when indirect sunlight is evenly diffused.

There is a great app for planning your shoots called “Photo Pills.” In my opinion, it’s the best $10 you can spend on an app. It will show you the sunrise/set and moonrise/set times for any place on Earth.  Google it, and check it out on YouTube to get an idea.

Shooting at this time if day is great in the National Parks, where there’s so much to choose from. 

​I took this shot in Grand Tetons National Park, at Oxbow Bend on the Snake River.  I don’t recall the time of day, but for the most part it was only photographers that were out at that hour.

Again, this is something you can do each day, as the sky will be different, and you never know what you will get.

I’ve also been told that early morning is a good time to shoot water, when there’s less wind, and the surface will be stiller. However, I live near a lake in Michigan (not the big one), and I’ve found it to be calm or choppy at all times of the day. Even so, it may be worth trying early morning if you want to capture reflections.

​I use SkyScanner, Kayak, Orbitz, and Google Flights to check my rates. Skyscanner has a rate calendar so you can see what the one-way fare is for that a particular day. Check different days. Sometimes a day before or after or a week later will have a better price. Try different departure locations, too. I like to check Toronto (YYZ) and Chicago (ORD), along with Detroit (DTW). All of this may take a while, but I like this part, it's the dreaming!
 
I looked for airfares to Athens, Greece for three or four months before I found a $500 round trip from Detroit with a checked bag. 
 
When shopping, see what's included. I found the same rate on two different websites for the same car from the same company, but one included the extra coverage. It's nice to be covered for free.

​Check what the weather will be like during your trip, and what events may be going on that will interfere with what you want to do and see that week. Use Google maps to see what the area around your hotel is like. I found an Airbnb across the street from the Parthenon with a balcony for $180 a night that would sleep five or six people. We would sit out there and drink sweet wine and eat olives in the evening and watch the light come up on the buildings.

​ You are on vacation!!!  This is one of the hardest parts for me. I'm always in a rush, and it's hard for me to slow down. You are also going to a different place, maybe they do things differently and the food isn't the same as you’re used to. That's the whole reason why we travel! Understand things will not be the same and just embrace it.
 
If you are flexible you may be able to take advantage of being bumped and get paid for it.  Know what time you need to be where and work with the airport staff. They will lay out your best options, and you can decide if you’re able to take advantage of the credit and a different flight. My mom was able to do this for two or three flight in a row.

​I’m happy to welcome Peter Gibb to HeartWood today. I met Peter when I took—and greatly enjoyed—his workshop, “The Joy of Mindful Writing,” at the Pacific Northwest Writers Association conference last fall. 

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​Peter’s award-winning memoir, King of Doubt, is a beautifully-crafted story of self-discovery—a must-read for anyone who’s ever experienced self-doubt. (Is there anyone who hasn't?) When I learned he has a book on mindful conversation in the works, I cleared a space on my bookshelf in anticipation.

​As he relates on his website, Peter grew up shy and isolated. Not exactly a conversational whiz. Eventually, though, he caught on to a few secrets that he honed and shared over a 22-year career of teaching, consulting, and coaching conversational skills “on 4 continents, in 3 languages, to Fortune 500 companies, to leaders of the emerging democracies in Eastern Europe, to doctors and bakers and just plain folks, hungry to learn.”
 
I’m honored to have Peter as a guest today. At the end of his post, you’ll find a link to his website, where you can take a quiz to learn your dominant conversational style. I encourage you to check it out. I took the quiz and not only gained insights into my habits in conversation, but also got tips on tweaking those habits toward more effective and satisfying face-to-face communication.
 
Now, here’s Peter . . . 

​First, I’m delighted to be a guest on Nan’s blog. So much interesting talk happening here, and such important topics.

​Is there any human activity that has the potential to bring us contentment and provide real connection, more than Great Conversation? Conversation is a master life skill. Essential for parenting, teaching, leading, making friends, getting along with colleagues, selling . . . you know, just about anything and everything you do will be more successful and more satisfying if accompanied by Great Conversation.
 
But here’s the rub. Not all Conversation. In fact a great deal of conversation isn’t conversation at all. It’s just talk. Talk that does not bring us contentment or connection. 

​A great deal of talk consists of what I call “Serial Monologue.” This is talk in which two people, supposedly engaged in conversation, are actually just talking heads, listening mostly to their own voices. Rather than paying attention to what the other person is saying, they are more frequently:

​Further, when such talkers do respond to the speaker, the most frequent type of response is what I call a “Grabbing Response.” Here is an example:

          Person A: “I just got back from a great trip to San Diego with my family. We had a                                 terrific time.”
          Person B: “San Diego, we were there in fall of ’17, but it was cold most of the time.”
          Person A: “The zoo was really wonderful. My Clara left saying she wants to                                            become a Vet. I’ve never seen her so excited.”
          Person B: “Really. We take our kids to the zoo at least once a year.”

​Person A is all excited to tell about her vacation, but Person B pretty much disregards everything that A says and launches into whatever story comes to mind. A conversation should be like a dance of connection, but in fact this one is more like a football game, each side trying to grab the ball and score points on some mythical scoreboard. Person B grabs the spotlight from A and changes the topic from A’s vacation to B’s cold vacation in San Diego and how one of the children is going to be a Vet.

​Instead of creating connection and contentment, this kind of talk fosters isolation and frustration. Neither talker feels heard or acknowledged. There is no real connection. 

We were given two ears but just one mouth. There must be a reason. The most critical ingredient for Great Conversation is “Deep Listening.” 

The first step toward deep listening is to get rid of grabbing responses and start using “reflective responses” instead.           

Imagine how different this conversation might have been, had it gone something like this:
          Person A: “I just got back from a great trip to San Diego with my family. We had a                                 terrific time.”
          Person B: “You sound so excited. San Diego. What made the trip so exceptional?”

​This is a “reflective response.” There are many types of reflective response, too many to go into here. They all validate the speaker, mirroring back some aspect of what the speaker has said and often inquiring for further about the topic. Note that in this particular response, Person B validates a feeling (excited) and then inquires for more detail (what made the trip so exceptional?) There is no telling my own story, or giving advice, or judgment, or distraction. It’s basically listening, reflecting and inquiring. Simple? Well, not always, but what a difference it will make. 

​Learning to become a more conscious, committed listener is the single most important step you can take to move your conversation from talk to connection and ultimately to “Great Conversation.” 

​So what exactly is great conversation? Well, that’s a longer conversation. The best I can do in this short time is to say that it’s a skill we can all develop. It’s based on four values whose first letters spell the word C.A.R.E.

​​If you’d like to learn more about Great Conversation, please visit my web site, http://www.petergibb.org/. Scroll down a bit on the home page, and you’ll see an invitation to take the “Conversational Style Assessment,” a short survey that will help you discover your dominant conversational style. You’ll learn which of four basic conversational styles (Observer, Nurturer, Performer, and Explorer) is your default mode. You’re not locked into any one style for life. You can change your conversational style, but knowing your default style can help you to get oriented and on the path to Great Conversation. Take the assessment and you’ll get a personalized report back from me. 

​I also have a blog that discusses issues of Great Conversation once or twice per month, and a forthcoming (but not for at least 18 months) book, titled Beyond the Weather: 5 Steps to Great Conversation. If you’d like to be notified when the book is released, please sign up on the drop down form on my web site, or email me: peter@petergibb.org

Thanks for Listening. I hope to visit with you again.
 
​Peter

Today’s visitor, Kelly J. Beard, is an author whose writing I have admired since we met in a master class at the Tucson Festival of Books two years ago. Along with the other members of the class, I was a finalist in the festival’s literary contest, and Kelly won second place for an essay later published as "Os Sacrum" in Santa Ana Review.
 
When I learned that her memoir, An Imperfect Rapture, was headed for publication after winning the Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award, I could hardly wait to read it. The book, which debuted last November, is a remarkable story of finding her way in the world after growing up in poverty, within the strictures of fundamentalist religion. The story is compelling, and the writing masterful.
 
I’m delighted that Kelly has agreed to answer questions today about the writing and publication of An Imperfect Rapture.

 It’s funny, but my latent love for writing probably served my legal work as much as (or more than) my legal work served my writing. A huge part of my litigation practice was writing motions and briefs, basically marshalling the facts and law into a persuasive story. Thinking about this has just reminded me of a legal writing technique I used while writing my memoir, An Imperfect Rapture. As you know, the writer’s ability to infuse her story with insightful reflection is the very essence of memoir. As opposed to the kind of writing approaches one might take in writing biography (“Just the facts, Ma’am”) or fiction (“Show don’t tell”), memoir’s marrow requires a measure of telling beyond the facts.

As I struggled to find ways to add reflective texture to my story I sometimes used a loose version of a writing technique taught in law school called the “IRAC” method. In short, the IRAC method requires the writer to identify the issue (describe the facts) and then to analyze those facts in light of the law. The analysis part of the IRAC is really quite similar to the memoirist’s reflection.
 
But to get back to your question, the real skill I developed as a lawyer that served me as a writer was self-discipline; the day-to-day commitment to sit at the computer (or wherever) and work on something you know won’t be finished that day (or year, or maybe even decade) because you believe in what you’re doing. That’s the real work of both practices. ​

​I started writing An Imperfect Rapture in my early-to-mid 50s, so the events I was writing about were anywhere from 30 to 50 years old. Like a lot of people—particularly, I suspect, people who had difficult early experiences—I submerged so much of those early years under layers of busy-ness, mostly trying to be a decent mom and lawyer. I hadn’t really thought about writing memoir. I used to write poetry and short fiction, and had started a couple of novels before practicing law. So my thought was that I’d write a novel when I finished practicing law.
 
All my life I’ve struggled with depression, but for most of my “mom” and “lawyer” years it was easy to stay distracted. I think I was also invested in trying to give my daughter a different experience than I had, so I never talked to her about the events in my memoir. She hadn’t lived in the shame of poverty or experienced the confusion of wildly erratic and unstable parenting, or the violence of their religious faith. When she left home, I fell into one of the worst depressions I’d ever had. And that’s saying something.
 
I finally found a brilliant therapist who is probably responsible both for saving my life right then and for getting me to write the memoir. I remember sitting in his office one day weeping over the distance between my daughter and me. My expectations of her and our relationship was unhealthy, I realize now, but at the time I felt utterly abandoned by her and betrayed by life. I told the therapist that I was thinking about writing to her—telling her how much I loved her, how irrelevant I felt in her life, how sad I was. I expected him to say, “Good idea, even if you don’t send the letter.” Instead, he looked at me and asked, “What doesn’t she know about any of that? What could you tell her that she doesn’t already know?”
 
And that’s the book, really.

​The scariest part was knowing I’d have to reveal this whole other life, this person and past no one—not my friends or colleagues or even my own daughter—knew about. I also have a pretty fractured birth-family. Only one of my siblings still talks to me; two haven’t spoken to me for decades. Although my father died in 1996, my mom is still alive, and I didn’t want to hurt her. It felt a little like deciding to pour gas on the charred remains of our family. 

​For one thing, I pretended I was writing for the very limited audience of my daughter and perhaps any child she might have, and that they would only read it after I was gone. I focused on telling the truth with as much beauty (skill) as I could muster. And I figured I could keep it from my mom. She’s 90 and doesn’t use the internet. Also, the more I wrote, the more committed I became to that Aristotelean ideal of truth and beauty. That ideal was hugely important in helping me work past any lingering sense of grievance and find a way to be honest with the reader about these deeply complicated people and experiences. 
​

​As I mentioned, the initial idea occurred to me shortly after my daughter started college in 2010. I was still practicing law, but I had my own practice and was able to scale back. I read somewhere that Virginia Woolf wrote two hours a day, always in the morning. She claimed not to have enough creative steam to carry her past the two-hour mark. I took her cue and wrote for two hours each morning (except Sundays—some things never leave us) and always before work or even reading email. The few times I tried to change this schedule either by working first or peeking at email before writing, I lost my creative energy for the day.
 
After a few years of working on it, I thought I had a pretty solid manuscript. In the summer of 2013, I attended a Master Class with Emily Rapp Black in Taos. The manuscript was 450 pages long. Emily critiqued the entire manuscript (as did the other workshop participants). Emily’s critique was brilliant, and I spent the following year working on the areas she suggested.

​That winter, I entered the Vermont College of Fine Arts low-residency MFA program. It was a pretty mixed bag, and while I had two fantastic advisors during my tenure there, I also had a couple that weren’t worth the tuition. But I went to tons of craft talks, studied work I might not have found otherwise, and worked diligently at learning the craft and revising An Imperfect Rapture. I ended up submitting the manuscript—essentially re-written and 100 pages “lighter” than what I’d submitted to Emily three years earlier—for my creative thesis in 2016.
 
At that point I thought, OK, this guy is ready to go. I started querying agents and submitting to a few contests. I don’t know how many agents I queried, maybe 30 or 40, but no one was interested. I think to a certain extent the gatekeepers—the literary intelligentsia, if you will—have a bit of a herd mentality. And, of course, it’s all about making money in that world, so increasingly agents make “safe” choices, a fact evident by walking into any bookstore and seeing how the genre has been cannibalized by celebrity memoirs.

So I started sending queries to independent and university publishers and also entering a few contests that were being judged by people whose work I loved. I don’t know how many contests I entered (not that many because it costs money to enter and it too often felt like a boondoggle), but An Imperfect Rapture was a finalist in two other contests before I submitted it to Zone 3 Press. Janisse Ray was the judge that year (2017). I’d read several of Ray’s books, and she was one of my idols. Her work is not only breathtaking, but important. By Important I mean necessary. So, when I saw the ad for the Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award, and saw Ray was judging, I knew I wanted to enter.
 
Actually, I almost didn’t. By the time I saw the ad, the deadline was only a week or so away, and there was a page limit of 300 pages. I’d spent two years largely re-writing the manuscript, but also cutting, culling, and winnowing it down from 450 to about 385 pages. The thought of getting it from 385 to 300 pages seemed impossible. Let alone doing so in such a short period of time. But I did. I killed way more darlings than I would have dreamed possible.
 
So there it is. Ray did love it! The darlings weren’t missed. Zone 3 Press is the press of my dreams. But that’s the contest I almost skipped. ​

 The hardest part to write, by far, was the end. Mostly because I didn’t know what I was writing about, and I kept trying out possible ends. As you know, the story in An Imperfect Rapture ends when I’m in my mid-twenties. I tried ending at later dates and with later events closing the final scene. I remember that in the third semester of my MFA I was trying to work out the ending, and not to sound all woo-woo or anything, but in addition to writing, I was spending a lot of time practicing yoga, meditating and praying. And at one point while trying to write the ending, I went into a kind of fugue state and wrote the end scenes. (It was the one and only time this has ever happened to me while writing, so I’m not sure I’d want to rely on it as a strategy for finding my way to an ending, but who knows?) I subsequently edited the heck of the rest of the manuscript, but the ending is the only part of the manuscript I could never really edit. It put itself on the page, and I had to leave it alone. 

​Oh, I absolutely agree with that description. I couldn’t pin down what the difference is with any precision, but “coming if age” conjures the idea of mastery: “I came, I saw, I conquered,” as opposed to the idea of “I came, I saw, I understood.” I understood. But I’m not sure I conquered.

​The shame of being poor. And the rage. I read somewhere that the average age of death for men who work as coal miners in Appalachia is 46. There’s a reason for that. Poor people are dispensable in this system, and they know it.
​ 

​That’s the mystery, isn’t it? When I was writing An Imperfect Rapture, I spent a lot of time wondering what my life would have been like if just one or two more kind, empathic people had shown up to mirror someone to me I could love and root for, or if one or two more tough-love kind of people had shown up to mirror someone to me I could admire. So, I’m not dead. I had the life I had, good and bad, so at the end of it all, I feel like it was exactly what it was meant to be. One more kind person (“angel”) or one more challenger (“worthy adversary”) and I might be—who knows, on the Supreme Court? The author of ten or fifteen important books? But one fewer kind person or challenger and I wouldn’t be here, I suspect. 
​

Right now I’m trying to give An Imperfect Rapture a chance to breathe. Maybe all authors feel like this, but I can’t imagine writing anything I love as much as this book. So, I’m trying not to pressure myself about that. Some readers have asked if I’ll be writing a sequel (a lot of years between 24 and 60), but right now, I really don’t know. I’ve written a few essays I like, but the essay form feels a little constraining to me. I’m moving toward another memoir, I’m pretty sure, but I just don’t know what slice of life is calling me to investigate it yet. 

It's National Poetry Month! You didn't think I'd let that slip by unnoticed, did you? What better way to pass the time while waiting for spring's late arrival than to read—or write—a bit of poetry? Short on inspiration? Look no further than the things you encounter every day.

​That's the advice of this week's guest, Cristina Trapani-Scott. I first met Cristina fourteen years ago at Bear River Writers' Conference. After the conference, we formed a writers' group with another writer we'd met there. The result was the Sister Scribes, an Ann Arbor-based group that eventually added three more members and became a source of support and motivation for all of us.

​​An author, educator, and former journalist, Cristina now lives and writes in Northern Colorado. Her debut chapbook collection of poems, The Persistence of a Bathing Suit, published in 2017 by Finishing Line Press, explores the moments that fill the space between surviving a breast cancer diagnosis and accepting the inevitability of change and uncertainty. Cristina's work has appeared in the Patterson Literary Review, Hip Mama Magazine, the Driftwood, Bigger Than They Appear: An Anthology of Very Short Poems, and Sweet Lemons 2: International Writings with a Sicilian Accent. She holds an MFA in poetry and fiction from Spalding University and currently teaches creative writing and composition online.

​April is National Poetry Month and each year it marks a whole month of celebrating this little thing that I found myself drawn to quite by accident more than 20 years ago. 

​I am not one of those poets that knew from a young age that I would be writing poetry. I don’t recall ever being thoroughly introduced to poetry as a kid beyond the handful of jingles I read in Shel Silverstein’s books and perhaps a Shakespeare sonnet. I don’t recall writing a poem until well after I completed my first round of undergrad studies. Still, even before I put marks on paper with the intention of calling them poems, I believe on some level I was aware of the poetry in ordinary things. 

​My mother, of course, made me hyper-aware of the ordinary world around me. She is an artist, and she always finds beauty in the most ordinary things. Her collection of garlic skins scattered on the top ledge of her china cabinet is a testament to this. I don’t have a physical collection of ordinary things like she does. I work in words. She works in paint. I do, in large part because of her, see the poetry in ordinary things.

​ I am aware of the poetry in a baby bird that had fallen from its nest in our backyard when I was a child. I am aware of the poetry in how my mom, my siblings, and I nurtured it by feeding it through a dropper with a solution a nearby vet had suggested. I am aware of the poetry in how the bird grew feathers and flew and perched on a curtain rod in our living room while our Brittany Spaniel, resorting to his instinct, stood on point.

​I am aware of the poetry in the way my Nonno so attentively showed my brother and me how to play ground darts in the backyard on Father’s Day not long before Nonno died from a heart attack. I am aware of poetry in the way my brother and I used to turn bricks over in our walkway to collect roly poly bugs and watch them curl into tiny balls as we touched them. 

​I teach creative writing at a college where students primarily are headed into business, technology, or health fields. They take my class as an elective. Many of my students have very little, if any, background in creative writing, let alone poetry (much like me when I first became curious about this thing called poetry). The first half of the class is focused on fiction, which inevitably more of the students are comfortable with. Halfway through the eight-week course, though, we shift to poetry. Many of the students admit early that they just never understood poetry, that they just never thought about writing poetry. My goal as their instructor isn’t to get them to know everything there is to know about poetry in four weeks. My goal in that four weeks is to get them to see, like my mother helped me see, that poetry has been with them their whole lives, that poetry is in the everyday things they do and see.  

​Poet Stephen Dunn said in an NPR interview, “We live with the little things much more than the large things.” I believe that to the core. I believe that has always been where I have found poetry. Even with the poetry I read, I am drawn most to the way a poet works the small things like a sculptor works clay, pushes at them until they breathe those large things on the page.

​Sometimes, it’s easy to forget that those small things are the most important things. In their book The Poet’s Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry, Kim Addonizio and Dorianne Laux write, “And what are the ‘great’ poems about? The big subjects: death, desire, the nature of existence. They ask the big questions: Who are we? Why are we here? Where are we going? We find it difficult to believe those subjects, those questions, can be explored and contained in a poem about working at a fast food restaurant, a poem about our best friend, a poem about washing the dishes, tarring the roof, or taking a bus across town.” This is precisely where those questions are answered. This is precisely where I tell my students to search for the big things. We talk about poems that do this. 

One that has stuck with me for a long time is Sandra M. Gilbert’s poem “Remnant” from her collection Belongings, a title that in and of itself suggests small, ordinary things. In the poem Gilbert writes of a carpet remnant in her office.

Remember the leftover
square of carpet you
unfolded in my office thirteen
years ago, two years before
the deadly surgery? Remember
​

​The “you” the speaker refers to is a spouse who died unexpectedly in surgery. The carpet represents not just a physical remnant here. It points to the memory as a remnant. It points to how the spouse, too, is but a series of remnants anymore. This small, ordinary thing, the remnant, leaps into the big thing, loss.

​ U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins does a similar thing in a much lighter tongue and cheek moment with his poem “The Lanyard.” I use this example in my classes because I find humor to be a great way to break down preconceived notions my students inevitably come to class with about what they believe poetry has to be, and I know that many of my students have memories of twisting and tying little ribbons of plastic as gifts for parents. Of course, the poem isn’t simply about the ordinary act of tying a lanyard at camp. It’s about the big idea of how we love our mothers. 

​ So, during this National Poetry Month (and after) celebrate the poetry in the small, ordinary things, in the colors that swirl in the soap bubbles on the dishes stacked in the kitchen sink, in the child that lies on the couch with one leg dangling off the edge, in the ordinary banter between partners on a weekday evening. There is poetic treasure in the ordinary, and it’s waiting to be mined. 

​Find the poems that do this in books at your local bookstore, your local library, or at websites like www.poetryfoundation.org. Explore how they connect the ordinary to the extraordinary. Finally, make your own connections and see that poetry is most definitely not about the extraordinary but about the ordinary made extraordinary.

Where do you find art in the ordinary?

For a daily dose of inspiration, subscribe to the Academy of American Poets' Poem A Day email at https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem-day​.

​We all start the new year with such great enthusiasm for our projects. Then, a month or so in, we sometimes lose our momentum. Ideas dry up, energy sags. That's when an injection of inspiration can be just the thing. 

​Welcome back, Lene!

​I hope you found something in here that might help you boost your creativity, and if you did, I’d love to hear from you! Maybe you have a tip that you’d like to add to the list, or maybe you’d like to share an experience when one of these “boosters” worked for you. Feel free to comment below!
​-- Lene

​One of my favorite January rituals is choosing a calendar to hang in our kitchen. More than a place to keep track of events and appointments, the right calendar can be a thing of beauty to admire every day.

​For the past three years, I've been delighted to find photographer Gail Howarth's calendars for sale at Artsplace in Fremont. I've been a fan of Gail's photographs since I saw a collaborative exhibit of work by Gail and painter Renae Wallace at Artsplace a few years ago. 

This year, Gail is donating profits from calendar sales to Mel Trotter Ministries, a Grand Rapids nonprofit organization that works with homeless people. Gail is also undertaking a photography and writing project with the organization. I've invited her here today to tell us about her work and this new project. 

​I feel as though my subjects find me. It is true that I carry my camera most of the time and that I often have a goal in mind when I go out for the day. However, what is on my camera at journey's end is seldom what I planned. I photograph a broad range of things, as you mentioned. I am attracted to things old and broken, beautiful landscapes, and interesting people. Often, I travel the same roads or walk the same paths and see nothing of interest. Then with a shift of light, I see the location or an object as though for the first time. This fascinates me and keeps in a state of wonder and awe. A potential subject is anything that tells a story. My hope is that my photography not only be beautiful but also conjures memories or inspires the viewer to create a tale about the image.

​I love old abandoned places. This is not unusual these days, as there is an entire genre of photography related to "abandoned places". However, it is where I am most surprised and intrigued. First, my storyteller's mind is intrigued by the possibilities of why a thing or place was left behind. Second, I am surprised by what is left behind. A girl's saddle shoe, the curtains, an apron over a bed frame, a lifetime of someone's greeting cards scattered upon the floor, a woman's purse, and so on and so on. Some images are heartbreaking, yet oddly beautiful.

​I have always had an eye for composition, but I thought my photography was ordinary. Honestly, it was my friend's comments on Facebook that made me believe I might have something more than snapshots.
 
Then Renae Wallace, a painter from Fremont, Michigan, began asking me if she could paint some of my images. Of course, I was shocked, honored, and so pleased. That eventually turned into our exhibit at NCCA - Artsplace: Of Time, Transition and Reflection. Words cannot even begin to describe how wonderful that experience was. Renae is a gem. A dream came true when Lindsay Isenhart said yes to the project. Everyone at Artsplace was incredibly supportive. Faune Benson Schuitema even helped me pick all the materials to frame and mat my work. The community came out in earnest to support both Renae and me. It was then that I knew I was on my way and felt like a real artist.

My technique improved once I learned more about all the settings on my camera. Instead of just taking a shot and hoping for the best, I learned how to set the camera for the best capture. Additionally, I started shooting in RAW versus JPEG and picked up a couple of higher-quality glass lenses. I learned Lightroom and Google NIK for editing. I do have Photoshop, but have not yet learned it. Perhaps this year. 
 
My approach is different, as I take more time with setup and take fewer images versus taking too many images and then sorting through for the best one. That was very time-consuming. I also ask for opportunities to photograph things that interest me. In the past, I would miss many opportunities because I was too shy to ask.

I worked as a practice management software trainer for Patterson Dental. When Mel Trotter Ministries Dental Clinic purchased the software, I became their trainer. Over the years, I would occasionally be called upon for follow-up training. I felt at home with this group and felt strongly that their mission was important. I was moved by their conviction to help and I would think, if I ever left my job I would want to be part of this.

​In early 2016 I began to feel more and more unsettled in the career I had loved. As the year progressed, I found myself thinking more about photography and writing and less and less about my job. One day when I was training the dental staff at Mel Trotter, I mentioned to Janice Keesman, Director of Clinics, how I was feeling. I told her I was considering leaving my job to pursue my passion. I mentioned that if they ever needed help, I would still like to be considered. That resulted in many discussions, and finally a job offer. I work in the clinic three days a week and spend the rest of my time cultivating my life as an artist.

​This is truly a labor of love. The project is so important to me that I do it on my own time. Mel Trotter Ministries is an organization that serves the homeless. It provides overnight shelter, meals, residential programs, job training, counseling, the dental clinic, chiropractic care, vision, legal services, and so much more. 
 
The project was born soon after I began working in the dental clinic. Patients often said the same phrases to describe what was happening in their lives. They went like this: No one hears me. No one sees me. I am invisible. I thought perhaps I could help. With my camera and writing skills, I could give them a voice, a face, and increase public awareness of homelessness. 
 
Mel Trotter Ministries publishes my pieces on their website. I will be including the blog posts on my own site soon.
 
Additionally, I would like to create an exhibit for ArtPrize and/or other venues to increase awareness. 

​One cannot work at Mel Trotter and not be changed. First, it has deepened my personal relationship with God. It may sound quite absurd, but I did not expect this. I think the usual things you might think: I am more grateful, considerate and have deeper compassion.
 
But, I would also say, I feel a bit more of a burden of responsibility in caring for those less fortunate. I find it difficult to leave the building between 4:30 and 5:15 pm. That sounds terrible, but I have a tender heart and my mind has a hard time wrapping my head around the extent of the issue of homelessness. That is the time when the homeless women check in for the evening. They wait in line and security goes through their sparse belongings before allowing them entry where they will receive a meal and bed for the night. I often see the same women day after day. There is no age limit. Some are very young and some very old. Some appear to be frightened, angry, resigned, and yet others quite joyful. And I wonder, where are their families, why does no one care enough to open their doors to these people, and what does the future hold for them? 
 
As an artist, I would say it has been a call to action. I am one person. What can I do? I can and will use my words and camera to do whatever I can to help.

I like photographing people, but not in a studio setting. Lighting with flashes, reflectors, and the use of backdrops is a mystery to me. The project at Mel Trotter is an extension of something I started in November of 2016. I began asking people to think about for what they were most grateful while I photographed them. I used the light that was available and processed the images in black and white. The result is a very raw image. Some people cried while others beamed radiantly. The first person I photographed for the gratitude project taught me that what I was asking was not a minor request. I was asking people to become vulnerable and to bare a part of their soul. I am grateful to those who participated. To be allowed a look into someone's soul is an honor and needs to be treated respectfully. This is what I hope to bring to the Mel Trotter Project.  

​I would like to pair writing with my photography more often. I will definitely be reviving my neglected blog. The folks at Mel Trotter have asked me to also photograph and write about the volunteer of the month and have begun asking me to photograph events. I am hoping that Renae Wallace and I can begin another collaborative project soon and am open to collaborative projects with other artists, but there is nothing in the works. Perhaps this is the year that I will finally learn Photoshop.

My work is available at NCCA - Artsplace in Fremont and at MB Woodworks & Company and Market 41 in Newaygo. Online I can be found at:
​http://www.lakehousephoto.com/
https://www.instagram.com/livingatlakehouse/
http://www.lakehousecc.com/blog/.

I am also starting a small gallery by appointment at my home in Holton.