Windmill Musings

....by Simon Sinek is one of my favorite books. I read it 1x awhile ago - turned onto it by my current bosses. I just found out that the author is doing a "Book Club with Simon" tomorrow on youtube. So trivia question: what is the one thing that finally got me to sign up for Audible? This book club with Simon Sinek! I couldn't find my book (I think I paid it forward and gave it to a friend so they didn't have to buy it) so I signed up and used one of my free credits. Today in now catch up day so tomorrow I can participate in the book club! Then I'm getting back to MY book - which is going through a major overhaul as I type in new chapters. It's getting more fun than annoying because now I am taking myself through a mystery that I don't even know how it ends! Really, I don't! With the new idea being weaved in it's giving me a lot of creative freedom that I didn't have before to really go out of the box. I think it's just the idea that I...

...more of my 2nd or 3rd novel (honestly, I'm not sure if this section fits in the first story or the sequel yet but time will tell me that). I like these characters; and I also hate them. I'm just not sure I can pull them off for one book or two or three as it's supposed to be a trilogy - but I'm trying my best. Creating characters is easy. It's also very difficult; they have to have the right amount of substance to them without being overly complex. How do you write someone, breathe life into a character that isn't like you? The main character is this book is a female and for now I've named her Ellen - my middle name. It both fits her - because a few of her characteristics come from me - but it also doesn't fit her because she's so different than me. I struggle with her name every time I write it; and yet I secretly love it. I'm pretty set on her counterparts name, Michael. It is the only name that fits that character, and it is a good bala...

April 4, 2020 It has not been the 2020 that we were all probably looking for. Sometimes though, the unexpected can be just what we didn't know we needed. Let me explain as I probably ramble this along. This year started out for me with working through the passing of my paternal grandmother and a self-imposed mandatory 2 week vacation to compose myself from a hard, lesson-learning year for me. I try very hard to be someone that people can depend on and also not worry about - especially at work. Working for two of the best in this world at what they do is an honor, a joy, and intimidating. I try really hard not to be but wouldn't you be if you worked for a leader in your field? You want to do your best and some days its not enough. I realized at just the right time that I needed to refresh and rejuvenate myself so I took two weeks off this year instead of one. Though it wasn't fun to attend my grandmother's funeral on my brothers birthday during the first of those two...

Okay, so I guess I'm not done tonight. I feel that for those of you that find this site soon, you might have a question on why I called it Windmill Musings. Simple answer: Growing up I had a thing for windmills and how they could be very mysterious. In fact, the first novel I ever wrote was entitled, The Secret of The Windmill. Of which, I'll post part of the first chapter in the next few days. It was liked but had serious style issues (I started it in 7th grade and finished it my senior year - so it was obvious that whatever style I learned that year transferred to my book). Basically, I had to re-write the whole thing and I was not in the mood at the time to do that. So in honor of my first novel and the dreams that I had as a child, I want to honor it in some way. Windmill Musings isn't the final title but works for now. I know I can find something better - and I will by the time that this writing thing takes off for me. And it will - it may or may not be how I want ...

I found my old blogspot account (finally) - and it couldn't have been a better day for it. In an effort to pry myself away from social media during the first quarantine-mandate of what may be normal for us on a yearly or bi-yearly basis (thanks to some really stubborn germs), I turned to finishing some stories. Only when I was able to find my old external hard drive that they were located more than half were missing. My heart sank for a moment (that was a lot of writing lost!). But then I realized that I had saved hard copies of most of them. It'll be a lot of retyping but most of them need editing anyway. But it gave me the idea to look for my old blogger journal and get it up again. I re-named it and made it easier to find: the url is just my full name now. So instead of spending so much time now on social media, I can just write on this blog site and then share it to my facebook and instagram pages (I hope - I haven't tried that yet. We'll see if I can figure that ...