The Problem With Paper ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

Or electronic pages…whatever…this is really about the problem

photo: pexels

with words on paper, or screens, or wherever that is not verbal. And, to be clear, by verbal, I mean “in person” with one another.

Consider this: when you are having a conversation with someone, face to face or over the phone, you can hear the inflection to their words which gives you a perspective on the feelings being conveyed. If it’s in person, body language, hand movements, twitches all tell a story that may or may not go along with the words being spoken. The same goes for sign-language too, since gestures come with speed and sharpness or smoothness to denote emotion as well.

Not so much with paper.

On paper…our options are limited.

“LOL”

Not really meaning “laughing out loud,” so much as it means: “I’m joking!” when you type it at the end of a sentence.

“Sigh.”

…okay, that one’s pretty obvious, but, whatever. (lol) (See what I did there?)

But a sigh can showcase exasperation, or want, or romance…so, I take it back, it’s actually not that obvious a “descriptor” either.

Which is, “okay,” I guess, in texts, except it’s hard to interpret the emotion behind the words. What I type can be construed differently in what you read.

“You’re dead to me!”

HOLY COW!?!?!?! What did I do!?!?!

“You’re dead to me! I just spit coffee everywhere when I read that!”

Oh…that’s in reference to a joke I made…and you’re laughing at it, it’s not real.

But when we’re typing our comments to each other, and when

Photo: Deposit Photos

we’re typing fast, those explanations don’t get thrown in the way they always should. And worse, when they do get thrown in, sometimes they don’t actually explain anything anyways!

More and more people are relying on non-verbal means of communication as an expedient way of staying in touch. (Not including hand written letters here…those are a different thing entirely!)

And in using text messaging or emailing, we’re losing our ability to communicate, to learn to read and respond to and interpret emotions, or emote ourselves, face to face. Not only that, but we’re becoming embittered by the “hassle” of having to answer a phone call. Granted, part of that is because telemarketing is a nightmare and nowadays you never know if you’re answering a machine’s call or a person!

Sorry…sorry…I digress.

I always like to include challenges in these posts because, for some reason, I respond well to being challenged by people to do things!

So here’s your challenge today.

Call someone.

Don’t text message them. Don’t email. If they don’t answer, leave a message and tell them: “Just wanted to call and talk to you over the phone. I feel like I haven’t spoken with you in a while and wanted to catch up.”

Make it a mission to have a conversation, whether with a friend, a family member, or your random “number-neighbor”…apparently that’s some new trend online…? I don’t know.

The point is, a phone call can allow you to show more emotion,

Photo: Deposit Photos

share emotion, with someone else a lot better than a text message can. Allow yourself to become involved in someone else’s life with a warm hello, not a picture on Instagram.

I’m not trying to bring back a “dying medium” in speaking on phones. Just trying to bring back the emotion that emoticons have stripped from communication lately.

And if that’s not enough incentive, think of it like this: a text message is easy to respond “good” or “okay” too…but a phone call let’s you hear the inflection and KNOW if the person you’re talking to is really “okay” or “good” or if that’s them reaching out needing to say more and not knowing how to “text it” to you.

Right now we’re all uniquely privileged to be going through this weird quarantine period. And yeah, I said privileged. Think about it: have you ever used Zoom or MeetUps or whatever-online-web-video-chat-platforms are out there before now REGULARLY? (I haven’t…so…sorry for lumping everyone in with me from that standpoint! Lol – jokingly said, not laughing out loud!) We are being given the opportunity and the responsibility to reach out and talk to people face to face online, when we can’t speak in actual person. Don’t let this gift go! I’ve seen my relatives more these past two months with Zoom than I have in the past 6 months since they live out of town. Friends I’ve only ever met online I’ve Video conferenced with and seen their faces and their smiles. I’ve heard their voices and learned their expressions because of phone calls to “check in” and keep myself and them sane by having some sort of communication with them.

Sometimes, the inconvenience of picking up a phone is a greater privilege than reading a text message.

So, the trouble with paper, with screens, can be overcome. And I just thought…what a better time to reach out than right now when we can all use a bit more than a text check-in once in a while.

Happy Phone Calls, everyone!

L.O.L.

(Lots of love!)

Andi 

Photo: Deposit Photos

PS. I almost forgot about handwritten letters! The GOOD news of paper! A handwritten letter is such a gift too! It means you took the time to write words to another person, send it in the mail, and it’s not a bill from a collector that they have to fret about! LETTERS ARE AMAZING! 

Photo: Deposit photos

And, if you don’t believe me, I am more than willing to show you how! Originality By Design is going to help me out with this one and if you would like a handwritten letter from me, to see the power of the pen and not the keyboard, leave a comment stating you'd like that. I will gather your information from your response.  I try to send out a letter to someone once a week to bring a smile to their face! And I want to share that with you, too. 

Let me show you how good communication can be, and maybe I can inspire you to reach out and share this new form of old-fashioned love with another! 

Meet Our Members

Author Andi Lawrencovna

Andi Lawrencovna is a fantasy and science fiction writer from Ohio.  Her education includes a BA in English from Denison University and an MFA in Creative Writing from Pine Manor College. She works as a legal secretary during the day and removes her glasses at night…wrong genre.  

Please check our our REGULAR CONTRIBUTORS page to view Andi's books and social media links. 

Tea Time with Andi ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

It has come to my recent attention that I am NOT the tea snob I always thought I was.

Yes, you read that correctly: TEA SNOB.

Tea snobbery, I believe, was originally invented in…no, wait, I can’t say that, that’s not nice…and the truth is, I would LOVE to be a tea snob! And also to live in England, where they drink tea, ALL THE TIME!

“What type of tea do you drink with lemon and honey? Which kind with milk? Black tea or green? Rooibos!?!??!!”

OH GOOD LORD THE TEAS! THE TEAS!!!!!!!!!!

I really do love tea. We have something here called the Republic of Tea, which honest to God does not get more tea snobbery-ish than that! (I would also totally live there.)

They have the most delicious teas, and also some that are the most not-delicious teas.

For instance: chocolate banana tea…DELICIOUS!

Turmeric tea…THE WORST! (Sorry if you like turmeric, folks, I think it is disgusting…though if you put ten tablespoons of honey in it, it’s not as bad…though why spoil the honey with the turmeric?)

Anyways, I love tea. It is one of the great pleasures of mine to go into a store, to the tea aisle, and look at all the flavors. But be warned, some teas, a lot more actually now days, are coming without tea bags! Yes! Just the leaves or whatever else that makes up the tea! If you don’t have the right spoon for it…I suppose it’s a good way to read tea leaves if you’re into that sort of thing. (Loose leaf teas…they’re called loose leaf teas…sigh…totally couldn’t come up with that name without looking it up!)

But teas are so fun. The flavors that people come up with!

Amazing. 

(Rose-bud tea…yeah, surprisingly, the floral flavor is awesome… Oh, oh oh oh! And then a nice Lady Grey tea with LAVENDER HONEY!!!!!!!!!!!! Da bomb diggity, I swear!)

For me, I have a random favorite one…two…thr---whatever…teas…

At Disney World, they sell tea bags that are Alice in Wonderland inspired. The Mad Hatter Tea Party blend has subtle hints of apricot, making the tea richly flavored and also fruity. Seriously, it’s delightful. Ginger, peach, and apricot! You can’t go wrong!

And check out the box for the teas?!?! Aren't they cute and whimsical?

But my favorite is the “Topsy Turvy Tea Blend.” There’s really nothing too special about it. It’s basically an Earl Grey tea which is typified by being flavored with bergamot. (I think I like it mainly because of the word “bergamot” which apparently is orange-flavored…? Don’t quote me on that!) But the Topsy Turvy tea has the Cheshire Cat on it…so…it’s like a thing.

But seriously, what the heck is the point of tea? …other than everything…? Well, tea is a great type of therapy for a lot of symptoms. Not only is tea great for colds and sore throats, but the art and practice of making tea has been used for generations as a ritualistic exercise that promotes concentration and focus, a type and form of meditation almost. Taking the time to let the world fall away to make a cup or a pot of tea is incredibly helpful in reducing your stress levels…plus, you get a cup of tea on the other side of it!?!? Hello!?!?! What more could you ask for?

Drinking tea has a lot of health benefits as well. Not only is that dependent on what type of tea you’re drinking (green tea is great for digestive issues, chamomile is wonderful to help you relax and go to sleep, black teas offer a lot of caffeine to help sharpen your focus) but what is mixed in with your tea. 

A lot of tea companies are now offering specialty teas that help focus on, well, focus, or healthy immune systems, or losing weight, or productivity. The different flowers and berries and spices in certain teas have properties that can help your body function at higher levels and even more efficiently in some cases. 

And drinking tea, the ingestion of warm liquid into your system, helps relieve sore throats, can sometimes aid in reducing congestion, clearing your sinuses by breathing in the steam of the tea, and actually, if you’re using natural honey as a sweetener, it can help you with overcoming and breathing through and building up immunity to seasonal allergies. Note that I said “can” and not “will” or “guaranteed.” As in all things, tea and honey for different people will have different effects. But in place of over medicating, tea can be a nice addition to your supply of helpful things to do to keep your body working smoothly. 

To be fair, though…black teas, which are my favorite, probably aren’t as great for helping cure common colds or allergies or for weight loss as some other teas, but they taste the best to me.

In the end, teatime should become a national pastime. And we should all be tea snobs, pinkie finger held out, stiff upper lip, charming accents, and all! Go and grab a cup, enjoy it warm especially these days, or, if you prefer, a glass of iced tea every now and then, too. 

SIDE NOTE: And if you are sick, or feel like you’re getting sick and tea just isn’t going to cut it for you, you would be AMAZED at the scientific evidence that suggests what a homemade bowl of chicken noodle soup can do for your systems! (Seriously…I know a doctor who literally taught a lecture on this! I love me some homemade chicken soup and now I can literally say: my doctor said to eat it!) 

Now, go enjoy a cuppa, boil some hot water, add a little honey, maybe some milk or lemon, and breathe in the fragrance and take a delightful sip of tea!

(P.S. Did you know that different teas should be steeped at different temperatures for the best results? Like, if you steep an Oolong tea in boiling water, you can BURN THE LEAVES!!!! Just a random thought for you to take as you leave!)

 

And Now For Something Completely Different ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

There once was a vase that wanted to be filled with flowers of every size and shape and color. Daisies. And dandelions. And roses and lilies. Sprigs of baby’s breath. Maybe an orchid or two. Great big bouquets that overflowed in floral fantastique, suffusing every room with the scent of the forest, or the garden, creating dreams of dancing with fairies, curling up in the petals and falling asleep surrounded by velvet softness.

The vase, you see, thought itself a very grand vase, with very grand ideas.

Put it in the drawing room. On the kitchen table. Somewhere that everyone would be drawn to its rainbow brilliance. A place where the sun would halo it in glory, for the vase held the decadent flowers it was filled with, and so was the centerpiece of everything as such.

It was a good vase.

But not in a house where vases were particularly important.

There were no grand ballrooms, or dinner tables that seated seven hundred. One did not simply sit in a room filled with flowers because it was a thing to do, largess and the like, in the house that the vase resided in.

In truth, the very grand vase was in a very mundane house. Three children ran around the circle table set in the center of the kitchen chasing a ball they tossed from one to the other, keeping the middle boy from touching it. The mother wiped sweat from her brow near the stove where she was boiling chicken to make soup. Father was at his desk, equally frazzled over the bills piled high on the counter top.

The vase held a relatively small bouquet that did not even fill its great mouth. The flowers in it drooped over the sides. Water putrefied in its base, turning green with scum from the dying stems in its mix.

How terribly, terribly undervalued was the vase.

It did not know, precisely, where its grand dreams came from. No glass blower had taken the time to shape and form the flute and flourish of its mouth, nor smooth the base it rested upon. An assembly line in a plant that used prongs and plyers on metal hinges turned by machines had created the vase. It was not one of a kind, but sold in bulk to stores around the world, though never in Florence or Venice or…what was that country that made all the glass?

Still, the vase had developed a sense of grandness, and hated that its life was limited to a table in the suburbs.

The oldest girl hip-checked its wooden perch. Tommy slipped around the leg at the base of the table and rose too soon on the other side, prized ball in hand at last.

Ma turned in time to gasp as the vase wobbled. Dad slunk over his papers, not wanting to deal with whatever mayhem was about to ensue.

The vase…tipped.

In trying to catch it, the youngest, sweat-hands-Eugene, fumbled the glass container, and the flowers tipped out across the floor, followed by the mildewed water, and, finally, by the glass which shattered on the tiles down below.

The vase screamed its cracking against the stone. It crunched beneath a foot too slow to stop moving forward, eliciting an all too human shriek in response to stepping on glass.

The room - stilled.

Vases – on sale at Target, Walmart, and Home Goods stores throughout the US and probably Canada. Get yours today for all your floral needs!

* * * * * * * 

Oh, fine! Here’s what actually ended up happening.

See, the mom’s a closet artist who enjoys working on mosaics. The shattered vase, which actually had some pretty good detailing on it, she used to overlay a river scene she’d been working on in her basement after she put her kids to sleep each night. On the banks of her river picture, grew flowers of every shape and size and color, and the glass of the vase made the water sparkle and move against the stems, giving the picture life.

She sold the picture in a gallery showing where she barely made back the cost of the vase. But her painting was then sold again, and again, and became a famous work of mosaic art the likes of Monet or Manet – though not exactly, and eventually the shattered-vase-river ended up at Buckingham Palace in some such drawing room or other, just as it always knew it would, a very grand place for a very grand vase to sit among the flowers.

Pat Hagen--Birches by the River
http://pathagen.com/projects/birches-by-the-river/

NOTE:  Story not based on real life. All account fictionalized. Any resemblance to real people is completely accidental!

 

A Ministry of Love ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

I had a really hard time writing this post today. For one, my mind is going five-hundred miles a minute on five hundred different topics and picking one was really tough.

But in the end, I had to focus, and I think I chose the right topic.

This Friday is Valentine’s Day.

Traditionally speaking, Valentine’s Day is the day of “lovers.” St. Valentine was the patron saint of affianced couples, happy marriages, love, beekeepers and plague…apparently. The saint ministered to persecuted Christians in the Roman Empire around the 200s AD and was martyred. Not sure how any of that links to marriages and beekeepers, but let’s go with it.

Over the course of years, St. Valentine has become more and more closely associated with hearts, roses, and red-pink-white colors and less with his religious ministry.

Moreover, he’s become more associated with gifts and candy, namely chocolate being given on February 14.

As children, we celebrated St. Valentine’s Day with cards to classmates that had little pieces of candy attached to them. As adults, we buy roses and jewelry mainly for women and a nice dinner for guys (and their dates…).

But in the end, we’ve actually forgotten what the day is truly about.

Not just “lovers,” but LOVE.

Ministry is a form of selfless love that we can offer to another person, and not necessarily a person who is close or related to us. It doesn’t have to be taking the coat off your back and giving it to someone who needs it – though it can be. Ministry can be as simple as offering a hug to someone who looks like they need it, or a smile to another who is having a hard time finding a smile of their own.

These are tributes of love that we should celebrate on St. Valentine’s Day. Even if you take out the “saint” part and just celebrate Valentine’s Day, it should still be about love. Loving ourselves, our relatives, our partners, our friends, our community, our world.

Love is one of the absolute greatest gifts humanity was ever given. It is a selfless expression of caring that we can offer to…ANYTHING.

In the wake of all the violence and hate polluting our world right now, I ask that on this upcoming Valentine’s Day, we celebrate with a gift of love.

Let’s post all the good things in our lives that we should show love for – from the smallest thing (that you found a pair of matched socks and don’t have to hunt for them today), to the great big things (that you got a raise, or you got engaged, or you sold 1,000,000,000,000 copies of WHATEVER), let’s take Valentine’s Day to encourage and praise those achievements. And if there is something bad out there, let’s do our best not to spread more hate, but to offer hope that those bad things will become better.

I have a project coming out on Valentine’s Day. It’s the second year I’ve been honored enough to have people join me for it. It’s called Kaleidoscope Hearts and it is a study in love, all the varied, different colors and shapes and sizes of what love means and can be to people. Self-love. Romantic love. Love of life. Love of others. The entire reason I wanted to do this project was because I wanted to spread a little bit of love with others.

So for this Valentine’s Day, enjoy that gift we are all so blessed to share. And share that gift, however great and however small, with others.

Let us minister to everyone with a smile and a warm heart this Valentine’s Day, and know that I love you, no matter what.

HELP! Blog Post Ideas Needed ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

Oh boy.

DepositPhotos

I’ve been sitting here for a while now trying to think of something to write about, and I’m drawing a total blank.

Christmas is over. The New Year is here. Resolutions suck. And, you know…Facebook…

Sometimes, I’ve found, it’s okay not to have a plan or any ideas on your plate. Your mind needs to take a break to reboot, because we really are just super high-speed computers, if you think about it.

We rush, rush, rush all through the holiday season, trying to do everything for everyone, and even though a lot of us have time off, it’s not a vacation. Or, you go on vacation, and when you get home you need a vacation from that!

Breathe. Relax. Go look up flowers on the internet and try to smell

DepositPhotos

them through the screen. It won’t work, but it’s kinda funny to look at and it’ll make you smile when you think about it later.

As we start this new year needing new ideas and new goals and new MORE…take time to sit back and relax a bit.

Don’t reflect. I think every time I try to sit down and reflect about last year, I depress myself because of all the goals I set and didn’t achieve, forgetting about what I did get accomplished. Reflection is great, but there is a time and place for that, too. Don’t let the new year get bogged down in last year’s…stuff.

For right now, just take a little moment not to worry about the past or the present or the future. Have that blank plate or page or whatever, and let yourself be okay with it – trust me, it will fill up fast.

The key is moderation. I know – really?!?!

Yeah. It’s so stupid and I hate that stupid phrase but “everything in moderation, including moderation.” Life is a balancing act of doing and resting. We tend to have attitudes of: if we’re not doing, we’re wasting, but that’s not true. Seriously, taking a rest is NEEDED. Our bodies and minds are so often forced to action that finding a moment of peace becomes a quest for the Holy Grail.

And a lot of times we need permission or an order to take that moment to ourselves, because those crazy active ideas in our heads keep telling us to move and we don’t want to listen to the “stop button” we’re pressing subconsciously.

So, here is your order to breathe, sit back, and relax for a moment

DepositPhotos

this year.

All those ideas you have or don’t have but are looking for will still be there in an hour, a day, or whatever. You’re too active not to go back and pick them up later, so don’t panic putting them down. And heck, if you need me to tell you to get back to work, I can do that, too. Not a problem.

In the meantime, after you’ve taken a minute to rest and recover and get ready to move forward, if you could think of some topics you might want to hear me ramble about, hit me up! Or not. Because you’re resting, and so am I. We’ll get back to the grind soon enough, but until then, this has been your friendly reminder that it’s okay to take a break, and not have a plan because the plans are coming and they’ll add up soon.

I guess I should really re-title this blog post, but…it hopefully got your attention, and you’re hopefully maybe a little giggly about it and breathing a little easier with it.

If not…uhm…blame Facebook. Seriously, everything happens because of Facebook, I take no responsibility after this.

Love you all and I hope that you truly did have a wonderful and blessed holiday season and start to the new year. Next month look for my post on getting back to work…maybe. I might have found a new idea to go with by then so, you’ll just have to breathe and move forward at your own pace.

(P.S.: Here are some links to pretty and fun things that you can look at to help you take that moment break…)

DIGITAL BLOOMS ARCHIVES

FUNNY MUSIC

DORKY COMICS

REJECTED PRINCESS

Fun Facts for Absolutely No Reason ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

Fact No. 1: in the event that your pen decides to explode,

disgorging the contents of its inkwell onto your hands, DON’T PANIC! While washing your hands is a good start, surprisingly, nail polish remover or alcohol swabs will also do the trick of getting the ink off your skin too. (Alcohol swabs are particularly good at removing ink stains from fake plastic looking wooden desks as well!)

Fact No. 2: in the event that you use nail polish remover to remove ink from your skin, do not put the implement with the wet liquid remover soaked/soaking through it onto a painted surface. If wood, the paint on the wooden surface might begin to molt a bit and there is definitely a good chance that you will ruin the paint job and strip the color from it.

Fact No. 3: in the event that the nail polish remover begins to erode

the paint job on a “wooden” surface, do not keep an open water bottle/glass on said surface where it might be easily tipped over. And if you DO tip over said glass, make sure to clean up the spill quickly before it seeps into/under the wood and causes the wood to expand or form a bump.

And finally…

Fact No. 4: in the event that your wooden desk/nightstand/whatever should warp from water absorption caused by alcohol seepage predicated by an ink spill, don’t pick at the now deformed surface, because it’s just not going to go well. And don’t try to hide it, because that bubble that has formed is not going away anywhere, and do not try to sell it, because no one wants to buy a ruined warped nightstand with chipped paint unless they’re in the refinishing business, and then they’re only gonna offer a very slim

amount to take that piece off your hands, namely an amount that won’t even cover the cost of a new replacement for yourself. 

This has been a segment of fun facts for absolutely no reason. I hope you have enjoyed, and I hope that you will keep these little tidbits in mind for your future adventures!

Over the Border and Through Some Woods ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

Well, the past two months have been monstrously busy, and next

year is looking to shape up the same, but that’s okay, because they’ve also been really fun.

I was lucky enough to be a signing author at two different events, and I thought that I’d take a minute to share some things that I really liked about them, and some things that maybe were not my favorite and that I would look into for the future.

The first event I went to was Penned Con in St. Louis.

It…was…HUGE! It was beyond huge. Like, epically ginormous. Over one hundred and fifty signing authors in two ballrooms for readers to get through. 

This was by far the biggest event that I had gone to, and probably the most well attended as well. It has a super dedicated following and has the backing of over five years to its name. It’s established, in the literary sense of the word/world…and so that brings it a lot of merit to authors looking to attend, and to readers looking to find authors. 

The event was supremely well organized and even when there were hiccups, the staff worked very diligently to fix them. I found the event to be “clean,” which sounds weird, but that makes a difference. It was not the type of event where people were handing out random…uhm…sexually promiscuous “giveaways” to any passerby. It was intended for all audiences, and required that authors acknowledge that and be aware of that when presenting their books. 

Honestly, to me, that is a HUGE selling point for an event. I look at this in two ways: the type of event am I going to, and the type of audience am I trying to attract. 

As a more “fantasy” author than romance, I look for broader events that cater to more than just romance readers. Don’t get me wrong, at a romance event, have at it! The gimmicky giveaways are huge referral points and I don’t begrudge you that at all. But events that are wide, which means that you are attracting a more diverse audience, then you need to be a bit more circumspect with what you’re allowed to display, and I truly appreciated that about Penned.

Surprisingly, my biggest un-selling point, in a sense, was the number of authors. Up to Penned, I’d only gone to pretty small events, generally in the range of anywhere between 40-85 signing authors. At 150, the readers who were attending were attending to see “their” authors, and not necessarily meet new authors. I found that those who had been to Penned before did better in book sales than new authors, because the readers were there looking for those they knew, not necessarily those they wanted to get to know. With so many authors gathered, you have to be a bit more choosy with who you are going to be buying books from, and as a reader, I totally understood that standpoint. 

That many authors was also a bit overwhelming, especially to me personally. I am, at heart, an extroverted introvert. I’m good with small talking my way out of a situation, but still, it takes an effort and after a while, I’m physically and emotionally drained and just want to curl under my table and hide for a bit. 

Penned was also a two-day, 8 hour days, signing event. Day one was great. Day two started hitting my migraine point. I did really like the extended signing hours though. I thought that having literally a full day of signing was great because you got to meet the morning people and the afternoon people, those who were free all day, and those looking to relax right after work by picking up a good book. Surprisingly, over the Friday and Saturday signing times, I did better on Friday, where I thought I would do better on Saturday. But again, I put this down to being a “weekend event” and those that were there for the whole thing were there first on Friday for the signing, so it makes a lot of sense. 

Overall, it was an epic experience, and really great because of it. 

Then, a few weeks ago, I crossed the border into Canada to go

to KaLiCon. That was a harrowing experience, to say the least…Crossing the Border…not KaLiCon! I probably should be more specific!

For the event itself, it was a small an intimate signing, geared towards author education and reader entertainment and was really great. I found the events that the Convention put on were inventive and unique. There were a ton of great things that I’d never experienced before at an event that I absolutely loved.

I think one of my highest points was the author-reader speed dating. Essentially, authors sit down, and readers come around and you get to spend 2-5 minutes with each one talking and getting to know each other. You can talk about your books, or your hair or whatever, making a connection more than a sales pitch which is essentially what has to happen at the signing table. 

For as introverted as I am, I do love getting to know people. Making connections puts me more at ease with others and allows me to function easier with them, I don’t feel as fake, personally, trying to force a smile and “entice you to my books,” once I know you.

It’s a delicate line. And during the “speed-dating,” I didn’t feel like I had to make a pitch, I just had to be myself. I think having readers and writers interact, realizing that we’re all people, and yes, sometimes realizing that we are not “like” one another, is a great thing. So, even the next day at the signing, when someone walks by who isn’t interested in your books but still smiles, it’s because you’re a person to them, more than just a seller, which I cannot stress how important that was to me.

The biggest hurdle for KaLiCon, and I will go so far as to say “foreign country events,” is getting to them. I ONE HUNDRED PERCENT went about it the wrong way. Apparently, to sell in Canada, and I am just guessing it is similar in other countries, too, you need a vendor’s license, and a slew of other things that go along with them. The issue is, most of the authors of KaLiCon were Canadian, and did not know what a “foreign” author would need to do to be “legally” allowed to sell outside of their home country. That said, it was still an AMAZING event. 

Unlike Penned, there was a small number of authors present, representing a wide range of genres. For one of the first times, I was not fighting with at a minimum three or four other authors of fairy tale re-telling. I’m pretty sure I was the only one there, which was great. A friend who went with me wrote contemporary rom-com, and she did amazing because she was a niche author there. From that standpoint, the smaller convention was great. 

Of course, we do have to talk about attendance though, and smaller convention equals, you guessed it, smaller attendance. Does that bother me? No. Like I said, I got to make great connections with readers at this event. That was honestly the best thing I could have asked for and it was wonderful. 

Overall, I count myself incredibly lucky because I have had amazing times at these conventions. I hope to be able to attend each of them again in the future, though I also have to consider branching out and trying to get into other venues, too, which is another hard topic to consider! 

All the same, going over the border and through some woods was definitely a journey for me, and I hope you get to take the time to travel the same path some day!

Oh right, and in case you’re interested, Penned Con’s theme for

next year is Mermaids and Pirates! AAARRRgggg! I’ll keep you posted on KaLiCon, too, because even if you don’t attend as an author, going as a reader is an experience you will not regret! 

Perception Part 1: Criticism ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

photo: pexels/jami jari

As a human being, each day we are prone to receiving criticism
from our fellows who walk the world around us. The media is full of the hype of who gained weight, who lost it, “Oh my God, Jason Momoa’s dad body!” and the other multitude of ridiculous critiques that do nothing but serve to show how shallow and cruel we can be to each other. In the Starbucks line: “I can’t believe that woman bought an espresso for her daughter!” Behind the driver doing the speed limit in the passing lane: “Who taught you to drive, you idiot!” To the coworker at the office: “My gosh, you go to the bathroom a hundred times a day!” 


We don’t know what’s going on in those other people’s minds or lives or hearts, what their needs and wants or what-nots are. But we judge them all the same. 

We don’t think about doing it, a lot of times it just happens because we are so indoctrinated into this mindset of critiquing. 

Think about it, from our earliest memories, we’re being told “Don’t be like Tommy” or “Don’t do what Jessie did.” We compare ourselves to each other, and against each other, and our entire perceptions are based on the critiques that our subconscious makes every time we’re put up against another person. 

In every walk of life. 

Truthfully, we all deal with it and don’t think anymore about it than

photo: Pexels Edu Carvalho

that. The comments affect each of us, but we’re so used to being commented upon, that “it” just “is,” and the people who can brush off the critiques are the high-ranking politicians and businessmen and women of the world. The rest of us get by, constantly subconsciously trying to change other people’s views of ourselves by redefining who we are based on their comments. 

Subconsciously. We don’t even know we’re doing it most of the time. Until it’s pointed out to us. 

My volleyball teammate, an older guy, and by older I mean he’s 50 to my 30, commented to me when I was around 25 or so: “I can’t believe you still bite your nails.” 

Innocuous. Who the heck cares? It’s not like he was saying: that’s a dangerous habit to have as we tend not to scape beneath our nails every time we wash our hands and so whatever has gotten under them, when you go to bite them, you are then ingesting…

Nope, he was just saying: “That’s a disgusting habit” which, in my mind, translated to: “You’re disgusting for biting your nails.” 

(I’m proud to say I haven’t “really” bitten my nails since! But that’s besides the point…ish.)

He said that, and I took care to make sure my nails aren’t bitten anymore, that he can’t ever say it to me again.  He’s like an older brother teasing a younger sister, and yet one comment made me change my life. Granted, it was a healthy change... 

Photo: Pexels Natasha Daher

I went to a doctor for a problem and instead of dealing with that problem, she told me, condescended to me, about a different problem, one that I’ve struggled with all my life, namely, my weight. She made me feel so self-conscious and “gross” by her comments and her, what felt like to me, disgusted diagnosis, that I left that office and spiraled down for over a year after what she said. (I haven’t been back to her, and my new doctor is freaking AWESOME from that standpoint, working with me, not at me). 

These are all critiques. The perceptions of other people that make us look at our own “senses of self” and redefine ourselves by those other opinions. They are the perceptions that color the judgments of other people around us. Baby boomers think of millennials as pansy pushovers who never had to work for anything. (Gross over generalization here, just to make a point!) Millennials swear that the boomers don’t know what we’ve had to deal with because “our world” changed faster with the internet. 

The boom of social media made criticism skyrocket, and perception become dependent on popular trends. Is there a way to overcome it? No. Not entirely.

We all criticize, even at the smallest levels. 

“That nail polish color does not look good on you.” Not gonna change the world or ruin a life, but it’s a criticism, and that person probably won’t wear that color again.  

What we can do is try to change the dynamic. 

Let’s criticize the good things about people. Let’s try to ignore the negative tropes and focus on the positive. 

You don’t like that nail polish, but dang, it looks like you got it professionally done, so why don’t you say: “Where’d you get your manicure? It looks great!”

Photo: Pexels Tim Mossholder

Compliments are just positive criticisms, but we’re so trained to focus on the negative that the good gets pushed aside. 

So, for this first blog post about perception, I challenge you to go a day without negatively criticizing something or someone. 

No, I lied, go one hour. Let’s make it manageable for you…oops, there I go criticizing and judging already. Guess I need to work on my own lesson a bit, too, right? 

A Cautionary Tale ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

Let me begin by saying that this is a cautionary tale that has widespread implications for all walks of life and is not necessarily only applicable to writers or people using computers…though it is definitely more geared towards them.

You see, as the day began, I was doing awesome. I had just finished a couple Photoshop pictures that I was pretty dang proud of. They looked, in my humble opinion, pretty good. Now, to be fair, I didn’t “exactly” create the pictures. I was just putting words on them, because… Anyways, they looked good. I was super excited about them, couldn’t wait to show them off, and…issue one occurred.

Facebook, which I already “love” dearly, decided not to upload my photos. Okay. That’s fine. Whatever. But, as a backup system, there goes backup number one (I’m not going to mention foreshadowing here…but…you get what I’m not mentioning…).

Again, it’s fine. The pictures are saved to the jump drive I have plugged in, so all is going well.

I upload a picture for a friend. I upload that friend’s manuscript. Everything, surprisingly, goes through. The internet seems to be holding strong today without any shorts.

Whoop-de-do-ki-ay!

And then it happened. I was looking online for an action or an overlay or a something, perhaps that’s where the problems began in not knowing what I was trying to do, for Photoshop. I had a picture that I wanted to prettify and couldn’t figure out alone, and Facebook – LOVE THEM… – showed me an add for where to go to find said overlays and actions and whatnot.

The download was free!

What could possibly go wrong, right?

Not. Mentioning. Foreshadowing!

Now, before you start with the “oh no, poor you’s”, which will admittedly be deserved, ish, in a few moments, let me just say that my computer is fine. Nothing seems to have happened to my computer or gotten disrupted or infected or what not…knock on wood.

The jump drive, however – which I was saving the download to, and which had all my writing on it, particularly the few pieces which I was currently working on, not EVERYTHING, thank God, but the current most important stuff – was not.

Halfway through the download, with documents from the jump drive still open on my computer, I get a: “transfer cannot be completed; driver corrupted” message on my folder.

SO, of course, I did the smart thing and did NOT save the documents I had open to my computer where they were originally saved to the jump drive…no, I just closed them down unthinkingly.

I then proceeded to spend the next hour trying to finagle the jump drive into a spark of new life, because it had files on it that I HADN’T SAVED ANYWHERE ELSE YET!

A little backstory: I run a writer’s workshop group one Saturday a month. I try to pick topics that might be useful for the group, and one of the month’s topics was – saving your work to multiple sources so that you don’t lose it…

To be fair, I did not run that particular lecture but let the resident computer dude do it…

I did listen to it, though.

I did not follow the suggestions/instructions of Doug when he said: SAVE EVERYTHING AND THEN SAVE A BACKUP OF EVERYTHING!

Back to the present…

The files that I had just uploaded to Kindle to publish my latest novellas…are gone. I never saved them to my main computer, and now they have “poofed” out of existence on my “corrupted” jump drive.

My Photoshop awesome manipulation…is also gone, only the memory of my pretties left to sustain me.

The majority of my work is still safe, but the last edits of the latest pieces I was working on are no more, and I am back to square-ish-one. 

This is not the tragedy it could have been. My freshman year of college I somehow managed to bend a jump drive. I had just gotten a new computer, hadn’t saved over anything yet, and all of my writing was on that jump drive, which refused to open. My poor roommate came into the room and I was sitting on the floor rocking, and she asked: "What happened?" To which I responded, potentially melodramatically, but who’s counting: "My family died!"

I was holding the jump drive up at the time I said this. And she was also a writer. So she understood I did not mean my ‘literal’ family, but my imaginary made up ones which, for a writer, had consumed my life for some time. 

You would think that would have taught me a better lesson…but, apparently, it did not. 

Sigh. 

(shakes computer in muted rage while cursing everyone and everything silently in my head)

Long drawn out, useless SIGH!

There is a moral that I want you to take away from my ineptitude here. ALWAYS SAVE, DOUBLE SAVE, AND THEN SAVE AGAIN WHAT YOU ARE WORKING ON.

Whether it be a simple form for work, or a manuscript you’ve put your heart and soul into, make sure to save it. Make sure that if “it” is something you want to keep, that you have a safe place where you can keep a copy of “it” for the future. A story shared between family members, recorded from a grandparent for the future – make a copy of it, back it up, transcribe it so that it is not forgotten or lost or destroyed and someone can always find it. How many times in life have the simple things become misplaced only to be missed later on?

A jump drive is not the safest medium to save your work on. Nor a hard drive, nor the cloud or whatever. But saving something to multiple places gives you a better chance of keeping your work safe than only saving it to one.

Take my advice. Be safe, save your work, whatever that work may be, and then re-save it again. Don’t lose what you have because of a silly mistake or because of a corrupted file. Save everything, and appreciate it, because life changes and erases and goes by in a blink, and you never know what the next moment will bring.

The End.

(Who just went and re-saved all their work to somewhere else? I know I did…)

A Killer Vacay You Won't Want to Miss ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

Photo: Google images

My family own camps in the Adirondack Mountains in Upstate New York. Now, when I say “camps,” I really mean homes that are made out of wood and that we call “camps” but that are pretty high-end pieces of real estate – absent air conditioning. These cabins reside on the banks of a small lake. Not directly on the lake, but each house has a golf cart, and the lake is less than a half mile away from the front doors, so we say “on the lake” and no one really argues it.

I always loved/love going up to the cabins. It’s a yearly ritual that I feel incomplete without completing.

Of course, now days, I go with a bit more trepidation than when I was younger, but…it is what it is.

I should probably explain.

As a child, I was oblivious to anything else around me but Disney movies and my Barbie doll. When asked: “Where you going?” I would respond and walk away without waiting for the resulting questions or, as I now have come to expect, shock when I spoke my answer.

You see: “Where you going?” was answered with: “The camps in the Adirondacks.” “Oh, where at?”

“On Crystal Lake.”

Let me repeat…I’m oblivious, and I watch ONLY Disney movies…mostly.

But I definitely do NOT watch horror movies, and yet would routinely get a “horrified” expression in response to “Crystal Lake.”

As it turns out, Crystal Lake happens to be the setting for a horror

Photo: Google images

movie.

Jason, whichever one he is…I don’t really know, never watched it, you see?...is a serial killer who worked or lived or whatever-ed at Crystal Lake in Upstate New York…

Yes…MY Crystal Lake. The one where I spent an idyllic childhood completely unaware of the horror that had ensued there sometime during the 80s.

Because, despite the “Friday the 13th” movies being fictional, apparently most people believe that Jason really did commit those dastardly deeds up at Crystal Lake.

It doesn’t help that there really was a boy’s camp up there at one point…just like in the movies…

Oh, and that one of my relatives actually bought one of the dorm houses that the boys used to camp in and converted it into their cabin…

Okay, you caught me, all three of my relative’s cabins were originally boy’s dorms! FINE!

I have never once found a remnant of blood or gore or chainsaws or knives or the like anywhere near or around the camps…but it’s still the first question people ask when they put one and one together: “Crystal Lake? Like from the movie?”

Why oh why can’t it be a movie about a romantic heroine who gets caught up in a love affair and she and her lover escape to the camps where they defend themselves by growing giant mega-crocodiles that eat-- wait, that’s Lake Placid, never mind.

I’m getting them confused.

I should probably point out, though, that for the thirty plus years I have been going to the Adirondacks, I have never once met a serial killer nor been threatened by anyone except the gas station attendant who was not going to let me get a lotto ticket without seeing my ID.

Finding a place to get away from the everyday, to relax in nature, enjoy time with your family, that honestly is the moral here.

No matter that Crystal Lake has this invented history of horror, it

Photo: Google images

has been a place that will forever be for me linked with good times and great memories. It’s where my Babushka (not the scarf, this is the Grandmother) went down to the rec hall and because she had to use a walker, sat down in a chair and danced the night away all while sitting. This is where my uncles taught me how to fish, and I had more fun rowing the boat across the lake than learning how to bait a hook. It’s where we sat around one night before the bonfire and passed around a Kindle and read “Meg” to each other, because why the heck not? The voices were epic, and the story was fun. It’s the place that someday I hope I can take my kids, blocking their ears from whispered tales of men with axes, so that they can go to the lake and run in the sand. So my uncles can tell them “the water’s so clear you can drink it,” even as I know WAYYY better. It’s the place where on the 4th of July, we’ll pack up the cars into a caravan, making seats where there most definitely are not seats so we can take as many people as we can with us over to the Dude Ranch where they set fireworks off after the rodeo and the little kids can have hotdogs on the house because it’s a celebration and it’s family but way more than family too.

It’s a retreat, and it’s a home, and it’s a vacation, and it’s work.

It’s crazy, and the people there are crazy, just not serial-killer crazy.

And I wouldn’t change it for the world.

My family own cabins in the Adirondacks. We try to go up once or twice a year, usually at the beginning and end of summer. The waters of the lake are so clean you can see all the way to the bottom twenty feet below, and that’s why it’s called Crystal Lake. The people are friendly, though some are a bit standoffish, but they’re family, and it wouldn’t be the Fourth of July without traveling to that place where the internet doesn’t work, but the TV does, and someone’s always got some sort of game going and you go home more tired than when you got there because there’s something going on somewhere every minute.

I hope you get a chance to visit someday, just remember that if you hear noises in the woods coming after you in the night…

…it’s probably just a bear.

The Making of an Author Family ~ by Linda Boulanger

I’ve had the honor of being a part of several box sets now and the one thing I’ve found is that in each one, at least for some period of time, there is a camaraderie that develops that is like nothing else I have found. It’s a sense of family… an author family.

We spend hours and hours planning these sets and hashing out the details. We have to iron down everything from what the common thread might be, how certain stories will fit into the overall theme, marketing plans… even who will post what on which days and where. And while there have been the occasional heartaches along the way, I have come away from every box set that I’ve been a part of with a sense of kinship, knowing I have joined together with kindred spirits to create something truly amazing.

I’m proud of these sets, but I’m even happier about the relationships that have been created, especially the lasting ones. I have authors that I call sisters and friends. How could we not grow close when we spend months pep talking, cutting up, crying, and cheering each other through slumps and spurts.

The sets may be fleeting… most of them only remain in existence for three months. But the relationships that develop… those are the things that last.

On Saturday, June 8th, Between the Tides will hit the virtual shelves. This is the latest box set I’m a part of. It includes some amazing authors that I’m super proud to be among. If you decide to grab a copy, I hope you’ll look beyond the pages, at least for a moment, and think about the authors included, knowing we created a family with a dynamic like no other that allowed our words to flow forth and onto these pages. You’re not just getting a set of books, you’re getting a piece of a very special author family.