What's real?

I've had so many wonderful experiences with people who do not want my characters to stop being in their lives. I just talked with a woman this morning who just read my book twice so she could keep them in her life a bit longer. So, my daughter's come up with a plan, and that is to create snippets of Langsberry life right here on my blog and post the happenings as they occur.

 A lot of people have wanted to know how much of this is autobiographical. They think because I'm a fiber artist I made Grace one. That's not how it happened at all though. While writing the book I would get visions in my head of what Grace was making, and since those visions wouldn't go away, I devised ways to make what I saw. Therefore, Grace made me a fiber artist. Hm...

What is autobiographical? I really did have a dear friend died of ovarian cancer. I really did work for my husband in his office and despised it. However, it was a chiropractic office, not an accountant's. I did leave him, but I did it long after the manuscript was written. So, again Grace did it first.

I live and work on a square now, but didn't while writing the book. I really didn't even know anyone who did until moving to McKinney, TX in 2008. I did grow up in the Dallas area. My mother is still alive, but my dad died of myocardial infarction (better known as a heart attack) when I was 24 years old. I was married for a hundred years to the same person and we have a daughter, unlike Grace.

What's interesting to me is that the husband character, Jack, is really based on someone I had a crush on in high school. When Grace is talking with Gordon about what her high school boyfriend said about love, that was a conversation I had had with this guy back in the '70s.

As soon as I graduated from Bishop Lynch High School in Dallas, I did go to Western State College in Gunnison, Colorado. I did meet the man I would eventually marry there. He was two years older than me, but I did complete my undergrad degree before marrying, unlike Grace.

We did live in a small town in Colorado, but there was no square to be found there. As a matter of fact, it was a metropolitan area compared to Langsberry.

The question I get asked the very most is if there was a Gordon in my life. The answer is no, and yes. It was interesting because I happened to be in Aspen one weekend editing my manuscript. I was on a page that described Gordon's flannel shirt, jeans, and work boots. There were very particular things about his clothing, and I had just read it when a friend of mine from college called to take me out to lunch. When I got in his car, he was wearing exactly what I had written about Gordon's attire. This man and I did not do art together. However, he opened me up to my own love of flying. The first time we flew together was from Aspen to Gunnison on my 48th birthday. The next day I asked for a divorce. I wanted to fly in every aspect of my life. I still do.

Finally

I have spent the day on the computer. Do you know how much information there is on this thing? In five minutes alone I've been on multiple sites and have no idea what I was looking for in the first place.

I've spent so much time lately in my studio creating amazing artwork that I've never done before, nor have I seen anything like it either, and now it's time to get it out there and market it. First, I had to see what there is out there to market to. What I discovered is what is there NOT????

I'm blown away by the enormity of the market out there. The universe is truly abundant. There is so much at our feet. Looking through the possibilities on the net is like going to the ocean with semi-trailer trucks and pipelines for water instead of the thimblefuls I've been picking up. (Thank you, Wayne Dyer, for that imagery.)

So, my book has been selling without much advertising by me. I don't know who's buying them, but I am so very grateful. I'm finishing up my work with the PR department so the book tour will be starting by next month at least. The main character, Grace James, is a textile artist, which is something I've also become, so my latest art pieces will be traveling with me. I've discovered that there are a lot of people out there who have no idea what a fiber artist does. That encompasses anything with fibers. I choose not only fabrics, but threads, papers, and even stretch the definition to include paints and beads.

So, Grace and I will be hitting the road soon. In the meantime, I'm gearing up for a lot of marketing, setting up websites, and blogging like crazy. I'll be on the radio on March 18th at 8:00 p.m. central time. Once I get more of the facts, I'll let you know. To the life of a writer and artist. Finally, I'm doing it...

Believing anything

The very first copy of my very first book. As my father would say, "How 'bout them apples?"

The very first time I saw the digital proof of the cover I was working for a shaman in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. I pulled it up on the computer at the front desk, and my heart pounded to see my name in print. The cover is in Tibetan prayer colors, my shaman's wife informed me. She said that it would be perfect to sell in the office with her Tibetan singing bowls and her red and gold decor. The book never came to life there in Steamboat. It took a year after moving to McKinney, Texas before it materialized.

What was the delay? I have no answer for that. I realize that I'm not in a rush for so much in my life. Before, years before now, I wanted everything NOW. Now, now, now. Now, I just want to be in the now. Now, I want to pay attention, to absorb the textures of what's around me, to have the sounds sink in, the colors swirl through me, and I want to feel the joy in it all. And after a whole bunch of nows, the book is finally published. And the length of time it took doesn't matter. It's here now. It's on the couch beside me as I type this. There are many, many moments throughout my days and nights where I forget it's done. It used to consume me, and now I can go through most of my waking hours without a thought of it.

Now, what consumes me? Besides the PR department at the publishing company? Besides the artwork that flows through my thoughts? Besides the to-do list that sits on the coffee table in front of me? Besides the dirty footprints and pawprints on the floor that need to be cleaned up? Besides all of that, nothing really. Nothing.

And if you believe that...well, you'd believe just about anything.

As of yesterday, January 19, 2010, I experienced a dream come true, a dream I've dreamt since I was in fourth grade. I received the galley of my first novel. For the first time in my life I held in my hand the very first copy of my very first novel -- ever.

I expected something different since I'd dreamed it for so long, but what came over me was a calmness, an absolute peace. I'm not sure if having a dream of such magnitude arrive in the mail has sent me into shock or what. It feels like a calm knowingness, an utter peacefulness of knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that this has already happened and I'm now just catching up to what's been waiting for me.

I've spent today reading. It's a 261 page novel. I'm on page 99 and took a break to call a fellow writer in the Colorado mountains. And now I'm still taking a break while workers are up in the attic in my studio. (It's too distracting to concentrate.)

I'm reading to look for errors. I'm checking for anything that's not to my liking, and here's what I've discovered. Even though I've been editing, re-writing, and meticulously combing through this manuscript for years, I'd change a multitude of things even to this day. Because why? Because I'm different. Because I'm different I want my characters to respond differently, my wording to be joined differently, and my messages to be conveyed differently.

That's why it's taken so long to rewrite this. How do I know when it's finished? When I say I'm done. I'm feeling very done. I feel it's time to finish diapering this baby, pat it on its butt, and send it on its way. It's time for me to move on, to accomplish the next thing in my life I feel called to do. It's time for me to explore new venues, to speak before crowds, to design new images, and to create new worlds, not continue to rewrite the ones I've already been through.

So, that being said, it's time to get back to reading page 99 and the rest of its relatives. And the men are still crawling around the attic above me with the ladder pulled down behind my chair. I can proof anyway.

Because it's time to call this bad boy done. Ah...I feel the load lifting as I swivel my chair back around to the book. Soon, it will be available to the masses through Amazon. Its name is Healing Grace, and mine is Jill Luigs. And with a few clicks on the computer the book could be in your hands too.

So, let me finish reading...