I came across this article last week that caught my eye.  The article, titled Book Offers Novel Approach to Weight Loss, talks about a study conducted at Duke University in which obese teen girls reading a book with a weight-management storyline resulted in those same girls losing weight.  This is the first study “to show a relationship between reading and making positive, healthy lifestyle changes,” according to study author Alexandra C. Russell.

 

This got me to thinking.  I’ve been reading Romance novels for almost twenty-five years.  Could my choice of reading material have an affect on my lifestyle choices?  This begged further attention, so the analysis began. 

 

I started reading mainstream Romance as a teen.  These books had a great deal of sex as this was still the age of the “bodice ripper”.  I hate that term with a passion, by the way, but it fits in this instance.  In my teenage years (prepare to learn more about me than you likely wanted to know) I did not make the lifestyle choice of becoming sexually active.  In fact, I think the books probably ingrained in me the idea that sex with the right person was the better way to go. And sure, the Catholic education may have contributed as well. So I waited. 

 

I don’t remember having a specific and detailed “man of my dreams” in mind as a teen.  Unless you count Joe Elliott, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t see him as husband material, even in my delusional teenage mind.  For those wondering, Joe Elliott is the lead singer of Def Leppard.  I was a head banger, what can I say?  But I did have a long list of traits my eventual husband would have to possess in order to win me. 

 

So we can say, so far, my choices were opposite the realities of the stories, but reflected the lessons involved.  Interesting.

 

Moving on to my 20s.  I believe it was around this time that Romance had much more variety to them than they do now.  Which is ironic as I’m guessing there are more Romances on the shelves today than there was back then.  I remember reading about drugs in Historicals and about infidelity and experimentation in Contemporaries.  This must have been my own little experimental phase.

 

However, I did not carry those experiments into my lifestyle.  In fact, my 20s could best be described as boring.  Other than a couple years of partying, my 20s consisted of marrying, settling down, and starting a family.  The true irony here is that you’d think after reading about the ideal man for so long, I would have chosen better.  But I didn’t.  I settled and it didn’t work out.  Whose idea was this analysis anyway?  Oh yeah, mine.  *sigh*

 

So instead of making choices that brought me my HEA, I went in the other direction.  Again, my choices were opposite of the stories I was reading.

 

Onto my 30s.  The message is getting through.  By the time I turned 30, I’d lost myself somewhere.  I’d like to think reading about heroines who were becoming increasingly more spunky and independent had something to do with me getting back on my feet and getting a back bone again.  It was by far not the only contributor, but I’m guessing it played a small part.  A good sign my choices had begun to come in line with the literature.  There is hope for this endeavor yet.

 

To the present.  I now have a quarter of a century of reading Romance under my belt.  Give or take a few months.  I have not found my personal HEA, but I do have a pretty good life.  I like myself most of the time, I’ve worked hard to make a stable and somewhat comfortable home for myself and my daughter.  And though my list of required traits in my hero is considerably shorter, I still have standards and I’m determined to stick to them.

 

Overall, I believe my reading history has shaped my life history.  Though as we can see, that does not mean one must reflect the other. So, when the detractors say Romance novels give women unrealistic expectations for life and love, I say, bull shit.  Romance novels have given me knowledge, adventure, laughter, tears, and hours (if not years) of entertainment.  They’ve shown me what women can do, what we are capable of, and that redemption is always possible.  They may not have handed me my perfect, real life HEA, but they have kept my hope alive.

 

What have Romance novels done for you?  Do you believe they have had any affect on your choices over the years?  If you’ve found your HEA, is he (or she) what you had in mind when you were making all those teenage diary entries?  Or do you think this is all bunk and worthless rambling to fill a blog?

It’s almost been a year since I started writing a blog at least once a week. Doesn’t seem like time should’ve flown by that fast. When I was little, a month would drag by. Summers seemed to last forever, and the time between Labor Day and Christmas was the longest stretch of time ever. Now, I can’t breathe without three months passing me by faster than I can snap my fingers.

 

I’ve learned a lot from the blogs this past year. It’s funny how we can all talk about one subject and have a different outcome that makes sense. I’ve also learned that life is meant to be lived to have fun, enjoy yourself and those around you. And not to mention, life is lived so that you can live it a different way through your writing.

 

Writing, for me, is an exercise in clearing my conscience. Redoing things I wished I’d done different, living life vicariously through my main characters. It’s one of the best things about writing a story. You are someone different when looking through a different POV. I give myself up to the feelings of first love, betrayal of someone closest to you, deceit, lying, cheating, begging, and relying on no one but myself. All these emotions claw their way to the surface when on the page. But also, writing teaches you a lot about yourself. Things you keep firmly locked away seem to bubble up until you’re unable to lock it away anymore.

 

Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. The best way to get it over with is to just get it out.

 

For the writing, the life of the character is everlasting until that last page when you have to say goodbye and move on. It’s not painful to say goodbye to a good story when you know you’ve given them the right ending. But what happens if life gets in the way of that happily ever after ending and the story must go on through a new POV?  It’s hard to let go then because you know somewhere in the story it went wrong. Your emotions swung the story onto the path less taken and no matter how hard you try; you can’t find your way back. That’s life breathing through your writing. My writing holds more emotion when I write this way. It’s painful for me, but I like the end result. This makes me think about life more often and how short it really is. How sometimes the most important things to us get swept aside in our quest to have bigger and better things. Makes me think about what we have to sacrifice to have what we think we want instead of just what we need. When I write, life is simpler. It’s as easy as that.

 

I have a theme song for writing. I’ve loved this song for so long that even when I haven’t listened to it for a while, I can still sing it without missing a beat. Love unrequited except for a single night. Lovers who can’t find a way to be together and each second they can spend together draws them further apart. The song is so heartbreaking to listen to but it’s hypnotic. I use this song when I need help remembering what’s worth sacrificing in life, in writing. I think about what it would be like to look at someone from across the room and pretend I didn’t know them. To walk past them and remember the way his fingers felt on my naked skin, the way he looked in the moonlight and the stars shining in his eyes and the way it felt when he kissed me goodbye. It’s that type of emotion that traps a reader and makes them turn the page and I needed to be reminded of that.

 

What sort of life do you put into your writing? Readers, do you find yourself reading a certain type of book based on what kind of story is being told? If you don’t fancy those questions, I’m curious about music. What kind of theme song would you give your life?

I’m a person who hates to know what is going to happen before it happens.  I don’t sneak to find out what my Christmas presents are or struggle not to give others their presents early because I can’t wait for their reaction.  I don’t have to know everything everyone else knows and I often forget to tell friends things that they consider a big deal.  I was born, by some strange twist of fate, without the nosey gene.  (This often gets me into trouble as what I consider minding my own business, others assume is a lack of interest or me not caring.  Which is not the case, I assure you.)

 

In surfing around some blogs last week, I came across a little snippet about the book Heaven, Texas by Susan Elizabeth Phillips.  I have this book in the TBR and even started it once.  However, I was also trying to write and this woman is so darn good, she was killing my confidence.  So I put it down.  I’ll get back to it when I think I can handle the awesome that is SEP. 

 

What I didn’t realize is that the blog I’d found was about endings.  I’d read the entire bit about how the book ended before I realized it.  Now, it didn’t really spoil the book for me, I mean, I know they get their HEA.  But still, it was more than I prefer to know ahead of time.

 

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last eight months or so, you know Stephanie Meyer is the latest publishing superstar and her Twilight series about Bella and her teen, vampire love-interest, Edward, is the smash, must-read of the year.  Recently, a version of a book Ms. Meyer had been writing, a re-write version of the first book from a different character POV, was leaked through the internet.  The fall out has been interesting.  I’ve heard everything from Ms. Meyer leaked the book herself (which I don’t believe) to one of the stars of the upcoming Twilight movie leaked the pages.  No matter who leaked them, they got out and now Ms. Meyer is supposedly not going to finish or publish the book (based on what she wrote on her website last I checked.  Sorry if that has changed since I last looked.)

 

My question is simple – how do you feel about spoilers?  Are you one of those people who read the ending first (and should be flogged!…lol)? Do you scratch and claw to get a much anticipated book as soon as possible?  And what would you do if something you poured your heart into, that you loved and couldn’t wait for readers to enjoy, got hijacked before you were ready?

*dun dun dun dun dadun dun dun dun dun dadun*

Your mission, should you choose to accept, is to write a Romance novel.  Don’t be fooled by how simple this sounds.  There will be many who work against you.  Your greatest enemy is the evil I.E.  She’s sly, unpredictable, and as mean as they come.  She’ll throw up road blocks, make you doubt your skills, and leave you crying in your rum if you let her.

 

Then there’s I.E.’s second in command, the Regulator.  Don’t let the taped glasses and scrawny frame fool you.  The Regulator is the keeper of *the rules*.  He’ll tell you over and over these supposed rules cannot be broken.  You must stay strong and keep writing.  Rules were made to be broken.  Break them and move on.

 

Don’t be lulled into a false sense of security once you’ve silenced the Regulator.  Because the next villain is always waiting around the corner.  The dreaded Big Chill.  The Big Chill wants everything cold.  No sexual tension.  No sizzle.  No sex.  Whatever you do, don’t let the Big Chill win.  Close the door on the sex if you must, but don’t lose the sizzle or the mission is over.

 

This mission requires all of your covert skills.  You must get inside your character’s minds.  Know what they think, how they feel, and most of all their greatest fears.  You must test them, torture them, tempt them to touch the fire.  You must raise the stakes.  Throw obstacles in their way and make them choose between fear and love. 

 

Yes, you see now why this is your greatest and most difficult mission.  Love is the prize.  The most desired and illusive treasure in the world.  It’s fickle yet steadfast.  Fragile yet resilient.  Free yet always comes with a price. 

 

Now, do you accept this mission?  If you do, how do you plan to defeat these evil villains.  And once these villains have been slain, will you be ready to face the next wave of terror – the Editor, the Publisher, and the Reviewer?

Or what I like to call pantsing it when you have no idea what’s going on.

 

 

Inspired by a Sunday morning impromptu dance off, I come to you live from my living room where Mattycakes is busting a move. I’m filling in for the Bo’sun today and you will have to bear with my crazy weekend antics. This is why they don’t let me blog Mondays.

 

We like to dance. Every Sunday morning, Mattycakes and I schedule a little dancing time. It’s our way of spending time with one another since we don’t see much of each other on the weekdays. I stay up extremely late on Saturday nights to write and then get up all goofified from lack of sleep. This is when the dancing gets wild.

 

We’ve spent a lot of time thinking up specialty moves that are unique to us. We turn on the radio in the kitchen and bust a move. We have something we call the lawn mower and the row boat with a little of the offset arm action to compliment each other. Then we go our own ways. Usually this is the moonwalk from me and the booty shake from Mattycakes before we move back to do a little of the freak boy made popular mostly by Too Short in the ‘90’s. You know, where the girl does the freak against the boy and the boy’s got his hand in the air like he’s a pimp or maybe that’s more popular now since the Lil Jon era. Anyways, then we go straight into interpretive dance. I call this my pantsing. This gets my brain warmed up. I love to dance. I’m not exactly the most graceful person in the room.

 

Mattycakes is good at the pansting. He’s actually quite creative. Today’s dance off was inspired by “So You Think You Can Dance”. I make Mattycakes suffer through this two hour affair every Wednesday night. What he calls his interpretive dance number is mostly moves he’s seen in movies. Which to watch a man who’s every bit of 6’4” and looks like a tank, try to move like a dancer is hilarious. But we have a different kind of humor here. Mostly us just jumping around like ballerinas and twiggy cheerleaders. Not a pretty sight.

 

I bet you’re wondering what this has to do with writing. I know Hellion is sitting on her treasure chest, chewing on the end of her dagger and trying to rationalize throwing it at me.

 

Just so you know, daggers hurt, babe. That’s why we’ve got a life size poster of Capt’n Jack. That’s supposed to be for target practice not me.

 

I went to the school of pantsing. Well, I did until I got tired of going and made up excuses not to go. For me, knowing the story before it unfolds on the page is boring. I like to go in several different directions when I write and if I’m set to one thing, it’s certain I’ll go another. The road less traveled is the one I enjoy the most.

 

Mattycakes and the dancing have really taught me a lot about writing. And no that’s not the lack of sleep talking.

 

I get an idea in my mind and I go somewhere with it. Just when I think I know what’s going to happen next, I throw a screwball in there and change it up. Dancing is just like that. You have to anticipate your partner’s moves and think up your next one.  It flows together even when you had no idea what was coming next. And if it doesn’t you move forward and interpret what to do next.

 

Just like dancing with a partner, you have to know your characters in order to pants. I’ve always thought pantsing is more of a character driven way of writing. You let the characters tell you what direction to head in next. Let them tell the story the way it was meant to be told. Sometimes, they aren’t sure either but that’s when you throw the screwball in, the kidnapping attempt. The phone threat. The stalker. The ex-girlfriend. The baby. Whatever.

 

Do what’s best for your story and you’re the only one who knows that. Learn to rely on instinct. It’s like an adrenaline rush each time you open a new page.

 

 

So today let’s discuss methods of writing. What crazy thing do you do to get into the mood to write? And if you’re a reader, do you have a method to your wicked reading ways?

It was dark by the time I walked through the door. Seven o’clock. You wouldn’t think that was overly late but it wasn’t yet spring in Missouri and time hadn’t reverted back to borrowing time to make it light longer.

 

I dropped my keys in my purse. I had a major headache going on. I’d just finished Eleven on Top by Janet Evanovich this morning before work and then ending was still bugging me. I went into the kitchen and flipped on the light, finding the book on my desk, I popped it open to the last 30 pages. It was a quick read for me. I had almost every line memorized. The way Ranger finds Stephanie crammed into an overhead cabinet. The way their eyes met. The way he kisses her bloody wrists. The emotion I felt in those few short paragraphs was killing me. How could she not be with him?

 

Matty popped his head around the corner and I closed the book with a sharp snap.

 

“You wanna watch a movie?”

 

“Sure.”

 

Blow was the choice movie. We’d seen it at least a dozen times before. We sat on the couch together in the dark, eyes focused on the TV and still my mind wandered. I couldn’t get that scene out of my head. I knew there wasn’t another book. I’d checked a million times at the library. No new book for a few more months. I surely was going to die with longing to know what happened next. What if they didn’t get together in the next book? What about that look? How could she not see what I see?

 

There was only one way to fix this in my mind. I had to just get it out. I had to write. But how the hell was I going to do that? I had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t even have a notebook to write on.

 

You know what will happen in the next book, don’t you? There it was. That little voice. Poking me. Prodding me. They won’t be together. What are you going to do then? What if he brushes a curl behind her ear and walks away. What if there wasn’t another book?

 

I had to fix this problem. It was driving me nuts. I had printer paper. As soon as Matty went to bed, I was going to find a pen and just write something. Who cared if it made sense. No one would ever see it but me. No one would have to know what I’d done. Surely I’d lost my mind. No character had ever come to life for me like Ranger and Stephanie on a page. There was something about the way they looked at each other.

 

I looked up at Matty sitting beside me on the couch and he happened to look down at me the same time. The glow from the TV was perfect on his smiling face and I knew why I was addicted. Matty was my Ranger. And I had to let Stephanie see that. Somehow.

 

That settled it. I had to do something. So I patiently waited. I fidgeted. I chewed on my thumbnail. I got up and walked around. I did the dishes. And finally, it was midnight. Way past our bedtime. I smiled all the way up the stairs. I thought of the way I wanted to write. What I was going to write. It was going to be perfect. And finally I’d be able to have some peace and quiet.

 

It was one am. I tossed back the blankets and crept down the stairs. The house was eerily silent in the hush of night and I was slightly creped out that I had the guts to walk down into the kitchen. I pulled a couple of sheets from the print and found an old ink pen. I slid into a kitchen table chair and sat there.

 

No words came to me.

 

I put my head in my hands. This was the worst feeling. I knew it was there. Why couldn’t I write it now?

 

“I glanced into the mirror. The black mini dress molded to every curve and made me feel slightly self-conscience. I could do this, I reminded myself. It’s not like I’d never done a distraction for Ranger before. Piece of cake, right?”

 

My god! What is that?! I read over it. “What the hell is this?” I ask myself. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m just going to go with this until I get to the scene where she throws herself into his arms and kisses him like she’s never kissed someone before and swear that she loves him.

 

I put my ink pen back to the paper. My fingers flew through sheets of paper. My hand would cramp and I rubbed it out, a mad gleam in my eye as I tried to remember everything flowing through my mind. I finally got to the end. By no means did Stephanie throw herself into his arms. She backed him into a wall and wrapped a leg around his thigh. She drew him into her, pressed herself against every hard inch of him and brushed her lips over his. And as quickly as she did that, she walked away from him.

 

WTF am I writing? I asked myself, reading back over it. I was cross-eyed. Delirious. I glanced back at the microwave clock and rubbed my eyes. It was almost six am!

 

I shoved the papers into my desk, underneath the keyboard covered in three inches of dust and dropped the cover over them. I hustled back upstairs and fell into bed, asleep before my head even hit the pillow.

 

Eight AM comes very early to someone on two hours of sleep.

 

I wrote about 40 pages of Mission: Distraction (which wasn’t what I ended posting and at this point wasn’t even titled), before I ever had the nerve to type it up. I knew how to type. I was a computer major in college. I type faster than my brain can keep up. But there was something very intimidating about the computer. I felt very phony. And I dared to breathe a word of my obsession to my younger sister- who at the time was very obsessed with Sailor Moon (Anime) fan fiction.

 

“You should post it.”

 

“NO!” I shook my head violently side to side. “No way. I’m too old for that crap. I don’t know why I wrote it. Surely I’ll get sued.”

 

“No way, dude. There’s a ton of stuff out there.” She pulled up her email account. “Listen. What do you have to lose? I’ll email you the site link to that fan fiction site.”

 

I made myself sick on the way home. Post it? Was she insane? Clearly she was because she was in the same family as me, but I couldn’t post this. I didn’t own these characters. People would make fun of me. They would KNOW it was me.

 

Wouldn’t they?

 

When I was in high school, I was being a smart ass to my English teacher and in my goal for what I wanted to do after high school I put: I’m going to be on the top of the NYT someday.

 

My English teacher thought this was brilliant. I laughed in her face. I hate writing. Why would I ever write for fun?

 

What did I have to lose?  Everything, I swore to myself. Okay so that might be a little melodramatic. But surely I’m too old to post “fan fiction” as my sister liked to refer to it as. And still, this writing thing was still in my head. I had to write something else. She was still talking to me. Telling me where she wanted to go next. Telling me what she wanted to do. This wasn’t good. I was obsessed!

 

I got home in a mood. The night was ruined. My stomach was churning. I might have sweated a little bit. I pulled up the email account and sure enough, there was an email from my sister.

 

Hey. I checked into that for you. You have to sign up for a penname

and there’s a three day wait. If you want to sign up, do it now before

you have a chance to think about it.

Buck up. Don’t be a chickenshit.

 

And at the bottom was the link to the site. I sweated it out for a minute. Palms sweaty. Mouth drier than the Mohave. Knees knocking. Did I dare click on it? I’m known for doing crap that I wished I hadn’t. I’m too impulsive for my own good. I mean, look where this reading thing got me! I knew I shouldn’t have picked up that book Janine told me too. “Just read this book. I know you’ll like it.” I shook my head politely NO. I’m not into those sorts of books. I told her. I like historicals. “No. NO. No. You’ll love this. Stephanie Plum is a riot. This is the eighth book. You don’t have to read them in order. I really think you’ll enjoy it.” Still I shake my head no. I hold this woman off for two years on this Stephanie Plum book obsession she had going on. And then I caved and now it has me getting up in the middle of the night like a thief and stealing downstairs to write like a mad woman until dawn.

 

So I click on the link. Fanfiction.net. It seems pretty harmless. There’s something like 10 pages to browse through of Stephanie Plum fan fiction. I read one. Someone rewrote the last scene in Eleven on Top in Ranger’s POV. I fell in love. I read this story about a million times. Never would I have ever thought to write in another POV. Stephanie felt natural to me, but this writer made Ranger come alive in front of my eyes. I felt his desperation. I felt his hunger for revenge. I felt his overwhelming moment of relief to find her alive. I was looking through his eyes and seeing the tears brushing along her lower lashes. Knew she thought she was going to die. Knew that she kept telling herself over and over again that he’d save her.

 

And in that moment I knew what I had to do. I went to the sign in page and filled out the necessary information. No one would ever know me. No one would know it was ME. I could do this anonymously.

 

No one would ever find out!

 

Wrong. I’m at something close to 35 fan fiction stories for Stephanie Plum two years later. Two full length stories under my belt, two novellas, and dozens of short stories. Fan fiction gave me the courage to try to write something of my own. Gave me the courage to reach out to other people, other writers and talk to them. Helped me meet women who I’ll never forget, who I’ll always be friends with, and gave me more sisters. Partners in crime.

 

So, I know that was long. I’m getting back into the old habit of long-windedness.

 

Tell me about your first time writing. The first time you wrote a scene you never thought you’d be able to write. The first time you wrote anything. Did it come out the way you wanted it or was it something completely different from what you envisioned? For our reading wenches, how about the first time you found a community for your favorite author? Did you have a hard time just jumping in there?

A little rum-soused undead monkey told me our very own Lisa is having a birthday today! Please join us in wishing her a Happy Birthday. (All gifts of rum and money can be directed to the Captain who will pass them along to Lisa….)

 

Captain Jack says because it is such a special occasion, we should put up more pictures for the lovely Lisa to enjoy–and he did offer himself (nude) for everyone’s, um, viewing pleasure, but since I’m the captain, I thought I’d post these instead:

                  

 

     

‘Ello me hearty mates and crew. Today we’re going to do a little elementary compass navigation and orientation. (No, Jack my love, not sexual orientation; you are prickly. And no, Sin, I’m not dumping anyone off into the middle of the woods and saying, “Well, see you at supper!” and then giving you a merit badge if you arrive back without being covered in poison ivy.)

 

No, I speak of: Writing Orientation. How to get your bearings in your book, head off again in the right direction (i.e. start writing again) and arrive at your destination (i.e. HEA) sometime before your supplies (i.e. the rum) run out. A handy device all pirates need if they find themselves marooned…or possibly in a hurricane in which they think their ship is going to sink.

 

First and most important, find due NORTH. You won’t get your bearings or headings or anything until you’ve got your center. Your due NORTH is two things: characters and goals. So if you’re ever stuck, flailing about, sitting in Doldrums and wondering if a brisk wind will come again, find due NORTH. Remember where you are going and put it in contrast with where you are now. Just like NORTH is the most important of the four, your characters and their goals are the most important part of your story. They are the story. Are your characters still behaving true to themselves? Are they pursuing their goals for all they’re worth? Like NORTH, are they bigger and bolder than everything else (i.e. plot, secondary characters)? Are you keeping your scenes (like your sails) trim? If the scenes you’re putting on the page aren’t necessary to the characters or the goals, then they’re most likely dross that’s weighing down your ship and sailing you the long way to China.

 

 

Once you’ve got NORTH, glance behind you to the SOUTH. Notice this. There is no North without South, no love without hate, no peace without war, no romance without heartbreak. Here in the SOUTH lies conflict and irony. While your NORTH is focusing on character and goals, the SOUTH should be raising hell on the NORTH, making everyone wonder which side is going to win. (Am I the only one hearing “Dixie”?) Conflict keeps your characters and their goals in sharp desire. And while you’re at it, make sure some of your conflict is of the ironic variety. If your heroine hates class reunions and hell would freeze over before she attended one, make her go to accomplish something that is very important to her, more important than her fear and hatred of confronting her demons. Irony sticks. Irony is conflict inflicted by method of laughing gas.

 

So we got the NORTH and SOUTH opposing each other; take a look over your right shoulder to the EAST. Venus the Morningstar is your guide. So our next important bearing: Love. Love is important since you need conflict for your Conflict, and nothing conflicts Conflict more than Love. (One of those ironic things again.) Clearly if you’re writing a romance, love is a main bearing. Make it big, make it count, and make it believable. We all need the Big 3: Faith, Hope, and Love, but most of all Love. John said it first; then the other John made a song about it. Notice, though, Love is not the sole focus of your story, nor the biggest focus—but it does shine the brightest.

 

Now look WEST, young man, look WEST. What good is the WEST? Why the ending, of course. We all admire the perfect sunset, and though it may be the same sun, no two are the same. The same is true of your happily ever after. Yes, it’s romance; yes, it’s a happy ending; yes, there are a 100 Regencies published a year—but your Happily Ever After is just as beautiful, just as unique as the thousand other sunsets across the world. Someone will enjoy seeing it; someone will be moved by it; someone will even remember it forever. And the thing about sunsets is you never get tired of seeing them and marveling at how beautiful they are—and how at peace with the world they make us feel. Write your happy ending; do it to make the world a little sweeter.

 

All right. Got your bearings now? Have you found your characters and goals? Is the SOUTH rising again? (Lisa, Sin, get your minds out of the gutter.) Have you put on that Beatles CD and a little song in your heart? Then start cracking toward that Happy Ending, mates. Head West to your destination.

 

What do you guys think? Any important headings I should have focused on instead? Anyone else dallied in filing their taxes like I did and are running to the post office after work like a chicken with its head cut off? Anyone else able to orientate themselves with a compass? (Me, I use the sun rather than magnets.)