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The Pang – and Danger – of Nostalgia

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nostalgia-wallpapers_37124_2560x1920Although I have rarely been dissatisfied by the world at any age, I get this kind of pang a lot and perhaps more intensely because of it. In fact I tend to glorify the world of times gone by. Different things can trigger it: sometimes it’s an item I haven’t seen in a long time, or an old photo. It can be from my own childhood, or even from when my kids were little.

It can be triggered by something as simple and silly as seeing Christmas decorations or pictures well after the holiday is done and all the accoutrements are packed away (confession: this just happened to me again today – for like the 10th time since Christmas – when I saw a friend’s old posting on FB from Christmas-time).

For me, who has a tendency to relish the past, I have to exercise balance when and how I can.

For many years, I could indulge my love of the past in a purely historical sense, writing my heavily-researched but still highly-fictionalized medieval romances.

Then, when I started writing Moose Tracks on the Road to Heaven, I got to spend some significant time in MY past – a practice that was actually both painful but ultimately cathartic after my father died (I’d only written about 70 pages of the 420 page manuscript when he died).

Here’s a snippet from an actual letter Pa wrote to me years ago, that I ended up using in the later part of Moose Tracks. I like his philosophy and try to remember it as often as I can:

“What was it that Scarlett O’Hara said? Tomorrow is another day!? Here are some thoughts about that: You can re-live the past but you cannot re-live the future. We dumb humans (there is no other kind) get ourselves all screwed up with more than one time base. We are forced to live in the present with minutes and hours and days and years. Everything is pretty linear, and if we stayed in the present our lives would pass linearly.

When you are young, you have a little past, the present, and a lot of future. When you are middle-aged, you have a lot of past, the present, and a lot of future. When you get old, you have a real lot of past, the present, and a little future. Notice that the only thing that doesn’t change is the present.

When you are young, you waste time looking forward to the future. When you are middle-aged, you waste time looking both to the past and to the future. When you get old, you waste time looking to the past. The problem is you can look back more than once. There are some moments in my life from many years ago that I probably have spent hours re-living. But those hours were lost to my present, never to be given back to me. It’s up to me that any re-living of my past is worth the price of time in the present..

I’ve come to realize that you can only live now. Don’t get hung up on the past or wait for the future.

Living is only for now!

The more that can be true, then the longer you live. Think about it awhile.”

So when that pang of nostalgia hits, I try to follow this idea: to allow the pang its moment, and then remember that this moment, too, will someday be part of the past. I try to live it now and to its fullest and  not be too sad in missing what’s gone before.

How about you – do you struggle with nostalgia, or are you someone who loves to throw out the old to make way for the new?

About Fishing With Pa…and Surprises

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I’ve come to understand a few things in the almost half century I’ve lived, and one of those is the realization that sometimes, people can surprise you.

Sometimes those surprises can be unpleasant, but since I try to focus on the positive, I’d like to share a moment from nearly 20 years ago that surprised me in the best of ways. I remember it so clearly, and it has stuck with me so well, that I even wrote one of the “past” scenes in Moose Tracks on the Road to Heaven around it.

trout

Adirondacks Rainbow Trout Fisherman Wall Art by Paul A Lanquist

It involves a fishing trip I took with my father on a beautiful, sunny summer day when I was in my early 30’s, and Pa was nearing 70.

Now you have to understand that my father was a dedicated, lifelong trout fisherman. Some of my fondest memories involve Pa helping me learn how to bait my line with an earthworm, cast, “feel” the fish mouthing the bait, and setting the hook to reel in a beauty. We often released the fish we caught back into the river, lake, or stream, but never before admiring their beautiful markings and color.

On this particular day, we hadn’t gone fishing together in more than a year. Real life had intervened for me…I was married, living more than an hour from the Homestead, teaching full time, and had a young child, so opportunities to get away and spend an afternoon together fishing or even just visiting by ourselves didn’t happen too often. My husband had offered to watch our young daughter on this Saturday, and my father and I agreed to meet up at a fishing spot about halfway between each of us. It was a kind of dam with a running stream below it – perfect for active and hungry fish.

Pa and fishing favorite memory 2The bank of the stream was formed by a combination of large rocks and tall flowering weeds. The sun beat down hot and bright on us as we fished, and the sky was a perfect blue with puffy white clouds. Here’s a picture I took of Pa during some of the quiet time…we stood farther apart as we fished, so as not to tangle our lines in the gently moving water.

The surprise came at lunch time. We’d reeled in our lines and were sitting up on the bank; I thought we were going to decide where to head for a quick lunch, but Pa walked up to his vehicle, pulled out a small cooler, and proceeded to take out cups, napkins, two cold orange sodas (one of his favorite flavors of soda back then), some chips…and two submarine sandwiches of mixed cold cuts – salami, turkey, ham – dressed with mayonnaise, cheese, lettuce, tomato – the works.

When I realized that Pa had made the entire lunch himself, I was shocked to the core. My father had always been very self-sufficient (he was a US Marine after all), but my mother was such a good cook that, except for the occasional turn at the grill or undertaking a project like making homemade sauerkraut, my father had never “cooked” or prepared anything to my knowledge.  And this was the best sandwich I’d ever eaten, without a doubt in my mind.

Pa and fishing favorite memory

Another picture I took of Pa, smiling on the banks of the stream, just after our wonderful lunch

Pa got a good chuckle out of my astonishment, and we enjoyed the nicest lunch I’d ever had, not because of fancy food or ambience (though the setting WAS right up my alley and the food, as I mentioned, was delicious), but because of the moment. Because of the beauty of sharing that peaceful time and place together, sprinkled with the magic of learning something new about a man I’d thought (in my youthful arrogance and ignorance) I knew pretty much everything there was to know.

I learned much more about my father in the years to come, all interesting and some amazing, including talents I didn’t discover he’d had until finding some papers after his death.

However that day of fishing on the sunny banks of that little stream provided me with one of the first of those kinds of happy surprises. I guess I needed to be an adult to experience it – to start becoming aware that people often posses depth and complexity far beyond the surface we tend to assume. It’s an experience I’ve never forgotten…another important lesson learned, thanks to Pa, and one that has never left my heart. ❤

Goodbye/Hello

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PauloThis thought is courtesy of today’s “Good Earth” tea bag. 🙂

It really struck me, because I’ve had quite a few goodbyes in the past four years…some willing and some very unwilling. I can’t say I’ve always been brave about it. But sometimes I have been.

Nuber family gathering 1967 enhanced cropped 2Pa and Mary before Mary's prom 1984 editedPa and Mary editedWhen my father died almost four years ago and I had to say goodbye to him, I was brave. He had been cheering me on to write Moose Tracks on the Road to Heaven for about two years leading up to his death, and afterward, I faced my fears, a new door opened, and I managed to finish it in a way that made me – and I hope would have made him – proud.

mother's heartWhen my then high school-aged daughter was hospitalized with an unexpected and incurable (albeit treatable) illness and I had to say goodbye to the safe and secure understanding of the world that I’d known up until then, I went through a period of shock, disruption and fear. But I ended up being brave. A new door opened over time – one of insight, knowledge, and the discovery of even deeper reserves of love – and it allowed me to be even more the kind of mother and wife I strive to be.

MooseTracks_CoverMost recently, when Moose Tracks ran into some road blocks and things didn’t go exactly as I’d planned, I was forced to say goodbye to the publication path I’d intended for it. And for the briefest of moments, I considered throwing in the towel. It had been a LONG haul…literally years of work and obstacles, tears and laughter, and digging deeper than I’d ever dug before. I was tired. But in the end I found reserves of bravery, and for every door that closed in front of me, I forced myself to face my discomfort, turn a corner, and find a new one to open. The last of these doors led to the publication of this novel that has meant so much to me…and according to early readers and two recent reviews, has been useful and enjoyable to others as well, striking the kind of chord and providing some of the thoughts, insights, and hopefulness that I was aiming to share with the rest of the world all along. I have high hopes that over time, this book will find the readers it’s meant to find, and all will unfold the way it is supposed to.

Life is good.

When we are brave enough to say goodbye…sometimes we are rewarded with a new hello. 🙂

 

Some Bone Deep Memories that led to Writing “Moose Tracks”

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Now that Moose Tracks on the Road to Heaven is published, I’ve been thinking about some of the “behind the scenes” and inspirational  kinds of things I enjoy reading about/seeing when it comes to novels I’ve read by other authors – and so I decided to do a post of this sort today, for anyone who might be interested.

Mary on threadbare chairWe were pretty materially poor when I was little. So much so that when my father married my mother (it was a second marriage for them both, and she already had my five older sisters) there was a carpet pad instead of a carpet for quite a few years, and some furniture that was extremely threadbare (like in this picture, taken from inside our living room, in our little house near the lake).

Pa took this picture, I’m certain, as he was the camera-expert in the house, and I only found it recently, on a slide he’d given me years ago. I love it, actually, because of the ragged carpet pad and chair. I felt so much love and nurturing in my young life that I have no memory or distress at having so little in a material sense. My parents ensured that we had plentiful, wholesome, homemade food (with one of Ma’s delicious desserts every night!) and plenty of sturdy, warm clothing and shoes; we were living on my father’s salary alone with many mouths to feed, and we didn’t have a lot of frills, but we always had more than enough in that regard. I felt then and still feel I wanted for nothing.

Mary cyI’m sitting in the pic above with my hands uncharacteristically folded and a solemn expression on my face. Here’s another one on the left of my more usual, energetic demeanor, and on the right, from a professional photographer about six months earlier. Mary at 22 monthsI was two years old in the picture on the right and about three in both of the pictures taken at home – a happy, exuberant kid. However, my parents often told me that I was also a child who would sometimes retreat into a profound stillness and deep thoughts. When I had the kind of expression I’m wearing in the pic above – the one with my hands folded – my mother said she always wondered what I was thinking, and people often said I spoke and seemed far older than my years. I wasn’t so still and quiet very often, but I had the makings of a bookworm/thinker even then.

I’ll finish this post with some final, visual examples of the kind of happiness and love I experienced as a young child – the foundation of the life and family atmosphere that would inspire my writings so many years later. These pics are from my first birthday and were taken in the Homestead’s kitchen, next to my father’s chair (empty in these shots, as he was taking the photos), back in the winter of 1967. I am the sixth of seven daughters, but my parents ensured that each daughter was recognized in her own right, with attention, conversations, and of course recognition of us as individuals on our birthdays. Pa was at the ready with his camera, and we always had a cake baked for us lovingly by my mother (who is a wonderful cook, even today, though she is in her 80’s now).

Birthday 17 Birthday 16 Birthday 14 Birthday 13 Birthday 10

Life was good in the purest and best sense…filled with ups and downs, conflict and struggle, but also filled with the kind of warmth and nurturing that helped a little girl understand what’s really important, far above and beyond material goods.

 

Release Day!

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Actual Final copy with endorsementIt’s finally here…and after five + years in the writing, another six months in editing and production, and two months in pre-sale mode, it feel very good to say that Moose Tracks on the Road To Heaven is now available for purchase in eBook or print TODAY! 🙂

You can purchase the eBook in these places:

Amazon B&N iBooks Kobo AllRomance GooglePlay

PLEASE NOTE: If you’d prefer a PRINT copy of the book, at this point it can be purchased here, from: Amazon

It will be available in print from Barnes and Noble and other sellers within a few days (there is a lag in terms of publisher availability).

It will also be available from some independent book stores, either in stock or upon request, including Mysteries on Main Street, in Johnstown, NY.

(Un)Happy Endings?

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hulsebus-unhappy-ending-thumb-250x386-33965I’m a bit stumped. I admit it…and so I’m reaching out to any of you in the blogosphere who might want to comment, to get your opinion on this.

Here’s the short version of what caused the controversy that has erupted in my mind:

I had a conversation with a colleague today. She is someone who loves books and is well-read. We were discussing my upcoming Moose Tracks on the Road to Heaven, and I was telling her about how it was a different genre from what I’d written before – Women’s/General Fiction rather than Historical Romance – and that is would therefore be appropriate for most age groups, as it has no explicit content, unlike my historical romances.

Here’s where the turn of the conversation kind of made my mind bend.

She says (and I’m paraphrasing, but it’s pretty close): “Oh, I read your first two books. I like historical fiction, so I liked the history in them.”

I think I see where she’s going here, and so I interject, admitting, “I know the love scenes aren’t everyone’s cup of tea.”

But she shakes her head, adding, “No, I didn’t mind the romance – I can skip over some of those parts if I want.” She looks vaguely uncomfortable. “It’s just…the happy endings! You know, at the end, everyone goes off happy…” She makes a wry face. “I read historical fiction.” (which I’m surmising she added to try to make it clear that historical fiction books DON’T have happy endings and therefore are her preference).

I was floored, I admit it.

I’ve had people tell me they don’t like historical romances because they’re not “historical enough”.

I’ve had people tell me they don’t like historical romances because of the focus on the romantic relationship, which often includes some explicit love scenes between the hero and heroine (who BTW are monogamous, according to the traditions of the genre).

I’ve had people tell me they don’t read “those” kinds of books (which basically means they won’t read romances because of the stigma attached to romance, as books that are somehow less worthy/well-written/complex/”real”…you can supply your own negative adjective).

But this is the first time anyone has ever said to me that they basically objected to/disliked historical romances because they ended happily.

So…what’s your take on happy endings? Please enlighten me, as I really, really want to hear from everyone, regardless of your perspective. Of course I’m a reader before I’m a writer, and I have my own opinions, but I’m interested in hearing about this issue from other readers’ point of view.  So please, chime in! 🙂

Find Joy in the Journey

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finish lineThis phrase happened to be on one of my tea bags this morning…but it’s something about which I remind myself regularly.

Life is a journey, but if you break it down even further, each book we read, song we listen to, film we watch…and yes, each day or even hour we live – is also a journey of its own sort. I end each of my books with an “Author’s Note” to give a little more insight into the history (for my historical romances) or the inspiration and content (for Moose Tracks on the Road to Heaven), and those always end with this phrase: “Thanks for coming along on the journey.”

So many times we rush through to get to “the end”. I suppose it’s human nature in this fast-paced, modern world. But it behooves us to slow down and notice the moments, the details, the notes, the images. It’s all part of the lush experience, both good and not-so-good that comprises life. So, try to enjoy the journey!

 

Secret Ministry of Frost

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frost

image courtesy of The Teacup Chronicles

On this lovely, sunny frigid day in the north country of New York State, I thought it fitting to share this poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. It’s one of my very favorites from the Romantic Age, for its gorgeous imagery, moods, and textures…beginning quietly peaceful and reflective before shifting to bittersweet contemplation of memories and hopes for the future, and finally, ending with a heartfelt and lush appreciation of Nature’s majesty in all her moods and seasons.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Frost At Midnight, by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The Frost performs its secret ministry,
 Unhelped by any wind. The owlet’s cry
Came loud–and hark, again! loud as before.
The inmates of my cottage, all at rest,
Have left me to that solitude, which suits
Abstruser musings: save that at my side
My cradled infant slumbers peacefully.
’Tis calm indeed! so calm, that it disturbs
And vexes meditation with its strange
And extreme silentness. Sea, hill, and wood,
This populous village! Sea, and hill, and wood,
With all the numberless goings-on of life,
Inaudible as dreams! the thin blue flame
Lies on my low-burnt fire, and quivers not;
Only that film, which fluttered on the grate,
Still flutters there, the sole unquiet thing.
Methinks, its motion in this hush of nature
Gives it dim sympathies with me who live,
Making it a companionable form,
Whose puny flaps and freaks the idling Spirit
By its own moods interprets, every where
Echo or mirror seeking of itself,
And makes a toy of Thought.

But O! how oft,
How oft, at school, with most believing mind,
Presageful, have I gazed upon the bars,
To watch that fluttering stranger! and as oft
With unclosed lids, already had I dreamt
Of my sweet birth-place, and the old church-tower,
Whose bells, the poor man’s only music, rang
From morn to evening, all the hot Fair-day,
So sweetly, that they stirred and haunted me
With a wild pleasure, falling on mine ear
Most like articulate sounds of things to come!
So gazed I, till the soothing things, I dreamt,
Lulled me to sleep, and sleep prolonged my dreams!
And so I brooded all the following morn,
Awed by the stern preceptor’s face, mine eye
Fixed with mock study on my swimming book:
Save if the door half opened, and I snatched
A hasty glance, and still my heart leaped up,
For still I hoped to see the stranger’s face,
 Townsman, or aunt, or sister more beloved,
My play-mate when we both were clothed alike!

Dear Babe, that sleepest cradled by my side,
Whose gentle breathings, heard in this deep calm,
Fill up the intersperséd vacancies
And momentary pauses of the thought!
My babe so beautiful! it thrills my heart
With tender gladness, thus to look at thee,
And think that thou shalt learn far other lore,
And in far other scenes! For I was reared
In the great city, pent ’mid cloisters dim,
And saw nought lovely but the sky and stars.
But thou, my babe! shalt wander like a breeze
By lakes and sandy shores, beneath the crags
Of ancient mountain, and beneath the clouds,
Which image in their bulk both lakes and shores
And mountain crags: so shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sounds intelligible
Of that eternal language, which thy God
Utters, who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all, and all things in himself.
Great universal Teacher! he shall mould
Thy spirit, and by giving make it ask.

Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee,
Whether the summer clothe the general earth
With greenness, or the redbreast sit and sing
Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branch
Of mossy apple-tree, while the nigh thatch
Smokes in the sun-thaw; whether the eave-drops fall
Heard only in the trances of the blast,
Or if the secret ministry of frost
Shall hang them up in silent icicles,
Quietly shining to the quiet Moon.

bird in snow

Moose Tracks Sneak Peek #2 – Meet Jesse

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Actual Final copy with endorsement

From Moose Tracks on the Road to Heaven, available for preorder now for Kindle and Kobo, and for sale in print and all other venues on February 3, 2015.

Diary entry #1: June 30, 1981

This is Elena Elizabeth, and it’s my first time writing even though I got this diary five months ago when I turned twelve. I’ve been feeling a little guilty cuz Ma says I should be using it, so here goes. I met a new kid near Caveman Rock today. He seems like a jerk. . . .

      The first time Elena saw Jesse James Wilder she was up to her elbows in

dirt and a rotting layer of last autumn’s leaves. She was a definite outdoors

girl, tall for her age and in the habit of running free all day each summer—

sometimes playing with Jen (less often Zippy or Patricia) or maybe the

across-the-field-neighbors Lisa and Debbie. But lots of times she just

rummaged around in the woods by herself.

      She could spend hours looking at plants, collecting feathers,

pretending to be a pioneer or an Indian, and finding dead birds and other

animals to bury in the little animal graveyard Pa had helped them lay out

behind the camp’s outhouse. She’d be the first to admit that with only one

bathroom at the homestead, the outhouse could be useful in a pinch, even if

it was stinky and dark.

      She felt safe playing outside by herself all day. Ma had never had

to worry about weirdos trolling the streets and byways for kids to pick up.

Not in rural areas like Moose Junction, and certainly not out in the acres of

woods behind their house.

      On the rare occasions when Elena went with her sisters on the ten minute

bike ride down the highway to the lake (from which the nearby

town of Lake Pines derived its name), they’d all stuck together. The older

girls watched out for the younger ones, and bad drivers were more of a

concern than kidnappers.

      All in all, Elena relished those summer days of freedom, coming

home at dusk and covered in dirt, and, more often than not, with twigs and

even burdocks tangled in her hair.

      As it was already nearing suppertime on that particular day, she

looked quite a sight as she crouched in the dappled light, trying to scoop a

half mummified chipmunk carcass into an improvised Maple bark coffin.

She’d been concentrating so hard that she hadn’t been paying

attention to her surroundings. So when Jesse Wilder surprised her by

stepping into her little clearing with his size thirteen feet, snapping twigs

like a black bear, she’d lurched to a partial stand and nearly clocked him

with the stick she’d been using to dig at the dirt around the dead chipmunk.

In fact, she swung her improvised weapon within a few inches of his head

at the same time that she pretty much growled at him.

      Both of his big hands shot up in front of him in a fist-clenched,

defensive pose as he yelled, “Holy shit!” But the terrified look on his face

immediately made her feel a little better, considering her temporary lapse

of attention to her surroundings.

      “What the hell!” he added as his fists slowly came down, but his

shock was still apparent by the way his voice cracked on the last word.

Elena’s mouth turned down at the double profanities. She gave him

a quick onceover, none too impressed. First of all, he was obviously a city

slicker, and second of all, he was a boy (a.k.a. an alien species). A tall,

wiry boy, sporting a shock of honey-colored hair streaked with blond, and

staring at her through narrowed blue eyes.

      She finally let out her breath, standing up out of her stooped

position. “Didn’t your mother ever tell you not to use that kind

of language?”

      “My mother died when I was six.”

      That kind of set Elena back on her heels. “Oh . . . sorry.”

She didn’t really know what else to say. The truth was that she

didn’t know anyone on a personal basis who didn’t have a mother. The

thought of what it would be like not to have Ma, with her soft hands, sweet

smile, and gentle voice (except when Trish, Zippy, and Elena had been

squabbling so much that they’d driven her up one wall and down another)

took away some of the sting of indignation she’d been feeling.

      But the temporary peace lasted only as long as it took for the tall,

scrawny blond kid to open his mouth again, right after he returned the

favor Elena had given him with a disdainful onceover, his expression

having shifted by now from his initial shock to a look of cool mocking.

“What are you, some kind of crazy mountain girl?” His sarcasm

was only fair considering the way she looked, she supposed, but she didn’t

much care for logic at that moment. She snorted, taking in his Jordache

jeans, Nike sneakers, and perfectly pressed Ralph Lauren shirt.

      “Yeah. Just like you’re a walking billboard for name brands.”

      He did something Elena didn’t expect then. He laughed.

Waiting

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universe 15Sometimes I wish the sharpening would occur a bit more quickly for me. I could use some magical things coming into my life. 🙂

Has anyone out there experienced any magical moments lately?