Promise in YOU.

This month in LitPark, Susan Henderson asked about Promise: "Tell me a story about someone seeing promise in you. What did they see, and how did this affect you?" Here is my reply:

My first grade teacher--the one who tied me to my chair because I wiggled and giggled too much in class--asked me to stay after school one day. I was terrified that I'd really done something bad. When all of the kids had left the room, she pulled out a paint-by-number set and told me that she was giving this to me because I loved to paint. She told me it had been her son's. Earlier in the year we'd learned that her son had been killed in a place with a weird name: Viet Nam.

While growing up I told everyone I wanted to be an artist, a painter. I wanted to pay back the promise Mrs. Jenkins saw in me. To do it though, I had to change the medium from paint, brushes and canvas, to letters, words and paper. Mrs. Jenkins will always hold a special place in my heart.

Go ahead and tell us a story about someone seeing promise in you, then skip on over to LitPark and share it there.

Five annoying things about me

This week in LitPark, Susan Henderson asked a simple question: What are your five most annoying habits. This caused me to sit back for at least ten seconds to consider mine. Here is what I posted at LitPark:

1. I am a clutter magnet. I have a beautiful, roomy office with several storage cabinets and cubbies, but my desk always looks like someone dumped a box of assorted business materials, files, pens, and other unusual items all over it. As I gaze over at it, I can see the following:
   
   . A small can of Play-Doh (orange).
   . Broken things: two digital cameras, a cell phone, a watch, and a light bulb.
   . A flying fish car intenna flag from Catalina Island
   . My cartoon mentors: Gumby (flexibility); Felix-the-cat (resourcefulness) Rafiki (wisdom), and Sponge Bob (humor).


2. I am a compulsive reader, especially when dining alone. I will read anything within eyesight and will get fidgety if there is nothing to read. When I am reading a novel, I slip out of this world and into the author's world so completely I lose interest in my own world--even my own writing, which is why I seldom allow myself to read novels when I am working on my own.


3. I am a crackberry addict, who has been known to check email in business meetings, read blogs while dining alone (see number 2, re: compulsive reader) or write notes about the coming week during church.


4. I am a computer geek to the detriment of my physical wellbeing. I would rather play at my computer than go to the gym with my husby. Because I also love to eat, this annoying habit is very noticeable to everyone who sees the extra fluff around my face and body.


5. I accelerate fast, stop fast, and generally push my car and myself to the limit whether or not it's a hop across town or a long road trip. If you read between the lines, this is also a metaphor of my life.

What are your five most annoying habits? Tell us here and then swing over to LitPark and share them with the gang at the park.

Loves Speed; Drives Like a Demon

I love driving fast. In fact, I love doing most everything fast. My mind is like an indy car fueled with ideas. I type faster than I can write, so I type everything. My handwriting, once studied to cursive perfection, now scrawls across the page in my drive to get it--whatever it is--out.

Maybe it's because I'm turning 50 this year, but I've noticed my foot pressing harder on the accelerator of my life. It's not that I'm in a hurry to get there--wherever there is--but there is so much I want to see, do, hear, tell before the years of my life are over.

This week LitPark is featuring Larry Smith and Rachel Fershleiser, editors of Smith magazine, whose book NOT QUITE WHAT I WAS PLANNING releases today. Subtitled as Six Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure, the book is the result submissions to Smith magazine for, you guessed it, six-word memoirs.

NOT QUITE WHAT I WAS PLANNING borrows from the legend of Ernest Hemingway's challenge to write a complete story in six words. His result was brilliant.

For sale: baby shoes, never worn.

Check out the video trailer for NOT QUITE WHAT I WAS PLANNING, then try your hand at your own six-word memoir. Post your memoir here and then hop over to LitPark and copy it there, too.

What do you notice?

LitPark has an interview with Dan Passamaneck about observation. I found his remarks so true to the core that you'll just have to read them at LitPark.

After you've read Dan's Five five reasons why it's important to notice what's going on around you, leave a list of five things you noticed today (or yesterday) and then come back here and copy your list.

Shout out for my daughter

Today on LitPark Susan Henderson gave readers the opportunity to shout out something of themselves. I chose to shout out my 19-year-old daughter's blog Bella Voce. Elisabeth, or Elle-chan as we called her when she was born in Japan, delighted me last year when she exercised the freshman tradition and changed her major from political science to English. She hasn’t lost her political charge—as you will see when you read her review of Blood Diamond in her blog—but she has found her voice through writing. You may also remember my proud mama moment when I wrote of Elisabeth here back in September.

Give yourself a hug this holiday season.