reposted from 12/31/13 from Donna O'Donnell Figurski's Blog

     It is scary to put your work out there for critical eyes. It leaves you wide open. It leaves you vulnerable. Of course you’ve done your best and you love every word, phrase, sentence, and paragraph. You’ve worked hard. You’ve crafted each word until your eyes seem to turn inward. You think that you can make your article, essay, story, or book no better and you hope that your reviewer will feel the same. After all, if you did not think it was your best, you would not have released it for other eyes – right?

     It’s hard to hear critiques – even the positive ones. Those words you dragged out of your head and arranged into neat little lines on the paper to tell your story are your babies. As a mother is protective of her child, you too, are the keeper of your words – their protector, their proud creator. So you don your armor, harden your shell, stiffen your upper lip, hold your breath, and … hope for the best.

     If you have chosen a reviewer, someone who you respect and who you can trust, then trust you must! Don’t fear the red pen. Listen with eager mind but remember too, that her opinion is only one view and not necessarily better than yours. Although she, no doubt, will look at your work with fresher, more neutral eyes, you must still pick and choose and determine what you think will move your writing further – what will make your story the best it can be.

     Then go back to the keyboard … and tackle your work with a new outlook until your piece shines – brighter than before.

  As I say after each post:

     If you enjoy Bookity Blog, please pass it on to all your friends and they to theirs. (I’d like to drive up the readership. Sometimes it feels like I am writing in a vacuum. So go ahead. Send it to 10 of your friends.)

If you hate my blog, go ahead and send it to your enemies. (10 enemies would be good.) I won’t mind.

(Clip Art compliments of Bing.)

                                              STRANGEST YET!      

                                                             TATTOO??                 

                                                                        You’ve Got To Be Kidding!
                                                                        It’s just a little hummmmmmmmingbird.

     Okay, so I added a few more holes to my ears. I now have a total of five. Thanks, Betty! And thanks for going with me, and for telling me that it was not cool to have an equal number of holes on each ear . . . thus the odd number of five.

     Then I poked an extra hole in my nose. Thanks, Kiersten! I swear – I would never have thought of this on my own. Although I can come up with some pretty weird ideas without anyone prompting me; this idea is totally your responsibility. And thanks to Betty for holding my hand and saying, “You can do it! You can do it!” but who wouldn’t do it herself when I encouraged her to get her nose pierced, too.

     Monique is totally responsible for the tattoo. Her friend, Sarah, called from Germany with the news that she got a tattoo. Hmmmm! That call changed both my and Monique’s lives permanently.

     Soon Monique was talking about hummingbirds. She talked about it in the car. She talked about it sitting on the floor of my office. She talked about it at the dinner table and she talked and talked and talked. She asked me if I wanted to get a tattoo with her … a hummingbird. “No!” I assured her. But I offered to take her to get one if she wanted it. She wanted it! She wanted it right that minute! We hadn’t even cleared the dinner table yet. It was dark out and rain was gushing from the sky. It was a Friday night. I suggested we go the next day. I could see Monique’s face fall. I sensed her intensity. What’s a little rain? We quickly cleared the table, cleaned up the kitchen, and set off in search of the tattoo studio not far from my home.
Donna's
 
     She thrust the picture of the hummingbird into the tattoo artist’s hand and asked if he could do it. He easily agreed. Monique relaxed into the chair as the artist sketched the hummingbird on her hip. I watched. She said it kind of pinched, but was not painful. When she was done, she needled me to do it too. Although her hummingbird was really cute, I refrained.
Monique's
  
     The next morning I woke with a burning desire to have a hummingbird etched onto me too. I  have no idea what got into me – what made me feel that way, but with an overwhelming intensity, Monique and I hopped into the car and set off for the tattoo parlor again.

     I wanted the same little hummingbird that Monique had. The only difference is that I added color to mine. It’s beautiful. It’s like a piece of jewelry – only it is permanent.

     This little hummingbird ties Monique and me together for life. It is a constant, pleasant reminder of when she lived with David and me and we shared some months together.

UPDATE

Some years after David's event, Monique came to visit us ––this time in Arizona. AND ... GUESS WHAT? We got another tattoo together. This time it was Kokopelli, the god of fertility, happiness, and good luck.

(Clip Art compliments of Bing.)

(Pictures compliments of ME.)

(Reposted from my website at Strange Happenings.)

     Friday, the 13th is a day that many people fear. It’s considered to be an unlucky day. I don’t usually buy into the superstition, but I have, on occasion, chosen to not fly on Friday the 13th or participate in various other functions that may tempt fate.
 
   In reality, my unlucky day was Thursday, the 13th, way back in January of 2005. That was the day that my husband, David, had a subarachnoid hemorrhage that caused him to endure three brain surgeries in less than two weeks. That was the day that his neurosurgeon told me that he would make a “great organ donor.” That 13th was my unlucky day. It changed the paths of David’s and my lives forever.
 
BUT . . . David defied the odds that his neurosurgeon gave him of survival and we celebrate life every day.  But, on this 18th year after his event, we want to celebrate with you too.
 
I’m making a special dinner for David tonight. If you can guess what I am making, I will send you a pdf copy of my book, Prisoners Without Bars: A Caregiver’s Tale.
 

        Contest ends at 12:00pm Pacific time tomorrow evening, January 14th, 2023.

(Click here to see book.)

Prisoners Without Bars: A Caregiver's Tale

     If you 've read anything about me, you probably already know that I love books. I have no idea where this love came from or how and why it developed, but I know the love of books is part of me.

     I have no recollection of my parents reading to me as a youngster. I was the eldest of five kids, so my mom had her hands full. My dad worked long hours in his pharmacy. My first memory of letters, words, and sentences was when I was in first grade. I remember using the little box of letters to build words. Maybe that's where I fell in love with words. I don't think they make those little letter boxes anymore, but just cut out the letters in the photo to the right and you've got the idea.

     In third grade, the craze was to read the Nancy Drew books by Carolyn Keene. I think I read them all--some twice. One of my classmates bought every book, and then she shared them with the rest of the girls in the class. It was like her own library-share. I couldn't wait for my turn.
​
     I started reading all kinds of books then. The Ramona books by Beverly Cleary, the Bobbsey Twins by Laura Lee Hope, the Donna Parker Series by Marcia Levin, and the Cherry Ames series by Helen Well were some of my favorites. If my mother could, she'd probably say I read too much. When I became a teen, my reading intensified. I was always in the library of my high school, and I toted home tons of books. The challenge then was to find a quiet spot to read. Remember, I said I was the oldest of five children. My favorite spot was to duck down on the floor between the twin beds in my bedroom. That worked for a while, until my mother found me out.

     As a young mother, I spent my years reading as many Russian novels as I could. I loved Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Turgenev, and Pasternak. Those guys had no lack of words! Many of those books have nearly a thousand pages. I loved being carried back in time. My imagination soared as the characters cavorted across the pages in horse-drawn carriages or dressed in billowing ball-gowns. It was a different era. It transposed me to a different world.
​
     I'm still an avid reader, but I have to admit it's hard to find time to read for pleasure. Most of my reading is directed at learning more about brain injury, preparing to interview a guest on my radio show, or delving into a topic about brain injury for a panel discussion.
​
     To be honest, I still tote tons of books home from my town library, and I do steal some minutes to read. I guess some things will never change.