He Loves Me He Loves Me Not

He loves me he loves me not. Since we were little girls we all have pulled petals from flowers and asked the universe the question that is closest to our hearts. He loves me he loves me not, funny but we never truly know the answer to that question. Why is this, why does the eternal question remain unanswered? Doubt. He loves me. Today you are in his arms and everything is roses, the next day you don’t hear from him and you feel that doubt creeping in and the next petal falls. He loves me not.

I believe that there should be a mandatory class for all boys and girls. This class would teach our children the art of romance. Today we see an increase in writing and reading that is unprecedented. Text messages, instant messages, emails, everybody is writing again. But they are writing quickly, without thought and they are writing poorly, LOL, ROFLMAO, BFF, and all the new abbreviations that take the place of common phrases. But where is the romance? In the last century a man would take days to pick the right stationary, the right ink and the right words to woo his lady love. Remember the flower petals? There was also a way to woo your love with flowers. Each flower meant something to the recipient. The nuances of the language are now mostly forgotten, but red roses still imply passionate, romantic love and pink roses a lesser affection; white roses suggest virtue and chastity and yellow roses still stand for friendship or devotion. Also commonly known meanings are sunflowers, which can indicate either haughtiness or respect. Gerbera (daisy) means innocence or purity. The iris, being named for the messenger of the gods in Greek mythology, still represents the sending of a message. A pansy signifies thought, a daffodil regard, and a strand of ivy; fidelity. What girl or lady would not want a bouquet of red roses sent to her on Valentines Day?

On my 24th birthday I received 25 beautiful red roses from a man I truly loved. He was not free to give me his love but he gave me the flowers all the same. He loves me he loves me not. I have been pulling petals ever since.

Angst You Say?

The emotional angst of relationships, the real thing not the cardboard cutout version, that is what I want to put into my writing, the real feel of longing for your beloved, the real pain of uncertainty. But is romantic angst just a female emotion or do men also experience the pang of separation? I believe a well rounded story is told with several voices and the hero's voice, of course, is part of the story. Is it the same as the heroines or is it colder, more removed? So I guess I have to figure out how male angst feels in his heart, how it sounds in his head and how it shows on his face.

In my search I watched a PBS special which aired during a pledge drive. It was hosted by this man, whose name escapes me at the moment, who tried to show his audience the differences between the male and female brain. I say show because he used those silly Styrofoam wig stands, you know the ones, they're shaped like human heads and are totally featureless and stark white. Well, his description of the female brain was that of a monster super highway interchange, where everything interconnects with everything else. But the male brain on the other hand was composed of neat boxes that did not touch nor connect in anyway. He said that each box has it own unique function; there is the car box, the sports box, the work box and the mans most favorite box of all... the nothing box. Oh and did I tell you that a man's thoughts are in only one box at a time? Yeah... OK, I hear you, let's back up. The nothing box; that's right, there is nothing in it. Which explains the answer to the age old question: "Honey, what are you thinking about?" and his age old answer: "Nothing!"

So now I get back to my original question about male angst and is it the same as a woman's. How the heck do I know? Every time I ask my current he just looks at me with a blank expression on his face. Yeah, he's in his nothing box again.

No More Boring Inner Voices

We are surrounded by sound--traffic, music, TV, computer websites, and electronic hums be they refrigerator motors or light bulbs. And that causes me to wonder does it block out our inner voice? Do some of us use these noises so we don't have to listen to the everyday hum drum of our minds?

I for one can not stand extra noise. When I am alone the only noises that invade my brain are the electronic hums and the sounds of my animals breathing, or in the case of the collie, her snoring. So that means I hear ever single word that my mind makes and that means I listen to a lot of boring stuff about housework and bills and dust and the list goes on. But when I write I have to remember that my characters don't have to have boring inner voices. They can muse about interesting things like war and the state of the union and helping the homeless and any manner of earth shattering things. Why? Because I can control their minds. Inner musings is what gives our written characters their dimension, their depth, their soul. That is also why I write in first person. I want to hear the inner voice, I want to hear the gut wrenching arguments that they have with themselves. Or I should say I want you to read the gut wrenching arguments. OK, I have to hear them first before you can read them.

Reading the newest installment in Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series has given me the push to really mold my characters, to give them a soul. Diana writes in the first person just like I do. She let's us see into the heart of her characters and that is exactly what I want to emulate. In fact I also believe Mary Renault wrote in the first person too. (Don't quote me yet, I am going to have to go check this out but it feels right.) Mary Renault is my hero when it comes to ancient historical fiction. She wrote about Alexander and she nailed it. She is truly one of the greats.

So I have decided to give my characters their own individual inner voice which will give them their own individual soul. Besides it just might help me learn to edit my inner voice, I'm tired of listening to myself think about laundry and vacuuming, I want to ponder world peace and grapple with the angst of love and life and death. Which brings me to my question today, do you have an interesting inner voice or do hide yours because it's dull and boring and if so how?

Sappy Movies That I Love

I just finished watching Sabrina, the new version with Harrison Ford not the original with Humphrey Bogart. Both versions are wonderful but the one with Harrison Fords hits closer to home (because I have the hots for him!). Older man falls for younger woman is an age old love story. There are other equally popular old love stories but this one is my favorite.

I don't watch many romance based movies, maybe because my romantic life has been less than perfect so watching someone else (albeit fantasy) find true love and eternal happiness is difficult to take. But, every once in a while I just have to have a good cry so I rent a DVD or find it on the TV and sit down with a box of Kleenex and sob my heart out over lost love and love never realized.

So, are you curious about the other movies I love? OK, they are Casablanca (Bogart & Bergman at her teary best!), Dirty Dancing (I like this one better than Ghost!), The Philadelphia Story (Love Hepburn and Grant!), Moonstruck (Cher and Cage!), Working Girl, Somewhere In Time (Christopher Reeve tear jerker!), Bull Durham (oh boy Costner is just dreamy in this one! Slow wet kisses that last all day, yum.), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (the ending is a real tear jerker, she dies and is united with her love! Ah.). That's the list. Of course there are a few marginal ones I like but these are the ones I would fight for the remote to watch.

That brings me to written romances, especially since I'm writing one of my own. I think just about every one will put Gone With the Wind on top of their list, not me. I am more apt to read romances like Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series or maybe something from Barbara Erskine who wrote The Lady of Hay and Joyce Verrette's Egyptian romances.

So it comes back to my writing, always does you know, will my book live up to what has come before it? I hope so, I intend for it to, OK, I know it will. Wish me luck!

A Dollar A Page

When you are broke and a "real" job is out of the question what do writers do to pay the bills? Anaïs Nin wrote pornography for a "patron" and he paid her $1 per page.

"Faced with a desperate need for money, Nin and [Henry] Miller began in the 1940s to write erotic and pornographic narratives for an anonymous "collector" for a dollar a page, somewhat as a joke. Nin considered the characters in her erotica to be extreme caricatures and never intended the work to be published, but changed her mind in the early 1970s and allowed them to be published as Delta of Venus and Little Birds." Wikipedia

So I am faced with just such a dilemma, bills and no cash. I enjoy writing erotica, almost as much as I enjoy reading it. It's exciting, come on admit it, it's exciting to you too. Forbidden fruit is always exciting.

I googled erotic anthologies and wow, what a list! On Amazon alone I didn't go past the first page of 15 books and it went on and on. So, this tells me that readers of erotica are as voracious as readers of romance novels. I am writing a romance novel but it's far easier to write erotica. Faster too! So, do I drag on and finish the romance novel or do I whip up an anthology of erotica? The mind boggles. Unlike Nin, I do not have a "collector" who is willing to pay me for the writing.

In fact, if I remember correctly, the "collector" would tell Nin and her partner Arthur Miller "less prose more sex!" So remember, if you are called to write for your daily bread get to the juicy parts fast!

The Smell of Memories

The smell of roasting garlic is heavy in the air. I love roasted garlic. I squish it on fresh sourdough bread with lots of goat cheese. I make a meal of it, OK, I add a glass of wine. One glass is good for the digestion.
Smells are the memories that we keep with us forever. They are strong memories. The smell of a Christmas tree, the smell of a babies neck, a puppies breath, and of course food aromas. These create those little synapsis that fire each time we come across something that matches what we have already experienced.
I am firing those synapsis today. Memories of touch and taste and scent keep jumping in to my fore brain. I'm tingling with past experiences. These are good things to use when I write. I conjure up those strong memories and focus on them real hard, remembering every detail so that I can write about them with accuracy. I want my writing to be believable so by using the past I can create the future in my stories.
The timer is clicking down the last few seconds. When it goes off I can have my roasted garlic, and crusty sourdough bread and creamy goat cheese... oh yes, and my cool glass of Chardonnay. Hmmm, sounds good doesn't it?

The Willows Have Buds

I live in the desert. Well, technically it is the desert but if you look out my front window you will see palm trees, green grass, fountains shooting water into the air and rosemary bushes lining the pathways. I live in Las Vegas where fantasy is king and we spend all our water on keeping the nasty dry desert at bay.

So yesterday as I walked my collie around a closed golf course I passed a naked willow tree. I paused and looked closer. Yep, little green buds of what will be graceful long willow leaves! Yippee! Spring is just around the corner and it is only the middle of February. This made me feel really good. I love spring. It is my favorite time of year. Still cool in the morning and evening yet the sun heats up just enough during the day to wake up all the living and growing things, like willow trees!

Now I have to wake up my writing. I did write a few small pieces, just as exercises, nothing on my novels. Which is what I am going to focus on today. My romance is in need of more action so I am going to add a sword fight scene between my hero and a baddie yet to be identified.

Writing a fight scene will be new for me so I have asked for help. A wonderful person on my Panhistoria writing site has given me marvelous pointers on how to accomplish this daunting feat. She has provided me with cause and effect, telling me what to look for and how to discribe it with believability. So armed with her information I am going to sit down and write.

Along with writing scenes for my novel I am also trying to keep up correspondence with my extended friends and family. This is another daunting task as I now have quite a few and most of them are Facebook members so I can't hide from them. They know I am on Facebook because they see all of the silly games I play to pass the time when I can't think of what to write.

So if you have a chance to get outside today, look for the willow buds.