No scheme of man, can ever pluck me from His hand.

Dear Reader,

What scares you? One of my sister's today was telling me about a storyteller who came to her school and told ghost stories, they creep ed her out. My family has been facing giant disasters since the beginning of the new year and its stressful to say the least. Lately I have been struggling with the fact that there is nothing I can do to earn God's favor for the past 10 days. I've been saved since I was a little girl, and I know this in my head, but the very fact that I can't do ANYTHING to move our struggles along, to save us from liars with badges, makes me cry out to Jesus with new fever. I hope we win tomorrow despite all odds.

WHAT I'M WORKING ON:
1.) Not falling apart, I'm not doing so well.

WHAT I'M READING:
1.) verses about God being on the side of the innocent.
2.) Kristin Billerbeck's 2nd Spa Girl's novel. I hope to read Camy Tang's suspense books soon though, (yay Amazon!)

WHAT YOU CAN PRAY FOR ME:
1.) That we win tomorrow.

WHATS ON MY iPOD:
1.) In Christ Alone, as sung by Newsboys

Do you cry when a character in a book dies?

Ok so this weekend I read Noel Hynd's novel "Conspiracy in Kiev" as you'll note from my last post. And while there was no sex (yay I won the bet!) there was a lot of flirting and bantering back and forth between characters. There were jealous boyfriend's, and jealous Ukrainian mobsters...and death. I mean you have to have death in a political/spy thriller right? I expected certain characters to die, or be kidnapped, but of course Mr. Hynd pulls a fast one on me. A totally unsuspected death in the novel.

And the most surprising thing out of the whole day was not that one character died. No, no, the most surprising thing to me was the fact that when I came home from bringing James (a 4 month old we have in our home now) from the doctor, my sister was up in our room all emotional about a character who died in a series she was reading! And since I hadn't yet read the death of the character in Hynd's novel, I was a jerk. I mean my sister is reading a YA series, Cirque du Freak or something like that and is almost done the series. A major character dies. All day she was complaining, "How could the author do this?" And of course I have to be a professional jerk and say, "Well you know, authors are really thinking of the story arc and character development and how could this one character develop if this other character was holding his hand the whole time?"

Is it silly to cry over fake people? See, I view it this way: we will never know the lives of FBI guys or Secret Service or CIA people, so in a way, when I get upset over the death of a character in a novel, I'm thinking: there is a chance that one of these patriots has died like this or in a similar way; and: isn't the world so unfair?

This is only one of the many reasons why my mother only reads memoirs and biographies. When she gets upset over characters in books, she wants it to be real people she has learned about and formed an attachment too, not fake people.

I give this book a Gold Star, not only for the emotional response it invoked, but because of a particular character's faith in God and the theme of long-suffering through out the novel. Bravo!

I forgot it was Hispanic Heritage Month

SO I COMPLETELY FORGOT ABOUT HISPANIC HERITAGE MONTH.

To be fair, as a month it was only instituted in 1988 but no one really cared until1996, which mean that at the end of my elementary experience, someone in Washington made noise about a formerly passed law, which made teachers and the media have to start incorporating what it means to be Hispanic into their lesson plans and the media. This sounds like a great idea right? Well the problem with this is that very few teachers in the schools I went to knew about this proclamation from Washington. Or if they did they were a) the ESL teacher (a class I was NOT in) or b) the Spanish teacher (who spoke Spanish with an Italian accent that made it different for certain native speakers to understand her). Needless to say, its understandable why I would forget that September is Hispanic Heritage month.

I often say my family hails from 2 countries in Latin America. Cuba. Colombia. When people ask me what my background is, they usually assume I'll say Sicily or Italy or something to that nature. Usually I just smile and say "No, I'm Cuban-Colombian." What follows next is the most insulting remark ever: "You don't LOOK Latino." I smile and shrug and say "Well you know."

What I'm thinking is this: Latin America is very diverse. Hispanics (I prefer this term over Latino) are usually made up of former inhabitants of the Iberian peninsula, the Netherlands (remember Spain used to own them) and even some Germans and Austrians, in some places the decedents of indigenous peoples and along the coastal regions, Africans.

Anyway, I thought about what do so that's special about this month, but really, I am Hispanic, I live it out each day with out effort since its my way of life, so what's to celebrate? I think there should be a Christian Heritage Month because that would give me something more challenging to live out. But maybe I'll hop on over to Babalu blog and check in on the Cuban-American news?

(book reviews resume next week).

Puddle Wonderful Days

Whenever I am in a super happy mood, I quote e.e.cummings. Specifically his poem about when the world was puddle wonderful. That fully describes the weekend I had, relaxing after an exhausting week at work, then going to my grandfather's 70th birthday party. God is beautiful and he creates beautiful lives.

Anyway, this past week I have been taking my lunch in the local shops around olde city, and I've been reading "Vintage Jesus" by Mark Driscoll and Gary Breshears. I went to a Christian elementary and middle school before being thrust into the wide world of public high school and a public university. I read C.S.Lewis in high school, and wandered around in emerging type books in college, so this book was a call back to true faith for me, a soul-brace if you will. It made me want to study the Bible again, not just take whatever popular "Christian" belief is out there. The chapter I liked best was about Jesus' resurrection. I would sub-title it "The common man's apologetics" because its more readable to most people than C.S.Lewis and its contemporary to our time. Gold Star for Driscoll and Bresheares.

Next week: "Names my sisters call me" and "This side of Married"

Now Showing...

I went to see the Broadway musical "Chicago" with my sister on my last night in New York. Balcony seats. It was marvelous, even if Jerry Springer was playing the lawyer Billy Flynn. I loved the whole experience. Although it bothers me that no one dresses up to go to the theater any more, not to the nines, especially those in the cheap seats, like we were. My sister and I were raised to wear black to the theater, so if you have to get up in the middle of the performance, you're not noticable (My family is big on theater, books and movies). Anyway, people were in sundresses, which is ok, you made an effort, but jeans-shorts? Come on. Respect the arts. They put in hours of practice into it, I think you can look a little bit nice in return, right?

Anyway, in other news, my books came in the mail!!! I'm very excited to read "Little Earthquakes" by Jennifer Weiner, "This Side of Married" by Rachel Pastan, and "Vintage Jesus" by Mark Driscoll this week. The first two are lighthearted reads that use the city of Philadelphia as their setting while the third book is a book about Jesus. I'll have a review for you next week on how they went!

And hopefully I'll have heard about Milwaukee by next Tuesday.

Everyday Life

So I'm sitting here after work and I am watching "The Wedding Singer." It has been on TV twice since I've come to stay here. All I have to say is I can't believe Billy Idol is in this movie! I always forget what other songs he has done.

Speaking of good stories, I like the story of Ruth. I led an indepth Bible study on the book of Ruth about two years ago. Do you know much about Ruth? Ruth was a Moabite. The Moabites are the descendants of Lot and one of his daughters (Lot was Abraham's nephew).

The Bible in my classroom at work upsets me because its introduction is so clearly written by a stone-cold scholar! The man (surely it is a man) says in the introduction to the book, "The peaceful story of Ruth comes between two violent books of the Bible." I didn't read much further than that to be honest because I disagree! Peaceful book?? How can you say that? Ruth married as a teenager, bore no children, and ten years later was widowed. Which means that she if she married at the usual age (between 12 and 18) then she would be a widow during her 20s! That cannot be a peaceful story! That is tragic!" It reminds me of a Bible version of P.S. I Love You. She spent ten of her "best" years with one guy and now society is telling her she's past her expiration date.

It seems God has wanted me to hear about Ruth and Naomi and how they stuck to God during the hard times. I'm not really sure why, as I'm pretty happy right at this moment, but--get this--when I left Philly I was bummed that I would be missing out on the summer sermon series of Ruth. So then I come to Bethany and BAM! they are just starting the sermon series on Ruth. Then in my devotional, the theme for July is "God in everyday life". So my question goes out to you bloggers, where do you see God intervining in your every day life?

Day of Babyfingers

So I am living with my Uncle, Aunt, their baby, my maternal Grandfather and maternal Grandmother for the summer (not the ones from the last blog entry). All in one house. I am working as the Art Instructor at a school Monday thru Thursday. I am enjoying it a lot. I'm actually surprised.

Most of all, there is my baby cousin. She is 1 year and one month and I wish I had a recent photo to put up but I don't.

Anyway so tonight at dinner she pinched me! Hard! Her little baby fingers are so sharp and she gives the teeny-est, tiny-est pinches that hurt super bad.

And did I mention her baby kisses? She gives these weird open mouthed kisses that are more like being licked by a puppy than really getting a little kiss. It will be a cute embarrassing story for her future first boyfriend-when she's 30.

In other news, I am only 30 pages away from completing my mystery novel. Let's all raise a cheer! It's weird though. I'm kind of scared that when I give the 2nd half of the revised copy the small publisher won't think its good. And if he does, and we work to get it published, what if I can't write another good story? This novel was fun to write, but it was hard work too. And what's more is that the next novel I want to write is a historical mystery. I've been wanting to write one for a while but it just won't work out right. Tell me, dear reader, do you ever wonder what it's like to see your goal only footsteps away? Do you hesitate or do you bull rush it?

29200 Days and writing well

5 Things I’ve learned from my 80-year-old grandmother:

1.Pray for your husband, even if you don’t have one yet. This woman has been praying that I marry well since I was 15.
2.Accessorize, accessorize, accessorize. She wears the simplest of jewelry but its always something pretty. Plus she's the one that started me on my jewlery box collection.
3.Any time’s a good time to travel. She's gone more places since retiring than most people have in their entire lives.
4.Take each day one at a time, just like the stairs. She may not like being alive or going up flights of stairs, but she certainly doesn't worry about tomorrow.
5.Computers are conquerable, no matter how many wires or buttons they may have! She is 80 and she e-mails. Who does that? And I complain that I can don't footnotes right, shame on me!

*she's the one standing in the picture.

Days of being Hospitable

I was awakened this morning by the cries of a 17yr old boy who is mentally disabled. My mom does therapeutic foster care, and as I still live at home, sometimes this is how I am awakened. Sometimes the children she takes in have anger issues, abandonment issues, mental issues, medical issues, and sometimes none or all of these problems. My parents began this vocation when I was in first grade. After giving birth to my sister and I; Mom, (with Dad's full support) decided to open her home to others, citing James 1:27 as her reasoning. It goes like this: Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

I love that Dad and Mom do this. Because of their faith in Jesus Christ, and the love of children God placed in Mom and Dad's hearts, they have taken in 8 girls and just as many boys over the last 16 years. Usually each child lives with us for two years, and either age out of the system, go to live with their relatives, or (in the worst of cases) go to a residential facility. In my life, this has taught me how to be hospitable, selfless, considerate, and patient. Most certainly patient.

My father keeps telling my mother to tell me stories of what she has learned about child-rearing from each kid, and for me to transcribe this into a book of memoirs. He says that it will be a best-seller and will encourage other Americans to be courageous and to open their homes to wards of the state. I smile and think, that is not the type of writing I am used to, but I know it will help other therapeutic foster parents to be encouraged and to keep up the good work. So, when my mom is really, I have a pen and paper at the ready!

I love what my parents do. There are rare moments though when I don't always feel comfortable living at such an open home. The biggest problem I've had over the years has been with boyfriends. These guys either have a problem with my desire to write for a living or my desire to have a big family. These guys are the ones who want a secluded 3 bdrm house with 1.5 kids and a dog, while I know I want 5 kids (mine or the state's, it makes no difference) and a hospitable house. I don't know if any guys at the local pub, or even the church will want so many kids, especially if some of the gang are not from their loins. But I think I'll keep praying. Only God knows what the future holds. ;)

A Day of Chuckles

So chapter 3 is done!

It took multiple hours, and a couple of read-throughs, but its great. The tension between the 2 ex-best friends is going well. The reader is finding out a little bit about why they hate each other, but not everything. I finally created minor character-growing problems for the men in the novel too. And like all small towns I’ve ever been too, it seems like everyone who’s married is related to everyone else in town and new people are looked upon as outsiders. I think it’s a little heavy on the dialogue, but it was necessary to the story, so it works.

So I am working on chapter 4 this week and I am not sure where to go. I have a letter from the past, 2 scared children, a pastor in the hospital, another one on the way and a ticked off fiancé. Some how I have to bring all of these characters together for the murder scene in chapter 5.

Anyway in other news: Aggie and I went to Transformed last night. We are used to going to a church that answers the pastor when he asks questions, one where people are encouraged/allowed to say “amen” when they feel the need. So it was funny last night when the decent looking announcer/jock guy was giving the announcements (and Aggie and I were commenting). I didn't think anyone could hear us, but then I think we actually made him nervous. At one point he was going on about how there is going to be this new relationship-focused Bible study on Thursdays, and I groaned, rolled my eyes and leaned my head on my sister’s shoulder. (I am sick of Christian dating books) He actually looked at us and said, “No! It’s not that bad. . .” We are trying not to be such vocal parishioners, but we aren’t doing so well with that. God made us loud, our parents made us opinionated.

Until next week! Keep writing ladies!

A day of mysteries and haystacks

So yesterday while working out at the Y, I came up with the next chapter of my current story. (Yay me!) And then I proceeded to figure out which character should be my murderer. Because, as you know, in every mystery story the bad guy has to be there from the beginning. I figured out which character would do and it made my day. I just have to write it.

Why didn't I write it when I got home? Well, Aggie and I decided to give away our cats. It was a melancholy day really. And that old R&B song about "every single day. . . I'll be missing you" was playing on the radio when we got to the SPCA. It really made the day kind of literary.

Any way, back to writing. I have this white notebook I write in when I am either plotting, or thinking of new ideas and I am super excited. I just came up with a new Idea for yet another story. It came to me while sleeping. This one will not be part of the mystery series, and all I will say is that in involves liars, haystacks, and makeup. Can't wait to figure that one out huh?

And gals, I am SO looking forward to Writer's Group!