You Asked For It…Not Really, But Here It Goes, Anyway

One of the great sages, symbols of an era, and arguably the finest singer of the twentieth century, Francis Albert Sinatra, came out of retirement on several occasions to treat his fans to another dose of his impeccable style.  During one of these lapses, I had the good fortune to obtain tickets to see one of those final performances. Though his range had contracted and his rasp was thicker with years of cigarette smoke coated vocal chords, the evening remains memorable nearly forty years later. The question remains, however, why would anyone give up even one day of retirement?

Authors Jane Porter, Suzanne Redfearn and Anita Hughes
at Canyon Hills Library in Anaheim.

I’m glad you asked that question. Since my retirement nearly two years ago in the spring of 2012, I spent a year substitute teaching, volunteered to lead along with my wife a reading club for adults with down syndrome, tutored a high school junior to improve his writing skills, served as a judge of youth writing at the county fair and am slated to be a board member of my synagogue for the coming year. A year ago I gave up the substitute teaching to focus on my writing.

I looked up from my book to snap this sunset.

Last month I had the privilege of attending the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books at the University of Southern California campus. After one of the panel sessions, I introduced myself to one of the authors, James Magnuson, who in addition to being the director of the Michener Center for Writing at the University of Texas is a native of Wisconsin and fellow graduate of the university in Madison. His warmth and congenial discussion of the homeland and becoming grandparents was a treat, but he topped it off by having me send a copy of my manuscript to him.

Simon

Last Saturday, we attended an author’s forum at a local library. Three authors, who write mainly women’s romance and suspense, discussed the writing process, getting published, and their books.  While their genre is different from my own, the steps they took to become authors, their journeys to find a literary agent and getting their books published, as well as the motivation necessary to continue the craft were all the same as what I find myself mired in currently.  One thing they all stressed was the need to continue to write.  A goal I had heard before and was repeated several times that day is to write a thousand words a day.  That’s about twice the length of my usual post at this blog or between three and four double spaced pages.

Another important area they said writers need to focus their energies on is reading.  So, while Debbie snapped her photos of the sunset at Laguna that evening I read a portion of Magnuson’s latest novel, Famous Writers I Have Known. It also led me to the decision that while we are in Wisconsin I will focus my efforts on reading and relaxing, while getting to know our new grandson (see last week’s post).  When we return on May 29^th I will catch up on writing this blog.