The Dance of Interdependence

 Yes, it is another meeting of the Insecure Writer's Support Group!

Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

The awesome co-hosts for the February 2 posting of the IWSG are Joylene Nowell Butler, Jacqui Murray, Sandra Cox, and Lee Lowery!

February 2 question - Is there someone who supported or influenced you that perhaps isn't around anymore? Anyone you miss?

I don't think that writers become writers in a vacuum. We are all affected by those around us in one way or another. In grade two or three, in Osgoode, Ontario - I got very positive feedback for a story I wrote about our family's 22 day camping trip. Right then I thought "hmm...there might be something worthwhile in this racket."  I won a prize in grade seven in Colorado Springs for an essay I wrote about wanting to be a hermit. It was chosen for a western American publication of student essays because it was a 'fine example of irony'. No it wasn't. I meant it. So, yes, there were teachers who supported my desire to write in various ways. I would love to meet Mr. Weiderquist, who was my grade seven English literature teacher, or the English grammar teacher, Mrs. Johnson - both at Horace Mann Junior High. That was so long ago that they are certainly not around anymore. 

The persons I will most miss when I hold my published novel in my quivering hands are my parents. My Daddio is the voice I hear when I'm shirking my discipline. I hear him sternly say "bum glue" and "pitter-patter fly atter" and "when the going gets tough, the tough get going".  When I had poems published my dad had one of them hand calligraphed by an artist which he presented to me. When he suffered from insomnia he used to edit texts in his head until sleep came.  My dad was in the RCAF. He was a bomber pilot in WW2 and then a flying teacher but went into public relations before it was technically even a thing. He edited magazines, handled the press through mishaps and so on. Mainly he worked with writers.

My mother loved to read and everyone in our home was encouraged  to develop a voracious reading habit. We three kids were excused errands if we had a book in hand. This was, by the way, stealth parenting at its smartest. Both my parents read both widely and deeply and nothing was off limits. Well, almost nothing. My father snagged my copy of Lady Chatterley's Lover saying it wasn't for the inexperienced. My mother snuck it back to me, rolling her eyes at his one try at censorship. My mother introduced me to writers that I still love to read - Margaret Drabble, Pearl S. Buck, Rumor Godden and Pamela Frankau among many more. She valued wit but valued kindness more and her reading choices underlined that.

When I think of my parents I feel extreme gratitude. My father for his belief that discipline was key and my mother with her compassion for the disenfranchised. Both of those qualities are the spark that drives my writing and I know they'd be so pleased to hold a book I'd written in their hands.

Well, enough farting around - I have to apply some bum glue so that I can pitter patter fly atter - because a job done well is a job well done and when the going gets... I could go on. My Dad would.