I just returned from the 2012 Florida Writer's Association Annual Conference.  I've learned a lot, but the most important thing I got from the conference?  I am motivated to write.  So much so that at 4 a.m. I couldn't stop thinking enough to get back to sleep, so I am up writing.  Of course, my daughter heard me up, and now she is up, too.  I guess this is just another challenge to overcome.  How do you explain to an eight year old that 4:30 is too early to get up when you are up typing away?
    At any rate, there are several thoughts running through my head, and I have decided to share them with you.  One, I am going to take a piece of advice from my friend Terri and not give myself a hard time about my blog.  The point is to write.  The point is not to make sure that every blog post is the epitome of perfect prose.  I'll have to work on that one, but I would like to get my thoughts out more often. 
    The second item on my mind has to do with the title of this blog (the whole blog, not this one post).  I decided to go with "Thoughts of a Rising Writer" because I want a place to chronicle my thoughts on writing.  I, of course, will write about topics other than writing as well because let's face it, life happens.  Still, I want to get some things out there about writing and the process a writer goes through from the act of writing to getting published.
    Writing is hard work.  I haven't been putting the hard work in lately.  Writing, particularly when you have a demanding full time job like molding the minds of a hundred plus young people on a daily basis, requires discipline.  Writing requires drive.  Writing requires one to get out of bed at four a.m. when there are things to be said, and sometimes when there is nothing to be said.  Writing is hard work.  I hereby dedicate myself to that hard work.

   The business of writing is crazy.  Still, I want to be a part of it. This past weekend I met with a few agents.  One agent is interested in a project I have in mind that may rise out of a blog post or two.  I haven't done much on this project, but she liked the idea so much she made it a point to approach me with her business card.  Two are interested in Jade, but not book one.  They are interested in Jade when I get book two done (the working title, by the way, is Dreamwalkers).  Book one was self published, and that lends itself to a number of issues if an author wants to switch to traditional publishing.  I'd like to give traditional publishing a try.  So that leads me to my other thoughts.
    When I wrote Flames in the Midst, there were things I didn't know about the YA (Young Adult) genre.  Most importantly, your character should not (traditionally) be in college.  The age of eighteen is pushing the limits on YA.  Jade has a few more books to go in her story, so I am going to make some changes to Flames in the Midst.  I actually think the changes will build her character a bit more.  I am going to knock her down by one year.  How am I going to do that?  You will see.  Since I have a small following (hurray, fans!), I am going to post some of the changes I am making here.  These will add to Jade's backstory and build a stronger dynamic between Jade and Zach.
    What does this mean for book two?  For one, I promised one agent it would be done in six months.  I plan to finish it much sooner than that, but it will need editing.  (Yeah, motivation!)  But it also means I won't be putting it out for the public right away.  Since I do have a few fans, I will put out some of it via this blog.  Let me know what you think.  I need to make book two a stand alone book (since publishers apparently don't want to touch the self-publishing world unless you have six figure sales).  I know I can do it. 
    By the way, one of the agents told me, "Well, obviously you can write."  I know it sounds lame, but it felt so affirming to hear that from someone in the industry.  Truthfully, before I went to the conference, I had almost given up on myself.  Now, I am ready to write!

A friend of mine recently inspired me to take up blogging.  It is not my usual mode of writing, and I don't necessarily want to inundate the world with my thoughts, but it seems a harmless enough way to get my own thoughts out--even if I'm the only one reading them.  Right now, I am working on writing the sequel to Flames in the Midst, planning out next semester of English I honors, and hoping to tighten up my teenage memoir documenting my pregnancy and the loss of my first love.  Oh yeah, I'm also trying not to fail miserably at being a mom to my three kids while still achieving my own dreams.  Somewhere in there, I'm also finding time to have a relationship with my husband.

Back in high school, I had the worst time choosing electives.  It wasn't that any one thing scared me or turned me off; it was that everything called out to me.  I wanted to play in the band while directing a school play, writing for the literary magazine, and running track.  If I had time for art, shop class, cooking, baton twirling, and sports on top of all that, I would gladly take it on.  I settled into a few things, but I ended up feeling like I never put my all into any one thing.  I made decent grades, held a decent second chair in band (once I stopped switching instruments), had a few decent poems published, and had a few decent roles in the theater.  I even won a decent third in my first track meet.  I could have been valedictorian (not that those exist anymore).  I could have earned straight superiors for my flute solo.  I could have published a book by the age of 17.  I could have stared in a play.  I could have been the one to beat on the track.  But I couldn't do it all at once, so I didn't do any of it.  I chose instead to experience a little bit of all of those things and make my choices later.

Then life happens.  Don't get me wrong, life happens all the time.  Every day.  Every minute.  LIfe is happening.  Yet, some moments really stand out and change you.  At seventeen I found myself pregnant and essentially widowed.  I wrote, but I didn't do anything with it.  I graduated.  No one gave that to me.  I worked for it, but to me, it was just going through the motions.  I continued living, but I stopped dreaming.  Not completely, but enough.  The path I was on when I lost my first love was the path I stayed on.  It was safe.  I would graduate high school, go to college, become a teacher.  That was what we had discussed.  There was not room for dreaming something else or exploring something else.  Not when your heart ached and your dreaming had to be reserved for the small bundle crying, growing, toddling across a college apartment.

But not choosing to explore other options was still a choice.  Even today, I don't know what I want to be when I grow up, but most people I know are lucky enough to be in the same boat.  Is writing a pastime or a career?  Which of those is teaching?  Will it be a lifelong career or only the first of several I will get to explore?  Life happens.  Sometimes it happens in tragic ways and sometimes in miraculous ones.  Sometimes it just happens in a series of little pushes.  Whenever life happens, it molds us.  It helps us choose our electives.  The things that drive us.

My friend Terri wrote a blog recently about human trafficking.  It moved me.  Life is pushing her; God is pushing her, or rather calling her, to become an abolitionist in some way and work against this horrible atrocity.  My dear friend Beth blogs for her son who is undergoing treatment for Hyper IGM Syndrome.  Lucas is her miracle, and when they finally come home, I know she will continue to work to help others going through what their family is now.

I am back where I started in high school.  There are so many causes that call out to me.  There are so many organizations I believe are worthy.  I just can't decide which elective to choose.  So I'll do what I can, when I can, for as many as I can.  One day, I'll figure it out.