All the Art of Living

Five for Five

2010-06-28T08:57:00.000-07:00

What have you spent five dollars on lately?

I've spent it on a new book. A lunch salad from Bajio's. The original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles DVD.

I shell out five dollars or more quite regularly for the things I want. I'm lucky to have that five dollars to spend. Sometimes I feel incredibly poor, like the months when we barely make rent. It's the life of a student family, I suppose. But I still spend that five dollars at least once a week without thinking, because it's really not that much to me.

I'm guessing it's really not that much to you either.

To five kids I love from Ghana, five dollars can pull them out of slavery. The slavery of poverty, of a life where they can earn five dollars in a whole week. The education that will give them freedom only costs about $5,000. If a thousand people gave five dollars, that's all we'd need.
Five dollars isn't that much. And a thousand people is less than the number of kids that went to my high school.
Can you give $5, and make a sandwich for lunch tomorrow instead of going to McDonald's? Can you be one of one thousand? Can you tweet or Facebook your friends to add to that one thousand?

Wherever you're at in life, I bet you make more than $5 a week. I bet you could do those things.
Five dollars for five kids. It's really not that much. Make a tax-deductible donation now through our raffle, and you can even have a shot at getting something out of it.

What will you spend five bucks on today?

You Can Promote Literacy in Africa-- AND Win Prizes!

2010-06-08T14:07:00.000-07:00

When I was 20, I ditched college and took off for Africa.

I thought it would be the adventure of a lifetime, and it was. But it ended up being so much more than that. For four months, I taught the children at New Life International Orphanage and learned more about patience and love than I had in the last twenty years of my life combined. I made friends and learned to live in a different world. Most importantly, I realized that it was real life for the people in Ghana-- not the amazing adventure I'd come for.

One particular boy I got close to was Michael. On my last day in Ghana, he quietly asked me as we walked down the dusty road if I would remember him. I have never forgotten him; I have prayed for him, sent letters to him, and visited him again in 2008. And now I have the chance to do more-- help him continue his education. In Ghana, high school isn't compulsory, and it isn't free. Michael and four of his friends have passed their exams to go, they just don't have the money to get there.

Here's the cool thing: you can help-- and you can have a chance to get some really cool Ghanaian stuff in the process.

Over at Reach for the Stars, we're holding a raffle to raise money for the kids. For as little as five bucks and spreading the word, you can get up to five entries for some amazing handmade Ghanaian prizes.

Please help Michael and these other kids that I know and love raise the money they need to break out of their poverty!

The Miracle of Michael

2010-05-22T13:26:00.000-07:00

The first time I really noticed 11-year-old Michael, he was throwing up the little bit of breakfast he had eaten.

He was hunched over on the veranda steps of the orphanage, and when I sat next to him, I found that he was also burning with fever. He begged for a cup of water. After a sip, he poured the rest over his head. Moments later, he was shivering despite the heat of the equatorial sun. I hurried to the headmistress, and her instructions were to take him home. Michael was a student at the orphanage school, but he lived with his mother in the village. With the help of Patrick, a local man who happened to be visiting the orphanage, I took Michael home. Patrick carried him on his back along the dusty roads while I bit my lip the whole way.

Michael and his mother shared a small room of mud bricks and bamboo with his uncle. She spoke no English, having never been to school, and Patrick translated for me as I gave her the last of my purified water and the Tylenol I happened to have in my bag. Staring at the small boy shivering on the rough, uneven concrete floor, my heart pounded. I had no idea what he had, but it seemed akin to malaria. I was new in this part of the world, with no idea of what he needed or how to help him. Looking up at his mother, I asked in a wavering voice through Patrick if I could pray for him.

With Michael and his mother, Grace (2005)

I knelt on the hard cement and began to pray, Michael’s mother and uncle whispering fervent amens to a prayer they understood even though they didn’t know the words. As I finished, I inhaled deeply, trying to cool the sudden heat in my chest. In those few moments, I fell in love with a small boy in Ghana. And I knew that small boy would be fine.

The next morning, I rushed anxiously back to his home to check on him. Michael, who had been so ill less than 24 hours before that he could barely open his eyes, ran toward me with an enormous smile and wrapped his skinny arms around me in a hug.

Michael is now a healthy 17 year old. To his mother’s joy, he has finished junior high school, but a new challenge lies ahead. Michael has passed his entrance exams to go to high school, but in Ghana, high school is not free. While it is absolutely essential for those hoping to get good jobs and a further education, it is also prohibitively expensive for a boy who still lives under a bamboo roof.

Michael and Grace at home (2009, from Zoe Reiches)

If you would like to help Michael and four of his friends achieve the miracle of education, please consider a donation or a sponsorship through the Reach for the Stars project (you can also link through the button on the sidebar). If you can’t do that, you can help spread the word by posting the button from the website on your blog or tweeting to your followers.

Please help send these kids to high school!

A Snatch of Dialogue from Ghana

2010-05-18T13:25:00.000-07:00

Mama Vic was cooking dinner; fried rice and chicken was on the menu, a Ghanaian favorite. For some reason, she was using a small charcoal burner to cook the rice outside, rather than the stove. She sat on a low stool in the courtyard, hunched over the pot while Martha fanned the charcoal with woven palm leaves to keep it hot. I sat on a plastic chair near them, inhaling the scent of charcoal and rice and staring absently into the leaves of the breeze-blown mango tree.

Mama Vic glanced at me. “Shallee, your face is not happy, oh.”

“It was a hard day at the orphanage today,” I said. “The kids are…difficult.”

She nodded. “I see. Sometimes, it can be harder for children who come from poverty to know how to learn.”

I chewed on that for a minute. “What do you mean?”

“Because their life, it is so hard. They sleep on the streets, steal from people so they can eat. Sometimes they are raped, and maybe have a baby at thirteen years and have to throw it in the gutter because it will die. It is too hard, oh.” Her voice had gotten louder, sounding angry at the state of the world.

I had never thought of these things, and it made me squirm inside. Some of the children had only recently come to New Life. How was I to know what their lives had been before they came?

“This orphanage,” Mama Vic asked as she stirred the rice, “is it a good place?”

“Yes. They take very good care of the children. And they’re getting an education.”

She nodded, looking satisfied as the dim thumping of drums from Addison’s sprang up. “That is good. Sometimes, these places take advantage of the children, and take the money they are given to buy things for themselves and the children are still hungry.”

I clutched the arms of my chair, horrified. “Really?”

“Yes, it is true. But I am glad the children you are teaching are having a good life now.”

“Me too,” I said, staring at the ants crossing the pavement at my feet. It wasn’t the best of lives, really. Not when they all slept three to a bed and had school on a veranda. Still, it was better than the alternative.

“Sistah Shallee!” Nananua appeared, bouncing as always, at my elbow. “Hello, my wife!”

I laughed, her cheerfully bizarre entrance breaking the melancholy of the fire-side chat. “Hello, my husband,” I teased back.

She shrieked with laughter. “Sistah Shallee, will you come with us to Tina’s Tavern?”

“Where?”

Mama Vic explained, “I want to go to a spot tonight, after dinner. Just to chat and have some spring rolls and let the kids have a Fanta. Will you come?”

“Sure!” I said, pleased at the thought.

Nananua tugged at my arm. “Then Sistah Shallee, come, I want to color before we go!”

This is Real Life

2010-05-05T13:23:00.000-07:00

Michael, age 10 in 2005

Cape Coast, Ghana, 4/9/05: “For the last few weeks, I’ve been gaining a greater sense of reality, as though the adventure aspect and novelty [of Ghana] have given way to the deep, intrinsic knowledge that this – is – real – life. For the people that live here, it is all they know, just as, before I came, Utah was all I knew. For Michael [a student at the orphanage school, pictured here], his everyday reality is hunger and cramped quarters and sleeping on concrete and a bamboo roof that leafs in the rain and he knows nothing else. And in a month, I’ll go back to my everyday reality of fast food and five bedrooms and a daybed and red brick and shingles, and I’m so afraid that I’ll forget, amidst the glamour of $10 DVD deals and the pink skirt I’m dying to have, that there is a village called Efutu where a 10-year-old boy and his family are still living just where I left them. And there is a part of me that wants to forget, the same part that wants the DVD’s and the pink skirt and doesn’t want to think about the ones who have nothing so I can enjoy my comparative wealth in the bliss of ignorance.

So the question becomes, where do I draw the line? I can’t subject myself to poverty merely to dole out money to a world that needs so much– for Efutu is one tiny village in Ghana, and Ghana is one tiny country amidst all those suffering in poverty. I can’t save the whole world, much as my idealistic heart wants to, and it makes no sense to deny myself the things I wish for others. That being the case, I can’t do nothing, not when I’m in a position to give. So I suppose that means for me to choose– choose one aspect of the world that is within my power to help bring about positive change and progression.”

I wrote this in my journal as I was nearing the end of my stay in Ghana. I grew afraid of forgetting, of returning home and doing nothing further to help. But I couldn’t forget, not completely. Not when I had found a love for these children so deep it felt like it couldn’t come from my own small heart. And yet, sometimes, I do get caught up in the $10 DVD deals, because that is real life too. I’ve realized that part of my fear of forgetting was the fear that as I forgot them, I would forget why it was so horrible to forget.

Then I remember the last paragraph of that journal entry. DVD’s don’t mean I have forgotten my children. I can’t do it all, and I can’t do it all the time, but I can still choose to remember, choose to do something. I have chosen a part of the world that I have the power to help, something that I chose to love, and I give out of that love.

So choose something. Choose someone. It doesn’t have to be New Life Orphanage, or Ghana, or solving world hunger. Just choose one thing, one person, and make a difference in that person’s life– because it is as real as yours.

The Plotting Tool for Pantsers

2010-05-04T13:23:00.000-07:00

My initial plan for TSAP was simply my normal, pantser, write-what-comes process. So far, I’ve got a whopping 30,000 words. There’s a problem, though: I haven’t even made it past the first month of my trip to Ghana, and I was there for four. That means this is shaping up to be around 120,000 words for a first draft.

Ouch.

Here’s another problem: this isn’t just going to be a travelogue of “this happened and then this happened…” It needs to have a cohesive storyline, with themes that tie the narrative together. And so, I came to the conclusion that I have to break out of my normal routine and– deep breath– make an outline. A full, complete, three-act, scene-by-scene outline before I write anything further.

Now, part of the reason I like the pantsing-with-a-bit-of-plotting method is that I love the freedom and creativity of it. So what’s a pantser to do when she has to plot (REALLY plot)? How about using this amazing method? The author of the Hal Spacejock series and creator of Ywriter shows a great, visually organized method for plotting using a tool called Freemind.

I gotta tell you, people, I am in love. It’s easy to use, it’s visual, it’s organized, and it’s FREE. Never did this pantser think that plotting could be done so creatively. And yet, I’m plotting like I was born to do it. It doesn’t even feel stifling. In fact, in some ways, it’s a bit freeing.

Even Tennyson approves. And when the Muse-fish speaks, I listen.

Experiencing Cape Coast, Ghana

2010-04-29T13:21:00.000-07:00

A view of Cape Coast from Savoy Hotel hilltop

I close my eyes sometimes when I’m alone, and call up pictures in my mind of my favorite places in Ghana. Kotokuraba market. I see a flurry of color and motion, of heat and noise. Set in the center triangle created by three crossing streets, it is a place of commerce, confusion, and commotion. Taxis, tro tros, and a few private cars crowd the streets around it. Both taxis and tro tros, or small vans, function as mini buses, with people crammed in with their goods and the occasional goat. Across from the market is the “station,” where I would take a tro tro every day to the orphanage. Dozens of little VW vans crowded the area, all painted to proclaim the driver’s belief in Jesus. “The Lord will provide,” or “Gye Nyame”—except for God. Apparently, this proclaimed belief precluded a need for seatbelts. The drivers stood near their tros, calling out their destination. “Takoradi, Takoradi,” and “Jukwa Jukwa Jukwa Jukwa Jukwa!” Women and children wandered around, adding their own voices, like that of so many birds, proclaiming the wares atop their heads—water, bread, cookies. “Aeeees watah,” “paaaanoo,” and “beeescuits!” One man marched through the area daily, holding an umbrella over his head that dangled with handkerchiefs of numerous colors and designs. Set in a large circle, surrounded by shops and flocking with hawkers, and only one way in or out, the station became a joyful place for me.

I became a common fixture there as well, a part of the pulsing mobs. After taking a taxi from my house to town, I “dropped” at Kotokuraba and found whoever was proclaiming “Jukwa!” that day. I always took a moment to buy “pure water” from one of the ladies or girls. Though it came in a plastic sachet like “ice water,” pure water was purified, its bag carefully sealed in a bloated square, and stamped with blue ink. I stuffed a few in my dirtier-by-the-day backpack and climbed aboard the tro tro. Somewhere between two and thirty minutes later, the tro pulled out—they only left when they were full. The ride took me through Cape Coast and into the suburb of Adisadel, then past Pedu Junction and to Abura, the suburb where my host’s sister, Mama Joyce, lived. After Abura came scattered jungle, a secluded hotel on a small crocodile pond called Hans Cottage, past the barren earth where women crushed rocks under small thatched shelters, and on to the tiny hamlet of Ansapatu—just short of the larger village of Efutu.

I called to the mate, the young boy who took passenger’s money, and the tro tro stopped. People in the aisle seats stood to fold their seats up and step out so I could crouch past, then piled back in again and headed on up to the town of Jukwa. I turned to Ansapatu, which consisted of a few small houses, a tiny shop, a school, and New Life International Orphanage. Smiling and waving at the women who sat among the enormous pile of greenish-yellow oranges they were selling, I headed down the red dirt hill, anxious to get to my children.

The orphanage was across the little lane from the orange and brown government junior secondary school (JSS), set nearly at the edge of the rainforest. It was painted a bland white with blue trim, and an unfinished three-room schoolhouse hunched next to it. A small orange tree stood near the front gate to the left, a palm tree further down. The refuse pile and laundry lines sat away from the school, near the large, overgrown area referred to as the garden. The cement basins where the children bathed were farther away, near the bushes where the “bathroom” was—a large pit crossed with wooden beams. A rickety wooden fence made a pitiful attempt to keep the goats out of the garden, and a painted sign declared it to be “New Life International Orphanage Home/School for orphaned, abandoned, and needy children.”

What is Africa to Me?

2010-04-22T13:20:00.000-07:00

Countee Cullen once asked, “Copper sun and scarlet sea, What is Africa to me?” I don’t remember what Africa was to him; I read the poem a long time ago. But I know what Africa is to me.

Africa is Fanta in 300 ml glass bottles for 3000 cedis.
Africa is cold bucket showers.
Africa is my blue backpack filled with teaching tools.
Africa is sharing the streets– not only with throngs of Ghanaians, but with goats, chickens, and taxis that seem ready to run over you if you don’t make way.
Africa is sharing taxis with six other people and laughing at how squished you are.
Africa is handing Benjie a “color” (crayon), and hearing his tiny voice cheerfully say, “Thank you, and God bless you!”
Africa is Adjoa singing while she works– all day.
Africa is Precious and her black backpack that is practically glued to her.
Africa is Kobi’s mischevious fake cry just to trick you into thinking it’s real.
Africa is Elizabeth wanting to play the hand-clap game “Mister Mister,” and wanting it “sharp sharp!” or very fast.
Africa is calling “Ansapatu” to the mate (or money taker) on the tro tro (minibus) and walking down the orange dirt hill to the orphanage.
Africa is plantain, pineapple, oranges, jollof rice, red red, fish, and chicken.
Africa is Ghana, and Ghanaians, and my children.
To me, Africa is heaven.

Kejetia Market, Kumasi, Ghana

Some people don’t like it when others use the broad, continental term “Africa.” Well, I know that Africa is not a country. I know that Africa has more tribes, customs, languages, and countries than almost anywhere else on the planet. But why should we not use the word Africa? I was in Ghana, yes, and that is the only part of Africa I know– but it is still a part of Africa. It is one of the only places in the world where people are proud of being part of multiple things: their tribe, their country, and their continent. They are Ghanaian, and they are African.

A street in Cape Coast

Someone once asked me what it is about Africa that captures nearly everyone who goes there. I have pondered on this often, and I’m still not sure. All I know is, it captured me. Something about the people, the cultures, the very land you walk on seems captivating and majestic and somehow more real than anything else in your life has ever been.

My host father once laughed and told me, as I stood wearing a Ghanaian slit and kaba, that I was “A real African now!” I would never want to lessen the dignity or honor of being African by laying claim to the title after a paltry four months of living there. But somewhere inside me is a corner of my heart that has become African, simply out of love for Africa and her people. That is what Africa really is to me; despite the hunger, the disease, the fear, the war, and all the atrocities the continent seems capabale of, there is more love than I have ever known in my life.

And that is why I have to write about it.

Playing Twister at New Life Orphanage

5 Drafts: Tips for Conquering the Dreaded Rewrite

2010-04-19T13:18:00.000-07:00

The first time I traveled to Ghana was in January, at the peak of the Harmattan season. For two months, strong winds blow across the Sahara desert and down to West Africa, blanketing the sky with a thick coat of dust. It gets everywhere– in the corners, in the wall cracks, in your elbow creases. Just sitting outside, you can taste the thick, dirty air you’re breathing and walk back in the house ready for a shower. It hovers over everything like a dense, brownish smog.

Post-Harmattan view

I lived on a hill in the suburbs of Cape Coast, a bustling city with a booming fishing industry. One morning, it rained, clearing the sky for the first time since I’d been there and signaling the end of the Harmattan. As I walked down the hill to catch a taxi into town, I stopped in amazement, gazing into the distance. I had a view of the ocean! I had lived on this hill for a month, and never once had I realized that the Gulf of Guinea sparkled just within my view.

I like to think that rewrites are kind of like the rain that clears the sky of Harmattan dust. As you draft and cut and rewrite, the rain falls and suddenly, hey, there’s a story hidden in there! A lot of writers fear the rewrite, but really, it’s where you shape the story out of all the muck you just threw down on your paper.

So, then. Once you’ve got that first draft down, how exactly do you make that story come to life?

First, JOIN A CRITIQUE GROUP. Just get someone else to look at your stuff and give you honest feedback. Having another eye, especially another writer’s eye, go over your work is a tremendous help.

Now, my rewrite process actually occurs in several stages. Because I’m a pantser/plotter hybrid, I tend to do some of my rewriting as an actual part of my first draft. I still consider that a first draft, though. One thing I’ve never tried that I think I want to before launching into my next rewrite is the shrunken manuscript technique to better diagnose weaknesses before I even start.

Once my draft is finished, I take it through several rewrites, focusing each time on separate things. Now, keep in mind, these aren’t cut and dry, and they can vary depending on the needs and weaknesses of the particular work. Sometimes I mix them up a bit. Generally, though, these are the things I focus on in each draft.

DRAFT 2

Plot elements (try/fail cycle, rhythm and pacing, climax, plot points and structure, rehashes, foreshadowing, etc.)

This is where I do a great deal of actual chopping, rewriting, cutting, and pasting. I start with the story as a whole, figuring out what needs to go, what needs to be added, where I need to change the pace, where I should be foreshadowing, etc. This can be quite a long process, and is usually drawn out through subsequent drafts. A lot of times, I’ll look at individual problem scenes here too, and analyze for the same things within the scene.

DRAFT 3

World building (descriptions, society, religion, clear view of setting, world feels real)
characterization (strong, proactive, unique, memorable, act within their character, differentiated from other characters)
character relationships (show ups/downs in relationship, each scene is a new interaction or moment of discovering more of that character)

This is another very large draft. These things are all interrelated (I tend to think of world-building as characterizing the setting), and I take the time to make sure all of the above are taken care of. Sometimes I’ll do multiple mini drafts, where I focus on one single character who I’m having problems with, or a specific relationship that needs tweaking. This is one that I take on first with a whole-novel view (do they follow a good growth arc?) as well as a scene-by-scene view (do these characters interact exactly the same in this scene as they did three scenes ago?). Like I said, it’s a big draft that can incorporate some elements of plot already mentioned, as well as some of the following elements.

DRAFT 4

show, don’t tell (descriptions, feelings)
sentence structure/flow and word choice
tight dialogue
voice/viewpoint unique and error free (includes dialogue)

As I mentioned, some of these things, such as dialogue and voice/viewpoint get taken care of as I do my character drafts (or even in plot, if I’m working on pacing, for example). I go over them again, however, just to make sure things flow. I often kind of gloss over details in my first draft, using a lot of “telling.” This is where I fix that, if it hasn’t already been taken care of in, say, the world-building fixes.

After this, I LET IT SIT for several days to even weeks. (Especially if I’m thoroughly sick of the whole process.) This is imperative for the last draft to be what it needs to be, and for the book to be as good as it can be.

This is usually a good point for alpha readers to come in. The book is better, but now I want to know, once again, what works and doesn’t for the actual reader. Once I’ve gotten their feedback, I can incorporate any of it I want in the last draft.

DRAFT 5

Everything

In this, I take the comments from alpha readers, as well as my own feelings on everything already discussed, and make any final changes. This is often a much more painstaking draft, getting down into nitty-gritty details. This is also a good place to do a copy edit, looking for typos, spelling errors, inconsistencies like changing eye color, etc.

Oh wait, did I say final draft? I lied. Although, I guess the last one isn’t really a rewrite. Again, LET THE WORK SIT for a little bit. Then, go back and do another read-through and make any final adjustments.

And boom! Finally, the book is done, and the story has finally been revealed in all its glory. (Until the agents and editors get their hands on it, that is.)

So what’s your rewrite process? What scares you about rewriting? Let’s discuss!

The Muse-Fish

2010-04-14T13:17:00.000-07:00

You hear a lot from writers about their muses. The word muse conjures up images of some formless, mystical creature that comes down with a magic wand and –bwang!– the writer is inspired. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not over here knocking muses. It’s very true that sometimes, something just hits you and away your fingers fly. However, if you hang around forever waiting for that bwangmoment, you might never finish that book. Writing, or at least writing well, is hard, day-to-day work. That’s just a fact of life.

However, inspiration struck in the fish aisle of PetsMart yesterday as I watched the mesmerized look on my son’s face. I didn’t need a muse…I needed a muse-fish! A relaxation-inducing, thought-provoking, idea-inspiring muse-fish. And so, despite my husband’s eye-rolling, I carefully examined the rows of beta fish, and we arrived home with a pretty little crowntail beta. He sits right next to my writing area, to do all that -inducing, -provoking, and -inspiring stuff a muse-fish does when you take a break to watch him swim.

He has been christened Tennyson. Because with a name like that, he’s got to be inspiring.

Welcome

2010-02-13T13:09:00.000-08:00

According to my mother, I’ve been writing since I was nine months old, and she has pages of lopsided circles to prove it. She’s probably the only one who counts that as the beginning of my writing career. I don’t think I can credibly claim the title until at least age 8; though the content wasn’t original, at least I was writing in words. My original love was for reading. I loved the power of books to take me to another world. When I realized that as a writer I could be the one to createthat world and make it come alive for someone else, I knew I had found my true love.

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