by Roseanna White | Nov 5, 2009 | Thoughtful Thursdays, Uncategorized
When I was younger, one of my favorite songs was “The Potter and the Clay.” I had the sheet music for it, and I would sit down and play and sing that song until my family was probably ready to snatch it from my piano and toss it out the window.
In high school, I got a little bit of experience with actual clay, the kind you shape and model and fire in a kiln. The kind that, as my art-teacher BIL pointed out the other week, is muddy and dark when you’re working with it, but which emerges from the flames a pure white. All sorts of spiritual significance in that, huh?
But these days, I’m in Play-Doh World. It happens when babies grow into toddlers and need to be entertained at a seat for ten minutes now and then. =) Now, I’m a big Play-Doh fan. Bright colors, non-toxic, not too messy . . . until it starts to dry out. Inescapable, right? Eventually, the modeling compound get dry and crumbly and cracked.
Gee, no spiritual significance in that. Ha. Ha ha. Seriously, I can’t count the number of days I’ve felt like that–like I started out this wonderful, bright, innocent thing, able to be shaped into whatever the Potter wanted. But then life sneaks in, disappointments and rejection keep coming, and there are days when I just feel dried out, crumbly. It doesn’t usually last long (for me–I’ve yet to successfully re-hydrate the Play-Doh), but still.
Then last year, I discovered a kind of RoseArt clay. Bright, colorful, non-toxic, and smells good to boot. And on the bucket, it says “Never dries out!” Yeah, right. Right? I didn’t believe it, and I didn’t figure I should try to test it out. Until one day, my daughter hid some when I wasn’t looking. I found it a week later, sighed, picked it up prepared to throw it away . . . and was amazed. This clay was still malleable. Still soft. Still bright, colorful, non-toxic, and fragrant. Unbelievable!
So as my kids sit here playing with this clay, which has been sitting out for who-knows-how-long (my daughter is an expert hider–I had no clue she had put some in her music box! Oy!) I realize I want to be like this clay. I don’t want to have the excuse of “dried-out days are inescapable.” I don’t want to think that of course things will crumble eventually. Why should they? Why should I? I serve an expert Potter, one who uses a secret formula of life to create the clay from which I’m made. Why should I assume He made me of stuff that can’t survive long in the fresh air?
Play-Doh is still awesome, don’t get me wrong. But I don’t want to be Play-Doh. I want to be made of a clay that can always be reshaped into the image the Potter has in mind, no matter how long I’ve been out in these winds and heat of life. I want to be molded by Him daily. I don’t want to sing about the Potter and the Modeling Compound. I want to be the clay.
by Roseanna White | Nov 4, 2009 | Remember When Wednesdays, Uncategorized
Jumping back to the Law of Moses today, and to one of the subjects of the utmost relevance to
A Stray Drop of Blood. Slavery. Or, perhaps more accurately, bonds.
According to Moses’ account in Deuteronomy, Jews cannot actually enslave their own people. Now, he admits that the poor will always be among them, and that there will therefore always be servants. But if said poor neighbor comes to the Rich Dude and offers himself up as a bondservant, it isn’t permanent. It’s a six-year contract, after which Rich Dude must not only release him, he must release him with a nice severance package so Poor Dude can make a name for himself.
Now, if Poor Dude loves Rich Dude and wants to serve him forever, he can opt to bind himself to the family for life. At which point they’ll pierce his ear as a symbol of his commitment.
Obviously, nothing is so simple in Stray Drop, LOL. I complicate matters by making my main character a slave to a Roman. He observes Hebrew law whenever possible, but his family and colleagues obviously don’t. So while in the Visibullis house the slaves are treated as equals, in the eyes of Rome, they’re still just slaves.
Now, my setup is that Abigail’s mother’s second husband sells her after her mother’s death. I imagine this sort of thing happened, but the Law really, really frowned on Hebrews selling each other to Gentiles. Even more unthinkable is something I have later in the book, that a desperate mother sells her six-year-old boy. This is unlikely because without a son, a woman has nothing in that day. But my setup is that the woman already has nothing, and the son is to young to provide for her, so she pretty much gives up. (Not to mention she’s just a you-know-what. Not that we see her in this book, but I’ve developed her dubious character in the planned-out-but-unwritten sequel.)
During the main part of the story, Abigail is in her sixth year of service. I don’t talk about this outright, but an undercurrent in the plot is that Abigail wants to serve her mistress forever. Said mistress is determined to give her a brighter future and arrange her marriage. Cause for all sorts of troubles when the arrogant son who thinks like a Roman arrives back on the scene. =)
Also cause for all sorts of imagination when Roman law and Hebrew law clash on the issue. I have no idea what would actually have happened in the situation, but I guessed as best I could, LOL.
by Roseanna White | Nov 3, 2009 | Uncategorized
I don’t often read “in” books. Not that I have anything against NYT Best Sellers, I just don’t often have time to read anything but the CBA books I get for review. But my best friend threatened to disown me if I didn’t read Twilight and even brought me the first two books in the series when we saw each other in Denver in September. So when I was sick last week, and not up to doing anything else, I cracked open Twilight, telling myself I could even write a review on it for the Christian Review of Books, since I know a lot of parents wonder if they should let their teens read it.
I readily confess–within a few chapters, I didn’t much care about any excuses or reasons. I didn’t care about the pounding in my head or the nausea in my stomach. My sole concern was keeping my kids happily snuggled in beside me on the couch so that I could keep my eyes glued to that book.
Twilight is the story of Bella, a klutzy seventeen-year-old who just left her home in Phoenix to go live with her father in the rainy town of Forks, Washington. After being invisible in her huge school in Arizona, she’s unprepared for how interested in her everyone seems to be in Forks. But her attention is snagged by the too-beautiful Cullens, particularly the brother named Edward. A more beautiful creature she has never seen–but when she has to sit beside him in their lab class, he recoils from her as though she just rolled out of a garbage can . . . and then doesn’t show up at school for the next week. Surely it can’t be her fault, right? How could he possibly hate her when they’d never even spoken? And when he comes back, he acts perfectly normal. Friendly even. Even kindly saves her life the next morning–in a way that brings a few things into startling clarity for Bella.
Edward Cullen is more than he seems.
Okay, so I figure everyone knows these are vampire books, so it isn’t too hard to figure out that the Cullens are the vampires. That’s not what makes these books so awesome. For starters, Bella is a character whose head you will love to be in. She’s delightfully insecure, refreshingly honest with herself, lands in the emergency room constantly with her clumsiness, and has that certain something that sets her apart without ever cluing her into the fact that she’s more than the norm. And then there are the other characters–the noble vampires, fighting what they are every day because they don’t want to be monsters.
For those parents who are very strict about this sort of thing, here’s what you might take issue with: there are vampires, both the noble ones above and the evil kind. There are werewolves (in the later books). There’s a certain amount of sneaking behind her father’s back, particularly with Edward being in her bedroom, though there’s no sex of any form. Barely any kissing, even. (Though what there is is oh-so-filled-with-tension. Very nice;-)
Here’s what makes these books totally awesome for anyone, especially teens: the whole point is about fighting lust, about denying your baser instincts and striving to be better than what “nature” may say you are. It’s about putting love above your own happiness, about sacrificing for those you care about. The characters remain pure sexually; for all her occasional-sneaking, Bella respects her parents and makes many a decision to love and protect them, even at a cost to herself. I noted a few mild curse words in New Moon, but I don’t recall any in Twilight.
And, the most important thing, these are just wonderful, well-written, fully engrossing books. I read the first two in two and a half days, and I would have devoured the second two right afterward if my niece had had them handy. 😉 I’m not “into” vampires, and I can promise my love of these books won’t lead to the vampire-obsession that seems to be going around, but WOW. I can’t remember the last time I’ve read anything so consuming. I highly recommend these books–and recommend you wait until you have time to neglect everything else, because trust me. You won’t be putting them down.
by Roseanna White | Nov 2, 2009 | Uncategorized
Is it totally pathetic that I wish I could be my character? It’s not that she’s got it all together. And I don’t want to look like her (not that it would be a bad thing, but I’m content being her physical opposite;-). I don’t particularly want to be in her exact situation. But man, I wish I could be that kind of mom! (And living at her home in the Outer Banks would be totally sweet, too!)
It’s kind of funny. When I was writing
Yesterday’s Tides, I’d just graduated college and was enjoying the freedom of having no classes, no job, and endless writing time. That lasted, oh, a month. At which point I started saying, “So . . . can we get insurance yet so we can get pregnant? Please?
Please?” Those maternal instincts roared especially loud when my sister had her first baby that summer. So maybe I just had kids and motherhood on the mind when I wrote my super-mom, Louisa. But as I reread the book to prepare it for conference, I had to sigh. And wish, oh wish, I could be as patient as Louisa with my precious kiddos.
I really tried to be realistic when writing her. She isn’t perfect, certainly. She loses her temper, she doles out discipline–but her whole goal is to be a good mother. That’s her life’s calling, and she does it with her whole heart. I have the added goal of being a good writer, so my time’s a little more divided . . . but still.
There are moments, when I’m outside with my kids, when I can shift my focus and see the world through her eyes. I love those moments. That’s when things seem to fall into order. Do chores wait inside? Well, I’ll just go do them and then they’ll be done. But first I’ll spend some time with my kids. I’ll laugh at their antics. I’ll enjoy their perspective. Maybe I can’t do it all, but I can do what matters.
Then my husband needs help with something, the phone rings, I see twenty emails that need responses, one of which requires edits in a manuscript, I smell a stinky diaper, my daughter starts screaming that her brother’s hitting her, my mother-in-law pulls up the driveway needing who-knows-what, I realize it’s yet again dinner time and I have nothing prepared, and my son starts trying to climb up my leg. Hello, headache!
This is why Louisa’s story starts when the kids are eight. =) Sure, that age has its own difficulties, but at least I didn’t have to write around the constant kiddo on her hip. LOL.
Most of my characters have some part of me in them. Davina has my quirkiness, Melrose my sense of humor. Brook has my stubbornness, Ella my optimism. But Louisa . . . Louisa has my heart. Or at least, what I want my heart to be. And every time I get involved in Yesterday’s Tides I think, “Somewhere inside, I have a Louisa.” It inevitably inspires me to try to let her Shine through.
by Roseanna White | Oct 30, 2009 | Uncategorized
After a week of feeling pretty blah physically (headaches that may have bordered on migraines, given the way sound grated on my nerves and my stomach was upset), I didn’t want to put the effort into the My Friend stuff, which takes longer than my other posts of the week. Especially since I’m trying to put myself into a prayerful mindset.
Tomorrow, my church is having a morning prayer vigil. We’re a small congregation, and while we keep getting new members, then other ones leave for one reason or another. Never that they want to leave our church, but it’s too far away or their work schedule changes or . . . you know. But it occurred to us that we need to have something better than ideas if we want to reach people. We need vision. So tomorrow, we’re going to be on our knees waiting for it.
I’m one of those people that needs to learn to listen better. Usually when I get something from God, it isn’t actually during my prayer time. Often following it, but it generally hits when I’m in the middle of a conversation or a task, one of those epiphanic moments that brings me to a halt. Tomorrow, I really want my heart and mind to be prepared to stop and listen to the Lord, not just talk to him.
We’ll be praying specifically for our church, for the local and national governments, and for other issues that weigh on our hearts. If anyone has ever held a prayer vigil like this and has some tips for things to do (i.e., make a list before you go, make a list of impressions after you leave, that sort of thing), I’d love to hear them. And if you just want to take a moment now to say a prayer for me and my church family to really commune with God, I’d appreciate it.
I don’t find it a coincidence that in the week leading up to this, I’ve been borderline ill, bad tempered, and unable to concentrate on anything. I want to slap my own wrist for getting caught up in the physical when I wanted to be preparing all week for this. So today, I’m hoping my friends will join their prayers to mine to help me get out of my headache-induced rut and focus on Him.
Love you guys!
by Roseanna White | Oct 29, 2009 | Thoughtful Thursdays, Uncategorized
It’s a phrase we’ve heard, and which I’ve tossed around a few times: “Oh, grow up.” And lately, I’ve had a few moments of “Wow. I feel like an adult all of a sudden.” Like when we finally bit the bullet and bought insurance. Do you have any idea how grown-up it feels to have a BlueCross card in your wallet for the first time?
But yesterday I wondered a little about the process. See, my kids are a lot like I was when I was small. Competitive, loud, and they throw temper tantrums whenever they don’t get their way. Every time my mom sees it, she laughs and says, “Gee, I wonder where they get that from.” To which I reply, “I have absolutely no idea. I certainly never acted that way.”
Now, it’s a bit of a joke because I’m so even-tempered now that one of my college professors actually said, “I’m concerned that such temperance is unhealthy in one so young.” Last night my husband asked, “So . . . what happened to that temper?”
My answer? When I was about ten, I started getting on my own nerves. It took a lot of energy to get upset over nothing, and it didn’t seem to accomplish much. So I made a concerted effort to grow up–in that respect, anyway.
Not so oddly, it’s been through having kids that are so stinkin’ much like I used to be that has sparked my temper again. I growl daily, and often think that this 2-4 age may just kick my butt–but then they cuddle up against me . . . I’m still amazed at deeply the mother-instinct runs. I mean, I remember being like my daughter, and screaming every single time I stubbed my toe. (Every. Single. Time.) But now when I thwack my elbow off the corner of a cabinet (like I did last night. Ow.), my first thought is, “Don’t scream. Don’t wake the kids. Suck it up.”
I still have those moments when I feel like a kid myself, I’m still amazed when I feel like an adult in a certain respect for the first time. And I’m finally realizing that this “growing up” thing probably never ends. There are always going to be new steps in the process . . . and as long as I realize that, I keep myself malleable for the Lord to keep on a-workin’ on me.
Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award winning author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary.