Once upon a time...

there was a young boy of seven or eight who, bored with the isolation that comes only with growing up on a farm, began creating fanciful places, began inventing characters, and thus began crudely telling stories. Puppets on popsicle sticks behind overturned chairs, or sheets of paper taped end to end with images drawn on each like some crude work of cinema. The urge, the need, was there to find a voice, an ever louder, more expansive voice.

This is perhaps my third or fourth attempt to write a blog. It never seemed quite right, as if the timing were off, or the subject matter not right, or it felt too narcissistic, or ...frankly, I never knew why until now: I didn't want blogging to become 'my voice', my sole outlet for writing and storytelling. So I come to it now more grounded, with clearer purpose. Now that I've found a larger voice with my first novel (second actually, but that's for another time) being sent out into the world, I can feel more comfortable blogging.

What will this blog entail then? Simply put, it will record my struggles and triumphs as an author. Perhaps someone out there will find it compelling, perhaps not.  I hope it is at least entertaining.

To that end, I thought I'd address one question that has come up regarding my novel "Mary Margaret and the Magical Mall."  In the front pages, I have dedicated this first book to Eryn, who endures. "Who is Eryn?" friends have asked, knowing that I'm neither married nor in a relationship.

Eryn is my Muse. If you read Stephen King's book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft he gives a rather humorous account of his chain-smoking, beer-drinking, unshaven, gruff Muse.  My Muse, Eryn, has been with me for at least twenty years. I say at least, because that is the first I was 'aware' of her. She may have been there even earlier. How does a Muse make itself known, you ask? Well in those days, I would write long journal entries, page after page of hopes, dreams, fears, troubles.

At some point a voice started talking back to me. A gentle voice, calming. A filling voice that was both profound and whimsical. Chiding, but never demeaning. I would enter into conversations with her, one of the very first questions being "Who are you?" to which she answered, "Eryn." Page after page of discussions, back and forth about things I've forgotten now.  What does she look like? Well she is a bit nebulous as if she emanates light, pale of skin, with long, waste-length white hair. She always smiles, and she is smiling right now even as I write this.

I was hesitant to expose her really, but she has encouraged it for some number of years now. Did I mention she's extremely patient with me? But when I read Stephen King's account of his Muse, I felt a weight lift, as if I really wasn't too crazy after all. I mean, objectively speaking, it sounds rather crazy. But she is there. Always there. Which is why I am so profoundly grateful to her, for her endurance. Even in those years when I was sort of lost, as many of us are in our twenties, she never left me. She would always come back with a smile as if my return to her were inevitable.

Here's to you Eryn. May the glory be yours.