Author: T. L. Sherwood

T. L. Sherwood lives beside Eighteen Mile Creek in western New York. Her work has appeared in Rosebud, Thema, Literary Orphans, and Vestal Review among other places.

Chore Girl!

I should be wearing a cape, as I’ve found myself thrust into the role of my dreaded alter ego: Chore girl.

Today, after pilates, I put up a cord of wood, mowed the front triangle, moved the swing, mowed that part of the yard, washed dishes, put laundry away and that’s all off the top of my head. I don’t think I stopped moving for more than ten minutes today.

I was once again reminded of what I know to be true—if I try to put off writing, writing will not be denied. On a brief break, I penned a 53 word story for a contest. After I put up some more wood, I polished and sent it off. It’s not even a mental ‘I must write,’ it has become a physical craving.

Not a bad problem to have.

So much more to finish before I head off to Chicago. I’m so excited! Back to mowing! I hope your last two weeks have been great!

 

*These are just my Creekside Reflections. Your experience may vary.

Summer: Hot and Hard

Summer always seems to be filled with interesting beautiful opportunities, and hard, hot work. On Monday, I went to Burger King and met up with an old friend. He had put out a CD and since he lives in Gowanda, I didn’t see the need to pay postage. We had a lovely catch up and he signed my CD case. He’s putting together another collection and I wish him well on that project. (I’d link a website to plug him, but he doesn’t have one yet.)

On the 11th, I sat in the library and wrote 1500 words–a story and a partial flash. By the 14th, the story “Brown Eyed Bess” was sent out to three places. I don’t know where it came from, but it is good. I sent it to XO man. He loved it. I sent it to an honorary member of Ugly Babies. I asked, “Yes? Or is it lacking?” and received this response, “Yes. This is new, both in timeline and in voice. I like the location very much.”

When I started the celebration thread on Zoetrope, I asked a paraphrased question that Mary Akers had brought up in her office, “How can you tell whether what you’re writing is good or not?” Some people mentioned “flow” and while I understand that, that isn’t what I meant. When I was writing “Brown Eyed Bess,” I knew it was a good story. I can’t say why I knew, but I just took a look at the original draft (written in a font I’ve never used before) and while I polished the piece, the bones were there…and really good bones at that.

Husband and I usually get two loads of firewood per summer weekend and that takes up so much time. This year, after the initial two loads, Husband signed out the white dump truck from work on a Sunday and in two trips, got ten cords that are now sitting in the driveway. I put up the first row in the woodshed on Monday–just moving the wood left over from last year over, really. Yesterday, I put in the second row. I had plans to put up the third today, but I forgot that the picking up the pieces and putting them in the wheelbarrow is different from just moving wood over. So, I’m achy today and I don’t see that happening.

Instead, I’m packing. Since Husband is working in Cuba, we decided we’d stop in at Jeff Rose’s party. Tonight, Dog is going to a kennel. I’m getting up early and going with Husband on Friday. I’ll be camping out in a teacher’s lounge and reading. Then we’re driving to Binghamton, checking into the hotel and walking over to Mr. Rose’s place for a bit. On Saturday, we’re going to the museum, then the party and then home. I’m nervous! New people, which aren’t all that ne. I’ve interacted with them on Zoetrope for years. Mr. Budman is likely to be at the party. He is Editor of Vestal Review where my first flash was accepted. I don’t know why this makes me so nervous, but it does…

So, that is a roundup of my recent doings and upcoming weekend. I hope yours is fantastic and filled with no stress at all. Thanks for stopping by!

(These are just my reflections. Your experience may vary.)

July with a Jolt

If you’ve heard this story before, mia culpa for boring you, but I’m still perplexed by the whole matter. I woke up Sunday and started to read The Buffalo News. I opened the Spotlight section and was thinking to myself, “I don’t know why I’m bothering to check. They are never going to publish one of my poems. Whatever.” And turning the page, boom there it was: June’s Chapter.

I was ecstatic. And then R. D. Pohl put the link onto my Facebook post. So awesome. Mary Akers opened a discussion about how to develop a F-it attitude. From what I understand, it takes practice.I’ve noticed myself that if I remain aloof and don’t get my hopes up, I tend to get more good ink rejections and/or acceptances that way. Yes, a rejection is a rejection, but a “we encourage you to try again when we open for submissions in September” from A Public Space is worth posting to my cork board. Some of the “We almost accepted you” letters feel pretty good.

Real life held an impromptu run down to PA for Husband to look at Whit’s roof. Here Husband is explaining what Whit has to do:

Then there was a week of visiting with my son, his beautiful wife and my grandson. We had such an action packed good time, from visiting Tuttle’s Yurts:

my Grandmother,

to a romp around Sculpture Park,

a trip to Niagara Falls,

a boat burning in the creek and then a non-party here on Saturday before they left.I didn’t get any writing or editing done, so it’s back to work around here. I hope your next two weeks are as productive as I hope mine will be. Adieu for now, and by the way, you look so pretty today!

(*These are just my reflections. Your experience may vary.)

Rigid, yet willing to bend

Hi. I’m tightly bound and anal retentive. How do you do? I’ve kept this blog up and running for a while now. I’ve thought about changing the frequency because sometimes awfully wonderful things happen in my life that I want to write about just as much as the sad things that tend to get the ink.

Ready? Here it is: SHEMEKIA COPELAND ROCKED. Not only was she the most talented vocalist surrounded by incredible musicians, she was kind, too. OMG. Husband and I went to see her at the Armor Inn Tap Room for our twelfth anniversary (seriously–has it been that long? I thought I just met this man.) We were joined by Paul, Kim, Charlie and Rick.

I wrote a thank you note and handed it to Shemekia before her set. I thought she’d toss it. She didn’t. She gave good tidings to me and Husband from the stage. It was awesome. And she was so generous to her fans with  the pictures she posed for and the autographs she signed…I could go on (hence the frequency debate.)

I digress… During that excursion, the back of my legs hurt because the day before I held a war on the slugs in my garden. I killed at least two hundred. Retaliation, since I had 16 pepper plants and by the time of the slug war’s end, I was down to 5.

The slug war, I could have blogged about that once I scrubbed the yellow goo off my fingers.

Tuesday was the last meeting of the the Ugly Babies Writer’s Group until September. It’s the third year I’ve conducted it and I am wavering on whether it should continue or not. I probably feel this ambivalence every year. My group is great and the owners, waitresses, prep crew, bakers and the line cooks at Julie’s Pizzeria are so wonderful. I’d miss sitting in the “fish bowl” of the private room once a month. I just wish there was more writing to discuss.

Marko is looking to take a break from doing the Celebration Thread in the short story studio at Zoetrope. I told him I’d consider doing it. My son, his wife and my grandson are coming to visit. They are on the road now. I’m not making any plans until after they leave. I told Marko if I do it, I couldn’t start until 1 July and that worked out perfectly for him. I’m hoping someone else volunteers. It’s rough to be a cheerleader when you only have rejections to report, BUT when I was leading the thread before, I put out a lot more submissions, so there is that to consider.

*Sigh*

Well, off to do the last minute things before they arrive. Until next time!

(*These are just my reflections. Your experience may vary.)

Working Theories

Well, aren’t I a bit chagrined to notice how late I am with this post? And surprised. I hadn’t noticed the date and I breezed over both reminders on both my calendars. So much for the “Writing things down so I don’t forget them” theory.

The garden is in and it’s now a race to kill the slimy slugs before they take out all of my pepper plants. They are gross, destructive and stupid. I don’t like having to kill things if I don’t have to, but all of these things have GOT to go!

Wednesday was hell, by the way. It might have put up a mental block on dealing with anything writing related. It was a brutal twelve hours of nothing but rejections. Totally wiped out the ‘happy’ I was having for my acceptance for “Educated Tina” in the summer issue of The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature. It’s such an honor to be included in a publication that has Dawn Corrigan’s work in it!

In other news, my mail carrier has been doing suspicious things lately. Not just to me, but to my neighbors, too. We either aren’t getting mail at all or we get mail for people who live two roads down. The day I got a credit card bill for someone on Snyder Road, I took it into the post office, handed it to the clerk and asked if my mail was there by any chance. “No,” she said, “They’re all back and no one had anything undeliverable.”

Great, I thought. Is someone else getting my rejections? I don’t know how much the lady’s credit card bill was, but it might have been a fair exchange. I’m trying to work that into a possible theory, but I don’t have enough information to work with.

And my son, daughter-in-law and grandson are coming to visit at the end of the month. I’m excited and have invited people to stop in to visit with him and his family. I don’t want to get my hopes up. I do that enough when I send out submissions, but I do hope everyone has a good time.

Right, so back to the writing challenge I’ve been keeping. I’m doing a modified version of Camp NaNo, I think. I’m putting in a minimum of 1667 words every day, but essays, flashes, and short stories instead of working on a novel. So far, so good, though a short story I started writing about a football player is on its third day and the ending still hasn’t shown up yet. I tabled it for something new today.

Anyway, the celebration of Husband’s & my 12 year anniversary is also going to be late, but it should be good. We’re going to see Shemekia Copeland at a tiny bar and grill. It’s so awesome already since we fell in love with her Turn the Heat Up  in the background. The title track is “our song.” To those familiar with the lyrics, it totally works. Husband and I get along great. The one part of the relationship that isn’t great is the most fun to work on. And now you have too much information. Congratulations!

Until next time!

*These are just my reflections. Your experience may vary.

If I Have Writing To Do, I’ll Be Out In The Garden.

I took a suggestion from someone, somewhere on the internet and started a first draft in a font I never use. I don’t know if I just had a lot to say on the subject or that the different type freed my mind and fingers, but in no time at all, I had a serviceable first paragraph, a nice ending sentence and about a thousand words total. If I could remember who said or suggested it, I’d tell you, but I can’t.

(MANY thanks to Alex Pruteanu! It was Matt Bell who suggested the change of the fonts. And I’m now up to 1700 words on this essay and really like it.)

 

Bong is Bard accepted a piece and it will go live on 22 May and on the 28th–Memorial Day–I have a piece up at Every Day Fiction and sometime eventually, Jumping Blue Gods will be publishing a poem. I’m reminding you–and myself–that I do have pieces accepted. I’ve run into a nasty, long list of rejections recently and I don’t care for it.

Luckily, the weather has been wonderful, so I’ve been outside and working on the yard. Yesterday was especially nice and I weeded the old bed that will be pulled up, tilled, and turned back into a yard. If you can’t beat the flooding ditch, you move the garden farther away from it.

I spent hours on the phone with my sister last night… Oh, the questions we have for our mom. Not that we’ll get any answers since she’s dead and all, but mein gott! The things one hears and learns after a death.

So, I’m off to water the pine tree that Husband moved from where it was growing to the yard. It’s the cutest little thing! I have a list of writing assignments that I want to ignore, I mean finish, so off I go. Have a pleasant Memorial Day weekend and remember to read my story. You’ll have the day off to enjoy it so no excuses! See you in June!

And remember, if you’re ever in Springville, New York, eat at Julie’s Pizzeria because they are so generous with allowing us to meet there in the private room on the third Tuesday of the month.

*These are just my reflections. Your experience may vary.

Contests and Acceptances

Right off, I need to mention this: WD 10th Free “Dear Lucky Agent” Contest.

I found this contest on Twitter. Part of the requirement is that a contestant mention this contest on two social networks or in a blog. It’s such an awesome contest, that I’m mentioning it three times. Plus, I think Ellie’s Elephants is such an awesome upmarket novel book that it has a shot of winning. Fingers and knees crossed.

Last night, the sky turned such a strange yellow before and during a thunderstorm that Husband thought it might be a harbinger of a tornado. As far as we know, no tornado occurred. Usually, I’d rely on the local NPR station to tell me, but they are in the middle of a failing pledge drive. Apologies to Mr. Tuttle and Mark Scott, but this recent merge blows. I can no longer support something that I don’t bother to listen to anymore. No blues=no pledge.

On my calendar, I have a notation that the results of something were to be announced on 1 May. I can not figure out what though, so I’ll take it as a “I didn’t win.”  I did get an acceptance though after quite a dry spell. I got a holiday! Every Day Fiction is publishing “Pinging” on 28 May 2012–Memorial Day.  When I found out, I went to Zoetrope to thank Mary Akers and Kim Chiquee. It was at their workshop where I wrote the piece.

The first game of croquet was played. Husband is sadistic with a course–as bad as, if not worse than Niece’s courses.  I mean, going across a ditch to the pole? That’s just sadistic. It was a great, fun weekend though.

I’ve got more submissions to prep and I “ought” to put in some more time on the pilates mat, so I’ll bid you adieu. Have a great two weeks!

 

*These are just my Creekside Reflections. Your experiences may vary.

Shilling

I’ve discovered a mighty fine remedy for a funk: Have someone say something untrue and/or slightly insulting about you. It’s very hard to remain blasé when you’re p*ssed off. And so, I’m back. Did you miss me?

Ping-pong goes the writing. Ugh! Spring is great, but trying to concentrate is a joke. For whatever reason, I’ve decided I want to try my hand at a poetry chapbook. I think I’m working on a winner. It’s called “Let the Grownups Talk.” I’m submitting it to the Burnside Review Competition–as soon as I finish tweaking the two bookend poems, or the deadline arrives. *Sigh*

Many thanks to Jennifer Bridges for accepting “After,” (a poem in the collection) for the wonderful Jumping Blues Gods. It isn’t posted yet, but stay tuned. And to Dawn Corrigan, because years ago she helped me craft “The Scholar’s Initiation” into a great piece.That’s another poem I’m including in the collection. If you’d like, you can check out one of Dawn’s stories that I really like here: “The Treehugger”

As usual, this month’s writer’s group was interesting. Shirley and I had a chance to talk about the craft part of writing. Oh, and by the way, I must mention these things: InkJoy is a proper description. I ended up buying a pack of these PaperMate InkJoy pens and I’m in love with them. I’m bringing that up because of a discussion about dialogue. When I’m writing, for the first go around, I write dialogue better in ink than trying to type it out because I can write faster than I can type. These pens are so smooth! I can’t wait to write my next first draft.

Julie’s Pizzeria on Main Street Springville, New York is the most Extreme Supreme Coolest Place EVER! They have been so gracious and kind and I cannot thank them enough for allowing the Ugly Babies Writing group to meet there, in the private room, on the third Tuesday of the month for going on three years now. Many, many thanks! If you’d like to join the group, shoot me a line for what we expect from our members. Otherwise, just go there, eat the fabulous food and know you are supporting a business that supports writers.

Besides the ping-ponging in my writing, I’ve been doing some spring cleaning in anticipation of a family gathering. I’m so excited about this weekend! Let the games begin. I’m jonesing for some bridge. May the odds–and the cards–always be in my favor.

Until next time!

*These are just my creekside reflections. Your experiences may vary.

Could It be the Weather

Welcome to my first blog after another birthday. If you wished me a happy one on Facebook, I appreciate it and thank you. It was really fun to get that many good wishes. The day before, my award certificate for the Mary Kennedy Eastham Flash Fiction Competition Arrived:

What a great early gift!

Husband brought me a lovely rose which Cat decided was hers:

She can have the flower as long as we’re allowed to live in her house. Territorial? Cat? Nah…

Then there was a tussle over the ribbon:

And there you have it, my birthday.

I’ve been in a funk, but I’m pushing through it. It might be considered a birthday funk though it’s been going on longer than that. *Sigh* Life sometimes, aye?  Maybe the many submissions I sent out on the 31st will be responded to with acceptance. I still have hope. A little bit, though nothing has happened yet. I have had 14 submissions on Submittable with 7 marked as ‘In Progress’ for days now. I’m beginning to think my page is broken.

So, back to the writing…and obsessive checking.

Until next time!

*These are just my creekside reflections. Your experiences may vary.

Name Dropping & Linking All Over the Place

After posting last time, I went shopping. Upon my return, I found an email from one of the women in my RL writer’s group. There was a writer’s conference in Westfield on Sunday and if I was willing to drive, she’d pay my conference fee. On Saturday, Husband took me to Eden so I’d know my way to her house. We stopped in and had a lovely visit. Then on Sunday, she and I went to the gorgeous Patterson Library.

It was the first time they had done a conference there and kudos to Peter Hamilton for putting it together. Mary Jo and I went to the same sessions. The first was done by James Goertel who tackled the Writer’s Craft . He’d just gotten back from AWP (I was so jealous! He could have heard Roxane Gay  give a reading while he was there. I would have!) and even though James was tired, he was a motivated instructor.

We broke to listen to LouAnne Johnson, author of My Posse Don’t Do Homework which turned into the movie Dangerous Minds. She read from Muchacho. It was very entertaining. She sat at the same table as we did for the lunch which was held at the church across the street.

After lunch was Marketing Your Work by Linda Lavid. I thought it was informative and I found out a few things I hadn’t known. Some things I was doing already and it turns out they were the ‘right’ things to do which was gratifying to hear.

Then, the people who signed up drew numbers to choose the order to read their work. I went second and read “Wildflower Wishes.” Mary Jo went fourth and read from her book, “Under Cover.”  While the conference had been scheduled to go until after six, we got out of there around 4 p.m. It was a great day all around.

Facebook revealed a chance for women’s essays to be included in an edition of Brevity titled Ceiling or Sky: Female Nonfictions after the VIDA Count and in response to the recently revealed VIDA and its nearly identical pie graph which shows 75% of most magazine’s contributors are male. I sent in “Finding Peers.” An editor of the new cool zine to read, Jumping Blue Gods asked for my submission. (Much appreciation to Jennifer Bridges!)

Robert Tucker at Chrysalis Reader sent the edits he made to “Delaware and the Rip-Off King.” We disagreed on a single line and he agreed to use the one I offered, so that is now wrapped up.

This past Saturday, I happened to see in Gusto that there was a reading being done at the West Falls library. I went and listened to Jeff Schober. Oddly, as he was signing my book, he mentioned the Arcade & Attica Railroad Mystery Train. Turns out, he was writing the script for this year’s production and he had been an actor in the last one with Betty. Tiny little world, isn’t it?

Then, later on this past Saturday, there was the most awesome news: The return of NPR’s Three Minute Fiction! Round Eight was announced. In case you missed it, hit the link above. I heard about it on FB before the show started and didn’t take long to come up with a story and write it. Seriously, maybe an hour tops to write–though I think it was closer to twenty minutes. I’d thought of an ending line, then two characters arrived, and as I wrote toward the end line, the story took me to a different place.

I trimmed it until I could read it in under 3 minutes, then read it to Husband, who–get this–thought it was nice. I sent it in. Usually, I end up with regret when I send things in so soon after they’re written, but the next morning, I still thought it was a good story.

On Monday, I sent it to Chyo, and except for one word choice, she thought it was fantastic. I wound up in a brief email exchange with Long Distance Friend and sent it to him. He not only liked it, but wanted to share it with his Secret Girlfriend. Now, I wait on Guy Roz and the judges at 3MF to decide if they like it, too.

In a teensy tiny way, I’m a bit on edge over the idea of finally having one of my stories chosen by 3MF. I mean I am the self-proclaimed Susan Lucci of this contest. Can I give up that continuing sting of disappointment? Well, it’s out of my hands now. And if it isn’t chosen as the winner, I hope it isn’t chosen as an also ran. I have three magazines I want to submit the story to. Sigh. We’ll see how it goes. In the other rounds, I’d written to win. This story I wrote because it was something I wanted to read.

Speaking of which.. One of the things Chyo said was that the story I wrote was a piece which would cause her to look up other work by the same author. She then told me of series of books she’s bought because of short stories she’d come across in an anthology. So, while I’m waiting on yet another person’s thoughts on Ellie’s Elephants, I’ve opened up the third book of the Dreaming Lettie series, and I think I’m falling in love all over again… How could I forget about the Dreads!

Until next time!

*These are just my creekside reflections. Your experiences may vary.