“Daughter Am I” Giveaway. One Day Only!

April 30, 2010 — Pat Bertram


Thank you, everyone, for making this Blogmania event such a success! The giveaway is ready to be given away, and the winner (chosen by Random.org) is Wanda Hughes. Congratulations, Wanda!

 

WELCOME To BLOGMANIA !

(My Blog is 98 of 123)

You’ve arrived at exactly the right time to explore lots of new blogs, all of which feature a very special Blogmania giveaway for one day only – April 30th.

All the work has been done for you. No hunting or surfing. Each blog will have a number and each new blog link will have a number. These numbers will allow you to keep track of which blogs you’ve visited and how many are left to visit.

DAUGHTER AM I GIVEAWAY and RULES: All you have to do to enter is leave a comment below. The winner, chosen at random, will receive a print copy of Daughter Am I. Since the novel is the story of a quest, I am also including a couple of travel essentials to accompany the winner on his or her journey — a journal to note your own travel experiences and a Burt’s Bees travel shower kit. This package will only be shipped within the United States. If the winner lives outside the states, he or she will receive an ebook of Daughter Am I.

Be sure to stop by these other blogs on April 30th and register for their giveaways.

Blog- 1 – HOST OF BLOGMANIA) Between The Pages – http://betweenthelinesandmore.blogspot.com/

(Blog -2 – CO-HOST OF BLOGMANIA) The Black Sheep Dances – http://www.theblacksheepdances.blogspot.com

(Blog-43 – CO-HOST OF BLOGMANIA) Books, Books Everywhere – http://bookywooks.blogspot.com/

(Blog-100) Reading Teen – http://ReadingTeen.blogspot.com/

(Blog-83) The Cajun Book Lady – http://thecajunbooklady.blogspot.com/

(Blog-70) DK’s Book Reviews – http://dkay401-bookreviews.blogspot.com/

(Blog-32) Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers – http://insatiablereaders.blogspot.com

(Blog-9) A Writer’s Life – http://carolineclemmons.blogspot.com

(Blog-108) Queen of the Castle Reviews – http://queenofthecastlereviews.blogspot.com

(Blog-41) The Lost Entwife – http://thelostentwife.net

(Blog-47) Joyfully Retired – http://joyfullyretired.com/

You can find all the participating blogs here: http://betweenthelinesandmore.blogspot.com

Posted in blogging, internet, writing. Tags: , , , . 142 Comments »

Blogmania! “Daughter Am I” Giveaway

April 29, 2010 — Pat Bertram

I am participating in Blogmania, a whacky free-for-all giveaway encompassing 123 blogs. If you stop by my blog on April 30th and leave a comment, you will be entered into a contest to win a print copy of Daughter Am I. Since the novel is the story of a quest, I am also including a couple of travel essentials to accompany the winner on his or her journey — a journal to note your own travel experiences and a Burt’s Bees travel shower kit.

This giveaway is one day only, so be sure to stop by my blog on April 30 and leave a comment. The winner will be chosen at random. Hope you win! You can find my blog here: https://ptbertram.wordpress.com

Posted in blogging, books, internet, writing. Tags: , , , . 49 Comments »

I Am a One-Month Grief Survivor

April 28, 2010 — Pat Bertram

I have survived my first month of grieving. I’m surprised it was so hard, and I’m surprised I survived it (at times my lungs stopped working and my heart felt as if it would burst with all the pain) but in the world of grief, a month isn’t much. Still, I’ve come a long way. I can look to the future, though I know the best way to deal with that future is to deal with each day as it comes — thinking of living the rest of my life without my mate makes me sick to my stomach.

And I have moments when I can stand outside my grief and see the process for what it is. Grief is an enormous undertaking (I hesitated using the word “undertaking” since it’s so close to “undertaker,” but it’s a good analogy because grief is, to a certain extent, facing the death of a part of you). Grief involves physical, emotional, psychological, spiritual, and in my case, geographical changes. Grief rocks you to the very depths of you being — a soul quake. Grief changes your sense of self, your sense of your place in the world. Grief affects your self-esteem. There is only one other experience of such immensity — falling in love.

I have come to realize hate is not the opposite of love, grief is. Grief encompasses all the wild emotions, the life-changing experiences, the immensity of love, but in reverse. Falling in love with the man I was to spend decades with and grieving for him are the bookends of our life —  not my life, my life will continue, though changed —  but our life, the life we shared.

I wonder sometimes if I’m going to change out of all recognition. I’ve gone through so many life-changing experiences in the past year that I no longer know who I am. And if one doesn’t know who they are, how can they write? Because isn’t writing is essentially an expression of who we are? If, as L.V. Gaudet rebuts, writing is more of a discovery of our inner selves, then when I get back to writing, the writing itself will change me.

Will he recognize me if we ever meet again? Will he be proud of what I become? I guess that is part of the future, not of this day. And right now, this day is all I can handle.

Posted in culture, grief, life, writing. Tags: , , , . 18 Comments »

The Best Thing About Writing Fiction

April 21, 2010 — Pat Bertram

This morning, author Lazarus Barnhill posted an article on the Second Wind Blog about why he writes fiction. He wrote:

”When you write about a controversial issue, you don’t have to make it the center of your story to express it fully.  You just work it in.  For instance, when I wrote The Medicine People, I dealt a lot with the quiet underlying bigotry Native Americans and Western European descendants still harbor for one another but never express out loud.  And while it was essential to the story, it didn’t overwhelm the novel.  Stories have the power to make an issue live in the mind of the reader the way a speech never can.

“And the best thing about being a fiction writer is, you don’t have to brag to get your point across.  The best writer is one whose reader gets absolutely lost in the narrative.”

When I began writing, I had a lot to say about the way we are manipulated to suit the needs of big business and big government, and that theme underlies my first four novels. Though that theme was important to me, I tried to make the story even more important so as not to overwhelm the readers. I used up that theme, so I don’t know what I want to say in my future books, which is perhaps why I haven’t been able to write — I don’t know what I want to say, or rather, why I want to say it. I tried to write a story simply for the story’s sake, but that manuscript is stalled halfway through. I do have a theme for that — freedom vs. security vs. responsibility — but the book is not a thriller, has no mystery, is more of an apocalyptic allegory, which is something I would never read, so I don’t imagine anyone else would want to either. The point being, I write fiction because . . . Apparently I have no reason since I am not writing fiction at the moment. 

So, why do you write fiction? What is the best about being a fiction writer? What do you hope to accomplish with your writing? How do you make sure readers get lost in your fiction?

Let’s talk.

The group No Whine, Just Champagne will meet for a live discussion about writing and the writing life on Thursday, April 22, 2010 at 9:00pm ET. I hope you will stop by — it would be nice to see you. You can find the discussion by clicking here. If you can’t chat live, we can chat on this blog.

Posted in writing. Tags: , , , , , , . 3 Comments »

The Problem With Grief

April 19, 2010 — Pat Bertram

The problem with grief is its immensity. If it were only a matter of being sad that the loved one is gone, as I thought grief was, it would still be hard but doable. Instead, grief affects every part of your life. It’s not just a matter of the person being dead, but also all hopes, dreams, plans, expectations that you had with him. If there was a misunderstanding of any kind, it can never be put right. If a person filled many roles in your life, as my lifemate did for me, then all those needs go unmet. And grief is not just about sorrow. It’s about anger, fear, depression, loneliness, despair, and many emotions I have not yet identified.

Grief is also physical. Losing a mate ranks at the very top of stressful situations, and that stress itself causes physiological changes. Sometimes I can barely breathe. I don’t sleep well, though that is nothing new. Food nauseates me. I have trouble concentrating, and I am always exhausted — grieving takes an unimaginable amount of energy.

Grief also affects one’s self-esteem and identity. He was my focus for so many years. Without that focus to give my life meaning who am I? How do I find meaning, or at least a reason to continue living? The irony of this particular aspect of my grief is that I never wanted to be so involved with anyone. I always thought I was independent. And perhaps I once was and will be again, but I apparently I haven’t been for many years.

Because of all these different aspects of grief, grief is ever changing, so one can never get a handle on it, at least not for a long while. And grief grows the further one gets from the loved one’s death, because you see more of the person’s life. In my case, the man he was at thirty, at thirty-five, at forty, are all gone now too. Which is another aspect of grief I had never considered: The sheer goneness of the person.

During my mate’s last years, I’d started doing things on my own, such as finding a new life and friends online, and I thought I was doing well in my aloneness. But there is a vast difference between being alone with someone and being alone with aloneness. As William Cowper said: How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude! But grant me still a friend in my retreat, Whom I may whisper, Solitude is sweet.

That is one more thing for me to mourn — the friend in my retreat. He is gone. And solitude is no longer sweet. Do I have the courage to grow old alone? The courage to be old alone when the time comes? I don’t know.

Grief changes a person in ways I cannot yet fathom, but one’s nature does not change, and I always tended toward solitude. Perhaps someday I will welcome the solitariness, or at least come to terms with it. As Jessamyn West said, “Writing is a solitary occupation. Family, friends, and society are the natural enemies of the writer. He must be alone, uninterrupted, and slightly savage if he is to sustain and complete an undertaking.”

Until then, I will continue to find a reason to get up each day. And always, I will miss him.

Posted in culture, grief, life, writing. Tags: , , , , , , . 4 Comments »

Blogmania — One Day Only. Mark Your Calendar!

April 17, 2010 — Pat Bertram

On April 30, 2010, I am going to participate in Blogmania, a one day massive blog giveaway.  Picture it as one of those 200 mile long garage sales that attract thousands of shopaholics because of its size. The people who go to those events love the pure adventure of seeing how many miles of garage sales they can personally cover in one or two days. On Blogmania, you don’t have to purchase anything. Nor do you have to wear out your shoes tramping from sale to sale. It’s all online. And every participating blog is giving away something special.

I will be giving away summer traveling companions. Sort of. Everyone who leaves a comment on my blog on April 30 will have a chance to win a print copy of Daughter Am I  — the story of an incredible journey — along with a Burt’s Bees Travel Shower Kit and a journal to record your adventures. Hope to see you at the end of April!

For more information: http://betweenthelinesandmore.blogspot.com/2010/04/blogmania-early-bird-check-list.html

Posted in blogging, internet, life, writing. Tags: , , . 3 Comments »

Grief Update

April 17, 2010 — Pat Bertram

It’s been three weeks since my lifemate died. I feel as if I am in an emotional whirlpool, spinning round and round, never quite knowing where I am or where I am going. I have days of relative calm where I can be glad he is finally at peace, then something happens to remind me of  my loss, and grief pulls me under. Most recently, I was cleaning photos out of my computer when I came across an image of him I didn’t know I had. (We did not take pictures of each other, so the only other photo I have was taken 15 years ago, and it does not look like him at all.) Last August, we took a trip to the north rim of the Black Canyon. (It’s only 20 miles away, but because of the bad road, it might as well have been 200.) The photo I found is of him, alone in that desolate place, with his back to me, looking at . . . eternity, perhaps.

I never expected to grieve so much. He was sick for so long and in such pain that we didn’t have much of a life together the past year or two. I struggled to live while he was dying and thought I succeeded, but nothing prepared me for this total devastation. It turns out that all of it, the good and bad, was part of our life together. In the movie Three to Tango is a film clip of a movie I have never seen — I think it’s Of Human Bondage.  The woman in the clip asks: “Will we be happy?” He answers, “No, but does it matter?” And, for us, it didn’t matter, at least where each other was concerned. We were connected, no matter what. And now that connection is broken. And I feel that I am broken, too.

I know someday I will find my way again. I know someday I will be able to laugh, to find joy in living again. I know that someday I might even find a new love. But for now, I don’t know how to be.

Hospice hosts a grief support group, and I’m thinking of going. If he were alive, I would never consider it — we were always each other’s support group. But if he were alive, I would not be grieving.

I hesitated about posting this — I do not want people to feel I am soliciting sympathy — but this is a writer’s blog, and what is writing if not life?

Posted in blogging, culture, grief, life, writing. Tags: , , . 11 Comments »

Review of More Deaths Than One

April 15, 2010 — Pat Bertram

I received the most wonderful review of More Deaths Than One from John Beck, who entitled it “Cover to Cover Intrigue.” Beck said:

Pat Bertram grabbed my attention at the outset and didn’t let go. The complex and intriguing plot is not difficult to follow, just impossible to predict. Characters are enigmatic but believable. Settings are appropriately described but not overly so. Each chapter begs for the next to be read without ending each chapter with a “teaser”. Romance is steamy but tastefully done. There’s science fiction involved which is not so far out that some readers have even questioned how much could be true.

Like the last book of Job, the epilogue brings some poetic justice and adds a bit of meaning to the plot, but the real story stands even without the epilogue. There is not a paragraph which is not well written. Highly recommended.

Click here to buy More Deaths Than One from Second Wind Publishing LLC.

Click here to download 30% of More Deaths Than One free at Smashwords or to buy any ebook format, including Kindle.

Posted in books, fiction, writing. Tags: , . 6 Comments »

A New Form of Kidnapping?

April 14, 2010 — Pat Bertram

I recieved a much forwarded email entitled “A New Form of Kidnapping”. Supposedly, a woman finished shopping, went out to her car and discovered that she had a flat. She got the jack out of the trunk and began to change the flat. A nice-looking man dressed in a business suit and carrying a briefcase walked up to her and said, ‘I notice you’re changing a flat tire. Would you like me to take care of it for you?’

The woman was grateful for his offer and accepted his help. They chatted amiably while the man changed the flat, then put the flat tire and the jack in the trunk, shut it and dusted off his hands. The woman thanked him, and as she was about to get in her car, the man told her that he left his car around on the other side of the mall, and asked if she would mind giving him a lift to his car.

She was a little surprised and she asked him why his car was on other side.

He explained that he had seen an old friend in the mall that he hadn’t seen for some time and they had a bite to eat, visited for a while, and he got turned around in the mall and left through the wrong exit, and now he was running late. The woman hated to tell him ‘no’ because he had just rescued her from having to change her flat tire all by herself, but she felt uneasy.

Then she remembered seeing the man put his briefcase in her trunk before shutting it and before he asked her for a ride to his car.

She told him that she’d be happy to drive him around to his car, but she just remembered one last thing she needed to buy. She said she would only be a few minutes; he could sit down in her car and wait for her; she would be as quick as she could be. She hurried into the mall and told a security guard what had happened. The guard came out to her car with her, but the man had left. They opened the trunk, removed the locked briefcase and took it down to the police station.

The police opened it (ostensibly to look for ID so they could return it to the man). What they found was rope, duct tape, and knives. When the police checked her ‘flat’ tire, there was nothing wrong with it; the air had simply been let out.  It was obvious to them what the man’s intention was, and obvious that he had carefully thought it out in advance. 

This might be the true story it purports to be, but I doubt it. It has all the earmarks of an urban legend. Besides, whoever came up with the story was not a writer — writers cannot get away with such slipshod plotting. She remembered seeing him put a briefcase in the trunk? Why the memory of it? Was it so commonplace for strangers to put briefcases in her trunk that it never struck her as strange until later? And why did he put the briefcase in her trunk? If he was bent on kidnapping her, you’d think he’d need the knives and other paraphernalia to keep her subdued while he did whatever he was going to do to her. And how did the police check her tire? Visually? Many punctures are hidden within the tread. Besides, a perfectly good tire can go flat if a bit of stone gets between the rim and the tire — that has happened to me. And why was it obvious what the man’s plan was? I often carry a brief case full of rope, duct tape, and knives. Well, perhaps not. Still, it’s apparent that the story was not “carefully thought out in advance”. (Excuse me for being picky but isn’t “in advance” redundant?)

Posted in culture, life, writing. Tags: , , , . 3 Comments »

Baby Steps

April 12, 2010 — Pat Bertram

I’ve heard that the death of a mate and the ensuing grief change a person, and perhaps this is true. If one is part of a couple, when he dies, so does the “we.” One cannot be the same after such a splitting apart. The world one lives in cannot be the same.

I feel like a toddler, taking shaky steps in this newly alien and dangerous world. I exercised this morning, took my vitamins with a protein drink, wrote a letter to my deceased mate (the only writing besides blogging I am doing at the moment), and I took a walk. I even managed to eat. The one thing I had never expected was how the thought of his being gone makes me sick to my stomach. When I do eat, I eat healthy, though. I got rid of all snacks a while back, so all that’s in the house is real food.

All these baby steps that I’m taking serve to take me further away from him, deeper into  . . . I don’t know what. I  just wish I could skip the coming months of pain and go directly to the part where I emerge strong, wise, confident, and capable of handling anything. But, ironically, those painful months will be the catalyst.

I never planned to talk about my grief. I thought I would just continue online as if nothing cataclysmic happened offline, but blogging seems to be in my blood. Once I started writing about my grief, I worried that I would become maudlin, but Donna Russell, a true friend on facebook, said:

You’re not being maudlin, Pat; you’re grieving. There is no right or wrong way to do it, no proper time period for it to last, no right or wrong way to feel. I just finished reading The Healing Art of Pet Parenthood by Nadine Rosin. In her book, Nadine makes this observation: “We are so careful in this culture to ignore death and anything associated with it as much as possible; it is so uncomfortable for us to have it in the open. Grief is such an isolating experience in and of itself, it’s a shame that our mores about it are so quick to support and intensify that isolation.” Perhaps if we were all more open and honest about it, as you are being, it wouldn’t be quite so uncomfortable.
Posted in blogging, culture, grief, life, writing. Tags: , , , , . 16 Comments »
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