Is it strange that I like spider webs? I am none too fond of spiders themselves, but the webs they create are often spectacular.  Add misty morning dew reflecting the first gentle rays of sunlight, and you have something straight from a fairy tale. They are like snowflakes, perfect, pristine, and beautiful. If you are foolhardy and attempt to touch them, hold them, they dissolve as if they were a figment of the imagination.

I love Virginia’s perspective and the idea that fiction must have even a tenuous connection to reality. Fiction, at its best, approaches perfection, pristine stories, expressed with beautiful words. They are true figments, with each reader conjuring a version, shaped, and colored by the totality of the reader’s personal experiences. The reader creates a rendition of the story that is unique to them.

How do you attach your stories to reality?

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Keep on writing.

Jo Hawk The Writer

The youngest old person I ever knew, was my grandfather. He was a lifelong learner. When his children left home, he started painting and even sold his work. He became a master gardener after he retired, and learned how to swim when he turned eighty.

He was big on healthy eating, exercising, vitamin supplements, and the healing benefits of massage and reflexology, long before any of that was a thing. Benjamin Franklin’s maxim of early to bed early to rise was a practice he adopted. And he read. I remember him saving articles for me and recommending good books. One of his favorite authors was Louis L’Amour. The latest releases he stacked next to his chair.

His example touched everyone who met him, and it leaves me inspired to be like him. I have seen people get stuck, who have given up, lost hope and let their dreams slip away. The light in their eyes fade and they drift, shuffling through daily activities, aimless, afraid and beaten.

Life can crush the unwary, dealing trials and tribulations that test our resolve. Reading exposes us to stories of heroes. Those rare individuals who persevere, triumph over difficulties and forge meaning and joy from whatever circumstances dealt them. In doing so, they maintain their youth and live forever.

How do you stay young?

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Keep on writing.

Jo Hawk The Writer

Another new month presents and one more chance to renew my commitment to reaching this year’s objective. October is roaring in reminding me the end of the year will be here in a little over ninety days. I am fighting back, refusing to relinquish my desire to reach my 2019 goals. While I have fallen a little behind, there is still time to make progress.

There are thirty-one chances to move thirty-one steps closer to success. I dusted off the goal list, checked my progress to date and identified the areas where I want to focus. I plotted and prepared an agenda for every day in October. It only remains to execute the daily plan.

Have you planned your month?

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Keep on writing.

Jo Hawk The Writer