New direction in my use of this journal - Character Profiles

Since I can't seem to get motivated to write daily any more have decided to begin using this blog to work on character profiles.  Today I am going to work on the characters in A Pioneer Woman's Journal.  The two primary characters are of course The pioneer woman herself and her husband Barry Kirkpatrick.
Scenario:  At the beginning of the journal is a newly married woman who has come with her husband to a dry land ranch/farm in Sheridan County Nebraska in an area just north of Gordan near Camp Sheridan and the Spotted Tail Indian Reservation as well as the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.  The area is called Albany.  This is in an area called the Sandhills region.  The Kirkpatricks had followed the trail laid by the Scammahorn party the year before in 1883 but went on further north of the Antelope Valley where that party had settled.
Hannah Kirkpatrick:  Hannah was a sturdy young woman who stood five foot six with a classic hourglass figure and as a woman once told her somewhat impolitely the perfect hips for birthing babies.  She had long, thick red hair the color of an Irish Setter and shocking blue eyes.  Even at a distance a person could detect those bright blue eyes.  For the most part she had a gentle personality but had a quick temper which quickly abated once she had blown off steam.  She had freckles splattered across the bridge of her nose and onto her cheeks.   She was not what would be called beautiful but pretty was more descriptive.  She was well educated which was unusual for women of her day and she loved to read and write.  She managed to place several books and a writing journal in her boxes of necessities packed for her new home.  She also managed to pack a few niceties of the time in the boxes also.  These included dollies, tableclothes, and napkins.  She could also sew and had several quilts as well as bolts of cloth that were included.  She had sacrificed the family piano leaving it at her parents' home so that she could include a trundle sewing machine and collapseable quilt frame.  She also knew how to ride and shoot which was a benefit on the prairie. 
Barry Kirkpatrick:  Barry was six foot two inches tall with a slender build that belied his strength.  He had a quiet even temperment.  He was not talkative but when he spoke it was direct and to showed his quick grasp of situations.  He was also well educated for a man of the time.  He knew how to read, write, and do math.  What he most enjoyed was being out in nature.  He loved working cattle and being a part of the land.  He was not overly fond of farming and only did as much as needed to be done in order to provide extra feed for his cattle and horses and a littl profit.  He was a natural at dry land ranching/farming that was the prevailing vocation of men in the sandhills region after people began to settle the area. 

Undecided

I just don't know what I am going to continue to use this blog to record. I have lost interest in The Daily Writer. I also find that I really have trouble writing daily on a consistent basis. Today when I opened this blog all I could think about was the happenings in Madison yesterday at Discovery Middle School. One student shot another student supposedly because he was upset with the remarks the student had made about "his gang". The incident has raise some many things in my mind. As a social worker and therapist I want to know what could have led to this killing. Several people on Facebook have commented that he shooter has been in trouble before. What sort of trouble I ask and did any one grasp the scope of his possible actions. I remember another incident that left me wondering if I had missed some serious warning signs when an adolescent's actions resulted in death. The another part of my intellect tells me that know one can really grasp just what another person is capable of doing. The social worker in me also wants to know what could have been done to prevent this senseless act. I also think about the two adolescents' families. Two families have had their lives forever altered by the actions that this boy has taken. Everyone in the area has been, at least momentarily effected by this incident. I, along with others want to point fingers at the parents, at our modern culture that endorses such actions, the movies, music, and video games that promote violence. However, that only leads to more questions. I firmly believe that God has a purpose in everything that happens and maybe the only purpose is to remind us of what we as a nation, as a culture, as a world are becoming. I'm sure that evangelists would say that this is another indication of the end time. I don't know if it is or not but my heart goes out to all those whose lives have been forever altered by this action. My prayers are for the dead child's family and friends, for the the shooter's family and friends, for the parents and children of the area, and for the teachers, school officials and leaders who must now try to make sense of this and take actions to prevent it (hopefully) from happening again.

This week in the Daily Writer

Mr. White started off the week with a discussion on the topic of honesty and authenticity and assigned the writer to read through a draft of a work in progress (WIP) criticiquing it for authenticity. I had actually already been doing that with a short story/novella/novel that is the journal entries of a pioneer woman telling about her experience in early Sheridan County Nebraska. Since that was where I spent the majority of my childhood there were somethings that I already knew but was somewhat foggy on the exact dates so I went back through it after I did some research on the internet.
Monday's entry was about the fact that writers creat worlds. Some of the worlds actually exist, or existed while others are modeled after real places but are fictional and there there is the true fantasy and science fiction writings that are not real places. Mr. White suggests to make the world you are writing about more realistic you need to sit and actually visualize the setting and using words as pigments paint the scene and scenery along with other elements experienced by the senses. That is what I did when I created the novella/novel that I wrote for my NaNoWriMo assignment. I created a fictional town modelled after a real town close to where I live. Some of the features are real and others are purely fiction.
Tuesday's entry was on confession and Mr. White extolled the benefits of personal confession for writers. Wednesday's entry was about writing adventure. Not some much as relates to say an action adventure story but what the writer would see as something adventurous to them. They also need to be aware of what the character(s) they are portraying would consider an adventure.
Thursday's entry was about developing an authentic writer's voice. He shared that in trying to be natural some writers try to hard and end up sounding fake. He then gave an assignment to help the beginning writer develop an authentic writer's voice. Friday's reading had to deal with symbols and reality. He stated that "symbols codify human reality, and in a spiritual sense become reality". He also discussed how symbols "render the abstract concrete". He then assigned the task to take common household items and free-associate possible symbolic meanings.
Today's reading was about dealing with writer'sblock. He listed five types of blocks and offered suggestions to cope with each. So far the ones I have experienced the most have been: psychological blocks (my inner crictic tells me that I'm not good enough, that my writing will never amount to anything), and distraction blocks (other things in my life distract me from writing). I have also experienced at times the creativity block that stricks some, if not all writers. Unlike his particular suggestion of keeping on writing one sentence at a time, I find that if I'll put that story aside and pick up a different one that I am working on, the block on the original story ends by the time I pick it back up. That is the reason I currently have six WIPs and suggestions for about a dozen more in my composition book.
I am finding that writing daily is a real problem but I can find time one the weekend to get caught up so for awhile until my schedule slows down I will make this a weekly blog instead of a daily one.

Still can't get with it.

I am in some sort of funk or something just can not seem to get with doing any writing.

Jan. 18: The Art of Concentration

Fred White's writing for today is related to the art of concentration. Concentration meaning to think intensely about a subject, and concentration meaning thinking about the essential aspects of a subject. Concentration is something that I struggle with at times. Sometimes it is very easy to close out background noise and focus on what I am reading, writing, or working on. At other times this is difficult and I have to get rid of all distractions in order to really work on the current project. Mr. White does give an exercise that he states will increase your powers of concentration. He suggests that you spend 30 minutes thinking about and concentrating on a topic you would normally only spend 10 minutes on. He also gives a writing assignment which is meant to focus your concentration on a topic/one scene.
I have also found that if I am really into the moment and focused on writing whatever it is I am writing about then my powers of concentration are very strong. However, if I am not that focused in the moment I get into the mode of multi-tasking which I consider the worst thing that we were taught to do a few decades ago. Multitasking keeps you from being mindful/aware of the moment. It keeps us from being focused and it reduces our ability to concentrate on the topic/problem/scene we need to be focusing on.
All of that said I am now going to concentrate on something that I want to work on tonight for 30 minutes to an hour, which is 1 Corinthians chapter one. I want to begin an in-depth study of Paul's two letters to the Christians in Corinth. Someone reminded me that these two letters address how we are to treat our bodies. So, will close this to go study Corinthians.

Jan 17: Listening Holistically

It would appear that in order to stay on track with my writing and to keep the creative juices flowing I do need to write daily so this week will start a new with this journal using the Daily Writer. Today's entry as the title states is learning to listen. According to Mr. White learning to listen holistically means listening to any given issue from multiple perspectives not just one or two. He also lets us know that this is not an easy task to accomplish. Just listening can, for many of us, be a difficult task. In therapy we refer to it as actively listening which means you listen to the others in the conversation well enough that you can paraphrase what they said. Both active listening and holistic listening would mean that you would have to focus your attention on what others are saying. All to often most of us, myself included, tend to listen with the intent of formulating our response. This is particularly true if we disagree with the other person(s) in the conversation. This is when Mr. White thinks we should listen the most carefully and so do I. So I will attempt to listen more holistically.
Mr. White states in For Further Reflection, that we should ask ourselves two questions in order to improve your listening ability. How good a listener are you? How closely do you pay attention to what people say? One of his assignments is to write a short story in which you satirie characters who get into trouble because they fail to listen carefully. Won't have time for that because I still have my original four short stories that have not been completed. But I will keep it in mind and add it to the growing collection of story ideas.

January 10 - Many different readings

Today I thought I would share my thoughts from all of my daily readings. From the Daily Writer, Fred White to day talked about dreams and keeping a dream journal. He states that dreams offer the writer a wellspring of character development. In his daily assignment he suggests that you write a story from one of your dreams and not worry about the fact that things seem to be odd jutapositions of items or actions. He refers the writer back to a large white rabbit and a pocket watch. On the surface an odd jutaposition but in reality from it developed the white rabbit in Alice in Wonderland going on about being late.
The two daily devotionals that I am reading are The Upper Room and Daily Splashes of Joy by Barbara Johnson. From the The Upper Room the writer talked about facing your fears and listening to God telling you to do something that maybe you are afraid that you may not be able to accomplish and he reminds us that if God wants us to do something He will give the courage and the strength necessary to do the task. In Daily Splashes of Joy Barbara Johnsn today talks about how Christians need not fear death because we know that the end of this life means the beginning of an eternal life that is so much more than what we have on earth.
Then there was my Bible reading for the day which was Genesis 30-31. In Genesis 30 I read again the story of Jacob's many children born by his two wives and their maidservants. The thing that has always made me wonder is that each one of these children were given by God but in answer to prayers that voiced the two sister's envy of one another. It would seem that God would not reward envy, but then I remember that it is from these twelve sons that the twelve tribes of Israel will come. In Genesis 31 Jacob prepares to leave Laban his father-in-law and return to his country. It also talks about how Laban has repeatedly attempted to cheat and underpay Jacob. These two stories on their own would make one wonder about how God treats his children. That would be taking the stories out of context. This is something that writers on the topic of Bible Study warn against. So for now am not going to try to figure out why these things happened but trust that God had a plan all along. Which is something that I need to take into my daily life.