The Courage to Write a Book

School started this week at community colleges and universities around my city. I ought to be enrolled, a slight thrill of anticipation pumping through my knowledge-starved mind. But nope, this term I won't be gracing the halls of Marylhurst University.  I can't. I work full-time at a hospital and I have two teenagers at home....and if you haven't heard, I'm writing a book. The on-deadline-writing-a-book kind of book. It typically consumes about 20 hours of my waking life a week, the equivalent of a part-time job. And though I can be amazingly productive and multi-task, I am no Super Woman. Last  time I checked, my day still only had 24 hours in it. (If you are willing to give up some of your daylight hours to me, please send 'em! Then I could get more done!).


It's hard work. I knew it would be. For the first time in the more than seven years I've been blogging and writing, I feel like a writer. Writers write. God knows that I've penned more words in the last year than the last two or three combined. Seriously.

This explains why my blog has become very quiet. I can't blog. I ought not to be blogging right now. I have writing and the swamplands of edits to sludge through, sentences to wrestle down like a Swampwoman alligator hunter. I have writing stuff to do!  Last week my publisher (who is a guy in California who started up an independent publishing house) spent 90 minutes with a thorough explanation of what revisions he is recommending. "Are we at square one?" I asked him when we reached the end of the word doc that outlined his editorial notes. "Can I possibly make this deadline with this much work still left to do?"

Discuss, Disqus....An Updated Commenting System

One of the reasons I've kept up blogging for over six years now is because of the interaction with readers.  There have been many memorable discussions and debates on this blog about things like women and gender equality in the church.

Over the last year I've noticed a very robust commenting system on other blogs I like to read, such as Michael Hyatt's  site (who, btw, if you are a writer or entrepreneur, he provides highly relevant and practical posts on topics like platform, social media, book marketing, etc...)

He has a very large following, in the many tens of thousands I believe, so the comments for his posts are typically in the three digit range.  I usually stay away from these oversized discussions since it's so crowded. That would be like trying to  follow a hundred people talking all at once. But I noted that Michael uses the Disqus commenting application. It gives readers and commentators a much easier, streamlined means of responding to the topic at hand. There is even a "Like" feature similar to Facebook's Like button. This way if a comment resonates with you but you don't want to respond to it, you can hit the Like button which does three things : it alerts the commentator that somebody else is tracking with their thought, it alerts that writer of the post that others are paying attention even if they aren't "talking," and most of all it gives the reader a simple way of participating in the discussion without actually speaking up. I have scrolled through many comments on a topic I am interested in, but lack time to jump into the dialog. I participate, though, by hitting the Like button for those comments that express my perspective.

Disqus brings interactive online discussions to another level, providing options of interaction as well as the ability to tweet and Facebook the post instantly...as well as comments that rock your boat. Social media is now and it's the future. Disqus helps utilize social networking so humble bloggers like me (as well as rockstar bloggers like Michael Hyatt) can provide a more open, accessible forum for those who care to know what we are writing about.

And that's why I have enabled the Disqus application to How God Messed Up My Religion.

So what are you waiting for?   Disqus!!

Resisting the Murky Curtain of Inequality

Vague understanding becomes the murky curtain by which true equality is trapped behind.

Pam Hogeweide  

The Duty of Resistance

Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral.     Paulo Freire

Resistance is not Futile

The first resistance to social change is to say it's not necessary.      Gloria Steinem

My 9/11

I was getting my seven year old daughter ready for school when the phone rang.
"America's being attacked!" cried my best friend Kim.

"What? What are you talking about? Who's getting attacked? " My barely caffienated brain couldn't register what she was saying.

"Just turn the tv on!"

Moments later I watched with stunned disbelief as the second plane hit the second tower.  Fire and smoke billowed from the Twin Towers like erupting volcanoes.

I debated what to tell Rose, a mere second grader. She was eating her breakfast, oblivious that life in her country had just been altered. But I realized that I had best tell her something lest she hear scary rumors at on the school playground. Breathing deep and centering myself to be calm, cool and collected, I told Rose about the attacks. By then the Pentagon in Washington D.C. had been hit and the plane in Pennsylvania had gone down. She listened with all the earnestness a little girl  of tender wisdom could possess.

"Are we safe, Mom?" she wanted to know. "Is Portland safe?"  Yes, I reassured her, Portland is safe. Nothing will happen here.