My Writing Career

After my spinal surgery in 2003, the doctors didn't know if I would ever walk again. After months of physical therapy and lots of prayers, I was able to walk without assistance. However, it left me with chronic pain. It has been over five years and I am still in a tremendous amount of pain. Even though I can walk ok most of the time, the pain is a little overwhelming. I haven't been able to drive for quite sometime. I really thought my working career was over. As I would sit here at home, I started to pick up my pen. My lifelong dream was to be a writer. Although a freelance writer could not pay the bills and feed three hungry boys. Now that I am remarried and my boys are raised, I thought I may have a better chance.





I started pumping out the query letters. For years, I had mainly wrote about my feelings or about personal stories - things and people that were closest to my heart. I found out very quickly that there wasn't a big need for that in the magazine world. I started looking around our life. My husband and I loved to go boating. There was always something interesting going on out there on the river. I found some boating magazines in the Writer's Market book. The first one I sent to, accepted my query. I would be covering "The Blessing of the Fleet" that summer. This was a huge event in a suburb outside of St. Louis. Boats decorate and parade down the Mississippi River past Our Lady of the Rivers shrine of Mother Mary. The local priest blesses each boat as they go by. It is to protect them and bring safety to the owners of the boat. I was excited but so nervous.

That July, I went out to Portage des Sioux, with my camera and my notepad. I took about 100 photos. I was amazed how pretty it was. The Shrine, the Illinois bluffs, the Fire Department spraying the boats, the priest blessing the boats and the beautiful decorations. After the event everyone gathered next door at Palisades to give prizes to the best decorated boats. I took down as much info as I could and tried to talk to as many people as I could. Since I had been home for a couple of years, I found that I was a little more shy from not being around people as much. But I sure loved doing it.

I went home and put it all together in a story. It seems that the editor was pleased with my warm approach about the event. Almost writing it as if I was sitting down to have coffee with someone and telling them all about it. The next month the same magazine accepted my article about the Asian Carp in the river. Another magazine accepted a story about our weekend fun on the river. For a few months, I was so excited. I wrote about my little Yorkie, "Angel" and got an article accepted about her from the Yorkshire Terrier Magazine, called, "Angel Therapy." I wrote an article about my brother-in-law's paintbal park and it was published in Action Pursuit. I wrote about our experience on Tablerock Lake when my husband and I were on his boss' pontoon at night and we were lost. That's when we noticed that we had an extra passenger on board - a raccoon. Pontoon & Deck Boat Magazine accepted that one. I wrote many more for Heartland Boating, Pontoon & Deck Boat and Houseboat Magazines just about people, places and things on the river. Our experiences, marinas, restaurants and even boating products. I did round ups. That is where I contact several boating product dealers and ask them for a sample of their products. Most of the time, we keep the product and I write about them. They are happy with free advertisement, I am happy because I get a check and the magazine is happy with the story. Not to mention, the readers may find a product they are needing.

Through the next few months, I continued sending query letters. I even wrote about writing. I wrote for Dialogue Magazine about the Lighthouse for the Blind. I also had my first book accepted, "From the Heart of a Mother." It was composed of short stories and poems about motherhood and my diagnosis with M.S. It was published in January 2007. I spent some time trying to promote it but in the mean time, I was still writing. I wrote for online publishers as well such as Story Circle, Quiet Mountain Essay, Helium and the AKC Newsletter. I wrote for the M.S. Newsletter.

Recently, I had my second book accepted, "Our Spiritual Make-Over." It is very exciting for me. Writing this book took me about a year. After I read the Bible - in 2-1/2 months. I wrote about the way we can get our spiritual body into shape. I provide an excercise plan, a nutrition suggestion and a way to keep ourself strong. Then we can look in our spiritual mirror and see our new image.

In the meantime, I have my third book in review. It is something totally different from what I have been writing about. It is five fiction short stories. I wrote them a couple of years ago. I had tried to get them all published in several different magazines, with no luck at all. That's when I decided to put them into a book form. The publishing company that is reviewing it will publish it in ebook form or in paperback.

One of the best things I heard about writing is that you should write something down everyday. That's the only way to get good at it. Practice makes perfect - right? Another thing I learned is that you can't let the rejection get you down. Even though I have some successful writing testimony's, I had a lot of rejection first. I'm still getting rejection. I just learn from it and go on. Luckily my husband pushed me to keep going. At first I got so discouraged. He didn't let me give up though.

Do you know that Harry Potter was turned down several times before it was accepted? Look at it now. What an amazing story that author has. It's a good thing she didn't give up.

I get four weekly newsletters by email: Writing for Dollars, Worldwide Freelance, Writer's Relief and Funds for Writers. Each one of them give good advice about writing and also provide writing markets. If you go to www.writingfordollars.com and go to their Guideline DB, you get hundreds of free markets. They tell you what the magazine wants, the word count and the pay. This is very helpful.

Learning to write a query letter is easier than you think. It is usually 3 or 4 paragraphs that sell your story. The first paragraph grabs the editor's attention. The second one describes your story and the third one gives your credentials. The lucky thing for writers now is that there is not as many expenses as before. You can usually email your query and your manuscript which saves you ink, paper and postage. Not to mention, the photos. I never get them developed. I just save them on a disk - one for them and one for me. This is a big expense. This helps your profit.

Writing is an art. Just as an artist paints a picture, we paint with words. We describe to the reader what our picture is about. We can give them as much or as little detail as we want. We each have our own technique which makes us unique. Some people have a hard time even writing a letter, but there is no end to what we can write. Our imagination is our best friend and our paper and pen is always close by. Happy Writing!