Monthly Archives: December 2019

So Many Good Things

So some of you know that I work as a librarian to earn money for all the things I love to do. And while I have largely always loved my job, there have been times when I haven’t, largely due to People-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named. Those people are no longer at the library, and I currently have a fantastic boss whose work goal in life is to make the library a good place for her employees.  One of the awesome things she’s done (besides finally getting me that promotion and raise I’ve been way overdue for!) is figure out what each of us likes to do, and then give us more opportunities to do that thing.

For me, that thing is doing more public programs. Despite being an introvert I truly enjoy public speaking, when it’s on a topic I’m passionate about. In the past, I’ve done a program here and there, but this past year I’ve done five, with more planned for the future. Two were on gardening and raising animals in a sustainable and natural manner.

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At the last program, I brought a couple of quail and a chicken with me. Maisie was a huge hit with the attendees! (Photo taken right before she pooped on the carpet – despite wearing a chicken diaper. Sigh. The library carpet’s seen much worst things….)

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The newest type of programing I’ve been helping with has been events where we’ve served a tasting menu of teas and scones, did a craft, and had a historical presentation put on by me. The first one was for the release of the Downton Abbey film, and I was told I should take my presentation on the road! There are just so many interesting/humorous things to say about historical fashion.

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Recently, we did a Little Women themed Christmas event, where I wore my 1850s beetlewing embroidered gown – still don’t have the pictures from that one. And next, we’re putting on one themed for Outlander. Needless to say, I’m currently working on the 18th century outfit I’ve always wanted to make.

Life is good, and I have so many things I’m looking forward to right now.

But no matter how good it is, the thing I’m looking forward to most right now, is the absolutely certain knowledge that I may not be staying here on earth long enough to do any of those things. If you’ve been reading this blog, you know I’ve been warning you that this world is on the cusp of changing forever, and I have to keep warning you. Time is running out. Biblical prophecy is being fulfilled at breakneck speed; everything the Bible said would happen right before the end is happening, right now.

One of the most significant things happening right now is the political turmoil in Israel. The Bible says that at the time of the end, Israel’s leaders will “perish out of the land” and there will be no government. For the first time in Israel’s history, they have lost their government. They are in the process of trying to hold their third election in a year, and every attempt at electing and setting up a government is failing. This attempt will fail too, I believe. The Jews know something big is coming. The rabbis are being outspoken in predicting the very soon coming of the Messiah.

They’re right. He is coming. The sad thing is, they will miss him again, because they are still waiting for the wrong person. Israel is going to be attacked for their wealth, and the people who don’t follow the biblical mandate to flee immediately when they see the city surrounded, are going to be killed and enslaved. The Holocaust was a shadow fulfillment of the prophecy that is going to be fulfilled in its entirely soon. In the 1940s, two-thirds of all European Jews were murdered. In the coming Holocaust, two-thirds of ALL Jews world-wide will be killed. We already see the open and growing anti-Semitism toward them. They are afraid to live in many European cities, like Paris, where they are attacked for walking down a street. It breaks my heart, what’s going to happen. But until they turn to the true Messiah, and understand who he is, these things have to happen. Every nation on earth will turn against them. You see it most clearly in the United Nations. It’s shameful.

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China is one of the most evil countries on earth, they murder and imprison millions of their own citizens, yet they have no UN resolutions against them. Israel, that unique country of personal freedom and life-changing innovations, who offers free medical aid and information such as how to turn salt water into fresh to their sworn enemies, is constantly having resolutions taken out against them. I love Israel. I can’t wait for the day these horrors are finished with, and God’s eternal peace begins.

Hosea 2:18
On that day I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field and the birds of the air and the creatures that crawl on the ground. And I will abolish bow and sword and weapons of war in the land, and will make them lie down in safety.

But sadly, until they go through the horror, they will refuse to understand the truth. Just like the rest of the world does. The bible says they will be eating and drinking, buying and selling, marrying, and will have no idea what is coming up until the moment – the second – when everything changes. There’s the going to be a series of natural disasters first. Earthquakes so large they create tsunamis, and also cause volcanoes to erupt across the world. I think it’s the ash from these volcanoes that is going to darken the sun and turn the moon red.

Revelation 6:12-17

12 When he opened the sixth seal, I looked, and behold, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood, 13 and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale. 14 The sky vanished like a scroll that is being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. 15 Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, 16 calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, 17 for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?”

But before that happens – or more likely at the same instant – the people who genuinely believe in Christ, and chose to accept his offer of salvation – will be taken off the earth and saved from everything that is coming. This is such an imminent event that I look up at the sky every morning and wonder if today is the day.

Revelation 7:9-12

9 After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10 and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” 11 And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12 saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”

The saddest part is that no one has to go through the hell on earth that’s coming. God wants to save you, but he will not override your own free will to chose him. More than half of the bible is prophecy, some of which was already fulfilled down to the smallest detail, but the larger percentage is still to be fulfilled. God says he gave us prophecy, so that when we see it happen, we will believe. It’s happening now. Cell phones, mingling human DNA with animals, globalism, specific alliances between nations, specific wars, signs in the constellations…all of was predicted thousands of years ago.

The only thing I’m surprised by is that we’ve made it through another year. But this year, wow. It’s been huge, prophetically speaking. So many things have happened, so many more pieces have fallen seamlessly into place. I see them happen, and as the bible commands me to do, I raise the alarm to warn everyone I can.

He’s real, and he’s coming. And because he is my savior, and my best friend, I can’t wait to see him face-to-face. Nothing on earth could be better than that.

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NaNoWriMo

If you’ve never heard of it before, NaNoWriMo, is short for National Novel Writing Month, also known at November. Also known as the month writers attempt to make themselves even more crazy than they already were, by attempting to write 50,000 words in 30 days.

I knew this thing existed. I just never wanted to do it.

Like, seriously. Never wanted to. At all.

But it turned out that one of my friends has done it for years, and she started talking about it, and I was all “I’ll encourage YOU, but I’m not doing it”, and she said, “You should at least sign up on the website so you can be my buddy,” and that is where I made the critical mistake of saying “Yes, I’ll do that, at least.” Because I really like this friend. She has critiqued my longest novel AND helped me butcher and pluck two roosters when she’s never done anything like that before in her life. If that isn’t the mark of a good friend I don’t know what is.

So because of her, I went on the website, and somehow I got caught up in it. Next thing I know I’m dropping the novel I was about 15,000 words from finishing, and over the course of one sleepless night deciding that I would instead write the sequel to a completely different novel instead…one that I hadn’t had even the lick of an idea for, or a plot, or characters.  I warned you this NaNo thing makes you crazy.

So here I am, at the end of November, and I have written 50,000 words in 30 days. Actually, in 25 days, because I got completely obsessed with doing this thing. Like I do with almost everything in my life.

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Am I glad I did it, and grateful to Reina for asking me (so innocently!) to be her buddy on NaNoWriMo?

Yes. Yes I am.

Will I ever do it again? I doubt it. I learned a long while back that ‘feeling inspired to write’ is meaningless. If you want to write, train your brain to create inspiration on demand by sitting down and writing. 9 times out of 8.9, after you sit for awhile, inspiration will come. And it will come easier and faster, the more you do it. So I already knew the primary thing NaNoWriMo teaches…but I didn’t know that I could push myself this hard and or write these many words, every day. That was valuable. That is the reason I would recommend every writer attempt this at least once.

But by the end of the month, I was a little turned off by the attitude of so many of the people who were doing NaNo. So many of them were…well, they were honestly cheaters. So many were posting on facebook, talking about how they were including all the words they wrote for their grant-writing job as part of their daily word count. Others were writing pages filled with nonsense children’s rhymes, or purposely writing each sentence in the most long-winded and convoluted way possible. Or upping their word count by never using any contractions, ever.

No. This is wrong, and quite honestly, it makes me a little angry. It’s no wonder NaNo novels are so notoriously terrible that many publishers and agents won’t look at any submissions at all right after NaNo. First drafts aren’t going to be perfect, and they can be quite bad, but I can’t even imagine trying to wrestle a novel into shape when you’re spent the whole month trying to make it as terrible as possible…just to get more words in. All I did differently for my NaNo novel was to write more words every day, and write every day. And I didn’t go back and fix plot points that changed as I wrote, or spend any time whatsoever researching online or fussing over names. If I didn’t know a thing, I just made a note and left it for later. And while I’m no where near writing the end of this particular novel (it will probably be around 75-90 thousand words, all told), this first draft no worse than a first draft I took months to write. And that should be the real lesson of NaNoWriMo: that you can write a book, and you don’t have to wait for inspiration, and you can write even when you’re tired, or not in the mood, or just really want to watch the third season of The Crown on Neflix instead. And you don’t have to cheat. Look, I get that many people’s lives are way more complicated than mine. I’m healthy, I don’t have kids, I’m not married, and I have a day job that doesn’t demand much from me.  But NaNoWriMo doesn’t have to be 50,000 words, or you fail. It can be writing for however long (or short) a time you have, every day. Just to prove to yourself that inspiration, while delightful to experience, is a hoax, and if you want to, YOU CAN WRITE. You can do this.

I taught a short class the other day about writing and brain-training, and afterwards had a lovely conversation with a middle-aged woman who had always wanted to write, but never had, because she was too intimidated. After our conversation, I told her to go home and write. Two days later, she came back to tell me that she had started writing, and it was exactly how I said it would be: her characters were coming alive for her, and she was having so much fun. She was glowing with happiness. I’m so glad I did that class, and I’m so glad she came.

I’ll leave you with one of my favorite bits from my NaNo novel, a fragment of conversation that sent a shiver through me when I wrote it:

His words went through my heart like one of his knives, and the blood that came out was poisoned and dark. “I should be the Queen, shouldn’t I? Not my mother. Not Anissa. Me. In spite of my eyes.”
      “Because of your eyes,” he said. He leaned in, speaking directly into my ear, a low whisper of words. “I swear to you, by every cut I have ever made, that you are the Queen of Minos. You will sit on that throne. Whatever I have to do.”
      And I believed him.