NOW AVAILABLE!

NOW AVAILABLE!
A HERO'S SPARK: the final book in the Wicked Women series!

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Let the music take control!

Good evening!

So the production manager at my job gave me a task this month that is one part awesome, and two parts expected.  See, every other office gig I've ever had has started with these words:

First, you need to fix our filing system.

It started right after I was first married and I took a temp job at a medical equipment company. My predicessor, a girl they called, "The pizza girl" for a number of reasons...none of them appropriate for this forum...filed EVERYTHING under "D"  for Doctor.

Which means we had 16 drawers for the letter D and ten for the rest of the alphabet.

That job took me almost two years to completely fix.

This time around, twenty years later, I was sure I'd avoided the dreaded task because I've been here for more than 6 months and the closest I've come to the filing cabinets has been on Wednesdays, for about six minutes.

And then 2012 rolled around and with it a need for more file cabinets...

Unless...

Let's just say I'm spending many of my days in the almost unheated shop converting alphabetical files to numerical files for the past 7 years.  It's going to take me months.  And I love it mostly because I'm good at it and it keeps me away from the nit wit I work with in the office.  (She of the Elsie W fame.)

I told you that so I can tell you this:  While I'm sorting and filing and assembling in the shop, I get to wear my beloved iPod.  And sometimes, I get to sing.

I've been so immersed in working on the Elsie W book(s) that I've sort of put "Fresh Ice" on the shelf.  Until this morning, when, while sorting through the year 2007, Night Ranger's "Goodbye" came on.

I had to stop what I was doing.

I was suddenly transported to a cavernous badly lit club in Nashville, where a tall, devastatingly handsome former NHL bad boy was onstage singing this touching song.  I...well, I of course was the recently widowed former Olympic figure skater in the balcony, falling in love without even knowing his name.

Yep...I just remembered, I write fiction!  I write romantic fiction!  I fall in love with my leading men all the time!

You all know that I'm one of those writers who writes as the spirit moves.  Well, right now I'm furious with Elsie W, and I see no humor in her.  However, I'm in love with Quinn Murray again, so this weekend I'll be traveling back to Nashville, the Waffle House, and the Wild Horse Saloon. 

I can't wait.

It's sometimes that easy for writers.  Even if you haven't been writing for whatever reason, a song will come on and suddenly you need to get to the nearest computer, the nearest notebook, the nearest quiet spot and write.  It's how I wrote "Lies in Chance."  I would set it aside for years at a time because people told me it simply wasn't worth any more of my time.  And then I'd hear that wonderful Kansas song, "Hold On" and I'd have to go back to Rock Harbor.

Maybe I'm insane.  But I don't think so.  At least not about this.

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