SUESSTIVUS TWITTER CONTEST 2012

CanadaWrites had a Twitter contest today, Dec 18th for a few hours and I caught the end of it...what a hoot!


The challenge was called Seusstivus and we were to ``to create and define a new Seussian word that best describes an element of your holiday experience.``

Two examples they used were as follows:

Twinkletanglucious: The way Christmas lights always come out of the box in a knot, no matter how carefully you put them away #CanadaWrites

Menorahmorph: The bizarre and wonderful shapes created by half-melted cheap menorah candles #CanadaWrites

SO...ignoring my plan of spending my day writing the next best seller, I wrote a couple Seussisms... then became COMPLETELY ADDICTED!

There are prizes, so wish me luck. Here are my entries:

Santasomnia: the inability to fall asleep Christmas Eve

faketreespreadaboriculture: spreading the branches of your fake Christmas tree to give it proper shape after being squished inside its box.

Fruitcakequitous: finding only boring gifts everywhere you look while last minute Christmas shopping

Throwthegamenopoly: games at Christmas where parents lose on purpose to see the joy on their child’s face.

Underwhelmedgivitis: the fake smile frozen on the face of someone who is pretending to like their Christmas gift.

Falalalalalalalalaryngitis: sore throat condition after singing too many Christmas carols.

Bluesprucespringsteen: listening to The Boss’s music while decorating the Christmas tree.

Boxingdaylateralepicondylitis: the inflamed elbow condition experienced fighting the crowds for the after-Christmas sales

Chestnutsroastingbyanopenfirehazzard:  when your husband stands too close to the fire after too much eggnog.

Felineornamentaldistress: the frustration of yet another Christmas tree ornament broken by the cat

Voldemortgage: The bank loan you must take out to take your kids to Harry Potter World for the holidays.

Mistletoethreesixtydegreeturnoff: the move you make when you find yourself heading for an unwanted  mistletoe encounter *Yes...I realize that it should be 180 not 360...but I was under pressure man! Give me a break! :)

Gunativity: the culture of putting guns before religion and children (*I actually left this one out. The Sandy Hook inspired tweet was hardly funny)

Canadposttraumaticstressdisorder: the condition of having suffered the LONG lineups at the post office before Christmas.

Showgirlsilverfantail: the long pieces of tinsel that hang from the cats bum, like a dancer from Vegas, after ingesting, but failing, to completely get rid of it. 

Twilightheadedness: headache incurred after a back-to-back, vampire saga marathon over the holidays

Gangnamstylepotroastsupper:  when your mother’s holiday roast tastes like horsemeat 

Bilbobagginskeddadlemania: the unexpected journey teens take when they hurriedly flee the table and escape doing the dishes after holiday meals.

Ladygagamaggot: how I felt when  a half formed chick came out of an egg I was using for our Christmas  morning omelets.

Fivegoldenlordoftherings: after seeing The Hobbit, the inability to avoid using LOTR references in any and all manners of speech or song during the holidays.

TheodorSeussGeiselObsessionitis: the inability to stop making up Suesstivusisms for Canada Writes!

Great way to stimulate the brain. Now to learn how to STOP thinking about it! aarrgghh!

 

denisesevierfries.com

I've opened a whole new can of worms.

Life wasn't complicated enough, so I decided to put my 'children' out in the storefront window.

http://www.denisesevierfries.com/

ELEVENTEEN

The birth of a story.

One night while tucking my youngest child in bed, we went through our usual routine of bedtime stories, hugs, kisses, etc…and when I was leaving the room, she called to me and said, “Mama, I love you SO much!”

For fun, I replied, “How much is so much?” and she began to count off on her wee fingers,

“I love you 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 9, 13, 11-teen!”

It was one of those flash-freeze moments that tattoo themselves permanently to your heart. I think every mother has a moment or ten like that for each of their kids held safe inside and it keeps us warm. I remember thinking to myself as I shut off her light and walked out the door, that if I had to write a test to get into Heaven, this would be one of the questions. Proof my life was well-lived and well-loved.

So the premise of my little book was born and I wrote it way back in 2003, and not knowing who would publish or buy a non-denominational story about Heaven, love and children, it has been gathering dust on a shelf ever since.

But now, with the advent of ebooks and Smashwords publishing, I have put it for sale online and hope it takes flight.

Here is the link and the descriptions…I hope you help to spread the word!

Short description

You will have to write a test to get into Heaven. Who knew? And you have to have a perfect score! What is the Key to writing this test? Tad Carson hadn't a clue. He didn't even know where he was or what to do. But God knew the answers. And Tad found out. So will you. This is a story of Faith, Love, and Heaven. It is a story for the whole family, about family. A small book with a big message.

Extended description

Tad Carson is a man who has discovered that he must write a test to enter into The Kingdom of Heaven…and he needs a perfect score! As unlikely as it seems, it is very easy to pass and he is not the only one who has to take it. Certain people will find it a joy to write, and others will find it a burden and a condemnation. Do you know the Key to Salvation? If you are a parent or guardian, you might be judged by a different standard than others.

Sometimes it is the little things in life that matter the most.

This man's Final Journey may be the one that helps you with yours.
 

BITING THE E-BULLET

I did it! I self-published one of my books and it is now buried deep within a pile of about 999,999,999,999 electronic novels.

I am so proud. How many people can boast that! Well…about 999999999998 authors, but you know what I mean. Here is the link:

I wrote a story about a woman who is looking for her birth mother and gets to know her anonymously through her online blog. It is a fictional character, but I made her my long lost daughter and I am the mother she gets to know through this very blog you’re reading now!

Here is the short description of my book as found on SMASHWORDS, the online e-book publisher:

What if the first time you met you mother was on her blog. Anna Maria Fortier is a woman who survived childhood at the hands of abusive adoptive parents. She finds her birth-mother online, writing a blog called Parca’s Chosen, which gives Anna a clear insight into the happy home she should have been a part of. As she recounts her own life she is bitter, but begins to heal. Is it too late for them?

The cover art (by my talented Fine Arts Graduate daughter Chaelan Sevier!)

The extended description:

Anna Maria Fortier had only one purpose in life while growing up. She was to obey her abusive parents implicitly. And she did. Until something happened that made her realize how perverted they really were.

She worked in their Salvation Army Thrift Store and rang the bell for donations from the day she was old enough to hold it by herself. The mean streets of Akron, Ohio were her playground and the only friends she was allowed were those who lived on them. It was hard to miss love and caring in your life when you’ve never had it, but the day Anna Maria found out she was adopted, she began to hope that there was a way out of her miserable existence. Maybe she was worth something after all.

Anna Maria escaped her foul life when she was16 and fought hard to made it on her own.

Twenty years later, she was ready to connect with her birth mother. A Canadian! But at the last minute, Anna Maria backed out and decided too much time had elapsed. What good would come of anything now? Best to let sleeping dogs lie.

However, her boyfriend Brennan had other ideas. He found her birth mother online, writing a blog called Parca’s Chosen, and Anna Maria found she was able to meet her mother after all…without having to actually meet her. She had brothers and sisters who talked to cats and a German stepdad who didn’t know the difference between buying and wearing women’s underwear! Reading about the crazy antics and happy, privileged lives of those she was a part of, but never really a part of, made her confused and uncertain.

Through Anna Maria’s in-depth recounting of her own life's experiences as she reads through the blog, we see the journeys (often comical and sometimes brutal and heartbreaking) of two women who were separated by circumstance, and who now have the chance to reunite through the world of the internet.

Maybe it really was time to meet this woman who she was getting to know on the sly. The more she read through the funny and oft time’s poignant blog posts, the more Anna Maria began to forgive her mother for abandoning her. But you would never know it by the nasty comments she left.

This had the potential for a happy ending. Or just an ending.

__________________________________________________

If I should get lucky and sell well, let me just say right here and now that NO! This is NOT a memoir or true story! I did not give up a child at age 16...it's pure fiction. The only reality in this book is my blog and it's posts. OK? Okay.

Happiness would be me having to defend this statement on Oprah or on TV. That would mean success!

SO…if you please, download a copy of my book (you can use an e-reader or just your computer) and enjoy! And pass along the word! It IS an adult book, so no under 17 readers please. The link again is :

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/220931

I promise you I am not a deranged, twisted sick person…I just know a lot of them. 

CHEERS and THANKS!

A CLOSE ENCOUNTER OF THE ORANGE KIND

Something happened recently that requires purging and sharing, so purge and share I shall do...

Most mornings, after dropping our daughter off at school, I drive to Point Holmes, our local car park/ocean walk/boat launch area which is a quick 2 minutes from the school. I just sit and relax for 10-15 minutes, watching the seagulls fly around, and boats putter about the lovely expanse of emerald waters of The Georgia Strait. It's a great way to fill the lungs with salty fresh air and expel the groggy demons of the night...and start the day right.

Point Holmes beach is quite long, stretching on for miles, and the parking or sitting areas spread along the shoreline give ample room for private moments, with a wide open berth conducive to not getting in anyone's face or invading their bubble, so to speak.

We ocean-ooglers and salt-air suckers like our space.

This particular day, it was a tad windy outside and I decided to find a good angle to park facing the ocean, stay in my little car and just roll down the window. The beach was completely dead and there wasn't a soul around, land or sea (which was very unusual), so I chose a perfect position and cut the motor. The rising sun was gorgeous but bright, so I lay my head back, closed my eyes and took a deep breath, trying to convince myself that the sharp tang of rotting fish and seaweed that sometimes rolled off the tide was actually quite ...um...'invigorating'. Like a nasal mud bath.

It was after a few solitary moments of peace that I heard the crunch of wheels on gravel. A vehicle was pulling in close to me on the passenger side, and parking. Ah well, I thought ...no harm done...there are always a few people out jogging, seeking calm or Tim Hortoning around this place. Out of curiosity, I cracked open an eye and lazily peeked over to see who else was sharing my prime view.

Imagine my initial surprise when I noticed that the car that had parked next to me had REALLY parked next to me. It was only two hand spans away. It was a wonder it hadn't scraped my door. I closed my eye and thought about that for a second. Then I opened both eyes and took a better look.

Now imagine my next surprise when I realized that the car next to me was orange, the same color as my wee Tigger (we always name our cars...makes them family) and not a common color on the roads around our little town. It looked to be close to the same make and model as well (ours is a KiaRio5), small, compact, new-ish and 4 door. It wasn't exactly the same, but very close. Hmmm...

I turned to look back at the water again, my mind humming with a 'this is so weird' sensation; but not quite an alert. I scanned the parking area and beach again and nope...nobody around. Just two small co-joined twin orange cars. How funny this would look to a passerby, I thought with a half-smile.

 Then my smile faded as my Spidey-senses started to tingle.

I was alone, on a lonely beach with a stranger parking up my ass in a copy-cat car. They had popped my bubble! Were they just sociable and needed to be 'near' someone? Did they think they had to park in some particular order? Had someone been following my habits and plan this to freak me out...or worse? The latter seemed crazy even to me. Who would buy a orange car just to play a joke or kidnap me? Neither option was profitable. My imagination was on over-drive and I needed to take it down a notch.

After half a minute, I decided to get a good look at the driver and see if the natives were hostile. A friendly wave or a kind smile would surely put me at ease and I could lay back and continue my daydream about wild jungle sex with Sean Bean (dressed as Boromir from Lord of The Rings, of course) which is how I usually like to start my day. I bent over and took a quick gander to the right, hoping I wouldn't embarrass him/her or myself by looking snoopy or psychotic.

The driver was alone, sitting ramrod straight in her seat and staring unblinkingly straight ahead at the ocean. She looked middle-aged and had short gray hair and wore a black top. I sat back quickly and swallowed hard.

I have short gray hair and was wearing my favorite black top. And I hate to admit it, but I too am considered middle aged. And I was aging quicker by the second!

Holy shit! That was beyond weird! My Spidey-senses were on full alert now and bells were ringing in my ears! I tried not to panic and thought to myself that coincidences happened all the time (and more often that not to me, especially, come to think of it) so best not to get so carried away. Maybe I should pop out and knock on her window and share the amazing coincidence of it all. It would make a good story for us both to share with friends!

But my heart started to thump and scream like a crowd at a bullfight and my 6th sense gave me a sharp bird-kick to the forehead: HELLO? Aren't you supposed to trust me? Same car; same hair; same clothes; same ocean.  POPPED BUBBLE!!!

I decided to check her out one more time and see if she made eye contact. It was just a woman in a car for God's sake. I was being ridiculously paranoid. I had been so careful making the initial peek look nonchalant and casual, I didn't remember many details, so I made a bargain with myself: if she looked friendly, I would be mature and stay put to enjoy the rest of my respite. If there was anything else 'Denise' about her, then bye-bye.

Nervously, I re-adjusted my gold rimmed glasses and turned to take a bold Kodak look at the woman next to me and lo and behold...the straw that broke the camel's back hit me straight in the face: she was wearing glasses. Were they gold-rimmed? My eyes froze in their sockets so I don't recall.

I don't know about you, but I don't need to be hit with a baseball bat  to take a hint. Heart firmly stuck in my throat, I smoothly turned to my ignition, switched it on, backed up gently and got the Hell out of there as fast as humanly possible without laying rubber or giving Tigger a heart attack. I checked my rear view mirror all the way home and sat in my driveway completely unhinged for about 10 minutes before I could get out and go in the house. What in all that is Holy was that all about? A coincidence bordering on insanity...like getting struck by lightning twice or buying winning million dollar lottery tickets 3 times in a row? (*or nobody discovering that Tori Spelling and Dennis Rodman are actually twins separated at birth?). Was there a Mother Ship hovering somewhere watching to see if their bait was going to catch any curious and STUPID humans? Makes one wonder...

Over-reaction? Perhaps. Immature? Maybe. Twilight Zone/Freaky Friday-like. Absolutely. What would YOU have done?

Personally, I'm just happy I didn't bespoil myself and ruin a good pair of pants. However, that might have convinced the aliens that I wasn't much of a catch after all and they'd have tossed me back.... 

A GIANT, RUSTY INFLUENCE (re-posted by ROGER EBERT on his FB page: see bottom of post!)

I’ve just had an epiphany. A retro-revelation, as it were. 

An unexpected foray onto Youtube left me seriously starting to reflect upon what invisible hands shaped the lump of me that became me.

If I were to get one of those social media, wanna-get-to-know-you-better questionnaires that say ‘TELL ME 5  FACTS ABOUT YOURSELF’, I would write:

1)      I am a huge Harry Potter fan, largely in part because of the Camelot-ish atmosphere and castles: the giant Hagrid is a clear favorite character of mine (and second only to Snape, who I would have sex with on my mothers dining room table during Thanksgiving supper if he asked).

2)      I collect roosters, but call then chickens. (Sounds funnier).

3)      I love miniatures.

4)      I enjoy classical music and medieval type folk songs (e.g. Loreena McKennitt)

5)      I am a romantic and was a far-too-clingy girlfriend in my day…but I was usually the ‘dumper’ and rarely the ‘dumpee’.

This random list is ‘me’... unexplored; constant. But fast forward to 10 minutes ago when, suffering yet another 3:00 a.m. bout of sleeplessness, I spontaneously decided to go on YouTube and seek out some old videos of childhood shows. Perhaps I could drift back into my childhood and remember how it felt as a kid to"Go to bed!" and actually sleep!

Living in a small town in Southern Manitoba, we had only two TV channels. Damn lucky to even have a TV! My strongest memories were of Hockey Night in Canada, newsman Linus Westberg from Yorkton, The Beverley Hillbilies, Ed Sullivan with Topo Gigo, Get Smart and Mr. Dressup. 

I adored Casey and Finnigan in Mr. Dressup.That Tickle Trunk was a right proper miracle! I quickly found an old clip.

But instead of clicking on it, I noticed another video of an old children’s show that I grew up with…a show I hadn’t thought of in over 40 years but had watched daily in my formative years in the 60's: The Friendly Giant. I loved that show and its theme song was the first music I remember…and the first song I learned the lyrics to. For those of you who don’t know the show, here is a quick preview of how many of us Canadian Baby Boomers spent our extremely limited TV watching hours: *watch closely, there will be a pseudo-quiz afterwards…

 Did you notice the following?

1)      A castle. Medieval, complete with moat and drawbridge.

2)      A giant who is gentle and loves animals.

3)      A rooster named ‘Rusty’.

4)      A miniature cozy living room with miniature everything in it.

5)      The opening and closing theme music is classical/folk mix with a decidedly haunting melody. This theme song is oft times called ‘Early One Morning’ but is actually titled "The Forsaken Lover". The lyrics begin…

“Early one morning,
Just as the sun was rising,
I heard a young maid sing,
In the valley below.

CHORUS:
Oh, don't deceive me,
Oh, never leave me,
How could you use
A poor maiden so?”

I admit that this is as far as I ever sang it, but I knew the words verbatim at age 4 regardless of what the hell they meant.

Are we seeing a pattern here? I sure did. The second I heard that tune playing and saw the castle drawbridge open, it was like my entire world made more sense. So THAT is where I formed this love of such odd things! It brought me to tears. Not the ear-shattering, heart-rending cry and complete agony one felt when Donny Osmond got married, but the light eye-dampening of yesteryear reminiscences. A wistful whimper.

And WOW!, the 'love'm and leave'm before they leave you' routine I subconsciously followed during my dating years seems like it was taken from the chorus of 'The Forsaken Lover'. What would Freud say about all this?

As I shook my head and smiled inwardly, I wiped my eyes and wondered, in enlightened awe, at the serious influence a children’s show can employ. Then two powerful ideas broke through my mist of nostalgia:

1)      Thank God we only had 2 channels and the only other show I now remembered watching faithfully was The Bugs Bunny Show, which explains my fondness for black and white, Sylvester-like cats (a pic I took of our little Jasmine is below):

                                                    

And it also explains my partiality to full-head-of-hair-challenged men like Elmer Fudd (you’d have to meet my hubby to see what I mean). My embarrasing rooster fascination, personified in the infamous Foghorn Leghorn, now made perfect sense as well! 

     Most surprisingly, my first taste of opera was slipped into my psyche with the following Bugs Bunny episode. Opera truly changed my life forever, as I met my husband whilst singing chorus with him for 13 years in an opera company in BC.

Watching this as a child, how was I to know my heart had just been prepped for my future happiness?

2)      My kids and their buddies grew up watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Dragonball Z, Transformer: Beast Wars and Pokemon. All aggressive, violently competative (in a Good vs Evil kinda way), winner-takes-all kids' shows that all had tiny slivers of high-morality embedded here and there between blood-spitting, head-exploding, torture-glorifying, save-the-world fights.

Conclusion? Our childhood shows molded us FAR more than we ever knew! It's a jarring reality.

Conclusion of the Conclusion? Honey, we are in grave danger. 

The upcoming generation is a highly desensitized army of warped war-mongers who have no problem with talking turtles; stealing spaceships that look like Hoover vacuums on steroids; brutal military tactics; misogynistic, sexless aliens that give birth by barfing up their eggs, and emotionless androids that can shoot fireballs from their hands and randomly chop up bodies and/or explode planets. 

And they are locked and loaded, ready to rumble. I should know. Apparently I helped warp them.

                                                                               **

_______________________________________________________________________

AFTERTHOUGHT: The novel I recently wrote is called Parca’s Forsaken (click for link). Remember the name of The Friendly Giant's theme song? ‘The Forsaken Lover’. How’s that for an eerie coincidence. Or a sign?

ROGER EBERT RE-POSTED THIS BLOG ON HIS OWN FB PAGE! MANY MOONS AGO BUT STILL A THRILL.

WHAT?

My amazingly sweet mother passed away on February 23, 2011 and grief has so clouded the joy I usually find in life that I haven’t been able to even think of Blogging…but the giggles are slowly coming back. And it seems fitting that my Mom is the reason for this. How can I think of her without remembering one particular conversation we had just a short while ago…

 Mom turned 85 years old in 2010 and although it was progressively difficult to speak to her on the phone (she 'lost' her dreaded hearing-aid fairly often), I phoned her about three times a week anyways. She was in Manitoba and I was on the coast of British Columbia and it was a 60+ hour drive there and back… a torturous journey I couldn’t manage too often. There were too many years in-between visits and I missed her a lot.

Once I called her after having already spoken to her the previous day, and this was how our conversation (and I use the term loosely here) went:

MOM: Hello?

DENISE: Hi Mom! It’s Denise. (*she had 6 children and we all sound similar, so introducing ourselves from the get-go was always advisable)

MOM: Who?

DENISE (louder): Denise! Your favorite daughter! (*my standard line that she always scoffed at; I knew she would recognize that, if not actually me.)

MOM (laughing): Deneezy? You again? You’re just like a little mouse peeking around the corner all the time! I can’t get rid of you!

DENISE (being silly): I’m just here for the cheese!

PREGNANT PAUSE

MOM: What cheese?

DENISE (louder): You said I was a little mouse and I said I was just there for the cheese!

MOM: What mouse?

DENISE (much louder): You called me a little mouse…

MOM (indignantly): A mouse? We don’t have a mouse in the house? Who told you that?

DENISE (feeling like she’s in a ‘Who’s On First?’ comedy sketch): I didn’t say you had a mouse, I said you called me a mouse, and I said I only wanted the cheese…

PREGNANT PAUSE #2

MOM (exasperated): I don’t understand what you mean.

DENISE (very loud): Mom...never mind, I was just joking. There is no mouse.

PREGNANT PAUSE #3

MOM (putting the phone down and calling out to my brother who was in the next room): Ken! Come find out what the hell Deneezy is talking about. I don’t know why, but she thinks we have mice…

KEN: What's going on?

DENISE (explains the entire scenario and they howl with laughter): Okay…now can you please explain to Mom what I said?

KEN (shouting): Mom! You didn’t tell me you had a mouse in the house! I’m leaving!

It was always a crap-shoot to whether or not Mom was wearing her hearing-aid when I called, and we had many a classic conversation like the one above. Frustrating? You bet. Maddening? Sometimes. But I tell you, I would give anything to hear her not-hearing me just one more time…