Pamala J. Vincent shares the driving force behind her desire to write.
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I think I’ve always been a writer or at least a storyteller. As a child, I left my world behind with King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. I wanted to train my own falcon and find a place that would be My Side of the Mountain. Pollyanna inspired me to find the good in every situation, and I dreamed of having a horse like Black Beauty.
As a young mom, romance novels and travel books were escapes when the babies napped or while waiting for a child at a sporting event. The Hallmark movies kept me company while I folded the laundry late at night when the house was still.
One year, while the caretaker of an elderly woman, I began to realize the wisdom in her comments and stories. I knew she wasn’t well, and I felt an urgency to write down all the things she told me so I wouldn’t forget them. It was then I realized she was grooming me to be a better woman, mother and wife. Her tales were centered amidst the plants in my garden, but they became parables for my life.
“Yah, unfortunately when my ship comes in, knowing me, I’ll be at the airport.”
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Following Rosie’s death, I began to write my own Lessons from the Garden stories. My hope is to inspire other women in the stages of ‘now what?’ or child rearing. I’ve collected 400 stories, and they’re still coming as I maneuver through each stage of being a woman.
One day, while sitting with my father-in-law who was dying of cancer, he complimented my writing. He always said, “You’re good, you just need to be able to put more time into it.
I responded by saying, “Yah, unfortunately when my ship comes in, knowing me, I’ll be at the airport.”
He sat up straighter and sternly said, “You be on that dock…be there.”
He changed me. I realized there is power in words. When I struggle to keep going, I hear his words echoing in my head. When he passed away, he left money to pay our house payment for 1 year so I can make it in the writing world without worrying about making bills.
This is me, working to be on the dock.
Photo Credit: Alex/flickr
Good Stuff, Pamala. Your writing always makes me think…and feel. What more can you ask for?