My Love Affair

"To be a great writer, one must first develop an intimate, sultry love affair with the written word." ~ Rebecca Reece 2004

(Grover, age 2 weeks)

I have often been asked about the books that have influenced me, and why I read so much. This will, perhaps, explain my love affair with the written word, and how it began...

As a young woman, my biological mother was a bookworm. Warn, mildewed copies of 'The Bobbsey Twins', 'Happy Hollisters', 'Trixie Beldon', and 'Nancy Drew', and 'The Hardy Boys' were all her influence on the bookcases of my very early childhood. My big brother taught me how to read from the Bible when I was just 3; I was young enough when I learned that I honestly don't remember not knowing how to read!

My five brothers and sisters and I raised one another; we all have different fathers, and our mother was mentally ill, and abusive due to her illness. Books were a lovely escape from the abuse and loneliness of being a child in my home; I devoured every book I could get my hands on.

One of the battles that mother fought was with depression; she would often spend days at a time in her bed reading. As a result, there were innumerable volumes of paperback fiction available. Whenever we moved (something we did a lot) one of the first things that happened in each new house was the installation of rows and rows of standard-and-bracket shelves to hold the boxes and boxes of books. I read them all.

It was fortunate for me, I think, that she was not the type to read romance novels, but I cannot look at a copy of Stephen King's 'It', however, without the same heat of fear washing over me that had overtaken me when I read it for the first time at the tender age of 10.

I fell in love with my favorite book to this day, 'To Kill a Mockingbird', when I was just 8 years old. I was held captive by the reality that my brothers and sisters and I were not alone in the injustices of life. I was also endeared to the characters because I found it terribly romantic that Scout and Jem had a father and no mother; with my mother's boyfriends in and out of my life more often than the changing of the seasons, my deepest, secret wish as a little girl was to have a father.

My first taste of Hemingway's work was at the age of 11; it was a collection of short stories, including 'The Three Day Blow'; there was something about the way the words fit together to create descriptions so real that I felt that I was in the cabin with that boy, feeling the pressing of the storm outside, and the warmth of the fire inside.

My favorite Hemingway (can there be just one?) is 'A Moveable Feast'. Upon reading 'Feast', I knew that I wanted to be a writer, and that I would, one day, make it to Paris and sit at the cafes where Hemingway sat, and suss out a book or two there.

I am thankful to have been lucky enough to have had my eyes opened at such a young age to the happiness, sadness, fear, magic, and complete joy that the written word holds in its' pages. At the end of my life, after I have passed many tests, and overcome many things, and experienced my life, my only complaint to God will be: "I didn't finish my list of books!"

*To Kill a Mockingbird image from www.art.com; Trixie Beldon image from www.abebooks.com, Moveable Feast image from www.log24.com

Leave a comment with your favorite book, and why.

See what's on my bookshelf: Rebecca Reece's Books

Look At Me!

When I was a teen, and later, an adult, I was involved with an organization called Western Youth Development (WYD) (I was first a participant, and later served as their Grant-Writer.) WYD ran weekend YES (Youth Empowerment Skills) trainings for “at-risk youth,” age 13 to 18 (many of the participants were either labeled as “troubled,” in the foster-care system, or court-ordered to be there.)

We participated in numerous activities/exercises that were meant to boost communication skills, relating with others, and self-esteem and self-empowerment. One of the exercises was called “Look at me!” During “Look at me!” we all stood in two lines facing in; each person had a person across from them, and the exercise was to look into one another's eyes. Out of all of the exercises that we did, this was often the most difficult!

After a long while, this exercise got easier and easier, but it always started with uncomfortable laughter, bad attitudes, and for some, complete refusal to participate. After the initial “shock” of having someone look directly at you, and looking directly at another person, some of the youth got very emotional.

Looking into the eyes of another human is a very personal, intimate thing. Something I learned through my experience with WYD was that by making choices to be platonically intimate with other people, I felt more fulfilled, stronger as a person, and able to have conversations on an equal level with others. It was, in a word, empowering!

Not only are you empowered and confident when you give good eye contact, but the other person feels respected and listened to.

Whether you are trying to grow your business, relationships, or just grow yourself, eye contact is more important than the smile, the hand-shake, or the words that accompany them,

With so many in this world these days with a craving for intimacy, perhaps mere eye contact can begin to spread the kind of fulfillment that will seep into and fill in the vast crevices that self-esteem falls into!

Look at me; I will look back at you!

The Cover-Letter

I recently applied for a job as a Part-time Moderator & Marketing Associate for a social networking site. When I finished the cover-letter, I thought it was worth posting here...
I am Rebecca Reece. I am a wife, a mom, and a wicked good cook! One the side, I am an inventor; I invented The GumSpa, and I am a (budding) Web Designer (I authored both www.thegumspa.com and www.builderjames.com, as well as having bids out for a couple more), and I am a Writer, and have turned my love for writing into becoming an avid Blogger and Social Networker.
My five favorite websites, that is, the ones I frequent the most (not counting Facebook, MySpace, Shelfari, or Twitter because we will get to those in a moment; and with the exception of online bill-paying and banking, two evils that must be stopped...) are as follows:
www.helium.com This is where I write articles, and read and rate other people's articles
www.merriam-webster.com This is the site I always have open on a spare tab for those words I just cannot remember how to spell, or to find a word that is a outside of the realm of cliche. (Add cliches to to the list of evils that must be stopped as well!)
www.playlist.com Project Playlist is the where I love to browse for, and listen to music that gives me a musical muse to write. I love being able to find songs from high school or childhood at Project Playlist. especially when writing a story/blog/article from then; music really does take you back to a place of ago, (so do smells, but sometimes it's difficult to recreate the smell of a farm inside my office, where so many of my (mis)adventures happened as a kid!).
www.webmd.com I love the availability of having illnesses, diseases, and disorders right here on my screen whenever I may need one! Whether I am writing an article, making suggestions to a friend, or looking up something interesting to afflict one of my characters with; Web MD has been the best site for all of my medical research needs!
www.writersservices.com This is the best site that I have found for finding the 'just right' quote on any topic that I may need. Sometimes I am able to find a quote here, and turn it into a thesis statement for a short piece I am writing. Often, I just like to see what other people have said about someone or something that I might relate or debate with.
Here are my Social Networking and Blogging Sites:
MySpace
Facebook
Reece's Pieces(Blogger) (you are here!)
Shelfari
Urbis
Twitter
And finally, I write and edit a newsletter for my husband's remodeling business, Build It!, you can view the newsletter here:
Build It! The Newsletter
Also, I write for, and keep up the blogs for my husband's business.
The Blogging Builder
Build It! The Blog
Build It! on Merchant Circle
Ultimately, I love what I do! I love being "in the know" (there is one of those dreaded cliches again) about events going on in the news, and what people think about those events. I have been known to offer my opinion, humble may it be, about products, services, or businesses that I have used. I enoy spreading positive thoughts and encouragement, and can often be found skipping through the Internet passing out compliments, insight, constructive criticisms, and even the occasional chain of daisies!

Saint Valentine's Day

I am not, nor have I ever been a fan of Valentines Day. My husband and I don't share in the "tradition" of making Valentine's Day a time to spend money on one another, or on anyone else. The commercialism of days (Christmas, Easter, Valentine's Day, etc., etc., etc.) that were meant to memorialize and remember, have turned the real reasons for these holidays into another spending-frenzy!

I don't send cards out on Valentine's Day, but often receive them; I AM thankful for the people who remember me, though. This year, I got a card from my wonderful Aunt Doris (who is always thinking about others!) and I thought I would share the content of the card here, because it is the first Valentine's Day card that I have received that I have really enjoyed. On it, is the story of Saint Valentine.

The Story of Saint Valentine

Ancient Rome was not a thriving city with all amenities as it is today. When Rome was founded, there was wilderness all around and the dense jungles were natural habitats of fierce wild animals. One animal that particularly should be mentioned in this context is the wolf. Countryside, in the infant city of Rome, abounded with fierce wolves who made mince meat of any human daring to enter their territory. But the Romans had Lupercus who looked after the poor innocent shepherds and their flocks of sheep. So to honor the God who does so much for them all through the year, ancients Romans celebrated Lupercalia in mid February. There was a great feast and young people mixed freely with each other in the hopes of getting a suitable bride or groom for themselves. Therefore the association of spring and love in the minds of mankind sprung in the pagan days.

Gradually with the passage of time and advent of a Christian society, love took on another dimension and meaning. If Lupercalia encouraged eroticism, then Valentine celebration is about more tender higher love which glorifies in sacrifices. There are many versions of Saint Valentine story and it is easy to get confused. There were at three Saint Valentines who may have or may not have anything to do with love. But the most accepted Saint Valentine story is about an ancient priest, St. Valentine.

He was chaste himself but that did not make him shun those who gave in to the most common failing (if it can be so called) of the human mind, love. Emperor Claudius II decreed that no young men should marry, as he realized that marriage and families made them reluctant to join the army. But how can the society move forward with so many unmarried people teeming with resentment and frustration?

St. Valentine performed secret marriage ceremonies in dungeons and other obscure places, with only the bride and groom apart from the priest present. Such activity obviously endeared him to the youth of the society, but the blow fell with Claudius coming to know of this practice. He was imprisoned before being beheaded on 14th February. There is a very tender story regarding the death of St. Valentine. The jailer's daughter apparently fell in love with him and visited him everyday in jail. She was cured of her blindness by the saint, but whom destiny had decided to part, what can any mortal do? The bereft girl received a message from him signed “from your Valentine”, on the eve of his death.*

Knowing the story of Saint Valentine, we as a family are going to start a tradition of having a family dinner (nothing commercially fancy, mind you!) and talking about the things that we love about one another. We will remember why we fell in love, how we stay in love, and reflect on our favorite ways of sharing love.


*source: http://www.mydearvalentine.com/saint-valentine/saint-valentine-story.html
source of heading heart picture: http://www.mackenziewhitetrust.org/images/Two-Pink-Hearts-lg.gif

One Day More

In the months following the death of my mom I used to have vivid dreams about her. There was never anything spectacular in the dreams; we weren’t skydiving over an ocean of grape jelly or anything (yes, I have actually dreamt that before, which, of course is an absurd concept… I would never skydive!) But we were sharing routine time together.

In one of the first dreams we were in the basement of our old house sorting hot socks out of the dryer; most of the socks were white, but still, it seemed that not many of them matched. We stood side by side in silence, sorting through the socks and folding the obvious pairs together, and setting aside the orphan-socks in a growing pile.

“This is stupid,” I said as I tossed more socks on the orphan-sock pile. “Half of these socks don’t even fit together, why did we even wash them? We should have only put pairs into the wash to begin with, and then we wouldn’t have wasted soap; we should just throw them in the trash bin!” I tossed a sock, yellowed from over-bleaching on the top of the pile.

Mom didn’t look up or say anything; she just kept sorting and folding, her rings clicking together the way they always did when she and I did horrid-looking latch-hook projects together on Saturday afternoons in the Winter.

I was frustrated with her silence, so I threw the next sock with more force than I needed. and it flew over the pile and slid into the crack between the wall and the dryer; I grabbed at it and missed, barely feeling the warmth of the cotton before the sock disappeared. I turned to roll my eyes toward mom in a “that figures” sort of way.

She was gone.

The basket of matched socks was gone as well; it was just me and the pile of miss-matched socks on top of the dryer. A wave of grief hit me hard enough to wake me from sleep. I sat up in bed and cried deep, heaving sobs knowing that she was really gone.

I sometimes wonder what, if anything, the socks meant. Sometimes I imagine that the socks represented all of the foster-kids she took in, myself included, and how she “put us through the wash” instead of letting us be “tossed in the bin.”

I also wonder how much valuable time is lost to being frustrated with one another over things as silly as miss-matched socks. It would be a gift and a curse alike to be cognitive of how short our time with one another really is, so we could get up above all the drama and get on with the business of living. Of loving.

Often I think about the things I would do with mom if I had just one day more: take her out for the perfect meal; sit in the coffee shop on a Sunday afternoon drinking in raspberry mocha's and easy conversation, or maybe a walk on the beach not talking, but just being together. Any one of these things would be spectacular, a blessing, but the truth is, I would do something as simple as sorting socks with her, if given the chance to see her for just a few moments more.

An Actual Rant: Who Moved My Country?

Why? Why must the Big American Puppet (any media outlet in this country) keep broadcasting the so-called "doomed" state of America's financial health; thus doing nothing more than perpetuating that state?
I know how it works: The Government controls The Media, The Media controls The People, and The People control the finances of the country... Wait! "The People control the finances"?
First of all, don't be offended by how much we allow the media to control us; who else has a cupboard full of rice because of the supposed "rice-shortage" a few months ago? (A shortage that, by the way, never seemed to transpire, and seems vaguely familiar to the butter-fat-shortage a decade or so ago which drove the cost of milk, butter, and ice cream to levels that never quite came down again... Hmmm... Perhaps The Dairy Farmers will be the subject of my next go-round.)
What would happen, I wonder, if "we the People" stood up and made financial decisions on our own; smart financial decisions, that is. What would it look like if we stopped buying the bull***t that we are far too ignorant to make these decisions on our own?
There would be plenty of people that would not be responsible, but isn't that the beauty of allowing independent thought and actions: The freedom to experience the natural consequences of choices. From the time we are tiny little Americans, it is the responsibility of our parents/caregivers to hold us responsible by allowing us to reap the natural consequences of our actions, both good and bad. It is how we learn.
It's how we learn; learning is power.
Learning is power.
I get it. If learning is power, and the "powers that be" want to keep the power for themselves, mayhaps we are not meant to learn. Should we stand for this blatant attempt to keep us, "the people" uneducated, poor, and, in light of the fuel situation, immobile?
We do not have to stand for it! Look at what is happening around you, and where you can, affect some change for the better!
Talk to an elderly person, and then listen to them! Teach your children the importance of saving, and take that damn cell phone away! There have been generations and generations of children that have *gasp!* survived without a cell phone; teach them how to conduct face to face communication with respect, and eye-contact!
Let's give our children the gift of hard work, hand-me-down clothes, and community volunteering. Do not give your children an education; give your children the desire for an education that they have to work hard for!
Pick up a book; and for the love of God, shut off the noise of CNN or MSNBC, or whatever media outlet we are allowing at the moment to tell us how much to spend, where to spend it, what to drive, where to go, what to fight for. We are a more intelligent people than that!
The only way to pull this Country out of the state that it is in, is by becoming a country again! Our Country is what we decide it is!
What do you want your country to look like; what are you willing to do to make it so?

Live Victoriously!

Isn't it empowering to realize that the choice to be victorious is up to us? God wants us to succeed; He has given us the desire and ability to pursue it, and it is up to us whether or not to do so.
When my husband and I were at [big-box-books] the other day, I saw a book titled: "You are poor because you choose to be!"
I was offended by that! Why was I offended by a book title? We are usually offended by things that are either abhorrent, or things that speak truths about us that we would rather not face up to.
It is really easy to (excuse the cliche) chalk things up to: Bad luck, the actions of others, being in the wrong place at the wrong time, etc., etc., etc.. However, it is really (really, really!) difficult to accept responsibility for our own failures and short-comings, to admit that: I am here because I chose (blank) over (blank).
Like I said to my husband yesterday: "If I were truly dedicated to finishing my books, I would be up every morning at 4am before the house got up." It is horribly uncomfortable truth for me!
I am finding that the truth behind our circumstances lies within our efforts, or lack thereof.
I am tired of being weak, bitter, and quick to blame others around me for my circumstances. I teach my son that we choose to be angry; people cannot "make" us angry. Good lesson, perhaps I should listen to myself!
I want to be victorious in my efforts: I choose to live victoriously!