Let's Talk Books with Robin Van Auken Robin Van Auken

Tonya Anderson is a writer, sacred therapist, and inspirational speaker. As a mental health counselor, she has vast experience working with people from all walks of life. She has a lot of wisdom to share, and her latest project is one that will make you sit up and take notice.
We're talking about a new book in the works and a course that accompanies it.

My husband, Lance, enjoys giving gifts. He finds amazing gifts, imaginative presents with meaning and symbolism.

For example, when we purchased our lovely house on the river, he knew we had traded in our dream to live on a boat and sail far away. Okay, my dream.

He mounted our ship’s bell—one he ordered for us with the name “Tangent” cast on it (my dream boat’s name)—on a plaque to commemorate the “launch” of our house. On the ship’s bell pull, he sewed two pearls from my wedding dress. These pearls represent the pearls of our life: our children.

Another present was a blue clock carved from fossilized coral and dyed the color of the sea. It was our 35th wedding anniversary and he wanted to mark time with the traditional wedding gift of coral.

Still another present was an amazing mystery game that arrived each month in the mail, a puzzling clue sent by a stranger, and I had to solve the mystery.

History of Writing - Robin Van Auken History of Writing - Robin Van AukenToday is Mother’s Day, and he’s given me yet another amazing gift. This writing set contains a leatherbound journal, a quill pen with extra nibs, a bottle of India ink, a small lamp, a box with colorful wax pellets, and a heavy brass stamp that is engraved with my logo. I can use the stamp and sealing wax to close letters and let people know they are from me.

This stamp, from a company called Nostalgic Impressions, features an outline of my logo, which he copied and sent to them for engraving.

My logo is an elaborate “V” and “A” from the ancient Book of Kells. It represents my married name, Van Auken, but my maiden name is Kelly. The logo is my way of honoring my Celtic Heritage.

This gift for writing and the brass stamp with my seal are a forgotten, or seldom-used, system of communication and I was so touched by his thoughtfulness, I had to dedicate this episode to the history of writing.

Today, I'm talking horses. Our son invited us to visit for the weekend, and join him and his sweetheart at the Charles Town Races in West Virginia.
I'm a huge fan of horses, and the racetrack is attached to a casino, of which I'm not a huge fan. I abhor casinos. It's not the gambling, which I don't partake, but the fact that these are massive, noisy, stinky buildings filled with people and are meant to do one thing - separate people from their money with deceit. I don't mind separating from my money. I'm a bit of a spendthrift. It's the people I mind - they're crammed into one big building, smoking cigarettes and cigars and playing slot machines, huddled over gaming tables, focused on something. I don't know what. I don't get it.
I'm happier outside where the racetrack is next to the turf and the thoroughbreds are walked sedately to the paddocks before ambling to the post. I enjoy seeing the gorgeous animals who receive the best care from their owners, trainers, jockeys and stablehands. Horses are made to run, and those who run fast and free are my favorite.

Janice Ogurcak is the Director of Public Programming and Outreach at the World of Little League Museum.

This museum is to Little League what the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown is to Major League Baseball.

Its filled with significant artifacts that range from serious to frivolous. There is a piece torn from the Berlin Wall when it fell, the badge of a fireman who perished in the World Trade Center on 9/11, a 1970s-era Troll Doll and a patch that flew in space.

Each of these artifacts tell a story — one person’s story — and how they credit Little League with helping them develop the traits of character, courage and loyalty that helped them persevere when difficult times called for it.

Did I mention that Jan is also the author of The World of Little League? It’s a photo book that shares some of the history of Little League Baseball, with a focus on artifacts that can be found at the youth sport’s organization’s museum.

A former newspaper reporter and editor, Jan is a consummate researcher and she loves the art of the interview. She was employed by the Williamsport Sun-Gazette, joining the newspaper’s editorial staff in 1977, then accepting a promotion in 1990 as Lifestyle Editor.

When she accepted the invitation to write the book, she dedicated herself to finding the people behind the artifact and, when possible, talking to them.

Despite the fact that their story can’t possibly fit into the lengthy photo caption, it was important to Jan to listen to it, and to honor it.

She also honors their stories when visitors come to the museum, and she’s able to tell them a bit more about that strange piece of dental work, or the bicycle, or the origami cranes and the Emmy awards.

A museum is a curiosity shop when you don’t have context, and that’s what Jan does best - gives context, and meaning, and accuracy to people’s stories.

I hope that Jan's interview inspires you to listen to someone’s story today. Honor the story by sharing it with others. That’s how we live forever.

Jan is a lucky woman - she has seven grandchildren, who fill her days with happiness. She may not have time to write another book yet, but that time will come. For now, she’s doing the most important thing she can - being a grandparent. I'm envious! She keeps saying she's happy to share, but I haven't opened my door to find a box of kiddies yet.

Spring is supposed to be here, but I live in northcentral Pennsylvania, and it's slow coming. We've had several snow storms in the past few weeks, but the ground is too warm for it to stick around. Then we  endured rain and high winds. I believe the temperatures are rising next week to the 60s, so I'm itching for a writer's retreat.

I like to go on solo writing retreats, isolating myself from the Internet and phone, and the various tasks that get heaped on my shoulders. My husband is heading out of town in a couple of days, traveling to Florida to visit with family, so I could technically set up a retreat here at the house.

But that still leaves the Internet and phone and the classes I'm wrapping up at Lyco. We have three weeks left in the semester, so I can't run away.

Yet. 

I enjoy writing retreats.

During sessions of solitude, periods of silence, or "Time Retreats," we shun life's chattering distractions and simply notice what is left: ourselves.
- Helen Cordes

Last year, I took a solo camping trip and had a great time. I mentioned this on a previous podcast, but it bears repeating. I took my camper and my dog to Bald Eagle State Park, about an hour's drive west of here. No Internet except for the data on my phone. X

Writers don’t always feel inspired to be creative. It’s happened to me. I’d been on a hiatus from my fiction writing career for too long. It wasn’t intentional. I let other tasks and chores get in the way.  I wanted to wrap up a book series and move onto the next one, but I needed to get back into the groove.

I wrote quite a bit on a novel I'm working on, and I read several books. It was a week of peace, hiking the trails with my dog, taking photographs, relaxing around the campfire, cooking whatever I wanted whenever I wanted to, going to bed late and sleeping in.

It's not the first writing retreat I've taken. I journeyed to Virginia with my friend Janice Ogurcak one year, when she had a timeshare vacation to use and her husband wasn't available. We drove to a cabin in the woods in January, and spent sleepless nights listening to the constant honking of migrating Canada geese. We also drove into D.C. to have lunch with her son and my daughter, at Old Ebbit's Grille. Then we toured the National Archives.

I wrapped up my first novel on that retreat, wrapped in blankets and downing kegs of coffee. Come to think of it, that's probably why I could sleep. Not the geese. Jan slept fine.

Writing retreats are great outlets for creativity, and they inspire me to kickstart new writing routines.

What helps even more than retreats are writing sprints. I look at these as mini retreats.

My infatuation with writing sprints blossomed after I attended a workshop taught by Dr. Rachael Hungerford, on “Journal to the Self.” At the short workshop, she armed attendees with tools to journal efficiently. I used her 5-minute and 10-minute writing sprints to break through a stubborn mindset, and was delighted with the feedback.

This is the kind of positive reinforcement you can only get with a challenge. Challenges force us to prioritize, and I needed a reason to quit shuffling between email and social media and my manuscript. I was able to combat this by accepting a simple, short challenge. It had a beginning and an end, and positive results.

It's a win-win situation.

So how about you? Can you take a writing retreat? If not, consider writing sprints. Better yet, create a mini writing retreat wherever you are.

Aren't writing retreats a time of solitude and quiet, when you go away to a secluded location to focus on your writing project?

Yes, but also no.

According to Judy Reeves, author of  "The Writer's Retreat Kit: A Guide for Creative Exploration and Personal Expression," a writing retreat is time you take out of your ordinary day-in and day-out routine, when you set aside everything else and give yourself over to your writing.

Kathy Kolb is the publisher of NorthcentralPA.com, a news outlet that’s been online since 2009, and she’s been steadily growing since then by personally connecting with her readers.

I know, this sounds impossible — how do you connect with thousands of people? She’s accomplished this by building an amazingly loyal Facebook following, which total tops out at 31 thousand people!

Kathy’s been chronically ill for the past 30 years. This illness prevents her from having an active life, physically, but she’s more than made up for it with her online presence.

Before she started her news site, she operated Kolb Net Works, a web design and development company, and she was helpful in creating most of the early websites of local companies, non profits and even government entities.

For many years, along with the J.V. Brown Library, Kathy hosted hundreds of local non-profit websites. I built many of those sites, and I was grateful that she created this absolutely free platform.

But, she always had a vision of what local news should look like online, and when this wasn’t accomplished by other local news organizations, Kathy decided to make this vision a reality. She imagined a community of citizen journalists, people who take ownership of the news and events that affect them, and that’s exactly what she’s created, along with her husband, Lou Kolb.

Kathy wants to make sure that community news is easy to access, but also that it will always be preserved. As traditional newspapers struggle to create new identities and to survive in the Internet age, they can learn much from a web guru like Kathy. She studies the analytics behind the curtain, so she knows what drives people to read and share and respond to online news content.

None of this mattered, though, when she shared her first scanner report. That, she did out of common courtesy to her readers. People were in the dark, literarily because the power was out, and frightened about a high-speed chase between a police officer and a criminal. The tragedy that ensued that night is not easily forgotten, and it shouldn’t be. A person died as a result.

That Kathy was able to share news in real-time was an amazing hat trick, but it was also a gesture of generosity. She takes her role as a news publisher seriously, and loves her hometown. Despite illness and fatigue that comes with it, she devotes herself — and her personal income — to making sure that people can have local news.

By being present, and being consistent, Kathy was able to build her followers. But more importantly, she didn’t just post on Facebook and sign off. She stayed online and updated people when she had updates.

She participated in the conversation and she kept the conversation civil, also, which is difficult to do with a social media platform like Facebook.

I’m a huge fan of Kathy Kolb. She’s a technophile, like me,and we enjoy learning new things and sharing with other what works. She’s a kindred spirit who has helped enlarge my world, and I’m grateful to her.