The good in Goodbye

One Meredith Wilson song in the 1962 film “The Music Man,” starring Robert Preston and Shirley Jones, is “Sincere.” Singing it, The Buffalo Bills lament, “where is the sin in sincere, what is good in goodbye?”

Goodbyes can be good.

This is the time of year in Fortrose-Rosemarkie, Scotland, when adult seagulls say goodbye to their young. Hearing the frantic, anxious calls of the abandoned youngsters rips my heart. The baby seagulls don’t understand why parents that have so lovingly cared for them suddenly leave and ignore their agonized cries. Big, fluffy, grey baby gulls walk along the edge of the water and sit on rooftops calling their absent parents. But this time, no matter how gut-wrenching the cries – the parents don’t respond.

I wonder if it is as hard on the parents to ignore the hurt cries of their young as it is on me. If so, they ignore the sharp, biting heart pains and distance themselves – using the wisdom God instilled in them – so the babies will be forced to exercise the feeding and flying skills that the parents have so diligently taught them. If they continued to care for their babies, the babies would continue to live on handouts and never learn self-sufficiency. A winged example of the popular cliché “tough love.”

All parents experience the hurt and learn the benefits of goodbyes when their children are still young. Goodbyes are a part of sending children to school to learn, sending them to visit grandparents and friends, sending them to summer camps…sending them away to universities, jobs, and distant locations. Without the goodbyes, children would never grow into their full potential and learn God’s will for their lives. Goodbyes can be good – but they still hurt.

The longest, hardest goodbye is when someone we love “dies.” It’s been nearly a year since my wonderful, talented son, USMC Major Luke Parker, “died” to this world. Perhaps my deep inner hurt and emptiness magnifies the anguished cries of the baby seagulls and makes me hypersensitive.

Everyone who has ever said goodbye to a loved one who departed from this world, however, has an advantage over those confused, lonely baby gulls. If we are Christians, we know that the separation is temporary. We will join our loved ones again in Heaven with Jesus lighting the way. What an awesome comfort! Death is not an end, it’s the doorway into eternity and the beginning of living a life without pain and loss.

As for the gulls…they are forced to use the life skills they have been taught. They will pass them on to their youngsters. But will they ever see their parents again? I hope so. I really hope so.

http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Shell Decorating

A pub in our area is welcoming students back to university with shell decorating contests and cocktails.

Contest categories include best fingernails, most glitter, most unique tattoos, wildest hair, and most body art – all of which will be left behind when we die. Our bodies are mere shells to hold the part of us that really matters while we’re alive. When we die – the us that is really us – escapes into eternity. Shells are buried. What a sad waste of expense and energy is reflected in decorating shells that will return to dust when we die.

The Bible advises in 1 Peter 3:3, “Do not let your adornment be merely outward…rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God.”

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to make the best of the bodies that God gave us by taking care of them. It honors God when Christians set themselves apart from the rest of the world by separating our appearances from non-believers. But the Bible tells us in 1 Timothy 6:7, “For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.” With that in mind, does it make sense to spend time and money decorating shells?

Shell decorating contests are vain, useless, empty events. As for the cocktails? Alcohol poisons the shells that we spend so much money decorating.

http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Rocks, Roses & Sea Breezes

It was hard when I first arrived in Scotland from Texas, USA. Even though it was “summer,” it was 25 degrees cooler and I went from wearing shorts and sleeveless shirts to wrapping up in three layers of clothes, a coat and a wooly hat.

Cars drove on the wrong side of the road. There were roundabouts – paved circles with no stop signs or traffic lights. Cars spin in and out of roundabouts without stopping and drivers use right turn signals – even though vehicles turn left entering a roundabout. Many roads are poorly marked or not marked at all. Signs are in both Gaelic and English, with the Gaelic on top. Since the lettering is small, it’s nearly impossible to read it.

Meals are called “tea,” so when you are invited over for tea, you don’t know if you’re joining friends for a cup of hot tea (which I don’t drink anyway), or a meal. Cookies are called biscuits and biscuits are scones. Toilet paper is “loo roll” and dish soap is “washing up liquid.” Sidewalks are called pavement. While waiting for a bus, the driver shouted at me, “Get on the pavement.” I was confused because I was standing on the pavement.

Favorite is spelled favourite, color is colour, program is programme, and long lines are called queues. Oh – and dog owners don’t like to have their dogs called “pups” unless they are actually puppies.

Church services are strictly timed to finish within an hour. Songs are usually accompanied by slow, ponderous organ music. Following human traditions is more important than following the leading of the Holy Spirit.

There are virtually no convenience stores and long trips are miserable because of the lack of public restrooms. Once, out of sheer desperation, I hunkered down in the back of a store that hadn’t opened yet, squatting between wire racks. Existing restrooms usually have thick-walled stalls from the floor to the ceiling with such painted-over metal hardware that I never lock the door because when I do – I either cut my fingers or am afraid I won’t be able to unlock it again.

When you order Italian food like lasagna in the U.S., you get hot bread, a salad, the main course, and refills of iced tea or soft drinks. In Scotland…you get lasagna. No refills on drinks.

Words like schedule, proven, resume and laboratory are pronounced differently. Words like garage and aluminum are pronounced so differently that I didn’t know what they were at first.

God brought me to Scotland. He’s helped me bloom. I still say “y’all,” and haven’t said “aye” yet, but I actually invited someone to have “tea” with us – meaning a meal! The hardness and trials have translated into blessings. We live where everything that is green blooms, and everything is green because of the surplus of rain. In any direction one looks, there is no blight, no ugliness. The people are warm, friendly, generous and independent. They remind me of Texas folks.

And my second Miz Mike mystery-romance-suspense is about to be released by Sunpenny Publishing Group, here in the UK. God has transformed hardness and confusion into rose petals and sea breezes.

It is possible to bloom amid rocks and hardness. Trust God to turn the hard circumstances in your life into garden spots.

http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Loof Lirpa & Money in the Bank

While my brothers and sisters were honor roll students, I was a mediocre student, predictably in the middle of my class. Sadly, my high school math average is – F.

However, I loved writing. Writing was the only occupation I knew where you got paid to lie. As a fourth grader, my first check as a writer was for $5 from a magazine that bought my story about the enormous snapping turtle in our pond. There was a snapping turtle. It was a whooper – just like the whooper about how much of a whooper the thing was!

Our seventh grade history teacher assigned us homework over the weekend, a two-page story on the explorer Loof Lirpa, who had discovered America before Columbus. I promptly forgot the assignment until Monday morning when I heard complaints and groans from students who hadn’t written their two-page paper because they couldn’t find information on Lirpa. No problem. I sat down at my desk and zipped out two pages feeling snug that for once – just once – I would be ahead of my class instead of behind them.

Our teacher asked how many people had completed their homework assignment. I proudly raised my hand. I felt like a champ when he invited me up to the front of the room to read my two-page report on the famous explorer.

Then he wrote Loof Lirpa on the board. Under it, he wrote “April Fool.”

Later, when I was a brand new Christian and a single parent, our church scheduled a special offering for building repairs. I desperately wanted to give generously to the project, but I knew that I only had $25 in the bank until my next check – a week away. However, when I sat down and carefully added and subtracted everything, I found an extra $100. Elated, I wrote out a check to the church for the extra $100. A few days later, checks started bouncing. Sure, my math was bad. Sure, I failed math in school. But I had checked and rechecked…and the money should have been there.

I marched into the bank with my check book to show them the deposits. They agreed with me and stopped all the bouncing checks and put money from the bank fees back into my account. They kept my check stub so their financial wizard could solve the conundrum. By the time they found the problem, I had received my paycheck and was in the clear…because the $100 really wasn’t in the account and never had been in the account. One of their cashiers had written a $10 deposit so sloppily that – even to the bank – it had looked like $100. The church got their offering, I got a week’s interest-free loan and no bank charges…God has a sense of humor!

Perhaps the reason I’m so excited about my next Miz Mike Christian mystery-romance-suspense “Bridge Beyond Betrayal,” is that it’s funny. I love humor. Bridge Beyond Betrayal is scheduled for release by Sunpenny Publishing Group on June 30. I can’t wait! I’m going to read it all over again just to get a good laugh!

Hope a lot of folks will buy Bridge Beyond Betrayal and join me in laughter. Besides, I can’t keep adding to the Miz Mike series if the books don’t sell. Even with my limited math skills, I understand that.

Writing, I love it! What other occupation pays liars?

http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

If This is all There is to Life, Why was I Born?

With Easter Resurrection Sunday approaching, it seemed a good time to ask the question: if this is all there is to life, why was I born?

I don’t count my life as a total failure. My dream has always been to be an author and I have six Christian mystery-romance-suspense books published and another one featuring sassy Miz Mike – Bridge Beyond Betrayal – being released this summer by Sunpenny Publishing.

Yet, I’ve never had as much money as other people have; I’ve never driven as new a vehicle as most people do; I’ve never lived in as grand a house as many people do; never been able to spend lavishly on Christmas gifts for other people at Christmas, or buy expensive gifts for others during the rest of the year. Because I haven’t been able to afford it, I’ve never been on a cruise; never gone to Disney Land; never taken a vacation to Greece or Rome or some other exotic place. So if this is all there is to life, why was I born?

I’ve had problems, trials, troubles, heartbreaks and sorrow. Having two abortions forced on me to hide the crime of constant childhood sexual abuse inflicted on me; escaping that abuse and living under a bridge; being cold, tired, hungry and despairing; spending years as a single parent and working two to three jobs to make ends meet; caring for a husband who died from cancer, and the most recent tragedy – the loss of my 37-year-old son in a plane crash. So if this is all there is to life, why was I born?

First of all, I don’t have a patent on hardships. My landscape is not the only one darkened by life’s storms. Job 5:17, written in 1520 BC, states, “A man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward.” Job would know. All in one day he lost everything he possessed on earth, including his children. All he had left was his wife. She told him to curse God and die. Job replied, “Shall we indeed accept good from God, and shall we not accept adversity?”

I am fortunate to have a loving, supporting husband in fellow author Alan T McKean (time travel series The Scent of Home, The Scent of Time) who stands beside me under the darkest clouds as a bright light and never tempts me to tempt God.

Most encouraging, this is not all there is to life. Jesus, the Son of God, was born to a human in human form so that He could experience everything we do as non-deities and set the example of resisting temptation, loving one another, and obeying God. Jesus came to earth to die. After healing multitudes of people from multitudes of illnesses, diseases, injuries and infirmities, He allowed Himself to be lifted up on a cross to die that we might live. Nails didn’t hold Jesus to the cross, love did.

The story doesn’t end there. After three days – after going to hell and wresting the keys of death and hell away from satan – Jesus rose from the grave victorious! Because He lives, we know that we will live again. Death is an illusion. Death is not an ending – it is the beginning of eternal life with God.

Victory in Jesus!

Bring on the sorrows, trials, problems, temptations, illness and hurts. They are temporary. Jesus is eternal.

I’m glad I was born.

http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

God’s Marvelous Sense of Humor

Folks often ask how someone from little ‘ol Bandera, Texas, “Cowboy Capital of the World,” and Scottish Pastor Alan T McKean found each other across an ocean and 3,000 miles apart – and got married. Especially since I can get lost in a shoebox.
The Lord has a marvelous sense of humor. Nothing demonstrates it more than putting two directionally challenged individuals together. We went for a walk in a wilderness park once and wound up on an eight-mile trek because we couldn’t find our way back to the parking lot. We finally got directions from fellow hikers so we could reclaim our vehicle before dark.
After our car was crushed by a taxi in Glasgow recently, we took a bus into Inverness to look for a new vehicle. We had a list of dealerships and addresses in one hand and a map in the other. We confidentially set out on foot to find a new car. Out of a list of seven different places, we never found even one. We got home to find a car in our driveway and keys through the letterbox. While we were on an impossible mission to find a dealership, wonderful Christian friends had decided to give us one of their cars. I can picture God chuckling as He watched us study the map and set off first in one direction, then in another, only to wind up back at the bus station again.
For nearly two years, we’ve made a mile-plus, twenty-minute hike up a steep hill to get to our dog’s veterinarian, because we can’t figure out how to get there in a car. Between the parking lot and the vet’s office, there are several roundabouts and a lot of one-way streets. Signs are small and lettered in both Gaelic and English, which makes them so cluttered that I can’t read them fast enough to react. When you hit a roundabout in the wrong lane and are fenced in by vehicles in every lane around you, you must simply keep driving around and around until you can move over and get off. I have on occasion wound up going back in the same direction from which I had just come! Many streets aren’t marked. When they are, the small signs with faded letters are perched up on buildings, eye level with giraffes.
On our most recent journey to the vet, Angel Joy had to be tranquilized for a procedure. The vet recommended picking her up in the car, because she would be too groggy to walk. We tried. We even bought a new map. We spent hours walking down every road that connected into the one we took to the vet’s office so we could find the right roundabout to take with the car. Finally…still on foot, we spotted a pedestrian trail up a steep hill that looked like it headed in the right direction. Out of sheer desperation, we took it. Five minutes later, we were staring at the vet’s office in amazement! We walked our mostly-recovered Angel Joy down the hill to the car.
God has a great sense of humor. When things get whacky in your life, enjoy a good laugh with the Creator of the universe – Who also invented humor!
And if you need direction in your life, turn to God. Unlike us, He never gets lost!
http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Faulty Hearing

Because of severe ear infections when I was a child, whenever I hear something one way and another person hears it another way – I am almost always wrong.

For example, I can’t tell the difference between Wales and whales. I almost never come up with the correct song lyrics until I see them in print. All my life, I thought that the Popeye cartoon featured a baby named “Sweet Pea” instead of SweePea, and Brutus instead of Bluto. I was totally amazed to discover that the mean non-charmer’s name was Bluto.

I can’t tell the difference between my Texas accent and Scottish accents. My y’all has a tendency to announce my non-native status here in Scotland. The Scot’s frequent use of aye and pronunciation of garage as garerugze, aluminum as alyouminemem, and resume as reezoome would garner attention in the U.S. Even though I can’t tell the difference in accents, I must sound different because I’m always being asked, “Where are you from?”

Nor can I sing. I can’t tell the difference between the way everyone else is singing and the way I’m singing. In elementary school, I was told that I could stand on stage and “sing” with the rest of my class as long as I opened and closed my mouth without making a sound. When I sing in church, I follow voices going up and down on certain words. The music everyone else is following is lost to me, and if the words vary from what I have memorized with the tune (as is so often the case with the Scottish version of hymns), I can’t sing it at all. The only flat I understand is a tire or a piece of ground and sharp means that if I keep messing around with it, I’m gonna get cut.

Recently, I realized what a blessing my faulty hearing is. It has made me more thankful that Jesus came into the world as a baby and grew to manhood, only to be nailed to the cross for my sins and the sins of the world. Before I was a Christian, I mocked the idea that one perfect, sinless Man would need to die for me – or anyone else. I didn’t want someone dying for me. I didn’t ask anyone to. But after I met Jesus in person and asked Him into my heart, spiritual blinders fell away and I realized the beautiful simplicity of God’s plan of salvation and why it is the only fair and just way of determining who goes to Heaven.

If people had to sing their way into Heaven, I’d never make it. If they had to work their way into Heaven, it would exclude anyone who was born with mental or physical disabilities. If people had to achieve Heaven through knowledge, it would exclude people who never had the opportunity to get an education. If people could pay their way into Heaven, it would exclude the poor. Instead, Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Anyone and everyone who asks Him into their hearts is saved and gets to go to heaven – whether they are young or old, rich or poor, whole or broken, talented or ordinary – and no matter what race or nationality they are. The ground at the cross is level.

And fortunately, God hears prayers of the heart and spirit. One doesn’t need a certain accent, a certain formation of words, a certain tone of voice, for God to hear his or her prayer. He smiled at my prayers and answered them even when I used to say, “Our Father Who art in Heaven, hollowed be Your name.

http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Why Winter?

Here on the Black Isle of Scotland, everyone is rejoicing now that the sun is staying visible longer and snowdrops are pushing timid white heads up to look around while royal purple crocuses snap to attention along the sides of narrow lanes. Winter is fleeing, following the freezing breath of snow and ice into last year’s memories.

Some people hate winter. I’ve always hated winter. I hate being cold. I used to mix cement and build with rocks in 100-plus degree temps in south Texas. Ironic that I should now live in Scotland where it rarely makes it to 70 degrees even in the “summer.”

Winter brings cold temperatures that kill people, animals and plants; traffic-snarling storms; massive banks of snow that must be moved, and increased heating costs. So, why winter?

Psalm 74:17 says that “God made summer and winter.” Ecclesiastes 3:1 says, “To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven.”

Winter provides a Sabbath for the land. Most people get at least one day a week off work to rest. Rested employees are less likely to have accidents or get sick. Manufacturing equipment that shuts down for at least one day a week is less prone to malfunctions. Jesus said that people were not made for keeping the Sabbath to please God, but rather, that the Sabbath was made for the benefit of people to give them rest.

I had a lovely rough collie named Scot in the southern U.S. Scot visited nursing homes. He made friends with everyone and everything he met including deer, a wild rabbit, a feral cat, a baby bird, a turtle, a possum, cats in the neighborhood. He was so friendly that even small animals were unafraid of him. Scot got protothecosis; there is no treatment, no cure, and it is 100 percent fatal. Dogs in Scotland don’t get protothecosis. It’s too cold for the cannibalistic algae. Nor are there mosquitoes, fire ants, venomous spiders or a plethora of other aggravating and dangerous insects. This is a winter land. Winter provides surcease.

Tulips must be kept cold to burst into energetic flames of spring color. Peach trees need numbered winter days of extreme cold to ensure a plentiful summer harvest.

Like God’s creation of nature, our personal lives cycle through seasons, from joy to despair, from busyness and fullness to emptiness and boredom. Why winter? Sometimes it takes a cold, barren winter wilderness experience to turn our hearts fully to God. To make us appreciate the benefits He daily loads into our lives. If every step of our path through life was lined with fabulously blooming flowers, we would quickly turn aside to grass.

Before we lament the winter wilderness experiences in our lives, we should read about history’s first recorded Christians in Acts 5:40-41. “They called for the apostles and beat them…and the apostles departed, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for Jesus’ name.”

These early Christians rejoiced in winters – trusting that earthly hardships were short and nothing to be compared to the eternal blessings of Jesus.

We should enjoy spring and let the winter go – but when it comes around again – we should embrace it like an old friend who is walking us into the kingdom of God.

I Didn’t Want to Run Today

I didn’t want to run today. I never do. It’s hard.

Weight control and general physical wellness benefit from running – so I run. Today was no exception; I didn’t want to run. Blessings followed obedience.

First, I met an 88-year-old neighbor who had suffered a stroke. Immediately following the stroke, he wobbled when he walked. Post-stroke challenges were hard. Determined to recover, he set up his own physical therapy regimen – golf. Now he strides along with confidence. Using partly speech and partly sign language, he informed me today that he and his 87-year-old friend play 18 holes four days a week. It was cold and blustery today – but he looked as brightly happy as a spring daffodil.

Then I met a stranger pushing her dad along in his wheelchair and taking their dog on a walk. We stopped and exchanged greetings. As I ran on down the road I reflected on how good and kind people can be. The news is full of bad-sad stories including the threat of war in the Ukraine, child and homeless abuse; alcohol and drug addiction; crooked politics, and violent crimes. Yet, because God’s Spirit is stronger on behalf of good than satan’s is on evil, people reflect God’s mercy and grace.

My most inspirational running discovery was The Trees. Surely had The Trees been given a choice of where they wanted to be planted, they would not have chosen the rocky soil on the side of Moray Firth that is buffeted nonstop by wind and gales. Because the wind has rocked them over the years, The Trees have sent their roots down into the soil so deeply that they can absorb water and nutrients. Needles on The Trees are glossy green with vibrant health. The trunks are solid, twisted into artistic compositions that shout victory over hardship. The Trees have endured hardships.

Hardships are often God’s blessings in disguise. Psalm 119:67 says, “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep your word.”

Some people think I’ve had a had a hard life: sexually abused as a child; nearly dying from two forced non-medically supervised abortions as a teen; running away from home and living under a bridge to escape abuse; being a single-parent and working two to three jobs at the same time; losing a husband to cancer; having my home and property stolen; and most heartbreaking – losing my awesome son, 37, in a plane crash. Yet God has used those trials to shake my roots – like The Trees – and grow me into His pattern, able to face the gales unafraid because I know God is in Control.

Childhood fears and memories inspired my newest Christian mystery-romance-suspense, Fear of Shadows. Sexual abuse and forced abortions inspired pro-life adventure-romance Love’s Beating Heart, which readers have called “inspirational” and “life-changing.”

Between now and March 8, Smashwords is offering both Fear of Shadows and Love’s Beating Heart – FREE.

No one owns a monopoly on hardship. Life is challenging. When hardship knocks, remember that trials are often God’s blessings in disguise – and open the door.

Love’s Beating Heart: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/307104

Fear of Shadows: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/387341

What my Date with Willie Nelson Taught me about Writing

Before Willie Nelson became a household word, he worked as a wrangler at Lost Valley Dude Ranch, in Bandera, Texas, “Cowboy Capital of the World.”

Just out of high school and two years of college, I fell in love with Willie Nelson – at least with his songs. As a writer myself, the simple brilliance of his words resonated with me: Pretend I never happened, Erase me from your mind, You will not want to remember, Any love as cold as mine.

Not knowing it, I broke one of the first rules of writing: write about what you know. I was a 20-year-old kid. I didn’t know anything about anything, so if I wrote anything at all – it had to be about something I didn’t know anything about. My first full-length adult novel (thankfully still unpublished) featured a country-western singer as the protagonist. Not that I knew he was called a protagonist.

Willie Nelson wasn’t my only interview. Local celebrity and bar owner Arkey Blue, of Arkey Blue’s Silver Dollar in Bandera, was kind enough to give me an interview. I’m sure I asked stupid questions. He patiently answered them without telling me how stupid the questions were.

When he was performing at Floore’s Country Store in Helotes, Willie Nelson gave me his phone number. For weeks, I called fruitlessly. Being a Texan, I never gave up. Finally, Willie answered and invited me on a date for an interview.

Willie was married to his third wife, but I was young and stupid – and not a Christian. I wanted to be a famous writer, and I wanted to do it the easy way. Willie Nelson was the ticket. He would fall in love with me, divorce Connie, marry me, promote my books – and I would soon be interviewed by Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show.

When Willie picked me up for the Menudo Festival in San Antonio, he was drunk. I didn’t realize how drunk he was until we hit the winding Texas Hill Country road to San Antonio in the middle or on the wrong side of the road. Fortunately we arrived safely, and I clutched a notebook with answers to my questions. Willie said that when he grew long hair, men with traditional haircuts hated him. When he cut his hair – the “longhairs” hated him even more. I asked, “Are you really as sad as the words to your songs make you sound?”

Willie looked at me with humor glinting from the depths of deeply brown eyes and said, “I don’t think anyone can be that sad. Do you?”

On the way back, Willie asked if I minded if he smoked marijuana. I said, “Yes.” He pulled the car off the road and tried to kiss me. I was shocked. In my dreams, we took long walks, talked, spent more and more time together until he proposed. Even young and inexperienced, I realized the sexual advance was fueled by lust, not love, and would be meaningless and demeaning. When I resisted, he was surprised. “You mean you really are writing a book?”

A few months later, I saw Willie at a restaurant. He was staring at me, so I said, “You probably don’t remember me…” He replied, “Sure I do. You’re the girl who really is writing a book.”

That date with Willie Nelson taught me more about writing than any writing course or writing book I’ve ever read.

Write about what you know. Make characters real. Don’t put them on a pedestal because no one – not even famous people like Willie Nelson – is perfect. Your characters need flaws as well as strengths. Persevere. Never give up. Don’t look for the easy way or try to ride someone else’s fame. Even if that works, it will only be temporary, and you will realize that you cheated. That will rob your sense of fulfillment.

As a Christian, let God write the script. Even if Willie had married me and pushed my writing to success, my life would have been all wrong. He is now 80, living with wife number four. He’s a liberal; I’m a conservative. He drinks. I hate alcohol. He’s an activist for marijuana; I hate drugs. God has His own plan and purpose for Willie Nelson and I am not part of that pattern.

Most of all, if my dream wedding to Willie Nelson had taken place, it would have denied me the joy of raising my wonderful son, Luke, who walked with God his entire life.

Instead, God has blessed me with author husband Alan T McKean (The Scent of Time, The Scent of Home, and the soon-to-be-released The Scent of Eternity). We live in the extraordinary Black Isle of Scotland with such vast and varied scenic beauty that one can look in any direction and never see blight.

It’s taken me 40 years and 150 rejection slips to do it the right way and the hard way, but I am now author of five Christian mystery-romance-suspense books, and one young adult pro-life adventure-romance.

Most importantly, I can stand before God and instead of echoing Frank Sinatra’s song, I did it my way, I can say to my Heavenly Father, “I did it Your way.”

http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

http://goo.gl/o9In3J

http://goo.gl/uvGzRU