Try a Bit Harder, Work a Bit Longer…

With a bit of weeding, digging and replanting, the garden looked nice…except for the dead branches and trunks of a tree along the fence. Our chainsaw will cut butter, but not much else and there are no repair or sharpening services in our area. The handsaw cuts a bit better, but the dead tree trunks were huge in circumference and grown too close together to allow the handsaw to get in between them. With our limited tools, cutting that dead, tangled mess looked impossible.

Enter determination. The same, “try a bit harder, work a bit longer,” that carried me past the agony and despair of receiving 150 rejection slips on different books over the years to eventual success. I now have five published Christian, mystery-romance-suspense books, Bridge to Nowhere (Rose & Crown/Sunpenny Publishing), Love’s Beating Heart, Heart Shadows, Until the Shadows Flee and Shadow Chase. I knew I was a writer. God had put that burning fire in my bones and I could not contain it. But every rejection slip made me quit and give up…briefly – before I remembered to try a bit harder, work a bit longer.

So, too, with the dead wood in the front yard. First the clippers to remove the smaller branches. With scratched and bleeding arms and facing those huge trunks, I started to give up. Then I looked again at the bright green garden tossed with blooming flowers and mocked by one clump of ugly dead tree. The butter-cutting chainsaw came out. The butter-cutting-plus handsaw came out. Then help arrived in the form of my gifted, talented husband (also an author, The Scent of Time & The Scent of Home). He had been out visiting folks in the parish. Still dressed in his clerical shirt and collar (he’s a Church of Scotland minister) Alan began helping. Between the two of us and the two butter and better than butter-cutting saws, the dead wood came out. Try a bit harder, work a bit longer.

Taking out the dead growth was the right thing to do. Besides looking better, the open space allows room to finish edging in front of the beds and trimming the shrubs.But it wasn’t easy. It took trying a bit harder, working a bit longer.

Having five published books was the right thing to do. Without preaching, the characters and action in the books point to God. It is my prayer that they will help readers find their way to the Cross of Jesus. Love’s Beating Heart sends two teens on a wild river adventure to save Baby. The fast-moving adventure upholds marriage, homeschooling and pro-life over abortion. If it saves the life of even one unborn child, I have fulfilled my purpose as a writer. But success wasn’t easy. It took years to achieve and a lot of trying a bit harder, working a bit longer.

When you have a dream or a task that seems impossible, don’t give up! Try a bit harder, work a bit longer.

Broken Dreams

When it was completed sometime after 1893, Rosehaugh House in Avoch, Scotland, was a mansion built to glory. Hundreds of people were employed and provided with the best and highest quality materials to complete the three-story, 60-room mansion with 365 windows, marble floors, Persian rug carpeted walls, painted ceilings, carved wood, and a car-sized fireplace in the billiard room.

The fabulous mansion was demolished in 1959.

Broken dreams. It seems unbelievable that such a rich, historic, and glorious mansion could be razed. The foundation, steps, overgrown gardens and out buildings are all that remain of one man’s dream to build the most splendid mansion in the world. What went wrong?

Death went wrong. Rosehaugh was already a magnificent home when James Fletcher died in 1885. Son James Douglas Fletcher hired famed Scottish architect William Flockhart to take the mansion from splendor to unmatched glory. Then James Douglas Fletcher died. His widow sold the estate in 1953 – and by 1959 – James Douglas Fletcher’s dream mansion had been demolished.

People die. Dreams die. Sometimes we kill our own dreams by poisoning them with drugs, alcohol, gambling, or other risky and dangerous lifestyle choices. Sometimes they die of natural causes.

I am thankful that God has given me the blessing of leaving behind a shelf of dreams when I die: Christian mystery-romance-suspense books like Bridge to Nowhere, published by Sunpenny Publishing, and Love’s Beating Heart, Shadow Chase, Heart Shadows, Until the Shadows Flee and the soon-to-be-released Fear of Shadows. But the fact is, I will die. I will follow James Douglas Fletcher off the stage of life and slip into a shadowy memory.

Unlike Fletcher’s dream, my dream won’t break or die. My dream is eternal. It is simply to follow Jesus and live for Him. The Bible promises that whatever I do for Christ here on earth will follow me to Heaven. It will be stored and waiting for me in a treasure chest where no one else can steal it and where it will never rot, tear, tarnish or age. When I get to Heaven, I’ll be able to lay it at the feet of Jesus and hear Him say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

Rosehaugh Estate is still a lovely place where dreams shimmer in the shade of ancient trees. The current owners are restoring the buildings that are left and many of them are rented out as holiday homes. It’s a lovely place to take dogs on a walk and capture something lovely and unique through the lens of a camera. But it is also a sorrowful, haunting place of broken dreams and trampled glory. I’m so thankful that my glory doesn’t rest in even the finest, most glorious mansion built by human hands – but rather in Heaven – created by the Eternal Hands of Jesus, the Creator of the universe.

Real Time Tortoise & Hare Story

I’ve always loved the Aesop’s Fable about the slow tortoise beating the boastful, confident hare in the race because the hare stopped to snooze. The other day, I experienced my own Tortoise & Hare moment.

I’m a slow runner. People watching me “run” might even call me a fast walker! But I can keep going for 4.2 miles, an accomplishment for someone over 60. Still, I’m slow.

Dressed in baggy jeans and sweaters – resembling no doubt a lumpy sock puppet – I went running. She passed me in a flash. She wore trendy, skintight running clothes and looked like a model that had been pulled off a magazine page and prodded to life. Feeling old and slow, I kept running.

At my turnaround point, there sat trendy glamor girl, talking on a cell phone and drinking a bottle of water. Feeling rather pleased with myself, I passed her. I ran down to the end of the trail, turned around and passed her again. By the time I had finished my two miles and was making the turn up toward the house, I saw her in the distance, her effortless, graceful run defeated by the slow-moving sock puppet who never stopped.

Life is often like that. I remind folks often not to give up on their dreams. I had 150 rejection slips before becoming a successful writer. Some of the publishing companies who rejected my manuscripts now follow me on Twitter! My published books include Bridge to Nowhere, by Sunpenny Publishing, and Love’s Beating Heart, Shadow Chase, Heart Shadows and Until the Shadows Flee. The newest mystery-romance-suspense book, Fear of Shadows will be out soon, and Sunpenny has committed to another Miz Mike “Bridge” series in the near future, Bridge Beyond Betrayal. So no matter how slow you think you are in life…never stop. Never give up.

Or as Hebrews 12:1 states, “Let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.” Running with Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, guarantees victory every time!

My Running Coach is a Dog

With Alan in the ministry, we’re a low budget family. Kindhearted folks in our church realized that when poor Little Red got smashed by a Glasgow Taxi and couldn’t be repaired. In an amazing, touching, and heartwarming gesture, they gave us a car. It has half the mileage that Little Red had and it’s simply awesome in every way. We are truly blessed. We call Red’s replacement “The Jesus Car,” because Jesus provided it.

Low budget or not, exercise is vital for good health. So I insist on keeping my running coach. She’s simply awesome and amazing. She doesn’t work for peanuts, but she can be bribed with treats. My running coach is our dog.

I didn’t want to run today. It was one of those rare Scottish days of sunshine and warmer than usual temperatures. Our garden had a surplus of dandelions. I love the cheerful yellow flowers that God plants everywhere. Our neighbors don’t. To keep peace, the dandelions must go. After a day of crawling around on my hands and knees pulling up the nearly impossible to uproot “weeds,” I didn’t want to go running. I’d had enough exercise.

Along came my running coach. “Woof, WOOF,” right into my face. Loosely translated, that meant: “get off your computer and go running. You need the exercise. I’ll supervise.” So we ran. As we ran, I began to feel guilty.

This is the weekend that the United States celebrates Memorial Day. Son Luke Parker is in the U.S. Marine Corps and has given up more than anyone other than God will ever know to serve his country. He and others like him have joined the military and fought for the freedom that allows me to sit at this computer and write. My freedom has been purchased with their blood, tears, heartbreaks, lives. With all the sacrifices they make on a daily basis, how could I possibly think I was “too tired” or had “worked too hard” to run? My sacrifice compares to theirs like dandelion fluff to an oak tree.

Thank you, U.S. Troops. God Bless and Keep You. May your sacrifice be rewarded with the attainment of every dream you cherish and every goal you set. Thank You, Thank You, Thank You. May Jesus be your constant Guide, Protector, Healer.

And if any of you need a good running coach, I can recommend one. She’s relentless – and affordable. If you don’t mind four paws and long strands of dog hair sticking to the carpet, she’s perfect!