Archive for the ‘Heartwarming stories’ Category
Country Singer Craig Wayne Boyd Tears it up on “The Voice”
Folks, I’ve never before written a blog about NBC’s “The Voice,” but tonight, it’s warranted. After watching singer Craig Wayne Boyd sing the Hell out of the song “Some Kind of Wonderful,” I had to come straight here and discuss what I’d just heard.
For those of you new to “The Voice,” it’s a show featuring singers who haven’t yet broken through to a wide audience. Craig Wayne Boyd is a man in his prime with a great big baritone voice, a huge stage presence, and charisma to burn. He’s someone who once you listen to him, you’ll wonder why he isn’t already a huge star — because my goodness, he ought to be.
I’ve seen two good articles explaining what Craig Wayne Boyd did tonight; the first is an overview of the entire show by writer Vicki Hyman for NJ.com, complete with links to the video performance, and the second is by Kenny Green for starlocalmedia.com, which discusses Craig Wayne Boyd in-depth and gives this excellent quote from coach Blake Shelton (who was talking directly to Mr. Boyd) during tonight’s airing of “The Voice:”
“I am going to go ahead and call it. That was the performance of the night, dude. That was so much power and muscle in your voice and just your stage presence. You got passed around, and that was stupid on my part. I can’t believe I got the chance to have you back,” Shelton said. “You are beating the odds every time you got out here and I think America is going ‘holy crap,’ this dude is the real deal.”
I agree with Blake Shelton, though I have thought from the beginning of this year’s season of “The Voice” that Craig Wayne Boyd was a potential power to be reckoned with. I didn’t say anything until now, though, for two reasons:
1) You never know how a musician is going to perform under pressure until he goes out and takes the stage. This is the most pressure-packed gig Mr. Boyd has ever had; to boot, he was placed in the final position, which could’ve sapped his strength.
Instead, he kicked serious butt.
2) While I was extremely impressed with Mr. Boyd throughout the previous rounds, because he has been coached by two different vocalists (Gwen Stefani and Blake Shelton), I wasn’t sure what to think of that.
Now, I think Mr. Boyd actually got the better end of that deal, because he has not one but two coaches in his corner. And with both of them, Mr. Boyd impressed them with his professionalism, his attention to detail, and his willingness to take direction. (It was at Ms. Stefani’s urging that Mr. Boyd cut his hair, for example, and got rid of his fringed jacket for a more modern one in black leather instead.)
Remember this name: Craig Wayne Boyd. He’s taken what could’ve been lemons in having two different coaches with two disparate approaches and learned from both. And he’s come out the other side with an even greater and richer musical palette to work with…I just can’t say enough about this man, and I hope he continues on “The Voice” for weeks to come.
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Before I forget, Adam Levine and his group Maroon 5 also performed their controversial song, “Animals” at the top of “The Voice.” (I’ve already weighed in with my take on this song previously; let’s just say I prefer the version they did on Saturday Night Live, but this one was fine, too.)
Written by Barb Caffrey
November 11, 2014 at 1:05 am
Posted in Heartwarming stories, Inspirational stuff, Music, Persistence, Pop Culture/TV criticism, Prescient observations, Public figures
Tagged with Adam Levine, Blake Shelton, country singers, country/rock singers, Craig Wayne Boyd, great performances, Gwen Stefani, NBC's The Voice, Some Kind of Wonderful, The Voice
Blog-hop Madness Coming Soon . . . and Other Things
Folks, the inestimable writer Katharine Eliska Kimbriel has tagged me in a blog-hop called “Four Questions for the Writer.”
Then, so did another of my writer-friends, Dina von Lowenkraft — she of DRAGON FIRE fame — which is why I’m letting you all know that I will be doing this particular blog-hop.
Just not today.
Nope. Instead, I’m going to whet your appetite a little bit and give you a link to Ms. Kimbriel’s current blog post (so you’ll know what the four questions are), and when Ms. von Lowenkraft gets her questions up (which should be soon; I didn’t see it yet, but that may be more about me and my inadequate Web searching abilities than anything else), I’ll be glad to get a link to that as well.
I plan to answer these questions on Sunday . . . by then, I may have some idea of just which writers I’ll be tagging in return, so there should be plenty of blog-hopping fun to go around.
As for everything else, I’m glad the Milwaukee Brewers continue to win baseball games. They’re playing well as a team, and are bouncing back from tough losses (like Tuesday night’s twelve-inning contest, which the Brewers ended up losing, 2-1). Wednesday night’s starter Kyle Lohse looked extremely impressive in seven innings worth of work, giving up only one earned run and striking out five (he did, however, walk an uncharacteristically high four batters, but the walks didn’t hurt him).
And really, every starter with the exception of Matt Garza (who’s going on Friday night against his old team, the Chicago Cubs) has looked very good. The team ERA for Milwaukee’s pitching staff is a sparkling 2.52, and that’s despite the terrible inning Wei Chung-Wang pitched in Pittsburgh (where he gave up six runs in an inning’s worth of work).
It’s mostly because of the Brewers’ outstanding pitching staff that they currently maintain the best record in Major League Baseball at 16-6.
Finally, it’s time for a quick report on what Racine native Vinny Rottino is doing these days. As I discussed a few months ago, Rottino is currently playing in South Korea with the Nexen Heroes, and he’s actually made some baseball history over there.
See, it seems that they’d never had an all-American battery over there (for non-baseball fans, a “battery” is a catcher-pitcher combination). Until April 11, 2014, that is, when Rottino caught Andy Van Hekken — Rottino and Van Hekken were the first all-American battery in the 32-year history of the Korean Baseball Organization.
Here’s how Yonhapnews.com described it (from their English language website):
The 34-year-old, who has caught 305 games in the minors and three in the majors, didn’t look too out of place behind the plate, as the Heroes defeated the Tigers 5-2. Van Hekken tossed seven shutout innings with six hits and four strikeouts to improve to 2-1 with a 1.96 ERA.
Rottino did give up a couple of steals and threw the ball into the left field when trying to nab Kim Sun-bin stealing third.
Kim sprinted home, but Rottino caught left fielder Moon U-ram’s throw and tagged out the runner at home.
Batting ninth, Rottino went 2-for-3 at the plate, and You Jae-sin pinch-ran for him in the seventh.
All I can say is “congratulations” for a job well done — even if I’m a few weeks late off the draw. (Well, better late than never, right?)
Written by Barb Caffrey
April 24, 2014 at 1:23 am
Posted in baseball, Brewers pitchers, Heartwarming stories, Milwaukee Brewers baseball club, Persistence, Vinny Rottino, Writing
Tagged with advance notice, Andy Van Hekken, Blog-hops, favorite writers, first all-American battery in Korean Baseball Organization, Katharine Eliska Kimbriel, Milwaukee Brewers, Milwaukee Brewers 2014, Nexen Heroes, Vinny Rottino
Hanging on to a Dream
Folks, this last several weeks has been incredibly difficult. The difficulties haven’t been anything new — my health has not been the world’s best all year long, though I continue to fight for better health as best I can — but sometimes, life can be frustrating.
To put it mildly.
When your body doesn’t work right, when you’ve been ill for five weeks straight with no end in sight, when many of the people who’ve mattered the most are already on the Other Side doing whatever it is people who’ve outlived their mortal bodies do, it can be hard to get up in the morning.
What gets me up and moving? Some days, I’m not sure, other than an unshakeable belief that I must keep trying.
I look at it this way. I have talent for more than one thing — actually, like many human beings, I have talents for several things, but the major things I’m good at are music, writing and editing — and I want to keep using my talents. Further, I want to develop them all I possibly can, and keep going as long as I can.
None of these things are earth shattering revelations, of course. If you’ve read even one of my blogs (at least, any of the personal updates, or when I’ve talked writing, publishing, editing, or most especially about my wonderful late husband, Michael), you almost certainly already know this.
But I say all this because it’s rare that I see something on television that actually gives me hope. Most of the TV programs I watch lately are downbeat (yes, even including Once Upon a Time, which has been focusing lately on rescuing Henry, who seems to be related to every other character through blood, marriage or adoption), and while the acting on some of these shows is phenomenal (James Spader has to be the frontrunner for an Emmy based off his work on The Blacklist, and Toni Collette would be my frontrunner for an Emmy for her work on Hostages), they are not exactly life-affirming in the traditional sense.
So it’s surprising when, while watching one of my favorite TV shows, Dancing with the Stars — something I’ve blogged about before, but not terribly often — I actually see something that is life-affirming. More to the point, something that’s actually inspirational.
And the person who’s actually inspired me enough to write this blog is none other than former “wild child” turned respectable husband and father Jack Osbourne. Osbourne’s dancing on DWTS has been very good to excellent all season long, but continuing to do his best despite his struggles with Multiple Sclerosis (by his own admission on DWTS last week, Osbourne had a nasty MS flare-up) and persevering to get to the finals is what got me to write this blog.
Of course, Osbourne is not the type of guy who thinks of himself as an inspiration. He seems to be the sort of guy who gets up every day, goes to work (right now, that’s DWTS), puts in all the hours he needs to be good, then puts in the extra hours to be great, and then goes home to his wife and child without any undue fuss.
I think that’s why I like him, or at any rate, have liked what I’ve seen of him. (Granted, I really enjoyed his sister Kelly, too, when she was on DWTS several seasons ago.) I can relate to his work ethic and his refusal to give in to his illness, even though I can’t relate to his famous family, all the paparazzi he’s undoubtedly dealt with in his life, reality TV show fame, or anything of that nature whatsoever.
Still. There’s something in what Jack Osbourne is doing with his pro partner Cheryl Burke that’s truly worth watching. Jack’s become a very strong dancer, which came as a surprise to him and his partner, and because he’s fighting a long-term illness along with learning a new skill that’s way out of his comfort zone, he’s actually kind of endearing to watch.
In many ways, watching reality TV can be cathartic, especially if you see aspects of someone’s best self playing out on TV. It can also be uncomfortable, as even the most admirable person doing the most admirable things can do and say things we, ourselves, would not say or do — but then again, if we were meant to be alone in our skulls, unable to learn anything new from observation or life experiences, what would be the point of living?
Anyway, we all have our own journey to make in this life. Some of my journey hasn’t at all been what I’ve expected. I lost my husband way too early, and every day, it’s a struggle to keep going — I’m not going to lie.
But on the other hand, because I keep going, keep fighting, keep writing as best I can, keep editing, keep playing my music whenever my health allows — well, folks, that’s a victory.
I take my victories where I see ’em, and I’ve had a few this year despite the illnesses and the arthritis and the carpal tunnel syndrome and all the other crapola I deal with on a daily basis. I sold two stories (granted, still can’t talk much about the second sale, but just as soon as I’m cleared, I will). The first half of my novel, ELFY, will appear during 2014 through Twilight Times Books — if all goes well, it’ll finally be out in April — which will complete a nearly eleven year odyssey (yes, ELFY has been in existence, more or less in its current form, since the end of 2003). And it will vindicate my husband’s belief in me, which is no bad thing . . . though my husband would tell me, if he could, that I vindicated his belief in me long ago just by being myself.
I’ve hung on to my dream, and I’m still hanging on. I think my dream of being a highly competent writer, editor and musician is achievable, and I continue to work at it in some way, shape or form every day. And the reason I’ve hung on to my dream is because I believe in the power of persistence — and I believe in taking victories where I find them.
So let this all be a lesson to you, folks — keep hanging on to your dreams, whatever they are. And do take your victories, whatever they are, however they manifest, as you find them.
If so, you’ve already won — whether you know it or not.
Written by Barb Caffrey
November 26, 2013 at 8:23 am
Finally! Ron Santo Makes the Hall of Fame
Folks, it is with great pleasure that I finally get to say this: former Cubs third baseman Ron Santo has finally made it into the Hall of Fame via the Veterans Committee (made up of former major league baseball players already in the Hall of Fame). Santo was a nine-time All-Star, won five Gold Gloves for his fielding prowess, and hit 342 home runs in an age where that number meant something. He was a career .277 hitter — again, this was in an era where there were many outstanding pitchers, before much of the expansion that diluted major league talent — and hit 30 or more home runs between 1964 and 1967. (Or, if you are mathematically challenged as I sometimes am, that means Santo hit 30 or more HRs for four years straight. That’s tough to do.)
Santo also was a well-known broadcaster for the Cubs for twenty years, until his death in 2010. He was known for vocalizing when things went poorly — “Oh, no! Oh, jeez! Oh, man!” and the like — and also cheered when things went well. (Even-handed, he was not.) But fans loved him — including this Brewers fan — because Santo wore his heart on his sleeve and unabashedly loved both baseball and his Cubs.
See this link for further details:
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news;_ylt=AqFJrda2AKMBjVKWqsB0AUIRvLYF?slug=ap-halloffame
Santo also was one of the very first players to admit he had diabetes. He was a hero to many precisely because he was open about his struggle; as Brooks Robinson alluded to (quoted in the Yahoo! Sports article I referenced):
“He’s just a terrific guy, he’s baseball through and through, he’s done a lot for the game of baseball in his career, and he’s been though a lot of hardships physically and he was just a terrific player,” he said. “He certainly belongs in the Hall of Fame. A long time coming. No one knows the reason he didn’t get in when the writers were voting, but this process we have has been the fairest, I think.” (emphasis mine — BC)
Santo was loyal, loved baseball, and was definitely someone the “common man” (sometimes called the “fan on the street”) could root for as he had problems, was open and honest about sharing them, yet never let them get him down. I am glad, for Santo’s family and for baseball fans everywhere, that Santo has finally received his due — better late than never — as it’s great to finally be able to write these words:
Ron Santo (3B) — Chicago Cubs. Inducted into Baseball’s Hall of Fame, 2012.**
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** Yes, this means that Santo is the first-announced member of the Class of 2012. He’s been voted on in 2011, yes. But he’ll still be a member of the Class of ’12.
** By the way, all the emphasis on the word “finally” is deliberate. Santo’s omission from the HoF was a curious one — nearly as curious as the continuing omission of Buck O’Neal — and the only word that came to mind was the one I (over)used — finally.
Written by Barb Caffrey
December 5, 2011 at 11:48 pm
Posted in baseball, Heartwarming stories
Tagged with Baseball Hall of Fame, Ron Santo, Veterans Committee
Persistence Pays Off — Florida Marlins call up Vinny Rottino
The Florida Marlins have called up Vinny Rottino, the hardest-working minor league player I know. Rottino is a Racine, Wisconsin, native — just like me in that — who plays baseball, and is 31 years old. As I’ve stated in other blogs, he plays many positions, including the outfield, most of the infield, and catcher.
I’d nearly given up hope that Rottino would get called up as I’ve been reading Marlins’ manager Jack McKeon’s comments on the subject; McKeon seems to believe that he needs time to evaluate the players he already has, as he came to this year’s group of Marlins mid-stream, and McKeon was not sold on calling up anyone at the September 1 call-up date.
Fortunately, someone in the Marlins’ front office either overruled McKeon, or sold McKeon on how hard-working Rottino is and how much he’ll enjoy having Rottino around. Because after Rottino’s fine AAA season, where he batted .304 with 31 doubles, two triples, 10 HRs, 81 Rs scored, 17 SBs and 59 RBI, Rottino definitely deserved to be called up to the major leagues.
Peter Jackel, who is a sports columnist for the Racine Journal-Times (my local newspaper), wrote an article for today’s paper (September 6, 2011) about Rottino’s call-up and quoted him as saying:**
“It means a lot,” said Rottino, who was signed by the Brewers as an undrafted free agent in January 2003. “I’ve been playing for nine years, I’m 31 years old now and there may have been other paths I could’ve taken. But I just felt with a lot of conviction that this was the path I was supposed to be on and that I was supposed to be grinding out minor-league at-bats, for whatever reason.”
Rottino, as you might remember from me blogging about it before, started out the season in dismal fashion, going 1 for 24. But then, he went on a tear and never looked back.
For whatever it’s worth, last night I Tweeted that the Marlins should call up Rottino right now because he has such a great story to him — he’s a fine player, but it’s his persistence that makes him great. His stalwart refusal to give up on himself is why I keep writing about him; I find it inspiring to realize that other people who might be a little older than others in their chosen profession come to realize their gifts and continue to act upon them. Because persistence really does pay off.
I don’t know if Rottino has read Malcolm Gladwell’s book OUTLIERS. But if he has, he knows that sometimes, it just takes someone a little longer to put in the 10,000 hours of work it seems to take to become proficient — then excellent — then outstanding — at any given profession. I believe Rottino’s done that work and I believe even more strongly that he will do well in the big leagues if the Marlins only give him a chance.
Congratulations, Mr. Rottino!
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** Note: I’m having trouble posting links to WordPress right now. Once I’m able to do so, Mr. Jackel’s fine article about Vinny Rottino will be added to this blog. For now, I hope the longer-form attribution will serve as it’s the best I can do. Never mind. Link has been added. All is well.
Written by Barb Caffrey
September 6, 2011 at 4:12 pm
Posted in Heartwarming stories, Persistence, Vinny Rottino, Writing
Tagged with Florida Marlins, Jack McKeon, minor league call-ups, Peter Jackel, Racine Journal-Times
Why Weiner’s Behavior Warrants the “Truly Horrible” Label
Over the past few days, I’ve resisted the temptation to kick Representative Anthony Weiner, D-NY, while he’s down. Weiner, as you probably know, has been in the news for the past two weeks due to having a picture of him, in his underwear, published inadvertently on Twitter. Weiner lied about this initially, claiming he had been “hacked.” He admitted on Monday that this picture really was him (the one in his underwear), and said other pictures existed, some conversations with women not his wife existed also (before and after his marriage to Huma Abedin, one of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s top aides at the State Department), and that he was “deeply ashamed” and really, really “sorry.”
So, since I resisted saying anything up until now, you might be wondering what has changed. Two things, really. First, Weiner’s wife Abedin is reportedly pregnant with their first child, which makes all of Weiner’s behavior (including a nude photo of Weiner’s “equipment,” which surfaced today) even more sophomoric than it already was — and second, I got to thinking.
Look. I’ve known people — myself included, with my wonderful, late husband Michael — who got to know each other online, mind to mind, before they ever got into physical proximity** (we’re talking long-distance relationships, here — committed, monogamous ones). Or perhaps one of the pair had to take a job far away from the other — hundreds or thousands of miles — and to keep the “home fires” burning, the pair may well have sent scantily-clad pictures of themselves in order to encourage fidelity. Or maybe the pair had intimate phone conversations. Anything, to keep the relationship — a monogamous, consensual, committed relationship — on track.
It takes a lot for me to call behavior “truly horrible.” Usually when I slap that label on it, we’re talking about one political party behaving badly and doing stupid things, not a juvenile, irresponsible man over 40 who can’t keep his pants zipped when he has a wonderful wife at home.
And make no mistake — what Weiner did is definitely cheating. He talked about sex with women (not his wife, when his marriage was still a going, vital concern), and presumably acted on his desires. That’s cheating. Period.
To be clear, I do not believe Weiner should resign from Congress. But I do think his behavior was terrible and reflected very poorly not only upon him and how he conceives of marriage, but makes anyone who’s trying to use cyberspace and/or the telephone to keep a long-distance relationship going feel like they’re either doing something sleazy, or have already done it.
I feel terribly sad for Abedin, who knows her husband has not been faithful to her and did not take his wedding vows seriously. And I feel even sadder for Weiner, who not only didn’t realize the jewel he had (and for the moment still has) in his wife, but went around cheapening himself — and everyone else who uses alternative means to remain close to his or her committed partner — because he was too damned stupid to know any better. Or care, either.
All of these thoughts make me wish once again my husband was still alive, because I’m sure he’d have something interesting, funny, scathing, or possibly all three at once about the Weiner set of scandals. But I truly wish I weren’t thinking about him — the most wonderful man in the world, the most wonderful person the Deity ever created — in this context.
Thanks a lot, Anthony Weiner. Really.
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** In my case, Michael and I met once, at a mutual friend’s house, then I went home to one state and Michael went home to another state, hundreds of miles away. We relied on our mutual friends (we had several) to help us out when the inevitable miscommunications arose — and ultimately, being so far away from each other helped our relationship immensely because we had to learn to communicate or our relationship wouldn’t survive. That’s how cyberspace, and the telephone, can help a relationship — whereas what Weiner did just shows how a stupid man can screw up his life with the latest, up-to-date technology.
Written by Barb Caffrey
June 9, 2011 at 11:54 am
Meditations on Easter
Today is Easter Sunday for most of the Western World, and I thought as it is both a secular holiday and a very holy day (where the word “holiday” came from), I’d talk about what Easter has come to mean for me.
To me, Easter means, above all else, forgiveness. Now, this may seem odd, as Easter is the day which commemorates Jesus Christ rising from the dead after being entombed three days before; you might wonder how I’m getting forgiveness from this, rather than persistence (which also applies), or hope (which certainly applies), or even faith itself (which definitely applies).
Simply put: Jesus was crucified on the cross, which was a common punishment of that day and time. Jesus was a very spiritual, holy man who believed in love, and truth, and light and faith — among many, many other good things — yet if he hadn’t forgiven the Romans who placed him on that cross, nor if he hadn’t forgiven Judas Iscariot (one of his Twelve Apostles) for placing him in a horrible position in the first place, nor if he hadn’t forgiven Peter (another of his apostles) for betraying him to the Romans . . . well, if Jesus hadn’t forgiven any of them, why would he have risen from the dead in the first place, much less done anything else after that?
I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that condemning an innocent man to death merely because you’re afraid of him (the Romans), or you need money more than you need his friendship (apparently Judas’s problem), or you’re unable to resist the pressure (though this is human and completely forgivable, while the other two actions are hard for modern readers to understand whatsoever) has got to be the worst thing you can possibly do to him. It is a grave sin in the worst of senses — you’ve ended a very good man’s life, a holy man’s life, someone who had done many wonderful things (including miraculous healings, feeding a huge multitude from very little, and much more) — for little or no reason, all because too many people were afraid of Jesus because Jesus refused to stop spreading his Word.
Yet Jesus forgave these people who sinned against him, some grievously (the Romans, those within his own Temple, Judas Iscariot) and those who sinned because they could not help themselves (Peter). And in the process, he brought hope, and light, and joy, and the belief that the spirit is eternal — or at least that it can be — and that all who wish it may learn about his Father (the Deity, otherwise known as God) and become better, wiser, kinder people who will partake of eternal life.
Now, the various denominations of Christianity differ on what, exactly, eternal life may be. Some think it is literally a restoration of our human faculties, but for eternity and without pain, aging, health problems or death. While some others believe that it means our souls are eternal — that our bodies ultimately don’t matter, but our souls do, which is why we must behave the best way we can, knowing all the while that we will sin and we will err, but that we must learn to forgive — not just our enemies, but ourselves.
Christians believe Jesus was the only son of God, while other faiths differ — some believe Jesus was a prophet, a holy man, or merely a good man who meant well. Yet somehow, the happiness of Easter tends to wind through every life, no matter how far away your belief system or spirituality is from the Christian belief system, because the message of forgiveness, along with the twin meanings of hope out of absolute despair (Jesus’s death was widely mourned) and the belief that anyone can be redeemed. Even a Roman who put Jesus on the cross to be crucified; even Judas Iscariot, who sold out his good friend Jesus; even Peter, who was weak during his hour of testing and had to learn to forgive himself for it after Jesus rose from the dead.
I believe in forgiveness, and most importantly, I believe in the eternal nature of the soul. As such, Easter may be the most important holiday we still have because it celebrates the worth of an important man, a very good man who did many, many wonderful things in his lifetime — a man the world can’t stop talking about. A man the Christians revere as Divine, yes — but Divinity alone isn’t why we remember Jesus, is it?
The last thing Easter means to me is that to believe in miracles still means something. All of Jesus’s family, friends, most of his colleagues, his followers, they all prayed for a miracle. Every single last one of them prayed — and they got their miracle when Jesus rose from the dead and came among them once more to spread the word and to remind them to “love one another” as he had loved them.
I believe in redemption, yes, but even more, I believe in the power of miracles. We need more of them in our lives, to remind us of how special life can be — at this time of misery in the United States, with extremely high unemployment numbers and stories about people getting killed for the few dollars in their pockets, it seems to me that whether the story of Jesus was true or not, we need his story like never before.
But I, for one, really hope the story of Jesus, all he did, and all he was, is true. Because it’s wonderful to think of a Deity who’d love us so much that despite all of our failings, our shortcomings, our problems and our pain — much less our wailings to him of woe (something the Christian God is said to welcome) — that he’d send his son to help us, guide us, and then to redeem us.
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Note that Horus among the Egyptian Gods has a very similar life-path and story to that of Jesus Christ. And there probably are other Gods and Goddesses throughout recorded history who share some of the same characteristics; as a Unitarian-Universalist who’s studied a great deal of comparative religion, I believe that the message — that the soul is eternal, and that we can have joy if we want it, no matter how flawed we are and no matter how many mistakes we make in the process — is the same, but that the messengers used may not have been. (Or maybe that’s just how our human minds can perceive it.)
Written by Barb Caffrey
April 24, 2011 at 2:03 am
Posted in Faith, Heartwarming stories, Inspirational stuff, Religion, Spirituality, Writing
Alissa Czisny, figure skating champion — and lesson in persistence
Alissa Czisny is 23 years old and a figure skater from the United States. She’s also the two-time U.S. National Champion, winning in 2009, and again this year in 2011. And if you only knew that about her — not knowing about her 10th place finish last year in 2010, about her 9th place finish in 2008, about her up and down career before that — you’d think she’d had an easy, and perhaps even tranquil, existence.
But knowing that she’s had an up and down career, not to mention that she’s now 23 years of age, which is ancient for a female figure skater (many of the best in the world are 18 or less), changes that perception immeasurably, doesn’t it?
I’ve watched Ms. Czisny’s career for the past seven or eight years; she has beautiful spins, gorgeous spirals, and yet her jumps were never quite up to snuff. She also battled her nerves, which endeared her to me as I knew when I used to perform that nerves were the final hurdle I needed to jump before performing well. These two areas — nerves and jumps — had to be part of why her performances were, to be charitable, wildly inconsistent.
However, now she has new coaches, Jason Dungjen and Yuka Sato (he a former US pairs National champion, she a former World gold medalist for Japan), a new and much more reliable jump technique, and much better control over her nerves.
All of this has resulted in outstanding performance after outstanding performance this past year, with Ms. Czisny winning the Grand Prix finale, winning Skate Canada, coming in third at Trophée Eric Bompard, and winning the Midwestern Sectionals before winning, easily, the U.S. National championship last night.
Clearly, Ms. Czisny’s new coaches, along with her re-work on her jumping technique to make her jumps more consistent, have helped her greatly. But what impresses me most about Ms. Czisny is the fact that she’s persisted. She’s refused to give up, and while she apparently considered quitting after her dismal 10th place performance last year at the U.S. Nationals, she knew she had more to give. And she was right.
Look. I root for Alissa Czisny for three reasons. The first is because she’s a gorgeous skater, with beautiful lines, and she does things I could never do with an ease and serenity that I find extremely appealing. The second is because she’s 23 — ancient, in her sport — and she’s only getting better as a skater. The third is because I root for the underdog, big-time, and Ms. Czisny qualifies because of her past inconsistency, and because of her indifferent performances on the international stage prior to this year.
Watching Alissa Czisny skate is like watching a ballerina on ice. She’s just that graceful, and looks so perfect as a skater that people “ooh” and “ah” over her even when she does the most basic moves. (Of course, all that “oohing” and “ah-ing” gets considerably louder when Ms. Czisny spins. She has to be the best female spinner in the world, with grace and center and perfect positions and forms. No one can outclass her in that area — no one.)
But I think the main reason people root for her, myself included, is because we want her to succeed. She’s been out there competing on a high level for the past eight or nine years, and has so many strengths, but it’s never quite been her time.
It looks like 2011 is now, finally, Alissa Czisny’s time.
Let that be a lesson to everyone — persist, and don’t give up. Don’t let anything stop you if you know you’re right. Be like Alissa Czisny instead, and let yourself soar.
Written by Barb Caffrey
January 30, 2011 at 4:56 pm
Posted in Alissa Czisny, Heartwarming stories, Persistence, Sports figures
Odds and Ends
I have some good news to report, and some odd news, thus the blog title header.
The good news? Mom left behind two scratch-off lottery tickets at the grocery store and thought they were gone forever. I called; they weren’t. Some kind and honest soul had turned them in. I went to get them for her, and unfortunately, they lost.
But it was greatly appreciated that an honest person found them and turned them in to the customer service desk at the store. It helped restore my faith in humanity a little bit, which has been down since the unprovoked attack on Gabrielle Giffords, which killed six people and wounded fourteen, last Saturday.
Now for the odd news — this past Tuesday, Mary Fallin was sworn in as the new Governor of Oklahoma. She is their state’s first woman Governor, and was taking her oath of office outdoors.
What happened? Well, rather than say she’d “support, obey and defend” the Constitution, she said she’d “support, obey, and offend” the Constitution instead.
Don’t believe me? Check out this story for further details:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/01/13/politics/main7242727.shtml
The most ridiculous quote in this article comes from Gov. Fallin’s spokesman Alex Weintz, who blamed the weather for Fallin’s verbal miscue.
“She dropped the ‘d’,” Fallin spokesman Alex Weintz said Wednesday. “I was amazed that anyone was able to speak at all or get any of their lines right considering how cold it was outside.” It was 29 degrees and light snow was falling when Fallin recited her oath of office on the steps of the state Capitol.
Now, folks . . . I live in Wisconsin. We have colder temperatures than this all the time, and often, the oaths of office are administered outdoors. No one here has ever said he’d “offend” the Constitution of the state, or of the United States of America. So I have to believe this is a spurious reason for why Gov. Fallin misspoke.
Anyway, other than that things are just rolling along . . . writing-wise, I’ve written 3000 words this week, which isn’t bad, considering. (Maybe I’ll get more writing in over the weekend; one can only hope.) And tomorrow, there’ll be a Packers playoff game to watch — not sure if I’m rooting for ’em, against ’em or just watching ’em at this point, but at least it’s something that keeps me amused.
Written by Barb Caffrey
January 14, 2011 at 11:59 pm
Posted in Heartwarming stories, Sports figures, Writing
More about the Story behind Lee and Miller’s FLEDGLING and SALTATION
Folks, I rarely get to have as much fun as I did today in writing a joint review for the first two books about Sharon Lee and Steve Miller’s excellent character, Theo Waitley, for Shiny Book Review.
Before I forget, here’s the link to the review:
Now, let me tell you a bit more about Lee and Miller’s excellent Liaden Universe. These two writers put out three excellent novels in the late 1980s — they are called AGENT OF CHANGE, CONFLICT OF HONORS, and CARPE DIEM — and they had a following, but their publisher apparently didn’t realize how well the books were actually selling. (This was slightly pre-Internet, or at least previous to the pervasiveness of the Internet.) So they were dropped by their publisher.
Normally, with writers, this forces them to try something else. Or it forces them completely out of publishing for a while, or for good. And in Lee and Miller’s case (they are married, and are co-writers), they took jobs but continued to work on the Liaden Universe because it interested them.
Then, as they have said in many places, came the Internet . . . and then, they found out how many people loved their three Liaden books.
At that point, they found publisher Stephen Pagel of Meisha Merlin Publishing, and he re-issued the first three Liaden books as PARTNERS IN NECESSITY, also contracting for several new books in the series — these were, not necessarily in the order written, PLAN B, I DARE, LOCAL CUSTOM, and SCOUT’S PROGRESS. After that came CRYSTAL DRAGON, CRYSTAL SOLDIER, and BALANCE OF TRADE. All of these were excellent books — truly outstanding — and I read and devoured them as quickly as I possibly could.
But then, something awful happened. Meisha Merlin went bankrupt, and suddenly, Lee and Miller were sitting there without a publisher, and needing to get the rights to their own work back before they could try any of those successful books with any other publisher.
Once again, many writers would have folded here — they would’ve seen the universe as against them, or perhaps just that their work had run its course, or maybe that no matter what they did, things just weren’t going to work.
Fortunately, Lee and Miller are made of sterner stuff than this, and continued to work on the Liaden Universe. They started writing FLEDGLING online and set up a unique way to fund it — they speak of this at the end of FLEDGLING, so I’m not “talking out of school” in any way — and finished a strong first draft of FLEDGLING that was paid for by subscription from their online friends and supporters.
At this point, Toni Weisskopf, publisher of Baen Books, entered the picture. She wanted more Liaden Universe novels (bless her) and was in a position to do something about it, so she contracted with Miller and Lee for three novels about Theo Waitley, the first two being FLEDGLING and SALTATION, the third the hotly-awaited GHOST SHIP. And when all the rights to the other Liaden Universe novels reverted to Lee and Miller, Baen Books decided to republish them in omnibus issues (this has already commenced, with THE DRAGON VARIATION, an omnibus that combines LOCAL CUSTOM, SCOUT’S PROGRESS, and CONFLICT OF HONORS; more of these omnibuses will follow in 2011), then bought a sequel to SCOUT’S PROGRESS, the recent, and outstanding, MOUSE AND DRAGON.
Best yet, all of the novels — every single last one of them that’s currently extant, that is — are available through Baen’s Webscriptions e-book program, or will be available through Webscriptions once finished (GHOST SHIP, I’m looking squarely at you). Plus there’s an excellent short-story collection available called “Liaden Unibus I and II” available at Webscriptions, in case you just can’t wait to read any more stories from Lee and Miller. (I highly recommend it; I got it as a birthday present for myself this past August.)
In short, we writers who are sitting on the outside looking in need to look at the persistence of Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. They have talent, yes — oodles and oodles of talent — but what is the most striking thing about them, aside from how well they write and how enjoyable every single last story I’ve ever read from either one of them (singly or together) is, is their persistence, their stalwart refusal to give up.
I know that persistence is the name of the game; I can’t create luck for myself, nor for my fellow writers like Loren Jones or Jason Cordova or Kate Paulk who are very good writers just waiting for their big breaks. But providing I can stay alive to write another day, and providing I can hold a positive thought, I can persist.
And I will.
Because I believe in the Elfyverse; I believe in what I’m doing. I believe what I write makes sense, and that if I can just get it before someone who will appreciate it in the publishing world, maybe I can have a small sliver of the success that Lee and Miller have enjoyed. I realize writing is not likely to be extremely remunerative — Lee and Miller, for all their popularity, can’t stay financially afloat on their writing earnings alone, nor can the excellent writer Dave Freer (who’s come out and said so on his blog; Sharon Lee has spoken of her day job, and how it helps to pay the bills, on her blog). But I believe it’s worth my time and effort to pursue.
It takes me longer without Michael to figure out how to get out of plot problems, but I can do it. I can finish what he left behind in his “Joey Maverick” SF universe. I can finish what he left behind in his alternate history/fantasy “Columba” universe. But most importantly, I can finish what I started — the three novels that (so far) comprise the Elfyverse (along with one complete short story and three others in progress). My non-Elfyverse novel CHANGING FACES. Many other short stories and at least one novella, all in various stages of development (or are out at magazines or publishers).
I refuse to give up on myself. That is not the winning strategy, and as seen from the example of Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, if you persist, and get any sort of shot at all, you can succeed in publishing.
So I will persist.
Michael would expect no less.
Written by Barb Caffrey
December 29, 2010 at 11:03 pm
Posted in Book reviews, Elfy, Elfyverse, Heartwarming stories, Michael B. Caffrey, Persistence, Publishing, Writing
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