Trying to figure out this blog today reminds me of when I was a returning nursing student--multiple times. But this is a tad more fun because there are no tests. There's just the satisfaction of seeing that my PAGES have indeed been started, my TAG CLOUDS streamlined, and my WIDGETS expanded. My expanded Widgets are …
Category: memoir
All in a Day’s Work
Today, I'm having fun trying to figure out how to get things on the new "Pages" list you see on the right. I've had many "views" of them already, so maybe you're as puzzled as I am that nothing is there except a place to comment. I'll figure this out. Eventually! Back to getting my …
Go Back to School – Again and Again
Writing Tip: Take writing classes. Classes can be taken in person or online. So no excuses--just need to carve out the time. I've learned a ton about writing that charting in a patient's chart or writing nursing curriculum never taught me. I've benefited by having teachers and many peers give me feedback on what works …
Find a Like-minded Friend!
Writing Tip: Write with a friend. I started writing Caring Lessons only because my long-time friend Marianna and I cooked up the idea together of writing our nursing stories. Marianna and I live in different cities. We met in person in August of 2000 to make our writing plans. In fact, with respect to Marianna, …
Writing as Mountain Climbing…in the Snow
Some days trying to be a writer is like climbing a mountain-after a heavy snow. Two years ago, I happened to be at Mount Rainier on the first day that hikers were allowed after record snowfalls. Their lone plodding journeys up long steep hills came to mind yesterday as I ran into some uphill snags …
Subscribe to More Journals?
Writing tip: Subscribe to writing journals. I promised in an early post that I'd describe my "writing process," how I "crawled step by step from teaching nursing to writing memoir." Here goes. As a nurse, I'd subscribed to several nursing journals for nearly 40 years. So, when I decided to begin writing Caring Lessons in …
Writer’s High
I'm on a writer's high today--thanks to the Festival of Faith & Writing at Calvin College last week. I'm also tired, but every ouch of muscle revolt is worth it as I start to sort out the 24 notebook pages of notes that I scribbled while attending 15 sessions in three days. If I needed …
In the beginning…
How did Caring Lessons start? And how did the writing progress? Since I'm a compulsive note taker, I've kept everything, and I mean everything--drafts, decisions, musings--in thick, five-subject, spiral notebooks. I can even tell you where I was sitting when I wrote the notes/drafts and what I was drinking--often nonfat, decaf mochas (as if you'd …
Caring Lessons: A Nursing Professor’s Journey of Faith and Self
My book, Caring Lessons: A Nursing Professor’s Journey of Faith and Self, is already available for pre-orders on Amazon, and is scheduled for release in October 2010. Imagine not wanting to be a nurse, teacher, or teacher of psychiatric nursing only to find yourself doing all three--and loving it! In Caring Lessons, I share my …
Continue reading Caring Lessons: A Nursing Professor’s Journey of Faith and Self
Write Along with Me 