ENDINGS TO BEGINNINGS

This post originally appeared on Julie N. Ford's blog for Cordelia's Corner.

            Well, they’re done.

            That’s probably not the most exciting intro you’ve ever read for any blog essay, but for Mel, it’s a Very Good Thing.

            Mel complained the other day that my previous entries misled you.  “They’re going to think I never finish anything!”  As much as I wanted to say, “If the shoe fits…”, I realized I wasn’t giving her enough credit.  While Mel has many ongoing and unfinished writing projects, it may surprise you that she’s actually finished several over the past couple of years.  Believe me, I’m stunned, too, and I’m her assistant.

            The majority of Mel’s writing has been on a volunteer basis for her church’s children’s ministry, mainly three projects.  She’s the first to admit that it has been a difficult blessing—there’s no money involved, and yet, she has a ready audience. 

            For her first project, she’s written several puppet skits for VBS, Lads to Leaders (their team won third place this year for their division), and some that were just meant to be enjoyed either at her home congregation or in the mission field.  Ironically, one thing that is not well-known about Mel is that puppets give her the creeps.  They’re okay during a performance, and she loved The Muppets and Fraggle Rock, but whenever she goes into the puppet storage room for meetings, she tries to avoid eye contact as much as possible.  It’s probably for the best that someone else is writing the puppet skits at the moment.

            Her second project has been adapting Sunday School curriculum for the past few years, as one of the writers for the curriculum committee.  Mel has been amazed at the quality of work, written and visual, her fellow curriculum committee members have put forth.  The lesson plans should be completed by early July, and the visual aids and other odds and ends by September (she thinks).  She’s proud of the work she and the others have done, but she also appreciates the gravity of influencing young souls.  I was always concerned that the other members would kick her out of the committee for having to miss meetings and running behind on lesson plans, but instead they embraced the craziness that is Mel, and memorized her order for their lunches at Demos’.  My fears that she would accidentally harm herself using the laminating machines and paper cutter were also never realized, although the old copier nearly gave her a nervous breakdown.

            Mel’s third project involves live-action VBS skits.  She did a handful last year, and she was excited to get asked again.  Two weeks ago, she finished four of them, two short, two long.  Mel tried to make them funny and poignant and scripturally sound; appealing to children and adults.  The last one she finished was The Good Samaritan, and reading over the live-action one, and the one she did for a puppet skit last year, she and I were amazed at how completely different they were.  We edited those four skits, rewrote entire sections, and emailed them as each one was completed.

            Mel will probably not see those skits performed.  Last year she was busy in one of the nurseries, and this year her son, Logan, is having his tonsils out, so she’ll probably miss these, too.  I think it’s odd that she’s only ever seen three skits, puppet or otherwise, that she’s written.  Something always happens.  I asked her if it bothers her that she doesn’t get to see the finished project, since inevitably things have been changed from the last draft to the performance.  She said that it didn’t.  It was important to her that her work got out there, and that the kids enjoyed it.  It was just that simple. 

            I don’t quite believe her.  There’s something magical about seeing something you wrote coming to life, even though there may be enough improvisation and editing that you frantically start looking back at your sheets to see if the actors at least kept the best parts.  Maybe that’s why she doesn’t mind not seeing the performance:  she can pretend that it went exactly the way she wrote it.

            So the skits are done.  The lesson plans are almost finished.  What’s next?

            As long as they want Mel, she’ll write for different ministries at her church.  However, I’m glad she can now focus on manuscripts she keeps putting off.  She has no more excuses.  I mean, I’ve been writing these essays for her since she’s been so busy. 

            Mel and I are currently editing Is This Seat Taken?, the short story I’ve mentioned before.  I (as well as all of her friends who were nice enough to promise to read the latest draft) can hardly believe it—it’s nearly done.  Part of the problem is that the manuscript keeps getting longer, which pleases Mel’s daughter to no end, since she has always loved the story.  “Make it a full-length novel,” she demanded a couple of months ago.  Mel tried to explain it was really meant to be a short story.  “Fine,” Lizzie said.  “I’ll just write the sequel myself.”

            “Come up with your own idea!” I told her.  Really, I can’t decide if Mel should be flattered or infuriated that her own children want to write fanfiction about her stuff.

            (I should note that Logan and Lizzie are pseudonyms that Mel’s offspring picked for themselves.  They stressed under no circumstances was I to write their real names because their mother embarrassed them enough and they didn’t need me to do it as well.)

            Mel is also working on her other manuscripts, the Vampire Romantic Comedy that Logan enjoys, simply because he loves what half-blood fire demons are capable of when they don’t wear their gloves; and another, The Siren’s Daughter, that Lizzie insists she doesn’t like.  At all.  When I asked her why, she said that it was boring. 

            I will have you know that it is not boring, not at all.  The Siren’s Daughter is quite exciting, and my personal favorite out of everything Mel has ever written.  Lizzie has no idea of what she’s talking about.  She’s a teenager, after all.  What do they know????

            Mel, surprisingly the voice of reason in this scenario, reminds me that I must not get overwrought, and to consider a few things:  First, The Siren’s Daughter is a YA (Young Adult) novel.  Lizzie is a young adult.  She reads young adult books.  Second, Lizzie is a teenager.  Teenagers typically like the opposite of what their parents want them to.  Maybe Lizzie would like the book better if someone else had written it.  Third, and it’s totally a lie, the book could be boring.  Mel hopes not.  I have assured her that it is a fun read, and once she cleans out all those tangents that can be found in her previous drafts, then it will work a lot better.  Plus, those tangents have already led to two other partial manuscripts, so maybe those little side trips were for the best.

            Mel says that she appreciates my defense of her, but that I may be protesting a little too much.  I told her to get busy writing.  She’s got a lot of work to do.

            Anyway, thanks for following along with this meandering tale of the recent past, present, and future of Mel, whose goal is to be published and paid. 

            Which reminds me, she owes me dinner.

            Until next time,

            Cordelia