Story Sparks by Jane Kirkpatrick

For Mother's Day, my publisher asked me to contribute a piece about step-parenting that's up on their website for a few weeks at http://waterbrookmultnomah.com/2010/05/08/happy-mothers-day/. Step-parenting is never easy. Either a death or divorce must be grieved through. But writing the piece reminded me that step-parenting is about stepping aside, stepping back, stepping in and stepping up and that we never step alone.

My grandmother became a step-parent and I admired how she accomplished what she did, blending two families into one. My cousins from my grandfather's first wife are as much my cousins as those of my grandmother's. I'm not sure how she did it, except that I know she stepped up and showed up to meet the needs of those children even at the expense of her own, all without losing herself in the process.

Since my mom's death five years ago, Mother's Day has taken on new meaning for me. I'm an orphan now. It seems a strange thing to consider in my sixties; but perhaps we are all orphans hoping to find our way home to the loving arms awaiting us if not in this life, then the next. But it's in the stepping stones of our lives where we find true meaning, the showing up despite the aches and pains and disappointments of our daily lives.

This year I'm also wondering how my mom might have felt about A Flickering Light and an An Absence so Great, the story of her mother. My mom loved to read. At the assisted living facility on the Warm Springs reservation where she spent her last days, she often read out loud to other residents. And while in her 80s, she volunteered at the Early Childhood Program reading to Indian kids. She never told me that she liked my books; but she told other people who told me she was my best publicist, making sure everyone knew when the next book was coming out and showing off her early copies.

Would she have liked the photographs from the family collection that I included (especially one of her as a child, the last photograph in A Flickering Light); would she have wished the painful parts of the family story had been left out even though one had to go through them to get to the happier

ending? Did she find meaning inside photographs the way I have?

One of my favorite family photographs includes my dad at the head of the table with his mother on his right, my mom on his left sitting next to her mother and with my mom's sister and brother on either side of the table down the line. My sister stands beside the table and that's me, the child in the striped shirt, at the opposite end of the table from my dad, a big smile on my face. I titled this picture: Child alive! Because it's evidence of my great joy, surrounded by family, being at the "head of the table" even though it's the foot.

The picture is also a reminder that my mom lived a full, rich life just as my grandmother did. She graduated from nurses school, married my dad and helped him farm while working as a private duty nurse and later as the head of a Lutheran home that served elderly people. In their retirement from the dairy farm, they traveled delivering campers across the country and eventually moved to Oregon. I miss her on Mom's Day; but her spirit still lives and that photograph of Child Alive! is a good memory of the importance of being alive as life is so short.

If your mom is alive then celebrate with her if you can; if she isn't, bring her memory to your day and thank her anyway, for making you a Child Alive! too.

Christy Nominee

I learned late in April that A Flickering Light was named as a finalist for the national Christy Awards. This award is given in nine categories of novels to celebrate the Best in Christian Fiction. Flickering is in the Historical Category next to a Lynn Austin for Though Water's Roar and Tricia Goyer & Mike Yorkey for The Swiss Courier. Flickering was also named to Library Journal's Best Books of 2009. A few years ago A Tendering in the Storm was also named as a Christy nominee and along with other nominees, I received a lovely pendant that hangs on the living room wall with some of the other awards. I'm delighted to receive the nomination and send out thanks to my editors and publisher and especially to my grandmother whose story I tried to capture in that book. The winner will be chosen in late June. I won't be attending the award ceremonies because I'll be at a bookstore in Minneapolis with my PowerPoint in hand telling the story of the sequel, An Absence so Great. But hopefully my editor will attend and pick up that pendant...or maybe, even the win. I already feel like a winner because so many of you have found my grandmother's story engaging so thanks to you as well.

Touching Base

Join me at one of the upcoming events! Check out www.jkbooks.com new additions.

May 13 - Powell's Books, Cedar Hills Crossing, 7:00 PM, Beaverton, OR
May 15 - Aurora Colony Museum: 11:00 - 1:00 signing; 1-2:00 presentation (reservations required www.auroracolonymuseum.org ) followed by visit to the cemetery honoring Emma Giesy's anniversary of her death.
May 20 - Women of Worth luncheon, 12:00 Noon. Rolling Hills Community Church, Tualatin, OR - reservations required (www.rollinghills.org)
May 22 - Yakima, WA, tea sponsored by Inklings Book Store. Held at White House Cafe. Reservations required mimi@inklingsbookshop.com
June 19, 1-3, presentation at 2:00, High Desert Museum, Bend, OR
June 24, 7:00 PM Winona Historical Society, Winona, MN
June 25, 10:15 KARE Television, Minneapolis/St. Paul
June 26 1-3:00, with presentation at 2:00, Northwest Bookstore, Burnsville, MN
June 26, 7:00 PM Barnes and Noble, Har Mall, Roseville, MN

Gifts of Comfort

When my sister was very ill she told me one day that when you're going through a hard time, it's difficult to concentrate long enough to read an entire book. So I'd give her little things to think about, metaphors of rocks, rivers, plants and dogs, everyday things she could consider to encourage herself. One day I told her that the word family came from the Latin word famalus meaning servant, hoping to ease that guilt sick people often carry as they watch others meet their needs when they no longer can. Or I reminded her that what brings on the bloom of a flower is not the quality of the soil or the amount of rain or fertilizer or even that a stake gets placed beside the plant before its really needed, to help it weather winds. What brings on the bloom is the lengthening of the days, the increase exposure to the sun. Despite her illness, she was still working toward that bloom and there were still things she could do which brought meaning to her life and the lives of her children.

She said those thoughts helped her and after she died (she passed away twelve years ago at the age of 55 so I am now "the older sister."), I put them together into a small book initially published as A Burden Shared. After 10,000 copies, it went out of print and then Harvest House picked it up and reissued it with lovely photographs first and now with luscious water colors and re-titled it A Simple Gift of Comfort.

I often read from that book at the close of presentations whether to the Western States Juvenile Justice Directors or the European Council of International Schools or a small book group. I'm always amazed at how the words seem to touch people, how people comment on those thoughts long afterwards. I suspect that if we knew everything about the people we meet each day, we'd discover that each person is in a hard place, struggling perhaps not with life or death issues, but struggling to be good parents, good employees, good caregivers, good servants, and welcoming words of comfort. Stories do that, of course. Like the Hebrew word for parable that means pebble, a good story just tosses along beside us, doesn't get in our face. The Greek word for comfort fits in well here, too, as it means "to come along beside" which is exactly what a good story does for us: it comes along beside us to bring comfort.

I hope this summer you'll find those great summer reads that bring you comfort and encouragement for wherever you are in your days. Thank you for sometimes making my titles part of your reading list.

Sincerely,

Jane

Jane Kirkpatrick