Bu++ Bites Build Gristle by Jodi Lea Stewart

It’s like this – the gander that was flapping my face, back and legs . . .

. . . while simultaneously biting blood blisters on my little three-year-old derriere didn’t know he was contributing to my future confidence factor.

Being left alone in trees by older cousins while they went off to play games assuredly built my self-reliance.

How did I get all this country-flavored therapy?

By being reared in a farm atmosphere with a pack of heathens for cousins, that’s how.

Descending upon Grandma and Granddad’s farm every summer made my cousins and me wacky. Throwing our shoes and socks over our shoulders as soon as we arrived, we screeched with pure summer madness.

My gristle got a good start during those summers

I was the youngest, shortest, and most sensitive of the cousin pack *actually, they called me bawl-bag*, which swelled in number from six to twenty+ throughout the summer. Why? My mom was one of eleven kids. That makes for lots of cousins, lol!

Our fun was simple in those days - we simply created something from basically nothing.

Running wild and barefoot, teasing Heir Gander (the baddest dude on the farm), and not minding our elders were outstanding activities.

Of course, not minding always resulted in a lesson on branch cutting (for switches) and a character-building session involving our gluteous maximus immediately thereafter.


Challenging Grandma's Gander to a mad race across the barnyard was forbidden.

And thrilling. 

Except for me. My legs wouldn’t get me very far before I was missing in action. A little wing whipping before being rescued by the cousins was worth all the grass-rolling hilarity that followed.

One day, Gander snapped

Possessed by Hitler himself, Gander went for blood, and I was his victim.

Hair-raising screams brought a rescue unit of five or six bug-eyed adults.
After Heir Gander was slightly reconstructed by my hysterical mom, I experienced a grit-building event. My mom, with multiple pairs of cousin eyes staring, pulled down my shorts to inspect the gander bites. Snickering, then outright peals of laughter, echoed through the barnyard.

That’s when I cried. Hard.

My gristle was building!

Other times, when my cousins grew tired of babysitting me, they left me in a tall tree and told me to hold tight and be sure to not fall.
Hanging on for dear life—I’m afraid of heights to this day—I squalled until they came back. When they did, I was the center of attention. Merrily swung onto a pair of shoulders, I was teased and promised games and stories. They even meant it.

I was all giggles when we returned to the farmhouse. Any notice of my red eyes or purple face was attributed to the heat and my allergic problems.

Experiences like these were difficult, but I’m glad I went through them, and so many others later on. Why? Well, I have a theory:

A little grit in your craw makes life’s toughest tidbits easier to swallow, let alone digest.

You know I love to hear from you!

💖💖💖💖


Just for fun . . .

 "Hey, Marilyn, did you read Jodi Lea Stewart's newest novel, The Accidental Road?"

"Jane, honey . . . I was her consultant! After all, it's practically written about me."

Jodi Lea Stewart is the author of a contemporary trilogy set in the Navajo Nation and featuring a Navajo protagonist, as well as two historical novels. Her current novel, Blackberry Road, is available on Amazon. Her next historical novel, The Accidental Road, debuted a few weeks ago. She is hard at work on her sixth novel set in New Orleans and St. Louis. She currently resides in Arizona with her husband, her delightful 90+-year-old mother, a crazy Standard poodle named Jazz, two rescue cats, and numerous gigantic, bossy houseplants.

 The Accidental Road, Fire Star Press.

A teen and her mom escaping an abusive husband tumble into the epicenter of crime peddlers invading Arizona and Nevada in the 1950s. Stranded hundreds of miles from their planned destination of Las Vegas, they land in a dusty town full of ghosts and tales, treachery and corruption. Avoiding disaster is tricky, especially as it leads Kat into a fevered quest for things as simple as home and trust. Danger lurks everywhere, leading her to wonder if she and her mother really did take The Accidental Road of life, or if it’s the exact right road to all they ever hoped for.

Blackberry Road is published by Sundown Press and is available on Amazon.

Trouble sneaks in one hot Oklahoma afternoon in 1934 like an oily twister. A beloved neighbor is murdered, and a single piece of evidence sends the sheriff to arrest a Black man that Biddy *a sharecropper’s daughter* knows is innocent. Hauntingly terrifying sounds seeping from the woods lead Biddy into even deeper mysteries and despair, and finally into the shocking truths of that fateful summer.

Jodi Lea Stewart was born in Texas to an "Okie" mom and a Texan dad. Her younger years were spent in Texas and Oklahoma; hence, she knows all about biscuits and gravy, blackberry picking, chiggers, and snipe hunting. At the age of eight, she moved to a vast cattle ranch in the White Mountains of Arizona. As a teen, she left her studies at the University of Arizona in Tucson to move to San Francisco, where she learned about peace, love, and exactly what she DIDN'T want to do with her life. Since then, Jodi graduated summa cum laude with a BS in Business Management, raised three children, worked as an electro-mechanical drafter, penned humor columns for a college periodical, wrote regional western articles, and served as managing editor of a Fortune 500 corporate newsletter. 

Grow Your Own Jewelry? by Jodi Lea Stewart

My childhood as the only girl on an Arizona ranch could get downright lonesome.

Television and radio reception were nonexistent, and all the wonderful gadgets of today weren’t yet invented.

Friends were far away, so play dates and overnighters were as scarce as green grass, which is plenty scarce in the high deserts of the Southwest.

One day, probably as a result of my mournful expressions and heavy sighs, my mother – shrouded in mystery – beckoned me to follow her to the garden. There, between a peach tree and the rock house that supported our water tank filled with well water, she poured several tear-shaped seeds about the size of corn kernels into her hand from a packet.

What were they?

Job’s Tears, she said, and I was immediately beguiled. What a name! I could barely breathe as I asked her what we were going to do with them.

Plant them, was her reply.

And we did.

What exactly are Job’s Tears?

For starters, Job’s tears are nature’s jewelry.

The plants grow a pre-drilled, polished bead that can be used to make an endless assortment of necklaces, bracelets, and other baubles. The male flower grows up through the center of the bead. When removed, it leaves a hollow core just right for stringing.

People have grown Job’s Tears for thousands of years. In western India, a bead-making shop circa 2000 B.C. was uncovered. They found beads made from soapstone (man-made beads) and Job’s Tears (nature’s beads).

Different cultures have used these beads in creative ways. In Africa, shaker gourds enclosed with a loose net and covered with hundreds of Job’s tears are said to produce a lovely musical sound.

Why are they called 'Tears?'

The tear-shaped beads sometimes refer to job of the Old Testament, a man who endured great suffering. They are also called David’s Tears, St. Mary’s Tears, Christ’s Tears, and Tear Drops.

So, why are they called tears? Who knows? But it's dramatic and fun to do so.

More than a pretty bead

• Coix lacryma-jobi – Job’s Tears’ scientific name – is a close relative to corn. The plants strongly resemble corn but are skinnier. It is considered one of the earliest domesticated plants.

• The beads have been used all over the world as a source of food and medicine.

• They can be ground into meal, or used as a coffee substitute.

• They are common in products sold in Asia. When supplies of rice were low during the Vietnam War, Job’s Tears became a staple substitute.

• In Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan and Vietnam, Job’s Tears are available as flakes or powder. They are often added to other grains, liquors, candy, bath products, vinegar, and tea.

• Hatomugi, the Japanese word for Job’s Tears, is used in traditional Japanese Kampo herbal medicine. The grain is valued as a nutritious food and has long been used in traditional Chinese medicine to support hair, skin, nails, and as a digestive aide.

• Here’s what Amazon says about them: This plant’s seeds are used in soups and broths, and can be used in any way that rice is used. They can also be ground into flour for making bread. The seeds are popular for making decorations and have herbal and medicinal uses. 

Growing Job’s Tears

Job's Tears are easy to grow. The plants don’t need a lot of water and are quite hardy. Here’s a link telling you exactly how to do it, but I promise, it’s easy!

Growing Job’s Tears and stringing the beads into necklaces remains one of my fondest childhood memories. My mother learned about Job’s Tears from her mother. Why not make some passed down memories for your special girls and guys?

They’ll never forget it. 

Amazon has the seeds right now. And don’t forget to come back and tell us about it, okay?

 I always love to hear from you.

 The Accidental Road, Fire Star Press, debuts September 2019.

A teen and her mom escaping an abusive husband tumble into the epicenter of crime peddlers invading Arizona and Nevada in the 1950s. Stranded hundreds of miles from their planned destination of Las Vegas, they land in a dusty town full of ghosts and tales, treachery and corruption. Avoiding disaster is tricky, especially as it leads Kat into a fevered quest for things as simple as home and trust. Danger lurks everywhere, leading her to wonder if she and her mother really did take The Accidental Road of life, or if it’s the exact right road to all they ever hoped for.

Blackberry Road is published by Sundown Press and is available on Amazon.

Trouble sneaks in one hot Oklahoma afternoon in 1934 like an oily twister. A beloved neighbor is murdered, and a single piece of evidence sends the sheriff to arrest a Black man that Biddy *a sharecropper’s daughter* knows is innocent. Hauntingly terrifying sounds seeping from the woods lead Biddy into even deeper mysteries and despair, and finally into the shocking truths of that fateful summer.

Jodi Lea Stewart was born in Texas to an "Okie" mom and a Texan dad. Her younger years were spent in Texas and Oklahoma; hence, she knows all about biscuits and gravy, blackberry picking, chiggers, and snipe hunting. At the age of eight, she moved to a vast cattle ranch in the White Mountains of Arizona. As a teen, she left her studies at the University of Arizona in Tucson to move to San Francisco, where she learned about peace, love, and exactly what she DIDN'T want to do with her life. Since then, Jodi graduated summa cum laude with a BS in Business Management, raised three children, worked as an electro-mechanical drafter, penned humor columns for a college periodical, wrote regional western articles, and served as managing editor of a Fortune 500 corporate newsletter. 

She is the author of a contemporary trilogy set in the Navajo Nation and featuring a Navajo protagonist, as well as two historical novels. Her current novel, Blackberry Road, is available on Amazon. Her next historical novel, The Accidental Road, debuts in September 2019. She is hard at work on her sixth novel set in New Orleans and St. Louis. She currently resides in Arizona with her husband, her delightful 90+-year-old mother, a crazy Standard poodle named Jazz, two rescue cats, and numerous gigantic, bossy houseplants.

Everyday Heroes by Jodi Lea Stewart

A few years ago, a man named Scott came to repair the dishwasher in a house we were leasing. He was bowed in the shoulders and wore knee-high therapeutic socks.

He walked slightly lopsided and breathed heavily with effort as he bent to check out the appliance. His knees hurt. His hands were swollen with neuropathic pain. Over the course of the next half hour, Scott shared some of his life with me in a voice clear and strong.

It didn’t take long before I realized a bona fide hero was standing in my kitchen.

More about that later.

Scott told me he was worried that he was losing weight and that his 6’2” frame seemed to be shrinking. His strength wasn’t what it used to be either. Not long ago, he said, he could wrestle a fat, new refrigerator from the back of his truck and install it single-handed. Now he uses an assistant – Frank – to help with that kind of physical stuff.

Lately he had been experiencing a lot of tiredness after the three kidney dialyses he receives each week.

“Used to, I’d be down for a few hours, then get right up and start working again. Now I’m tired for hours afterward,” he said.

Scott happens to hold the record for the longest living male to receive kidney dialysis in the state of New Mexico. When I met him, he’d been doing it every week for 22 years.

The dialysis is the result of his taking bullets to the abdomen during the Vietnam war. Lying alone and bleeding in the jungle, he did something that saved his life.

“I stuffed my wounds with leaves,” he told me. “Now you’d think I’d get infected, but the leaves I used turned out to have a penicillin-like effect. How about that?”

How about that, indeed.

Beautiful like a hero

I’ve been thinking a lot about Scott since I met him that day. He inspired me. I have a feeling he inspires everyone he meets. He’s called a workaholic by his coworkers, and he’s a tad vain about his appearance. 

I told him he was looking good, and I meant it.

Come to think of it, Scott looks just like a hero to me, and that’s a beautiful thing to behold.

~~~~~~~~

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines a hero as a person (or animal) who is admired for great or brave acts. 

I think heroes are something more. I believe they are icons on which we project our greater selves. Deep in our psyches – maybe in our DNA – we want to believe that if pressed, we will rise to heights of courage and greatness. Heroes make us aspire to flee mediocrity and pursue the impossible. 

 Some of my heroes:

Gerard Butler!! How did he get in there? Gracious! You just never know where Gerard will show up, do you? 

Who are some of your heroes? We'd love to hear about them.

Blackberry Road is published by Sundown Press and is available on Amazon.

Trouble sneaks in one hot Oklahoma afternoon in 1934 like an oily twister. A beloved neighbor is murdered, and a single piece of evidence sends the sheriff to arrest a Black man that Biddy *a sharecropper’s daughter* knows is innocent. Hauntingly terrifying sounds seeping from the woods lead Biddy into even deeper mysteries and despair, and finally into the shocking truths of that fateful summer.

 The Accidental Road, Sundown Press, debuts September 2019.

A teen and her mom escaping an abusive husband tumble into the epicenter of crime peddlers invading Arizona and Nevada in the 1950s. Stranded hundreds of miles from their planned destination of Las Vegas, they land in a dusty town full of ghosts and tales, treachery and corruption. Avoiding disaster is tricky, especially as it leads Kat into a fevered quest for things as simple as home and trust. Danger lurks everywhere, leading her to wonder if she and her mother really did take The Accidental Road of life, or if it’s the exact right road to all they ever hoped for.

Jodi Lea Stewart was born in Texas to an "Okie" mom and a Texan dad. Her younger years were spent in Texas and Oklahoma; hence, she knows all about biscuits and gravy, blackberry picking, chiggers, and snipe hunting. At the age of eight, she moved to a vast cattle ranch in the White Mountains of Arizona. As a teen, she left her studies at the University of Arizona in Tucson to move to San Francisco, where she learned about peace, love, and exactly what she DIDN'T want to do with her life. Since then, Jodi graduated summa cum laude with a BS in Business Management, raised three children, worked as an electro-mechanical drafter, penned humor columns for a college periodical, wrote regional western articles, and served as managing editor of a Fortune 500 corporate newsletter. 

She is the author of a contemporary trilogy set in the Navajo Nation and featuring a Navajo protagonist, as well as two historical novels. Her current novel, Blackberry Road, is available on Amazon. Her next historical novel, The Accidental Road, debuts in September 2019. She is hard at work on her sixth novel set in New Orleans and St. Louis. She currently resides in Arizona with her husband, her delightful 90+-year-old mother, a crazy Standard poodle named Jazz, one rescue cat, and numerous gigantic, bossy houseplants.

Why Using Metaphors is Both Awesome and Terrible by Jodi Lea Stewart

One dreadful  inspiring morning at a writing seminar long ago, I emerged from a face-to-face editor session feeling as if I were stepping from inside that room onto a parade float. For a few minutes, I could have sworn I was wearing stilettos, a flowered crown, and a ribbon sash proclaiming I was Miss Metaphor, and not in a good way.

Said editor had reviewed the first pages of my first novel and had practically stamped the lofty title of *Miss Metaphor* on my chest. I remember walking back into the area with a weak little Miss America wave at the other terrified aspiring writers waiting their turns at the chopping block.

That experience caused me to:

• Greatly revise my first manuscript, and
• Consider why metaphors are both awesome and terrible

With a little research, I found a true Metaphor Devotee – Italian semiotician, literary critic, and novelist, the late Umberto Eco who said, “ . . . metaphor gives birth to pleasure. . .”

He claimed that knowing how to conceive brilliant metaphors is an art.

I agree.

Metaphors, and their cousins – simile, hyperbole, allegory – add punch to pallid writing. They enlighten and freshen dull manuscripts.

Too Many Metaphors

Some writers (Jodi Lea Stewart in the past, for example) are addicted to figurative language. Consider the following paragraph, and yes, I wrote it for this blog, and furthermore, it was easy because I could almost live inside a metaphor, but that’s another story, n'est-ce pas?

The female fire hazard blazed her way into the board meeting, bull-nostrils flaring, poblano-pepper eyes glowing and roared at the Sovereign Power himself, “Give me back my job or I’ll torch your underwear from the inside out!”

Thirty-nine words, twenty-one of which indicate some kind of metaphor.

That’s overkill.

Writers who use metaphors to that extent might want to hook up with a 12-step Metaphors Anonymous program sooner versus later. Over metaphorizing *I made that word up to add interest* dulls out the reader almost as much as the writer who doesn't understand how to use figurative language in his or her writing.

Too Few Metaphors

If The Elements of Style by Strunk & White makes you salivate,

If you love stringent grammar rules and feel it is a crime to alter them,

If you use symbolic language ultra-sparingly, or not at all,

If you wallow in strict English correctness,

Stop reading this blog.

Grab your Elements of Style and repertoire of grammar books and take a nap with them because you’re boring all of us to death with your writing. 

Sleep. Just sleep.

However, if you are boring even yourself, and you are often told by readers, agents, or editors that your writing lacks color, excitement, or imagination, then I have a suggestion for you.

Run, don’t walk, to buy Arthur Plotnik’s Spunk & Bite. Read it under the covers with a flashlight if you must, but read it without delay. 

Plotnik, a self-defined, writing-rule-rebel said, “Both Strunk and White knew well that bending the rules . . . can give writing its distinction, its edge, its very style. Bending the rules can spring writers from ruts – get them out of themselves, out of the ordinary, and into prose that comes alive, gets noticed, and gets published.”

Strike the Balance

A sassy blend of metaphor mixed with essential writing rules will let you stand proud on that Miss (or Mr.) Metaphor float, or anywhere else. Just as a superb pageant contestant is attractive, well-rounded, and interesting, so is the kind of writing that stands out from the crowd.

Another quote from that metaphor-loving genius, Umberto Eco: “Metaphor is the supreme figure of all . . . connecting notions and finding similitude in things dissimilar.”

That’s kind of a gorgeous way to put it, wouldn’t you agree?

What about you? Have you been guilty of too much flowery writing? Did anybody ever tell you to stop? Maybe you abhor metaphors, simile, hyperbole and the like. Tell us about it. 
As usual, I love to hear from you!

Blackberry Road is published by Sundown Press and is available on Amazon.

Trouble sneaks in one hot Oklahoma afternoon in 1934 like an oily twister. A beloved neighbor is murdered, and a single piece of evidence sends the sheriff to arrest a Black man that Biddy *a sharecropper’s daughter* knows is innocent. Hauntingly terrifying sounds seeping from the woods lead Biddy into even deeper mysteries and despair, and finally into the shocking truths of that fateful summer.

 The Accidental Road, Sundown Press, debuts September 2019.

A teen and her mom escaping an abusive husband tumble into the epicenter of crime peddlers invading Arizona and Nevada in the 1950s. Stranded hundreds of miles from their planned destination of Las Vegas, they land in a dusty town full of ghosts and tales, treachery and corruption. Avoiding disaster is tricky, especially as it leads Kat into a fevered quest for things as simple as home and trust. Danger lurks everywhere, leading her to wonder if she and her mother really did take The Accidental Road of life, or if it’s the exact right road to all they ever hoped for.

   

Jodi Lea Stewart was born in Texas to an "Okie" mom and a Texan dad. Her younger years were spent in Texas and Oklahoma; hence, she knows all about biscuits and gravy, blackberry picking, chiggers, and snipe hunting. At the age of eight, she moved to a vast cattle ranch in the White Mountains of Arizona. As a teen, she left her studies at the University of Arizona in Tucson to move to San Francisco, where she learned about peace, love, and exactly what she DIDN'T want to do with her life. Since then, Jodi graduated summa cum laude with a BS in Business Management, raised three children, worked as an electro-mechanical drafter, penned humor columns for a college periodical, wrote regional western articles, and served as managing editor of a Fortune 500 corporate newsletter. 

She is the author of a contemporary trilogy set in the Navajo Nation and featuring a Navajo protagonist, as well as two historical novels. Her current novel, Blackberry Road, is available on Amazon. Her next historical novel, The Accidental Road, debuts in September 2019. She currently resides in Arizona with her husband, her delightful 90+-year-old mother, a crazy Standard poodle named Jazz, one rescue cat, and numerous gigantic, bossy houseplants.