Month: October 2010

It’s Been One Year…

| rachelhamm

365 days and 100 posts.

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One year ago today, I picked up a pen and started writing down the story of how I came to pick up a pen in the first place.  It’s crazy how much (and how little) can happen in a year’s time.

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I was working at a hair salon last October, frustrated that I couldn’t pay my bills and hating how stressed out every day at work made me.  I had fallen in love with Ben Harris, the character I dreamed up to fall in love with my fictional equivalent, Abigail Bronsen.  I had never sent out a query letter and I had no idea how self-esteem crushing writing one could be.

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In November, I attempted my first NANO novel, which I called Anita’s Dream Diary.  There were certain things about ADD that I loved- the first chapter contained a rather hysterical (I think) suicide attempt- but as I kept writing, I just realized the entire style of the book wasn’t suited to my voice.  It was an interesting lesson in learning to let go when things aren’t working.  I started writing The Death Effect on Thanksgiving Day and I didn’t “win” NANO, but I’m still glad I attempted it.

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December was a big month.  I gave my boss notice and started looking for other jobs.  I knew that I was never going to be happy working as a hair salon receptionist.  So I moved on.  And on January 20th I started my new job.  As a receptionist at an orthodontist’s office.  Okay, so I’m still a receptionist, but the great thing about working at the ortho is that when I leave work- I’m done with that job.  I don’t have to worry that someone is going to call and ask me to work their shift or about the crazy guest that didn’t like her hair.  I’m not on-call 24/7.

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I went on a couple of dates in February!  It didn’t end in a love connection, but it felt good to get out there and feel some butterflies and wonder where it was going.  I hadn’t been on a date in seven years, so even being asked out boosted my confidence!

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March and April were wedding months for me.  I met with a lot of brides, worked a couple of weddings, and started planning with a full-service couple.  I really really love being a wedding coordinator.  I cannot wait until that grand day when I’ll get to do it full time.  I really hope it happens soon. I know that whenever I’m able to quit my day job to do weddings full time, I’ll be able to put a lot more of my free time into 1- writing and 2- having a social life!

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Disney World and all of it’s fantubulousness happened in May.  It was a much-much-much needed vacation.  I really needed to see my friend, Brooke, and I really needed to have some fun and some alone time with my writing.  I got all three things.  And my adorable niece, Gracyn, was born on May 24.  She is one of the happiest things in my life right now.  She’s not my actual niece, but her mother and I have been friends since first grade!

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I turned 26 in June.  If it’s is possible, I think turning 26 was more difficult than turning 25.  I had my book to focus on on my twenty-fifth birthday.  On my twenty-sixth, all I had to focus on was the fact that I was twenty-six!  I realize I’m not old.  I realize I’m still young.  But I am not living like a 26-year old.  I’m a nomad.  I don’t have a real home.  I have three jobs.  I’ve never had a relationship.  I wonder what’s wrong with me that at 26 I’m not more grounded.  Some people would be happy with leading this kind of existence.  I am just not one of those people.  I like order and stability.  I can’t understand what’s been keeping me from living the life I want.

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A client was unhappy with me in July.  I can’t explain how uncomfortable and upset that makes me.  I want to make everyone happy.  I am sickeningly accommodating of people, especially my clients.  It keeps me up at night when someone is angry at me.  But I had to push through it, because I kept getting prospective clients and I still had other weddings to plan and coordinate.  It wasn’t easy for me.  And I still think about it sometimes on my long commutes to and from work.  I hate that I can’t get over things like that.

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The Hamm family took a trip to visit more of the Hamms in August.  We spent a long weekend with my grandparents in Buffalo. It was another much needed vacation.  My really good friends Ashley and Charles moved to Burlington with beautiful Gracyn around the same time.  I’m soooooo happy I finally have close  friends nearby.  And that I don’t have to spend all my weekends alone in my bedroom!

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September and October have been wedding-crazy-busy again!  As you can see, the year started with writing and it pretty much fazed out and into wedding work.  I wish I had an extra twelve hours every day so that I could focus equally on both my loves.  Maybe one day I’ll be able to.  I miss writing.  I can’t remember the last time I sat and wrote anything new.  I’ve been slowly editing Twenty-Five for the past month, but haven’t picked up a pen and written anything fresh.

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So that’s where I am, on this, the one-year anniversary and one-hundredth post of my blog.  I hope I’ll have another eventful year.  I hope I’ll grow and maybe have another finished book by the time October 15, 2011 comes around.  Maybe I’ll be in love.  Maybe I’ll be living on my own.  Or maybe I’ll have learned to start living in the moment and not looking to the future.  Who knows.  But I hope you’ll stay along for the ride.

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Quick reminder- I’ll start posting my book chapter by chapter on Sunday.  Please, if you are a regular reader, but have never commented- let me know how you like it!  And share it with everyone you know.  Especially if you know any literary agents or publishers 🙂

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And thank you so much for reading, for following this journey I’m taking to become a real writer.  I appreciate it more than I can say.

My Favorite Posts

| rachelhamm

There’s less than a week til the one-year anniversary of this blog!  I can hardly believe that I’ve been writing and sharing with the blogosphere for a year.  I’m so glad I let a friend convince me to start it.  It has been a friend when I had no one to talk to, an outlet to vent, and the best place in the world to share my writing.  I sincerely hope that those of you who are kind enough to follow me have enjoyed my nonsensical ramblings and bitching and exultations.

For those of you who may not have been around since the beginning of this blog, I wanted to catch you up a little bit/ share my favorite posts from this past year.  I hope you enjoy!

The Road That Let to Know

Originally Posted October 15, 2009

It’s amazing how seemingly insignificant moments in life can become catalysts for major change.  At least that’s what I’ve been told.  And it must be true because I’ve witnessed the phenomenon time and time again.

I tend to be the type of person who thinks I always know what path I’m walking when, in reality, I could stumble upon a fork in the road, trip over a tree root, or walk right into a dead end at any moment.

Read more here…

My Top 10 Favorite Books

Originally Posted November 9, 2009

This was a HARD list for me to make.  I love to read.  I’ve always loved to read and my taste in books is broad.  I only had one requirement for a book to make my top ten list: I had to have read it more than once.  To me, that’s an automatic way to determine if a book is good.  Do I want to read it a second time?  A third time?  Otherwise, I just went with my gut.

1.) Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.  I know, no big surprise here if you’ve read other blog entries and the Randomness page.  I’ve read this book more times than I can count.  I cry every time Darcy says, “You are too generous to trifle with me…”  I have “I love Mr. Darcy” as the screen saver on my phone.  Yes.  I really do.  I’m such a dork, but I don’t care.  Elizabeth Bennett is witty, independent, and kind.  She stays true to the women of the time period she lived in, but she also breaks new ground.  Jane Austen is a genius.  This is ABSOLUTELY the best book ever written.  If you disagree we cannot be friends.

Read more here…

Bookshelf Browsing- Why Judging a Book By Its Cover is Totally Fine By Me

Originally Posted January 6, 2010

I read somewhere that writers aspiring to be published should

(A) Read as many books in the genre they are writing in as possible

and

(B) Support other beginning (or non-famous) authors by buying their books.

Well, if you’ve been reading my blog regularly you’ll know my financial situation as of late hasn’t really allowed me to purchase many books (or any at all), so I’m dreadfully out of touch with what is out there in book world right now.

Read more here…

What I Learned This Week

Originally Posted March 11, 2010

I’m often told that my writing is very honest- that I’m not afraid of putting myself out there on the page.  And I definitely find this is true.  In fact, I’m more honest in my writing than in actual conversation.  Not because I am untruthful in real conversation, but because I often just can’t find the right way to express myself.  Somehow, in writing, I always can.

I’ve been thinking about this phenomenon a lot lately.  Namely due to this guy I went out on a couple of dates with.  Let me emphasize A COUPLE OF DATES.  I’ll be more precise.  TWO dates.  You’ll see why the number is important in a minute.

Read more here…

The Query I Wish I Could Send Out

Originally Posted May 3, 2010

Dear SuperAgent,

I wrote my first novel, Twenty-Five, a year ago, on the verge of my own twenty-fifth birthday to deal with the trauma of that milestone.  It is the first time I’ve attempted to write fiction other than a contest in the fourth grade (which I won) where I wrote a short story entitled The Summer Aliens Invaded My Brother’s Brain.  I know my strengths and I know my weaknesses.  Twenty-Five is a love story, pure and simple.  The characters are not so utterly unique that reading about them makes one wonder if I was on acid when imagining their personalities.  The plot is not so action packed and full of twists and turns that readers will sit looking at the wall, scratching their heads, for ten minutes after reading because they have no idea what the hell just happened.  Instead, I’ve created characters who are a lot like you and me, your best friend, your next door neighbor, and the boy who grew up down the street from you who you always had a secret crush on.  What happens to them is what happens to us all- the firsts of a new relationship.  The first meeting, the first date, the first kiss, the first fight, the big breakup, etc.

Read more here…

And some milestone updates for you:  this is my 99th (eek!) post and there are only 4 days until the anniversary!!!!
A little thing that makes me happy: decorating for Halloween!

The Books I’ve Read This Year, Part 2

| rachelhamm

My original plan was to post this on New Year’s Eve, but it’s getting kind of long and I need a 98th post and don’t really have a topic for one, so here’s PART TWO of the Books I’ve Read this Year!  If I get a chance to read any more- which seriously might not happen because I have 3 weddings coming up in the span of 6 weeks, and that’s a ton of work, and I’m also thinking about giving NANO another shot this year, so November is out for the most part, plus polishing Twenty-Five and posting it here, well, you get the idea- then I’ll post a part three.

Quick Stat update before I get into the books:

This is my 98th post.  There are only 11 days left until my one-year anniversary!

My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One Night Stands. Read for the first time.  Finished 7/11/10.  I’m sure there will be some readers out there scratching their heads- why is the virgin reading about one night stands?  Well, I blame (and thank) my sisters.  My older sister and I went to Charlotte for the July 4th weekend because that’s where my younger sister and her husband live and it was her birthday on July 5th.  While we were there we somehow made an agreement to each buy one of Chelsea Handler’s books and we’d read them and write notes to each other in the back and then swap.  Younger sis got Are You There Vodka, It’s Me Chelsea, older sis got Chelsea Chelsea, Bang Bang, which left My Horizontal Life for me. (I’m the middle sis, I pretty much just do what I’m told) It’s probably appropriate seeing how I’m the only one still capable of having a one night stand (since they are both married).  Sadly, I have no desire or inclination to act upon this power I possess.  Which is how I know that Chelsea Handler and I could never be friends.  No matter how funny I find her.

The Choice: Read for the first time.  Finished 7/12/10.  This book wasn’t bad.  But it wasn’t as good as I think it should have been.  I normally love Nicholas Sparks, because I love love stories.  But I feel like he put all of the good stuff in Part One of the book and half-assed Part Two.  I just didn’t feel emotionally connected to the characters at the end of the book.  This sparked a conversation with my mother who believes that I don’t enjoy reading anymore because I’m reading everything through a writer’s eye.  She’s partially correct.  I definitely read differently now that I’ve spent so much time reviewing and making suggestions of other people’s work and having other people reviewing and making suggestions about my work.  I hate getting reviews of my work, honestly.  I know I need it, but I hate it.  It usually makes me feel like no one understands me and it is so frustrating.  But anyways, back to the point.  My mom loved this book.  I thought it was okay.  I would have written it differently- and therein lies the problem.  Everyone who writes would have written it differently- would write my book(s) differently, very often suggest that I should write my books differently.  And I think that’s why I’ve stopped working on my books.  I’m sick of being told to write it differently.  So, maybe I should stop imagining how I would write someone else’s…

Bleachers: Read for the first time.  Finished 8/6/10 (on the flight to Buffalo).  This book was really good.  I enjoyed the simplicity of it.  No crazy complicated plot or characters.  Just real life people dealing with real life stuff- only fictionally.  I wasn’t sure if I’d like a John Grisham story that wasn’t based around lawyers or a courtroom, but it worked.

Same as it Never Was: Read for the first time.  Finished 8/9/10 (read during the trip to Buffalo, on the plane ride home from Buffalo and in my house when I should have been returning emails after I returned from Buffalo) LOVED LOVED LOVED this book.  Claire LaZebnik! I’m so happy I bought one of her books at random and was able to discover her beautiful stories.  Why can’t I write like this?  Did I mention that she sent this one to me?  And autographed it? But that’s not why I loved it.  I just couldn’t stop reading it.  And I’m such a sucker for a love story.  I want a love story!

Also read for the second time.  Finished 10/2/10.  I couldn’t help myself.  I really wanted to read it again.  And I’ve been so good this year about repeats, that I let myself.  Besides, I had to get in Claire LaZebnik mode so I could read her NEW book. (See below!)

Other People’s Love Letters: 150 Letters You Were Never Meant to See: Read for the first time.  Finished 8/20/10.  This was a collection of actual real-life love (and some hate) letters written between couples.  Some of the letters were so sweet I actually teared up.  I saw this book when I was in Buffalo (visiting my grandparents) at a store in the mall and I really wanted it, but it was like $23!  Which I feel is a ridiculous price to pay for any book.  So I found it later on Amazon for cheaper and I’m so glad I bought it.  It’s going to be my go-to “I need a smile” book from now on.

Chelsea Chelsea, Bang Bang: Read for the first time.  Finished 8/21/10.  The second round of my sisters-bonding readathon.  I liked this book better than the first one, I thought the stories were funnier and more likely to be true- plus some of them had pictures accompanying the chapters.  This book was more about her relationship with her family and her boyfriend, and not about random one-night stands.  Perhaps that is why I enjoyed it more.  I mentioned in the blurb about My Horizontal Life that we were writing little notes in the backs of the books to be passed on to each other and I wanted to share a little bit of what I wrote in this one.

Interesting fact: Somewhere around chapter 5 or 6 I told our mother she could really be a bitch sometimes.  I think Chelsea would approve.

Now to clarify, yes, I did indeed tell my mother this.  But, in all fairness, she said I could be a bitch sometimes too.  And that’s why I love my mother.  Oh, and no, at no point in the book does Chelsea call her mother a bitch.  She does refer to her father as mentally retarded, psychotic, and delusional though, and devotes several pages to the idea of her brothers and sisters and herself euthanizing him.  I would never do that to either of my parents.  I don’t think.

Jesus Wants to Save Christians: Read for the first time.  Finished 9/2/10.  My really good friend Ashley bought this book for me after the incident with Religious Guy- and I have to say, it was just amazingly good.  The book is about Jesus’s real message and how modern America has gone off-track and built an empire instead of pouring out our bodies to do good for the poor and needy.  The larger and more powerful an empire becomes, the more it feels greed and entitlement, which just leads to violence and the acquisition of weapons in order to maintain the power, which leads to more greed and entitlement.  We are not entitled!  Christians need to remember that God’s message is one of love, humility, assistance, sympathy and empathy.

My favorite quote from the book:

“When people are manipulated with guilt and fear and when they are told that if they don’t do certain things they’ll be illegitimate, judged, condemned, sent to hell forever- that’s violence.”

Please go out and buy this book.  Read it.  Live it.  And share it.  For my part, I already try to be super conscious of keeping my judgments at bay, but I’m not perfect- I have to work harder to really live what I believe.  I also need to remember that I have a good life and that there are so many people out there who are worse off.  I need to be generous with myself and with what I have and always remember that when I help the less fortunate, that is when I’m truly living the life God wants me to live.

Conversations with the Fat Girl: Read for the first time.  Finished 9/5/10.  I bought this book because of the title and because, let’s face it, there aren’t a lot of fat literary heroines for young 26-year old tubbies like me to look up to.  I actually related to a lot of what the main character, Maggie, was going through, but I can’t say that I really enjoyed the book.  I hated how the author started every chapter with backstory.  And I hated how the main character constantly contradicted herself.  And I really really really hated the dialogue.  It was soo unrealistic.  Like she needed to spin the conversation so the characters HAD to say what she was making them say, but most of the time, the things they were saying made no sense.  And she used a lot of question marks in dialogue after phrases that were not questions.  Really annoying?  Yes- absolutely annoying.  I never felt immersed or engaged in the actual story, I could feel the author on every page.  Very disappointing.  But like I said, I did relate a lot to the main character.  I’ve felt like a fat girl for most of my life.  I know the pain of trying on outfit after outfit and nothing fitting; of going out with a group full of girls, none of whom are larger than a size 4, who can’t understand why I feel uncomfortable talking to guys.  Hell, I even make my MC’s pretty and skinny so that I can live vicariously through them.  What the hell is wrong with me?

Breakfast at Tiffany’s: Read for the first time.  Started and Finished 9/6/10.  Great book.  What a character.  I mean the whole book was Holly Golightly, and it was just entrancing.  Everything Capote wrote about Holly brought her to life.  I could see her, hear her.  Amazing.

If You Lived Here, You’d Be Home Now: Read for the first time.  Started and finished 10/3/10.  Claire LaZebnik knocked it out of the park again.  I have to say I’m wildly thrilled that my random bookstore adventure one day led me to her books and blog.  Her MCs always seem to be in a place that makes sense to me personally- I can really relate.  In this case, Rickie is a single 25 year-old woman living at home with mom and dad and wondering when her life is going to change.  Can I just say, um, hello!  Me too!  Of course, Rickie has the added responsibility of a 6 year-old son and feelings for said son’s PE Coach whereas I have a bag of Doritos and good ole Ben & Jerry (they never let me down), but I still got her frustration with her mother and trying to figure out exactly what she’s supposed to do to change her life when she feels stuck in the situation she’s in.  Of course, I cried at the end.  Because I don’t really consider a book good unless it makes me cry.