Thankful Writers

[paulwest]

I'm hoping everyone is keeping busy writing and enjoying it.

I thought I'd title this thread "Thankful Writers" as this is the month of Thanksgiving. I think we should all be thankful for the talent God has given us to write and enlighten others through our writing.

Keep up the good work,
Paul

[charlie]

I am thankful that Elder David Baxter, First Quorum of the Seventy, came to our stake conference yesterday (actually the whole weekend) and we now have a new stake president, R. Lance Marshall, who is in my ward.

[paulwest]

26 Now it is not common that the voice of the people desireth anything contrary to that which is right; but it is common for the lesser part of the people to desire that which is not right; therefore this shall ye observe and make it your law—to do your business by the voice of the people.

27 And if the time comes that the voice of the people doth choose iniquity, then is the time that the judgments of God will come upon you; yea, then is the time he will visit you with great destruction even as he has hitherto visited this land.

(Mosiah 29:26 & 27)

I am thankful for the Book of Mormon, other scriptures, and latter day prophets that gives me and my family direction in times of strife.

[sachiko]

Innit THAT the truth!!!

The way one blogger I read put it is that the more part of our people desire evil now. They WANT to be able to do wrong things, and they also want others to pay for those things and the consequences of them.

[paulwest]

'bout right. I think we just witnessed a partial, beginning fulfillment of the prophesies of the last days. Keep in mind, that if we are prepared, we should not fear.

[Gary McCallister]

Sorry about that! You will all be shocked to know that my life has been completely out of hand. I won't bore you with details, but I simply haven't been able to keep up. I think things are slowing a little. I will say that one added issue was the election as my wife and I got quite involved. It is the first time in my life I have actually contributed money, or time, to an election campaign.
My wife and family were thrown into a depression by the election. Interestingly, it affected me quite differently than I expected such a result would. The very next morning, I awakened with full clarity on what I now must do. Spent the rest of the week researching and planning and I am still implementing plan B, which i didn't even know I had.
I have still been writing my weekly column, but not much else. I did complete a 26 page educational manual on Gravity. I wrote it for my daughter who is home schooling. I may try to put it out as an e-book if I can find the time. Right now i can't even figure out how to save it as a pdf.
Congratulation Sachiko, on your new great expectations! People generally think the world is run by things. In fact, it is run by knowledge and the only things that possesses knowledge are humans. So for every human that manages to be born in this modern age of savagery a greater responsibility rests to save the world. It wouldn't seem fair, except we understand that those very demands are what calls forth great souls.
I had an e-mail from T. Lynn a month or so ago. I think that her success has just overwhelmed her. That often happens to ambitious people (which I suppose all of us are or we wouldn't be here).
Well, I hope i can continue our correspondence a little more faithfully. Bless all of you for keeping on keeping on.

[paulwest]

Hi Gary,

I'm glad to hear (read) from you. I was beginning to think everyone had given up on this site.

Sounds like you've had a rough few weeks, and I completely agree with your depression over the election. Read Mosiah 29:26 & 27. IT describes what our nation is going through. However, Heavenly Father has promised that this nation would never fall, so I think we can take some solace in that. But keep your powder dry and a sharp lookout. Times are a changing and we need to be aware of what is happening and do our best to stop it.

[paulwest]

Today is what I call the aftermath of the Thanksgiving weekend. I'm exhausted but feeling great. I hope it was as wonderful for you all as it was for me.

One of the great things I was thankful for was to have my entire family, 4 kids and spouses and 11 grandchildren (with one more on the way), all together at one time and in one place. My daughter who lives in California even came with her husband and brood. It was wonderful.

Now I'm looking forward to Christmas and all the wonderful music and programs that go with that holiday. I don't look forward to all the shopping but I love Christmas stories and sacred music.

On Saturday evening, Brenda and I went to downtown Salt Lake City and enjoyed seeing the new City Creek mall. I'd not been there before. It's quite impressive. Then we went across the street to the Tabernacle for a concert by the Sterling Singers. Three of the singers live in our Ward. The concert was beautiful. If you get a chance to attend one of their performances, do. They almost sounded as good as the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and the entrance fee is reasonable, too. Zero.

[paulwest]

This weekend during some house cleaning, I made an exciting find -- to me at least. Going through my file cabinet in my home office I found my old notes for Johnny Sweeting's Story. I began writing this story many years ago, in the early 1980s, and I thought I'd lost them. They include background information of the two towns I describe, plus my early attempts at starting the story, and even an outline of where I wanted the story to go and end.

A lot of the notes are garbage, or not where I want the story to go now, but a lot of it is great, and my writing style back then was a lot better than it is now -- how embarrassing to find that out. Well, it's because I had more time to write back then and simply only have time these days to get down the bare story now.

Anyway, I'm hoping this find will help my future writing as I can see now what I'm missing.

[Gary McCallister]

Well, it isn't even Thankful Writers anymore. Today is Dec. 1, 2012. Our Thanksgiving was a little lame. My wife, daughter, and grand daughters all ended up watching some Jane Austin move that lasted four hours. The guys wanted to go shooting, but the girls said they wanted to shoot to and to wait. By then it was too late. But we did go on a fun hike and I started building my first mandolin.

I finally have a rough draft of my book on religion and science. It is a little over 100 pages and needs a lot of work. I have discovered, obviously too late, that it is really hard to write complex things over a long period of time. I forget what I have said, I forget what I haven't said but meant to, and I change what I wanted to say as I learn more. I think for the new year I am going to pick one writing project and stick with it until it is at least rough draft stage. That is harder than it sounds for someone like me.

BY the way, I have finished a new CD. I call it "Ghost in the Garden". It started out, conceptually as a sort of Halloween concept, without the goblins and gore. It has a lot of semi-ghost stories about dying and people coming back from the dead. But I think all of them are couched in Gospel principles. For example there are two songs about Joseph's martyrdom, one about Abinadi, and a couple more about eternal love and life after death.

If anyone would like a copy send me your snail mail (again) to [e-mail]

[paulwest]

Hi Gary. I think we've died again. Aside from you, Sachiko a few weeks ago, and me there's not been anyone else here.

Glad to hear you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Mine was wonderful too. We had all our family, kids and grandkids, here, even those who are currently living in California. I hope everyone here had a wonderful Thanksgiving as well.

Gary, I'm anxious to read your book on religion and science. From what you've said in the past, it sounds exciting, at least to me, a fellow scientist. Are you going to try to find a publisher, or self-pub?