September 21st

By David G. Woolley
History has a way of repeating itself and in my case that happens every 1st, 11th, 21st and 31st of each month. I complained about these dates in my last blog, but repetition has a way of, well, repeating itself. Today's date ends with the cosmic number one. Cosmic because it is likely the meteoric day appointed from the foundations of the world as my Latter Day Authors blogging day. And cosmic because it was the gloriously grand day appointed for Joseph Smith to be yanked out of thinking that his first vision was a personal experience intended only for his personal salvation and inform the seventeen year old that "God had a work for me to do".

We all have a mission in life. Mine is bad blogging. What else could a writer of fiction be than a bad blogger? I spend hours figuring out new and creative ways to muffle my voice and disappear from the pages. If I'm fortunate enough to succeed my voice falls entirely silent and my characters do all the talking. Blogging is the anti-fiction. There is no invisible third party beguiling the reader into believing they are communicating dreictly with a fictional character. The blog is the nightly news equivalent dangerously left to the unable hands of amateurs and for this broadcast I happen to be your anchor speaking right at you without the protecting filter of a fictional character. If you're feeling my intrusion, I beg your pardon, but today is September 21st and there is some good news to share.

Despite my recurring mention of the dates that end with the number one, I'm not fixated on calendars, though this month does sport one of the really important dates in all of recorded history. Sometime tonight, one hundred eighty four years ago, a seventeen-year-old Joseph Smith was concerned about his standing before God and when he prayed for assurance that his sins were forgiven an angel named Moroni not only assured him that his plea had been heard, he set the boy's feet on a path that would lead four years later to the unearthing and translation of an ancient record of scripture.

I am just this morning placing the finishing touches on historical notes that will be appended to a novel titled Day of Remembrance. I'm going to suggest to the publisher that it be released next year in September. Good luck with that. It will likely be a hard sell. Publishers prefer to get things out as soon as possible no matter how non-cosmic the date. Last Thursday, September 13th 2007, Jews celebrated Rosh Hashanah (The Jewish New Year). It's a solemn day devoted to remembering covenants made with God. The feast celebrated on that day is called the Feast of Trumpets. The horn playing is intended to awaken Israel to a remembrance of her covenants. It was the day Moses returned down the slopes of Sinai to the playing of shofar horns (a trumpet made from the hollowed horn of a ram and a common instrument in the homes of ancient Israelites) with the covenant written on stone tablets. About 1200 years later in Lehi's time the day was known as Ha Zikron (The Day of Remembrance).

This Jewish holy day falls on the first day of the month of Tishri on the Hebrew calendar,but doesn't always occur on the same day on our western Julian calendar. Next year the Day of Remembrance will be celebrated on September 30th, 2008. When the angel Moroni directed Joseph Smith to the hill three miles south of his home to get his first glimpse of the ancient gold plated record buried in a stone box it was Monday, September 22nd 1823 and the Day of Remembrance had already been celebrated seventeen days earlier on September 6th. On Joseph Smith's second visit to the hill one year later the Day of Remembrance was celebrate the day before. On Joseph's third visit in 1825 the Day of Remembrance was celebrated nine days earlier on September 13th as it was this year, and in 1826 the Hebrew celebration took place ten days after Joseph's yearly visit to the hill on October 2nd. It wasn't until the Jewish Sabbath, Saturday September 22nd 1827 did the celebration of the Day of Remembrance coincide with Moroni's declaration that the time had arrived for Joseph Smith to receive the ancient record. Not unlike Moses, Joseph Smith returned down the hill south of his home in Palmyra New York bearing a record he called a New Covenant and he did it on the same day Jews celebrate the remembrance of ancient covenants.

In honor of a four-year run of events which began one hundred eighty four years ago tonight with a sincere prayer offered by a seventeen year old boy in the attic bedroom of the Smith family cabin and culminated with the coming forth of the Book of Mormon, I share this historical note:

The Feast of Trumpets marks Israel’s final harvest period in the fall of the year. It is the first feast in a series of three of the holiest feast days in Judaism which are also referred to as a trio of feasts of ingathering beginning with the Feast of Trumpets followed ten days later by the Day of Atonement and ending with the Feast of Tabernacles. Bruce R. McConkie indicates that these High Holy days occur during the final harvest period to metaphorically symbolize Christ’s final harvest of souls (McConkie, Promised Messiah, 432-37). These interrelated feasts include the symbolism of the Feast of Trumpets as a time when God remembers His covenants with Israel and is likely the reason the feast day was originally known as the Day of Remembrance (ha-Zikron) before it became better known as a Jewish New Year (Rosh ha-shanah). The term Zikron means memorial or remembrance and according to Hebrew scholars the blowing of trumpets on the Day of Remembrance is in keeping with the definition of Zikhron “as a sound that will arouse God’s remembrance (or judgment) of his people” (Bloch, Jewish Customs and Ceremonies). Numerous Jewish scholars explain the purpose of the trumpet sound on the Feast of Trumpets as the signal of Israel’s redemption from world-wide exile. The Old Testament indicates that “And it came to pass in the day [the time of regathering] that the great trumpet shall be blown, and they shall come which were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt (Sherman and Zlotowizt, Rosh Hashanah, 58, 61-62, 112-13, 117-18; Artz, Justice and Mercy, 55, 94, 154; Block, JewishHoly Days, 21; Snaith, The Jewish New Year Festival, 162; Leo Trepp, The Complete Book of Jewish Observance, New York: Behrman House and Summit Books, 1980, 95).

The prophet Zechariah writes that “The Lord God shall blow the trumpet,” and that Ephraim will help raise up God’s covenant people, and that those of Israel’s blood would return to be part of the God’s flock (Zechariah 9:13-16). After the Israelites returned from Babylonian bondage the prophet Ezra gathered them together and read the law to them on the Feast of Trumpets (Nehemiah 8:1-2) and they rejoiced when the truth was restored to them. LDS scholar Lynette Reed indicates that this ancient restoration of the law after exile in Babylon which took place on the Day of Remembrance may have its latter-day counterpart in the coming forth of the Book of Mormon. Among the ancient readings still used during the celebration of the Rosh ha-Shanah is the restoration of Ephraim. The prophecies of the prophet Jeremiah are among the important readings on this feast day where he calls Ephraim a darling son and that God will “remember Ephraim” (zakhor ezkerenu).

The name most often used for the day on which the Feast of Trumpets is celebrated today is Rosh ha-Shanah which means New Year. But that was not its original name and the significance of the day is really a new beginning rather than the start of a new calendar year. On this day the Lord is said to move from His seat of judgment to His mercy seat by mercifully providing a new beginning through gathering Israel out of exile, remembering His covenants with their fathers, and restoring them as His covenant people. This new beginning was to be initiated by the sounding of the trumpet.

The sounding of the trumpet appears not only as a remembrance of the revelation given at Sinai, but also as an indication of future events. Just as the trumpet preceded God’s revelation of the law at Sinai (Exodus 19:16) some scholars believe the trumpet sounding during Rosh Hashanah signals further revelation, including the establishment of the true law (Goodman, The Rosh Hashanah Anthology, 42). Old Testament, Book of Mormon, and Doctrine and Covenants scriptures speak of the trumpet preceding the establishment of truth that leads to redemption (Isaiah 58:1, Alma 29:1, D&C 33:2). “And at all times, and in all places, he shall open his mouth and declare my gospel as with the voice of a trump” (D&C 24:12). The statue of the angel Moroni atop Mormon temples is portrayed as blowing a trumpet, proclaiming the gospel to the world, and particularly to the house of Israel. A review of LDS history and scripture indicate that most of the restored truths in the gospel of Jesus Christ began with the coming forth of the Book of Mormon.

The return covenant-blessings from God which follow Israel’s remembrance of their covenants with God are repeated in prayers offered on the Day of Remembrance and are similar to the words written by the prophet Moroni in the title page of the Book of Mormon where he stated that one of the two main purposes of the book was, “to show unto the remnants of the House of Israel what great things the Lord hath done for their fathers; and that they may know the covenants of the Lord, that they are not cast off forever”. As part of the prayers offered on Rosh ha-Shanah Jews today still read the Old Testament passage, “I will for their sakes remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt” (Leviticus 26:45).

Jewish religious scholars (Arzt, Justice and Mercy, 146-48) indicate that Jeremiah’s prophecy regarding the remembrance (or restoration) of Ephraim has special significance to the Day of Remembrance, but are uncertain what that significance may be. LDS scholar Lynette Reed suggests that the part the Book of Mormon plays in restoring knowledge of significant religious covenants to descendants of Ephraim is the connection between remembrance (or restoration) and the Day of Remembrance.

Happy 21st of September everyone! And be grateful that September only has thirty days.

Your Favorite Book?

By C.S. Bezas

Ever heard the quote: "We will yet have Miltons and Shakespeares of our own..."? Orson F. Whitney stated this long ago.

Forget the fact that perhaps you have never read any works by Milton or perhaps the only thing you know of Shakespeare is that taught by your 9th grade teacher. What really counts is that quality literature has the power to move and change souls.

To celebrate just such books, the prestigious Whitney Awards have been born. Begun to stimulate the search for quality LDS literature, the Whitney Award is in its infancy and first year. Yet just as the acorn contains immense potential, the Whitney Awards seek those books whose impact resonates and continues to expand through space.

Have you experienced such in your life? Do you have a favorite book? If so, nominate that book today for the new prestigious Whitney Award! Click here for the nomination form and further details.

Sarah Jane's Very Best Story Ever

By Lori NawynFrom the back cover of the book Sarah Jane's Very Best Story Ever:

"Sarah Jane Van Komen was a most amazing storyteller. Now what made her such an amazing storyteller was that she always knew exactly the right kind of story to tell. Sarah's simple tales began when she first started to speak. Those tales carried children, as well as adults, into her gifted imagination of wonderment and purpose.

Many admirers, friends, and family members were brokenhearted at her tragic death in an automobile accident when she was only sixteen years old. However, not long after her death her mother began to record the occasions of people calling her to report that Sarah had indeed come back and told them stories in their dreams. The common thread in all the reports was that the story or message Sarah brought them was one of purpose and peace. This story is one such story, and Sarah believes that it is her Very Best Story Ever. All of the events in this story talking about Sarah really happened.

Sarah claims that the entire story is true."

I never knew Sarah Jane Van Komen while she was alive, yet she is a person I can say I am much the better for having known about. I know her from the book Sarah Jane's Very Best Story Ever, a book compiled by her mother, Janie Van Komen, which details Sarah's life, death, and return to our Father in Heaven. Sunday night, while I sat in a packed audience listening to Janie speak about Sarah, I savored the comforting surety that heaven and earth are not so far apart and that miracles still occur. I am grateful for the power of the spoken and written word to bear witness.

Thank you, Janie. Thank you, Sarah.

Rating Rejections

By Terrie Bittner

When my daughter was nine or so, her teacher decided to send a poem she had written to a magazine. He did so without telling me until after the fact. I was not thrilled, since her home address was included and the rejection, if it came, would come to her. This was not a children’s magazine, but an adult magazine, and unlikely to publish her. I worried about the impact of getting a rejection letter so young. My first one was certainly hard on me, and I was an adult when it came.

Sure enough, one day a thick envelope came back, and we know what those mean. I hovered nervously as she opened it and read it. Then, to my surprise, she started to giggle. I leaned over, thinking it had been an acceptance after all, but it wasn’t. It was an ordinary rejection letter. Seeing my confusion, she said, “Look, they have five grammar and spelling mistakes in their letter. It’s a good thing they didn’t publish my poem. Their magazine is probably really bad, too, and who wants to be in a bad magazine? I want my poem in a good magazine.”

So where did this child inherit that sort of wisdom? Not from me, certainly. But this day started a new family game. When my rejection letters came, we graded them together. Often, my children saw funny things I missed, but they (and I) learned not to take our rejections too seriously.

One magazine, run by nuns, sent rejections we all loved. They went on and on about how they could see how much I loved children and God, and about how proud God was of me for wanting to serve Him. They expressed so much sorrow and guilt for not buying the stories we pictured them in tears of anguish. But best of all, they always sent me a present to cheer me up—a pretty bookmark with a scripture on it. Presents are good, and always lead to good grades in Rejection 101.

One had a checklist of reasons the manuscript was rejected. Some of them were silly. The editor I sent my stories to invariably checked, “My mother made me do it.” I was disappointed none of the helpful reasons were ever marked, but my children loved the idea of an important editor bowing to his mother’s demands. Humor got high marks, too.

It was a bit surprising how often we found grammatical errors in rejection letters. These are, after all, editors. I had never noticed them until my children made it their goal in life to find them.

One thing I learned from all this was that rejection is just a part of the job, or maybe even part of the game. Life goes on, and so does my writing career.

Fear -- cluck, cluck -- of Failure

By Lori Nawyn

I write manuscripts then file them away like a squirrel hoarding nuts for winter. Unlike a squirrel’s stored supply, however, my stashed manuscripts do me little good. That’s because I’m not a squirrel…I’m a chicken. I never submit half the manuscripts I write.

At first, I thought I suffered from manuscript rejection anxiety, an ailment I have yet to find a clear and concise definition of. After an internet search, I discovered it’s not uncommon for authors to suffer from such a malady. I found this appeal from John Last, Emeritus professor of epidemiology of the University of Ottawa, wherein he pleads for a colleague:

“Are there any editors aware of support groups for authors who have something original and important to say but suffer from obsessive anxiety that inhibits their ability to pursue their ideas to fruition?...My admittedly rather superficial inquiries about the prevalence of this condition suggest that it is not uncommon among creative artists and writers, which leads me to wonder whether there is/are support group(s) for victims.”

I didn’t have time to attend a support group, even if I could find one. So, I further researched the subject and stumbled upon the following advice, intended to ease the pain of rejection:

“When submitting manuscripts, send two SASE's, one rose colored enveloped labeled"Acceptance Letter," and a black envelope labeled "Form Rejection Slip.” Enclose a smiley face sticker, with instructions to the editor to affix it to the black envelope if he has scribbled a personal note of encouragement or advice in the margin of the rejection slip.”

Interesting counsel, but not applicable to my particular situation because, after reading and contemplating the advice, I realized it was not the rejections, or the words therein, that unnerved me. Some of my rejection letters actually evoked a smile. One I still have:

“Had we had received your manuscript a year ago, we would have been eager to publish it. However, due to what we perceive as instabilities in the market that render us unable to make a profit, we cannot do so as we plan to cease publication. However, please feel free to send additional manuscripts as we enjoy reading your work.”

And, my personal favorite: “If you were a well-known author, or a male author, we feel your manuscript would be saleable.”

I was working on the first problem. However, since the publisher didn’t mention an option to adopt a masculine pen name, there wasn’t much I could do about the second!

I decided to break things down to see how I really felt about the whole process of writing and submission. Writing - good. Rewriting - check. Filing - great. Getting manuscript out and rereading, revising, and rewriting - wonderful. Putting manuscript into envelope and sending -- eeekkk!

Two images popped into my head. The first was of my fiery, redheaded high-school typing teacher, Mrs. Weidman, who gave my fingers a sharp rap with her ruler if I erred at the keyboard. She made it plain she didn’t like me, and she had zero tolerance for my inability to produce spontaneous, blunder free papers. To this day I don’t know why -- it wasn’t for lack of trying -- but my brain and fingers could simply not make a connection that would allow me to type 100 plus words per minute with no errors.

The second image was of my mother. In my youth, I frequently followed her around and tried to get her to listen to my stories. Her response was almost always the same: “Lori, writing is not your forte.” I knew she thought she was doing me a favor by discouraging me from making a fool of myself. She believed writing, for me at least, to be a frivolous occupation. Her words stung.

Silly as it seemed, though nearly two decades had elapsed, I continued to allow my self-esteem to remain in a battered state. I wasn’t really afraid of rejection -- I pretty much expected it. The problem was I feared I would never measure up. My efforts would never -- ever -- be good enough for the Mrs. Weidman’s of the world. Sometimes, I could almost feel the smack of her ruler on my fingers when I even contemplated putting a manuscript into the mail. “Yes, Mrs. Weidman, I’d better check it one more time -- I’ll file it away until I can…”

In addition, as I’d discovered with a handful of other things in my life, when a parent expresses stringent and repeated opposition to your choices, it can be difficult to overcome. Could my manuscripts ever be perfect enough that my mother would believe writing was my forte?

My yearning to have my manuscripts be undeniably perfect in every aspect, to the point I feared sending them out (some even after private editors combed over them) was rooted in a fear of failure. I had to have a stern talk with myself and remember failure is a normal part of life. Without it, like I often told my children, how could we learn? It’s not failure that matters, it’s the way we handle it. It’s getting up one more time and trying again, even if those who oppose us think we shouldn’t.

I’m getting braver at submitting manuscripts. As a result, I’ve enjoyed some rewarding achievements, milestones I never would have reached had I always been a chicken and not tried. Now, each time I submit, my fingers and heart hurt less because I know I haven’t truly failed until I quit, and I don’t intend to quit.

What All Stories are About

By David G. Woolley

There was a time in my college days I didn't believe the script writing professor. He said all stories were ultimately about birth and death. The man was an ad director who retired from his Manhattan agency for a career in teaching script writing. Not that you can't trust ad people and their creative attempts to convince me I need a hand sewn magnetic head warmer to promote brain wave function, but they're the ones who hype high fructose corn syrup to reduce the risk of type four diabetes--the type of diabetes the coroner diagnoses. Can you really trust a professor who makes a comment using the word all ?

I don't remember everything I learned in my college statistics courses, but when a lecturer said it was statistically possible to know if a question was true or false based on how it was phrased, I perked right up. You mean there is a real-world application for standard deviations? I admit my perkiness was more about not having to study the course material too deeply and still have a statistically significant chance of acing the test. It was the greatest find since Columbus used a time machine to transport the Pilgrims to Plymouth Rock. History is my best subject. My statistics professor was also the same scholar who advised a local frozen food packing company that the best way to insure lower rates of employee turnover was to hire applicants who scored below thirty percent on the company's entrance exam. Apparently exam scores predict a reverse correlation between the repetitive work of stuffing pasta into plastic freezer bowls and job satisfaction. Based on those findings I was willing to suspend my disbelief and I took copious notes to preserve forever the knowledge of how to divine which test bubble, A or B, to darken with a #2 pencil.

Turns out it was a pretty simple matter of semantics. If the question uses the words all or always, you can be 95% certain that the answer is false. When my script writing professor insisted that all stories are ultimately about birth or death, I was statistically skeptical. It wasn't until after he explained the nuances of his claim that I learned he fell into that narrow 5% category of being always semantically false while at the same time remaining true to the art of storytelling.

I said, "Where is the story of birth or death in the Sound of Music?"

He pointed out that when characters change they essentially let their old way of thinking or behaving die in exchange for a birth into a new way of behaving. What he called a new life. Maria, the Captain, all the Von Trapp children, the blond-headed telegram delivery boy of going-on-seventeen-fame turned Nazi. Even Max the freeloader who loved rich people ephiphanized new wine and stored it in a new bottle. There's something to that Jewish parable. It was Max who said he loved the way he lived when he was with rich people, but finally exchanged his greed and let his new-found Von Trapp Family Singers escape over the Swiss Alps.

Okay. Maybe my script-writing professor was right. There are metaphorical births and deaths in that rerun-of-a-drama, but that was an old story lost among millions of newer stories.

I said, "What about Ground Hog Day?"

I was willing to concede the stories of romance, drama even documentary. But comedy? I figured I had him until he pointed out that the main character in Ground Hog Day, when he discovered he was living in a repetitive day that re-cycled every twenty four hours, searched for happiness in the base pleasures of the world. When that didn't make him happy, he gave away his former life, essentially letting it die. It wasn't until he was reborn into a new life did the repetitive daily routine break and the story end with a satisfying conclusion.

Darn. I was forced to concede comedy too.

This is the point where I should limit my analysis to storytelling and declare that birth and death act as metaphors for character change. But its deeper than that. Character change just may be a metaphorical death and birth equivalent for slavation. The spiritual connections are obvious. Faith. Repentance (and its corollary forgiveness). Baptism. Atonement. Maybe what my script-writing professor was teaching me without actually mentioning it was that all things are spiritual. Even all our stories.

Always.

Writer's Travel Trunk

By Janie Van Komen

It’s never really convenient to write. There are always clothes to wash, weeds to pull, people to visit, scriptures to read. I think God set it up that way so that we always have some kind of choice to make.When I was younger I believed I would eventually have time to do everything.

As I collected more and more years into my travel trunk of life I finally realized there is only so much room in that trunk. Everything won’t fit. I am more selective about the trappings of choices I throw in and also about the ones I consider and then throw away. Startled at the revelation that the trunk was filling up too fast I was angry with my past self for dumping lots of tidbits of things I was only interested in for about ten minutes or ten days. Why did I waste all that precious space in time?

Then the writer side of me poked a pencil into a book and as I began to catalogue the contents, stories both real and imagined interrupted the mechanics of the record keeping. The record keeping was my excuse of acceptability to those who prefer I wash dishes or run errands, but the imagined interruptions rejuvenated me.

This exercise of putting my hand to paper is just as vital as keeping my family tree properly trimmed up. The choices of my past rise out of my trunk of life and reappear in some story like coins a magician pulls out of ears and other unlikely places. The choices, whether good or bad, are vital to making my life trunk valuable to a future somebody. My explanations, tangents, and imaginations spun out of those choices are my interpretations of the journey of my mortality.

It’s never really convenient to write but if I don’t, my fear is that somebody else will sort through my travel trunk of life and write what they think my story was all about.