The Port City of Denver

Denver is a port city — yes, I’m referring to that pioneer town in Colorado and yes, I’ve consulted a map. While there is no harbor welcoming incoming ships, there is, in fact, a symbolic harbor: the soothing warmth of the sun; the genuine hospitality of the people; the irresistible lure of ever-present mountains. I see the mile high city as a place to sail toward and drop anchor. I always know there will be people waving me in from the docks: my friends, my family, my author tribe. Eagerly I lean into the arrival, knowing these lovely, loving people will securely moor my boat and invite me in.

Later, when my journey calls me back to the open sea and sails to distant shores, I carry a treasure trove of memories to sustain me until the next voyage.

I did that recently - sailed in a flying vessel that swooped down into the spectacle of plains and mountains, cityscapes and golden sunsets. I never tire of it.

My odyssey of authoring began mostly in the rolling Allegheny mountains of Northwestern Pennsylvania, my home of origin.
The honing, the polishing, the unromantic task of edit-edit-edit, has largely happened in Colorado, near the hogback or in the watchful shadow of Vail Mountain.

Long evenings hunched over our laptops, my publisher and I, chiseling the rough draft into a sculpture of words. Edit. Edit. Edit. Checking for accuracy, leaning into art. Typing, retyping, waltzing with words.
This is how it’s been with my latest project in the Breath of Joy Series. This one’s titled “Singing Spring”.

How ironic that we put the finishing touches on bursting buds, blushing brides and babbling brooks while outside the temperatures plummeted; the snow teased and blustered.

Spring emerges out of the dormant hard ground. It’s a labor, a process, a feeling of arrival followed by a sudden plunge back into the cold, unfinished business of winter. It’s a rogue breeze. A hint of earth and rain in the air. A swell of anticipation followed by a dance of freezing rain. Spring is a watery promise, a temperamental season of joy and uncertainty, mud and glory.

And so it is with writing, editing, crafting, honing to the finished work: so much like Springtime with its fits and starts and buttery sunshine chased by capricious winds.
What a heady mix!

How grateful I am, that the rough drafts born in my home state of Pennsylvania have found their true voices in the untamed West, under the vast blue skies of Colorado.

Breath of Joy! Singing Spring is humming an anthem that I hope and pray will stir the imaginations of my readers.

Let’s sail into port - wherever that may be - with a good book, a song, and a new season on the horizon.