Charlotte Observer Readers Response and Book Winners

This is the list of readers who posted Sunday, April 19 in response to the article you read in the Charlotte Observer. At my request, the Observer posted an invitation to visit my blog Words to Go and ask their readers to leave feedback. The first 25 posting (and leaving your name) were selected to receive a free autographed copy of Painted Dresses.

Thank you for your warm response. If you posted anonymously and left no name, it was assumed that you were not entering the contest. Here is the list:

Greg Faggart

Kathy B.

Nancy P.

Lynn Dulcie

Sandra M.

CAN

Al Huntz

Jacquelyn Mate

Cheryl Regan

Elizabeth

HR Lynch

Jenny N.

Tiffany Johnson

MJ Lewis

Samjcil (dearlittlefoundation)

Silky

Nicole B.

Joanne

Brenda

Fetsje Goettsch

Amy Bennett

Wendy Newton

Faye Apple

Becky Caudle

Judy Murphy

This contest is reliant on the reciprocal response of winners, especially if you left no full name or email addy. If you left an email addy, you’ll be contacted through email. Otherwise, please respond directly to me at pattyhickman at bellsouth dot net. (spelled rather than linked to avoid web crawlers.)

Thanks for visiting me at Words to Go!

Observer Readers--Stranger Than Fiction

If you are responding to the Observer article, you've come to the right place. Please feel free to leave your comments here about the article or you may ask questions, but do leave feedback.

Once you've read Painted Dresses, please visit booksellers websites such as Amazon or CBD and please leave feedback for me. Thanks!

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Wow! I came home from church to a full blogger box. I will post the contest winners Monday morning along with instructions on how the winners will receive their books. I need your first and last name--but don't leave other info for the sake of your privacy. . .
This is amazing. I'm thrilled that such an energy draining journey has resulted in a life-giving story. Thank you!

The Simple Life Book Give

We've had a great week at Words to go visiting with authors Randy Alcorn, Cara Putnam and Susan Page Davis. The material has already given my hubby and I great topics of discussion. All of our authors are offering book gives. Here is the list of winners:

Carly Kendall wins Maine Brides by Susan Page Davis

Connie Sue Larson wins Deadly Exposure by Cara Putnam

Wanda Chamberlain wins Canteen Dreams by Cara Putnam

Karen Harrington wins 50 Days of Heaven by Randy Alcorn (your choice, book or audio of author reading)

I hope your skies are as blue as ours down here in the Carolinas. It's a great day to open the windows and listen to the music of birds and kids' laughing. Have a great weekend, friends!

Join Patty this week chatting with best-selling authors including Lisa Samson!

How Novelist Susan Page Davis Makes Room for The Simple Life

This week we’re discussing The Simple Life with novelists, a group of folks who often have to live on much less and under simple circumstances in order to preserve the life they’ve worked so hard to obtain. Today author Susan Page Davis and I are chatting about the things Susan and her husband have done to simplify. Susan, welcome to Words to Go.

SUSAN: Thanks, Patty!

PATTY: Your simplification process comes more naturally to you since you were brought up with this mindset, right?

SUSAN: Yes, as a girl, I lived in an old house with no running water. In the pantry was a cast iron sink. At the end of the sink stood a small pitcher pump, and when we wanted water, we pumped away.

PATTY: Even though the town had grown up around my grandmother’s house, her sink was exactly like this. I loved drinking from the ladle that hung on her kitchen wall, pumping that water into the ladle.

SUSAN: This small pump was connected by pipes to the hand-dug well out in the woodshed. Over the 16-feet-deep well was another larger pump, and you could get water there too. When we wanted to wash dishes, we pumped water and put it in a pan on the stove to heat. When we wanted a bath, we heated more water and dumped it in the bathtub. Then we added cold water until we had enough lukewarm water to bathe in. When we wanted to wash clothes, we heated even more water.

PATTY: It’s unusual to hear these stories told by someone your age today. Primitive, for certain, but probably not so simple.

SUSAN: I am glad my life is not quite that “simple” anymore. I do love the convenience of running hot water, flushable toilets, and Internet service.

PATTY: When our churches take missions trips, it builds character for us to live at that level. But truly, the problems faced by these emerging countries seem to be complicated by this lack of infrastructure. But some of it is good, don’t you think?

SUSAN: But my husband and I have chosen to retain some of the simpler ways. We heat only with wood in a land of hostile winters. We pay cash for (used) vehicles and just about everything else.

PATTY: Yes, we pay cash for vehicles. But it’s not easy.

SUSAN: In these tough financial times, it’s a true blessing to be without the encumbrance of the monthly bills many are struggling with. Doing without some modern conveniences helps free us from the worries of paying for them and maintaining them.

PATTY: But in spite of all you have to do to preserve this lifestyle, you still write.

SUSAN: The Lord has blessed me in allowing me to write novels. Some of them are historical settings, set back in the simpler days. As I transport myself and my readers back in time, however, I find that even in the old days, life was complicated.

PATTY: But again, it seemed to build so much more character. My sons think I’ve been harder on them than other parents because I wouldn’t buy their cars, pay for cell phones, and I made them earn a college scholarship. But overall now I’m glad because they’ve both turned out well—I don’t lay awake worrying about them. But as a mom, there were times I know they thought I was e-v-i-l. Our forefathers taught us a lot about building character because they earned it the hard way. But, still, they had our same human flaws, didn’t they?

SUSAN: My heroes of the 1800s and colonial days might not have had oil bills to worry about, but they had the same basic problems we have today. Strained relationships, financial hardship, sickness, injustice, sin.

PATTY: True. They still struggled with the same flawed human condition.

SUSAN: I spend a fraction of the time my mother spent on laundry, cooking, and housework. She might have possessed the talent to be a writer, but I doubt she would have had time. She had five children, a big house to maintain, a large garden to tend, and many other chores, besides sometimes working outside the home to supplement the family income.

PATTY: I grew a vegetable garden a few years and canned. It takes three people to bring in the garden and prepare it. You would have thought I was asking my kids to cut off a limb. But they did it and now it’s a great memory. But if I’m going to write, something has to go. I gave up canning and vegetable gardening.

SUSAN: Because I have the time, I’m able to produce books. I thank God that my life is somewhat simple, even though I live in modern times. We no longer have to pump and carry every drop of water we use. Instead, I get to craft stories. I like that trade. But I’d still rather drive an old car than scramble to earn enough to buy a new one.

PATTY: Thank you, Susan, for sharing your thoughts on what you’ve done to have the life you always wanted.

SUSAN: I’m giving away one of my historical books today—Maine Brides.

Come visit me at my Website: www.susanpagedavis.com.

Thanks for having me here, Patty!

Thanks, Susan! This has been a treat getting to know you.

Please leave feedback and your name is entered in the Big Straw Hat for Saturday’s book give. And stay with us this week as we have more great author chats on this week’s topic “The Simple Life.”

The Simple Life and Novelist Cara Putnam

Today on Words to Go kicks off a week of asking authors what they’ve done to simplify life. I created a poll to the right of these chats. Might I add that although I’ve written on the disciplines (accomplished only when life is simplified) that as soon as I get untangled from the weights and obligations, the temptation to complicate life returns with a vengeance. Novelist Cara Putnam knows this very well. Cara could you share what led you to embrace a simpler life?

CARA: Patty, this is a great question and one I wrestle with. Anyone who knows me would tell you I have a hard time saying no. Over-commitment has been the challenge of my adult life.

PATTY: I wrestle too. And it seems that when I divested of all that did not tie in directly to my writing, here came the deluge and sometimes in a very demanding voice.

CARA: Last year the issue came to a point I couldn't ignore it. I had a baby and two books release as well as started teaching an MBA class -- all in a two-week period. Then I had three books due in three months along with two more classes -- and an infant who still hadn't figured out how to sleep through the night.

PATTY: Teaching college was the final brick in my load too.

CARA: Not to mention a daughter on a gymnastics team, homeschooling, church responsibilities, home life, being a wife. My plate teetered on breaking into pieces.Talk about overload.

PATTY: They do grow up. College is the best sitter I’ve ever had.

CARA: So I'm on a journey to learn how to rest.

PATTY: What calms your spirit, Cara?

CARA: A verse that God's pulled to the forefront as I'm on this journey is Isaiah 30:15: This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says:
"In repentance and rest is your salvation,
in quietness and trust is your strength,
but you would have none of it.”

PATTY: Yet, it seems we have to grant permission to the self to do this. What is the challenge of this verse?

CARA: In quietness and trust is your strength. That's such a challenging concept. How do we live in a way that no matter how Type A our personality, we always trust God for our strength. That we learn to be quiet even if He's given us a Martha personality.

PATTY: Hand going up.

CARA: What I'm learning is that while God definitely gave me this personality...and a large component of that is being a doer, someone who sees a need and steps in, that doesn't mean He wants me to do everything. Instead, He wants me to focus on the tasks He has for me. And His tasks are not necessarily every task that someone thinks I should do.

PATTY: The ones to watch out for are the individuals—God love them—who neglect to plan in advance. And then there are those who are probably being nudged by God into an arena, but they’re the Jonahs who decided to not only obey and do it, but lay the task in another’s lap. My new banner is not to enable either of these types of folks. And it’s been a battled. My focus is on writing, but because I work at home, folks tend to think that I’m available for everything.

CARA: I'm also focusing on the activities our kids are in. Abigail, my 8 year old, had to make a tough decision in the fall between ballet and gymnastics. Part of me really wanted to make it possible for her to continue to do both, but she'd been invited to higher levels with both activities that required a much bigger time commitment. She made the choice, and our life as a family was less complicated. Now that challenge is multiplying as her 5 year old brother starts t-ball. Thank goodness our almost one year old isn't old enough for activities yet!

PATTY: We cut back on the athletics when it seemed evident our kids were more talented in the arts. It was a wise decision as both sons have scholarships in the arts now.

CARA: I've also consciously worked on how to say no. That two-letter word is extremely hard for me to say, but as I practice, it's slowly becoming an option.

PATTY: It gets easier with practice.

CARA: I've also become more intentional about involving others in leadership to help remove some of the lie that I'm the only one who can do certain things like teach classes at church. There are so many people that God has gifted, but they don't see it. So I love to help pull those gifting out of them.

PATTY: Yes, I’m happier now too as an “adviser.”

CARA: And then there's that wonderful invention called the crockpot. My friend Heather Corbin has a ministry for moms www.simplefamilysuppers.com that has been a lifesaver for this person who hates grocery shopping and figuring out what's for supper at 5 p.m. She sends out monthly menus with shopping lists and recipes and it's been a lifesaver by removing one stressor from my days -- when I remember to use it LOL

PATTY: Thank you so much for sharing that link.

CARA: I've also started being much more intentional about having the older two help with chores. They are old enough and it's a help. It also means that I've relaxed my standards a tad -- perfection isn't as important as the peace of a clean house without the stress of trying to do it all to an impossible standard. As the sign says, if you want to see my house, make an appointment. If you want to see me, come on over.

PATTY: It’s actually part of character training to have children participate in the household chores. And, especially sons, need to realize that what they live in is as much their responsibility as females. How is your life different now and what about simplifying has enriched your life?

CARA: There is a certain level of pandemonium that young families have, but as I seek to simplify life, my stress level has lowered -- most of the time. There are still points particularly when a deadline looms and I'm working late into the night that I have to watch myself. But as I try to adopt simplicity, the tenor of our home has improved.

PATTY: Learning that every surface doesn’t have to be spit-shined is a weight off. Cara and I give everyone reading this the imperfection of a slightly cleaned home.
I was killing myself on Saturdays trying to clean every baseboard and the tops of doorposts. Now I focus on one area on Saturday morning and will get to the rest in the following Saturdays. And for big chores, like cleaning out closets, I drop the regimen until the big chores are finished.

CARA: I love knowing that I don't have to be perfect. Instead, I just need to keep seeking to obey God and ask for His wisdom on what our family should do at this season.

PATTY: Great wisdom from a mother of young children. Thank you, Cara!

CARA: Thank you, Patty. And I’m giving away two books today.

PATTY: We love you anyway, but thank you for your generosity.

CARA: I’m giving away Deadly Exposure for lovers of romantic suspense. And I’ll give away Canteen Dreams for historical romance.

PATTY: We entertain lovers of all genres here at Words to Go. Thank you so much, Cara.

Tomorrow novelist Susan Davis will be sharing her thoughts and wisdom as we continue in our very practical discussion, “The Simple Life.”

The Simple Life

“I mean to lead a simple life, to choose a simple shell I can carry easily—like a hermit crab. But I do not. I find that my frame of life does not foster simplicity.”

--Anne Morrow Lindbergh

There are many types of sabbaticals, some planned and some forced. I’ve found that when I don’t plan for them that soon I’m forced into one. For many years, I was the “good” employee who didn’t take my vacation time. As an author, there is no allotted vacation time. When I stop my work, there is guilt over not writing. My friends are like me. We writers continue in the same frenetic pace from which we had hoped to escape when we quit our day jobs to write. It is not the life imagined. We simply traded the color of our shackles.

This week at Words to Go we will chat with three authors about The Simple Life. There are authors who have stopped their lives in order to renew and replenish; and there are a few authors who have pared down life in order to preserve it.

Preservation is an important reason to simplify. We rid ourselves of the debts that have shackled us so that we are no longer a bondservant to life’s overlords. If we spend our minutes paying off debtors rather than accomplishing Christ-honoring works, then we are slaves to our debtors rather than freemen to our dreams.

Free people own their hours, especially their down time.

As an exercise, if you’d like, you may keep a list of how you spend your free time this week and this weekend. Then categorize your list into two sections. Make one list the things that you imagined you’d do in your dream life. For the other, make a list of the things you do because you are shackled to it. Then when your list is about a week old, ask what you could do to leave behind the shackles and embrace the dream. And it’s a good time to assess the dream too. Is my dream achievable? What measures must I take to achieve it—such as sacrificing some of the excesses of life to achieve it. Also, does the dream include serving others; and at the opposite end of that deficiency, do you do nothing but serve others—an equally exhausting debt. People who tend to “only serve” might have fallen into the pit of “existential debt” or subconsciously trying to rectify a wrong from an old childhood wound.

Ask yourself, “What do I carry out of necessity and what can I lay down?”

Join Patty this week on Words to Go chatting with authors Randy Alcorn, author of The Treasure Principle and many best selling novels, and authors Cara Putnam author of Deadly Exposure and Susan Davis author of Maine Brides. Those leaving feedback will be entered in a drawing for book gives this Saturday.

Fun Fact: Patricia Hickman co-wrote Secrets From the Treadmill--Discover God's Rest in the Busyness of Life with Pastor Pete Briscoe, son of celebrated pastor-authors Stuart and Jill Briscoe.

The Struggle to See and Hear

“What is this thing He is telling us, ‘A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me’, and ‘because I go to the Father?” So they were saying, “What is this that He says, ‘A little while’? We do not know what He is talking about.”

When Jesus gathered his twelve faithful followers into the Upper Room, he gave them one last final talk. Some might call it a General’s final instructions. He is speaking more plainly than he’s ever spoken. No metaphors to color his words: “They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think he is offering service to God. But these things I have spoken to you, so that when their hour comes, you may remember that I told you of them. These things I did not say to you at the beginning, because I was with you.”

Christ’s tone is one of urgency. It is a bunker speech before the bombs start dropping, but the disciples don’t hear the enemy approaching. Then he shares one last metaphor about a woman in labor and the grief she must bear to bring the child into the world. He knows grief. It is his constant companion because it is full of men's shackles, the cries of the wounded, the tears of slaves.

The Upper Room speech was mingled with the disciples murmuring that he was making no sense; they did not know what he was talking about. As in other instances where they thought their Lord was losing touch with reality, the disciples muttered audibly their confusion.

Then Jesus told them some good news: “In that day you will ask in My name, and I do not say to you that I will request of the Father on your behalf; for the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved me and believed that I came forth from the Father. I came forth from the Father and have come into the world; I am leaving the world again and going to the Father. His disciples said, “Lo, now You are speaking plainly and are not using a figure of speech. Now we know all things, and have not need for anyone to question you; by this we believe that you came from God.” Still, Jesus answered, “Do you now believe? Behold an hour is coming when you all will be scattered, each to his own home, to leave me alone.” He urges them to remember that as they hide out, He is not alone. He has never been alone because the Father is with Him. But to the disciples, surely this is a day far off.

He continues to underscore all the He has taught them, especially to define what a believer must do and what a Christ-follower looks like so they may recognize one another. He prays over them and leads them out of hiding into an open garden where he may easily be found.

This morning as I read Christ’s final talk to the disciples, I said, “This was your thesis, Lord,” to which he responded to my heart, “No, you are my final thesis.”

Today we commemorate the day that creation seized God by the arms and legs while heaven fell silent, while the sky darkened and the earth quaked in horror and the rocks cried out, “It can’t be so.” It is on this day we who, like the disciples, declare, “Yes, you are God. You are who You say you are.” And even though I spend much of my time hearing but not understanding, seeing yet not discerning all that God is doing and intends to do through us and on behalf of us, he is gracious enough to write his thesis on my heart so that I can return to His words when the clouds overshadow life and the days grow dark.

I can rejoice because he said these words to me and all of us and made us a part of his story. “Truly, truly, I say to you, that you will weep, and lament, but the world will rejoice; you will grieve, but your grief will be turned to joy. . . I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you.”

“Pilate then took Jesus and scourged Him. And the soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on His head, and put a purple robe on Him; and they began to come up to Him and say, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!” and to give him slaps in the face. . . There they crucified Him, and with Him two other men, one on either side, and Jesus in between . . . Therefore when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, ‘It is finished!’ and He bowed His head and gave up His spirit.”

Meditation: Think about the things in your life that God has buried with Christ. Name them out loud and then rejoice in the resurrection of new life inside you. Pray this scripture with a heart of gratitude: "Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we my offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire." Heb. 12: 28-29.