​Last week PBS conducted an excellent two part interview with Bruce Springsteen.   The interviewer asked him candidly about his bouts with depression, which the Boss as suffered throughout his life.  Springsteen explained that based on his life and those of many artists he has known; artists often have a dual nature. 
One part of the artists suffers from crushing doubt and insecurity.  That is the voice inside the artists that judges – and always judges in the negative.  The voice tells us our work is worthless and we are wasting our time trying to be creative.  It doesn’t matter what type of artists you are, a painter, a performing artist, a writer – it is a part of anyone living a creative life.
The second aspect of the artist is a tremendous ego and drive to create and express that creativity in whatever way you’ve chosen.  Many artists, in an attempt to explain their creativity and the energy they devote to it, express the creative urgency they feel.  Many writers, when asked, explain they write because they must, it is who they are as unique people.  I have written in blogs previously that writing is not what I do, writing is who I am and the words express that person.
Springsteen believes it is the duality in the artists that creates the magic of our art.  It is the constant battle between the Ying and Yang in our lives.  Springsteen believes he needs both aspects of his nature to live and to create his art.  He also expressed that his acceptance of the dual nature has made a tremendous difference in his creative life.
As we close the chapter of 2016 and begin to turn page one of 2017 as artists we need to reflect on our nature.  While it may not make any sense, it is our reality.  Accept it.  Use it.  Let it guide you to an energetic, creative, productive, achieving your potential, 2017.     

​This blog post is a day late.  It’s posted on Thursday, not Wednesday.  Yesterday we were on a plane on our way home from Fort Worth, Texas where we celebrated both Lynette’s and my granddaughter’s birthdays.  It was great to visit our Texas family for a few days.  It’s hard to have family and grandkids thousands of miles away – it’s very different from the family we have that’s five miles from our home.
Back on the last day of November I proudly blogged that I had finished my rough, draft manuscript for third historical novel Dead Reckoning.  I promised to let the manuscript “get cold” and begin editing in January.  I’ve found that I miss working on a manuscript.  It has been very tempting to open the file just to take a peak.  I’ve already had second thoughts about the final chapter, I worry that I’ve ended Ian Murphy’s story too abruptly and have ached to jump into a re-write of the last chapter.
I won’t do it.  I must have faith that the path I’ve set out for myself is the right path.  There is some solace in writing weekly blogs; however, a blog is much different than developing a story.  By writing a blog is how I know that I’m not a non-fiction writer.
So, I won’t torture myself or you by stretching out this little piece any longer – until next week then.     

​My oldest grandson is in kindergarten this year.  He had his first parent/teacher several weeks ago.  I didn’t know that they had parent/teacher conferences for kindergarten.  In my day kindergarten was a half day in a local church and my fondest memory was quiet time on a piece of carpet.  Today is a very different world.  My grandson has already been tested on how many numbers he knows, how many colors, both upper and lower case letters and a host of other things.  It’s fully fledged school.
His teacher has identified my grandson as left handed one of six in his class of 26.  A whopping 23% of the class is left handed.  We (I am a confessed left hander) make up only about 10% of the general population.  In my immediate family my Mom and Dad and three kids, two of us – the boys – are left handed.  In my world growing up I was in the majority and knew nothing else.
One of my most traumatic memories in when my 5th grade teacher insisted I wasn’t normal and insisted I should be converted to right handedness.  When I went home after school and explained my sin to parents my Dad had one of the most memorable responses.  He looked right at me and said:  “Rex, no one is going to change you from being left handed.”  The next day both my parents were in the Principal’s office demanding that my 5th grade teacher is instructed to back off.  The Principal agreed – she did – but she got even.  I received poor grades on my penmanship because I forced my hand across the page rather than dragging it and some letters were just backward for me.  One day the teacher called me to the front blackboard to demonstrate to the class how to write the letter “r”.  I wrote and everyone laughed, including the teacher.  She then asked another student to join me at the blackboard to show me how to write the letter “r”.  I was then instructed to fill the entire blackboard with “r’s”.
For my grandson it’s very different.  His teacher asked if someone in the family was left handed that my grandson could work with to show him how a left handed person writes.  I gladly accepted that assignment.  We bought a tablet that has the letters and numbers on the inside cover and then the paper with the big lines.  My grandson and I practice writing every time he visits.  He holds his pencil between his second and fourth finger which looks painful.  I tried to show him the “correct” way to hold the pencil and decided that was silly.  His way is the correct way.  Now we have fun together on projects that require writing.  This weekend he made a birthday card for his cousin.       
I’m so happy that my grandson won’t ever experience trauma at school because he’s left handed.