Author: Barbara Hightower

I am an aspiring writer/novelist. I am a pretend chef. I am a gift. I am an avid reader. I am special. I am perfect. I am a music junkie. I am Diet Pepsi lover. I am a water activist. I am an old soul. I am a lover of a hand written note. I am a pen thief. I am a sticky pad addict. I am everything I want to be. I am in love. I am me.

New Things.

I realized the other night, while trying to make dinner, that I am in a rut.  A cooking rut.  I never thought that was actually a thing.  But apparently it is.  And I am in it.

Trying to find new things to make is actually more complicated than I thought.  Mostly because everything anymore had like cups beyond cups of red or white wine – I don’t keep any form of alcohol in the house.  Maybe I should start?  I don’t know.  I’m not even sure if I even know where to buy red or white wine.

The new recipe trend started a few weeks ago when I attempted to make chicken enchilada’s.  Turned out really well – the boyfriend really enjoyed it.  Or at least that’s what he said.  I’m still curious if he’d even tell me the truth if I made something that was horrible.

1chicken enciladas

I have a made a few other things.  One night I made alfredo sauce from scratch, & made a crock pot roast.  Both seemed to turn out good.  Sadly, I didn’t picture of the take either of those.  Just know one looked like alfredo sauce & the other looked like a roast.  I can find pictures randomly on the internet if it’ll make this post better.

Last night I decided to make a Rachel Ray recipe I came across through facebook, Lasagna Sloppy Joes.  

1sloppyjoes

The sauce itself was good other than I couldn’t get it to thicken.  I wonder if it’s because she used wine & I did not.  But everything else I substitute wine for something else seems to work.  But this, wouldn’t thicken.  Maybe I did something else incorrect, I was really tired and was thinking about sleep, but I feel like I did it right.  That, & my town grocery store does NOT sell cibata rolls, so I had to buy the frozen ones and it’s all I could taste was the bread itself.  Then of course that bread was hard.  So mental note: Do not use frozen cibata bread.  Go to a bigger store next time.

Tonight, since it’s bowling night for me, I’m thinking about making a slow cooker Chinese meal.  I found a recipe for General Tso’s, but I’m nervous as crap for that.  White person attempting Chinese food.  Mexican’s do it well – but I’m not that either.  That was funnier in my head than in print.

General Tso’s and sesame noodles seems to be a good way to start cooking Chinese food.  Don’t ya think?

…worse enemy

I decided that I am my own worst enemy.  Hard thing to admit, but it’s true.  I am the reason my book isn’t getting finished.  &&& what I decided the most is that it’s not because I can’t write.  All I would have to do is sit down and write.  But it seems when I sit down to write I find something else to do.  Then, I turn around and blame it not having inspirations (although, at one point I didn’t have any, but I do now.) or not being able to write when I want to.

Truth is – I’m lazy.  I never thought a person could be too lazy to sit in a chair && do nothing but hit buttons on a keyboard.  But apparently I am.  I go into my “writing room” – which isn’t actually that, it’s an empty room that my computer sits in with a calendar, cork board, & dry erase marker board on the walls – pull out my chair, sit down, roll around the wooden floor screaming “weeeeeeeeeee” for about thirteen and a half minutes – finally pull up my story and then I sit and stare at the words on the screen.  My eyes bounce around the words as my brain tries to decide if I want to remove some of them.  When it finally decides to stop they bounce around the room.  I’ll turn around in circles in the chair.  I’ll roll over to the window and stare out at it, which would be my sister-in-law’s house.  I watch the children run up and down the road screaming, laughing, and having fun.  I’ll get a grip on the wall and push hard, rolling my chair across the room until it stops abruptly on the other wall.

I do this for awhile.

I always feel so accomplished when I finish a chapter.  Especially if the chapter has given me a tiny headache.  When I finished chapter twelve I was so excited because that means I was going to start chapter thirteen.  As I pulled up word to begin chapter thirteen I got discouraged and aggravated.  That would be the moment I wish I could wiggle my nose &&& the words just appear on the paper.  Yes.  I know it doesn’t work like that.  But it would be nice.

As I sit here I have wrote maybe three or four pages into chapter thirteen.  Just staring at that blank chapter is a moment where you just think ‘ugh!  Never going to finish!’

I eventually roll myself away from my desk and into the living room, abandoning my rolling chair and removing myself to stare at some shitcom playing on one of the six channels I receive in my living room.  I sit on my lovely couch & think that only a few minutes of television then I will go write some more.  (Just fyi: at the point, I haven’t wrote a single word.)

Fifteen hours later I awake in a puddle of drool and crusted over eyes & realize somewhere I fell asleep and it’s now tomorrow.  At this point, it’s still dark outside and I decide that if I go to sleep, in my bed right now, I will wake up at a decent time.

But first, I’m hungry.

After rummaging through my kitchen, I shovel the food in, yes, using a shovel, my mouth before I proceed to go to bed way too full.  In the middle of the night I wake up with heartburn so bad I have to vomit back up all of the food I decided to shovel into my face, half of which falls out of my bra and onto the bathroom floor.

Sweaty and weak I take myself back to bed where I doze off again.  49 hours later, I awake with a headache so bad I can’t open my eyes or move my legs.  (How that works, I’m not sure.)  I wake up in just enough time to go back to sleep so I can get a little sleep before going back to work.

I work three days, twelve hours a day – that’s it.  Then on Tuesday I repeat everything I did the previous week.

I’m mostly joking.  Expect for the truth in there.  I will leave it to you to decide what is true.

Dear Imaginary Friends,

writers block

 

I’m not sure if I’m still suffering from writers block, or if my imaginary friends are quiet.  Or possibly I’m attempting to write stuff that I’m not meant to write?  Is that even possible?  Can a person only be able to write one form of writing about certain subjects & the rest are completely off limits?  Would Stephen King be able to write romance?  Would Nora Roberts be able to write a thriller?  Is it possible for James Patterson to write a science fiction?  (If any of them have, it’s throws my theory out.  I am not well read in all of their books.))

But as I sit here I think of the novel I’ve been working on since November of 2012 & I wonder to myself, am I trying something that is impossible for me to write?  People always tell me that I am capable of writing anything I put my mind to.  But am I?  Honestly.  But then I wonder even more than that, am I really the writer I think I am?  I feel like if I were I would have more writings that are finished.

Maybe I am still trying to find excuses as to why I don’t write more.  Last night I opened up my novel & wrote three paragraphs & then when I was finished, I sat back in my chair & wondered if I even liked what I had wrote.  Do all writers go through this?  I’m almost to the point of cutting off a finger.. or two.  Pull a Picasso and cut my ear off.  But instead of whatever he did – I would put mine in a box & mail it to someone.  Who?  I don’t know.  Who on this planet would want my ear?  I’m joking – mostly.

Honestly, at this point, I have no idea what I’m even talking about.  It’s seven o’clock in the morning & I haven’t been to sleep.  My head is foggy & my body is exhausted.  All I want is to sleep – however, sleep isn’t my friend at the moment.  I know that throughout the day my mind is still on the same thing.. writing.  I still carry a trillion pens, & fifteen hundred notebooks in my purse.  I think if I were to dig I’d find a notebook in my car.  You know, just in case.  I still find myself going out in public with friends and writing on napkins when something hits and I need to write it down.  I still find myself watching or reading something thinking, oh yeah, I need to make a note of that.  It could come in handy for something I could write in the future.  All of the articles I read of writers & authors, they all sound like me.  Everything they say they feel or do – I find it’s exactly what I do or feel.  I love to write.  ((Even simple things like a blog.  Even though I don’t write as much as I used to.))  I just can’t always seem to get the words flowing as easily as I did.  Like when I was between the ages of seventeen & nineteen.  To be quite frank, if I had started a novel at seventeen, I would probably have finished it.  But at seventeen, I had no idea what I liked or wanted to do with my life.  I didn’t realize writing was it until I was in my twenties.

I just need to take it day by day.  One day at a time.  Day.  By.  Day.  I can’t expect the novel to write itself or me write it in three days.  It takes time.  I even know this.  Common sense.  But there will always be a part of me that believes it shouldn’t take YEARS to write a novel especially if you already have the outline of it.

I have faith in myself, always have – I will finish this novel.  When?  That I have no idea.  But I will.  Hopefully before I’m thirty, but at this rate, I honestly don’t know that.

I have always been good at working through problems.  That is what I have right now.  A problem.  So I will trudge on and work through my problem.  Hopefully, I will fix it soon.  But I could always write more of these, at least then I know I’d still be writing, even if it isn’t on my story.

Luck.  I need luck.

Happy Mother’s Day!

I have spent 11 mother day’s without my mother. So today, instead of being sad, I figured I’d tell a story about her.

There were many years, fifteen worth, of stories to tell about her. All different but alike in the same. My mother was my best friend. The only person on the planet who I could tell anything to && not be afraid of their reaction. I always found myself going with her to work, mostly because I couldn’t find many reasons not to. On day, early morning hours where dew was still on the grass and fog hovered over the trees, I was with her. At this particular job she was a morning cook &&& opened the cafe. Every morning was the same thing, I’d fall asleep on the top of the freezer while she made homemade biscuits. This day started out no different than any others except I didn’t go to sleep. That morning I decided that I would keep my mother company, pulled up a seat, and sat there talking.

In the middle of a conversation I heard banging on the back door. My mom told me to open it, it was more than likely the lady that comes in after my mom to help finish prepping breakfast. As I made my way to the back door I stopped and thought about this for a moment. I was there every morning, even when the co-worker showed up, and never did her knocking sound like this. I turned &&& told my mom I was a little afraid of opening it. My mom pulled me back && decided I was correct, instead, she called the police.

That particular day a man was banging on the back door trying to get in because someone was literally beating the snot out of him. If I had opened that door they would have been on top of me.

Happy Mother’s Day to all of the mothers out there. I hope you get a chance to spend it with your children and enjoy your day. For y’all of you out there who no longer has their mother – share a story. Put their life out there so everyone can enjoy just how wonderful your mother was or is.

♥♥♥

Write Through It.

I am attempting to write through this writer’s block.  Yes!  The writers block I have had since November of 2013.  No!  I’m not kidding.  It’s beginning to grind my gears to the point of wanting to scream.  

The last few days I have wrote a few stories.  Nothing big.  But stories nonetheless.  It still takes me a bit to do it and I have cheated a little with writing poetry.  But small is better than nothing, correct?  I may be kidding myself, but I am trying.  

I decided to give a new writing style a try.  See if I get the creative juices flowing.  What style?  Limerick.  For non writers out there that is scratching their forehead trying to remember from school what a “limerick” is, let me enlighten you.  A limerick is a five-line poem with a strict meter.  The rhyme scheme is usually A-A-B-B-A. Lines one and two end in the same rhyme.  Lines three and four end in the same rhyme.  Line five ends in the same rhyme as one and two.  

Example: 
There was an old man with a beard,
Who said, “It is just as I feared! – 
Two Owls and a Hen, four Larks and a Wren
Have all built their nests in my beard.”
       -Edward Lear, “A Book of Nonsense”

I have yet to actually try and write one.  But I plan on it.  Tomorrow.  Maybe?

Admit & Correct.

This post was originally wrote November 05, 2013.

I sat here tonight and cleared out my computer.

For almost five years I have not had internet and rarely ever used my computer.  Only doing small things: playing games or using it to write.  A few months after I moved into the house I live in now, I hooked up my computer and it wouldn’t turn on.  That’s always a sad moment for someone who used to live on their computer.  Then I think about how much music and writing I have saved on this and the moment becomes even sadder.  So, I unhooked my desktop and put it away – hoping one day I might figure out how to fix it.  Last week my brother came and got my desktop and fixed it – sending me a picture message while at work proving that it was on.

I am not sure if I have been that excited in a while.

I finally hooked it up and turned it on.  Then sat here and deleted everything that I no longer have the use for.  I removed quite a bit from my computer.  Three different messengers (MSN, AIM, & Windows), games that I have played & won many times (leaving only three games left: Supermarket Mania, Farm Frenzy 1 & 2, & Hotel Mogul.

It was so many years and days I spent on the internet when I lived with my dad that I feel like I have completely erased that side of me.  I think about it, every now and then, of how many years I spent in front of a computer.  That when my Dell went out a few years ago I freaked!  Not honestly because I lost all my music – I could get that again – or the writing I had – none of it was finished – but because I couldn’t spend my life sitting in front of it eating as much as I could put in my mouth.  I have wondered how I allowed myself to do that.  Even though the internet obsession began when I was 13 and ended when I no longer had the internet (19 years old) it seems like a part of me that I need to put to rest.  Finally be done with it.

I had made a whole new me.  A better me.  I went by a fake name, fake looks, and fake hobbies.  I made things up so much that, for the longest time, I honestly believed it.  Until I looked into a mirror and realized that it was nothing but lies.  It was so nice to be able to sit around and have conversations with people about everything, from politics to music.  I enjoyed the people so much that they became all I ever thought about.  (I have often wondered what ever happened to those people.  The friends I made all of those years hiding out.)

I have sense been in contact with friends I had before that happened & they all ask me the same thing “where have you been? “  Truth is, I was here.  I was living in my hometown until I was sixteen & then only moved twenty minutes away.  I was not able to be found on MySpace (when it was popular) or FaceBook because I used my ”fake” name.  Fact: my FaceBook is still under my fake name.  That’s why no one can find me unless we’re mutual friends with people.

I wonder a lot, sitting here today, if it was a down spiral after losing my mother.  I was fifteen when that happened and after that never came out.  I never surfaced again until I was 23 when my dad passed away.  Why then?  I am not sure.  But I do know that I got back in contact with friends from high school, and I leave my house.  I have a job (didn’t back then and when I did only lasted about six months before I quit, leaving myself back into the internet) that I enjoy more than anyone could imagine.  I began writing again – almost finished with the rough draft of my novel.  I have a cell phone & that might seem strange to admit, but I didn’t have a phone when everyone else did.  Because I didn’t want to be found.  I wanted to be left alone with my food and computer.

I found it a big step when I made my twitter account & used my name @HightowerBarb. (Follow me. *winks*) 

Will I delete my FaceBook & make a new one finally, making it public, and letting people know how and what I’m up to?  That’s the biggest question for me right now & I’m not sure yet.  Finally getting under my name on everything will be something I didn’t think I would do when I was younger.

Will I go back to those ways once I get the internet back (will have it about three weeks after I wrote this), or will I continue with the life I’ve made in the last two years?

Will the internet seem as great as it did, not even, six years ago?

This was an issue I had for many years and I decided last year that the only way I could fix my problems and live the life I want – achieve the things I want in life – is to admit & correct.  I guess that’s what I feel like I’m doing right now.  Admitting it so I can correct it.

I have admitted to having a lot of problems in the last few years and I haven’t had as many issues.  Life seems better and the sun seems brighter.  (Even as corny as that sounds.)

I guess only time will tell just how much I have changed and how many things I won’t let affect the way I live and act.  I’m just hoping for the best – and hopefully I will finally be able to be the person – completely – that I have always dreamed about being.  Intelligent.  Happy.

For now, though, I’m happy with being content.

Unfinished.

My issue has always been finishing a piece of writing.  I set out with the greatest idea I have come up with in a while.  I sit writing for hours, days, or even months.  Get almost to the end && decide that I need more than that.  So I then attempt to write more on something, that probably doesn’t need it, get irritated && never finish.  

Looking through a journal I have it just irritates me as to how many short stories I have started but not finished.  Or even the book that I started that I am still not finished with.  I understand that some writers take years to complete a book.  But they usually write daily, page by page, chapter to the next – I haven’t wrote on mine since November.  I haven’t done anything since November.  

I feel like I should be doing something.  Anything.  But i’m not.  I haven’t.  Does that mean I may not want it as much as I think I do?