Writing yields thousands of words
The written word was forced upon me as a child. How many spelling tests did I endure in my early years of schooling. I was so frustrated by them in first grade they gave me my first lesson in character.
I just couldn’t seem to get the spelling into my head, so I would slip a piece of paper under my leg with the spelling on them of that week’s words.
Although I knew what I was doing was not proper, I didn’t really understand that it was cheating. I was just trying to gain approval by spelling properly. Instead, I received the life lesson of Miss Crumbley catching my efforts and I found myself standing outside the room awaiting being sent to the principal’s office where I caught a paddling. Then of course, she called my mother, and a few more licks found there way onto my behind.
I learned a lesson that has lasted a lifetime, cheating, no matter the reasoning, is not something a good person should do.
I eventually became a proper speller that I should have been all along. Amazing how a bit of a tanning gets one’s mind on the right track.
After a couple years, words from books became my constant companion. There was not a fiction or a history that did not interest me. As I grew instead of consuming the words, I began to see them flow from my pencil, pen or ends of my fingers as I typed. Eventually those words created something worthwhile. Articles that people wanted to read that appeared in a school newspaper, then organization publications, magazines and newspapers.
After a few years, they contributed to being what allowed me to construct books which have provided hours of enjoyment to readers, a creative outlet for me, and the blessings of some income.
My pastime of genealogy has provided a basis for the efforts as I have found a list of writers and poets in my tree who have shared in the same gene pool of inspirational talents. The great Geoffrey Chaucer, considered the father of English literature was one of my grandfathers. Among my cousins are names such as Clemens, Poe, Dickinson, Austen, Stevenson, Hawthorne and Ingalls Wilder. I often pray that some of the God flows He shared with some of them might find their way into my writing spirit.
My latest book has now hit the market. I embark on a new genre not non-fiction, not cookbooks, not autobiographies or murder mysteries, this one is religious as I created “Seeing Faith: A Devotional.”
My life experiences combined with the theological knowledge of seven pastors have yielded 31 lessons to fill a month or two-thirds of a year with an opportunity to find a closer walk with Jesus through the words He provided me over many years. I talk about lessons from friends in film, television, music, and people from the South and Appalachia and how they provided experiences for me which allowed me to see Jesus through them, in them and in their treatment of others. I pray the words are a blessing for all that read them.
That book is now finding its way into other’s hand and eyes and God is already providing words for the next written adventure, this time another foray into fiction, set in a Southern town with an amazing group of characters. The words keep flowing through the genes. Thank you grandfather, and thank you Lord.
Find out more about “Seeing Faith: A Devotional” at www.RandallFranks.com/Seeing-
