This April we had FOUR OUTSTANDING “My Gutsy Story®” authors. Their stories will be included in our 2nd “My Gutsy Story®” Anthology, published in the Fall of 2014. Thank you to all four authors. Your stories are all WINNERS.
Our first place goes toGinger Simpsonwon 1st Place for her “My Gutsy Story®” about whether she caused her husband to turn to drink. The phrase that struck me in Ginger’s inspiring story is:
“Wanting someone to change isn’t enough. They have to WANT the change.”
Ginger Simpson
2nd Place goes to Kathy Gamble, about finding her way as an expat living in different countries around the world.
3rd Place goes to Benny Wasserman, about the impact that one teenage friend had on Benny to change his life.
BennyWasserman
4th Place goes to Alana Woods for her inspiring story about her 200-mile trek across the U.K.
Alana Woods
Thank you to all four authors. Your stories are all WINNERS.
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Would you like to submit your “My Gutsy Story®” and get published in our 2nd anthology?
Please see guidelines below and contact Sonia Marsh at: sonia@soniamarsh.com for details.
The Icelandair flight taxis down the runway. I peer out the window, a brown suede shoulder bag clutched to my chest. Moments later, the jet lifts off and zooms toward the clouds. New York City shrinks, the North American continent recedes, and it hits me: we’re crossing the Atlantic; there’s no turning back.
I open my bag to affirm the travelers checks, passport and open-ended return ticket are tucked where I last saw them—about a minute ago. Also inside is a note with the address of a friend of a friend in Switzerland, along with a list of Youth Hostels in Europe.
It’s 1973. I am twenty-three years old, and feel like my adult life so far has been a great big zero. No, scratch that. It’s been a negative number. I just left a man 13 years older than I am. A man I met when I was eighteen, and confused. A man I never loved but I married anyway because I thought I’d never be able to leave him. A man who recently threatened to kill me. That jolted me out the door, at last.
Now I am about to land in Luxembourg without a plan. I might be crazy; I don’t know. I’ve attended night school and I want to return to college full time. But when I think of sitting in a classroom with students several years younger than I am, I can’t imagine what I would say about myself. That I could have gone to college right out of high school, but I put it off, stumbled instead into things that ripped me apart and left me that way? That I allowed myself to be so completely controlled by someone that I often couldn’t even speak? That I don’t know if I deserve to have any hopes at all? Not exactly good ice-breaker material.
I want to create a new life, a different me. Flying to a continent where I don’t know a soul may be foolhardy. But I’ve heard that young people from all over the world hitchhike and ride trains throughout Europe, and the people there welcome them. I thought I’d give it a try.
I nap during the flight and then delve into The Teachings of Don Juan before the plane lands for a stopover in Reykjavik, Iceland. It’s 11 a.m. and pitch black when the other passengers and I deplane to explore the wares on sale in the airport store. I admire a brown lopapeysa-style sweater with a yoke of brown white and tan. A woman who looks about my age approaches and says, “Nice, huh.” The lenses of her wire-rimmed glasses are slightly fogged.
“Sure is, but it’s probably way too expensive for me.” I say.
“Me, too. Dan–the guy over there; he’s my boyfriend.” She points to a tall man with long, wavy red hair. He’s wearing a green parka and looking at a jewelry display–”Dan and I have about four hundred dollars to last us our whole trip.”
“I’ve got less than that, but there’s only one of me.” We both laugh.
“I’m Mags” She extends her hand.
“Laura.” I reach out, too, and we shake.
“Where are you headed when we land?” she asks.
“The Youth Hostel.”
“That’s where we’re going, Let’s go together.”
“Sounds good to me,” I say.
Dan looks up and motions for Mags to come over. “Oh, my guy’s up to something. I’ll see you later,” she says.
After we arrive in Luxembourg, Mags introduces me to Dan and three other young travelers she’s just met. We all pick up our backpacks and duffel bags and share a ride to the city, marveling at the breathtaking bridges we pass. Once we’re on the street, I find the address of the local Youth Hostel. Dan studies his map and picks a route. We march off but are soon lost.
“We should ask for directions,” Mags says. “Anyone speak French?”
I know a little French, but I’m sure someone in the group is more fluent than I am. After a long pause, I say, “I can try.”
I approach a tall woman with black hair and smiling eyes, “Excusez-moi, s’il vous plaît. Où est ‘lauberge de jeunessse?”
She replies with such speed I cannot understand her. I ask her to please speak slowly. She laughs and then drags out, “Allez tout droit pour un bloc, puis tournez à droite et il sera là.
I thank her and tell the group, we’re just a block away.
Mags grabs my hand and says, “You’re handy to have around.” She pulls me, skipping toward the hostel. I feel a little blush of pride.
In the morning, all those who bunked in the dorms gather over cafe au lait to talk about where we’ve been and where we’re going next. Mags and Dan are headed for Amsterdam. Two guys from Ohio are meeting friends in Paris. They ask me to join them. I recall staring at posters of Sacré Coeur and Montmartre during French class when I was in junior high. I opt for Paris.
The group of Ohioans and I become siblings for a few days. We buy croque monsieur sandwiches from street vendors, tour the Louvre, Musée d’Orsay, and all the landmarks I used to dream about as a child. We talk over French bread, cheese and wine long into the nights in our pension. Then they board a train to Marseilles, and I catch a ride with a Canadian family bound for Madrid. As I settle into a spot in the back of their VW van, a blue eyed preschooler offers me a bag of trail mix, “Wan’ some?” he asks.
“Sure.” I say. The van lurches forward. The boy tosses a roasted nut into my mouth. I toss a raisin into his. We continue our game as the van bounces along, and I realize my new life has begun.
LAURA MCHALE HOLLAND is a multifaceted storyteller and indie publisher, who has released two books: the flash fiction collection, The Ice Cream Vendor’s Song, and the award-winning childhood memoir, Reversible Skirt. Laura’s work has appeared in such publications as Every Day Fiction, Wisdom Has a Voice, several Vintage Voices anthologies, and the original San Francisco Examiner. Her prize-winning play Are You Ready? will be produced by Sixth Street Playhouse and Redwood Writers in May 2014. In all of her work, Laura strives to illuminate truths that are often hidden. Intrigued? Get her newsletter at http://lauramchaleholland.com.
SONIA MARSH SAYS: I hope your gutsy story of seeking a new life helps someone take the plunge to do something bold and start over. Thanks for sharing your courageous story with us.
Click on cover to go to Amazon
Would you like to submit your “My Gutsy Story®” and get published in our 2nd anthology?
Please see guidelines below and contact Sonia Marsh at: sonia@soniamarsh.com for details.
Please leave your comments for Laura. She’ll be over to respond.
Next “Gutsy Webinar” on May 30th at 9 a.m. PST “Everything You Need to Know About Formatting e-books and Why Metadata is Important.” Jason Matthews, expert on e-books will be presenting with me. Reserve your seat TODAY.
Special June Book Coaching Offer. I have room for two new clients and am offering my 3-month coaching package, for only $499, instead of $599.
I am thrilled to finally meet my East Coast memoir writer friends including Susan Weidener, founder of the Women’s Writing Circle, Kathy Pooler, and Jerry Waxler. Susan Weidener invited me to present to her group of writers.
Date: Thursday, May 8 Time: 6:30-8:30 p.m. Where: Fairfield Inn, Exton PA 19341
Cost: $25 To Reserve Your Space: Contact Susan Weidener: sgweidener@comcast.net; 610-304-5370 Sponsored by the Women’s Writing Circle, this workshop is open to men and women who want to publish or who already have.
There are many options available for you to become a successful indie author. Want to get your books in COSTCO, land a front page story in the newspaper, get a radio interview, create your own Google+ hangout to chat with other authors and readers? During this two-hour workshop, Sonia Marsh will guide you through that and more.
Topics include:
• Building your platform to sell your books
• Creating your brand
• Pros and cons of various publishing options
• How to get endorsements from best-selling authors
• How to get reviews on publication day
• Creating a successful book launch party
• How to sell your book
• Mistakes to avoid
Sonia Marsh is an award-winning author who knows how to market books both online and in person. She continues to promote her own books at Costco, REI, and other retail stores and is committed to helping authors avoid common mistakes. Sonia understands that most authors cannot afford to hire an expensive publicist, so her goal is to help authors develop their own plan to sell books. Contact her at: sonia@soniamarsh.com or visit her website: https://soniamarsh.com/
It’s wonderful to finally meet friends you’ve met online, and in a way, thanks to Google+ Hangout interviews, it seems like you already know each other.
Here is my recent interview with Kathy Pooler on “How to Do Everything Right Before You Get Published.”
After my presentation this evening, I shall fly to Madrid, Spain, to volunteer with Vaughan Volunteers. More photos about El Rancho, the village where I shall be speaking English to Spanish business people for one week.
I spent my fortieth birthday not being whisked away to a Spanish city for a romantic weekend, as had been hinted in what now seemed the distant past, but weeping and shaky with my parents. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.
My life had seemed to be coming together, at last settling into year two with a nice man. We were talking about moving somewhere beautiful together. Then he changed his mind.
For a while, the only option was falling apart at the seams.
All I’d wanted was a simple, comfortable happiness at the centre of everything: helping me to be the person who sang tunelessly as she cycled to work in the morning, had good friends and a fulfilling job and got out into the countryside on the weekends. I’d lost not only the potential love of my life, but my love of life. I hated being a miserable me who cried herself to sleep on friends’ couches.
How did other people manage to stay in stable relationships? What was I doing wrong? Gradually, I started to think of a better question: how could I take action to make myself happier?
I was suffering from more than heartbreak, clearly. It hadn’t felt like I was in a rut, but now when I asked myself what I would really like to do with my life, I realised I’d been putting up with things because I thought they were temporary. I had to replace the plans I’d made with my ex, and come up with new ones; the age of forty seemed a good time to take a good, hard look at what I wanted.
Why wait for someone else to change my life? In fact, I was lucky: now, there was only myself to consider. I’d so often compromised for a partner.
Two years earlier, I’d been invited for a weekend in the country where I was surrounded by happy couples with beautiful children. I’d felt inadequate for two days, and the dinner on the Sunday evening was offering much of the same. Then one of the father-husbands asked me if I’d been on holiday that summer.
‘Not yet,’ I said. ‘My job’s always busy during the summer. But next week I’m off for a week on my own in Ibiza.’
His jaw dropped, and his eyes assumed a dreamy look. ‘I would kill for a week on my own in Ibiza.’
All those people in their seemingly perfect relationships had others to think about. I only had myself. In fact, I almost had a duty to think about myself, and how to be happy on my own.
Holidays on Greek islands always gave me huge amounts of joy. My love of Greece started when I was a child on family holidays, and continued into my university years when I travelled around with a friend. I’d spent a year there after university, when I’d been feeling a little lost career-wise and didn’t know what to do. Then, Greece had been the answer – could it be the answer again? In recent years, holidays on Greek islands for a week or two snatched from my busy working year always left me feeling rejuvenated and wanting more. I wondered about going for longer, perhaps a month: two weeks of holiday and two weeks working remotely from there.
My boss took some convincing, but finally I had a month on a Greek island to look forward to; a month to swim in the sea, walk in empty hills, sit in the brilliant, warm sunshine; a month to think – but not too hard – about who I was and what I wanted to do next with my life. In the meantime, I’d put relationships on hold, and I’d start escaping from the never-ending cycle of work, beginning with a freelance day per week, taking a pay cut to invest in my future.
On my first morning waking up on the island of Tilos, with a view of deep blue sky and mountain from my bedroom window, and the glittering sapphire sea through my bathroom window as I brushed my teeth, I knew I’d done the right thing. In fact, it felt like the cleverest thing I’d ever done. Happiness is easy sometimes, as a Greek friend had once said.
I’d work in the peace of the morning, with sweet smells from the next-door bakery wafting up onto the terrace. At lunchtime I’d plunge into the sea, maybe doze a little in the sun as I dried off. After an afternoon of work, I’d walk around the bay, admiring the light and inhaling the fragrance of herbs on the hillside – herbs I’d pick to sprinkle over a simple dinner. In the evening I’d sit out in the balmy air and look up at the stars.
Halfway through my month there, I was snorkelling in a pretty pink-sand bay with my new friend Dimitris, when he found a fat red starfish and put it in my hand. I felt its feelers on my skin, then let it float gently down to the sea bed. Swimming back to the same spot ten minutes later, I saw it had fallen upside down and was slowly, slowly turning itself the right way up. Perhaps that’s what I was doing.
It was hard to leave Tilos at the end of that month. But I’d got my mojo back. And I thought of it not as an ending, but a beginning. Strong again, I decided what to do: not what was sensible or expected, but what felt right for me. The taste of freedom, working from home on a sunny Greek island, showed me the way forward. I could do it.
I used to have recurring dreams of Greek islands, especially in winter when things looked bleak: I’d see myself walking in sunshine on a wild hillside with clear blue water below, into the whitewashed alleyways of an old village. Now that’s not my dream, but my life.
JENNIFER BARCLAY is the author ofFalling in Honey: How a Tiny Greek Island Stole My Heart, and blogs about Greek island life at www.octopus-in-my-ouzo.blogspot.com. Her first book was Meeting Mr Kim: How I Went to Korea and Learned to Love Kimchi, and she is the editor of many travel-related memoirs. Having worked as a literary agent and then an editorial director at a publishing company, she now works freelance from her home office as a writer, editor, writing coach and agent (www.jennifer-barclay.blogspot.com).
Get ready to VOTE for your favorite one of 4 “My Gutsy Story®” submissions. You have from now until May 14th to vote on the sidebar, (only one vote per person) and the winner will be announced on May 15th (from Spain!) and will select a prize from our generous sponsors.
SONIA MARSH SAYS: After reading Alana’s story, I feel like I’ve exercised enough for the year, thanks to you for taking me on this amazing trek across the UK.
SONIA MARSH SAYS: Ginger asks her alcoholic first husband the question “I continually asked him if I was the reason he turned to alcohol.” So often we blame ourselves for others’ behavior.
Click on cover to go to Amazon
Would you like to submit your “My Gutsy Story®” and get published in our 2nd anthology?
Please see guidelines below and contact Sonia Marsh at: sonia@soniamarsh.com for details.
