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MiscellanyCynthia's Column November 2004 This month I have a lot of little things I wanted to write to you about, some of them completely unrelated. So I'll itemize the paragraphs and you can skip to the ones that interest you. Let's start with a little inspiration, take care of some business and then wind up with a real life miracle. My Kid Sister. I wrote a Column a few months ago about my sister Laura selling her novel to Houghton Mifflin after writing novels continuously since she was sixteen. The novel she sold, A Certain Slant of Light, will be coming out in the fall of 2005. But her adventure keeps having exciting new events. After selling the film rights to Brad Pitt and Jennifer Anniston's Plan B Productions, Laura has sold the Italian rights for a good sum. And, in collaboration with her agent Ann Rittenberg, has a new contract with Writers Digest Books for How to Write and Sell Your First Novel. It's like she kept paddling diligently up the river, pushing past log jams until she finally found the rapids and went over the waterfall of success. With new check in hand, new retirement account set up, new tax savings account opened, new haircut, new clothes. . . well, there is a new contagious atmosphere of success around our family right now and we're loving it. If you have been working hard writing novels for years, pay attention to this example. Hard work, perseverance and faith in the writing can pay off. In real life. Some dreams do come true. The Board:Many of our board members have been serving continuously for several years. This gives us the solid base that is so valuable as our organization goes through other changes, such as relocating our conference to its latest location (The Embassy Suites) and working with a new conference committee, etc. The board is a wonderful group and there are a couple of openings if any of you have been thinking about joining us. Particularly we have a need for a new Treasurer as Cherie Walter is moving to Mt. Hood . Cherie has done a terrific job for more than ten years and we will miss her cheerful voice as well as her sharp head for business. If you have accounting experience and are interested in exploring serving on our board, please call Bill at the office. (503 452-1592) or email me. (cwhitcomb1@aol. com). The Conference. This year our conference was the most successful ever with 787 people coming. There were a few glitches as we made the leap to new size and new location, but they have been solved for next year. (Parking, registration lines, you know the ones I mean. )In 2005, Willamette Writers celebrates our 40th Anniversary and we will use next August's conference as our birthday party. Save early August on your calendar. Money. We have kept membership dues for W. W. at $36 per year for more than ten years now and we are committed to not raising it. In order to cover the expenses of publishing the newsletter and running the Willamette Writers office, the conference needs to help cover the organization's expenses. In order to try to keep conference registration fees as low as possible, we are looking for sponsors for next year's conference. If you work for a large company or have ideas or connections with corporations that might be potential sponsors for the conference, please let us know. We are currently soliciting sponsorship. SMART. After last month's Column "Save The Books," one of our members, (F. I. Goldhaber) suggested that another great way to promote reading in young people was the S. M. A. R. T. program which has volunteers read aloud to kids in schools. Thank you, F. I. for adding to our list of ways to help turn this around. Mom. This is the miracle part. I wrote a Column in this space in June 2002 about my mother who has Alzheimer's. For years my parents lived in the mountains near Yosemite. When Mom started to get lost in their three bedroom home, or worse, wander outside looking for Dad in the woods, I talked them into selling their house and moving up here. I sold mine and we bought a house together big enough for three generations to cohabit happily. And it has been working out beautifully. A year ago Mom had shrunk down to 89 pounds and seemed to be near death's door. She could no longer walk, feed herself, speak English (only incomprehensible gibberish) and she couldn't recognize any of us. We were accepting that this was a gradual downhill slide and when the other children and grandchildren came that summer for our annual family week together, there were many tears at parting, everyone being fairly sure that they'd never see Mom again. Last January a new drug came on the market. (It may have come on a bit sooner, but in January it came available through Kaiser. ) It is called Namenda (also called memantine)and is given in combination with Aricept. Aricept is a drug which they tried on Mom a few years ago in an earlier stage of Alzheimer's and it didn't seem to have any effect, so after a couple of months they took her off of it. But this year, things went differently. Four weeks after beginning this course of medication, Mom began to change. Nine months later, my mother weighs 103 pounds. She feeds herself. She speaks English. She knows us. In the next room, she will hear my voice behind her and call to me by name. If you love someone in late stage Alzheimers you will understand what this means. It is like hearing your baby call you "Mama!" for the first time from her crib. Thrilling. She is still sick. This is not a miracle cure. Studies show that it works for a time and then fails. But studies don't know everything. And her doctors are astonished by her improvement. She's had the best results they've seen. Mom still often pours her juice onto her plate of meatloaf. (Like many actual two-year-olds. ) And she still says things that make us laugh. The other day I saw my Dad walking up the lawn, coming back from playing tennis. I said, "Here comes David, your husband." She lit up"Oh good. That's so good." Then a pause. And "Is he on the young side?" Dad, who looks like a tall, athletic, trim Santa Claus, is not exactly on the young side. But Mom is. And we are overjoyed to have her back, how ever long she chooses to stay. Cynthia Whitcomb is president of Willamette Writers, and has had 29 of her screenplays produced. She is author of The Writers' Guide to Writing Your Screenplay and The Writers' Guide to Selling Your Screenplay. She teaches screenwriting classes at Portland State University.and through Willamette Writers. |