REDWOOD TREES AND US

I love trees. I don’t know why. Trees play a significant role in every one of my books so far. I am so connected to them that whenever I read or hear things about trees those facts or stories generally stick with me. Again, I don’t know why, they just do.

In church one Sunday when I was younger I heard someone compare us, the human race, to Redwood trees. (I wish I could remember who said it so that I could give them the credit, but maybe it will be enough for you to know that I didn't think of it first.) I have thought of that comparison many times since this person made me aware of it . . .  and as I have grown older I have come to believe passionately in our likeness to the Redwood trees. Or rather, the fact that we are meant to be like them, if we are not.

This person said that Redwoods, some of the tallest and oldest trees on earth, have the shallowest root systems of any of their counterparts. The moment they said this I sat up straighter in the pew. With this comment the speaker captured my full attention because when I was a child we had an enormous Cottonwood in our yard. All through my childhood I loved to climb in it and I spent countless hours in its high branches. My mother often cautioned me not to play around it in a storm because it had been her experience that Cottonwoods could easily be uprooted by a strong wind since they were notorious for having very shallow root systems.

I couldn’t help but wonder: If Redwood trees had shallow root systems like Cottonwoods, then how was it possible for them to grow to be so tall, and live to be so old? I waited, breathless, for the answer. The secret to the mighty Redwood’s strength and longevity, the speaker went on to explain, was indeed found within their unique root systems. The person said that Redwoods, unlike most other trees, always grow together in groups, entangling their root systems as they go. This entanglement lends them great strength—a strength they would never possess on their own. In other words they grow together living more like one entity instead of several separate entities . . . in this way they are able to reach their unimaginable heights and whether the storms around them.  

Over the years, I have come to wholeheartedly believe what that person was trying to tell us in church that day. I have observed firsthand, that like the Redwoods, the human race truly is much more robust and thrives a whole lot better when we stretch out, irrevocably entangling our lives with the lives of others . . . lending what strength we can to those around us as we grow.     

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Check me out on Wattpad.com

Hey everyone just wanted to let you know that the short little book I was writing for Wattpad turned into a short little story of around 13,500 words. I decided to shorten it for a contest that they were running in the ChickLit genre which just happened to be the genre of MY EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES ON GA GA ISLAND. It was a happy coincidence so I thought I would go with it. Feel free to check it out if you are in the mood for a light, entertaining read! It really is a lot of fun and a very different style for me. Enjoy!

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Forever Eating Elephants

     Have you ever eaten an elephant? You know tried do something so big it overwhelmed you? Well, I have eaten a few elephants in my lifetime and I think that I am getting pretty good at it now.

    

     My first elephant was writing my first novel. Wow, that was a hard one to chew! It took me six years and I must say it didn't go down very smoothly—I almost choked to death a few times before I was done.

    

     The next elephant I set my sites on consuming was a 300 mile bike ride in three days. Some of my extended family members completed the ride, and for years that elephant paraded back and forth in front of me begging to be eaten. I finished that elephant fifteen years after I told it I would eat it and just before my 40^th birthday.

     

     The elephant I currently am planning to consume is internet marketing/social media. I am determined to get on the outside of this one if it kills me. I just sat down at the table, so stay tuned if you want to see how fast I am able to force this wily one down.

     

     There have been a few other elephants I have eaten in my lifetime; some I chose to eat, and some I was forced to eat. I won’t mention them all. Some were palatable, and some were tough, and some were just plain gut-wrenching, but no matter what type of elephant you are eating I promise you the technique for ingesting them is always the same: the only way to eat an entire elephant is one bite at a time!

     

     Hope this helps you find the courage to try Elephant in the near future. They might be an acquired taste, but I warn you, if you ever start eating them . . . it is very hard to stop!   

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Life Happened

Okay so it has been a little while since I posted. What is that saying? I think it goes something like this . . . "life is what happens when you are making plans" Well, life happened to me for a little bit and now I am ready to blog. And as the heroine in my newest novel THE UPLANDERS would say, "I know we are going to have a wonderful journey together. I feel it in my center."

So to update you all on the writing journey . . . I finished my first Y/A fantasy novel in October. It is the first book of a series I have planned, and after I finished writing it I wondered where fantasy had been all my life . . . I loved the story that much!

Publication is also pending on that one but if you are just burning to read more of my work (and I hope you are) keep checking wattpad.com. I have a profile there and I will soon be posting pages of my newest story. It will be in the Y/A, romance/chick lit genre and so far it promises to be a real raucous good time. It is called, MY EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES ON GA GA ISLAND. It is about a girl who makes an impossible wish over her seventeenth birthday cake and turns her whole life upside down.

You will be able to read it unedited as I write it. That should be an interesting experience for both of us don't you think--Elizabeth Hathenbruck raw and uncensored. How scary is that?

Oh, by the way the adoption agency had to be put on hold for the time being. I will keep you posted on my dreams of helping little children find families somehow, someway, or somewhere, as it unfolds.

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