Water – Our Most Precious Resource

(Created on Canva by Dawn Pisturino)

I had intended to honor Earth Day (Monday, April 22, 2024) in the United States by planting trees and tomatoes and sprucing up my garden. I support the National Arbor Day Foundation, which promotes planting trees to combat CO2 emissions and climate change. As soon as my back felt better, I planted orange, lemon, lime, and avocado trees (one each), bought 9 tomato and 2 lavender plants, 2 cherry trees, and 2 green seedless grape vines. It means a higher water bill (the county raised our water rates to discourage overuse), but trees cool warm temperatures, act as windbreaks, and improve the habitat for birds and other wildlife. My husband is obsessed with growing some of our own food, and I enjoy the exercise and hard work outdoors. I use as little water as I can to maintain the plants that I grow.

Recently, we received word that a predatory land developer wants to build a 3,000-home, high-density housing development down the road from us. My husband and I have lived here since the 1980s. This isn’t the first time we’ve been confronted with this type of development, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. Our community has successfully fought incorporation, housing developments, and agricultural projects that sucked up water and caused dust storms across the valley. The county board of supervisors approved a much smaller development on the south side of our valley two years ago, and we’ve had problems with our water system ever since. Approving the smaller one paved the way for them to possibly approve the much larger one. Local residents are outraged because we live in an agricultural/residential zone, and the developer wants city-size lots in a rural area that is all desert. It’s irresponsible, environmentally unfriendly, and threatens our precious water resources.

So, I am using Earth Day to fight the county board of supervisors, the predatory land developer, and anybody else who wants to destroy our precious water. I’ve been using my writing skills (take note, all you writers out there!) to contact state and federal agencies, politicians, journalists, environmental groups, and anybody interested in protecting our water. Exposing the flippant attitude about water resources held by members of our county board of supervisors and taking advantage of the pro-water climate in Phoenix, is my main strategy. It’s an important issue among Arizona voters, and if these clowns want to stay in office, they’d better address it. I’m a registered Independent. I do not support any political party, and I’m willing to work with anybody who will help address this issue. Once you go down the path of unreasonable, greed-driven over-development, and all of its consequences, it’s almost impossible to go back. That’s why we have so many communities struggling to survive. The boom-and-bust phenomenon is real.

Here’s my Letter to the Editor, which I sent to the local newspapers and every member of the board of supervisors:

“Water concerns are one of the top issues for voters in Arizona, and they span the entire political spectrum. Attorney General Kris Mayes has launched an effort to protect groundwater aquifers in Arizona. The Mohave County Board of Supervisors must do the same. The 3,000-home, high-density housing development proposed by Angle Homes/Pennington will put stress on the current water system and affect the Sacramento Valley Basin aquifer. It will be an environmentally unfriendly development that residents in the area oppose. The density is out of character within the neighborhood and creates problems with traffic congestion, pollution, overpopulation, and water. Golden Valley is growing naturally on its own. We don’t need or want forced development threatening our water supplies and ecological system. Our community belongs to us – not the Mohave County Board of Supervisors – and they have a duty to respect and honor the residents in the valley. I have reported the situation to the Arizona Dept. of Water Resources, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, AG Kris Mayes’ office, Gov. Katie Hobbs’ office, our senators and reps at the state and federal levels, the Arizona Water Assoc., and reporter Brandon Loomis at the Arizona Republic. Water is our most precious resource. Save our water! Say NO to Angle Homes.”

My husband and I will attend the BOS meeting on May 6th, along with all other concerned residents. Signs are already popping up to oppose the project.

Wish us luck!

Dawn Pisturino

April 21, 2024

Copyright 2024 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

[NOTE: I’ve been inundated with emails, comments, and notifications. I am slowly catching up. Thank you for your patience!]

Spillwords Press “Author of the Month” Interview

(Courtesy of Spillwords Press)

As most of you know, I was voted Author of the Month for March 2024 on Spillwords Press — thanks to all of you! Today, my interview with them is live. Check it out here:

Interview Q & A with Dawn Pisturino

Thank you so much! Have a beautiful, flower-filled April day! Our cactuses are already starting to bloom. And while you’re at it, please check out my author website: https://www.dawnpisturino.org.

Dawn Pisturino

April 18, 2024

Copyright 2024 Spillwords Press. All rights reserved.

Copyright 2024 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

“How I Got Published” on Happiness Between Tails

(Photo by Etienne Girardet on Unsplash)

Good morning, fellow writers and readers!

I want to thank da-AL of Happiness Between Tails for inviting me to be a guest blogger and publishing my article, “How I Got Published.” I wrote this article to share my story with newer writers who are trying to get their work published on platforms other than self-publishing. I hope it helps.

How I Got Published

by Dawn Pisturino

Young writers often ask, “How do I get published?” Every writer has their own story. I can only tell you mine.

After participating in numerous writing classes and workshops, I began writing short stories and submitting them to select publications, such as Weird Tales. I received rejection after rejection. Once in a while, an editor would encourage me to keep writing but turned down my submission.

I became increasingly frustrated. . .

Please go HERE to read the rest of the article.

Thanks!

Dawn Pisturino

February 1, 2024

Copyright 2024 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

The Wonder of Books: A Childhood Memory

A quote from author Eudora Welty:

“It had been startling and disappointing to me to find out that story books had been written by people, that books were not natural wonders, coming up of themselves like grass. Yet regardless of where they came from, I cannot remember a time when I was not in love with them — with the books themselves, cover and binding and the paper they were printed on, with their smell and their weight and with their possession in my arms, captured and carried off to myself. Still illiterate, I was ready for them, committed to all the reading I could give them.”  (One Writer’s Beginnings)

How I can relate to Welty’s introduction to books!

My mother treated books with all the delicacy and reverence of a holy relic.  Every Friday night, the family would pile into the station wagon and drive into town. The public library loomed before us like some great cathedral, magnificently lit, silent, and austere; a place for study and reflection; a place of refuge and escape. My brother and I browsed through the racks, carefully opening the precious treasures, awed by the words we could not read and the colorful illustrations that dazzled our eyes. We carried off the chosen books, secure in our arms, and with smiling faces, looked forward to our bedtime story hour.

I remember The Cat in the Hat and Madeline and so many more. I remember my mother’s voice, lulling us into sleepiness, and then the final ritual before going to bed:  putting the books away in a special cupboard, high enough so that we could not reach them without my mother’s help. Books were special. Books were expensive. Books were rare. They needed to be locked away and protected like royal jewels. But most of all, they required love, a deep and abiding love that would last a lifetime.

~

On another note, tomorrow is Independence Day in the United States.

Happy Birthday, America!

Appreciate your freedom! Once you lose it, you may never be free again.

~

Dawn Pisturino

February 5, 2014; July 3, 2023

Copyright 2014-2023 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

A Lesson from Dr. Seuss

I have a tendency to over-write, so I found a poem by Dr. Seuss to remind me to keep things simple:

“So the writer who breeds

More words than he needs

Is making a chore

For the reader who reads.”

Brilliant, huh!

In my case, it’s true. If a writer does not engage me in the first 50 to 100 pages, I toss the book aside, and voila! I never go back again. I won’t even give that author another chance. Is that unfair of me?

I see it this way: my time is limited, and I just can’t waste it wading through a lot of gibberish.

I try to remember this when I’m working on my writing.

Get into the story early, get out early. Stick to the story, and don’t meander all over the place and repeat yourself umpteen times.

Don’t get blinded by your own brilliance! If I have to keep a dictionary handy to read your book, I guarantee I won’t be reading it.

Readers expect a lot from their authors.

Don’t aim to disappoint.

Dawn Pisturino

June 28, 2023

Copyright 2012-2023 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

Brave Thoughts

(Photo and haiku by Dawn Pisturino. Copyright 2023 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.)

Dawn Pisturino

May 10, 2023

Copyright 2023 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

We Can Do It!

(Photo from Professional Woman’s Magazine. Naomi Parker Fraley, the real Rosie the Riveter, died in 2018 at 96.)

I wrote a short script for a One Week Short Script Challenge early in April. After getting all the feedback, I edited the script multiple times and re-submitted it for more feedback. On May 1st, I entered it in the 2023 Pipeline Media Group Short Script Competition. I’m not expecting to win anything, but I’m proud of myself for doing it. I challenged myself, and that makes me feel stronger as a writer.

What are you doing to challenge yourself?

~

The Writers Guilds of America, East and West, are officially on strike. This is a significant strike against the major Hollywood studios and networks that will affect everyone. New movies and TV shows will not be produced or delayed, projects may be canceled, and the new season episodes we are all waiting for will be put on hold. We will see more reruns and recycled TV shows until the strike is resolved.

Writers are striking for the same reasons all workers go on strike: long hours, less pay, loss of value and respect, less creative autonomy, and fewer opportunities. The regulation of A.I. is on the list of demands.

The WGA has already sent emails to its members and members of organizations like The Black List, warning against “scabbing” and crossing the picket line. Any writer who sells a screenplay, makes a deal, or gets hired to write for a Guild signatory company during the strike will be blacklisted and banned from WGA membership for life. Their Hollywood career will be over.

Dawn Pisturino

May 3, 2023

Copyright 2023 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

Humans Only

(Photo by Brad Neathery on Unsplash)

HAPPY MAY 1st! Old Man Winter is gone, and Summer is officially on its way!

~

Recently, I read posts on LinkedIn and Reddit about A.I. and how it seriously impacts freelance writers and content creators. Freelancers sell their services to clients and rely on repeat and new customers to make a living. Content creators may be freelancers or work for a company. The spotlight on A.I. has made customers wary of freelance writers and creators to the point where they are canceling contracts, refusing to pay for work already completed, and questioning the integrity of the writer/creator’s work. To put it bluntly, customers don’t want to pay for content generated by a robot. Since it’s hard for freelance writers/creators to prove they have not used A.I. in some capacity, customers react to the spread of A.I. with paranoid accusations against them. (And some do use A.I. for limited uses.) I see this problem getting worse, not better, as A.I. is used increasingly in the creative arts. I have not seen any articles about how this affects companies using A.I. or the people who work for them.

If you are using A.I. to generate blog posts, artwork, poetry, prose, or any kind of creative effort, revealing it and which A.I. program you are using would be a good idea. If people know this out front, they cannot accuse you of deception.

I use Grammarly to correct my punctuation, spelling, and grammatical errors. Otherwise, my writing is generated by my own brain.

HUMANS RULE!

Dawn Pisturino

May 1, 2023

Copyright 2023 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

Wedded Bliss

(Photo by Jabber Visuals on Unsplash)

“Music is a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy.”

~Ludwig van Beethoven~

I was listening to a variety of music and paid close attention to the lyrics. Some of the lyrics were so beautiful; they astounded me and reminded me that song lyrics are poetry, too. And that reminded me that long before I fell in love with poetry, music was my muse.

People often comment on the lyrical quality of my poems. If they have a musical quality, it’s because I played piano for many years, studied music and music theory, composed music, sang, married a jazz pianist, and listened to many different kinds of music, from hardcore classical to hardcore heavy metal.

I also read all the classic English poets when I was a teenager and studied French for many years, which is a very musical and rhythmic language.

The marriage of music and poetry is a story of wedded bliss. Although they can function independently, the result is sublime when partnered together.

Dawn Pisturino

April 28, 2023

Copyright 2023 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.

Too Many Books, Too Much Competition

(Photo by Gaman Alice on Unsplash)

I re-blogged this from an earlier post.

~

January 11, 2013:

In an interview with the blog SIX QUESTIONS, John Raab, Publisher/CEO/Editor-in-Chief of Suspense Magazine, answered the following question:

“What can you truly expect to get out of your writing?”

“I feel that many authors have false expectations and think they are writing the next NY Times Bestseller. Here is the problem with that. Just because your book is not high on a list or selling that great, doesn’t mean you can’t write. Authors have to remember that anybody can now publish an EBook on Amazon or Barnes and Noble. What does that mean? That means that readers now have to navigate through thousands of more books to find one they like and readers only have a certain amount of money to spend. If you don’t have thousands of marketing dollars behind your work, then you have to spend triple the amount of time marketing to fans than it took you to write the book. Writing the book is the easy part, getting paid from it is the difficult part. Authors should expect to not retire off their work, but instead write for the love of it, because it is your passion. Writing and music are the same thing, you see a great band in a bar and say ‘They are better than anything I hear on the radio, why aren’t they signed?’ Writing is the same way.”

Is it true? Are there too many books on the market? Writers don’t just write for the love of writing, they write to make a living. But if thousands of self-proclaimed authors are flooding the market with books, how can someone achieve that goal?

For myself, I stopped buying books because I was tired of wasting my money on mediocre crap that was marketed as best-seller material. A slick cover and a wide audience do not a-book-worth-reading make. Extensive marketing will not salvage a poorly crafted commodity. Readers might buy from you once, but they won’t come back again.

The book market is, in fact, overwhelming. Every time I go into Barnes & Noble, the stacks of unread (and unbought) books make me want to swoon. Scanning through Amazon and Goodreads makes me feel the same way.

The books shout in my head: READ ME! READ ME!

It’s the same on Facebook. Thousands of self-proclaimed authors scream at me: BUY MY BOOK! BUY MY BOOK!

Millions of blogs and online publications float around in Internet outer space, vying for attention.

TV, movies, and video games also provide tough competition. And to top it off, a recent poll suggested that only 75% of the population ever reads a book (print or digital.)

So, what’s a writer (and reader) to do in an age of information overload?

1. Write the best damned book you can, using original ideas.

2. Don’t write derivative material because thousands of others are doing the same thing. We don’t need anymore books about vampires and wizards unless the slant is so original, and the characters so unforgettable, that the world just can’t live without them.

3. Define your goals realistically. If you are only writing out of love for the craft, then be content to do so. But if you dream of making a living as a writer, then treat it as a business.

Personally, I think the publishing industry bubble is going to burst, just like the dot.com bubble and the housing bubble. Too many books means too many choices and a flattened market. After all, people don’t have the time or the money to spend on reading all the books out there. And traditional publishing houses depend on blockbuster best-sellers to keep themselves afloat.

I will continue to write because I love to write. But don’t be fooled: I want to make a living off of my writing as much as any other writer. The question is: can I beat the competition?

~

April 26, 2023:

The book industry did, indeed, undergo a massive upheaval. Publishing houses folded or merged, small presses failed, people lost their jobs, authors lost contracts, and writing scams emerged as independent authors sought alternate publishing avenues.

Traditional publishing is a challenging route to pursue. As of 2022, only 64% of the population reads a book in twelve months. Only 1% of books submitted to traditional publishers are lucky enough to get published. Nonfiction generally sells better than fiction. An author will never make big money in niche categories like poetry and short stories. People have shorter attention spans and become more visually-oriented thanks to movies, TV, and social media. Writing screenplays has become “the thing” because that’s where the demand is, a writer can make big money, and it sounds cool. Writing for TV can be incredibly lucrative, although it’s demanding, and living in L.A. is mandatory.

When I wrote my middle-grade children’s mystery novel for a children’s writing class, I spent hours editing, writing the synopsis and query letter, and submitting it to agents. And yes, agents looked at it, turned it down, and encouraged me to edit more and submit it again in two years. I re-wrote the first part of the book because it was too long. But I was so sick of that book I put it away and only recently pulled it out again. I will finish it because I love the characters and the story. I LOVE WRITING! And that’s all that matters.

And yes, I still buy a book occasionally, but it’s more likely to be a used book I haven’t read, a free Kindle pick-of-the-month, a nonfiction book I can use for education and reference, or a poetry book I want to review. I have six bookcases full of books, many not yet read. As I read them, I give them away unless there’s a good reason to keep them. I have always loved to read a good book.

Keep reading because you love it! Keep writing because you love it!

What are your thoughts?

Dawn Pisturino

January 11, 2013; April 26, 2023

Copyright 2013-2023 Dawn Pisturino. All Rights Reserved.