Tag Archives: Albert Lea Tribune

Does Your Community Have A Gratitude Attitude?

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My column from the week of February 22 in the Albert Lea Tribune and the Courier Sentinel.

Boris the shysterCan a negative attitude make or break a community? It is always interesting talking to people when they move to a new community. Does negativity itch, get scratched, become infected, and break open and spread to an entire community?

I was feeling the negativity recently in conversations with different groups of people. Some outsiders, you know, those who move into a small community but never fit in because — gasp — they aren’t from here, remarked that it was hard living in a community always being reminded they couldn’t do something a new way because it has always been done a certain way and they wouldn’t understand because they aren’t from here.

Another group was complaining about businesses and business owners and things not being the way they thought they should be, so they would never support the business again and they would tell everyone about it.

Another conversation was with business owners. They told the opposite tale of nothing ever being right no matter how hard they tried. And admitting they weren’t always cordial to their customers because it was hard keeping the smile on their face day in and day out in the face of such negativity.

As a former business owner, as a customer and as a person who moved to a smaller and new community for a short time, I could identify with the feelings of all of these groups. I have been the crabby customer, I have been the crabby business owner and I have felt like the outsider. I must say all of these situations fed the negativity in me, the negativity that resides in all of us, and festers if it is fed by our contact with each other.

Here’s a little tip, not everything that is said is entirely accurate all the time so as Mr. Negativity is fed, it grows sometimes with untruths and explodes. Pretty soon we all jump on the bandwagon and join in because we want to fit in to the conversation.

There is a saying in business that the customer is always right, but I don’t know if I agree with that premise in the world we live in today. My reasoning comes from a phone call I received when I was in business. The phone call actually wasn’t for my business, it was a wrong number but when I picked up the phone the language and screaming coming out of the other end was not for the faint of heart. I asked who they were calling and they named the business. I told them who they had reached, and they profusely apologized and hung up. The phone rang again, it was the same caller, and they apologized again for their language and their rudeness as it was to be directed at another business. My thoughts were why apologize if they were going to call the other business and repeat the mistake message I had heard. No business owner deserves to be treated to verbal abuse.

They say it takes 10 compliments to cancel out an insult. As an author, I get reviews on my books and most of my reviews are positive but it is the one negative that I always remember and the same can be said for things said in our communities.

Bullying wasn’t a big factor for me when I was growing up. I can only remember two instances in my middle school and teen years when it happened to me. The key is I remember those instances, the negativity directed towards me, more than I remember some of the positive complements or experiences during those years. And I remember who directed those attacks. The memories of those people’s actions have lived on for more than 45 years.

The best way to keep our communities from growing — the best way to close our businesses — is to not support them by our words, what we say and by how we treat those who are new, those who choose to run their businesses and those who chose to shop and visit our businesses in our communities.

Choose to help our communities and our businesses grow by planting seeds of encouragement and positivity instead of feeding the weeds of negativity shutting down anything positive that is trying to peek up between those weeds. The choice is ours. Our communities health may depend on it

 

 

Mental Dental Mishap Fear!

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It is no secret I don’t like dentists. I live in fear of their tools the same way the characters in my books fear being caught by the protagonist.

I don’t actually dislike the people who are dentists. I have very good friends who are dentists, and I like them as the person they are but not the career they have. It’s not their fault I fear their tools. It is a deep-seated fear from childhood and the old ways of the dentists back in the ’50s and ’60s.

My fear of dentists began the summer after I finished eighth grade. A fun game of badminton turned into the last time my real two front teeth inhabited my mouth. A little swing of the racket, my coming forward with my racket, and the meeting of my friend’s racket with my mouth as my friend swung at the birdie, sent pieces of my teeth probably flying over the net or somewhere never to be found. I remember my mom’s angst when she saw what happened. I wasn’t too upset until I visited the dentist. What was left of the teeth had to come out, a root canal had to be performed and pegged teeth had to be cemented in my mouth.

We didn’t have the technology we do today, so the first month of that summer, every few days was spent in the dentists office. I had a month of no front teeth. There were no TVs or music to drown out the noise of the drills. And I remember a lot of pain when he was working on my teeth.

Again, the man behind the drill was a very nice man and a caring man, but he wasn’t trained in gentleness technique. And his hands always shook, so occasionally they missed their mark.

My old school friend and I were comparing dentist notes from our childhood. She always wanted to go to my dentist, and I always wanted to go to hers. Must be the grass is always greener on the other side of the street thing. I wanted her dentist because they got cute plaster Disney statues for going to the dentist, and she wanted my dentist because hers sometimes had imbibed too much before working on patients. It was the shaky hands from being older versus the shaky hands from having a few fun beverages.

There was an upside to my accident; before the accident I had spaces between my real two front teeth. My new teeth were great.

Because of all this I have avoided the dentist for years and years. Yes, that many years. Add to the fact I have no dental insurance and it cemented my resolve to stay away from the imaginary torture chambers in my mind.

Over the years I have tried to make it to the dentist. I have made the appointments, and the office has made bets on whether I would make it. In the past weeks I could no longer avoid the dreaded dentist.  I was in a dither. My broken tooth sent me into a panic. Yes, I know, a small thing for most people but remember the torture chamber of my youth.

I remembered the restful feeling I had when accompanying my husband to his dentist this past year. He is a veteran and this dental office had a day when they provided free dental work for veterans. I thought possibly the restful feeling was the fact I was not the one undergoing the work, but I bit the bullet and had my husband make an appointment. They got me in right away.

The office was as I remembered it, peaceful with restful decor and a quiet atmosphere which calmed my nerves. The staff, knowing I was nervous, took time to make sure I was calm and comfortable. I had a TV right in front of me as I sat in the spa-like comfortable chair. This was not the dental office of my childhood.

And then I met the dentist and the dental assistant who were the essence of calm. I had my teeth examined — not as bad as I thought — and the gentleness made me quit shaking. I made the next three appointments. The truth was in the pudding. Would I make it back to actually have the work done? I canceled the first appointment because we had a blizzard, and the dentist was 40 miles away. I made it to the second appointment.

As I sat in the chair and watched “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” on television, the dental hygienist worked on my teeth. I almost fell asleep. I was able to daydream and plot my next book, and I can’t believe I am saying this: It was a relaxing time. I have two more appointments, and again I can’t believe I am saying this, but I actually am looking forward to getting my teeth fixed.

I have always loved new technology, but I haven’t thought about it in the terms of dentists. Technology has come a long way in making the torture chambers of my youth into a better experience for those of us that have dental aversion. My fear made the thought of the experience into a bigger terror than it was. I think I need to ponder that and wonder where it might carryover into the rest of my life.

“One of the greatest discoveries a man makes, one of his great surprises, is to find he can do what he was afraid he couldn’t do.” — Henry Ford

 

Authors and Editors, We Need One Another!

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love my editorsI love writing and when I write my creativity takes me along

with the story and I get lost in it, not caring about comma’s etc. I put comma’s in the wrong places, forget to use quotation marks and forget about correct sentence structure. I check my finished work and try to clean it up, but usually it is a mess. That is where my editors come in.

I want to highlight two people who work magic with my books. One is my publisher and editor plus being an author, Patricia Rockwell. When my manuscript for Cozy Cat Press cropped-ccplogonegative-e1433524649126.jpgis ready I send it in and she crosses the t’s, dots the i’s and makes me look better. She does this for all of her authors at Cozy Cat Press as she is the owner and publisher of the company.

Another person I rely on is D.A. Sarac and The Editing Pen. 1f71c0_74832be138cf469cb3612d72986d5b76I always feel it is good to have more than one set of eyes so I have her edit my independent books I publish under Hermiony Vidalia Books and the books I send to Cozy Cat Press. She has become invaluable to me. In fact, she too makes me look good. My new book The Penderghast Puzzle Protectors was  a mess when it came to comma’s and quotation marks. You would think I would learn but in my excitement and haste I miss many things and I hate editing and Annie Sarac loves editing.

Not only has The Editing Pen been invaluable to me with editing, she has also helped me with my promotions. An author needs to write, edit and promote and it is exhausting and so we ask for help. The Editing Pen offers a wide variety of services and support for authors.

I did try at one time to publish without an editor and it was a big mistake. I have learned my lesson. Every author you read, hopefully has a good editor in their back pocket. I am lucky to have two.

My new book will be featured here on Monday, so stay tuned, sign up to follow this blog  and for my newsletter where you can find the sign-up on julieseedorf.com.

For me this is thank an editor day. I just made it up. Thank you Patricia Rockwell and D. A. Sarac. You are the trick I carry in my back pocket to help my career be successful. And I would guess you would love to edit the post and all my snafu’s.

If you have an editor out there you love, leave a comment. I will choose one lucky winner to receive a surprise. And if you are a reader and don’t have an editor, make a comment anyway. I love to hear from you. And make sure you check back to see if you have won.

It’s Happy Editor’s Friday. Thank an Editor.

Edited by Patricia Rockwell and D. A. Sarac

Edited by Patricia Rockwell and D. A. Sarac