2026 and The NYT Games

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Happy 2026!

My niece gave me a much-appreciated Christmas gift: a year’s subscription to The New York Times games. We had limited access before. It’s nice to have full access to all of the games.

     

Getting the little badges or other benchmark notices reminds me of the gold stars teachers passed out in elementary school. Hooray! You did it, they conveyed. Of course, that was back in the Stone Age. I have no idea what teachers do now to encourage progress in their students. Maybe they give digital versions of gold stars? Emojis? Gift cards? (I’ve seen the latter given as prizes for Battle of the Books in schools.)

  

In a time when some communication (social media comments; work emails or evaluations) can feel like taking a bullet or when affirmations seem few and far between, it’s nice to get a little positive reinforcement. I also am glad that I have a whole year of these little endorphin boosters coming! Because I appreciate them, they encourage me to seek ways to affirm someone else in a small way. The gift that keeps on giving.

       

What are some ways someone affirmed you or you affirmed someone else recently? What gift have you received that inspired you? Please comment below.

Photos by L. Marie.

Christmas 2025—Calendars and Puzzles

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While the days peel away toward Christmas Day
I can’t help sharing this:
an almost empty Advent calendar
once filled with chocolate bliss.

 

I helped put together puzzles with friends—
twelve lovely days of joy.
Though some puzzles had too much red or green
and threatened to annoy.

Still the colors are festive, you can see.
So, I will not complain.
I am counting the days until next year
when they come out again.

 

For those of you who are signing off until the new year, happy holidays! I’ll probably be back next week with a post.

Poem by L. Marie. Photos by L. Marie.

Snowy Owl Visitors

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For many winters we’ve been hit by the subzero temperatures of the polar vortex. But this time we’ve had a pleasant surprise from the Arctic.

You might have heard about the pair of snowy owls who recently arrived in Chicago. I have only seen photos of them literally chilling at the pier of Montrose Beach. People have flocked (pun intended, hee hee 😊) to the beach to see them. (See here.)

As a result, the Chicago Park District closed access to the pier to keep people at a safe distance from these endangered owls.

I’m reminded of the many times years ago, when I saw crowds gathered in La Jolla, CA to see the seals, sea lions, and newborn seals at a safe distance. But there is still a controversy brewing there about the presence of the seals. You can find out more about that online.

Still, I love the fact that people gather to see the snowy owls despite the cold.

What would you brave the cold to see?

Snowy owls photo from the Chicago Park District Facebook page.

An Everyday Adventure

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The Midwestern states have received a lot of snow recently. And when you park on the street instead of in a garage, you have to brush the snow off the car. A lot.

   

I had brushed and scraped layers of snow and ice off the car as I had done for days now. I just wanted to get out of the cold and get where I was going. (The temperature was 27 degrees Fahrenheit/-2.7 Celsius. Not terrible, but not Myrtle Beach weather.)

As soon as I turned down a street to head out of the neighborhood, I had a feeling I might be in trouble. The windshield wasn’t totally clear. But I kept going anyway since I could sort of see.

As I turned to head south on Route 59, a four-lane highway with a speed limit of 45 in some areas (or 72 kilometers, which means people who speed drive 60 mph or 96 km), I suddenly realized I couldn’t see out of the windshield. The glare of the sun on the ice layer I hadn’t quite scraped off was like a thick veil.

And here I was on a road that would soon curve downhill.

My heart was pounding. What was I to do?

The only thing I could: I pulled onto the shoulder and put my hazard lights on. There was no telling what I might have hit (or what might have hit me) had I not pulled over.

Trucks and cars whizzed by as I returned to clearing the windshield. Finally, it was clear enough to get back on the highway. As I drove, I thought about horrible outcomes I (thankfully) dodged.

You might be thinking, How silly is she to get on a highway with little visibility out of a windshield? I was needlessly in too much of a hurry. I wasn’t late for work or an appointment. I was going to pick up a prescription—something I could have done anytime.

Route 59

But this incident reminded me of the everyday adventures we sometimes have in the winter, when you think you’re okay until something comes into play that you hadn’t foreseen (but should have).

Of course, the choices we make have consequences or rewards. If I had spent more time cleaning the windshield before leaving, I wouldn’t have been at risk on the highway. But then there wouldn’t have been much of a story had I done everything correctly. (This is not an excuse, however. I knew better.)

And that’s the crux of writing, isn’t it? Writing characters who don’t always make the best choices. Characters who are in a hurry when they should have delayed and who get themselves into trouble. Characters who aren’t always strong or wise and sometimes act stupidly. Characters who go down to the basement in creepy houses where the serial killers definitely lurk. We might scream at them to make a better choice. But really, didn’t we go to the movie to see these types of choices?

What adventures have you faced because of a less-than-wise choice you made? What happened? Have you ever written a story in which your main character made the same decision you made? Did that character face the same result or a different one? Why?

Route 59 sign from Wikipedia. Other photos by L. Marie.

Thankful for the Hard Lessons

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I remember when I was a kid, listening to a parent telling me what to do. Being naturally rebellious, I thought their commands were optional. I wanted to do what I wanted to do. Each time, I learned the hard way that they were right. But for a while I was resentful. I wanted life to be easier.

Why do we have to learn the hard way? Human nature, I guess. Many times, we want things to be easy. But many of the lessons I learned the hard way (and I’m grateful to have survived them) are the ones I never forgot.

Years ago, a budding author asked me to read his manuscript. He knew I was a manuscript reader/book editor for a publisher and wanted me to submit the manuscript to them. I told him I would read three chapters of it. After doing so, I gave him some advice on revising the chapters.

He disagreed vehemently and entered the manuscript in a writing contest. The judges ripped it to shreds. In a chastened frame of mind, he admitted to me what happened.

We writers are often very sensitive about our “book babies.” We don’t want to hear feedback from someone who doesn’t speak well of them. And some people are insensitive in that regard—feedback being very subjective at times and unasked for sometimes too. (Looking at you, critique group member who gives a negative review of a manuscript not because something needs to change, but because you want to look “smarter” than everyone else. Looking at you, online stranger, who want to be mean because you’re in a bad mood and want to take it out on someone.)

Manuscript reviewers have feelings too. If you’re an editor or a reviewer or someone who has participated in a workshop or critique group, you know that giving feedback on a manuscript isn’t always easy. This is especially true when you know that your feedback will mean a lot of revision work.

When someone asks me to read a manuscript, particularly a new writer, I pause before giving an answer, having had to deal with the hurt feelings of someone who expected me to say, “This is perfect!”

Most of the time, I just read the manuscripts of my fellow critique group members. They know what to expect with a critique, because they really want feedback to improve their manuscripts. All of us in the group have had to learn the hard way that sometimes others can see what we can’t.

What hard lessons have you had to learn that you now appreciate?

Person with a pen from wisegeek.org. Book stack from blogs.mtu.edu. Other photo by L. Marie.

If I Write It, Will They Come?

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Recently I attended on Zoom a mass book birthday of five authors who graduated from the same school I did. It was a wonderful evening of readings and reminiscing.

This morning, I awoke to the realization that all of their books were middle grade or picture books. No young adult novels. Of course, I knew at the time what their books were. But this brought to mind how some of the authors I know who previously had written young adult novels now wrote adult fiction. Some cited the lack of acceptance by some publishers for new young adult novels.

And that was before the recent uproar about an October 2025 article in The Atlantic, “America Is Sliding Toward Illiteracy.” The article describes the decline in reading among high school students and espoused the “pervasive refusal to hold children to high standards.”

This was followed by a student reaction article in The New York Times earlier in November, “What Students Are Saying About the Decline in High School Reading Skills.” But before that was a September podcast found at the Harvard Gazette website, “’Harvard Thinking’: What’s driving decline in U.S. literacy rates?”

In The New York Times article, one solution posited was to rethink education, since reading wasn’t, in the opinion of that person, “useful.” (Though I would argue that if I couldn’t read a one-way sign on a street or a wrong way sign on a highway, an accident might occur. That makes reading pretty useful.)

Anyway, the book birthday and the articles got me to thinking about my own writing, which involves a series of young adult novels. I stopped working on the series after several rejections and after learning that many young adult novelists had left the age level. (Please note that many, not all, had left.)

Today, I questioned that decision. By ceasing to write my young adult novels, was I giving in to the negativity of the news? The answer, I concluded for myself, was yes. So, I’m going back to work on that series.

“If you build it, they will come,” came to mind. That’s actually a misquote of what Kevin Costner’s character, Ray Kinsella, heard in the 1989 movie, Field of Dreams. Kinsella had what others considered a crazy dream: to build a baseball field in the middle of a cornfield.

Maybe writing young adult novels might seem crazy to some, in light of the above. But the actions of dedicated teachers, like one young language arts teacher I know who has her students reading Shakespeare’s plays, gives me hope.

I know what giving up on writing is like. I’ve done it before and felt miserable. Maybe if I build my field of dreams, they—readers—will come.

Do you have a “field of dreams”? Are you still working on it? If not, what stops you from working on it?

Down arrow found somewhere online. Stacks of books from blogs.hpedsb.on.ca. Field of Dreams poster found at eBay.

A Hard Habit to Break

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Some close friends have a border collie named Toivo (a Finnish word for “hope”). (In the photo above, Toivo is with his “sibling”—a kitten named Panther.) Toivo has a habit of shoving one of his toys under couches, storage cabinets with feet—whatever practically inaccessible place he can find. He barks until someone comes to retrieve it. For some reason, this delights him, regardless of how difficult it is for the retriever to obtain said object.

According to an American Kennel Club list, the border collie is the smartest breed of dog. So, he knows exactly what he is doing. I imagine Toivo doing the doggy equivalent of giggling whenever I struggle to retrieve his toy.

My friends and I have told him that this obsession of his is very obnoxious, especially when he does it several times in a row. No one wants to keep moving a couch or get on hands and knees, especially if your back hurts, to retrieve something you told the dog over and over to stop putting there.

Believe it or not, this is a dog toy.

Yet as I think about it, this is character gold. I don’t think I could make up something like this on my own. I needed friends, and their family members who have a habit of raising border collies, in order to mine this characteristic for an animal character in a story.

I don’t yet have a story that could do justice to a dog like this. So for now, I’ll keep Toivo’s little habit at the back of my mind. (He also is excellent at catching a ball. He’ll then drop it and push it back to you with his nose or paw to keep the game going.)

Do you have pets with strange, but endearing, habits? Have you written about them? Do tell!

Toivo and Panther photo by C. Pyykkonen. Other photo by L. Marie.

Fall 2025, In Which I Ponder the Color of Leaves

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I was born in the Midwest, so you’d think I would be used to the changing colors of the leaves of deciduous trees. But since I’ve been thinking about worldbuilding in fiction, the harmony of the colors stood out to me more than ever. Red, orange, yellow. But why these colors and not others (like blue)?

 

It’s been ages since I was in elementary school, when such things were discussed, so I turned to a Smithsonian article aptly named, “Why do leaves change color in the fall?” to brush up on why certain colors appear. I learned

 

As the season changes, temperatures drop and days get shorter. Trees get less direct sunlight, and the chlorophyll in the leaves breaks down. The lack of chlorophyll reveals yellow and orange pigments that were already in the leaves but masked during the warmer months. Darker red leaves are the result of a chemical change . . .

Since I like to cross-check facts and avoid using too many quotes from one source, I hunted up another article. According to “The science behind fall colors,” at the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources website:

Very little photosynthesis occurs on cloudy days, and rain can actually leach the anthocyanins [which produce red and purple leaves] and carotenoids [which produce orange and yellow pigments] out from the leaves.

But I’m sure you already knew all of this. I wondered about colors, because in the creation of plant and tree species for my world, what colors make sense?

Oh, I know that if I create a world, I can do what I want. But sometimes, it’s nice to know that leaves change into specific colors for a good reason.

What do you appreciate about fall? Even if you live in an area where the leaves stay the same color, please tell what you appreciate about the season.

Photos by L. Marie.

Dedicated to Story

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Lately, I’ve been reading this book.

In the introduction, Ed Catmull explained that this book is not just about how movies like Finding Nemo or The Incredibles came to be. Mostly, it is about how he helped to foster an atmosphere of creativity so that these movies could exist.

This is not a book review. I wanted to post about one of the many aspects I find fascinating about this book: the discussion of a group of creatives known as the Braintrust,

[A] tight, well-defined group that . . . assembled, as needed, to solve problems on all our films. . . . Over the years, its ranks have grown to include a variety of people—directors, writers, and heads of story—whose only requirement is that they display a knack for storytelling. Catmull/Wallace, 88-89

I love the aspect of a group of people dedicated to making a story the best it can be.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: But this is my story. I don’t want a group of people telling me what to put in MY story.

I hear you. We writers want control over our narratives.

Listening to feedback on a story is not easy. Many of us have sat through workshops where brainless idiots fellow students tore our work to shreds.

I recommend Michael Arndt’s video: Toy Story 3: Mistakes Made, Lessons Learned, if you want to see the Braintrust in action. (He wrote the screenplay for Toy Story 3.) If you don’t like people messing with a story or you don’t want to a watch a video that is over an hour, you might skip it.

I have a “braintrust” of individuals I turn to whenever I write a picture book or a novel. Sometimes, I hit a wall and don’t know how to get around it. Many times, they’ve made suggestions that caused a story to blossom.

Do you have a trusted group of people who help you in your writing? Or is the thought of someone having input repugnant to you? Please comment below.

Photo by L. Marie.