My First Year

First Year
What seemed like forever, has only been a year. It has been a whole year, come October the 14th. That was when I published Catmando! It is a good thing I was not expecting to be a millionaire within that first year. Whew! It was never about money in regards to my writing. Yeah, yeah, you heard me right I did not stutter, I am not writing to be a millionaire, for that, I buy a lottery ticket at my grocery store along with those coffin nails.
As I have said before, in the back pages of my blog, writing is an addiction for me. What I thought was unique for blind people was to be able to write in the dark. There goes another busted bubble.
A friend of mine, Melody, suggested I Google blind author. And much to my dismay, I got 45 thousand hits. I was not alone in the dark.
I should have known better, but one of the greatest blind writer, in my opinion and not counting myself, is Homer. We are still reading his stuff thousands of years later. Would not that be cool? To tell a story in meter. I tried it once and let me tell you, IT AIN’T EASY! I also learned that John Milton was blind his last twenty years of his life. I was not aware of that when I wrote Paradise: Lost and Found. A must read.
There might be only a handful of blind writers publishing independently, but there are many blind writers and to think I had something unique that would separate me from the two million writers publishing with Amazon. Oh well.
Despite the competition, I still feel special and have friends who say and I quote, “You’re definitely something else.”
Anyway, The Beggar King is progressing slowly but shirley. ;]
Stay tune, the reissue of Hostage and the Beggar King are coming soon to your e-bookshelf nearest you.

How Blind Authors Write Better in the Dark

As silly as the title sounds, it is true. Here’s a blind author’s secret: not being able to actually see the printed word allows my mind to focus on the story itself. The one obvious problem with that – a blind writer cannot view his work to ensure it meets the standards, especially to make sure it is free of those pesky typos. 

Always in this business, a blind author must rely on others to pick up the difference in a writer’s career. For instance, my screen reading software cannot access a lot of web sites, nor can we read books from a Kindle app., or a PDF if not set up properly. That is the hardest part of being a blind author. If I cannot read what others are writing; I am at a disadvantage, just one more hindrance to keep the blind from achieving fame and fortune.

It is frustrating to need someone else to post pics, or publish the manuscript when it is time to preview the final touches Amazon demands. 

It is ironic that a blind man who loves to write, but cannot see what he writes. That’s the point, I have to listen to what I have written and I am carried away into that world. So, whatever I am doing; it is working for me.

To write in the dark should be a silly notion to the sighted. But that’s the trick!

Eighty percent of our perception is through our eyes, so if there is no longer any visual input, your mind will have less distraction when writing in the dark. 

I am told that all writers need editors, no less so for the blind writers. I am no exception, especially while in high school, I cut more English classes than I had attended in my senior year. Ironically, I took English Lit. as my major at Augusta State University eleven years later when I was condemned to becoming legally blind.  And quit a fifty thousand a year job to write full time.

What is the point of living if you don’t follow your dreams. I want to have my stories reviewed in Lit. classes in colleges as standard reading material. Oh well, a boy and his dreams. So, I feel a duty to my fellow human to bring them out of the darkness of ignorance and into the light.

Writing The Beggar King, I have learned so much about another world alien to mine, and find the same injustices.

Like Sir Lancelot, I will joust with the evil dragons of injustice and preserve the American way. 

If you do not know BS when you step in it, then keep on truckin’ 

Welcome to a Blind Author’s Blog – Please hang around and read more about my world and my worlds manifest in my ebooks.

Here you can get more information about my life…

This was my first ebook published…

And this is my latest release…

COMING SOON  – BEGGAR KING

New Release Coming Soon: Beggar King

In the workings – a new novel by Willow May Jennings: Beggar King

This is the cover reveal – just received from my cover designer Melody Simmons of eBookindiecovers. Watch this spot for more info and extracts from the book – coming soon!

Begging In India

Begging In India

Begging In India

As a writer, I have a responsibility to not only entertain, but to educate. While researching for my book, The Beggar King, I found a lot of interesting facts and figures.
Begging in India is a way of life.
It is thought that there are about 800,000 full time beggars, if each beggar get 12 rupee each day of the year; the industry brings in about ten million per year. In Kolkata as one example, the beggars are genius at tweaking a system.
A middle aged woman whose children have already grown will rent another’s baby to enhance her pitifulness and more alms. She has to rent her space for about 3 rupee every day.
Rag pickers play a vital role in Kolkata’s recycling. They sort through the trash. Many items found in the trash can be sold to someone else.
The Skelton men had made Kolkata one of the world’s leading exporters of human bones.
I’m pretty sure I’ve only scratched the surface of five thousand years of India’s history, but it’s a start.
Stay tune for the release date for the Beggar King, coming to an e-book store nearest you.

Being Ex-SIghted Ain’t So Bad

Being Ex-Sighted Ain’t So Bad.
There are many disadvantages to being blind, but there are several advantages, if you only look for them.
One such advantage is to taste and appreciate food more. Since I cannot see the food I am eating, or even worse, placing a proper size bite into my mouth, so, when I’m able to get a bite instead of wearing it, the experience gives me great pleasure.
I had one such experience in which I forked my salad and tried to stick half a head of lettuce into my mouth. Of course as Murphy would have it; I was on a date and in a crowded restaurant during lunch rush. The second I tried placing the lettuce, I was instantly marked. There was enough dressing on the lettuce that excess dripped from both sides of my cheeks. Embarrassing! My date caught me and while she laughed at my antics of trying to be cool as if eating a half a head of iceberg was an everyday thing, she wasted no time in cutting up my salad.
Another advantage of being blind is you hear more than the sighted.
I was partnered up with a guy in the science lab at Augusta State. We were filling out the daily lab when the professor told the class of a formula to complete the paperwork and I heard it.
When my lab partner came to that point that he needed the formula, I repeated what the professor had said. He was utterly amazed. He exclaimed, “How did you know that?” The entire class was all talking at the same time when I told him the professor had told us earlier. He mumbled his astonishment as we completed the lab.
Sightees as I call you people, who can see, are so easily impressed. When I try to explain it was easy enough that they could do it too, I am usually met with a lot of skepticism.
What I enjoy being blind the most is listening to a bird call in the twilight gloom. A little while back, I heard a Northern Bob White. This particular fowl usually hangs out in the mid-western states where I first heard its simplistic song. I wonder how many other people heard the call of a Northern Bob White that evening.
It sort of makes me feel special. Not being able to see and still do things the sighted could easily do for themselves but usually can’t hear past the television or their smart phones.
Let’s not forget the best part of being blind, is that misunderstanding and confusion over doorknobs. [Author’s note: For reference to doorknobs, see previous blog on the exploits of being blind.]

Willow May’s latest release!

The Trials and Tribulations of Writing in the Dark.
[A Blogger’s note: I must beg your forgiveness for last week’s blog. The spelling was a half ass job and we apologize.]
Finally! I have finished putting down the rough draft of Beggar Man Thief. Whew! This is the first time, I’ve ever had such difficulty: “brainstorming” the first draft.
Now, for the fun part of writing. Seriously!
Like the artist who finished the outline of his drawing, I get to fill in between the lines with colors, scenery, and populate another world with words and my imagination.
Allow me to tell you a little bit of Beggar Man Thief.
The story reveals a Mid-western couple seeking a family of their own. When the Walkers could not make babies themselves, Ernie Walker sought to feed the orphaned children of India in a search of a family of their own.
Thelma Walker flew to India: to find her delinquent husband, to find out what her heart is really telling her, but most importantly, find a family who needs a mother.
As if Thelma’s life was not hard enough; she must save her husband from himself, then she has to deal with a Russian gangster who wants her children for sex slaves, and the Walkers out of the way permanently.
Her biggest hurdle is the undercover cop who is collecting evidence against the Russian Mafia while falling in love with the American. Her heart strings are being pulled between her husband’s attempts to save the orphaned thieves, while expanding his kingdom of Beggars and the handsome cop with his lustful gaze.
Here is another story by Willow May Jennings’ of Man’s constant cravings and the effects it has on women and children. Willow May is once again turning over rocks to expose the underside of human nature’s cravings.
Willow May realizes she cannot solve the world’s woes, but she can keep the issue of human trafficking a constant dialogue in the world’s consciousness.
From CatmanDo; which revealed what self-indulgences can warp one’s nature, to Dragon Shifters, where self-indulgences can be lucrative and froth with danger.
As in Beggar Man Thief, like the other two novels, Willow May attempts to show the lengths we will go to satisfy those indulgences and still rise in the morning with our self-respect intact.
Finally, Willow May conveys a sense of humor that lightens the seriousness of white slave trade.
You can expect the book Beggar Man Thief’s coming out party around the end of September.

Continuing Ed for the Sighted

Educating the Sightees

Willow May and I are both ex-sighted. That is to say, we’re both blind. Of all disabilities to have, being blind is the worse.
There are more people, even the educated, who don’t have a clue what to do around the blind.
I speak from experience when I say, trained professionals whose job it is to help get their clients readjusted to their new circumstances; freak out as to what to do with us.
I need to qualified that statement above. There are those disable who are also dysfunctional. Willow May and I seem to be the exceptions.
I can clean my house, wash my clothes, and cook my meals. I’m actually a good cook, especially with Mexican cuisine. What I can’t do is see.
I can’t see when someone points the way, I can’t publish my manuscripts, or create a cover image. I can’t drive, so I rely on others to help and this is where the problems begin. Interacting with the sightees.
People just don’t get it. They violate personal spaces, grab the blind person, or even shout at us because we’re probably def too.
Like in writing, not only do we need to entertain, to ease the sightees’ anxieties, but to educate the ignorant. Here’s a few suggestions:
Never grab a blind person, unless, of course, if that person is about to step in front of a bus. Grabbing the blind, especially a female, can frighten or even anger. Always ask if you can help and offer an elbow to guide them.
Instead of going to great lengths to avoid running into the blind, just speak out and say,” I’m in front of you or there’s a opened manhole.”
I imagine the sightees’ antics like the Three Stooges when they try to help without knowing how. Then again, I have a very fertile imagination.
Now, let us talk about service dogs. Labradors are easily trained and are ideal for guiding the blind. So, when animals lovers try to pet the service dog, it usually distracts the dog and delays the guided. Most people just don’t understand why it is important not to feed the animal or his guide. I guess people just can’t help themselves and give the animal French fries! Not only is human food bad for them, but it could cause injury to the blind, or get the service dog in trouble when he wants to follow the girl with the French fries.
Being blind does not mean we can’t be productive citizens. There was a governor in New England somewhere, Homer was allegedly blind, right? Look at Helen Keller, who was also deaf and see all of her accomplishments.
Actually, I don’t mind being blind. For one thing, it forces me to judge people by what they say and how they say it. I can’t see if they are big and fat, or just plain ugly. When I hear an ugly person, it’s usually because they are being mean spirited or rude. That’s ugly!
The other ting, if the doctors were able to find and offer me a cure; I would have to decline.
“No, thank you. Why should I want to go back to the seeing, when I can get away with so much. For Example, Excuse me Ma’am! I thought that was a door knob.”

Hostage

If God is Time, Then the Devil is Memory.
Hostage
By Willow May Jennings

A TALE TOLD ABOUT A SOLDIER BATTLING THE BETRAYAL OF HIS PLATOON TO THE ENEMY BY THEIR SERGEANT. CHARLIE WILSON MUST SUFFER THE TORMENTS OF HIS CAPTORS, STRUGGLE WITH HIS NIGHTMARES OF BETRAYAL AND THE FEELING OF DESERTION BY HIS COUNTRY.
IT IS HIS NEED FOR REVENGE THAT HOLDS HIS HEART HOSTAGE. BUDDHA MONKS RESCUE HIM FROM THE POW CAMP. HE IS ALLOWED TO RECOVER FROM THE TRAUMA OF WAR, BUT THE NIGHTMARES WILL NOT ALLOW HIM TO FORGET. HE IS FORCED TO ABANDON THE MONASTERY HE HAD CALLED HOME FOR MANY YEARS; BOUND FOR A COUNTRY THAT HAD FORGOTTEN HIM.
CHARLIE IS WAYLAID BY A MEXICAN FAMILY WHO IS BEING TERRORIZED BY NONE OTHER THAN CHARLIE’S PLATOON SERGEANT.
HE FALLS IN LOVE AFTER RESCUING THE BEAUTIFUL MARIA AND HER CHILDREN. IT IS LOVE’S TURN TO RESCUE CHARLIE FROM HIS NIGHTMARES. MARIE REVEALS TO CHARLIE THAT REVENGE WOULD HAVE COST HIM MORE THAN HE COULD AFFORD. HE IS TRULY FREED ONLY AFTER SERGEANT WILKES DIES FROM HIS GREED. ONLY THEN, IS HE ABLE TO GO HOME.
HERE IS AN EXCERPT.
The monsoon blew over his cage like a runaway banshee. The torrent of rain poured through the top of the bamboo cage.
Lieutenant Charlie Wilson was a guest of one of the seven POW camps in North Vietnam. The Chinese puppeteers were ingenious with their ageless craft of torture. The cage was barely big enough for an ordinary Asian, but to force an American into the same cage was inhuman. Charlie would persevere.
His cage was housed in a pit. The hole in the ground was just big enough to accept the cage.
When the monsoon season began, it reminded Charlie of standing in a waterfall.
As the torrent of rain pounded his skull, he was forced to keep his face down as far as his chin could touch his chest. This was the only way he could breathe. The water was bone chilling cold. As the pit began to fill with the runoff, Charlie forced his thoughts back to a better time when he and the other Boy Scouts of Beaver patrol went on their first scouting expedition in the Appalachian Mountains.
His entire Troop had worked hard for their annual fall trip. That year, they hiked the Blue Ridge Mountains. Charlie remembered that summer like it was yesterday.
Despite the high altitudes, the oppressive humidity, and add top that, fifty pound packs; the scouts were lucky to have hiked more than five miles the first day. Despite the scoutmaster’s cajoling, the majority of the scouts voted to spend the night at Amicalola Falls.
The fall was an incredible sight as it was over three hundred feet high. Many smaller falls cascaded off the Amicalola into smaller pools.
Charlie’s best friend, Bobby Lee, said it reminded him of a private shower. His best friend had double-dog-dared Charlie to step under the falling water completely naked. There was the usual badgering and poor mouthing each other until they both agreed to do it together.
In the shade of long needle pines, the boys stripped off their sweaty uniforms, but modesty demanded they wear their underwear. They tried to hide their embarrassment of being such tenderfoots as they walked across the rocky ground. Charlie remembered the feeling of the mist of the falling water shower on his body. It felt cool and refreshing. Charlie had his eyes closed enjoying the moment when he felt Bobby Lee’s hand in the center of his back. He was shoved through the curtain of water and into the pooled runoff. The shock of the cold mountain water stole Charlie’s breath.
Charlie struggled with the confusion of time and place as the freezing cold rain was suffocating him and knew he was going to die. Panic seized every molecule of his body and his soul shrieked for release. His captors raised his cage out of the pit. The level of the runoff had reached his lips. The guards were playing a game and would wait until the very last moment before lifting their prisoner out of the pit. Their masters would not be pleased if their labor force drowned.
The guards found other ways of entertaining themselves. Their favorite pastime was to poke the prisoners with sharpened bamboo sticks. It was not just the pointed sticks jabbing his body, but where they jab their pointed sticks. Today’s torture would be no different than any other day.
Oh dear God! Not again.

Defining Gross

I Can Define the Word Gross
Living in the dark can be hazardous like walking into a hole. It can be pleasant when you reach out for the door knob and find a breast instead. It can also be gross.
Remember when it was Mom who took care of all of us sick kids, and that included Dad, but who would take care of Mom when she was sick? The same can be said about a service dog and his blind person.
The animal is trained to guide and protect his user around obstacles. However, what happens to the dog when he gets sick or injured?
Fremont and I just moved into downtown Decatur and did not know a single soul, did not have a clue where anything was, but best of all, we had a full bag of tainted dog food. The food made Fremont sick as a dog could be. When he was not hurling the chewed food mixed with blood: the bloody soup was coming out the other end. .
The problem became apparent when I snifffed and learned we had an accident, just as I set my foot down in the pile, and of course, I was barefooted.
“Gross!” It was warm, mushy, and I wanted to throw-up.
The accident started in the bedroom and the paper towels were in the kitchen, of course. So, I did my best impression of Festus, Marshall Dillon’s old deputy and hobbled towards the kitchen. I made it to the kitchen and wiped my foot clean.
All the while, telling Fremont that everything was okay, despite my gagging noises of nausea. I froze with a start. Where was the pile? I had not counted the steps. I could get down on my hands and knees and probe. I took another step and found what I though was THE pile I was sorely mistaken.
Relief washed over me like a breath of fresh air until I went to throw the used towels away when the next two steps were the other piles.
I wanted to cry out loud, but instead, I called out for my Momma. No help there.
Needless to say, another trek to the kitchen and this time, the entire roll of paper towels.
When I covered all the accidents, I phoned downstairs to housekeeping to get the carpets cleaned.
The housekeeping guy was sympathetic and only charged me a dollar per pile. There was ten piles and I still had a sick puppy.
Now, it was time to panic. New kid in town, had no mobility training for the immediate area, and I was flat broke. So, I asked around and found out that there was a vet close by. Six blocks away, they said. Technically, it was seven blocks to the vet. The sighted don’t count the medium of the second to Last street. I was lost when we turned down the wrong street. Nothing the secretary said was around us as she described. Up and down the block and I could not find the vet’s office. I called them and asked if they would come out and see if they can see me. Two hours later, while Fremont is about to have a stroke in the heat, we found the parking lot. Believe it or not, the front door was behind a brick wall.
After all that, the doctor gave Fremont chewable pink tablets and a bowl of water.
“And that will be fifty dollars, please.”
Since we would need a vet, I worked out the details for setting up an account with the vet and the guide dog school.
It took us only half an hour to get back home. Fremont ate rice until I was sick of cooking it and he was tired of eating it. At least, I was sick and tired of him eating it, but he always ate like it was his last meal on earth and if he did not eat it in less than a heartbeat; it would disappear.