“You only care about Art,” offered a grade two student at my school. “That’s what we all think.” Now returned to part-time teaching because the royalties of my one published novel pays out hobby money rather than indent upon household bills, I was on yard duty – the time when I trod tiredly at work, keeping close watch on my allotted area of the school. To my increasing pleasure, I usually have company to chat with– a little troupe of students from the nine (prep to grade two) classes I teach at my local State school.

“You only care about Art...” First taken aback by this student consensus about what makes me tick, I found myself flustering out, “Oh, I care about many things!” Then I became more thoughtful, remembering another time and place, when my very annoyed and then teenage daughter rapped out, “You care only about writing!” Of course, she was at that stage of life. Knowing her words reflected teenage angst and her surface frustrations with a far too often distracted mother, knew I’d just be wasting my breath to argue beyond a firm denial. My children know the buttons to push to get my attention; they also know there is nothing in my life more important than them.

Still, I hold close to my heart certain strong beliefs and I really shouldn’t feel surprised that their vibrations are picked up my own kids and students. There is a purpose to this life of ours. All of us are on a pilgrimage up the mountain, the quest to really know ourselves, discovering the things we must tap into for a complete life.

Via life’s choices, we sometimes stumble, getting lost along the way. We take trails away from the main road, dropping back on the lower tracks or become very stuck, for a time, on seemingly safe plateaus. But these detours, taken in the right ways, return us to the road only richer.

I knew I wanted to write by eight. At ten-years-old, I won my first poetry competition. After that, the road to call myself a writer became very rocky and almost impossible to see, with pitfalls at almost every step. By seventeen, I put aside my writing dream for “real life.” I met my husband not long afterwards, married him at eighteen and had our first child ten months later. But my writing dream never left me. Its lack of fulfilment blighted my happiness, leaving me open to true despair. It took the traumatic birth of my second son at twenty-two to awake and set me free from this dark half-life.

Recovering from my son’s birth, I soul-searched about life and about all the choices I made in my twenty-two years of life. I always wanted to be a wife and mother, but I also wanted to be a novelist. Growing up, very few adults believed in me or encouraged my desire to write. My English teacher, in my last year of High school, told me I would never write a novel. Her off-hand verdict hurt so deeply I left school and became a shop assistant, rather than even attempt finding my hoped for job as a journalist cadet. Before the judgement of this teacher, I thought becoming a journalist would step me closer to the career my heart so ached for.

To be fair to her, my writing at seventeen lacked a great deal – awful handwriting (that hasn’t changed!), dreadful grammar twinned to inability and desire to self-edit. It took my life’s various detours, marriage, children, and university to turn and hone my various attempts to write into real writing.

In blithe innocence, many years ago, I started writing my first novel by seizing hold of a poem that first ‘spoke’ to me in my teenage years. This poem gave me a voice of a long dead Tudor poet who told of his love for Anne Boleyn. The Greek chorus of a lifetime of doubters only added more fire to my belly to prove to myself that I could do it – and, by a lot of hard work, I did. Only holding my children for the first time compares better to the moment I knew Dear Heart, How Like You This? was finally finished.

I am writing my second novel no longer innocent – just laden with knowledge of the mountain climb I must conquer before this new novel is ready for publication. Excepting for those days when I let those dogs of doubt pull down my confidence, I’m old enough now to feel a sense of gratitude to all the people who said it wasn’t worth me trying to aim high or try to achieve my dreams. I hold the truth in my own hands; it’s up to me. I have to be willing to work hard at making my dreams come true. And life experience has taught me working hard to attain my dreams equals cause and effect – the agony and ecstasy of achievement – the realisation of true inner joy. Once you’ve found that in life it is so very difficult to lose; my well of joy just seems to keep on spilling over.

Because I know the reality of this joy I passionately want the same for all the young folk coming come under my radar. I want them to know to never let go of their dreams.

One of my most favourite sayings is, ‘Aim at the sun, and you may not reach it, but your arrow will fly far higher than if aimed at an object on a level with yourself.’ Believe me – I know it is not easy to pull yourself up from foothills or the safe plateaus of our very own and very personal mountain, but why deprive yourself of the higher view and the sense of accomplishment to see how far you’ve come in life?

Human beings all possess a creative force. Possessing myriad ways to live a life to completeness, this creative force is something we all must connect to and develop throughout their lives. Once we do, we start climbing to the apex.

In 2000, I coordinated and judged the very first Tudor England Ghost contest at my Tudor column at Suite101. The stories were all high quality and resulted in two of them gaining places: The Visitation by Fred Pachter won first place - a beautifully written piece about Barnaby Fitzpatrick, one of the dearest friends of Edward VI. I won't tell you who is the ghost in the story! The second place getter, The Maid's Tale, was also a great story, based on a true incident in the life of Dr. John Dee. I enjoyed reading all the entries so much I decided to do the contest every year. It even inspired me to write two short pieces of my own as part of my Tudor column: Let me tell you a true Tudor Ghost tale and Tell Me What You See.

The 2001 contest winner Alesha Polles wrote a story about the young Elizabeth and a meeting with her mother Anne Boleyn in Always One. Alesha Polles also won the contest in 2002 with As the Sun Sets, another story about Elizabeth, when the contest was judged by author Cindy Vallar. The winner of the 2000 contest came in second with a wonderful Tudor ghost poem, The Ghost of Edmund Dudley.

2003 saw the stories judged by another award winning author, Sandra Worth. Again, the contest received great stories from all over the Globe, which resulted in Frozen Ghost by Sabine Naus taking the prize that year, with An Afterlife at Hampton Court by Heather Gustavsson coming in second!

In 2004, the very generous Elizabeth Chadwick, an author described by Historical Novel Society as "the best writer of medieval fiction currently around," judged the Tudor England contest. She awarded first place to: Past Design by Joann Bolner-Thomas, second place to: The Ice Ghost of Willoughby Lake by Julie Atwood and third place to: It isn't fair! I won't be king! by David Morrow.

A Question of When: won the 2005 Tudor Ghost Story Contest - judged this year by Christopher Willis (C.W.) Gortner, author of The Secret Lion, described by Historical Novel Society as "capturing the very essence of Tudor glamour and depravity. Honourable mentions also went to S.K. Naus' Out of the Fog and Alesha Polles' A Message from God.

Now - with my Suite101 site no more, Lara E. Eakins has kindly agreed to help keep this great contest running. This year we are doing it a little differently - there will be a five-dollar ($US) entry fee for stories via the donation button on this page. Publication will be at Lara's very respected Tudor England site and with a possibility of a Historical fiction magazine. Watch this space for more information.

This year's judge will be Anne Easter Smith, author of Rose for a Crown.

Please free to contact me (Wendy J Dunn at wjeandunn@yahoo.com) for further information.

I am replying to Jennifer’s question here because I just cannot work out how to reply to comments via myspace... no doubt it is something very, very simple but simplicity has never been a particular trademark of mine! I always do things the hard way, usually proves more fun and interesting way to get through life, but the deciding factor was when I found the myspace blog deleted all my apostrophes and other stuff on posting - I do not like!

Jennifer (and how lovely it was to find you at myspace!) asked how my new novel is going. Jennifer knows I have been writing the new novel (actually a series) for some time now. Sigh, I for one would really, really like to jump and down with glee and say book one is finally finished...bigger sigh, not yet... But I am getting there. The whole narrative is almost all in place now and I believe the gelling of fiction and history is working well. It is also nice to know there is a lot of drafting already in place for the following books. The unpublished manuscript, at one-third its present length, gained a prestigious short-listing, so the writing must be going in the right direction. But I really want to achieve so much with this project. I have booked a week in June at a writers' retreat, the last week of my second term break; I am hoping a week without my usual life distractions will finally make that happen.

Writing about the childhood of Catalina of Aragon has been both an ecstasy and an agony. I have gone out my comfort zone of Tudor History and into a brand new area of research. I have brought so many books that it is really no wonder I need to work at a second job. I know my husband is not pleased with my increasing library, despite my constant reassurance that selling my books will pay for my funeral. I so yearn to go to Spain before I even hand this book to a publisher but, alas, that won't happen until my writing pays for it. Nevertheless, with returning to my old teaching job, I have now discovered a crock-pot is a great helper in getting my family fed at night. Dear Jennifer - I promise you faithfully here, in the public view of all, that this new novel will be "dunn"...Talking of which, I better get back to it!

Peace!
Wendy

Joys of writing...there are days so magical I forget I am typing; I’m just “there,” experiencing with my characters what they experience. That is the connection I always seek for in my writing – without it, I doubt I could connect the reader to the stories I want to write.

I've pondered about this connection a lot in my writing life. I often felt channelled by Sir Tom Wyatt during the writing of Dear Heart, How like You This? This sense of channelling is also happening with my new work...not long ago, I found myself with my character at The Alhambra (I wish!), dappled by the flutter of countless, white butterflies. Why on earth white butterflies and so many white butterflies, I wondered? I knew nothing about the butterflies of Spain. Forcing myself to stop for a few minutes of Internet research, I discover that The Alhambra is famous for its butterflies - and lots of white butterflies amongst them. Writers get rather used to these moments of serendipity.

Other writing days I really need to force myself to stay with it, struggling with self-doubt, wondering whether I am right to continue on this particular life journey of mine. Staying true to my aspirations has never been easy – not only for myself but those important people of my life. Emerging from the first finished draft of my first novel I became very aware that I achieved it through becoming rather obsessive and selfish. It left me cold. My family is the foundation of my life; they should never ever question whether they come second to my need to write. I promised myself I would be careful to never let this happen again.

I have tried hard to keep this promise. But it is hard. Both family and novel writing demand and deserve 100% from you. In recent years, I attempted to keep my writing time pinned down to the times when my gang are busily engaged at work or school – and leave myself available for them when they are at home. That might help explain why my work in progress is taking such a long time to finish.

Life is not meant to be easy, and my family still complains I’m on the computer too much. But my job as a teacher calls for it, as well as the other bits and pieces of my life. I do think my family can take the yet unfinished manuscript and my recent return to paid teaching, that “real job” they’re wanted me to go back to for the last few years, as evidence that they do come first in my heart and mind.

Getting a novel to a level worth publishing is rather like a pregnancy. Bring a novel into the world too early only gambles with its survival. Sometimes I wonder writers possess any power on that elusive “finish” date. A novel is born when it is ready to born.

Modern life comes at the cost of days and sometimes weeks seemingly disappearing with a blink of an eye. All our lives are so busy, and I sit here tonight pondering the five days remaining for me to get a decent amount of writing finished before another school term begins.

Six weeks back at teaching saw the first novel of my trilogy move forward just 1000 words. Not surprisingly, I began my break worried about the lost of the momentum and felt very relieved when the writing started flowing again...all right, not as much as I hoped (there’s my nine-year-old to think about too), but enough for me to feel confident that this year will see book one finally a completed manuscript.

My actual goal is to make this happen during the term coming. This is a report writing term and I’m still striving for a good balance of work, family and writing, but working as a teacher has now allowed me to book a week at Varuna, the Writers House for the last week of the second term break. My plan is to take the manuscript of book one and work to push it through to something I’d be happy to see published. Varuna is the carrot before my gaze to ensure I keep all my balls of family, work and writing in the air.

The other night I had one of those writing light bulb moments, when I suddenly thought of ending the first part of the trilogy at the point storms damage the fleet taking Catalina to England, forcing a return to Spain for repairs. That's about 90,000 of writing; when I finish weaving some hanging threads it should give me a book of at least 100,000. I am chewing my finger over what to do. It means I'd need to stretch out the canvas from the time of Catalina's arrival in England to Arthur's death, but I don't think that would be a bad thing...lots more room to move and a opportunity to develop stronger threads for the narrative.

And, yes, I really need to restart my exercise regime alongside a far better writing output too...Sigh, exercise is something I avoid like the plague, but I’ve worked hard to lose 11 kilos and I really like to see the weight loss continue. My weight has remained the same for weeks – so it’s time to start pushing myself again. I often cringe at my daughter's cry, “You’ve just got to make the time for exercise!” Although I really do enjoy my gloaming walks, I’d so rather be home writing... if I’m actually writing, that is...

I survived! Well – all right – weeks back at my old school, at my old job as a Primary Visual Arts Educator isn’t really pushing the limits of survival (and the Commonwealth Games gave Victoria a short term for me to settle back into paid teaching!), but there’s been so many changes for Victorian government teachers during the almost ten years I've spent pursuing my writing dream.

I am still pursuing my dream and getting closer to the completed manuscript of my new work, the first novel of a planned trilogy about Katherine of Aragon, but family priorities must be considered first here. Ten years as a mostly singled income family has left our mortgage at a standstill – and it is time to either change that or think about moving elsewhere.

I really, really love where I live – so back to school I go.

I remember when my husband told me he wanted to move our family here. "M_______?" I asked, and I looked out my kitchen window. The closeness of the fence separating our inner city home from our neighbour’s hedged me in. Daily, I grieved for the absence of trees and the morning chorus of birds. Suddenly, my husband’s suggestion filled me with a yearning to return to a place closer ‘home;’ to a place I remembered from my younger years. A place that nourished my spirit, gave me ‘space’ to breathe, think, and create.

I grew up less than one hour away from M________. I took for granted trees, as it journeyed kilometres to my parent’s property, in my morning walks I saw deep valleys turned into pale oceans of dawn-kissed mists, treading upon dirt tracks marked by the signs of wildlife; in summer, the earth showed passage of a slithering snake at my feet.

Going to High School, I travelled down Heidelberg-Kinglake Road- the twisting, stomach-turning and sometimes dangerous road transporting ‘Kinglake kids’ part of the lengthy journey to the now defunct Hurstbridge High. With wildlife abounding in my growing-up years, I took for granted the morning sight of kangaroos bounding in bushland cut through by the road conveying us to school. Mobs of kangaroos even grazed on the lush, green grass of the school’s oval.

For me, Hurstbridge High was just the perfect High school. I came out of it filled with lofty ambitions of the novels and paintings I would one day create. Hurstbridge High introduced me to Eltham friends and soon to greater intimacy with Eltham itself. Many of these friends were the offspring of people pursuing creative pursuits, as were many of our teachers- some of my friends were even part of artist colonies. Then, as now, M_______ seemed part of the Eltham’s environs; I remember school friends describing M________ as Eltham’s little sister.

Flooded with these memories of earlier days, my husband easily persuaded me to put our city house on the market. We became residents of M________ and I found myself returned to a greater sense of belonging, my feet set more firmly on the road to realising some of my teenage dreams. I only have to walk outside and I am in a leafy neighbourhood nourishing and inspiring my creativity, my spirit.

Seven years after moving to M________, my first novel became published. The longer I live here, the more entrenched I’ve become in my writing journey, my true art, and a well of joy overflows to every particle of my being. With my home abutting a small, heavily treed reserve, I again awake to the songs of birds.