When the butterflies come (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780998232126)

I'm reclusive by choice. I live near the edge of a wilderness area and my best friends are the forest animals. I love watching them go about their lives. I like to disappear into the wild for several days or a week at a time to get my best ideas and do my thinking. I have one house pet, a big tabby cat named Bud. My interests are varied. I'm fascinated by peoples' varied personalities and forever curious about how different people came to behave the way they do and think the way they do. I like to write about things where I believe I can tell a story that sheds a fresh perspective on a possibly misplaced common perception, or when I can perceive something about the future that, for reasons I do not fully understand myself, I can develop a story around and use that story to project what will happen. I try to feel what my characters feel in my stories. In fact, sometimes I cry when I write about sad things, and sometimes I cry happy cries when I write about things that relieve a character from stresses or something bad. I also feel a terrible sadness for my bad boy and bad girl characters because they can't help themselves from being bad. When my characters fall in love, I try to put into their minds the same feelings I think I would have if I were them. In the evenings I like to write my first drafts in pencil by an oil lamp. There's something special about thought processes that take place when I'm alone with my lamp, my pencil, the wonderful silence and Bud. He loves to walk on my draft paper or lie down and stretch himself out on it. That's his goofy way of telling me he needs my attention. Then I hold him close to me like he's a little baby and give him gentle hug rubs until he purrs. That's how I know he's happy and feeling healthy. He has a great purr. He goes "purr, purr, purr, purr purr. " The rubs help him slip into another world, cat dream world I guess. My place gets a little untidy when I'm immersed in writing but it's always clean, except for when Bud leaves a fur ball someplace. He can't help himself when he does that. He's a cat!