The Universe Speaks by Janie DeVos

                            

  

     

     Our so-called retirement home on the lake is nearly complete.  It’s been a long, drawn out process, but because of supply shortages and construction crews out sick, we’ve experienced countless delays, and, at times, set backs.  However, our contractor is wonderful, and she—yes, she—has gone above and beyond in the building of our home. 

Over the last two years, the house building process has been enough of a distraction to waylay my writing, which hasn’t been a bad thing necessarily.  On the contrary, it gave me a much-needed break.  When I was writing for my last publisher, I was under a five book in four years deal, and though I loved every minute of it, it was exhausting, and it also prevented me from doing other things I might have wanted to do.  For example, there was no time for taking a trip anywhere.  And lunches with girlfriends was done on a limited basis.  I missed my friends, I missed waking up someplace new and unexplored, and I missed enjoying other little things in life, but I remember my very wise and wonderful friend telling me when I’d gotten my first book contract that with everything you gain, you have to give up something, and for years that “something” was not having much down time.  With the final touches being put on the house, I don’t have that to distract me anymore, so it should be time to get back to work on my manuscript, Wednesdays at the Wabash Diner.  But now, a new little monkey wrench has been thrown into the whirring blades of my writing life; it’s a new little character, in a new place and time, that keeps annoyingly creeping into my mind and distracting me, once again, from moving forward with my more than half-written Wabash manuscript.  

I wrote about the genesis of this character in a blog about a year and a half ago after visiting a local cemetery to get ideas for names of characters, as well as any other inspiration from dates on headstones or from stories told to me about the families who are buried there by my friend who accompanied me.  She’s a local and she knows everyone, and I can’t help but wonder if she knows just about every family’s secrets in these parts, too.  As we’d walk by a headstone, she’d say, “Let me tell you about her…”  Or, “Now, that person there…” she’d start, pointing at another headstone.  

On one of those visits to the cemetery, I saw the grave of a woman named Dovey, and as soon as I saw that name, the image of a character emerged even though my friend didn’t know anything about this woman buried there.  A crystal-clear image of her, and the idea of her being a water diviner, wouldn’t leave me.  She sat at the forefront of my writer’s mind like a guest who had been invited for coffee but decided to remain for an indefinite stay.  I couldn’t shake her.  Not that I really wanted to anyway, however, my logical mind kept reminding me that I was in the middle of another manuscript, and considering how long it’d been since I put pen to paper on the Wabash story, I really, really didn’t need to allow myself to be distracted yet again.  However, Miss Dovey wouldn’t fly away.  As a matter of fact, it seemed as though the universe and Dovey were in cahoots together, for a couple of days after my visit to the cemetery, I was out shopping with my builder (Mary), in an enormous antique store in Asheville, for doodads for my house, when lo and behold, there, just sitting on a table waiting for me, was the most beautiful plaque of a girl cuddling—what else—a dove in the crook of her neck.  I stood there staring at it, thinking how pointedly the universe can send you a message when it chooses to, and the in-your-face kind, too.  Scooping the enormously heavy plaque up, I took it over to Mary, and, after I explained how serendipitous it was to have found it, she enthusiastically exclaimed that she would hang it above my little fireplace mantle in my office at the lake house, which she did, and beautifully so. 

Several weeks later, I unwrapped a Christmas gift from a dear friend, and there, nestled among the green and red sparkling tissue paper was a little statue of a cherub holding—what else—a dove.  My friend had no idea that I had been rolling this character around in my head for sometime.  Instead, it was another case of the universe nudging me with its elbow.  Finally, the universe gave me a swift kick in the patootie (as my father used to say), when several weeks after that, another friend gave me a birthday gift of a brooch with a dove carrying an olive branch.  I felt like shouting up to the heavens, "All right, already, I hear you!"

My office is nearly all set up now, and Miss Dovey will be staring over my shoulder when I finally sit down at the keyboard, and somehow, I think she’ll be demanding my attention.  I just hope both she and the universe will be courteous and patient enough to allow the characters in Wednesdays at the Wabash Diner to finish telling me their story first.