Kneed I Suffer or Laugh: Guest Post by Mike Befeler

MIKE BEFELER: Kneed I Suffer or Laugh

By way of background, I had my third surgery on my knee due to an infection. While in the hospital and first week at home, I was depressed about the whole situation since I needed to be on IV antibiotics and use a walker. Then I reread Victor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning. I highly recommend this book. Frankl was in a concentration camp in Europe during WWII. He discovered that although the Nazi’s controlled his existence, when he ate, when he slept, whether he lived or died, the one thing they couldn’t control was his attitude. Even in that horrible situation Frankl learned that he was master of his own attitude.

This helps me to put my situation in perspective, and I realize gratitude for a family assisting me, good medical treatment. I can choose to suffer or laugh about the small absurdities of my life.

Here are some observations:

I drop things, and one night I dreamt that I was playing volleyball and went to hit the ball . . . and actually knocked things off my nightstand.

My memory also drops things from time to time. I was thinking of the play Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat but couldn’t remember the name Joseph. In the middle of the night, I woke up with the name Joseph.

I continue to have my ups and down but have learned to pace myself by doing an activity, then rest, then another activity and another rest.

One thing that improves my attitude is talking to friends on the phone. This gives me an opportunity to think about someone else and experience a few laughs together. I also look forward to a weekly phone call with a good friend who understands human nature and is very wise.

Our six-year-old grandson comes to our house two to three times week after school. His smile and hugs give me joy. After having a snack and doing homework with my wife, my grandson and I play games (he loves Monopoly).

I take naps, some planned and some not. We get the Los Angeles Times as a newspaper, and I enjoy lying in bed and reading it. I did doze off one time half way through the comics.

In spite of all the problems, there are little gifts that appear. Our neighbor is a head nurse for the section of the hospital I was assigned to. I had a single room with a good view and excellent assistance from the nursing staff.

When I bend my knee, it squeaks like a door needing WD40.

As I have become more mobile, my wife and I have been going to the food store. Since I’m more interested in food now, this is an enjoyable experience as I pick out things to eat that I have been craving.

New forms of entertainment: I spend some time trying to find things. One recent example: I couldn’t find the eye drop bottle I keep on my nightstand. I figured I had knocked it off when waving my arm. I looked all around the nightstand, in the drawers, under the bed. Nope, it had vanished. A little later, I had a thought. I have a beach bag on the side of my walker to keep stuff in. I looked in the outer pocket. Nothing. Then I looked into the main part of the bag, and, lo and behold, there was the little bugger. Apparently, I did knock it off the nightstand and somehow it hit the small opening in the bag. My own March madness. I’ve seen my attitude shift when I forget something or drop something. I used to get mad because it took extra effort to correct. Now, I’m more accepting of these incidents. After one recent event, I chuckled and said to myself, “Here I go again.”

After returning home from the hospital, I would wake up and think, “Oh groan. Another day to deal with my stupid knee.” Lately, I’ve awakened and considered what I would be doing during the day and what I have to look forward to.

Rather than complaining about my limitations as I did earlier, I am more often now recognizing my limitations and accepting them.

Small Victories: I finally am able to go to sleep without taking my pain medication. I also have developed routines that keep me off my feet as much as possible so I don’t overdo. I now have more energy to do things such as fix dinner, which takes stress off my wife who suffers from arthritis. Given that my left knee is the bad one, I can now drive again.

The Bottom Line: I will have to go through a fourth surgery in July. Although this thought depresses me, I’m thankful that I’ve been able to control my attitude in a more positive way. I have a daily schedule that includes the early activity of breakfast, cleaning up, doing my physical therapy stretches, brushing my teeth, shaving, taking my IV medication and checking email. Then I rest and read. In the middle of the day, I eat lunch, clean up and take the IV medication. Then I rest, read and nap. At the end of the day, I fix and eat dinner, clean up and take my IV medication. Then I relax, sometimes watching TV before retiring for an early bedtime. My attitude is shifting from “oh, no, not another day with this stupid knee” to “what am I going to learn and achieve today?” I’ve always been an active person, but now realize I don’t have to be busy every moment. Now I’m more mellow, balancing the activity with rest. Finally, what has also helped me is writing about my situation, I keep a notebook with me and jot down observations during the day and sometimes when I wake up in the middle of the night.

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Mike Befeler is author of 16 novels, a biography of a WWII veteran, and a novella about a young boy's life transforming experience at the beginning of the pandemic. Most of his novels feature older characters and are affectionately referred to as "Geezer-lit mysteries."
 www.mikebefeler.com

BEHIND THE SCENE: Writing a Personal Organizer Mystery: Guest post by Mike Befeler

MIKE BEFELER:
BEHIND THE SCENE: Writing a Personal Organizer Mystery

The saying is “write what you know.” This is good for a beginning writer. But it’s also important to “write what you don’t know.” This is called learning.

Mystery writer Elaine Viets took jobs so she could learn the occupations for writing a mystery series.

There’s a debate, and some authors have been criticized for writing characters that are of different races than they are.

So can we write about people in jobs we have not held or other races or different genders?

Here’s my experience:

Most of my protagonists have been men, but in my latest mystery, Unstuff Your Stuff, it’s a sixty-eight-year-old woman. I’ve been sixty-eight, but I’ve never been a woman, so how can I write about one? By listening, observing and putting myself in her position. I’ve also benefited from the feedback from my wife and women critique group partners .

Three of my mystery novels are set in Hawaii and have some Asian characters. I’m not Asian, but I grew up in Hawaii and have many Asian friends from high school days.

I have a historical mystery set in 1919. I’ve never lived in 1919, but I learned a great deal about 1919. How? Research: Studying the time period and reading microfilm copies of newspapers from that era.

I have a scene in one book from 1895 New York. Again, the secret is research.

I have a book set on an Alaskan cruise. I had to take an Alaskan cruise with my wife and daughter for research.

I’ve never been in law enforcement, yet I write about police. How can I do this? Research: I attended three Citizens’ police academies and participated as a volunteer role player to help train police officers. A hostage scene in Unstuff Your Stuff is loosely based on my role playing a hostage for SWAT training. In addition to a hostage, I’ve played roles involving illegal camping, traffic violations, drunk and disorderly, spousal abuse, assault, victim of an active shooter in a high school and hostage taker.

I’ve never murdered anyone, yet I write mysteries that have the villain being a murderer.

Regarding my latest mystery novel, Unstuff Your Stuff, that features a professional organizer, here’s my disclosure: I’ve never been a professional organizer – I’m a professional disorganizer, but my wife has been squaring me away. Here’s a typical conversation:

My wife: Throw away that threadbare shirt.

Me: It’s just getting comfortable.

My wife: You have plenty of other shirts but look at it.

Me: You can almost make out the LA Ram’s logo.

My wife: But the holes.

Me: They’re only half an inch in diameter, and there are only three of them.

My wife: It goes!

So what gives me the ability to write a professional organizer mystery? Answer again: research. At the time, I belonged to an organization of people providing services to seniors. I met several professional organizers who were kind enough to let me tag along on some of their gigs. One example that I loosely included in Unstuff Your Stuff was an estate that included an extensive doll collection. When I say extensive I mean that every surface in a multi-bedroom house was covered with dolls. The estate agent estimated that the owner had spent over two hundred thousand dollars on dolls, but the estate would be lucky to recoup ten cents on the dollar.

In Unstuff Your Stuff, my protagonist has a mantra: GRR—group, reduce, reorganize. This is the philosophy I’ve learned from my wife and professional organizers.

The litmus test of needing a professional organizer is when someone, says, “I know it’s good for nothing, but I’m keeping it until it’s good for something.”

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Mike Befeler is author of fifteen books including six books in the Paul Jacobson Geezer-lit Mystery Series and recent books The Tesla Legacy, Death of a Scam Artist and Unstuff Your Stuff. On most days he can be seen taking his three-year-old grandson to the park or library. He resides in Lakewood, CA, with his wife Wendy. http://www.mikebefeler.com
 

Publishing a Backlist: Guest Post by Mike Befeler

In the May, 2008, issue of the AARP Bulletin Mike Befeler was identified as one of four authors in a new emerging mystery sub-genre, geezer-lit!.Mike turned his attention to fiction writing after a career in high technology marketing. Mike's published books include six book in the Paul Jacobson Geezer-lit Mystery Series and a stand-alone. Today Mike shares his experiences on publishing a Backlist.

Mike Befeler:
Publishing a Backlist 

The publishing industry constantly changes, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. We authors always face the consequences of publishers consolidating or eliminating parts of their publishing businesses. Six books in my Paul Jacobson Geezer-lit Mystery Series and a standalone theater mystery were originally published by Five Star (a part of Gale/Cengage Learning). Unfortunately, Five Star decided to exit the mystery publishing business. The good news is they reverted the rights for these books to me.

Since I wanted to keep these books in print, I contracted with another publisher, Encircle Publications, to release these as trade paperbacks. The original books were in hardcover, so the new editions are approximately half the price. This is a win-win for readers and me, as I can continue to offer these books in print and readers can get them at a more reasonable price.

For those of you not familiar with my Paul Jacobson Geezer-lit Mystery Series, here is a summary. Paul Jacobson, the protagonist, is in his mid-eighties and suffers from short-term memory loss. Although Paul can’t remember the day before, he becomes an amateur sleuth and even has a romance with a young chick in her seventies.

In book one, Retirement Homes Are Murder (ISBN 978-1893035-85-0), Paul lives in a retirement community in Hawaii and finds a dead body in a trash chute.

In book two, Living with Your Kids Is Murder (ISBN 978-1893035-86-6), Paul flies to Colorado to stay with his son, daughter-in-law and granddaughter, and his seatmate on the airplane dies suspiciously.

In book three, Senior Moments Are Murder (ISBN 978-1893035-37-9), Paul moves to Venice Beach, California, and discovers a dead body in a canal.

In book four, Cruising in Your Eighties Is Murder (ISBN 978-1893035-87-4), Paul takes an Alaskan cruise. He gets a massage but becomes implicated in murder when the massage therapist turns up dead.

In book five, Care Homes Are Murder (ISBN 978-1893035-88-1, Paul returns to Hawaii for a Christmas vacation with his family and once again happens upon a murder victim.

In book six, Nursing Homes Are Murder (ISBN 978-1893035-89-8), Paul moves into a nursing home to help the Honolulu police solve a case of sexual assault.

In Murder She Wrote, Jessica Fletcher seems to find more dead bodies in the small town of Cabot Cove than there are people living there. Since Paul is also a dead body magnet (the Jessica Fletcher syndrome), I move him to different locations so he doesn’t decimate the population in any one place.

Paul resorts to keeping a journal as a memory aid, and his twelve-year-old granddaughter, Jennifer, helps him solve several of the murders in the series. They also tell each other politically incorrect geezer jokes much to the consternation of Jennifer’s mother. Here’s an example of this sophisticated form of humor: Why didn’t the geezer cross the road? Because he was no spring chicken.

I enjoy writing humorous mystery novels. Two of the books in this series (Living with Your Kids Is Murder and Cruising in Your Eighties Is Murder) have been finalists for The Lefty Award for best humorous mystery at The Left Coast Crime Conference.

The standalone book, Mystery of the Dinner Playhouse (ISBN 978-1893035-90-4), introduces Gabe Tremont, a recently retired police detective who attends a performance at a mystery dinner playhouse where a real murder takes place.

I am delighted to keep these books in print, and I hope you readers will have a chance to sample them.

Left Coast Crime New Authors Breakfast: Mike Befeler

Gigi Pandian & Mike Befeler

Left Coast Crime is right around the corner, and I hope you're planning to attend. This great convention will be held in Portland this year, March 12-15, 2015. One of my favorite events at LCC is the New Authors Breakfast. It's free to all attendees, and it's a great time to learn about new authors! I asked Mike Befeler, the organizer of this special event, to do a guest post! Hope to see you there! Register for LCC here.

Mike Befeler is the Author of MYSTERY OF THE DINNER PLAYHOUSE, NURSING HOMES ARE MURDER, CARE HOMES ARE MURDER, CRUISING IN YOUR EIGHTIES IS MURDER (Lefty Award Finalist for best humorous mystery of 2012), SENIOR MOMENTS ARE MURDER, LIVING WITH YOUR KIDS IS MURDER (Lefty Award Finalist for best humorous mystery of 2009), RETIREMENT HOMES ARE MURDER, THE BACK WING AND THE V V AGENCY.

Mike Befeler:

Meet the New Authors Breakfast at the Left Coast Crime (LCC) Conference

One of the favorite events at the Left Coast Crime Conference is the Meet the New Authors Breakfast. Since this breakfast event started in 2008, there have been between twelve and forty-four new authors introduced to readers each year. The format is simple. Each new author has one minute to tell the most important thing that fans should know about his or her debut mystery/crime/suspense/thriller novel. I have been privileged to moderate this event every year except in 2014 when I was unable to attend the conference and Donnell Ann Bell graciously took my place.

The event started because I was a new author at the 2007 Left Coast Crime Conference in Seattle, and I found no events for debut authors. Since I was on the committee for the 2008 Left Coast Crime Conference in Denver, I volunteered to put an event together, and this breakfast program is what resulted. Subsequent LCC committees have decided to keep the tradition going.

We had confusion the first year because we called it the New Authors Breakfast, and some people thought it was only open for new authors to come to breakfast. Once we changed the name to the Meet the New Authors Breakfast, this cleared up some of the confusion, although I still get questions about who can attend. The answer: this event is open to all LCC attendees to have breakfast and listen to the presenters. The presenters are authors with a first published crime novel from the year before up through the date of the conference.

Some of the award-nominated, award-winning and bestselling authors who have been introduced at this event over its seven year history include J. T. Ellison, Michelle Gagnon, Beth Groundwater, Rosemary Harris, C. J. Lyons, Rebecca Cantrell, Sophie Littlefield, G. M. Malliet, Kelli Stanley, Jeri Westerson, Stephen Jay Schwartz, Darrell James, Rochelle Staab, Chuck Greaves and Terry Shames.

What I particularly enjoy about this event is having the opportunity to introduce new authors and then watch as their careers unfold.

I invite everyone to attend the Left Coast Crime Conference in Portland, March 12-15, 2015, and join the Meet the New Authors Breakfast from 7 until 8:30 on Friday morning. Rochelle Staab will be joining me as the official timer and does an excellent job of holding people to the one minute allotted for each presentation. So far we have a list of twenty-eight outstanding new authors, and I expect the list to expand by the time of the conference. I always provide a summary sheet of the new authors so that readers can make notes and take this with them as a reading list.

Enjoy!


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Are you a new author coming to LCC? Be sure and contact the organizers and sign up for the New Author Breakfast.