Stories from the Writing Journey
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Reminder of Threads of Life
by Joanie Schirm on January 16, 2014 PermalinkSo the world continues to show how small it is…and the never ending threads of life from the story of my father’s life continue… Today I got a sweet email from Czech cousin Ondrej “Ondra” Matejka. To those of you who have read Adventurers Against Their Will, Ondra is a great-grandson of my father’s Aunt
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Things that are tough are what you remember.
by Joanie Schirm on January 8, 2014 PermalinkThings that are tough are what you remember. I was brought up on the view that if you wait patiently until the end of the story, the good people will live happily ever after. As a 1960’s child, “Treat others with respect and make the world better wherever you go” paraphrases the example
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A Piece of Great Advice To Start the New Year
by Joanie Schirm on January 2, 2014 PermalinkA Piece of Great Advice to Start the New Year Six years ago when I sold my engineering firm to begin my life as a full-time writer, I got some great advice from my friend Dr. Sandy Shugart. Known in Central Florida for his leadership of extraordinary accomplishments among the nation’s 1200 colleges, as President
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Walt Disney’s Birthday – Thanks Walt for Inspiring us to Dream
by Joanie Schirm on December 5, 2013 PermalinkIf there is one person I can think of who best represents making dreams come true, it is Walt Disney. While I grew up in Florida, Walt was my inspiration for achieving big goals in life through dreaming and doing. As an adult, the most pride I’ve felt while receiving an award was when I
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International Day of Tolerance – Be Remembered for What YOU do Next
by Joanie Schirm on November 16, 2013 PermalinkToday is the International Day of Tolerance. Seventy four years ago at this very moment, my young Czech father was on the wrong side of desperate as he encountered the greatest intolerance the world has ever seen. Hitler and his henchmen were making their hate known toward a wide array of people they deemed “undesirables”:
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Honoring the Continuing March Toward World Peace
by Joanie Schirm on November 11, 2013 PermalinkNovember 11 – yesterday marked the 95th anniversary of the signing of the armistice ending World War I. You remember the much repeated phrase “The war to end all wars”? It originated from British author and social commentator H.G. Wells’ book titled “The War That Will End War.” Later, the words were used by U.S.
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“The life, my dear friend, is the art of meeting people.”
by Joanie Schirm on October 22, 2013 Permalink“The life, my dear friend, is the art of meeting people.” A wonderful event just occurred. Czech words from seventy years ago were read aloud in my writing room. It happened because I read a fortuitous article in the Orlando Sentinel newspaper reporting that the Rotary Club in our College Park neighborhood was
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From the Floor of British Parliament, Echoes from the Past
by Joanie Schirm on August 31, 2013 PermalinkAs the crisis in Syria boils and the clear path is made to the Bashar al-Assad regime being responsible for chemical weapons dispensed on innocent citizens (including some 400 children) I think of days past and wonder what the lessons are we should have learned. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=217296289 How bad does something have to unfold for humanity