A Writer's Wife

Both Ginny and I are a trifle deaf; this makes for some interesting conversations.

The other night as she made a Christmas list of people to send cards or to buy for, I asked, “Are you listing individuals or couples”?

“Combining husbands and wives,” she said.

“Well, we know some folks who live together but are not married, as well as some homosexual couples, so your card could say—To You And Your Significant Other”.

“I hate that term, Significant Other. It sounds so cold”.

“Well,” I said, “You could address the card to Cohabiting Units”.

Ginny paused a moment with the eraser of her pencil tapping her teeth, then said, “I didn’t know we even knew any Eunuchs”.

See what I mean about interesting conversations?

Last Tuesday, my friend Wes treated me to breakfast at someplace that isn’t Dave’s. In the course of our conversation, he remarked, “John, your wife is the best thing that ever happened to you”.

I hardily agree.

Ginny did something particularly nice for me that very afternoon—she brought me a book, the latest Stephen King novel, Under The Dome.

Back in April or May, when Ginny first heard the new King novel was coming out, she reserved a copy to give me. At that time, my name was number 89 on the list. But Tuesday, when she heard my copy had arrived, she took off work at lunch to pick it up and bring it home to me.

She hardly ever reads Stephen King herself, but she knows my great admiration of his skill as a storyteller, writer, and craftsman, so she went to a lot of trouble to get this 1,074-page book for me. So far I’ve only read the first 484 pages, so I can’t say how the book will meet my expectations because I think Stephen King is…

But, this is not about him, but about her.

From the word GO! Ginny has supported me 100% as I’ve pursued my career as a writer for the past 35 years. We’ve especially set goals and planed to be able to do exactly what we are doing today. We are very deliberate persons.

I wrote my first magazine article because I suddenly lost a job I’d held for eight years. At the time I raised mosquitoes for test purposes for the local mosquito control board. As everyone knows, a man who knows how to grow mosquitoes can write his own ticket in the job market.

Well, not exactly.

I could not find work of any kind.

Our money ran out.

We faced starvation.

As we prayed about our own dire situation, we realized that other people might be in the same boat. So, I wrote an article about coping with unemployment as a Christian. Wrote it with a pencil in longhand on a yellow legal pad. Ginny typed it for me.

Problem was, I did not have money enough to buy stamps to mail it to a magazine.

Ginny believed in me.

When she was a little girl, Ginny had collected postage stamps.

She dug into the back of the closet and pulled out her old stamp album. She peeled out mint, uncanceled, stamps. We mailed my fledging first attempt at writing using 25-year-old stamps from her girlhood collection.

That article sold, but not for much. So I began writing articles about coping with poverty.

That’s how I got started.

And that’s a tiny part of what Ginny did to help me get started.

I know little about Stephen King’s career or his personal life other than what I read in press releases. I imagine that as America’s best-selling author, he is blessed with a fortune. I just pray the poor guy is also blessed with such a wife.