One Way To Write A Book

By Jim McMullen

Deep in the Florida Everglades, in the gentle embrace of this untamed world, I slowly crouched and ran my hands through the swamp grass water into the cool, soft, wet black peat, letting it ooze between my fingers, smelling its thick swamp scent.

I had been furiously tracking the endangered panther for more than three days. So far I had not found any evidence the big cat even existed. No tracks in the mud. No resting sites in high grass lines.

As I splashed water on my face baptismal-like, shivers went up my arms and across my chest. At times like that, I felt as though I became part of nature: the trees, mud sky, water, animals... everything! My soul seemed to be cut in a million different parts, all living and breathing in the same tempo of life. It was as real as the kiss of a single raindrop on a wild orchid.

Suddenly,

Something. . .

Something stirred in the cypress trees fifty yards away. I felt an animal presence...

Instantly, a patch of gray-brown fur appeared in the trees!

The animal seemed to float above the swamp floor moving swiftly and as stealthy as a... cat!

I breathe slowly, deeply, making every effort to hold sound in so as not to spook the animal. For over six months I had been tracking and preparing for this moment, a moment of true excitement, maybe my only opportunity to be rewarded a sighting of this untamed misunderstood creature.

Then, the fur disappeared! My heart stopped. No... I cried inside. No. Not now. Not after so long. As the last words rolled across my mind, the fur was there again. Then it melted into the shadows, reappeared, only to disappear once more. I still had not had a glimpse of the entire animal.

All movement stopped. It saw me, I thought.

At that second large paws sprang in a bolt of speed into the swamp trees. But I saw it... the whole cat! It was like no other animal I had ever seen! It was furred power, gray-brown on top, creamy white underneath, and at the end of it, a magnificent, long, J-shaped tail streaked in dawn light and swamp darkness like a retreating ghost.

However, as he ran the big cat reminded me of the soft, silent motion of a ocean wave rising from the depths, rolling and forming into a single wave, then lowering into the depths once again, only to swell once more.

As though immediately magnetized to the animal, I jumped up and ran through the grass, pivoting into the cypress trees, splashing into the swamp, in pursuit of a Florida panther. Fumbling with my camera, I tried to get it up to my eye, while bobbing and weaving through the density attempting to get him on film. Instead, I got tangled in the vines and tripped over fallen cypress trees. But I ran on. Most of the animals in the Everglades were quick, but this big cat was earthly sudden.

As instantly as the big cat appeared, he disappeared. My mind was burning with excitement as I fell to the mud exhausted. Lying there, gasping for air in a morning already hot and humid, I felt both elation and wonderment. I had tracked, found and had a true sighting of the endangered Florida panther in the Everglades.

In a very direct sense I had accomplished the impossible with a lived experience in the wilds that would affect my writing for years to come.

Your individual experiences in life, whatever they may be, can accomplish the same thing in your writing career. By drawing on your everyday happenings can well put you in a position of writing successfully. Even more important you can write for money because of your hands-on experiences.

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