That S-15 is still in the driveway. The back hasn’t quite healed right. No new relationships, though I did inherit a cute little puppy from the last one. And today, I spent 5 hours (actually 3 and a half, I took a siesta around noon) mowing what felt like a never-ending yard with a push-mower that’s older than me.

Lawn care has never been my thing, mainly because from the time I was told enough to walk, I was told I couldn’t do it right. Growing up, there were lots of times I’d hidden in the bathroom, pretending to be sick when really I was crying because of whatever I’d been yelled at for doing wrong–seriously, it’s lawn care, not rocket science.

Still, I haven’t mowed a yard in years. After surgery, I was told never to climb on a riding lawnmower because the vibrations would be the quickest way to have a follow-up surgery. Like, for the rest of my life, pay some neighbor kid to do it.

I don’t know what possessed me to push-mow today. The grass wasn’t that high but there were clusters of weeds that needed to be knocked down. I’d say I probably did a little under five acres–not your average postage stamp yard. And it felt really good to do it.

Mowing the yard wasn’t my plan at all. I’d planned on joining a gym today. But stepping out and seeing the weeds and knowing that the lawn had just been mowed six days ago made me sad. I thought I’d just touch up here and there, but once I fired that old lawnmower of dad’s up, touch-ups weren’t an option.

This lawnmower is ancient. Set it on level pavement and only three of the four wheels touch the ground. The deck’s so beat up it’s got weld spots and bondo from decades of repairs. Still, it fires up on the first tug and never backfires, it just runs smooth and strong.

I ran the throttle to wide-open, just like anyone would do with a push-mower, and I started to work. After a little while, my dad came over to see what on earth I was doing. He didn’t say anything, I expected some lecture about how I wasn’t putting an even distribution of force across the handles or how the blades on the push mower were an eight of an inch higher than the riding mower and he’d have to do it all over again. But I didn’t get any of that. Instead, when the lawnmower ran out of gas–which didn’t take long–he just lugged out a gas can and filled it. He said, “This old lawnmower doesn’t need to be run at full throttle,” and he turned it back to half throttle and told me to crank it. I did.

See, this old lawnmower cut just as much grass at half-throttle as it did at full. Full throttle didn’t give it any advantage and just made the engine run harder and drink gas faster. At half throttle, it wasn’t as loud and it didn’t sent so many vibrations through the handlebars, the engine didn’t get nearly as hot and we got a lot more laps in before the gas tank ran dry.

And so, that old lawnmower and I walked around the yard together. Every now and then we’d hit a patch of thick grass and it would grown, but it would cut through and keep going. Half throttle.

I’m starting to think maybe I should live my life the same way. Half throttle. I might get just as much done and not have to work so hard.

If you’re not already familiar with ENT, be sure to like them on Facebook and follow them on Twitter for great daily free and bargain book recommendations.

What happened yesterday was a nice reminder of how many people in this country still adhere to traditional conservative values. The problem is, those people apparently don’t vote, because there is no conservative candidate in the upcoming election. They don’t engage culture, either–because they’re not represented in the mainstream media, they’re not represented in Hollywood, they’re not represented in academia, and they’re not represented on Wall Street.

Yesterday, America’s mainstream conservative base proved they are the nation’s largest and possibly most influential consumer group, but little else.And as happy as I am for Chick-Fil-A’s newly-filled coffers  and Mike Huckabee’s new-found cultural influence, and as much as I wish I could have taken party in what happened yesterday without driving an hour to wait in line two hours for my food, I’m terribly sad that the biggest cultural ripple America’s mainstream conservatives have made in quite some time has been to go out and buy mor’ chickin.

Yesterday was not about forcing a political agenda or imposing a specific set of beliefs on those who don’t share those beliefs. It was the rumblings of a sleeping giant, a group of people who have long felt disenfranchised and ignored, belittled and neglected. They’re tired of being lied to, tired of having their words twisted and their beliefs ridiculed. And yet, for all the hate and rage that has been attributed to them by those who don’t share their conservative beliefs, the biggest act of rebellion that America’s mainstream conservative base has orchestrated in recent years has been to swarm Chick-Fil-A en masse.

Oh the humanity.

For those who just don’t get it, let me make this as simple as I can. Conservatives just want to be left the hell alone.

Despite popular misconceptions to the contrary, conservatives don’t want to be told what to think, how to act, and what to believe. Conservatives can think for themselves just fine, thank you. The thing is, they tend to think alike, and when somebody stands up and speaks for conservative values with common sense and respects the conservative ideology without talking down to America’s conservative base or preaching like an insane zealot, the conservative base moves. Big things can happen–huge things, like Chick-Fil-A appreciation day.

Was Mike Huckabee the sole force responsible for Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day? Absolutely not.  It was political activists in positions of high office whose saber-rattling struck a nerve with the people. They became so offended that politicians would have the audacity to prevent companies from doing business based on the personal beliefs of the company’s owners that they stood in lines for hours to buy fast food. Think about that for a minute.

Who is really more hateful and intolerant in this picture? The politicians who politicized a man’s personal convictions without respect for his religious beliefs, or the men and women who stood in line to buy chicken sandwiches because they wanted to support a business whose values, they felt, were in line with their own?

Will this uprising translate to election day? It’s doubtful. That’s the saddest part about this. The people who swarmed Chick-Fil-A because they felt like they needed to do something are the very people who have walked away from political parties that have abandoned them, lied to them, and used them as scapegoats to advance agendas nobody wants.  These people don’t take to the streets to protest, they don’t hang effigies or form crowds around business entrances so people can’t go in and do business. They don’t try to harm anyone–they aren’t the people picketing funerals, or bull-horning at public gatherings, or trying to disrupt the life of anyone else in any way.

It was mainline, conservative Americans who swarmed Chick-Fil-A yesterday. And they did it to make a point.

If you watch cable news, you’d think everyone in America was either a communist or a fascist, that there were no more choices and we’ve all been forced to pick a side and fight. That’s not the truth at all. The views of mainstream America are not represented by shouting maniacs who claim some moral imperative even though their actions defy the tenets of the religions they supposedly espouse.

Yesterday, America’s silent majority made itself known, but it’s the silent majority for a reason. No one speaks for them, no one champions their cause. They are Americans, they live and work in small towns, they struggle to make it week to week, they adjust to whatever challenges are thrown at them, and they survive.

This is not a people who hate. This is a people who just want to be left alone.

This is a people whose voice is rarely heard.

The irony of all this is, if those same people put as much effort into voting for politicians who actually represent their beliefs as they put into buying chicken sandwiches yesterday, this country would probably be much less divided and the people who feel oppressed by the extreme political activism on both sides of the isle would probably feel as though they have the freedom to live their lives they way they want without having to fight all the time. After all, people who just want to be left the hell alone don’t usually tell anyone else how to live their lives either.

Tonya is giving away TWO copies of A Charming Crime and a copy of Tricked Out Toolbox to some very lucky readers! Email tkgiveaway@williamgjones.com with the subject line TK Giveaway and put your choice of book in the body of the email. Winners will be drawn at random later today!

You can buy A Charming Crime at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

If you missed it, check out part 1 of this interview here.

You have the most amazing home office—what’s the story behind it?

Hahhaa! My entire house is feng shui, and my office is the same. I have a clear vision, and my amazing husband brought it to life. I’m one lucky gal.

Mac or PC?

PC

Well, that’s unfortunate. Though, to be fair, I bought my first Mac the week Vista came out and I haven’t worked on a PC since, so maybe my memories of how horrible and soul-crushingly miserable working around my old PC’s crashing fits are exaggerated just a bit.

Moving on…  iPhone or Android?

iPhone

How would you advise a new writer who knows nothing about the publishing business, who just wrote their first book and has no idea what to do next?

I did this and the writer quit…

Well, that’s encouraging.

You have to decide what you want. Are you in it for the long haul or just a book? Is the book for you/your family/readers?

It’s a job. And if you don’t treat it as such then you won’t succeed.

I believe in giving! And giving without expecting anything back. There are so many things a writer needs to do before the book that I really can’t answer your question properly. A new writer needs to go to conferences, take classes, read, join writer’s groups, have other (besides their families) read their work….lots to do!

Did you go to the Derby this year? If so… pictures of the hat, please.

In-field gal. And I hope you know what that means!

If Churchill Downs is anything like Talladega, then yes. And we should probably stop there. Um, changing the subject… top three eateries in Lexington?

Ramsey’s, Joe Bologna’s, and Merrick Inn

You know, I only went to Ramsey’s once the whole time I was there and didn’t eat anything. Fun night, though—loved the vibe there. To this day I still try to hit up iChing and Old San Juan when I’m in town. I could go for a Cuban right now, in fact…

Okay, gotta stop making myself hungry…

Tell us about your dogs!

Oh! *blush* They are my babies. They are loyal, loyal, loyal. Both schnauzers. Scooter was rescued from a puppy mill and Charlie was bought from a breeder. Go figure, Charlie has all the health issues! I’ve always rescued dogs. I have a soft heart for any animal!

That’s awesome! I never was much of an animal person until I met Dallas, my little toy poodle. There’s a long story there, but needless to say, he’s become my buddy. Although, if your dogs are anything like Dallas, it’s kind of hard to

I’m going to give you the floor now so you can tell anyone reading this exactly what’s on your mind:

Pay it forward. No matter what! There are so many jealous people in this industry, and not enough givers in the world. Don’t become one of those people! Be true to yourself and give back.

-AND-

Don’t give up on your writing. Every day I ask myself “how bad do you want it?” If you want it bad enough, you will make it happen! No excuses.

Thanks for taking the time to do this interview! It’s been fun, and I hope everyone reading this will run out and get a copy of A Charming Crime. Like, now! Seriously—what are you waiting for?

Thanks for having me. It’s been real fun. GO CATS!

Go Cats, indeed!

Don’t forget that Tonya has graciously agreed to give away TWO copies of her latest novel, A Charming Crime, as well as a copy of Tricked Out Toolbox!  Email tkgiveaway@williamgjones.com with the subject line TK Giveaway to enter!

Also, be sure to check Tonya out online at her blog, http://tonyakappes.blogspot.com/ and follow her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/authortonyakappes and Twitter at @TonyaKappes11

You can buy A Charming Crime at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Tonya is giving away TWO copies of A Charming Crime and a copy of Tricked Out Toolbox to some very lucky readers! Email tkgiveaway@williamgjones.com with the subject line TK Giveaway and put your choice of book in the body of the email. Winners will be picked at random on Friday.

If you missed it, check out part 1 of this interview here.

Tonya, tell us a little bit about yourself and your writing. How does your personality influence your writing?

Hmmm….when I meet readers, they tell me they can see my positive and funny personalities in my characters. Life is so crazy and I try to give that escape. I’m a positive person and I want my readers to feel that positive energy when reading my novels. I want them to walk away feeling good.

When did you start writing and what was the learning process like for you?

Gosh, I didn’t start until five years ago. I’ve always been good at telling stories, but boy is that different than writing them down.

I took a lot of on-line classes, joined writer’s groups, critique group, and attended a lot of workshops. Writing isn’t an easy job, but it’s one that I continually learn something. The learning process never ends.

Do you (did you) have any writing mentors?

Starting out I had a couple of mentors that really took me under their wing and sent me in a great direction. Claire Cook and Jane Porter. Both of them had movies, New York Times best sellers, and I didn’t bat an eye when I emailed them for advice. They both have been instrumental to where I am today.

What was the turning point—what made you say, “I am a writer”?

When I set my mind to something, I do it! When I decided to write my first novel, Carpe Bead ‘em, I told everyone I knew. It made me accountable to get the job done.

How much time do you spend writing every day?

That is a hard question! I can write my 2-3k words a day goal within two hours. BUT I spend about four hours marketing and promoting.

You’re making yourself known throughout the indie publishing scene as a marketing maven. Were you a marketing major at UK? If so, how much time (if any) did you spend at Phillip’s Market?

My degree is Elementary Education, minor in Family Therapy.

I didn’t hang out at Phillip’s! GASP! I’m a Lynaph’s Pub girl Lynaph’s and I can’t resist the Grateful Dead…..sigh…

That’s funny. My boss is a family therapy major and he’s constantly trying to analyze me. I don’t know if it’s because I’m so messed up he’s decided to make me his hobby or what…

Anyway, in the introduction to Tricked Out Toolbox, it talks about how there’s no silver bullet, and how being involved with The Naked Hero website helped you gain exposure before your first book even released. Was that your goal or more of a happy accident?

I always have a goal. I created the audience for The Naked Hero and once I had that, I knew I could market the blog and emailed writer’s groups about doing on-line classes. Those were successful and turned into doing live workshops.

Tricked Out Toolbox also describes you as a pantser. How do you keep from writing yourself into a corner? Or have you gotten to a point where your rough drafts have a natural flow from beginning to end?

I let my stories hang out in my head until I know my characters inside and out. Plus, I’ve gotten the beginning, middle, and end figured out. At that point, I will loosely outline the book by writing chapter headers out.

I write mystery, so I write backwards… make sense??

Totally. Though it doesn’t sound like you’re much of a pantser to me… we might have to revoke your membership.

How did you get so involved in helping the indie community? Has it grown over time or did you just jump right in from the get-go?

When I left my publisher, I JUMPED in. Like I said, when I put my mind to it, I DO IT! There is NOTHING half a**ed with me.

Except, maybe, your use of asterisks in the last line there… I keed, I keed…

One thing that has struck me from day one about your books are the covers. They’re fantastic—and there’s nothing about them that says “indie”. Have you always had such fabulous covers or was that part of your evolution as an indie author?

ALWAYS! Again, when I left my publisher, I wanted to put out a book that was closest to traditional as you can get. My cover artist, Laura Morrigan, is amazing. We talked about my novels, my vision, and she made them come to life.

How long does it take you to write a book?

Two months.

Okay. I officially hate you now.

What’s your end-goal—to stay indie for as long as it’s feasible? Or do you eventually want the big publishers knocking down your door with contracts in hand?

I actually just parted with my agent….but I’m still looking for a new one and talking with several. I believe that authors, now more than ever, can be HYBRID. (That’s my term for doing it all!) I want traditional through an agent and Indie. I will never go with a small press again.

What’s next for you as a writer?

A couple of my novels are being turned into audio books, so that’s pretty cool. I will continue to write and write.

Come back on Friday for part three of my interview with Tonya, where things go a little off the rails…

Also, be sure to check Tonya out online at her blog, http://tonyakappes.blogspot.com/ and follow her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/authortonyakappes and Twitter at @TonyaKappes11

Tonya is giving away TWO copies of A Charming Crime and a copy of Tricked Out Toolbox to some very lucky readers! Email tkgiveaway@williamgjones.com with the subject line TK Giveaway and put your choice of book in the body of the email. Winners will be picked at random on Friday!

Tonya, first off, I know this is what you really want to talk about today and I won’t make you wait until the end of the interview. How about them Cats?

C-A-T-S CATS, CATS, CATS!!! I don’t think Kentucky will EVER see a team like this in a long time. I was there in the Rick Pitino years and we were pretty good then… Pitino definitely doesn’t encourage the team to play like a team. That was so much fun to watch this year. They were an unselfish team and just plain fun to watch.

The defense only let the opponent shot 36.7% from the field. That’s pretty amazing. UK had the most blocked shots out of any other college basketball team. LOVE THE BROW!! The brow, Anthony Davis, had more blocked shots than 300 division one teams combined. Seriously, you shouldn’t have started with this question!! I could go on and on!!

Hahaha! I know the feeling! Except with me, it would be a question about NASCAR… which nobody really seems to care about beyond the Sportscenter crash highlights. Anyway, now that we’ve got that out of the way, tell us about A Charming Crime. What’s it about and what inspired you to write it?

It’s easier to give you the blurb:

Magical Cures Mystery Series

Cures don’t solve murders…

June Heal has nothing to lose when she relocates her homeopathic cure
shop, A Dose of Darla, from the flea market booth in her home town,
to a quaint shop in the cozy but unusual little town of Whispering Falls,
Kentucky. Or so it seems.

Whispering Falls has a lot of secrets. From talking snow globes to
whispering animals not to mention a few sprinkles of fairy dust, June
realizes Whispering Falls is more magical than she thought. . .literally.

June discovers she was born into a family of psychics, and her
homeopathic cures truly are magical. Unfortunately, they are not magical
enough to save her from being the number one murder suspect when
a member of the community that she had just had a disagreement with shows up face down in the lake with June’s lucky charm in the victim’s grasp.

Add to that an attraction to her high school best friend, Sheriff Oscar Park
and Mr. Prince Charming, her cat, is stealing charms from Belle’s Baubles,
June is forced to clear her name in more ways than murder.

I’m so excited to hear that you’re basing the story in Kentucky! To be honest, aside from the show Justified–which I hated because they didn’t depict Lexington anything like real life in the few episodes I watched–I haven’t seen that many positive portrayals of Kentucky in popular culture.

A Charming Crime is the start of a new series for you—what made you want to start a new series?

It’s hard for me to write one book and that’s it. I get way too attached to my characters. Plus I want readers to invest in my writing, and series are a great way to do that. If they like the first one, chances are they will buy the next ones.

What sets A Charming Crime apart from your previous work?

A Charming Crime is a made up world of magical/psychic stuff….I’ve never written anything where I completely make up the entire world and words with in that world. It was a ton of fun!

If there’s one reason readers should rush right out and buy A Charming Crime, what is it?

It’s magical! I write super light and give my readers a good escape from today’s hectic life. When they pick up a Tonya Kappes novel, they know they are going to enjoy a light read where they don’t have to think for a few minutes.

Can your readers expect any new twists from A Charming Crime that they haven’t experienced in your novels before?

The entire magical made-up world. I’ve always made my settings in a real town or a relatable town. In Whispering Falls, A Charming Crime town, there is talking animals, witches, fairies, etc…

Come back tomorrow for part two of my interview with Tonya, where we’ll be discussing writing.

Also, be sure to check Tonya out online at her blog, http://tonyakappes.blogspot.com/ and follow her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/authortonyakappes and Twitter at @TonyaKappes11

You can buy A Charming Crime at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

What we don’t know is if this was caused by a sudden injury or if it has been this way ever since surgery. We also don’t know if it will get worse or stay the same or maybe even get better.

So many unknowns.

The good news is, on Saturday, I started the six-month ProSeries screenwriting program offered by Hal Croasmun at ScreenwritingU.com. If you check out their Buzz Page, you’ll see a lot of activity among their students. My goal is to have my picture on that page sometime soon.

If you’re looking to improve your writing skills, I can’t recommend the FREE ScreenwritingU teleconference 21 Powerful Rewrite Strategies highly enough. It happens THIS SATURDAY (May 26th).

If you decide to take it, here are a couple of hints–since it’s a phone conference, your best bet is to listen on your cell phone and use headphones. I use a pair of cheap Skull Candy earbuds. Keep your phone plugged into the charger or at least have the charger handy in case your battery starts going down. The call I took last year was 3 1/2 hours long.

I know many you reading this are writers yourself, and trust me, this isn’t some kind of time-share pitch. I took this class last year, and it changed the way I write. In fact, it highly influenced the writing of my novella (for those of you who didn’t like my book, just think–it could have been much worse).

This teleconference is powerful and best of all, it’s FREE.

People like Lia Fairchild ( @LiaFairchild ), proprietor of Quickie Book Reviews, whose novel, In Search of Lucy, has been a perennial bestseller in the Kindle Store ever since its recent relaunch.

People like Tonya Kappes ( @TonyaKappes11 ), co-author of the marketing how-too book Tricked Out Toolbox, whose fiction recently earned her a finalist’s position in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards.

People like Donna Brown ( @_mrs_b ), author of Double Take Tales, who organized Adopt An Indie Month and runs the Indie Exchange.

People like the gracious Elizabeth Kaye ( @ElizKaye ), who’s Kindle Single Lifeboat No. 8 should be on every Titaniac’s to-read list.

I could go on and on. All I can really say about these women is that they’re all fantastic writers, but more than that, every one of them in engaged in the fan community and with other authors, helping promote, encourage, and educate fledgling authors like myself.

In a world full of people shouting, “Buy my book!”, there’s something powerful about a spirit of community.  It sounds so cliche, but nothing can quite match the impact of like-minded people working together for a common good.

I’ve found there’s two kinds of people when it comes to Titanic. Those who are fascinated by the great ship, and those who aren’t.

Count me in the fascinated camp.

For me, Titanic’s story is this grand Shakespearean tragedy that actually happened. Yet, it’s more than that; the story itself is so very multi-faceted.

It took a hundred events conspiring in perfect order to bring death on the scale that Titanic left. If only one thing had gone differently, she might have stayed afloat and gone on to sail the Atlantic for many years. Had she not sank, the White Star Line for which she sailed might have become the dominant shipping line as Titanic’s creators had intended.

As far-fetched as it is to believe, some argue that had Titanic never sank, the men who died on board her would have fought the banking cartels and may even have prevented the first World War (which likely would have prevented the second world war).

Without the first World War, the third ship in the class, Britannic, wouldn’t have been torpedoed by a German U-Boat off the coast of Greece and would have instead sailed the North Atlantic route as well; it is likely that these three ships would have enjoyed a long and storied service life, much longer than the Olympic itself—the only one of the three to ever make it to New York—eventually enjoyed.

It is also likely that, had Titanic never sank, public interest in her would have wained as bigger and faster ships took to the seas. Titanic and her sisters might have finished their days as cruise ships before being scrapped; it is unlikely that anyone would have raised objection to their eventual end, certainly not on the grounds of historical significance. Titanic, had she not sunk, would have been one of many grand steamers, once built to navigate oceans, now served her time and replaced by new and bigger and better.

But Titanic did sink, and the first World War did happen, and Britannic went to its own watery grave, taking its own collection of souls with it, while Olympic soldiered on through the war as a troop transport and earned the nickname “Old Reliable”, a name it would carry to its own dismantling.

White Star faced severe financial hardship after Titanic sank; despite generous war reparations allowing it to resume the North Atlantic trade route after the war, in 1935, White Star Line was absorbed by arch-rival Cunard, and Olympic went to the breakers to be sold as scrap. By 1937, Titanic’s sister no longer existed, except in the paneled walls and chairs pulled from her and auctioned off, still adorning hotel restaurants and museums.

If only.

Why is Titanic still making headlines a hundred years later? Why do people who have witnessed the collapse of the World Trade Center and the collapse of the world economy care about a boat that hit an iceberg so long ago?

Titanic’s story is a morality play, like some Wrath-of-God passage from the old testament played out in modern times. And while it’s difficult to imagine the revelry of Sodom and Gomorra, or the wickedness of a primitive world before Noah’s Ark, it’s positively easy to close our eyes and envision ourselves walking the grand staircase of that great liner. The people aboard Titanic were people like you and me; they were you and me—travelers, men and women who bought their ticket and boarded their vessel and wanted nothing more than to get to New York in comfort and style.

Had they lived today, they would have boarded a jumbo-jet. But in 1912, Titanic was a jumbo jet.

They never wanted to be embroiled in history on that voyage. Sure, there were history makers among her passengers. But that week in April was a utilitarian voyage. They were going home.

There’s this big, macro-universe story about a ship that sank in just under three hours, but there also some twenty-two hundred micro-universe stories about the individuals on-board her when she sank. Some were lucky and lived to tell about it; most were not.

Roughly twice as many died as were saved. The difference between life and death could have been something so simple as which side of the boat deck you decided to step out on as you came up from your cabin.

From an engineering perspective, those ships were built by hand (Titanic was the second of three basically identical ships; only the first one built ever successfully crossed the Atlantic). Titanic and her sister ships were the largest machines ever created. They were designed without computers, just brains and pencils and slide-rules. They were built without robots or automation of any kind, just sweat and brawn and back-breaking labor, aided by a few cranes and some horse-drawn buggies.

Every plate was shaped by hand, every rivit was hammered by hand, heated to red-hot and banged into place. Those luxurious interiors were hand-made, the wood carved by craftsmen, the carpet laid down by hand, the linoleum tile placed by hand. Thousands of people created that ship, spent years working on it, considered it so big and solid that it would last for generations.

Once Titanic met her iceberg, all that work was gone in a matter of hours.

Talk about a de-motivator to those same men, who were in the process of building Titanic’s sister ship by hand when Titanic sank. For years, Titanic was Belfast’s shame, the men’s spirits broken as they had an extreme pride in their work that few today can fathom. Their hearts were broken. They felt a sense of responsibility for those who died. They tried to lock the Titanic away in some dark corner of their psyche reserved for the most dreadful of personal failures.

Then there’s the crew, a dogged English crew that, to a man, had fought the seas in little ships tossed about like bathtub toys and survived the worst nature could throw at them, and they were so sure of the size of that ship that they didn’t bother with basic safety procedures such as lifeboat drills.

Most likely they thought they were doing their passengers a great service by forgoing the Sunday afternoon lifeboat drill; why impose such a tedious task when the ship itself was built with double-hulls and watertight chambers to be its own lifeboat?

Titanic only had enough boats for half its passengers, and four of the boats were stored above the boat deck on the roof of the cabin structure. Titanic only carried as many boats loaded onto davits as it did because the law required it, plus the four extras on the roof for good measure.

Titanic didn’t have enough lifeboats a) because it was assumed that Titanic would need to use them, unless giving aid to a smaller and less fortunate vessel, and b) because ships in great distress generally didn’t get the chance to lower lifeboats to begin with, they capsized and floundered too quickly for anymore lifeboats to really matter.

Both assumptions proved fatal a century ago.

We tend to look at the decision to carry less than a full compliment of lifeboats as horrible, negligent, and even murderous. Yet, when looked at through the eyes of the men making these decisions, it’s easy to understand why they chose so low a number. Extra lifeboats would have only been added cost on an already expensive vessel, and a utilitarian redundancy that could easily be eliminated on a ship where more frivolous redundancies were preferred.

Besides, it was well known by everyone involved that the Titanic was practically unsinkable.

If doubts to this claim were ever raised, those doubts were likely quelled when Titanic’s sister ship, the Olympic, was rammed by a British navy ship equipped with a battering ram and designed to sink other vessels.

Not only did Olympic survive, albeit damaged, but Olympic proved so strong that it simply destroyed the bow of the naval ship, a bow designed to destroy as brutally as a war savage.

Nobody dreamed that Titanic—or any ship sailing the Atlantic trade—would ever meet a fate worse than that.

Quite simply, none ever had.

Mass deaths at sea were not fathomable. As Captain Smith commented to a reporter before Titanic’s fatal voyage, “Modern shipbuilding has simply gone beyond that.”

By the time April 14th, 1912, rolled around, Titanic plowed through icy waters and icy winds, sailing upon a sea so unusually calm both passengers and crew took note. It was said the sea that night looked as calm as a mill pond, the surface of the water like plate glass. No waves, no breakers, no moon overhead. Just stars, and the reassurance of those three big propellers swirling beneath the water, pushing the ridiculously massive ship forward, coupled to engines undulating softly somewhere in the belly of leviathan.

As Titanic raced forward, no doubt the freezing air stung the eyes of her lookouts. In A NIGHT TO REMEMBER, Walter Lord recounts witness testimony that the air was so cold that fairy-like slivers of ice floated through the air, glistening around the exposed lighting on the ship’s decks. The cold drove Titanic’s passengers inside, where they shuttered portholes and went to bed dreaming of the New World, so close they could almost reach out and touch it.

A nearby ship, the Californian, signals via wireless radio to Titanic to inform her of pack ice. Titanic’s wireless operators, backlogged with messages, aggravated from the hours they spent repairing their wireless system earlier in the day, responded back rudely. Californian’s wireless radio operator listens to some of Titanic’s outbound radio traffic, then powers down the Californian’s wireless system.

This is where the game of “What-Ifs” and outright conjecture begins.

There were no binoculars for the lookouts. The crow’s nest itself wasn’t much higher than the bridge.

Would the lookouts have even used binoculars? Would binoculars have frozen on them? Or would they have spotted iceberg sooner, giving the bridge crew vital extra time to react?

Then again, did those on the bridge who had binoculars stand a better chance of spotting trouble than the lookouts?

With no waves to break at the base and no moon to light the ocean, the iceberg appeared out of the darkness, described as darker than black, a vague form appearing on the horizon and growing like an apparition.

The warning bell rang. The bridge crew was alerted. First Officer Murdoch squinted through the wheelhouse windows and called a quick, decisive order. “Hard-a-starboard.”

No doubt, many thoughts were colliding in Murdoch’s brain. From her sea trials, it was known that Titanic needed roughly a half-mile to stop. With no breakers to judge distance and no moon to help see, Murdoch had to guess how far they were from the black void rushing toward them. Was it so massive it only appeared near? If that was the case, it would allow Murdoch—the wheel man—the ship—a chance to maneuver.

But what if Titanic couldn’t move out of the way? The best course of action would be to ram the berg head-on. That would minimize the damage and keep her afloat. Still, with the owner of the White Star Line aboard the ship, how would one explain that? Would J. Bruce Ismay simply accept his account that a berg appeared in the horizon and couldn’t be avoided, so they rammed it?

He no doubt knew the force of Titanic ramming the berg would be a tremendous impact. He no doubt remembered standing on the docking bridge of Olympic not one year earlier, when it was rammed by the warship Hawke. In the lawsuit that followed, a British court had ruled the Olympic at fault for the accident.

Murdoch may have felt that he stood on shaky standing with the company. But Murdoch also knew how unwieldy Olympic had proved to be. Not only had there been the incident with the Hawke, but he’d been first office aboard Olympic when she banged into a floundered ship and knocked one of her propellers off, and too when Olympic nearly ran aground in Belfast because she simply got away from the command crew.

Those big ships could be unpredictable at the most inconvenient of moments.

That he gave the order to turn the wheel hard-a-starboard indicates two things—one, that he knew Titanic was in peril, and two, he wasn’t about to plow her into the berg.

In the moments before he gave the order, Murdoch may have seen Titanic in his mind, bow crushed, limping into New York.

The press would have a field day with that and he would never work the Atlantic trade again.

Murdoch know, no doubt, that reports of pack ice had been flooding the wireless rooms. Captain Smith had received how many warnings? And had chosen to push forward, to beat Olympic’s maiden voyage time. Yes, each ship simply had to be faster than the last.

But Murdoch, as any experienced sea man, also knew that a flanking would would be the worst damage Titanic could suffer. Titanic may have been in peril, but Murdoch’s eleven months of service on the Olympic gave him some assurance that the beast would turn out of harm’s way.

What if Murdoch had rammed the berg instead? Titanic—and most of her passengers—would have survived. Nevertheless, Murdoch took a calculated risk to save his career and save the ship from what would have been certain calamity.

The wheel hard over, Murdoch ordered engines to full reverse. Those massive propellers stopped spinning, stopped driving water over the ship’s rudder.

What if Murdoch had let the engines run ahead? Many naval engineers believe the reversing of the engines created a movement of water that made the rudder less effective. Titanic might have steered clear of that ice berg had the propellers kept providing thrust.

But that’s not what happened. Those massive propellers went still for a moment, then the two outermost propellers began turning in reverse.

Up in the crow’s nest, the lookouts watched that ice berg get bigger and bigger and it didn’t look like the ship was turning at all.

Perhaps they envisioned the ship ramming the berg. Perhaps they even thought the bridge crew had decided to ram the berg. No doubt, they braced themselves for impact, afraid for their lives—maybe even picturing themselves being flung from the crow’s nest onto the deck below.

But they began to breathe easier as the berg moved away from the bow, though growing closer.

That’s when there’s this moment of the ship sliding sideways into the iceburg.

Titanic was steered by a rudder in back, so instead of the front of the ship moving aside when the wheel was turned, it was the rear of the ship that moved. Turning the big ship at sea meant throwing her sideways, so that instead of a straight line moving forward in the water, she was moving forward diagonally, with her broad side exposed to whatever stood in their bath.

Now the rear of Titanic was on a collision with the iceberg.

Murdoch ordered the wheel turned hard-a-port, to pull the back half of the ship away from the iceberg, in a procedure known as port-rounding. With the bow out of the way, or so Murdoch assumed, the reversal of the rudder would push the stern over and the whole ship would miss—albeit narrowly—collision.

As the wheel came over, ice and steel collided. As the iceberg scraped down the side of the ship, chunks of it broke onto the decks, filling the deck wells.

The ship is so big more than half the people on board don’t even feel the impact. Those that do would describe it as though Titanic slid across a floor covered in marbles, not so much a damning impact but a general uneasiness.

From the bridge, Murdoch watches the iceberg slip past. It vanishes into the night, somewhere behind them.

A lever on the bridge is pulled to seal the watertight bulkheads. Deep inside the ship, in her bowels, ungodly heavy steel doors began crawling downward. They’re so heavy that can only fall free for eighteen inches without damaging the ship, so hydraulic dampers prevent them from falling until that critical threshold is crossed. Then, one by one, those doors slammed in place, sealing the watertight bulkheads like cannons signaling the end of war.

Captain Smith is called to the bridge and informed of what has happened.

Does Murdoch realize that he made a fatal mistake? Or did that glancing blow feel so light that he breathed a sigh of relief and reported to the captain that they’d averted a crash.

Captain Smith called for the engineer who built Titanic, Thomas Andrews.

While Andrews is below decks, watching water pour into his creation, Smith orders to bridge crew to exercise the ship. The propellers spin forward and backward. The rudder is tested. Titanic moves lazily through the dark Atlantic waters.

No doubt Smith, too, remembers the moment the Hawke crashed into Olympic. The impact had damaged a driveshaft, rendering one of Olympic’s propellers unusable, and had laid Olympic up for lengthy repairs. It was those repairs that caused the postponing of Titanic’s maiden voyage by nearly a month.

One has to wonder if Smith thought to himself, had they sailed in March, as planned, there would have no damned iceberg.

At this point, J. Bruce Ismay is not pleased. He storms onto the bridge of Titanic, likely thinking only of the bad press White Star will receive if Titanic is delayed. White Star had bet everything on these big ships, and so far, Olympic had done nothing but bleed cash.

Titanic simply had to perform better.

Sitting in the Atlantic with her engines stopped no doubt infuriated the businessman.

Andrews returns from his scouting expedition. He knows how much water Titanic can hold, how many compartments can be exposed to the water. He does some quick calculations to be certain, but he knows—and he informs Smith. Ismay scoffs, refuses to believe it. But Andrews asserts the certainty. Titanic is mortally wounded. She won’t make it to New York.

She won’t make it ’til sunrise.

Captain Smith orders an evacuation of the ship. On the horizon, he sees another vessel, it’s lights glowing. He orders distress rockets fired and commands the wireless operators to send out the Titanic’s coordinates with the call, Come Quickly, Distress.

Soon, steam pressure bleeds from the boilers through the ship’s whistles like a monstrous tea kettle. Ship stewards move room by room in the first two classes, informing passengers that they need to put on their life vests and go up on deck. But still, Titanic feels safe and warm, and the crew can’t convince people to leave that big, warm ship and get into tiny, cold lifeboats.

It wouldn’t be until later, with water pouring in faster and faster and the bow tipping downward, that the people would be ready to listen.

At that time, Titanic seemed fairly flat, with a barely noticeable list. Certainly nothing that should cause panic. Smith waits for sign that the ship he sees in the distance—its lights so clear he should be able to reach out and touch them—is coming to their aid.

He would receive no such comfort.

There’s the British way of women and children first, and Second Officer Lightoller sees to it that only women and children get on board the lifeboats. On the other side of the ship, Murdoch is much more willing to load anyone and everyone who will take a seat onto a boat.

There was a passenger on board named John Harper. A devout Christian, he was a widower, traveling with his six-year-old daughter. As it became apparent the ship was doomed, he put his daughter into a boat, kissed her forehead, and assured her that they would see each other again someday. John Harper then went up and down the decks, screaming, “Women, children, and all unsaved men into the lifeboats!”

The sinking of the Titanic took two hours, forty minutes. By the time it became apparent that the ship was doomed, many of her lifeboats had been sent away half-empty.

Many men stood on deck while their wives and children climbed into life boats, assuring them that all was well even as it became apparent the situation was anything but.

Three of the world’s richest men were on that ship. They died with dignity. Meanwhile, others took a coward’s way and tried to bluff, bully, and lie their way onto boats. Some of the crew lied and claimed to be seamen when they weren’t, in fact, while passengers who really were seamen were denied entry into the boats.

What could Thomas Andrews have thought in those moments? He designed Titanic, then watched his creation become a tomb.

There were workers from Belfast who were chosen for the great honor of sailing aboard the finest vessel they’d ever produced, now trapped inside her, fighting to pump out water. Below decks, too, were electricians who stayed below deck to keep the lights on until the very end, the wireless operators frantically pounding out distress calls until their fingers bled, the Captain who, at the end, came to relieve the wireless operators of their duty once all the lifeboats were gone, solemnly informing them that “It’s every man for himself now, that’s the way of it in times like these.”

Was he thinking, at that moment, of the ship so close he could see its lights, yet sitting there stubbornly refusing to come assist? Or of the Carpathia, the closest ship that had responded to radio calls, steaming toward Titanic but still hours away.

As the ship sank, it broke in half. John Harper dove into the water and swam away as Titanic’s back twisted in two. Many others jumped, too. The back half of the ship twisted like a cork and floundered, pulling men and women down into its wash.

All those lifeboats stayed safely away. Their passengers reasoned that they were safe enough, that if they drew closer they’d be swamped and they didn’t want to risk their lives.

John Harper swam the waters, preaching like an evangelist, trying to convince as many men to accept Christ as their Lord and Savior as possible. Did he evangelize to the rich and famous who perished that night? No one knows. But there was a boy adrift on a piece of wood who John Harper asked to receive Christ.

The boy refused.

Harper unfastened his life vest and gave it to the boy. “Here,” he said. “You need this more than me.”

Harper swam away, and the boy put on his vest. Moments later, Harper swam back and asked him to reconsider. The boy did. Harper led him through a prayer of salvation, and Harper’s last words before he slipped into the ocean were, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved!”

And that boy he gave his lifeboat to was one of only six who were pulled out of the water by a rescue team who’d taken one of the lifeboats to look for survivors.

Six pulled from the water of more than fifteen hundred who went in.

While John Harper was drowning, captain Arthur Henry Rostron was standing on the deck of his ship, Carpathia, running full steam ahead into the same ice field where Titanic sank. Rostron had all steam diverted to the engines, turning off the heat and hot water for all passengers aboard his ship to squeeze every extra bit of unintended speed from his vessel.

Time after time, Carpathia’s crew would spot ice and swerve to avoid it.

It was said that Rostron spent most of his time standing, head bowed, lips moving but no words coming from his mouth. He would later explain that he was praying for safety as for his ship and for those aboard Titanic.

As the sun rose over the ocean on April 15th, 1912, the ocean was littered with frozen bodies and broken reminders of what once had been the biggest, most luxurious machine the world had ever seen. And a hundred years later, we’re still trying to figure out exactly what went wrong.

I can’t believe it’s been a year.

My back first went out in April, 1999. For twelve years, I fought a severe pain. For long stretches of time during those twelve years, I had to use a cane to walk. Sometimes my left leg would just stop working.

And I’ve been pain free for a year.

2011 will not go down in my personal history as one of the better years of my life. But it was, perhaps, one of the most profound because that was the year I got my life back.

I wish I had something profound to write to mark this occasion. Alas, I don’t. As the world commemorates the 100th anniversary of the Titanic disaster, I just realized that I have my own commemoration to mark.

They say after back surgery your back has no strength at all, and gains one percent of its strength back every week after surgery. I’ve just barely crossed the halfway point. I’m stronger than I can ever remember being before. Next year, I can’t even imagine how strong I could be.

Thank God for simple miracles like a good back surgeon.