Celebrate International Friendship Day with this "From the Vault" episode of Big Blend Radio that features Kristine Ochu, author of "Campfire Confessions" (2022). The story focuses on three childhood best friends - Annie, Sondra, and Jo – who reunite for on an adventure that is equal parts hilarious, dangerous, and enlightening. Of course, when best friends get together….those deep secrets find a way of coming out...
More at: https://www.kristineochu.com/
Big Daily Blend
Author Kristine Ochu - Campfire Confessions
Celebrate International Friendship Day with author Kristine Ochu, author of ”Campfire Confessions” (2022) that focuses on three childhood best friends - Annie, Sondra, and Jo – who reunite for on an adventure that is equal parts hilarious, dangerous, and enlightening.
- Duration:
- 44m
- Broadcast on:
- 30 Jul 2024
- Audio Format:
- mp3
(upbeat music) - Hey there, welcome to Big Glenn Radio with your host, Lisa and Nancy, editors of bigblendmagazine.com. - Hey everybody, welcome to Big Glenn Radio with Nancy and Lisa, publishers of Big Glenn magazines and full-time travelers on our "Love Your Park" store. And of course, you know we love anything to do with the outdoors, but what about campfire conversations, but not just conversations, confessions? That is the book we're gonna be talking about with author Christine Oshu. She is a log-rolling champion, we love this. (laughs) She's also written a kids book, she is amazing. So her book is out now, it is released through books fluent, again, it's called "Campfire Confessions" and it focuses on three women and, you know, childhood friends, best friends, I know what that's like, you get together, in fact, I'll be doing that, Nancy, we're gonna see Melissa, my best friend, I haven't seen her in 30 years. - Yeah. - Summer in Michigan, she's flying in from England in South Africa and what kind of confessions will happen? (laughs) - You know more than, I know more than you think I do. - You know, I know that there is no getting away with anything around really good friends, especially with childhood friends. So welcome to the show and everyone, Christine, Christine's website is Christine Oshu and that's OCHU and that's Christine with a K. So welcome to the show, how are you? - Thank you, I'm doing great, I'm so jazzed to be here. - Oh, we're glad to have you. I mean, as soon as we saw the book, we're like, well, we have to do this 'cause you guys, you know, it's three women outdoors doing things and of course there's confessions and there's also it's women helping each other. That's the other thing, it's about friendship too. - Yeah, that was a really big part of the book for me is about just wanting to capture that real core part of friendship and how friendship can really empower us to overcome these inner obstacles that we have and of course in the book, they have a lot of other challenges and obstacles they have to overcome but I just really sharing the power of friendship. They really are able to uplift themselves and give themselves out of a lot of trouble. - I like that. - How much of it is also about forgiveness and allowing each other to be imperfect? Because women I think we get ourselves in trouble a lot because we always have to put on the good front and yet be nurturing to the rest of the world at the same time. - Yeah, I love that question, thank you. 'Cause one, I wanted the book to be fun about friendship and that banter and all that kind of stuff that happens when you get together but I really had some core themes underneath it that I wanted to just bring to the surface and that is how women really have a hard time. It keeps the characters has an inner struggle and one really is trying to learn to embrace self-love, right? Kind of get caught into that martyrdom syndrome, having to do everything for everybody else and kind of losing herself. And I think that that's a very common problem with women and another one is just letting go of past mistakes. Sometimes we can be so hard on ourselves. I think we're our worst critics, right? So learning to let go of past mistakes. Then also just learning to forgive yourself sometimes and others and the freedom that gives. And so, you know, by doing this, we get to really create our own authentic life that we want that makes us happy. So these are some of the main obstacles that I found that women really struggle with 'cause I use IT workshops as well to help women create their own amazing life. And these are sometimes the biggest three obstacles that get in the way. And so I wanted to bring them into the book and show how the characters deal with them by using different tools. And depending on how far you got into the book, on each kind of different tools that they use to help themselves, whether it's a tapping tool or power statement or meditation or visualization. - Talk about the tapping tool because some folks may not be familiar. Nancy and I are familiar. It's, isn't it EFT you, isn't it? Am I saying it, is it? - Yeah, there's different kinds of tapping. And I think that's, there's over like, I think probably 12 million people now that practice EFT emotional freedom technique. That's one type of tapping. Another type of tapping is a little bit more of what I do is more acupressure type of tapping. So tapping is basically comes from Chinese acupuncture. So we know that there's 365 acupuncture points in our body and each point correlates, it's connected to a nerve or tissue and organ in our system. So when we tap on a certain part of our body, then we send different signals to that organ tissue muscle. When you think about it, I'm glad this wasn't hundreds of years ago because the Chinese did like, you know, practice on people to stick those needles in and figure out where it can be. - Nancy's out, Nancy, that's how she's gone. - How can you do a tapping tool? It's really short, it's using fingertips and tapping certain parts of our body. So one of my favorite tapping spots is tapping on my cheekbones. It's when you tap on your cheekbones that kind of grounds yourself. So if you're feeling kind of maybe a little flighty or you're feeling a little discombobulated, you can tap on your cheekbones. Is that actually sending signals to your stomach meridian? And it just really kind of goes all the way down through your body and just really helps you ground yourself. And I have other ones I can share depending on how-- - That's awesome though that you're doing this in a form of a novel. And by the way, if I tap my cheek and it goes to my stomach meridian, will I lose weight? Like? (laughing) - Fine, okay, if you do tap under your armpits, you do actually affect your gastrointestinal system and it helps you get rid of toxins and sugar and all that kind of stuff, so-- - Oh, that's good to know. - It kind of splurged a little bit, a good place to tap this under your armpits kind of around that bra line area. - Oh, wow, who knew this? This is good. (laughing) But yet to bring this into a novel, I think is a really good approach because I think there's so many books to teach and self-help, which is great. And I could see that you would be good at doing that as well with what you're doing and your writing is great. Nancy Knapp was saying, you're a terrific writer. So bringing that in, you could do a self-help kind of book or women's strength in the book. But I think there's something novel about voting it into a novel where we get to connect and tap into our imagination. I've got the tapping going now. The tapping to our creative side too. - Yeah, yep, yep. And actually I use a daily energy routine every morning for myself and where I tap. You can just go through this and I use power statements. And it was life changing for me. So every tool that I have in the book and in my workshops I've used in my life. And I believe in them and they helped me overcome my own rough spots in my life. So, and I'm excited to just plant the ideas and the readers had. And then they might resonate with one or two and I can reach out and explore more 'cause the information's really available also. And I'm always available too. - So can you tap to your favorite music? - Sure can, in fact, music. - Ooh, fun. - Is one of the strongest mood changers. So if you're in a bad mood, you know, you put on a happy song. It's gonna hurt a stay grumpy if you've got something really happy going on in your life. - Yeah. - Yeah. - I like that. - That's really true. Music every time I'm like, even in a... You know, it's like you've got a deadline for an article and you were all done, oh, about writing it. Then you sit down to write it and you're like, oh, oopsie. What did I give myself into? And then you made promises, you gotta do it. And I always have to remember, I should like have a piece of tape with a label on my computer just saying, just play music, you'll be fine. 'Cause as soon as I do that, I can... So thank you Bonnie Ray. She's the best user to write by. (laughing) - I love it. I love it. And you're stuck in this body. - I love it too, right? So... - Right, uh-huh. - Yeah, the characters in the book, Annie, especially, she was the small-time minister's wife, right? - Oh, yeah. - And she loves to sing and she loves music and she makes up songs. And so the characters do kind of use music to have fun with each other. And she also uses it as kind of part of her past, kind of a something special she did with her father, that she gonna bring us forward into her life just singing with her young sons. - Mm-hmm. - Oh, are you gonna do a playlist to go with the book? - Ooh, that's a good idea. - Fun? - Yeah, that'd be cool. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Yeah. - I don't know if anybody wants to do it on Spotify anymore, but... (laughing) - Now now. - Well, I don't know. It's like, I don't know what to do about that. - No, no, no, no. - But, you know, it's kind of it's every bit politically, you know, whatever. But yeah, I mean, it would be great to have like a playlist of music and maybe even get readers to submit like music that, you know, that resonates from the book. 'Cause I see this as being a fabulous book club book, the choice. Do you see that? Is that something you'd be open to? - Oh, absolutely. In fact, I mean, April, I'm already gonna be at five different book clubs here locally. And I promised to meet with anybody virtually. And if they're within like a two or a drive or two hour plus, I'd be happy to go see them. Because yeah, that was one thing book life reviews from Publishers Weekly said, they felt that this was definitely a must read for book clubs. And, and it really spent a lot of time at the back of the book writing questions. I think I have 17 or 18 questions. And when I submitted them for review, I had kind of a group of kind of friends that were readers too. One of my friends said, "Oh, these are some pretty deep questions." You know, my book club, we could just kind of talk about surface things, but you're asking us to go deep here. Do you think women will really, you know, talk about these questions? And I said, you know what, I think so. You know, I think there's a, now it depends up to the book club and the group, how far they wanna go. But I know that I'm part of two book clubs here. And one of my most favorite experiences was when we read one book and it was at the Midnight Library where I met Haig and people just really started sharing some of the personal experience that they had been through. And after that book club, we all bonded, it became even closer friends. You know, so I think that's a good possibility as well. I'm hoping that I can create that opportunity for women. - So for in person, which for a lot to do these days, which is really quite nice, this would be, you're in Amelia Island, Florida, which is such a beautiful and historic area. You've got all that Spanish maw stripping down and all the Spanish history and of course the ocean. And it's just, it's beautiful. And then in summer, you're up in Northern Wisconsin, right? So that could be an area as well. - Absolutely, yes, absolutely. Hayward, Wisconsin. And so in only three hours from Minneapolis, St. Paul, I would have saw the Duluth. And I love driving through Wisconsin anyways. I mean, it's beautiful. - You're driving from woods to farmlands to lakes. I mean, and it's just, to me, it's taking a drive out there is like it's taking a long time in heaven, you know? - Speaking of that, let's talk about the nature side and the adventure in the book. I don't, you can't give it away. So, you know, talking a little bit. So you give everyone a little overview of the other two characters too, but how do they get out on this grand adventure, outdoors, kayaking and getting themselves into trouble? Because that happens. Somehow we all take different, like our friend, Rondi, he said, oh, I know this hike really well like the back of my hand, you know? She took us out in the middle of the desert and we ended up on some overnight hike somewhere. And some guy turned and said, ladies, you better start thinking about turning around. Otherwise you're sleeping out here tonight. And to which we all sat down and got the giggles head our sandwich right in the middle of the pathway. And drank champagne. But anyway, that's how we rolled out that one, but we did get out of the park in time. It's funny because we just saw her and we were just all giggling about getting lost. It happens a lot to us. But this adventure, what sparked the adventure and gave everyone an overview were no spoilers. - Okay, yep, yeah. Now I love kayaking and I love canoeing. And so I grew up in here in Wisconsin. So we had the Namakagan River right there. So I get on that river at least, you know, five times the summer and sometimes I go by myself and I'm far grab a friend, a family. But anyways, I just feel like there's just something special about canoeing on a river because, you know, one that's less worth canoeing on the lake, to get the current to help you. But you never know what's gonna be around the next bend, you know? So I just really find it just to be a great place to be and escape. But I have these three women that were childhood friends and I have them based in Northwoods around Hayward, Wisconsin. I just figured it was easy to use and I love the area. And so they were childhood best friends in a small town and once now out in LA, once in the Minneapolis St. Paul area and once stayed home and they had this promise that they would one day reunite to go on this long promised canoeing trip. Well, when each of their lives kind of explode with a secret or about to explode, you know, they each get themselves into quite a pickle. They end up with one secret explodes. They end up, I'll just give tiny bit 'cause it's on the back cover. So in the small town minister's wife, Secret explodes, the two best friends race to rescue her and they escape on this canoeing trip, which, you know, starts out hilarious and a lot of fun and jokes and banter. And then find themselves, you know, the next morning after having a great time around the campfire, the next when they wake up and everything starts to go wrong, you know, a storm comes up, you know, I think I said, I want to say too much more but one thing after the night was wrong and they soon they find themselves, you know, basically lost in the woods, wondering how they're gonna get home. - Wow, which that is a fun conversation to have and also the trauma side. We've done that and so we ended up in the trans-die. - Wow. - Yes. We were in another country and not knowing which way to go and we ended up on the back of a pickup of some farmer hoping he was taking us right away 'cause we didn't know where we were and trusting him as women and, you know, so there's that feeling and there's, it is funny 'cause we will giggle. There's always that giggle part and there's a, uh-oh part, you know how it just goes to those? - Exactly. - Because it's gonna stand out because I've been, I've been hiking by myself and I've been in situations where when I came home until my mother, she was not happy with me even in my, you know, adult years and, you know, my little fifties. And, um, so I just, um, I've been there too where you've taken chances because you've gotten yourself in a situation where you have to rely on a stranger and hope that they're the right person in your life. (laughing) I actually looked like two summers ago, I piled into a van with a family as I got stranded kind of on a hike trip and I couldn't make it the rest of the way. And, um, you know, the husband was so sweet, he went and sat way in the back and I was in the family with five kids so I felt it was pretty safe. (laughing) But I do remember that little strange feeling in my gut like, okay, you know, you're told not to take a ride as strangers, right? - Yeah, I mean, but there's that excitement because you know you're pushing the envelope and you really don't know what's gonna happen. That's the, you know, if you can guess what's gonna happen or you've been through a similar experience, it's not quite the same when you really don't know what's gonna happen. There's, it's exciting. - It is. - I want that adventure which obviously you two love and I love. - Yeah, yeah. Well, it's cold, weird. Like people keep saying, "Why aren't you traveling in the country in an RV?" And I'm like, "No." And then quite frankly, I think some people really need to stop doing this. There's a huge surge of RV sales happening across the country and since COVID, which is great. But I do encourage people to go and take a class on driving them. I'm just saying, after so many overturned RVs, we have seen on the road lately, I'm not being mean, I'm just saying. - It's the towing of the extra vehicle or to behind the RV that I think is causing a major problem that balances way off. - There's something going on, just go to the school app because we're seeing a lot of disappointed people and people get hurt. But we don't do an RV for that reason. A, nobody wants to see me drive that kind of thing. And we end up on roads that we never should take. You know, we're supposed to meet somewhere and it's like, "Oh, but look, I bet you there's gonna be wild geese or something for there. Let's go." - Let's go. - Our car has been through things you would never imagine. Like you're not supposed to, including all your snow in Wisconsin and a snowstorm and snow fog at two in the morning. But it was pretty, it really was pretty. I'm sorry, it was magical. It was magical. - Yeah, but I think there's something that getting out, you're challenging yourself and getting yourself out of the box. And I think relationships, especially friends, and you think about childhood friends because as kids, we misbehaved in some format and pushed the boundaries. We were also very, well, we didn't have all the limitations that we have as adults. So I think this reunion of friends, no matter how you look at it, all the things you did positive and the naughty come together. And that's what creates who you are. And those friends know you from the purest form of self. That's what's so exciting about a reunion with friends. They really do. You can't, you can't fake it. You can't fake it. And I love the fact they know all the stuff that you really don't want other people to know, or they know your dark secrets, you know, where I look. But they love you anyways, because they know the whole picture, right? And they know that's one thing too. It's about letting go of the past is, I don't remember who said this. They said, you know, they look back in their life like 30 years, you know, later. And they said, who the heck was she? You know, I don't even know who she was, you know, because we all get a chance to change and evolve, you know. So there's that part of it too, but then down at the core, I think our best friends really know all the wonderful parts of ourselves. And no, the rest of it was part of the journey, the mistakes and, you know, the groups and whatnot. And they wish I would have done this differently. And they just love you for who you are. And, okay. - Now, didn't also you work in the field of human resources? Are you still doing that? And how does that, you know, tie into what you, obviously you know how to read people. Don't fire me. (laughing) - I have a BA in psychology and then my master's in human resources, industrial relations to be. - Wow. - In fact, but that industrial relations, I think like two years after I got my master's, I changed it to human resources. So it was kind of like an old term that evolved, even though I'm not that old. But yes, I worked in human resources. For four or 15 years, I was in the corporate world and I was the last opposition I held. I had international responsibilities. So I got to travel a world a little bit, had offices in Paris and London and Germany. - Nice. - In fact, I do love traveling. So the human resource side was, I think really seeing all so many different situations, so many different sides of people. Because when you're a human resource, you know, as you work your way up and I was, you know, vice president at the end, but you're counseling people, you're helping people, you're coaching people, you want them to achieve, you want them to develop and be their best. And you're also helping that organization be their best. So, you know, for the organization to be the best, the people have to be their best, right? So you want to align all those values, those goals and help people. So I just have always loved personal development and I believe in human potentiality and I love studying that field. I mean, give me a good book on human potential, like neuroscience or quantum physics or spirituality or how we can evolve. I just, I just dive in. So, and I also think, you know, there's the good in the back through those years, you know, I've been through mergers and acquisitions. I've been through layoffs, you know, there's been hard times. So you just see so much of the human experience. So I just feel like that's made me a very compassionate person, I'm very down to earth. So I just feel like I was able to bring some of that compassion into the book as well. - I think that's important because you're connecting with characters and, you know, that's what I think good stories do. It's about the human experience like you were talking about where we talk about this all the time about movies and TV shows. And like England was really, and still is one of the best in really, you will watch something. It's got nothing to do with the plot. It's about just watching these characters continue through things. It's not about the plot has to do A, B and oh, you know what? We have to spend a million dollars on this and that. It's not that, it's about these characters. And I think TV and movies have changed on the American side because of Netflix and all the streaming opportunities that we're starting to dig into being more independent and free or spirited in how we do things. So we're seeing more character driven stories about the human experience. And that's why I see like campfire confessions. I see that totally being such a cool, like series or movie, but I think it's just following friends and having that experience those conversations and how do we get out of this together? How do we help each other? And also once you know someone's deep secrets, you've got to not utilize that in a negative way. You can't step on that fragile place. - It's a responsibility. - Yeah, it is a responsibility. - It's a responsibility. But I always feel like there's always a secret part of a person and that's how they continue to surprise you with the things they do. It's like, oh, wow, that's for me. I never thought you'd do, you know? And there's that secret side that somehow comes out every once in a while, you know? And you see a whole different side of a person. That's what I find really interesting. - And I think sometimes adventure brings that out as well. - Yes, yeah. - When I challenge this event, we'll be taking a trip. We went to Ireland and I thought, geez, we've been married in like 20 plus years. And it's, oh, but do we know everything about each other? And we'll surprise each other by sitting down and having a whole new conversation and getting out of our normal routine or the normal surroundings, right? And opens up and say, go. And I also don't know about you, but I also have a little rubble inside me sometimes too, that I don't want somebody to think they know everything about me. - Exactly, yeah, that's... - 'Cause I don't think you know everything about me. - But also don't we don't know everything about ourselves. And the only way we know is to get out and have some kind of adventure, because whether... And I think that's a beautiful-- - By different things. - And the outdoors really will always challenge you because of weather, you know, it's like when we still live in Tucson and also Joshua Tree area. So the desert is interesting. There's storms, the monsoon season is epic, cool. So you get the big monsoon storms, but you could go out hiking. Blue sky is beautiful. And for those who know the desert, you'll just know it's coming. You just can feel it in your body. You can feel if there's gonna be no monsoon season. And it really sucks. Your body's craving that moisture and it's craving the big kaboom. But for someone who's never hyped it, you can go out and it's beautiful. Oh, it's gonna be a beautiful day. Yeah, but it's gonna happen. And you can feel it. And you can get yourself into some serious doo-doo if you don't know, and that's a thing. So you have to, well, in this, there's snakes, there's all kinds of things that you can get. Everywhere, you've got gators where you are. Yeah, you've got gators. You've got gators, you've got sharks in the water. I mean, anything, and you've got cotton mouth. I saw cotton mouth just the other day. So you can get yourself into trouble and then how are you gonna get out of it? That's the, you know. - Yeah, and I find myself a number of times on my adventures where I've got myself a little bit of a trouble. And I do love the desert when I was eight years old. My father sold his John Deere business and Hayward was black, so I'll clear Wisconsin. And he took the summer and he put my two brothers around the house. It was my mother and my three sisters, myself. And he pulled a pop-up trailer behind our Green Station wagon. And we traveled around the United States where he decided where we were gonna live next. And so we had quite a few adventures at that. - Wow, cool. - So I did spend a few months in Sedona during COVID and we were lucky we landed in Sedona. But I did find myself in top of a mountain 'cause I kind of wanted to see what was up there. What does it look like up there? - See, this here it is. - Yeah. - And then suddenly a storm came up and I really literally kind of had to go down on my butt and on my back and hold them to every little, you know, bush that had anything to hold on to 'cause it was a good job. And I was like going, oops. No, I don't know. - She did the desert slide. - I did the desert slide. - I did. - Yep. I've done a lot of sliding and falling into rivers. And there's, yeah. And if there's a snake, call me. I will find the snake. I'm the snake person. If there's anywhere nearby, for some reason, they want to come say hello. (laughs) And so when you're grabbing hold of things, think of that because you never know what you're gonna grab. - Nice, Lisa. - To get out there. Yeah, I know, right? But it's really, it's true. But that's the thing, going through those kind of like, you push your strengths. And afterwards, you know, so long as you get out alive and not broken, you know, you're gonna sit and kind of like, okay, should I, should I, should I, should I, what I, could I, all of those good words come out and you've got to forgive yourself to be able to move on and that's you know, obviously a metaphor for the greater things in life. So what's greater than going on a hiking space? - Yeah, yeah. Well, yeah, you know, and that's one thing with in the book too. I mean, each of the characters has something happened on this journey and they're kind of really pushed beyond what they thought they could do. And, you know, and I love that part. They are able to kind of find, you know, that's strength inside and in unexpected ways. - Who are the women from like the three characters? Do they inspired by specific women? I mean, I love that you're releasing this, actually March 8th is Women International Women's Day. So that is awesome. I know this is airing March 10th, but it is March. So Happy Women's History Month, everyone. So I think it's a perfect timing for your story, but are the women from women, you know, obviously you've met a ton of people in your life in different circumstances with what you do. - Well, I have to say, you know, there's a little bit of me in every character. There are some of my childhood best friends that are in the characters. And there are some of my adult friends that I've met later in life in those characters that are, you know, close to me. So yeah, I really feel like it was like a meld, I like a little bit of everybody and I use a little bit of, like I remember one of my childhood friends we used to camp along the Name of Coggin River. And we would like go skinny dipping in the middle of the day, right? You know, 12, 13 years old, whatever. And, you know, we would, you know, be in the water and then you'd hear the canoe paddles and we'd run up screaming out, you know, running the woods and hide all this kind of stuff, you know, and stuff, you know, the things like, you know, you're due back then when the world was in this, maybe we were even 10, I can't remember. But, you know, there's like a, there's a fun scene that's kind of around that, you know, it's definitely changed to modify and all that kind of stuff. But just sort of memories like that. And one of my very best friends who passed away that she's part of, I dedicated this book to three of my best girlfriends that passed away, each of them the cancer, different types of cancer. One of them, Kathy, I mean, and George, I have to say, in Sydney, they all had a big laugh, you know. And so, you know, just, there's a character that just reminds me, you know, that a big laugh and a big hug, you know, and some of us are really huggers and they can really like, suck the air out of you. You know, there's different characteristics that I gave to Joe, for example, who is a big hugger in the book. You're famous for her bear hugs. - So I like the laughter too. The laughter is important for everything 'cause it allows you, it's humbling, you know. It just kind of allows you to get down to, it's funny. - Well, it lessens the seriousness because if things are really serious and you go down that road, you really have a much harder time finding your way back. - Oh yeah, okay. And you know what, that was one of the goals. And I really hope I achieved it was, I thought that they mix enough bant, witty banter, kind of like, you know, sex in the city, a lot of witty banners. So there's a lot of witty banter between the friends, a lot of teasing. And then you add in some, you know, funny scenes and hilarious things that happen that I would have created enough levity. And so when you got to talk about some of the more serious stuff, you know, it's just easier to talk about, you know. So, and I think that's life. Like if you add some levity, I mean, like how many times have you been like, and tears have been coming down and you've been talking about something and then eventually kind of shifts the end up laughing about it. And you know, this conversation where you're, you know, laughing at yourself and you've been able to move on, right? And I do think that's what we can do for each other. - I agree. That's, to me, the giggles and laughter is, it's the most important thing. Because it just, it gets all the nervous energy out. I mean, even funerals, Nancy and I laugh at funerals. So we're not allowed to go because we look at the giggles. We look at people's hats when you're supposed to be doing something else. We were, at my aunt's funeral, somebody, the one lady's hat, flew off her head and landed on the casket in the grave. - Oh, dear, how do you not laugh? - I, well, I had to laugh. I mean, and I couldn't stop. You know, I mean, it's funny. It was funny. The thing was, do you get the hat out or do you throw dirt on top of it? Nobody knew what to do. - Get it out and you play for as many. - No, they threw dirt on top of it. They buried it. - They buried the hat. - They buried it. - So that's a whole, like, other story. - I know, it's like, wow, you know, better than a hatchet. - It's really nice. - It's really nice. It's very nice. - I still think it's funny. - So do you want campfire confessions to be a movie? - I would love for it to be a movie. You know, I started out writing screenplays. - Oh, see, yeah. - Yeah, cool. - So that's my corporate career. I want to spend a little more time with family because I had gotten remarried and I brought my two daughters into this marriage. And so it's fortunate enough to be able to say, okay, need to spend more time. But I've always wanted to get back to writing. I used to write poems and poetry with one of my childhood best friends, by the way. And so, my name is Robin, just in case she's listening to this. But anyway, so I wrote, I just fell in love with screenwriting and I love, I'm so visual. And so that's one thing fun about screenwriting. So I studied it. I was in Boston at the time. So I started with Howard Square's group writers. And then, you know, went out to L.A. and took courses and conferences and grew up street writers with another writing organization I was with. But just really studied the craft for some time and then I ended up writing about six screenplays. - Cool. - Three of, yeah, I would have to say four of them were pretty strong. One actually optioned a few times as called Nantucket or and it was chosen for Nantucket Arts Festival, not the big film festival, the arts festival, small little thing. But it got a live stage reading, which is really fun with professional actors. - Yeah. - So, yeah, so I feel though, the fun part of that is I thought that I was able to take that visual heart of the writing and, you know, screenplays are about action and dialogue, right? You can't have talking heads, you know, you have to show, you can't just tell them how you're feeling. That's what you can do in a book. You can share emotions but in a screenplay you can't. So you learn how to show things and be visual and dialogue has to be quick and snappy. So I really kind of brought some of that style into the book. So the book moves more quickly. It is not, doesn't have like a ton of description and some readers might really love a lot of description. I tried to find a nice balance there to kind of face moving. So, yeah, I really do see, in fact, I met with the Harvest Course group writers group last night, virtually, it's a wonderful organization for anyone who was interested, I'm very supportive of new and old writers. And so we talked about the book and maybe, you know, so that is, that would be a dream come true. That would be another dream come true. But you read fast and I think that's the screenwriting part of it. It's got a nice case. You're in it from the very first word in the church scene, I'm like, uh oh, I mean, that's like a classic movie entry. Yeah. I see like Julia Roberts in there, I don't know why she's always in a church somewhere. But you've given each character a little kind of body movement that they do, the one is always pressing her forehead, the other one is always stepping one hip out further, you know, than other, yeah, so that you can identify, because now when I read, I'm like, oh, that's her, she's going to move her hip out like that, and then she does it. So, I'm so glad you picked up on that, I worked on that. Oh, no, it's there, it's good, so who would you pick to play these three women? Oh, boy, you know, I was thinking about that, that is hard. In fact, it was starting to, you know, somebody had asked me that question, and it's hard not to because it's, it just belongs, it makes sense. Yeah, I kind of thought Dakota Johnson might be a great one. Margaret Robbie, I may be living a while, Amanda Siegfried, am I seeing that right? Alexander Breckenridge, maybe I'm a stone, I got this right now, Gail got it, Dakota Johnson. Yeah, there's a, yeah, good ages for it too, it's a good, good blend of that, that's, this is cool. I'm excited for you with this, and you just, you got to get like bestseller awards and all of that, I know it's happening, it's there, I know, it's honest. I really appreciate that, because it's really smart AIDS, so it's just one week from today, and we're getting those like, you know, pre-launch nerves, but excitement, and everything in between, and, and I just, I just really, yeah, I guess like anybody wants it to really take off, but it's not just the part of selling the book, it's about the messages too, I mean, I really feel a passion for the messages in the book, and, and just to offer women a chance to just come together and have a fun, entertaining read too, right? There's so much serious stuff out there, I mean, you two laugh a lot, and it's wonderful, but a lot of women have felt very isolated, I think the staff there now that around the world globally, like almost 45%, people feel lonely, you know, and they don't know how to connect, and no, things are changing, and they're getting better, but you know, whenever we can help lift each other up and have that good laugh or that unseen, that's a really good point, because loneliness can be, even if you're surrounded with a family or friends all the time, there's a, there's a, there's a connection that has to happen, and you can lonely nice yourself, you know, but you need to have a connection, you know, there's, you have to build connections in a way, best friends from school, yeah, and I also love that you're putting women in the outdoors, which women love the outdoors, I don't know if it's just that we, you know, as we travel, we, I mean, we're obviously parked for us to animal people, so we're always meeting people of that, you know, kind, but I find it that it's kind of forgotten that women are adventurers too. Absolutely, in fact, here on the island, and also of course in Wisconsin, you know, I'm part of a hiking group and hiking and so we get out and do things together, but when I sit down and talk to women or I do a post, you know, and I try to do a lot of inspirational posts, just, you know, out there in social media, and people really respond to things about nature, I mean, it's so healing, but it's also a place you can go and have fun, and so I really hope the book can take off in book clubs too, and it can be virtual book clubs, now I'll host some virtual book clubs as well, just for women to connect and talk, but there is a lot of just wonderful things about nature, and I don't know how far you got into the book, but there's even just different spiritual beliefs about nature, you know, what does animal represent? Where does the bird represent? You know, I have a lot of friends who love dragonflies, I love dragonflies too, my mother loved dragonflies kind of feeling that. That's a spiritual belief too, it goes with butterflies and water, and have you read Ted Andrews? Oh, I have, his books are tattered in my house, I have the ones in Wisconsin, one here, and I give them to friends. I, yes, I studied his animal speak for years now. And he did one on plants and magical things too, because I always believe in like they're connected, and so a lot of times we'll forget about the plant side, and so there's like a whole other thing with that too, which I need to dig into, because I think I believe plants are communicating with this, I know that's weird, but I do. Well, it's actually a study, I actually studied this. I think it's Max, oh my gosh, I've been in this front of the name, but he was noted, he actually won a Nobel Prize. He was somebody who worked with lie detection tests. So he took a plant in the room, and he was going to, and he was had it hooked up to this lie detection test, and he wasn't getting any readings, so he said, well, I'm going to burn a leaf to see what happens, so I went over to get some matches, and she went off. Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad. It's so, so bad I can remember the name, but it's a true scientific research, and we did win some prizes for that in the science world. And then also Sandra Ingerman, I don't know if you're familiar with her, but she's a world-famous shaman, and she teaches people to respect the earth and to respect the plants and to how to connect with them, and how to really be one with nature. Yeah, it's part of who we are without nature, we would not be here, and everyone's exactly, but different spiritual beliefs, but I think that that's, I think what's beautiful about nature, you're talking about the workshops and everything that you do about, you know, there's neuroscience or science, but there's also spiritual, and I think that's what nature is good, I think nature brings the two together, that is the unity, because so many times it's only spiritual, only science, but Mother Nature is the conduit between the two. I love it, can I use that? I won't let it you with that. Yes, I'm just a voice for Mother Nature. Yeah. Well, I mean, you have to have both, you need to have the plants, and you have to have the animals, you can't have one without the other, it just doesn't work, and everything is connected, because everything works together, you know, and when it doesn't work together, we have things like droughts. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, so this is great, I love it, so you know what, it'd be great, you know, when people go on summer vacation to take your book, Campfire Confessions, and read that, you know, you're sitting, you know, maybe out on a overlooking the mountains on a, you know, mountain vacation, this is a good time to read your book, I think, it'd be perfect, you know, and for women's groups too, so I think this is awesome everyone. Now, did I pronounce your last name correctly, because I did. You did, you were amazing, yeah. Oh, wow, good, because everybody always butcher everyone's name and language, and it's really, I don't mean to you, but it happens, and as soon as I get it right, I get it right, we'll go live, or we'll, you know, hit the record button, and I go backwards, it happens. But anyway, at Christine Oshu is .com is the website, and it's Christine with a K, and it's ochu.com, so go get Campfire Confessions. We thank you so much for joining us, and hopefully, we'll get to go paddling with you in the summer or in the future, maybe we could do it with alligators in Florida. Cool. I'll take you out. All right, if you're a game, work game, you just don't know what you're getting yourself into. Right. I know I'm going to laugh a lot, so some of the laugh is okay. I go in circles. Yes, she does. So just be warned, and apparently, I do make people laugh when I get in a kayak, or a canoe. Can you, I don't know, I don't know, but I could just go on an inner tube and wear arm wings. That's what I'll do. That works too. That'll work, well, thanks so much for joining us, and best wishes with the book. Thank you so much. Thank you to both of you. I really appreciate it. Have a wonderful day. Thank you. You too. Bye. Bye. (air whooshing)