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Welcome to Three Questions with Van Heerling. This is where you get to meet authors, actors, painters and anyone else that is bent toward the arts, but on a more personal level. I am thrilled to have artist and writer Tracy Pittman on Three Questions. VH: Tracy, if you had two years left to live from this moment, what would you change about your life? TP: I think that I would quit stalling. By that, I mean start living. When you're young you have dreams and you're biting at the bit to conquer the world, but as you grow older you realize that the world fights back and not only does it fight back, but it's bigger, meaner, and pretty much a bully. You end up hunkering down in a corner just fighting off the wolves. While I would want to spend as much time with my family as possible, I'd also want to break free and see some of the world (the only time I was out of TX was when I was too young to remember it). I want to stand where Michelangelo stood in the Sistine Chapel. I want to hear the rush of a waterfall and run through a field of wild flowers. Stand atop of a mountain or canoe down a river, but most of all I want to walk through a real castle (laugh at me if you will, but it's always been a childhood dream of mine). I think that I would dare to dream and actually have the courage to chase after it. I might even finish this freakin' novel. lol! VH: I think you should find the castle you most want to visit, book a November flight and start pressing your shoes against those castle steps. If you could go back in time to when you were seven years old, what wisdom or advice would you pass onto yourself? TP: When I was young, somewhere around that age, I saw my brother drawing from a magazine. I looked over his shoulder and saw a turtle and...hmm...I can't remember what the other picture was, but it was a drawing contest. One that appeared in most magazines back then. You draw one of the pictures and send it in to see if you were talented enough to go to art school. Anyway, when my brother was done with it, I drew the turtle and then ran to my mother so she could mail it in for me. To my shock, she wadded it up and said that they wouldn't take cheaters. I was crushed when she wouldn't believe that I didn't trace it. I seldom ever drew again after that. My advice to myself would be--that it was all right. Know who you are and what you can do. Never give up on what you love because of someone else's actions or reactions. Believe in yourself when no one else does, because only you can make your dreams come true. VH: Absolutely heartbreaking. I am happy to see that you continued with the arts despite that experience. After a difficult day what do you do to recuperate? Does it work? TP: Well, when I come home from a ten-hour shift at work, my cats greet me at the door. They meow and glare at me until I feed them and change their cat litter and then I trip over them, all the way into the kitchen. Oh wait, what was the question again? Right, well if it's a night shift, then I fix me a nice cup of coffee and then hit the computer to see what my friends were up to all day at Absolute Write, Twitter, and Facebook. And then, depending on my mood, I either watch a movie, read, draw, listen to music (this includes some of Bob Marley and Eric Clapton) and paint. All of those things are very relaxing to me and help me forget my aching feet and back. Plus a dear friend sent me a foot spa! And for a while I can escape this world. Around three or four in the morning, I start my second job--writing. This could go either way...relaxing/headbanging. A lot of coffee is involved. lol. VH: You have great taste when it comes to music. Thank you Tracy.
 Tracy Pittman resides in Texas where she writes horror, science fiction, and fantasy at night. During the day she works forty-hours a week as Head of Dept. at a drug store. She has written several short stories and is currently working on an apocalyptic/horror novel called, One Of Us. Tracy is also an artist and when not writing, she spends her time doing sketches, oil paintings, and ink drawings.
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Welcome to Three Questions with Van Heerling. This is where you get to meet authors, actors, painters and anyone else that is bent toward the arts, but on a more personal level. Today I welcome author, painter and sculptor Uvi Poznansky. VH: At what age were you the happiest? What triggered such joy? Uvi: The happiest memory I have is from my childhood, playing on the beach with wet sand. This memory is vivid in my mind, to the point that I let Ben, the character in my novel Apart From Love, borrow it from me: “I figure I must have visited them a long time ago, as a child. My hands still keep the memory, the touch of wet sand, and the sequence of scooping it, packing it tightly into a bucket, turning it upside down, away from the wave rolling in, then lifting the bucket away to see a castle take shape.” The joy of creation, building castles and sculptures on the beach, is something I remember as a perfect moment, a moment when I am one with the elements: the warmth of the sand, the glow of sunshine, and the playful glint of the waves. Every time I create something, be it painting, sculpture, animation, poem or prose, I go back in my mind to that joy, and I am a child again. “I spot a beam of sunlight caught, somehow, by a grain of sand. It is shining there, as if through a diamond. Under that sparkle, protected from the surge by a jagged wall of rocks, is the pool: the tide pool, in which I used to splash my feet a long time ago, when I visited here as a child, with him. Dazed by the sight, and by the visions it brings out, in layer after layer of memories, I open my mouth and close it again, like a fish out of water.” VH: When was the last time you helped someone? I mean really helped someone. What did you do for this person? Were they grateful or did they resent your help? Uvi: When my father turned seventy, his wife and my brother left him and moved to another place. Being eager to put down the old man, my brother missed no opportunity to quarrel with him, mock his frailty, and even spread rumors about his mental state. Trying to come to my father’s rescue put me often in the ‘line of fire‘--placing me as the outsider in the family, opposite my brother. There, I never expected any emotional satisfaction, quite the opposite. After my father’s death, it took time until I could put things in perspective. And the way I did it was through the power of the pen, and the joy of creation. I wrote a series of short stories around the biblical story of Jacob as a young man, trying to fool his old father. I chose to tell the story in Jacob’s voice, as a way to put myself in my brother’s skin. Here he is, putting on his disguise, getting ready for the last moment he is going to spend with the old man. “After that, my mother attends to the cooking. I can hear the hiss, the slight hiss of the pot as it comes to a boil. I can smell the aroma. Somewhat bland to my taste; but then again, this is the way my father likes his meat. At any rate, he can barely swallow food nowadays. She ladles a steaming hot portion onto a platter and sets it upon a large tray, so I can carry it over there, to his bedside. Then she gives me the slightest of hints. It is all set up. The time is now. My arm covered with the hide of a kid, I stand up. Pretending to be that which I am not, I am ready, at long last, to do her bidding. Ready for my defining moment with my father: The old man is on his deathbed. He is waiting for me. Waiting there, in his tent, for his trusty, favorite son.” VH: After a difficult day what do you do to recuperate? Does it work? Uvi: After a tough day I take a deep breath--literally--and go out for a walk around town, with my loved one. It is a four mile walk, and we stroll rather leisurely, taking in the evening air, the hustle-bustle of city life, and the beautiful view of the beach from afar. If we are in a good mood, this works like a charm. We hold hands and tell each other about the events of the day. But even if not, it gives us an opportunity to talk, and to iron out the kinks between us. We have been doing this evening walk every evening, in cold weather and hot, wherever fate happened to find us. So does it work? You judge... We’ve been together for thirty-some years. VH: I think it works. Thank you Uvi.  Apart From Love Written with passionate conviction, this story is being told by two of its characters: Ben, a twenty-seven years old student, and Anita, a plain-spoken, spunky, uneducated redhead, freshly married to Lenny, his aging father. Behind his back, Ben and Anita find themselves increasingly drawn to each other. They take turns using an old tape recorder to express their most intimate thoughts, not realizing at first that their voices are being captured by him. Meanwhile, Lenny is trying to keep a secret from both of them: his ex-wife, Ben's mother, a talented pianist, has been stricken with an early-onset alzheimer. Taking care of her gradually weighs him down. What emerges in these characters is a struggle, a desperate, daring struggle to find a path out of conflicts, out of isolation, from guilt to forgiveness. The title Apart From Love comes from a phrase used in the story: After a while I whispered, like, "Just say something to me. Anything." And I thought, Any other word apart from Love, 'cause that word is diluted, and no one knows what it really means, anyway. Anita to Lenny, in Apart From Love Why, why can't you say nothing? Say any word--but that one, 'cause you don't really mean it. Nobody does. Say anything, apart from Love. Anita to Ben, in The Entertainer For my own sake I should have been much more careful. Now--even in her absence--I find myself in her hands, which feels strange to me. I am surrounded--and at the same time, isolated. I am alone. I am apart from Love. Ben, in Nothing Surrendered Amazon ebook Amazon Paperback Barnes and Noble Paperback 
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"For me, writing is a joyful torture or sorts." ~vh~ “In this life, seek your own answers, and quote yourself for a change.” ~vh~
The muse has tapped my shoulder and my ear is turned toward her lips. I am waiting for her whisper. ~vh~
"The funny thing about life: more often than not it’s laughing at you rather than you laughing at it." ~vh~
"At some point there is a moment when you should give up. I’m here to tell you that today is not that day." ~vh~
“If you are afraid of the truth, never ask a young child a question.” ~vh~
“The frailty of life is most evident at its last breath.” vh
“Prove not to the world but to yourself that you are above your current circumstance.” ~vh~
"Don't be wishful when it comes to your dreams. Take aggressive action in your pursuit of them. Start now with a single step, no matter how insignificant it may feel." ~vh~
"Nothing is more powerful than an unwavering, unapologetic decision to BE." ~vh~
"Strive to be the light in an ever-darkening world. SHINE!" ~vh~
"Think big and then think small. That’s where the details live." ~vh~
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