How Physics Helped Me Become an Author



MY FIRST NOVEL

Remember all those math courses you were required to take for your high school diploma and/or your university degrees? How many times did you wonder, "What good is all this math? I'm not planning on becoming a mathematician, and besides...I have a calculator." The same was true with Physics. All right, I admit the science of physics might possibly help you as a human being with some Law of Physics that might pop up in your everyday life.

Physics, though, almost did me in. I was an Education major, with biology/science as a teaching field. I took all the biology courses I could, knowing that Physics was also on my Required Courses List for my degree. I could not graduate without it.

A PHYSICS PROFESSOR BUT NOT MINE

The first day of class for this horrendous subject rolled around all too soon. I entered the elevated lecture hall that held three hundred students. I spotted an empty seat five rows up. Excusing myself halfway down the row, I sat down, flipped the desktop over my lap, and placed my books and notebook there.

The year: 1968--I was 28 years old with preschoolers at home. And way out of my element.

Enter the professor, who looked to be about thirty years old and resembled a young Steve McQueen. Not very tall, blonde, cute, fit. He announced his name and said:

"I intend to be an astronaut one day, but in the meantime, I will teach you everything you need to know about physics. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I will give my first lecture, complete with drawings on the chalkboard. Listen carefully--if you do not understand this elementary problem when I finish, pick up your books, walk out, and proceed to the registrar's office and drop this course. You cannot pass if you do not understand what I do today."

A VECTOR FIELD

So, he proceeded filling up the chalkboard with a lesson on Vectors. Remember Vectors? When he finished, several students began to pack up and walk out. I sat there perspiring, with my heart beating too hard, and very close to crying. I HAD to have this course to graduate.

He might as well have titled his lecture "MAN FROM MARS SPEAKS GOBBLEDY-GOOK TO EXPLAIN VECTORS."

Next to me, the blond young woman--probably twenty years old--actually did begin to weep. I said, "I guess you didn't understand the lecture."

"No," she said, wiping her eyes, "and I must have this course to graduate."

"Me, too," I confessed.

"Well, are you going to drop?"

Taking a deep breath, I said, "No. I'll try as hard as I can to pass. I don't even know enough math for this. But I can learn and work hard, and so, I'll give it a go."

"Will you help me? Be my lab partner?" she asked.

I suggested she might get some young engineering student as a partner--not someone like me who knows zip about this. But she wanted someone to feel secure, she said, so we sealed the deal.

To make a long story short, in the labs I developed a way to work backwards with the apparatuses we were manipulating. Don't ask me how I did it...but since I knew the problem and the desired outcome, instead of going from the beginning, I set up the outcome, then worked backwards. Another student--who was taking the course a second time--gave me some advice. He said, the lab professor is quite old, and tired, so when you write up your lab report, write as many pages as you can and include numerous drawings. He goes by volume, not so much content. Well, you should have seen my lab reports. I--and my little friend--made A's in lab. The lecture exams were another problem, but I did know enough to get by. With the lab grade averaged with my lecture grades, I came out with a C the first semester. I cried--well, I'd only made A's in my courses, and I never expected a C in anything. But realizing I was lucky, I worked harder the second semester and made a B. I thanked God for those grades.

Perhaps you get the point of my ramblings today. Never in my wildest imagination did I think I could write a story and get it published as a novel. Actually, the thought never occurred to me. However, after a few incidents in my life, I found myself writing and working hard to polish a manuscript enough to submit to an editor.

There were those unfortunate tries at submitting, but even though New York kept rejecting me and suggesting I get an agent, I continued on my set course of publication. By then I discovered electronic books and found an entire new world and way of accomplishing my goal.

I still thank The Wild Rose Press for my first published novels. They opened the door and believe me, I rushed in. Today, I marvel at the number of works published with Celia Yeary-Author on them. It's still a thrill, just as it was when I received my degree from Texas Tech University, claiming I had successfully completed ALL required courses.

Anything I can do, you can, too--that is, if the desire is there, in your heart and your mind.

What was your inspiration for forging ahead against all odds?

My Publishers:
The Wild Rose Press
Wings ePress
Whimsical Publications
Victory Tales Press (Western Trail Blazer)
Desert Breeze Publishing
Whiskey Creek Press
Willow Moon Publishing

Celia Yeary-Romance...and a little bit 'o Texas
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