Girls Take Flight on Isle of Palms

Editor's Note: This week's guest blogger is Isle of Palms native Gretta Kruesi, professional kiteboarder, artist, and environmentalist.  You can follow her work at http://grettakruesi.com/

On the Isle of Palms, we don't often get great waves but we consistantly get a lot of wind. I grew up mostly surfing but the moment I first saw kiteboarding introduced at my local beach and how much fun those guys were having gliding across the water, hitting waves and soaring through the sky, I knew I'd be hooked. It's a sport that we have perfect conditions for with long flat beaches and a steady sea-breeze most days of the year.

Back when I first learned, it was intimidating because there weren't any other girls doing it in the area. There wasn't a female in the sport I could learn from or look up to and say "hey, I want to do that too!" But over the past couple years, the equipment has become more user-friendly and the sport has become increasingly popular among women and men alike. Charleston (known as Chucktown to the kite community) has quickly become a popular kiteboarding destination, with more and more women and girls entering the scene.

I've noticed a big influx of local women ready to give kiteboarding a try. Air Kiteboarding co-owner Elea Faucheron started the Air Kiteboarding Club For Girls last year.  The Club served as a vehicle for local women and girls to get together, look out for each other on the water, and have fun. I'm thrilled everytime I return home to the Isle of Palms and see the comraderie and new female faces at the beach-- and how much everyone has progessed.

Photo: Gretta teaches a girls only workshop on Isle of Palms

This past Sunday, I hosted a "Miss Independent Rider" workshop and Naish gear demo for the Girl's Club. Fifteen enthusiastic women attended to learn more ways to push their riding limits. A few girls even came by just to hang out and support. Not only did we have a blast, it's amazing to think that just a few short years ago the were only a couple female riders total in all of Charleston.

I'm excited to go to the beach and see the emerging community of female kiteboarders and I feel honored to be in the position to promote the sport and help other girls get off the beach and into the water, the way I wish there were girls to do that for me. 

As my friend Dan Floyd always says, "Share the stoke!"  And that's just what these ladies do. So if you happen to see kites flying on the Isle of Palms, chances are it's one of the girls.

PROTECTING WHAT WE LOVE

Editor's Note:  This week's guest blogger is my friend Linda Love, also lovingly known as Nana Butterfly.  You can meet her and learn more about butterflies at Blackbeard's Cove Family Fun Park in Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina.


As I watched the sun rise over Sullivan’s Island on Sunday morning I noticed 13 stately pelicans flying gracefully in a line looking for breakfast. My first thought was you guys are so lucky because your cousins on the Gulf Coast can’t do this anymore. How horrifically sad this oil spill is for all who live on this planet. We can’t imagine what the long term effect this catastrophe will have on all who live in the ocean and on the land.

The frustration of this event causes everyone to say “What can I possibly do?” After pondering this for awhile on my walk I thought we can’t act globally; we can only act locally. Having raised butterflies for the last 12 years I immediately thought of what I do locally and what almost everyone of you can do also. You too can make a difference right in your backyard.

With all the housing growth and deforestation in this area we can replace the natural plants with indigenous plants that take our summer heat, don’t require spraying of pesticides and support the growth of butterflies, bees and hummingbirds.

Mother butterflies will have up to 100 eggs in them and they search constantly for a certain plant to lay their babies on so that they can mature to large caterpillars. If she does not find the specific plant she will die with her eggs in her. There is a long list of plants that supplement the butterflies but to name a few: parsley, dill, fennel, passion vine and milkweed. These plants are hardy and prolific growers with most of them in the perennial category (They come back year after year).

For a quick guide to planting for butterflies here is a simple site: http://www.thebutterflysite.com/create-butterfly-garden.shtml

Butterflies also need nectar sources of blooming flowers but we do have an abundant source of these along our roadsides and in our yards. If you would like to have these cute little creatures pictured here in your backyard to observe and protect just plant the host plants and wait for the mothers to come.

Thinking of my favorite quote on nature I know how true it is that more knowledge will be needed to counter act the devastation in the Gulf will require.

“In the end we will protect only what we love, we will love only what we understand and will understand only what we have been taught”.

A LITERARY ROAD TRIP

A great blog for devoted readers that I enjoy is called Bermudaonion's Weblog, created by Kathy Roberts, a self-proclaimed "middle-aged suburban housewife" who was born in Bermuda and moved 11 times before settling in South Carolina.

Recently, she asked if I would answer some questions about my life and my work for her blog.  I was flattered and she asked some great questions, which she titled and posted online as "Literary Road Trip".  I selected a few of them for you to see today since they seem to be popular ones that readers often ask me.

Kathy:  Please share the story of how sea turtles changed your life.

When I moved to the Isle of Palms I knew I wanted to write a story that included the loggerheads. I began what has become a fundamental of my research –I volunteered. I joined the Island Turtle Team and over the course of two years performed every task from walking the beaches in search of turtle tracks, to moving turtle nests, monitoring hatchings, and keeping records. I was committed to write a novel that didn’t merely use loggerheads as a setting, but rather, to bring an awareness of the plight of this threatened species and to educate the readers as well as entertain them. I wrote THE BEACH HOUSE and its success validated my efforts and green lighted my future books. It helped focus my career as I created my own niche. I’m currently licensed with DNR, I serve on the board of the SC Aquarium, and will always be a “turtle lady” on our barrier islands.

Kathy:  I love that your newer books have an environmental message to them. Can you tell us about your involvement in environmental issues?

Each book I write is set against the backdrop of some environmental issue I feel is timely and that my readers were resonate with. My novel SKYWARD is a love story set at the SC Center for Birds of Prey, SWIMMING LESSONS and my children’s book, TURTLE SUMMER, return to sea turtles. For both, readers participate in their rehabilitation and their uplifting and emotional release back to the wild. SWEETGRASS (re-released May 2010) tells the story of a plantation family struggling to hold on to their land and highlights the area’s historic sweetgrass baskets. TIME IS A RIVER is unique in that this story of a survivor of breast cancer learning to fly fish in the mountains near Asheville, NC holds the message of the healing power of nature. My latest book, LAST LIGHT OVER CAROLINA, is the story of a shrimp boat captain and his wife’s long marriage and depicts the clannish and poignant ties found in the vanishing shrimping communities.along the SE Coast. This book has become suddenly very timely in light of the tragic oil spill in the Gulf.

Kathy:  I know that your next book is about butterflies. Can you tell us a little bit about it? When will it be published?

THE BUTTERFLY’S DAUGHTER might be my most ambitious book yet. Of all the butterflies, I chose the monarch butterfly because it is the most unique and magnificent of all butterflies, and the most common throughout the United States. Who doesn’t know and love a monarch? This amazing bug is the only insect to migrate like a bird or a whale. Yet, it isn’t the same butterfly that makes the round trip. It is the great-great-grandchild! Long live the king! But the monarch is endangered. This year some 80% died. My novel is a mother-daughter story set against the endangered phenomenon of the monarch migration. In other words, we have an amazing road trip that chases butterflies from Milwaukee Wisconsin , through the Midwest to Texas and finally the remote mountains of Mexico where millions of monarch butterflies overwinter.

I’ve spent a year raising monarchs and visited the sanctuaries in Mexico. When I stood before millions of monarchs flying around me like brilliant flames against an azure sky, I knew I was breathing rarified air. It was pure joy—and I had to bring that moment to my readers.

I believe I’ve succeeded in my novel. THE BUTTERFLY’S DAUGHTER will be released from Gallery Books/Simon and Schuster in May 2011.

You can read the complete interview on Bermudaonion's Weblog.   Thanks, Kathy for the great interview!

THOUGHTS ON WRITING: The Struggle with a Blinking Cursor

I do all of my writing on the computer, so the rapid clicking noises my fingers make on the keyboard are the sounds of progress, a story in the works. That is, until the so-called “writer’s block” strikes, forcing my cursor to a blinking halt.


The most recent time it happened was while I was working on THE BUTTERFLY’S DAUGHTER, which is now in revisions and set to be published May 2011. The specifics of my struggle are not as important as what my husband said to me while I was venting my writing frustrations to him. He reminded me that my temporary storyline roadblock, was just part of the process I endure with every novel; a metamorphosis of sorts that I must go through for my story to emerge into what it is intended to be.

Looking back, I see now that I was much like the monarch butterfly I was detailing in my story. This period of writer’s block was similar to the chrysalis stage when the caterpillar quietly transforms into the beautifully painted winged insect. The struggle lasts for days, but soon enough, I emerge renewed, refocused and ready to return to the creative process.

Before the creativity returns, the period is a source of temporary anguish and frustration. American novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne acknowledged this struggle when he once said,

“Easy reading is damn hard writing.”

There are a few things I do to move beyond the writer’s block. I sometimes call my sister whom I lovingly refer to as “my muse.” I can talk out a scene with her to get inspired again. I have also done this countless times with my husband, another special person whose conversation opens up my storytelling vision.

Sometimes I just have to step away from my work. Immerse myself in something else to temporarily forget about the book. Taking time to garden, swim, walk the beach and step outside of my writing cave is often just what I need to feel inspired again.

When I am not writing, I am reading. I like to revisit the classic works of my most favorite writers when I need inspiration-- Charles Dickens, William Blake, Henry David Thoreau, Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters, John Steinbeck and Edith Wharton. Sometimes, I’ll re-read southern classics by Marjorie Rawlings, Eudora Welty, or Tennessee Williams. And I also find modern poetry to be inspiring as well.

My final tip-- don’t ignore your dreams. The images and words provided by the subconscious mind can be a great source of creativity. I trust my dreams, and I often feel most creative and ready to write first thing in the morning.

Whatever you do, just don’t dwell on your frustrations or fears during a state of writer’s block. Instead, take heart knowing that you will find your way back to your story again.

What things do you do to move beyond moments of writer’s block?