Betsy Horvath

Category: The Early Years

  • Lazy Life

    BIG wave

    My friends, it is about a billion degrees here at the Palatial Horvath Estate, which makes me think of the seashore. When I was in first grade (or so), I drew the picture above. It is, as you can see a very BIG and SKINNY wave towering over the shore. I’m not exactly sure what’s going on there – but it looks like we were vacationing in New Jersey during a typhoon. Not pictured (because my scanner’s not big enough), is a small person on the extreme right who is frantically waving her arms in distress.

    By the time I hit fourth grade my relationship with the sea seems to have mellowed. This time, instead of a tidal wave, I wrote a wee bit of an ode to the sea, melodic in it’s redundancy. Huh. Maybe it’s really a pop song.

    Well anyway, as we head into a pressure cooker of a week here in good old Pennsylvania, I thought I would present….”Lazy Life At The Sea” by Little Betsy. See if you can spot the change-up in the last stanza. I was so avant garde.

    It's a lazy life

  • The Story of “Joey Balone”

    In honor of the Curiosity rover landing on Mars earlier this week, I thought I would share the story of “Joey Balone” from the Little Betsy files. I’m pretty sure I meant “Joey Baloney”.

    This was written at the beginning of third grade when I was 8. It might be a little hard to read from a .jpg, so I’ve typed the full text after the photo, preserving the original spelling for full impact.

    And away we go!

     

     

    Joey Balone is a space man.  He lives on pluto.  A planet far far away.  He is 24.  His mother and father are 44.  Popeple on pluto live longer becuse years go by faster.  One day Joey decied to go exploring.  As he was walking along he saw a strang rocket ship go by.  Joey thot it would be inchisting to buld a rocket ship like that.  It took him monthes and monthes to build it but finaly Joey was finshed.  He dident know how well it worked so Joey decided to give it a test.

    After the test Joey was shore that it worked.  So he went out after he ate.  He dident know where to go so he just thout that he’d go for a spin.  Just as he got in a metereright storm blew up!  Poor Joey!  He dident know where he was!  He dident he was going!  But otherwise he exsied!  But he wasent very when he finaly laned.  Boy, was he scared!  he looked and looked at this new land.

     

    Then he looked at his space ship.  It was all banged up.  It had a dent in the side so Joey gave up he would have to make friends with these peopele.  Then he saw a little girl and boy.  They were tiwns.  When they saw him they ran to him and made friends.  Joey thoat he would live with them.  So he did!

    And That the story of Joey Bolone.

    The End

    Happy new year

    Boy oh Boy, am I tired!

     

    And there you go – the full and unabridged story of Joey Balone.  Happy New Year!  Boy oh boy, am I tired!

  • A Fateful Decision

    I have a pack of papers my mother gave me of things I wrote and drew in elementary school. It’s nice. Not only does reading them make me laugh, but reconnecting with little Betsy has helped me understand things I didn’t know before.

    For example, I thought I remembered when I decided to be a writer. I was in my early twenties, driving in to work, thinking about Bruce Springsteen. I often thought about Bruce Springsteen in my early twenties (don’t judge me). I was thinking about how he decided he wanted to be a rock star and how, having made that decision, he just went for it. I remember thinking, “well, I can’t play the guitar, but I like to write. I think I’ll be a writer.” And I started trying in earnest to write books and stories.

    Later, when I was no longer in my early twenties and Bruce and I had gone our separate ways, I thought youthful infatuation had been a pretty stupid reason to make a life-altering decision. Doubt grew. Maybe I wasn’t a writer after all? Then I realized I really did like writing anyway, so what the hell. And I kept at it.

    But I always thought my decision to be a writer had been because of Bruce Springsteen.

    Now, looking through my elementary school papers, I can see that my love of writing came long before my infatuation with Bruce.

    There are so many stories in that pack of papers – way more than I remembered. Little Betsy was creating many different worlds with her number 2 pencil. Yes, the stories were probably the result of homework assignments, but she – I – was happy to write them. You can see that. You can also see the freedom there. I didn’t care if they were good or bad. Of course I was going to write stories. Of course I was going to draw pictures. Of course I could do that and I wanted to do that.

    Now I can see that Little Betsy was always a writer. She just forgot for a while. And the decision that I made on the way to work that day was a decision that had always been there and was just waiting for me to find it again.

    If only I could explain the saxophone lessons….

     

  • The First Synopses

    When I was a kid in first and second grade, we had to write essays every Monday about what we had done on the weekend. Our Weekend Stories, as they were called, were a few paragraphs written on ruled yellow paper and illustrated appropriately with a drawing such as the one to the left.

    I realize this dates me. I believe that first graders today are writing essays about what they did on the weekend using their i-Pads and posting them on their blogs. They photoshop the digital pictures they took with their cell phones at various weekend athletic events and insert them with appropriate special effects.

    But I digress.

    I remember finding it kind of frustrating to write my Weekend Story. First I needed to think of something to write about. And we never seemed to do ANYTHING exciting. There were only so many times I could write “I played Barbie with my sister.”

    Then I had to summarize. I mean the WHOLE WEEKEND had to fit into a few sentences! And, honestly, the less sentences the better as far as I was concerned. Writing neatly was hard (it still is).

    Looking back at my Weekend Stories now, I believe they were my first attempts at the art of writing a synopsis. For example:

    Note the concentration on action, streamlined to hit only the high points: “First we ate.  Then we played.  Then we ate.  Then we played.”  No wasted words – just a brisk summary of events to give the gist of the story.  Note the lack of detail. I have no idea what the “little prade” was that I “murched” in.

    I think I didn’t like writing a synopsis then any better than I like writing one now.

    But that’s okay.  Miss Leta gave me an “O”  😀

     

  • Herman, The Unhappy Loaf Of Bread

    Happy Day Before Thanksgiving everyone!  And in honor of our nation’s day to feast until we drop, I am happy to present my first published work – Herman, The Unhappy Loaf of Bread.  This was written and illustrated by me when I was in 6th grade, and it was supposed to be for the 1st and 2nd graders.  A few of the stories written were bound in hardback by the elementary school (Herman was one of them).  It was even in the library for a while!  (although nobody ever checked it out – I’m trying not to be bitter).  I think you’ll find it to be not only a tale of awesome self-sacrifice for the greater good, but proof that I’ve been carbo-loaded since I was a wee little girl.

    Anyway, without further ado, here’s Herman!

    I’m not quite sure what it says about my sixth grade psyche that my hero’s highest ambition is to be made into sandwiches and eaten…except that I do love me a good peanut butter and jelly sandwich

     Note how tenderly she cradles the loaf of bread in her arms…  I’m not quite sure what those barbell things are on the bottom shelf.  Skeins of yarn?  Candy?  I really can’t remember.


    Ah, Herman. Life is full of disappointments isn’t it?  But never fear, you may get eaten yet…

    I think this really was my first suspense novel.

    I love the tongue sticking out in this picture.  I think this is my version of “Toy Story”  Mom!  The bread comes to life!  LOL

    Oh noooo….what could it be???

    Wow!  I wonder if that dog likes bread?!?  I remember how hard I thought it was to draw that dog.  I think this was the last picture I drew for the book (yes, the artwork is all original Betsy creations. LOL)

    Hump, Herman!  Hump!

    Whew!  That was a close one…

    Awww.  A happy ending.

    Um…I guess.  After all, Herman wasn’t unhappy anymore because he was kind of…consumed.

    But that’s a problem for another therapist.

    So there you go.  Herman, The Unhappy Loaf of Bread is happy, and I hope your Thanksgiving is happy as well.  Have a wonderful holiday!  And don’t let yourself get made into peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  😀

  • Poetry: The Early Years

    My friends, everyone must start somewhere.  And thus it was with my humble self.  I did not spring full grown from my father’s head.  Little Betsy took her tottering steps towards a writing future just as every other writer does.

    In proof of this fact, I offer up the following limerick, which was published in my fifth grade newsletter to great fanfare.  If I remember correctly, which is kind of chancy at this point in my life, I was the absolute Queen of the Limerick in fifth grade. This one’s the best, though. Well, okay, it might not be the best, but it’s the only one I remember. And I thought I’d share it with all of you.

    huh-hmmmmm

    Untitled
    by
    Betsy Horvath in Fifth Grade

     

    Whenever I go far from home
    I send not myself, but a clone.
    The other five me’s
    Sit in the trees,
    Have fun and are never alone.

     

    Honestly, I’m not quite sure where the whole “sit in the trees” thing came from. I did have a favorite tree back then, a tree that was honored in my multi-stanza epic poem “My Tree and Me” (My tree and me / are as happy as can be).  It also might have come from “The Sound of Music”. The scene where all of the kids were hanging out of trees wearing outfits made from old draperies did make quite an impression.

    When I quote this poem as an adult, I tend to change the line to “the other five me’s / will do as we please”, but I wanted to give you the original unaltered version.

    Fifth grade was a year of significant growth in my art, and then in sixth grade my opus maximus “Herman the Unhappy Loaf of Bread” was published. Someday Herman may find his way here too.

    And now I think I shall go out and sit in a tree for a while.

    Thank you for your time.