Ryan Snyder

My Writing, 1999-2004

I’ve been in the process of cleaning out the hard disk of an old computer that I’m donating to a local non-profit organization. In doing so, I’ve run into the pieces I wrote between 1999-2004, some of which I’ve decided to publish on Scribd.

Finding your Path: Using Divine Guidance to Determine Your Life’s Direction

After selling Cram Session back in December 1998, I spent some time putzing about between various projects.  One of those projects was to write a book about asking for, receiving and interpreting guidance from one’s God.  I finished Finding your Path in the autumn of 2000, then re-edited the book in 2002 and called it finished.  However, I never took the time to make the book publicly available, until now.

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Giovanni Pascoli Myricae Translations in English

I attended college at The Ohio State University, where I graduated with Bachelors’ degrees in English and Italian.  My senior year I worked on a self-study course where the sole purpose was to translate 20 of Giovanni Pascoli’s 19th century poems.  It has been 7 years since I translated these poems, but felt it was time to make them publicly available so that others could explore the works of Pascoli.

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The Mortician’s Son

My family runs a 4 generation family funeral business, and I was raised in a house attached to the funeral home.  This is a short memoir containing selected vignettes that represent my experience as a mortician’s son from the ages 4 through 8.

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Farfalla

I’ve written poetry for a good portion of my life.  Most of the poems I’ve kept to myself; not for any particular reason, it’s just largely been a private pastime of mine.  The following are few select poems that I decided to share with the public.

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Finding your Path

As I’ve mentioned in other recent blog posts, I’ve been in the process of cleaning out the hard disk of an old computer that I’m donating to a local non-profit organization.  In doing so, I’ve run into many of my writings from 1999-2004, which I’ve decided to publish.  Including a book.

After selling Cram Session back in December 1998, I spent some time putzing about between various projects.  One of those projects was to write a book about asking for, receiving and interpreting guidance from one’s God.  I finished Finding your Path in the autumn of 2000, then re-edited the book in 2002 and called it finished.

At the time I was back in college at The Ohio State University, finishing up Bachelors’ degrees in English and Italian.  I knew little about the publishing process, mainly the fact that it was a lengthy and daunting process and that writers needed to be prepared for a barrage of rejection letters until their works were either published or until the writer gave up hope.  I just didn’t have the energy to commit to that process, and decided to leave the book to grow a layer of proverbial dust on the hard drive of my computer.

Today, there are any number of online self-publishing outfits.  And considering I’ve long since given up any expectations of being paid for my work, I decided to make the available for free:

Finding your Path: Using Divine Guidance to Determine Your Life’s Direction

I really enjoyed the process of writing this book.  When I started writing the book, I was 22 years old, and by that time in my life I had accumulated a number of experiences that I attributed to divine guidance.  One story I like to tell is that for each of the first 3 jobs I took coming out of high school, when I went in for the final interview there was a crow standing on the front steps of each establishment, which I took as a sign that I should accept the job when it was offered.  

Part of the process of obtaining the material for this book was to interview a number of people to find out how they experienced divine guidance in their lives, and to use some of their anonymized stories as examples.  In short, I talked with some fabulous people who shared some pretty profound stories.  

10 years later, writing this book was a wonderful personal growing experience.  When I set out to write this book, I only believed in the idea of predestination; interviewing and having lengthy philosophical discussions with others led me to combining the ideas of predestination and free will in the book as well as my own life.  It allowed me to finally think for myself, rather than always taking another’s word (regardless if derived from God, diety or human) as gospel.  But more importantly, it allowed me to see life as a series of choices we make with God, rather than being dictated by God.

Hopefully making this book publicly available make a positive difference in others’ lives.

The Mortician’s Son

Back in college at The Ohio State University, I took a non-fiction writing course, and decided for one of the assignments that I would write a short memoir about growing up in a funeral home.  My father was a mortician in a 4 generation family business, and my family lived in the house connected to the funeral home. 

Whenever I recount a story from my childhood, people inevitably ask me, “Oh my gosh… What was it like growing up in a funeral home?”  My response is, “It was just normal.  When you see dead people from the time you’re born, you don’t think of it as strange or creepy.”

There are many stories that I’ve collected over the years of growing up in a funeral home, apprenticing with the family business and returning home over the holidays and pitching in to help when needed.  But for this piece I wanted to answer the question above, and the selected vignettes represent my experience as a mortician’s son from the ages 4 through 8:

The Mortician’s Son