Lithia Writers Collective

2010-10-20T17:03:00.000-07:00

Van Attachment -- Kelly

2010-04-30T08:06:00.000-07:00

I have a complicated relationship with my eight-year-old minivan. Every time I see her I see myself.

She's silver-grey, like an overcast sky or a rock road. Perfect camouflage, her color renders her invisible. Her body's not what it used to be, either, missing a big piece of trim and sporting hail stone pockmarks. There's that scrape from the misjudged turn, another from the Starbucks drive-through, yet another from a tree. I won't catalogue the dents, but they're noticeable and plural. One sliding door is broken and the other is recalcitrant and the repair costs are way too high for such luxuries.

For a long time I took pride in my van. She was very fancy when brand new, and among the cars of Oregon she gleamed. When we moved to Texas and I found myself invisible in the carpool line between a Hummer and a Porsche, I felt superior to the materialists who somehow needed a fancy carapace. I wasn't like that, you see. I was perfectly happy with my utilitarian, reliable transportation (and my Birkenstocks and jeans, but that's another story....or is it?). My van rendered me anonymous in a new community, free to observe the landscape, able to move stealthily through the new environment.

Her inside began to resemble her outside. Old French fries, kid meal toys, multiple water bottles in various stages of consumption, a gaggle of empty coffee cups, school papers, books, receipts....they all piled up between my ever less frequent trips to the car wash. I took a perverse pride in this, too. She was lived-in. I could always find something to drink. And why bother cleaning her out only to have her fill up again in a week?

But slowly I began to resent her. She was certainly not the car I'd planned to be driving when I was 50. And when four of five women in my core group of friends bought lovely new vehicles in an 18 month period I found myself with a raging case of new car fever. I had grand thoughts. I researched comfort, foreign and domestic. The van was an embarrassment, an old aunt who'd "let herself go." But a new car wasn't in the budget. As The Man reminded me, she was paid for, ran well, and had a long shelf life. I began to think of her as The Van that Would Never Die. And now that I've just paid for a major service and a new timing belt, I know she's - unfortunately - perfectly healthy.

Some of you know about my stumbling attempts at meditation and Buddhism. I understand that attachment leads to suffering. And this is certainly true when it comes to my van. The perverse pride I took in her ordinariness and invisibility was merely a cover for insecurity in a new environment and led me into disorder. The resentment I feel toward her serves no purpose other than to make me feel bad and desire something for which I have no need.

So I'm trying to break my attachment to my van and to treat her mindfully. I cleaned everything out and visited the car wash. I'm making sure that both Young Girl and I take out everything we put in and leave only minimal supplies (soccer ball, lap desk, notebook paper) inside. I would not say that I'm taking pride in my clean van or feeling particularly noble about my efforts. I'm simply trying to make my van part of my practice.

So far, so good.

For a wonderful look at practice in everyday life, whatever your faith tradition, pick up a copy of Karen Maezen Miller's new book "hand wash cold: care instructions for an ordinary life."

The Little Match Girl--Marcia

2009-12-12T14:21:00.000-08:00

The roads turned into sheets of ice last night. It took only moments for the cold to soak through my jeans, and it took hours to warm back up.

We canceled the Roosevelt caroling party. The image of fifty children racing, sliding, colliding, and cracking the whip along Queen Anne Street and Academy Way was all we needed to decide to pull the plug. I parked my car down by the crumbling tennis courts at the far edge of the playground and waited for the stragglers I knew would show up.

My kids immediately got out of the car and started sliding around on the sidewalk--Bowling for each other. It didn't take long before merry revelers showed up with their canned food and cookies and joined in, despite my insistence that the function was canceled.

There must have been 25 of us clustered around Allison's SUV singing because we might as well anyway. Here were children. Here were mini cupcakes, chocolate cookies, and rice crispie treats. Someone had a candle in a jam jar. Someone had a flashlight. Someone in a puffy pink snow suit came wrapped in a battery-operated light pack. So we sing. Jingle Bells, Frosty the Snowman 'was a Hmm, Hmm, Hmm,mm mm', Silent Night, Joy to the World, Feliz Navidad 'Prospero Ano y hmm-hmm, hmm-hmm.'

A little girl named Juliet sang a solo about a rooftop. It was staggering. Another tiny one led us in 12 Days of Christmas and we sussed out 8-12 on the fly. We questioned ourselves all the way until '5 golden rings' and we all knew the home stretch. It was good--And it was cold. The sky was crystal, the ground was crystal.

It was a great show of spirit, standing there against the chain link fence. Our new school loomed, under construction behind us, the street too icy to drive down was empty. I was proud of us for rallying and enjoying ourselves. We sang 'We Wish You a Merry Christmas' and meant it. It felt very subversive given the stir in Ashland over the Christmas tree at Bellview Elementary.

I woke up this morning, lit the flame under my tea kettle and thought about "The Little Match Girl," a story my mother used to read to me every Christmas. I bought the book for Daniel when he was born. When he was old enough, I started to read it and then put it away. It's a horrible story. The girl dies on the street because no one will buy her last match. She curls up in a ball and freezes to death.

I looked out the window at iced over grass, the hoar frost on all the branches, the dead quiet grey of the morning. And then I thought of Joanie Mc Gowan.

Joanie was a local personality. I wanted to be her. Sometimes we would wind up in the same place, the same functions, fundraisers, concerts. She had no idea who I was. I was an insignificant nobody. She lived as if she was on fire. Tall tall woman, giant hair, big throaty voice, funny funny wisecracker, great red lipstick. Living juicy. I wanted to be her friend, hobnob in her circle, become one of the stand up comedians with the group she helped start--the Hamazons. That was so me. If only she knew, we were supposed to be best friends.

Then one day about four years ago on a bitter cold morning in February, just like this one, a fellow commentator on the radio, walking on the greenway in Ashland, found her. She was dressed only in blue jeans and a bra. She was blue from cold, her great wild mane of curly black hair fanned out around her. No one really knows what happened. There was no foul play. Something snapped inside of her. She got hypothermia. She died. The gorgeous, glamorous diva, died like a transient on a cold winter night. She faked "fabulous" so well.

As the temperatures drop and the holidays loom, take good care of your friends. Light a match to a candle in their name. Keep them warm, keep them safe. Even strangers can come together around nothing more than a chain-link fence and find some comfort and joy on a cold and empty night.

Amen Joanie, I'm thinking of you. I still hear the shadow of your voice when I turn on the radio.

Growing Up--Marcia

2009-12-07T13:40:00.000-08:00

I walk the mile or so to school this morning. The trees are grey and silver. Every breath becomes a cloud. It is so bitterly cold my nostrils ache. But it feels good to feel my feet move over the ground. I love the grey, pink, bruised blue colors of a sky aching for snow.

I remember walking through deep snow to get to the art studios at my college. I'd trudge out in a wool skirt, vintage petticoat, long undies, heavy boots, down coat, and hat. We had no choice but to walk. It is my oldest child's eleventh birthday. I want to find a way to mark it. I can walk and remember.

It snowed the night before he was born. My sister and brother-in-law were catering a Christmas party about 40 minutes north in the country. Some rich guy with a 70 stall garage. He wanted a luau and roast pig. The boys had never done a roast pig before. Betsy and Andy made it there and back over the snow-thick roads, but not without Andy winding up covered in pig fat from trying to carve that buried pig.

I filmed that day, not the pig fest, but the snow storm. The deep quiet everywhere. The branches laden with their fingers of snow. Funny, I gave birth to the loudest baby ever born in the Rogue Valley Medical Center--Daniel-The Fire-Breathing-Baby from Hell.

He yelled and he nursed. The only place he would sleep was on my chest, head tucked under my chin. That held true, minus the nursing part, until he was about six years old.

Daniel is 5 ft. tall now. He looks good in his jeans. He loves basketball shoes and knows how to move in them. He scored 18 points out of 22 at his last basketball game, and yet if you ask him how many baskets he made, he doesn't know the answer. He still loves to be read to, wants to snuggle when we watch movies, will play "guys" with his little brother, and run around in a dinosaur costume that is way too small. He will try to make friends with anyone and is sad if it doesn't work out. He still misses his best friend from Kindergarten, but still has his best friend from first grade.

He just asked for Axe deodorant--I also got him the shower gel. It promises to make "Dirty Boys Clean." Oh boy. Can't wait.

Eleven.

He is no longer "10 and under . . ." The expectations are greater. The pressure increases. I feel it within myself. Then I have to remember he is interested in the world, loves people, is fun-loving, kind to others, and still has a sense of wonder.

Happy birthday my beautiful, beautiful child.

Here's to writing friends out in the blogosphere --Kerry

2009-09-29T14:04:00.001-07:00

There's really nothing quite as nice to a writer as asking her writer friends to proof a piece due for submission in less than twenty-four hours, on a Sunday to boot, and having them respond with feedback and help. This behavior merits a "true writer friend" title, and I bequeath it on Christy and Jennie, who performed the aforementioned good deed.

We writer types spend a lot of time alone hunched over the computer shooing away dogs, kids and phone calls like flies as they alight anywhere near us. We are not generally consistently this ornery, rather it is in the guidelines to the craft of writing that we have to perform in solitude because as my mother would say,"no one else can do it for you." So we are alone alot and rarely does anyone but a writer friend really understand your need to converse with other writer friends who feel your angst over a pending assignment and can help you allieve it.

As a twenty-something fledgling reporter, I thought I knew it all and writing groups were for middle-aged mommies. Gulp, I have reached that pinnacle but hey, it's not so bad here, and I get why we as writers need each other, because Lord knows asking my husband to edit something when he's trying to watch football is just plain crazy and really why chance it?

Autumn Deficit Disorder -- Kelly

2009-09-11T23:59:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year when I long for a fall that just won't come. When the usually ubiquitous squirrels go missing, probably to Vermont or some autumn haven, because nothing in the atmosphere suggests they should bother burying acorns. When the desire to pluck a perfectly ripe apple from a tree is defeated by green pecans.

But this morning brought gentle rain and a hint of coolness. Such minuscule harbingers of fall always improve my mood and inspire new ideas.

Along these lines, here are some random plans/resolutions for the upcoming season.

1. Eschew restaurants for food I cook myself.

2. Go to my daughter's soccer practices and games with glee.

3. Revive my blogging spirit.

4. Advocate calmly for health care reform.

5. Advocate calmly, period.

6. Inspired by K a r e n M a e z e n M i l l e r , do the laundry.

7. Attack a pile of paper a day.

8. Spend time outdoors, damn the mosquitoes.

9. Touch base once each week with an old friend.

10. Renew.

This Little Piggy

2009-07-18T10:24:00.000-07:00

People's appendages seem to be in serious jeopardy lately.

Maybe it's because I ripped off my own toenail (getting into the car) last month, but I seem to be seeing and hearing a lot of toe and finger tragedies.

There's the guy at Dave's fire department who severed his pinky at the knuckle when it got caught in a ladder.

Another brother sliced his finger a few days later.

My little friend Riley tore off her big toenail.

And my friend Linda was run over by a grocery cart, then stepped on by a coffee shop customer.

What's interesting about these stories is not so much the plot of it all, but the characters' reactions to it. Honestly, it's quite telling, the way one responds to driving a hammer into one's thumb.

Though I'm sorry for these folks' suffering, I am, admittedly and sickly, except for the lost finger, amused by the effects. There's been some crying, some swearing, some shrieking, some grace.

I guess there are two things to learn from all this: to study people in appendage crises, and to be extra careful right now when walking barefoot or shutting doors or using electric knives.

43, Luckily -- Kerry

2009-07-16T18:23:00.000-07:00

My sister-in-law died on her 42nd birthday a few years ago.
I made it to 43 today and celebrated with, among others, her three remaining children.
I threw a covert glance in her eldest daughter's direction. She resembles her mother the most. I wondered if she felt the injustice of a life cut short every day, like I was feeling right now.
Perhaps every birthday I should glance in these children's direction and remind myself that I too am mortal, that I should never ever forget what an amazing miracle it is that we walk on this earth, for whatever amount of time we're here.
Me, I'm glad for 43.

WOW!

2009-07-08T22:52:00.000-07:00

I knew 7/8/9 would be a lucky day! I got my first WoW (Waiting on Wednesday) post - which means a YA book reviewer has marked my book as one she's excited to read! You have no idea how cool this is to a newbie author. Seriously. I'm levitating right now. Thanks Catt!

Click here to check out at Catt's blog, The Dreamer Reader, and see the 7 reasons why she wants to read the book!

Another one flies the coop

2009-07-02T09:12:00.001-07:00

When is enough enough? How do you know you are done with a manuscript? I find it a lot easier to write "The End" on a first draft than I do with subsequent drafts. I just sent off my work-in-progress manuscript (Astrid) to my agent and I had a hard time figuring out if I was “done” or not. When someone questions your work, pushes you to strive for more, it’s hard to know if you’ve reached that goal they had in mind for you.

For me, the biggest surprise in this publishing process is how little line editing is done early in the process—mostly you receive “notes” in letter form, describing overall things that need to change with not a lot of direction about how to do it. And it seems you could do one of a hundred things to fix each thing! In my experience, revision has been a bit like throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks. But then again, I have a very editorial agent who wants to go through a revision (or two!) before ever sending to editors.

So, Astrid is gone. She’s flown from my email to a desktop where she will be printed and scrutinized. Good thing I have so much to do in the coming weeks—stewing over whether or not the spaghetti is sticking to the wall is no fun at all.

How do you know when you are done?

Dispatch from Salt Lake City -- Kelly

2009-06-26T19:15:00.000-07:00

Some random musings from the cross-country drive:

• What do you do when you pull out of your driveway to log 2200 miles, turn on your radio, and get NOTHING? That means no NPR, no random Tejano, no books on iPod. You decide to be in the moment, as deep introspection interferes with driving acuity.

• The taste of fear: being in the middle of the pack of cars and trucks driving 85 mph on I-25, even when it’s down to one lane.

• Even though the amber waves of grain have been harvested to frankly unattractive stubble, the purple mountains’ majesty is out in full force, last lingerings of snow on top.

• Breathtaking? Two huge thunderstorm cells outlining a clear alley when you turn west into Wyoming. Alas, the alley did not stay clear; a truly horrendous thunderstorm (and, as a Texan, I’ve seen my share) with an active lightning display, followed by pea-soup fog on a twisty bit of I-80, makes the last room at the overpriced Best Western look mighty good indeed.

• Little America is still scary.

• The Hotel Monaco Salt Lake City is featuring white sangria in its fabled Wine Hour. Yum.

Books that changed me -- Kerry

2009-06-22T19:29:00.000-07:00

I just finished reading "Thirteen Books That Changed America" by Jay Parini.

Books I don't really think about much, but am now more than ever aware of how they influenced readers in their time.

"Of Plymouth Plantation" through the "Feminine Mystique" along with such classics as "Uncle Tom's Cabin" and "Hucklerry Finn" are eloquently summarized (without having to read the cliff notes!) by the author.

I realized how many books have also influenced me in my life.

Anyone remember how cool the real Nancy Drew was? Or the first time you read "Are you there God it's Me Margaret" by Judy Blume?

Years after my juvenile forays into life shattering literature I plunged voraciously into a whole lot of a little of everything, "Ya Ya Sisters," by Rebecca Wells. "Living with Uncertainty," by Pema Chodron - they all changed me.

There are countless others. What about you?

Happy Father's Day! -- Jennie

2009-06-21T21:22:00.000-07:00

Here's me and the best poppa in the world in Tahoe last week:

Trip Prep

2009-06-19T10:26:00.000-07:00

I began, today, the ritual Sorting of the Clothes.

First stop? Melange Mountain, the stratified heap of miscellany in my dressing area. I recovered a few missing items, uncovered two forgotten purchases, and discovered many things that Simply Will No Longer Do.

Next stop? The Oregon Pile, where I re-heap the clothes I may need for my trip, including long sleeved items and light jackets that make me sweat on sight, even in my air conditioned rooms.

Final Stop? Laundry Junction, where I de-dirt the delicates and soap the sturdy.

Actual packing begins Sunday!

Working Writer-Marcia

2009-06-17T18:08:00.000-07:00

Today was a business day. Always fun in writing land. I sent something off to This American Life--It could take six months to hear. I sent something off to O magazine, and drafted a query for Parenting.

It's fun to act like a real writer.

I've been working on my chicken story and hope to post it here later, but Daniel made the Allstar team, for 9-10 boys so, I'm off to the baseball diamonds.

Silence begins...NOW!

2009-06-11T15:02:00.001-07:00

In a few minutes I'm heading out to the Moody cabin for some high-level hermitry. Between this evening when I arrive and Monday afternoon when I leave, I'll finish my revision of Book One, get to the halfway point of Book Two, and possibly dabble in a WIP I've got going on the sidelines.

No TV, no intewebz, no children, no laundry.

No problem!

Ding Dong Deconstruction circa 1969--Marcia

2009-06-10T14:48:00.000-07:00

My mother hides the Ding Dongs at the back of the fridge so my brothers can have one when they get home from basketball practice or smoking doobies on their surfboards. Only she doesn't know about the doobies part. All I can think about are those Ding Dongs. If I try to sneak a Pecan Sandie my mother can hear the wrapping, If I try to sneak one of my dad's weird Tiger's Milk bars she can heart hat too. Ding Dongs are the perfect food. Packed so tight they are soundless tinfoil hockey pucks. If I can get my hand inside the white cardboard box and back out again without making a whumping noise my mom won't know. She's very busy. There is a lot to vacuum here.

I usually wear a polyester skirt with an elastic waist band and polyester shorts underneath. Girls are not allowed to wear pants to school, but we can't swing on the monkey bars unless we have petit pants or shorts on. Petit pants are really pretty underwear that look like shorts. Caroline Krupp has a pair that are swirly like a melted creamsicle . . . pink, purple, and yellow with a lace edge. My mother will not let me have any of those. This might be a good idea since the monkey bars are close to the boardwalk and any old person walking along the beach can see your petit pants, so I don't beg too much.

I also am not allowed to have a tutu, plastic high heels from Market Basket that have yellow fluffy feathers on them, or Ken dolls. My father did let my mother get my sister and I Barbies.

If it's a day when Jim Grey spits at me at the bus stop, or Chrissy Mac Niece throws dried dog poo on my new turtleneck, or no matter what Miss Hilton in her GoGo boots tells me I can't come up with the right numbers for 24 plus 36, I can't wait to get off the bus and stuff a Ding Dong in my favorite pair of stretchy shorts (red with polka dots--Sears Chubbies) and head to the guest bathroom at the back of the house by the garage.

Cold Ding Dongs are no good. If you can hear your mother calling you, or know your big brothers are about to come storming down the hall banging on the door and rattling the knob then eat it fast. There is no place to really hide a Ding Dong. They'll find it. But the best way to have a Ding Dong is to warm it up a little.

This requires a little extra time. If you don't want to eat cold hard chocolate and dry cake that doesn't taste cakey you have to pretend you're going Number 2. Hold the Ding Dong like a little bird up close to you, but not for too long or it gets ruined and all the coating melts on to the inside of the foil. Maybe count to whatever 24 plus 36 is.

Hold your breath and sit very still. The foil is very smooth on top, but folded like tiny sails all around and whirling like going down a drain at the bottom so it can close together and not show any Ding Dong. Listen make sure no one's coming. It makes a little noise if you don't pick it apart very carefully with thumb and pointer. Open it really slow so there's not even a little bit of crinkling noise. The chocolate coating will be just right, not too soft, and not too cold where it breaks off in chunks and tastes like candle wax after Sunday dinner.

You want to peel all the just-right chocolate off with your teeth, and then eat the cakey cake, sponge-y and hole-y, but not as good as birthday cake. Birthday cake is my favorite. I eat the cake first and the frosting last.

It always seems like there will be a whole bunch of white, pure-white, whiter-than Crest-white blop of cream in the middle. Then you get to the middle and it's only the size of a gumball-machine gumball. It's kind of a gyp. Still, if you can tell your Mom is upstairs sorting laundry or changing all the sheets you have time to eat around the Ding Dong until all that's left is just a fat-pea blop of cream covered in brown cake crumbs. Then you pop it in your mouth. It is quiet and the best part of coming home after school.

Did the front door just open? Can you hear your giant brothers throwing back packs and shouting? Can you hear Mom headed to the kitchen to start peeling carrots and turn on the stove? Sometimes this makes my heart go fast and my face get prickly.

Ding Dong tinfoil is so thin, wipe out all the wrinkles and press it flat against your leg and it's like a Barbie space blanket. Stephanie Brown had a space blanket for Silly Skilly Days, our sleepover Girl Scout camp at Rancho Santiago. It sounded like someone was digging in garbage at a fourth of July picnic every time she rolled over. Sometime I'll tell you about Space Sticks and Tang.

It's nice to try to rub the wrinkles our of the wrapper for awhile. Pick off any crumbs with a wet fingertip, and make up things you could do with that perfect square if you could leave the bathroom with it.. But you have to get rid of it.

It's the only bad thing about stealing Ding Dongs.

If you put it in your pants you could forget and it could fall out, or your brother or Chrissy Mac Niece could chase you and it could fall out. And then they'd make fun of you until you were grown up. Or even after.

You could eat it, it's really thin. But that would ruin everything. I roll it up as tight as it can get. Squinch it down to the same size as the blop of cream in the middle of the Ding Dong and then bury it in the pale plastic garbage can under the bathroom sink. Don't let any of the foil press against the edge of the can or it will show. Careful of gooey tissues, they're gross.

Then you should probably go to the bathroom, or at least rattle the toilet paper roll and flush to make it sound real. Then straighten out your stretchy skirt and shorts, open the door, and pretend like nothing happened.

And that's how you steal a Ding Dong.

Commiserate -- Kerry

2009-06-09T20:27:00.000-07:00

"I'd like to have the perfect twin. One that walks out, when I walk in. I'd like to catch that big brass ring. I want everything, everything," Barbara Streisand/ A Star is Born, 1979.
-listened to on a vinyl 78 lp record player by a twelve-year old girl ready to change the world.

"Hey little Mama you're a class all you own," Chris Brown/With You/2009,
-listened to on an ipod portable speaker by the twelve-year old daughter of the aforementioned twelve-year old girl.

I suppose there comes a time in every parents time in the Western Hemisphere, or at least the west coast hemisphere, when we remember with crystal clear clarity being in fifth grade and what it felt like as we observe our children undergo the same experience.

Claire graduated from fifth grade this week. She was hacked off she had to wear a bra (ditto her mother) but even more miffed that she had to still go to bed at 8:30, because Lord knows she was old enough to rule her own life, thank you very much.

She blared music from her room.

I stood outside her doorway and debated my options. Should I play the hardcore mommy card and tell her it was time for bed or should I confess that I remember what all this growth felt like?

My journey with hypnotherapy came to light. According to a basic caveat in the art of hypnosis, we are all arrested children and communicate often as such.

So from one twelve year-old to another, I went in, curled up on her bed, and started to commiserate.

Faith, Hope, and Blueberries -- Jennie

2009-06-07T10:03:00.001-07:00

I'm a day or two away from sending my revision back to an editor. I love the suggestions he had given me, even if they were pretty tough to pull off.

Here's what got me through shrinking 55,000 words down to 40K, while flushing out characters and motivation, backstory and arc:

* faith. That what he told me to do was brilliant.
* hope. That I did what I was supposed to do. That he'll like it.
* blueberries.
* long walks.
* yoga.
* days when I didn't work but when the kids were in school.
* a serious love of my character.
* a planned week in Tahoe, following re-submission.

All that. Plus some serious caffeine.

Let Evening Come -- Kelly

2009-06-05T20:22:00.000-07:00

My mother died a week ago tonight, and her memorial service was today.

I thought I'd share the poem I read, since I obviously haven't been doing any writing.

Let Evening Come (by Jane Kenyon)

Let the light of late afternoon
shine through the chinks in the barn, moving
up the bales as the sun moves down.

Let the crickets take up chafing
as a woman takes up her needles
and her yarn. Let evening come.

Let dew collect on the hoe abandoned
in long grass. Let the stars appear
and the moon disclose her silver horn.

Let the fox go back to its sandy den.
Let the wind die down. Let the shed
go black inside. Let evening come.

To the bottle in the ditch, to the scoop
in the oats, to air in the lung
let evening come.

Let it come, as it will, and don't
be afraid. God does not leave us
comfortless, so let evening come.

Outdoor School/Indoor Mom -- Kerry

2009-06-02T19:55:00.000-07:00

Along the lines of Jennie's post, I am cramming two field trips, laundry and a girl scout outing into my already busy week without my husband or oldest child who are attending outdoor school.

While there is a bit more silence around the house, fewer bodies and more general independence on my part (first in line at the computer and the bathroom all to myself), there is also a chasm.
I find myself drifting into it as I do all the dishes after dinner sans aformentioned husband and dilligent eldest child, reading and tucking the kids into bed, and folding laundry; all tasks my husband and I have shared in tandem almost rhythmically for the last ten years.

In the morning, I ponder the idea of feeding the chickens and walking the dog, after I dress the five year-old and cook a hot breakfast for she and the eight year-old. Then I'll go to the barn, price tag about fifty items and push a whole room full of furniture around.

All my choices, but still, I am exhausted even thinking about them.

Alright, I give, I am not the woman from the 1970's Angelie perfume commercial who sang,
"I can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never never let you forget you're a man," that has been seared into my psyche along with the theme song from Batman and the names of the Mod Squad.

Honestly, who is that woman anyway?

What's (Not) Going On?

2009-05-31T08:28:00.000-07:00

Not much is going on in the blogosphere.

Understandably.

It's a super busy time of year. The days are longer; there are places to go and yardwork to do. If you have kids, they're going on field trips every other day right now. Plus, there are the track meets, music recitals, choir concerts, softball tournaments, birthday parties, barbecues, and graduations.

If you're a student or a teacher, you have finals.

Or maybe the decent weather has prompted you to get out and make some money in this sick economy.

There's some wedding stuff, too. I've wondered how the bridal industry has been hit by the recession, which has led me to thinking about depression weddings: if there were fewer than usual, if the gifts were more less-expensive or even homemade, if the feast was pared-down and the guest list trimmed.

Seriously, though. I don't have time to think.

I have All Of The Above, plus two manuscripts to revise.

It might be crazy spring, but it's time to get crackin'.

Note for Note-For Mom who Couldn't be there--Marcia

2009-05-27T12:34:00.000-07:00

James composed his first song at around three and a half. He was in time-out in what we call "Granny's Room". I was moving through the house doing what moms do and overheard him singing the blues, hunched over like Mississippi John Hurt. . . "Mommy took my video/flushed it down the toilet/ I loved that video now I'll never see it again--Ohhhh." I was impressed with the composition and the poetic license.

There have been other instances of musical genius over the years. Daniel and his two mock-sisters Jenna and Sophie (mock-sisters to each other-separated only by a few houses) had a band called "Ruby Red and City Slick." Sophie was Ruby, Jenna was Red, and Daniel was City Slick. They used to perform at every BBQ, Christmas Party, and vague reason to gather and drink good wine.

The girls had a much bigger desire to put on boas and flap around in front of the parents. Daniel was having none of it. The last night of his incarnation as City Slick, Ruby and Red were definately macking on the mic, pushing Slick further into the shadows. Finally, when the Sistas realized they were about to lose what could pan out to be their main draw, they threw Daniel a guitar solo. Daniel knows he doesn't know how to play, he does know he has a voice, and it's possible he might think he's a tad better than they are. He might have looked at his girls and said something like, "You guys suck," and left the room. The girls quickly went running after him, trying to get Daniel to consider a reunion tour.

James, however, didn't waste a minute. He was on that mini red Fender like a hungry hawk on a dachsund. He strapped that thing on like he'd been doing it all his life. He addressed his audience from his stage by the fireplace . . . "Okay, ladies and gentlemen, this is the halftime show." He struck the strings with all the vigor of Stevie Ray Vaughn impersonating Elvis. He'd been watching somebody's moves. His head kept time, his shoulders were grooving, his knees flexing, there was flourish, there was passion . . . Sweet James . . . the one who never tried to find a place in the spotlight stole the show.

He did it again Thursday night up at the Manor.

He has been taking piano with Mrs. Brown for about three months. Seeing as my sainted mother-in-law thinks he's delayed, we decided to hone some fine motor skills and harness his kooky mind. Mrs. Brown has been teaching in the little yellow house near the crossroads of Roosevelt and Donut Country for 40-some years. Everyone knows Mrs. Brown . . . If they play piano. That is life in Medford.

Every Monday James rushes straight from school, hops on his scooter, and we race down to Mrs. B's. His clothes are usually covered in dust from the rocks on the Hoover playground (yes, rocks!), his pants are hanging down around his hips a good three inches of whatever kind of underwear showing, and his hands are a little grubby. But he loves Mrs. Brown, and he really wants a "sculpture."

Mrs. Brown keeps a very accurate and elaborate tally system based on homework, memorization and performance. When you get 100 points you earn the bust of a composer. Red aka Jenna, has a whole bunch of sculptures, and James knows it. He told Mrs. Brown. James wants to catch up. So James decided to perform at his first recital after something like 10 total lessons. James picked his own piece, "The Shoe Cobbler." an easy choice due to a favorite fairy tale, The Shoemaker and His Elves.

He was told to dress up and that he would be going on first.

I asked James what he wanted to wear. "I want a blue jacket, a blue and red striped tie, a fancy shirt, and black shoes . . . that tap."

Okey-Dokey.

Put a kindergartner in a tie and a blazer in the middle of a room full of very Senior citizens and you are definately going to be a crowd pleaser. We got to the Manor early to do a dry run, but the room was already packed. While we were standing to the side trying to show James where to get on and off the stage, two sweet little old ladies chatted him up. He made sure they noticed the Westies on his tie and his new top siders. "Mom couldn't find tap shoes."

You know you finally belong somewhere when you have issues with some of the people in the room. I had history--some good, some not so good--with just about everybody in the room. So did my husband, but with him all history is good history. It was fun.

Two seconds before James was to take the stage his nose started gushing like a Brooklyn fire hydrant in July. I couldn't catch it all fast enough. Luckily Mama Katie was right behind me. Having Katie with you is equivalent to having an ER nurse in your hip pocket. She shoveled me advice and Kleenex as fast as she could. My mum-in-law scrubbed at the spots on James'tie while I pinched his nose.

I turned to my sister, "Tell Mrs. Brown to stall a minute." Katie and I tried to get James to leave the room so we could hemmorage in private and not spill on any of the audience. James would not budge. Mrs. Brown adapted. The show must go on. She announced that James would be on a little later and the second youngest took the stage. As my sister said, "The La Fonds are here." We can't help but make a scene. As my sister, mother-in-law, son, and several neighbors shifted around in their seats and went back and forth for fresh supplies, my husband went missing.

I wanted James up on that stage before any of the older more talented kids could intimidate him and I didn't want to send him up without the camera rolling and blood staunched. I hissed at Katie, "Where is my husband?" She gave me a wry look that all married women recognize-- a squint that basically says, "Typical."

"Do you want to stick some Kleenex up his nose?" She asked. We hunkered around my little pianist trying to twist a cone small enough to wedge up one of his nostrils. We couldn't get anything to fit. James didn't cry, panic, freak out, or back out. He kept his eyes on the stage and occasionally checked the state of his fancy shirt.

Once my husband emerged from the shadows and the red sea calmed enough not to surge on the Steinway, it was time to send James upstream. I eased us into the piano- playing lane.

"Are you ready?" I asked.

"I'm a little afraid."

"Do you want me to walk you up?"

"No mommy," and he pushed past me, as the boy before him made his exit, stage right.

Mrs. Brown, seeing James headed for the spotlight, stood to announce that the medical emergency was over and she presented James La Fond.

My youngest acts like a complete spaz at home. Now that he had the stage he was a complete piano professional. He even faked it through his flub at the end.

He was so brave. We are so proud.

And now, with so much ado . . . we present James La Fond playing "The Shoe Cobbler".

Majicl Farm Fresh Furniture -- Kerry

2009-05-26T22:24:00.000-07:00

For three days I stood in the middle of my in-laws barn and sold vintage indoor and outdoor furniture and collectibles.

For the first time in since I closed my furniture store ten years ago, I felt the rush of excitement in selling even the most minute of items, from $2 plastic hummingbirds to $200 dressers.

There is a flow state here for me, the same plane I fly when I am writing.

Dust flies out of my brain and also out of the barn floor.

Perhaps I am manic like my sister, insanely excited about giving old picnic baskets new light and renovating beat up coffee tables.

Well, whatever.

"If it makes you happy," sings Sheryl Crow.

Indeed.

Three-Legged Race -- Kelly

2009-05-22T09:53:00.000-07:00

Again bereft of inspiration, I'm recycling a favorite from June, 2007. The photo of sweet Poogan was taken by her owner, Lori V. of Do You Realize?

So, dogs and people. A lot alike, according to the old saw.

I adore Ashland's dog park. It’s beautiful to watch the animals run, ears flapping, muscles doing what they were meant to do, coats gleaming in the sunshine. Some are perfect specimens. The rest do all right. Even that miraculous phenomenon that never ceases to amaze me: the three-legged dog.

We’ve all seen one – leg lost in some traumatic way – that runs, wags, even leaps for a Frisbee now and then, perfectly compensating for his loss, never looking back. The disability is obvious, but its effects are invisible. Sure, it must have been hard to relearn some things, and maybe he can’t sit up and beg any more, but he’s done what a dog does. He’s just gotten on with the business of joy.

In some of the early entries in my personal blog, I mentioned the epidemic of change in the lives of my friends (and, of course, my own as well). While some of these changes are positive, many of them – even the good ones - involve loss. The loss is sometimes sudden, an amputation if you will. A parent dies, a job disappears, a child gets in trouble in a spectacular way. Such loss is brutal, ruthless, but is easily defined. Something Has Happened.

But what of more insidious loss? What if the limb isn’t severed but is slowly withering? What if the leg is there, even normal in its outward appearance, but is without function? When these losses happen in the confines of a family or an individual’s essential self, the analogy to limb loss becomes a little less stable.

When an actual limb begins to fail, a person has options: physical therapy, medication, adaptive technologies or supports. In extreme cases, amputation is the answer to creating a new whole. But people and their systems aren’t that simple, are they? Think of the physical and emotional erosion of chronic illness. The slow train wreck of substance abuse. The withdrawal of intimacy in a strained marriage. These traumas – and that is what they are, even if they are not sudden – happen piecemeal, painfully.

Sometimes the loss is a realization, an “I will never…” statement. Not the whining kind that calls up a response like, “Don’t be silly! You have plenty of time/energy/money to do a, b, or c.” but the peaceful, mature knowledge that the time for a certain action is truly past, that the skills required are beyond a person’s reach, or that some dreams will simply never come true.

None of these scenarios are uncommon, and none are beyond our imagination. They number as many as the grains of sand on the floor of the ocean. The challenge comes, as always, in how we react. Is a full recovery possible? Sometimes the loss is too great, the energy required long gone. People do hit bottom, and they don’t always come back up. I’m not a character-Nazi, the kind of person who believes that a stiff upper lip and a strong work ethic can bring you back from anything. And not everyone is capable of adaptation.

But what of those who don’t want to stop walking, who dream of leaping once again for a well-tossed Frisbee? Even if you do persevere through loss, even if no one around you has any idea that recovery is in process, you still must face the absence. The leg is never going to function again. You leave an untenable situation. You strengthen the remaining limbs. Perhaps you find substitutes.

The challenge lies – at least for me – in the choice of a metaphor to understand your life from the loss forward. Do you choose the four-legged-but-one-is-impaired dog image, or do you radically remake yourself as the three-legged dog?

The answer means the difference between staying in the crate or chasing the tennis ball with your ears flapping and your coat gleaming. You may no longer be the fastest dog, you may no longer have AKC conformation, and you may even elicit pity from those who stare at what is no longer there.

But you will have found your balance.

And you will continue to run on your three strong legs, and the sun will feel good on your back when you take a big slurping drink of cool water and collapse, happy, in the soft, green grass.

The Claws That Haunt

2009-05-21T11:03:00.000-07:00

I am not always a good mother. Revision: I am often not a good mother. But, if you want to grow something in water, I’m the mom to have. Triops, fish, crustaceans, frogs, snails, seamonkeys, algae—you want it; I’ll help you grow it.

So this week we built a pollywog nursery in the yard and went out pollywog hunting. We made three stops before we finally tracked some down at an old reservoir, and we now have 14 beautiful babies scurrying around under a layer of lacy duckweed.

My children’s first experience with tadpoles ended with me possibly breaking some environmental bio-hazrd laws. It started innocently enought through a grow-a-frog by-mail thing. You get this tiny aqua version of a hamster habitrail called Tube Town, put the ’wogs in, and watch them grow. It was great (for me, the kids got bored after about 42 seconds) to watch them sprout their tiny little legs and arms and turn into itty-bitty frogs. After a week or two I noticed one of the frogs was getting much bigger than the others, then one morning one of the smaller frogs a had vanished and the larger frog had a bit of a pot-belly. A few days later the other small frog was gone, and the lone frog remaining was licking his smug little frog lips. I kept my distance and had the kids feed him after that. He was the kind of frog that had long toenails that you could hear click against the plastic of his aquarium. My daughter enjoyed picking him up and feeling the little claws, but that’s something I really can’t abide.

One day we realized he could touch all four walls with this arms and legs and the clicking of nails was getting louder as he grew, so we transferred him to the lovely new aquarium chock-full of a variety of interesting fish that my in-laws had given the kids. I think you can see where this is going. The next morning the aquarium was empty, save for the frog, who looked like he could use a cigar and a couple of Tums.

By that time we learned not to put anything in with him. But after that massive fish buffet, he grew really big, really fast. I started to dream about him and those sickening claws tapping against the glass. I won’t say exactly what we did with him because after looking this species up on the web and reading things like, “when released into the wild they have the capacity to wreck entire ecosystems by eating native wildlife such as fish and turtles that have no natural defense against these creatures,” I’m pleading the fifth.

Lesson learned: no frogs by mail. Now we just get native species and let them do their thing outside the house. Who doesn’t love the sound of frogs at dusk?

Insomnia--Marcia

2009-05-20T03:57:00.000-07:00

An hour ago it was 3:00 in the morning. Obviously, I am still awake. My husband, back from his foray to le toilette, is snoring comfortably. As for me, the thoughts come rushing in.

At first it's the little things: pack a gym bag, pack a lunch, pack for the trip this Friday, need a haircut and clothes for James for his first piano recital tomorrow,things my trainer told me to help me to stay positive on my long, long road toward fitness, images of Daniel out on the field last night, looking like a twenty-something rather than a ten year old as he swaggered in his catcher's gear toward his spot behind home plate. And then my thoughts settle down and fix on the unavoidable. My mother is in the hospital.

My mother reads my blog when she's well, and so, given that she is one of my two readers, I don't want to bore her with stories about herself or alarm her that the whole cyber world might be reading about her personal life. So, no stories about mom's health.

Still, I know she is lying in French Hospital in San Luis Obispo tonight. Most people would write the word alone after that, but my mother has been living by herself for over thirty years. So tonight whe will have more noise, action, and assistance than usual. Tonight she does not have to be afraid that she will stop breathing. Nurses, doctors, machines, will make sure that she is getting oxygen to her uncooperative lungs. So even though none of us is at her bedside, she is not alone.

My moether doesn't want to be a patient, she doesn't want to lie on a couch, she doesn't want to stop working at the thrift shop she runs for her church, or arranging the flowers for Sunday service, or tell the brown baggers she can't make it, or book club, or her salon (read with a french accent). My mother does not sit still. After feeding everyone, writing up a little marketing piece for the church bazaar, hemming up a pair of pants for her grandson, and designing a new studio for her daughter, she'll finish wiping down the kitchen--even though the movie she insisted she wanted to watch has been spinning around in the DVD player for at least a half an hour. When she does finally finish up every last little thing in the world that needs to be accomplished, she will mosey out to the couch for our "girl time." Nine times out of ten, I am already half asleep trying to rally. Twenty minutes later her eyes are half-lidded and she's slurring. Time for bed.

I love my mother. There is nothing I can do for her tonight. She doesn't want us there. She doesn't want to be pitied or babied. She doesn't want flowers-her arrangements are prettier. She doesn't want fine wine, it's a waste of money. My mother loves to talk . . . that's hard on the days she doesn't have breath. Books on tape, CDs. Those are things I can do for her.

At one point she talked about moving here. She even put money down on Horton Plaza. My sister and I, my boys, all fantasized about having "granny" around the corner. That's the way I wish it was. But she has her wonderful garden, incredible friends, good sons and spectacular daughter-in-laws, and the light of her life, Bella--my three year old, highly unexpected, niece. I smile thinking about mom and Bella. They are a mutual adoration society of two. Maybe that's what mom needs more than anything. I just hope she knows I want to be part of that club too.

"Show a little faith, there's magic in the night..." -- Kely

2009-05-15T00:00:00.000-07:00

When I was a college senior, I took a course titled “Fielding and Byron.” I remember telling my professor something along the lines of, “I just can’t get into Tom Jones.” She looked down at me and replied, “You’re not old enough, not ready. Read it when you’re thirty and we’ll talk.”

I was insulted. How condescending! A sophisticated 21-year-old English major like me – well versed in the ways of the world…I could write my own damn picaresque based on the last two years alone...if she only knew – was “old enough” for anything she could throw at me. I even wrote my major essay on “Tom’s Naiveté.” That'll show her…

…that I was the queen of Unintentional Irony. She was, as usual, right, even though I “got into it” quite well just three years later. That professor has been a colleague and is now a friend, and we had a big laugh about that exchange a few years ago when I reminded her of it. Sometimes you’re not ready for a book; it’s just that simple. And sometimes you’re ready again, and again, and again and it’s new every time.

While we may well be able to do dispassionate analyses of our favorite flavor of art (and – burn me as a heretic – sometimes I doubt that we can ever put ourselves outside our analyses), and while we may be ashamed to admit it, we do see ourselves in books, paintings, songs. As a writer, I struggle with taking myself out of the work so a reader can put himself into it. But this entry is getting away from me.

If you’re reading this, you’re probably old enough to remember records. The kind you played on a turntable. The kind you stacked on a spindle and let drop while you lay on your bed and thought about your life in all its miseries and triumphs. Maybe this is something only girls do, but I doubt it. I know enough audiophile men to suspect otherwise. Perhaps you’re back there in your head right now, thinking of a particular song.

If so, track it down soon and play it. Listen to it the way you did back then. Notice the differences in the places it touches you, in the messages it holds. Let go of the part of your intellect that says, “Well, this line doesn’t exactly capture my existential ennui” or “You think your heart is broken now, singer, wait until you express those feelings to the person in question and see how you feel then.” Close your eyes. Be patient. It’s going to be a very different song, but the experience of listening while open to reverie is liberating.

Baboon Metaphysics - Christy

2009-05-14T14:28:00.001-07:00

Books titles are tricky. Titling is a marketing function performed by the publisher and while the author does have input, it’s the publisher’s call. That’s okay with me—I like to rely on experts so I’ll go with whatever they give me. I’ve never been wed to any of my titles anyway, and there have been a few already. The book that Flux is publishing started as a manuscript called The Fáistine, which became The Last Daykeeper when I was agent hunting. Then when my agent submitted to editors she renamed it Prophecy of Days, and the working title my editor has given it is Prophecy of Days, Book One: The Daykeeper’s Grimoire. In a couple of months it will go through the marketing/titling process and come out with an ISBN and a final title. Let’s just hope it doesn’t get me the Odd Title Prize.

Yesterday the Oddest Book Title of the Year was announced. The winner? The 2009-2014 World Outlook for 60-miligram Containers of Fromage Frais. That title edged out other front runners, including Baboon Metaphysics, Curbside Consultation of the Colon, Strip and Knit with Style, Techniques for Corrosion Monitoring, and—my personal favorite—The Large Sieve and its Applications.

I’d love to see some other working titles. Care to share your titles and/or title evolution?

Writing Prompts-Forward Thinking--Marcia

2009-05-06T21:46:00.001-07:00

Ahh, sweet relief, the bowling season is finished, the choir just had their end of year celebration, and there are just a scant few weeks left of school. Tuesday nights should be getting a lot easier. We'll still have piano Monday, batting practice and t-ball games, Tuesday, drop-in and Draw, Hockey, and Writers group on Wednesday, more baseball Thursday, Singles practice for me Friday night, Saturday baseball and hockey games, and Sunday Mixed Doubles practice for Dan. Wow. We do love sports.

I need to be unemployed just so I can keep our gym bags appropriately packed.

Here is a list of a few of the subjects I have been backlogging and hope I can get to soon: My fabulous fiasco of a Spring Break; my wounded chicken, discovered mutilated and broken-legged one morning when I came home from school: an estate sale at a deceased neighbor's (it's unbelievable what lurks behind bad stucco walls); Andrew my ADD kid from the choir who spent most of the year turning his eyelids inside out and falling out of his chair; the realization that my Hub IS a good father; finally winning a tennis match, and of course foreclosures.

I should get better at Wednesday morning posting now that the only thing left to do on Tuesdays is baseball. I'll start writing a few of these up now. I know by next week I'll have thirteen more things that urgently need my writerly attention. We'll see what comes up.

Chickies, Kitties, Doggies, Jillies--Kerry

2009-04-28T20:20:00.000-07:00

We are new parents this month. One scrappy terrier and two chicks later, we roost cozily together with our two cats and three children most nights.

Most nights, that is, until someone turns the heat lamp off in the chicks boudoir and they cheep furiously, chirping for the orange metal mother ship that has disconnected, not unlike Jilly, our five year old, yelling for me when she can't find her purse/blanket/cheese stick/whatever.

The cats hiss at the dog when it walks by and jump onto the highest point they can find. Only occasionally does the dog seem surprised. She came from the pound, where we found her 12 pound body in a cage next to a cage with a 100 pound titan named Hercules who barked interminably during our stay. She is unfazed by the chicks, the cats and even Jilly, who picks her up and squeezes her like a pillow uttering words of endearment loudly in her ear such as "Peppa I wuv you".

I tucked Claire and the dog into bed last night. The dog put it's head on the pillow, under the covers, and looked up at me. I didn't even think of the doggy smell on the sheets because she was just so obnoxiously cute.

Animals, like humans, don't really need much more than food, water, shelter and attention. Life really doesn't have to be so complicated. Maybe I should just stick to the basics more often, seek more heat lamps and warm beds, and let life be sweet and fuzzy like a soft chick next to my son's cheek.

Finding the Umm in Summer - Kelly

2009-04-24T10:12:00.000-07:00

Sure feels like summer here: the first mosquito bites of the season, the first grass burr under(bare)foot, the car's AC breaking on the first 90 degree afternoon.

You need to know that summer is my least favorite time of year. I despise heat.

For five of the last seven years, I’ve escaped to my favorite home away from home, Ashland, Oregon. There I revel in cool mornings and evenings. I also get to hang with my friends in the Lithia Writers Collective.

What’s not to love?

Will I go this year? I don’t know yet, but I’m steeling myself for another Texas summer, just in case.

To psych myself up for that dreadful possibility and to make up for the first paragraph’s glum trinity, I’m determined to conjure some positive things about summer in my native state.

• Friday mornings around my friend V’s pool. She’s gracious enough to extend a standing invitation to the women of First Amendment Friday (i.e. our wine and conversation group), kids and all.

• Consumption of the year’s summer beverage with friends and family (in moderation, of course). Our standard Pinot Grigio (from Target! In a box! Go get some!) will likely, this summer be supplanted by a vodka concoction. The current contenders are sweet tea vodka, mixed with either water or lemonade; fresh squeezed grapefruit juice and plain vodka, with or without a salted rim; and blood orange Italian soda with vodka. My sister-in-law plans something that involves soaking pineapple chunks in vodka, too. Vote now for your favorite.

• Enjoying (in the morning, early afternoon, or at night) the patio furniture I finally talked The Man into purchasing at the end of last summer thanks to a ridiculous combination of discounts. Our patio is on the west side of our house, and if you sit there from 3-7 p.m., without shade, you will not be enjoying anything.

That’s three….do you have any to add?

Mad Scientist, Secret Lab, Clones! Creepy Creeperson, M.D. is Back.

2009-04-23T18:30:00.000-07:00

Did you guys read the latest from Dr. Zavos, the mad scientist hell bent on making cloned children? Yesterday he claimed he’s already cloned 14 human embryos and put 11 of them into the wombs of four women who wanted to give birth to cloned babies! The cells? Yeah, culled from dead children. Apparently grieving parents are desperate enough to do almost anything. This is total movie material, including the fact that he’s operating out of a secret lab, suspected to be in the Middle East where there’s no ban on cloning.

Why would a parent want a developmentally challenged version of a previous child to the tune of more than $45,000? Why not just have another child naturally? It seems the easiest way for Dr. Zavos to get test-cases is to prey upon parents who cannot get beyond their grief. Is this ethical?

One of my favorite freelance clients is the Women’s Bioethics Project, a think tank in Seattle that focuses on making sure women don’t get hosed in the policy making process. Let’s face it; almost all biotechnology issues have to do with women yet the majority of the people making laws about biotechnology are olde white guys but. Having hair sprouting from your ears does not necessarily make you wise, sometimes it just make you crotchety, shortsighted, and misogynistic. (Color me jaded.) Anyway, if you are interested in women’s rights with regard to medicine and biotechnology, check out the Women’s Bioethics Project. Interesting stuff.

Plaster girls in bonnets--Marcia

2009-04-22T12:17:00.000-07:00

Today, the kindergarten literacy aids were sent into the streets of Medford with door hangers, announcing the upcoming Kindergarten Round-up.

We need to boost enrollment. Next year is going to be a hard sell. We will be moving out of our shared housing at Hoover and back into our brand new school in the middle of the year. (YEAH!!!)

The three other aids and I showed up in our mobile-trailer library with our prerequisite coffee cups and water bottles. I dressed Kindergarten-y--floral skirt, white blouse, and black Mary Janes. The other aids dressed for battle: sneakers, running pants, and sleeveless shirts. I was impressed.

We decided to hit the financially challenged neighborhoods first, as a group. This is always a good eye-opener. The HUD apartments are immaculate. Everything is swept and tidy. No beat up Barbie cars or sun-dyed Big Wheels strewn about. There is nothing to tell you about the people that live within. Order and quiet force us to keep our voices down. Where moments ago we'd been joking about ditching our propaganda in a nearby dumpster and heading to Donut Country we're serious now. We fan out. I am the leader and direct my comrades left, right, and center.

We move swiftly trying not to jostle doorknobs or rustle our fliers, we don't really want to have anyone come out. There is a sense of people behind doors. But nothing moves.

We pack up and head back out for the circa 1970s Woodlawn Apartments. I used to think there were maybe 24 apartments at the Woodlawn. But the lot is really deep and wide, and there turns out to be over 100. At first I am not sure they are all part of Woodlawn, I check to see if all the street lamps have that big white ball and that all the window trim is forest green. We divise a plan and attack. Here the doorknobs are a little grottier, the stairwells a tad more like the projects. I pass a bicycle with a sticker on it that says Suck My Dick. Seriously. Are there people that say "OK!"

I start to worry about blond, blue-eyed April. She looks like she's 23, and her knickers are the tightest. What if some meth freak drags her into his apartment. How would I find her?

I climb a cement staircase. There is a jug of bleach by one door and a can full of cigarette butts by the other. I wonder about the bleach. Do people bleach their feet before entering? Is he/she bleaching the stoop? Is it for recycling hypodermics?

We decide to do the apartments across the street and move forward with great vigor. I can't keep up with these ladies. My whole family had the 24-hour flu, only staggered. So I've either been cleaning up barf since Sunday, or adding to the mess for three days. I'm not in top shape for the mission.

The sign says "Something Estates" and in small letters "living opportunity--Equal Housing Something". We wonder if this is a place only for the elderly or for the disabled.

We start hanging our little yellow papers. "Oh goody" I think, there's a rolled up diaper and an empty Huggies carton, "Ages 3 and up" out front of this one. That means Kids!!!!!

At the same time we spot a shoeless little boy up the driveway. "There's one!" We say, confidant that we will find Roosevelt converts here.

Knowing my population I can't help but wonder if the boy has been sent outside while mommy "works" or takes her "medicine". But I'm wrong. He follows us silently up the sidewalks. An older hispanic woman pokes her head out and shouts at him to come back in, to get his shoes on. But he doesn't listen. He smiles and follows us until we are finished.

Our next stop is East Medford's drug den. A lovely old neighborhood with broad sidewallks, old Elm trees, porches and camelias that must have been planted in the early 1900s. But unlike Bend's Westside and Ashland's Railroad District, few are gentrifying down here. Craftsman bungalows are decomposing before our eyes.

What is amazing though, is that even at the lowliest hell hole, people try to make the space their own. Despite a derelict house, a hibachi in a flower pot, curtains that are water stained, someone has planted a few zinnias by the stoop.

Another porch is made cool and welcoming with a handmade broom propped in a corner and a cute iron table with matching vinyl covered chairs. I hang my flier on the stoller handle as I duck under the pine boughs that arc over the pathway.

On one porch I go to hang my doo-hickey, registering, porch, stoller, plush couch, ashtray and then ahhh . . . Where others have put plaster statues of frogs fishing or doing a jig, sun-bonnetted girls, myriad aryan angels, bleach bottles, or cans for butts by their door, this person has propped a romantic painting of a flaxen-haired woman either in the process of buttoning or unbottoning her bloozy white blouse. She just neglected to put one globular rosy-tipped breast away or forgot to air out the other. It is unclear. Different, however, from the cross-legged frog and windchime crew.

What do people think when they come to my door? I think I better run home and put away the scooters, basketballs, shoes, gatorade bottles, and Shark Men, that litter my front door. I think about people's need, no matter the circumstances, for a little beauty or humor, or something to call their own. I see how at the Stevens Street Apartments where people are being given a fresh start, they are following rules, keeping things tidy, being proud of their little patch of a chance. At the others, they are maybe at their last chance, and things are not so pretty. Some don't even have real front doors just sliding glass doors hung with sheets and a worn out rubber mat from Bi-Mart. These are the only places that make me want to wash my hands. The stripped bike and heavy chain, the reek of so many cigarettes is depresssing. No Cat Crossing sign here, just an abandoned Dora the Explorer backpack and a cardboard carton with a stray chile in the bottom.

Then the little houses, however hard the life, however many children, there is the stab at expression.

We finish off in the neighborhoods that have stopped sending their kids to Roosevelt. The families that have opted to send their kids off to private or Christian schools, or transfer into the wealthier districts like Lone Pine or Hoover.

Here the driveways and borders have had their dose of Round-Up, the tulips and jonquils are still in bloom, lawns are mowed, dogwoods are in bloom and only one house has a plaster statue and a hibachi. I know who lives at this one, and she does send her kids to Roosevelt. She's one of the most active parents in the PTA.

All of us noticed how all but the meanest situations flowered with this desire for a spot of beauty, the will to express. It leaves me today, with this great desire to take care of what is mine. Remember how lucky I am, and to show my gratitude on occasion.

Studying Kids Studying Bugs -- Jennie

2009-04-19T18:49:00.000-07:00

Hey readers!

While I figure out how to transfer my own blog onto the Lithia site, please sneak a peek here.

Enjoy!

Piece Work - backstitching a freelance job--Marcia

2009-04-16T11:49:00.000-07:00

I miss my blog.

I woke up this morning craving a little time with her. She is a place where I can write whatever I want. I can be as good or bad, short or long, irrelevant or irreverent as I want.

I don't think anybody reads this. I certainly don't get paid. And maybe that's the beauty of it all. Maybe that's what I'm hankering for right now.

I've been in the writing trenches for over a month, and left my little bloggie alone to whither and die. I missed her, every Wednesday I'd think about crawling into her clean white space and filling it with fragments from my life.

Wednesday would come and go, I'd make a mental note of things i wanted to talk about: the birth of the Princess and Captain Morgan's baby Dutch, our foiled spring vacation, our neighborhood Easter, Erma Bombeck, teaching kids to read . . . But I knew I could not look up from my research, could not afford whatever time away from the manuscript I was working on, to play with my blog.

So many bitter thoughts went through my head. As time wore on with the museum job, I made less and less money. And yet, I couldn't stop. Facts needed to be checked, hypothesis iron-clad, writing pristine. There were nights it got later and later and later until it was morning and time to make coffee and wake the kids for school. All I wanted to do was cry, or quit.

I missed the day James' training wheels came off. I missed tennis practice, I missed baseball games, I missed hockey matches, I missed family dinners and bedtimes. Spring break was a grind, keeping my children at bay, trying to buy time, trying to work.

My family proved that they could do it. They could give me the time and space I needed to write. They were wonderful. James cried. He missed me. He wanted me to stop. But he didn't interrupt. My husband manned the dinner hour and helped occasionally by putting out clothes for school.

As the writing wore on and on, it started to make sense. Truths that I thought might be hidden in the quilts and needlework turned out to be so, it just took a while to prove it. I finally loved the quilts, loved the women who made them, and was impressed with the time they lived in. They taught me to shut up. Our lives are so easy. Our freedoms vast.

In the late 18th or early 19th Century I would have been a spinster who probably got burned at the stake. There is no way I could have kept my mouth shut, my corset cinched and my mind and body supine.

I am trying to be grateful for the schooling I've just been given--on so many levels. The most obvious: I learned a bucket load about how our country was founded, about women and their role in supporting our country, and about quilts. What do you want to know? I can tell you.

About writing? I learned that I am prone to wedding cakes instead of Hot Pockets. I am a rich detail girl not a pop-it in the micro fake meatball and cheeser. All I needed for this job was a Hot Pocket. I could not deliver. I had to make the four-tiered thing first and then scale it back down. Not good. Not cost effective--especially for my soul.

The money offered was less than an entry level school teacher makes in a week--it took me eight. And now they're holding the check. Do I feel insulted? Yes. Welcome to writing.

I have to look on the bright side. I did finish something. I was proud of it for a short period of time. I learned a ton. I got to work in a world-class museum. And, I have a really good manuscript in my hands. I do something with it, or I don't. It's all on me.

The True 3G Network

2009-04-10T20:20:00.000-07:00

Two to Three Weeks.

That's how much longer the oncologist thinks I will have a mother.

I realized yesterday that my daughter hadn't seen her grandmother in weeks, and that each needed time with the other. So, last night, Anna accompanied me when I went over to put Mother to bed.

I've never felt more like a fulcrum.

I held two hands: one gnarled and cool, the other smooth and warm.

I stoked two heads: one bald, the other covered in thick, lustrous curls.

I rested my head on two shoulders: one bony and brittle, the other round and strong.

This is the true 3Generation network.

Pondering the Miracle of Life--Kerry

2009-04-07T13:47:00.001-07:00

Spring has sprung.

After the harshest winter in forty years, I stare out the window lost in sensory wonder.

Pink cherry blossoms.
Yellow daffodils.
Children skipping.
The smell of barbecues and lawnmower gas. (That one's for you Christy).
There might be a haiku somewhere there...

"If you find yourself out of the race, so far behind the pack that you can hardly see its dust-if the odds weigh against you, the odds against happiness returning to fill your days with joy, the seemingly overwhelming odds that you will never recover from whatever is beating you down- take a moment and consider life's cosmic odds and how you're already beaten them," writes Forrest Church in Utne Reader about the miracle of our just being born in the first place.

Spring reminds me of miracles.

My Favorite Part of Disneyland -- Jennie

2009-04-05T08:00:00.001-07:00

Really good.

Even better.

Best ever.

Project Buenos Aires!

2009-04-02T10:25:00.001-07:00

Envy has been dripping from my pores ever since I heard about the gaggle of YA authors who planned a writing retreat in a castle in Ireland. In my head I've been planning my own writer's getaway. We can dream, no? While castles in the British Isles do have a certain allure, I'd also like a place that has really really great food and wine. And nice weather. And an excellent bookstore. So when I saw this site that shows photos of the most interesting bookstores in the world, I knew it would be Argentina. Just look at this photo!

Isn't it the most exquisite site in the world? Acres of book! Acres!

Plus, Buenos Aires, known as the Paris of South America, figures prominently in Book Two of my series, so I figure it's meant to be. We can rent Jardin Escondito, Francis Ford Coppola's villa in Bueno Aires.
We'll write like fiends all day (with breaks for dips in the pool and tapas, natch) and then talk books and writing over scrumptious food and great local wines.

Who's in? Say 2011-ish when we're all wildly successful? Vaminos!

Ditch Digger, Flower Farmer --Kerry

2009-03-31T09:23:00.000-07:00

My mother cranked the steering wheel in her bright red 1972 Mercedes into the ditch on purpose if she saw even a bit of flora and fauna that looked delectable for flower arranging. Most indigenous Oregon plants didn't' stand a chance; cattails innocently waving in the breeze, daffodils blooming, they all were prey to my mother's observant eye.

I'd slink down in the back of the car as she maneuvered us onto yet another shoulder of the road and grabbed her pruning shears out of the car in hot pursuit of another plant for her Japanese flower arranging obsession, Ikebana.

I'd fear the worst: "What if someone actually owns that cattail? What if this is private property?"

So far her only violations have been from a few people honking the horn and a brush with three feet of mud, in which she completely lost one of her plastic rubber boots and had to walk to her car in muddy socks. I don't know which was worse sensory overload, the smelly mud or the scotch broom that was jammed in over my head.

Completely unrepentant, she claimed that the only thing that bothered her about the incident was the sucking sound of the boot as it went under.

So without trepidation I pulled the car over the other day - a beautiful, crisp, lush Oregon Spring day and tried to avoid taking furtive glances over my shoulder. I had spotted a Magnolia, in what I deemed was a "public property" ditch. I wrenched it from the branch as best I could without pruning shears. I realized I too had joined the club.

Anyone else a club member of "ditch pilferers anonymous?"

Jargon Riff Two -- Kelly

2009-03-27T10:13:00.000-07:00

I suspect the reason I'm so miffed about jargon right now is my need - with so much serious illness and upheaval in my life - to pare things down to the bone.

I've always been fond of sparse, precise prose. "Be precise," I say, over and over and over again, to my writing students. In fact, my own precision hang-up is the number one driver of my on-going writer's block.

Sigh.

So imagine my miffed-ness when I looked up at coffee shop television (blessedly muted) and saw the following bullet point:

Fear of Risk Aversion

Just what does that mean? Am I supposed to be afraid of "risk aversion" or am I supposed to be averse to "fear of risk"?

Literally, both form a kind of emotional double negative and connote bravery in the face of risk.

When I googled the phrase, however, I found the following quote:

Can GM overcome the fear of risk aversion so many American consumers have about its brand, regardless of the actual reliability and competitiveness of its cars and trucks? That's a hard question to answer, and one only the consumer, over time, will be able to answer.

This poses another interpretation, in which "fear of risk" modifies "aversion" (i.e. What kind of aversion? The kind that fears risk, of course!). Such sloppy modification drives me nuts.

But this version, posing perception against reality, offers a lesson far removed from current economic crises.

What is depression (both economic and personal) if not fear of risk? Of change? What is it if not paralysis of courage?

I want to be clear: I do not see depression as cowardice or even as something that can be alleviated by a change in perception; neurotransmitters don't respond to will, after all. Clinical depression is a medical issue, and it's not what I'm about in this post.

A "fear of risk" aversion - just like "process management" - keeps us from living fully and authentically.

Here's hoping all of us can put such aversion aside and stride out into the messy chaos of life.

Jargon Riff -- Kelly

2009-03-20T07:33:00.000-07:00

I'm doing my best, these worrisome days, just to be: enjoy what the day brings, and be mindful of my good fortune.

And thank the universe that I'm not part of the jargon-filled world that surrounds me.

My understanding of the need to sit with my life crystallized this week when, making my daily drive past various plants and office buildings, I happened to glimpse - literally - the writing on the wall.

EMERSON

PROCESS MANAGEMENT

"Wait," I thought, "How do you manage a process? Why would you want to? Isn't 'process management' an oxymoron?"

A little googling alerted me to the "true" meaning of that word duo (PM even has its own international journal), and I slapped right up against what I miss the least from my days in university administration: jargon. I flashed back to those horrid meetings - program evaluation, task forces, assessment reports, and mission statement creation. I can feel my pulse rate increasing as I type those words.

As a writer, I was constantly frustrated with the clunky diction and obfuscation such gatherings generated. I'd take my pen in hand and eviscerate cumbersome paragraphs, peeling them down to their essence; sometimes I'd prevail, but often others clung to catchphrases or worried that a pared down version didn't sound "smart enough." Insert graphic of me virtually banging my head against the wall. Why couldn't we just stop and go back to our work with students? Back to true process, which tended to manage itself on its own timetable?

But back to the present.

What are our lives if not process? What are our days if not process?

All around, I see pain and difficulty as people try to manage their process down to the last tiny detail and attempt to control events and individuals.

Granted, some planning is necessary. But isn't the joy of life to be found in its unfolding? Its unfolding, not our attempts to shape circumstances to fit our needs.

Every time I drive by that building, proudly broadcasting its commitment to total control, I pledge to remind myself to let go. To just be.

Stepping away can be the best process management tool I know.

Dream to Novel: A Peeve Story --Christy

2009-03-19T12:41:00.000-07:00

Pet peeves. I’ve got lots of them. I guess I’m just a peevish person. But numero uno pet peeve relating to writing is this phrase, “I was having this amazing dream so I woke up and wrote it down and it turned into a novel!” I know of several people for whom a dream turned into a six-figure book deal.

Because this peeve usually comes from the mouths of urban fantasy/romance writers, I’d sort of chalked it up to genre thing, but then recently I read that Josh Berk’s The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin, started as a dream. Because I know and respect Josh, I wasn’t immediately peeved; I was intrigued. His book is not urban fantasy and it’s being published by Knopf, most likely on high-quality deckle edged paper.

So I’ve been thinking: What is it about books that start as dreams? I always remember my dreams and have an incredibly rich dream life, but I never wake up and think, This would make a killer novel! Usually I think, Wow, trippy dream! Shouldn’t have has so many Thin Mints before bed.

I think the reason books from dreams become so popular is because for the most part we dream in archetypes—primal, inherited patterns of thought. Look how Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series, the perfect example of dream to novel, has become a worldwide phenomenon. That’s some straight-up anima/animus + shadow archetypes mixed with some Mormon doctrine (or at least that’s how I interpret the old man/Edward & young girl/Bella relationship, as well as Edward’s parents/The Church, who gave him everlasting life by “saving him” from dying in 1918, the same year Joseph Smith died. But that’s just me.).

Tapping into the archetypes of the collective unconscious is like hooking your pipes up to city water instead of pumping from a well; you’re tapping into a steady flow of ideas that we all share. These have nothing to do with personal experience, but rather inherited thought buried deep in the primal brain. Sadly, I think I’m a writer who continues to work a deep, drying well. I need to get hooked up to the flow. Come to me, oh six-figure archetype dream! I’m waiting with open arms…

Has anyone out there had the dream-to-novel experience?

Write on --Kerry

2009-03-18T11:37:00.001-07:00

My husband is going to be a lawyer at a different place now, whenever he finds that position, without putting too much drama into it. Hence the short blog. It's been a tough week during his resignation process but tough = resilience doesn't it?
I am more emphathetic now, to those who have gone before me. This is a scary place.
Luckily I know that a job cannot take away dreams and love. For that I am grateful.
And losing a job can't take away my ability to write either, and express myself.
So write on everyone, because we still can.
Right on.

Real Magic -- Jennie

2009-03-15T13:01:00.000-07:00

As my kids count the days (6) until our trip to Disneyland, I remember my own anticipation before visiting the Happiest Place on Earth as a seven year-old. Amy, my younger sister, and I had side-by-side twin beds with Betsy Clark quilts. Every night after our mom read us a chapter of Little House on the Prairie, Amy and I stayed up for hours, whispering about the Disneyland rides we had heard about, the characters we might see, and the treats our organic mom might let us have.

Like my kids, I had my suitcase packed weeks ahead, but with Dolphin shorts, and Saltwater sandals. Though it was late fall in northern California, it was still warm in the southern half, something else to look forward to.

Amy and I loved each other but bickered a lot over everything, especially who made the mess, and having to wear matching outfits. Plus, I had been having sleep issues, and dreaded the clock’s creeping toward bedtime. But in the mystical days before our Disneyland trip, I couldn’t wait to crawl under the quilt, get past the reading, then enter the world my sister and I had created. We had no idea how big the park was, or what was in it, or what it would look like, but we were delighted to imagine it all.

Finally, it came: the last night before the big trip. Amy thrashed around excitedly in her bed, but I was surprisingly sad. The late-night whispering would be over. So would the trip. And what if the Disneyland we had made up wasn’t as good in reality?

When our parents picked us up from school and drove the long eight hours to the Howard Johnson Hotel, I was nervous. But that all disappeared inside the gates, with its charming Main Street. When Goofy swaggered up to us in his big hat and big shoes, I was enchanted. Each moment was better than the last: the Country Bear Jamboree, the Mickey Mouse pancakes, the Electrical Parade, the Small World mermaids.

Even the scary things were thrilling: the Haunted House and the Pirates of the Caribbean. During the old Journey Through Inner Space, I was equally horrified and ecstatic to be shrunk to the size of an atom.

With the one dollar our dad had given us, Amy and I bought matching name plates: Mickey Mouse, with his arms behind his back, and our names in square letters. When we got home, I stuck mine on my headboard.

For years, even after our mom had finished the entire Little House series, I would stare at that glowing name plate. But instead of remembering the pirates, the pancakes, or the parade, I remembered the real magic: how it felt while I was waiting to go.

2009-03-13T00:00:00.000-07:00

All around me, trees welcome spring. Normally I love to watch this process, but this year is different.

If you’ve been reading for a while, you know of my mother’s amazing cancer journey and how it is drawing to a close. You may not know that my oldest sister died, at 55, of ovarian cancer in 2000. And now my remaining sister has discovered suspicious lumps; her doctor biopsied a lymph node and removed a fist-sized breast mass yesterday; pathology should be in by Monday.

I, thankfully, remain healthy.

Back to those trees. I’m stuck in a metaphor loop.

Dark branches against the sky are lungs. Bronchi. Bronchioles. Alveoli. All reaching toward the sky in a gasp for air.

Dark branches against the sky are the blue veins visible under the milky white skin of a breast.

Dark branches against the sky are the circulatory system.

Dark branches against the sky are the lymphatic conduits that run throughout our bodies.

Dark branches against the sky take the shape of a brain, tracing the folds and valleys, mimicking the neuron. Axon. Soma. Dendrite.

The tangled nests of squirrels are tumors. The small nests of birds are tumors. Fruit trees bloom with disease. The green buds are tumors, coursing their way though lymph, blood, and tissue.

The process of spring, which should mean growth and blooming and change, has become malignant.

This Concerns Me --Christy

2009-03-12T13:46:00.000-07:00

While sitting at your desk, lift your right foot off the floor and make clockwise circles. At the same time, draw the number 6 in the air with your right hand. Your foot will change direction and there's nothing you can do about it.

This bothers me far more than I want it to.

Reason #1 Why I Might Write--Marcia

2009-03-11T14:44:00.000-07:00

In working on a quilt exhibit for the High Desert Museum, I have inadvertently become immersed in American History. In entering it through the world of needlework and fabric choice I am finding history far more interesting than I did through the worlds of the Revolution and the Civil War. The quilts I'm investigating bracket those two seismic events and yet, like a sharp needle, stitch around the edges and reveal a world reflective of its times: wealthy, industrious, patriotic, religious, philanthropic, and artistically talented.

In less than a hundred years, one person's lifetime, America went from a new nation of 13 colonies to an industrial nation in the midst of a Civil War . . . And in the middle of it, women were stitching their hearts out expressing their love of Liberty, their president, The North, The South, the 12 apostles, or "gun boats". Yes, they made quilts to raffle off to buy gun boats. Some just loved fabric--really expensive fabric, challis and calico, block printed and hand painted in India and imported to England and then to America into the hands of the women of Charleston Harbor and beyond.

Fortunes rose and fell. Ways of life collapsed and were reborn.

Due to an embargo on textiles and textile workers in the early stages of our country, all fabric in America was handwoven until well into the 19th century. Colonists made their own fabric, thread, and dye. I can barely get my laundry done, I can't imagine actually making my own 3-ply thread, linen, and dye out of crushed beetles and pee, and then making my own chemise. No way, Jose. Where's my Lean Cuisine and Wife Swap, I can't handle all this industriousness.

I have read many a great quote from those swearing that a woman is only as fine as her needlework and mastering it as essential to good breeding as speaking French, to quilting being the "primary symbol of a woman's unpaid subjection . . . " oh, those Suffragettes!

One of the most amazing stories I have discovered is that of Eliza Lucas Pinkney. Eliza's mother died young. Eliza was educated in Europe, her father was British and lived in Antigua. At 15 she arrived in the colonies and, when her father returned to Antiqua with the British Military, almost immediately wound up in charge of three plantations just outside Charleston.

At 16, while reading Virgil, Eliza got to thinking South Carolina was mighty similar to Virgil's Indigo-growing Italy (!?). Eliza loved botany. Women loved fabric. Women loved blue. It was very, very expensive and had to be imported from India. It took 100 pounds of plant to produce 4 ounces of dye.

She found her own niche market. The young botanist decided to tinker around in her spare time with growing Indigo. Four or five years later, at 21, she had her first successful Indigo crop. She exported it to England, shared the seeds with her other plantation pals and Indigo became South Carolina's most profitable export.

"Indigo proved more really beneficial to Carolina than the mines of Mexico or Peru were to Spain.... The source of this great wealth ... was a result of an experiment by a mere girl."

--Edward McCrady, historian of colonial South Carolina

Eliza amassed a great fortune, and from all accounts worked really hard for it, and considered herself a patriot. During the Revolution, however, her plantations were destroyed and her life left in ruins. She lies in an unmarked grave somewhere in the south, but there is a stone commemorating her as the mother of two sons of the Revolution. Hmmmm.

Something about Eliza's pluck, acumen, determination and demise is stirring, haunting, and disturbing. Indigo is my favorite color. Charleston is a fabulous city . . . Do I have an historical novel in me? Has somebody already done it? It certainly can't be as hard as handweaving flax.

Online Mothers--Kerry

2009-03-10T09:28:00.000-07:00

Horrors! I turned on, gasp, daytime t.v. this morning and watched the "Today Show" pundits. Normally I get my news from an NPR webcast, but today my husband was home, so I can blame the t.v. indulgence on him, can't I?

I did learn something actually relevant to blogging, mothers and life in general. (Amazing! My i.q. did not actually fall when I watched the tube). An advertising exec from an agency called Razorfish was being interviewed for a segment called "The Big Business of Online Mothers." She explained that websites such as Cafe Mama http://www.cafemama.com/ (started by former editor of Hip Mama and Portland resident) and other online websites designed by mothers were rapidly proliferating and influencing the advertising demographic, including, yes, the blogosphere, in many areas of life including environmental issues in the case of Cafemama. Advertisers were giving away products to online journalist mothers, in hopes that they will influence their demographic to buy a particular deodorant or diaper. Yes writer mamas, apparently there is hope for us yet in the land of free stuff even if we don't get paid to blog.

So if we diligently post our blogs and wait patiently, is free stuff going to start arriving on our doorstep? I'm still waiting, but at least it's given some meaning to turning the t.v. off and blogging.

Saint Dominic -- Jennie

2009-03-08T19:15:00.000-07:00

"Who do you hold in your arms?" Father Anthony asked my husband eleven years ago in the vestibule of Our Lady of the Mountain during our son's baptism. "What will he be?"

"Whatever he wants to be," Dave answered, pulling the white gown over Dominic's baby feet.

"He could be a great artist," Father Anthony said. "Or a saint. You could be holding a Nobel Prize winner."

This was big. Having our first baby was tough enough. We had never thought about his potential, his impact on the universe.

At only nine months old, Dominic was already a vessel.

Here we were, in church again, less than two weeks after my mom's funeral.

"There is great grief in this family," Father Anthony said. "Let this child heal you."

He has.

I can't tell you the sorrow that melts when this boy puts his arms around me. He has hands like his dad's--large and capable--and shoulders that invite the world to rest there, as his brother and sister, and his uncles and grandpas often do.

"Do you realize the significance of his name?" Father Anthony had asked during the pre-baptismal meeting. "Saint Dominic: handsome and compassionate. An ordinary boy, with extraordinary love."

Eleven years later, this is so true. Our Dominic is a gentle spirit who stands up for the mistreated. During his first grade year, the classroom assistant cried while telling me about Dominic pairing up with his autistic classmate and cheering him on in P.E.

Our hero of virtue is in fifth grade now, and we hear these kinds of stories about him every week.

He is a friend to all, a leader.

There's a lot of pressure on this young man, most of which he puts upon himself.

He takes out the garbage, ties his little brother's shoes, and starts the car every morning--without being asked.

Last month, when I was behind on itemizing our business taxes, I considered having Dominic do it. Although he'd be happy to, I managed to remember that he isn't even in middle school yet. But really, he would've helped out--no complaints.

How did his daddy and I get such a miracle?

We are asked often.

There's a lot of his daddy in him: discipline, a good heart, the will to do what's right. But he is himself, too: a fanatic Lego builder, an electric guitarist, a bike jumper.

What will he be? We still don't know.

But this is for sure: Dominic, who has slept on the floor by his little sister since her bout with epilepsy two months ago, who slipped an extra dollar under his little brother's tooth fairy pillow last night, who asks me how my writing's going, this boy is a gift from God.

A Flashy Recycle -- Kelly

2009-03-06T07:16:00.000-08:00

Me? I got nothing today.

So, in honor of the seven writers at Flashy Fiction, I offer my response to today's prompt, recycled from aways back.

I don’t remember which of the guys got the idea to replace the star on the tree with a picture of John Lennon, but Ben handed me David’s copy of Let It Be and a pair of scissors.

“I’m too stoned to cut straight, and what if I cut George, man? I never liked John that much but, shit, he’s shot.”

All things considered, I didn’t double check with David before I cut. I handed the portrait to Ben, and he pulled a chair over and propped it among the branches. Everyone was quiet for a minute. Just then, someone on the other side of the room dropped the needle on The Stones “Miss You.” There’s justice, I thought. The King is dead. Long live the King. Let’s dance. I chugged the rest of my wine, put the mutilated album back in the block and board shelf, and headed to the floor.

It was just after ten, and faculty were starting to trickle in. They’d been grading all evening and were ready for a break. I felt hands on my waist, and a voice in my ear shouted, “You look thirsty. I’m headed to the keg. Now do you like it with head or no head?” I knew it was Professor Reed*. “Head, always!” I smiled and slipped away. I’d seen Professor Williams come in, and thought I’d best attempt a rapprochement.

I was pretty sure she’d be here tonight. David had shown up at one of our Friday night department drinking things, and she’d taken notice. His painfully thin, tofu fed demeanor called up her Berkeley glory days. His radar registered this immediately and, being David, he began figuring out a way to use it. He knew he’d need an outside reader for his dissertation. He’d audited one of her courses, poured it on pretty thick, and my radar detected her attraction. Even though my dealings with David were a deep secret I was pretty sure that, somehow, Williams knew. Williams always knew everything.

I knew she liked red wine, so I picked up an extra for her and headed that way. We made eye contact and I lifted her glass. The group of dancers blocked my view, so it was way too late to turn around when I saw that David was on a similar mission. We arrived at the same time, and when she turned to greet him, her gaze fell on the tree and rose to the top. She spun around and hissed, “My God, what have you arrogant children done now.”

Flashy Fiction!

2009-03-05T10:27:00.000-08:00

Here's a fun new diversion: Flashy Fiction! Seven writers, seven days of flash fiction. Each day there's a new writing prompt, which will inspire you to write a mini "flash fiction" piece in the comments section. It's fun and gets the gears rolling...come check it out!

Reason #5628 Why I Can't Write--Marcia

2009-03-04T15:29:00.000-08:00

I called in sick today. James was snoring, it was rainy, there was a sub in my classroom, I' m on a deadline. I'm sick of school, my kids are sick of school, I'm freaked out about a job due Friday. So I decided what the hey, I'm calling in.

I settled in front of the fire with my big stack of books, a nice cup of coffee, my slippers on . . . the kind of day I dream of in my head all the time, and get to experience once every three years . . . Ahhhh, I started ruffling through the beautiful pages picturing quilts made by women more than 150 years ago.

Then someone rapped on the door and rattled the knob, and my morning by the fireside deep in research was over. My little idyll came tinkling down around me like so many crystal pendants on a delicate chandelier. I kid you not, my bliss, carefully constructed, lasted less than five minutes.

So, the day has slipped by, my work is not done, my blog is not done, and my writing is not done. Here is what I have to offer today:

In honor of Women's History Month, there will be a poetry reading tonight down at the Community College. This sounds like the kind of thing I ought to be doing. The last time I did anything literary-ish was more than a decade ago when I had a poem published in the West Wind Review. We met at the Rogue Brewing Company and congratulated ourselves and "read" our pieces. It was so long ago, I wasn't even married. It's been awhile since I've submitted anything.

I picture myself going downtown tonight--hanging with the artistes. Do I still own a black turtleneck? I need something in my nose or tongue don't I? A tattoo? None of the looks I used to sport would make the cut anymore: I liked to look either deep and interesting or romantic and poetic --sort of Gloria Steinem meets Nora Lofts in a vintage petticoat. Now I just try to put on a little mascara and make sure I'm in something other than my husband's underwear. (Yes, I have worn them in a pinch.)

In Honor of Women's History Month, I delve back into my own . . .

Here is a musing from a file I just opened entitled "college years".

"Hey you! These ain't no radical rose colored glasses. It seems to me Joe, that your glasses are pretty pink as well. Thinking it don't matter. Thinking you can run around with your money and your white skin and your fancy education. Didn't you learn that the world is our backyard? Or were you in the class that said the real man is an island unto himself? That's what you must think man. Yea, you go off and make your little graphs and charts. Collect your data. All of your practical information and go be rational. Make your practical investments. But remember you aren't an island--somebodies blood is gonna spill all over you, that you are drenched in it already."

I went to a beautiful, dreamy, tiny East Coast Liberal Arts College. Almost everyone was priveleged . I think I was mostly angry at my dad and brothers and instead, while heavily influenced by my Democratic-Socialist boyfriend got very het up about South Africa. I was so militant I protested The Man, who was actually Margaret Heckler, and walked out (briefly) on my graduation ceremonies. I did, however, have on, underneath my blue gown, a long peasant skirt, a red leather cummerbund and a high-necked victorian blouse--All of this before Medicine Woman.

Here is a doozy I believe written about loving the wrong kind of boy . . . something I did fervently and often.

"Why did she stand in the wind,
sand biting her ankles,
cardboard truths folding against her chest
Pressing a hip to hold up the corner of his hope?

Why did she?

Not because he needed someone to believe
in the creases and vegetable stains of thin worn words.

Maybe she believed in hard-pressed paper
Maybe she found something sound in corrugations
but mostly because cardboard can't stand alone in the wind."

Nice. The stains and creases concern me. I didn't like being too specific back then. I didn't want my mom or the loser boyfriend to know what I, I mean she, was talking about.

Here I am at my tragic/romantic best circa 1985:

"I search myself for the spot where the pain used to be
the ache which was you
Your tongue in my heart [he was a really good kisser]
A pain-in-the-ass neighbor one learns to live with

I woke this morning to find the house of my heart
Clean
And empty
A history of what I used to call love
Vacuumed away

Just when I was getting used to it."

Now skip forward about twenty years. I spend most of my time writing about my neighbors: Women's History Be-damned!

They are so worried about their lawns.
I knew she wasn't nice.
She and the skinny, enhanced Martha Stewart from across the street always
comparing notes.
Martha's house is bigger
Her Bungalow-style garage is a workshop and a studio
It's all white inside--nothing but a Table Saw and an elliptical.
Martha has a white terrier.
The West Point Bitch has a schnauzer
and she just had her new sprinkler system dug in
and her lawn rolled out.
She doesn't even let her own dog poop on the lawn
She frisks down the street in her fleece anorak
big glasses
and leggings
dog neat on a leash.
I don't know where she lets him do his business.

When my giant gallumpher goes roaring down
the block headed straight for Martha Stewart's
(he likes the terrier)
he crosses West Point's freshly rolled lawn.

My child goes racing after on a rickety-ridge scooter
scudding along the asphalt
chasing the black beast from hell
only to find
West Point
out on her green green grass
daffodils and snow drops curling at the base of
a lovely dogwood
her B.B. gun aimed directly at his heart.

So there's the drivel from the archives. Have a great day! Celebrate your own history--you too can be really embarassed.

Short Attention Span Writing--Kerry

2009-03-03T08:26:00.000-08:00

The sign flashed in front of the car as I was driving through the bucolic town of Amity in the Willamette Valley.

"Amity Vineyards", one of the first vineyards in Oregon, was painted on the 4 x 6 wooden board. There was a bit of paint peeling in the corner and blackberries graced the bottom of the pole it hung from. This simple unassuming sign prefaced an entire story line I created in my head as I continued to drive. The owner of the winery and my family had planted our grapes during the same years in the 197o's.

"Path of the Pinot Pioneers" is still in my head. I am waiting for the perfect time to get it out on paper, in between bouts of a persistent stomach flu that is traumatizing my children and countless other things that take precedence to the birthing process of article writing.

At least I know the story is there, in line with several others.

I'm composing stories in my head all the time. Getting them onto paper is another thing all together.

THE Movie -- Jennie

2009-03-01T20:55:00.000-08:00

If you only have seven dollars for one movie, see "The Wrestler." With its simple scenes, the plot is unpredictable, delivered with clever cinematography and well-crafted acting. Mickey Rourke elicts respect and compassion. Women will swoon (and cry), and men will seriously envy those abs.

And the soundtrack? Will take you back twenty years right to the state fair. I could never define how I felt about the next decade of music, until Rourke put it into his words.

"The Wrestler" beats "Slumdog Millionaire," in that the film does not rely on sweeping cinemascapes, color, flashbacks, or a cast of hundreds. It is not as inspiring as it is empathizing. If nothing else, it is rich, heavy in metaphor and irony.

This is a film that explores the tough and tender sides of a one-trick pony's struggle to define his essence and purpose. Like the wrestler himself, the story is simple, but deep. We may not agree with the wrestler's choices, but we understand his fight, and cheer for him all the way.

Rigorous Introspection (or "I'm Just Like Them...Sort Of." -- Kelly

2009-02-27T00:00:00.000-08:00

During George W. Bush's presidency, I and others who share my political persuasion would be having a conversation about some political event or administration position. Sooner or later someone would pose some variation of the following question:

"How can someone who has

* lost a job while CEOs plundered
* found himself with no health insurance and ended up paying through the nose for private or "risk pool" insurance
* living on a fixed income and struggling with high cost of whatever
* been forced to work 2 or 3 part-time jobs with no benefits thanks to the corporate trend of eliminating full-time jobs.
* some combination of the above

possibly vote for Bush?"

During the last election cycle, we asked a variant of that question: "How can someone whose life has been decimated by Republican policy even consider voting for McCain?"

Now I think I know the answer, and it isn't pretty.

During the year or so leading up to the election, I was a passionate constant consumer of political writing. I paid attention and spent countless hours informing myself.

But ever since the inauguration my consumption of such media has dropped by about 75%.

At first I thought I had political burnout or a simply too much on my plate, but now I'm investigating an unflattering possibility:

Could I be a blind follower, too?

I have little interest in following issues these days. I no longer read Huffington Post, Daily Kos, fivethirtyeight, or Wonkette three times a day. I no longer watch CNN during my time in the kitchen. I no longer read the newspaper regularly.

I am, according to this hypothesis, exactly like the individuals on the right I used to castigate.

So I want to ask for your help.

Will you let me know, in the comments, if you (as a conservative) are now consuming more political media or if you (as a liberal) are consuming less?

Please throw your virtual two cents' worth into the fray.

Cougar Barbie

2009-02-26T07:21:00.000-08:00

This has nothing to do with writing, but it made me laugh really hard. Especially when she hit play on the boom box...

Don't Stop Believin', Barbie!

Writing--It's Not Rocket Science--Marcia

2009-02-25T12:05:00.000-08:00

As I was brushing my teeth this morning, I was thinking of rocket scientist jokes. I'm sure there are some, but mostly people mention rocket scientists as an excuse, as in "Well, what did you expect, I'm not a rocket scientist!" or, "It's not like I'm a rocket scientist or something." We sometimes use the moniker when speaking of others who are waaaaay smarter than we'll ever be, "He's so smart he's like a rocket scientist," or "She's scary smart--rocket scientist smart." Most of us have no idea what this means, because we've never met any scientists, needless to say one that can engineer a projectile that shoots into space. When we use the term rocket scientist, we're mostly talking about math whizzes. We use this term as a way to forgive our own inability to calculate the sum of the square root. (See, I wrote that, but I have no idea what I'm talking about.)

My friend Greta's brother is a rocket scientist. He builds rockets for the Orbital Sciences Corporation of Virginia. He has friends who are astronauts. He spends his days dreaming up ways to better our lives by sending Taurus XL rockets and satellites into the atmosphere out into the black mystery of space, and in this case, to track carbon emissions that contribute to global warming. High minded stuff.

Years of effort and many millions of dollars went plunging into the sea off Antartica yesterday. John Brunschwyler's rocket failed--the rocket he christened with his beautiful, smart, discerning mother's name.

Greta and I talked on the phone yesterday. She is worried about her brother, the burden of responsibility he has as manager of the program. She wondered about the ramifications for all the people and the funding and for her brother's career . . . now that he has failed.

Failed? I asked. How many years did these people get to spend imagining, dreaming, designing, calculating, reaseaching, building, and striving? They were given an opportunity to reach new heights. It was always a gamble.

How many individuals are there that can even think on the level of these "geniuses"? We are lucky to have them reaching for the stars. I certainly couldn't.

I told her not to worry. Her brother's reputation was safe on the West Coast, we are more worried about what Penelope Cruz wore on the Red Carpet then what might have fallen into the Red Sea. (There is no mention of this cataclysmic failure in today's Mail Tribune.)

Then she tells me, incidentally, that seven of his other rockets succeeded. He has seven rockets?! Seven out of eight made it into "Outer Space"! That's a 90% success rate! Worse comes to worse he can go back to the rocket scientist trenches and tinker around with circuit boards or something. (?) It's not like there are a bunch or rocket scientists on Skid Row.

What if he had never tried? It takes guts to apply your skill to something and see if you can make it fly. Yes, his rocket failed. At least he had the courage to turn his ideas into reality. The busted up bits of his mistakes have to be hauled off on flatbeds. My own ideas rarely make it on to paper. They don't even have to be hauled to the curb on Tuesday.

I challenge all of us to fail on such a grand scale. To try so hard, to dream so big, that when it all comes crashing down there's damage, there's a crater, there's a new lake with our own name on it. Be brave Imagineers. What's the worst that could happen? Remember, seven made it.

Part 2: Fact is stranger than fiction--Kerry

2009-02-24T15:31:00.000-08:00

Okay so if you really want the whole sordid scoop, here's the basics:

My father Jim and his brother, John ran a grain/fertilizer mill in McMinnville that my grandpa Harry started in 1919. My Dad played the violin and made pets out of animals on the farm, my uncle John shot squirrels and drank whiskey. They fought violently with each other even as children. A third son, older son named Richard mediated the fights until he was killed at aged fifteen as he was delivering the morning paper on a bike and struck by a car. He died on the kitchen table in front of the family. Profound grief still envelopes my father over his death, the one person who probably could have prevented the drama of the next fifty years unfolding as it did.

My grandfather was a class-one miser amidst his millions, his one indulgence, besides his grandchildren, was an occasional black cadillac that he drove around with various tools and garbage that shifted from one side to the other when he rounded corners. When he died, he gave me my grandmother's diamond ring, bequeathed the eight grandchildren $10,000 each, and gave the whole mill operation to my uncle, writing my father completely out of the will because he thought the "older brother" should be the appropriate heir. A month before his death he expressed remorse but was too weak to rewrite the estate and heavily manipulated by my uncle.

My aunt Shirley, married to my uncle John, was a 1950's beauty queen raised in an impoverished household who married my uncle for his money, among other things. Both my uncle and aunt descended into rampant, but somehow functional, alcoholism. My aunt bought a new Lincoln every year changing only to Lexus in the last decade. She parked the cars on a carpet in the garage so she could step out onto the carpet. She was a compulsive neat freak. The whole house was white/neutral colors and since she favored her two daughters over her son, she stuck him in the unfinished basement, where he would get so mad at his mother that he would sneak upstairs and pee on the aforementioned carpet.

John started having affairs and would charge hotel rooms bills to the mill expense account until the accountant starting yelling one day in front of the whole office staff:
"I'm tired of paying for John's "f------".

You beginning to get a feel for the cast of characters?

As adults Jim and John continued to disagree on most operations of the mill, so the one thing they could agree upon was to split it down the middle, 50/50. My father took the grain mill and the land on one side of town, John took the fertilizer plant in the other side of town. My Dad planted a vineyard twenty miles away and tried to escape my uncles increasingly illicit behavior.

Then an arsonist, who had burned down the country club, the high school football stadium and twenty-three local garages and outbuildings, decided to apply for a job at the grain mill after serving prison time. My father gave him a chance and hired him to sweep and clean the mill. The man started a fire in garbage can a week later so my Dad let him go. A few months later the man returned and burned down the mill, followed by two more mills in the downtown complex. Before the arsonist was caught, my parents and I were on sheriff survelliance with tapped phones and I was not allowed to walk or be alone without supervision after continued anonymous threats by the arsonist, until he was finally caught trying to light the downtown Thrifty-drug and fire and confessed to the whole thing in a plea bargain attempt.

To make a long story short, during these events my uncle quietly skimmed money off the top of the profits and carefully destroyed financial records. The statue of limitations had long since run out on anyone's ability to sue.

When he died ten years ago, his widow was left with hundreds of acres of farmland and the aforementioned money. She died last week of leukemia estranged from her son with the acreage and money still intact.

Even though my father never saw his rightful inheritance, he did retire at 54 after he sold his one remaining mill and has lived managed to survive and thrive, while his brother has been gone for ten years. There has been some vindication, at least.

Maybe, Maybe Not -- Kerry

2009-02-24T10:33:00.000-08:00

My aunt died Friday. She was worth four million dollars, most of which her husband embezzled from my father, his brother, in a complicated ponzi scheme worthy of Hollywood. She wrote her son and all family inheritors out of her will except her two daughters. The details are too vast to encompass in these short spaces. Let's just summarize it with this: someday that money would have been, at least partially, mine.
Would it have changed my deepest desires to be a writer, or a mother who is present for my children, or start an organic farm?
Maybe, maybe not.
Once again the crazy drama in my life is like a cast of characters from Falcon Crest meets Dallas with my aunt in her starring role as Cruella Deville. The two girl cousins who are inheriting all of the money are too cheap to pay for the funeral at the country club, where my aunt was an institution, and instead are having a paltry lunch at the local deli. This would have horrified my socialite Aunt and is the only bit of hilarity I can find in the situation.
I ponder this incongruous ending at the deli to a fifty-year old family drama.
"A happiness that is sought for ourselves alone can never be found...True happiness is found in unselfish love, a love that increases in proportion as it is shared," wrote author M.J. Ryan.
I am trying to believe this.

From the Zoo to the Nines -- Jennie

2009-02-22T18:09:00.000-08:00

“You don’t like animals, that’s why you’re not having a good time,” my nine year-old daughter tells me at the Portland Zoo on Saturday.

“I do,” I argue. “I like… um… butterflies.”

Daney gives me The Look: Just because I like butterflies does not mean I like animals.

“And.. . ladybugs,” I add. “Yeah! Ladybugs! They’re unbothersome—helpful, even.”

Daney is unconvinced.

So, I'm not the World Wildlife Fund's Member of the Year. (For totally understandble reasons, see this.)

But animals are not why I’m sitting on a concrete step by an abandoned crocodile tank. Rather, it's a lack of them. The few creatures that are actually in their exhibits have their backs to us. There are two zebra bottoms and a monkey tail or two. There are no bats. There is one snake (one, not plural, according to the the misprinted map). Most of the paths lead to blocked-off construction zones. Strollers are jammed against the new baby elephant’s fence.

Then there’s the food—rubbery, costly, and with the slowest order-to-table-time in Oregon's history. We dump our sad strips of blistery pizza and opt for elephant ears, which brings my seven-year old vegetarian to tears.

It’s hot. I’m tired. We drove five hours to get here. There is nothing to see, nothing to eat, and I’m wishing I brought my laptop to get a few words further on my YA thriller while the rest of my family checks out the construction tape and crows.

Until a seventeen year-old girl in heels smacks me in the face with her toddler’s mylar ball, making me realize: there are incredible creatures here! The unpredictable and amazing homo sapien! What wonder! I’m suddenly enthralled by teen mom-overwhelmedious, zoo keeper anti-socialus, and grandpa out-of-breathious.

Get the camera! Grab the notepad!

After some observation, we leave for Todai, a seafood buffet where my brother is our server. Over the cracking of my crab legs, I listen to the customers at the next table: huge fans of miso soupious —and I chuckle at two big guys in sports hats: dessert-bar and ice cream greedious.

“I like animals! I love them,” I tell Daney later, lounging on the pillowy bed at the sleek new Nines hotel.

There’s even more to study here: customer service put-outious, socialite tweenius, happy-hour/hair-frostedius.

“Mommy, you’re crazy!” Daney says.

I raise my eyebrows up and down. “Mommy: sleep-deprivedious, hoping for publicationus.”

Daney tosses a blue and brown pillow at me.

I catch it and tell her, “Let’s check out the animals in the fitness center!”

Busted -- Kelly

2009-02-20T03:00:00.000-08:00

One of my deep writerly fears has been realized.

Someone, mentioned during my period of blogging anonymity, has expressed dissatisfaction with his or her portrayal.

During those years, the blog was a protected outlet. When I joined Lithia Writers Collective I needed to link my name to my personal blog for administrative reasons. I thought I'd "scrubbed" any significant identifying references to others; apparently I did not.

I haven’t told many of the stories I hold inside for exactly this reason. I’m not skilled at “fictionalizing” things. Something to work on, I suppose. It’s times like these when I sorely miss a weekly, in-person, critique group.

I know the LWC women could kick my butt right over this hump.

Initial responsibility for the words I write lies with me. But only I know my intentions. Final responsibility lies with those who read. While I never bought into Reader Response Criticism, all readers shape their interpretations through their own experiences.

I hope readers now and in the future will understand that I mean no one harm.

Reading Aloud to Children--Marcia

2009-02-18T06:14:00.000-08:00

My ten year old has been doing sleep-overs since he was five. He was shocked to discover that none of these friends were "put to bed."

At two out of his top three sleep-over joints they watch TV until they pass out. At the third, they are told to climb in, clothes and all, and the lights are switched off.

So the discussion ensued. Daniel wanted to know if this was the usual routine. The answer--Pretty much.

I have been reading to my kids from the moment they arrived home from the hospital. I can remember being stretched out on a loveseat in front of the bay window, just days after coming home from the birthing center, with Daniel splodged out on my chest, reading him "Goodnight Moon."

Bedtime is one of the only times Mommy slows down, so we head in early. Jammies, tooth-brushing, running around screaming and batting each other with anything (favorites include leftover tubing from my mother's oxygen machine and the duster from the vacuum--how can they resist that bit of yellow fluff on the end of a wand?), there's usually some farting and jumping on beds and wrestling, then Mommy shouts and we all settle down and get cozy.

Each kid gets books and songs. For years the only song Daniel would let me sing was "Frere Jacque". Once in French, once in English. Anything else sent him into orbit, now "Frere Jacque" works like one of Pavlov's experiments. I can hum a few bars and clunk---he's punched out like a shopgirl's time clock.

The boys have been pushing bedtime out later, so reading time is shorter. Some nights, I don't get up to Daniel's bunk in time for stories. I thought this was okay, that it was time for him to read to himself, separate, grow up. But I was wrong.

As he is pushed in school to read for "AR points" the joy has been taken out of reading, it seems like a chore and a punishment. As he gets teased for being different (He sings, has my favorite girl Maia over every once-in-awhile, goes to the Craterian with his parents, has some girth on him, and is not allowed to hit or swear.) it is even more important that I climb up there with him and pull out some of the old favorites: Man Between The Towers, Piggie Pie, Tacky the Penguin, The Giving Tree, Harold and the Purple Crayon . . . As boy life gets harder, the familiar pictures and stories help him feel secure and loved.

We get home late last night from basketball practice. Hoops are interfering with bedtime for both kids. He knows he still has reading to do. He is calculating that there is not enough time for both reading and stories. I know he really wants the stories.

"You know, Mom, I am the only one of my friends that gets read to." Another thing he is teased about!

This is not a new conversation. He's been pondering this since that very first sleep over.

"I know, buddy, but most people do read to their kids . . . You can tell who gets story time, by how they think and speak . . . Not every kid uses words like delicious, velocity, momentum, and beautiful. You guys have vocabularies and imagination from all that time with books. That's just what we want for you."

Daniel's been needing an edge over his bone-headed friends lately. This answer seems to give him a glimmer. But, in truth, I don't know many people who read to their kids. I can only think of two.

But I know I'm on the right track, James came home from Kindergarten with a book about himself and his family as his Valentine to us. His favorite time of day? Bedtime. I think Daniel would say the same. So, I'll keep reading, keep singing, and falling asleep in the top bunk with my tennis shoes on.

PS. In a brief search on the benefits of reading aloud, I came across a site called Family Education. There, under a tab called "Mom's Coffee Break" I got some great laughs reading posts by "Max's Daddy," by Jess M. Ballier. Very, very funny, especially if you have rambunctious boys.

Knowing + Doing = Writing

2009-02-17T21:21:00.001-08:00

Knowing and doing are two different verbs for a reason. One does not always follow the other.

I know I like how I feel when I write every day.

Doing it is another matter.

According to Martha Beck in a 2008 Oprah magazine (which I was reading when I could have been writing), human nature is predisposed to this knowing, this listening to our inner voice, and then perhaps not acting on it for a number of reasons. Mine reasons read like a melodramatic "women who do too much" self-help book, so I will spare you from them.

The good news about this inner struggle is that when I actually act on what I know, the joy of being in flow is pure bliss.

And it's that knowing that's worth doing.

Tense -- Jennie

2009-02-15T18:32:00.000-08:00

My first book was the typical, never-gonna-get-published work. It was a solid first effort at a new hobby for me. After never have taken a creative writing class, I learned a lot while drafting this YA novel, particularly about about character and dialogue. Needless to say, the plot was severely linear. And the whole manuscript was written in one verb tense: the present.

For my second work, the characters were slightly more developed. Dialogue was a bit more important. And I expanded the present-tense plot by integrating some flashbacks, sprinkling "-ed" endings throughout.

I'm still learning.

This new piece I'm scrawling probes the consequences of human suffering. I'm keeping the motivation of my main character at the center of plot this time. I'm trying to return often to her thoughts, feelings, and reactions. I'm reminding myself to have her talk to the other characters with the same vernacular and tone in which she narrates to the reader. And in addition to using present- and past-tenses, I'm throwing in glimpses of the future.

Now, I'm wondering if I could have better polished my craft if I had just stuck with one tense all along. It's difficult to focus on character and dialogue when you're straddling three kinds of verbs. The whole thing makes me, well, tense.

The way I see it, though, is that for the next novel, I'll have to move on to character and dialogue. Because I've run out of verb tenses, right?

Maybe, unlike my fictional first character, I'll take a cyclic journey, winding up, where I started, only deeper, and in only one tense.

Things I'm Trying to Tell Myself Today -- Kelly

2009-02-13T00:00:00.000-08:00

The laundry can wait.

People who talk endlessly about themselves despite social clues to stop are lonely and need our kindness.

Scrubby brown winter woods can be beautiful.

Wind is pleasant.

Mistakes are fine.

My daughter’s selfishness is not evidence of irrevocable spoiling.

I'll think of something to write someday.

My heart is not tired.

A new way to think about creativity...

2009-02-12T08:54:00.000-08:00

No matter how you feel about Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love, her speech "A new way to think about creativity" at the 2009 TED conference is really, really interesting. A worthwhile way to spend 19 minutes. (Thanks Katie!)

In Search of Role Models--Marcia

2009-02-11T05:55:00.000-08:00

The Australian Open just wrapped up. Temperatures were at an historic high. Andy Roddick, one of the last Americans standing, said, "Well, I did pretty well today, considering the weatherman was predicting death." He and a comer named Djokovich were the last to play with the roof open. There were riots among Serbs and Croats. Cypriots and other Greeks keep the grandstands lively with soccer chants and body paint, and there were always Australians in large numbers out on the grass drinking from beer steins the size of oil barrels.

During all of this Rafael Nadal played one of the most stunning matches of all time--and he's already played some of the most stunning matches of all time--that tells you how stunning it was. It was so spectacular that when it was time to leave for work, I seriously considered lettting us all call in sick. I had to peel myself away from the TV, but in a rare move I left it on, so I wouldn't have to try to find the channel when I came home later. As I shoved my key in the lock 3.5 hours later and walked in the door I heard an odd sound--the familiar pock, grunt, pock, grunt of two men smacking away at a little green ball. The thing is, coverage wasn't supposed to pick up for another hour . . . could it be . . . was the match from this morning--still? Yes.

A friend called. I rudely hung up on her. Then I called her during the commercial. We agreed at the next commercial I'd run up the block to her house, and we'd watch together. When I got home at the match's conclusion, there was a message from Sherrie the sandwich girl at the Deli to please call when I got in. I was sure my husband had finally had that heart attack.

When I called the line was busy, no doubt Mercy Flights.

I called my mother-in-law.

"Shirley is Dan Okay?"

"I think so, I just talked to Andy a minute ago."

Wouldn't my brother-in-law have told their mother that Dan had either amputated his fingertip chopping chicken, or been wheeled out on a gurney after all those years of steak, tots, Raisinets, and bacon ends? Hmmm. It's hard to say.

When someone finally picks up at the Deli, it's Sherrie.

"Sherrie, Oh My God, Is Dan alright?

She starts to laugh. HaHa. "Whatever you do, don't tell him the score."

It turns out they're all down there shaving turkey slices, making sandwiches, washing dishes and sweeping floors and watching another network's airing of this amazing tennis match.

Sherrie says, "So, tell me who wins."

"I'm not telling you who wins. That takes all the fun out of it. This is the match of the century."

"I have to leave before it's over." This from someone I'm sure has never watched a tennis match in her life!

"Maybe not," I say coyly, "Call me before you leave and I'll give you the score."

Rafael Nadal and Fernando Verdasco, two muy guapo young Spaniards played for 5.5 hours. They played until well past 1:00 a.m., in one of the most physically taxing, exciting, bravado- filled brawls I've ever had the pleasure to watch.

Rafa won by two points.

Commentators were beside themselves. Words like epic, historic, impossible, freak of nature were being bandied about. The truth was, it was an historic moment. The two freaks played the longest match in tournament history.

Shortly after, 92 seconds later, the sports casters immediatly began forecasting Rafa's demise at Roger Federer's hands in the final. There was no way Rafa was going to be able to come back, with less that a day's rest, restored, recovered and able to fight against The Great Roger Federer.

Everyone was simultaneously stoked and bummed at the same time. Yeah Rafa, poor Rafa . . . but yeah Roger.

Roger is the Australians' darling. They love him and make no bones about it.

Roger was to become a legend, equaling the record 14 Grand Slams of Pete Sampras' career. All of the legends of tennis, still alive, were present for what would inevitably be Roger's crowning as the new king. This was his chance to regain his #1 ranking, become the best player in tennis history, and prove that Rafa will never be able to win on "hard courts" like those at the US and Australian Opens.

It took almost five hours, but Rafa did it. Rafa won the Australian Open.

Then came the trophy ceremony. The director of Tennis Australia took the mic and announced that Australia loves Roger Federer and he is their favorite player. Well, if I'm Rafa, how am I supposed to take this? The crowd agreed, applausing wildly. The Legends were already lined up, ready to receive their initiate. Then Roger took the stand, and was handed his massive silver platter. He tried to speak. His voice cracked. He looked at the crowd, he heard their cheers, he saw Rod Laver, his own personal God, and his face cracked. The ice king, broke apart. It was shocking. The world stopped breathing. I thought his long time girlfriend Mirka, was going to both barf and jump over the grandstand wall to try and scoop him up.

After several attempts at controlling himself, the world could see that we were going to have to cut to commercial quickly, or get him off the mic. The director complimented him again for his grand contributions to the game of tennis, put his arms around him and asked if he'd like a break. Roger stepped down.

Then the world's #1 player, the first Spaniard ever to win the Australian was called to the stand and handed a keg-sized silver cup. This is the part where the champion usually raises the cup over his/her head, smiles as big as Austalia herself, and brings out the roar of the crowd. Rafa had certainly earned it. Instead, he tucked the trophy under his armpit, left the dias and went to put his arm around his rival. He put his head to Roger's head, his sweat-soaked mane shielding his eyes, he spoke privately to Roger, gave him a squeeze and then motioned for Federer to take the stand again. Roger did, but barely. He said his thanks, said it was "killing him," and left the rest of the ceremony to Rafa.

When Rafa took the stand again, it was still without the flourish and glory of most champions. He quietly looked to his friend and said, "Sorry for today, Roger, I know how you are feeling right now. But remember that you are one of the greatest champions from history and you will go on to improve the 14 (Sampras' record in Grand Slam titles)." He briefly held the trophy aloft, thanked everyone and went back to stand with Roger.

This to me was even more stunning and shocking than anything I'd seen so far.

Tears rained down my face. I was so glad my sons were watching. Already, by the age of 10, there are young athletes, kids, who think they are God's gifts to the world, because they are fast, or can hit a ball, or knock someone over in a football game. Here is one of the greatest athletes in the world, humble even during his crowning achievement. This is the kind of child I hope I can raise. One that can be good without also making others feel bad.

Rafa's coach, Uncle Tony, told him when he was young, "just because you can hit a tennis ball well doesn't mean you're better than anyone else." That was a lesson that seemed to have stuck. It's not what most Americans are teaching their children. I know this, because I've already been watching it for years at the sidelines of my son's baseball, basketball, hockey, and tennis games. We worship our athletes--teach them to be cocky, self-assured to the point of absurdity.

If this story appeared at all, it was all about Roger's tears. Few if any talked about Nadal and his great act of compassion, elegance, sacrafice, and sportsmanship at what surely was one of the greatest moments of his own life. To me, this was a story worth splashing across the cover of every magazine and newspaper.

How disappointed I was yesterday, when even Tennis magazine failed to acknowledge the greatness of this moment, this brand of champion. Tennis magazine did not feature a single photo of Rafa with his arm around his opponent anywhere in the magazine, needless to say on the cover. Nope. The cover featured Roger Federer swinging his classic backhand. There is not even one mention of Nadal, his "epic" matches, or his otherworldy sense of what it means to be a good sport. So perhaps this is a moment that was merely a blip on the world's radar, but, it was for me an astonishing, astounding, heart-wrenching and heartening glimpse at what it means to be a true champion and a great man.

Writing 1939/2009 -- Kerry

2009-02-10T20:48:00.000-08:00

My grandfather bought a newspaper in Bemidgie, (pop. 800) Minnesota in 1939 and published it weekly with the help of my grandmother and one part-time assistant. He called in the debts for the back issues of deliveries. One farmer paid him with a pig. Another brought in pies. The depression was just ending, and they wanted him to keep the newspaper going.

My grandmother was the editor, reporter, obituary writer, columnist and advertising director. As an English major fresh from the University of Wisconsin, she relished the task.

To write the obituaries, she had to walk through the hardware store into the mortuary, where the body of the day was laid out only a few feet away from a display of garbage cans and hoses.

Her column themes revolved around the farming community and often resulted in inadvertent dilemmas.

"Fertile Woman Marries" (Fertile, Minnesota) was one of her headlines that sent my grandfather into orbit.

She would have been 100 years this year. I ponder the changes the in the writing world she never saw, like automatic typewriters, the web, blogging. Her writing environment and mine may be radically different, but the basis remains the same, trying to write something, anything amidst trips to the hardware store and occasional blooper blog headlines.

The End -- Jennie

2009-02-08T18:07:00.000-08:00

My writing students are at that point in the term where we're working on conclusion. They have mastered introductions, theses, and the body of essays. Now we're tying it all together.

From years of teaching writing, I know this is tricky. But it's also important, I emphasize, because it's the impression that stays with the reader (or, in their cases, the grader).

But from editing thousands of papers, from reading magazines, and critiquing books, I've happened upon something interesting. There are only so many ways to end.

Honestly.

It seems pretty formulaic.

Take, for example, David Wroblewski's all-the-rage The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. This tale ends with a choice.

Laurie Halse Anderson's Chains? With a quote. Donna Tartt's The Secret History? A journey.

Here are a few other kinds of conclusions I've found: imagery; a summary or revisitation; a question, a lesson, or what the future might bring; hope; a call-to-action. Lots of conclusions fit into more than one category. On Thursday, we found the last sentence of a short story that used five.

Me, I seem stuck in the same kind of conclusion: a peek into the future through imagery.

I might try something for else for my next book, if I ever write another. Because my problem isn't wrapping it up. Like Eve Porinchak, it's how to begin.

(Wah Hoo! My first link!!!)

Concept Writer -- Julie

2009-02-07T09:02:00.000-08:00

I figured the occasional Saturday blog was just my speed. Surely I could conjure up some solid writing every few weeks to share with the Lithia Writers and Readers. What I have in reality conjured up are half-baked ideas expressed in barely coherent word scraps littering my lesson plan book. An idea will pop into my head when I'm in the middle of deciding when to schedule that spelling test; I'll capture it in a rush and then a few lame faltering words later – crickets. I lose steam. I'm like a half-rate concept artist. There is a tolerably interesting idea, but there is no craft in the expression of it. You need me to put my money where my mouth is, you say? So where are these tolerably interesting ideas, you ask? Let's go. You and me.

Blog Idea #1 “As Seen”
A post written from the perspective of an alert television viewer who thinks she saw the elderly woman from the LifeAlert commercial on the commerical for PastaNMore as well, and is concerned that her LifeAlert necklace has given her a false sense of security. Several other As-Seen-On-TV commercials would be woven in, including but not limited to: the HyrdoGlobe plant watering system, the SwivelEase vacuum, the CleverClasp necklace putter-onner, and the LateralThighTrainer.

Blog Idea #2 “The Other Shoe”
This would open with a brief description of a morning I had recently that resembled the opening scene of a movie, establishing that the main character has a perfect life, moments before everything goes awry, vis-a-vis a murder, a kidnapping, a cataclysmic natural disaster or a terminal diagnosis. This sunny morning my son was practicing for his oral report on Paul McCarney when I said goodbye, and he said “I love you Mom!” in his best Liverpool accent, then my husband showed up in my classroom with coffee and a rice crispy chew for me, and in the middle of class one of my students blurted out, “Ms. Inada, this is my favorite class!” I would go on to say, in this blog, how days like this leave me feeling anxious, like I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop, and that sometimes the other shoe is simply a creeping pessimism that slides in unannounced, mucking up your montage. But then I would need to address the fact that I don't really understand what is meant by 'waiting for the other shoe to drop' – it implies that one shoe has already dropped, and is that first shoe-drop something good, or simply the first of two bits of bad news? You see why I couldn't follow through.

Blog Idea #3 “The Inadas Turn Down the Heat”
This post would begin by explaining that I have always maintained near tropical levels of heat in my house, day and night, with hilarious descriptions of it – “wall of heat” “company gasping for air upon entering,” very good stuff. I would go on to reveal that my son and I, inspired by a December '07 issue of National Geographic for Kids, decided to turn down the heat to 64, day and night. We had read the issue a year ago, same article, but it was only now, when I felt sure that my president had also adjusted the heat in the White House, that I felt compelled to do it. I was confident that if Obama got chilly, he would simply get a sweater – likely a nice striped Gap number. A year ago I was equally confident that if W got chilly, he was cranking the heat to 73 and parading around in a 'Don't Mess with Texas' wife beater. But then I wondered whether it was okay to use the term 'wife beater', if readers would know what I meant, or if they would be offended. And when I start thinking about whether or not I'm going to offend someone, it's pretty much all over.

Okay, so you enjoy your lengthy blog posts, meandering along beautifully and then coming to a sweet insight; I'll just be here with my little concepts. See you some other Saturday!

Dropped Stiches -- Kelly

2009-02-06T00:00:00.000-08:00

This is supposed to the post in which I wax rhapsodic on the joys of knitting. I’m supposed to tell you that nothing has ever brought me out of my head and into the moment like the hypnotic rhythm of looping and pulling. I’m supposed to tell you how I’ve abandoned my perfectionism, my inner critic, and learned to love each stitch, even the dropped ones.

That was all true.

For a bit.

I spent several days knitting and unraveling. Knitting and unraveling. Knitting and unraveling.

Binding off.

Gathering courage to purl, and discovering it wasn’t difficult at all.

Unraveling.

Starting again.

Unraveling.

I completed two little rectangles my daughter called “knitties” and took to bed each night.

I was totally relaxed. Peaceful and Mindful.

Then I noticed I was actually producing something and that it actually looked like knitting done by a knitter.

So I choked.

The minute my project began to have the potential to become a scarf, a sweater, a doll blanket, the minute the process disappeared, the joy went away.

I began to tense, to worry that I would make a mistake many rows into the project, a mistake so egregious I would have to abandon the entire thing, beautiful yarn and all.

This is, of course, pertinent to both meditation and writing.

Today I had a long talk, about knitting and writing, with a wise young woman. She posed a wonderful question.

“Have you ever set out to fail?” she asked.

“Well, I knew when I started knitting that I would make mistakes. Other than that, honestly, I’ve never done it consciously but unconsciously is another story altogether.”

And there you have it: fear of failure and fear of success in a nutshell.

I resolve today no longer to fear either with my writing.

I resolve today to be gentle with myself.

I resolve today to write to explore rather than to control.

For that last, we have editors.

Reason # 56728 why I can't write today--Marcia

2009-02-05T15:44:00.001-08:00

When someone calls and says, I'm coming over tomorrow to clean your house, you don't say no. Especially when he is the Universe's answer to your call.

The funny thing about that call, is you have no control over when and how it is answered.

My answer came in my burly builder with a leaf blower.

I came home from James' first piano lesson to Otis Redding blasting on the stereo and Richie waving a leaf blower over the now empty rooms of my home. He plunked every piece of furniture, all the baskets of toys, and piles of laundry out on the patio.

Even more miraculous my truculent ten year-old was using a shop Vac on a carpet hung over the fence in the side yard. Richie wreaks havoc, but it's good havoc.

He had no idea that the women of my neighborhood had decided that my house was too unsanitary for the Princess Ariane, now seven months preggers, to stay in this weekend. No idea that this kind of thinking drains me of every ounce of energy.

Richie was able to accomplish the impossible, he had every member of my family up and at it. Floors were mopped, surfaces wiped, clutter put away, animals cordoned off, children disciplined and everything smelled like oranges.

It astonishes me when the Universe sweeps in and makes my wishes come true. I don't always understand why good things like this happen. But I know how to be grateful. I truly am.

It is nice to have a slime-free abode. It's nice to hear from the Imperial Empress, the Higher Power, I can't wait for the Princess to arrive.

Writer Incarnate -- Kerry

2009-02-03T08:50:00.000-08:00

An 89 year-old man in a tight blue speedo swam with carefully placed arms and long, graceful flutter kicks in the Master's swimming meet last weekend. After four lengths in the 100 freestyle event, he touched the wall as the timers hovered over the edge.

As his head came out of the water and his arm went in the air with a thumbs-up victory sign, the packed crowd in the bleachers by the steamy pool erupted into wild applause.

And then the room became eerily silent as a tiny 87 year-old woman with a hunched back emerged from the bleachers and walked slowly to the starting blocks to compete against people twenty years younger. She slid gently into the water. Five other swimmers towered above her on starting blocks. The gun went off and she glided off the wall with a beautiful strong stroke, keeping her own time, as the other five swimmers flew into the churning water and passed her.

The crowd began cheering wildly again, "Elsie. Elsie. Elsie." She finished a 100 i.m., which is a length of butterfly, a length of backstroke and a length of breaststroke, followed by a final length of freestyle, performing a breathtaking show. She touched the wall at the finish and the crowd went wild again. She didn't even break a smile as she emerged from the pool, instead she just sort of saluted the stands and shuffled away.

I wondered how many times she'd had to start over working at this craft of swimming. Like Marcia's metaphor for writing and her son's ice hockey experiences and Jennie's expository on the different stages of growth in a writing life, perhaps that is what this writing game is all about: reinvention and reincarnation.

Not to mention a little bit of tenacity and maybe a bit of orneriness.

Out From Under? -- Jennie

2009-02-01T09:13:00.000-08:00

I don’t think my problem is plot. I have a million ideas for stories, a million ways to begin and end them, a million conflicts and resolutions.

It’s everything else that kills me: picking that perfect word to convey meaning, creating well-crafted characters who are deep and fully developed, who are relatable but also unique. And scripting rich dialogue between these characters, dialogue that shows the conflicts and resolutions without my telling it.

It’s setting, too—slowing down the action, so the reader can see the scene: letting the rivers rage, and the owls call, and the carcass of a cat sink slowly into the dirt.

Once Christy told me that the first three books go under the bed. This means that it takes writing a few novels before actually publishing one. Since Christy’s so clever (she published her first), I told her I’d give her my plot—all of my plots--and she could work her word choice, dialogue magic, etc., etc.

She chuckled.

So I’ve had to apply all these tedious little things to my plot by myself.

It’s been interesting.

Wherever I go (the mall in Eugene, a museum in San Francisco, my classroom on a test day), I’ve found myself studying people, and I’ve listened to what those people say to each other. I’ve taken long walks to hear the crack of ice under my feet, to the sound of sticky tires on pavement, and to the air trapped under a pigeon’s wings as it took flight above a bridge.

I breathed in hay after a rain.

I’m reading Poe before bedtime, and scaring myself silly.

I’m crying over loss.

In essence, my senses have become heightened, and I’m trying to transcribe that in my writing. This book, in turn, has slowed down. It won’t be tied up in the two months in which I usually complete a manuscript.

It has grown up; hopefully enough this time, to stay out from under the bed.

Needlework -- Kelly

2009-01-30T08:55:00.000-08:00

So many worries…

Is it time for my mother to stop her cancer treatment?

Should I take an aggressive, invasive approach to prevent cancer in my own body?

Need the release of every dollar be fraught with such anxiety?

Why is my sweet daughter suddenly exploding with anger?

After 25 years of marriage and 50 years of living, why do I feel as if everything is starting over?

But such elegant, smooth cord….

I treasure good friends who listen and who have, in some cases, faced the same worries.

Each day my daughter learns in a peaceful, loving academic environment

My sister, at least today, shares rather than attacks my thoughts about our mother’s care.

I’ve found new pursuits – knitting, drawing, and painting – to open a new chapter for my hands; my heart will follow, surely.

I’m grateful for the Lithia Writers, who have my back from so very far away.

And the finest needle, language, in its infinite richness and precision….

May it help me string these beads, and place them in my fingers to touch and consider.

Every word can be a healing, every page a release.

We are fortunate, indeed, to write.

Dominance and Sumbission: A Cautionary Tale --Christy

2009-01-29T07:34:00.001-08:00

This business of writing is a subjective one. It’s not like say, accounting, where there’s a right answer—writers have to rely on arbiters of taste, namely agents and editors, to tell us if we will be successful.

To illustrate how powerfully the pendulum can swing between loving a manuscript and loathing a manuscript, I’ll tell you a writer’s conference tale. Pull up a chair, won't you?

A few years ago our ambitious writer’s group decided to go to a conference together. We chose the Whidbey Island Writer’s Conference because it was close enough to drive to and Marcia’s friend had a cottage near the conference that she’d let us use. We polished our work, had business cards printed, and ordered authentic manuscript boxes off the internet. (They tell you never to bring your manuscript because no one wants to lug them back to New York, but we were certain that ours would be the exception. They weren’t.)

The great thing about the Whidbey Conference, other than that it’s on an exquisite little island in the San Juans that you must ferry to, is that you can sign up for as many agent/editor meetings as you are willing to pay for. Plus, the people you sign up with read ten pages of your work the night before so you actually have stuff to talk about. I signed up for four 15-minute agent sessions. At that point I was shopping two manuscripts, a collection of memoir stories and the manuscript that is now The Prophecy of Days: The Daykeeper’s Grimoire. The adult-genre agents I met with, Jandi Nelson and Esmond Harmsworth, were both charming and complimentary and I walked away with business cards and offers to submit from both of them. Then I had a meeting with Jodi Reamer, who was a relatively new agent actively looking for YA clients. She had thoroughly read and made notes on my ten pages, asked great questions, and told me to definitely submit when I was ready. Not long later she signed a new writer named Stephenie Meyer—maybe you’ve heard of her?—and became a capital-a Agent.

My last meeting was with he-who-shall-remain-unnamed because I fear his wrath. But I’ll tell you this: his name rhymes with Hairy Molerat and to my utter bewilderment he is married to an amazing, funny, talented writer. Anyway, back to Whidbey. The minute I sat down with him he looked annoyed. He told me he hadn’t read the ten pages so I’d just need to pitch him. Caught off-guard, my pitch was probably not as polished as it could have been, but I was not ready for the full tongue lashing that followed. He told me, among other choice things, that the plot was too ambitious and I’d never be able to pull it off, that girls aren’t interested in science, and that I should give it up and try something else entirely. Honestly, this went on for the full fifteen minutes; I’d try to explain it another way and he’d find another way to shoot it down. He was relentless and I know this shouldn’t matter but I WAS EVEN PREGNANT! Have you no heart Hairy Molerat? No mercy at all?

When my 15 minutes of brutality were over, I went directly to a bathroom stall and cried my eyes out. My writing group came to the rescue—pugnacious Marcia wanted to kick his a**; Zen Julie wanted me to forget it ever happened, to remember that he is working out his own issues and that it has nothing to do with me; and tender Erin just cried along with me.

The next day at the closing ceremony I won awards in two categories, Young Adult Short Story and Nonfiction Essay. I’d hoped Mr. Molerat would be in the audience to see that I wasn’t the loser he’d told me I was, but of course, he’d done his damage and then taken the red-eye home the night before.

So, the moral. Treat agent/editor responses to your work like horoscopes: only believe the good stuff. Rely on your critique partners to tell you the truth. And never, ever, submit to an agent whose name rhymes with Hairy Molerat.

Falling for Fun---Marcia

2009-01-28T14:58:00.000-08:00

--Photographs Courtesy of Rodney Rampy

Last week, despite head lice, James started learning to play hockey. When Daniel was in Mighty Mights, it averaged out to about $5 a lesson: you got an hour of ice time, skates, puffy pants, all kinds of shin and elbow guards, a helmet with a grill, and coolest of all --- a stick.

Having head lice is not so bad when you are fantasizing about holding a hockey stick. So we get to the rink half an hour early to suit up. There is no one at the desk, no one in the lobby, and no one manning the concessions. Hmmmm.

A rumple-haird 20-something emerged from somewhere and verified we were in the right place at the right time, he just didn't know who was in charge. Then a manager came out. I handed him a check for $85 and he handed James a pair of size 3 skates. Okay. We got into them. Now what?

I go back to Mr. Rumple-hair, "So . . . is this it? No shin or elbow guards? How 'bout a helmet?"

He starts looking left and right.

"I think that's it," he said.

Huh.

Let me make it clear. James has zero sense of balance. He spends all of his time at the Roller Rink falling on his heinie, or with me trying to keep him standing by hoisting him up by his armpits. It will be about another ten years before James' motor skills suit his stature. The guy needs help . . . no kidding. James on skates--on ice--Danger Will Robinson.

I begin to look left and right myself.

Other little skaters are filing in. They are all tricked out--think "Can you Pimp My Hockey Player?" Proud boys full of swagger (skates make everybody swagger), with cool helmets, big robot-like gloves, and shiny sticks. These kids are bristling with kid-size doses of testosterone and confidence.

"I guess he could pick out a helmet." Rumple-hair says as he heads out with his bristlers.

James cruises over to pick out head gear. I hesitate a moment, given the lice situation and all, and then it's like, what the hell. I am so tired. Let this kid have something good. besides, the insides are plastic. I wonder, briefly, if there is something they spray in these things, but given the lack of attendance at any of the points of command, I am sure they are not de-lousing the helmets.

C'est La Vie, C'est La Guerre. It is now the official start time for our lesson.

"Well, James, let's get out there."

James can't wait. He barrels, with a swagger, for the doors that lead out to the ice. I am really ticked that my kid is hobbling around with worn out skates and a helmet that doesn't fit, and not an elbow pad to his wobbly name.

There is one other tiny little boy out on the ice. He is in blue snow pants, a helmet, and hockey skates. His ankles collapse inward, his knees are knocking, and he's hanging on to the rink's edge like it's the deck of the Titanic.

His parents look tight-lipped out onto the ice at the spectre of their precious angel splashing his brains out as his skates slip out under him.

I quickly find out that the Peewee lesson was no different last week. There was no coach, no equipment, nada. They were told, it's best for kids just to get the feel of the ice.

"Well, I can let my kid get the feel of the ice for a hell of a lot less than $85. And I'd have skates on so I could help him!" Ooooh, I do get fiesty. The clock was ticking. James was floundering. I stalked back to the front and dug around for the manager.

"This isn't going well, I'd like my check back."

"Um, well, it isn't always like this, I'd like you to wait 'til next week. There's usually a volunteer out there with the kids."

"Well, there isn't now. My kid's at risk and I'm very disappointed."

Manager Man looks out over the smoke coming off my fuzzy hair.

"Ahh, it looks like they're here now. See." He points.

"Ahh. Good. Uh. This lesson was supposed to start at 5:15. It is now 5:40. Please tell me they'll be skating an extra 20 minutes."

"Ahh. No."

"Unbelievable."

"Sorry."

Stalk, stomp, huff. Somewhere between the rows of skate-scarred benches, and the penalty box out in the rink, I get my act together. I can see out on the ice. I can see that my child is having

fun. He's moving, he's trying something new. I tell myself to get my game face on and suck it up.

By the time I meet up with the Grimlips again, there is a nice guy on skates working hard to keep James upright. I keep waiting for James to give up. He falls over and over and over again.

I keep the grin plastered to my face, keep my thumbs Chaney-style--rigidly pointed toward the heavens. Good Job, Bud. Splat. It takes everything I have not to race out onto the ice in my sneakers.

The thing is, James loved every minute. He went back for more punishment . . . twice this week. The coaches are now on board, they are terrified of me, and so, now treat me with the greatest fear and respect. My kid is getting everything he needs--including a really good time, a sport of his own, joy, accomplishment, and new friends. Plus, he now has his very own sporty red hockey stick.

I have to ask myself, when was the last time I applied myself with such fearlessness and passion? When was the last time I let myself fail, repeatedly, in order to grow? I can't remember. But, I am watching my child. I am paying attention. There is definately something to be learned here, and those who know me, know it applies to my writing.

Splat!

Thanks for sending me the photos Rodney.

Pondering the 1980's --Kerry

2009-01-27T08:54:00.000-08:00

Last night I succumbed to the lure of Facebook.
It's taken me awhile to acquiesce. I was only somewhat charmed until yesterday's evening foray into the netherworld of 1985.
I journeyed through pages of people, perusing photos and time-traveling. I came to the following conclusions:
1. The hair wasn't really that big of a mistake, it really does come kind of close to the "tousled" look of today if you ignore the side wings and straight up hairsprayed bangs.
2. We really are still the same personalities and have ascended along the trajectory, more or less, that I would have predicted. Lawyers, Mommies, Microsofties, etc.
3. Being in a sorority can be a good experience. Really.
4. The most important things to me are still love, books and writing, among others.
5. Republicans and Democrats can still be good drinking buddies.

Anyone else have additions to the list?

2009-01-25T20:06:00.001-08:00

We're 3 1/2 weeks into 2009.

Where are you with keeping your resolutions?

Words and Lawns - Kelly

2009-01-23T00:00:00.000-08:00

Last May, I overcame extreme anxiety and hit “send,” pushing two essays of the nest. I submitted these fledglings, the first non-academic work I’d submitted anywhere under my own name since age 16, for inclusion in a collection of creative non-fiction. Its editors are two writers and bloggers I’ve come to admire and respect.

The publication date, “fall of 2008,” implied a decision sometime around October. Apparently they did not receive enough submissions, and instead extended the deadline to December 31. Despite the standard “we cannot respond to inquiries about individual submissions” warning, I sent a “cheery little email” not long ago and received a form response. The project’s website has not been updated in any form or fashion; it still mentions the original submission deadline: May 15, 2008.

I do not have the confidence of the other Lithia Writers. I am meek. It was a huge leap of faith to hit that button. And you know what? When I sent those words away they somehow were no longer mine. The sending itself was the point of this event, not acceptance (or so I’m telling myself until the rejection email arrives).

All this brings me around to my lawn.

Every fall, in the hopes of continuous employment, a landscape service spreads winter rye seed over our two acres. The first time they did this, I blustered, “How dare they assume I want a green winter yard!” Then the compliments began to roll in and I learned to savor the feel of soft, cold green blades under my feet.

But this year? My yard looks like a Chia Pet undergoing chemotherapy.

You see, we’re experiencing a serious drought. Smack in the middle of all those biblical weather systems (floods, blizzards, Gulf hurricanes, etc.), we’re high and dry.

Here and there, hopeful patches of brilliant green have erupted among the brown dirt and sere Bermuda and St. Augustine. Looking down, I see hundreds of seeds, dreaming of germination.

This afternoon, I realized that my lawn resembles the writing life as well. Amid the drought of anxiety, we sow our seeds and we wait.

Here and there, celebration and growth!

There and here, patience and nothingness.

And you always have to mow, either way.

Dear Muse

2009-01-22T10:59:00.000-08:00

Last night at out weekly critique meeting, Marcia brought her neighbor Earl. He's a retired professor of music and aesthetics who has now turned his full attention to poetry. I heard him read at her birthday party this fall and was moved to tears by a poem about his mother, so I was excited to hear more. He brought a sheaf of poems and we read about five. There was one about the Muse that I loved so much I asked to take my copy home. With his permission, I'll reprint it here.

Dear Muse

Each night, along another stretch of heart,
I dig, or work some old abandoned claim.
Years of fever for this golden art
and me without an image to my name.
Look. No luxuries; the room is bare.
These books are paperback; those bits of art
were gifts; one bulb to light the desk and chair
where I can lean my mind against my heart.

And all for what? Less than a word an hour;
it barely meets the interest on my loans.
To pay a bird I borrow from a flower,
and I need words that skip like small smooth stones
across a pond; my mind is a stagnant moat.
There are some soft explosions in the silt;
I can make out a promissory note.
You've helped before; I'm overwhelmed with guilt
asking again, but what with all I've spent
I don't have a verse for next months rent.

--Earl Jones

Reason Why I Can't Write No. 4332, Nit Picking--Marcia

2009-01-21T17:21:00.001-08:00

Okay, I’m just going to spill it. Last week’s reason why “I Can’t Write” is Head Lice. Yup. My worst fear. I have seven-quajillion hair shafts per scalpimeter. I am louse nirvana. I am a warm hairy haven for creepy crawly scab-like parasites to blood suck to their heartless carapace’s content.

It’s not like I wasn’t suspicious.

The night we arrived home from Christmas vacation, I bolted out of bed. My head was alive with Pringles (prickling tingles). I rudely nudged my snoring husband. Get up! Can’t you see this is an E-mergency! Ahhh. Itch, itch, itch. Gaah. My husband is a 6’1” lumberer. He’s fast as lightning at his busy restaurant, but when it comes to the Honey Dos he’s slower than a glacier. It doesn’t help that he sleeps in the buff, but is unusually modest when it comes to roaming the halls naked. Any red alert requires his robe or a pair of pants. Good God, doesn’t the man know we have children? I’ve been wearing Flak suits to bed for the last ten years!

EIGHT HOURS LATER! when we finally got down the hall and snapped on the light, he half-heartedly fumbled around in my mane.

“See anything?” I asked, talking into the sink as I tried to get better exposure under the vanity’s dim bulb.

“Nah,” he said, scratching himself before shuffling off to bed.

Four seconds later I heard my ten year old climbing down the bunk bed ladder. He caught me in the bathroom still scratching away like an old blood hound.

“Mom, my head itches.”

My youngest has been scratching since Thanksgiving.

The next day I rushed, like a good mother, to Rite Aid and spent $20 on dandruff shampoo and an expensive treatment for scalp dermatitis. A week went by. We were still scratching. I loaded up Monday morning to head off to my job in KINDERGARTEN!--scratch scratch—thinking it’s probably time to call the doctor. That dermatitis cream is just NOT working.

Tuesday night, per usual, I was snuggled down with James reading him a book when I took a good scratch at the back of my noggin and felt something--something vaguely scab-like. I dragged it down the hair shaft and pinched it between my fingers. It took awhile for me to register what I was looking at. It sort of looked like a patch of dead skin. Translucent, brown and grey flecked. Then I saw its weensy legs move.

Just as I jumped out of bed my husband walked through the door. Both kids, moments ago calm and sleepy eyed, began screaming and jumping around on both feet.

“Lice!”

“Lice!”

“It’s Lice!”

“Are you sure?” Hubby asks.

“Well what else looks like a moving scabie with wiggly legs and sucks the blood from your scalp?”

“You don’t know that, it could be anything.” He scanned the room for the remote.

“It’s LICE!” From all three of us.

He was still in his coat, bags in hand, slowly taking in the fact that he was not going to get to unpeel the film on the Haagen Daas and park it in front of ESPN.

“We need you to go straight to Rite Aid and get everything you can.”

“Now?”

“Now!” I win because I am already in pjs, and the louse was in my hair.

My husband proceeds to putter around the house, not really sure we have self-diagnosed correctly. Those of us being drained of our life’s blood by parasites are swarming like an angry mob. There is no possible way for him to move fast enough.

I remembered reading that you can kill lice by smothering them in Vaseline. I’ve had a tin of Bag Balm lying around in my room for years. I find it tucked back in my closet behind some gloves. There is half a tin left. I scoop all of it out. I plaster a baseball sized blob of Bag Balm all over my head. But this only covers the top layer. I rummaged through the bathroom cupboards. Half used bottles of Lubriderm, saline solution, and outdated Immodium tablets are flying off the shelves. No Vaseline, but I do find a small container of organic baby-friendly Vapo Rub. I slap that on my head, trying to massage it into my scalp. My hair now can be honed to a point and stand for days on its own. Think Coneheaded troll meets Rita Marley. Rastafari-with a faint hint of eucalyptus and liniment. But the itching stopped. I wrap my head in plastic wrap for good measure. That’ll killem for sure.

My Hub comes home with $40 bucks worth of product and a bad attitude. He takes one look at me.
“Well that won’t wash out “til Easter.”

“Everything should be good and dead by then.”
We set to work on the kids. Nine, ten, and eleven o’clock went by.

They fell asleep at 1:00 on the couch, too afraid to go back to their beds, now orgiastic communes for loose lice.

I couldn’t blame them. After treating myself and combing at the madness with a microscopic Barbie comb until 4:00 AM, I too fell asleep on a couch—one in another room, one they don’t usually sit on. Sorry.

I tried to put a good face on it. Tell my husband to consider it valuable bonding time. Wow, we rarely spend this much time together in one spot—so what if it’s hunched over our squirming children with clamp light and magnifying glass in hand.

I didn’t see the sunshine until Friday afternoon, when I took a break from the combing and picking and piles of laundry and vacuuming. I thought I was losing my mind.

But the thing is, it wasn’t all bad. I got my kids to wash their hair. I put their heads in the kitchen sink, just like my mom used to do with me. It turns out Daniel has beautiful rich brown curls that glisten prettily when treated with DDT. They no longer fight when I nit pick. Believe me, we all understand the true meaning of that word now. And we’ve had to slow down and let absolutely everything go. Our whole life is about laundry and hair.

Ironically, I got a call from my sister-in-law in California a few hours ago. I hear her voice on the machine and tell the kids to knock it off, Granny must be sick. I call her back as soon as I find the phone. It’s not Granny . . . It’s L-I-C-E.

I have come to find, once I came out of the closet about our family’s dread condition, that everybody has had it. I am not kidding you. Everybody. And everybody has a remedy. None of them work.

The most telling bit of research claims that Ancient Egyptians were found buried with their lice combs, mayonnaise and Rid. To this day, the best cure is a comb and your fingernails. I will, however, try one neighbor’s suggestion of dousing your head in Listerine and wearing a shower cap for an hour or so. I will also try Cherie’s (my sis-in-law) pediatrician’s choice—a head full of Cetaphil applied hair-dye style, blow dried in, and left overnight. If your hair doesn’t break off in your sleep, you’re cured!

The problem with Lice is you are, in good conscience, supposed to tell the schools, daycares, and close friends who may have rubbed themselves against your children’s heads that they may also have the plague.

I called the school, told the office ladies, and they announced over the loud speaker that there had been a “bio hazard” in the Kindergarten and 4th grade and could those teachers please come to the office at their convenience. This of course raised the eyebrows of every good parent volunteering in the classrooms, and set everyone to trying to figure out who had the be-crittered heads.
Next time I will choose my sister-in-law’s way. She wrote an anonymous note to the pre-school, folded it, handed it to my brother who then, like a messenger for the King, pedaled it on his bicycle up to the school to slip under the doorframe.

Unfortunately there was a “Village Meeting” going on; parking lot full--good parents swarming. He had to abort.

“Do you think anyone noticed?” Cherie asked.

“I don’t think anyone saw me,” my brother said. “It was getting dark, I was wearing a hat.”

He went out on his stealth mission several hours later in the dead of night, pulled up the weather stripping on his child’s classroom and delivered the news. His child will not be called “Madagascar” (Kindergartners, what do they know), told to get away, or shunned on the bus. I’m all for subterfuge now.

I find myself scanning the heads in the classroom and at my sons’ basketball and hockey practices for newly shorn hair. I check for nits as I bend over to help a kid with their letters. When I scratch my ankle I think, can they get down there? When I scratch other places I think, oh Jesus, Not There!

I have had a good laugh this week, now that the worst days are over, hearing other people’s stories and laughing at the sheer exhaustion of the work involved. But now you’ll have to excuse me, my ears itch, and I’ve got to go spend some time bonding and legitimately nit picking at my family.

If you need any advice, let me know. I am now an expert at something.

.

Walking Through Walls -- Kerry

2009-01-20T16:05:00.000-08:00

I had to give myself permission to watch two hours of daytime television today.

"Watching an inaugaration is considered productive work," I countered my conscience.

I have just finished reading a memoir called "Walking Through Walls", by Phillip Smith. He wrote about growing up with a psychic father, Lew Smith, who just happened to be a famous interior designer to the stars in the post-modern 195o's cocktail world of Miami, Florida before he developed his healing vibrational energy techniques. His son claims his father was way ahead of his time.

Obama is also ahead of his time, in a way. And I hope he is also a healer. I couldn't help applying the title of the book to my blog today; this historic day when Obama indeed walked through walls of racial barriers, set his sights high, and kept on walking to the other side.

What Comes Around -- Jennie

2009-01-18T08:40:00.000-08:00

I lend out a lot of books. It brings me super satisfaction to hook up a reader with the perfect read.

The winning pairs have been an old family friend and The Future Housewives of America, my cousin and The Alchemist, my daughter and Mandy, my aunt and Patty Jane's House of Curl. There was also my son's teacher and Possessing the Secret of Joy. And my college roommate and Like Water for Chocolate.

For some reason, it's easier for me to match literature to females, but successful relationships have been formed between my brother and Godless, an acquaintance and Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, and a doctor and Freakonomics.

On rare occasion, someone will give me a book that fits perfectly, like a pair of shoe orthotics that are between being nicely broken in and too worn thin. These have included Pobby and Dingan from my sister, Someday This Pain Will be Useful to You from Christy, and, though I hate admitting it, Four Blondes from my husband. Because I read a lot/teach English/write, I guess, well-meaning people are always loaning me literature they think I'll love.

But as you know by now, I'm a tough critic.

When someone asks to borrow one of my books, I am both eager to lend it and doubtful; I want to be sure it comes back. After writing my name prominently on the front cover, I stress that the book is one of my favorites, to please return it. I know: anal. I always remember who has my book, when I gave it to them, and whether or not it's returned.

You know where this blog is going.

Yep. Someone kept my beloved The Shadow of the Wind.

Here's how it happened: in June 2007, my kids were in swimming lessons at the park. I had just gotten back the Gothic novel from my friend, when a colleague noticed it laying on the lawn, and took interest in it. Said Colleague is a professor of literature, from Europe, with a fetish for all things foreign. I couldn't believe he hadn't heard of the book. It was such a fit! I handed it over with much enthusiasm.

And have waited a year and a half to get it back.

I've missed that $14 book. Since I gave it away, I could've lent it to other readers a hundred times over.

Once my dad told me that he let a co-worker borrow $7 from him, which to this day remains uncollected. So the origin of my memory, okay, resentment, is easy to trace.

I've hinted at needing the book back, even flat-out demanding. No luck. Though I'd like to, I can't imagine forgetting that Said Colleague has my book stashed away on some shelf, buried by dust. Excuse me while I grab a tissue.

Last month, a funny thing happened. I was Christmas shopping at a big gift store, when Said Colleague sauntered over, wearing the store name tag. He explained that he was moonlighting during the holidays, earning extra cash for some hefty wish lists. He'd be happy to give me his employee discount card, he said. I could save 30 %.

Of course I took him up on his offer. He had my cherished book hostage, remember?

With the employee discount, I pocketed a $14 savings.

Guess what I did with it.

Let The Sun Shine In - Kelly

2009-01-16T06:00:00.000-08:00

Hair Lyrics

Five preteens, four girls and a boy, sit in the small bedroom. The blue ripcord bedspread marks the backs of their tanned legs. It’s 1969, and they're playing their favorite summer game. While “spin-the-bottle” has been part of their repertoire for some time, let me remind you that it is summer. Texas summer. And it’s 1969.

What this means for those of you who are younger or more economically or geographically fortunate than our five friends is that the 3BR 1.5B brick has no central air conditioning. The boy in question is fortunate enough to have his own window unit and his parents are both at work.

The game is “Freezeout.”

They’ve set the Kenmore at its lowest setting, blocked the crack under the door with a JC Penney bath towel, and are just beginning to feel the first goose bumps. Someone drops the needle on an album forbidden in at least one household, in spite of the squeaky-clean singers, because of a single song, the song they all love, the song that brings them to their chilly bare feet….

“Gimme a head with hair…”

Shining. Gleaming. Streaming. Flaxen. Waxen.

I’m pretty sure I was the only one who knew – at least at age ten – that the song was from a play famous for actual naked people (did you guess that I was the one barred from the Cowsills album?). Our parents worked desperately to convince us that hippies, be-ins, yippies, sit-ins, and other manifestations of malcontent would turn us into “juvenile delinquents.”

But no amount of distraction shielded us from the daily parade of body bags, the tear-gassed protestors, and the flecks of color entering our all-white world.

We taped our peace sign posters up inside our closets and showed our families Bobby Sherman on our bedroom walls.

In one of those great ironies only the universe can create, I now assiduously work to ensure my daughter has the kind of social consciousness my parents did their best to prevent me from developing.

Toward that end, I downloaded the soundtrack from Hair and slipped it on her iPod Monday night.

Never trust anyone over 50.

A Moment --Christy

2009-01-15T12:20:00.000-08:00

I'm not someone who is comfortable positioning the spotlight directly on myself, but I have to remember that this is the blog of a writer's group and writers will, at some point, have monumental moments. My moment was last night, when my book's website went live.

Click here to see it.

I was a very difficult client for my long-suffering web-tastic husband who put this site together. I had to have it just so: I wanted hot Mexican colors; a unique but not kitschy sans serif font; a universal symbol (the ouroborus) rendered by a Central American culture (the Aztec) but made to look like a Chinese chop. Yes, I am annoyingly particular! But he did an amazing job.

The book won't be out for a year, but book selling starts far in advance of publication. This is the "grown-up" version for sales force, booksellers, librarians, and educators - we'll make the site a bit more teen friendly once we're closer to the release date. Thanks for checking it out!

Shelter from the Storm --Kerry

2009-01-12T20:23:00.000-08:00

In the backround of my 1970's childhood, a dim political picture emerged on the television screen and dinnertime conversations. The picture included Vietnam, Nixon and long lines of cars with names like Pinto and Dasher waiting for rationed gasoline. However, that's about as much as my parents let me understand. They sheltered me from the graphic horrors of war and the economic fears (11% home mortgages) the same way I shelter my own children from Iraq and the financial crisis.

My children joined the swim team today, the same team I swam on twenty-five years ago.
However, I would come home and talk on a yellow phone attached to the wall with a cord dangling from the receiver. To dial you inserted your finger in a round plastic six-inch circle on the corresponding number. My children came home and used their father's blackberry to make phone calls, do their math homework and email a friend.

Times have changed, but some of the basics of childhood still remain.
The swimming pool is still twenty-five yards and you're still hungry as all outdoors when you're done with the workout.
It's still uncool to take cuts in the line at grade school.
It doesn't matter how much money you have, what you look like, or what you wear as long as you are really fun to play with.
Doing your best is still the best way.

The horrors are still out there, but for the moment they can wait until the end of childhood.

All The News, I Get On Sundays -- Jennie

2009-01-11T21:18:00.000-08:00

There's not much "new" about the news lately.

Americans are all well-aware by now that Iraq is a bloodbath, that unemployment and foreclosures are high, that the economy is in the tanker.

For my weekly dose of news, I turn to two sources, only on Sundays: the San Francisco Chronicle, and CBS' "60 Minutes."

If you're after a dose of new news, check out these facts:

1) According to the Chronicle, Americans spent less of our annual income on food last year (9.8%) than we did during 1933 (25%).

2) Granta literary magazine hired its first female editor during a 120 year history.

3) With tips, taxes, and extras, the promotional price of cruises is only half of what they actually cost.

4) If you chose mostly A answers on the etiquette quiz in the "Style" section, you're socially "inept." The solution? "Stop living like a hermit..."

5) Per CBS correspondent Scott Pelley, hip hop star Wyclef Jean, who left Haiti for America when he was nine years old, founded and directs an organization in Port Au Prince, which distributes 50,000 pounds of UN food each month.

There. I've spared you the usual top stories, without leaving you bored, hopeless, or clinically depressed.

Yikes. I sound like Andy Rooney.

In Which I Embark on a Task Long Postponed.... - Kelly

2009-01-09T00:00:00.000-08:00

After my daughter was born, I decided I would conquer my "math block." I resolved, at age 41, to complete a calculus course before I turned 50.

One obstacle lay in my path: my last math instruction, trigonometry, had taken place when I was 17. Truth was, I could no longer factor an equation.

Finally I had a reason to be thankful for the sad state of public education. I enrolled in the easiest developmental math course at the university where I worked. While on maternity leave, I factored and solved while my baby slept. I loved it. Putting numbers in neat columns and arriving at finite, correct answers was the perfect counterbalance to the chaos of first-time motherhood.

I breezed through the three "pre-credit" courses once I got my number legs back; the hardest part was using that newfangled graphing calculator. In the old days, such wonders didn't exist and the dinosaur versions were so expensive - even though TI was a 20 minute drive from our school - that we had one per classroom and had to take turns. Yes, Virginia, we used slide rules. Google the term.

My return to work coincided with my entry into "College Algebra." I was doing fine, but the combination of math, child care, sorting out the adminstrivia of six months' absence, and finding time to sleep was not working and I put numeracy aside. And I never resumed, even after I resigned and returned to Texas.

So 50 came and went last month with nary a bit of calculus. No big.

But I have decided that something else absolutely must come to pass this year. I owe it to myself and to one amazing teacher in my past and colleague and friend in the present, Carol Daeley.

I've never read a novel by Charles Dickens.

It's a long story, but over the years it's become a point of perverse pride, a literary party-fact: "Why, yes, I'm an aborted-doctor-of literature and you know what? I've never read Dickens. Take THAT."

But in my sixth decade, it's time to shit or get off the pot. My education is incomplete.

I have chosen Bleak House, and it arrived from amazon yesterday. It lies before me on the bed The die is cast.

Is It So Wrong To Love You? --Christy

2009-01-08T10:51:00.001-08:00

Everyone in my writing group knows I’m smell-obsessed. I probably have far too many scent references in my work and I’m always asking the others in the group things like, “But what did the locker room smell like when your main character walked in?”

In my work in progress, the aroma of a Sharpie pen figures prominently. I don’t mind the smell, but it’s not one of my favorites. I’m a big fan of scents that are either severely organic (the inside of a corn husk, good damp soil) or severely chemical (gas straight from the nozzle, WD-40).

What are your favorite smells? Will anyone admit to offbeat or politically incorrect scents? Allow me to start by publicly admitting that I love the smell of gun cleaner and wet cat fur.

My excuse for the day--Marcia

2009-01-07T16:39:00.000-08:00

I had heard that Richie had come by to see us while we were on vacation. I was hoping he'd stick around and maybe come back. We haven't seen him in about five years. I was hoping when he arrived I'd be looking good in my new boot-cut jeans, heels, and good hair. But instead, he showed up today, just after a grueling post-holiday training session. One in which I felt more water-buffalo than warrior.

School bus dumps kids, I'm mixing up a pot of goulash, knock-knock. There is a very tall man at the door. Guess who!

This my friends is Richie, the subject of my first novel, and the reason I am not going to be able to write my blog today.

I have been listening to him tell me about meeting lesbians who inherited stagecoach houses from dead cowboys, ladies who mine sea salt off the top of rocks in the middle of the ocean , of getting stuck in a flume trying to rescue his two inner-city culturally challenged young men who did not know how to swim, and now of his golden goddess a black-dreadlocked woman with a diamond in her tooth who he tipped over in a canoe one dark midnight in the middle of nowhere. Professional marijuana trimmers.

He has already told my sons that he'd be happy to share his beer, yes they can drive his truck, after they do their homework, and let's see . . . told em the meaning of "ho" and "Pimp". That in fact, their daddy is a 'noodle pimp." Life with Richie is always exciting.

I was going to write a fabulous story about New Year's and the Polar Bear Swim, how rejuvenating and exhilarating, etc. but, well you know, Richie popped in And when the big man shows, everything stops. I mean when was the last time you heard a good story about being chased by cops throught the hills, culverts, and bamboo of Paradise, California.

It's good to see Richie again, we've all missed him. He reminds us of how lucky we are to have really boring lives, and of the great possibiltiy of excitement in the world. We prefer to get ours vicariously.

My New Years resolution will have to wait. I have to hear how the story ends.

Happy New Years!

Dispatch from Dundee - Kerry

2009-01-05T18:20:00.001-08:00

It took me twelve hours and one overnight at the Eugene Shilo Inn before we made it officially home to Dundee. We pulled into the driveway of the house, or should I say slid into the driveway through a foot of snow, after which I pulled the emergency brake and came to a stop inches from the arborvitae hedge as the cats and kids wailed in unison.

All was silent in the car as we contemplated the drop-off behind the hedge into the backyard.

That was perhaps the last moment of silence I have had since our arrival here three weeks ago. But, as all writers know, we just can't stay silent for too long.

Three intense weeks have kept me from this beloved blog but no more, it's back to business.

Here's the rundown:

Through a maze of boxes we erected a Christmas tree and threw some lights on it. The kids all got chicken pox from their cousin and the cats vomited in the basement. The power went out the day before Christmas Eve and I am not putting this in sequential order because it all became one big crazy emotional blur. While the power was out, Christian could not go to work so we lit the house up with candles and played all the games we could find. Not a bad way to spend forty-eight hours with each other. We celebrated our great good fortune to be alive in 2009 dancing with the kids and their grandmother in the living room amidst confetti, noisemakers and Argyle Champagne surrounded by lush Douglas firs laden with snow outside the window.

Anyone have any New Year's resolutions they feel like sharing?

Here's mine, or one of them: No more thinking that life should be any other certain way than exactly what it is.

Once You're In -- Jennie

2009-01-04T08:31:00.000-08:00

Celebrity children's books are everywhere.

I'm not talking about books about celebrities. I'm talking about books written by them.

Actors, dancers, comedians, and country singers have tried their hands at picture books, mostly of the tyke self-help nature, others with some stab at ecology. Morning talk-show hosts, afternoon talk-show hosts, even late-night talk-show hosts have authored something.

There are books by celebrity chefs, by a former NFL coach, by governors and governors' wives, and psychologists.

The list goes on.

Former President Jimmy Carter penned a kids' book. So did Fergie (the royal one). Spock spit out a read, and a soccer stud put out two. Just to give you an idea how many children's books are authored by celebrities, Google gives almost 4 million hits!

Why is this?

Are these folks really so talented, they can cross (even conquer) Amazon? Um. No. Unless you can overlook content. And character. And plot.

So why are celebrity books flying off shelves?

It's because of us. Americans. American consumers, to be exact. It's because of our obsession with Hollywood (or Washington, D.C.) (or even Nashville). We have it backwards, turning celebrities into authors, instead of turning authors into celebrities.

The bottom line? Celebrity books are being snatched up at ginormous advances, while invisible, talented writers, who have devoted their lives to poverty for the cause of creating the perfect kids' book, are totally ignored.

I'll just go ahead and say it: it's not fair!

Yes, I'm jealous. And mad and frustrated.

Those folks already have money. They already have fame. They already have everything.

Note to Madonna and Emeril: take your boredom elsewhere! Please! Leave writing kids' books to the unknown, unpaid authors who have an actual interest in it.

Note to you, the yet-to-be-famous: the situation is not totally hopeless. The picture-book market may be flooded with celebrity authors. But middle grade and young adult, far less so. Could that be because those markets are much more difficult? Because they are actually discerning? Is this the Kryptonite of celebrity authors?

Don't stop to think. Just write. Write fast, right now. Forget about content. You might have a chance at publishing a kids' book. Even if you're not a world-renowned financial analyst.

Turning Over a New Lexicon - Kelly

2009-01-02T19:05:00.000-08:00

Hello, everyone. I'm thrilled and humbled to be here!

The Lithia Writers can back me up on this one: I am not stodgy. I will say just about anything to anyone anywhere at anytime (though I promise to keep my LWC posts PG-13).

That said, however, I also believe that certain niceties should be observed, and right at the top of the list is Standard English When Appropriate. I toss around slang and, um, colorful diction all the time but I do my best to be cognizant of my audience. And one thing I guard against is the linguistic equivalent of “mutton dressed as lamb.” Nothing is more cringe-worthy than a middle-aged teacher trying to hang with the peeps. Writ small, u will not c me l8er. As a neophyte texter, I faced a dilemma every time I whipped out my thumbs. Character limits forced me to send three messages to every student’s one. And since it took me forever to figure out how to coax an apostrophe from my non-QWERTY device, I wrote without contractions for months.

Eventually I loosened up a bit, but only to a small circle.

My peeps, u no.

When I teach, my students are usually veterans of the AP wars; they write shell-shocked, stilted, voiceless prose and I must help them loosen not tighten their diction. But I still want things right, damn it.

So when I finally became a mother, those who’d known me for big chunks of the 41 years it took me to breed braced themselves for the birth not only of a girl child but also of a fire-breathing perfectionist bitch of a mother… Joan Crawford with The MLA Handbook.

But just as ligaments and tendons loosen to allow a baby’s body to pass through a small space, my rigidity collapsed in the presence of my daughter’s linguistic development. While an adult mispronouncing a word usually sends me running for the Xanax, I was fascinated by the organic process in which she sussed out verb tenses and found her "r" and "l." But I’m still a perfectionist on the inside, and her spelling is another story altogether. Maybe I’ll come back to that in another post, after enduring homework thanks to a couple of glasses of Oregon pinot noir. A commentator on NPR recently urged listeners to accept the reality that “thru” and “nite” may well become standard spellings in 10 years.

ROFLMAO!!! No wA.

But motherhood has relaxed me. It’s made me a more patient, process oriented teacher and a more self-forgiving writer (which is a good thing, considering that this post ended up in Chicago when I was headed for Providence, but oh, well…). My daughter has taught me more about Being, Impermanence, Suffering, and Life than any wall of texts could. She’s also inspired me and made me laugh.

And she’s a princess of neology.

I’d refer to her as a “neologist,” but Merriam-Webster Unabridged hasn’t extended its definition yet. So as my initial contribution to Lithia Writers’ Collective, I offer you two new words, courtesy of Anna Elizabeth Hudgins, age eight for six more days.

Snoreful: one who snores noticeably. “Mommy, Kaiser's such a snoreful dog.”
Braggative: someone (most often a third grade girl, but you never know….) who seems to think she’s awfully special. “Mommy, Narcissa’s nice, but she’s kind of braggative sometimes.”

Use these with pleasure, and happiest of Januarys to you all,

Kelly

New Year, New Blogger

2009-01-01T15:20:00.000-08:00

Seven years ago, a group of women met in a writing class that each had enrolled in to legitimately and routinely escape toddler bedtime once a week. When the class was over, they enrolled again. When that ended, they enrolled again. By the time the third session was over, they had sussed out who was writing the stuff they liked to read and who was editing their writing well and they decided to start a critique group. The Lithia Writers Collective was born. It would not have a fancy name until years later when they needed one for their blog; back then the night was referred to as, simply, “writing” and it was sacred. It was the one night a week one could count on having good coffee and intelligent conversation and husbands knew not to mess with it.

Recently Julie, an LWC blogger who has a stressful full-time job as a middle school Language Arts teacher, admitted that blogging—or missing her blog day—was making her anxious. Inducing feelings of guilt. Here at the LWC we’re anti-guilt and we loath anxiety; that’s what families are for, not writer’s groups. So, Julie is now our contributing editor and she will blog only when and if the muse calls.

In her stead, Kelly Hudgins will be taking over the Friday post. One of the original LWC members, Kelly moved to Texas a few years ago. But, much like the mafia, once you’re a member of the LWC, you’re in it for life. Kelly has her own remarkable blog with a worldwide readership, so we’re fortunate to have her fresh voice four times a month here at the Lithia Writers Collective.

Kelly, tomorrow is your debut…take it away old friend!

Psychic Junkie --Christy

2008-12-26T14:38:00.001-08:00

True confessions: I’m a psychic junkie. I use psychics like other people use therapists. Seriously, why spend years yapping on about your issues when you can spend an hour with a clairvoyant who can tell you all you need to know? Most people—first and foremost my husband—find this strange, so I try to keep it on the down-low. But this time of year, as we rollover to a new digit on the calendar, I get the itch to make an appointment with a seer.

In my defense, I blame my parents. They started me early—my father booked appointments for each of us with a renowned local psychic when I was just 14. Not that my dad is some kind of hippie; at first glance you'd assume he was very conservative. He held a job with a large corporation and went to mass most Sundays, but he’s always had a healthy fascination with the dark side. He grew up going to Catholic school so naturally he was in to anything macabre. The shelves of his study were crammed with books on crime families, the supernatural and medical anomalies. I’m not exaggerating when I say that the subject of hermaphrodites came up at least once a week in our house. While other kids were reading their Golden Books, my sister and I were looking at grainy pictures of elephantiasis.

So the psychic thing was not such a stretch. In fact, it was probably inevitable.

We arrived at the psychic’s home, a normal-looking house in a newer subdivision, in our Oldsmobile sedan. Only when the door opened did things start to get weird. We were greeted by a man in a wheelchair who introduced himself as the psychic’s brother. He was ferrying three small white dogs with yellowed beards on his lap, and although he was dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt, he was also wearing rouge and a woman’s wig. This was not a long, luxurious Cher-style wig but rather a short, curly gray and white wig that a woman in her 80s might wear—what my grandmother would call a “wash and set.” At first, I thought the hair was his own until I caught a glimpse of the flesh-colored mesh cap that anchored the wig hair.

He welcomed us in and asked us to sit on the couch where we would wait for our individual appointments. The smell of dog pee permeated the house and I followed Mom’s cue of sitting while having the least amount of contact with the couch. I wondered if my parents were having second thoughts about toting their young daughters to a psychic who lived in such slipshod conditions and may or may not have some unseemly relationship with the rolling dog ferry who calls himself “the brother.”

As the youngest, I was allowed to go first. On my way in, Dad slipped me a dollar and instructed me to walk up to the ice cream shop when I was finished; they would all join me one by one. As I prepared to enter, I tried to recount all of the ice cream flavors I could remember so he could not read my mind and hear the voices in my head that said Run! The guy’s a fraud! A slob! Quite possibly a pervert!

I walked into his office and was greeted with the wet, toothless grin of an elderly man sitting behind a small white desk that was so short his belly could rest on the edge of it. He wore a tight plaid shirt, kind of cowboy style with pearl snaps and curly stitching on the pockets, and he twiddled his thumbs. I had never seen someone actually twiddle their thumbs before—I’d only seen it used as physical punctuation after a joke about being bored. His hands were large and rough so the twiddling made a sound like nylon-clad thighs rubbing together. I said hello while chanting Butter Pecan, Heavenly Hash, Strawberry Cheesecake over and over in my mind until he said, “Why did you stop playing the violin?”

His question stunned me. Two things ran through my head: Oh my God, he can read my mind, I had better not think bad thoughts, and Oh my God, he can read my mind, maybe now someone can understand me. All of a sudden the need to be understood, the yearning for someone to really know who I was eclipsed the fear of having someone read my mind. “Can’t you see how awful I was?" I responded.

I had played the violin for three years but my playing was remarkably unremarkable. I used my mother’s childhood violin so I thought my playing was extra important to her. One day I mustered up the courage to tell my parents that I was going to stop playing the violin and would be taking an extra science class instead of orchestra. They just shrugged and complemented me on my practicality. It became clear to me that my playing was as painful to my family as it was to me.

“Is it important that I play? Are messages coming from my music?” I asked, thinking that angels might be speaking through my strained rendition of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, one of the few songs I could play by heart.

“No, I can see that wasn’t the creative outlet for you. But you must remember that what you produce is not as important as the creative effort behind it. Remember that. Now I see beautiful writing. Lots and lots of beautiful writing.”

This delighted me. My new passion in art class had been calligraphy, and I was prolific. Nearly every day I pumped out a new poster-sized calligraphic rendering of Pink Floyd’s lyrics and I was extremely proud of the gold-leafed illuminated letters I had done on Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven.

“Wow! Will I become a famous calligrapher?” I asked eagerly. He laughed so hard I was able to see that he did indeed have a few teeth back in the grotto of his mouth and he said no, that’s not really what I mean sweetheart, you’re quite a literal girl aren’t you?

With much lisping and smacking, he mumbled on for nearly an hour about my future, which was surprisingly uninteresting to me—at fourteen hearing about your future seems as irrelevant as listening to someone’s dream. I simply could not reconcile what he was saying with my own life. In fact, as soon as he told me I would not be a famous calligrapher he lost me.

Afterward, I met my sister and parents at the ice cream parlor and listened to them excitedly tell each other their predictions, which was even more boring than hearing my own. I was much more interested in the Rocky Road milkshake I was drinking than anyone’s future. So I tuned out and started to calligraphy the words to Comfortably Numb on my napkin, itching to get home to see if my dusty violin had a secret message for me.

Only later, after the dog hair had been long washed from my clothes and the stale smell of the house had faded from memory, I realized I was hooked. Still am. But let's keep it on the down-low, okay?

Tradition--Marcia

2008-12-24T10:35:00.001-08:00

My childhood Christmas was full of traditions. First was picking the tree. This was a long and arduous process that one year, when my mother was still trying to maintain our standards on a post-divorce, Reagan de-regulation budget, took us to five lots, one as far away as Huntington Beach. The tree had to be just so-- Fluffy, no gaps, over six feet and under $18. We would cry if we didn’t get to see the live reindeer and then we'd go to IHOP for dinner.

Why we were always looking for trees at night is a puzzle to me. Were we waiting for Dad? Mr. Bah-humbug himself! Probably.

The only thing Californian about my Christmas was a trip to Roger’s Gardens to see the lights and luminaries, and the boat parade. The boat parade is a two week spectacle of floating lights and drunken Santas shouting ho-ho-ho to people sitting on docks and the suburban island beaches. From our two story house you could see the lighted masts go by at night.

I love the way my mother decorates for Christmas. Mantles, banisters, buffets are loaded with greenery and garland, berries, pinecones, and beautiful ribbon. Then there has to be sheen--a glint of silver vase, or old gold ornament, a bronze candlestick donning sprigs of pine and a plaid bow. We were never flocked tree or all blue ornament people.

My Christmas memories are mostly Dickensian. My mother read us stories Christmas Eve about a child lucky to get an orange in the toe of her stocking Christmas Day. My father towered around trying to read us A Christmas Carol, embodying Ebenezer Scrooge with spittle flying as he got into character.

I would fall to sleep to the sound of my mother's sewing machine as she worked long into the night finishing up doll clothes, dresses, or a puppet theater.

We were allowed to wake up as soon as the Street lights went off. Then we would pile onto our exhausted parents beds and delve into our stocking plunder.

While my mother was still practicing her husband’s Catholicism, there was dressing for church and then undressing after. There was breakfast of "sticky buns", a half grapefruit with a cherry, Christmas eggs, and frizzled ham. We could not open our gifts until church and breakfast were finished. It was excruciating, but it was worth the wait. I always got something I really wanted: Roller Derby Skate Queen roller skates, an Easy Bake Oven, a Chrissy Doll with her trashy hair that pulled out of a hole in the center of her head. You could give her a bob or make her hair fall straight to her waist. I know my mother did not want me to have that floozy doll in her butterfly-wing burnt-orange lace mini dress, but she got it for me anyway.

Then we ran around. We were let loose on the neighborhood. Nobody went to Colorado or Hawaii or Back East. We would meet somewhere in the middle of the street and compare loot and then go play. Not inside. Outside. Our mothers were busy making six course dinners; our fathers were nursing hangovers and busy lying on the couch. There was no ESPN. There was no Internet. Dads fluffed through the newspaper until they dozed off just in time to complain about all the mess and tell us to wash our hands before dinner.

Dinner was extreme. Old fashioned. Prime Rib, horseradish, Yorkshire Pudding, brussel sprouts, creamed onions, parsnips, cubed potatoes (from my father's side), salad with oranges and slivered almonds, and string beans. There was a sleigh on the table that my mother had filled, sometime in 1957, with tiny boxes wrapped like gifts. She still has them. In the early years I remember pies, mincemeat, pecan, and apple. But later it was always Buche de Noel, or Berries in the Snow for dessert. My sister replicated this meal exactly here in Oregon last Christmas. She even had a little apron around her waist, sweat on her brow, and the "Get Out of my Way Dear, Can't You See I'm Busy!" look down pat. I was proud of my sister for not deprecating her own cooking. My mother is always the first to critique her own food. Too salty, too dry none of us ever noticed. It was all delicious.

I tried to carry on some of these traditions for my own family. But I married a bit of a bah humbugger myself. My husband prefers the illusion that we have no traditions. But my children love them.

On nights when Dad is catering or bowling, I let the boys put on their jammies, grab their blankies, and we got to see the Christmas lights at Greystone Manor or Harry and David. Sometimes we bring Cocoa. We make cookies. Yesterday there were five children here decorating gingerbread men and rolling out sugar cookies. Tonight they will get to open the books we will read before bed. Each of them gets a Christmas Classic every year. We always read the Night Before Christmas.

When the kids wake up in the morning there will be a pile of presents wrapped under the tree. Santa will have hung candy canes and chocolate ornaments (on the years he can find them), eaten the cookies and left them a new snow globe.

The table will be decorated for brunch and the house will be clean. Really.

I’ve already received the best Christmas gift of all . . . For years I have done the tree myself. And it has always made me sad. This year, after coming home from my eldest child’s matinee performance at the Craterian, he and his brother and a neighbor child we were watching decided it was high time our tree got decorated. They were absolutely right.

So, while I made dinner they did the whole thing. First they put on their jammies, then they put up the lights, the garland, and all the ornaments. They poured over the ornaments asking questions about those from my childhood and questions about the ones from their own. My freshly minted ten year old got the honors of putting on the star. They sang songs throughout and once it was done they got out their “guys” and invented a game called “prison cell”.

My tree is a bedraggled mess. Garland hangs off to the side like a bad toupee, lights spread mostly along the front, and the usual kid-clusters of ornaments all hang in one spot. But the kids played “Prison Cell” in the tree for five days. Sometimes Rey Mysterio and Captain American even spent the night in their “cell” in the tree.

I have not ‘fixed” the tree. I haven’t redone the lights, moved any ornaments, or restrung the garland. The magic is brief. I want it to last. So for this shining moment luchadors and superheroes will be part of my Christmas Décor. The holly and the Ivy, the bronze, blown glass, and the gold will have to wait.

Merry Mysterio Christmas

Decking the Halls? -- Jennie

2008-12-21T16:53:00.000-08:00

Happy Holidays!

Good for you for taking a second or two from the shopping, wrapping, baking, and card signing to sit down at the computer.

Does anyone read blogs at this time of year?

Instead of writing, I'm going to finish making apricot popcorn with my daughter. Then the whole family is headed to Auburn's epic Taco Tree. After that, we're hitting up Hilda's bakery for some pre-holiday sugar. On the way back, we'll check out Christmas lights.

How about you? What do your festivities include? Anything to rival apricot popcorn?