The end of the year Facebook trend of 2014 is for people to share highlights of the year through some of the photos they’ve posted. After being prompted at least a dozen times to look at mine, I decided the pictures I’d either posted or had been tagged in didn’t represent my year very well, so I chose not to make one. Instead I did a month-by-month review of what I had posted on Facebook in 2014, thinking there would be at least fifteen moments (which I’m estimating is the average number of pictures used in the year-end photo cards) which would summarize my year. Here’s what I found, along with some background information about why each moment made the list:
January 28
“I don't mind saying it: Going back tomorrow to a full day meeting after having three of the last four school days off from the cold, and being somewhat limited in the amount of planning I'm able to do right now leaves me feeling a bit disoriented and apprehensive about the rest of the week.”
There was very little about the winter of 2014 that could be given a positive spin. To begin with, last January was historically, unreasonably cold. And if that wasn’t enough, the teachers’ union in our district was on Work to Rule for several weeks during prolonged contract negotiations. This fueled contentious moments of distraction for many people with different perspectives, and even being on the periphery of such things eventually took its toll on a lot of us.
February 20
“Nature is Lucy. Spring is the football. We're all Charlie Brown.”
The winter dragged on relentlessly. More than once we thought we could see the light at the end of the tunnel, only to be greeted the following morning by a twenty-degree temperature drop and eight fresh inches of snow on the ground. It was disheartening, to say the least.
March 16
“I found out today ‘Following Infinity’ made the cut for another writing contest. A boatload of agents who represent similar works will be looking over the excerpt I submitted in the next few days. This makes having to go back to school tomorrow a bit easier to take.”
The list of finalists in Brenda Drake’s Pitch Madness contest went live just as Spring Break came to an end. We’ll call the inclusion of this moment a bit of foreshadowing.
March 26
“1A. Nice.”
As if I haven’t had cancer intersect with my life enough times already, it showed up twice this year, in a friend of mine and in a family member -- the relieving diagnosis of 1A referring to the latter. I am so very happy to report that as the year closes they have both successfully completed their treatments, with neither person experiencing more than minimal complications or side effects. Thank God for 21st century medicine.
April 15
“I am unreasonably, ridiculously happy to share this news: I have accepted an offer of representation from Carrie Howland, a literary agent with Donadio & Olson, Inc. based in New York City. I have no question that my manuscript and my writing career are in the best of all possible hands. More detailed information to follow soon....”
There isn’t much more to say about this that I haven’t already covered elsewhere. But it is worth mentioning that receiving a vote of confidence like this, from not just any literary agent but from her, led me to discovering a new belief in my writing I hadn’t allowed myself to own before.
May 11
This blog post: Rock and Roll Grandmas
My cousins, my sister, and I had a great time conspiring to put together a Mother’s Day gift of a trip for two little old ladies to a big time Vegas rock show in the summer. I couldn’t be happier that everything came together as perfectly as it did.
June 10
“Today will be, without a doubt, a great day at school. None of our students will be hurt on the field trip, or explode into filthy-mouthed rants, or steal anything, or get suspended, or make their friends cry, or try to argue how it's really okay that they didn't leave their phones in the main office like they're supposed to because they aren't using them. Plus everyone who is supposed to return items checked out from the school will bring them back right away in the morning, and of course those items will be in perfect condition. At least that's what I'm telling myself.”
If I remember right, June 10th, the second to the last day of the school year, was a pretty good day. But I found it interesting while I reviewed my posts from this year to discover how many references to my day job were less than enthusiastic.
July 15
“Whew... tagged by a distracted driver at a stoplight, upcoming appointments with Abra and Enterprise in a couple weeks, and all I can say is good thing for auto insurance. Now just to shake the residual unsettled feelings that follow.”
I felt lucky at the time that my accident, for as much damage as there was to my car, hadn’t been any worse. I really had no idea just how lucky I had been.
August 22
“Last Friday of the summer. I don't know whether to cry or cry.”
It’s never easy to say goodbye to summer break. It was particularly rough this year.
September 25
“A morning walk that began under the stars and ended inside of the sunrise, listening to Peter Gabriel's "Ovo" album and thinking about my characters for an hour. A nice start to the day.”
I had been in a habit of taking early morning walks through my neighborhood this summer and autumn. It was a beautiful way to start the day, and turned out to be a great way to fire up my writing brain. I look forward picking up that routine again after winter runs its course.
October 17
“I haven't given Harry Potter a second thought in years, and now this week I can't stop watching the movies.”
The whole Harry Potter universe has been a reliable escape for me when I needed it. It was great serendipity that a Harry Potter movie marathon came on while I was dogsitting for my parents, and one of the dogs became very sick for a very long week, capped off with two visits to the emergency vet. The movie marathon was the perfect distraction right when I needed it. (And the dogs are both fine now, by the way.)
November 15
“Yeah...Garth who?”
This November Garth Brooks had a stretch of something like ten or eleven consecutive nights of concerts in the Cities, and so many people were posting photos of how they were getting all cowboy’d up on the night they were going to see him, it rivaled the frequency the Ice Bucket Challenge. Now, I have nothing against Garth Brooks. Seems like a nice guy. But I’m not a fan. So when Motley Crue came to St. Paul the same weekend Garth was playing in Minneapolis, I felt it was important to make sure people knew which side of the river I was on that night.
November 28
“So I wake up this morning and see this thing staring at me. No idea what it is or where it came from. I'm a little freaked out.”
The first Cinnamon post, back before I had any idea what the response would be like. In fact, before I even knew his name was Cinnamon.
December 14
“It may have taken six days longer than she had originally planned, but my sister finally made it home from work tonight.”
My sister was driving home from work one night and when her car was blindsided on the highway. She ended up in the hospital for nearly a week, and still has months of recovery ahead of her. Which is awful but also a blessing, since she was millimeters away from things being so much worse. I’ll say it again -- Thank God for 21st century medicine.
December 19
“The last day of school before winter break has always been one of my favorites. By this time in the year I've known my students long enough for them to become truly important to me, so the hyperactive and joyful tone of the day is more like riding a wave than trying to survive one as it crashes against me. The upcoming time away from school also helps me appreciate getting to work with so many talented and dedicated people, many of whom have become my good friends. For all of the stress and frustration that comes with the job, days like today serve as a reminder that things could be so much worse.”
I’ve been teaching for a long time now, so I’ve been around to see many different patterns and trends and philosophies and ideals cycle their way through the profession. As much as things change and as frustrating and discouraging as they can become, it’s always worth remembering that having both a great class and working with people you respect can make a tremendous difference in the best possible way.
And that puts a cap on 2014. As for 2015? Simply put, I can’t think of the last time I’ve had a year ahead of me with so little about it I felt I could predict.
I kind of like that.
Sunday, December 28, 2014
Thursday, December 25, 2014
The Conclusion of the Cinnamon Invasion
Day 22
I find this sign on the garage door when backing out to go to school this morning. I hope Cinnamon has a good hiding spot picked out. His days are looking numbered.
My day goes on without as much as a passing thought toward Cinnamon and his shenanigans. I walk out to the mailbox when I get home and find out that now it seems mail addressed to Cinnamon -- from someone who knows him primarily by his Elven name -- is being delivered to my house. Today he received what could be fairly described as a threatening jigsaw puzzle. As a result, his stress level is very high this evening.
Day 23
The arrival of that puzzle last night really got to Cinnamon. I find him sitting back in the sun room this morning, exhausted from trying to shed his anxiety and frustration all night.
"I thought squeezing this tennis ball was supposed to help me get rid of my stress!" he shouts with his demented cartoon chipmunk voice. "It isn't working!"
"Now, you do realize you're sitting in the sun room," I point out, "and you're surrounded by windows, and anyone looking for you would be able to see exactly where you are?"
He closes his stupid plastic eyes and lets the ball roll to the floor. "I don't think it makes a difference anymore," he says, sounding utterly defeated.
Day 24
When I didn't see Cinnamon this morning, I knew better than to hope he had moved on. He hadn't really bounced back from his depressive spiral yesterday and this concerned me; not because I was worried about him, but I didn't want anything damaging going on inside my house.
I began to hear a quiet, low-pitched rumble in the middle of the afternoon. It almost sounded like a poorly-maintained engine idling somewhere down the street, but whenever I stepped outside to try and figure out what it was, it would stop. After some careful exploration, I figured out it was coming from my grandmother's piano, almost as if it were alive and breathing. Then I noticed the hat.
"Why? Are you in the piano?" I ask. He doesn't respond. I slam my palm down on an octave of keys and hear him skittering awake.
"What? What?" he screeches. Raw panic. I don't think he could tell he was trapped in place by the hat. I let him struggle there for a few moments, enjoying the sound of his fright more than I care to admit.
"WHY ARE YOU IN THE PIANO?" I shout.
"What time is it?" he whispers.
"Late afternoon, almost sunset," I said. "Why could you possibly care?"
"I thought over what you said yesterday, about hiding places," he answers. "Today is the Winter Solstice. I need a good hiding place now more than ever before."
"Because?"
"Because?" he repeats, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Because? You really can't be this stupid. The Winter Solstice is the longest night of the year, which almost means it's the darkest day of the year. For Dark Elves, this is the day when our powers are the most...heightened."
"Really. And your smiley-faced elf powers are so mighty that you need to hide in a ninety-year-old piano."
"There's only one of me," he finally replies. "There are more of them."
"So I'm guessing you don't get along with the other elves very well."
"They aren't all elves," he says. "It's a guild. The elves just lead it. Or at least we had at one time. I really don't know anymore. Now, please just leave me alone. One way or another you'll be rid of me soon."
And I think, Not soon enough.
Day 25
I left the house early to finally get my Christmas shopping done. It went fast, so I was home sooner than expected. I walk in with my packages to the sound of bloodcurdling shrieks.
"Help me, please!" Cinnamon screams. "They've found me! They're here in the house RIGHT NOW!" I see him sprawled on the floor, restrained in a manner which gives me a moment of pause.
"Where are they?" I ask, setting down my gifts and hurrying into the living room, searching.
"I think...there's only...one," he replies, the strain in his voice evident. I rush down the hallway, more than ready to finally put an end to all of this ridiculousness. No sign of anything or anyone. Just as I turn back I hear a loud grunt and a painful cry. By the time I return to the kitchen, he's gone.
"You shouldn't have done that." A menacing voice fills the room. "Coming in when you did surprised me. You gave him the moment of distraction he needed for escape."
"Yeah, did I?" I answer. "Well, your problem, not mine."
"Unless I decide to make it your problem," came the amused reply.
"Seriously?" I say. "I've had that little freak taking over my life for the past month, and now you really think I'm going to put up with whatever YOU are? Show yourself!"
A figure rises from behind a chair. Twenty-five days ago this sight would have had my jaw dropping to the floor. But now?
"Of course," I say. "You. It makes perfect sense now."
"We'll continue this later," I hear as it vanishes, the sound of the voice trailing off into nothing like dissipating smoke.
Day 26
I'm awake much too early. There's an unfamiliar sound coming from the living room, and immediately I know something is wrong. I stagger out of bed and down the hall. As both promised and threatened yesterday, she's back.
I'm in no mood for this. "What?"
"Where is he?" she asks.
"I don't know, and I don't care. Just get out of my house. I never had any purpose for an elf, and I surely don't have one for a doll."
"Doll?" Evil laughter follows. "I am no doll. This is merely the appearance I chose to get his attention. I needed a way in here so I could watch him closely." She pauses. "What it it with so many of you males, by the way? All it takes is long hair and a short skirt, and your brains shut down. It's quite pathetic, really."
"So if you've been here all this time...."
She anticipates my question. "I've stayed hidden in that chest filled with the Legos your nephews used to love so much, waiting for the proper moment. I tried going after him several times but was never strong enough to act on my own until the Winter Solstice. Clavicus may have evaded us for the time being, but he knows his days are numbered. And there are several of his brethren around the country that need to be dealt with before Christmas arrives. With my powers at their current peak, I'm needed on other fronts. This may be the last time we see each other, unless he's fool enough to come back here. And if he does, you'd best beware." With a flash of light she was gone.
I went back to bed, hoping this bizarre Christmas toy civil war going on around me was only a dream. If Cinnamon showed his face today, he'd better have some answers.
Day 27
No sign of Cinnamon or Evil Barbie for over 24 hours. Part of me hopes he got away, just because she was so awful and I'd rather not see her win. But on the other hand, considering everything that's happened this month...I don't know he wouldn't deserve whatever he had coming. I keep thinking back to how I never actually heard anything like a slamming door when he broke free the other day. If he did get away, I'm not sure how far he would have made it.
I step out to get the morning paper and see shredded red fuzz scattered around the doormat. No hat, no bits of Cinnamon anywhere. Did he only make it this far before she found him, or is this the sign of another struggle from which he narrowly escaped? Knowing his tenacity, I suspect he's still out there somewhere. But with Christmas Eve only hours away and the Season of the Elf rapidly coming to an end, I can only wonder.
I find this sign on the garage door when backing out to go to school this morning. I hope Cinnamon has a good hiding spot picked out. His days are looking numbered.
My day goes on without as much as a passing thought toward Cinnamon and his shenanigans. I walk out to the mailbox when I get home and find out that now it seems mail addressed to Cinnamon -- from someone who knows him primarily by his Elven name -- is being delivered to my house. Today he received what could be fairly described as a threatening jigsaw puzzle. As a result, his stress level is very high this evening.
Day 23
The arrival of that puzzle last night really got to Cinnamon. I find him sitting back in the sun room this morning, exhausted from trying to shed his anxiety and frustration all night.
"I thought squeezing this tennis ball was supposed to help me get rid of my stress!" he shouts with his demented cartoon chipmunk voice. "It isn't working!"
"Now, you do realize you're sitting in the sun room," I point out, "and you're surrounded by windows, and anyone looking for you would be able to see exactly where you are?"
He closes his stupid plastic eyes and lets the ball roll to the floor. "I don't think it makes a difference anymore," he says, sounding utterly defeated.
Day 24
When I didn't see Cinnamon this morning, I knew better than to hope he had moved on. He hadn't really bounced back from his depressive spiral yesterday and this concerned me; not because I was worried about him, but I didn't want anything damaging going on inside my house.
I began to hear a quiet, low-pitched rumble in the middle of the afternoon. It almost sounded like a poorly-maintained engine idling somewhere down the street, but whenever I stepped outside to try and figure out what it was, it would stop. After some careful exploration, I figured out it was coming from my grandmother's piano, almost as if it were alive and breathing. Then I noticed the hat.
"Why? Are you in the piano?" I ask. He doesn't respond. I slam my palm down on an octave of keys and hear him skittering awake.
"What? What?" he screeches. Raw panic. I don't think he could tell he was trapped in place by the hat. I let him struggle there for a few moments, enjoying the sound of his fright more than I care to admit.
"WHY ARE YOU IN THE PIANO?" I shout.
"What time is it?" he whispers.
"Late afternoon, almost sunset," I said. "Why could you possibly care?"
"I thought over what you said yesterday, about hiding places," he answers. "Today is the Winter Solstice. I need a good hiding place now more than ever before."
"Because?"
"Because?" he repeats, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Because? You really can't be this stupid. The Winter Solstice is the longest night of the year, which almost means it's the darkest day of the year. For Dark Elves, this is the day when our powers are the most...heightened."
"Really. And your smiley-faced elf powers are so mighty that you need to hide in a ninety-year-old piano."
"There's only one of me," he finally replies. "There are more of them."
"So I'm guessing you don't get along with the other elves very well."
"They aren't all elves," he says. "It's a guild. The elves just lead it. Or at least we had at one time. I really don't know anymore. Now, please just leave me alone. One way or another you'll be rid of me soon."
And I think, Not soon enough.
Day 25
I left the house early to finally get my Christmas shopping done. It went fast, so I was home sooner than expected. I walk in with my packages to the sound of bloodcurdling shrieks.
"Help me, please!" Cinnamon screams. "They've found me! They're here in the house RIGHT NOW!" I see him sprawled on the floor, restrained in a manner which gives me a moment of pause.
"Where are they?" I ask, setting down my gifts and hurrying into the living room, searching.
"I think...there's only...one," he replies, the strain in his voice evident. I rush down the hallway, more than ready to finally put an end to all of this ridiculousness. No sign of anything or anyone. Just as I turn back I hear a loud grunt and a painful cry. By the time I return to the kitchen, he's gone.
"You shouldn't have done that." A menacing voice fills the room. "Coming in when you did surprised me. You gave him the moment of distraction he needed for escape."
"Yeah, did I?" I answer. "Well, your problem, not mine."
"Unless I decide to make it your problem," came the amused reply.
"Seriously?" I say. "I've had that little freak taking over my life for the past month, and now you really think I'm going to put up with whatever YOU are? Show yourself!"
A figure rises from behind a chair. Twenty-five days ago this sight would have had my jaw dropping to the floor. But now?
"Of course," I say. "You. It makes perfect sense now."
"We'll continue this later," I hear as it vanishes, the sound of the voice trailing off into nothing like dissipating smoke.
Day 26
I'm awake much too early. There's an unfamiliar sound coming from the living room, and immediately I know something is wrong. I stagger out of bed and down the hall. As both promised and threatened yesterday, she's back.
I'm in no mood for this. "What?"
"Where is he?" she asks.
"I don't know, and I don't care. Just get out of my house. I never had any purpose for an elf, and I surely don't have one for a doll."
"Doll?" Evil laughter follows. "I am no doll. This is merely the appearance I chose to get his attention. I needed a way in here so I could watch him closely." She pauses. "What it it with so many of you males, by the way? All it takes is long hair and a short skirt, and your brains shut down. It's quite pathetic, really."
"So if you've been here all this time...."
She anticipates my question. "I've stayed hidden in that chest filled with the Legos your nephews used to love so much, waiting for the proper moment. I tried going after him several times but was never strong enough to act on my own until the Winter Solstice. Clavicus may have evaded us for the time being, but he knows his days are numbered. And there are several of his brethren around the country that need to be dealt with before Christmas arrives. With my powers at their current peak, I'm needed on other fronts. This may be the last time we see each other, unless he's fool enough to come back here. And if he does, you'd best beware." With a flash of light she was gone.
I went back to bed, hoping this bizarre Christmas toy civil war going on around me was only a dream. If Cinnamon showed his face today, he'd better have some answers.
Day 27
No sign of Cinnamon or Evil Barbie for over 24 hours. Part of me hopes he got away, just because she was so awful and I'd rather not see her win. But on the other hand, considering everything that's happened this month...I don't know he wouldn't deserve whatever he had coming. I keep thinking back to how I never actually heard anything like a slamming door when he broke free the other day. If he did get away, I'm not sure how far he would have made it.
I step out to get the morning paper and see shredded red fuzz scattered around the doormat. No hat, no bits of Cinnamon anywhere. Did he only make it this far before she found him, or is this the sign of another struggle from which he narrowly escaped? Knowing his tenacity, I suspect he's still out there somewhere. But with Christmas Eve only hours away and the Season of the Elf rapidly coming to an end, I can only wonder.
THE END
Thursday, December 18, 2014
The Cinnamon Invasion: Week 3
Day 15
"Yay!!" I hear a disturbing scream coming from the next room too early in the morning and I'm startled out of bed. I find Cinnamon with a wide smile on his face. It seems we've made peace, or have at least reached some kind of
compromise. Either way Cinnamon is in far too good of a mood to bother with
any threats, idle or otherwise.
"Check it! This is perfect! They'll never
find me!" he says with a confident swagger that doesn't match his
stupid elf voice. "The perfect disguise!"
Day 16
The Saturday end of a busy week. I'd planned to try and get some Christmas shopping done, but it didn't go well so I gave up and drove home. My neighbor Don was standing out in the yard between our houses, raising a hand in greeting as I park in the driveway.
"I wasn't sure if you were home," he said, nodding toward the house. "I was sure I saw your car leave a few hours ago, but the music is so loud in there we could hear it from our living room." This is no small thing since it's winter and all of the windows on both our houses are closed up tight. I thank Don for his concern. As I walk in through the garage entrance, I'm greeted by an apocalyptic blaring. Cinnamon sits beside my old CD player.
"Dude, why didn't you tell me we had
all this?" he said. "This is SO MUCH better than Burl Ives and Gene Autry and Andy
Williams!!"
Apparently he calls me Dude now. And I can't help but wonder: What exactly does he mean by "we?"
Day 17
"Hey!
HEY!" I hear myself being summoned. "Get a picture of this and put it
on the Internet," Cinnamon tells me, his voice temporarily reduced to a dry gag. "To what purpose?" I ask.
"More effective than a disguise," he replies. "If there's anything about the world that I know for sure, it's that your enemies won't hunt you down if they think you're already dead."
Day 18
Cinnamon was waiting at the front door when I got home.
"Are you alone?" he asks. His voice has a nervous tremor I haven't heard before.
"Yeah, of course I am," I answer. I try the key. The door is barricaded from the inside.
"Are you really alone?!" he demands. "I'm not joking around here!"
"Yes, I'm alone! Open the door, you twerp! It's raining!"
I barely get inside before he slams the door and locks it again. He looks up at me with haunted eyes.
"They found me," he croaks. "We aren't safe anymore."
There he goes with that "we" business again....
"Are you alone?" he asks. His voice has a nervous tremor I haven't heard before.
"Yeah, of course I am," I answer. I try the key. The door is barricaded from the inside.
"Are you really alone?!" he demands. "I'm not joking around here!"
"Yes, I'm alone! Open the door, you twerp! It's raining!"
I barely get inside before he slams the door and locks it again. He looks up at me with haunted eyes.
"They found me," he croaks. "We aren't safe anymore."
There he goes with that "we" business again....
Day 19
A
burning smell as I enter the house, and my fight or flight response
activates. Something left on a furnace grate? A forgotten candle? Is my house safe?!
"HELP!!!" A scream from the kitchen. Cinnamon's enemies must've found their way in. I quickly remove him, mostly to prevent any further damage to the grill. "Put me...on the tree...." he pants. "Time on...the Christmas tree...only way...to heal...for certain...."
Reluctantly I comply.
"HELP!!!" A scream from the kitchen. Cinnamon's enemies must've found their way in. I quickly remove him, mostly to prevent any further damage to the grill. "Put me...on the tree...." he pants. "Time on...the Christmas tree...only way...to heal...for certain...."
Reluctantly I comply.
Day 20
This
morning I find Cinnamon impaled by an ornament and
lying motionless on a plate as if he's been served up. This happened while I slept? I hadn't heard a thing. Oddly enough he seems to have something like maple syrup leaking from his body instead of blood, and somehow this doesn't surprise me. (At least it smelled like maple syrup; I wasn't about to taste it.)
I don't like the
thought of his enemies being able to enter my house at will,
particularly in the middle of the night. There's no way this can end
well.
"...tree, again..." he pleads, barely with the strength to speak. "...please... hurry...."
"...tree, again..." he pleads, barely with the strength to speak. "...please... hurry...."
Day 21
There's no sign of Cinnamon anywhere this morning and I think, maybe he crawled off to die somewhere.
No such luck.
"Take me with you!" he pleads. "I'm not safe here alone!"
"Take me with you!" he pleads. "I'm not safe here alone!"
"Dude, they stabbed you when I was here, sleeping. I don't think I'm really much help."
He unconsciously pats at his side, mumbling something about how that was only a warning. "I just...I don't know what to do."
"Well," I tell him, "I've invested a lot of time into crafting a safe and welcoming classroom environment, and you represent a variable I am not comfortable introducing into that. Maybe you want to think of a better hiding place than sitting on the kitchen counter and staring out the window."
I pick him up and carry him back inside. He's still too weak from his injuries to struggle.
He unconsciously pats at his side, mumbling something about how that was only a warning. "I just...I don't know what to do."
"Well," I tell him, "I've invested a lot of time into crafting a safe and welcoming classroom environment, and you represent a variable I am not comfortable introducing into that. Maybe you want to think of a better hiding place than sitting on the kitchen counter and staring out the window."
I pick him up and carry him back inside. He's still too weak from his injuries to struggle.
One week until Christmas. Part of me wants to see how all of this ends, while another part just wants it all to end....
Thursday, December 11, 2014
The Cinnamon Invasion: Week 2
Day 8
Well, Cinnamon is back this morning. And it seems he's made a new friend. And I'm going to have to burn my favorite sweatshirt now.
Day 9
I've reached the point where now it's more about what curiosities I'll discover in the morning instead of if there will be any. Cinnamon greets me inside the front door, all cheery and smiling. "Happy St. Nicholas Day!" he yells, with his usual high-pitched dentist drill of a voice.
"St. Nicholas Day?" I ask, rubbing the sleep out of my face.
"Yeah, you know, treats in the shoes, that whole thing! December 6th! That's today!"
His description triggers a vague childhood memory. "So you're saying St. Nicholas came here last night?"
He laughs indulgently. "Of course not. He tried, but I kept the place locked down -- sanctuary and all, you know. It wouldn't be safe to let just anyone in here. I took care of business myself instead."
I see my shoes beside the front door. "Pizza?" I ask. "That's my treat?"
"You like pizza, right? Everyone does!"
I lean in for a closer look at the other shoe. "And...a vitamin?"
"Yeah!" he says, enthusiastically. "Because, health!"
I walk away, shaking my head and mentally adding shoe-shopping to my To Do List for the day.
Day 10
I managed to get the Christmas tree up today. Cinnamon's reaction was not at all what I expected. "It's happening too soon," I overheard him say, as if thinking aloud. "I'm not ready yet." I thought, "HA! Join the club, you little monster. Nobody's ready for Christmas yet. I haven't even started shopping."
By the time darkness settled in, he had checked the lock on each door at least twice, then began standing vigil at the patio door. "It's only a matter of time until they find me," he whispered, seemingly oblivious that I was even in the room....
Day 11
It seems Movie Night was going on while I was sleeping. I was much more comfortable with the idea of Cinnamon being potentially influenced by holiday cartoons from the 1960s.
For some reason this reminded me of my first fight with Tyler....
Day 12
I found Cinnamon staring at the wall. Before I could even ask, he said, "I just wanted to watch something burn."
Day 13
I found Cinnamon in the kitchen when I got home. "I wrote you a poem today," he said. "I hope you like it."
I'm sleeping with the bedroom door locked tonight.
Day 14
I came home to the sound of maniacal laughter echoing from the office. Cinnamon was sitting beside my desktop, looking a little too self-satisfied.
"What did you do?" I asked, my mind scrolling through too many bad possibilities.
He laughed some more, then suddenly went stoic. "I learned today that you've been posting pictures of me all over the Internet. Since I have made my needs for sanctuary abundantly clear, I was greatly displeased by this and decided you needed to be taught a lesson. Therefore, certain contacts found in your address book have experienced, shall we say, 'slight technical difficulties' today."
"Okay, whatever, enough with the vague sanctuary talk," I replied. "Just cut to the chase. Why do you need sanctuary? Who or what are you hiding from?"
He sighed. "If I tell you, you won't ever be able to go back to a time when you didn't know. And you might end up regretting that."
I left the room, refusing to take the bait. I can only hope this nonsense will resolve itself by Christmas.
Will the madness ever end??? Tune in next week! Same elf-time, same elf-blog....
Well, Cinnamon is back this morning. And it seems he's made a new friend. And I'm going to have to burn my favorite sweatshirt now.
Day 9
I've reached the point where now it's more about what curiosities I'll discover in the morning instead of if there will be any. Cinnamon greets me inside the front door, all cheery and smiling. "Happy St. Nicholas Day!" he yells, with his usual high-pitched dentist drill of a voice.
"St. Nicholas Day?" I ask, rubbing the sleep out of my face.
"Yeah, you know, treats in the shoes, that whole thing! December 6th! That's today!"
His description triggers a vague childhood memory. "So you're saying St. Nicholas came here last night?"
He laughs indulgently. "Of course not. He tried, but I kept the place locked down -- sanctuary and all, you know. It wouldn't be safe to let just anyone in here. I took care of business myself instead."
I see my shoes beside the front door. "Pizza?" I ask. "That's my treat?"
"You like pizza, right? Everyone does!"
I lean in for a closer look at the other shoe. "And...a vitamin?"
"Yeah!" he says, enthusiastically. "Because, health!"
I walk away, shaking my head and mentally adding shoe-shopping to my To Do List for the day.
Day 10
I managed to get the Christmas tree up today. Cinnamon's reaction was not at all what I expected. "It's happening too soon," I overheard him say, as if thinking aloud. "I'm not ready yet." I thought, "HA! Join the club, you little monster. Nobody's ready for Christmas yet. I haven't even started shopping."
By the time darkness settled in, he had checked the lock on each door at least twice, then began standing vigil at the patio door. "It's only a matter of time until they find me," he whispered, seemingly oblivious that I was even in the room....
Day 11
It seems Movie Night was going on while I was sleeping. I was much more comfortable with the idea of Cinnamon being potentially influenced by holiday cartoons from the 1960s.
For some reason this reminded me of my first fight with Tyler....
Day 12
I found Cinnamon staring at the wall. Before I could even ask, he said, "I just wanted to watch something burn."
I found Cinnamon in the kitchen when I got home. "I wrote you a poem today," he said. "I hope you like it."
I'm sleeping with the bedroom door locked tonight.
Day 14
I came home to the sound of maniacal laughter echoing from the office. Cinnamon was sitting beside my desktop, looking a little too self-satisfied.
"What did you do?" I asked, my mind scrolling through too many bad possibilities.
He laughed some more, then suddenly went stoic. "I learned today that you've been posting pictures of me all over the Internet. Since I have made my needs for sanctuary abundantly clear, I was greatly displeased by this and decided you needed to be taught a lesson. Therefore, certain contacts found in your address book have experienced, shall we say, 'slight technical difficulties' today."
"Okay, whatever, enough with the vague sanctuary talk," I replied. "Just cut to the chase. Why do you need sanctuary? Who or what are you hiding from?"
He sighed. "If I tell you, you won't ever be able to go back to a time when you didn't know. And you might end up regretting that."
I left the room, refusing to take the bait. I can only hope this nonsense will resolve itself by Christmas.
Will the madness ever end??? Tune in next week! Same elf-time, same elf-blog....
Thursday, December 4, 2014
The Cinnamon Invasion: Week 1
I’ve always enjoyed the holiday season, but this year it’s turning out to be something very different, and not necessarily in the merriest of ways.
Day 1
Thanksgiving had been a great day, full of family, laughter, football, dogs, and pie. I drove home that night through the unseasonably frigid temperatures and went to bed feeling full and content and loved. Then I woke the next morning and saw this creepy little thing perched by the television, staring me down. I recognized it as one of those disturbing “Elf on the Shelf” misfits, but the thing is -- I don't own one. I don’t mind saying I was a little freaked out. I mean, look at it. I know there are families that love to get all Pinterested up this time of year with stuff like this, but to have one of these awful things just show up in your house? Not cool. I went on with my day and did the best I could to ignore it, because there was no way I was going to touch the thing.
Day 2
I had almost forgotten about my interloping red bag of horrible when I went to bed Friday night and thought I was in the clear Saturday morning...until I walked into the kitchen and found it waiting for me. It sat on the kitchen table with the strangest handwritten note beside it: "I seek sanctuary. My Elven name is Clavicus Hrothgar, Overlord of the Darkness Guild. But perhaps it'd be best if you simply called me Cinnamon."
Cinnamon? I don’t know if that’s any less creepy than that other name. “Cinnamon” didn’t exactly specify what he needs sanctuary for, but I didn’t feel terribly compelled to grant it. Before I could tell him to get out of my house, he was gone. I didn’t see him again for the rest of the day.
Day 3
I found Cinnamon sitting vigilantly by the kitchen window this morning, quietly muttering to himself, "They're coming....they're coming....I know they're coming." This is not reassuring. I wish I had some idea who “they” are supposed to be.
Day 4
My first day back to work after the Thanksgiving break. I get home to find this scene.
Oh, Cinnamon...I just...I don't even want to know....I can only hope all of this was enough to quiet whatever demons are plaguing your tormented elven spirit. Especially now that I have to finish off the leftover pie without any Reddi-Wip.
Day 5
For once there was no sign of Cinnamon when I woke up this morning, or when I got home from work in the evening. In fact, I had almost successfully banished the idea of him from my head altogether. Just when I was settling in for the evening, figuring I was finally in the clear, I heard the television turn on all by itself, which never happens because my house isn’t haunted. I walked to the living room to see what the deal was and turn it off when I heard a low, threatening growl coming from the edge of the coffee table behind me: "You will NOT. Touch that remote."
Day 6
After what I now think of as The Charlie Brown Incident, my sleep last night was frequently interrupted by unsettling nightmares. By the time I woke, I'd all but decided to send Cinnamon on his way, maybe even with the trash pick-up tomorrow. When I got out of bed to do some early work on revisions I found this, and noticed a recently recorded voice memo on my phone: "You didn't know I can see your dreams, did you? Do you ever want to work on your clever little story again? I think a few weeks of sanctuary would be a fair trade for your new password. Or, should I say, OUR new password."
What choice do I really have? And again, I'm wondering: Sanctuary from who? Or what? If whatever he’s hiding from would get him out of my life, I’d almost be ready to put up a neon sign outside the front door to guide the way.
Day 7
There was no sign of Cinnamon this morning. I’m learning to trust the mild anxiety that follows when that happens. Sure enough, I find another message on the iPad when I get home. Paraphrased, because it was kind of scattered and written in more fonts than I knew the iPad had available: "Haha I found the candy hidden in the bathroom and finished it off! It tasted awful but I feel great! I'm going on a pizza run, back later!!"
Is Cinnamon gone forever, or will tonight just be a temporary respite for me? Tune in next week to find out!!
Day 1
Thanksgiving had been a great day, full of family, laughter, football, dogs, and pie. I drove home that night through the unseasonably frigid temperatures and went to bed feeling full and content and loved. Then I woke the next morning and saw this creepy little thing perched by the television, staring me down. I recognized it as one of those disturbing “Elf on the Shelf” misfits, but the thing is -- I don't own one. I don’t mind saying I was a little freaked out. I mean, look at it. I know there are families that love to get all Pinterested up this time of year with stuff like this, but to have one of these awful things just show up in your house? Not cool. I went on with my day and did the best I could to ignore it, because there was no way I was going to touch the thing.
Day 2
I had almost forgotten about my interloping red bag of horrible when I went to bed Friday night and thought I was in the clear Saturday morning...until I walked into the kitchen and found it waiting for me. It sat on the kitchen table with the strangest handwritten note beside it: "I seek sanctuary. My Elven name is Clavicus Hrothgar, Overlord of the Darkness Guild. But perhaps it'd be best if you simply called me Cinnamon."
Day 3
I found Cinnamon sitting vigilantly by the kitchen window this morning, quietly muttering to himself, "They're coming....they're coming....I know they're coming." This is not reassuring. I wish I had some idea who “they” are supposed to be.
Day 4
My first day back to work after the Thanksgiving break. I get home to find this scene.
Oh, Cinnamon...I just...I don't even want to know....I can only hope all of this was enough to quiet whatever demons are plaguing your tormented elven spirit. Especially now that I have to finish off the leftover pie without any Reddi-Wip.
Day 5
For once there was no sign of Cinnamon when I woke up this morning, or when I got home from work in the evening. In fact, I had almost successfully banished the idea of him from my head altogether. Just when I was settling in for the evening, figuring I was finally in the clear, I heard the television turn on all by itself, which never happens because my house isn’t haunted. I walked to the living room to see what the deal was and turn it off when I heard a low, threatening growl coming from the edge of the coffee table behind me: "You will NOT. Touch that remote."
Day 6
After what I now think of as The Charlie Brown Incident, my sleep last night was frequently interrupted by unsettling nightmares. By the time I woke, I'd all but decided to send Cinnamon on his way, maybe even with the trash pick-up tomorrow. When I got out of bed to do some early work on revisions I found this, and noticed a recently recorded voice memo on my phone: "You didn't know I can see your dreams, did you? Do you ever want to work on your clever little story again? I think a few weeks of sanctuary would be a fair trade for your new password. Or, should I say, OUR new password."
What choice do I really have? And again, I'm wondering: Sanctuary from who? Or what? If whatever he’s hiding from would get him out of my life, I’d almost be ready to put up a neon sign outside the front door to guide the way.
Day 7
There was no sign of Cinnamon this morning. I’m learning to trust the mild anxiety that follows when that happens. Sure enough, I find another message on the iPad when I get home. Paraphrased, because it was kind of scattered and written in more fonts than I knew the iPad had available: "Haha I found the candy hidden in the bathroom and finished it off! It tasted awful but I feel great! I'm going on a pizza run, back later!!"
Is Cinnamon gone forever, or will tonight just be a temporary respite for me? Tune in next week to find out!!
Saturday, November 29, 2014
Blog Award
A long, long time ago -- something like three weeks now -- I was tagged by the one and only Rachel Simon to answer some writer-type questions. At the time I was knee-deep in NaNoWriMo 2014 and didn't have the physical or mental or emotional capacity to put together anything resembling a coherent blog post. But, since this happened a few days ago...
...I'm in a much better place for posting. So thanks for the tag Rachel, and sorry for the delay. Here we go:
Describe your current WIP (work in progress) in 6 words.
"Self-discovery prompted by personal tragedy."
Who was the first fictional character you had a crush on?
I had to think hard about this, because the reading I did growing up wasn't exactly populated with crushworthy characters. I was about to give up on this question and pass until I remembered my devotion to the Disney version of Alice in Wonderland when I was about five. That standard at such a young age ruined all other blondes for me.
What authors would you like to do a panel with, and why?
Easiest question on the list -- the rest of Team Howland. Why? Because we're collectively that awesome and our panel would be historic.
What is your favorite beverage to have when writing / revising?
This was given to me as two separate questions, but I'm combining them because they're the same answer: Diet Mountain Dew. Or Orange Vitamin Water Zero in the summer, when I don't need to rely on the caffeine quite as much.
If you could describe your main character as a candy, what would it be and why?
I would choose a fictional candy -- Littmus Lozenges from Because of Winn-Dixie. Everyone in the book described them as being sweet, but containing a buried sorrow. I think that describes my character Molly very well.
Did you ever change a character's name in any of your works? And from what to what?
Yes. In a previous (and soon to be reactivated) manuscript, I changed one character from a "Jake" to a "Will," because his best friend also had a "J" name and it wasn't working. Ironically, since Rachel was the person who tagged me for this, I am about to change the name of a character in my current manuscript from Rachel to something else I haven't decided on yet. No offense Rachel, but I keep seeing a former student named Rachel when the character comes up in the story, and that student is in no way related to the character so it's messing with my head.
If you could describe your WIP in a song, what would it be?
There are so many songs on my Following Infinity writing playlist I feel perfectly capture different moments or themes, so it's difficult to pick one. But after a scroll through the 254 songs on that playlist, I think one of the best overall would be "Life Must Go On" by Alter Bridge, both for the lyrical themes and the musical tone. And trust me, since this is a music question, I put some serious thought into my answer.
What is your main character's astrological sign?
I honestly have no idea. I don't even know when her birthday is specifically, though I do know it isn't between early October and New Year's Day.
If you could re-cast your favorite movie for today's audience, who would play who?
I'd have a heck of a time even narrowing down to one favorite movie, though since one of my current favorites would still be "The Avengers" and that's already pretty recent, I don't think any recasting would be necessary.
Since I cut my list down to nine questions instead of ten by combining two of them, I'm going to borrow one of the questions Rachel had to answer on her blog to complete my list:
If you could have dinner with any author, alive or deceased, who would it be and why?
I would go with Justin Cronin on this one. Because: A) He writes with amazing voice. B) Everything I've seen about him -- from his interviews to his tweets and Facebook posts to how he was at his book signing -- convinces me that he's just a really good guy. C) I could sit at that table and go all "Chris Farley Show" on him: "Remember...remember that time when you wrote The Twelve? And that time when you came to Minneapolis and you did a book signing in Roseville? And I was there? And I sat in the third row, and you were awesome? And then you signed all of our books, and remember when I said I was a teacher who wanted to be a writer, and you said, 'Well you know, I also started out teaching before I did this?'"
That was AWESOME!
Describe your current WIP (work in progress) in 6 words.
"Self-discovery prompted by personal tragedy."
Who was the first fictional character you had a crush on?
I had to think hard about this, because the reading I did growing up wasn't exactly populated with crushworthy characters. I was about to give up on this question and pass until I remembered my devotion to the Disney version of Alice in Wonderland when I was about five. That standard at such a young age ruined all other blondes for me.
What authors would you like to do a panel with, and why?
Easiest question on the list -- the rest of Team Howland. Why? Because we're collectively that awesome and our panel would be historic.
What is your favorite beverage to have when writing / revising?
This was given to me as two separate questions, but I'm combining them because they're the same answer: Diet Mountain Dew. Or Orange Vitamin Water Zero in the summer, when I don't need to rely on the caffeine quite as much.
If you could describe your main character as a candy, what would it be and why?
I would choose a fictional candy -- Littmus Lozenges from Because of Winn-Dixie. Everyone in the book described them as being sweet, but containing a buried sorrow. I think that describes my character Molly very well.
Did you ever change a character's name in any of your works? And from what to what?
Yes. In a previous (and soon to be reactivated) manuscript, I changed one character from a "Jake" to a "Will," because his best friend also had a "J" name and it wasn't working. Ironically, since Rachel was the person who tagged me for this, I am about to change the name of a character in my current manuscript from Rachel to something else I haven't decided on yet. No offense Rachel, but I keep seeing a former student named Rachel when the character comes up in the story, and that student is in no way related to the character so it's messing with my head.
If you could describe your WIP in a song, what would it be?
There are so many songs on my Following Infinity writing playlist I feel perfectly capture different moments or themes, so it's difficult to pick one. But after a scroll through the 254 songs on that playlist, I think one of the best overall would be "Life Must Go On" by Alter Bridge, both for the lyrical themes and the musical tone. And trust me, since this is a music question, I put some serious thought into my answer.
What is your main character's astrological sign?
I honestly have no idea. I don't even know when her birthday is specifically, though I do know it isn't between early October and New Year's Day.
If you could re-cast your favorite movie for today's audience, who would play who?
I'd have a heck of a time even narrowing down to one favorite movie, though since one of my current favorites would still be "The Avengers" and that's already pretty recent, I don't think any recasting would be necessary.
Since I cut my list down to nine questions instead of ten by combining two of them, I'm going to borrow one of the questions Rachel had to answer on her blog to complete my list:
If you could have dinner with any author, alive or deceased, who would it be and why?
I would go with Justin Cronin on this one. Because: A) He writes with amazing voice. B) Everything I've seen about him -- from his interviews to his tweets and Facebook posts to how he was at his book signing -- convinces me that he's just a really good guy. C) I could sit at that table and go all "Chris Farley Show" on him: "Remember...remember that time when you wrote The Twelve? And that time when you came to Minneapolis and you did a book signing in Roseville? And I was there? And I sat in the third row, and you were awesome? And then you signed all of our books, and remember when I said I was a teacher who wanted to be a writer, and you said, 'Well you know, I also started out teaching before I did this?'"
That was AWESOME!
Thursday, October 23, 2014
The 777 Challenge
The 777 challenge is when one author challenges others to post seven lines of text, seven lines down, on the seventh page of a work in progress. Early this morning I discovered I’d been tagged for a 777 post by my agent sister, the one and only Rachel Simon. I’m more than willing to participate and post my seven lines of text, because they turn out to be seven lines I really like.
In case you may have missed my several dozen earlier references to it here on the blog, Following Infinity is a literary-leaning contemporary middle grade novel I’m currently revising with the insightful guidance of my agent. In this scene, my main character, a thirteen-year-old girl named Molly, is attending the funeral of her younger brother, Michael.
**********
The pastor gave a sermon about Michael’s life that kind of annoyed me. You could tell he was probably reading from some pastor book like Things to Say at a Child’s Funeral and plugging in details about Michael along the way to make it sound like he knew him, like how much he liked roller coasters, or soccer, or collecting rocks. Sometimes he’d tell a funny Michael story or make a joke to break some of the tension, and everyone would laugh more than the joke deserved. I hated that. The laughter was a moment of relief, but it hurt even more when the relief passed.
Most of the crowd followed us to the cemetery when the service ended, an easy walk from the church. The afternoon sky was a deep blue, broken up by the kind of heavy clouds you see on a clear day in October.
**********
Hope you enjoyed that little sample of the manuscript. Thanks for tagging me and putting up your seven lines, Rachel! I'm really looking forward to the day I'll have all of our Team Howland titles sitting next to each other on a bookshelf in my house.
And now a brief update. If you had read my previous post about NaNoWriMo 2014, I’d outlined some plans I had coming together regarding my Following Infinity revisions, and how I planned to take advantage of all the work to be done during NaNo to help that cause. I think it’s now safe to say those plans have been shelved. In the time since I wrote that post, another project has crept to the Number One must-write spot, and it’s all the more likely that’s what I’ll be drafting in November. Which is all I will say about it now, because for all I know another pretty idea might come along between now and late at night on October 31st and I’ll change my mind yet again. Stay tuned....
In case you may have missed my several dozen earlier references to it here on the blog, Following Infinity is a literary-leaning contemporary middle grade novel I’m currently revising with the insightful guidance of my agent. In this scene, my main character, a thirteen-year-old girl named Molly, is attending the funeral of her younger brother, Michael.
**********
The pastor gave a sermon about Michael’s life that kind of annoyed me. You could tell he was probably reading from some pastor book like Things to Say at a Child’s Funeral and plugging in details about Michael along the way to make it sound like he knew him, like how much he liked roller coasters, or soccer, or collecting rocks. Sometimes he’d tell a funny Michael story or make a joke to break some of the tension, and everyone would laugh more than the joke deserved. I hated that. The laughter was a moment of relief, but it hurt even more when the relief passed.
Most of the crowd followed us to the cemetery when the service ended, an easy walk from the church. The afternoon sky was a deep blue, broken up by the kind of heavy clouds you see on a clear day in October.
**********
Hope you enjoyed that little sample of the manuscript. Thanks for tagging me and putting up your seven lines, Rachel! I'm really looking forward to the day I'll have all of our Team Howland titles sitting next to each other on a bookshelf in my house.
And now a brief update. If you had read my previous post about NaNoWriMo 2014, I’d outlined some plans I had coming together regarding my Following Infinity revisions, and how I planned to take advantage of all the work to be done during NaNo to help that cause. I think it’s now safe to say those plans have been shelved. In the time since I wrote that post, another project has crept to the Number One must-write spot, and it’s all the more likely that’s what I’ll be drafting in November. Which is all I will say about it now, because for all I know another pretty idea might come along between now and late at night on October 31st and I’ll change my mind yet again. Stay tuned....
Friday, October 17, 2014
NaNoWriMo 2014
Back in 2008, a teacher friend of mine wanted to participate in National Novel Writing Month, a.k.a. NaNoWriMo, but didn’t want to do it alone. She knew writing was a hobby of mine and convinced me to sign up as well. If you aren’t familiar with NaNoWriMo, it’s an organized event challenging people to write a complete novel during the month of November, with the benchmark of a complete novel being a written work of at least 50,000 words. Anyone and everyone who reaches that 50K mark wins the event, even if you don’t finish telling your entire story. The point isn’t to get everything perfect and polished, but to pound your way through that first draft. My results so far:
2008: Contemporary middle grade satire - Win. Good idea overall, but it started as one story and evolved into a different one halfway through. It remains in the vault.
2009: Literary-leaning contemporary middle grade - Win. Plus it got me an agent four and a half years later, so Win x 100.
2010: Literary-leaning middle grade contemporary fantasy - Win. I still love the concept behind this one, but the manuscript is a mess. Maybe someday it will get another shot.
2011: Middle grade horror - Win. That year I actually took an older manuscript and rewrote it from the ground up, then kept working on it to the point I queried it and even had a full request before I shelved it in favor of a manuscript I was more confident about. I LOVE this one. Now that I have representation, I have serious hopes it will see someday see the light of day.
2012: Contemporary science fiction young adult - Win. This one has a great concept, but is so freaking ambitious and complex I felt I was struggling to do it justice. The first draft remains only mostly finished at about 70,000 words, most of which will have to be rewritten in order for me to ever make it into something real. But the story...ooooh, man... I’m going to have to revisit it someday.
2013: Middle grade comedy - Win. Again, first draft unfinished, but at about 68,000 words. When I finish the revisions on my current project, this one is probably next in the queue.
So that catches us up to 2014, and into an autumn that I’ll openly admit has had more than its share of time demands and stress, not to mention finding me in a place where my writing time and energy would really be best served by working on my latest round of revisions. But does that mean I’m going sit out this year and rest on my winning streak?
Not a chance.
Instead I think I found a way to both work on revisions and aim for my 50,000 word win, which is a goal I have every intention of reaching. This year’s manuscript isn’t going to be one continuous story, but something I’m going to write just for me -- a collection of short stories featuring the characters from the manuscript I'm revising, FOLLOWING INFINITY. By doing this I hope to gain deeper insights about my characters and their relationships, especially as I’m preparing to build up some currently smaller roles into more significant ones. Since the stories I’m thinking about will take place both before and after the events in the story, and possibly even concurrently or from an alternate-timeline perspective, having those added events will give me better background material to work with when I get back to actual revising. It’s been forever since I’ve tried writing short stories and I’m excited about what this could help me discover. (EDIT -- It's a week and a half later. I had a conversation with my agent since writing this post, and consequently got so fired up about a different idea I changed my project over to that. So this whole paragraph? Yeah. Ignore it.)
To any and all writers reading this (especially Twitter folk, and of course anyone else from the greatness that is Team Howland): If you're planning on participating, go ahead and add me as a writing buddy when you sign in. You’ll find me under the username Hooshea (it’s a nonsense word created by a second grader; long story). Having gone from writing in isolation and existing in online anonymity for so many years, I’m looking forward to connecting with other participants. Everyone can be a winner in this, and it never hurts to have more people in your camp! You prod me along and I'll prod you right back.
And if you're one of my non-writer Facebook friends, I'll be posting frequent word count updates during November. Supportive comments along the way are always helpful and appreciated.
Wish me luck!
2008: Contemporary middle grade satire - Win. Good idea overall, but it started as one story and evolved into a different one halfway through. It remains in the vault.
2009: Literary-leaning contemporary middle grade - Win. Plus it got me an agent four and a half years later, so Win x 100.
2010: Literary-leaning middle grade contemporary fantasy - Win. I still love the concept behind this one, but the manuscript is a mess. Maybe someday it will get another shot.
2011: Middle grade horror - Win. That year I actually took an older manuscript and rewrote it from the ground up, then kept working on it to the point I queried it and even had a full request before I shelved it in favor of a manuscript I was more confident about. I LOVE this one. Now that I have representation, I have serious hopes it will see someday see the light of day.
2012: Contemporary science fiction young adult - Win. This one has a great concept, but is so freaking ambitious and complex I felt I was struggling to do it justice. The first draft remains only mostly finished at about 70,000 words, most of which will have to be rewritten in order for me to ever make it into something real. But the story...ooooh, man... I’m going to have to revisit it someday.
2013: Middle grade comedy - Win. Again, first draft unfinished, but at about 68,000 words. When I finish the revisions on my current project, this one is probably next in the queue.
So that catches us up to 2014, and into an autumn that I’ll openly admit has had more than its share of time demands and stress, not to mention finding me in a place where my writing time and energy would really be best served by working on my latest round of revisions. But does that mean I’m going sit out this year and rest on my winning streak?
Not a chance.
Instead I think I found a way to both work on revisions and aim for my 50,000 word win, which is a goal I have every intention of reaching. This year’s manuscript isn’t going to be one continuous story, but something I’m going to write just for me -- a collection of short stories featuring the characters from the manuscript I'm revising, FOLLOWING INFINITY. By doing this I hope to gain deeper insights about my characters and their relationships, especially as I’m preparing to build up some currently smaller roles into more significant ones. Since the stories I’m thinking about will take place both before and after the events in the story, and possibly even concurrently or from an alternate-timeline perspective, having those added events will give me better background material to work with when I get back to actual revising. It’s been forever since I’ve tried writing short stories and I’m excited about what this could help me discover. (EDIT -- It's a week and a half later. I had a conversation with my agent since writing this post, and consequently got so fired up about a different idea I changed my project over to that. So this whole paragraph? Yeah. Ignore it.)
To any and all writers reading this (especially Twitter folk, and of course anyone else from the greatness that is Team Howland): If you're planning on participating, go ahead and add me as a writing buddy when you sign in. You’ll find me under the username Hooshea (it’s a nonsense word created by a second grader; long story). Having gone from writing in isolation and existing in online anonymity for so many years, I’m looking forward to connecting with other participants. Everyone can be a winner in this, and it never hurts to have more people in your camp! You prod me along and I'll prod you right back.
And if you're one of my non-writer Facebook friends, I'll be posting frequent word count updates during November. Supportive comments along the way are always helpful and appreciated.
Wish me luck!
Wednesday, October 8, 2014
Writing Process Blog Tour
A few months back I was invited to be a part of the Writing Process Blog Tour. If you aren’t familiar with this, it involves different writers responding to questions about their writing process, then passing the same questions to other writers, and so on. Back then I didn’t feel I had to the time to take it on, but a few weeks ago I luckily got a second chance. This time I was tagged by Melissa Gorzelancyzk. Her debut young adult novel ARROWS will be released by Random House / Delacorte Press in January of 2016. It’s the story of Aaryn, a wayward cupid, and Karma, a dance prodigy whose destiny is derailed by the power of a single arrow. You can find out more about Melissa on her website, and can add her book at Goodreads here. Melissa and I are both lucky enough to be represented by Carrie Howland of Donadio & Olson, Inc. Whew. Lot of links to navigate through in that paragraph. Here’s a nice picture to look at as a reward:
And here are the questions Melissa handed off to me, with my answers.
-- What are you working on?
In the big picture I’ve got four projects going right now, although one is by far getting the most attention. I’m currently working on the newest revision of my middle grade novel Following Infinity. It’s the story of how a thirteen-year-old named Molly struggles to cope with the death of her younger brother Michael. She takes a cross-country road trip with her cousin and grandfather to visit the dream roller coaster her brother never had the chance to ride, which leads her to unanticipated levels of self-discovery.
-- How does your work differ from others of its genre?
I always intended the story to deal with delicate subject matter in a way that doesn’t sugar-coat how rough Molly's experience is. I want it to reflect honest feeling, even when it gets dark and emotionally brutal, which I think it's safe to say it does at points. I also think that when compared to a lot of middle grade currently out there, my story leans in a more literary direction. At least that’s what I’m aiming for.
-- Why do you write what you do?
The short answer, since I just expounded on this not long ago on the Middle Grade Minded blog: I see myself as less of a middle grade writer and more of a writer living in a middle grade world. For me it’s always been more about what story needs to be told than anything intentionally directed toward or created for a specific audience. Writing was never as much of an active choice for me as something that organically began to happen when I needed it. I write middle grade now because that’s what I see in front of me every day, and that environment is rich with stories. But that doesn’t mean middle grade is all I’m ever going to write.
-- How does your writing process work?
It can all begin with a character or a setting or a premise that intrigues me enough to keep thinking about, and when that extra bit of something interesting arrives and kicks everything to a new level, the dam bursts wide open. The sitting down and typing business most people think of as writing happens in some form on most days, but the brainstorming and development and note-taking and character inventories and speculating and organizing and assembling is almost constant, from before I start the first draft until I think I’m done revising. When I am at the keyboard, I’m usually listening to a playlist that’s been carefully constructed to reflect the tone of whatever I’m working on, and if I’m in serious flow state writing mode I’ll have the music playing from another room so I can’t interrupt myself to change songs. I’m a pretty quick and adaptive thinker, so once I have an idea of where the story will be going I can often just start working and let it roll out in front of me, sometimes following what I had planned but sometimes pulling me in the direction of new discoveries. Often I’ll stand up and pace around the house, talking to myself to outline upcoming moments or to act out dialogue exchanges between characters. Once everything in a project starts coming together and I know I’ve got something serious on my hands, that backyard part of my writer brain will always have something going on related to that work in progress.
Afterward, the revision is hard, long, tedious work. It’s reading chapters forward and backward several times over to find typos and grammar fixes that can’t be excused in the name of voice. It’s searching for how many times I’ve overused my usual writing crutches and then rewriting around them. It’s running the story through several different filters, usually one at a time, trying to find the good bits in all the unnecessary. And then doing it all again and again.
My turn to tag: I’m passing on the fun to Lara Chapman and Daniel Kenney, two of my co-conspirators from the formidable Middle Grade Minded blog. You can find out more about them on their websites below, and look forward to their process posts coming in the next week or two.
Lara Chapman
Daniel Kenney
And here are the questions Melissa handed off to me, with my answers.
-- What are you working on?
In the big picture I’ve got four projects going right now, although one is by far getting the most attention. I’m currently working on the newest revision of my middle grade novel Following Infinity. It’s the story of how a thirteen-year-old named Molly struggles to cope with the death of her younger brother Michael. She takes a cross-country road trip with her cousin and grandfather to visit the dream roller coaster her brother never had the chance to ride, which leads her to unanticipated levels of self-discovery.
-- How does your work differ from others of its genre?
I always intended the story to deal with delicate subject matter in a way that doesn’t sugar-coat how rough Molly's experience is. I want it to reflect honest feeling, even when it gets dark and emotionally brutal, which I think it's safe to say it does at points. I also think that when compared to a lot of middle grade currently out there, my story leans in a more literary direction. At least that’s what I’m aiming for.
-- Why do you write what you do?
The short answer, since I just expounded on this not long ago on the Middle Grade Minded blog: I see myself as less of a middle grade writer and more of a writer living in a middle grade world. For me it’s always been more about what story needs to be told than anything intentionally directed toward or created for a specific audience. Writing was never as much of an active choice for me as something that organically began to happen when I needed it. I write middle grade now because that’s what I see in front of me every day, and that environment is rich with stories. But that doesn’t mean middle grade is all I’m ever going to write.
-- How does your writing process work?
It can all begin with a character or a setting or a premise that intrigues me enough to keep thinking about, and when that extra bit of something interesting arrives and kicks everything to a new level, the dam bursts wide open. The sitting down and typing business most people think of as writing happens in some form on most days, but the brainstorming and development and note-taking and character inventories and speculating and organizing and assembling is almost constant, from before I start the first draft until I think I’m done revising. When I am at the keyboard, I’m usually listening to a playlist that’s been carefully constructed to reflect the tone of whatever I’m working on, and if I’m in serious flow state writing mode I’ll have the music playing from another room so I can’t interrupt myself to change songs. I’m a pretty quick and adaptive thinker, so once I have an idea of where the story will be going I can often just start working and let it roll out in front of me, sometimes following what I had planned but sometimes pulling me in the direction of new discoveries. Often I’ll stand up and pace around the house, talking to myself to outline upcoming moments or to act out dialogue exchanges between characters. Once everything in a project starts coming together and I know I’ve got something serious on my hands, that backyard part of my writer brain will always have something going on related to that work in progress.
Afterward, the revision is hard, long, tedious work. It’s reading chapters forward and backward several times over to find typos and grammar fixes that can’t be excused in the name of voice. It’s searching for how many times I’ve overused my usual writing crutches and then rewriting around them. It’s running the story through several different filters, usually one at a time, trying to find the good bits in all the unnecessary. And then doing it all again and again.
My turn to tag: I’m passing on the fun to Lara Chapman and Daniel Kenney, two of my co-conspirators from the formidable Middle Grade Minded blog. You can find out more about them on their websites below, and look forward to their process posts coming in the next week or two.
Lara Chapman
Daniel Kenney
Sunday, October 5, 2014
Decade
Just days ago I finished my first class read-aloud of the year, Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo. One plot point in this book has the main character, a young girl named Opal, wanting to know more about the mother who abandoned her and her father when she was very young. In the early chapters she tells her father she wants to know ten things about her mother, “one thing for each year I’ve been alive.”
After some thought her father provides the list of ten things, many of which are referenced throughout the book, making the mother an influential presence in the story even though her character never actually appears. This caught my attention since in my own revision work right now I’m looking for new ways to give voice to an absent character: What do I need to show to make him real? How do I do it with the economy and balance that will help readers know him well enough to care, but leave them with a vague sense of loss for not knowing him better?
Opal deciding on the number ten for her ten years of life also connected with me on an entirely different level, since it was ten years ago today, October 5th, when my sister Erin died. It’s easy to encapsulate that amount of time and label it as the unit “decade” without thinking about how much time it really represents. Ten years means her death predates the Obama presidency, every version of the iPhone, Taylor Swift’s entire recording career, Hurricane Katrina, and the time before Facebook evolved into the ubiquitous thing it is now. On a more personal level, I’m slightly astonished when I think of how many people have entered my life in the past ten years, and therefore wouldn’t know much about Erin outside of things I might have mentioned at incidental moments. Some of these people have even broken through my most preciously guarded introversion barriers and are now central to my life, yet they know next to nothing about her or why her death was one of my defining events.
So today I’m going to share ten things about my sister -- one for each year that has passed since we lost her. Hopefully these ten things will make her seem more real for people who never knew her, but will also bring back memories for those who did. And all of this is to say nothing about my lesser agenda, of practicing how to make an absent character seem more relatable and present. This works nicely here, because Erin was undeniably a character.
1. She loved dogs. We’ve always been a dog family; if my count is accurate, we’ve had a total of fifteen in my lifetime. She dearly loved all of the ones she knew, and they loved her back for it. Making friends with dogs was just as important to her as making friends with people. Our cousins' dogs, neighborhood dogs, any dog she saw passing on the street -- they were all precious to her. If she had ever read Because of Winn-Dixie, she would have laughed at the times the dog Winn-Dixie smiled his way into a sneeze, since our former neighbor’s dog Annabelle had done the same thing.
2. She was a natural leader. She was the captain of her high school soccer team, and took that role very seriously. She once had to escort members of the police department and their K-9 unit through the creepy basement of our father’s drugstore when the alarm went off late at night, and was only about sixteen years old at the time. When she and Jenny both worked at the drugstore she made Jenny wear the white pharmacist’s jacket, because customers noticed the way Erin carried herself and assumed she was in charge, then would ask her for medical advice she couldn’t give. She once invited our family to a pancake breakfast event she had organized at the assisted living center where she worked, and clearly had everything running exactly as she had intended.
3. She had a big sense of humor. She had a variety of laughs that ranged from loud and brassy to an oxygen-deprived silence followed by a croaking gasp. She was her truest self when sharing late-night laughing fits with our cousins in our aunt and uncle’s kitchen. It sounds slightly off to me now when I hear them laughing like this, without her, like a song intended to be performed as four-part harmony that’s missing the one voice needed to make it perfect.
4. She loved older people. She had settled into a career as the activities director for an assisted living facility, and formed close friendships with many of the residents there. She was never patronizing but treated them with genuine dignity, respect, and warmth. When our grandmother moved out of her final house and into a senior apartment, Erin organized everything for her, making things easy for her to find in the most logical manner. She even once made the driver of a train wait until she could make sure an older woman she had just met was seated and had the walker she was using situated before the train departed.
5. She loved her nephews more than anything else in the world. She clearly would have done anything for those boys. For years she’d be greeted with wide smiles and hugs and an excited “Hi Doppy!” The nickname evolved from her constantly prompting one of the boys to repeat a nonsense word he would sometimes say while learning to talk, and him coming to associate her with it. She could always make them smile for pictures, usually by entertaining them with one of her silly and often-requested mouth noises. The oldest was the only one to visit her bedside in her final hours. He was mature enough to understand the permanence of what was happening, but too young to be emotionally equipped for it. It was the only time in his now twenty years I’ve ever seen him break down crying.
6. She was a superfan on many different levels. Once she found a new interest, it didn’t take long for her to develop an unabashed enthusiasm for it. She followed college sports at a level that didn’t make any sense to me. She had a bookshelf filled with “Star Trek: The Next Generation” novels, and even attended a convention. She had a deep knowledge of musical theater and a collection of cast recordings to go with it. She really had a thing for Thomas Kincaid paintings. She was so deeply into the “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” Christmas special that she owned a set of character ornaments and multiple holiday CDs by Burl Ives. If my phone ever rang during a commercial break of “The X-Files,” I knew when I’d pick it up I’d hear her gasp “DID YOU SEE WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!” only for her to abruptly hang up the moment the show came back on.
7. She was fiercely protective of her individuality. It had been a goal of hers to go skydiving by her 30th birthday. She invited our aunt and uncle to come along and watch from below, but didn’t tell our family about it until after it was over. I remember being struck by conversations I had with some of her friends and our cousins in the days surrounding her funeral, about important moments they shared with her that had been so completely separate from me, and I know it was the same for Jenny. It wasn’t so much that she worked at actively distancing herself from us but was intent on finding a way to define herself, which was something she had to do on her own.
8. She had a highly competitive streak. Maybe being the youngest in the family and participating in the sibling rivalry that came with that started it out, but it was always there in some form. She took the wins and losses of the teams she followed very personally. She mixed it up with our older cousins her whole life, trying to keep up with them through so many games and sports when she was little and often putting them (us) in their places when she grew up. She had side bets each year in my aunt’s football pool, leading to opportunities for good-natured knife twisting when things went her way. She played twelve years of soccer at a level of intensity that would have guaranteed the need for knee replacements if she had lived long enough, and stayed involved in the sport with some coaching long after her playing days were over.
9. She was a committed friend. When she took someone into her life, she went out of her way to make sure they realized how important they were to her. She looked for opportunities to help them or ways to include them in whatever she was doing. She was the kind of friend who would just agree to help carry boxes for someone when they were moving, but she’d volunteer to drive the truck as well.
10. She died well. Spending her last year living through her illness and facing her unavoidable death could have turned her inward and bitter, but instead it self-actualized her. She put up with more general discomfort and acute pain than any of us could ever really understand, but still managed to maintain a version of her humor throughout. Sometimes it wasn’t much more than a mask to conceal her anger and fear, but she held onto because not doing so would have been out of her nature. Knowing she was going to die allowed her to put aside the insecurities and pretense which define so many of us and instead become the best version of herself, with an awareness of everyone around her and an intent on molding a perception that would endure after she was gone.
Toward the end of Because of Winn-Dixie Opal believes her beloved dog has run off during a thunderstorm, so she makes her own mental list of ten things people should know about him. In doing so she realizes that such a list “couldn’t even begin to show somebody the real Winn-Dixie, just like a list of ten things couldn’t ever get me to know my mama.” But right before this, she tells the readers her reason for memorizing the list: “...so if I didn’t find him, I would still have some part of him to hold on to.”
Sometimes the list has to be enough because it’s all we get. Luckily though, my list doesn’t have only ten things, but ten times ten times ten things. I don’t need a box of photographs or residual pain to remind me of her, because I have that to hold on to. And as long as I do, I know I’ll be able to honor her dying wish and stay true to the words I wrote ten years ago in closing her eulogy:
My little sister is no longer here, and this has happened much sooner than it should have. But I don’t think it would be right for me to spend the rest of my time thinking about the things she was never given the chance to do or become, so I will try my best not to do that. That isn’t what she would want. Instead I’ll remember Erin for who she was, and why she was so important to the lives of so many people.
After some thought her father provides the list of ten things, many of which are referenced throughout the book, making the mother an influential presence in the story even though her character never actually appears. This caught my attention since in my own revision work right now I’m looking for new ways to give voice to an absent character: What do I need to show to make him real? How do I do it with the economy and balance that will help readers know him well enough to care, but leave them with a vague sense of loss for not knowing him better?
Opal deciding on the number ten for her ten years of life also connected with me on an entirely different level, since it was ten years ago today, October 5th, when my sister Erin died. It’s easy to encapsulate that amount of time and label it as the unit “decade” without thinking about how much time it really represents. Ten years means her death predates the Obama presidency, every version of the iPhone, Taylor Swift’s entire recording career, Hurricane Katrina, and the time before Facebook evolved into the ubiquitous thing it is now. On a more personal level, I’m slightly astonished when I think of how many people have entered my life in the past ten years, and therefore wouldn’t know much about Erin outside of things I might have mentioned at incidental moments. Some of these people have even broken through my most preciously guarded introversion barriers and are now central to my life, yet they know next to nothing about her or why her death was one of my defining events.
So today I’m going to share ten things about my sister -- one for each year that has passed since we lost her. Hopefully these ten things will make her seem more real for people who never knew her, but will also bring back memories for those who did. And all of this is to say nothing about my lesser agenda, of practicing how to make an absent character seem more relatable and present. This works nicely here, because Erin was undeniably a character.
1. She loved dogs. We’ve always been a dog family; if my count is accurate, we’ve had a total of fifteen in my lifetime. She dearly loved all of the ones she knew, and they loved her back for it. Making friends with dogs was just as important to her as making friends with people. Our cousins' dogs, neighborhood dogs, any dog she saw passing on the street -- they were all precious to her. If she had ever read Because of Winn-Dixie, she would have laughed at the times the dog Winn-Dixie smiled his way into a sneeze, since our former neighbor’s dog Annabelle had done the same thing.
2. She was a natural leader. She was the captain of her high school soccer team, and took that role very seriously. She once had to escort members of the police department and their K-9 unit through the creepy basement of our father’s drugstore when the alarm went off late at night, and was only about sixteen years old at the time. When she and Jenny both worked at the drugstore she made Jenny wear the white pharmacist’s jacket, because customers noticed the way Erin carried herself and assumed she was in charge, then would ask her for medical advice she couldn’t give. She once invited our family to a pancake breakfast event she had organized at the assisted living center where she worked, and clearly had everything running exactly as she had intended.
3. She had a big sense of humor. She had a variety of laughs that ranged from loud and brassy to an oxygen-deprived silence followed by a croaking gasp. She was her truest self when sharing late-night laughing fits with our cousins in our aunt and uncle’s kitchen. It sounds slightly off to me now when I hear them laughing like this, without her, like a song intended to be performed as four-part harmony that’s missing the one voice needed to make it perfect.
4. She loved older people. She had settled into a career as the activities director for an assisted living facility, and formed close friendships with many of the residents there. She was never patronizing but treated them with genuine dignity, respect, and warmth. When our grandmother moved out of her final house and into a senior apartment, Erin organized everything for her, making things easy for her to find in the most logical manner. She even once made the driver of a train wait until she could make sure an older woman she had just met was seated and had the walker she was using situated before the train departed.
5. She loved her nephews more than anything else in the world. She clearly would have done anything for those boys. For years she’d be greeted with wide smiles and hugs and an excited “Hi Doppy!” The nickname evolved from her constantly prompting one of the boys to repeat a nonsense word he would sometimes say while learning to talk, and him coming to associate her with it. She could always make them smile for pictures, usually by entertaining them with one of her silly and often-requested mouth noises. The oldest was the only one to visit her bedside in her final hours. He was mature enough to understand the permanence of what was happening, but too young to be emotionally equipped for it. It was the only time in his now twenty years I’ve ever seen him break down crying.
6. She was a superfan on many different levels. Once she found a new interest, it didn’t take long for her to develop an unabashed enthusiasm for it. She followed college sports at a level that didn’t make any sense to me. She had a bookshelf filled with “Star Trek: The Next Generation” novels, and even attended a convention. She had a deep knowledge of musical theater and a collection of cast recordings to go with it. She really had a thing for Thomas Kincaid paintings. She was so deeply into the “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” Christmas special that she owned a set of character ornaments and multiple holiday CDs by Burl Ives. If my phone ever rang during a commercial break of “The X-Files,” I knew when I’d pick it up I’d hear her gasp “DID YOU SEE WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!” only for her to abruptly hang up the moment the show came back on.
7. She was fiercely protective of her individuality. It had been a goal of hers to go skydiving by her 30th birthday. She invited our aunt and uncle to come along and watch from below, but didn’t tell our family about it until after it was over. I remember being struck by conversations I had with some of her friends and our cousins in the days surrounding her funeral, about important moments they shared with her that had been so completely separate from me, and I know it was the same for Jenny. It wasn’t so much that she worked at actively distancing herself from us but was intent on finding a way to define herself, which was something she had to do on her own.
8. She had a highly competitive streak. Maybe being the youngest in the family and participating in the sibling rivalry that came with that started it out, but it was always there in some form. She took the wins and losses of the teams she followed very personally. She mixed it up with our older cousins her whole life, trying to keep up with them through so many games and sports when she was little and often putting them (us) in their places when she grew up. She had side bets each year in my aunt’s football pool, leading to opportunities for good-natured knife twisting when things went her way. She played twelve years of soccer at a level of intensity that would have guaranteed the need for knee replacements if she had lived long enough, and stayed involved in the sport with some coaching long after her playing days were over.
9. She was a committed friend. When she took someone into her life, she went out of her way to make sure they realized how important they were to her. She looked for opportunities to help them or ways to include them in whatever she was doing. She was the kind of friend who would just agree to help carry boxes for someone when they were moving, but she’d volunteer to drive the truck as well.
10. She died well. Spending her last year living through her illness and facing her unavoidable death could have turned her inward and bitter, but instead it self-actualized her. She put up with more general discomfort and acute pain than any of us could ever really understand, but still managed to maintain a version of her humor throughout. Sometimes it wasn’t much more than a mask to conceal her anger and fear, but she held onto because not doing so would have been out of her nature. Knowing she was going to die allowed her to put aside the insecurities and pretense which define so many of us and instead become the best version of herself, with an awareness of everyone around her and an intent on molding a perception that would endure after she was gone.
Toward the end of Because of Winn-Dixie Opal believes her beloved dog has run off during a thunderstorm, so she makes her own mental list of ten things people should know about him. In doing so she realizes that such a list “couldn’t even begin to show somebody the real Winn-Dixie, just like a list of ten things couldn’t ever get me to know my mama.” But right before this, she tells the readers her reason for memorizing the list: “...so if I didn’t find him, I would still have some part of him to hold on to.”
Sometimes the list has to be enough because it’s all we get. Luckily though, my list doesn’t have only ten things, but ten times ten times ten things. I don’t need a box of photographs or residual pain to remind me of her, because I have that to hold on to. And as long as I do, I know I’ll be able to honor her dying wish and stay true to the words I wrote ten years ago in closing her eulogy:
My little sister is no longer here, and this has happened much sooner than it should have. But I don’t think it would be right for me to spend the rest of my time thinking about the things she was never given the chance to do or become, so I will try my best not to do that. That isn’t what she would want. Instead I’ll remember Erin for who she was, and why she was so important to the lives of so many people.
Tuesday, September 30, 2014
The Difference A Year Makes
A lot can happen in a year.
Today is September 30th. It was a good enough day, but it was nowhere near as exciting as September 30th was for me a year ago. According to the Facebook “On This Day” tool, here’s what I posted back then:
“So how about that: I spend most of my summer completely rewriting a manuscript that I really believe in, and one of the first literary agents I contact sends me a request to review the whole thing. For anybody who has never tried to get a book published -- this is KIND OF a big first step.”
I was thrilled by this because at that stage in the game any kind of good news is a big deal, and getting a full request was huge. I didn’t know it at the time, but the best thing about that request was how it began a six-month period of continuously overlapping agent requests and passes which culminated in my connecting with the right one. While my 2013 self would have been happy to end up with any agent willing to give me the time of day, my 2014 self can now give testimony to the incredible difference it makes to not just have an agent, but to have the right one. Writers, pay attention to that: It really does matter. (I won’t get into the whole story of how that happened right now, but click here to read the “How I Got My Agent” post if you’d like to see how everything came together.)
Circling back to this One Year Later idea, I’m struck by the thought that almost a year to the day after I was so happy to get a request for my manuscript, I just finished up a giveaway on the blog Middle Grade Minded, which I write for now. The prize for this giveaway was a critique of the winning writer’s query letter and the first three chapters of their manuscript, from both me and my agent. A year ago I was desperately trying to find a way into the writing community, and now today I’m taking steps toward giving back to it and had an agent who jumped at the chance to help. There are moments this is still absolutely surreal for me.
Incidentally, in what I can only attribute to the weirdest of somewhat relevant coincidences: Today, this year’s version of September 30th, saw the release of Dream Theater’s live album “Breaking the Fourth Wall.” It was recorded during their 2014 “Along for the Ride” tour. I saw them play on that tour out in Seattle, on the very same day my agent Carrie and I were on the phone deciding we wanted to work together. (Admittedly that might be somewhat convoluted as far as coincidences go, but I like the synergy so I’m going with it.)
I once wrote in an earlier post that all anyone can ever do is put themselves in the best positions possible for when the right opportunities come along. For anyone working toward a seemingly impossible goal (and especially for any writers who found your way here through the giveaway) I can tell you that persistence pays off. Hard, hard work pays off. Fight back the self-doubt and bask in the rare shiny moments of confidence. It might take longer than you hope, but every step along the way brings you closer to your goal. There are no guarantees in life, but reaching that goal really can happen. I’m proof.
Of course, achieving one goal brings on a set of exciting new ones to work toward. Tonight I’m wondering a little what September 30th of 2015 might be like.
Today is September 30th. It was a good enough day, but it was nowhere near as exciting as September 30th was for me a year ago. According to the Facebook “On This Day” tool, here’s what I posted back then:
“So how about that: I spend most of my summer completely rewriting a manuscript that I really believe in, and one of the first literary agents I contact sends me a request to review the whole thing. For anybody who has never tried to get a book published -- this is KIND OF a big first step.”
I was thrilled by this because at that stage in the game any kind of good news is a big deal, and getting a full request was huge. I didn’t know it at the time, but the best thing about that request was how it began a six-month period of continuously overlapping agent requests and passes which culminated in my connecting with the right one. While my 2013 self would have been happy to end up with any agent willing to give me the time of day, my 2014 self can now give testimony to the incredible difference it makes to not just have an agent, but to have the right one. Writers, pay attention to that: It really does matter. (I won’t get into the whole story of how that happened right now, but click here to read the “How I Got My Agent” post if you’d like to see how everything came together.)
Circling back to this One Year Later idea, I’m struck by the thought that almost a year to the day after I was so happy to get a request for my manuscript, I just finished up a giveaway on the blog Middle Grade Minded, which I write for now. The prize for this giveaway was a critique of the winning writer’s query letter and the first three chapters of their manuscript, from both me and my agent. A year ago I was desperately trying to find a way into the writing community, and now today I’m taking steps toward giving back to it and had an agent who jumped at the chance to help. There are moments this is still absolutely surreal for me.
Incidentally, in what I can only attribute to the weirdest of somewhat relevant coincidences: Today, this year’s version of September 30th, saw the release of Dream Theater’s live album “Breaking the Fourth Wall.” It was recorded during their 2014 “Along for the Ride” tour. I saw them play on that tour out in Seattle, on the very same day my agent Carrie and I were on the phone deciding we wanted to work together. (Admittedly that might be somewhat convoluted as far as coincidences go, but I like the synergy so I’m going with it.)
I once wrote in an earlier post that all anyone can ever do is put themselves in the best positions possible for when the right opportunities come along. For anyone working toward a seemingly impossible goal (and especially for any writers who found your way here through the giveaway) I can tell you that persistence pays off. Hard, hard work pays off. Fight back the self-doubt and bask in the rare shiny moments of confidence. It might take longer than you hope, but every step along the way brings you closer to your goal. There are no guarantees in life, but reaching that goal really can happen. I’m proof.
Of course, achieving one goal brings on a set of exciting new ones to work toward. Tonight I’m wondering a little what September 30th of 2015 might be like.
Saturday, September 20, 2014
All You Need to Know About Snack Time
My grade has the last lunch of the day this year, so it really becomes important for the students (and the teacher) to have a morning snack. Without it, some of us are going a solid five or six hours with no nourishment before lunch, and we can’t have a room full of empty tummies because empty brains will inevitably follow. But think about the kind of mess one kid can make when she or he sits down to eat, then multiply that by twenty-five to thirty times, and welcome to the middle of my morning. (FYI: Now that I’m teaching 3rd grade again, I'm becoming much more comfortable using all forms of the word “tummy” than I would have been even a month ago.)
In a perfect world the kids would sit down at their desks, eat their snacks in five minutes, throw away any trash they have left and be ready to get back to work. I promise it never happens this way. During my years in the classroom, I’ve seen enough snack incidents to turn nearly anyone into a compulsive neat freak. We end up with at least one fruit snack wrapper on the floor beside the trash can on most days, because some kids don’t have that magic three-point shot touch they think they do, and they show very little interest in chasing down their rebounds. By the time snack is finished, the classroom floor has become a minefield of Goldfish crackers and cereal nuggets waiting to be crushed into flavored dust by the first foot to accidentally find them. I know that if the syrup from a single-serving plastic fruit cup isn’t wiped up immediately with both wet and dry paper towels, the next sheet of paper to touch that desktop will become fused to it at the molecular level. More than once I’ve seen a student cleaning out their desk and finding a forgotten (and blessedly sealed) plastic container that never quite had all of the ranch dressing rinsed out of it, discovering an impromptu science project had commenced since it was last seen. Which is to say nothing of the kid who one day found eleven forks in her desk. I don’t mean plastic picnicware here, I mean actual take-them-out-of-the-kitchen-drawer metal forks. Eleven of them. It made me wonder how long her family had been living off finger food and cereal.
Let’s also talk about the stink. I don’t know at what point in the past ten years snack food companies decided they needed to offer so many “Flamin’ Hot” options, but kids LOVE them. The few I’ve ever tried taste very wrong, and the smell that lingers in the room afterward is even worse. It’s an artificial stench so foul it wouldn’t surprise me if it had been engineered to offend anyone older than sixteen. It’s so bad that one day a kid brought in a bag of sliced red peppers which, while still strong-smelling, were refreshingly natural by comparison.
Don’t even get me started about birthday treats and class parties. Regarding those, I’ll leave you with three snapshot visuals to consider: Cupcakes buried in sprinkles with frosting that turns tongues different colors. Lollipop sticks sucked and chewed on until liquified. Root beer puddles. It’s always the root beer....
Even though dealing with the mess drives me crazy, I enjoy a lot of our incidental snack time moments and how they reveal little things about my students I wouldn’t otherwise learn. One morning this week one of the kids stepped out to his locker at snack time and returned moments later carrying the first Honeycrisp apple I’ve seen this season. If you don’t know Honeycrisps, they can get pretty big, and this one had. He walked in with it carried in both hands like a trophy.
“That...is the biggest apple...I have ever seen...in my life!” I exclaimed when I saw it, causing every other head in the room to turn his direction, making him smile even wider. “That apple is bigger than your head!" I continued. "There is no way you’ll ever eat the whole thing!”
To reply, all this quiet, unassuming little guy did was look at me with raised eyebrows as if to say, “You think? Okay. Just sit back and watch.” Sure enough, he powered that thing down to a thick core, but easily ate enough to count it as finished.
Thankfully that core made it into the trash can.
In a perfect world the kids would sit down at their desks, eat their snacks in five minutes, throw away any trash they have left and be ready to get back to work. I promise it never happens this way. During my years in the classroom, I’ve seen enough snack incidents to turn nearly anyone into a compulsive neat freak. We end up with at least one fruit snack wrapper on the floor beside the trash can on most days, because some kids don’t have that magic three-point shot touch they think they do, and they show very little interest in chasing down their rebounds. By the time snack is finished, the classroom floor has become a minefield of Goldfish crackers and cereal nuggets waiting to be crushed into flavored dust by the first foot to accidentally find them. I know that if the syrup from a single-serving plastic fruit cup isn’t wiped up immediately with both wet and dry paper towels, the next sheet of paper to touch that desktop will become fused to it at the molecular level. More than once I’ve seen a student cleaning out their desk and finding a forgotten (and blessedly sealed) plastic container that never quite had all of the ranch dressing rinsed out of it, discovering an impromptu science project had commenced since it was last seen. Which is to say nothing of the kid who one day found eleven forks in her desk. I don’t mean plastic picnicware here, I mean actual take-them-out-of-the-kitchen-drawer metal forks. Eleven of them. It made me wonder how long her family had been living off finger food and cereal.
Let’s also talk about the stink. I don’t know at what point in the past ten years snack food companies decided they needed to offer so many “Flamin’ Hot” options, but kids LOVE them. The few I’ve ever tried taste very wrong, and the smell that lingers in the room afterward is even worse. It’s an artificial stench so foul it wouldn’t surprise me if it had been engineered to offend anyone older than sixteen. It’s so bad that one day a kid brought in a bag of sliced red peppers which, while still strong-smelling, were refreshingly natural by comparison.
Don’t even get me started about birthday treats and class parties. Regarding those, I’ll leave you with three snapshot visuals to consider: Cupcakes buried in sprinkles with frosting that turns tongues different colors. Lollipop sticks sucked and chewed on until liquified. Root beer puddles. It’s always the root beer....
Even though dealing with the mess drives me crazy, I enjoy a lot of our incidental snack time moments and how they reveal little things about my students I wouldn’t otherwise learn. One morning this week one of the kids stepped out to his locker at snack time and returned moments later carrying the first Honeycrisp apple I’ve seen this season. If you don’t know Honeycrisps, they can get pretty big, and this one had. He walked in with it carried in both hands like a trophy.
“That...is the biggest apple...I have ever seen...in my life!” I exclaimed when I saw it, causing every other head in the room to turn his direction, making him smile even wider. “That apple is bigger than your head!" I continued. "There is no way you’ll ever eat the whole thing!”
To reply, all this quiet, unassuming little guy did was look at me with raised eyebrows as if to say, “You think? Okay. Just sit back and watch.” Sure enough, he powered that thing down to a thick core, but easily ate enough to count it as finished.
Thankfully that core made it into the trash can.
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