on writing about good and evil

Artwork by Ilka Lesonen.
Source: Haunted Florida

Before I begin, would you be interested in seeing one of the bizarre findings I occasionally find on my phone on the account of having a child who likes to just press buttons and crap when she has it in her possession? This is a potential blog post that might have posted from "me" had she been astute enough to actually know what the hell she was doing:

I like frozen in my head now and then 20 the same time 9th thrill k knhrghrjrhuwuyj3msnsbnfndnsmksehmekdkksnkshjhwhjjmnwknnsnjdehjrm.   Maybe some help hfj. The hotel. We 30 gggrhejsjekkmejwgrbhrnsjenwkrjjr

\=!!%!_£₩94₩69689₩€€&*,;,&***&¥*(¥$%&&&*$÷

Honestly. I think things like this are pretty good evidence of what the inner workings of a child's mind is like: weird, confusing, and scary. In addition to things like this, in past mishandlings of my phone, she's:

*Private Messaged a mad-faced devil from "me" to Patresa Hartman, who sweetly responded with: "Uh oh." and was very good-natured and understanding when I explained what was going on.

*Started a Words with Friends game with at least 3 adults who totally would've beat the pants off her had I allowed it to continue.

*Almost posted an Instagram comment from "me" under one of Jason Isaacs' pictures (watch DIG on USA--March 2015!). Very similar to the one above. Oh, he wouldn't have freaked out at all at that crazy message if he'd seen it, I'm sure. :-/ (....though, quite frankly, it would have served him right, because he posted a picture of himself this past summer with blood dripping down his face, which slightly freaked her out when she saw it {"Mommy! That boy has blood on his face! What happened to that boy on your pictures?!"}, thumbing through my Instagram account as she sometimes does. We had to have a talk about how actors pretend, that was just fake, that boy's name is Jason and he was just pretending; he's going to be just fine. Then, a few days later, he goes and puts up a picture of himself getting operated on in a hospital scene. So I had to do damage control, show it to her, and explain: he's still okay, still just acting. Then, about a month later, he goes and puts up a picture of himself with shrapnel coming out of his neck AND then follows that with one of him beat up and bloodied in some type of garbage heap. The garbage heap one she did see on her own, and wanted to make sure "What's WRONG with him?? Is he going to the hospital?" Quite frankly, I have no idea what's wrong with him, love--I mean, physically he's okay...but I suspect Jason Isaacs may have a slight issue with the macabre. Maybe? Though I bet this means he's had some kick ass Halloween costumes in the past.)

*Left a really bizarre picture with ensuing comment on my Instagram account which I didn't find until about 375 days after the fact. I left it up as evidence for what I have to deal with, day in...day out.

*Called several people at inappropriate times. Once left a bizarre voicemail. Possibly made a few calls overseas to complete strangers.

Okay, that's addressed. Now, let's move on to the writing process/novelist-in-training (aka NaNoWriMo 2014 project):

I love this process.

First of all, I'm ahead of the game. Thanks to a bottle of wine (Day 1, which was actually Day 2 of Nanowrimo), I made up for lost time. Then, thanks to Election Day (aka a day off work), I was able to get ahead of the game by about 10,000 words. This is unheard of for me. I am never (never!) ahead of the game, any game. And so this is going fairly well. 

The story is not going with the outline I set out to begin with. This is okay. I like it when stories veer off to the left, the right, and zigzag around several bends. I think this is how Life works anyway. 

I generally like my main character so far...I did some character development for her, but I don't really have a good feel for her yet. However, you know who I do have a good feel for? My antagonist. He's the coffee shop owner's son/Main Character's boss, and he's decided he's very psychic, and not in a good way. Sort of in a Rosemary's Baby kind of way--looks normal/nice on the outside, secret sadistic Satanist on the inside. And aren't THOSE people always such assholes. But god, when they're attractive, they're insanely hard to resist.

What I'm trying to communicate is: I would like to have unpure moments of wild abandon with this character. This character could take a nice girl and teach her to do very, very bad things at incredibly inappropriate moments in unseemly locations.

But you know what the most exciting part is, the part where I'm having the most fun? The research. 

So one of my characters (who I've not gotten to yet--he's coming, and I am So! Excited!) is a pirate. A dead pirate. The ghost of a pirate. And don't even look at me like that couldn't ever really happen because currently I'm reading WHAT WE TALK ABOUT WHEN WE TALK ABOUT GOD, and it's teaching me all kinds of amazing, scientifcally-proven/Neil deGrasse Tyson-approved things about the utter mind-blowing, breathtaking magic of the Universe, atoms, energy, quantum energy, and the nature of all energy everywhere since the dawn of time before there was time. I say this all the time, but I'm pretty sure Science is one day going to back me on it when I'm long gone: GHOSTS ARE TOTALLY REAL, Y'ALL. 

I'm also researching pirates. Historical ones, not the dipshits who are out there going nuts on Captain Phillips and friends. Fascinating. I'm talking lesbian women pirates, pirate-hunters-turned-pirates, crazy ones, sane ones, greedy ones, courteous ones. All kinds of people sailing the Seven Seas once upon a time. And they had ridiculously awesome music, too, as if all that other stuff wasn't good enough. 

It's that part of the process that I think is making me too, too happy. Just the very act of researching builds onto the story in my brain. I'd like to find a pirate expert and talk to them. And now I also want to go on a ghost hunt with real paranormal experts. (Ask my friends who've been on ghost tours with me who are all laughing their ridiculous heads off right now why that's hysterically funny...I'm easy to scare the crap out of, is why--I almost pulled one friend's arm off the other night in the basement where The Shadow Man resides in the Sorrel-Weed House). 

But mostly I'm finding that research is also, in and of itself, sort of character building: lots of "what if?" questions pop up...what if this pirate had xxx? and what if there was also a girl pirate who xxxx? and what if my pirate really did xxx? 

I love that.

I just realized I wrote about God and quantum energy and pirates and ghosts and good and evil and my kid in one blog post. I also confessed to wanting to be lewd and inappropriate with someone who doesn't even exist. AND managed to stick in a Jason Isaacs/DIG (on USA!) mention on top of it all.  I am most proud of letting everyone know, publicly, that I'm willing to go bad places with fake men. I think it summarizes my purpose here on Earth pretty well, in terms of why I write. 

Go ahead and judge all you'd like...'cause God gets me and that's all that matters. Proof: the Milky Way Galaxy. (Read the book.)

team movies vs. team books

I think I said not long ago I had an opinion about why so many people see a movie based on a book they loved and leave the theater going, "Meh, the book was better."

Here's why (and I am no expert; just a chick who digs stories, so take this with a grain of salt): When you read a book, you're in it like Gwynneth (before her conscious uncoupling). You're in the minds of your characters (who and how much depends on point of view the author chose), you've got foreshadowing, back story, lots and lots of descriptive narrative, etc and so forth. In addition, you're the movie maker:  you're casting the actors, coming up with the set design, you're the experienced camera guy who knows the perfect angles, and all that. All inside your own big brain. Your amazing, movie projector brain.

Not to mention you have the luxury of re-reading parts you didn't quite get, or just really loved, and the storyteller had a good 200+ pages to tell you the story. And you can make notes! (Not on an electronic reader--do it on paperback; far more scholastic.) And if that storyteller was a master weaver, she or he knew about good character development as they wove their tale, and was able to pull you right smack dab into a character's life, heart, and soul. Because everybody knows most stories have already been told one way or another over hundreds and hundreds of years, so what really causes us to fall in or out of love with a book (or a movie; any story, actually) isn't just good (or bad) writing, but also a writer's ability to create believable, wholly formed, really good protagonist(s) and antagonist(s). Everyone knows this, yes? Yes.

That's what makes you love a really good book. (Or maybe you actually prefer graphic novels. In which case, god love you. I don't understand. But there's a niche market for everyone, and god love you.)

The problem with translating a lot of books to movies is that you only have a finite amount of time to get in, get the story told, and get out of there. Two hours, tops. Maybe three if you somehow managed to con a major movie studio company out of 250 million bucks or something. Which means you probably also have contacts in the Mafia. (I'm not Hollywood, so I don't quite know how that works; I just know I read it Mario Puzo's THE GODFATHER and saw it in the movie version. But if it gets a movie made, I'm open to it.) (Wait! No no! What am I saying??? I watched The Sopranos. I saw THE GODFATHER parts 1-3. I know about family blood pacts and all that. So no, I'm NOT open to The Mafia! I only like The Mafia on TV or the movies. The TV Movie Mafia.) (I'm sorry. I'll get back on topic.)***

So you only have 2 hours to tell your tale. And what do you leave in? What do you cut out? (Assuming you're the writer, director, AND editor.) (Quite frankly, as an overworked teacher who does about 5 people's jobs August-May, I don't know why the heck you'd want to do all 3 jobs, but I suppose somebody's got to. Hopefully, Hollywood will pay you better and you'll get treated nicer by the US Dept of Education.)

I think the deciding what to put in/leave out would be the hardest part for me to do; what I really love about a book is often very different than what moved Friend A who also read it, and Friend B liked (or disliked) other things about it. A lot of times, Friends A & B and I all love the same part(s) of a book...and we are INCENSED beyond all human reason if what we loved all together gets left out. That's when you get on imdb.com and start leaving troll posts that make no sense, have poor grammar, and are spelled so ridiculously nobody even knows what the hell you're talking about but they do know you're mentally ill. (I don't troll imdb.com. My handle on imdb.com is amylynne223, and I promise I just stick to what I know: which is lurking so I can silently judge other people who do post stuff on imdb.com. The End.)

At any rate, that's also part of the beauty of reading a book--the connections you make in them.The things you love (or hate) best about characters and incidents in any given story are due to personal connections you make. In 2nd grade Reading Workshop, we call this text-to-text, text-to-world, or text-to-self connecting; you do that all the time when you read. Personally, I think it's what draws us to certain stories and repels us from others.

So basically: Time's a-ticking; what to cut? what to include?; you're IN the book when reading; you're in the THEATER when watching a movie...you're in the store while reading a book; you're window shopping at the movie. All of it equals hard to adapt books to movie. Not impossible, just really really hard. I think people who make movies who give you a sense of losing yourself while watching a movie (based on a beloved book) somehow manage to tap into those connections we have--they get you to the shop's threshold, and it is AMAZING. Like a Victoria's Secret sale where everything is 95% off. (No? Not a Victoria's Secret fan? Okay...like everything's 1 cent at the Dollar Tree.) (Heh. Teacher wet dreams.) You're a part of the action, even though you're sitting in a theater with a lot of fallen popcorn in your bra, maybe sitting on a melted Junior Mint, too (here's a cinematic tip: NEVER wear white to the movies, Things Amy Learned circa 1992). But you don't care! This is a  freaking beautifully woven story, on paper AND film. It's a testament to how amazing human beings can be when that happens.(And yet we continue to melt the polar ice caps. *sigh* yin. yang.)

I think the Harry Potter films mostly do an excellent job with this. I'm not a big Harry Potter fan, but I have friends who are obsessed (OBSESSED! In weird, are-you-okay?? kinds of ways), and they assure me movies based on  books don't get more magical than the Harry P. ones. I thought Interview With a Vampire also did a good job (in spite of Anne Rice's tirade against its casting of Tom Cruise in the lead role...and be honest: weren't you all, "Yeah, Anne! What the hell?!" right along with her? But then Tom did okay. And also, there was Brad Pitt. And Antonio Banderas (in a bad wig). It all came together and worked, somehow. High five, Neil Jordan! And Anne Rice, who adapted her own book to script...which may have contributed a lot to that.) (Later, someone adapted Rice's Queen of the Damned, which is a good example of how NOT to translate a book to a movie. I notice Anne didn't take out any full page rants in the NY Times over that...sometimes, you just take the check, get on a plane for Maldives, and pretend it isn't happening. Is what I'd do.)

Was this a boring blog post? I'm worried this was a boring blog post. I tried to make it as entertaining as possible, and apologies if you fell asleep or  you've already clicked over to tmz.com (stay off of that site! you'll rot  your mind!).

In more entertaining news, summer break is a mere 6 days away. Six! Days! Away! I have a lot of plans, because Miss M is headed off to theater camp, bug camp, princess/fairy tale camp, and (gigantic pause for cinematic effect) The Swim Nazi (do do do!). Yes, it is true. We found a Swim Nazi. Don't tell her people call her that. We do it behind her back. What she does is...well, first of all, you can't stay. You have to wait in her driveway in your car. She suggests blasting music and wearing headphones so you don't hear the screams. But apparently, by Day 3 (you go all week: Monday through Friday) they're over their fear of putting their heads underwater. It's worked for countless children, I'm told.

I have a good child psychologist number at hand, though, for in case. Just in case. (Does anybody know if children can get PTSD?) (I'm slightly nervous about this, I don't know if you can tell or not. But desperate times call for desperate measures and so. Let's hope kids can take Xanax or something.)


***Speaking of movie mafia...I'd think another difficulty in adapting a book to a movie would be the people holding the money bags. It seems to a lot about ROI (return on investment) these days in Movieville. Bookville, too. But especially Movieville. I like it when people just want to tell a good story. In PublicEducationville, it's also become a lot about ROI, and I can tell you the results are pretty sad. Some day, I'll write a blog post about what happens when ROI takes over the world and nobody cares about connecting anymore; they just want their damn money back times 10,000. (Hint: zombies are involved.)

the miraculous journey for good heroes.

Sometimes I stumble upon someone who makes me think: huh, here is a fascinating, seemingly admirable human being. So I get out The Hero List. Because before I decide to officially make someone my hero, I have a really picky list of Criteria (capital C, because criteria matters). (You realize I'm about to list some of these Criteria now?) (FYI: none of the Kardashians have ever made my list) (ditto all Fox "News" analysts plus Rush Limbaugh and the creator of Girls Gone Wild) (I know someone who finds all of these people heroic, and if you're reading this That Someone, I'm not scared to let you know you need a better hero list):

*Does this person seem like a kind person? Do they seem approachable and real?

Side story: Once, I met an author--I won't name her, but she was a Somebody in the world of Writing Somebodies--who I gathered enough courage to speak to at a book reading/signing...a BIG thing for me, an incredibly INFP person, to do. I went up to her, her book in my shaking hands, and asked her to sign it. The book was about a diary she'd kept as a young writer, and I thought she'd written a lot of interesting, important things in it. I gulped down all my starstruck and said as she autographed the title page, "I really loved what you wrote about journaling; it's something I've always done, since I was little." Her response? "God. I hate that word 'journaling'. I prefer 'keeping a diary' or 'writing down thoughts.' My mother always called it journaling, and my mother was just so...SO. You shouldn't call it that. That's not really what it is."(Please re-read that in a really judge-y kind of tone of voice.)

I threw her book (and her stupid snotty autograph) in the trash when I got home because I just felt so ucky about her then. In my brain, I knew I'd just met a person with (clearly) deep psychiatric mother issues, but my heart was broken. My heart was just a jumbled up mess of confused and broken disappointment. A simple, humble "Thank you" is nice and (I think) the best route to go when someone tells you they admire you or your work...because we all have our issues, believe me--no one gets out of childhood alive without them. So unless you're paying me the big bucks, I'm not a psychotherapist to help you through your mental woes; just a girl who thought you rocked as a (insert creative outlet job here) and wanted to let you know it. Because if someone did that to me, it would have made my day, so I'm hoping it'll make yours and that you won't be a complete a-hole. Please don't be an a-hole, we have far too many of those already.

(To be fair: I do think experiences like I had with Arrogant Author are also quite good for us, because those tend to stick with us for awhile in our scarred over and bruised hearts, so they teach us how to treat others and make important decisions on who and how we want to be.)

*Are they genuinely talented and freakishly smart? I mean: Will they make me aspire to be like them? Will they inspire me to be better? Isn't it always awesome to run across people who not only make you want to be you and make you feel good about the You you already are, but also inspire you to want to be a better version of you? I love these kinds of humans; my sweet friend Carol is one of these, and I think this crazy rock we're flying around on is better because she's here.

*Are they people I'd invite to my house for dinner, or even just meet for coffee? Do I have conversations with them, read things they've written, or listen to speeches they give, or enjoy creations they've gifted to the world and do these things make me think: Man, I wish we were next door neighbors all the time! I'd pick up your mail and keep vigil over your house while you're on vacation. AND invite you over for barbecues every summer.Certainly I'd loan you all my lawn tools.

*Do I sense we could talk about sensitive subjects (politics, sex, religion, the bizarreness that is 21st century American public education) and this person will not create in me a deep and driving need to punch them in the neck? These kinds of humans are so hard to find these days. (When did we, as a species, become so divided over things that will matter so little 200 years from now? And why are people so ANGRY about everything? What are you so angry about, fellow Earthlings?) (Here, let's pause to allow Frozen's "Let It Go" play in our brains until it gets stuck there for the next 3 hours.) (You're welcome!)

*Do they have a good sense of humor? Oh, this is so important! Having a good appreciation of irony along with an irreverent, self-deprecating wit is such a delicious quality in a person. I think people with a good sense of humor flavored heavily with irreverence, self-deprecating irony, and maybe even a good dash of gentle, sardonic wit are the kind of people who ought to be running the planet, because they're smart. Smart people like irony; that's why not too many right wingers get irony (HA! I kid! I kid the right wingers...in a very ironically sardonic way).

But, for obvious reasons--reasons like being too smart to wind up in some Corporate Sleazy Guy's pocket--those who are irreverently ironic will not ever run anything global. But they should at least be in charge of a very large Homeowner's Association somewhere, in my opinion.


Have you ever met one of your heroes? Elizabeth Gilbert (a tremendously important hero of mine) has met some of hers, and she wrote once about it. About the relief when your hero turns out to be a true hero, someone worthy of your admiration. And I have a long list of heroes from various different artistic fields I'd sell a lot of my worldly possessions to just to be able to shake hands with, or even just stand in the same room 5 feet away from and breathe the same general oxygen. And every time I envision myself meeting one of these people, I do it with a deeply held breath of hope with some tightly crossed fingers that the person will get to remain a hero in my heart after we shake hands or make brief but meaningful eye contact across a crowded room. Because I don't want to throw any more autographs in the trash.

Here's my point: I wrote to Kate Dicamillo recently, a new hero I've discovered, who wrote The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane (please read this book if you haven't and/or share it with your child/ren if you haven't yet; it won't just change your life...it will change your HEART. Your whole heart will be softened in magnificent, magical ways you don't even know about right now. I mean, seriously: you don't even KNOW).

I'm writing about this because it's terribly big for me: I rarely contact people who are heroes I don't personally know, but I love and admire from afar. Doing this intimidates me, because I worry I'm bothering them and/or they won't respond, or that they will respond but they'll respond in a weird, you-are-in-deep-need-of-a-good-therapist tone of voice, which means I'll get the sads and won't know how to feel about them anymore. I want my heroes to stay my heroes--don't you? This planet is full of Crazy with a capital C; I sense it has a lot of hearts crying out for a good hero or three to safely harbor forever.

I hope you have some of your own heroes. If you've met some of your heroes, I hope you haven't had to throw any of their work in any trash bins. I hope you get a chance to have at least one of your heroes' full attention over coffee and a long chat one day. I hope you come away knowing your heart made a right choice and your hero gets a permanent home in it. (And I hope you have a very detailed list of criteria for who gets to be a hero in your heart, because I don't think sipping coffee with Donald Trump's self-promoting egotistically weird hair would be quite as awesome as sipping coffee with the Dalai Lama beaming across the table at you with his laughing, kind eyes. Just sayin'.)

And go read The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane! Right now! It could save your life.

stories are magic.

It's a weekday, and I am writing a blog post. The Apocalypse has formally begun (gather your zombie fighting gear). (Heh, see what I did there? I rarely write blog posts during the week...quite frankly, I rarely write blog posts, the end.)

Anywho.

Various different things going on in my brain (a list shall follow, as my brain loves these):

1-I have noticed that, by merely reading many chapter books, I have begun to teach 2nd graders about the difference between theme and lesson. And have developed a love of chapter book reading in them. It's really the only time I can get most of them to listen. There are the few knobheads (what would life be, without the knobheads??) who insist on not listening and try to muck it all up for the others, but for most of my small charges, chapter book read aloud time is one of their (and my) most favorite moments of the day.

I think my crying at the ending lines of Charlotte's Web ("It's not often someone comes along who's a good friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.") (Oh my god, I'm tearing up AGAIN!!) was the turning point for many of them: What's this? A teacher crying? Who normally yells at us? My god, stories are magic!

My job on Earth is complete, I feel, when I can impart this knowledge to other human beings: stories are magic.

So far, we've read the following (I've included theme/lesson we decided on as a class, in case you're interested):

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie (my personal favorite, not theirs though)--theme: Bravery, lesson: never giving up

Fantastic Mr. Fox by Roald Dahl (their favorite--good lord, they text-to-text connect this frickin' story to Every.Thing. now)--theme: Bravery, lesson: sometimes, you have to make hard decisions

Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum--theme: Dreams (and Travel) are Important, lesson: you don't have to travel far to find your dreams because everything you need to make them real is already inside you

Charlotte's Web by E.B. White--theme: Friendship, lesson: there is nothing more important in life than a good friend

The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams (not a chapter book, but still an awesome read nonetheless)--theme: Magic, lesson: if you really believe in something, anything is possible

Currently, we're reading The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate Dicamillo. We haven't discussed its theme/lesson yet, but I think they're: theme--love, lesson--you are capable of more love than even you know.

Do you read to children? You should; it teaches you a lot. It teaches them, but it also teaches you. It's simply the best part of my day.

....also, if you can find a movie that coincides well with your book, you can a get buttload of work done on a Friday while they compare and contrast the book and film versions. (If they were older, we'd also have a very frank discussion about why so many film versions of books suck so bad...but that's another opinionated blog rant for another day.)

2-I get Rob Brezny's amazing astrological forecasts in my email inbox every week. They never fail me. He's completely confounded me lately, though. This week, he told me I can shut what's been opened, or open what's been shut; just make sure I do so with high integrity. Last week, he told me I was evolving into a more soulful version of my idiosyncratic self. The week before that, he told me I'd get a second chance at something I'd passed up the last time it had come my way.

I have no idea what any of this means, but it sounds auspicious, ominous even. I think I'd just like to be a more soulful version of myself, when all is said and done. I'd like to live out loud. That's hard to do, but really cool when it works out.

3-This summer, I'd like to take a trip. I'd like to take a trip alone. I wish I could get on a plane and go far, far away. Instead, I think I'd like to take a trip alone to a lake, or the ocean. I would just like to stay for a night or two. Stick my feet in some water and think. Write some (incredibly BAD) poetry, and maybe the beginnings of a story (or two). I don't know if the people in my life understand my need to be alone. I don't mind Alone. It's quiet, and I like it. I feel better afterwards. (I test like 100% positive as an INFP on that Myers-Briggs thing, which I find to be far more accurate than any Pisces personality summary I've ever read.)

4-I have an idea for a novel (?) novella (?) or at least a very long short story:

My family (my father's family) is from the Pocono mountains of Pennsylvania. They have tragedy in their family line (not counting for the fact I may possibly be related to George W. Bush via his mother Barbara, via a Pilgrim ancestral connection named Henry Sampson--holy heavens, I can't imagine anything at all more tragic than being even loosely related to George W. Bush). I would like to call this book(?) story(?) Samson Road. Because in Lake Ariel, PA there is a road called Samson Road. That's my family's road. Except if I use that road name, then I worry I can't really fictionalize it; I'd like to fictionalize most of it...base it on real stories that happened, but in a fictional way (isn't that how we roll in the 21st century these days?). I'm talking: childhood drowning, accidental gun shootings, horse-riding suffragettes, the whole lot. People in Lake Ariel still refer to my grandfather as "Papa Joe," like he's The Godfather.

It's fascinating; my dad's family is fascinating to me and I have a deep suspicion they'd fascinate others as well. We have a lot of really complicated people on that side of the family, and I find complicated people to be the best characters in stories.

5-Speaking of families: My little Miss M, who is 5, is deathly terrified of water and has been all of her short, half-decade here on this ironically water-covered planet. Actually, she's not terrified of water itself, but rather of putting her head beneath it. She's taking swim lessons now, and I'm frustrated to the point of wanting to just throw her in the deep end and let her figure it out and get over this stupid B.S. The thing stopping me is I can just see the therapy bills. The other thing stopping me is my memory of being deathly afraid of water...until the day I figured out there was a whole 'nother world underwater, and I loved being there a lot. I was a mermaid (in a pool, in my head...I'm certain the neighborhood life guards thought I was an insane kid, flailing about in the deep end, pretending my feet were fins). I was a true dolphin wannabe; how does one join a dolphin pod? I wished so deeply to be part of one, at age 10. I wish so hard for similar discoveries in my 5 year old landlubber. I will take her for a dolphin ride if she ever gets there.

Today, we were driving back from (yet another) unsuccessful swim lesson, and she asked for a lollipop. Then she said, "Oh, right. I bet you only give lollipops to girls who put their heads underwater." And I said, "You got it, lady." And she said, "Well, I'll just lie to daddy. I'll tell him a story about today when I put my head underwater. I'm good at stories and he'll give me an ice cream cone I bet."

I didn't know whether to be proud of my budding little storyteller or to be horrified at the monster I've created. 

Stories are magic, but apparently they can also create family havoc. I'll have to watch this.

(Epilogue of The Swim Lesson: she tried to tell her story, and her story was whack. She did not get a lollipop or an ice cream cone. She did get a bath, and some Honey Kix cereal with a small glass of iced tea. A satisfying, and far healthier, ending.)

nail shop parrots on winter break.

I am on Winter Break now (notice: I am writing again). I have 17 days to myself (mostly), with zero accountability for anybody else's brains or learning styles. This is what Freedom truly feels like.

Miss M is excited about Santa and opening presents in ways no words in any human language can accurately describe. On Monday, we are going to visit Santa Claus in person. She thinks he's an online amazon.com catalog: "Mommy, when I see Santa on Monday, I'm going to order a Frozen princess doll! And I'm also going to order a fake kitchen with some toys."

On Christmas Eve morning, we always decorate cookies with her cousins and some friends and make magic reindeer salad and oatmeal glitter for the reindeer. And then we watch a puppet show at my mom's (her Grammy's) Methodist church. (Off-topic side note: I have a deep-seated belief in Something Out There, but have serious issues with organized religion. For instance, I generally really dig Jesus but gaze with wary eyes on many of his followers. And I think there is more than one path to God and no one religion holds all the answers and it's arrogant to assume (a) you know which team God roots for the most, and (b) you know the mind of God in general. Still,  I'm a total sap for that moment we're all standing around with our fellowship-lit candles singing Silent Night and wishing Baby Jesus a big old Happy Birthday to You, Sir of Peace. In fact, I'm tearing up right now, just thinking of it.) And every year, we do Santa's Portable North Pole (PNP). Do you know about it? You should. Here's why: Santa's Message to Melissa. And no, I did NOT tell Santa he could go ahead and put little Miss M on his Nice List. If you'd been around little Miss M for much of 2013, you'd understand why. I mean, she'll make it...but by the skin of her teeth.

My Art of the Story class has concluded. I completely flaked and never wrote my 700 word story that I was supposed to for Assignment #5. However, I have one to write over the next 17 days for when we meet again. Because good news! About 6 of us in the class loved each other SO much, we've hired the instructor to continue the experience throughout January and February at a lovely local restaurant's private dining room. Food, drinks, storytelling, budding friendships, and merriment. Life simply doesn't get better than that, reader friends.

I'm in a quandry, though. Recently, I experienced some most awesome human interactions from which to craft stories: (1) the parrot lady in the nail shop, (2) the pregnant woman breaking up with her baby daddy during a football game, and (3) the crazy knitting lady at the craft store. Which one would you most like to read about?

That's what I thought. Let me tell you about the parrot lady in the nail shop:

When I went to get a manicure/pedicure two weeks ago, I sat down to wait for my chair to be ready, and some lady was speaking to some creature in an animal cage. Seriously. Speaking to it, encouraging it to cluck like a chicken. This lady is CRAZY, I thought, as most humans are wont to do when confronted with people who take avians into traditionally non-avian locations. After awhile, the lady took the animal from the cage. It was an African Grey parrot, and she sat in her spa chair nuzzling its neck and making grunting sounds at it--when not requesting it cluck like a chicken. Then, then.....they sat me next to her. This was most fortunate, because I happen to love being sat next to eccentric people with little regard for societal norms and standards.

So I'm to the right of the bird lady. On the other side of her is a pregnant lady texting on her phone. In front of us is a lady with her back to us, getting her fingernails done. The two nail shop workers are busy/deep in thought. Nobody--I mean NOBODY--appeared to be the slightest bit concerned or even casually aware that this lady HAD A PARROT ON HER KNEE.

Friends, it was too much. Too much. I mean, can we all just acknowledge that this lady in this nail shop had a parrot on her KNEE?? No. No, we couldn't; I was the only one willing to acknowledge and deal with. And I knew. I knew I could simply not just...sit there. I could not just sit there, get my nails done like no big deal, yeah a parrot in the nail shop, whatever. And then let the woman pack up her bird and leave, never once acknowledging: Hey Lady. Um, why'd you bring a bird into a nail shop?  Who in the world doesn't deal head-on with people who bring parrots into non-pet shops? 98% of the people at that nail shop two weeks ago, that's who.

Thankfully, my parents bought an African Grey parrot while I was in college. So I had a connection! I told the lady this, and let her know our African Grey had been called "Max." What was her African Grey's name? Miles, she responded. Mrs. Miles, actually.

And for the next 25 minutes she delivered a fascinating monologue about Mrs. Miles and the history of Mrs. Miles. For example:

*Mrs. Miles lays eggs every Spring. Laying eggs makes Mrs. Miles egg-constipated and hormonal, and this makes Mrs. Miles extremely vicious. Lynne (the parrot lady) had no less than 1,000 beak slash marks on her arms and hands.

*Mrs. Miles is toilet-trained. Yes, toilet-trained. And every morning when Lynne wakes her up, Mrs. Miles says, "I have to poop." Then she climbs out of her cage, over to the nearby bathroom, climbs up, and, well, poops. Isn't that magnificent? I think that's the most magnificent thing I've heard all of 2013.

*Lynne, her husband (god love him), and Mrs. Miles live with eight--EIGHT--cats. All eight cats are terrified of Mrs. Miles. Terrified. Mrs. Miles once tried to murder one of them, and she bit the tail off another. They all know what Mrs. Miles is capable of, and they furiously try never, ever to make eye contact with her. They give Mrs. Miles a wide, respectable berth when she's about.

But the most awesome part of the whole experience was when the lady with her back to us turned around and realized, "Oh my god! There's a BIRD! I heard some weird sounds; I thought someone was passing gas. I was trying to be polite and not say anything...but wow. There's a BIRD!" And then proceeded to tell us all how terrified she was of birds.

Then, the most awesome of awesome parts of the whole experience happened (and this is why I love other human beings so deeply and completely): the lady in front of us told Lynne she knew African Greys can go for 1,000s of dollars, and asked Lynne why she didn't sell Mrs. Miles and make some money? This was Lynne's very somber and quiet response:

"Oh, no. No, I wouldn't sell this girl here for $1,000,000. Mrs. Miles and I have been together a long, long time. I've seen her through a lot, she's seen me through a lot. We've been together through thick and thin, so she's worth much more to me than any money. I love Mrs. Miles and I'd be lost without her. I can't imagine the world without Mrs. Miles in it. She's my sweetest, best friend on Earth."

So. I walked in to that nail shop going: OMG! A crazy lady!! But by the time Lynne and Mrs. Miles walked out the door, I was begging for Lynne's phone number. I'd fallen deeply in love with both--just when I think the world is full of the nefarious and frightful, I meet a Lynne and her Mrs. Miles. People like Lynne and her Mrs. Miles remind me why this crazy little rock in the Milky Way is actually chock-full of sweetness and light, in spite of right wing talk radio and the Kardashians.

Which is why I probably will not write my 700 word story for workshopping about that. I will probably go with the pregnant lady breaking up with her baby daddy via phone during a football game for the story. Word to the wise, friends: if you don't want to end up in some budding, unpubbed writer's short story for a writers' workshop, do not--DO NOT--have your crazy on display in public. Don't do it! For the record: turns out, Lynne & Mrs. Miles weren't actually crazy after all; they were sweet and good and kind and lovely. The baby daddy thing, however, was pure de-Crazy.

However, I might still add Mrs. Miles to the story--I think baby daddies who abandon their babies at the very last minute via phone during a football game should totally be turned into eunuchs by hormonal African Grey parrots. It makes a satisfying ending. It may win me a Pulitzer. And I'm totally dedicating my first novel to Mrs. Miles.

art of story

I'm taking a writing class called Art of Story. It's good; I love the people in my class. What I love most about people I meet in Writers' Circles and writing classes is the great diversity. Most writers are kind of eccentric to begin with; it's an introspective, solitary activity, and if you don't get out of the house or away from your computer, I think you spend way too much time in your own head. I don't know about you, but when I spend way too much time in my own head I typically end up in a fetal position in some corner, mourning my life and questioning everything. Every. Thing.

Anyway, from writers' groups and classes, I've met all kinds of people: Goth people with exactly 100 facial piercings and bodies covered in meaningful tattoos, quiet grandmas who like to write children's stories about reindeer, and some people who've never written a thing in their lives--they just got a notion in their heads that they've been called to write a novel. I've met other people who are the next Alice Munro (and I hate them) (no! I'm kidding--I just want to leech myself onto their brains and steal their magnificence).

Specifically, I've been asked not to write about my classmates on this blog, so I will not. However, I would like to throw out there into the ethos that I love them all. Eight of us went for drinks after class last week, and I sat and listened a lot and just absorbed their awesomeness and great senses of humor. I embrace their eccentricities and individual talents, and am supremely glad to know I share the planet with each one of them. I hope we find a way to keep in touch forever when it's over.

Our teacher (who says I can write about her, specifically), is chock full of knowledge about writing, good storytelling, and publishing. I love to listen to her talk; she's professorial and literary. I like people who use big words but in a way that anyone listening can use context clues and figure out what they're talking about. I think it's a talent.

Two weeks ago, our assignment was to go out in the world and eavesdrop on a conversation, then write a scene with a conflict and character development via action. I love this, and do it all the time. However, two weeks ago was a bad time for that. I ended up at a sports bar, which are notoriously bad places to eavesdrop on conversations. And coffee shops? Who the heck has time for those (except at 7:30 a.m. when your brain doesn't work)?

So I went to YouTube, found an interesting interview with one of my favorite actors and catapulted. It's not perfect--for one, I think it reads like a trashy beach novel, and I do not want to write those. Second, it has some character/story inconsistencies and one too many adverbs. I knew this going in, and sure enough, those are what they all pointed out. (Can I just say, though, that I think maybe adverbs are my writing style? Ernest Hemingway wrote really short sentences about fishing and bull fighting. William Faulkner wrote a lot of stream-of-consciousness and inner brain thoughts of characters. Amy Samson shall write with a lot of adverbs, and do so unapologetically.)

Anyway, this has been a good thing for me. It gets me out of the house, thinking about writing and proper storytelling, and gives me a lot of good assignments that keep me accountable, and keeping me accountable is probably the only thing that keeps me together. Were I not accountable to anyone, I feel quite sure I'd be a panhandler sleeping in a cardboard box right now. Or waiting tables at Hooters. One of those.

Our next challenge: to write a 500-700 word short story that includes character development via action, exposition, rising action, conflict, falling action, and resolution. And avoid adverbs and inconsistencies, which I will take a very good shot at. There's a lot to think about when creating story, and I like that. But it also hurts my brain and I have no idea where to start. The writing prompt (if we need it) is: pick an object in our house with a lot of meaning to us and either build the story around it or incorporate into the story. I can't think of a single object in my house with a lot of meaning to me (yes, seriously).

I am currently trying to come up with as many "What if...?" scenarios as humanly possible and go from there because I think all good stories ultimately begin with a "what if?" question that needs answering.

What if...I bought a plane ticket to Fiji tomorrow and didn't show up for work on Monday? (I actually know the answer to this question, and it's less than pleasant.) (See? Accountability.)

a list of random writerly thoughts

1-I have finished the story of Emmaline (including one crap ending, because I needed to wrap that thing up). If anyone reading this would like to be a beta (test) reader for it, let me know--it's completely unedited, and god knows when I'll find time to edit/revise it. But I'd love any kind of (constructive) feedback.

2-I discovered Michael Erard today. He's an author, journalist, and linguist. He also wrote an interesting article once for the New York Times about escaping your own shadow when you write. Two things about this article:

(1) I loved this quote: "I'm a dancer who walks for a living." (Aren't we all, Michael? Aren't we all?) (Maybe not all of us--I think Charlie Sheen may just have discovered the magic to dancing through life for a living.)

(2) Structural priming/Syntactic persistence: you repeat patterns you've read or said earlier in your own writing (and, I guess, talking since we're dealing with language here). Basically: don't read or write anything you don't want to repeat later in your own writing. Turn off the Web (Michael! What?!?!) No email, no twitter, no facebook, no blogs, no books, no essays, no newspaper articles, no nothin'. Before you write. Because it'll pattern up in your brain, and your brain will want to write stuff like it just saw on that one friend's Facebook status update in your newsfeed and that friend can't spell for shite, so don't do it! Do Not Do It.

Which I think is (a) good, sound advice, (b) really hard to do, and (c) I'm going to try it, but poop, Michael Erard, do you understand how frickin' HARD this will be for me and my addictive personality to come to grips with? Man.

Please note: Michael Erard has an open invitation to any summer barbeque at my house from now until infinity. He sounds much smarter than Charlie Sheen, and--just going off from what I perused briefly on his website--I like him. We could smack mosquitoes off our arms and legs and talk story well into the evening, gorging on ribs and smoked chicken legs. (I hope he's not a vegan.)

(3) Jason Isaacs. I discovered him much earlier than today, and have written at length about my embarrassing lust tremendously innocent and very pure admiration for him. He's not a linguist, but he is a very good actor and just seems to be an all around very nice, decent human being. Who maybe needs a personal assistant willing to sort socks and screen calls and cook dinner for him? (I'm just grasping here--what do actors of stage and screen have their personal assistants do? Is there a school for it? And could a 4 year old indignant girl tag along for much of it? And, more importantly, would Jason Isaacs leave me alone long enough each day for me to write blog articles into the silent Internet atmosphere and maybe craft a crap story here or there?)

Anyway, I digress. One of the reasons I am most drawn to this man (besides the British accent and wolf-like blue eyes) is that, in many interviews, he talks a lot about storytelling, and people who worry about storytelling are exactly the kinds of people I like to invite over for barbeques and sit on my back porch with, getting eaten up by mosquitoes, talking shop. He talks about what good storytelling is and isn't, and that makes me want to clean his toilets for him and I hate toilet cleaning.

Here, according to Mr. Isaacs (via my summarization and interpretation of several interviews I've watched or read) is what good storytelling is:

(1) You start with a "what if?" question and go from there.

(2) In the process, you spend much of your time building character, and you build character by attempting to figure out what makes people tick: what makes people fall in/out of love? what makes people hate? why do good people do bad things and vice versa? etc etc.

So here's my thing about this:  I have a lot of "what if?" questions, and it sounds like that's a good start. My personal irony is that I'm asked--all damn day long--a lot of "what if?" questions by people under the age of 10 (including one under the age of 5) who craft stories much the same way crazed monkeys like to throw feces at each other, which means me hearing any phrase starting with the words "what if..." is sure to make my right eye start twitching wildly.

Although, now that I've written all that, I suppose I should and could do a writing craft lesson on using your "what if?" questions as a spring board to write a really good personal narrative. "What if we're just in the bathroom doing our business and a big 5th grader comes in and starts throwing toilet paper at our heads?" (actual "what if?" question I recently received) would make an excellent premise for a really interesting coming of age story, I bet.

(4) My fifth metatarsal. It's still broken, but I'm allowed to walk on it in regular shoes. I go back in a few days for some (hopefully) final x-rays. It slightly aches if I'm on it too long, but it doesn't hurt, and I'm told it may never really heal. Even so, I'll be able to walk, hop, run, etc on it because it's pretty solid and not going anywhere. If it starts hurting, I'll probably have to have a pin put in it. I'm fine with this, and just joyous to have both feet back on the ground and the use of both hands while upright again. I will never, ever take walking for granted again. I will never, ever climb a fence again...okay, maybe if it's the Apocalypse and there's fresh, clean water on the other side of a fence. But other than that, no! I have softly closed the chapter on my climbing fences dreams. Sometimes dreams must die.

(5) School has begun again. I am tired. I am tired, exhausted, knackered, wasted, drained, fagged, faint, fatigued, empty, played out, petered out, pooped, run down, haggard, overtaxed, tuckered, done in and done for, worn out, and really really droopy. Sundays are sad, and Mondays are so so hard. I am, at this point, one of those people who works to live for the weekend. Jason Isaacs had something to say about that, too, in this video I saw on YouTube, and I felt wistful and not a little bit jealous of him at the end of it.

We'd talk about that, too, on my back porch while eating barbeque. I'd ask for his advice on how to find a vocation that is what you love (particularly one in the arts, which are notoriously hard to break into and make a decent wage at), and then we'd ask Michael Erard for his thoughts as well, and also to please pass the citronella spray.

hormones and words.

I have started....a story. I think it's just a short story, and I really have no idea what it's about or where it's going. I put what I've written so far (rough rough ROUGH draft with zero editing, please be kind) in my ::snippets:: section. I just felt like writing a story about an older lady named Emmaline who no longer cares what people think of her. I bet this is because lately I feel the need to find my inner Emmaline, bring her out, and parade her around shamelessly and with abandon.

I am hormonal, have been since about Tuesday, and each day has been progressively worse. Some activities have lightened it: swimming at my sister in law's neighborhood pool with my little girl (I felt practically whole-bodied again!), going out for dinner with former work team members/people who are precious pieces of my heart. I think it's important to note here that every activity that has lightened my hormonal festering has involved me getting out of the house. (With one exception: I took Melissa to the library on Tuesday, where we were shushed 3 times and I almost broke my other foot trying to carry the bag of books we'd put on hold...I feel this may have begun the hormonal rage.)

The problem with leaving the house is this: I have to be on my good foot, which means my broken foot swells to elephantine proportions, and this is not good, according to my orthopedist and "sports doc" on ehealthboards.com. Which gets me worrying. And then I get pessimistic and annoyed and begin having thoughts that go something like: Really. I'm going to be walking on July 3? I don't think so orthopedist. What the heck do YOU know? Sports doc and all the other experts on the fractured metatarsal board at ehealthboards.com seem to think otherwise. (Please ignore me when I get like this: I'm just wallowing.)

I am tired of the Paula Deen controversy. It's been chewed up and spit out at this point, much like her, and I'm not sure what else good, non-prejudiced people not harboring resentments in their hearts are supposed to say or feel about it now. I liked it a few weeks ago when we all linked arms and stood strong against prejudice and racism and started buying Cheerios like the dickens. Even the people who are now all angry and mad about how Paula's getting treated were in agreement--leave that interracial family alone, they aren't bothering you! In America, we can kind of shine like that; we're good people when we see people getting beat down for no real reason other than them trying to live a life.

Which is why I think so many are rushing to Paula's defense. I just wish they were doing it in ways that didn't sound like excuses for what she said. If Paula Deen jumps off a bridge, how many will jump with her? Quite a few, if the internet is to be believed.

Please know: I do feel for Paula; I hate to see people get fired for speech, especially in a country that promotes free speech and all. But dammit, I abhor what she said (and, quite frankly, think her brother Bubba needs intensive talk therapy, possibly medication) and it should be addressed. So yes. Got a little hormonal/cabin fever/stir crazy, started reading commentary under news articles posted in my facebook news feed (tip: NEVER a smart idea when suffering from hormones and cabin fever), and then started seeing people I know and love talking about it, qualifying and excusing what she said. So I spoke up, in sort of hormonal way. One, because I have made a pact with myself to ALWAYS speak up when I see or hear prejudice, and two, because I was pretty frickin' hormonal and had had enough.

Needless to say, it did not go well.

Anywho. I have not written any freelance blog articles. I've been over at blogmutt looking for some, but what these people requesting articles written for them actually seem to need makes me want to get a bunch of push pins and stick them repeatedly in my brain. I would rather write about angry Southern older ladies, painted up for Dia de los Muertos, taking naked pictures of themselves flipping the bird at nosy, busybody townsfolk. This will not earn me a single penny (sorry friend Becky, if you're reading--I think I promised you a fancy Subway lunch with my first article's earnings). Writing short stories that lack direction is much funner (I know that's not a word; I just like it better than "more fun").

I feel like I need to end this article in a sort of pithy, witty, really wrapped up kind of way. But my kid is demanding access to abcmouse.com, and so I'm going to abruptly end this without a single ounce of closure for you.

...Except to say: please don't make excuses for the n-word, or get angry about black people getting to use it. Sometimes, people just get to do things you can't, and there's nothing you can do about that. And please don't get worked up about people calling you cracker or honky and nothing bad happening to them. Because first of all, cracker and honky both have the hard "c" sound in them, and I once read an article somewhere about writing comedy that said words with the hard "c" sound always get laughs. And second, because the words cracker and honky, if put in a boxing ring in a world championship fight against the n-word and all its ugly and hateful history, would be TKO in half a second flat. And if you don't believe me about that, gather some of your friends, black and white, to stand on a street corner and scream these words at each other. Every single one of you will look absolutely ridiculous, but I'd bet half a million dollars I don't have the people getting the n-word screamed at them will be the winners (nobody wants to repeat that kind of history, unless they wear hooded sheets to cross burning rallies).