"It Was A Long Dream"

Happy Book Birthday, Prophecy of Days II: The Serpent's Coil -- and double Happy Birthday to author Christy Raedeke!

Our lovely friend Julie gave a very fine (and impromptu) intro: "It takes a village to raise a writer," she said.

And here are the writing group babies, to prove it!


All best for your readers' delight and PoD II's success, Christy!

This Is How Much I Love My Writing Group

On Wednesday night, I brought the worst piece of writing to Starbucks.

While I sipped my salted caramel hot chocolate, Christy, Anjie, and Julie's pens went to work, crossing out circling and adding arrows and inserts.

It was an essay I've had in my head for four months, an application for a National Endowment of the Humanities fellowship.

The thing was, my creative juices just weren't flowing. At all. I ended up pretty much writing two opposite things and trying to mash them together.

Nope.

And then, there were the beginnings, all twelve of them:anecdotes, imagery, question, setting, thesis.

It. Was. A. Mess.

But after a few minutes, er, an hour, thanks to my WG, I had ideas!!! And since Wednesday, I've let them sit and stew and get all juicy and yummy.

Today is the day I will take Christy's suggestion to really plug the need for diversity in Southern Oregon. I'll add Julie's argument that our current composition topic, "Terrorism," only fuels the fear our students already have. And I'll answer Anjie's questions about how my past experience will enrich the program.

And that will make a way better four pages than I've got right now.

And I promise. Next week, I'll bring my A game to edit for them.

This One's For the Girls!

Here they are! Meet them and love them -- the amazing women in my life!

There's Mary, my auntie, my Godmother, my friend, with whom I chat and laugh and scrap. And Jeanne, my younger auntie, who I stayed with in San Francisco so many high school weekends, who gave me freedom and trust to run all around the city.

I wouldn't be the same without my sisters: Amy, smart and beautiful; Erika, ambitious and resourceful; Brigit, big-hearted.

Mo's been my bestie since kindergarten. I still remember her peeking out at me from behind her mom's legs on the first day of school. Mo and me, we've played socccer and survived Catholic school, and when we get together like we did last month at the American River to catch minnows and tadpoles with our babies, it's like no time has passed at all.

Andrea made it through St. Joseph's with us. She had the whole collection of Strawberry Shortcake dolls, and she didn't get mad when I took them swimming the summer of second grade and they lost all their smells.

Lisa W. had a knack for making papier mache. She zipped Kristen, our deep and wise gal pal, and me all over in her brown Toyota. And Lisa A. had an infectious giggle and superhuman algebra ability.

Wendi was Dave's friend first. They lived in the same neighborhood, and Wendi got her first speeding ticket with him in the passenger seat. Twenty years after long, lazy summers of lifeguarding, Wendi and I have kids 10 days apart, and we live 12 minutes from each other.

In college, Stephanie lived on the other side of my wall. We both ended up teaching middle school.

Karlee, from the college days, is a part of my every day. She is one of the kindest, hardest-working people I know.

Then there are the writers: Christy, Julie, and Anjie: insightful and bright, and right more often than not.

And Daney, who I haven't known a long, long time, but who I've known the very best: my daughter, who I'll have a rich, deep love with forever and ever.

And many, many more sharp and talented women: Maddy and Miah, my nieces; my cousin, Heidi; Genny; Aunt Nancy; Polly, Linda, and Leslie. Kim and Amy. Daney's bestie, Gracia, and Gracia's mom, Becky. Dominic and Rees' friends' mamas. Holly Root, agent extraordinaire! And all you super cyber-women.

I'm a lucky, lucky, lucky girl.

Writing Group Water Babies!

Okay, so we "forgot" to take a picture of ourselves last night at a very wet writing group. But we had a (beach) ball splashing and noodling around. There's was even a bit of writing talk, but mostly giggles and gossip and Jolly Rancher Popsicles.

To Washington!

Tomorrow, I'm leaving my good husband and our three babies, and our town that's just beginning to bloom with blossoms and tourists. I'm going to Seattle, or near it anyway, with my friend and talented writing partner, Anjie.

We're all signed up for SCBWI Western Washington Conference.

Here's what I'm hoping: I'm hoping to learn, to be inspired, to be a better writer. Stronger. With more depth. With a fresh perspective. Descriptive.

I'm taking along tuna. To increase my attention span. And to hold me over between those fabulous chocolate chip cookies (if, fingers crossed, they have them like last year.)

I'm taking my running shoes, too. In case I need some fresh air. Which I will.

Oh, and pens. Lots and lots of pens.

Home Improvement

So the other day, I offered my husband some tips on how to be a better dad (like taking the kids hiking on their day off instead of watching two movies in a row). Needless to say, this advice--or much other--was not well-received.

Without sounding sexist, I'm wondering if perhaps one gender is more open to "suggestions" than the other? Does one gender have more of a desire to evolve?

There's that, and this: I am critiqued, criticized, and even rejected daily. Writing group, query letters, submissions...my "art" is constantly being hammered.

In the beginning, of course, it hurt. I didn't know how to receive or even really give constructive feedback.

Two years later, though, I see how critical it is to making my writing stronger. With more developed characters, tighter plot, twists, fluid sentence structure. Especially that last one never would've happened without the influence of my talented writing partners.

I had to learn to put aside my ego, and try their suggestions. To think critically, which is to consider plural perspectives--the perspectives of Anjie, Christy, and Julie.

Last Wednesday night when we met at Starbucks, my new first chapters garnered lots of praise. There are hearts and stars and happy words all over my sample.

I have a long way to go, but I am growing.

I want to.

Now about that obstinate but completely adorable husband of mine...

Field Trip!

My friends, give your fingers and your brain a little rest. Because WE are going on a field trip today! Yay!

WE will be touring Ashland, Oregon, where I've lived (off and on--another story) for sixteen glorious years. Dave and I looked all over the nation for somewhere to move from California. I liked Boston; he liked Montana. Because we couldn't find the place we both loved, we decided to stay one more year in Sacramento, and we headed to Oregon for a plain old vacation.

When we hit Ashland, a town 14 miles north of the California border, we loved it! Nestled in below the Cascade Mountains and consistently at the tops of "Best Places to Live" lists, Ashland hosts the internationally acclaimed Shakespeare Festival--and is home to cattle farms.

It was culture for me, and cows for Dave. Perfect!

But, since this is my field trip, we'll be skipping the pastures.

Instead, we'll grab a mocha at Noble Coffee. Anjie will save us a spot at the Big Table. We'll browse Bloomsbury Books and stroll the Bear Creek bike path and have Pangea's Ipanama Wrap as a grill (best secret ever, it's not even on the menu).

Next, a play. For three hours, we'll feast our eyes on the rich set and lavish costumes of Hamlet, directed by OSF artistic director Bill Rauch, whose hand I held two weeks ago at our kids' school.

"Grease" is playing at Ashland High; it's choreographed and engineered by OSF directors in their off-season.

Then there's the Oregon Cabaret, my fave. We've missed "Men on Ice," "Alter Boyz," and "The Pageant." But there is the knee-slapping "Red, White, and Tuna."

We can hike Pilot Rock or the White Rabbit Trail. Many acclaimed artists and actors have homes here; we have a good chance of bumping into a serious somebody!

We can stroll the SOU campus, check out the bubble room at ScienceWorks, watch the flame throwers in Lithia Park.

Are you tired?

For $30, we can have an hour massage, courtesy of The Ashland Institute of Massage.

Dinner? Kobe's tasty dragon roll. And because you were so much field-trip fun, a lemon tart from Mix.

Me(me)

My BCF (Best Cyber Friend) Shannon tagged me with this meme. Shannon is wise and hopeful and I would bet anything, a really good teacher. Like her, I love a HOT cup of good coffee, and hate dirty floors, and that my sisters live so far away.

Do you want to play?

Fill in the blanks after each bold word and tag 3 of your friends with your meme!

Here's Me(me):

I like musicals: live, on disc, or in the stereo
I like mochas
I like my friends--from Mo, who I met in kindergarten, to Anjie, my new writing partner
I like the fall
I like art
I like teaching and practicing critical thinking
I like decaf green tea
I like collecting Los Dias De Los Muertos skeletons with my kids
I like living in Ashland
I like living in America
I like when my kids lay in bed and read together
I like how I feel after I do yoga

I love my incredible husband. And San Francisco

Today is a new opportunity to be a more patient mom, to be a better house cleaner, to be a stronger writer, and to serve my students and community

I hate the word "hate"
I hate doing yoga
I hate ignorance
I hate that I hate ignorance
I hate girl drama

I (secretly) like weekdays when I'm off work and have the whole, quiet house to myself

I love my two families: my little one, where I'm the mom, and my big one, where I'm the sister

Critical Writing

My generous and talented writing partner, Anjie, made me borrow a nice thick textbook the other day. It's called The Fourth Genre, by Robert Root, Jr. and Michael Steinberg, and defines and presents creative nonfiction.

Because the book has a boring cover and 473 pages, it took me a while to crack it.

But when I did, I blew through almost the whole thing in one night.

This new market I've been trying out, adult memoir, is tricky; adult readers seem to demand better construction, unpredictable organization, deeper content.

"The Masked Marvel's Last Toe Hold," by Doctor Richard Selzer, is a stunning example of parallelism, of metaphor, of finding mature meaning from a childhood event. This essay reminds me of "The Wrestler," in which Mickey Rourke plays a veteran athlete who struggles with identity as he ages.

Then there's Pico Iyer's "Where Worlds Collide," an analysis of LAX.

Richard Rodriguez's "Late Victorians" is also about a place: San Francisco, where the social agenda is transformed, but where physicality stays the same.

If you don't have time to read these short short stories, here are the best tips I gleamed from reading the book.

1) Overall, it appears that pure essayists are a dying breed; most essayists now hail from other media (journalism, fiction).

2) Make a list of all the topics you'd never write about. Then write about one of those topics.

3) Time change can be accomplished through changes in landscape, biography, and commentary.

4) A memoir is a quilt of one's favorite memories. It is the writer's perspective on history, and when written, it changes the past and sets it in stone.

5) Writing critically communicates with the reader, challenges her to consider plural perspectives, while being courted.

5) "The true rewards [of writing] are internal--the satisfaction of asking your own questions and finding your own answers" (Root and Steinberg, 1985, p. 357).