Taking a Risk

          Reading Mary Horner's recent post--about taking a risk and sharing with students/the audience--made me think of writers who share themselves in their writing.


         Some of my favorite authors--Anne Lamott, Augusten Burroughs, Rick Bragg, Mary Karr--are writers who share ...everything. They're brutal. They cut themselves open and lay bare their bones--all the skeletons in their closets come clattering out.


          In May I joined a dozen or so other St. Louis writers for the Listen to Your Mother show. We got up on stage and shared our lives. Some of what we shared made people laugh, and other stories made the audience cry. Almost always I lead with my funny bone, but this time, I didn't.




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5yGkJP7Sy8


          If you click on the link above, you'll be able to see me in all six minutes of my splendor. However, consider yourself forewarned. The photographer was ill on the day of the show, and so some of the videos got screwed up. In real life, people often mistake me for Halle Berry, so when you see someone who looks quite different from that, understand: the camera guy had problems...  

        Speaking of risk (again)--I'm friends with some writers who willingly share all sorts of things on paper, and yet when it comes time to share their writing with a live, breathing audience, they hesitate balk. These are writers whose talents are wickedly amazing ...and yet many people miss out on enjoying their gifts because of their reluctance to share at book signings and other events.


        Was there a time when you shared with an audience/family member/friend and the results were encouraging? Perhaps if my shy writer friends hear stories that ended up on a positive note, they might share the next time they get a chance...


       

Being a Mom

       Early this week I'm going to be working on a "mom" story *. It's going to be early this week because I have a writing critique meeting on Wednesday, and I don't have a single word written that I can share. (Only rarely do I come empty-handed because when I have nothing to share, it's a waste of the great critique I get. As I sit there on pins and needles--will they declare my piece a pile of poop?--I have to listen to Linda's pen scratch across an entire page as she deftly rearranges my story. I have to hear Lynn's pen roll across the margin as she writes a whole letter's worth of suggestions and encouragement. I have to see Beth and Tammy's faces scrunch up, and I wonder if it's a good scrunch or a bad scrunch...) I haven't decided if I'm going to write a story about my mom or whether I'm going to write a story about myself as a mom but I...wait, as I was typing this, I made a decision.
     That's the interesting thing about writing. Sometimes just the physical act of typing something helps us sort things out in our head.
      I recently got some great news. (And no, I'm not going to "tease" and make you come back to my next post for the news.) My story "Elmo's Lesson" is going to be published in the upcoming Publishing Syndicate's Not Your Mother's Book...On Cats. And, my story, "A Risky Jump" has made it through to the final phase of Chicken Soup's Reboot Your Life. (Thank you WWWPs.) I know it can be yanked up to a month before publication but even though that's not happened to me yet, I won't say it too loudly. (I used to brag that I had been stopped by police officers many times--for speeding--but had never gotten a ticket, until I got my first and only one, so now I only whisper boasts like that.)
      I am giving away a copy of the recently published Not Your Mother's Book...On Being a Mom. Many of my friends and writing friends have stories in this collection--Terri Elders, Donna Volkenannt, Renee Hughes, Debra Mayhew, Pat Wahler, Mary Horner, Pat Nelson, Linda O'Connell, Marcia Gaye, Alice Muschany, Ellie Grossman, Diana Graveman and Tammy Goodsell. (My husband judges how good my story is by where it is in the book. He is positive that the editors put the good stories in the front, and they get progressively worse. My story, "So Little Wine," is on page 200 which makes it a "dud" in my spouse's eyes. You'll have to read it to see if you concur with him.)


         On July 1st I will post who won the book...
      My story that's being considered by Chicken Soup is about me wanting to do something that some of my family considered stupid/dangerous. Is there something you've done/considered in the past that made your friends or family look at you like you're crazy? 


* Chicken Soup is looking for mom stories--tales of you and your kids as well as stories about your mom. Two different anthologies doubles your chances of getting published...


    

The Stand(s)

        Yesterday I participated in an event in another country city. A library graciously hosted an evening with local authors. Since I had eight books I was bringing to sell, I wanted to make some bookstands.  

         My idea: take three pieces of dowel rod, put a "spot" of hot glue at the top to hold them together at the top, tipi-style, and put another spot of glue on two of the legs and attach a horizontal piece of wood, to act as a "ledge" to hold the book in place. It was going to be so easy, and would result in an extremely functional product. Or so I thought...

         I had to modify my design, because my tipi bookstands needed a fourth leg to keep them stable. I got that. I had vacillated between 3 and 4 legs at the hardware store, but decided on 3 for frugal reasons. So...modifications made.

         The three "spots" of glue didn't really cut it, either. I needed at least eighty-four several hot glue sticks for each stand. I would squirt blobs onto the top, and when it was more or less set, I'd turn it upside-down and squirt out another fifteen gluesticks' worth of glue glue stick into the inside of the pointy top part. They held together, and worked, and because of all the hot glue I had to use, they only cost approximately $63 apiece.

        While I was working late one evening this week, my husband took my visually-interesting bookstands as a challenge. He made stands with screws and nuts and bolts. (I think that's what those things are called.) The legs were adjustable, they were more stable than my stands, but each one looked like the others. Their uniformity was boring. I appeased him, and took his bookstands to the event. But deep inside my heart, I knew my stands would have attracted more crowds...When the clamoring hordes of book buyers would have caught sight of my stands, their mouths would have gaped open. I just knew it.  

          Here is a picture of the two stands having a stand-off. You be the judge.

     My husband's plain-Jane-all-the-same stand is on the left. Mine is on the right. What the camera could not capture is the enormous and numerous globs of glue glistening on and hanging from the rods. But don't let the camera's limitations sway you--you will have to use your imagination.

      And how was the event? It was fun. I chatted with several writing/publishing friends, including Marcia Gaye, Jack Zerr, Mary Horner and Robin Tidwell. 

       My next post--Marcia Gaye's "best" writing, and a book giveaway...And if you're a child of the 60's or 70's, you'll want to check it out.

The Kind of Sugar That's Calorie-Free

 

 

 

 

Lynn Obermoeller got this award, and then passed on the award to some of her blogging friends, which ended up being all of my blogging friends, so I'm going to have to find some strangers on the street to give this award to.  (Thank you, Lynn.)

 

The Rules:

• Thank the Super Sweet Blogger that nominated you.
• Answer five Super Sweet questions.
• Include the Super Sweet Blogging award image in your blog post.
• Nominate a baker’s dozen (13) other bloggers.
• Notify your nominees on their blog.

The 5 Super Sweet Questions:

1. Cookies or Cake? – Cake, with lots of frosting. 
2. Chocolate or Vanilla? – You mean there's another flavor besides chocolate? Are you sure?
3. Favorite Sweet Treat? – I have many favorites. Fudge. Chocolate nut heaps (a family recipe cookie). Ted Drewes' hot fudge macadamia sundae. I could go on and on and on... 
4. When do you crave sweet things the most? – I am an equal opportunity addict. I eat to celebrate, I eat to wallow. I eat when I'm bored, I eat when I'm stressed. It's always dessert time somewhere in the world...
5. Sweet Nick Name? – Suzy-Q, which coincidentally is the name of a chocolate, cream-filled snack cake...

    Okay, I can count, but I couldn't stand on the street corner any longer in order to get 13 names of bloggers. The police kept circling around, thinking I was hooking for dry-erase markers, so I am a little shy of a "baker's dozen," but here goes:

 

Kim

Shay

Pat

Katie Gates

Cathy C. Hall

Jennifer Brown Banks

Lisa Ricard Claro

Mary

Janel
Pat Wahler
Kathy and Her Kampground


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dianna Graveman's Magical Breasts

      Get an image of Dianna Graveman in your head. Super-smart. Uber-talented. Co-editor of two Not Your Mother's Book anthologies. Owner of her own editing and design business. Got it?

     Now, imagine that her breasts are able to win a gold medal in a target practice. Imagine they can aim and hit a bullseye across a table. Imagine they are capable of shifting the way people think, the way people perceive things.

This collection includes stories from Tammy Goodsell (her story is the first one, and darn it, they included a photo of her
in her pajama jeans, and she promised it was a terrible picture but of course, she looked cute as a button), Linda O'Connell, Alice Muschany, Mary Horner, Dianna Graveman and moi...

 When I read the stories written by my writing friends, I enjoyed them all.  They were all witty and well-written. However, when I read Dianna's story, I was lucky I was not drinking milk at the time. Otherwise, I would have snorted it out of my nose. The ending is hilarious, and it made me have a completely different opinion of Dianna.

How about NaNoWriMo? Are you doing it? If so, what is your story about? Share, please...