In the Bleak Midwinter or Christmas Guilt

In the Bleak Mid-Winter

This time of year, I always feel like my emotions have been sandpapered to an exquisite tenderness. Joy and sorrow reverberate off each other and memories boil up, stirred by the scent of pine or the weight of an ornament in my hand or the sound of bells. That’s how I know it’s time for the annual Christmas guilt.

When my sons were younger, it was all about working full time and not being available to choreograph the day-care holiday pageant or help them craft original holiday art to be featured in our family Christmas cards. Not that I can draw my way out of a paper bag (nor, apparently, come up with an appropriate metaphor). There was the one stellar year when my older son and I made wrapping paper by block-printing butcher paper with cookie cutters. Or was it carved potatoes? I disremember. Maybe I just made that up.

I do bake homemade cookies, rich with butter and sugar and nuts, but these days you never know whether to feel proud or guilty about that.

My Christmas cards have computer-generated address labels affixed (my calligraphy pen is out of ink, you see.) They do not include a Christmas letter. In rare cases there is a hand-written two-line update (We have two sons now and they’ve both already graduated from high school. Time flies.)

I’m not the designated Christmas shopper. At holiday parties (which I don’t host, by the way) I end up sequestered in groups of women who gripe about having to do all the shopping—for themselves, for the kids, and for their husbands’ relatives. I just keep quiet. Because, in fact, my husband is Father Christmas (but sexier). He really gets into Christmas, and he will do hours of research in order to find just the right present, and he prides himself on finding things that aren’t on your Christmas list, but that are just perfect. Gift cards are not allowed. He knows all the games and books my sons own, and he knows what the new releases are, and he gets online and sends away for obscure T shirts and classic sci-fi and horror movies and buys the All Clad cookwear I’ve been dreaming about.

And I let him. Knowing my presents for him will be lame, lame, lame.

Breaking News

Breaking News

I’ve just accepted an offer from Hyperion Books for Children for a new 3-book high fantasy series set in the Fells, a mountainous queendom in the Land Between the Waters. More to come on that.

Students at Smithfield Middle School near Dallas-Fort Worth created a book trailer for The Warrior Heir for a school project. You can view the video on YouTube at http://youtube.com/watch?v=BTSpzjzbDPo

Spanish language and Portuguese translation rights for The Warrior Heir have recently sold to Via Magna in Barcelona and Difusão Cultural do Livro Ltda in Sao Paulo, Brazil, respectively.

We have an official release date for The Dragon Heir. It will be published September 8, 2008.

I’ll be visiting Isaac Newton Middle School in Centennial, CO January 10, 2008. I’ll be appearing at Barnes & Noble, Littleton, CO Wednesday, January 9 at 7 p.m.

R.I.P. Whitey: Just One More Victim of Global Warming

My son Keith came home for Thanksgiving from [The] Ohio State University with some tragic news. It seems a murder took place on the South Oval on the afternoon of November 9 in broad daylight.

Whitey the Albino Squirrel, a beloved South Campus celebrity resident, was taken out by a Cooper’s hawk before the horrified eyes of several students and at least one campus tour group.

Thirty to forty students gathered around the victim and his killer. Some even documented the event with their camera phones, but no one intervened.

In the media frenzy that followed, reporters have pursued this story relentlessly, and graphic photos have been posted online.

Now emotions are running high. It’s been suggested that the students’ unwillingness to get involved is emblematic of life on the nation’s largest college campus. While some claim that Whitey’s passing was part of the natural order of things, others see a more sinister explanation. Some claim to have seen the Cooper’s hawk at the OSU-Michigan game sitting in the Michigan section.

Kent State University’s famous black squirrels have donned white armbands in solidarity with Whitey. A Facebook page has been opened in his memory, and more than two thousand students have joined.

I have a different take on this—one with serious international implications.

Whitey was clearly a victim of global warming. The murder took place in mid-November. Had there been a blanket of snow on the South Oval, Whitey would have been naturally camouflaged and so escaped the hawk’s eagle eye.

For a map of albino squirrels spotted around the world, follow this link.
http://www.thewildclassroom.com/biomes/speciesprofile/deciduousforest.html

Miss Direction

I have this theory that the writer gene is incompatible with a sense of direction. This is based on a totally unscientific study in which my writer friend Marsha and I went out to dinner in Saratoga Springs, NY, during which we each had a glass of wine and fabulous conversation. It was dark by the time we went back out to the car. Neither of us had any idea which way to turn out of the parking lot. I proposed we sleep in the car until either the sun rose or we got arrested for vagrancy by a nice policeman who would tell us how to get back to the bed and breakfast.

Now recently, I’ve been doing a lot of school and library visits in unfamiliar places. Mapquest is my friend, but it has its limitations. Like if you really mess up you’re on your own.

Then I rode with my friend Joann to book club. I was appointed navigator and arrived with my usual fistful of Mapquest printouts. But it turned out my services were totally unnecessary. Joann has a new Chrysler Pacifica, which sails the highways like a true oceangoing vessel. It has all kinds of Jetson features including a camera in the back so you can see when you’re backing up. But the best part was the GPS unit.

“Turn left in ¼ mile,” a cool, feminine voice said as we pulled out of the Giant Eagle parking lot. And “Keep to the right to enter freeway in ½ mile.” Whoa, I thought, peering around. How does she know where we are? But I believe in magic, since lots of things are magic to me, like the entire Best Buy catalog.

I decided to call her Patsy (Pacifica, Patsy, get it?) And all the way there, Patsy coached us through every turn. It was like riding with my dad, without the swearing. I liked how she gave us plenty of notice that we had to get over to exit.

Once, despite her best efforts and the Mapquests in my hand, we made a wrong turn. Patsy didn’t lose her cool, oh, no. Not like Some People. Calculating, Patsy said, and then, “Proceed 3 miles, then turn left.”

Patsy had never failed Joann, though a few times, out of desperation, she’d suggested an illegal U-turn. Home is permanently entered into Patsy’s system. And Patsy always talks her home. (Home is the place where, if you can find it, they have to take you in.)

I’ll go anywhere, if I know I can get back home. Gotta get me one of those.

Concealed Carry

I like to think of blogging as a kind of literary concealed carry.

Let me explain.

It’s argued by the gun lobby that concealed weapons protect us all. The street thug and carjacker might think twice knowing his prospective victim might whip out a .44. And because it’s concealed, they don’t know who’s armed.

These days, the world of commerce is a haven for thieves and grifters. Only a fool would attempt to navigate those mean streets without a weapon. Blogging empowers the powerless and—um—franchises the disenfranchised.

Let’s say you’re a health insurance company and you turn down an expensive claim from one of your customers—a claim you know full well is legitimate. Hey, you think. Business is business and I gotta think about my bonus. What’s Granny going to do? Threaten me with her cane? She’ll be dead before this gets through the appeals process.

The next thing you know, search engines are turning up hits on Granny’s Blogspot account of her experience. Links are proliferating. There’s even a new Yahoos Group—MegaMutual Ripoffs.

Granny shows off her incision on Good Morning America. Turns out she has a name—Carolyn—and she’s very telegenic. Other news outlets are calling for a quote. Some busybody Senator is convening a committee and your boss wants to meet with you on Friday afternoon.

Who knew Granny was packing?

Predators of the corporate world—consider yourself warned. Maybe you’re selling electronics gear that you know is defective. Maybe you’re marketing toys covered in lead paint. Maybe you’re an airline that routinely cancels flights and dumps passengers onto the tarmac. Maybe you’re a ripoff vanity publisher that feeds off people’s dreams. Whoever you are, whatever you do—consider this:

Do you feel lucky? Punk?

A Night in the American Airlines Holiday Inn

The first time I flew on an airplane, I was in 7th grade, and we flew from Little Rock back home to Ohio. I was beside myself with excitement. I sat in the window seat next to a stockbroker from New Orleans who good-humoredly entertained an aggressively verbal 12-year-old. We were served a full meal on china, and I remember looking down on lighted swimming pools like aquamarines set into the dark landscape.

Since then the flying experience has, shall we say, deteriorated. I’ve learned to keep a weather eye when I fly to the east coast. The east coast air traffic grid is like a delicate sand sculpture that dissolves to mud whenever it rains.

Recently I flew to New York for a meeting. It was meant to be a quick trip—I took an obscenely early flight on Thursday morning, with a return flight 8 p.m. Friday night. It began raining mid afternoon on Friday, and umbrellas bloomed along Fifth Avenue like black mushrooms. I arrived at the airport two hours early. A few minutes before our scheduled departure time we were told our plane and crew were stranded elsewhere. For the next three hours we shuffled like refugees from gate to gate on Concourse C in response to announced gate changes. Finally, it seemed we might actually depart at 11 p.m. The plane was there, the crew was there—all except the captain, who didn’t show up. They couldn’t find a new captain. The dreaded announcement came over the speaker. Our flight was canceled, and we were instructed to approach the podium to reschedule.

The savvy among us leapt forward to be first in line. The mood grew ugly as the podium staff denied passenger requests for vouchers for a hotel room or even cab fare. We were told that because the cancellation was due to weather, we were on our own. No, we said. The delay occurred because of weather. The cancellation happened because the captain didn’t show. American Airlines was unmoved.

They said the soonest they could fly me out was 5 p.m. the next day. I vigorously objected. Finally, they booked me and three other women on a Delta flight to Atlanta that left the next morning at 6 a.m., with a connection to Cleveland.

I joined up with Sharon, a sales manager from the Cleveland area, and we made our way over to the Delta terminal together. The ticket counters were deserted, the walls lined with sleeping bodies, bundles and bags like the homeless on some desolate urban street. I went to the Delta office to see if I could score some of those plush airline blankets. “How many would you like?” the clerk said. “Oh!” I said, so beaten down I was expecting abuse. “You mean it? I can have more than one? I’ll have two, please.” The clerk handed over two blankets and said, “Would you like some crackers, too?”

“Crackers? I can have crackers?” Tears sprang to my eyes and I nodded mutely. It was the nicest thing that had happened to me since I left Manhattan.

Back in the gate area, Sharon and I rolled baggage carts into a corner and spread blankets over them. We joked about our slumber party hosted by American Airlines. I worried that we could be rolled away during the night by white slavers. Nevertheless, I curled up on my side, still in my skirt and jacket from my long-ago lunch, and sought sleep.

It was long in coming. Loud music blared over the overhead speakers. Cleaning staff relentlessly circled our small camp with floor polishers. Some intrepid passenger was snoring, and a child fussed nearby. I maybe slept an hour and a half.

At 4:30 a.m. the Delta ticket counter opened and we checked in. When we went back through security for the second time in two days, we were in for a rude surprise. As a last minute booking, we were flagged for “special” treatment and shuffled over into the “special” line. Our carry-on baggage was opened and searched and run through a special x-ray. We all spread our legs and raised our arms and submitted to pat-downs, thus completing the full contemporary airline experience.

By the way, this is the third time in three flights on American Airlines that my flight was canceled and rebooked for the next day. Two flights were to the east coast, and one was to Wyoming.

So what is the airlines’ responsibility to the stricken victims of flight delays and cancellations? True, the airlines don’t control the weather. But it doesn’t make sense to have a system so fragile that the slightest perturbation destroys it.

There was just a big debate on a writer’s email list I’m on about author visits. The question was, If I write for children and teens, do I have to do school, bookstore, and library visits?

Some authors love to meet the public, and others don’t. Either way, the potential for humiliation is great. I’ve heard a story about an author who came into a classroom and was asked if she was the substitute teacher. Clearly, the class had not been prepped for her visit!

The travel thing can be grueling and difficult to coordinate with other responsibilities. The hardest thing for me is when I'm being hosted by someone who is embarrassed about a small turnout. They keep apologizing and I'm like, Who can predict these things? I've spoken to groups that consist of the librarian and her sister and others where there are 150 kids (school visit or joint school-library program.)

I’ve had unexpected blessings. I once did a school and library program in this tiny town in southern Ohio. It was so small I had to stay across the river. The town was run by these six powerful sisters-one was a librarian at the county library, one was a librarian at the middle school, one was married to the high school principal, one was the English teacher, the sister in law was the library director. They were the literary and educational aristocracy in that town, and they were powerful. These women pre-sold scads of books, and the entire 6th grade had read my book when I arrived.

I did a writing workshop at a school in San Antonio, and those 6th graders could hardly stay in their seats, they were so excited about writing and sharing what they’d written. And I spoke at a library in Youngstown for Teen Reads Week to a huge crowd of students brought in for the occasion. The library staff made me feel like a celebrity. At a teen book club I spoke to a boy who was so excited about the new fantasy book he’d just read that he wanted to give me his copy so I could read it.

I did a bookstore visit in a nearby small town and a few of my friends showed up and a couple people I didn't even know who saw it in the paper. The store clerk seemed really pleased, so I asked how many people usually show for a booksigning, and she said, "None."

I was a reading nerd when I was a teenager, but I never got to meet an author. I didn’t know where all the authors lived, but I was sure it was nowhere near me. So I do like meeting kids who love books, and who want to write books of their own, because I see my 14-year-old self in every one of them.