Empty Baskets

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This weekend we received a letter from our friends at Tecolote Farm. (For years now, we’ve been grateful recipients of their organic and imaginative vegetable baskets, delivered all spring and summer to our front stoop.) I imagined it would be their annual call-to-action, with details on this year’s pricing and delivery schedule, but instead I read that Katie and David and their team are taking a sabbatical, for the sake of themselves and their land.
 
Needless to say, I’m bereft. It’s because of Tecolote that we understand the beauty of eating locally and within season; that I learned to cook mustard greens; that our daughters love arugula and beets. When it’s basket season, we step out of our rut and appreciate the surprises on our table each week. We spend less time at the grocery store. We make gazpacho. I like to think we glow a bit. This spring, we’re going to have to go it alone – hit the farmers’ markets and try to recreate the bounty for ourselves. We’ll make do, of course, but Tecolote will be sorely missed.
 
It got me to thinking, though, about letting ground lie fallow, about recovery, about that little pause in between inhale and exhale when things go completely still.
 
I think about how my family delights in those occasional Sunday mornings or Wednesday afternoons when things stop spinning – no birthday parties, no home repairs, no take-home work. We come together restfully, reflect on the day or the week, play cards, curl up on the couch and hum. 

And teaching – those semester breaks that always seem to arrive the day before I’ve been completely wrung out of energy and inspiration. 

And writing – I am not a steady-as-a-clock artist, writing for four-hours-every-morning-of-my-life-so-help-me-god. There are months when I’m awash with ideas, and driven – absolutely driven – to get them down in ink. Other times, I chastise myself for being less than attentive to my work.

 
But in my own defense (and yours, if you can relate), I think there are periods of our lives as people or parents, writers or wives, when we are depleted and stuck in cycles of less-than-optimal productivity. My own inclination is to try to pick up the pace when I feel like that, kick it in gear, snap out of it. I wonder what would happen if I did the opposite.
 
Katie and David say that their soil needs nourishment and their irrigation lines need repair. That just sings to me as I move through this first month of the new year. Today I am healthy and energized with a new project in hand. Tomorrow or next week or someday in March, things will be different. To sustain myself now and then, I need good sleep, long runs and vitamins. But I also need to sometimes lay fallow, quiet, still. 

We all do.

Research Redux

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My very astute husband discovered this weekend, while poring through some of my research material for that budding work-in-progress, that the acknowledged expert in the field LIVES IN AUSTIN, TEXAS, as do we. Is that lovely serendipity, or what? 

Now I just need to load up on enough knowledge and courage to give him a buzz.

The Truth about Research

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re–search n. to travel through
 
I’ve dreaded dipping into the deep well of research for my new book project; it’s been years since I’ve been a proper student and most of my recent manuscripts are about the length of your average footnote.
 
But I’ve literally been dreaming this story, so I had no choice but to jump in.
 
Well. Lemme tell ya. I took the leap, and I didn’t drown. I didn’t even choke. It’s… refreshing!
 
Yesterday morning I mailed a revision of one of my picture books to a waiting editor (I like to think she checks her mail for it daily), and then ensconced myself at Austin Java with my laptop and a cup of decaf. I hooked into their wireless, started swimming and didn’t come up for air ‘til noon.
 
You would not believe the discoveries I stumbled upon. Everything from a new surname for my protagonist to the exact date of the most pivotal plot peak in the piece. I even hit upon a working title!
 
And here’s what felt most titillating to me. I set out with expectations of dry, grueling, academic research and instead I find myself on a journey during which “all will be revealed.” That may sound a little woo-woo to you, but honestly it’s as if I’m discovering the truth of the story rather than figuring out reasonable details to make up.
 
And isn’t that the kind of book we love – one that feels true, through and through – regardless of how preposterously fictitious it may be? If I can hang onto that sense as I move forward, I just may have a crack at writing the kind of book I’d like to read.

Poetry Friday…

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… puts me in the mood to read Seven Silly Eaters, by Mary Ann Hoberman. 

I often tell my students that when editors say they don’t want rhyme, they mean they don’t want BAD rhyme. THIS kind of rhyme is delicious.

I love reading this book aloud; it’s another gutbuster.

“…Creamy oatmeal, pots of it!
Homemade bread and lots of it!
Peeling apples by the peck,
Mrs. Peters was a wreck!

She wiped her brow and heaved a sigh;
Another year was passing by. 
In fact, she realized with sorrow,
Her birthday would arrive tomorrow!
Drearily she shook her head
And wearily went up to bed.

She thought the children had forgot
Her special day — but they had not!
At crack of dawn they all began
To carry out their secret plan:
Mrs. Peters would be fed 
A birthday breakfast in her bed!
A breakfast made of all the food
That kept them in such happy moods…”

And that’s when things really get crazy.

Baby, It’s Cold Outside

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Flakes float down as big as pie plates. Ice mimics each vein of each leaf on the Asian jasmine. The back deck is a skating rink.
 
Every ½ an hour or so, runny-nosed daughters and neighbors rush in, hungry and chilled; we pop hats and gloves into the drier so they’ll  be ready for the next jaunt out.  
 
The weather folk are calling it ICE STORM ‘O7 (read with a threatening boom) but heck, I just call it vacation. Mind you, I’m posting from AUSTIN, TEXAS, where we’re more accustomed to burning our hands on the heat of our steering wheels.
 
The delight of this unfamiliar weather – keeping us home together, reading and cooking, taking baths, playing cards, and did I mention reading and cooking? – it’s enough to shake up the most routinized among us, it’s a new new year.
 
Our 2nd grader’s science fair project suddenly entails freezing a whole variety of liquids in an ice-cube tray – outside, on our front porch! Nobody’s trying to fry an egg out there today. Her dad (who “should” be at work) has fresh pizza dough rising in the kitchen and his guitar is freshly tuned. My semester remains un-started. Even our 12-year-old dog feels frisky.
 
We are ill-equipped, to be sure. Our fleece jackets, so toasty most Texas days, seem pathetic, even doubled up. Our shoes are porous and slippery, and our windows and doors don’t seal like they ought to. The highway department reports hundreds of wrecks and the Blockbuster shelves were stripped of everything but the crankiest videotapes yesterday by noon.
 
But we ignore the bluster, crank up the cocoa to a full boil and sing, I swear, more Christmas carols. ‘Cause why not? There’s a bright white light in the air and it’s winter, even in Texas.
 

MLK

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All of the MLK events planned for Austin have been cancelled because of ice. Outdoors. Clinging to the trees and wires. So we’ll be home in our sweats and slippers, reading and baking, which sounds swell.
 
My kids, though, had hoped to march – were even willing to bundle up.
 
When I collected them at school on Friday, King’s “I Had a Dream” speech boomed from the PA system. In the car, on the way home, they explained why we oughta call him “Dr. King”, to show respect. I like that.
 
But there’s also something so intimate about his legacy, isn’t there? His was a looming figure that one could imagine being at home with, over dinner or the morning paper.
 
I think it’s the serenity he held, in the face of everything impossible and abhorrent. There he stood in the storm that was the civil rights movement while the rest of us bring anxious hysteria to airline ticket counters and afternoon traffic.
 
I cannot imagine the yogic practice it must take to embody one’s beliefs that completely.
 
What if we moved more peacefully and spoke with less shrill? What if our decisions were more intuitive and less rash? What if we learned “to live together as brothers, or perish together as fools”?
 
Dr. King was shot to death on my birthday, in April, 1968. I turned one, ate cake with my plump hands, laughed in the light of the flashbulbs burning. King was dead, we were at war in Vietnam, and the sixties were exploding into the seventies. But I was full of hope. Full of hope.
 
Today, ice sheening on our streets, King’s voice like music on our radio, I still am.
 
  

Pssst…

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Muchos gracias to Tasha at Kids Lit (http://www.greenlakelibrary.org/kidslit/ ), DonTate at Devas T. (http://devast.blogspot.com/ ), and Kelly at Big A little a (http://kidslitinformation.blogspot.com/ ) for calling out my blog to their fine and faithful readers. So happy to share the airwaves with you all…
 
Kudos to Baranoff Elementary School for hosting a really vivid Young Author’s Conference today. What a delight – working with all those wide-eyed kids, and chatting with so many shining writer-folk. My students crafted some real metaphoric gems, including: “horns like ski poles”… “orange as honey”… and “a dollar bill, green like a leaf and crinkly.”
Lucky Austinites: Rumor has it that my own personal and fabulous illustrator Robin Preiss Glasser is coming to town in late March. Living and breathing, up close and personal. Yea!! Stay tuned – I’ll fill you in on details when I’ve got them.
 
Hurrah for my clever friend and children’s writer Polly Robertus (The Dog Who Had Kittens, Holiday House, 1992) who’s just sold a middle grade novel to the same house. Perseverance paid off and we’ll all be the luckier for it.
 
Deep bows to the wise Carrie Contey (http://www.earlyparenting.com/index.html ) for offering her amazing insights to my beloved group of Goodness gals. She’s agreed to work with us in making the most of our art and our lives. There was firecracker energy in the room the other night as we got started. Don’t you love being around people who’ve got great big dreams?
 

Once More With Feeling

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Lately, when one of my daughters physically mauls or maims the other – be it in a blameless bunkbed accident or a purposeful fit of rage – the hurter ends up crying harder than the hurtee.

These aren’t tears for fear of consequence ‘though I’m familiar with those, too. (I remember wailing after my sister as she ran toward home to tell about the big kids unjustly clobbering the little ones in a snowball fight.) Nothin’ like the sorrow of being badly busted. We’ve seen our fair share of that kind of ‘remorse’ around here, too.

But these tears of late? They’re genuinely pained distress signals, the awful clarity that comes with the caption “I-can’t-believe-I’ve-hurt-my-sister.” And as sad as it is to witness, I find some solace in the palpable human empathy between them.

There’s debate about whether we all come equipped with an empathic heart or whether it needs teaching, and I think I’ll let the social scientists hash that one out. But one thing I know for certain is that books are the perfect proving ground. There is safety in feeling deeply for the folks we read about; it’s a risk-free way to love and worry, grieve and celebrate. So we do – with less reserve than we might in stickier, more personal situations – and, as a result, we come out the other side with more practiced hearts.

I remember way back, tucking into my parents’ bed for another chapter of Little House, only to be put on hold as the reader, my mother, stopped to cry – for Mary, for Laura, for the bulldog. We’d stare and nudge and sometimes giggle as she gathered herself and began again. 

I’d stopped the nudging and the giggles by the time I read National Velvet, Deenie, Misty of Chincotegue, Anne Frank. The list could run waist deep, I assure you.

Later, when I met my future husband, one of our first important synchronicities was the discovery that we’d both wept over Dan and Little Ann in Where the Red Fern Grows.

What I know now – what I learned in my mother’s bed – is that crying (or laughing) over books is a way of saying, “I’m in tune with the human condition, with the state of the birds and the bees, with this writer and all of her readers. I am in tune with you (daughter, lover, student, son).”

What an affirmation.

So, on that note, I offer up a sinfully short list of some of the good laughs and cries around our house lately:

Tearjerkers

Anne of Green Gables, by L.M. Montgomery – We were on an airplane when Matthew Cuthbert died and my god, they almost had to drop the oxygen masks for us.

Ruby’s Wish, by Shirin Yim – I’m not going to give away the punch but it’s tender and requires a couple of tissues, to be sure.

Togo, by Robert J. Blake – Did you know the Iditarod sled race commemorates a treacherous serum run made during a diphtheria epidemic in Alaska? Me neither. This is just one of the myriad dog stories out there that’ll get you straight between the eyes.

Miss Lady Bird’s Wildflowers, by Kathi Appelt – That part where a young LBJ sends Ladybird a love-letter and she is “dazzled”? Golly.

When Jessie Came Across the Sea, by Amy Hest – Toil and troubles, true love, a good grandmother and a happy ending. What else do you need?

Gutbusters

Mr. Popper’s Penguins, by Richard Atwater and Florence Atwater – This book about a housepainter and his penguins is hilarious. But don’t take my word for it. Read it. Aloud.

At the Hotel Larry, by Daniel Pinkwater and Jill Pinkwater – Utterly absurd. I literally could not catch my breath for laughing the first time I read one of the Larry books.

Judy and the Volcano, by Wayne Harris – The teacher’s name is “Mrs. Be-the-best-you-can.” Need I say more?

Double Whammies

I can’t help it. Beverly Cleary’s Ramona books and all of Kevin Henkes’ picture books make me mist up and, a moment later, laugh out loud, every single time. Praises be!

So, what’re you reading???

Wrapping Up Another Year…

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…in the life of a book.

A SOCK IS A POCKET FOR YOUR TOES: A POCKET BOOK (illustrated by the amazing Robin Preiss Glasser, published by HarperCollins) has been on the shelves since 2004.

I delight in delivering it to babies, reading it to school kids, signing a stack for generous grandmamas.

Rather than dwelling on the fact that this book really, really needs a sibling (and I’ve got a neat little stack of eggs… errr, manuscripts… just aching to be put between covers), I thought I’d celebrate the highlights of this book, this year:

SOCK is a 2006-2007 Children’s Crown Gallery finalist, along with the twangy BUDDY: THE STORY OF BUDDY HOLLY by Anne Bustard, the lovely WHEN YOU WERE BORN by Dianna Hutts Aston and a bunch of other sweet reads. A very nice tip of the hat indeed.

The book earned back its advance this year – a neat little caper that means I am no longer in arrears to the venerable Harper Collins. (AND that I will get a tuppence every six months or so – a pointed prod to get my other manuscripts in the post, pronto.)

Last spring, I partnered with creative whiz JJ Langston to do a cooking class for kids based on the book. Think pita pockets, fruit tarts, fortune cookies. We greeted the young chefs at Gina’s Kitchen (aka Cookabilities) with bookmarks and baking soda. Trés fun.

In July, I spoke at the monthly meeting of Austin’s SCBWI chapter. I rattled on about the joy of school visits – using my Pocket Presentation as Defense Exhibit #1. What a great day! I learned as much as I lent, and got all sorts of warm fuzzies from local literary luminaries.

I took the book to the little burg of Odem, Texas, in September, as the featured author at their first-ever Children’s Literature Festival. The book-loving folks of Odem had raised a pile of money to build themselves a library, and it was a joy to spend the day there with the Odem Library Board and all the pre-kindergartners in town, reading and rifling through my pockets.

Illustrator Extrordinaire Robin Preiss Glasser was all over the NY Times Best-Seller list this year – not with SOCK, but who cares?!! She could illustrate a toaster manual and make people swoon in wonder. Her latest big splashes are FANCY NANCY by Jane O’Connor and OUR 50 STATES by, ahem, Lynn Cheney.

The wildly productive and generous Cynthia Leitich Smith has invited me to do an author’s interview for her kid lit site. I’m honored, and psyched to reflect and expound. OK, so this technically falls under the heading of 2007 rather than 2006 but what better way to close out last year’s diary.

Moving forward…

Starting a Book

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ON YOUR MARK:

Inadvertently reinforce procrastinative habits by stumbling upon a Great Idea while surfing the web.

Have two glasses of wine in honor of the G.I.

Fantasize about winning the Newbery or a Pulitzer or both.

Mull over G.I. for a few more days, looking for a good reason not to write it after all.

Clean out silverware drawer.

Consider the merits and/or contraindications of writing a book without caffeine. Drink a lot of expensive decaf coffee drinks during this deep philosophical inquiry.

Admit that you are powerless in the face of the G.I.

Surrender.

Have two more glasses of wine.

Clean out desk drawer, under the influence.

GET SET:

Go to library for research materials. Come home with a lot of cute books to read to the kids.

Set up coffee dates with other writers who know all about wine, silverware and procrastination.

Spend a whole day reading a baby name book and toying with the idea of naming the protagonist Tigress.

Realize that Tigress rhymes with digress and that the storyline has veered off course before it’s even been committed to paper.

Dream, with vivid historical accuracy, about being a nurse during World War I. Realize that it’s easier being a writer than being a nurse.

Open up a whole new document. Stare at the blank white screen.

Do not get up to get a glass of wine or a cup of coffee. Even decaf.

GO:

“Ruth tried to keep her chin up. Literally, tilted toward the top of the stairs as she headed to bed. This is her job, her mother’d said, here at home, with Father off at war. To keep her chin up. Ruth tried, but tears pooled cooly in the wells of her cheeks and she finally dropped her head to let them fall.”

OK, one cup of coffee. But don’t touch the bloody silverware…