And They're Off and

Running their blog . . .

This is about the Olympics, which started yesterday. You'll just have to wait a minute for it to get here.
I think I've finally realized that writing a blog is a way for a writer, who appears to be completely dead when you poke her with a stick, to continue writing. Not a bad deal, actually. Botox for the brain. A quickie "see, I'm still here!" brainlift. A quick trip to the Keyboard Clinic of Restorative Beauty.

Speaking of cosmetic surgery, I find I can barely look at older women on American TV anymore. Other than the brave women appearing on a few "nonfiction" shows like "Washington Week" on PBS, most older TV women have faces so distorted by wretched cosmetic efforts to not look wretched and distorted, that, well, as a viewer I instantly reject them. I don't feel good about this--I know what they are up against. But if I watch a British show, the older women just look like the older women I encounter daily in ordinary life (including the face that for some reason I see in the mirror every morning when I wake up.) I just relax and enjoy the show and don't think OMG what did they DO to their face?

Just saying.

I think one of the great things about the Olympics is that none of the female competitors has had any work done to her face. Yet. Of course, I might be wrong, though I imagine hitting the water at a hundred miles an hour (or however fast a high diver hits the water) might render a cosmetic job moot. I can't vouch for boob lifts, but it seems to me that most of the Olympic women don't tend to have big ones. The beach volley ball women seem to be more about magnificent fannies. Anyway, the virgin skin of the Olympic women is refreshing. Though it's also true that none of them has yet seen fifty. Which I suppose renders my entire point moot, and yet I still make it.

And speaking of the Opening Ceremonies, I loved the way the pastoral scenes transformed so dramatically into the forbidding factories of the industrial age. Very effective, and very determined in making the point that the sweat of the common man and woman, i.e., the workers, made the industrial age possible. Something people tend to forget, at least in the good ole USof A.

Oh, and did I mention that in my non-writing life I'm a public employee? Who knew I would grow up to be public enemy #1? Although it is also true that I am not an Olympic competitor and have not used Botox. I leave the rest to your imagination. And to mine.

Disconcerting

It is a little disconcerting to click on this blog after not having visited since my previous post of a couple of weeks ago to discover I never logged off. So apparently my blog has been waiting patiently in cyberspace for me all this time, longing for my return. I hate it when I disappoint my digitals. They love me so much. Or so they claim. Sometimes it is mutual, but not always. I do not fall easily for flash and shine. This is a personal trait that some consider deeply boring, which is probably why I don't have a lot of friends.


But this post isn't about lovelorn digitals. It's about online solitaire, a mighty weapon in the fight against anxiety. Online solitaire doesn't love me, it fact it disdains me. And yet I return to its cold embrace and like a black hole it sucks up my fears. For a while.
I should first state that I was born with my anxiety level shot straight through the roof. It might have been an inheritable family thing. In fact, I believe it was. But however it got here, it's got me and I've got it and it clings to me to like a baby trying to eat its mother.

And of late it's been clinging hard. It's been a rough six weeks--the death of very good family friend ; a family member's serious medical issues reaching a crisis point (though hence mostly resolved, thankfully); the death of my wonderful former agent (not the secret kind, the literary kind) as mentioned in my last post; an inability to just write my damn books already!; and a corner of my world turned deceptive and sneaky. (A vague reference to protect the innocent. The guilty don't have a clue, which is part of the problem. It's always part of the problem, isn't it? I think so.)

Anyway, to manage my anxiety level I have been playing online solitaire instead of writing. Not playing obsessively, but probably more than is healthy. And I don't trust it. As already stated, it doesn't pretend to love me. In fact, I am pretty sure it cheats  without guilt, repeatedly turning up weird card combinations that you would certainly find occasionally in offline solitaire (the kind played with actual cards) but not all the freaking time like online. As in, when you first start, all black cards, again? As in, when you first start, three freaking threes all at once, again? As in, when you first start, every single card under the number six? I have to tell you, certain card combinations are just plain depressing. Depressing to look at, depressing to contemplate having even a brief fling with.

And the sly distrust what arises whenever you turn over a new card. Has that card been set in stone for that game, or does the game make up the card on the spot, the better to play you? Am I playing the game or is the game playing me? The mind spins.
And yet, the game calms my anxiety. So I guess you could say we're having an unlove affair, each getting what the other needs: the game gets another sucker, I get a distraction.

A win-win situation. And I sense occasional small improvements in my overall level of anxiety. I opened my novel today and wrote seventy-seven words. Such a paltry sum is definitely disconcerting. And yet I wrote them after not writing anything for weeks, so that is definitely concerting. Maybe I should rename this post.

Deborah Brodie

This past week my former editor, Deborah Brodie, died. She saw me through five books. Felt I had worth as a writer and provided the guidance I needed to shape my words into better stories. Her help was invaluable, and I was with her long enough to absorb a lot of her lessons. A lot, but not all. I will miss her wisdom keenly.

Then, as sometimes happens, things fell apart. Separate from the current tumble and toss the publishing world is experiencing due to e-books and Amazon, all on its own it sometimes rises up like a wild horse and bucks those clutching tightly to its back right off into the dirt. That happened to Deborah--though she quickly found her footing again and launched herself into a whole new career--and it happened to me.

I am of course thinking about her a lot. I'm a nature girl, but Deborah wasn't. She wasn't born in New York, but she was a New Yorker through and through. I remember, on the one visit I had with her in New York City, as we strolled through Central Park, her pointing to the far side of the park where trees stood tall against the buildings. "That's how nature should be," she said. "With buildings in the background." I laughed out loud.

I haven't had much experience with New York, but when I think of the city I always think of her. In fact, after the phone call when she accepted my first book, the very first email I ever sent to her was the week after 911. She was okay, but, of course, none of us were, really, and still aren't.

Deborah once told me that as the former wife of a rabbi, with all the social demands that entailed, she could make conversation with a stone. A good thing, as I was often a stone myself. A shy oyster, if you will, with limited social skills. But Deborah was always there for me, not only teaching me how to write a better book, but telling me what to expect in terms of reviews, conventions, interactions with others, even sometimes telling me, at my request, how to act in certain situations--because, honestly, I didn't know.

The last five years have been difficult for me. For a myriad of reasons, I have gone silent, my words have floundered, I have felt lost. I drifted, from Deborah and from my agent and from my writing friends--except for a couple who kept in touch with me even though, because I had wandered away, I did not deserve their attention. I only talked or exchanged emails with Deborah occasionally. She had agreed to read one of my manuscripts, and said she would read it again when I completed the revision I was working on--a revision based on her suggestions.

And then she died. A big shock.

The past several months have been a time of lessons for me--painful lessons--coming from many different directions. I have told myself repeatedly that I must change, that I cannot continue to drift away from everyone. But changing is hard, and I have despaired of making any real gains, knowing  that we are what we are. Still, I do have Deborah's example--of moving on, of continuing, of connecting with others, of refusing to stop doing what you love.

And so, here I am again. On the blog I had largely abandonned. Remembering Deborah. That's as good a start as any.

Thank You, Letter Writer

Dear Letter Writer,

It was wonderful to hear your kind words about my writing. Thank you so much. I hope you visit my blog again to see this reply, as I was unable to email you directly. I had disconnected the email on my website because I was getting spammed to death. Perhaps I should reconsider.

The way you described yourself--awkward, anti-social--sounds familiar to me. I think it also describes the girl I was, many (many) years ago. So you are not alone. I am glad A Fast and Brutal Wing provided a way for you to really feel who you are, what you are like. For me, that is what the best kind of reading does—the story enters me and I enter the story, leaving me "in a sea of thought." If that happened for you with my work, I am truly satisfied.

I felt very much like Niki myself when I was writing her. The claws felt very real to me. I felt like Emmet, too, but then I always feel like all my characters—or at least parts of them. And I miss them terribly when the story is over.

Your observation is correct--I haven’t published a book since 2007, though of course I hope to publish again. But life goes up and down for writers just like it does for everyone else. Your letter has reminded me of exactly what I love about writing fiction for young adults—creating characters that are meaningful to at least some of my readers.

Thank you for taking the time to write to me; I am grateful.

Wishing you the very best,

Kathleen Jeffrie Johnson