10/09/2011

Guest post: Robin Stafford Sorrentino

I’m delighted to welcome Robin Stafford Sorrentino as a guest blogger today. I’ve known Robin for years — we met first online and then in real life at a writing conference. She’s one of the Imaginary Internet Friends who think it’s perfectly sensible to drive down from points north to meet up for a five-hour lunch, and then drive back the same day. She’s a dear friend.

Robin is also one hell of a writer, one of a handful of prolific writer friends who, inexplicably, remain unpublished. She writes both romantic suspense and paranormal romance and her stories are flavoured by the influence of her time spent “at the Bay” in the Tidewater region of Virginia. I’ve been fortunate enough to read and critique some of her work over the years and stand in awe of her talent and voice. She is that rare thing: a natural storyteller.

I was flattered when she asked me to give feedback on a piece she’d written about her Dad, who passed away on Friday. It’s a beautiful and moving tribute to a remarkable man. I loved it so much that, once I dried my tears, I asked whether she’d be willing to be a guest blogger and post it over here. Because writing this good, writing that tells a story of courage and optimism and a life well lived, is meant to be shared.

Please give Robin a warm welcome. I hope one day, very soon, you all will be able to enjoy her stories in published form.

Dad

by Robin Stafford Sorrentino

Life doesn’t always go as planned.  I guess that’s why there are so many clichés like: if life gives you lemons, make lemonade, and whenever a door closes a window opens.  When life slammed the door on my dad and showered him with lemons, he not only found the window, opened it and made lemonade, he did it blindfolded.

Once when I was struggling with some complicated long division homework in elementary school, Dad helped me figure it out.  But while I was using page after page of paper, he worked the problems in his head.  I said I guessed he’d made straight As in school.  He said he hadn’t been a very good student.  Not because he was lazy, one of his cousins told me later.  It was during the depression and he had to work before and after school to help his family out.  This didn’t leave much time to study.

He dreamed of being a mechanic, joined the National Guard and applied for training in the air corps.  He was accepted, but before he could get his training, his unit was called up in WWII.  Instead of working on or flying planes, he became an army medic.  In April of 1945, just a few weeks before VE day, the jeep he was riding in hit a land mine and shrapnel destroyed one eye and severed the other optic nerve.  He was 24 years old.  And he was blind.

When I was in high school, I found some newspaper articles written about him and one included a picture of him in his hospital bed.  Grinning.  Knowing Dad, he’d probably just told a joke or teased one of his nurses.  A childhood friend of his once told me that he and another friend went to see Dad when he came home on leave from the rehabilitation hospital.  He said they dreaded seeing him, didn’t know what to say, how to treat him.  Dad answered the door and said, “Paul, boy it’s great to see you,” and put them right at ease.  I imagine he was grinning then too.

With his dreams of being a mechanic dashed, he decided to take advantage of the GI Bill and go to college to get a business degree.  He figured, why sell pencils on the sidewalk when you could sell them and a lot more running a store.  A course in business law fascinated him and he applied to and was accepted at the University of Virginia Law School.  He completed his last year of college and his first year of law school at the same time.

Dad and Mom met one summer over a jetty on Stingray Point.  They married when he finished law school and he returned to his home town and opened a private law practice.  A few years later, he ran for Commonwealth Attorney and won.   I can’t imagine the courage that must have taken.  He served in that position until he retired at age 73.

My dad taught me more than long division.  He taught me how to fish, steer and dock a boat, drive a car, decipher all sorts of instruction manuals, and drag creosoted pilings with a huge set of ice tongs.  But the most important thing he taught me was not to be afraid to dream and to try to make those dreams come true.  He taught me that if a window doesn’t open when that door slams shut, all I have to do is grab a putty knife and shimmy the lock open.  And if it still won’t open, break the damn window.  Take a chance.  Work for what you want.  Crawl under, climb over, but never, never stop trying.  Add sugar to those lemons and grin.

When my dad died Friday morning, I didn’t lose him and I never will.  All day I’ve seen him.  Dancing in the living room with Mom to the music of the Tijuana Brass.  Wearing his Frank Buck hat and steering the boat in the Chesapeake Bay.  Rubbing his head after I walked him into another tree.  Grinning.  Working on the boat motor, rewiring the fuse box, digging up the septic system.  Listening to me read a book to his grandsons on the porch of his cottage.  Holding my children in his arms.  Grinning.

And I hear him.  Singing “C’mon over to my house and I’ll give you candy.”  “I’m Chiquita Banana and I’ve come to say…”  Laughing.  And saying “I love you.”

I love you too, Dad.  Thanks for teaching me to make lemonade.

George Woody Stafford

April 20, 1921 — October 7, 2011

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09/28/2011

Arts and crafts and other trauma

I’m trying to get back to posting regularly over here, but I’ve been writing and am fresh out of ideas for a blog post this week. Not that I’m going to let a simple thing like that stop me. I figure I’ll just ramble on for a bit and eventually I might make some kind of sense. Or not.

My mom has been cleaning out cupboards in her house. She has lived in that house since I was five years old, so you can imagine there is a bit of accumulated stuff tucked into the odd corner. Stuff that isn’t necessarily hers. And some stuff that is, regrettably, mine.

Seeing as how her polite suggestions that we box up our stuff and take it with us (I have three sisters and we all happily left various childhood treasures behind) have been largely ignored over the years, she recently decided to just do it herself. But there is some confusion about which stuff belongs to whom. This prompted a few phone calls and text messages this past weekend and one of those was my older sister texting a picture of some “artwork” and asking, “Is this yours?”

Sigh. Yes, I made that. In middle school, I think. It’s plaster poured into a milk carton, which we then had to carve into some kind of thing using blunt instruments. Pure torture. I hated every minute of it. I asked my mom to throw it out, but I suspect she’s going to pack it lovingly into a box so I can take it home with me one day. She seems determined to make me appreciate a creativity gene I just do not possess.

I am not artistic. Not when it comes to arts and crafts like drawing or painting or sculpture. Or sewing. Or cutting and pasting construction paper. Or anything to do with glitter or beads or styrofoam or toothpicks as construction material. I’m not good at it. I’ve always known I’m not good at it — all of my sisters are very talented in these areas and the contrast is stark and undeniable — and that doesn’t bother me. Really, I just don’t care. I have other talents.

Those of you relatively new to this blog might not realize that I am in fact somewhat infamous for my [lack of] drawing skills. After one of the first luncheon meet-ups of Imaginary Internet Friends, everyone demanded to see pictures. I hatehateHATE having my picture taken and refused to let anyone take any. Yes, I am a tyrant. So I drew this instead:

Everyone agreed it was hilariously pitiful. [I'd link to that blog post, but it was on a different blog and we broke it anyway.] Delighted my drawing was received with the silliness intended, I’ve continued in those efforts.

Here’s one from a couple years ago, of me having a fine needle aspiration biopsy of my thyroid:

And the aftermath [blog post and more "pics" here]:

And then there’s the one of me imagining my daughter calling me, as promised, after being eaten by a BEAR [blog post here]:

Lest you think I labour over these things, these are all first drafts. No do-overs. Well, except the bear. After the first attempt, I realized I’d better draw the stomach contents first, then fit the bear around it, er, her. Whatever.

I really don’t care if people laugh at my lack of artistry. I’ve been laughing at it all my life. Although, inexplicably, I did manage to create some adequate pottery back in high school. Maybe I’ll round up a few pieces . . . here, I think there are a few upstairs too, but these are the ones I gathered up in a quick tour downstairs. I made these and I like them:

Anyway, back to drawing. I found this link through twitter and it totally cracked me up: Draw a stick man.

This is perfect for me! I’ve actually drawn several now and it makes me laugh every time when it becomes animated and moves clumsily through the little story, aided by other clunky items also drawn by me. I thought I was bad with a marker pen, you should see the results using a fingertip and the track pad on my MacBook. Or maybe you shouldn’t.

Is there anything like this you know you’re just not good at? Something you always hated but did it anyway because it was required at school? Can you laugh about it now or is it still a source of frustration or embarrassment?

Or are you really good at arts and crafts and wish you were back in school where you had unlimited supplies and an excuse to sniff paste indulge your inner artist? It’s okay to admit it, I won’t think less of you. As long as you don’t make me join in.

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09/18/2011

Finding poetry in titles

Literary agent Janet Reid is having another contest on her blog this week while she’s at Bouchercon, a mystery writers’ conference. A distraction for those of us unable to attend, perhaps. Or maybe she’s just trying to keep writers busy doing something other than clogging her inbox with queries. I usually try to avoid these temptations, because I’m trying to write fiction in my “spare time.” But this one looked like too much fun to pass up.

The challenge was to create a poem using book titles, with each line containing the title of a book. Any book. Well, maybe not ebooks, not unless you have some mad photoshop skills. Because part of the challenge was to include a picture of the books you used, shown in the order in which you used them.

I emailed my entry and then decided to post it here too, including the high-tech sad blurry pic taken with my cell phone. I tried to choose a diverse mix of fiction, a bit of non-fiction, and then threw in a couple of my daughter’s Spanish language titles. Honestly, I’m not sure it qualifies as a poem. Unless you count it in the little known category of “seven-line, four-stanza poems that don’t rhyme or follow any known cadence.” Because then it totally qualifies. As a poem. Sort of.

Either way, it was fun. Ms. Reid has been posting entries over on her blog. If you have a minute or twenty, you should go read them. Some very creative stuff over there.

UNTITLED, DUE TO AN EXCESS OF TITLES

I knew from DAY ONE in GEORGIA
You were THE AMERICAN,
THE MISANTHROPE,
TELLING LIES FOR FUN AND PROFIT as if
they were A CHILD’S GARDEN OF VERSES,
and TALKING TO THE SUN
like a LOST DOG.

We spent ONE MORE SUNDAY in THE CHAMBER,
IN THE COLD ROOM
of LA CASA DE LOS ESPÍRITUS.
HAVING OUR SAY, you claimed.
I was CHARMED AND ENCHANTED,
trying to DECIPHER your FATAL SECRETS.
For THE FAMILY, you said.

You were CHARMED AND DANGEROUS,
a MONSTER with a KILLER INSTINCT
for THE SUBTLE KNIFE.
OUT OF THE SHADOWS, like a MOMENT OF TRUTH,
came THE BETTER PART OF DARKNESS.
Not SHADES OF GRAY, after all,
but a LEGACY OF ASHES.

I’ll be GONE TOMORROW, EMMA.
SAY GOODBYE, never to MIRA SI YO TE QUERRÉ.
With THE THIRD STRIKE, my METAMORPHOSIS is complete.
For me, it’s THE END OF AMERICA.
MORE TWISTED, you,
stay in THE DARK with THE UNSEEN,
in the CANYONS of your OBSESSION.

I have a feeling it’s going to take a lot longer to put all these books back where they belong than it did to pull them out and stack them on the mantel. Or maybe I’ll just leave them there. Let people wonder.

Looking at the titles on your shelves, what kind of story do they tell? If you have time, go ahead and write a poem of your own and post it in the comments. Not as a contest, just for fun. It’s easier than you might think, given that someone else has already written most of it for you.

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09/11/2011

I didn’t know you, then

Ten years. In some respects, it seems an eternity. In others, the blink of an eye. So much reflection and remembrance has been perpetrated on this inauspicious anniversary that I hesitate to add to the cacophony. But I’m a writer and I write about things. Sometimes, I write about things like this.

I don’t know what it was like to be in New York City or Pennsylvania or Washington, DC on that day and I don’t want to write about that. I do know what it was like to be in my town on that day and I don’t want to write about that either. Nor do I want to discuss terrorism or politics or a costly decade of war.

We all know, and probably will never forget, how it felt to be wherever we were on that day, how it felt to see the things we saw. We don’t need anyone to remind us.

What strikes me as worth noting, as being different now from what it was then is the degree to which events have become personal despite the barrier of distance. The degree to which we all have become intimately connected, known to one another, familiar. How the internet, more so than radio or television or print media, has intensified not just our perception of events but also our regard and concern for each other.

Because even as we remember that day, we know full well there have been other days, memorable days. Days seared into our mind’s eye with indelible laser-like clarity. And yet, those were days that for most of us were graced, if you will, with a certain distance. A distance that is becoming increasingly negligible.

I will never forget the day I watched coverage of the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City. I didn’t know anyone who lived there, then. Now I do.

I will never forget the day I watched televised images of massive earthquake-loosened sections of freeway pancaked down onto cars and people in California. I didn’t know anyone who lived there, then. Now I do.

I will never forget the day I saw pictures of the bloodied bodies of slain school children in Colorado. I didn’t know anyone who lived there, then. Now I do.

I will never forget the day, after day after day after day, as I watched news reports of Hurricane Katrina and the stunning neglect of our government ravaging the city and people of New Orleans. I didn’t know anyone who lived there, then. Now I do.

And I will never forget the day, ten years ago, when I watched commercial airplanes used as weapons. Back when blogs were rare and twitter didn’t exist. I had not yet met my friend who works in DC. I did not yet know my friend whose family lives in PA. I had not yet conversed in 140 characters with people who live in NYC. I didn’t know anyone who lived there, then. If you’re reading this blog, I didn’t know you, then.

Now I do.

It makes a difference.

Maybe it shouldn’t. Maybe it’s wrong to imagine being more deeply affected by distant tragedy due to a personal connection. It certainly makes it no more or less tragic to those directly involved. But that’s human nature. As horrible and gut-wrenchingly painful as it was to witness those events from a distance, it would have been so much worse had I known, then, the people I know now. And I can’t help but think that if more of us were connected on a global scale, if more of us were personally known and, by association, accountable to each other, we’d have less tragedy and loss of the man-made variety over which to grieve.

Or maybe we’d just have more reason to regard each other with contempt and distrust.

No. I’ve resolved to be more positive. Sorry, easier said than done.

On this day of remembrance and looking back, I choose instead to look forward with cautious optimism at a world that is gradually becoming more connected. And to offer my sincere hope that, wherever you are, there will never come a day, a memorable day, when for whatever unspeakable reason I will find myself wishing, however fleetingly, that I still had the selfish luxury of saying, “I didn’t know you, then.”

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09/10/2011

Summer Stock

I know I’ve neglected my blog lately, but didn’t realize it had gotten quite so dusty over here. What’s up with that, you wonder? Damned if I know.

I think I have the summertime version of SAD. There’s light therapy for wintertime sufferers, but what’s available to those who are depressed by summer? Do I need to find a sympathetic grocery manager who will let me spend an hour every day shivering in the walk-in freezer? I’m so tempted.

This summer has been tedious and uninspiring and depressing. For many reasons. The economy is battered and sulking, politicians are mired in dramatics and self-interest, it’s hot outside, the day job is exhausting and unrewarding, friends and family members are sick or dying, it’s hot AND humid outside, publishing is full of uncertainty and overwhelming choices, and Mother Nature seems to have lost her damn mind. And that’s just stuff in this country.

The day after the earthquake in Virginia, this is what I encountered on my drive to work. It seemed symbolic, a physical manifestation of everything that is just WRONG lately.

That’s one of the bridges over the little creek that meanders through my neighbourhood. The city’s website says they found structural damage and that it’s not related to the earthquake. Probably they discovered it because they were out checking all the bridges the next day. Just in case.

Here’s what it looks like from the other side, on the drive home:

I’m sure you’re wondering why I would even BE on the other side, seeing as how I KNOW THE FREAKING ROAD IS CLOSED. Heh. You’d think I could remember this simple thing and go the other way. But no, several times a week, both coming and going, my mind is elsewhere and I have to turn around.

I was venting about all this, yes ALL of it, in a phone call with my older sister a few days ago. But you know how it is when you’re complaining to someone and just letting it all out and you realize that rather than agreeing and making sympathetic noises the other person is growing increasingly concerned about you and so then you start downplaying your own complaints because you don’t want that person to worry or stage an intervention or tell your mother and get her all upset? Yeah. That.

So I started backpedalling and saying things like, “But you know, it’s really not that bad.” And, “It’s not as if any of this is new. You know, just the same old stuff.” Sigh.

A man’s as miserable as he thinks he is. ~Seneca

Yes, I was placating her, but it’s true. The economy has been bad before and will recover and get bad again. Politicians have always been . . . politicians. I’ve never expected the day job to enrich my soul or feed my muse, people get sick and recover or sometimes die and then we grieve, nothing is ever certain, choices are only scary until you make a decision, and natural disasters are actually fairly common.

And summer is summer is summer. It never fails to depress me, just as the cooler weather of autumn never fails to rejuvenate me.

Now, I’m not trying to make light of depression or suggest it can be shrugged off. It’s a devastating illness that usually requires professional treatment. But what I’m suffering from is more along the lines of allowing negativity to seep into my view of things. Something a friend calls A Big Old Case of the Poor Me’s.

You cannot prevent the birds of sadness from passing over your head, but you can prevent them from making nests in your hair. ~Confucius

Speaking of hair, I’m in desperate need of a haircut but have somehow convinced myself I don’t have the time or energy to make an appointment. That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about. I’ve allowed my annual bout with “the summertime blues” to join forces with my natural laziness and talent for procrastination. I’m perilously close to agreeing with Roger Daltry that “there ain’t no cure.”

So I’m calling myself out. There are things over which I do retain control and I’ve been letting them all slide. No, you do not need to see a list, that’s just embarrassing. But I do. So I’m making one. I’m going to stop focusing on all the negative crap in the world over which I have no control and focus on the positive. The things I can do something about, that I can cross off with big bold marks and say, “I DID THAT.”

The most important item on that list? I’m going to stop telling myself I’m too tired or too hot or too overwhelmed, too fucking enervated by summer, too uninspired and boring and talentless to write. And get back to it. Because, taking stock of this summer, the writing is what has suffered most. Well, that and my hair.

Anyone else feel like they need a swift kick in the rear? What’s on your list?

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07/31/2011

Avoiding meltdown, in 3… 2… 1…

So far, this has been a wretched summer with epic heat. Enervating record-breaking triple-digit heat that fuels scattered short-lived afternoon storms wherein even the raindrops are hot. Hot steamy rain that saturates the air and leaves it so thick you feel as if you might drown on the next deep breath.

It’s making me cranky.

Today was unusual. Today a “cold” front passed through and not only did it rain, it rained all afternoon. Thick clouds thwarted the sun’s intensity and the outdoor temp dropped into the mid-70s. And stayed there for hours. It was dark and gloomy and I didn’t even bother to turn on lights, just basked in the dim filter of day-long dusk and enjoyed it. Because tomorrow, and every day next week and every day the week after and every damn day for the next two months, is forecast to be back into the upper 90s, flirting with 100.

I hate summer in the South. It is pure relentless wilting misery and I hate it with a passion.

But it occurs to me that complaining about the heat just makes it seem worse. So let’s think about a different time. And a different kind of rain. A rain that felt cool and refreshing and life affirming. Yes, we do have that kind of rain down here. In fact, I wrote about it a couple years ago and am re-posting it today — mostly because I like it but also because I’m focused on other writing just now (please forgive the repetition).

I hope it will be a nice break from the stifling heat of summer and that you all can let your imagination wander to a quiet moment on a cool weekend morning when I paused to enjoy a . . .

Rainy day in spring

It is dark and raining here this morning. The kind of hard heavy steady rain that says, pay attention, and no matter what you thought you were going to do, you stop and listen instead. Too many drops to count, yet you can hear the rhythm of each one. The small steady slap of it on the roof and leaves and street, the music of it running fast through eaves and downspouts, in the fleeting splash of a car driving by.

A quick gust of wind waves dense leafy branches through the flow, disrupting the steady downward path, diverting drops like a hand testing the temperature of a shower. The gust moves on and the thick drops fall harder, crowding together in a pale gray sheet.

The back door is open and the smell of wet comes through the screen. Sodden chlorophyll and damp ground, giving up the hot sweat of the past week’s growth, rinsing off leaves and bark and blades of grass to run down the slope of the next yard to the creek, filling the air with the ripe earthy scent.

The torrent is timeless and ageless, full of significance yet devoid of meaning. The rain is all there is. No crackle of lightning or rumble of thunder. Nothing moves under the onslaught, there are no other sounds, only the steady soaking drum of the rain. And you are still, listening.

The gloom lifts slowly as the rain tapers off, the symphony ending not with a crescendo but a soft reprise as a cool damp breeze gently teases small drops down in a light patter from the high branches where they linger. There is movement in an upstairs bedroom and you recall the tasks at hand.

Soon the air is redolent with the smell of freshly sliced melon and frying bacon. Outside, the birds resume their springtime songs.

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07/20/2011

Kids and Dogs and Cookies, Oh My!

My daughter was in town last week for a highly anticipated visit, part of which was spent at the beach. Hey, it’s summer. Time at the beach is practically a requirement down here. She left The Intruder Cat behind in New Orleans, but brought along her five-month-old black lab puppy, Jenny. Which was fine. Well, it would have been fine. Except Jenny wasn’t the only pet in residence. I’d also agreed to take custody of Quincy The Wonder Dog for the week. Plus my own ancient curmudgeonly cat. I know, what was I thinking?

So my daughter dropped off The Little Terrorist, as Jenny quickly became known, and she and her brother went to the beach in SC with their dad for several days. Luckily, Jenny is crate trained and I still had a dog crate in the basement.

Now, I love black labs and all three of our dogs have been labs, either purebred or some kind of lab mix. So I KNOW how hyper they are. And after 11 years of dealing with The Wonder Dog, I know exactly how BAD um, that is, how wild ass crazy they can be.

Even so, I was surprised by Jenny’s sheer exuberance. She SO wanted to be best friends with Quincy (and my cat, when she could find her) and was convinced that if she just tried a little bit harder, things would all work out. She was mistaken. Surprise. But the big shock for me was realizing that, in comparison, The [Sadly Maligned] Wonder Dog was a model of calm well-behaved patience and tolerance. Made me feel old.

I tried to take some pictures, but mostly they were a dark blur of moving dog parts. My cell phone is my only camera these days and it pauses for several ominous seconds between when you push “take” and when it actually takes the damn picture. My old cell phone didn’t do this, so I assume this is some fancy new technology, even though I have no idea what’s going on in there. Maybe it’s contacting Homeland Security so they can run the image through a facial recognition program. Probably notifies MI-6 and the Mossad as well. Whatever. But during that time, the tableau has completely changed and I find I’ve taken a picture of . . . carpet that desperately needs to be vacuumed.

My son took this pic, wherein Jenny is attempting a submissive attitude. That didn’t last longer than it took her to notice The Wonder Dog had taken possession of her bone.

Here she is taunting him with her massive hunk of knotted rawhide. No, that is not a euphemism. Quince is not allowed to have rawhide treats — he’s too strong. He tears off huge chunks and swallows them whole and then I end up scraping a slimy fetid mess off the carpet in the middle of the night while thinking up horrific tortures to inflict on whoever invented the damn things.

Here they are together, promising to be good if I’ll let them come inside. If you’ve ever wondered, this is exactly what it looks like right before all hell breaks loose.

And here’s Quincy pouting. Wondering when His Favourite Person is coming back to rescue him. Poor baby.

But mostly we had fun and the cat didn’t inflict too much lasting damage on either dog. A little canine therapy, perhaps a few sessions of shock treatment, and they’ll be good as new. And then the kids came back from the beach and I discovered they no longer had any idea how to fend for themselves, given the amount of food I cooked for them and their friends during the rest of the week. Ahem.

My daughter did make the blueberry pie featured in the last blog post. As an early birthday treat for her brother. Who promptly laid claim to the leftovers and said, “You’re not going to eat this, are you mom?” and took it home with him (which was the plan). And then my daughter somehow talked me into staying up past midnight on her last night here to bake Monster Cookies to take with her on the 13-1/2 hour drive home. Honestly? There was very little persuasion involved.

[I mentioned Monster Cookies on twitter and received a request for the recipe. Rather than add it to this already lengthy post, I added a page called "Misc." and put it over there. Hope you enjoy, Adrienne!]

So now my house is quiet again and the dog hair has been vacuumed up, narrowly escaping inclusion on the list of Superfund sites, and the cat has emerged from pissed-off seclusion. I’ve already eaten the handful of cookies allotted for my own personal consumption. Although they were satisfyingly large, they didn’t even come close to filling the empty aching void that opened up again when my daughter left. Given her penchant for spending time in far off places, you’d think I’ve have gotten used to that by now. You’d be wrong.

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