Come Back My Love

Something very wrong has happened to my dreams. I never would’ve expected this, not in a million years.

First a little background.

I might not know what African tribe I descended from, but I do know I come from a long line of horny people on my father’s side. I’m not saying I was a witness and certainly not a victim; I was just a nosy kid and I heard things–okay? I was interested in most things sexual, albeit on mostly an intellectual level, during my formative years. I made it my business to be around when the stories were being told. I wanted to know exactly how things--fit.

I was the girl who checked out the Kinsey Reports, both of them.* This was no small feat for a twelve year old because these tomes were kept behind the checkout counter and they had to be requested and signed out. And my aunt worked at the library and she talked to my mother at least twice a day. In case you never read the Kinsey reports, they were about as exciting as the Oxford Dictionary, but I scanned each volume carefully. I don’t know if my aunt ever found out that I borrowed them. I can’t imagine something happening at that library that my aunt didn’t know. Reading was scared in my household and there was very little censorship. My father read everything he touched and he believed if you were old enough to understand it, read it and “we’ll talk about it later.” Looking back on it now, I think my aunt probably told my parents and they decided it okay for me to read them because I probably wouldn’t understand most of it. They were right.

So you see the fact that many of my dreams over the years had a sexual component was a given. It was in the DNA. That has changed. These dreams are slowly changing from sexual to action/adventure. I still wake up exhausted, but it’s a different kind of exhaustion. The movie star who was once my dream lover has become my sidekick. We spend our nights together now fighting crime. It’s enough to make a sexual being sick. I want him back! In my bed, on the beach, in the private airplane and especially in that limousine. And I want him to leave that sword he’s been carrying around lately at home! I’m not that old yet–am I?


*Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948) and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female (1953)

No, Guns Do Kill People

I watch and I enjoy The View, it. The women remind me of my weekly writers critique group where we evaluate world events before we read our new chapters. I don’t always agree with Rosie O Donnell, but I don’t always agree with myself. There’s plenty of things I’ve said and written about in the past and I’ve since changed my mind. I reserve that right, God isn’t finished with me.

Today on the View I felt Rosie’s pain as she said we will never get gun control in this country, the gun lobbies are just too powerful. Rosie loves children, I can tell–it takes one to know one. She openly speaks about the depression she fell into after Columbine. I understand, the same thing happened to me. It wasn’t the first time either. I was very young during Kent State, but I believe I suffered my first depression then. I’m not using depression to mean a little sadness. Clinical depression runs in my family and I know what depression means.

I’m hoping Rosie is wrong on this one. Like Joy Behar pointed out, this week we have two amendments that need to be reviewed and revised.

Let’s review. The first amendment prohibits the federal legislature from making laws that establish religion (the "Establishment Clause") or prohibit free exercise of religion (the "Free Exercise Clause"), laws that infringe the freedom of speech, infringe the freedom of the press, limit the right to assemble peaceably, or limit the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Some say the Don Imus incident is a first amendment issue.

The second amendment declares the necessity for "a well regulated militia", and prohibits infringement of "the right of the people to keep and bear arms."

As I write this, it’s the day after the Virginia Tech massacre that left 33 people dead.

As the mother of three children, each of whom left the state to attend college, this tragedy hits close. I feel deeply for those parents who thought the worst thing they had to worry about was the occasional bad grade, the freshmen fifteen (pounds) and constantly warning them to stay out of cars with drunk drivers.

I know what’s coming and I’m going to work this time to avoid the depression that’s lurking in the periphery. The Constitution can be amended, it has been amended 17 times since final ratification of the Bill of Rights in 1791. There is no way the founding fathers envisioned a world of automatic weapons that could mow down so many people in so little time. There were real threats in 1791 that haven’t existed in our world for a long time. If we ever needed them, we don’t need the guns anymore, folks. Study the rest of the world, they don’t have the guns and they don’t have massacres like what we saw yesterday.

Recent courts have already interpreted the second amendment to say that it (the second Amendment) guarantees a collective right of political organizations to form militias, not an individual
right to a firearm. We can and should make that fact clearer with revision.

We must let our representatives know we don’t want the guns in our country anymore. Let’s start today.

Let's Share That Contract

I’ve had a lot of jobs. I guess most people my age and older can say that, but the only job I was trained to do is teach. I’ve taught every grade level from preschool to a freshman psychology class at the University of Michigan. When my children were very young, I was the director of a preschool. In my twenties, I found myself with a little extra time so I used it to teach an adult education class two nights a week.

I started studying writing when I was still an elementary school student. I got my first subscription to Writers Digest when I was twelve. I even worked in the school library where my children went to elementary school before feeling qualified to attempt my first juvenile novel. I guess you could say my vocation is teaching and my passion is writing (and reading).

I say all this to qualify what I’m about to say. I write books for and about children. I read children’s book, I have children, I was trained to teach children and I’ve studied how to write for children. I have picture books that I’ve written so long ago they’ve never made it to my hard drive. No problem, I’ve got more than enough on my hard drive to pay off all the college loans my three children incurred while I was trying to get a contract.

This week while we were all talking, debating, and arguing about Imus, an article in my local paper almost slipped by me without notice; Ex-Spice Girl Geri Halliwell is writing a series of children's books for release next year. After my initial ex-what? Geri-who? I read the article and learned that yet another celebrity, and I used the term celebrity loosely, has “earned” my dream. “Geri Halliwell has landed a six-book publishing deal with Macmillan to chronicle the animated adventures of Ugenia Lavender, a bold and assertive 9-year-old girl who balances everyday school life with solving mysteries and working her way out of fantastic situations.”

A six book deal? Yes, a six book deal.

It’s hard enough for any author to get a book contract without sacrificing the children’s book category to celebrities. I understand why these celebrities keep getting these deals. Some of them must sell well. Why do they sell? Because they are well-written and useful additions to a young person’s life? Probably not, although I will admit that I have read a few that weren’t terrible and one or two that were well done. They sell because the celebrities can get interviews that other writers can’t. Interviews translate to sales.

I propose a solution. I am volunteering myself as a cowriter for celebrities interested in breaking into the apparently lucrative children’s market. You, dear celebrity are free to appear on any or all talk show interviews, schedule book signings at your own discretion and I will stay home and write or “cowrite.” I will split the advance and royalaties with you fifty-fifty. If it was never about the money and you don’t want a split, suit yourself. Also, you’re free to donate your portion to charity.

Let’s start the sign up sheet with me.