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This is an occasional journal about how my life affects my writing and my writing affects my life. This journal is not to be a classic blog, in other words it's not interactive. It will not have photos either. Or links. Nor do I expect to write in it every day. And I don't want to have to moderate the thing.

However, if you read something here that you want to respond to, send me email (janeyolen@aol.com) and I will write back. Please say whether or not you agree to have your email quoted somewhere in "Telling the True." I like getting questions from my readers--whether you are a writer or a book fancier, a teacher, librarian, or child.

Note that the order of the entries is most recent first. Entries from earlier days are archived.

 

August 31, 2005:

I got this oddly wonderful email from Sue, who said: “Did I ever tell you that one of my friends. . .was mistaken for you in a NYC bookstore?  This was about ten years ago.  A woman rushed up to her and started gushing about how much she loved this book and that book.  <She> quickly figured out that this woman was talking about you and told she said she wasn't Jane Yolen.  "Oh, yes.  You are!" It wouldn't be so funny if you two looked anything alike, but we still get a good giggle out of it from time to time.  Not that her mom understands why I sometime greet her with "Look!  It's Jane Yolen!"

I have my own stories like that. Two children walking past Jane Dyer’s house in Northampton were overheard by her daughter. One child said, “Look! That’s Eric Carle’s house.” The other said with great authority, “No it’s not, it’s Jane Yolen’s house.”

And there was the time in a bookstore far from home—NOT at a signing, I quickly add--where I accosted a woman who was standing in the checkout line and was carrying one of my books. “Who are you?” she asked. I smiled. “The author.” She frowned. “Can you prove it?” I tried to tell her what the book was about, what the flap copy about me said, but she assured me I could have read all that. “Show me some identification.” My driver’s license would have been little use. It is in my married name. I finally found an SCBWI card and she looked at it for a long moment. Then she burst out excitedly, “You ARE the author. Will you. . .will you sign my book?”

Ah yes, most authors’ celebrity is small and fleeting. But it means we can go out to dinner and to the movies and get married in relative privacy, unlike real celebrities who are stalked and photographed and shot at and tattled upon and hounded, some even to death. We are as close to anon as someone can get who has millions of copies in print and is beloved by many. Because of course what is important is not the author but the story told. I have related this before, but I love it. A letter I got from one child fan said, “Your stories will live forever. I hope you live to 99 or 100, but who cares.”

I must add, that at least at major library conferences, we children’s books writers have a bit of actual celebrity. Patty MacLachlan likes to tell the story of how, after signing for hours and giving one or two major speeches, she got away to the Ladies Room for a moment, went into a stall, and had just sat down on the toilet seat when a hand with one of her books slipped under the door. “Will you sign. . .?” Now I am not as nice as Patty, and I would have found an easy way to leave my mark on that book forever! But she said sweetly, “Of course,” took out her pen, and scribbled her name.

Book news: Did another 500+ words on ELIJAH, dealt with some problems on the DANCE book with Heidi, managed to match up all the house calendars (not an easy task), and tried to do some work on the website’s travel section but failed. We had moved everything over to my computer, and it seems it needs some David mojo. So maybe in a couple of weeks. . .

Slept all last night without a single spasm. Bananas and calcium—that seems to be the ticket! At least so far.

And of course we watched for far too long and with far too much pain all the tv news reports from the Katrina disaster. Have written out a check for the Red Cross. They didn’t want any clothing yet. No staging area available, alas. I worried not only about all the perfect strangers whose lives have been changed forever, but worried for particular friends as well—like storyteller/children’s book writer Colleen Salley with her wonderful apartment in the Quarter stuffed full of memorabilia and signed children’s books and original children’s book art. Later in the day I heard she is safe, in Hawaii of all places, but whether her lovely apartment is safe is another matter altogether. And I worry, too, about the De Grummond Collection, the second largest collection of papers and artwork from children’s book writers and illustrators like Trina Schart Hyman and hundreds of others. And that led to worrying about all the schools and libraries. How do we deal with those—after we deal with the actual lives of the survivors? Awful to contemplate. Just as the tsunami was awful to contemplate.

What I think is this: We should be living lightly on our planet. Our only planet. But instead we are tearing her apart and she fights back with devastating thoroughness. Only the ones who get hurt are so often the innocents of the land.

August 30, 2005:

Book news: “Read” magazine is going to do a play based on PAY THE PIPER.

I wrote about 750 words on the ELIJAH story. Probably have another 1-2,000 words to go. However, I know the ending. So maybe I should just shut up and get there.

Lots of emails back and forth from friends, relatives, fans, colleagues, and one from a (young?) woman who is trying to continue engaging me in a conversation about the Newsweek interview by calling me names. I have had to, reluctantly, end our dialogue. However, as she has said that I refuse to put anything bad said about me online (I guess she doesn’t count rejection letters and “bitter old fart” letters which I have been quite open about receiving, or when I have made a factual mistake and been called upon it, how I quote the letter and make the change) yet she refuses to give me actual permission to quote her. So I will paraphrase and let you know that she insists she “knows” me by what I have written online and that in fact I am two-faced about only setting out the good stuff.

So I have had enough of this and will no longer try to engage her in a reasonable conversation. Nor will I send her an annual Christmas letter filled with warm, fuzzy family stuff.

Warm fuzzy family stuff: Glen is working hard on landscaping a friend’s house. Maddison has learned to ride her big bike without fear. Alas, dear Betsy has pneumonia but is getting better. The twins look up to the sky and shrug their shoulders and say “Sh..it” but Jason and Joanne insist that is not a swear. The twins are merely remarking about airplanes too high above for visibility that they can’t “See-it.” Alison is becoming a golfer. Adam guesses she will be better than he is in about six months. (Though where she can golf in Minneapolis six months from now is a puzzle to me.)  And Davey. . .I think he’s going to become the family engineer and support us all.

Otherwise, I received three Nigerian scam letters, 2 in email and 1 in real mail.

Am I babbling? After the good news on David’s tumor, of course I am.

 

Interstitial Moment:

Happy dance. The doctor went back and re-evaluated David's latest scans with two different radiologists and they came to the conclusion that the tumor in the sinus has indeed shrunk. Whew. Though we actually knew this from physical evidence, we are relieved that now it is confirmed.

Onward! Excelsior. Sieze the day!

 

August 29, 2005:

David's scans were puzzling, to the doctor as well as us, so he is going to have them read again by a different radiologist.

Book news: this was the kind of day where I felt a lot of movement even when there wasn't any. Sort of like the beginnings of labor.

*CHANUKAH--the editor told my agent that she thought I wasn't working on something (I hadn't been, but now I am!) and so she'd talked to several other authors about writing a Chanukah book; and besides she doesn't want a memoir but a kind of tale. So I sent my agent what I had, along with a complete outline of the rest, to let her decide what I should do with it.

*Sent new book idea, as a companion to APPLESEED (for illustrator Jim Burke) off to the HarperCollins editor whohad turned down our last idea. Jim and my agent loved this one, but HC is always a hard sell.

*Agent spoke to Charlesbridge about getting the rest of my SEA QUEENS monies and it seems there are few more i's to dot and t's to cross.

*Got contracts for audio recording of HOW DO DINOSAURS GET WELL SOON. But since I already did the voice-over for the video, I am wondering why they aren't just using that.

*Agent loves what Jason and I sent on SHAPES and will get it off to the editor ASAP.

The only thing I actually wrote today was the CHANUKAH outline.

Angela deTerlizzi and Cris Martin were over for a raucous dinner, along with our entire crew and a friend of Glendon's besides. Tony was busy at a life drawing class and we couldn't decide whether he was having more fun than we were. I think it might have split along gender lines!

By the way--Heidi, David, and I all want to join the church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. If you haven't seen it yet, you must hurry and go to: http://www.venganza.org/

 

 

August 28, 2005:

Jason left for home on a 10 am plane.

Up to 3300 words on the CHANUKAH book done. About a third of the way there, I think.

Friend Cris Pedregal Martin, who was a graduate student when David was a professor, came for a visit. He considers us his “other parents.” He was our housesitter for two summers when we were in Scotland and he took great care of Phoenix Farm. He kept us laughing for several hours before heading out into the night.

David holding steady.

Only one foot spasm for me last night, so light I could just flex my foot a couple of times to get rid of it, instead of leaping out of bed and walking up and down a bit.

My brother Steve called from Brazil where he lives. I always love to hear from him. Talked to Liane, his stepdaughter, too. Though she’s an old married lady with two kids, I still think of her as the teenager I first knew who came and lived with us for six months.

Quiet day all around.Tomorrow will be different. We go to talk to the doctor about the dreaded scans.

 

August 27, 2005:

Medical alert: For the last two months I have been having severe muscle spasms in both my feet several times a night. I have a doctor's appointment in three weeks. But since the spasms had gotten really bad recently (6-8 times a night) I did a google search fearing something like Parkinsons (which my father had) or MS or something even worse. One of the things I read said that it could indicate a calcium deficiency. So I started taking calcium tablets yesterday--only two, one at lunch, one at dinner--and last night I didn't have a single spasm in either foot. Astonishing! This seemed an actual miracle. Whether it's a placebo effect or it will continue, I will have to see.

David went off on a birding expedition with Jason for about three hours, Jason driving of course. This after David did about an hour of recording around the outside of our house, chasing a Carolina wren from tree to tree till the poor thing just sang to get rid of him, I think. Unfortunately, someone working in our barn was playing music, which ruined the recording. But the fact that he was up and energetic enough to record was wonderful.

On the birding trip David and Jason saw two black vultures, way north of their range, and it was actually the first time David had ever seen them in Massachusetts. He reported it to the Rare Bird Alert. Of course, the trip exhausted him, and he took a long afternoon nap. But it was the good kind of exhaustion.

I took the time they were on their trip to finish reading THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL which I quite enjoyed, especially because it fed into the discussion of plot spoilers in the ChildLit listserve where everyone is being overly uptight about Harry Potter and other book spoilers. I posted there that for those of us who read historical novels, it’s hard to spoil books that way. We aren’t reading for plot, after all. Going in, I knew things were going to go badly for Anne Boleyn!

I also got a little more writing done on the CHANUKAH book—am up to 2200 words- and then tidied up both my actual desk and the computer desktop.

Received a copy of book of Halloween poems edited by Lee Bennett Hopkins with one of my little verses in it. Lee has always been such a good friend—even when he turns down my poetry for his anthologies, as he often does. He also published Heidi’s first poem in another book, while rejecting the two I sent for the same anthology. Someone asked me if that made me jealous, and I said I was delighted, because it proved to Heidi that Lee was picky and didn’t just publish his friends or the children of friends. The actual poetry came first!)

Heidi made a huge dinner, for seven us: David and me, Heidi and her two girls, Jason, and Brandon. We were stuffed! Then Jan came over to chat with Jason and Glendon.

In fact, I was the first one to bed--and hoping that the foot spasm miracle might continue. (PS It did--only one spasm, a light one, the entire night.)

 

August 26, 2005:

Quick note because the house is bursting with people and hardly any writing (or anything else)went on today except chatter and memories and looking at baby pictures (my twin grandbabies are gorgeous).

Two nice bits of book news, though:

1. Asimov's took the "Growing Old Mythic"--how quick was that! (Message to newbies, don't try this at home! It has taken me 40 years of writing, of cultivating relationships with editors, to get to the point that an editor will read something of mine overnight and make a decision, and get back to me the next morning. And as any careful reader of Telling the True has long since noticed, this rarely happens, even to me.)

2. Heidi and I each got copies of the Italian and the Greek editions of the BALLET book. These were her first-ever foreign editions and I loved watching her take them in, stroking the cover. And then--a spasm of anger crossed her face. She noticed what I had not on my quick perusal of the two books. The Italian edition doesn't have illustrator Rebecca Guay's name on the cover. We are both humiliated by this oversight. Yes--it's on the inside, and perhaps this is an Italian tradition for these kind of books. But they used the same jacket illustration and the same jacket format--except for her name. It left a bitter taste in the mouth.

The only other thing to mention is that there is a lively discussion on "Making Light" (the only blog I regularly visit) about the paranoia of the statement that "New writers can never break into publishing." One wonders where the old writers came from in the first place! As I say--about 2/3 down the 100+ message thread, that all writers are new once upon a time. And in fact published authors always complain in the opposite direction: "They are paying more attention to new writers than to me. . . . !"

 

Interstitial Update:

Janet wrote to me: “I got a bit teary over you leaving the attic writing space. Hum. Nostalgia for another writer's writing space? Must be because I'm currently writing in the bedroom -- our study is currently a wild and woolly teen zone!  Let us hungry readers know how your new workspace works out. Heck, give us a bit of romance. Tell us it's beautiful or give the workspace an exotic name.”

Well, Janet, it has no name yet as it is in the music room, where the piano takes pride of place. And if the upstairs writing space is the McDowell Colony, perhaps this should be called Yaddo. Though Yolen’s Yaddo is probably a bit much. Or as the upstairs is also called The Aerie, perhaps this one needs to be named The Warren. Though in nearby S. Deerfield is the Hotel Warren that, because of a malfunctioning sign, has long been called the Hot L Warren. So maybe not. Of course badgers (I love badgers) live underground in Setts. So perhaps I will call it The Sett.

See--that wasn't hard!

I seem to be writing a bit, so the new space is helpful in that way. What I am having to adjust to most is being in the center of the house again. Until Maddison goes off to school and Glendon goes back to college, I am not sure how well this will work out. Remember, I first moved upstairs to get away from teens and company. David is now not only retired, but ill, so he is home a lot. The space is not very private. It overlooks the road instead of overlooking a field where deer and foxes and rabbits cross occasionally. But at least I don't have to climb all those stairs.

Another adjustment: being in the eye of any visitor’s even casual perusal of the house, the Sett needs to be kept neat. And that is a botheration. There’s simply not enough room in it for me to chance being messy. Okay—so maybe that’s also a blessing.

The proof, though, is in the writing. So far the writing consists of 1.a long mythic poem taken by Asimov’s (I haven't even had a moment to tell you that!) and 2. 2000 words on a novella about WW2 and Chanukah. Not enough to know if the Sett’s a success yet. More about this anon.

        

August 25, 2006:

Sometimes the flood gates open.

By this I mean that there were a few faucet drips over the last several days, and suddenly I found myself writing 2000 words on something I hadn’t planned to work on at all. It’s a point-of-purchase Chanukah book, ie. one of those small books (more like a novella) that sits right by the cash register in a bookstore. An impulse buy. A small gift. Two years ago Algonquin asked if I could write one. . .and nothing happened. There was no book in my mind or heart until this thing came along. It will probably run between 5-10,000 words. And Algonquin is probably no longer interested. Goodness knows I should be working on other stuff if the flood gates have actually opened. But this is what I worked on.

And in the middle of the night I had an epiphany plot-wise for DRAGON’S HEART.

So to those folks who say they plan out every inch of their writing lives, I say: Be prepared for serendipity. Seize the moment. Be open to the universes of Story.

Sometimes the magic works. Sometimes the magic still works.

As far as Real Life goes: Glendon got home from her three months on a Hawaiian organic kava farm. Found her last Smith grades—3.5 again on Dean’s List.

David did some walking, a lot of eating.

And Heidi picked up Jason at the airport at midnight.

A good day, all in all.

                          

August 24, 2005:

We had to get up and out early because David had a 10 am Cat scan, and in fact we got there a bit early and they took him ten minutes early. Unlike the MRI, it is a quick thing. But I still got quite a bit read on THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL, which as one friend described it, is “High class smut.” Well, a bit more than that: it is an historical and a bit bodice-rippery. But the times--Elizabethan--dictated that approach. And I like the ambiance, the sense of the claustrophobic court where even a whisper in the wrong ear could get a friend beheaded. Phillippa Gregory gets that exactly right.

Then we had brunch at a favorite Northampton breakfast place, Sylvester’s. Named after Sylvester Graham, who once lived in the house that became the resturant. Who was he? 1794–1851, American reformer and Presbyterian minister, who advocated the use of coarsely ground whole-wheat flour. Graham flour and graham crackers were named after him. As the Wikipedia says: “In 1829 he invented Graham bread, made from unsifted and unbolted flour and free from chemical additives such as alum and chlorine. Graham argued that chemical additives in bread made it unwholesome, and he was correct: both alum and chlorine are now known to be toxic. The use of additives by bakeries was a common practice during the Industrial Revolution to make breadwhiter in color, and more commercially appealing." He also was a bit of a crackpot in other ways, such as giving public lectures on sexuality that made women faint in the aisles. A nutcase, but our own.

Home, and David took a long nap while I went over the DANCE book. The publisher had not only copyedited but rewritten sections. And didn’t even send us either the original mss with changes or email it with the changed portions written in red. So I had to spend an uncomfortable afternoon with both the original and the new mss. side by side on my computer screen, comparing the two word by word. For the most part they did a decent job, with two exceptions. They left out all the materials about the various dance stories which we’d originally included (and which teachers and librarians love) and instead put in really difficult stuff about how to dance the dances. I fixed the former, but the publisher is adamant on having step-by-step instructions for the individual dances, which they plan to illustrate. The problem is, these are very short intros, and do not go into enough detail for anyone (especially children) to really learn the dances, which include Hula, limbo, belly dancing, Scottish reel, waltz, polka and several others. So whole sections of each of the story introductions are basically instructional material which, in my opinion, don’t do what the publisher wants them to do. Sigh. Only how do we explain to reviewers that WE—Heidi and I—did NOT write that stuff? After all, our names are on the book as the authors. However, this is not a winnable battle and we have to let the publisher have her way on this. Some book battles are winnable and some are not. As the song goes, "Know when to hold 'em and know when to fold 'em." Heidi has the next pass and then it goes back to Barefoot with out notes (in red) and our concerns.

Much to my surprise, after struggling with the DANCE book, I found myself writing. It’s been a while, folks. This is my favorite part of the job! What I wrote was a long poem called “Growing Old the Mythic Way” which consists of six short poems about mythic creatures now old—green man, Jack and the giant, the little mermaid, last unicorn, fairies in a ring, and an old troll under a bridge. They moved swiftly from my fingers onto the page and after several revisions—and reading them aloud to David—I sent them off first try to Asimov’s. The concerns, of course, are absolutely current to our situation. But I think I managed both metaphor, distance— and a bit of humor besides.

Brandon was over to spend time with Maddison (who is reading a pirate novel and decided to work on a costume for Halloween early—she plans to be Mary Read.) He stayed for dinner and fixed our front toilet, just in time for a houseful of guests starting tomorrow.Well, not exactly guests, but family. Glendon is coming home after three months away in Hawaii. (She missed her first plane, so we HOPE she’s coming home.) And son Jason is also coming to spend time with his dad.

 

August 23, 2005:

Between my writer's group and David's MRI scan, no writing got done. However, I read the Adele Geras novel ITHIKA, an historical novel with fantastical elements (the Greek gods) about Penelope waiting at home for Odysseus to return, and what happens after he arrives. Geras follows the basic outline of the Homeric plot, but fills in with characters and subplots of her own. The setting feels real and well realized, and I enjoyed how she played around a bit with small characters, and what she did with Penelope, but I kept getting thrown off by the very British slang out of the mouths of the characters. I know what Geras was trying to do--substituting Brit slang for what would invariably have been a slang of the Ithikans, but it didn't entirely work for me. And I am a big Geras fan.

When I read a novel--whether I like it or not--I am so obsessed that I find it hard to do anything else. Which is why, when I am writing, I don't read big or important works. They simply take over my life. I remember as a teen, my brother complaining that I was boring because I was always reading. "You're no fun," he would whine. And indeed, I was no fun--to him. I was in another very complete world, whether it was the world of T. H. White's Arthurian novels or MARJORIE (Godhelpme) MORNINGSTAR, or Edna Ferber (I remember being on a huge Ferber romp then) or Doestoevsky who I discovered in 9th grade. Years later, my son Adam at age 9 told me how much he loved "world" books, meaning McCaffrey and Tolkien. "You can stay there forever," he said with enthusiasm. And I totally understood.

 

August 22, 2005:

This was supposed to be another quiet day, only the doctor’s office called before 9 and wanted to check out David’s rash ASAP. So off we raced after breakfast, and ended up sitting in a small room waiting for the nurse-practitioner an hour and a half. We were not amused. But this was the only glitch so far. And the rash seems to be an allergic reaction to something other than the chemo. Whew!

And of course when we returned, evidently we’d missed the copier man by minutes, so I had to call and leave an abasing message.

There was a begging letter in the mail, wanting a blurb for an enormous mss. which I just cannot bring myself to read. I have made a deal with myself, a kind of promise—no more blurbs until we are out of all this chemo stuff. As well as a reprint offer for my short story, “Birthday Box” for a fine fee. And a small royalty check.

A flurry of emails with artist Jim Burke, as we tried to find a project for the two of us, since the one last week fell through. And then I had another idea, which he loves. So I will do some early research for it later in the week to see if there actually is a picture book there.

Then another flurry of  emails about the project Heidi and I are working on for Judy O. Our agent feels it needs to be “sassier” and we think she is right. Only how to do it. . .damn. I am not feeling particularly sassy these days!

After that, a scheduled library talk in October seems to have fallen through, or is about to fall through, or be pushed back, which is fine with me. But trying to reschedule may be impossible, and it’s all guesswork anyway, depending on David’s health.

A bit of lovely news: SOFT HOUSE is going into a second printing! Already! How surprising, as I have only seen one review—a nice one (but no star) from Kirkus. And the Amazon numbers are abysmal. I am guessing this is one the Walmart/ Costco crowd have bought big on, it being about a happy family with cozy art. If that’s not true, I am beyond explanation.

And in-between all this, I read a charming little novel by Ellen Kindt McKenzie called UNDER THE BRIDGE which was sent to me by my friend David Lenander. It is a middle grade story of a family in trouble and how a bit of fantasy holds them together. It was easy as an adult reader to sort out the puzzle, but I think a child might hold on to the fantasy a bit longer than I did.

 

August 21, 2005:

A quiet day. I managed to do a little bit of work on the website, wrote a little bit on the ELIJAH story and a little bit on a CHANUKAH novella I’d began two years ago that Algonquin had wanted and I never quite got a handle on. My Jewish phase I suppose. Maddison is a little disappointed that I am not working on the FOILED short story but it went dead and I haven’t given it a moment’s more thought or tried to resurrect it. (Not a good Jewish metaphor!)

Got a lovely review of PIPER in the Washington Post Book World, as reported to me by a friend.

Maddison and I did a bit of work choosing books to give to the library—books I don’t need or won’t read or won’t reread, and she wasn’t interested in. Books that I didn’t think appropriate for the other grandkids either. And non-fictional books that are long out of date.

Then I purged several files for the Kerlan—HOBBY and more on HARVEST HOME. 

See—a quiet day.

We watched a golf final. Stop the presses—Tiger Woods won.

Then Jan came over for a long confab with David, and Pat arrived for a swim and dinner which she and Heidi and Maddison concocted. Pat  brought basil, parsley, swiss chard, and other stuff for a pesto concoction and steamed greens. We had pasta and fried green tomatotes and garlic bread--and a jolly time was had by all.

And while I was doing the dishes (she who cooks, does not clean--our one major kitchen rule) I had an epiphany. The things I am working on these days are either very short or easy to put down, so they are not threatening. The idea of immersing myself in a major novel when my day is fraught, seems an impossible undertaking. So I peck here, poke there, and convince myself I am still a writer. And somehow, with all that pecking and poking, I still am!

 

August 20, 2005:

So David still has a rash, meaning more benadryl, but otherwise feels fine.

I worked some at the new desk on ELIJAH (about an hour), on a long letter about the TAKE JOY copyedited mss. (an hour), caught up on much mail, on much website stuff (another couple of hours.) Read newspapers, did two crosswords, laundry.

Maddison and I took chocolate chip cookies out on the porch swing again We were discussing Linda Sue Park’s new novel about mulberries and silkworms. Maddison is hoping that it can be her Book Club choice. She loves the voice, and the way the author breaks in and talks to the characters. But just as we were really getting into it, a neighbor’s lawn-care person started mowing her lawn, on a super-dooper riding mower, and drowned us out. So we had to go inside. The perils of living in the country!

 

Interstitial Moment:

This is a genuine Moment in my writing life. Let me explain. Before I had my attic office, called alternately the Aerie (for Eagle's Nest) and McDowell Colony after the place that never accepted me (long story which I will tell some other time) my writing room was on the first floor, amid built-in bookcases and a desk built to fit my small stature. (I am 5'3.). I was in the very heart of the house and my children could always find me. The window by my desk looks out over the porch and down the road to the Hatfield town center.

 

Fast forward ten or so years. My children are all hulking teens. My father is living with us, has Parkinsons, and has full time, round-the-clock nursing. In order to have some privacy, I construct a hideaway in the attic, far from the teens and their loud music. Far from my father's demands (he can no longer climb stairs, and besides, he has full time nurses round the clock.) I build in bookcases, have a reading sofa, coffee table, two computers. My main desk has a big window that overlooks a field. It is a nineteenth century view.

Fast forward twenty more years. My daughter and her daughters move in with us. She shares my office. I get a new knee and have a bad back. I can not easily climb all those stairs. And they are much to narrow for one of those little elevator seats. Then Heidi has a wonderful idea.

So over the last couple of days, Heidi and Maddison and David when he is feeling up to it, have given me back my old office, which I now share with the piano. My piano. And my complete set of books. And I only have to go up to my attic Aerie once a week or so. When I feel like it.

Yes, I will miss it. I wrote twenty years worth of books up there, including DEVIL'S ARITHMETIC, OWL MOON, the Pit Dragon novels, and the HOW DO DINOSAURS SAY GOODNIGHT? as well as about 150 other books. But I won't miss the 3-5 times daily runs up and down the attic stairs. Or the desk that is too high for me and hurts my back when I type. And as soon as Heidi and her girls move into their own house (some time this winter) it will be quiet again in the house.

Yes, a genuine Moment. Now if I can just keep the place neat. In the attic I could spread out expansively and without care. No one got to see the mess up there. But here. . .


August 19, 2005:

David: A fairly good day. We are on the upswing. A rash on his chest, no other symptoms. Benedryl says the doctor. Otherwise, he did a lot of work, some naps, and a visit from our friend Pat.

My work: a flurry of emails back and forth on a new project suggested by artist Jim Burke. The first editor we tried "didn't get it." So we will move on. Also I finished working on the copyedit of  TAKE JOY. A strange thing. They got my disk and printed it out. Or retyped parts. And some pages were in different fonts. But the headers weren't. It's a mishmash. No ToC, no acknowledgements, no dedication page. Arrrrgh. I have clearly been in the business too long.

However, a lovely thing is happening. Cat, the editor, of the online Greenman Review some time ago asked me to be the review's "Winter Queen" which meant that I wrote a little piece (gratis) for a winter issue. I was delighted. And actually, I am using that piece--slightly edited--to be the final "Interlude" in the new edition of TAKE JOY.

Now Cat is giving me an even greater gift, having asked Zina Lee, an Irish fiddler in Denver with the band Ask My Father, to write a reel in my honor. (She's also a writer, designer, and Irish stepdancer whose company, Aniar Design, specializes in the design, embroidery, and building of Irish stepdancing costumes.) Zina, in turn, asked help from fiddler Will Harmon. The piece is called "The Winter Queen, Jane Yolen's Reel." I am almost faint with anticipation.

Zina wrote this about the reel, and Cat sent it on to me: I thank them both for permission to post this on line. But if you want to use any of it, you have to get permission from Zina herself at: zinaforgmr@yahoo.com.
 
Zina's thoughts on the reel: "Are they just a bunch of notes strung together, or is there actually some kind of meaning to them?

"Irish traditional tunes are, after all, only notes strung together in time and tipped out of an instrument in long complicated strings, aided and abetted by that little push of a beat here, the drag off a beat there.  A bow scratches a triplet outt, the flute flicks out a cut, the piper slams the low D cran out on his knee.   Musos attach stories and memories to the tunes they play: who they learned it from, where and when they learned it, where the person who taught it learned it from.  But really, that's about all there is to it.

"Some of the titles are fun, though:  Hag You Have Killed Me, Put The Knife In and Stick It Again, Drag Her Round The Road, When Sick Is It Tea You Want?, Kitty Got A Clinking, Poor But Happy at 53.  It's so easy to imagine the jokes around the table: "What do you call that one, then?" "Ask My Father!"   Was he saying to ask his father the name of that jig, or is that the name of the jig?  (It's the name of the jig.  At least, it is now.)

"Add to that, many tunes have more than one name.  Kitty Got A Clinking, according to Breandan Breathnach's /Ceol Rince na hEireann/ (Dance Music of Ireland), is also known as Rolling In The Ryegrass, What the Divil Ails Him?, Love Among the Roses -- you might be catching a trend here in the titles -- Boil the Kettle Early, and Punch for the Ladies, among others.   But it's also the name for a totally different reel than the one I know as Rolling in the Ryegrass.  Did someone just mis-remember, far back in the mists of what passes for time?

"Complicate it further: many tunes will also be commonly called by the name of the player who used to play it a lot in any given area.  McCaffrey's is another name for the many-titled tune mentioned above, and you'll often see something like Danny Pearl's Favorite (which is a story for another time) for a tune like The Red-Haired Boy.   Sometimes it'll be called after the name of the person who wrote it: McMahon's, which is also known as The Banshee, that second name being a bit of an insult to the tune by someone slagging Mr. McMahon, I've heard.

"As Ciaran Carson put it in his classic *Last Night's Fun: In and Out of Time with Irish Music*, "the names of tunes are /not/ the tunes: they are tags, referents, snippets of speech which find themselves attached to musical encounters."  Just before he wrote that, he also wrote, "'Last Night's Fun', to take an example, is a name or a label for a tune: it does not describe its musical activity nor impute experience to it.   It is not /about/ frolics revelled in on some particular night, although the name might put you in mind of them.  In other words, the tune, by any other name, would sound as sweet; or as rough, for that matter, depending on who plays it, or what shape they're in."

"So when Cat asked for a new reel to honor one of our Winter Queens, Jane Yolen (one of my favorite authors), and I in my turn asked my friend Will Harmon (who once wrote a reel called Bang Your Frog on the Sofa, by the way) for such a thing, I can only really say that Will, upon hearing the intended title of the reel, The Winter Queen, put his fiddle under his chin and had the first half of a reel fall out from under his fingers.

"And I can say that as I play the tune, all shiny and new, rubbing some comfortable wear into the corners, navigating the tune's twists and little surprises (that F in the B part catches me off guard every time!), I have been thinking of some of Her Majesty's books that I've read; recalling some of the catches and turns in the plots, as I listen to the tune garlanding its way out of my fiddle, finding its own new life and taking its first breaths of fresh air.   As tunes naturally do, this one will morph and grow and change a bit with every playing any player gives it;  as they pass it on to others, it will continue to gather its own life around it.

"And I shall always think fleetingly of Jane Yolen and the enjoyment her books have brought me, whenever I play this tune."
   

I think I shall lie down and do a classic swoon now. You know, I have a block of condos in Holyoke named after me, and a reading room at the Hatfield Elementary School. But this is, somehow, a moment of real faintness. Yes, pun intended. Wow!


 

August 18, 2005:

What a busy day for us. At least busy compared to the last six weeks.

First David and I and Maddison (on her scooter) walked down to get the mail and then went a bit further to sit on the bench we had donated to the town. It has our name on it, so we had a good giggle sitting on it. And then we walked home. Since this is more walking than David has done in quite a while, we were delighted. We passed many other Hatfielders out walking themselves, their dogs, and their partners.   The weather was perfect, warm but with a nice breeze. The houses are all surrounded by lush greenery, though the profusion of spring and summer flowers is mostly past. Folks went by in cars and waved. It felt very. . .old-fashioned small town wonderful.

Then David and Heidi went off to speak with the architect about the plans for the house. Maddison and I delivered the HOUSE/HOUSE materials to the head of the Hatfield Historical Society who is thrilled. Then Maddison and I drove down River Road till we came to the Creameree, a summer stall in a barn with umbrella tables for sitting at while eating your ice cream. She had double scoop Peppermint Stick, and I one scoop chocolate. We also bought two huge chocolate chip cookies, came home, and ate them swinging in our porch swing and talking about all kinds of things that Grandmothers and granddaughters talk about: school, grammar, books we are reading, best friends, how good the cookies are, etc.

When David and Heidi got back, quite satisfied with their architectual decisions, David had a wee kip, Scottish for a nap. And then he and I got dressed nicely and went off to the China Dynasty for a dinner celebration with his colleagues in honor of moving the Center of Computer Based Instructional Technology--CCBIT--(which David had been instrumental in setting up ten years ago) from the Computer Science Department to the Campus Computing Center. David spoke for ten minutes, his voice strong, his wit as sharpas ever. After that, the woman who'd been dean at the time also spoke. David ate 11/2 plates of Chinese food from the buffet. In fact it was like old times, except he is bald.

Of course, no writing got done. But as I wrote to someone who'd been reading my journal: "I still have stories in me, but the NEED to write, that nagging feeling that there is more yet to say, has gone quiet on me. I am finding that occasionally I write as a reflex action. So I have been evaluating that recently. Of course balancing need and desire, balancing desire and reflex--are the signs of a PROFESSIONAL writer. In other words, someone who writes for money as well as passion. But what if passion goes altogether. Ah--that is something I have to think about. Not that I am there yet. Not that you are there yet.   Just a niggling thought."

 

August 17, 2005:

Books: Worked some more on DIMITY--maybe a scant hour. Did a bunch of pre-filing (another scant hour) and discovered stuff I neglected to mention: contracts for PERFECT WIZARD audio, the poem "Kwaku Anansi Walks the Web of the World" for a Datlow/Windling anthology, and for the Quaker reprint of the biography of George Fox, FRIEND. All received within the last couple of weeks. 43 copies of APPLE FOR THE TEACHER arrived. Worked some more on the TAKE JOY copyedited mss. A couple of hours.

Maddison has been making astonishing bead creatures. Heidi made a massive veggie dinner. Talked to both Adam and Jason in the last two days.

David: Out on the porch, Heidi shaved his head as his hair had reached that awful wispy stage. Makes his blue eyes even bluer somehow. And he looks younger. And very hip. We hope the birds grab up the wisps for a second round of nest building. That would be very appropriate.

How are we doing? Laughter remains. Love remains. And we have a great commitment to the future.

 

August 16, 2005:

David was doing well, and working on his birdsongs, so I worked an hour on the website, and then an hour and a half upstairs purging files to be sent to the Kerlan Collection at the University of Minnesota plus purging the HOUSE HOUSE files to give to the Hatfield Historical Society.

When I purge files, I go over everything in the file, keeping only the business stuff--money matters, contracts, copyright notice. But the materials I used in research, notes, various drafts, letters of rejection and acceptance go off to the Kerlan for scholars to pour over (and paw over.) This time I did the 5 or 6 huge files for BRIAR ROSE, and smaller ones for HARVEST HOME and HOUSE HOUSE.

Midday, I received the copyedited manuscript for the revised TAKE JOY. Though I had offered the publisher (Writer's Digest) different titles--Take Joy, Take Two and The Birkenstock Muse--they decided to stick with the original, even though the book now contains 10,000 words more. So that gave me something to work on that didn't take creative effort. But it did take three hours, and I am only a third of the way through it.

In the afternoon, Heidi's friend Brian--one of her best friends from high school--came over for a visit with his two daughters, both a bit younger than Maddison. Brian is a 21-year-veteran of the Navy and works on an aircraft carrier out of Virginia. It is both odd and satisfying seeing Heidi's classmates as reasonable adults with their own families.

I received this astonishing email from Joe, a reader of my journal, detailing a rejection letter he'd received, which said in part: "You're trying too hard to be the new E. B. White, and frankly, if the next envelope contains the first three chapters of 'Stuart Little' from E. B. himself, I'll send those back, too." I am so stunned, I can hardly speak. If anyone has a good riposte for that idiocy, or cares to carry on for a while, I'll be glad to post it on the journal. As for me, I am, as I told Joe, "floored, furious, fuming, and any other f word you can imagine."

 

Interstitial Moment:

This interesting email came from someone who is on an HP fansite. I post it here with her permission and without comment!

Dear Ms. Yolen,

After reading about the whole interview ordeal, I felt compelled to write you and tell you my thoughts. My first exposure to the hoopla was on an HP fansite (the-leaky-cauldron.org.) I'm not sure whether you're aware of it or not. Anyway, they'd posted a rather snide account of the interview. I responded in the comments section several things: that a so-called news site should publish news, not bash authors (respected like you or otherwise), that those who call for class should be classy themselves, and that it was ironic that the site was calling attention to an author while simultaneously claiming that she just wanted attention.

All of my comments were promptly deleted, though inappropriate comments with views supportive of TLC's take were not.

My point is that the response you're getting is hardly balanced. I think a lot more people agree with you/defend reason, but are either silenced like me or aren't so brainwashed and obsessed that they vocalize everything.

I hope that you aren't at all discouraged by immature or mindless emails, views, etc. If you don't have time to respond, don't feel obligated. Thanks for your time and years of writing. And, by the way, I totally agree with you about JKR's style of writing.

Sincerely,

XXXX

 

August 15, 2005:

Early morning I did a number of errands, including lining up a handyman service to help us with tasks we can no longer perform on our own.

Mid-afternoon, I drove David to his doctor's appointment where he answered many questions. Dr. McCann will be setting up new scans to see how the chemo is (or is not) working. Still seems pleased with the progress.

There was a huge--and I mean HUGE--traffic snarl that ran ten miles back. We saw it on the way down to Springfield. So we took a leisurely trip home, which kept us out of the house many hours.

During the late afternoon yesterday, I had had a flurry of emails with Jim Burke, the illustrator of my book about the Wright Brothers--MY BROTHERS FLYING MACHINE--and two upcoming books of mine, APPLESEED and NAMING LIBERTY. He had an idea for a new book, intriguing but not my usual (er--is there a "usual" for me, you ask?) I had sent editor Maria Modugno the results of those conversations as a quasi proposal since she'd been the editor on both the Wright Brothers and Appleseed and had discovered Burke originally. She liked it, asked for an "angle" on the book. I did a bit more research--just online stuff--and found a wonderful idea. Have sent it on to her and to Jim. Jim loves my take on it, but now of course it will be months before HarperCollins makes any kind of decision yeah or nay. So you will notice how skillfully I am NOT mentioning what the subject matter of the book is. Not until it is nailed down!

 

August 14, 2005:

Quiet day. Heidi and Maddison at the Cape. We read, watched tv. David napped. I did more work on the third DIMITY.

And I answered lots more email about the Newsweek interview. One woman insisted everything would be all right if I would just never talk about ("badmouth") HP again. I explained I was not badmouthng, but critiquing. And that critiquing, reviewing, discussing books is part of the whole world of literature. She insisted that if I didn't take her "advice. . ." We agreed in the end to disagree. Though it makes me think that the line between fan and fanatic is sometimes very thin.

 

August 13, 2005:

David doing well.

I spent almost the whole day answering more J. K. Rowling email. I enjoyed the exchanges with adults who were moderate in their criticism and were willing to discuss things. I learned some things; I hope they did, too. I did NOT enjoy children calling me names. But I still answered them in what I hope was the spirit of dialogue.

In-between we watched golf, read Newsweek, and heard from Maddison who'd just been on her first ever whaling trip. The awe and astonishment were still in her voice though they'd been on shore for some time. And we also looked at new pictures of the twins that Joanne sent up for our amusement and delight.

 

 

August 12, 2005:

David's second round of chemo. It went very easily. He slept through a lot of it. I read three People magazines (guilty pleasure); did two crosswords; read the entire issue of a folklore journal, this issue devoted to the 17th century French court and their fairy tale retellings; and began ANANSI BOYS by Neil Gaiman. I also may have solved (in my head, not yet on paper) a major plot point in my ELIJAH story.

Once home and settled, I discovered that the Newsweek online interview had been posted. A several hours interview cut down to two short pages. And of course, all that was important to readers was what I said about Harry Potter! I got a barrage of "You are a bitter old fart" emails from kids who swore never to read my books again. (Though I wonder if any of them ever had read any.)And about a half-dozen letters from other writers and teachers saying, "Thank God someone has finally said the Emperor has no clothes." And several emails from adults who, while they disagreed with me, were willing to engage in a dialogue, which I found encouraging. Actually what I said in the interview (and not all of it got posted) was that Rowling is a strong storyteller, but her prose style is not really very good. She certainly has brought children to reading, but it rarely translates into them reading other fantasy books. I wish she would become a good ambassador for literature, but she repeats her oft quoted assertion in a Time Magazine interview that she didn't know she'd written a fantasy book until after the first book had been published. See http://www.time.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,1083935,00.html (Thanks, Craig, for the link and setting me right on this.) Terry Pratchett's great letter to the London Times takes her to task for that, something I also did some three years ago on the BBC in much the same vein when I first heard her say that. You can findPratchett's letter at http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFriendly/0,,1-1501-1715263,00.html

Oh yes, I may have sold the SHAPES picture book. It is still in that funny limbo we call pub committee but is looking more promising every day. Two other picture books turned down by another publisher, but with an encouraging letter. (We authors live on encouraging rejection letters. How sad is that!)

 

August 11, 2005:

Of course no sooner do I whine in public about NOT writing, than I start to write again. Maybe as penance. Maybe as cattle prod.

I worked some more on those several SHAPE poems. Not only did I redo lines, but rethought whole poems.

I fiddled with the new DIMITY DUCK idea, mostly scrapping what I had written before and starting anew, trying to get it to move more quckly and not just be about a single duck on page after page. That meant dispensing with some images I loved. But things were just too static the way it was written. Of course, now that I have those delicious Sebastien Braun illustrations from the first book in my head, I "see"this book differently. One of the things I adore about working on picture books is that dialogue between the pictures and the words. (Though not between author and illustrator, which rarely happens.) Something greater than each part occurs. A transfiguration.

Friends came to visit in the afternoon--Jack and Andy. He is a colleague of David's from the university and his wife, a great favorite of mine. We chatted, talked about both university matters and ballet, as Andy is head of the Amherst Ballet's board, which was the group that had put on the two storybook ballets that Heidi and I narrated. (Have friends in high places!) They bought along a delicious fresh blueberry cobbler that David and Maddison devoured later.

 

August 10, 2005:

Heidi being off to NYC for an adult couple of days, Brandon moved in with us to wrangle Maddison. That meant they spent the day at the Six Flags Water Park and David and I were on our own.

I actually got to work on a couple of poems for the SHAPE ME A RHYME book, as well as fiddling with the book proposal for Judy O. None of this was major work, of course, but it felt good to get my mind into a low gear. Bottom of the hill stuff, not even slogging up the steep macadam yet. But certainly better than I have done in days. Maybe I needed to whine first. (See yesterday's journal.) All in all, maybe two hours worth of actual work.

I have been reading Joe Haldeman's online journal at Dueling Modems and feeling like a punk kid at this writing game. Joe and wife Gay and friend Judith Clute are doing a biking tour of Scotland and England, going up and down the kind of hills my car labors along--and doing it in the rain. Then at the end of the day, he sits with his laptop and a glass of wine and. . .writes. Now maybe he's telling huge lies about this. He is a storyteller after all. But I believe him. And I, sitting around all day, am a first class wuss. (Though how he got on a bike from Carlisle to Windemere in a day befuddles me. I probably missed a couple of entries there.)

I would like to say that reading Joe's journal has given me the kind of impetus I need to get back to work. But actually, I AM as driven as he as a writer. Just that right now several of my bike chains have slipped off and I haven't the wherewithall to fix them. (See, a metaphor always comes along when you really need it!)

 

August 8-9, 2005:

I wrote the following to my agent:

"This has been a bad couple of months. I have been decidedly NOT writing. When I sit down to write--and I have lots of time since I sit in the tv room with David who isn't going anywhere--I stare at my laptop's screen. I pull up one after another after another projects that I really want to work on, then shut them again. My mind goes as blank as the screen. This is not writer's block, but heart's block. I am just too exhausted by life to care about writing right now. One part of me is furious with the refusal of my mind to cooperate in writing. But some secret other part of me knows that the pressures of life and death issues take precedence. That there is only so much room in the mind and heart.

"This is not like the first time when David was in radiation and I kept myself going with the sonnets. This is more a slow leak in a tire. The tire will keep rolling along for awhile, but will eventually grind to a halt. So I have to find ways to plug the leak. I read a little, I think a lot, and I am sure I will get back to writing. Just not quite yet. Not quite yet."

I didn't say this to her, though:Yes, life goes on. A rejection of some of my Emily sonnets from the UMass Review. A meeting with the Springfield Symphony who want me to narrate their children's concert as they are doing "Firebird." (I hope we can work this out as I love it when various arts can work together.) A bad review of PIPER in PW. (After so many good reviews, I suppose that's okay.) Lots of bills to pay. Some money from my agent for a variety of foreign royalties. We talk some more about the house we are building next door for Heidi and her kids. David had a good visit with his friend and birdsong mentor, Don Kroodsma. Maddison made blueberry pancakes. I had my writers' meeting. Adam and family got home safely, as did the astronauts. Life.

 

 

August 3-7. 2005:

So, off I went to Glasgow, and except for some lumpy bumps into Newark, the trip was fine. Of course I don't sleep on overnight airplanes. And because there was only a movie I'd already seen, I read a trash novel--a Cornwell Scarpetta I'd missed. And that kept me occupied until we landed. (Okay, I probably dozed off here and there, but no real sleep.)

I was met at 7:45 am Glasgow time by the wonderful Yvonne my spirit guide for the con. She maneuvered the back streets (the highway exit right next to the convention hotel was blocked off) like a pro. And by 9 am I was in my room, unpacked, slept for three hours.

When I woke and brushed my teeth, as if by magic, son Adam appeared. He had driven in from St Andrews. A bellman delivered a bottle of wine, compliments of the management. Handing it over, he said, "Do you know Terry Pratchett?" When I said, yes, he beamed. "I just got to deliver a bottle of wine to him." It was an ur "What am I chopped liver?" moment. It passed.

Adam and I went down to our first panel, "The Family Business," which we were supposed to do with Anne McCaffrey and her son, but they never made it in time. With the delightful Sean McMullen moderating (but not at all moderate) we managed to fill the hour. Signed some books. Got some laughs. Checked in at the SFWA suite. Used the computer connection there to get our email.gabbed with friends. Put in an appearance at Opening Ceremonies, piped in by the official bagpiper. And then eventually met Patrick Neilsen Hayden for dinner.

As PNH is Adam's editor, my co-editor on YEARS BEST, and a long time family friend, we had a wonderful meal. Well--the two guys did. Three hours sleep was not enough for me. I fell asleep over my haggis as the two were having a high old time arguing politics. Well, arguing is not quite the right word since they are on the same side. Mutually ranting might better describe it.

The rest of the con went well. Except for the poetry panel, my panels were well attended, my reading reasonably so. I was on a Harry Potter panel with Sharyn November and others. A panel on folktale retellings. One on editing anthologies. A kaffeeklatch where I answered up-close-and-personal questions from fans. I signed a lot of books, gave out a lot of hugs, answered a lot of questions, and found myself weeping silently in front of the boards on which were genuine and genuinely lovely testimonials from friends like Bruce Coville, Susan Shwartz, Tamora Pierce, and others.

The GOH dinner (with Adam as my date) was a lot of fun. I sat next to old friend Alan Lee and pumped him for tidbits about the six years he was in New Zealand working on "Lord of the Rings." Longest conversation we've had since we drove two hours from Chagford to Cornwall to hear a June Tabor concert.

On the way back to the hotel we had an ur Glasgow moment: at a bank's ATM machine, severl; steps up, were two very soused young men. One was busy getting money from the machine, and the other was pissing on his shoes. The other ur moment was when a very drunk man asked Adam for money. "I'm a musician, man," Adam told him. "Oh sorry, sorry, lad," the man said, looking hopefully at me. "I'm a musician's mother," I said. And nodding at us in understanding, he walked away.

I have to admit my favorite part of the con, though, was at a Saturday night party thrown by HarperCollins UK aboard a nearby (within walking distance from the hotel) Tall Ship. The ship was decked out as a pirate ship, the HarperCollins editors wearing pirate gear. They also had party favors for the guests, consisting of fake doubloons, plastic sabers and hand hooks, pirate banadanas. The weather was gorgeous, if a bit on the chill side. At one moment I looked up and saw the skull and crossbones flag flying bravely in the wind. When the cold got too much for us, my HarperCollins editor Stella Paskins, Debbie Turner Harris, and I sat in the poop cabin which, as I explained, was where they served the ordures. It was a mot that made the rounds.

The trip home on Sunday was easy. I found David a great deal of hair lighter, but four pounds heavier. No one missed me at all!

 

 

August 2, 2005:

Many errands, plus an interview with the BBC about being a parttime-based Scottish writer.

Then the arrival of the first copy of the simply scrumptious THIS LITTLE PIGGY (which used to be called TROT TROT TO BOSTON) my collection of lap songs and rhymes for mothers and fathers as they dandle a baby or toddler on the lap. Adam did the music pieces. Will Hillenbrand did the illustrations that are to die for. I did the happy dance.

David overdid it. Running off with his naughty daughter for kraut dogs! One step forward, one step back.

And I am off tomorrow till Sunday to Glasgow, where I am Guest of Honor at the World Science Fiction Convention. A terrific honor which I would have forgone in an instant if David hadn't been at a good place.(Kraut dogs not withstanding.) Heidi and a group of our friends will oversee things. I will see editors, sign books, give (too many) speeches and panel talks, play with my son-the-Booklist-starred-review-author, and come home in time for the next chemo round.

And home to write a roundup in this journal. As my West Virginia in-laws used to say, "God willing and the creek don't rise."

 

August 1, 2005:

Book news: Fiddled a bit more on "Elijah" and did an interview with Newsweek Online. Then we went off to the doctor's.

Health news: The doctor said he was "very encouraged" by the progress made these first 11 days in David's chemo. He smiled, and he is not much of a smiler. We asked if we could be optimistic and he told us, "Yes." So we did a modified happy dance in the driveway of the medical building.

It is amazing how beautiful the drive home was, I felt as if I could see every individual leaf on every single tree. That I could see the veins pulsing with green juice. And when we went to bed at night, I heard the buzzing insects making a lively pulse that beat through the night.