I finished The Blind Side by Michael Lewis (author of The Moneyball and Liar’s Poker- neither of which I’ve read) today and am ashamed to admit that I thought the book was about a blind football player. I know, I know! Very silly of me, but when everyone around me was raving about the movie, I wasn’t paying attention. The story of a homeless black kid adopted by a wealthy white family near Memphis Tennessee is more than a heart-warming, isn’t it nice what they did for that poor boy read- it explains football… no really- it gives you an in depth look at the sport and how it’s changed since New York Giants #56 Lawrence Taylor started playing Left Tackle. LT… the wall of meat…

My love of football began shortly after we moved close to Philly (and the Eagles) and I started teaching at a school for kids who were involved physically and mentally. Many of them would never talk, never talk, and suffered from a variety of health issues. They had complicated wheelchairs to prevent all kinds of medical incidents that could be fatal and the chairs tended to dwarf the children. Every year we attended a Christmas Party sponsored (in part) by the Eagles. The team members waited for our bus to pull up and they lifted those huge bulky chairs out of the bus without using the lifts. They were big men with generous hearts.

After seven years in the private school, we moved to Central NJ (closer to the NY Giants) and I started teaching in a public school. In the early years, my friends at school had a mission of sorts- to see how many bars they could be barred from and I didn’t know so many dirty dives existed in the city. I quit going out with them fairly quickly for one main reason- I couldn’t keep up with their drinking. Two drinks and I’d fall asleep (at the table, at the bar) which meant that I missed the reason we were asked to leave more than once. But once in a while, I’d join them after school for a short while at one of their favorite bars. LT was at the height of his game back then and everyone had LT fever (except me, because I was a die-hard Eagles fan). One night, I ran into LT, literally, and bounced off the wall of meat to the ground. It hurt– a lot! He was a giant and he made the Eagles players I knew seem like puny insects. He laughed. I moaned. I saw LT a couple of times after that because he was hanging out with a friend of mine at the time and he was always warm- solid, but sweet.

Reading The Blind Side helped me put that time into perspective and gave me a new appreciation for the sport… and the man. Not sure how I feel about kids playing it… or college football. Now that we live in Ohio, I’m less than thrilled with college football.

Oh and the Blown Away thing? It’s not about football at all… Saw the COVER of my book tonight for the first time and it is perfect! It isn’t at all what I imagined- it’s better! Can’t wait to share it with you!

The book is completely written, has been for two years at least, and is in the hands of the editor the publishing company hired. But now it’s time to write the dedication for the beginning of the book. At first it seemed like an innocent enough task. I dedicate it to the people who … and that’s when the alarm bells went off in my brain. So, I did what any other modern writer would do, I googled book dedications. What a mistake!

Look at the dedication C.S. Lewis wrote for The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe:

To Lucy Barfield
My Dear Lucy, I wrote this story for you, but when I began it I had not realized that girls grow quicker than books. As a result you are already too old for fairy tales, and by the time it is printed and bound you will be older still. But some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again. You can then take it down from some upper shelf, dust it, and tell me what you think of it. I shall probably be too deaf to hear, and too old to understand, a word you say, but I shall still be
your affectionate Godfather,
C.S. Lewis

Umm… sure…. 

Not that Terry Pratchett helps with his dedication in Guards! Guards!

They may be called the Palace Guard, the City Guard, or the Patrol. Whatever the name, their purpose in any work of heroic fantasy is identical: it is, round Chapter Three (or ten minutes into the film) to rush into the room, attack the hero one at a time, and be slaughtered. No one ever asks them if they wanted to. This book is dedicated to those fine men.

And Will Durant? He steals the show when he writes to his wife in the “Story of Philosophy” to…

Grow strong, my comrade … that you may stand
Unshaken when I fall; that I may know
the shattered fragments of my song will come
at last to finer melody in you;That I may tell my heart that you begin
where passing I leave off, and fathom more.”

Writing the dedication is harder than writing the entire book, I complain to my publisher who laughs at my distress and then agrees. But some how I manage to find the words I need to let a few special people know how special they are- it’s not C.S. Lewis or Terry Pratchett caliber and it’s not at all similiar to Will Durant, but it comes from the heart.

to move stuff!

It started in the main living area as I began to remove everyday toys to make room for the “Christmas toys”.

Games, puzzles, books, Mr. Potato Head, educational DVDs all went into storage on the second floor (which is a big closet with fairly easy access if you don’t trip over all the stuff on the floor where I am currently stashing things).

Thanksgiving tablecloths went down the laundry shoot, but the Christmas tablecloths and towels are on the second floor… in the dressers… so up the stairs again.

Sit down, check email, send a note to my publisher telling her I heard from my editor, forget why I’m there, take down the Christmas DVDs and CDs.

I want to pull out the manger sets (but I have seven or eight- at least- and I’m not sure which ones I want first) out of the basement, but first, I need to clear off the mantel and the display unit, which means a trip to the basement for a box, but the box is still full from the trip to New Jersey this month.

Empty the box, carry it upstairs, carefully pack up all the collectibles, and dust.

Have I dusted since last December? I’m sure I have, but you can’t prove it.

Back down to the basement.

Do I unload the box and try to find safe storage for these things or keep them in the box until January or February?

Can’t decide, but am chilly.

All my winder clothing is still in the basement.

Up to the main floor and stare at my closet. I absolutely can’t cram another thing in there until I take out all the summer and spring clothes. The thought makes me tired.

I look around… tables are naked, but not much else is done. I can hear the conversation at dinner tonight.

“What’d you do today?”

“I walked up and down stairs sometimes carrying arm loads of things.”

Hmm…. remember in ABQ when we had a one floor ranch and all the toys were mine and not a three year olds?

I haven’t started decorating for Christmas yet and I’m not sure I can manage to climb another set of stairs… except… where are those tablecloths again?

Newark Mayor Cory Booker is going to try living on a food stamps budget for a week- which is a total of $4.44 a day… could you do that? What do you think you’d have to sacrifice?

When our kid was three months old, I applied for food stamps. We were so far below poverty level that the woman doing the intake asked how we were surviving and gave us emergency food stamps. By the time the month was over, we had new (low-paying) jobs and didn’t apply for any more food stamps. We felt that we could make it alone (although we kept WIC- even if it was inconvenient). We had so much food that month we were on food stamps- more than we’d had the whole year and half that we’d been married. I stocked up on the essentials- rice, flour, sugar, jello, canned vegetables and fruit- and had enough left over to freeze cheaper cuts of meat. WIC gave us milk, eggs, cereal, and cheese for the month so we felt like we had plenty. We stretched everything. One week we got seven meals out of one little chicken. Seven! I never did that again and by the time we ate the last of it, there was very little chicken left.

You don’t eat healthily on that little though. Fresh fruits and vegetables are too pricey and a rare treat. Salads take too much of your available money and don’t stretch or last. Starch is cheap and a staple (as well as filling). Spices are expensive and if you can find cheap knock-off brands, you buy them knowing the flavor won’t be intense. Peanut butter is worth the money, but bread is a staple you can’t always afford and making it from scratch requires yeast (another expensive little extra). You learn to buy everything on sale, or a poor quality (like cheap bags of beans that you have to pick over carefully).

Mayor Booker will have a hard time eating on $4.44 a day because he won’t be able to stock up on things like ketscup, mayo, and mustard and will have to pretend that his kitchen is bare. I’m sure he’ll resort to eating ramen (24 packs of ramen= $2.00). If you add some canned veggies and tiny silvers of chicken, it is tasty (high in sodium) and filling. And I’m sure the Mayor won’t have time to cook from scratch so he better splurge on peanutbutter and bread (and maybe some jelly- but that’s optional!)

I’m glad I don’t have to live so frugally any more and that we can afford fresh vegetables and fruits. But there is a huge part of our population that could use some help this holiday season so if you have a little extra, donate to your favorite food pantry. It may make a difference to some family on the edge!

The three year old is positive that tomorrow is the day we tell people thank you and I’m not about to enlighten her or change her wording. She also thinks we eat corn dogs and pie (one of which is on the menu).

There’s so much to be thankful for and it nearly feels ungracious to list them all when so many people are hurting. This has been the year that I’ve put my writing in second place as my time with child went from one day a week to three. Writing during nap time is a skill I’m beginning to learn (just as she’s outgrowing). My dad asked recently if it was a sacrifice having her here so much, but it doesn’t feel like a sacrifice. From the beginning, I assumed it was temporary and looked for ways to enjoy every single moment with her. The time will come when she’s not such a part of my weekly life and my writing schedule will be my own again, but I think I’ll grieve the passage of this special experience.

I didn’t grow up with a gentle childhood and neither did my son (since we were too young, too overworked, too stressed out, too poor, too everything…), but his child is used to a gentle world with talking instead of yelling and very few stern words. She’s rarely needed time-outs and puts herself in one when she realizes she needs it. She has choices, her opinion is respected and valued, and she is listened to. Some might say she’s spoiled, and maybe she is, but she is fun to spend time with. I am very grateful for this opportunity to help create a peaceful world for a special child.

Her parents are amazing people who work long hours and yet try to put this one first. They love sharing her with us and I am intensely happy that we have a relationship built on mutual respect and love. Her mom knows she can tell me her preference about something and that I’ll do it that way, but she trusts me enough that it is rarely needed. What a gift that is!

We are surrounded by people who love the little girl who entered the world barely three years ago. Friends who treat her like she is family, laugh at her silliness, and who participate in her learning. Yesterday a friend came for a couple of hours in the morning to play with the child and to reinforce her Chinese tones. She read a book in Chinese and English, had a tea party with her, and taught her a new number (6) while reinforcing numbers 1 – 5 in Chinese. And our friend is busy (graduating from grad school, finishing up her final papers, planning a December wedding) and yet it was important to her to spend time with our granddaughter.  Other friends drove their three little ones over an hour so they could participate in the newly three year old’s birthday party. Do they know how important that was? I think not- they just did it! How do you say thank you for that kind of giving? Simple words isn’t enough.

We sold the ABQ house this summer after the fire repairs were complete (after nearly four years of paying two mortgages). The men that did the restoration treated our home as if it was their own since we weren’t close enough to supervise the work. They made sure everything we talked about was done correctly or re-done. This was more than simple pride in a job well-done. This was above and beyond. The house was beautiful (the nicest home we’ve ever owned – and didn’t live in) when they finished. My gratitude overflowed.

A woman in my writer’s group got a contract for her book this summer and pushed me to contact her publisher month after month. She didn’t have to do that. She could have said, “Be a snob,” and not brought up the topic again, but she didn’t. Every time we met, she told me how wonderful her publisher was, how her publisher was LOOKING for new writers, and did I have still have the card? Here, take another one! Because of that, my first novel will be out before Christmas. Her generousness enabled me to have a dream come true. I bought her a nice bottle of wine, but she deserved a vineyard.

So…. Happy Thank You Day Tomorrow. May there be people in your life who deserve more than a few words, but who will smile when you tell them “Thank You!”.

For the last two weeks, I’ve been waiting for the edits on Panda Girl from the editor the publisher assigned me. A total stranger was reading my baby. What if she didn’t like it? What if she thought it was horribly written? When I finally saw the email from her, it was difficult to open it.

And then it hit me…. come December 3rd, Panda Girl is no longer mine. She will belong to a world of strangers, all bringing their own opinions, views, backgrounds, insights, and reactions to her. Some will love her, some will hate  her, and some will go “eh- no bit deal”.

I’m having a bit of hard time letting go and am praying the critics aren’t too cruel, but the reality is that we have become a much more vicious world. We say hurtful things about other people’s work all the time. We hate a movie and we trash it- not just to friends, but online in forums and in blogs. Same goes for books, music, and art. All creative work has to undergo the ritual of human introspection once it’s released to the world. What can I say?

I’m a bit anxious here… ok… a lot anxious…

So anxious that I forgot to tell you that you’ll be able to download a copy of Panda Girl on Dec. 3rd from Amazon and in a few months you can get it for your Nook and then… IN PAPERBACK! Panda Girl is the newest book published by Wordbranch publishing! How cool is that?

Yesterday we celebrated Diwali in the kitchen sink. I dug out mostly used golden tea light candles and she found a small copper bell from India on a shelf where it’d been long forgotten. We pushed a chair up to the kitchen sink, dropped in blue bath tablets, and floated the lit candles in the Ganges River. I hesitated about lighting them (and the whole playing with fire thing but I was right next to her and she knew we were doing something special and unique). She rang the bell and shouted “Happy Diwali” before blowing them out and repeating the experience two more times. We talked about how Diwali was a Hindu holiday and how it came from India (which she knows about from her globe and her parents love of Indian food). It is the beginning of our exploring festivals of light this season, but I am hoping it is more than floating candles in a kitchen sink.

I am hoping it is the beginning of a love of all kinds of culture and experiences; a place where she can find more in common with people who are “different” from her and can give her a foundation for understanding that people are respected for what they believe and think even if it’s different from what you believe and think.

We have been playing with culture since she was a baby. She can count to five in Chinese, Spanish, English, and Japanese. We are working on learning French and I’m searching for a bit of Russian to teach her. Maps and globes are a critical part of her life already thanks to her Mom’s love of them.

She loves language and word play but Chinese is still her first love. It helps that we have adult friends who speak Chinese and make an effort to read Chinese books to her when they visit and play with her. When she heard a friend’s Taiwanese parents were coming in December, she asked, “Does Angela’s mommy speak Taiwanese? No,” she self-corrected. “Chinese. Does Angela’s mommy and daddy speak Chinese?” I was impressed because this summer she didn’t know about adding -ese to the end of a language’s name and wasn’t sure how to say she could count in Japanese so to be able to guess that people from Taiwan would speak Taiwanese is a nice jump.

“They speak both even though Angela doesn’t speak much Taiwanese.” She nodded seriously and then asked for her Chinese DVD (as if to brush up!).

At some point, we’ll meet YeYe for lunch with his coworkers from around the world so that she has faces to go with her languages. Knowing real people who speak the language makes it worth the effort. She learned to count in Japanese this summer while visiting with a Japanese friend and his wife.

Her knowledge is incomplete- she doesn’t know the stories behind Diwali, or that there are many ways to count objects in Japanese, or that Chinese has many dialects to learn, or… the list of things she doesn’t know is endless, but she won’t be three until Sunday. She’s allowed to have a child’s understanding of complex things. She’s learning faster than we can teach her and she is beginning to apply one set of knowledge to a new setting (so there will be a ton of things she gets wrong in the near future!). Yet, I think she knows the important things- saying sorry when you hurt someone, sitting and thinking when you make a mistake on purpose so that you won’t do that again (she puts herself in time out and can tell you what she’s thinking about), loving people for who they are, and letting people know that you are here and have an opinion.

I wasn’t going to write about the girl today, but the things I’m learning from my time with her are things I don’t want to forget… so they are here! Sorry! And Happy Diwali to my friends who celebrate… and to those who don’t… Happy Day to  you… may you find joy and excitement in the simple things of life- a sink full of water, a few candles, and an old bell.

When I picked up the almost 3 year old at her dad’s work this am, she was covered in green dots- because she was a green spotted cat. Most days, it’d be something I could enjoy all day, but we had an appointment for Christmas pictures this morning. After a bath and carefully putting two bows in her hair and twirling the ends around my fingers, she approved the dress and picked out red shoes with flowers over shiny black ones. It was a close call. The dress had layers with a white sweater over the short sleeves and was black, white, and red. More sophisticated than the usual holiday outfit, but it was soft and not scratchy and perfect for her with the little ladybug buttons on the bows on the waist. She picked up her stretchy almost life-like lizard named Message to accompany her in the pictures and we were ready. The photographer told me the shoot would take 15 minutes, then we’d have 15 minutes to walk the store while she prepared our pictures. 45 minutes top… which is about right for a not quite 3 year old who is all dressed up and ready for a dance party.

But this thing happened… this thing that happens whenever someone new meets her. The photographer couldn’t quit posing and taking shot after shot of the child who worked hard at following all the posing directions even when she didn’t understand them. Over an hour later, she regretfully quit, feeling like the next picture would be the perfect one, the one that captured that illusiveness of her spirit, that thing you see right before you press the shutter. The girl was starving so we went for sandwiches. A little boy couldn’t take his eyes off her. “What’s he saying,” she asked. “Is he saying I’m pretty?”

“Sure,” I said without hesitation, because she is looking beautiful even with orange Cheetos cheese on her cheeks. She can wear anything and look priceless.

After a long nap, she woke up saying, “That was a hard adventure today, NiNi.” She told the same thing to YeYe when he asked her about her day. When he questioned her, she tried to explain how hard it was to sit still, smile, and not move after the photographer put you in a position. Her favorite pictures are the ones the photographer took when she was dancing. For her, the whole experience was work- fun, but work. She is willing to do it again and the pictures came out beautiful, natural and sweet, just like her. When we looked at them on the big TV set, she wasn’t interested in seeing them, more content to play with her animals and pretend they were eating ants. “All done pictures,” she finally said as the slideshow went around again.

It’s interesting to see life through her eyes. This wasn’t a simple adventure that ended up with Christmas presents for people she loved, but a gift that took a lot of hard work. They won’t understand that when they get the pictures in the mail. They’ll see a very cute child and think “Aww”. I am truly privileged to have shared the adventure from the beginning bath to the final product.