First Few Pages

I drove Jake to work at 4 a.m. Could have gone home after, but the air was sharp with autumn, and out in the world, there was internet and coffee.

I've got everything I need: a coffee, a laptop, revision notes.

Not doing much, except dreaming.

Revisions. That's what Jake and I have made to our lives. I mean, it sounds cheesy. Obvious, and a little painful, that a writer would draw parallels from revision notes to life. But it's almost six and the number of cups of coffee I've had has now outpaced the number of hours of sleep I got. So it makes sense to me at the moment.

Six years ago, when Jake and I started our life together, there was no wise editor to pencil notes in the margins. Of course we had parents and siblings and friends, but they each had separate chapters. Nobody could step back and look at the plot arc, make sense of the characters and warn us of the plot holes.

Six years ago, just as fall began, we stood on a balcony in our small city and looked down on leaves and people.

But this morning feels more like five years ago, the end of our first year together. Already we'd survived two moves, two kittens, one broken-down truck and the public bus system. But now it was autumn again and we lived in a trailer on a hill. The nearest bus stop was a mile away, but a mile and a half if you walked the long way, the graveyard way, which wasn't as scary as the other way. Better silent gravestones than shadows not quite silent enough, following us through the darkness of the bad neighborhood down by the interstate. Better we walk an extra half mile and make it to our destination.

Jake worked at a pretzel place then. And the fall was long, but the winter was longer. We walked the cemetery way in the pitch-black, frosty mornings, me accompanying him because he didn't like me staying in our trailer alone, and I didn't like him walking by himself.

We were punchy, giggly, a little nuts with cold and tired. He had bronchitis and I had a foul mouth and we stood by the road waiting for the bus to top the hill, hoping the driver could see us in the dark. Christmas lights and balloon Santas decorated the path to work. All morning, he made breakfast for people while his stomach growled, while I sat in the aisle eating the free pretzels he snuck me and scraping up change for coffee, writing on the backs of already-filled pages and hoping this writing thing would take us places someday.

Pages turned a little quicker once spring came. And chapter after chapter went by.

The changes came slowly. Something added here. Deleted there. A few changes of a character's name, a few shifts in setting, a few unexpected plot twists. The notes in the margins weren't the guide for the change, but the record of it. A scribbled year on the back of a photo, a crumpled notebook page scattered with pencil marks and pretzel salt. And the taste of autumn air that can always take me back to the opening paragraph.

I've got to admit, this is a convoluted tale. The plot arc doesn't make much sense and the character motivations haven't always been believable. But I love the suspense, and a lot of the prose. And sometimes, on fall mornings, I like to re-read Chapter One.

Launch Party Recap

"Emmett, I'm filming you!" my husband sing-songed, joking around with our four-year-old nephew.

"No you're not!" Emmett giggled ... before promptly flipping backward over the arm of his chair and crashing to the floor.

This was only one of the many exciting events that took place during the LIVVIE OWEN LIVED HERE launch party!

Taylor Books in Charleston, WV, is a wonderful, cozy bookstore. Yesterday, it was packed with people ready to celebrate the release of my new novel. I was touched by how many people came. High school friends. Writing group members. Family, of course. But the coolest thing was when strangers walked up, wanting to talk about, and buy, and read, the book I wrote!



In addition to reading a chapter of LIVVIE OWEN LIVED HERE and signing the books that were purchased, I also collected books for Hanover Public Library in southern West Virginia. They lost much of their children's section in a flood in June. It was wonderful to see people buying cherished children's books for kids I used to teach. I hope to collect many more books for this library, and I'm really grateful to everyone who already donated.

Oh, and don't worry. After his fall, Emmett bounced back up, ready to take on the world. His plan?

"When I'm a grown-up guy, I'm gonna be a 'offer' like you! I'm going to write a scary story about scary pirates! It'll be scary!"

I can't wait until THAT launch party!

It's launch day.

LIVVIE is out there now. :)

LIVVIE OWEN LIVED HERE Book Trailer

It's August! That means LIVVIE OWEN LIVED HERE will be released THIS MONTH!

In honor of August, I have immersed myself in Windows Movie Maker for the weekend and created a book trailer. What fun! I'm going to be setting all the family photos to music now using this program! It's my new favorite hobby and procrastination method!

Anyway, here it is -- the brand new Livvie Owen Lived Here book trailer:

LIVVIE OWEN LIVED HERE

Enjoy!

August, and with it, temptation

It's that time again. August has rolled around and teachers everywhere are getting back into their classrooms after the floor-polishing and wall-painting and building maintenance that takes place in July.

The posts are already starting to pop up on Facebook:

Got into my classroom today.

And

Starting on bulletin boards, ugh.

And

Anybody know of any good math centers? I'm setting up this week.

Three years in a row, I have quit teaching in June. Two of those years, it only lasted till August. When those "Got-into-my-classroom" posts started cropping up on Facebook, I started opening a new tab. Cruising the local district employment websites. Placing a bid just to see if I'd get it.

Always do.

I'm determined this year not to return to public schooling. Last year, I was off my game. Tired. Negative. I did my best by those kids, but my best wasn't as good last year as it was in school years past. I did not leave with a sense of having done well, of having made lasting changes. I left with the sense that we had, all of us, just barely kept our heads above water.

Bad metaphor, actually, given that the town flooded not two weeks after I left it.

I will teach this year, just not in a public school. I will work with children, but I will not have a classroom. This is both good and bad. It's good because I can focus on the needs of each individual child in the program that's offered me work come fall. It's also good because I won't be staying in public education long enough to completely lose my faith in it. But it's bad because ... because ...

Man, I really like having a classroom.

I'm happy with my choices. This is a good move, mental-health-wise. It's a good move, career-wise. It's a good move, interest-wise. So I'll stay strong as my Facebook friends dangle lesson plans and teacher's desks and literacy centers in front of me. I will pour my creative energy into writing instead of materials creation. I will block the district websites from my computer.

But if anybody needs a bulletin board created? I'm your girl.

My odd computer-geek analogy for home

It's kind of like a computer game. The menu screen of the computer game. I have this image in my head of a map, and it's full of areas of the game you can visit, but only certain ones can be active at a time. Some of the places on the map are dormant, and when you mouse over them, they don't light up. You can see them, faintly, just the image, just the outline. But you cannot open them and go inside.

I'm back in a town I first lived in a decade ago. I lived here for six years and left for four, and now here I am again, driving familiar streets, shopping familiar stores. It is startling how little changes when you leave a place for a while. How easy it is to slip back into the routine of living there.

On my way to Kroger, I pass the building that once housed the offices of the job I held at the time. Below that building, in the alley out back, is the first gay bar I ever entered, out and proud, and scared to death, at the age of 20. I remember my sister taking me there for my 21st birthday. I remember watching her dance months later with a boy who would break her heart.

I remember dancing there myself with a girl I barely knew, a girl who is now a man named Jakob, my husband. I mean, who could have predicted that, on a dance floor seven years ago? Who could possibly see where the map would lead and which sections I had yet to unlock?

Kroger has great produce, but their freezer section is lacking. Which means I turn around and head for Wal-Mart. And on the way to Wal-Mart, I pass a bus station that used to make me cry. I pass a balcony I used to stand on at sunset, looking toward the horizon, thinking about the future. I pass a college I used to attend, a house, an apartment, a trailer I used to live in. All of these so vivid, so familiar. But I can only see the outline now. I can't click. Although the memories are so vivid I can taste the oatmeal cookies I used to bake and smell the laundry detergent I used to use, these sections of my life aren't active anymore. They don't light up when I mouse over them.

Just past Wal-Mart is a little yellow house. It isn't mine, but I've got high hopes for it. I can't help but look at it and wonder whether it's on the map. Whether the outline is there, waiting to become active so I can click on it, so I can enter. I can't help but hope for oatmeal cookies in that place, for the homey smell of laundry detergent and a headful of memories I've yet to know.

Once, I walked past a kid in a dance club and half-turned, thought, I'm going to know that person someday. And once, ten years ago, I walked around this city fresh, without knowing a single face, a single building.

It's funny how many times you can walk past your home and not know it.

Want a copy of LIVVIE OWEN LIVED HERE?

Heather Kelly and P.J. Hoover are both offering LIVVIE as a contest prize!


Also, I'm sorry for not blogging lately. I've been busy: