Summer Kinard's Blog, page 23

How I Published

I received a note through my Contact Form from a fellow blogger, Novice Landscapes, asking about the process of publishing my books. Her question saved you all from a long, meandering post wherein I wondered about something everyone else finds obvious, so go give her some click love. Since there are lots of sites online that tell you the basic outline of publishing, I’m going to focus on the parts of the process that I didn’t know ahead of time. (And I LOVE hearing from readers of the blog or my books/articles on other sites. Please send your questions through the form or to summerkinard {at} gmail {dot} com.)

1.) Stop Worrying And Just Write

I have come across a jillion people who have stories to tell that they are cutting off with their own perfectionism and self doubt. I could name names, but instead, I’ll just raise an eyebrow at a lot of my friends. Here’s the secret secret secret about writing: you write for yourself. It absolutely has to be something you believe in and care about. And if it is, then write it down, because there’s no place for judgement and condemnation when you’re working on that kind of energy. You can figure out the audience and market after you’ve written your story.

I loved the elements of the story: reuse, fabrics, lucha libre, home shrines, flowers, interaction with saints. It was easy to tell people about my book! (This is the table I sat up at my launch and other readings.)

2.) Author Platforms

You will get mostly wrong advice about author platforms. Some people spend years with an active platform but no completed manuscripts. First you have to write something. Then listen to yourself and figure out what you really care about. I am writing my third novel now for publication (fourth overall), and I am starting to understand the core of my writing. I write about women of faith navigating complex relationships with the aid of friends and tea. Maybe someday I will be able to write a book where tea is not a big deal, or where a friend or five does not absolutely save the heroine’s day. But probably I’ll use a pen name then, because the pattern in my writing is that deeply thoughtful women learn through faith and relationships.

I started out as a scholar, and thinking carefully or deeply is very important to me. I love people and theology and old fashioned patterns of living. There’s no way I could pull off one of those super cute blogs that we all love reading, where the mom makes fun of herself and mentions underpants a lot. Those are fun, but they aren’t me. (I’m tea party and opera flash mob and ridiculous bedtime story fun.) Takeaway for you? Don’t pretend to be someone you’re not, because no one will listen. It’s dead obvious when someone is faking or totally hiding behind a persona.

3.) I published with a small press, Light Messages.

The reason I published so quickly –which is rare — is because I was talking about my novel casually to friends. I talked about the book a lot because to made me laugh (see above about being genuine). It turned out that a friend of mine from church had recently taken on the position of Senior Editor at Light Messages. The press had previously specialized in partnership printing for academics (well-edited, carefully selected self publishing for authors with a speaking platform) and children’s picture books. I was one of their first few fiction authors! The Light Messages folks have been wonderful to work with, and they are growing in influence in the field. Several books that came after mine received national recognition as book finalists and award winners, and another LM author, Elizabeth Hein, is already getting stellar responses from her book due out this fall.

This may sound like a “who you know” story, but remember what I said about platform. You have to write something you believe in. Then, your enthusiasm and joy will show through to everyone around you, including people you meet at conferences or who are in the industry and can help you.

At the signing table at last year’s Bookmarks festival.

4.) Editing is at least as important as writing.

In my case, Can’t Buy Me Love needed a major rewrite. Its heart was elsewhere than the plot arc in the first draft, and it showed. After the book was basically in shape and I had signed a publishing contract, there was still a lot of work to be done. Editing does not mean proofreading! Though my publisher has an excellent proofreader, she only went through the book after several rounds of revisions. Parts of the plot needed tweaking or sounded too vague or needed more dialogue; some of the love scenes came across as cheesy and needed to be redirected. I recall one line that was realistic to the characters that was not appropriate for the book. We wound up cutting it out altogether rather than rewriting, and the scene worked well.

After a couple of months of back and forth revisions, the copy editor took to the text with a fine toothed comb and found still more spots that needed attention. I tended to slip into too-formal English when my professor character talked, and that sounded unnatural. There were also a few spots where I had left in references to former plot points that had been edited out. And because some of my characters spoke Spanish, we had to contend with my terrible spelling of Spanish phrases.

THEN there was a review copy issued, where a few other spots were found. Still! And finally, the Real Book came out. I want to stress that every book needs to be edited. Not just by the author, not just in revisions before contracting, but several times once the ink is dry on the contract.

I stress the fact that editing is a huge part of the process for two reasons: 1) I have come across friends who have the misguided impression that some people write perfect books that need no editing. That never, ever, ever happens. I know a lot of published authors through writing groups, and they all edit -even the famous ones. Everyone edits. Everyone. 2) If you are not willing to spend a lot of time EDITING – not just proofreading or having your friends say they understand you – then you will not write a book that deserves to be published. You may write a book that you decide to self pub (which is not a bad option in itself), that goes on to sell 100-200 copies to your friends and social network. But it will not be your best work. Great authors who self published work very hard and hire real editors to help them with their stories. You cannot skip this part of the process, even if you love the sound of your own words and voice.

5.) Marketing? What’s that?

I’ll tell all of you aspiring writers right now: Facebook ads are a waste of money. I spent way too much trying to extend my book’s reach through Facebook ads. They were not worth it. Every now and then, I may promote a blog post, but I’ve given up on the idea of reaching anyone through social media ads.

The fact of the matter is, as a writer, I’m a really good listener, but not so great with facades. I love other people. I think every single person I’ve ever met is fascinating – like the 10th and 11th Doctor (hi, Whovians!) fascinating. I write to make sense of things. When it comes to marketing, I may be able to give you a cool pen or some insightful advice, but if you read my books, you’ll see that what I’m really offering is my attention.

Readers have said that my books make them feel like they are part of intimate friendships. My books are not autobiographical, but that feeling is. I write because I care.

Which is really just a way of me saying, you’ll have to read some books and hire someone for specifics for you on the marketing question. All I have figured out about it is that I have to be genuine, that I care about my readers, and that I love conversing with them. I have a great Marketing Guru – Tivi Jones - who has helped me find ways to bring my specific interests forward through articles, and I count on my writer friends and editors to help me do the best work I can. You’ll need your own team to help you with your message.

6.) Reviews.

Once your book is in the wide world, some people may review it. Most of them will not. I sold a little over 2,000 books in Can’t Buy Me Love’s first six months. I received two trade reviews, one major mention in a big source (USA TODAY Happy Ever After pick for Women’s Fiction), and a few blog mentions. Then, over the course of about four months, I received 39  reviews, 11 of which Amazon removed because they were trying to figure out their review policy and decided that the tone suggested the reviewers knew me personally and that was not allowed (It is allowed, but you can’t argue with Amazon). So, I currently have 28 reader reviews up on Amazon, most of which were very positive. And 11 positive reviews from some fellow authors, distant cousins, and old friends that aren’t allowed to be posted, oh, well.

The thing you need to know about reviews is that they are not necessarily about your book. Some people write reviews to make themselves feel superior; some write them because they like to sound smart to themselves (like the ones where a reviewer suggests that the author edit or rewrite the already published book – as though they were grading a term paper instead of reading a published (finished!) book); some reviewers will be absolutely awesome and generous in the way they share their thoughts about your story and its effects. But even great reviews should not be taken personally. I am always grateful to read a good review because the reviewer’s encouragement spreads good will and makes me feel heard. But I know that some really good people in the world may just not resonate with a particular story line.

You can’t do it alone! Some of my local writing connections.

7.) Professional Organizations

This is not a direct part of the publishing process, but if you want to publish, I highly recommend joining professional writers organizations. I am a member two branches of Romance Writers of America, the North Carolina Writer’s Network, and sometimes participant in a local speculative fiction writer’s group that happens to be excellent. I also have a few trusted writer friends to whom I can send trouble passages for advice. I have learned so much about writing from my fellow authors. Unlike some professions, authors are not in competition, really. No writer could fill the needs for even one avid reader, much less millions of them. Perhaps that’s why they are so generous as a group with assistance, advice, and practical guidance. Search online for genre specific groups, or check Meetup for general writers’ groups.

8.) I have been writing since I was 12.

I published my first novel when I was 36. In between winning the Promising Young Writer’s Award in middle school and publishing, I spent years writing and grading advanced academic papers and reading a LOT of books. I also worked on and off on the craft of writing. The main ingredient in publishing is writing, writing, writing. When you become trustworthy to yourself, your inner voice will speak so you can hear it. Then you keep writing till you’ve told the story. Then you tell the next story. (My next novel, Tea and Crumples, will be published by Light Messages in October 2015.)

9.) I’d love to hear from you!

Please comment with specific questions, and I will do my best to answer them. Have you published? Do you have an idea you’d love to write about but don’t know where to start? Let’s talk about it!

The Russians Are Coming…To Tea!

No, she’s not afraid. My daughter watches videos of a Russian iconographer painting images of Christ before she falls asleep at night.

When I was a kid in Texas, we used to take our Bowie knives and dogs and our dads’ old Army canteens out into the woods to run along deer paths and defend the middle of nowhere against the Russians. Because, Wolverines! (If you’re too young or cultured to know what I’m talking about, watch this Youtube trailer of 1984’s Red Dawn. In case you can’t tell, Midwestern high school kids defeat a Russian invasion. Set in the Midwest because Russia wanted more territories with harsh winters, apparently, or because the South was too armed for no reason already.)

I was struck the other day at how differently my children think of Russia and Russians. We have met almost all of our Russian friends through the church, and the rest through music. The children have a vague awareness that Mama sings with Russians sometimes, and they love their Russian friends at church. In fact, on any Sunday morning, one or both of the twins spends a lot of time with our dear friend Elena, who sings to them in Russian. We’re pretty sure they’ll learn to say [good] things from her that we won’t understand.

One of our babies with his Auntie Elena.

When we became Orthodox, we were sponsored by a family with Russian roots. We were drawn in through iconography and music. The iconographer who leads the school in which my husband practices is Russian. Our lives are richer, fuller, warmer, and more beautiful because of the kindness of our Russian friends.

The first time it occurred to me, some months ago, that peace had replaced our once pathological Cold War ideas about Russians, I laughed to my husband in the kitchen. “Hey, Andrew,” I said. I quirked a brow ominously and made claws. “The Russians are Coming! To tea.” We both laughed. We love that our children don’t have crazy ideas about a whole people based on propaganda.

On one hand, times have changed. On the other, there’s still plenty of bad stuff committed by any large, armed nation to make fodder for stereotypes. More than the times, we have changed. Long disciplines of learning to love have sunk in. Praying alongside people of every nationality has taught the hard and tiny parts of our brains that grace comes with every accent and dress and skin tone and language.

The past two weeks have revealed to a lot of us the deep pain of racial divisions in the U.S. in ways we cannot ignore. One of my sons is Michael. I have been haunted by the horror of seeing another mother’s Michael shot down unarmed in the street just because a white cop had been taught to fear black men. I wish times had changed. I wish long habits of prayer and humility had reformed white hearts to love black faces. But that is not always the case. In the United States, Sunday mornings are still the most segregated hours of the week.

But what if you and I start by applying our religious truths to unfamiliar persons? I don’t mean forced conversions or assuming that our way is universal. I mean, what do you practice religiously? Do you work out? Wash your face? Floss? Drink coffee? Have tea? Love mustard? Make the best chili? Garden? Find something you do every day that you consider sacred, whether that is prayer or a ritual of daily life. Then remind yourself that the persons you fear or the persons with whom you are least familiar, share those same loves or ones very like.

There’s a truism in ministry circles that you have to eat together in order to form connections. That’s because it’s hard to dehumanize a man who likes your Grandma’s sweet iced tea or who makes the best biscuits. It’s hard to view black women as exotic and sassy embodiments of white women’s sexual insecurities if you as a white woman remember,”Hey, black women also have to put on lotion. They are also glad, at the end of the day, to take off their uncomfortable shoes [and maybe bras].” When you bathe your little white son’s hair, remember the black boys getting scrubbed in their own tubs, and pray for their safety when you pray for the safety of your children. Remember these things, not to be trite or oversimplistic or Polyana – because just remembering is not going to stop the racial violence – but because these simple patterns in our lives are where we meet God.

As my preaching professor once said, “We are all washed in the same tub.” In the church, we are all washed in the same tub. We are all fed at the same table. We are all dressed from the same set of immaculate hand-me-downs.

But even beyond the life of faith, we have life in common. I had the privilege of speaking over dinner one evening with Bishop Ochola, who works for peace in Northern Uganda where there are child soldiers and devastating war. I asked him if the peace process there had any insights for American religious and racial discords, and how he spoke to people of different or no faiths. He answered simply, “I start by talking about water. We all drink the same water. There is only one water.”

At the time, I wondered if the message was too simple to catch on here. But I had forgotten that I live in the most tolerant city in the United States. I had forgotten that my network of highly educated and gifted friends of all skin tones and nationalities had dulled me to the stark racial divides in most of our country. I had forgotten that my children are strange, not in being color blind, but because they are being taught to believe a story contrary to racism.

So, here we are. There is only one water. If that’s the start of a good thought in you, I’m glad to share it. And if you come into my life, I hope I’ll use a little to make tea.

On Having An Ugly Voice

I was eight the first time I knew my voice was ugly. My cousins and I were playing around with a tape recorder. I filled with shame when I heard the stuffed nose kid speaking my words through the speaker. We all lived with chain smokers, though. We all had ugly voices then.

In junior high and high school, my ugly voice plagued me. Lisa liked to mock the stuffy nose sound. B.J. liked to mock the vibrato that came in so much earlier than most girls’. They did it in front of class. At home, I sang only in the garage. Dogs and drug dealing neighbors don’t have a lot of motivation to critique voices.

I found out I was a writer at the age of twelve. I sang with my ugly voice and wrote with one that made up for the singing. I won awards for both, but I only believed the ones for writing.



In high school, my voice did not fit. It is not a pop music voice; it was never an inside voice. I muddled through, half singing, holding my breath through choir concerts, trying to keep it down, to sound like someone else, like I was supposed to. I stopped writing. The abuse that caged me through childhood broke me when I was fifteen. I didn’t have a voice; I was speaking with my feet. I focused on overachieving so I could go away to school.

A creative writing program offered me a full scholarship. It was ranked third in the nation. It was too close to my abusive family, so I had to pass. I went into debt for thirty years so I could go to school 300 miles from home. It was far enough away that I no longer had a stuffed up nose, but close enough to hear my mother prompt my 5-year-old sister over the phone line, “Ask her why she doesn’t love you any more. Tell her she would come home if she loved you.”

In college, a belligerent choir director reminded me of my dad with his bullying ways. I barely sang. I buried my huge soprano voice in the alto section. I still did not write. I sang a bit, but I could not afford the fees for extra lessons. The mean director policed the halls where the practice rooms were. I would sneak in as late as I could to sing without having to compete with piano students clamoring through the paper thin walls. Sometimes the director would knock on the door, thinking I was one of his pet sopranos. He was always surprised to see me, the alto exile, on the other side of the door. I never welcomed him.

I did some mediocre solo work in churches and oratorios in college, but I felt as though it was by luck instead of talent. I still remembered that my voice was ugly.

When I was 28, I tried to write again, but nothing happened. I could sketch characters but not plots. I was afraid.

I joined a writing group and tried my hand at short stories, which everyone said was the place to start. I wrote bad poetry. I wrote terrible short stories. I stopped. It just wasn’t working. I would write every day and have hardly anything to show for it. I decided to do good works instead, and I committed myself to over 20 hours a week of volunteer work, mostly through my church.

It wasn’t a great place to work for someone who thought her voice was ugly. I didn’t speak up when people slandered me for “taking over a meeting” by talking for 15 of its 90 minutes, or congratulated me on “making posters” when I put in over a thousand hours of work to arrange a weekend conference. But at least at church, I could sing in the choir, rarely even solos. Singing for church turned into my salvation.

One day just before I turned thirty, I was singing a descant that ended on a high B flat. When the reverb came back, I realized that I was singing louder than the pipe organ that accompanied us. Something had changed in my ugly voice. I looked around for a voice teacher and found one who sounded reasonable.

The day I met Katherine was a day my soul started to wake from a long sleep. I came for a trial lesson. We vocalized. I was nervous. She listened to me, heard my story about the B flat, and smiled. “Honey, you can sing anything you want. You have an extraordinary talent.”

“What do you mean?” I asked. I think I cried. “I always thought my voice was ugly.”

“Your voice is huge.”

Katherine went on over the next few months to explain the way of dramatic voices. They are uneven and unpredictable early on, though a skilled teacher can hear the core of the voice well before it becomes ripe. I was then a coloratura, what some people called full lyric, some spinto, some young dramatic. But there was still the unevenness, the feeling I would so often have of my voice getting stuck in my throat.

I was too old to start an opera career. Not old in voice, but too old for the prejudicial opera culture that favors light voices and early starters. My voice wouldn’t even begin to show itself till my mid-30s, I knew, but it was highly unlikely I would ever be granted an audition when it did. I talked to opera professionals who weren’t my teacher. They were grim. You can have a career, or you can have a happy family life, they advised. Not both. I decided to have a family.

But I still sang, and the glorious horizons of songs written for my voice healed me deep. After my second child, a daughter, was born, I found myself growing restless. We moved to a larger home. The restlessness wriggled at the base of my spine. I sang more often to try to assuage it, but it wasn’t music I needed.

One night in September, my son fell asleep in the car on the way to the grocery store. While I waited for him to wake up, I pulled out a notebook and pen from my bag. The light was dim, just the fluorescent glare that filtered in from the store awning, but it was enough to see by. I started writing. Over the next three months, I wrote a novel by hand in notebooks. It had plot holes and inconsistencies, but I wrote it anyway.

The following February, I sat down and typed out what would be the first chapter of my first published novel. “That was weird,” I thought. It had come from nowhere, it seemed, the way music comes when you stop fretting and just sing. A month later, the story came back. I wrote the first draft before I turned 35. It took another several months to edit and polish, but the story came to life. It was a real book.

Between the first and final draft, my dad died. I was with him for his last days. I sang to him most of the time. The last song he heard with his ears was, “Steal Away To Jesus.” My voice was rich and easy and cutting the way only a voice singing high and soft can be. Writing and music and tears had washed the ugly out. I spoke forgiveness to my dad. I sang healing into him, even as his body failed.



That fall, I finished the revisions on the novel and turned it in. My editor loved the new story, and we contracted to publish the following summer. I dedicated the novel to my dad. I kept writing. The next novel took longer, took more singing and healing, but I finished it this spring. It will come out next fall. The soundtrack to the first novel was La Traviata. The soundtrack to the second was Suor Angelica.

I’m working on my next book now. Since my first novel, I’ve lost a pregnancy to miscarriage, borne healthy boy twins, and made it through my first trimester with our expected little girl. These sorrows and joys have changed my singing and deepened my writing. I’m writing the new novel to the soundtrack of Greek liturgical hymns and Puccini arias. Tosca and Turandot are working their way into my voice.

We talk about voice as though it can be taught, but what we really teach is how to weed out what it isn’t. Simplicity is the heart of singing. I could not sing Tosca six years ago, because I tried too hard. Now I am Tosca. I couldn’t write novels six years ago because I didn’t know how to listen and decide. Singing taught me the discipline of trust that allows me to let words come.

When I was in the hell of an ugly voice, I thought that the way people treated me was relevant to my abilities.  I was used to abuse and sadness. I could not sing past the lump in my throat. I could not write and make myself vulnerable to the scorn of people who thought themselves my judges. I thought they were my judges, too, but I was wrong.

When you learn to sing, you stop trying to sound like someone else. You listen and let go of artifice. You find the stability of discipline that we call the open throat, and you trust. When you write, you cut out all the judgmental voices and listen deeply. Then you write what you hear. When you do this well, people notice. They say, “She has a strong voice.” Or they either love or hate your work. Strong voices rarely evoke mediocre responses, though I would not advise a writer to pay much attention to responses. The reason you write is because you are taking the risk of sounding like yourself in words on paper, the way a master singer risks herself to sound like herself in song.

It has been almost thirty years since I found out my voice was ugly. It turns out that my voice was strong. I have lived through ugly, but it didn’t take. I have sung through ugly, but it didn’t keep.

No one was ever long inspired by a soul rising up. It’s when she comes back down, into herself, to say with decision that this is good and to tell out how the world is beautiful in all the reflected glory of God that her words ring out true.

You will fight, young voice, against all the ugly laid on you. But don’t give up in the thick. When you get through, you’ll find you have been saying truth all along. At first you were so quiet you did not even hear yourself. Your voice was as small as the scratch of eyelashes on a pillow wet with tears. One day you’ll surprise yourself by harmonizing with a known arbiter of joy and beauty. It may be a pipe organ or a protester. Maybe an admired teacher will look at you in recognition; maybe someone will smile as if they knew. When that happens, find people who love you even if you don’t know how to love yourself. You’ll know them by the way they say, “O-kay” to your doubts and excuses and get you to move on and make beauty anyway. They’ll hug you or hold your hand or get you tea or just keep coming back even if you have been ridiculous in your frantic search to distinguish yourself from the ugly.

When you find your voice, thank those people. They’ll be at your readings even if the reading is in a bar and they don’t even care for novels. They’ll make you food when you need it, even if you never call and cannot benefit them a jot. Then, take your strong voice and sing or write and live so that someone hears that truth you worked so hard to free.

It calls out “holy” in all things. It’s the hand of blessing that makes art beautiful. It’s the turn of phrase that steps your mind into a clear space where grace seems possible. It’s why roses bother with colors and mamas kiss their babies in the dark when no one is awake but nightmares. This truth will transform you when you tell it.

When you come back down from your fight, you will not be on fire. You will be fire. You will be the flame that shows up truth and love around you. You might even be catching.

But first, you might be ugly.

Early Friday Faith Talk: The Pearl of Great Price

When I was a child, sometimes ends would not meet. We would have to put things in hawk (pawn them). The television would go if things weren’t too bad, the wedding rings would go if they were dire. I had a little ruby ring that was lost to the pawn man. You can pawn things with resale value.

You cannot hawk the pearl of great price. The world cannot and will not understand the Kingdom of God. It is as foreign to them as jewels are to swine. There is no way to convince a mocker that the life of God in Christ in the Church is worthwhile. Its power is not one they appreciate. You cannot control God’s gifts or mass produce them for consumption.

Pat answers travel far because they do not stick to any wound. They do not aid healing. Their uselessness is the reason for their ubiquity.

The pearl, though, how it shines in the darkness. How impossible it is to describe. Artists have mimicked pearls in paint and apt words. But to hold it, to behold it, this gift worth more than all you have – when you see it and reach for it, you know its value.

Stretch out your hand toward the Kingdom, and every strength flows through it. Every foe tries to block it. Every bill comes due. But do not get distracted. This pearl cannot be hawked in exchange for bills or trials. Its worth obliterates them. Foes beware! The pearl comes with guardians of its own to refresh the seeker and rebuff the foe and obstacles.

Perhaps the pearl was given into your tiny hand when you were a baby. Perhaps you cut your teeth on it.

Maybe you found it shining in a box of heirlooms in your youth. It caught your eye, and you worked to make your life a setting for it. Perhaps you are an ornament of grace and joy.

Maybe you saw it in the mud when your eyes were washed out with tears. Maybe it was the only light in the gloaming at the end of a weary day.

Treasure it. Do not worry if it is not understood. Walk with those who stretch their hands/minds/voices, their checkbooks/studies/paintbrushes, their weary limbs and stewpots towards it. For anyone who stretches and reaches out toward that pearl will find it. They will understand though you cannot explain They will reflect its light into your yearning and pull with you in struggle. They will cry with you, “How long?” and rejoice when you hear, “This day.”

They will wrap your stiff fingers around it and call you a light bearer when you make it. They will sing of receiving the light. And when you fall down and drop every good thing in the muck and the crud, they will help you up and wash you and wash the pearl with their compassion until you can see again its worth. And you will see your worth, for you have the pearl. Then, you will not hawk yourself either.

Before We Had Bucket Lists

Seems not that long ago that it was normal to save up for a new couch instead of a vacation. It was exciting to have enough money in the bank to make an extra big dinner for lots of friends. Digging in the garden was more exciting exercise than going somewhere far away to run. But over the past ten years, I’ve noticed a big shift. Now my newsfeeds and emails and reading lists are riddled with “bucket lists.” Ten, or Fifty, or 100 Things to Do Before You Die. Get out there now, because, because, um?

A rich moment.

What are you running from? Do you think you can outrun death faster by visiting the world’s best tacquerias on five continents? Will you live longer if your last night might be in Paris, France, instead of Paris, Texas?

Now, I know there are lots of people who pack out into the wilderness or distant places with friends, and those friendships make life fuller and richer. The stars are brighter on those trails because they are filtered through laughter. If that’s you, you aren’t bucket listing. You’re overflowing your bucket.

Having tea with friends.

If we have to think of our lives as a bucket, why not overflow it with hospitality, small joys, and daily rituals that soothe our deepest selves? Anyone who has had a leaky faucet knows how quickly drips add up. One moment, droip-droip-droip, the next, splashing on the floor. If we focus too much attention on extraordinary experiences, our buckets can run dry for months, years, even. We may get the trips and luxuries we have taught ourselves to crave, but they won’t satisfy us. Our eyes may close for the last time on a completed to-do list, but if those eyes are not wrinkled with love and laughter, it will not have helped us.

Now, that’s laughter.

I think about bucket lists now when I hear Jesus’ question – what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul? We can’t add length to our lives, but we can add breadth and depth. Without a list of expensive things attached to our buckets, we would be more willing to share the goodness of daily life with one another. If we stop thinking about what we have today as scarce resources to be hoarded in service of lists, what might happen? Perhaps we’ll share more. Perhaps our couches, even the old, shabby ones, will comfort friends and children, pets and long sessions reading novels while it rains. Perhaps our plain old kitchen mugs, purchased nowhere more exotic than the local discount store, will hold our friend’s hearts warm while we serve them coffee and tea.

Maybe joy is already on hand.

There’s nothing wrong with vacations and breaks and special occasions. But if we think they are all there is to life, our bucket may not be worth kicking.

What will you do this weekend to fill your bucket?

A suggestion to get you started,

What Calms You Down?

This is the logo I envision for the eponymous tea and stationery store in my book Tea and Crumples (Light Messages Publishers, fall 2015)

Well, it’s official! I have signed the contract to publish Tea and Crumples with Light Messages Publishers in fall 2015. I am so, so happy that this book will see the light of day!

See, Tea and Crumples is not just a book; it’s a life philosophy. So much so that I’ve decided to draw on the combination of writing longhand and taking tea as the theme for my new monthly author newsletter: Finding Balance One Cup At a Time (click bolded words for sign up form!).

I’ll tell you more about the rich storyline of Tea and Crumples as the time for publication draws nearer. For now, I want to talk about the power of simple daily rituals to heal and redirect us. This is a recurring thought in the book and in my life. There’s so much power in taking a few moments to tuck down the edges of one’s feelings around the curves of a richly scented candle or the roundness of a cup of tea.

When my wonderful littles overwhelm me – and let’s face it, with four small children, this happens more often than I’d care to admit – I give myself a Mama Time Out. I light a beeswax candle, put the kettle on, sing a few bars of an aria, take some deep breaths, shake out the arms that had gone numb holding a fussy baby. These small movements put me back on track. My neurons, excited beyond my ability to cope just two minutes before, sit down at the table with me and say, Oh, that’s alright, then. And importantly, because these little rituals are daily, they give me the chance to always start over, whether I think I need it at the time or not. (I always need it.)

So, your turn! What calms you down when your day is just too loud or hot or much? Share in the comments.

 

Something to Read at Coffee Break

 

Mr. Darcy versus The Beast. Check it out.

 

How to Look Great in Lemon and Fuschia

The surprise went great with my coral and magenta pajamas.

This morning, I went from a sleep deprived stay at home mom wearing yoga pants and a nursing tank that did not at all match, to a beautiful Queen of the Fluffies in one fell swoop. All I did was accept a surprise from a three year old girl. It was a velcro hair clip in colors of fuschia and lemon, and it made me both royal and beautiful. Proof that you don’t have to comb your hair to be glam. And that you should always accept gifts from children.

Our Taxes Pay for These Poisons

I’m angry. My state legislature has been bought off and has decided it’s cool to poison our water supply and ruin our environment. This isn’t a conservative idea, though the people supporting fracking in our state will try to say they are conservatives. Nope. Now our tax dollars are going to pay for the state to do mineral testing to make way for fracking companies. {Citizen-Times ARTICLE HERE} You know, because we can afford to make everyone pay for billion dollar industries’ prep work, owing to how we cut funding for mental healthcare {Save Wright School Page} and Medicaid and school funding and teacher’s salaries {WRAL ARTICLE HERE}, teacher’s aids, textbooks, and so many other needed services for citizens in our state, including veterans (which is a whole other thing I’m angry about. We have so many veterans who are being thrown under the truck by the same legislature that tries to pass itself off as pro-military at election times.)

So, before it’s a felony to do so {Bill Moyers ARTICLE HERE), I’m directing you to take note of a few of the chemicals used in fracking, chemicals that will end up in the water supply, in our rivers and lakes and streams, not to mention the natural gas itself that leaks into many wells in fracked areas, leading to flammable tap water {WALB ARTICLE HERE}. For more exhaustive lists, check out this chemical disclosure site {FracFocus ARTICLE HERE} and another from Wikipedia {ARTICLE HERE}.

Some of my least favorite fracking chemicals:

Lead
Acetone
Kerosene
Naphthalene
Methanol
Sorbitol

Usually I would just write about my family and writing here, but my family is threatened right now by a state legislature given over to corporate interests, masquerading as conservatism. I can’t get out to the Moral Monday gatherings this summer, but I can add my voice to those who wish to keep our state healthy and her parks beautiful.

Permanent Worms*

A year before we had children, I visited my mom and stepdad on their small horse farm. We were out in the pasture meeting a foal when my mom looked down at the shin I was scratching.

“That looks like ringworm.”

“What’s ringworm?”

“It’s these worms that burrow into your skin and lay eggs. When the eggs hatch, it makes your skin itch. You get it from cats.”

“What? Ew!” I suppressed my bile and galloped hysterically to my husband, who was guarding my sister against a mean goat.

“Mom says this is ringworm and that I have worm eggs in my leg.”

“No, Summer, ringworm is a fungus. You just put some athlete’s foot spray on it, and it goes away.”

I trotted back to my mom, who was placidly brushing a horse where I’d left her.

“Mom, Andrew says it’s just a skin fungus and will go away with foot spray.”

“Yeah.” She tossed her head authoritatively. “I know.”

Ever since I was able to talk, my grownup relatives have warned me against worms. Eat raw potatoes, get worms. Roll that bread into tiny dough balls and eat it, get worms. Stop sharing drinks with that kid or you’ll get worms. Worms were so prevalent a diagnosis that sometimes they couldn’t help issuing them in dire prognoses, even when they knew better.

Internet medical sites are the same way. You type in that you have a headache and chills; the site suggests making out your last will and testament. Stub your toe too hard and want to know if it’s broken? Put in your symptoms; get diagnosed with bone cancer. A cough is probably a hernia, and more than likely the splinter you can’t quite remove is worms. Permanent worms.

Basically, you are standing in a field with an itchy leg, surrounded by strange horses, and there is no hope of ever going hoseless to church or on a date again. Your hair looks great, your dress fits nice, but below it all, your skin is crawling.

*Or, why I won’t use Doctor Google.