Jennifer Lauck's Blog, page 31

Book Talk: Without a Map by Meredith Hall

Meredith Hall tells of being a sixteen-year-old girl, in 1965, forced to give up a baby and how she lives so much of her remaining life in emotional (and sometimes physical) exile.

She writes: Shunning is supposed to keep bad things from happening in a community. But it doesn't correct the life gone wrong. It can only expose the transgression to a very raw light, use it as a measurement, a warning to others that says, See? That didn't happen in our home. Because we are good. We're better than that. The price I paid seems still to be extreme.

The story begins in 1964 when Hall meets a boy who gets her pregnant. She is the youngest child of a divorced mother who is distracted with a new career and a new lover. The story carries forward through Hall having her son, isolated from the life she once knew and then (post relinquishment) how she attempts to go on as a college student, a wanderer, a mother, a caregiver for her ailing mother and finally a mother in reunion with her relinquished son.

The aspect of this book that haunted most was the relationship between Hall and her mother.

In the prologue and then in the second chapter, Hall decribes the scene where her mother says, "Well, you can't stay here," in response to the pregnancy.

The mother doesn't even hesitate. She doesn't say, "oh, hey, this is complicated," or "whoa, didn't see that coming," and later, she never says, "wow, big mistake with my initial response. What I meant to say is…okay, you are my child, this is a sticky situation, let's figure it out." No, the response is and remains, "Well, you cannot stay here."

Hall writes, My sister will say later, "It was just the times." But this is not true. There was something more, something I should have known, a capacity for this betrayal I should have sensed was coming. I should have prepared myself, kept my feet under me better, not spent a lifetime wondering how this could happen, and, always, wondering at my own lack of worth. I wish I had been able to see my mother—my two mothers—more clearly, to predict her capacity to judge me so fiercely, to withdraw so abruptly her love and protection of me.

Eventually Hall's mother declines due to MS and Hall is able to step over the line that marks the betrayal and take tender care of her for many years. They never speak of the wound between them. Hall writes: And then she is gone. On the bed lies a pure and perfect—sublime—casting of a woman's form, my mother's body. Finally, here is peace, for her and for me. God seems to move in the room, incomprehensible, brutal, embracing.

….There was no atonement. My mother died with our past laced between us, love and its failures, love and its gravity.

It seems absolutely stunning that the sacred covenant of unconditional love for ones own child could be broken and never restored and yet, I must look inward to understand my own reaction. Aren't I also struggling, still, with the fact of my own relinquishment—that impossible decision made by my very own caring mother, who went on to have more children, to keep them close and to nurture them with great love—which resulted in my own lifelong exile from the world and myself? I find myself asking again and again: How could she have abandoned me? Me? Why me?

No answer makes lasting sense to my heart and it seems to be the same for Hall.

[image error] Hall is, in my opinion, a truly exquisite writer. She wholly captures the inclination of mankind at this ruinous time, which has evolved it's social morays to such a degree that it is acceptable to annihilate any mother who has the audacity to become pregnant prior to the arrangement of acceptable conditions, ie: being married, of a certain age and within certain economic conditions. In China, you cannot keep your baby if she is a girl. In Ethiopia, you cannot keep your child because you are starving to death. In many other countries, you cannot keep your baby because you simply do not have enough money for medical care.

And around the world, it goes.

Humans are not in the habit of empowering a mother to keep her children. Rather, we take the children away and exile the mother to her unfortunate situation (which often leads to death). We adopt these children and call them "miracles" and "gifts from God." Don't we wonder about about the results of our actions? What do these morays say about us and our capacity to love and to teach love? What will be our future with a such past?

I hear people say, "adoption is a way of life, it is a historic fact." I would like to note that similar rhetoric circled through conversation during the times of slavery. These are not times to be complacent and make excuses based on what has transpired through history. This is a time to awaken and to take action in a way that reflects our goodness.

Meredith Hall's book is a beat of sanity, during an insane time, primarily because she has been willing to be honest. That she does so with such glorious craft is a testimony indeed.

Countdown to Publication: 41 Days

For those of you who have followed this post, I'm re-running these to coordinate with posts now taking place on Shewrites.com!

Every year, I purchase (for a buck) the "countdown to Christmas calendar" for the kids. For twenty-four days of December they open a door and are rewarded with a tiny piece of waxy chocolate thus getting them that much closer to the BIG day. As I picked up the calendars this year, I thought about my own countdown—not to Christmas—but to the publication of my fourth memoir.

In a perfect world, I would get a sweet little calendar pre-set with doors that read "blurb day," "first pass pages day," "cover decision day," "gone to print day," and "great review day". My calendar would also include extra bonus doors like: "appear on Oprah day", "New York Times Bestseller list day", and "your book gets made to a movie day." Behind every day there would also be a nice wedge of dark chocolate, perhaps laced with orange peel or a touch of lavender. Why not? It's my fantasy calendar, right?

Alas, there is no countdown calendar for authors and Santa won't be showing up on release day with a bag of goodies to reward my year of goodness. This is the real world and a writer has to make her own magic as she counts down those last grueling, exciting, terrifying and agonizing days to release day.

Then along came SheWrites.com and it seems there is some magic in the world afterall! I now have a wondrous opportunity to tell you, in detail, some of the stories of my countdown as a way to help us all become savvier in making the transition from being the creative force who wrote our books to the promotional dynamos who get the word out and make our books a hit!

My fourth memoir, Found: The True Sequel to Blackbird, releases March 1, 2011. This book, long in coming, is an end to an 18-year long journey that began in 1995 and kicked off with the book Blackbird: A Childhood Lost and Found which released in 2000.

I began my memoir writing life wanting to get the answers to some very specific questions. One, I wanted to know who I was and two, I wanted to know who my mother had been. Initially, I thought I had been asking after my adoptive mother, Janet, who had died when I was seven years old and under mysterious circumstances. But in fact, I was searching for much more than I knew. That story is contained in Found and includes a stunning reunion with the woman who gave birth to me and had to relinguish me under heartbreaking conditions.

Back in 2000, when the first book of my memoir series came out, I was published by Simon & Schuster and watched Blackbird take it's spot on Oprah, achieve international sales and land on The New York Times Bestseller List. Blackbird was followed by two not-so-successful sequels, which were "pressure creations," meaning the publisher and my agent were eager to latch on to the success train that was being lead by the engine Blackbird. While these were fine books and I stand behind them, they were not true sequels in the way of Found.

And this is one of the first points about releasing a book verses creating a book. The call to write comes from a deep place in the soul and the soul is—as well all know—timeless. Publishing, marketing, selling and making money—capitalism—is on a deadline and part of a culture that has a very short attention space. As a seeker-of-truth and a writer-of-my-discoveries, I had to straddle the world of the soul and the world of capitalism. It was a messy walk sometimes and I fell down. Hard! My second and third book, Still Waters and Show Me the Way, did not get the attention Blackbird enjoyed and they did not earn back their advances. This meant, when I did finally finish my creative process last year and produced Found, no one in New York was interested. The book was lovely, my agent was told, the writing was "breathtaking" and the story was "stunning" but "Jennifer didn't earn back her advances" and "we cannot take the risk on her again."

How can a writer overcome what might appear to be a terminal blow to her career?

In my own case, the answer was "never say die."

Yes, it was painful to be rejected by New York, especially after having such a stunning run of success, but after crying, moaning and complaining, I decided to toss out the old story and begin setting new goals. I told myself I would get published, period and if I had to do it myself, I would make it happen This "can do" attitude led to a series of synchronistic decisions which included attending the Associated Writing Programs conference in Denver, meeting the editor's of smaller presses and talking until I lost my voice. A few weeks later, a deal was struck with Seal Press and since my book was truly finished, Seal decided to push the book out for a Spring 2011 release. In less than six months, I went from "no hope of ever getting published" to "having a book out in a few months."

This is what is now happening: My agent works to sell foreign rights, Found has been beautifully laid out, made into galleys and has gone out to major American media publications for review. I have met the media rep for Seal and she books speaking events in the Northwest. And on my own, I am setting up events in Florida (for the American Adoption Congress), at Sitka Center on the Oregon Coast and in Minnesota, Pittsburgh, Palm Beach, L.A. and Georgia. Finally, I am writing and submitting for publications around the country.

Over the last few weeks, we have also gathered a solid collection of blurbs from Hope Edelman, Cheryl Strayed, BJ Lifton, Nancy Verrier, Adam Pertman and (soon) Karen Karbo. It must be noted that the Lifton quote came just two weeks before this remarkable woman passed away. I feel both blessed and baffled. How lucky could I be, to have a quote from one of the pioneers in the area of increasing awareness around issues of adoption, and more so now that she is no longer with us.

There are just a few weeks ahead, so many opportunities to fly or fail. As I embark on this remarkable journey—which I am delighted to share with you—I wonder about you my sister-writer. Have you had a time in your own writing life when you fell down and had to pick yourself up? How did that work out?

Fresh Writing: The Newsroom Part I

This story is true, from a long time back and I have to do some research on exact dates...so don't hold me to a damn thing. But it's fresh and now and a beginning.


The backdoor is an industrial gray number with a window that has wire in the glass. I've got a special key that gets me in and after tumbling the lock, I tuck the key back in my purse and walk the long dark hallway past a line of editing suites that are all dark now. The click of my high heels is the only sound.

It's Saturday morning, eight a.m., and the newsroom—as big as a pro basketball court—is twenty empty cubicles and that many desks. In the middle of the massive room, elevated in order to have a view over everyone and everything, is the assignment desk and Ava is already at her post with her frizzy afro poking up all over the place.

"Hey," I say.

"You're late," Ava says without looking up. Her voice is flat.

I reach over the top of the assignment desk with a cup of coffee the way she likes which is Seven Eleven fresh brew, three cream's on the side and two vanilla crullers with sprinkles on top.

"You're welcome," I say.

Ava's milk chocolate face is buried in the morning papers from local to national and behind her the police, fire and emergency medical service scanners, set on low, buzz with that sound that means nothing is going on, at least not yet. Against the wall, the electronic printers hammer out national news from the Associated Press and the United Press International and at her back are three TV's, suspended from the ceiling and set to our station which is ABC and the other two, CBS and NBC.

As the smell of coffee hits her, Ava smiles just the smallest of smiles but she doesn't look up and she doesn't say thanks. Ava isn't that kind of person. She doesn't show she's happy or even pleased but we've got it down, Ava and me. Saturday mornings, I bring her coffee and donuts—every single time—and she's halfway human to me the rest of the day.

I drop my purse on the back of my chair and put my own coffee by the typewriter, an IMB Electric Selectric with an automatic back up correction key. It's the same typewriter everyone else uses—from the weather guy to the sports guys to each anchor woman and man. We all use the same typewriters.

Ava and the news director, a guy named Steve Johnson, are the only one's who use computers and Johnson bitches about his all the time. Too slow. Too complicated. Give him an old fashioned typewriter every day of the week. Johnson is old school and even though I'm just in my twenties, I'm old school too. I prefer a manual typewriter to this stupid electric jobber. With a manual typewriter, you know you're whacking the keys and hammering out a story. The feel of those keys is powerful, active and alive. Staring at a computer screen is like having your soul sucked out your eyes. No thank you. That's what I think.

It's the late eighties. Technology is still a long ways off.

"Anything on the kid?" I ask.

"You haven't read the paper?"

"I read the paper," I say.

"Bullshit," she says. "You haven't read the paper."

"Okay, fine, I haven't read the paper."

I sit hard in my chair, a swivel number that goes up and down with a little handle pump on the left side. I'm less than five feet from where Ava sits and the only lights on in the place are over her and over me. Flood lights which bombs brilliant florescence down on our shoulders.

"Catch," Ava says.

A rolled up Spokesman Review is lobbed over the wall of her desk and drops down in a graceful arc, which I catch one handed. I snap off the rubber band and unroll the paper on my desk. I un-wedge the lid from my cup and the smell of coffee mixes with newsprint.

Front page, there it is. Missing kid. Son of abortion Rights Activist. Blah blah blah.

I already know the whole story. It's my story, which broke yesterday afternoon and we were the first ones on the scene. The kid, a high school senior, disappeared at a place on the little Spokane River called Bowl and Pitcher named for the way the rocks are formed into those shapes. The boy's wallet was found next to his abandoned car and that's all anyone knows.

KXLY (that's us) was on the scene early, got the video and even had an exclusive interview with the cops. Celebration happens when you can kick out breaking news and beat the pack. We did it. Ava at the desk, Allen as my cameraman and me as the reporter and best of all, it was my little victory since I got the tip off from a cop who is my personal source. Norm and I worked together a year ago, on an abduction case, which remains unsolved. When I called, just checking in like I do every week, Norm told me about the missing kid. "It could be another abduction," he said, off the record of course, and that was it. We were out the door.

"There's nothing new here," I say.

"Read," she says, "Jesus. Why don't TV people read?"

"I'm reading. It's a total rehash of last night."

"Go to the inside."

I flip the paper open and follow the story to the smaller print.

While I read Ava sits back from her papers and swivels in her chair—back and forth. She's got the lid off her coffee too and looks up at the ceiling the way she does when she's waiting.

Ava is a beautiful African American woman with wide hips, heavy breasts and strong shoulders. I'd guess she's in her twenties, like me, maybe a few years older. I'm twenty-six. She's probably thirty. But that's all I know. I have no idea where she is from, who her people are or even where she went to school. I have no idea how long Ave has worked at this station or if she has ambition to go anywhere else. I do know there is a resigned, low down quality to her though. Ava is worn out and that seems odd for a woman so young. What's got her down anyway? I'd like to ask except I don't know how and I'm too damn young and too damn serious about other things—like becoming the next Barbara Walters, working in New York or L.A. or maybe even in a war zone somewhere. At twenty six, I've been promoted to this station from the outback of Montana where I worked in a teeny tiny station covering cattle round ups and in this larger market, I'm all high-strung ambition and competitive about just about everything. And defensive. I'm defensive and argumentative and feel like I'm always trying to prove myself. Each exhale is an opportunity to validate my existence, each inhale is a way to try a little harder.

I push out of my chair and go to sit across from her.

"Okay, so the story says there have been tips. People are calling in sightings."

Ava afro shines under the spot light and she adjusts her glasses on her face, nodding like this was the new news she was waiting for me to find for myself.

"It's pretty common to get call in tips and sightings," she says, "it happens."

"Okay, so did we get any?" I say.

"Sure did," she says, smiling and I guess that's the magic question.

Ava swivels around and scoops up a handful of pink paper, notes she's taken in her odd little scrawl of letters and numbers and sure enough, the boy has been spotted along I-90 and out in Sprague which is a farming community west of Spokane.

"That's weird," I say. "These aren't random. I-90 is a pretty straight shot to Sprague."

"See, you're not as dumb as you look."

She's joking but it hurts. I brought the woman coffee and still, she's such a bitch.

"Jesus, Ava, what are you getting at? Just tell me."

"He's probably not an abduction at all," she says, in that droll, I've-got-it-all-figured-out tone of voice. "He's a run-away."

"Well that's good news," I say.

Ava tucks her chin and looks over the top of her wire rim frames. Her dark eyes, milk chocolate too, are bloodshot from how she never sleeps.

She shakes her head at me like I'm hopeless.

"I'm just saying it's good. He could be alive."

"That's not the point, Lauck," Ava says. "A run-away isn't lead news. Run-away isn't national news. No one cares about a run-away."

"Tell his mother that," I mumble under my breath.

Ava says nothing more.

Last year, I covered a story about a woman—a beautiful young woman with a fantastic husband, beautiful home and few horses she liked to ride—she was abducted and never heard from again. One day, she was working at her job as a sight inspector for Bonneville Power and then she was gone. Her vehicle was abandoned, her tools were on the ground and a whole year has passed without a clue as to her whereabouts. Her horses wait, her husband waits, her family waits. Even her co-workers wait and the police can find nothing.

We all know that poor woman is dead. She was stolen in the middle of the night. Gone to some unthinkable fate. I hate being a reporter of that kind of news even though it's exactly that kind of news that leads the show, wins awards and makes a career as a reporter—if you do a good job.

I've done a good job—the best I can and I've been nominated for an award for my stories on that poor woman but it's not an honor for me. Sometimes, I really hate this job. And deep down I just want this kid to be okay.

Ava says I'm too soft hearted to be on the hard news beat. She says I should have stuck to crop reports in Montana. She says there's no way I have the chops to make it to New York, L.A. or even a war zone overseas and deep down, I am afraid she's right. Another part of me—the ambitious part—thinks Ava can go fuck herself because I'm tough too. I can learn how to be like everyone else who works here—hard and uncaring and mean enough to chew metal. I can.

I go back to my desk, reading through the messages and formulate a plan for the day. I'm going to call all these people who sighted kid, go to the scene and video tape the search efforts and then—who knows. We'll see.

Ava says I'll have a cameraman—Allen—in about an hour and I pick up the phone to make my calls.

Book Talk: The Red Book by Carl Jung

[image error] Not everyone is interested in individuation but Carl Gustav Jung was and his work is some of the most interesting you can find on the subject. Jung worked on this book for years and his family kept it from being seen or sold. It was a "private" work although aspects of it were apparently made available to the writer who helped pull together the book Memories, Dreams and Reflections. It seems the writer of that book didn't really "get" what was going on in The Red Book and didn't take advantage of what was being presented in that material. So we all remained in the dark.

Jung's worry was that the contents of his The Red Book, wasn't "professional" or serious enough. This work is basically an accumulation of "active imagination" exercises, where Jung engaged in awake dream states in order to meet all aspects of what he called Personality II, that deep unconscious material that existed in the realm of shadow and at the animus/anima level. His goal, of course, was to meet the ultimate self at the core of being.

As he did this work, he gathered others to a salon format, to make the journey inward with him. He would often show clients and fellow seekers The Red Book, but again, he was uneasy with what he was creating. He felt it wouldn't be understood.

How interesting, the Buddha felt the same thing about his teachings called Dharma. He didn't think people would understand and almost didn't teach it but after great pressure from his followers, he decided to try. Look what we have now.

Jung's work is very interesting to me. I have spent 18 years of my own life meeting all aspects of Personality I, which is the conditioned outer self because I am searching for Self. Of course. What else is there? Fame passes. Beauty is just a bridge. Even money isn't all one hopes...yes, you are more comfortable but you are still in the miserable dark most nights.

I want to know the Self and as enlightened masters in all traditions will tell us, the Self isn't out there...it's in here. In the core of the house that is our being. Jung went there and this book is his map. I want to go and so I am reading this book very carefully. The illustrations and insights are stunning.

This book was a gift, for my birthday and it is huge and amazing. We are so blessed that the book is now available, due to much perserveance of those who follow Jung's work and brought it to the world in published form.

Count Down to Publication VI

So, here we are, in a kind of holding pattern of waiting/waiting/waiting for reviews and feedback from the media on Found. And I've just talked to the last person...who is in my book...about the fact that the book is coming out. My mother. Better to say my birthmother, because she is that and of course, we haven't known each other for many years.

When we reunited, in 2008, I told her I had been writing a memoir that was about this part of my journey and likely would write about our meeting. She was very generous and told me to "just write whatever you want, I trust you."

That comment was made at the rosy beginning of the reunion but of course, as is common with reunions, the process made a hard turn, personalities clashed and old pain surfaced on all our parts. She and I took time apart and didn't speak for almost eighteen months.

During that quiet time, I finished and sold Found and it is coming out in March. Finally, my mom and I have begun a slow re-establishing of relationship. So, suffice it to say, I think it's pretty important for her to consider reading the book. And I respect that she might not want to. I've protected her privacy and the privacy of her other children and I have been very careful with all that went down in order to keep the spotlight on myself. But it's a sticky area.

When you write memoir, you are talking about your own experience and mulching it for meaning. That's the goal of the well-wrought memoir, but in the end, the people you include as part of your journey will have a different perspective. Of course. No one among us sees a situation the same way. We all have different perspectives and viewpoints and will even go to the death insisting that our truth is THE truth. Which is, of course, ludicrous. Ultimate truth is bigger than experiences like meeting someone and having a cup of coffee together and getting every line of dialogue exactly right in the rendering of that meeting.

This is the debate of the memoir writer and what has so many of us so frustrated that we just throw up our hands and say, "forget it, I'll write fiction instead."

Too late.

In my own case, it's too late. I have chosen to write memoir and must take the heat of the debate. I also try to do the best I can to be open but also to be diligent in protecting my art/my truth/my experience and the meaning taken away. That is my work.

After our careful conversation, my birthmother has opted not to read the book and I respect her decision.

Another day closer and I must remind myself that one day, not to far from this day, the book will release and this will all pass away like a wave on the sea. This is the way of the world. All of this is fleeting. All of this will pass.

Fresh Writing: The Stunning Mary Oliver

[image error]
Well, this week has been harried and I've not had a chance to write a fresh story (although one is tick, tick, ticking within). I have had this poem drumming in my head though and so...here it is. This is a photo of Mary Oliver with her dog, the sea out her window. This woman's writing is vital for the soul.






Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours,
and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

from Dream Work by Mary Oliver
published by Atlantic Monthly Press
© Mary Oliver

Book Talk: Women Who Run with the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

I have had this book, in hard copy, since it came out in 1992. That's nineteen years ago. I was twenty eight years old.

At that time, I read it cover to cover, underlined like mad and then set it away. When my second marriage ended, I was forty years old and out the book came again. I focused all my attention on the story The Handless Maiden, as a metaphor for my self imposed and determined time without a husband or a man in my life (I was convinced from a deep soul place that men were wholly distracting me from a larger purpose). While I could barely understand why I was taking to the mountains to meditate and immerse in Tibetan Buddhism, I drew strength from Estes reminding me that there was a time for a man and a time to be without and I carried on being drawn, by a large wild instinct, to land and a practice that were called Tara. After several years of this immersion, man-less but maintaining my work as a mother, I discovered the hidden truth about my soul wounds. Tara, it turned out, was the name my first mother gave me when she gestated me.

Soon after I reunited with my beautiful mother and the rest--well, you'll just have to read Found, when it releases in the spring.

What is still stunning to me is that I had been so anestized by my culture that I had no idea my origianl mother was of the utmost importance to my sense of self, my identity and my understanding of a cloud of perpetual misery that rained whereever I stood.

Estes writes of this wound as part of her conversation around the myth of The Ugly Duckling: One of the least-spoken about oppressions of women's soul lives concerns millions of unmarried mothers or never married mothers throughout the world, including the United States, who, in this century alone, were pressured by cultural mores to hide their condition or their children, or else kill or surrender their offspring...

And...When a mother is forced to choose between the child and the culture, there is something abhorrently cruel and unconsidered about the culture. A culture that requires harm to one's soul in order to follow the culture's proscriptions is a very sick culture indeed. The "culture" can be the one a women live in, but more damning yet, it can be the one she carries around and complies with within her own mind.

Yes. Yes. Indeed yes!

1992











1999














2010









I look back to the young woman in 1993, who held this book before bearing children. I look at the brave soul who left her husband and a very limiting marriage that was stunting all possible evolution due to a larger committment to soul deadening consistency and I look at myself now in 2011. As I read the book and take it in, I can say "My god, I've come a long way."

How have I done it?

How have any of us done it?

This week, I am reading this book very carefully, all over again, and underlining still more. I adore the depth and the storytelling and the examples. Reading Estes' writing is like getting a damn good talking to from the wisest woman you'll ever have to good fortune to speak to.

Last night, I read Chapter Seven titled Joyous Body. I almost skipped it because I wanted to revisit The Handless Maiden. But I didn't and faced a lifelong compulsion surrounding my own loathing of my body. I realized all this crazy Weight Watches crap I'm doing is just starving my beautiful body, bossing it into a kind of odd conformity and creating war out of discontent. What's the matter with me? Why do I buy into this odd culture and it's demand that I look like a twenty year old Olympic athlete or will have no worth?

Estes writes: Destroying a woman's instinctive affiliation with her natural body cheats her of her confidence. It cause her to perseverate about whether she is a good person or not, and bases her self worth on how she looks instead of who she is. It presses her to use up her precious energy worrying about how much food she consumes or the reading on the scale and the tape measure (let me add...the points she adds up via programs like Weight Watchers). It is unthinkable in the instinctive world that a woman should live preoccupied by her appearance in this way.

If she (a woman) is taught to hate her body, how can she love her mother's body that has the same configuration as hers? Her grandmother's body, the bodies of her daughters as well? How can she love the bodies of other women (and men) close to her who have inherited the bodies of their ancestors? To attack a woman thusly destroys her rightful price of affiliate with her own people and robs her of the natural life she feels in her body no matter what height, size, shape she is.

After reading these passages, I went down and made myself dinner (which I hadn't had as I had been busy and also busy dieting!). I ate two lovely beef tacos with cheese and arugala, soft shells drenched in olive oil, drank a glass of blood red wine and then slept the deep sleep of a woman well fed and at peace. I believe I will toss my WW book into the garbage, thank you very much. It's time to start loving my body (and my life) and the way it is shaped (and the mistakes I have made) and stop wasting my life following the culture (as well as my own limiting thoughts about my value). I'd rather follow the truth and the beat of my own heart as well as the call of my own appetites. I guess this book has helped me into the center of what we all crave--which is my own power and my own being.

Thank you, Dr. Estes for your timeless wisdom and your care for women. Women Who Run with the Wolves is an absolute essential.

Count Down to Publication V

What kind of publishing world are we in today?

What does it take to reach readers?

How will a writer reach readers without the infamous hope of getting on Oprah) (SIDE BAR: Now that she's doing this new offshoot of herself, which is baffling to figure out, how many shows are there anyway and where is she now?)

I guess what I'm asking is "what are my promotional alternatives now?"

As I have been prepping myself for the release of Found with Seal Press, March 2011, I am going for the "saturation" approach. This means I am writing and submitting articles and essays like mad. One a week. These are going to spiritual pubs, writerly pubs., parenting pubs and adoption focused pubs.

Second, I am connecting with bloggers and writing for them. For the latter, I hired an intern from St. Mary's High School (a fantastic idea proffered by Karen Karbo).

Third, I am posting regularly to this blog which connects to my Facebook Fan Page as well as SheWrites.com.

Fourth, I have updated my blog, website and created links to my Facebook Fan Page and YouTube (reminder to myself...ask my website designer to play YouTube button on blog).

Fifth, I have joined professional organizations: The International Writing Guild (IWWG), Assoc Writing Programs (AWP), Willamette Writers, American Adoption Congress, Evan B. Donaldson Institute, Adoption Mosaic and Concerned United Birthparents.

Sixth, I write for these pubs (or am writing for them) and I am seeking cooperative relationships where I can.

Seventh, I am teaching for Literary Arts of Portland, Oregon, have two of my own private classes going of about twenty students and am building a Writer in Residence opportunity with a local college (TBA).

Eight, I am booking workshops in various cities (I anticipate six) and am working now with a host in each city to pull together a public reading, a weekend teaching on memoir and a salon style evening. There may also be an opportunity to speak at the local collage.

This is all on my own.

Nine, the publisher, Seal Press is doing their fine work as well, submitting galleys for reviews and article possibilities) and they are creating a three city tour of book store events in Portland, Seattle and SF (I'm doing L.A. but Seal is helping out there too). And they are planning a radio tour as well as a virtual book group type tour.

Slow and steady wins the race, that is my sense.

Ten, I've set a goal. In fact, I've set a lot of goals and I say these goals to myself every single day along with a series of affirmations and visualizations (courtesy of the amazing Jake Gudger. Go see him to ramp your focus up). One of my big goals is to take this book--in a pairing with Blackbird, to the big screen. Video is the place we are all going, apparently and this makes sense when we look at the trends. I personally adore movies and watch them all the time. A well made movie is as good as a great book.

Being very human, not feeling overwhelmed is another goal. While I write this, I'm in bed sick (for the first time in something like five years). Perhaps I'm resting up?

Finally, I have been told to "hire a PR person" and while I appreciate this advice, I did hire a PR person for the book Show Me the Way and I have to ask you this. Did you know I wrote a book called Show Me the Way ? Your answer, if you are honest, is likely, "no." And you don't need to feel bad about that.

I need to feel bad.

I spent $10,000 of my own cash for a PR person and it was the biggest waste of money ever. I will not hire a PR person. I AM A PR PERSON.

My advice to every writer, set your pride aside and get out there and sell your own damn book. It's good for your sense of worth. You'll quickly see how self deprecating you are and even how low your self esteem is. Both are not helpful in the process of reaching the world. People gravitate to the light for a reason. It warms them--body and soul. So shine. Shine your light. That's my goal, each and everyday: Be real & shine.

Fresh Writing: The Assassination of Language

I am writer. This is my craft. The love of words, of language, is what brings me to work each day and has me wander, with creative abandon, over the canvas of the open page. So much can happen with words and the way they are shaped together.

Words can make us cry for what we regret, can send us to the corner bakery to acquire a gooey chocolate chip cookie (or make a batch ourselves) and even escort us to forgive a million sins of humanity. The well wrought story of an orphan child, forced to eat a meal from the gutter, will keep us up into the dark hours of the night in order to discover her fate and then will have us leave our cozy bed in order to cradle our own sleeping child and whisper silent prayers for his or her happiness and well being. Words can slice, devastate, ruin and on the other side, they can make a million promises that the heart wants, perhaps needs, to believe. Words are an alive tapestry with a history that contain layer upon layer of meaning and they point to our evolution as a species—beginning very often in Greek or in Latin and then traveling through countries and time to be more or perhaps less than they were originally intended to be. To know a word, truly know it from the beginning, is to understand others and to know ourselves. Insight can be gleaned by one word spoken or placed just so on the page.

Words. Words. Words.

Like a true New Yorker will talk about her love of Manhattan—I am a wordsmith who can talk forever about my love affair with words, which began in the womb when my sixteen-year-old mother was removed from school and confined to her room for most of her pregnancy. As we traveled together, my mother and me, she focused her attention on books. The epic romance novel, to be exact. Gone with the Wind was a favorite. From that tempestuous love story, my young mother culled the name Tara. She spoke loving words to her swelling stomach. "I love you, little Tara," she said, again and again.

And then there was my father, a boy from the wrong type of family, a "bad" boy who wasn't considered good enough for my mother. His name had been Wright.

Together, their supposed wrong, made me. Tara Wright.

Although I was adopted away and named something else--Jennifer Lauck--I never forgot. Because of my beginnings, it's makes sense I was born with a love of words and books. As soon as I could read, I was a goner. Dr. Suess, Mary Poppins, Oz, fairy tales from The Brother's Grimm, all the books of Laura Ingalls Wilder, Maya Angelu too. I read love stories, epics, autobiographies, novels and even poems. The turn of a phrase, that perfect twist on words, could send me into a swoon and I transcribe those little pearls into a notebook in order to savor them again and again.

In college, I became a journalist trained to hone my words with deft precision. Who? What? Where? Why? And when? Word count mattered, time mattered and so word choice mattered too.

And now, here I am, some forty plus years into my love affair with the word and I see the advent of the death of language (with it, the death of the attention span). Technology now gives us the coded, to be decoded. What started as little dots and slashes, binary code, has evolved to be Twitter and Text.

L8r. OMG. Brb.

Later? Oh my God? Be right back?

These abbreviations, as part of a new world of speed and character count send my eyes into spasm and my mind into a form of tilt one might see on those old pinball machines. I cannot even try to decipher what these combinations of letters and numbers mean and the effort (which requires a primer for translation) takes far longer than it would have taken to simply use the language as it had been intended—in it's fullness.

The other day, I sent my husband a photo of a drawing I had done—one I spent hours crafting. While albeit, I am rusty with the charcoal, I was surprise to get an email of that read "LOL!"

Laugh out loud?

Had my fifty two year old scholar of ancient Chinese medicine actually typed LOL in response to my careful creation of art?

In my own home, it seemed I had become archaic, a relic, a toss back to perhaps a more romantic age where humans took the time to speak in compete sentences and considered what we said with care. Long ago (like about three years ago when this phenomenon of texting appeared), word choices came from the depths our heart and were made like little offerings to show our wisdom and potential.

As I squint at the letter combinations that people send to me now, I wonder if the ripe harvest of language been consumed? Has the sweetness of whole words departed for good? Are we left now with shredded cores and empty rinds like: "idk," "omw' and "rofl?" (I dont know, on my way and rolling on floor laughing).

What meal is this that we create as we talk to each other in code?

Who are we hiding from?

What is the point?

It feels to me like a language of fear. We are cutting it all down to nothing, in a hurry, rushing about, accepting these odd like contortions of ourselves that technology demands.

The philosopher Ram Dass once said it best: We bought science as our religion, we bought the intellect and materialism 
and the analytic mind 
with it's off-shoot technology as that which would save us. 
It's made life interesting but it hasn't freed us. 
It's tangled us in the addictions to things our minds produce.


I rebel.

My cellular phone was retired a year ago and I am now free of that miniature distraction. I look people in the eye when I speak to them. I don't have to search around when something is ringing. I am with the one I'm with, choosing my words carefully and saying what matters in my heart.

And, I am saving money.

And, I am being glad I don't profit AT & T.

And, I am free of the fear that my phone will give me brain cancer one day.

We are, each one of us, free. We are free to speak, in the language of our fathers and those who came before them. A full sentence is our birthright.

Top Ten for the New Year!

Giving back is good and that's what had me compile this list. These are the people in Portland who make my life worth living. Each place and person on this list is a master at what they do. And they've been tested out by me personally, so I vouce for all I write here. Enjoy!!


Number One Full Service Healer: Dr. Roger Batchelor

[image error] For mothers who are tired of taking their kids to the doctor, sitting in germ infested waiting rooms, being given yet another prescription for antibiotics and watching your child be sick—all winter long. Roger is a natural healer who does acupressure and moves energy in kids—who are so sensitive, they respond very quickly. He prescribes herbs and gives mothers great tips on home care for issues like insomnia, sore throats, upset tummy and of course, viruses. My kids have been seeing him for three years now and we have not had one round of a serious illness. I take that back, we've had one ear infection and did have to do antibiotics but then he was there for the follow up care and we've had nothing since. Zero, nada, zip! He's affordable, will bill your insurance and available. (And yes, he's my husband! See how much I like his work??)


Number One Energy Worker: Dr. Tamara Stoudt
tstaudt@earthlink.net

Tamara came recommended to me by several sources and I've seen her only twice. Both times, she has been wonderful. She is the real deal—a woman totally tapped into higher consciousness via her attention to detail and compassion. Roger is amazing for health issues, chronic pain and with the care of kids. Tamara is a BIG gun who is better than a therapist when it comes to healing wounds of the soul!


Number One Man to Readjust Your Whole Attitude: Jacob Gudger
jacobgudger@lifesuccessconsultants.com

Jake is a young man, just out of college, who had the very good sense to spend his time becoming a teacher of The Goal Achiever program developed by Bob Proctor (of The Secret fame). Jake provides you with a booklet, a set of CD's and six weeks of his personal coaching through the Goal Achiever program and I'm here to tell you—DO IT! Jake changed my life and the life of several of my close friends. The investment-to change your life-is $995.00 and that is cheap in contrast to one more day of being stuck mired in old conditioned patterns, habits and attitudes around your self worth, money, your life purpose and relationships. Jake WILL change your life and your life direction.

Number One Best Astrologer: Carol Ferris
rficf@easystreet.net

Tell her I sent you. Carol Ferris has been reading my charts, and the charts of everyone I know, for nearly thirteen years now. She saw more about me than I could possibly comprehend. She predicted my many year run of publishing with Simon & Schulster and has become a trusted advisor on matters of life energy, partner choices and business decisions.

Number One Favorite Restaurant: Screen Door & Porque no?

Screen Door is Southern cuisine and is run by Nicole and David, a great couple with a new baby boy! They are great people, very hard working and they produce some of the best fried chicken I have ever eaten. Ever.

Porque No? is mexican and run by a wonderful woman and a great dance teacher, Claire (and her husband Brian). I love both these places and am at them a couple times a month. The service is great, the food is fresh NW and the atmosphere at both places is sensational.

Number One Hamburger in Portland: Bamboo Sushi

If you have to eat a hamburger, do it right. Kobe beef, so tender it melts in your mouth, served on a brioche bun. Share with a pal beucase it is too much for one person. I adore these hamburgers. And if you can't get a burger, because they are out, the rest of the menu is stunning! Perfect. I love Bamboo.

Number One Yoga in Portland: Root Whole Body

And I say this for several reasons. The studio is simply beautiful and going there, if you take the time to use the sauna and showers, is a real treat of self-pampering at an affordable price. Root also is home to several wonderful instructors: Chia Rafelson is truly the most amazing, compassionate and insightful instructor I have come in contact with. Sarah Robinette is also quite wonderful and a mainstay in my yoga regime. And Jay Fields is a treat for those who want deep, core understanding of the body. Another worthy mention is Joel Schudde.

Number One Tea House: Heaven's Tea

Paul is a tea master who takes you to an entirely new dimenstion when it comes to drinking and utilizing tea in your life. I personally drink several pots of tea a day, from seven in the morning on. I drink tea when I teach as well and Paul has guided my tea choices to be more healthy and conscious. I had no idea I was consuming pesticide loaded tea. Now I drink tea from 1500 year old trees and bushes, that brings me to a place of instantaneous calm and peace.

Number One Photographer: Staci Vriese
svriese@gmail.com

[image error] Staci got me into her studio, with my kids in tow, in about a day of notice. And she took simply gorgeous shots of me and that wasn't easy. I was wearing sweats and no makeup when I arrived. We worked together for about an hour and the work was complete. She even took photos of my kids. She was a dream! A dream and a heart felt woman on top of it. If you are looking for gorgeous shots of your family, your kids or yourself—run to see Staci.

Number One Real Estate Guru: Stephanie Wiarda

Stephanie treats you like royalty and has an exquisite eye for detail and beauty. No wonder, she used to run an art gallery I believe. The woman works overtime for you and keeps on working even when the deal is done. Tell her I sent you. She is a gem. You'll never let her go.

Number One Auctioneer: Steve Dorsey

Yes, I used to be married to Steve and this is us with out wonderful boy, Spencer! And Steve is still the best damn auctioneer in town. If you have a fundraiser coming up and need to get the job done, raise a lot of money and have a great time, Steve is the guy. He works his tail off for you and is a real person. He listens and gives great advice. This year he was in New York, auctioning for the Parkinson Foundation and here in Portland worked for several schools and for WorkStock. He will raise money for your organization. Guaranteed.