Abby Rosmarin's Blog, page 14

The Things I Think About After Seemingly Harmless Interactions

Funny, the little things you remember.

I remember how adults, absolute strangers, used to smile at me when I was a kid. This was long before I realized that lots of adults do that with practically every little kid they see. I would take these interactions — whether it was a direct, emphatic smile & wave, or a more distant, observant smile — as a sign that they knew something I didn’t. And the only logical conclusion my five-year-old mind could come up with was that everyone else in the world knew that I was a princess: that I belonged in a castle and that I had been kidnapped or intentionally hidden or left behind, like in so many fairy tales. And it was only a matter of time until the king and queen — my *real* parents — came to claim me again.

Now I’m an adult, doing that exact same thing, smiling at kids and emphatically saying, “Hi!”, blatantly snubbing the “stranger danger” concept right in its face. And it makes me wonder if any of those kids rationalize these interactions in the same way. That I know something they don’t. That I know that they’re secretly princes or princesses.

And it makes me want to say to them, “Yes, I do. I know something you don’t. And that’s that you already have the keys to the kingdom. You don’t need to wait until the king brings you back. You have a sense of wonder and magic about the world that could slay any dragon. The trick is in not letting the world take that way. The world is limitless; don’t let the world make you believe otherwise.”

An alternative title for this post was: “Reach for the stars, kid!  And also tell your mom to quite side-eyeing me.”

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity Jig.

“That’s a little rough, driving all that way just for some casting.”

“I don’t mind,” I reply. “I like driving.  Plus, I grew up on the South Shore.”

“Oh, well that’s good, at least!  Are you going to visit home?”

A sheepish grin creeps across my face.

“I’m planning on it.”

—

I grew up just south of Boston — as Johnny Depp says in the movie Blow:

“A small New England village.  A town called Weymouth.”

Although God bless anyone who steps into Weymouth and labels it a “small New England village”.  It is a condensed, busy suburb of Boston.  It’s home to George Jung, the infamous drug dealer that the movie Blow is based on.  It’s also home to Abigail Adams, arguably America’s most beloved first lady.

Sharing the same first name as your hometown’s most famous resident presents an interesting set of experiences.  A lot of “future First Lady” jokes.  A lot of “future First Lady President” jokes.  It hit critical mass when I started attending middle school — Abigail Adams Middle School.

I haven’t been called “Abigail” since the 6th grade, by the way.

—

A week before the casting, I get a text message from my best friend:

“How lucky were we to grow up next to the ocean?”

When discussing our upbringing, “lucky” is usually not the first word that comes up. 

But we were.  We were lucky.

We were lucky to grow up so close to the ocean, to be a stone’s throw from the marshlands, to be barely a mile away from the Atlantic.  We were lucky to take in that salty smell, to walk the sands until our feet rubbed raw and tender.  The same way we were lucky to grow up with each other, essentially two ragdolls tossed around in a sea of disfunction.  We were each other’s lighthouses, each other’s buoys, something to guide the other away from rocks, something to hold onto when the waves got rough.  We learned to tread water next to each other, learned the importance of swimming alongside riptide instead of fighting it, learned that even the biggest storm will eventually pass.

I reply back:

“Bloody lucky.”

She reminds me of a Wuthering Heights quote: “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.”  We now live in different states in different time zones, leading lives that — at least on the surface — are complete opposites.  But a quick dive below surface level shows just how much we ride the same waves, how much we are on the same wavelength.  Whatever souls are made of, hers and mine are the same.

I get a message from her five minutes later:

“Man I’m hammered.”

I laugh and reply back with a smile and a smiley face.  There are very few people in this world I love as much as I do her.

—

The casting is as cut-and-dry as they come.  I sign in and greet with exuberance and shake hands and smile for some snapshots.

In many ways, it’s barely worth it, these castings.  I probably go on 25-30 castings/go-sees/availability checks for every job I actually get.  I always go in hopeful, but without getting my hopes up.  It’s an extremely fine line to walk, the line between hopeful and getting your hopes up.  I’d be lying if I said I don’t falter from time to time.  But today I remind myself that I’m not just here for the go-see.  I’m here to visit home. 

Hopes up or not, this is the real reason I’m back in the South Shore.

—

When we were finally old enough for driver’s licenses and cars, my best friend and I constantly drove out of Weymouth.  It was as if the town itself would suffocate us, and leaving the city limits was the only way to breathe again.

We usually drove to Hull, two towns over.  Home of Nantasket Beach, Fort Revere, and some of the prettiest views of Boston.  At the very end of Hull — the Gut, as locals lovingly call it — you’ll find a sturdy wind turbine and Peddocks Island.

Most people would recognize Peddocks as Shutter Island — the location where Scorcese filmed that Leonardo DiCaprio movie of the same name, where DiCaprio slowly goes mad at an insane asylum.

There is an actual asylum built on that island, including its main building right on the beach.  The people who designed it believed that the ocean’s air had healing effects.  Today I stand by the edge of the rocks, the wind turbine spinning wildly behind me, the sound of the changing rapids to the side of me and Boston off in the distance in front of me.  I take in the ocean breeze and fill my lungs.

The designers had it right.  Anyone who spends a moment in silence here would agree.

—

Before we could drive to Hull, we walked to Great Esker.  Back when kids could walk the streets without adult supervision, when an 11-year-old could buy a Slurpee and a snack at the 711 without the cashier going, “Where’s your mother?”

These days, Great Esker Park has a drug problem.  The whole damn town has a drug problem.  At night, the park becomes a breeding ground for dealers and addicts.  During the day, however, it is nothing more than a baseball diamond and a playground and a set of trails around the pungent marshlands.

With a group of friends, with my best friend, with no one, I would swing on the swingset and wander the trails.  One end essentially brings you to my best friend’s house.  The other side brings you to what was originally the mall, but was torn down in the late 90s for a Lowe’s and Bed, Bath, & Beyond.

Today I drive down a road I know by heart, past my friend’s former house, and to the dead end, cut off by a gate before spilling into the rest of the park.  I’m running out of time, which automatically makes me think of a quote I saw online:

“Spend 20 minutes each day sitting in nature.  Unless you’re busy.  Then spend an hour.”

If nature could absorb what is going on in your head and heart, these trees would be besotten with adolescent and teenaged angst and anger, sadness and confusion and stress.  Clique gossip and first love woes and music from an antiquated Walkman.  These days, it would take in the grips of addiction and systemic flaws in our society and an epidemic that only now people are starting to talk about.

—

And of course I visit my parents’ house. 

There’s an extra sense of importance on visiting these days: although things have finally settled and plateaued out, my father’s health had been on a steep and steady decline for a while.  Enough to make each phone call, each visit, slightly different.  Slightly more weighted.  Like we had been confronted with something we couldn’t turn back on and every step forward was a reminder of that.

It’s an interesting experience, going back to my parents’ house.  My old bedroom is now essentially an office.  I’ve got a few childhood toys in the eaves, but that’s about it in terms of my stake in this land.  I’m not exactly sure when visiting my parents stopped feeling like a homecoming.  I think it was long before I packed up my things, long before my furniture was moved out and a brand new desk was moved in.

I do love these two.  It’s a careful, cautious type of love, but I love them in a complete way.  These are the people who introduced me to hiking, to camping, to fishing.  To Rat Pack music and Ella Fitzgerald and tapping out a staccato beat against the steering wheel while driving.  I inherited my mom’s bleeding heart for anything with a heartbeat and my dad’s love of the open road.  She taught me how to knit and he taught me how to drive stickshift.  They love to the best of their abilities and with everything they have, and I cannot ever fault them for that.

There are two pictures hung up just outside the living room.  Both taken on top of Mount Washington.  One of is my mom, a vista of central New Hampshire behind her, a pair of thick, 70s-era glasses and the biggest, most carefree smile on her face.  The other is of my dad, his jet black hair blowing in the wind, looking off in the distance with a slightly world-weary look on his face. 

Even as I stand in front of the real versions of those people in the photographs — photographs I was not even alive for when they were taken — I choose to envision them as those versions, on top of the mountain, wind in their hair, a sense of accomplishment in the air.

My parents’ dog — adopted sometime after I moved out for college — raises onto her hind legs when I give my hugs good-bye.  She wants in as well.  Her love is simple and straightforward.  There is no nuance.  She just wants a hug.

—

“Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.”

Whatever souls are made of — if I had to guess, I’d say souls are made of changes in the wind, the simple feel of water at your feet, the horizon at your fingertips, a high noon sun that’ll eventually ease into a pink sunset.

We’re made up of the light and the shadows that light casts and the changes in hue and brightness.  We’re made up of reversing currents and receding tides and the distant noises that mimic the sound of home.

We are made up of cherished and fragile memories, experiences we’d kill to relive and experiences we’d kill to have wiped from the slate. 

We’re made up of the people we hold in our hearts.  We’re made up of the love we give out, no matter what the return or personal cost is.  We’re made up of those we influence and those who influence us.

We are made up of a sudden inhale and a weightless exhale.  We are the moments when we forget to breathe, whether the reason is good, bad, or simply unexpected.  We are the tangible, the intangible, the simple and the complex.  Whatever our souls are made of, in a way we are all the same.

—

The drive back is never easy.  There is no good time to be on a Boston-area highway on a weekday.  Even with good music on the radio and that staccato beat drummed out on my steering wheel, I can’t help but get antsy.

There’s a certain level anxiousness these days, a lingering restlessness, something that serves as the baseline to almost everything I do.  I’m grateful that my job fits perfectly with my current personality — come in for an hour or two, find balance, find harmony, breathe, dammit, breathe, now hit the road with the windows down.  Let every concern and needless worry melt onto your mat, and the remainder can become untethered by the highway winds.

—

Home is where the heart is.  If that’s the case, then my home base is as scattered as my own heart.  Home is on the sands of Nantasket, the pebbles of Wessagusett, the rocks of the Gut.

Home is the dirt paths of Great Esker and the skyline of Boston.

Home is the skyline of mountains, a white house with a farmer’s porch and a chicken coop in the back.

Home is my best friend’s place, an apartment I have never even been to in Chicago, Illinois.

Home is a place that I cannot properly pinpoint or categorize, and I know that I would drive myself crazy if I tried to, so I don’t.

Home is a place that simultaneously hurts and heals.  Home is the undeniable, even when it would make life easier to deny.

It means I’m perpetually in a state of homecoming, perpetually in a state of longing.  It means no matter how full my heart is, it will ache for something else.  There will always be another place I would like to also be.  There will always be a part of my soul that I am away from.

The traffic breaks, I pass the New Hampshire border, and I’m greeted with the first set of vistas Route 93 provides.  The green trees and the gentle hills and the arcing roads before me.

My heart flutters.  Welcome home.

D’s Nuts

The story of D’s Nuts first starts with the cupholder in my car.  This cupholder holds my nuts.

*dramatic pause*

But seriously: my cupholder holds my nuts.  Peanuts.  I keep a bag of peanuts propped up in one of my cupholders for some intelligent snacking.  It’s there so I have something to tide me over, especially when I’m zipping around for the majority of the day, so I don’t come home and essentially pull a Chris Farley the second I walk in the door:

Now we can start to paint the picture that brings us to D’s Nuts: I’m driving back from one of my classes, snacking away on my cupholder’s nuts, my mind doing its usual ADHD bounce-around.  Eventually my mind lands on, well, my nuts, and the types of jokes you could make with them about deez nuts, which lead me to think:

I sure hope there’s a lady named Denise out there who owns a peanut farm.  And I really hope she markets her goods as “D’s Nuts”.

Of course, I had to research to see if this actually existed.  Outside of a few novelty items called “D’s Nuts”, this is sadly not the case.

But, seriously, could you imagine a company who genuinely tried to sell their food as “D’s Nuts”?  Imagine the marketing you could do!  The possibilities are endless.

You want some of D’s Nuts? Come on down and try D’s Nuts.

Say goodbye to everyday snacking and say hello to D’s Nuts.

D’s Nuts are so good, you won’t want anything else in your mouth!

You can take D’s Nuts anywhere!

Don’t know what to bring to a party?  Bring D’s Nuts!

Don’t know what to have?  You can have D’s Nuts!

Don’t know what to eat?  You can eat D’s Nuts!

Making a grab bag?  Grab D’s Nuts!

Looking for a snacktime remedy?  Re-me-D’s Nuts!

Here’s something that’ll always bring a smile to your face: D’s Nuts!

When a friend tells you they don’t know what to buy, tell them they can buy D’s Nuts.

Did your friend say she usually doesn’t like peanuts?  She’ll like D’s Nuts, I’ll tell you what!

When you’re at the store, make sure to ask the grocer if they can direct to D’s Nuts.

Come on down to the farm so you can see firsthand D’s Nuts!

…

My brain has got to be one of the most exhausting places anyone could ever be, but I’ll be damned if it doesn’t provide entertainment from time to time.

Wicked Good Yoga

You know what can be incredibly relaxing? Savasana, aka that resting pose at the end of a yoga practice.

You know what is never — EVER — relaxing? The Boston accent.

Most of my family grew up in blue collar Medford, which produces one of the thickest accents you will ever hear. I grew up not knowing there was a difference between “author” and “Arthur” (true story). My own accent is but a distant memory, but it’ll slip out from time to time. There are certain words I’ll say incorrectly if I’m not thinking about it (like “pharmacy” – er – “phah-mihsee”) and the accent will come out in full force if I’m tired (or should I say “tie-yihd”).

Why am I giving you a brief history of my Boston-area roots? Because tonight, during savasana, I decided to talk about the “one breath meditation” — where, instead of trying to keep the mind blank for all of savasana, you focus all your attention on just one inhale, and then on the corresponding exhale. You can repeat that if you’d like, or you can let the mind wander. And — if you let the mind wander — you can try observing where the mind goes, but without interacting with the thoughts. I’ve heard this neutral observation likened to a theatre goer watching a movie on the screen, and that’s exactly the metaphor I used.

The only problem? I was absolutely exhausted AND “theatre” is one of my accidentally-Boston words if I’m not careful.

The result?

“You can watch where the mind goes, like a THEE-YA-DAH GO-AH at the movies.”

Oy.

So, given my absurdly overactive imagination, I did a little more than “let the mind wander” during savasana. I started thinking about a yoga class taught by someone straight out of Southie. The biggest, most stereotypical, The-Departed-meets-Boondock-Saints Bostonian you could ever come across. I imagine him (or her) running the class a little like this (I mean: “like dis”):

“Alright, so — yeah. Welcome to dis yoga thing, whateva dat iz.

We’re gonna staht in dat easy seat-ihd pose. Alls you gotta do is sit der an’ close ya eyes. Don’t think about nothin’ for a second, a’right?

Den we’re gonna do some poses. Get in ya downwahd-facin daaaahg already. I ain’t got all day.

Okay, ya in ya downwahd-facin daaaaahg? Get in ya upwihd-facin daaaaahg. It’s a wicked good backbend.

Ya gettin’ some idears in ya head? Get ’em out. Breathe ‘n shit. Dat shood do da trick.

Yo kid! Kid! In da back! Why you talkin’ durin’ yoga? Shaht the fahck up! Ya mutha raised ya better! Also, tell her I said ‘ello!

Now we’re in our warrior two — I mean: nows we-yah in ah wah-ye-ah two! Didja fah-get to breathe? Betcha did!

Nah, it’s okay, kid. Ya fine. It’s okay dat you fih-got. S’all good, kid. S’all good.

Okay, now ya get to go into that shah-vah-san-ah. Dat final restin’ pose n’ shit. Alls you gotta do is nothin’. Nothin’! Don’t think about nothin’ kid. And — if ya do — dat’s okay, kid! Just let ya mind wandah. Watch it like one of dem, uh, ‘neutral outsidahs’ — y’know, like dey ain’t gotta be ya thoughts or nothin’. Like you’re one of dem THEEYAHDAH GOAHS at da mooveez. Like, ya watchin’ it, but it ain’t you. Ya get it?

A’right, but no, seriously. Shaht up and go to sleep.

A’right. Class is ovah. I’m off to the packie for some bee-yahs n’ some smokes.”

The Beauty of the Fallen

I think of the fall of Rome.  I think of the incredible empire, the vicious rule, the reminder that it wasn’t built in a day.  And I think of the tale of Nero playing his fiddle while his city burned.

I think of advances in architecture and winding, complicated roads.  I think of advancing armies and victorious gladiators and Roman mythology.  I think of it all coming down, first all at once and then a little more as time progressed.  And then I think of the ruins.

I think of the ruins where buildings once were and I think of how tourists flock to them in the modern age.  I think about how the Colosseum is a top attraction, about how people come from all over the world to walk around former buildings, wrecked roads.  How people will leave their structured homes in structured cities and gladly pay the admission to walk amongst what was.

I think of all the photographs taken to capture the beauty of the fallen.  People will snap, pose, ask others to take pictures for them.  People will use up film, battery life, ink cartridges.  These pictures will be framed, put in scrapbooks, published to the internet — and people will be jealous, wishing that they, too, had a chance to go to Rome, to walk the ruins.  They will voice their desire to go there someday, to witness something so pretty firsthand.

And I think of how no one thought it was pretty when Rome was burning.  Even the music Nero played hit sour in people’s ears.  I wonder if anyone in the midst of the chaos knew what relics they were creating.  I doubt anyone who witnessed the wreckage firsthand thought about exactly how things would be when the dust finally settled.  Just what would emerge after Rome collapsed in on itself.  That there will be beauty in the fallen and beauty in what remains.

Disjointed Summer Mornings

If my childhood could be boiled down to just one smell, it would be the smell of early summer mornings after a rainstorm.  The tepid humidity, the wet gravel under your feet — the songbirds and the rising sun and the lazy, easy feeling.  Like all that was good and innocent about being a kid reemerges at 7 am.  The air is thick but welcoming.  It’s enough to make you excited for the day and wish it will never fully start.

It’s a smell you can only truly duplicate in the heart of New England.  Away from the seacoast.  It’s a smell that reminds me of Freedom, NH — of freedom, in general.  It’s a smell that reminds me of a now-defunct campground, of blackberry picking — of being blissfully unaware and of not recognizing that not all families behaved the way mine did.

If my parents are correct, my first steps were at a campground.  I was toddling around the perimeter of my Pack-n-Play, my hands guiding the way and I practice step after step after step.  At some point, I let go and started moving towards the center.  Four or five steps in, I realized what I was doing and immediately fell back down.  My body knew I was ready to let go the railing.  My mind wasn’t ready to recognize that.

I was a dirty hippy before I knew what a dirty hippy was.  I spent my summers running barefoot.  As an adult, I’ll still sprint outside without shoes, using the excuse that it’s my property and I can do what I want.  I would credit my tough feet on those summers, never having enough time to put on proper footwear.  It was pure luck I never stepped in any poison ivy.  These days, I get to use my status as a yoga instructor for my bare feet.  Look, I have the mat, the mala, the, “Ohm, shanti,” to prove it.  Just another dirty hippy yogi who prefers to drive barefoot.

Summer mornings mean I’m up even earlier than usual.  Seasonal affective disorder is not always a bad thing.  I sometimes see myself as a solar battery, only as powerful as the amount of sunlight I can get in.  The cloud cover will keep me listless but I’ll be ready to move as soon as those first rays come in.

If the rising sun is any indication, it’s going to be a bit of a scorcher today, the kind that open windows and fans will eventually lose its battle with.  We’re edging dangerously close to the time when we’ll shut the windows and put on the AC and go from one climate-controlled building to the other, holding our breath as we go outside and get blasted with the heat.  It only makes these mornings even more special.  Like childhood itself: precious, short, and incredibly fragile.

Boston: A Love Letter

Stepping off the orange line and into the Back Bay is like stepping into an old friend’s home. ��Long time, no see. ��Welcome back. ��Nothing’s where you left it but the refrigerator is stocked. ��You’ve been missed.

Half a block down the street and the Prudential Tower comes into view. ��From this angle, it is a perfect rectangle, its lettering above the top floor proudly on display. ��For years, it served as my lighthouse, my beacon back home from wherever I was in the city. ��Like a faithful friend, always there when you need them. ��No, old buddy. ��It’s you who’s been missed.

My time in Boston is incredibly short today. ��I have a meeting��scheduled in between the classes I teach in New Hampshire. More time will be spent on the road than in the neighborhood.

“Is it really worth it?” I’ve been asked. “Being signed to��an agency in Boston? ��Isn’t that commute a bit tedious?”

My meeting is not for another hour and I do what I do best: wander. ��In many ways, the neighborhood has changed. ��There’s construction equipment and dirt where there��had been lunch tables and statues at the Prudential Center. ��The front of the Boston Public Library is covered in scaffolding. ��There’s a lingering feeling in the air from where two bombs went off two years ago. ��There are new businesses and new storefronts and new bus stop advertisements. ��But these are still my sidewalks. ��The concrete might’ve changed in some areas, but it still makes the same noise under my feet.

I’m in the best of moods��when I finally arrive for my appointment.�� Meeting with potential clients through my agency always has a way of turning��on my most affable, social self��—��but now I feel downright��effervescent, even as my high heels dig into my skin. ��The people who may or may not hire me for their project bid me a good afternoon and tell me to enjoy the weather while it lasts.

I meander again. ��The quickest shot back is to cross the street, board the orange line train at Back Bay again, and go straight home. ��I hang a left instead, through Copley and across Newbury Street and towards the Esplanade.

My brain chatters. “On the train by 2:30. ��On the road by 3. ��Check traffic on your phone. ��You don’t want to be late. ��You have a class to teach at 4:30.” ��But all I hear is the passing traffic, the beep of a reversing construction vehicle, the sounds of the city.

My shoes are horribly impractical. ��I can already feel blisters starting to develop. ��I can feel every edge and pressure point in my heels. ��But, weirdly, I’m unaffected.

By 2:15 I realize I have no choice but to head back. ��I start to climb up the bridge that connects the Esplanade to the red line. ��I loop around on the ramp and face the water and stand stock still. ��I find that I’m holding my breath. The view of the Charles and the Citgo sign and the Longfellow Bridge fills my heart past maximum capacity and I’m frozen in my spot, as if one wrong step and��mi corazon will burst.

This is my city. ��Ciudadita mia. ��I love it the way a parent loves a grown child — tenderly, if not a bit from��a distance. ��I love it like a practical��paramour, implicitly understanding that it is not truly mine. ��I love it without a need for ownership. ��I love it expecting nothing in return. ��I love it knowing it will continue to evolve without me. ��I love it because I have no other choice but to love this city with every fiber of my being. I love it exactly how it is.

I’m on the road before 3, but the traffic is already horrendous. ��I’ve noticed that I’m a noticeably more aggressive driver in Massachusetts, like crossing the border turns on something dormant in me. ��I blast down highways and quickly change lanes and curse out inconsiderate drivers and I shock even myself with how easily I slip back into this roll.

Nothing like a reflexive, “Yield, fucker!” to remind me that you can take the girl out of Massachusetts…

��� Abby (@thatabbyrose) May 8, 2015

I applied for a New Hampshire license back in 2011. ��I had all the right paperwork, the proof that I lived and worked in this state now. ��The lady at the DMV — a DMV that was once a Welcome Center for tourists and travelers back when I was a Bostonian — explained to me that I couldn’t keep my Massachusetts license. ��Kids could use it as a fake ID. ��As she confiscated it, I thought, “Damn, and I actually liked my picture on that license.”

Three exits past the New Hampshire border and I’m already treated with views you just cannot get in the Boston area. ��As if someone had turned on something dormant, the highways become hilly and winding. ��I drive around one bend and I’m greeted with a vista of hills and trees and green. ��I know I’ll be making it to my afternoon class by the skin of my teeth, but I’m already switching lanes to be in the slow, rightmost one. ��The one that provides the best view of the view.

It was this very view — this panorama��in between exits three��and four��on route 3 — that once calmed my nerves when we first went apartment hunting, when my husband’s car had Massachusetts plates and I still didn’t even own a car. ��We were driving to yet another apartment complex and it felt like the rest of southern New Hampshire had opened up��before��me and I thought to myself, “With views like this, I think I can get used to this town.”

I’d eventually move from a town by the Massachusetts border to a town further north, a town that effortlessly straddles the line between civilization and the boondocks. ��I’d be greeted every morning and night with sunrises and sunsets over the hills and ponds, the highways and roads themselves as mountainous as the skyline. ��It puts a smile on my face. ��This is my home, and I know it the way a boat knows it’s secured to the dock. ��But it’s never the same type of smile as the one I get in between two exits on 93, right before I get off for the orange line, when there’s a curve in the road and suddenly all of Boston comes into view. ��And for a brief moment, I’m not the aggressive Masshole driver making jokes about her “New Hampster” status. ��If I’m not careful, I’ll forget I’m even driving. ��I’m just watching the Prudential Tower come back into my��line of sight, my little lighthouse to let me know I’m close to where I want to be going.

Hey there, old friend. ��I’m back again. ��You were missed as always.

Do You Have 30 Seconds of Spare Time? I Need Your Help.

Hey there — do you have an Amazon account? ��Do you not mind blindly nominating something? ��Are you capable of finding a blue button and clicking?

Then I have the task for you!

Ladies and gentleman, my very first manuscript is officially part of a Kindle Scout campaign. ��It’s been a serious comedy of errors from the get-go, complete with an 11th hour, “Hey, your synopsis — your 500��word synopsis? — yeah, we meant 500 character synopsis.” ��But my fingers are crossed that all this mad dashing and nutty-ness will lead to something.

How does this work? ��My book is on a 30-day campagin and the Kindle Scout team will consider my book for publication after its campaign ends. ��While it’s a little more complicated than, “nominations = publication,” the more nominations I receive, the more favorably they will look upon said book.

So — please, please, please, look at this noise, I’m actually begging — click any one of the links I have going on, and click “Nominate Me”. ��That’s it. ��It’s as simple as that. ��If you have an Amazon account, you don’t have to sign up for anything. ��And — really — who doesn’t have an Amazon account these days? ��Even the Amish appreciate Amazon’s vast selection and convenience. ��Even Isis is like, “Death to America! ��But thank you, dudes in Seattle, for making Amazon.com.”

You can do a lot of things once you click that link. ��You can read my 500-character version of my synopsis (the 500-word synopsis is down believe), you can read a few Q&As, and you can stare at my picture in awe. ��Or disgust. ��You can also do none of those things and just click “Nominate Me”. ��Quite frankly? ��I’m not too concerned.

So do it already! ��Also, here’s my full(er) synopsis:

Is chick literature nothing more than easy beach reads, or can we learn something about ourselves through them?

Life hasn���t changed much for Katy Sinclaire. Years after she graduated college, Katy still lives with her old university roommate and still works at the same bookstore that she���s been with since she was a teenager. It is an increasingly unsatisfying life, but it is a life that she does not question. That is, until a chain of events forces Katy to confront the painful truth: she is going absolutely, positively, nowhere. She realizes that she needs to do something with her life, and now.

Only one problem: Katy has absolutely, positively, no idea what the first step should be.

The other problem? From her harebrained misadventures, to her chisel-jawed boyfriend, to her best guy friend (who is not-so-secretly in love with her), Katy���s life starts mimicking the very chick literature she mocks at the bookstore. Only life isn���t as predictable as a storybook, a lesson Katy is forced to learn as she desperately tries to figure out her purpose in life ��� if such a purpose even exists.

—

On a serious note: I wrote this puppy way back in 2010. ��It’s been a wild ride since. ��I’ve probably queried over 150 agents over the span of four-something years, edited and re-edited, proofread until my eyes went cross-eyed, submitted to far too many contests. ��It would be really nice to finally give this book a proper publishing ground. ��I really do appreciate every single nomination — so your 30 seconds really would mean the world to me.

Okay, enough serious talk. ��Here’s a puppy clamouring over a cat:

Seasonally Affected

I have a desperate desire for the sun. ��I do not care if my feet are in boots or sandals, my shoulders bare or covered in layers. ��I need a reason for sunglasses across the bridge of my nose —��because it creates��an easy smile across my face.

I’ve noticed I can stave off a cold or a stomach bug until the weather turns. ��I��find I am nomadic with the sun but restless with the clouds. ��I find that the overcast days are actually harder than days that bring about blizzards and storms. ��The rumble of the thunder resonates with my heart. ��The mist from an overcast day only brings me down.

They say seasonal affective disorder was once an evolutionary advantage — those who remained listless when the weather was bad were more likely to survive. ��I say I need windows open, natural light pouring in. ��I need to feel my cheeks flush with high noon rays. ��I need to put on sunscreen and feel my freckles rise up like daisies after the winter. ��And, if I’m not going to see the sun, then give me excitement. ��Give me lightning if I can’t get sunlight. ��If life is about learning to dance in the rain as opposed to waiting for the storm to pass, soak me to the bone when I go outside. ��Then bring out the sun to dry me off.

I Like My Coffee Like I Like My Men: Written About in a Blog Post

I like my coffee like I like my men: caffeinated.

I like my coffee like I like my men: French. ��Or Cuban. ��Or Colombian. ��Or Hazelnut… wait…

I like my coffee like I like my men: in a way Europeans would frown upon.

I like my coffee like I like my men: READILY AVAILABLE FIRST THING IN THE MORNING OR ELSE I’M GRUMPY.

I like my coffee like I like my men: in a cup with a straw! ��Wait…

I like my coffee like I like my men: from Dunkin Donuts.

I like my coffee like I like my men: available for pick-up at a drive-thru.

I like my coffee like I like my men: certainly not strong, rich, dark, or creamy because seriously everyone makes those jokes and they are so overdone I mean oh my God and what the hell would creamy even entail I don’t wanna know but now I feel like I should go to church.

I like my coffee like I like my men: hot.

I like my coffee like I like my men: iced.

(Oooh I’m kidding. ��I prefer half ice. ��You get more coffee that way.)

(…you get more man that way?)

I like my coffee like I like my men: next to me in my car. ��Preferably in the cup holder.

(What?)

I like my coffee like I like my men: in a way that might hint at addiction.

I like my coffee like I like my men: in a way that gives me a headache.

I like my coffee like I like my men: available at your local convenience store.

I like my coffee like I like my men: purchasable by the pound.

I like my coffee like I like my men: created in a percolator. Wait…

I like my coffee like I like my men: extra crispy and on practically everything. ��No, wait: that’s how I like my bacon.