Category: Miscellaneous Ramblings

As you may, or may not, know, Carina Press asked me to come up with three interesting facts about myself to use during the release week promotion for HOLD ME.

Oy! Can there be a more daunting task? Part of the problem was that the two most interesting facts about me are:

1. I wrote a book
2. It got published

And frankly, those seemed just a little too obvious (since it was the book…being…promoted…).

Fortunately, I finally did come up with a few things. But today I thought I’d share some of the interesting facts about me that I rejected along the way. So, here we go!

1. Upon request, I can sing the entire score to Oklahoma, Carousel, The Music Man, Jesus Christ Superstar, Godspell, and Top Hat.

2. For Top Hat, I also provide appropriate dance routines (email me for open tour dates).

3. If required, I can play “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” on the recorder. I play other things, but I don’t know what they are.  Neither does anyone else.

4. I failed typing in high school, but now I type very fast. (so THERE!)

5. My Driver’s Ed teacher called me “Crash”. I think I scared him a couple of times.

6. One of my cats used to lick plastic shower curtains until I was forced to take them down and hide them from him. Now he’s gone, but my shower curtain is still cloth. I don’t want to risk that he passed his addiction on to the other cats.

7. My ambition is to live either 1) on the coast of Maine in a windswept house overlooking the Atlantic 2) on the coast of Oregon in a windswept house overlooking the Pacific, 3) in the Scottish Highlands in a windswept house overlooking a picturesque loch, or 4) in the Marriott Marquis hotel overlooking Times Square.

8. When I was visiting Las Vegas, I became addicted to a Spanish soap opera. I don’t speak Spanish.

9. In my youth, I collected two complete sets of “Empire Strikes Back” bubble gum trading cards. Today they are worth exactly – nothing.  But I remain ever hopeful.

10. I own a leopard print Snuggie. And I use it.

Hey, I can’t help it if I don’t have many interesting things going on in my life! I mean, it’s not as if I’m an international super spy working for a clandestine government agency….

Or is it? Hmmmm…

 

Boy, last week was one of THOSE weeks. A week when you want to  throw back your head and howl to the (full) moon “I am not an animal! I am a human being! AAAOOOOOOOO!!!!”

But everything’s okay now, because at some point during the week Fall arrived.

I missed the arrival – I was trapped in my cubicle, tied to a computer, eyes bleeding. But when I woke up on Saturday morning I said myself, “Self, this feels like FALL!”

I love Fall. Winter is wonderful, Spring is fine, I tolerate Summer, but Fall is my kind of season. There’s something about the cool bite in the air contrasted with the warmth of sun. Something about the colors of the trees, the dry rustle of leaves underfoot. Something about the smells in the wind. You can smell apples and sage even when there aren’t any apples or sage around. At least I can.

In that backwards way I have, I come alive again in fall. All summer long I’ve been in a hot, wet, pressure cooker (especially this year). For various reasons I have to be careful how much time I’m outside in the summer, so I’m trapped in air conditioning most of the time. Then fall comes, and I am released.

But it’s more than just a physical release. There’s something about the season that releases my creativity as well. I want to write. I want to paint. I want to run naked through the fields…

Okay, not that last one.

Well, if I DID want to run naked through the fields, I wouldn’t post it on my blog.

Except I just did.

I think I love the bittersweetness of fall, the urgency. The world around me prepares to go to sleep for the long hibernation of winter with a beauty that is both stunning and fleeting. It is a reminder of the reality that all beauty, all life, goes through its cycles. As we watch it, we are connected to it and by it.

Maybe I love fall more now because I am in the (EARLY!) fall of my own life. Seeing the seasons change reminds me of the beauty I own within myself, and the importance of loving every moment I am given.

That’s important to remember. Especially after one of THOSE weeks.