Writing Journey: Part XXII

So here was this giant, hidden Mormon Woman blogging community I knew nothing about even though I'd been blogging for a long time, and the only person I knew for sure who knew where it was, was the woman who'd made the comment on that blog.

And that would be Sue over at Navel Gazing at Its Finest. Ever wonder what sparked her post that asked her readers who their favorite Mormon bloggers were? Um, well, that would be my e-mail to her saying basically, "Who in the heck ARE these people, and where can I find them?!" She said, bascially, I'll ask my readers. So she did.

I didn't even know Sue at the time. Yet Sue is one of those big Mormon women bloggers she was talking about. That's just how in the dark I was.

She got something like 84 comments to that post listing favorite bloggers. Many comments were from people who are not LDS and said things like, "Why is it you Mormon people are so dang funny?" and the like. A lot of the same bloggers' names cropped up several times.

I started blog stalking several blogs. I started commenting. I started clicking from their blogs to brand new ones. I found ones that were good fits for my personality. I added subscriptions to my Google Reader. I deleted ones that didn't feel like good fits even if they were big. For months I felt like I was on a massive treasure hunt to find this secret world I hadn't known existed before and to figure out where I fit in it.

The journey started out as a way to find places to do a blog tour. But it turned into something else entirely. I developed dear friendships during those months, friendships I now cherish. I have had opportunities open up for me. I've shared dear experiences with people. I've learned some of the greatest lessons simply by reading their words and sharing comments with each other.

No wonder there's this giant blog world of LDS women. It's like Relief Society on steroids.

I have no clue if my question to Sue sparked the idea or whether the timing is coincidental, but very shortly after she asked her readers about their favorite Mormon bloggers, she created Mormon Mommy Blogs, and now we have a giant forum and a place where we can go find one another. It's all thanks to her and Motherboard and MomBabe, but there's this teeny tiny part of me that likes to hope I had something with sparking the idea in the first place.

Even though I had created all this great relationships, I still had a blog tour to do. I made a real point of trying to do a tour not all in the same circle. Yes, I knew that some of the stops would overlap. I knew that Erin's and Lara's and Lisa's readerships overlap to some degree, but I was pretty sure that they didn't overlap at all with the LDSWritersBlogck group and their friends, and Annie is in an entirely different circle and so is An Ordinary Mom. And so on.

So I like to think that even if some readers saw several blog tour stops, that there's no WAY anyone saw anywhere near half of them (unless they were deliberately linking over from my blog). Plus, I was just happy that superstar KristinaP was willing to include my book on one of her giveaways, because everyone and their hamster knows her.

Generally with a blog tour, the blogger gets a copy of the book to read beforehand. I knew that my publisher financially wouldn't be able to do that (I had nearly 50 tour stops. They would have laughed me out of the room). So I asked if I could send out PDF files of the book to the bloggers. They were thrilled with that idea (because it was FREE). So that's what we did. It wasn't ideal; it's not so fun to read a book on a screen or use a ream of paper to print it out.

My publisher also agreed to provide 15 copies of the actual book to use as giveaways on some of the bigger blogs. I ended up doing around 22 giveaways, so I gave away some of my personal author copies. I paid for postage on all of them.

I also knew that weekends tends to be the lowest time for blog readership, so I planned my tour stops to hit Mondays through Fridays, with a couple of exceptions when the person doing the stop had to post on a Saturday for whatever reason.

I also ended up with a few people coming to me asking if they could be part of the tour, one of whom was a biggie blogger. Like I was going to say no to that. As a result, there were several days I had more than one person posting about the book at a time.

A week before, I sent out a reminder e-mail to everyone for their week with their dates with instructions. They could do anything they wanted: a review, a Q&A with me (provided I had a couple of days to get answers back to them), or something entirely different. Their creativity was awesome.

Erin lifted some of her favorite quotes from the book. Jenn talked about the memories that the smells described in the book evoked in her. And so on. It was a lot of fun.

Because they all went to so much trouble for me, I felt like the least I could do for their efforts was post when they did and link over to them. So for six weeks straight, I blogged every single day, Monday through Friday (and a couple of Saturdays). It was a serious marathon, but in some ways so rewarding and fun.

Meanwhile, for the previous several months, I'd had friends constantly e-mailing me with questions along the lines of, "Is this the correct usage of lay/lie?" Or, "Which do I use in this sentence, was or were?"

On the LDStorymakers list, similar questions were flying at me all the time.

Finally someone on the list said, "You should just write a book about this stuff so we can all stop pestering you. I'd totally buy it."

The idea was seconded and thirded and fourthed. (If those are words.) :)

I'd thought about doing that exact thing for a long time, but I'd never really gotten around to it. But I was between projects (not that I wasn't always busy). During the blog tour, I started tinkering with a grammar/usage/punctuation book.

Halfway through the tour, I looked at the calendar and realized that the LDStorymakers conference was a month away. And I was teaching a class on grammar and usage. Having a book at the conference bookstore on that very topic might be a good thing.

If I were to write something like that, it would be a self-published venture anyway; I wouldn't expect a traditional publisher to take it and distribute it through regular channels or sell thousands of it. It would be be labor of love, something I'd sell to friends and colleagues at events . . . like, um, conferences.

I got my behind in gear.

WNW: Malapropism Fun

Malapropisms are some of the best parts of English. They're funny and can make your day. (That's only a slight exaggeration.)

I'm guessing a lot of you already know what they are, but let's refresh our memories. In short, a malapropism is the unintentional misuse of a word in funny way. The sentence still makes sense, but not in the way the person meant.

One fun example is in Kerry Blair's book, Mummy's the Word, where she has a character constantly using malapropisms. You know what word she means, but what she says instead is hysterically funny. I don't have a copy on me, or I'd give examples. Just find a copy and read it. You'll get a kick out of it.

A blogger who often does entire posts showing malapropisms is My Imaginary Blog. Check those posts out here. With her permission, here's her post from last Christmas, with a whopping 32 malaprops in it.

See if you can spot them all:

***

Today it’s poring rain, but soon, in lieu of the Christmas season, snow will come and, low and behold, it will be time to dawn your best apparel and come baring gifts! Then we will all be espiring to celebrate the soul purpose of the holiday: the peace which defines description. Christmas is truly the holiday that is a par above the rest.

Although it’s tricky to thread that line between spirituality and materialism, you can fandangle ways to remember the true meaning of Christmas, and why you are at it, still enjoy all the great traditions that come back with a vintage every year. The joy and glea of Christmas are always growing by leaps and pounds. There are always the engagments — Love is a many splended thing! And there’s the holiday intertaining, with the ubber-fun parties. I’m usually very health conscience, but at the holidays it is no holds bar — I can be sueded into excepting a treat or two. Even if it does reek havoc with my diet, I can always get back on the eleptical in the New Year and get back to a healthy regime. Also, at Christmas I like to get a new outfit – this year I have an adorable camosile which will perfectly compliment my new sweater.

So, voile! I’d just assume give as receive, but, as I eluded to above, all of these great traditions can help bring the true spirit of Christmas. Here Here!

***

It's almost scary how much joy these things bring me. Back to home:

My almost first-grader has taken to using the word "technically" when she means "sort of." She'll say things like, "Well, technically, we'll be leaving for Grandma's house in an hour."

"No," I tell her, "we won't be leaving until this evening."

"Well, technically, it'll be in about an hour."

"No, technically, it won't be until after dinner."

She can't seem to get it into her head that "technically" is exactly the opposite of what she thinks it means.

But the best recent malapropism I can think of in my family was when I came across a school assignment my son did a couple of years ago when they were discussing childcare.

He'd drawn a picture of a stroller with a baby inside babbling baby talk. The stroller sat beside a staircase. The boy babysitter sprawled, sleeping on the couch, holding a phone with words coming out of it saying, "Hello? Hello? Is Jamie OK?"

Across the top of the page in big, bold letters, was SAFETY TIP #1:

And the bottom had the tip and the malapropism, which I still giggle over:

Never leave children unintended.

Not quite what he was going for, but still good advice, that.

Lessons from Random Stuff in My Head

Don't Be Judgmental, Because You REALLY Don't Know.

Today, my dear friend Brillig's post about put me into tears. Go read it. You'll be glad you did. (Her blog has had some techno-problems. I hope the link works.)

If Writing a Random Claims to Fame Post, Don't Forget Your Own Family.

Um, duh. Yeah, I'm feeling kinda stupid on this one.

If you live in Utah (or are LDS and shop in Seagull and Deseret Book), you have probably heard of the A Capella group VoiceMale.

Okay, so here's my giant claim to fame: The founder and vocal percussionist, John L. (there are 2 Johns in the group, so they really do use their last initials) is my dear cousin. He put the group together when they were at USU. They practiced in my uncle and aunt's home, and he often arranged (and still does arrange) some of their music.

And he's one of the most generous and sweet guys I've ever known, and that's counting all the years we had growing up together as cousins when he and my brother played Stratego in their basement.

(John's the one in the middle sitting on the couch arm. Can't you totally see the family resemblance? Kidding. Actually, he looks freakishly like my nephew. It's odd how genes jump around.)

So here's why I'm mentioning it right now: VoiceMale has an upcoming benefit concert for the Ulster Project, which has been going since 1974 to help sow the seeds of peace between the Catholic and Protestant sections of Northern Ireland. You can learn more at the Ulster Project site.

The benefit concert will be July 31 at Murray High school, and tickets are available at the Ulster website (see the link above). VoiceMale concerts are always a ball, and they're great for the entire family. And I'm not just saying that because John's my cousin or because the acrobatics he can do with his voice are mind-numbingly amazing.

Other random lessons I have learned recently:

Don't Be Overly Optimistic

I recently lost more than five (much needed) pounds. In Sunday's rush to get everyone ready for church, I grabbed a dress that used to be pretty tight on me and I haven't worn in awhile. But I've lost some weight, right? Surely it would fit now.

In the whopping 1.3 minutes I had to get it on, I discovered that I didn't quite fit into it. The buttons bulged a bit, and they ended in a place so I looked about 5 months pregnant. Ahem. No time to change into something else. I grabbed the requisite "church bag" and ran out the door.

Note to self: Do not even touch that dress until you've lost at least another ten pounds.

Six Isn't Enough, And Seven Might Not Be, Either. Because I Am a Masochist.

If you followed my Facebook whining, you'll know it took me a whopping six batches of chocolate cupcakes experiments to get ones that both tasted good and didn't sink in the middle.

(My kids kept telling me to just use the sunken ones in the cookbook and call them "chocolate ice cream bowls. Yeah . . . sure . . .)

This cookbook journey has been a massive learning curve in the chemistry of baking. (I feel like Dr. Seuss: "Oh, the things you can learn!") Recently I had an epiphany and realized two things that might make the cupcakes really great. So I jotted down two notes to try yet another batch.

Today I did batch #7 . . . but since I'm so tired lately and observant (Haha!) and lame, I noticed and applied only one of the two notes.

The cupcakes actually turned out pretty darn good. But there's that little part of me that wonders if they'd be even better if I tried one more time adding that other note, because ya know, what if it made all the difference and made them that much better . . .

But do I have it in me to make an EIGHTH batch when I'm not even halfway (and should be!) on the book? I mean really?

I need to wear make-up more often.

I've really let this one go this summer, something I've never done before. My daughter recently commented how much better I look with make-up, in her words, "not scary."

Thanks so much, cutie. I think.

In her defense, it's actually a little weird how different I look with and without makeup. Part of the difference is that my eyelashes are very long but totally blond, so without mascara, it's almost as if my face has disappeared. I've shocked people on more than one occasion with the difference. And then I have adult acne and a rather splotchy skin tone, and blue circles under my eyes. The list goes on. It doesn't take much to hide it all, but the result is very different than what we started out with.

Once I had to go to church for the first hour but was sick myself and had to leave after that to get home to a sick child. I deliberately wore very little makeup (but I did put on some mascara), because I knew people would assume simply by looking at me that I was sick (which I really was). If I wore the full face, they'd wonder why I left, and I'd end up having to answer more questions. I'd predicted exactly what happened. I had people telling me to go home because I looked so awful. All because I wasn't wearing the full eye shadow/liner/blush/lipstick combo.

Yet this summer I find myself going to the grocery store in the middle of the day having barely gotten out of my pajamas, taken a shower (If I'm lucky. I often have hair in a greasy pony tail or it's wet from the recent shower) and wearing no make-up to speak of. Not sure what my problem is. Maybe I just don't care anymore.

Regardless, I think I'm giving small children at the stores trauma. I mean, it's bad when your own kids start commenting on it. I hope I'm not embarrassing them, but I must be. Worse, they're at that age when they CAN be embarrassed by their mother.

Sometimes I Need Chocolate I Didn't Make

Like tonight. There are days I'm so sick of my "chocolate laboratory" that I just want some comfort chocolate that my hands had nothing to do with. So it was with great pleasure that I saw my husband walk in the door this evening with my favorite chocolate silk pie. I'm going to have a very large piece right now.

See you on the flip side!

Writing Journey: Part XXI

So last time I was left with a book coming out in March (Tower of Strength), a YA fantasy based on a Finnish folktale I'd written because, well, I felt driven to, and now needed to shop around nationally, and I was on the LDStorymakers Conference committee and the Whitney Awards committee.

And of course, throughout all this, I'm always doing editing and magazine writing stuff.

Nope. Not busy or anything.

Right around the new year, Covenant sent out an e-mail to their authors requesting submissions for a compilation of true Christmas stories they'd be putting out for the holiday. My gut reaction was sort of, yeah, right, like I can put one more thing on my plate.

But immediately following that came a memory of a really amazing Christmas experience I'd had nearly twenty years prior. Plus, if I'm given the chance to submit something, even if I don't know if it'll be accepted, I'll usually take it. I'm nuts that way.

So I wrote the story up. Technically, I'd already written it many, many years before when Covenant had a Christmas short story contest for a similar compilation of new authors. That contest was for short stories, fiction. I didn't make it. (One more of my many rejections.)

This time I went back to that version and kinda cringed. It wasn't that bad, but I could see why they didn't want it: the piece really wasn't written that well. Man, I'd come a long way in ten or so years.

I used very little of the original and pretty much rewrote the whole thing from scratch. About the only thing I kept was the fake names for some of the people involved, because the story is real, very personal, and in some spots, painful, and I don't want the real people to be easily identified.

I submitted it and almost forgot about it because my plate was so stinkin' full. (For the sake of brevity, I'm going to finish up this story quickly: my true Christmas story was accepted a few months later and will be out this fall in the compilation. Yay!)

Now I had my blog tour to coordinate. With my first five books, I'd never done one. Of course, with my first book in 2002, blogs pretty much didn't exist, so neither did blog tours.

The summer before Tower came out, I saw a debate on a blog about whether blog tours were effective. One person said that no, they weren't, that all the tours they'd seen were, to use their term, "incestuous," meaning that the same five or ten people blogged about each other's books, so the exact same readers saw the book over and over again. The person also said that Mormon blog tours would be pointless because Mormon readers aren't online reading blogs.

One commenter disagreed, especially when referring to Mormon women. She said that there's a HUGE female Mormon blogger community, if you just know where to look. It's the new Mormon scrapbooking, she said. And so, yes, they're online, and a writer could have a very effective tour if they knew where to do it.

My eyebrows went up. I'd been blogging for some time by that point, but I still had no inkling about this huge Mormon women blogger world OR where to find it. I tend to be clueless that way.

So I decided to ask her to find out.

Gratitude: My Best Friends

Recent events have made me take stock of some things, and one of those big things is looking at who are my true friends.

I believe true friends are those with whom I can be purely the real me. No games, no pretending.

These are the friends who love me as I am, no matter what. When I am with them I can express my honest opinion and be accepted even if the other person disagrees completely. (And you know that's a big deal, because I'm so darn opinionated.)

These are the people who love me even if they haven't seen me in months. We can pick up exactly where we left off last time. There's no awkward lulls or getting used to one another again.

They love me even with all my faults (a big deal, because they know all my faults).

And best of all? They think like I think.

With two exceptions (Hey, Shauna and Janee!), each and every one of my best friends is a writer.

I spent most of my adolescence aching to fit in. Trying, hoping to, and often, miserably failing.

I was so painfully shy in my early high school years that frankly, it was a miracle that by my junior year, I found a group where I thought I fit in. But by senior year they'd go off and do a bunch of big stuff without me.

So I knew that I sort of fit in with them, but I was really on edge of the group, not the inner circle. They might disagree with that assessment (go ahead and say so in the comments. I dare you; I know some of you are reading this), but from where I stand, it's the truth.

But with my writer friends, it's different.

I finally belong.

I remember vividly doing a Literacy Night event at a Relief Society Enrichment Night back when I felt welcomed by several writers but didn't quite yet feel like I was one of them.

Shortly after I arrived, Julie Wright put her arms around me, gave me one of her trademark hugs, and said, "Annette, I just love you."

And you know what? I knew she meant it. I had to hold back tears.

I hugged her back and said I loved her, too. And boy, did I ever mean it. I absolutely adore Julie. She is a gem, and I value her friendship more than words can express. From that moment, I knew I belonged.

The members of my critique group are also on the list of my dearest friends. They've put up with me for a very long time. They get an earful from me every week (poor Lu Ann has heard me longest, but Michele isn't far behind, and then there's Jeff and Heather and Rob).

They are all there for me and they genuinely care for me as family, whether it's at weekly meetings or via e-mail, whether it's to celebrate a small success or vent a frustration or just share a laugh. I can always count on them.

Then there's Josi. I still laugh at how our friendship got off to a bumpy start nearly six years ago with a totally stupid argument, but now, we're closer than many sisters. I can't imagine writing or publishing or working a conference without her in the picture (or sharing a hotel room so we can chat late into the night).

There are others who have been there for me and are dear, dear friends (the LDStorymakers list is nearing 100 now; I can't list everyone who has impacted me in a positive way!).

But this is a short list of my rocks, my dearest friends, the ones who have been with me the longest and have made the biggest impact on my life.

And I don't mean the ones who have made the biggest impact on my writing life, although if I were to make that kind of list, it would probably include most of the same people.

I mean that these friends have made a huge impact on my life.

Thanks, you guys. To each and every one of you.

You have no idea how much you've given me and how much I owe you. I've needed your friendships. I love you all. Thank you for letting me into your lives and hearts. I believe I'm a better person for it.

Writing Journey: Part XX

Wowzers: Part Twenty!

So as you probably figured out from last time (well, THIS was really last Friday, but you know what I mean), even though I turned in the deployment book in October of 2008, it wouldn't be out fall 2009. Instead of a lag time of roughly 9 or 10 months, it would be about twice that.

Originally the release date was "spring" 2010 (which was hard to hear, because that could mean several different months and you have no clue what to plan for), but I now have an official release date for that book: this March.

I don't yet have an official title, but for the first time in ages, I submitted a manuscript with a title. I'm calling it Band of Sisters. (Get it? Like an army "Band of Brothers"? Their wives at home are a "Band of Sisters"? It was my husband's idea.)

So far, my editor and I are still calling it that, but I have no idea if the committee is really giving it that title or whether it'll change. (I'll post that info here when I find out.)

Right about the time I was finishing up Band of Sisters (and getting ready for edits on Tower of Strength . . . remember how the time lines of of all these stories really overlap?) my husband and I took a trip to visit my parents on their latest mission when they had a two-week break for temple maintenance closure.

You can see our trip in all its glory on this blog HERE, but the short version is that my parents are the first president and matron over the Helsinki, Finland Temple and we got to see all the great sites in the area. What long-time readers may know is that I lived in Finland for three years when I was a kid while my parents presided over the mission there.

I hadn't been back in over twenty years, but even so, Finland has always felt like a second home to me, and returning even for those few days was life-changing. I really felt in so many ways like I'd come home. Smells and sounds and tastes bombarded me, bringing with them memories and emotions that had been buried for over two decades. I even got to see a dear friend a couple of times. (And we're both all grown up! How did that happen?)

I simply didn't want to leave.

One result of the trip was writing-related (of course, or I wouldn't be writing about it on this post). My dad used to teach Finnish literature classes at BYU, and because of that (and also likely because Mom's a Finn and we'd lived there), I'd learned bits and pieces of the Finnish mythology, the Kalevala.

Also, in the Finnish National museum, I'd seen the ceiling murals depicting four of the stories from the book, and I even mentioned one of them in At the Water's Edge. When I was younger, we had several decorative plates showing scenes from the Kalevala on the living room wall.

During our trip to Finland last fall, I had this gut feeling that I had to finally read the whole Kalevala myself once and for all (the one good English translation; I knew I wouldn't understand the original Finnish well enough anymore).

A second thought followed right behind the first: after reading it, I needed to novelize one of the folktales in it, much like Shannon Hale's Book of a Thousand Days or Jessica Day George's Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow. I left Finland absolutely compelled to do something similar. I just had to.

The trick was first finding a copy of the Kalevala. My sister and I searched our parents' house for Dad's copy, to no avail. Copies are hard to find, and online they run about a hundred bucks. Ahem. Not exactly in the monthly budget.

But about two weeks later, a package arrived in the mail. My husband, knowing I had this burning drive, had secretly bought me a copy online. After giving him a massive hug and smooch, I dove into it.

Before writing anything new, I had to finish my Tower edits and polish up Band of Sisters and then get through the holiday rush, but after that, I wrote a young adult novel about the Aino story very quickly. It was so much fun to write something totally different.

I hadn't dipped my toes into fantasy since my son was a baby (he'll be in 9th grade this fall). It felt good. Even better, my critique group loved it (and a couple said it might be my best work ever . . . that felt even better).

One tiny issue: This book is nothing Covenant would ever in a million years want to publish. It's just not something that would appeal to their target audience. That means to get it published, I'd have to start the national agent query and rejection process.

(We'll not discuss how many rejections I've received so far.)

Right around the time I was finishing up the Kalevala book, which I'm currently calling Song for Aino, two other projects landed on my lap because others asked for them.

Here I had a book about to be released in March (Tower of Strength, if you're keeping track) and with it a blog tour and other promotion to coordinate. And yet . . . since I have a habit of not saying no when it comes to writing stuff, I said yes to both projects.

Plus, I was on the Whitney Committee. And the LDStorymakers Conference Committee.

Spring would be a bit busy.

WNW: Conversational Pause Lengths

One of the most interesting things I learned in my English 223 class (you know by now who taught it, right?) was about conversational rules and pause lengths in particular. It was also the first place I heard the name of Deborah Tannen (I've mentioned her before . . . read her! She literally changed how I view myself).

One thing Tannen mentions in her work is pause lengths in conversation, cues as to when it's someone else's turn to start talking. Most of the time, we aren't aware of these kinds of things as we talk, but all of us have our own internal "clock" that tells us when someone's done saying something and we're allowed to take the floor with our own thoughts.

The interesting thing is that everyone has their own pause lengths. Genders tend to have different pause lengths. So do different cultures. For some it's half a second, for some it's two seconds, for someone else it's a length in between.

And, as I've read some of Tannen's books, I've realized that even families have their own conversational styles and rules and pause lengths. The one I grew up in would be one of them.

In one of her books (I believe it's That's Not What I Meant!) she describes a male/female work team who often gave presentations together. The woman was deemed not "aggressive" enough in her approach, while she felt her partner just railroaded over her and never gave her a chance to get a word in edgewise.

Someone mentioned to her the idea of pause lengths and suggested the idea that maybe she was just waiting to long to jump in, that perhaps her partner was speaking up during what he perceived as a silence needing filling because he thought the silence had gone on a fraction of a second too long when it was her turn to speak, so he jumped back in and kept talking.

She took that advice. As uncomfortable as it was for her to jump in when he'd barely stopped talking (to her it felt like interrupting him), suddenly their presentations started going great. Instead of being offended at her "interrupting him," his respect level went up like nothing else, and she started getting rave reviews.

All because she'd previously been waiting possibly as much as half a second longer than she needed to before she spoke up.

In general, I think women have slightly longer pause lengths than men.

That's definitely not the case in my family (which consists of mostly women), nor in the family I married into (which consists mostly of men).

The first time my husband-to-be came to a dinner at my parents', I think he felt like a deer in the headlights at how fast and furious the female conversation flew around the table. Based on a lifetime of experience, it was no big deal to me; I could follow it and knew how the turn-taking worked. I don't think my poor (then) boyfriend got a word in edgewise, because there wasn't a pause length long enough for what he was used to.

(After fifteen years of marriage, he's learned how to get a word in, but most of the time, he, my brother, and the other brothers-in-law just watch us three sisters jabber. It's almost a sport, we're so good at it.)

To this day, I have to be aware of other people's pause lengths and try to reign myself in, because without even realizing I'm doing it, I can easily go on a chatty rant and roll right over someone trying to talk. To me, the pause length was short enough to indicate that it was my turn to talk. But it wasn't a long enough pause length for them.

It's a delicate balance, and I often wonder how many people I've offended based on growing up with short pause lengths.

Our "Exciting" Fourth

We spent the weekend up at my in-laws with all four of the Lyon siblings who are in Utah. (The other two are on opposite coasts, alas.)

I cannot explain how much more enjoyable these kinds of visits are to me now that my kid are older. On my side of the family, there are several older grand kids, and I remember chasing my toddlers and walking the floor to comfort babies or having to leave the grown-up table conversation to deal with an owie or just nurse a baby or whatever and being so jealous of my sister-in-law, whose boys were old enough to just run off and play. I couldn't wait for the day I could do that.

Well, MY kids are the oldest grandchildren on the Lyon side. A few years ago, I was on the opposite side of the table. Several grown-ups were playing a board game, and every few minutes, a mom or dad jumped up to take care of a toddler or baby crisis. But I was never one of them. I got to sit and smile as I watched them. My kids were older now and happily playing amongst themselves. Even better, I wasn't pregnant in the heat of the summer.

A new stage of parenthood. Aaaaaaah!

So these kinds of trips really are enjoyable to me now. They aren't the WORK they used to entail.

Grandma Lyon went to a lot of effort to create some fun activities for the grand kids: quite a feat when you realize that they range in age from about a year and a half to about 14. There was swimming and water balloon fights and a treasure hunt and more.

During the treasure hunt portion, the kids were still sporting swimsuits.

And here's where it got "exciting." The neighbors to the west (relatively new to my in-laws, as they've moved into this house within the last year) have two large dogs: a black lab and a massive brown mastiff.

The two dogs, who were obviously not leashed, jumped the pathetic excuse for a fence and decided to "play" with my son (remember, he was wearing nothing but swim trunks). Fortunately, there wasn't any majorly broken skin, but across the back of his torso, my son ended up with several deep claw marks and two or three areas that are clearly bruises from dog teeth.

And now he's (understandably) freaked out about dogs.

The owners swear their dogs are up-to-date on their shots, but we aren't taking their word for it. We made some calls. The mastiff is in a kennel until we know for sure. (I don't think there's a real problem, since the wounds aren't deep enough for something like rabies to be an issue, but the owners deserve losing their dog even temporarily.)

Turns out they were doubly cited: first for not keeping their dogs leashed, but second because the mastiff wasn't licensed. I laughed with a cackle only mothers can appreciate.

My son's had a couple of scary run-ins with dogs, so he's developed a bit of a phobia. Not a cool thing. But the thing that ticked me off the most about the situation is that what if the dogs had decided to "play" with some of the younger cousins, like my youngest (who is 6) or worse, the one who is a year and a half old? We could be talking an ER visit here.

I was THRILLED that the neighbors were cited twice. The idiots.

Moving onto a lighter note . . .

That night we watched fireworks from two different cities from the comfort of the backyard (knowing we were safe because the lab was leashed and the mastiff was kenneled). We didn't have to deal with traffic or anything and had a great light show. And that was after the traditional Lyon pyrotechnics, where the Lyon brothers take those tanks and pimp them out with other fireworks to see how big and flaming they can get them. (Safety first, right?! The Lyon brothers are all engineers of some kind, and it shows.)

The last thing of note that happened was before bed when my darling little 12-year-old daughter stared and stared at my forehead. I knew what she was looking at and said, "Sweetie, stop staring at my zit."

"But Mom," she said. "It's so . . . BIG!"

Yeah. Thanks, babe. Just wait a couple years, and your forehead will be FULL of them.

I'm excited for next year's Independence Day, as we'll be spending it with my parents.

(Less than four months until they're home from their latest mission!)

Not that I'm counting down or anything . . .

Thoughts on My Writing Journey

Today's post is a bit different (sorry for last time's cliff hanger ending; I'll resolve that next week).

Something's been bouncing around my brain as I realized that some people who are not in the publishing industry might view some of these posts in a light that I never intended, especially if they haven't read all twenty posts in the series (or whatever number we're at now).

First, a story. I promise, it's relevant.

Back when I had several tiny kids, I was part of a neighborhood book club. We got together once a month and, of course, talked about whatever book we'd read. Inevitably, as happens when you get a lot of women together, discussion often meandered into motherhood.

No mother in the group had a teen yet; we were all in the grade school or younger era, most with babies. So we had lots of talk about sleep deprivation and potty training woes and colic and vomiting and trying to get crayon off walls and how to unclog toilets after kids had flushed down a variety of things, and so forth.

One woman in the club wasn't a mother, but not for lack of trying. She and her husband had yearned for years to have a child, and every time talk veered into the whining and complaining about sleepless nights or tantrums, I could see her stiffen and her jaw clench. She never said anything aloud, but I could just read her thoughts.

She would have given anything to have a month of sleepless nights if it meant she had her own baby. She would love to have an uncooperative toddler to potty train. Crayon on the wall? Bring it on. How dare we complain about what she wanted so badly?

But here's the golden question: Did we not appreciate motherhood?

At moments, perhaps. Did we not want it? Of course we did. If you took any of those women aside and asked them what their most precious possession was, I think each one of them would have given the same answer in a heartbeat: "my children."

We loved our kids. We adored them. We were grateful for them. Perhaps we at times took them for granted, but we would never, ever give them up or devalue them.

On the other hand, motherhood, while one of the most rewarding things ever, is hard. Children are a sacrifice. Motherhood comes with problems that, going in, you never could have anticipated because you've never been there.

It's common for people to compare publishing a book to giving birth. I'm going to take that analogy a bit further.

Aspiring writers are sometimes like that woman in our book club, wanting so badly to have what the others around her do: a contract. And they can be shocked when they hear a writer complaining about their agent or the marketing department or whatever else. They'd kill for an agent or [fill in the blank].

But here's the thing: publishing is very much like parenthood. It doesn't end when you sign that contract on the dotted line (or when you bring the baby home from the hospital). You're embarking on a brand new journey you know very little about, one that has ups and downs you cannot fathom yet, because you haven't been there and have no clue what you're in for.

It's so much more than getting a book on a shelf.

I spent EIGHT YEARS submitting and getting rejected. You can believe me when I say that I don't for one second take for granted the place I'm in. If you've read this entire series, I think you know that. I scraped and clawed my way to where I am. And the view here is fantastic.

But at the same time, I'm no longer in the place of "aspiring writer." I'm a published writer. It's now a job and a career. It's work. I have a whole new host of issues to grapple with. Much like the mother who has her child grow from six months to six years to sixteen yearsof age, I have new problems and difficulties pop up with each stage of my career.

Back to the mother in our book club. Through the miracle of modern medicine, she was able to have two little girls. While they were still toddlers, she tried for another baby. AND GOT QUADRUPLET BOYS.

I have a sneaking suspicion that she had her moments of complaining . . . just like (horror!) we'd complained.

Surely, if anyone had sleepless nights, she did. Not to mention constant diaperings and feedings and so on. I imagine potty training in that house three years later was interesting to say the least.

I'm guessing she developed some empathy for the rest of us mothers in that group who just needed a little validation that, at times, mothering is hard work.

Did this woman not want those children after years of infertility? Of course not. Did she love all of them and passionately adore them? Yes, absolutely. But that doesn't mean that raising them was a cakewalk or that she didn't have her moments of whining even though having a passel of kids was exactly what she'd wanted for years.

In publishing, when you finally get that contract, you won't live life in a jetted tub, eating bon bons as you type your next Great American Novel because your life is now perfect.

I'll never, ever forget the work it took to get where I am. I still remember the exact spot I was standing when I got that acceptance phone call for my first book . . . and the way I squealed like a three-year-old when I hung up. I appreciate every tiny thing my colleagues, editors, and publisher have done to help me along the way.

But I'm still working. The journey is not over. And that won't change, no matter how grateful I am that I have another book coming out in March, no matter how thrilled I am that I just published another article or got hired to do another freelance edit. There's another hill to climb or another pit that's in my way, some new river to cross, a difficult decision to be made.

I challenge anyone to find the perfect career (including motherhood) that doesn't have those blips and difficult moments.

As you likely know, I belong to the LDStorymakers, which is essentially a guild for LDS writers. We have nearly 100 members now. We celebrate one another's successes just as greatly as our first ones, because they still mean that much to us.

But you know what? There are a lot of problems popping up regularly (I'd say close to daily) on our e-mail list. We help each other through those as well. It's not all sunshine and rainbows.

I love what I do. That's why I do it, even in the harder moments.

For the aspiring writers out there, just be prepared for it: the hard times will come even after you sign on the much-anticipated dotted line.

It's called life. But that doesn't mean you aren't loving it and appreciating it.

WNW: Speech Acts

This post goes back to my favorite professor and class from BYU whom I've raved over enough that I'll stop embarrassing him by pointing him out by name. (*cough* Dr. Oaks *cough*)

Actual definitions of what a "speech act" is varies from linguist to linguist, but the basic idea is what is being accomplished by what a person says when they're speaking.

The list we got in class included the following speech acts:

Statement: John is a doctor.

Question: Are you sleeping?

Apology: I am sorry.

Directive (Order): Go outside.

Threat: I'll kill you.

Promise: I'll come back at six.

Okay, so here comes the fun part. A direct speech act is pretty obvious.

The form follows the function. Basically, with a direct speech act, if it looks like a statement, it's a statement. If it looks like a question, it's a question. The form tells you what kind of speech act it is.

So a question in a direct speech act would always has a question mark after it:

Are you sleeping?

This is a simple question asking exactly what it appears to be asking.

Indirect Speech Acts, however, get a little trickier. Form doesn't always follow function here. And this is where people often get confused and miscommunicate, assuming someone said one thing when the other person meant something else entirely.

It's fascinating to me to watch families and the degree of indirectness they get in their communications.

(If you like this kind of stuff, I highly recommend reading Deborah Tannen's work, especially That's Not What I Meant! and You Just Don't Understand. She's a sociolinguist who studies conversational styles, including indirect speech acts. She changed the way I view a lot of things.)

Here's an example showing form not following function in an indirect speech act: a question mark after something that really isn't a question:

Can you pass the salt?

The speaker here is actually giving a directive (an order), but it's indirect so it sounds more polite than just telling someone to give them the salt.

Other common indirect speech acts we see take place in the dating world.

"So, what are you doing Friday night?" is a common way for a guy to enter into the waters of asking a girl out. They both know it, but he's not actually committed to asking her out yet.

So if she says, "Oh, I have a big midterm to study for," he can save face because he never put himself out on a scary limb of potential rejection in the first place.

And neither said anything directly. He never asked her out, and she never directly rejected him.

We all do this kind of thing all the time.

A couple of years ago I noticed a similar thing at a family reunion at Disneyland (I notice these things because I'm a total word nerd. We know that, right?). The Lyon clan was in line at a ride and trying to decide where to go next.

My sister-in-law piped up loudly so everyone could hear, saying, "We were thinking about going on X ride next."

That was the end of the the discussion. As a word nerd, the moment fascinated me. What she'd said looked like a commentary or a suggestion. In reality, it was a statement of a plan. Basically, "Unless someone else has an objection, this is what we're doing next." And that's exactly what the family did.

What she'd said was an indirect speech act, and the family's communications were such that they all understood that.

Other examples of indirect speech acts:

You left the door open.

Form = Statement.

Function = Directive (Close the door.)

Do you know where the bathroom is?

Form = Question.

Function = Directive (Tell me where the bathroom is.)

Get out of here!

Form = Directive.

Function = Showing disbelief. (Think Elaine on Seinfeld.)

Here's a fun speech act: Answering a question with a silly question.

The form is a question, of course, but the function is to affirm the original question.

Examples:

Do birds fly?

Is the pope Catholic?

Performative Speech Acts are where you actually DO something by SAYING it.

Examples of these kinds of verbs include:

• bet
• nominate
• apologize
• promise
• resign
• baptize
• testify

And so on. If you can say, "I hereby . . ." and add a verb to it, then it's a performative speech act. You do it by saying it.

"I hereby resign the presidency . . ." or, "I testify that I saw the defendant at the scene . . ." or "I nominate Joe for the position."

In a performative speech act,the speaker does what they're saying by saying it. You can't argue with it, saying, "No you don't," because the speaker has already done it. It's not a matter of opinion. They nominated or apologized or resigned or whatever. Whether they have the proper emotion is another story, but you can't say they didn't do the act.

A final bit: One of my favorite speech act quirks relates to the PROMISE and the THREAT.

Think about it: There is NO DIFFERENCE between the two except for what the listener wants. If the listener wants the thing to happen, it's a promise. If the listener doesn't want it, it's a threat.

Generally speaking, "I will kill you," is a threat. If it's Dr. Kevorkian talking, it's a promise.

I don't remember where it came from, but shortly after learning this, I saw this very idea used in a cute way (I have no memory where, alas).

One character said, "I'm going to kiss you."

And the other responded coyly with, "Is that a promise . . . or a threat?"

Cute line, but probably more so for word nerds like me than anyone else.

For those interested in this stuff, go back to last week's WNW, at the end of which I mentioned I'd be talking about speech acts this week. Scroll down to Jordan McCollum's comment (#3). Do you see why I giggled at it?

And another plug for Deborah Tannen's books. Read them. They are AWESOME.

Your Perfect Summer Read

Almost exactly ten years ago, a woman I had met but barely knew, Lu Ann Staheli, called me. I remember where I was during that call: sitting on the lid of the toilet as my two children took their baths. Lu Ann had found my name in the League of Utah Writers directory as living near her and wondered if I'd like to be part of a new critique group.

Heck, yes! But see, I was also 8 1/2 months pregnant and serving in the Young Women presidency. I couldn't, not right then. The presidency had been in almost 3 years, so I was pretty sure we'd be released soon, and I thought that when baby was a few months old, maybe I could swing it, so I asked if they'd hold me a spot. They did.

I joined up in January of 2000. It was terrifying, to say the least, but the group wasn't quite full. A dear friend mentioned an aspiring writer she knew, and we met at a League chapter meeting. She became the next member of our group.

To this day, Michele Paige Holmes seems surprised that I was so "generous" in inviting her to the group, because, according to her, she was a terrible writer. (Don't let her fool you; she was never, ever, a bad writer.)

But the truth was, none of us was great; we were all learning and hoping to some day be published. Eventually, we all were.

Week after week, Michele brought brilliant chapters to the group. It was hard not to be envious of her skill, especially when she'd say, "This is really rough; I just wrote it an hour ago." Then we'd read it, it was freaking brilliant, and I'd go home with my chapter dripping in red ink.

Michele is good at what she does. So it was hard to watch her struggle to publication and constant rejection. It was with true joy that I heard of the acceptance of her first book, Counting Stars, which won (most deservingly!) the Whitney Award for Best Romance in 2007.

I was lucky enough to be the one who read off her winning name the night of the awards gala, and I cried tears of joy for her.

The road between her first and second published books has been a longer one than her fans hoped for, but her next novel is now out, and the wait has been worth it. All the Stars in Heaven is now in stores.

It's what some people call a "spin-off" novel, in that it takes a minor character from Counting Stars and tells his story. But this book stands alone completely; there's no need to read the first one before picking this one up.

Counting Stars dealt with heavy issues and emotions and had me weeping and laughing, often on the same page.

This book is a bit different. It did have me crying and laughing, but it has an element of suspense and action; it has you on the edge of your seat as Jay and Sarah get pulled into (and need to escape from) a drug ring with their lives.

It's an exciting read, one I highly recommend.

I'm already excited for her next book. Since I'm in her critique group, I've gotten to read a few chapters, and I'm already laughing and giggling. It's gonna be good.

But you'll just have to wait for it.

Writing Journey: Part XIX

I had gotten into a rhythm of turning in manuscripts mid-December and having the book released the next September. I turned in Tower with the same time frame: I submitted it December 2007 and assumed, should it be accepted (with it being the fourth in the series, I had faith it would be), that I'd see it on shelves fall 2008.

A good friend and I shared the same publishing time frame for several years; we often swapped manuscripts each fall to edit one another's work before we both turned in our stuff. Then each fall, we both had our new releases at the same time.

She got her September 2008 release. I didn't. Mine was pushed back to the next "spring," whatever that meant (a window of about three or four months: February through May).

It also meant I wouldn't have a book out in 2008.

For most of my career, I'd worked hard to get that book out every year, and except for the gap between books 1 and 2 (which, if you've read this entire series, you know wasn't because I wasn't working my tail off, but because LWY had an unusually quick push through the pipeline), I'd done it:

Lost Without You: 2002

At the Water's Edge: 2004

House on the Hill: 2005

At the Journey's End: 2006

Spires of Stone: 2007

And then . . . 2008 . . .

At first I was a bit irked, especially when my dear friend got her usual slot. But, then, I couldn't blame her for a marketing decision. The following is purely my conjecture as to why the decisions were made, but here's my guess: her books simply sell more books than mine do. This is a business, and her books are money in the bank for the publisher, much more than mine are.

Fall is the prime release slot, and she's more of a sure thing. Spires didn't have the sales it should have, and in this business, the past predicts the future. That's why I think I lost the slot.

Plus, with the stupid economy the way it is, all publishers are putting out fewer books each month. As a result of that, a lot of books are getting release dates that are farther out. It didn't affect her, but it affected me.

It's complicated. On the other hand, I knew of some writers whose books were being pushed back several times (a few months and then a few more months and then a few more months) or canceled altogether because of the economy.

So I stopped whining. Sure, I didn't get a 2008 release. And yes, by the time Tower of Strength came out, it was almost 2 years old. But at least I still had a book coming out!

One big result of all of this is that I volunteered to be on the Whitney Awards Committee. The rules might be changing soon, but at least for last year, if you were on the committee, you were ineligible for an award.

I was ineligible anyway since I didn't have a book released that year, so I figured I might as well help out. And I'm so glad I did; serving on the Whitneys was a fantastic experience, one I'll never forget.

Moving forward: When it came to the deployment book and its timeline, Kirk gave me serious hope. If I could turn it in by Halloween, he would try to push for a fall 2009 release. It the powers that be went for that, it would mean Tower would come out spring 2009, and the deployment book would come out fall 2009.

I'd have TWO books out in 2009! That would make up for not having a book out in 2008.

How cool would that be! Yes! But I'd have to get it in quick for a shot at that happening.

I worked hard finishing it up. It was truly a joy to work on; I learned to love the women in the story, and I really feel that I learned a lot about women and female friendships in the process. I turned it in, as promised, on Halloween.

And then waited and waited to hear back. Eventually, I did, although it took longer than I expected. But it was accepted, and that was a thing to celebrate. But the timeline?

Let's just say . . . head + wall = lots of banging thereon.

WNW: Subjunctive Mood

FIRST, AN ANNOUNCEMENT:

Tonight (Wednesday, June 24) I'm speaking at the Provo Library, 7:00 pm. It's for the Utah Valley Chapter of the League of Utah Writers. Copies of my grammar book will be available at a discount.

I'll be talking about using archetypal characters and plot concepts to create fresh stories using what's called "The Hero's Journey." Whether you're a League member of not, please come! Everyone is welcome.

Now, back to business:

I'm sort of cheating on my Word Nerd Wednesday post today, but for good reason: I've been buried under crazy busy stuff. (Summer slow-down? Ha!)

As a result, we've got a double-dipper post.

You know how sometimes you wonder whether to use was or were in a sentence?

Like:

If she was/were home, she could tell her mom about it.

He wondered if his date was/were cold.

One of those sentences needs was and the other needs were.

Do you know which is which? AND why?

If not, take a gander at my Writing on the Wall post today. It's all about this very thing: subjunctive mood, a section adapted from my book There, Their, They're.

Next week, I hope to have the time to put together something fun about speech acts, something true word nerds can appreciate.

If you can come to the League meeting tonight, I'd appreciate it. It's always nice to NOT talk to a bunch of empty chairs. :)

Would You Take the Pretty Pill?

Pretty matters. It's a reality that's unfair, but it's real.

The first encounter with it that I recall was around eight years old while taking dance classes. One girl, Erin, I think her name was, was the teacher's pet. He treated her better than anyone else, always putting her on the front row and fawning over her, giving her far more compliments and attention than anyone else.

She was a good dancer, sure, but there were plenty of other great dancers in the class. I remember thinking how unfair it was that we didn't get anywhere near the same adulation, nowhere near the same encouragement or commentary. And even with the hindsight of almost thirty years, I can honestly say I was as good as she was. It made no sense.

I complained to my mother. I described Erin. Mom raised an eyebrow, having a clue as to what what going on.

See, Erin always arrived at class with really cute dance clothes, hair in curls and ribbons. I think she had earrings, and quite possibly a thin layer of lip gloss.

Mom's eyes narrowed as she came up with an experiment. For my next dance class, I wore a brand new leotard and tights. We put my hair in darling curls with bows. Mom even added a slight, natural-looking touch of blush on my cheeks, and maybe even a tiny bit of eye shadow.

Mr. Dance Teacher couldn't give me enough attention.

It felt good at the moment (Ha! Mom's experiment worked!), but afterward, I was hurt. The only thing that had changed was my appearance. I looked cute, so my teacher acted differently. Mom was irate but not at all surprised.

It was my first experience with the reality of the world we live in. There are times we all deal with it: we dress up for a job interview, we put on nicer clothes for church. But in day-to-day interactions, yes, we're also judged. And people treat us accordingly.

But here's the important thing: no matter how we change on the outside, we're still the same people inside.

Recently I came across a blog post that brought this issue center stage for me. It posed a question: If you could take a pill that made you physically thinner and prettier . . . but stupider . . . would you take it?

The comment section stunned me: the overwhelming response was yes, the readers (mostly female) would take such a pill in a heartbeat.

The responses made me want to cry. Yes, the Erins of our world may get treated a bit differently. But do these reader really think that being pretty and skinny in and of themselves make you happy?

REALLY?

They DON'T.

For someone seriously overweight, this may hard to swallow; they feel as if they'd do anything to be thin, and if they were, they'd finally be happy. But you know what? That's not how it works. I know plenty of people (many close to me) who have lost 40 or 50 or more pounds, have looked fantastic at reaching whatever size . . . but then gained it all back. Why? Because being skinny didn't change them on the inside.

Having a new dress size didn't change their mental and emotional thermostat, the way they respond to life events and stress, the way they see the world. The same things that made them sad and happy and stressed and overjoyed before still did.

A lower number on the scale didn't change those things.

Consider this: I know plenty of people (and I bet you do, too) who have never struggled with weight issues but who are still unhappy and possibly even clinically depressed. (If being skinny makes you happy, explain that one.)

Newsflash: Skinny does not equal happy.

I've lived through this pill experiment (inadvertently, but literally). You can read that whole post here, but here's the nutshell version:

I was on a preventative migraine medication that made me lose a lot of weight. I ended up very thin (nearly 10 pounds lighter than I was at high school graduation) and looking great.

However, I physically ill all. The. Time. I felt no joy in life.

On top of that, I became, literally, stupid. One side effect basically made my brain fall out of my head. I found myself trying to focus on what my kids were saying to me and asking them to repeat themselves several times.

Once (not making this up) I had to count 3 + 6 on my fingers.

I was skinny. I was stupid. I was miserable.

As I weaned off the medication, I decided to wear a dress I could finally fit into after a good 15 years or so of being too big for it, knowing that the minute I was off the medication I'd never fit into it again. Because yes, I did enjoy being thin.

But that size did NOT make me happy. There is a distinct difference.

That medication period was a very dark, miserable time.

I had exchanged a physical improvement for the loss of my mind and intelligence.

I couldn't write then. I had a hard time reading, because frankly, I wasn't smart enough (couldn't focus enough) to follow. I was stupid, skinny, and utterly depressed.

I doubt I'll ever again be as thin as I was during those few months. While it's a nice pipe dream to think I could be, I recognize that if I ever fit into that peach-colored dress again, it'll be a fun moment, but it won't be the greatest source of my joy in life. The greatest sources of joy in my life are a lot more significant than a stupid dress.

During that time (and even since), I cannot count how many people have said they'd love to try that pill for the weight loss, even if it made them stupid. I always want to shake some sense into them, make them understand that losing who you are while being thin doesn't bring happiness.

Really, it doesn't. Happiness comes from within, not from a number on a scale, and not from a dress size.

I try not to care about the Erins among us, although I admit to being intimidated by drop-dead gorgeous women who look like they just walked off a Vogue cover. But here's the catch: I doubt they're happier just because they're skinny and pretty. They surely have their own life challenges.

No one escapes this life unscathed, curls or ribbons notwithstanding.

I'm not sure what the point of this is, exactly. On the one hand, I'm very aware that appearance is significant and that how I look affects how people treat and view me. It's an odd line to walk.

So I'm always sure to wear something a bit businessy-dressy for author appearances and the like. I wear casual clothes (jeans, sweats, t-shirts, and [who am I kidding?] pajamas) around the house. I refuse to visit the salon every few weeks to color my hair and get my nails done or to follow fashion trends. While I know it's important to make a good impression, I don't want to be an Erin.

There's a part of me that whispers that trying to be one of them will only make me miserable, because I can't be perfect. I can't be the most pretty. I can't be the skinniest.

But I can be smart. And I can be me.

No stupid and skinny pill for me, thanks.

The trick now is trying to teach my three daughters that balance: value your appearance. Present yourself well, but don't chase after perfection, thinking it'll make you happy, because it won't.

Never, ever, give up part of who you are for someone else.

I'm currently a bit chubby, but I'll stick with that if it means I'm smart and happy. Yes, I'm trying to lose weight (mostly so I don't have to buy bigger clothes, plus it's a healthy thing to do, and because exercise keeps my mood more even).

But no way would I ever again exchange smart and happy for something as shallow as thin or pretty.

WNW: The Ellis Island Myth

One of my favorite Word Nerd books I borrowed from my good friend Lu Ann Staheli, who knows just what a freak I am about these things. She knew I'd love it, and I did. I still haven't bought my own copy, but I really, really need to, because the book is so dang cool.

It's called Word Myths, by David Wilton.

The author did a ton of research to track down the sources of many things we think we know about English and English phrases, but many of which are downright wrong. Some of these are often seen in e-mail forwards and some of which even get passed down in university English classes as truth.

He digs around and then find the truth, where possible. In many cases, he debunks the myth. Then he tells us where a phrase really came from.

In some cases, he debunks the myth and then has to admit that we really don't know where a phrase originated. Such is the case with phrase, "the whole nine yards." There are a good dozen possible explanations, and he debunked every one. None of the theories holds water. The source of that phrase is an ongoing mystery.

One of my favorite debunked myths from the book dovetails with history (shocker, huh, being that I'm both a word nerd and a history junkie).

We all know that during the Ellis Island years that a lot of family names were changed, generally made more easily pronounced by American standards. That often meant spellings were altered and sometimes entire names were changed.

Because of this, we see sad, identity-crisis moments portrayed in such movies as An American Tail, where Fievel and his family end up with all new first and last names (which, of course, makes finding each other later that much more difficult when they're separated in the film . . . sniff).

My own (maiden) last name is an Americanization. My grandfather and his parents came to U.S. in the early 1920s from Switzerland. Their last name at the time was Lűthi. It was changed to Luthy.

But here's the catch: WHEN did the name change occur?

According to Wilton, NOT at Ellis Island, because here's the thing (and frankly, it makes a lot of sense):

The U.S. agents running Ellis Island lacked the authority to change people's names.

Duh. What kind of government would allow that kind of thing? The records they took matched the ships' manifests and other records. Nothing was ever changed.

So then how did all those names get changed?

The people did it themselves later on. Many immigrants came to the U.S. looking for a fresh, new life. They wanted to feel American. As a result, they changed their own last names after arrival to look and sound more American. To feel like they belonged.

Doing so was their choice, and it always took place sometime after their visit through Ellis Island.

There were no sad, tragic moments of families losing their identities. Name changes were their own choice, a sign of embracing their new homeland.

(There were plenty of other sad, tragic moments at Ellis Island, like sending back a sick family member so a disease wouldn't spread to the U.S. or turning away someone because they couldn't read, but those are for someone else to post about.)

I tend to be a bit opinionated (shocker, huh?), and I get excited when I learn new things.

Shortly after I read this book, a brother-in-law started telling me about how his family name had been changed at Ellis Island and how sad that was. I jumped in and told him that nuh-uh, he'd been told a fake story his whole life.

Yeah. I think I took the wind out of his sails a tad.

I really should shut up sometimes. These kinds of trivia bits belong on blog posts, not at family reunions.

The Clueless, Smart Girl

To this day, I'm somewhat surprised I got married, let alone at the age of 20.

Back in eighth grade I was convinced I'd never marry because I was painfully shy, and see, marrying a guy would entail speaking to one first, and like that was ever going to happen.

Fortunately, I broke out of my shell a bit in high school and ended up with lots of guy friends. So that issue resolved itself.

But I never, ever learned to flirt.

It's this void in my female psyche. A gene I lack. Or something. I seriously don't get it and never have.

I had a friend back from our high school years (rival high school, but I loved her anyway . . . bulldogs, schmulldogs . . .) who was so brilliant at flirting to the point that she often didn't realize she was doing it.

We were both in Into the Woods together. She had a boyfriend. Yet she constantly flirted with the guy who played Jack. Jack, poor kid, had no prayer of ever winning her heart, but she flirted with him so much that he hung on for the entire show, thinking that maybe, just maybe . . .

More than once I had to tell her to knock it off, she's doing it again. But I watched in open fascination. How does one do that flirting thing? It was almost a scientific phenomenon to me at that point. I could identify that she was flirting, but I couldn't figure out how such a thing was accomplished.

Later, as BYU freshman, she and I had a class together. On one of the first days of class, she pointed to a guy in the back of the room and said, "By the end of the semester, he's going to ask me out."

Yeah, right.

HE DID.

Talk about stalking prey. I was stunned and amazed.

But also a bit disgusted. Because I knew one ingredient to her flirtiness, and I wanted none of it: she pretended to be stupid. She was actually exceedingly intelligent. She got several 5s on AP tests, including on the Calculus test her junior (not senior) year. She was a Stirling Scholar. And so on. But in front of guys, you'd think she couldn't count to 20 with her shoes on.

I knew there had to be more to flirting than acting dumb, but I never did figure it out. And I never believed people when they said that the first few days of university classes were a waste because of guys and girls checking each other out.

Me? I was checking out the syllabus.

About ten years after getting married, a friend of mine said she'd gone back to BYU campus for something and was sad that the guys no longer checked her out, that she was obviously an "old" lady now.

My brow furrowed. Yet again, my lack of some feminine gene was apparent. I was never aware of guys checking or NOT checking me out. Guys actually DID that? I wish I'd known to look for it. Maybe if I'd noticed some guy checking me out, I wouldn't have felt like such a dork.

When walking across campus, I was always thinking about my term paper or (very likely) actually reading one of the many books I was assigned. (I got rather good at avoiding people and navigating stairs and the like while reading.)

So it's no surprise, really, that I didn't meet my husband in a flirty environment. As cha cha partners on a summer ballroom dance team, we had two months of becoming friends before our first date.

When I realized I kinda liked this guy, I decided to test him. We were chatting in the hall outside the practice room when he mentioned an assignment that had him worried. It was a big part of his grade, and if he didn't get a good enough score, he might lose his scholarship.

Really? Man, tough. . . . And then I worked the fact into the conversation that I had a scholarship TOO, just to see his reaction. See? Your dance partner is a smart girl. Whaddaya think of that?

Didn't faze him. That's, I believe, the closest I ever got to actual flirting.

It's also the first big point he got in my book.

The second was when he quoted Shakespeare.

Writing Journey: Part XVIII

Catch up on the rest of this series HERE.

After publishing that military wives article, the topic wouldn't go away. I had pages and pages of thoughts and feelings and events these five women had poured their souls into. I felt as if they'd let me into a corner of their hearts and lives. It was an honor that a mere 1200 words didn't do justice to.

It just wasn't enough. I had to do more with it. I was driven to do more. Other people needed to understand what deployment was like for those at home. I hadn't had a clue until I interviewed these remarkable women.

Maybe I could write a longer version of the article and sell it to a bigger magazine, I thought. But even that didn't quite sit right. I wasn't sure what I should do, but I had to do something.

About that time, I had difficult moment during a Christmas Enrichment night. I ended up in the lobby feeling a bit sorry for myself, and what happened over the next few minutes turned on my writer brain.

I suddenly had an entire scene about a woman, Brenda, going through a deep depression during the Christmas season while her husband was deployed. The entire scene unfolded in my head and demanded to be written.

Keep in mind, I was still researching the Vernal Temple and fully expecting to write novel about that, although no story was really popping out at me yet. Finding one was sure taking a long time (I had a few elements floating around my brain, but nothing really solid yet), but I wasn't in panic mode. The story would come, I figured. It always does.

But Brenda's scene itched to be written. It wasn't the beginning of a story. If anything, it belonged somewhere in the middle of a book. But I sat down and wrote it.

Since I'd recently submitted Tower, I had nothing else to read at our weekly critique group meetings, so I brought that scene.

In no uncertain terms, they told me, "You have to write this book."

On one hand, I was flattered. But on the other . . . what about the whole temple series thing? Well, maybe I could do both.

I kept researching Vernal and writing this deployment book on the side. I ended up with five different women whose lives come together when their husbands are deployed together. Each has her own stage of life, her own weaknesses and trials. The story went into their friendships and support of one another. The result was something unlike anything I'd written before, something that not only shows a glimpse of deployment but also what real female friendships are about.

But when it was more than half done, I still had no story about Vernal.

It was late spring when my trusty editor Kirk told me that first of all, Tower was accepted for publication. (Yay!) But then he said the committee was asking me to do something else after that . . . something not temple-related. They thought maybe the temple series idea had run its course now that I'd done all four of the old Utah temples.

I was taken aback, because I'd had plans for Mesa, Alberta, Hawaii, Nauvoo . . . but okay, I'll put the Vernal book on the shelf and let it gather dust.

But then Kirk asked if I had any ideas for writing something else.

And I had to smile. Because not only did I have an idea, I almost had another book ready. Something that sort of spilled out of me.

I told him about the deployment manuscript. It's not a romance, I told him. It's not a historical. It's "women's fiction." And it's not remotely like anything I've done before. But I love it.

Kirk thought the idea was great and very timely and asked how quickly I could get it to him.

I bit my lip and wondered just how fast I could get it to him.

I made a leap. "By Halloween?"