*DONE!*

I patted myself on the back yesterday, because, frankly, there was no one else to do it. When I write not to a deadline set by another, but to a self-imposed discipline that is its own reward, I am alone to raise the virtual glass and say, “done!”

I am referring to the first draft of my new novel for middle grades. Nothing is really “done” here, except that I have a story with beginning, middle and end. The ever-present doubts that threaten to creep in every single day while working on very first preliminary drafts (whether the shortest picture book texts, chapter books or novels) were kept at bay. I “brought it home.”

It’s a very good feeling.

For the next week I won’t even look at it, though I have already jotted down a few thoughts to consider when revising. In a week I will do an once-over revision. It is not ready for anyone else’s eyes yet, but it won’t be that long.

A first draft is also the time I don’t read any fiction. Just a habit I formed that works for me- I need to “clean out the voices,” if that makes sense. So I celebrated last night by starting to read a new book. The other narrative voices are not an issue for me when revising.

This is my way of communicating with you as to “where I am,” (how California.) and what I've been up to. I‘ll spend the morning having coffee with a longtime friend who has moved to the city. (Here this means San Francisco.) I have two other coffee dates this week with neglected friends. All this caffeine-, which I happen to think is perfectly fine BTW- and re-connection, makes me feel like I’m on vacation. Funny. The laundry is still there and I will have to get up at 6:00 AM everyday to drive DD. But my inner-world is different.

‘Nuff about me. Tell me about you.

The Writing Place

Waist-deep in first drafting mode now, I pause  just long enough to share this memory here.

I recall a dear friend’s question when I first told her I was writing. That was a few years ago, and until then I had not shared this with anyone. But I needed my mornings free and didn't want her to think I was spending them doing something illegal or, worse, avoiding her. So I came out and told her my mornings were for writing.

“Oh, wow,” she said. “Do you have a special retreat to do your writing?”

In the popular imagination, writers go on retreats. I know some real writers do. These are rich writers. Others are retired people who have romanticized about being writers, and can finally afford to live out this image. There are whole operations ready to offer these retreats, usually for a good $$$ fee.

There are paintings, and now movies, that re-enforce this^ accepted wisdom.

“Oh, I said. “ My desk in the basement.”

Because reality is a lot closer to this^.

I’m happy to report that I have since graduated to a small desk in the corner of my bedroom, gratis of DH making my computer wireless. But it is still not a Victorian dream.

Or is it? In my mind, the “space” I go to is, pretty much, well,-

Yawn… Snooze… WAKE UP!

How do I know if what I’m writing is interesting?

I don’t.

But as I strive to offer a riveting-can’t-put-it-down story, I must use the best clues I have. This is at the pre-beta reader stage, when my work-in-progress is still between me and me.

Clue No. #1-

Not good. ^

If I’m yawning, the reader would probably also. No excuses. (Maybe the coffee I made was the decaffeinated kind… I did stay up too late… it’s gray and gloomy outside….) Just make sure, at the very least, that the first reader (you) is like-

---And that you are the fish in this scenario, not the feline.

{And for goodness sake, don’t have the first word of the chapter/post be yawn  and the second snooze. Oops.}

This pretty much describes my struggles today.

To the Perfectionists Out There…

Nope. I’m not one of you. Perfectionism is one of the afflictions I have not been burdened with.

 It’s evident not only from my occasional typos on this blog and my disrespect for conventional writing-rules, but from the blatant joy I seem to take in putting less than polished posts on chat boards without hiding my identity. I’m just happy to be there and to put myself out there. It’s FINE.

I had a friend years ago who made the most elegant ceramics. She would not allow the flawed ones to be displayed. By “flawed” I mean the tiniest imperfections you’d need a microscope to see.

Another old friend made exquisite textiles. Few of her pieces were ever completed. There was always something wrong with each. A stitch out of place the size of a microbe, and the piece was relegated to the shredded heap of dusting cloths.

I also have a relative who has been working on the same first half of her first book for thirteen years. By now the text is barely coherent from all the critical surgeries it had endured.

Now you understand why I see this not as a search for excellence, something I understand, admire and participate in. Perfectionism is a serious affliction.

There is a saying attributed to the Muslim mystic Ibn Arabi: “The universe’s imperfection is part of its perfection.” More than seven hundred years later Leonard Cohen said it this way: “…Forget your perfect offering. There is a crack in everything- that’s how the light gets in.

^^^Celebrating the cracks and imperfections.^^^ Come dance with me.

Dastardly Distractions at the Door

Drat! Not another one…

Sitting down to write a first draft has become a ritual-filled routine. I begin with shutting down all the likely distractions. Cell phone- Off. Landline set on Do Not Disturb mode, and turned around so I won’t even see the orange light that tells of a message left. Silent headphones on so if anyone dares talk to me, I can point at then frantically- not now!

And then my ever-friendly mail-carrier honks his horn to let me know he’s got a package. How can I ignore Louis, who will climb up the gazillion rickety stairs to our house rather than leave a package by the garage as his predecessors used to?

Friendly Louis gone, I’m back to hunker-down mode. The words begin to flow again. I ignore my cat, the Honorable Stella Marbles, as she decides to meow at the door. Miss Marbles doesn’t give up. She gets louder and I begin to wonder why my family members call her The Quiet One. None of them let her in- too busy. She wins.

All settled again, when there’s a tap at the window. My neighbor is dropping her Thank-You Bundt cake for my watching her cats all last week. She didn’t want to leave it on the porch, you see, and well- no one was answering the door.

The real challenge, it seems, should be finding le mot juste. Instead it is a dance between keeping the words streaming in, and the door-knockers out.

I’m determined. So is the raven. Let me get in a day’s work- only this, and nothing more.

A Gift to Self

It wasn't until my 30^th birthday that I had this epiphany: If there is something I wish someone would give me for my birthday, that someone should be me.

I remember how mind-blowingly freeing this was. No, I don’t want a party. I wish I could spend the morning in a museum by myself.

I took the day off work, and I took myself to the museum. Anything and everything after that was happily received and gratefully accepted. I had already had the birthday celebration I wanted.

Well, thirty was ions ago. But I have kept this gift to self every year since. Sure, I could do this every day, but really- I wouldn't.  Life and my obligations get in the way. However, every birthday Mirka gets something she really wants from herself.

Last year I got the happiest shoes. 

I still float away every time I put them on.

And this year I made myself the yummiest cake-

^^^Chocolate Raspberry torte^^^. The cell phone in my hand was because I had to tell everyone about it.

And here I am doing it again.

Sorry you can’t try the cake. But try my gift to self on your next BD. You might be as happy, or at the very least you’d have gotten something you wanted.

The Little Things

Another blogger’s lamentation of being stuck at home, because she slipped by the washing machine and tore a muscle, brought back a visceral memory.

Wowee-ouchee.

Two years ago I fell tripping on the edge of a rug on the way to answer the door. The resulting sprained wrist and blue lip and black eye brought some pitying looks from people who would  never look at DH the same. The poor guy was nowhere near, but yea, right, they all say that. I could see it in their eyes- next thing you’re gonna tell me you ran into a door, lady?

But what struck me (aside from the hard floor) was how mundane it was and how much it took away from me (not to mention my spouse’s good rep.) for the next couple of months.

And I also never got to see who was ringing the doorbell. Probably a solicitation for whatever, dagnabit.

It’s the little things.

Maybe I can remind myself that these are also the stuff magic dust is made of. DS saw a wounded pigeon limping today. Near her were other pigeons, chirping away and doing their best to keep humans away from their crippled comrade. DS’s eyes were moist when he told me of this.

A little thing.

This is a contemplation of the little things.

This is a little post.

The Competition

To paraphrase: all the world’s a competition and all of us are running.

Back from the piano competition, DD did not win. But in a real way she did. She had a marvelous time, made good friends, and did very good work.

And best of all- we felt wholeheartedly that the winner was *the right one*. This, oddly, makes all the difference.

I feel the same about all the writerly competitions I seem to have inadvertently gotten myself into. I don’t see them in the making as DD does hers, but we are always in competition- for a slot on a publisher’s list, an award, or even a reader’s time.

When I feel the winners are superb and wholeheartedly deserving, I am glad to be anywhere on the periphery of their sphere. When I don’t- oh, you see those kvetchy posts on writers’ blog/tweets/chat-boards. I try not to lament much in public, but I feel it just as much.

So this was one good excursion, and now I’m back.

Almost. Just in case you think this was all fun and games, I’ll share some of the hair-raising dangers you don’t want to run into in the dead of night. Yup, this from the still undisclosed location we were in.

 Lookie here now …



It's an Al eat Al world out there.

Nowhere Near a Computer

After a year and a half of blogging, I made the earth-shattering discovery of how easy it is to have posts scheduled to pop here when (gulp) their writer isn't anywhere near a computer.

So this is where I am- nowhere near a computer. At least until next week. I'm still very much on the job as DD's chaperon for yet another international piano competition. She was picked to be one of twenty semi-finalists, (fingers crossed, everyone) but the location? Can't complain.
 

I’ll leave you with a hint, gratis of the very talented Canadian artist Shelagh Duffett:

© Shelagh Duffett

The Shy Tribe

Almost all the writers I know personally are introverts. Few of us were tailor-made to "be public." But the very act of seeking readers means putting our inners out.

My not-writer friend (I’ll call her Alma) told me she had always imagined writers wrote for themselves. I disagree. Those who write for themselves have drawers full of diaries and manuscripts. But if a writer is seeking publication, they are not writing for themselves. We want to engage. We want you to know us through our characters.

In other words- we are a living oxymoron. {Some would say we are the other kind of moron, but that’s another post.}
 

I remember how very awkwardly awful it felt when my first publisher told me they expected me to have a website. The editor offered to help me develop it. But his vision was wa-a-ay too scary for me, so in a defensive move I quickly put up what I thought was a palatable version I could live with. It helped that DD made it as a holiday gift. It took her all of two hours, and there it, or I, was.
 

But then, OY. I was on the Internet. I mean my name and my picture. I had trouble sleeping that night.

Alma said it was nice, though. To me it felt like an aging dame in a bad wig wearing rickety stiletto heels. Sort of like a Rula Lenska, if anyone remembers her. But Alma, who had a non-writerly website for years, assured me few people will ever look at or see the site.
While this sounds contradictory, it was a soothing thought.
 

Other shy writers told me they had the same funny feeling, but got used to it. They too confirmed that few will visit the site, and I was safely still pretty private. One likened it to wearing a wristwatch or a wedding band, and forgetting about it.
 

Gradually it happened to me also. I not only got used to wearing my modest site, but my second publisher, who encouraged blogging, got a veteran “webby.” I can confirm that you get used to it and, because few people visit, you can maintain the illusion that you are still in your slippers and pajamas.

Wait a minute, I actually am.

[It occurs to me that maybe the explosion in self-publishing isn't just a function of digital publishing, but also of the option of digital promotion. Our Shy Tribe can now put our selves out there from the privacy of our attic, and pretend to ourselves we are not really doing it.]
 

And Alma is convinced I secretly love it all. Maybe she knows something. Overcoming any fear is rewarding.

Spelling and Writing

To quote my favorite storyteller: I ain’t no grammarian.

I have long marveled at the gaping trench that sometimes opens between the mysterious art of storytelling and the craft of writing.

Why are some writers competent technicians but lackluster storytellers? Why are some storytellers grammatically challenged?

Must the great ones be stellar in both aspects? Why?

{I suspect there are too many WHYs up there^.}
 

Back to my favorite storyteller, Ms., Fannie Flagg. (Yes, the Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café and Can’t Wait to Get to Heaven Fannie Flagg.) There’s a quotation from her that has been a flag-post of sorts for me: “I can’t spell worth a nickel, but no one can tell my stories the way I can.” Fannie used a saltier word for ‘nickel,’ but I’m not so pungent.

As it turns out, Ms. Flagg is dyslexic. She’s also a genius and a national treasure.
 

Maybe my point is that great writing is much more than technique. My father used to say that editors were invented to place the commas, but writing was vision first.
 

Like the old dilemma of whether to start from plot or character, both vision and technique matter. Try drinking nectar without a cup! But if it must be weighted, I’d tilt toward vision. A vision-less great technician is like an empty cup. Nice, sturdy, and leaves you thirsty.
 

This may be my excuse or justification of daring to write even though I’m grammatically challenged.

Fair enough. Now tell that to Fannie Flagg.

What is this thing called LOVE?

The famous refrain of a famous song struck me today, as I was enmeshed with heart-frenzied imagery. You can’t step out the door on Valentine’s Day Week without someone selling you love for a dollar. Or for five, get a dozen.

Cheap love, that.

Got me thinking- what is this thing?

A two-thousand year old Talmudic saying came to me. My ancestors were answering. So many years between us and their answer still made perfect sense.

“If your wife is short, bend down and listen to her.”

{Babylonian Talmud, Baba Metzia 59a}

Sounds simple, and in the end it is. Love is a feeling followed by an act. Not always convenient, nor intoxicatingly fun. Not lusty, nor heady. Neither grand nor shattering.
Love is the act of extending to another.

In that way I can grasp what the pious say when they speak of G-d’s love for us.

This week I will bend down or stretch up to listen. It doesn't cost $$$. (Though it may cause some pulled muscles.)

And if what you tell me is that you could use some chocolate, maybe wrapped in red foil and molded like a heart, I will get if for you. Hey, that’s what I’m here for.

*SUCCESS*

Years ago I read a writer’s account of what an insatiable beast the craving for success can be. If you get a positive rejection, you need to have an acceptance. If you have an acceptance, you need it to be from a large publisher. If you get a contract from a large publisher, you need to have great reviews. If you get great reviews, you need to have fantastic sales. If you have great sales, you need awards. If you have great sales, glowing reviews, are published by the largest publisher, and have awards dripping from your lapel, why oh why isn't one of those The Nobel???

Back to what success really means to me- do good work and stay sane. Success!

Respect Your Work

“Should I pay to be published?”
 

Not a week goes by when I don’t bump into some variation of this question. I’m newly baffled by it because, for some reason, it was one I never asked. I think I respected my work even when others didn't seem to.
 

Paying never occurred to me. I was ready to go to my grave unpublished. As it is, I am ready to go there (though not for sometime, I hope) un-lauded or never to be published again. I’m ready to never have this-that-and-the-other rather than pay someone to please, pretty please, let-me-work-for-you-and-I’ll-even-pay-you.
 

That’s what vanity/subsidy/co-op publishing is in fact doing. Whatever the Mot Du Jour these operations use, whatever slick terms they couch it in, this is what a writer does when engaging with them. Writers then pay someone for the opportunity to work for them.

I had plenty such opportunities. I unwittingly submitted to publishers who appeared traditional, and was offered such contracts. They use language like “we invest in your book as much as you will,” and “we like our authors to take part in every aspect of the process.”

Well, I have invested in my work. I've invested time, sweat and tears. I have taken part of the process at every turn when my (traditional) publishers asked me. But money?
 

Money flows from publisher to author, not the other way. Period.
 

The other day a writer, who was about to sign with a large press, asked if paying four-hundred dollars for editorial fees was on par with the market. A few months ago another writer told me her small publisher asks only for one-hundred dollars to have her picture book set for a print edition. Doesn't that sound reasonable?
 

Not to me.

 I should add here that there is a difference between self-publishing and paying a vanity publisher. Not all "paying" is created equal.
True self-publishing is a courageous decision to go it alone and be your own publisher.
I’m not courageous enough, so this also isn't for me.
There are good reasons to undertake this. Writers sometime want control of every aspect of their work including the design, title, editorial decisions, cover, and more. These fall into the publisher’s court in a traditional arrangement. True- many self-published, (who now use the term “Indie” for Independent, which used to mean small but traditional publishers) have grown weary and despondent of ever seeing their work in print through the traditional routes. But some have been well-published traditionally and are looking for more control.
The most admirable to my thinking are the self-published who have always dreamed of starting a small press and of being publishers, and so they start with their own books. Many publishing houses had their origins in such an endeavor. Assembling a team that includes an editor, a designer, a marketing person and so on, and you've got the start of a small publishing house. Good luck to you, because you will need it.
 

So back to paying a publisher for “services”-

Respect your work. You are the creative genesis of the business. You are the alpha and the omega. You may get paid a lot or- more likely- not a lot. But you get paid. The business can and will do without many of its traditional operators, but never without writers. We are the real deal. I wouldn't take any other.

A Time to be Quiet

“If a person feels he can’t communicate, the least he can do is shut up about it.”

                                                                     ~Tom Lehrer

How do you feel about the plethora of blog posts that say they have nothing to say?

You've seen them if you hang around the blogosphere. One of those “I know I haven’t blogged for a while, but really, nothing much has been going on…”

And if you are on Twitter, you've seen enough of these (mercifully shorter) “standing in line at my favorite coffee shop waiting for my latte, bored…”

OY.

I have a friend who has such contempt for the endless space filled by these published nothings, that this friend will not ever admit to seeing this blog, or any other. Friend refers to us who hang out here as “bloopers” and “Twits.”

Friend has a point.

But we have a better one, methinkst.

I have found beautiful posts on others’ blogs. I’m not on Twitter, but I have seen some clever tweets that are worthy of great Haiku poems. So a lot of it is benign? A lot of traditionally published books are surprisingly vacuous. And the latter aren’t free.
 

And my last point is the one I really popped in to talk about. There’s writing about nothing, and then there’s quiet writing. Quiet stories, quiet poems, and quiet novels. I have found that some of the most subtle and exquisite writing is not about much, at least not on the surface. I’m thinking of Henry James passages where the writer makes us rest a bit while observing the quiet seemingly mundane gestures of his characters. Not a lot going on, and yet a whole lot present.  

The television series Seinfeld was supposedly about nothing. The characters could make much of standing in line at their favorite coffee shop, waiting for that latte. It was different, and it was great.
 

Made my point. Now I’ll go and be quiet.

It Will Be All Right, Or- How to Overcome Fear of Author Events

I thought that since I am now the Grand Maven of Authorly Events, having just had my very first book reading/talk/signing party, I can bestow some wisdom for all who think about this and need advice. Obviously I’m jesting here, (just a little) because you’d want to hear from the uber-experienced on this. But it gives me a way to prattle about mine.

If you’re not shy, you might be looking forward to these. It’s a different ballgame for us shy persons. We have serious doubts we will even survive and live to tell the tale.

What are the greatest fears Authors have when thinking of Author Events?

Fear number one: No one will show up.

Here’s what happened –

Fear number two: I won’t be able to open my mouth, and if I do, no sound will come out.

Here’s what happened:

I didn't lose my voice or my place, and they laughed and even gasped a little.
 

Fear number three: I won’t enjoy it at all.

Here’s what happened:

Fear number four: No one will buy the book or ask me to sign it.

Here’s what happened:

This^

And this^

And plenty of that^.

----

Author is happy. Just go do it!

Is an E-book a Real Book?

Or

What’s REAL anyway?

A writing colleague asked the other day, “is an E-book not a real book?”

She had a reason to ask it this^ way. Her debut novel, traditionally published, was published as an E-book no paper edition. Her parents, not much older than I am, asked when she’ll have a real book published.

The first dictionary definition I found said---

BOOK: A written or printed work consisting of pages glued or sewn together along one side and bound in covers.

But we know dictionaries are properly conservative, and always a bit behind the curve.

In substance, more than form, a book is its content. So E-books are real books. That said- why do I have the need to print a paper copy of every manuscript, even after saving to another computer, to a flash drive, and finally, to The Cloud?

{And what kind of Cloud never makes rain, anyway? Take that, Dictionary.}

I have a dear friend, a generation plus older than I am, who scoffs at E-books. But same friend and I have not met face-to-face or spoken on the phone in over ten years. We live very far apart and communicate, almost daily, via E-mail. Bet my friend considers our friendship real.

And my kiddos, a generation and a half younger than me, don’t even understand the distinction. Much of their life is E-life. Even their real homework often knows no paper.

~~~

I was thinking about all this yesterday, when sending out invitations to my debut novel’s Launch Party. In a way, although the book (real paper) came out in August, its launch then was all virtual. This Sunday The Voice of Thunder will have its first real, hence “launch,” party. You know, real tea with real cookies. Not-

And hopefully, real guests.

So if you’re anywhere near, I’d *really* love to meet you. Here’s a, ahmm, virtual invitation-

When: This Sunday, January 13, 3:00pm. (Yup, tea & cookies time. And my book too.)
Where: Afikomen Judaica, 3042 Claremont Avenue, Berkeley CA 94705
Who: Me, my book The Voice of Thunder, and hopefully a few friends. Maybe you?
What: Reading, answering all questions, (about anything and everything) and having nice tea-time refreshments.
Why: because it is a truth universally acknowledged that every new book is in need of a party...

^ {for real} ^

~~~

Back to the beginning.
I’m of the school that the most real is neither seen with the eyes nor of this world. Call it imagination, or give it a theology.

It’s been real.

Keep the Child in View

As blogosphere joins most other spheres in New Year’s lists and resolutions, I’m determined not to. Oh, I can’t beat them, but I won’t join them. It’s plenty crowded over there and mine won’t be missed.

Because where I am, lists have a diluting effect. And lots of lists are a dilution of the dilution.

Have you noticed that when we tell of one child who is affected by some horrible challenge, the telling is more effective than when we pile them up? The Diary of Anne Frank, the story of *one* Holocaust victim, was a door to the event that killed millions. A million and a half Jewish children perished. But we remember Anne.

And so the other day, when I heard this quotation from Charles Dickens, I instantly knew that I had a new motto, a guiding pole, for the New Year. “Keep the child in view,” Dickens wrote.

All right, not a list, but one luminous guidepost. Keep the child in view.

Dickens’ children with their pet raven “Grip,” by Daniel Maclise 1841

DS was asking me why so much emphasis on the horrible massacre in Newton Connecticut is put on the twenty young victims, and not the six adults who died trying to protect them. His point was rational. These adults did something heroic. These adults had dependents and have lived lives of effort and striving. Why is the whole world focused on the children, with an afterthought of a mention about the adults?

My response, after some contemplation, was that the adults’ life journeys were already set. We knew them as teachers, school principal, and the school psychologist. But the children, every one of them, were a world of possibilities and wonder. A possible inventor who will change the world. A possible great leader, or even a prophet.

That is what keeping the child in view means to me: keeping that sense of possibility and wonder. Keeping it in my story telling and in my life.

Welcome 2013. I will remind myself to come back to Dickens, and keep the child in view.

Christmas in West Jerusalem

Our family has established our own Jewish tradition for Christmas, inspired by my childhood in west Jerusalem in the early sixties.

We are the outsiders, looking in.

We take a walk on Christmas Day, beginning in the late afternoon. As the sun goes down, the Christmas lights go up. Front lawns twinkling, colored lights on trees placed by windows, and an occasional neighbor who’d gone Santa-wild with bobbing reindeer on the roof and illuminated giant Mr. & Mrs. Claus waving mechanically. We come home, chilly but jolly, to hot chocolate and the calm harbor of our Jewish home.

No, I didn’t have any of these winter lights displays in my childhood. If fact, west Jerusalem streets, pre-1967, didn’t have a single overt sign of Christmas. The Jewish part of the city, then cut-off from its older parts, had neither church bells nor a whiff of a hint of any but the Jewish Holidays.

My mother was a member of the local YMCA. We treated it as a health club and a good place to park me, the daughter of a single working mother, for summer camps. Its Christian character was so subtle that you’d blink and miss it.

But one Christmas day, when I was seven, my mother decided we’d take the bus and go to the YMCA on King David Street to see the Christmas tree in their lobby. The YMCA had the only Christmas tree in town. She felt I should at least know much of the world was experiencing something that day.

There is nothing like the first time of something. My first glimpse of the towering green pine, a real tree in the corner of an indoor space, all adorned with twinkling colored lights, was the stuff imprinting memories are made of.

It was so beautifully exotic.

To this day, my viewing of others’ holiday decorations has the same intriguing and fabulous effect on me. It isn’t mine, it is of the other, and it is lovely.

I have no wish to bring it into our own living room. I like being an outsider looking in. I like that you wish to share it by putting the light so it is visible to us.

Merry Christmas, friends.

Shades of Gray

Because one blogger compared my book to it, and another writer thought The Voice of Thunder belonged on the bookshelf along side it, I am now reading BETWEEN SHADES OF GRAY. No, not the world-wide best-selling but decidedly smutty other book.* This SHADES is a critically-lauded literary award-winning Young Adult book, by Ruta Sepetys. The only smut in this book is the outrageous behavior of our species when we are convinced we hold the right to abuse one another in the name of “truth.”

Yes, this book. And it deserved every glowing review it got.

*The one I’m not reading is “GrEy,” British spelling, whereas the good book I am  reading is “GrAy, American spelling. Who knew we’d have one over the Brits in taste and literariness?

This got me thinking about how I have always had a visceral recoiling from black-and-white thinking. I come from a region where everyone (that’s everyone) has an opinion about everything. My parent’s idea of social get-togethers consisted of friends coming over for tea and cookies after dinner, and arguing together. The evenings often ended in raised voices, declarations of mental inadequacy on the part of the other, and, finally, a walk to the door and an agreement to do this all over again next week.

And my parents and their friends were the open-minded ones. They discussed things. They didn’t throw stones or vow to kill. They only committed to arguing and trying to persuade. But they did feel, strongly, that they were “right.”

And so I came to this great melting-pot, the U.S.A.. Here the pervasive cultural ethos, sometimes referred to as WASP, was the polite avoidance of arguing. Underneath, many still feel they hold the absolute truth. But polite conversation avoids religion and even politics, the mainstays of both social connectedness and divisiveness where I came from.

It suits me fine. My interior meter tells me black-and-white is the illusion. I do believe there are higher truths that are not shades of gray. I also think it is the height of hubris to think we are privy to those from our perch. I’m a shades-of-gray lady.

For me- black & white is for wearing, not thinking.

Let it Shine...

From our home to yours, taken moments ago...