My Favorite Book, But Not For The Happy Reason You Think
I am asked all the time which of my books is my favorite.
My answer is always the same, Julia’s Chocolates. That was the first book I sold and had that book not flown off into the wild blue publishing yonder, I was going to go back to teaching school.
I loved teaching but – and all you teachers out there will relate to this – it is an exhausting job on many fronts, and I had three very young kids at home.
I’d had an image in my head since college of a woman throwing a wedding dress into a dead, spindly old tree on a deserted street in North Dakota. I later had images of Breast Power Psychic Night, giant sized ceramic pigs, a pink house with a black door to ward off evil men, a free speaking aunt, and four new friends.
I threw all that together to create the book I wanted to write.
When Julia’s Chocolates sold, I could not have been more thrilled. I had wanted to be a writer since I was sixteen, I had written my first book at 19, and FINALLY, after many rejections, one sold.
But here’s the REAL reason I was excited about that book being sold.
It has to do with my mother, Bette, and my father, Jim.
One summer day my dad, my three kids and I were in his Taurus pulling our very old, rickety tent trailer, which I had been camping in since I was eight, to Orcas Island.
My husband had to work, and my mother had died three years before of cancer. Neither one of us was “over” her death, neither of us ever would be.
But Orcas Island had been the family vacation spot for years and I wanted the kids to see it again. On the way up I told my dad that I was ready to give up on getting a book published. The rejections had been too many, it had gone on for too many years, and I felt like I was flat on my face on the ground, demoralized enough to eat dirt, plus a few spiders, maybe a worm.
My dad, a former Navy pilot, raised his fist up in the air and announced, loud enough to make the kids in the back seat jump, “You’re going to have a break, honey! I feel it, I really do! Something’s going to give. Keep going! Keep writing!”
Ah, fate. Ah, the love of a dear father and mother who had always, always supported my dream and truly believed that I could do it, even when I felt that I didn’t have the brain power, creativity, or story telling abilities to do it.
Two days later, as I lay in a sleeping bag in that rickety trailer under huge pine trees, the lake shining in the distance, a ranger came to our door and told me that I was to call my agent on the pay phone down the hill. My kids said later they had never seen me get up that quick.
I threw on a sweatshirt over my pajamas and mis-matched flip flops and sprinted to the phone, leaping over a log fence like a hurdler.
I called my agent and I was soon laughing and dancing around in the middle of a state park on an island in mis-matched flip flops. Julia’s Chocolates had sold, the publisher would also buy my next book, sight unseen.
I about wet my pants I was laughing so hard as I sprinted back up the hill to tell my dad and the kids. I spilled my news and my dad, sweet dad, got tears in his blue eyes. He hugged me tight, the kids bopping around happily, then pulled away and said, in his usual calm manner, “Well, that’s just wonderful, honey. Now come and sit down. I’m going to make you some…” and he paused, building the suspense, “Buttermilk pancakes!”
And that was that. We all sat down, said grace, and ate buttermilk pancakes under those huge pine trees, the lake shining in the distance. We swam and hiked that day and watched the deer. It was a beautiful day.
He later read Julia’s Chocolates, and if you remember some of those scenes, “Your Hormones and You: Taking Over, Taking Cover, Taking Charge,” or “Getting To Know Your Vagina Psychic Night,” and you can imagine my father, a devout Catholic, honest and good and proper, with an old fashioned, gentlemanly attitude, you might get a vision of his reaction.
But he got it. He understood that the women were healing, together.
In 2006, before my book came out, my father was diagnosed with aggressive, metastasized prostate cancer. We started going to endless appointments with doctors and to hospitals. He had chemo and radiation to blow a tumor out of his head.
He would ride his US Mail bike (his choice) to the doctors or my siblings or I would take him. In between he played. He rode his bike in the country and ran. He traveled all over and visited family and friends. He had parties and went to parties. He made a baked Alaska and set it on fire for my fortieth birthday party.
He endured a brutal clinical trial, but not because he thought it would help him. He knew he was dying. He did it for my son. He did it for his two other grandsons. “If I can help someone else, just a little bit, by doing this trial, then it’s worth it.”
He came to my first reading at Powell’s for Julia’s Chocolates, and I know I saw tears in those blue eyes when I spoke. Shortly after that, all treatments were stopped, it was pointless.
He was too busy to meet with the hospice nurses when the time came, so I met with them. Can you imagine? He was too busy living his life to stop to talk about his death.
He only had four bad days at the end, in the summer of 2007. I shouldn’t even call them bad, though. I could tell by his blank, blue stare that he was gone. I call it halfway into heaven. His body was here, shutting down, his soul was up in heaven with God and my mother, whom he had never stopped missing.
One time, about a year after my mom died, I said to him, “Dad, it’s so neat that you have all these hobbies, running, biking, swimming, traveling…”
He said, “Honey, your mother was my hobby. Everything else is just to fill the time.”
He had never stopped missing her. I have never stopped missing both of them.
So now you know the true reason why Julia’s Chocolates is my favorite book. Not because it was first bought, although I will always be eternally grateful for that, but because of Jim and Bette, Orcas Island, a rickety trailer, pine trees and a shining lake.
When I eat buttermilk pancakes, I am telling you, I think of them every single time.
And I try real hard not to cry.
Oh Cathy,
1I cried with you when I read this. I LOVED Julia’s Chocolates and now love it even more. You are such a gift. My favorite is still my first read of your books Henry’s Sisters. It moved me more than I can ever tell you. ALL of your books have taken me to places that I want to continue to revisit. THANK YOU, thank you for what you do. And this is coming from a 30 year retired teacher (mostly kindergarten). I also did some projects while teaching…writing, co-producing, and hosting a children’s program on PBS and developing a multimedia project for classroom use, but what I have always wanted to do is write a children’s book.
Please know that your writing is inspirational and uplifting to so many of us. You are one of my heroes. Seriously! I can’t wait for you next book. August???? I will do my deep yoga breathing to get me through the next 7 months.
Susan
Hi Cathy,
2I’m so sorry about dad (and your mom). So hard to lose people you are so close to. I love reading your books if only to get glimpses of the Oregon I love!! I’m reading “The first day of the rest of your life”. My eyes have gotten really bad so I can’t read for very long at a time. I love to read so this really stinks!! I so miss the NW. Ohio does not even compare!! Miss you and the kids and watching them grow up!!
Love ya!!
Patty
Hi Patty and Cathy! Cathy you made me cry. And you made me think about my mom and dad. Which I was already doing today because I went to the service for Lori Thoms’ dad this morning. He passed away on Sunday. It’s really hitting me hard that they will be gone someday, and maybe soon, and that sucks. Patty, I love that you are reading “The first day of the rest of my life”! I just picked it up from the library yesterday! I’m working all weekend, but next week I’m reading and I can’t wait! Thank you for sharing your gift with all of us Cathy! I miss seeing both of you!!!
nancy
3I tried real hard not to cry while reading this. It didn’t work. What a wonderful, heart-wrenching, joyful story. Thank you for sharing it. My dad just died two days ago. While I didn’t have quite the same sort of relationship with him as it sounds like you did with your dad, your story has me reflecting on my dad with a perspective I haven’t hit yet this emotional week. Thank you, and will be talking to you soon.
4I can barely type a comment because I’m blinded by the flood of tears in my eyes.
5Ah Cathy! So I just cried reading this. What a gift your parents were. I loved your mom and will cherish our time together forever. Keep writing… you rock!
6Cathy,
7Oh man, you just peeled the outside of my heart and then something else happened that I cannot find words for. This is one of the best pieces on writing and family and love that I’ve read in a long time. Thanks so much for this. Your dad knew what I saw the first time I met you–you were born to write stories. Best, Jessica
Thank you for your letters.
This entry was a hard one for me, for obvious reasons.
It’s interesting how the love of a parent, and the grief of losing that parent, never goes away. It’s always just … there. Waiting.
But then the memories, those happy memories, come on in, and I take a moment to just love them, and laugh, and remember, and feel blessed that I had the parents I did, even if it was not as long as I would have liked.
8I love this blog! I really, really enjoy your writing. I take something out of each one of your books, each time I read it, for myself, for my life…to make it better and to heal my heart. Thank you for what you write. Thank you for listening to the voices in your head, the conversations that your characters have. You make my past easier to life with. You make my hurts easier to feel. I am so glad you posted the way to your blog on FB and I got here. These snippets make the wait between books a little tiny bit easier.
9Cathy I’m currently reading, The First Day of the Rest of My Life. I can’t put it down! You are a true gift. I’ve read all of your other books. They are ALL my favorites. Thank you so much for each and every one of them. Your story above about your Dad and Julia’s Chocolates was really touching and I’m sorry for your loss. Please keep writing. I can not wait til August!!
10Cathy,
11I just finished reading “Julia’s Chocolates” in ONE NIGHT! I could not put it down without finding out what happened next, then next, then next. I am so in love with this book, and now after reading your blog, I am even more in love with it! It is the first of your books that I have read, and I am chomping at the bit to get back to the bookstore for the rest of them. I am so happy that you got your break, and that we are now all blessed to have these incredible characters to get to know, and to get to know you as well. Your book made me literally laugh out loud (that was a first for me), cry, shiver with dread, feel that awful fear of being stalked (unfortunately, that was not a first for me) as if it were happening, and then the warm, fuzzy in love feeling at the end when all ends as it should. From one Oregon girl to another, YAY YOU! 🙂 Your newest biggest fan, Jeannie