For years I was a freelance writer for The Oregonian. I wrote about homes, home décor, people, events, and fashion. When I started freelancing I had three kids under the age of five. I was buried in diapers, the housework was crushing, and I rarely slept like a normal human. I tried to remember to brush my hair. My most glorious of days occurred when I realized I did not have spit up on my shirt. My three little sweethearts were dear and wonderful, and oh, how I loved them and their sweet smiles, but the Role Of Mommy was all encompassing. I felt myself, I felt Cathy, slipping away, down a rocky cliff, no life raft or calm and serene, pineapple – filled deserted island in sight.

Until I started working as a freelance writer.

Freelance writing gave me something else to think about. It gave me an identity. It gave me something to do that I loved doing – write. I had a new, part – time job, complete with interviewing and photo shoots, and it did not involve seeing how lickety-split fast I could change two diapers in a public restroom.

I loved going into people’s homes and writing about them and their remodeled, glittery kitchens, their tiny pink house with a red and yellow Scandinavian bed, or how they decorated their kids’ bedrooms with jungle animals. I loved meeting all of them and learning how others were living their lives. The fashion article assignments never ceased to amuse me because I do so hate shopping and have zero fashion sense, but it was fun. Yep, fashion was fun. Anyhow, I digress.

During my freelancing years I also wrote an article for a local hospital on patients who had had bariatric surgery. They would usually lose a hundred pounds in a year and more after that. They were whole new people. I talked to many of them and was truly touched by their stories and fascinated by what their doctors had to say about the new lives these people were leading. However, not all parts of these new lives were happy.

That always stuck with me. We so often want change, but change doesn’t mean all will be well and dandy. It certainly doesn’t mean all problems poof into thin air like magic dust. In fact, a lot of these now thin people had a whole new set of problems, including some seismic shifts in their relationships with others.

Anyhow, the character in my book, SUCH A PRETTY FACE, Stevie Barrett, has bariatric surgery, then a second surgery to lift and tuck and remove excess skin. She loses 170 pounds and starts her life over. But all is not perfect. It is not dandy.

As a writer I had to figure out why Stevie let herself get to 320 pounds in the first place. What’s behind that? Who is she now? Who was she then? Why? How is she changing?

I gave her a past…and then I gave her a future.

In between, well, that’s the story. SUCH A PRETTY FACE is about an old, white schoolhouse that was remodeled into a home. It’s about a farm, a field of corn, a vision named Punk, a damp cave, a schizophrenic mother, a bridge on a frothing night, planting a vegetable garden, blood, fantastical wood chairs, roller derby, grief, falling in love, a green house with a white picket fence, dead people in cans, a hope chest, daring to dare, finding home, blow up dolls, Trash Heap, a dark and terrible room at the end of a dark and terrible hall, an ice sculpture of a mermaid, and Amazing Grace.

I hope you like it.

 

Printed first in Fresh Fiction. http://freshfiction.com/page.php?id=2747

 

  THE FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF MY LIFE started with a slightly scratched and dented eighty year old violin. Our daughter has played the violin for years and we decided to buy her one, instead of continuing to rent. Standing in a dusty, old music shop downtown, with a quirky owner who had been in that same exact place for decades, who possessed an encyclopedic knowledge of all violins for the last three hundred years, I was struck.

Struck with a new story idea that centered on unanswered questions about that violin.

Who had owned that sweet sounding instrument before my daughter? Had they cried over it? Had they lived long and well? Had their dreams come true, or had their dreams remained just that – dreams? Had they lived lives filled with hardship or lives filled with love and laughter or both? Who built the violin? What countries had it been played in? What languages did the owners speak? How had it become scratched and dented? How had it landed in that dusty shop?

Over the next few weeks, while I was, to the point of annoying obsessiveness, thinking about that violin, I also had a stream of images flowing in and out of my overloaded brain. These are the images:

A  lavender farm in Oregon I’d visited.

A bustling beauty parlor on Cape Cod.

The color pink.

Gunshots.

The secrets families hide for generations when they flee other countries.

Running from your past.

Sisterhood.

Love.

A yellow ribbon.

Explosives.

I wanted to throw all those images, along with the scratched violin, into a  story. I started scribbling in my journal and drafting characters, settings, plotlines, etc. but I was suck on my main character, Madeline O’Shea.

Who was she?

That was when my editor, John Scognamiglio, rescued me from my own mental torture and gave me a life coach.

As in, how about if Madeline is a life coach?

Ah ha! The fog cleared. The mess in my head settled out. I was off and running or, more accurately, off and writing.  Madeline became a life coach who didn’t have a clue how to run much of her own life, yet she was advising others on how to run theirs.

I tossed into that literary cauldron a reporter who was going to expose a tragedy in Madeline’s childhood, a mother who wears high pink heels and a shooting in a courtroom.

I folded in a wee bit of blackmail,  a fiery magazine column, a wild appearance on a morning talk show, a sister who likes her explosives, an Irish fisherman father, a tortured grandfather, and a Grandma with dementia who drew a finger down the dents and scratches of the violin and started revealing a long-hidden history.

And, for humor, I sprinkled in a few of Madeline’s clients, one of whom wears a tail, another who hurdles chairs, a lady named Mae who sexually blackmails her husband when she needs things done around the house,  three sisters who dress like cats, and a client named Aurora King who throws fairy dust.

With THE FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF MY LIFE, as with all my books, my characters lived in my head until the story was done.  This is like co – habiting with a strange, troubled, funny, very noisy family that is out of control, and only exists to you.  It becomes a problem when I get into arguments with my characters and they win the argument.

As for my violin playing daughter? When I see her playing that slightly dented and scratched violin, with all the mysterious history behind the strings,  I still smile. Inspiration for writing can come from anywhere, but when it comes from your child, your dear and well loved daughter, there’s a special sparkle to it.

I hope you enjoy Madeline, and the story of her violin in THE FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF MY LIFE.

 

 

Below is an interview I did with EZ Read about being a writer.  http://global.ezread.com/meet.asp?id=56

 

From your website’s biography, you have obviously always loved writing. But, what made you finally decide to write books? What was the actually turning point for you?

I decided to become a writer when I was about sixteen and went to work for Beaverton High School’s newspaper, The Hummer, as a reporter. It was the most thrilling thing to ever happen to me outside of learning how to skate board really fast and crashing my ten – speed bike into the garage door because for some inexplicable reason I couldn’t find the brakes.

I was hooked on writing and decided that HAD to be my career, in one form or another.  My journalism teacher and I are still friends and we laugh about how much she had to use her red pencil on all of my articles. Honestly, it looked like she bled on them when she was done, but she was one of the key people who taught me how to write.

In addition, my late mother always encouraged me to write, from the time I was three. She was an English teacher, she loved reading and writing, and I clearly inherited her genes and her addiction to the written word,  which translated into my novel writing.

 

Was it difficult to transition into a full-time writer?

 

Not difficult at all! I loved it. I skipped into writing full time with a jig and a happy wiggle and a few hoots.

Writing full time is what I dreamed of doing for years.  I plowed through many, many rejection letters, a bunch of tears, feelings of hopelessness because I was often sure I would never become a real writer, and wrote millions of words to get to the point now where it’s my full time job. I considered myself a  full time writer after I sold Julia’s Chocolates in 2005.

To get to the “full time” part, I was very busy, didn’t sleep much, and was very focused on that one goal. I was a freelance writer for The Oregonian for years while my three kids were young, which I absolutely loved doing, while I also worked on my novel writing late, late, late into the night. A couple of times over the years I had to go back to school and renew my teaching certificate in case I never made it as a writer and had to go back to teaching. (A VERY real possibility).  But every night now, no kidding, and every day when I wake up, I am so grateful that I’m able to do this.

 

How would you classify your seemingly versatile style of writing?

I call my writing women’s fiction, even though I do get letters from men, too.

I like laughter. I believe that tears are a part of life. I combine the two. Maybe that’s the versatile part.

 

You have been a part of several compilation books of short stories with other authors. What is it about these books that interests you?

I love writing my short stories. (See list below)  They’re about 35,000 words.  My novels are between 135,000 – 155,000 words. The  novels are  monsters, but the short stories are just that…short. And they’re a lighter tone. They must end happy.  I try to develop my characters and add supporting characters that are relatable, interesting, funny, and add a new dimension, or depth, to the story. I keep it light, but I want there to be meaning, too, something that women can read and hold onto.

You have to use the delete button a lot when working on these short stories because the word count is very tight. So you get a tight story, where every word is maximized, the scenes flow, and the story line is quick and gripping, in a good way.  And, let’s face it. I do like happy endings, and I do like the romance part of those books.

 

What other hobbies do you like to do, when you’re not writing?

My primary hobby is my family. We are not a perfect,  Brady Bunch sort of family, too noisy and rowdy for that, but we sure do have a lot of fun together.  I love reading, walking, I do not love going to the gym or running, but I do it anyhow. I do not like to cook or clean because it is boring.  I love going to lunch with friends, to the beach, to the mountains, and to bookstores. I am in love with Broadway shows, smaller plays, and the symphony. I love going to Starbucks and I am really good at going on vacation and sitting on a deck reading books. I daydream a lot.

 

Is there anyone you like to discuss your stories with, besides your editor or publisher?

 I discuss my stories with my editor and with my agent. They have been immensely helpful with my books. My deadlines are really close, so I lean on them for advice and help and direction so I can be off and writing. I also run ideas by my daughters.  That’s about it. Too many voices and you have a mess in your head. I do not need a mess in my head.

Once I start writing the story, and I get it, so to speak, I dive straight in, no life jacket.  I draft out the whole story, no corrections as I go, few deletions, and I just write. I let the words and the story and the characters flow naturally, even though that takes me off on tangents that I hadn’t planned. I listen to the characters in my head and watch what they’re doing and write it down.  I edit all my books at least eight times before I send it off to my agent and editor, then I edit more.

Makes me tired even thinking about it.

 

Which of your books has been the most fun to write, so far?

 

Honestly, they’re all fun. Julia’s Chocolates gave me the most laughs, however, because it published first and I was just so thrilled. I don’t think I’ve quit smiling since then.

Well, okay. Breast Power Psychic Night, and Your Hormones and You: Taking Cover, Taking Charge Psychic Night, in Julia’s Chocolates also made me laugh.

 

Does your previous work in education influence any of your writing?

I think that my work as a fourth grade teacher gave me a unique perception of kids and the very real troubles and hardships that they go through. Some of my students had very, very sad problems in their lives. That experience made me even more sympathetic to young people. That said, I also met some quirky, funny, creative, kids who were definitely on their own unique walk and I use that knowledge to form “compilation kids” in my work.  And, I throw parts of my own kids in my books, too. 

 

What has been your greatest accomplishment in your writing career, so far?

My greatest accomplishment?

I hope it is still to come.

 

Is there anything else you would like to share with your fans?

Thank you so much for reading my books!  If you have a book club, invite me! We can Skype or you can put me on speaker phone. Email me if you’d like to chat! I eventually look up from my stories, from the cacophony in my head, from the strange characters saying odd things,  and answer all emails.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I wrote this article for Lori’s Reading Corner.  http://www.lorisreadingcorner.com/

 

Each year my husband and I have a Marital Moment on Halloween night.

Some people’s Marital Moments might involve a negligee, wine, and candles.

Well, none of my negligees fit anymore. I tried to struggle into one of them the other evening and I thought my breathing was going to be cut off. It felt like I was wrapped in a purple python’s grip. Not helpful. So, no negligees.

As for the wine? I very rarely drink.  Alcohol makes me cry, and I don’t need more of that in my life. So, no wine.

Candles I like. So my husband and I set some out.

We climb the stairs to our upstairs bedroom, chuckling as long married couples do, open the door to the attic and …. Pull out our Ghoul Masks!!

Our Ghoul Masks are white with eye holes, surrounded by black. They are crazy scary. I scare myself when I look in the mirror.

We make ghouly sounds to each other, dance around a bit, and embrace our annual Halloween Marital Moment.

Mr. Ghoul and I head out into the cool, star speckled night and sit, oh so quietly, oh so still, in two chairs, on our driveway, and await the Trick or Treaters. Beside us, our house is decorated and spooky.  Our orange pumpkin in the window flashes on and off, the white, wispy cobwebs cover our bushes, and two  plastic skeletons, one without an arm, dangle from our porch.

Halloween is a sweet holiday in many ways. It’s not like Christmas, which takes weeks to plan, buy gifts, decorate, and gain yet another ten pounds from fudge and frosting.

It’s not like Thanksgiving where a turkey must be basted, salads set out, pies bought, stuffing crammed into the bird, a house scrubbed for relatives and friends, and a relatively clean outfit found that does not have stains on it from browning onions.

No, Halloween is easy: Grab a costume, hopefully out of the box in the attic. Invite friends over and have a chili contest. Buy bread, cheese and sour cream. Buy a bag of candy. Send the kids out trick or treating.

And put on your Ghoul Mask.

When the Trick or Treaters arrive we sit real still until the kids are about five feet away, then we BOO them. They think we might be Halloween decorations up until that moment. We NEVER scare the little kids, but the older kids, they are fair game as we bring a little trick into their Halloween.

Each year there’s one kid that says, “I’m not scared of you two. I’ve been here for five (four, three, two) years and I know what you’re going to do.”

We sit, so quiet, not moving, he gets closer and closer and, “BOO!”

He still jumps. Every single year.

We also have a number of visitors, parents and children, from Japan and India who are participating in the trick or treating, which I think is just wonderful.

They bring their cameras and I flash the peace sign. My husband slings an arm around my shoulder as the whole family surrounds the ghouls, smiling, giggling. I’m up nights wondering how many photograph books Mr. Ghoul  and I are in all over the world.

Between Trick or Treaters, I eat the Butterfingers, my husband eats the M and M’s and we talk about serious stuff like: Why do we eat this junk? And, I wish it would stop raining. And, Where are our own children? And, You look sooo hot in your ghoul mask, give me a kiss baby.

The sky is dark, the kids are laughing as they run by. Tonight they are robots, Darth Vaders, angels, firemen, gypsies, and super heroes. They will go home and stuff themselves with candy.

Halloween is a heckuva fun American holiday.

And as for my husband and I?

It’s an excellent Marital Moment.

Happy Halloween to one and all! May your tricks be funny and your treats be yummy.

I wrote this article for Lori’s Blog Corner…obviously for Halloween. See below for a little bit about my Nana, Mary Kathleen. http://lorisreadingcorner.blogspot.com/

 

 

When I was a little girl my Nana turned me into Little Bo Peep.

I don’t know why someone like myself, who ran around in ragged shorts and sandals, climbed trees, rolled on the grass, studied spiders, hid in bushes during Hide and Seek, and roller skated everywhere wanted, all of the sudden, to be a sweet and gentle Little Bo Peep for Halloween, but I did.

My Nana, Mary Kathleen, could sew anything.  The sewing machine and she were one and magic came out the other side.  I still remember a padded golden sewing kit and playing with a jar full of unique buttons.  From yards of white silky material and pink satin sprang the most beautiful dress and bonnet for me. I was a homely kid, and I knew it, but for once, in that soft white and pink material,  I felt pretty.  I was Little Bo Peep Cathy, complete with a wood staff.

It’s interesting what you remember about your grandparents, and what you wish you had asked them before they died. My elegant Nana died when I was in my mid – teens, long after Bo Beep, but before I was mature enough to realize that I should be sittin’ my ole’ bottom down in a chair with Nana and asking a bunch of questions.

I knew a little about my Nana, and much of it was heart breaking. Her mother died when she was four, a few weeks after giving birth to my Nana’s brother. She died of “blood poisoning,” their term then, which we would treat here immediately and the mother would go on home and put her feet up. After her mother’s death, Mary Kathleen’s father took off into the wild blue yonder. I do not believe that he ever returned from the yonder.

Mary Kathleen and her baby brother were then tossed around from family to family and, I heard, through my own mother, that my Nana never felt that anyone really  wanted her. She felt she was a burden. It was rumored that the son of a judge in her town in Decatur, Texas, wanted to marry her and would pay for her to go to college if she did, but that marriage was not to be. She politely declined,  a southern lady through and through.

Tall and willowy, she fell in love with my Grandpa, Thomas Cecil, a tough man from a tough background who loved her from the start.  Thomas Cecil was the son of an Arkansas farmer who, with three wives, all of whom died before him, had eleven kids. His, hers, and theirs. Thomas Cecil’s mother died when he was about four years old, also. His family had a farm and all the kids worked it, long hours, every day. You worked, or you didn’t eat. Pretty simple.

As he told me later, with some bitterness, “You don’t want a farm, Cathy, honey, it’s hard, hard work.”

Thomas Cecil and his brothers moved from Arkansas to California for a better life and built houses all over  Los Angeles.  He knew what being poor looked like, and he did not like it. He knew his way out was through endless hard work, long hours, long days, maybe a fight or two. He would swear up one side and down the other at other men in the rough and tumble construction business, but never at my Nana and never at my mother.

He went through booms and he went through busts, a pile of money, and no money. My guess is that his houses are still standing as the man believed in quality and craftsmanship.

Mary Kathleen and Thomas Cecil had a long marriage. Both lived into their seventies, though they each started smoking in their teens. It was stylish, it was cool. They didn’t know then what we know now.

They had my mother, who they adored, and she had four kids, one of whom was Little Bo Peep on Halloween because her wonderful Nana, who had survived painful hardship and loss, took the time to lovingly, carefully, make her the perfect Halloween outfit, a treat she has never forgotten.

Hello.

I’m a writer.

This means I am just about half sane most days. I wander through my mind often, skip and hop, and play. I have an odd imagination and tell stories to myself.  I hear voices in my head when I am writing my books.

I think I’ll blog once a week. Maybe. Or twice. Or when the moon looks orangish or when I see a cool humminbird and I watch it for awhile. I think I’ll also add excerpts from my books, or rants or musings from my characters, interviews of other people, funny pieces, and photos that are pretty or interesting. At least to me.

I truly hope you enjoy it.

I need chocolate.

I like images.

When they pop into my head, I sit and enjoy them for awhile, wondering why they’re there, what I can learn, and how they’re going to change my thinking for that moment.

Sometimes the image is a mermaid or a white butterfly.

Sometimes it’s a white wedding dress in a tree, a five foot tall pig, a lady having a nervous breakdown, a condom smeared with peanut oil, sisters, a one night stand, wind, a Queen Anne house, an old white schoolhouse remodeled into a home, schizophrenia, a garden, a cross, or a pink beauty parlor.

I see images. I see pictures. The pictures form stories. And the stories form my books.

For my latest book THE FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF MY LIFE, the image that started the book was a violin. We were buying my daughter a violin after years of renting. In a dusty, old shop downtown, with a man who I am sure has worked there for two hundred years, we found the perfect violin for my daughter. She loved the sound, she loved the feel. It was eighty years old, scratched and dented.

I held that violin in my hands and had images of people…people from all over the world, all ages, all colors. I thought, “Who owned this violin? Where was it played? Did it cross the ocean? Who built it?” And, most importantly, “What were the lives like of the people who owned the violin? Did they love the violin, or did they love scotch? Did they love the sound of the violin more than they loved the sound of their grandchildren playing? Did they laugh and smile while playing their songs or were they very serious, valuing each note? Did they play with friends? Were those friendships still strong, or did they break along the way?  Why did they break? Did they cry over the violin as they played  for a lost wife, a lost love, a lost son?  What hardships had life thrown their way? What kindnesses had they received? Did they like sunsets or sunrises better?

Who were they?

Other images came for THE FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF MY LIFE. Images of a pink beauty parlor and a mother who wore a yellow ribbon for hope.  A sailboat. An Irishman. A lavender farm. Terror, tears. Love. Israel. World War II. My own parents’ gravestone with this Irish saying, “My the road rise up to meet you, may the wind be at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face, and the rain fall softly upon your fields. And until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of his hand.”

And that violin….the image of the violin danced over the whole story.  So, I dropped the image of the violin and all the other images together, mixed them around, pulled out the characters, shifted the settings, combined the tears and the joy, and worked through my story.

I like images.

Posted on December 5, by Cathy Lamb

By Madeline O’Shea

Vasectomies and You

After particular sessions, I ask my clients if I can print what they’ve said to me in order to share a tidbit of women’s wisdom with other women who might need this tidbit.

My most recent client, we’ll call her Tess, agreed.  “If I can help one woman out there deal with a man whose afraid he’ll never be in heat again like a horny dog if he gets a vasectomy, it’ll be worth it.”

Tess is five feet one inches tall, a hundred pounds, with blonde hair that she calls, “The Frizz Blast,” and, in her words, “outsized brown eyes. I look like a raccoon with blonde hair and the teeth of a cow. They stick out, you know. See?”

Here is Tess’s story:

“My husband did not want a vasectomy. It was like trying to get a drunk bull to squish through a tire.  I am freakin’ tired of birth control. The pill makes me vomit and dizzy. Diaphragms are gross and condoms are what you use when you’re a teenager rolling around naked in the back of an El Camino.  Do I look like a pesky teenager? No, I don’t. So I told him he needed to go in and get clipped.

“He acted like I’d asked him to give up his whatsits on a plate with a garnish of pickles and relish. I have given birth to five children, two at one time with the twins, and I have never, ever whined like that man did. But I told him no sex until you’re castrated, whack and whack. It took him a week and he finally caved in, but he was pale white, like a ghost, so I trailed after him going, ‘booooo boooo.’

“Anyhow, I had to drug him before we even got to the hospital that morning. A double dose.  I had to drag him in like a dead dog. If he could have cupped his jewels with both hands without looking ridiculous, trust me, he would have done it. So I hand him over to the doctor and the doctor claps him on the back like, ‘Buck up, man.’”

“Honestly, I have pushed five kids through something that is normally the width of a grape, and I didn’t moan and piss like that. So I’m in the waiting room and I brought a flask of whiskey with me, I needed it after what I’d been through, and I start reading my romance novel and I’m perfectly happy.  His mother, Hatchet Face, is with the kids and I am finally alone for the first time in months. Even when I pee the kids come into the bathroom and fight with each other on the bath rug. Anyhow, I am sitting there hoping the vasectomy takes five hours or there’s some earthquake – sized complication, and we have to stay overnight at the hospital. I mean, wouldn’t that be great? I could stay overnight in a hospital! No kids and hopefully my husband would be out cold. But no! The doctor is a man and doesn’t understand. Way too quick, and right when I’m in the middle of a hot sex scene, as if I have the energy to think that sex can be hot anymore, the deed is done, he’s been sliced and diced. The nurse comes to get me. I wanted to cry when she said my husband was ‘ready.’ Darn it, though,  I wasn’t ready!

“So I went back to the room and there he is, lying down, his face gluey white. And I let this man get me knocked up five times? This coward?  This ghost? ‘I think I saw smoke, Tess, and I smelled it,’ he whispered, his eyes staring wildly, like he’s seen the hounds of hell running around his balls gnashing their teeth. ‘There was fire. I think I saw flames. I was on fire!’ That man got teary eyed over his testicles. It’s not like they were removed and put in a jar of formaldehyde, you know.

“‘You had a vasectomy,’ I told him, pissed off there weren’t complications. I had wanted to read my romance! It would have been great if the knife had slipped and we’d had to stay a week in the hospital, that would have been a treat. ‘There wasn’t any fire or flames,’ I told him.

‘I’m not a man anymore,’ he moaned.

‘Yeah, you’re a man.’ I rolled my eyes. ‘You still got your pecker.’

‘I’m not a man…

‘If you’re not a man, you’re not a man, you eunuch, so maybe you won’t pester me so much for sex anymore.’ I have had sex hundreds of times, Madeline, how many more times do I have to have it?

“So, after a lot of irritating whining, so bad I wanted to smack him, we went home and he laid in bed with an ice pack on his balls, still moaning and it reminded of me of my childhood dog, Frisky. Frisky ran out and chased down kids and bit them, letting out this terrible howl.  He would dart out the door before we could stop him, running at high speed. He even had a girlfriend dog that he would visit every once in a while even though the girlfriend’s boyfriend – dog chewed him up a couple of times. My mother used to have our neighbor’s St. Bernard chase Frisky down and get him home.

“Anyhow, as soon as my mother got that dog castrated, the ole’ balls cut off, he settled right on down. No more gallivanting around, no more cheating with the ladies, no more biting of kids on bikes. So that’s what I told my husband when he was in bed groaning about the fire and smoke again. I told him about Frisky and said, ‘You two got something in common. Now shut up and quit whining.’”

“He complained for days from bed. By the fifth day, when he yelled my name three times, and I walked back to the bedroom, carrying the baby, the toddler hanging onto my heel, and he whined, “Can you re-fill my orange juice? And, I need another blanket. I’m chilled. Do you know where my gray socks are? No, not the white ones. I need my gray fishing socks, can you put them on my feet?” I let him have it. I told him that I’d given birth to five kids, I’d been pregnant for most of our marriage.  He never took care of me when I got home from the hospital, even the time I got sick with the flu after the third kid. Didn’t even take a day off work to help out, but two weeks later he was able to take six days off to go fishing with his buddies. I hadn’t laid in bed for five days after I’d had the kids. In fact on the second day I was up and taking care of him and everyone else.  He never brought me a meal in bed or so much as orange juice. He never brought me socks and put them on my feet. I told him all that and I told him I was sick of his being a baby and I poured an entire pitcher of orange juice on his crotch and told him to get his slack balls out of bed.

“I kicked him out of the house. I packed his suitcase, and threw him out and told him to go home to Momma, the Hatchet Face. I threw an ice pack at his head, too, I was so mad. I felt like years of fury were bottled up in me and they all came out.   He works eight hours a day, an hour off for lunch, comes home, lays on the couch, and makes derisive comments about how I, ‘…don’t work…he’d like to stay home all day and watch TV, too…it’s his money, not mine….

“I called a lawyer, the lawyer served him at work, told him what his child support was gonna be for five kids. He came home three days later on his knees after being with his mother, who is a tyrannical dictator. I told him to stay with her for three months because I needed a break from him. The next weekend I dropped all five of the kids off at his mother’s house, thank heavens I’m done nursing the baby. I also dropped off all the crap he has stacked in our garage he refuses to throw away, plus his beer bottle collection, and the lights shaped like beer cans. My daughter said his mother left for a hotel by Saturday morning. By Saturday night my husband was crying because the baby wouldn’t stop crying, my two year old kept fussing, and the other three kids were driving him crazy and wanted to come home to me.

“I had the best three days of my life, Madeline. Can’t wait to drop the kids off in two weeks again. He’s begging to come back home. Begging like a fiend. You know what the lesson here is?

“If you’re going to have balls in your life, make sure they’re good balls. If I’m going to allow his balls back in my life, there’s going to be huge, huge changes, if he doesn’t want to make them, he’s out. He causes me too much stress. My life is easier, easier Madeline, without him, no question. He’s more work than my kids, and he never gives back to me. He takes. Sucks me dry emotionally. I need to go ball-less for awhile. The kids and I and none of his balls. And, hey, twice a month, I get free weekends, Friday afternoon to Sunday evening, and every other Wednesday I get three hours to myself. Plus, he’s paying through his nose for child support and alimony. Loses more than half his check. Now that I don’t have to pay for his gambling and beer runs, I’m way ahead.”

She left later and I thought about what Tess said.

Ladies, you don’t have to have balls in your life. It’s a choice. Remember that. You can be on your own. You can be veryhappy on your own. In fact, much happier than you are now if you’re living with a man who sucks the life out of you.

Think on it. Balls or no balls?

What was  your inspiration for your first book, Julia’s Chocolates?

Years ago I heard several writers say that writers should only write about what they know. This was truly alarming to me because I really didn’t know jack about anything.  Surely no one wanted to hear about how quick I could change my twins’ diapers while standing in a public restroom or how I prevented my one year old daughter from eating a spider? I decided that advice was silly.

So, I decided to write a book about something I knew nothing about.  Which was, again, truly alarming. The list of subjects I know nothing about could wrap around Neptune twice.

But there was one thing I didn’t know even a wee little thing about: What it would be like to be raised by a lousy mother. My mother was a beautiful woman, inside and out, and everyone loved her. So, I flipped things for Julia’s Chocolates. The mother in the book is an abusive, neglectful, drunken wreck of a woman, completely opposite from my own.  She was the beginning of the entire book. I gave her a daughter, dropped her off at an eccentric aunt’s house, and all the characters evolved from there.

When did you start writing?

I started writing when I was four. I had this neighbor next door named Sandy M.

We squabbled a lot because Sandy always had to have her way. Her specialty was sulking and she cheated at hide and seek. One day I sat down at our kitchen table and wrote her a note with my green crayon. I wrote, “Dear Sandy, you are a …” and then I paused, totally stymied by spelling. I asked my mother how to spell “brat.” I didn’t think she would help, but whaddya know. She said, “Cathy, it’s B.R.A.T.” Voila. I learned the power of words.

Do you like writing or does it drive you nuts?

Writing is like breathing for me. It’s chocolate, sunshine, my kids’ smiles, snow days, the San Juan Islands, hope, joy, my roses and that cool waterfall in the Canadian Rockies I saw two years ago all rolled into one. When I don’t have a project going (rare) I’m on edge and scattered and super restless. My life has no seams to hold it together on either end. Although I don’t sit at my computer all day long because my brain would start to splinter and shrivel with boredom, I am, for most of each day, thinking about my book, the characters, the pacing, the dialogue, etc.  When I’m schlepping my kids around town or staring morosely into my coffee at a café, I often can fix the problems I’m having with my books.

And yes, I like writing, I love writing, and yes, it drives me nuts. Absolutely, totally, mind-blowingly nuts. But I simply must  write.

Most writers do not become successes in a 24 hour period. Can you comment on your writing experiences, rejection slips, etc.

A brutal rejection slip actually was the best thing that happened to me as a writer.  I had published many articles in a local newspaper, but hadn’t published any of the category romance books I’d been writing for years.

To be baldly honest, the reason I was trying to break into the category romance field was because I didn’t think I was smart enough to write women’s fiction. I didn’t think I could create interesting enough characters or develop a deep enough plotline with cool twists and turns and the right pacing to be published. Yes, I know, that doesn’t say much for my self esteem as a writer.

The romance editors at major houses were very encouraging. I’d sit down, write up the first chapter and a synopsis and send it in.  They would then ask for the first three chapters. So, I’d sit down, write the three chapters up, and send it in. The editors would then ask for the whole book. So I’d sit down, write it up, send it in.

Then the publishing house would reject it, usually with detailed two page rejection letters, and ask me to try again.  This was, of course, tremendously disappointing. All that work, for nothing. Still, after flinging myself against a wall a few times, I hung in there and kept writing.

The brutal slammer was when I went through the above process and had an editor with a name that starts with S who worked for a company that starts with an S tell me over the phone she was pretty sure they would buy my book if I made a few minor edits. I made the requested edits. To make a long story short, the editor didn’t actually make a final decision on the book for two years.  I wrote a scathing letter and the publishing house ended up apologizing to me for the length of time the process took. They encouraged me to write again and submit all future work to the head editor.

The book, however, was rejected.

Crushing.

I could either start banging my head against my keyboard and muttering strange things to myself, or I could quit writing category romance completely.

I quit.

And then later I finally, finally, finally wrote something that meant something to me.

I let my imagination fly and I let my characters be the wild, devoted, screaming, lost, strange, quiet, secret-harboring, desperate, joyful, lusty, pig-loving people they needed to be. I let the plot grow organically instead of trying to shove it into a rigid formula. I addressed issues I wanted addressed that were close to my heart and I tried to inject humor. I wanted to reach women. I wanted to give them a book that would allow them to escape from life for a few hours, a book with characters they could relate to. A book that would make them laugh.

I sent Julia’s Chocolates to the five top agents/editors I could find. I figured I could then say I was rejected by the best. The editor never answered. Three of the agents asked for the book. I went with my favorite agent. He sold it to Kensington Publishing in about a month as part of a two book deal.

Any advice for writers who are not yet published?

Right here I’m supposed to say: Never quit. Keep writing.

But that would be pretty hypocritical because I did quit for a time (see above) because  the rejections had gotten me too down. I needed time off, away from my computer and I needed to get a life. I got a life, got my head back on straight, and started writing again. I have also taken time off writing because of some serious life issues that came my way. I don’t regret it.

If you’re in the midst, as I was, of rejection slip hell, allow yourself a moment for a “literary temper tantrum.” Allow yourself to believe that the editor who rejected your book has giant warts on her ears, a voice like an boar, a bottom the size of Oklahoma, and no friends.  Then let it slide. Let it go. Write again.

Except

Except when you’re writing isn’t bringing you any joy at all. Except when you’re so down and so steamin’ mad you can’t get that writing flow back. Except when your writing is causing your family and pals to avoid you as they would a rabid tiger because you have become an obsessive schmuck. Then take a break

For a little while.

Looking back, I should have quit trying to break into the category romance market about two years before I did.  It was hopeless. I was not going to get published in romance. I should have seen that but I let my determination to succeed override all rational judgment.

My agent laughed when I told him about my romance rejections and said to me, “Well, you’re not a romance writer, Cathy.” He’s right. I’m not. I can’t do it. I can’t be boxed in like that. Julia’s Chocolates has romance in it, but it’s not completely a romance. Now where was my brain all those years? Why couldn’t I see that for myself sooner? Who knows.

So, my advice would be that if you’re trying to write for a particular genre and you keep getting rejected, rejected, rejected, take a step back and ask yourself if you’re in the right place, if it’s a good fit, and if it’s possible for you to be successful in this area. If it is, stay with it. If it’s not, move on.

In terms of other advice, I would say that writers should write all the time. They also should read all the time and be very selective about what they read and why they’re reading it. I look at the New York Times book reviews and the top 20 list for book suggestions. I listen to friends and acquaintances who are book aficionados. I read what the people in my book club tell me to read. I read fiction and non-fiction, American and international writers, classics and contemporary. I read The Oregonian and the New York Times regularly.  If you want to write well, read well.

My last piece of advice if you want to be a writer: Hang out with your kids, be kind to your spouse or partner, go to cool parties, have parties and make everyone wear pink, travel to small towns with windmills and bright cities with kooky corners, hike through the woods when it’s raining, walk on the beach in the fog, laugh a lot, get rid of pesky people in your life, sing loud in church, dance even if you can’t groove at all, volunteer your time all the time, stop worrying about your weight, and dress up like a pirate on Halloween.  You gotta live well to write well, so go live.

What’s your daily schedule like?

I would love to say I am one of those dedicated writers who works from 9:00 – 5:00 in a sunny private office in the middle of 20 acres out in the country.  Or, that I work in some drafty and ghost – ridden attic with a bat and a rat that I climb up to each day via a secret staircase in the ceiling.

The truth is, I try to have a schedule and write regularly during the day, but am often distracted by my life. Mornings don’t work for me because I don’t think anyone should work in the morning, it’s uncivilized. Afternoons are shaky because I like to go to cafes and drink coffee and then I have our kids and their friends here and I have to shuttle them eight million places. Early evenings don’t work well because of a husband who likes me to hang out with him and a small meal called “dinner” I must prepare.  So, usually, after I get the kids in bed, I work. I love the blackness and softness of night and it’s pretty much the only time my brain gears down enough for me to concentrate. I don’t sleep much.

How do you balance writing and family life?

What a funny question. Here’s what most women know: There is no balance. It is an illusion. “Balance,” in fact, is a stupid word that was invented so counselors and self-help gurus would have a new vocab word to throw around and about. Feel like you’re running around like your hair is on fire, ladies? Well, it is.  And if you stopped for a second, you’d see what I’m talking about and grab a fire extinguisher. Ladies, do not strive for balance, it’s just one more thing you’ll feel like you’re failing at. Strive for sanity, shaved armpits, clothes without dirt spots, control over your hot flashes, cool friends, bras that fit, an invisible moustache, a working memory, and a lot of time at the local coffee shop so you can drown your sorrows in mochas. Going to a coffee shop is certainly cheaper than laying on someone’s couch so he can tell you that you need “balance.”

Give me a break. Strike that word from your life. Sheesh.

Where do you get your ideas for your books?

I get my ideas from my head. I have a bizarre imagination. I also get my ideas while running, watching plays and musicals, listening to the symphony, staring at a tulip, laughing with my kids, listening, listening, listening, reading newspapers and magazines, walking on the beach, staring at Mt. Hood, tracking a white butterfly, and watching the wind.

Favorite books?

Too many. This is a partial list.

• People of the Book
• Night
• Infidel
• The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks
• Unbroken
• The Cellist of Saravejo
• The Heretic’s Daughter
• Love, Loss, and What I wore
• The Vagina Monologues
• Lakota Woman by Mary Crow Dog
• Snowflower and the Secret Fan
• Water for Elephants
• The Color Purple
• Year of Wonders
• The Queen’s Fool
• The Book Thief
• Those Who Save Us
• The True Story of Hansel and Gretel
• Remarkable Creatures
• Girl With A Pearl Earring
• The Nazi Officer’s Wife
• The Nineteenth Wife
• Daughters of the Witching Hill
• Sarah’s Key
• One Thousand White Women
• A Single Thread
• The Help
• Cutting For Stone
• Songs of the Gorilla Nation
• The Guernsay Literary and Potato Peel Society
• A Walk In The Woods
• Erma Bombeck’s books
• Song Yet Sung
• A Long Way Gone
• The Art of Racing in the Rain
• Escape
• American Bloomsbury
• Look Me In The Eye
• Warrior King
• Manic
• The Color of Water
• The Lady and the Unicorn
• The Virgin Blue
• The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
• The Bookseller of Kabul and A Hundred and One Days: A Baghdad Journal, both by Asne Seierstad
• The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.
• Cutting for Stone
• Books by Alexander McCall Smith with Mma Ramotswe
• Swallows of Kabul by Yasmina Khadra
• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon
• Songs of the Gorilla Nation: My journey through autism by Dawn Prince-Hughes
• The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kid
• The Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells
• Of Mice and Men and Cannery Row by John Steinbeck
• The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory
• The Diving Bell and the Butterfly by  Jean-Dominique Bauby
• The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
• The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
• Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt
• The Number On Ladies Detective Agency
• To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• I Know Why The Cage Bird Sings
• Shanghai Diary by Ursula Bacon
• Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
• Any book by Kaye Gibbons
• Mama Makes Up Her Mind: And Other Dangers of Southern Living by Bailey White
• The Nineteenth Wife
• Look Me In The Eye My Life With Asperger’s
• The Seamstress
• The Wolves of Andover
• A Walk in The Woods
• Girls in Translation
• Remarkable Craetures
• Where The Heart Is
• Stolen Innocence/Polygamist
• All of Wally Lamb’s books
• A Long Way Gone
• The Hiding Place

Great Books on Writing

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott.
On Writing by Stephen King.
Writing out the Storm by Jessica Morrell
The Right to Write by Julia Cameron

Best Children’s Book Author

(My friend, fellow scribe, lunch partner) Trudy Ludwig