Mesmerized by a squirrel

Sue Lyon Springfield
New US citizen, new US voter

This morning I sat and stared at a squirrel for the longest time. He perched on the half wall outside my French door and appeared to be staring at me, though I know he couldn’t see me. But he was motionless, and the longer he stayed, the more I was mesmerized. Both of us stared, as though frozen in time and space. And then, with a sudden flip of his tail, he was gone. They are, I admit reluctantly, such cute little creatures. I wish they weren’t so numerous and so destructive.

It was a lovely day today, harbinger of spring just around the corner. In the low eighties with bright, sunny skies, and that pale green of new buds on the trees. The redbuds are beginning to bud, and tonight I saw a dogwood with faint blossoms. Our Chinese pistache is slow to bloom, but Christian scraped a piece of bark, found green, and pronounced it healthy. It’s still early March, and I cling to the almanac wisdom that says March 15 is the first date it’s safe to plant without fear of frost. Jordan and I need to make lists of herbs for my moveable garden and plants for the pots—fountain grass in two, but we may try some other things too. I’d like sweet potato vine in the two urns outside my door, with something in the middle—but what? Choosing plants is half the fun this season.

Tonight Jordan, Christian, and I went to a party—a rare occurrence these days for me. The occasion was a celebration of my Canadian daughter’s US citizenship. (I’ve explained that relationship many times, but here goes again: her mom is in Ottawa, Ontario, so I am her FW mom, because every girl needs a mom close by.) Sue, Canadian by birth, never showed much interest in changing her citizenship, or so I thought. When I’d bemoan the fact that she couldn’t vote, she’d say something like, “It’s hard to give up your country” or “I’m still Canadian at heart.” She has probably lived here close to twenty-five years.

So I was surprised this winter when she announced she was studying to take the citizenship test. Apparently, there are some hundred study questions. And then one day, she took her test, which turned out to be an oral interview where she was asked ten questions. I am quite sure she now knows more about our constitution than I ever will. She passed, of course, although she admitted to more nervousness than expected.

Then it was some time before the swearing-in ceremony which she shared with a hundred or so others. Sue, who is not a sentimental person, was quite moved by the ceremony.

She also instantly became an enthusiastic voter and is excited about getting to vote in local elections this spring. In a heavy political discussion one evening she asked me if I thought there was corruption at polling places, and I said it was always possible. And that I thought in some cases there was voter intimidation. She sort of jumped to the defense of those who work voter registration, reminded me they are all volunteers, and said when she goes to vote she’s going to thank every one of them personally. I think maybe all of us should take the citizenship class and test over again, just to remind us of the importance and privilege of voting. Sue sure gets it right.

The party was lots of fun, with doors wide open to the yard on this spring-like night and a duo playing mostly soft jazz in the back yard. I hadn’t seen the yard in a while—last time I was there it was winter and dark and I couldn’t see outside. But it is lovely with a small pool, a fire pit, a huge dining table, and lots of paving around a center patch of grass. I did what none of us should do at a party, visited with those I usually see frequently, though I hadn’t seen Subie and Phil in a long time—she had knee surgery and couldn’t drive, and I couldn’t drive to them. And Renee has been out of town. I did greet some neighbors and people I knew and met some new folk, including a couple who were devoted Elmer Kelton fans and raved about his classic novel, The Time It Never Rained. My kind of reader, since Elmer, as an author and as a friend, was a favorite of mine. I guess Sue must have told them.

All in all, it was a lovely evening, lovely party, and nice to be out among folk.

Is next week spring break for you and yours?  Plans? I’ll be right here, watching the traffic as people from all over head to our world-class zoo. Most of the year I love living down the street from the zoo, but during spring break, especially on half-price day, we are virtually prisoners in our own house. I’m trying hard to be a good sport and think of all those kid who are going to have the joy of a day at the zoo.

Life is good.

Dreaming a novel

Last night was one long dream for me. I was telling myself a novel in three parts—three parts because twice I got up to use the restroom, not out of necessity, but because I wanted to leave the world of that dream. But the characters were persistent and kept returning, although they changed considerably from segment to segment.

At first, there were three people, two men and a woman, incarcerated at a prison in a desert, presumably for nonviolent crimes. They escaped disguised as employees (more like cleaning people or someone in scrubs than guards) and spent the night in a nearby empty house. Then they took off in a van.

Sometime during the night they morphed into three women. Think Thelma and Louise or a “Golden Girls Take to the Highway” episode. While they were always on the run and in some perilous circumstances, including snowbound in a cave, they agreed it was the best time of their lives. (Don’t anyone get Freudian on me!). Finally, they ended in a twin city area—two small towns. They grocery shopped in the lesser town figuring they would not know anyone. But they ran into the husband of one; then another met the love of her life, and the third asked for a ride to the bus station. I woke up, and my mind finally went back to my WIP.

I know I’ll never turn the dream into a novel, what with changing characters and a lot of unexplained things like the snowy cave, but the kernel of a story is there if I wanted to pursue it. What I found interesting is the process involved, the way the story flowed in spite of my efforts to stop it. I thought of Elmer Kelton, the late dean of Texas fiction. He once described writing his award-winning novel, The Good Old Boys, saying he was sitting at the bedside of his dying father and listening to stories of the old-time cowboys at the turn of the twentieth century. Suddenly, he began writing, and the words wouldn’t stop. Elmer used to say that it was like a horse with the bit in its teeth, and he was just along for the ride.

Elmer wrote that way. One of his favorite pieces of advice was, “Listen to your characters, and they will tell you what’s going to happen.” He did not use Scrivener or Grammerly, a story bible, or any other devices and aids designed to help novelists tell a story. He simply told the story. A graduate of the University of Texas, he was not some unlettered genius but was knowledgeable about structure and the need for a story arc. He just never let those things dominate his storytelling.

For me, the three-part structure of my dream is significant, because I too learned about structure in school. Not so much the arc within an arc and subplots and all the intricacies that guide us today, but the basic Shakespearean pattern of rising action, climax, and denouement. To this day the parts of a novel to me are the beginning, middle, and end. 

To say that storytelling should be natural is not to jump into the pantser vs. outliner controversy. I’m a pantser who works best from a page of rough notes. But I know everyone has to choose the way that works best for them. Perhaps what I want to suggest about storytelling is that it should be less of a science and more of an art, more instinctive and organic.

If you’ve never read Elmer Kelton, you have a treat waiting for you, whether you think you’re interested in cowboy literature or not. Start with The Good Old Boys, move on to The Wolf and the Buffalo—Elmer set out to tell the story of a particular buffalo soldier, but a Commanche chief kept taking over the story. And then move on to his classic, The Time It Never Rained, described as one of the twenty or so best novels by an American of the twentieth century.

Me? I’m going back to sleep and see what happens next.

Some thoughts on writing

Yesterday, I wrote 1,721 words on my work-in-progress, otherwise known as my WIP. Today I wrote 1,652. Proud of myself, except that it got me to thinking about measuring writing, if you can do such a thing. Most writers I know judge their daily progress by words written. They set a daily goal—for many it is a thousand words. And they judge themselves at the end of the day and then at the end of the week by how many words they have written. Lord knows I’m among the guiltiest.

Mostly here I’m talking about mysteries, because those are the authors I know who fall into this word trap—and I hasten to add that not all of them do. But bear in mind that the average mystery runs about 80,000 words, so if you wrote a thousand words a day, it would take you eighty days to write a novel, not counting weekends, holidays, and those days when the words just don’t flow.

The downside to all this is that there’s a temptation to set increasingly more difficult goals for yourself. Mine used to be a thousand words a day, but with this new novel the words seem to come easier and I’m averaging about 1500 a day. So now that becomes my goal, and if I only make a thousand, I feel somehow deficient. I’ve slacked off, not tried hard enough, given up. It becomes a contest with yourself.

Of course, the goal of writing should be quality, not quantity. But that somehow eludes many of us. My mysteries these days are indie published, which means I publish them. So I have no deadlines. I may say to myself that I want to get this novel out in time for summer beach reading, but there is no contract under which I’ll be punished if I miss the deadline. No one cares but me.

On the other hand, some among mystery writers—and I’m taking this from posts by Sisters in Crime—believe that what really matters is getting that first draft written. Just pile up the words. You’re going back to revise and edit anyway, and that’s the time to seek quality, not quantity. Some writers do five or ten drafts—or more—before they are satisfied with a manuscript.

I don’t. I tend to write it, go back and check for inconsistencies, awkward phrases, repetition, etc. But I rarely if ever revise to the point of changing major structures in the plot. So what I write is pretty much what stays there and becomes the final book.

When I moved from writing western historical fiction to mysteries, a move I haven’t really finalized yet and don’t intend to, I discovered a whole new world of everything from rough drafts to agents and publishers and, most of all, promotion or marketing or whatever you want to call finding clever ways to say, “Please buy my book.” But one big thing I learned was the difference between plotters and pantsers. Plotters map out the book in advance. Well before that first sentence, they have down on paper what is going to happen in each chapter, how it fits into the arc of the book, and so on. They know how each character looks and feels and how they will act. When  you write historical fiction, this is easier, because history gives you the road map.

When you’re a pantser, like me, that road map is not there. Literally, I write by the seat of my pants. I have a general idea, and often it’s the first sentence that gets me going. But then I’m off and rolling—at least that’s what I hope. The plot unravels as I write. Frequently I can’t tell you until well into the novel who is the murderer, sometimes not even who is the victim. My characters surprise me and take the book in wildly different turns.

Texas novelist the late Elmer Kelton used to say, “Listen to your characters, and they will tell you what’s going to happen.” I have known very few authors who disagree with this.

With the cozy mystery I’m currently writing, a culinary novel set in contemporary Chicago (my hometown), I am fortunate because the plot easily moves along, often without my interference. For instance, yesterday when I was napping and semi-asleep, I worked out the backstory that the protagonist needs to know to solve the mystery. So now I have notes that will carry me forward for several days. And I find maybe the mystery is going to be a small part of the story. The relationship between characters is the main story.

Writing, for me, is an exciting process of discovery. But I wish I could get over the fixation with word counts. Even as I say that, I’m checking to see how long this blog post is and finding its way longer than most. Sorry.

A bit of this and that

Two Elmer Kelton titles keep going through my mind. The first is his classic novel of the 1950s drought, The Time It Never Rained. More apropos now is the article titled, “The Time It Always Rained.” Today I don’t know which one applies. We were supposed to have rain, but it was sunny and pretty. Now I hear it’s going to hit at two o’clock in the morning. And rain all day tomorrow. Today Houston was hit again, and I have texted to ask about my kids in Tomball, northwest of Houston.

A saying about the rain that I loved and stole from local sage, Tom James, who runs for Fort Worth Memories and History page on Facebook: “The humidity just suddenly burst into rain.”

And going back further in time, this from Galileo: “Wine is sunlight held together by water.”

Yesterday I wrote 443 pages of dreck and was most discouraged. Today I wrote 1500 words of what I think (and hope) is good copy, and I’m feeling more confident about the new project. I may finally have the voice where I want it. At least it’s a good start. And I feel that old, familiar compulsion to make every minute count for the project at hand. My kind of fun.

Tonight I am both alarmed and amused by trump’s antics in the UK. I do feel that the media watches like a hawk for a chance to catch him in the slightest mis-step, and in England he made several of them, that gosh-awful tux not being the least. I can’t bring myself to feel sorry for him, because he brings his grief on himself. But a part of me wonders if he is even capable of recognizing that. Does he really believe that those huge crowds were cheering for him? Is he in denial?

I watched the press conference where he and Theresa May took questions. He read his opening remarks in a mechanical fashion, without inflection. When I mentioned that to friend Mary last night, she said, “At least he can still read.” Missing her point, I said, “Well I suppose they deliberately used small words that he could handle.” And she repeated, “At least he can still read.” Then she added, “He soon won’t be able to,” and I saw where she was headed. She believes, as many of us suspect, that he is in the early to medium stages of dementia, losing what they call “executive ability”—the ability to manage our own lives on a daily basis. Reading, writing, thinking clearly, even dressing ourselves. I do think it’s time for an impartial assessment of his cognitive abilities. I had a dear friend some years back who was diagnosed with “mild cognitive impairment,” and he made a lot more sense than much of what trump says.

Today he told the prime minister of Ireland that he liked the millions of Irish living in America and added, “I know most of them.” Out of touch with reality—and scary for us.

A Quiet Saturday

Weekends are often the quietest days of my life, and today was no exception. My family was busy, to put it mildly: a football game for Jacob, two weddings, a party, and a Dallas get-together for the adults. When I saw Jordan this morning, I said, “I’ll see you tomorrow,” but she did sneak out for a quick minute late this afternoon. And Jacob has promised promised promised to check in with me when he comes home from ice skating at ten. I remember days that busy fondly, not sure if I miss them or not. Maybe that's part of the identity I am giving up for elderhood.

Meantime I had a pleasant day doing two things I enjoy: writing and cooking. Yesterday I cleaned out the odds and ends left in the freezer—a bit of something tomato-based I didn’t recognize, some beans (not sure of seasonings on them), some cooked chicken, a seasoned lamb patty, and a half-full container of beef broth. From the fridge I got caramelized onions—should have cut the strips into small pieces, because they were stringy and hard to deal with but so good. I added chicken broth and canned tomatoes, and voila! Soup! I let it simmer all day and had a cup for supper. All that simmering meant you couldn’t distinguish anything in it, but it was good--a touch of that lamb flavoring came through. Now I have this large pot of soup I’m wondering what to do with.

I wasn’t really hungry by dinner, because I’d had a cranberry/orange scone from Central Market for breakfast—I had no idea how big those were. For lunch I had a twice-baked potato, also from Central Market. But with my soup, I managed a small sirloin slider and a small salad with Cardini’s Caesar dressing—my latest favorite of prepared dressings.

As for writing, today was the day I vowed to get back to what I laughingly call the work in progress—there’s been no progress for too long. I abandoned it at 2600 words because other matters kept pressing in. Tonight, I have it up to 2800 words but the strangest thing happened. It isn’t going at all like I planned—the characters are not doing what I thought they would, and the good guys are being stubborn, the bad guys acting nice.

I remember the late Elmer Kelton, great Texas cowboy novelist, talking about the writing of The Wolf and the Buffalo. He set out to write about the life of a Buffalo soldier at Fort Concho after the Civil War, but this Comanche chief kept crowding in, demanding to be part of the action. Ultimately the novel became the story of two lives—a Buffalo soldier whose fortunes were rising, and a Comanche chief whose world and way of life were disappearing. Elmer won awards for the book, and it is considered one of his best, out of a long and prolific career. If you haven’t read any Kelton novels, rush, do not walk, to get your hands on one. You’ll be richly rewarded

The message of course is an age-old one for writers: listen to your characters, and they’ll tell you where your novel is going. I’m listening, but I’ll be darned if I can tell what Kelly and Keisha are telling me. (I’m working on a Kelly O’Connell Mystery.) I’ll get back to it tomorrow, and see if I can figure out what’s happening.

A really pretty day, but I didn’t venture out of the cottage. I often don’t if I’m alone. I can open the French doors and have the lovely day come inside with me. Now, at nine at night, the air is getting, as a former nanny used to say, “airish,” just a touch cool.

Don’t forget to watch for the super moon tonight.

Rain in Texas, Tattoo in Scotland, and good friends

The rain in Spain may fall mainly on the plain, but in Texas this August it falls on everything and with unusual frequency. We had a good storm this afternoon. I heard the distant thunder but at first, it’s often not recognizable—could be the construction trucks from the never-ending gas pipe work or any other number of city noises. But then a great clap right overhead, and Sophie was on her feet barking defiantly. I hadn’t even realized that she’d crept up close to me. It blew harder than usual this afternoon, and I worried about the umbrella on the deck. A friend who came by to pick something up about five, reported we lost a small limb or two from the big elm tree in front—the “suffering” tree that I was so indignant about earlier. And the rain continued, slowing down but still coming for well over an hour. Now it’s less a question of watering things than it is to dump water out of flower pots so the plants don’t get root rot.

Elmer Kelton wrote the classic novel, The Time It Neve Rained, about the 1950s drought in the Southwest. But years later, he wrote an article, “The Time It Always Rained,” about the problems that beset sheep ranchers when there is too much rain. I don’t have enough ranch knowledge to enumerate those problems, but I was struck by the fact that too much rain is almost as bad as too little. There are those pests!

A social day. Margaret, a steadfast friend since we met as student wives in Missouri in the early sixties, took me to lunch to celebrate my birthday, almost a month after the fact. We had delicious blue cheese burgers and good slaw with cabbage, kale, and a nice, just-right dressing. Each of us brought half of our lunch home. Then Margaret, good soul that she is, took me grocery shopping. Having spent too many months sending people off with grocery lists and getting some questionable products back, I find grocery shopping for myself a pure delight. And now that I do the motorized carts, it’s even better. I’m not sure Margaret had as much fun as I did.

My list was short, but I promised to cook dinner for my family tomorrow night. Then an opportunity came up to include a recipe in a guest blog, so I decided to kill two whatevers with one meal. I will cook a family favorite for them and take pictures for the blog. But it’s not a last-minute meal, at least not for me, and I needed some supplies.

Tonight, neighbors Margaret and Dennis came for happy hour, joined by Teddy and Sue. Margaret and Dennis have just been to Scotland and knew I’d want to hear all about it. Among other things, they went to Tattoo, an enormous military celebration of Scottish music and entertainment. Warmed the cockles of my heart when Dennis said that mind-boggling spectacle was great but not the highlight of the trip. He was most impressed by the majestic landscape of the Highlands. Fun for me to listen and relive some of my trip to Scotland. They kindly brought me a program from Tattoo and a kilt pin for my clan, MacBean. Dennis said, “Your clan is shrinking,” and I told him it’s always been small—but proud.

A confession: I am so grateful for company and for those who get me out of the cottage, but all day today I was thinking, “When will I write my thousand words for today?” I wrote maybe 200 just before they arrived at five and wrote the rest before I did the dishes. Now that’s focus.

And I got bookmarks today for Pigface and the Perfect Dog. Excited to start passing them out.

Rain, rain, go away

Remember that childhood verse, “Rain, rain, go away/ Come again another day”? Nobody in Texas ever sang that. We are always grateful for rain, even in July. But I’m getting a little weary of this nightly occurrence. My patio floods, my dog is terrified, and I’m terrified she’ll get muddy when she goes out after it stops. Some patio plants are wilting from too much water. The wonderful fresh air is a real treat though.

Such a richness of rain always makes me think of the late Elmer Kelton’s classic Texas novel, The Time It Never Rained. One critic called it one of a dozen or so outstanding novels written in the 20^th century. Elmer grew up in West Texas ranching country, and he understood drought. But he also knew there came years when too much rain that meant weeds grew unbounded, sheep got burrs in their coats, livestock got diseases. He once wrote an article, “The Time It Always Rained,” about one of those wet years. But the novel about the drought of the ‘50s is his premiere work, winner of many awards. If you haven’t read it, do so—you'll be the richer for having read it.

A pleasant lazy Sunday. Jacob was an acolyte at the 11:00 o’clock service. In the car on the way home, he was bemoaning that he was told to do his reading and math after lunch, because he hadn’t kept up with his homework while at his grandparents. “No kid wants to read on a Sunday afternoon,” he said. I was sitting there thinking to myself, “Oh good, I get to go home and read all afternoon.”

I did read much of the afternoon but also cooked a Boston butt pork roast for supper. I’d had the butcher cube it (the butcher’s idea of cubes and mine don’t mesh, and I always have to cut the cubes into smaller pieces but at least it’s a start.). You boil the meat in salted water for an hour and a half or more until the liquid cooks away. The meat will be pale, and you keep it on the heat so the pieces brown. Serve with garlic/lime juice. I also made a radish salsa that turned out to be too heavy (literally) for chips. Christian grilled corn, and Jordan made a salad. Lovely supper.

Storm over and the lights go out. Now? Really? Everyone bustled around, made sure I had candles and flashlights, and then the lights came on. Ah, Texas!

Legend, a collaborative novel—and a bit of BSP

BSP? Blatant self-promotion.

Over a long ride as a western writer (that’s so bad it’s almost a pun so I’ll stick with it) I’ve ridden with some notable authors. The late Elmer Kelton will forever be my hero, the epitome of what a western writer can and should be. His titles, awards and honors are too numerous to mention, but if you’re not familiar with his novels, start with The Good Old Boys (a made-for-TV movie directed by and starring Tommy Lee Jones). As well as a revered author and staple at TCU Press, Elmer and his wife, Ann, were good friends.

During the’90s, I was invited to participate in several anthologies and collaborative novels (several authors unite to tell one story). Not once, but twice Elmer wrote the first chapter of a novel, and I followed with the second chapter. You don’t know intimidation unless you lived in my skin during the writing of those chapters. Elmer himself was the gentlest of critics, masking his rare criticism in irony; I was much harsher a self-critic.

The second novel, Noah’s Ride, was about an escaping slave during the Civil War. Ye gods! Not only did I have to follow Elmer, but I had to write from a masculine point of view, a masculine African-American slave. Nothing could be farther from my experience and knowledge. But I muddled through.

But in the first of those two novels, I gave in to my hesitation to write masculine point of view and wrote the only chapter in the book told from a woman’s point of view. Legend recounts the life of Lyle Sparks from hardscrabble boyhood in Texas to later years as an aging cattle rancher n Montana, years in which his colorful past may come back to haunt him. From one end of the West to the other, Lyle Sparks, bounty hunter, was feared and respected. Now he wants to set the record straight.

Chapter Two tells of the episode of Melanie Beaufort early in his life. Melanie is a proper young southern lady from Jackson, Mississippi, visiting her sister, who is enceinte, and her pretentious brother-in-law, a banker in the raw frontier town of Fort Worth. You can see this coming—Sparks and Melanie fall madly in love, and she is determined to take him home to meet her parents. He reluctantly agrees. But Melanie’s sister lies to her about her mother’s health, and the girl loses her nerve and returns alone to Mississippi. Now disillusioned about love (and having lost his entire family to an Indian raid), Sparks rides on alone.

Yes, it’s riddled with clichés, but there’s some fine writing in this novel from great names of the western – Loren Estleman, James Reasoner, Jane Candia Coleman, Ed Gorman, and Robert J. Randisi. (The Amazon blurb says “legendary” authors but modesty forbids….)

Until January 31, Legend is available as a Kindle e-book from Amazon for one dollar. western fans will find themes and authors they cherish; newcomers can explore the western genre and read new authors. Who knows? We may get a whole new generation of western fans. Find Legend on sale at https://www.amazon.com/b?node=14435394011.

Bone-weary tired

This is my not stodgy, not an old person's car--eleven years old with 31,000+ miles!

Bone tired. You  ever feel that way? That's how I feel tonight. I've done a lot of running around this week that I'd rather not do. I'd like to be home at my computer, but I took the dog to the vet for an annual check-up, went to physical therapy which is always tiring, went out to lunch twice and dinner once (all of which I enjoyed), had Jacob overnight three nights (which means I don't sleep as well even though I love having him here--mostly), got a haircut, went to the grocery, took the car to be repaired (predictably it cost four times what I anticipated) and went to a doctor's appointment. Maybe it was the nap I took this afternoon that made me lose my oomph--slept so soundly that the alarm was a great intrusion. Woke up to go get Jacob--who promptly went home to play with a friend. Should have gone back to bed.
The weather doesn't help. By now, everyone knows about the monsoon season we're having--22+ inches, more than all of last year. And it's supposed to rain at least until mid-week. Sometimes a gentle rain is comforting, but we've had sudden heavy downbursts--they don't last long, but they're intense. Plants and lawns are loving it. People not so much. We're beginning to long for sunshine and to feel moldy; crops are dying from too much water. It's been a great drought-breaker, with lakes a year ago almost empty now overflowing.
Texas novelist Elmer Kelton's most significant work was the novel The Time It Never Rained, but he later wrote an article titled "The Time It Always Rained." Writing mostly from sheepmen's point of view, Elmer stressed the difficulty for animal raisers. I wish he were here today to give us his view on this deluge.
To make it worse, this is the weekend of the PGA tournament at Colonial Country Club (sponsors change occasionally and I can't remember what we're calling it this year--it will always be Colonial to me). I don't know much about golf, but I imagine a soggy course is a real problem for golfers. And surely it discourages both real golf fans and those who go to drink beer and ogle the women--a Colonial tradition. However, if traffic is an indicator, it hasn't discouraged many people--traffic is as always a mess anywhere near the golf course. Streets closed, etc. This morning I thought I'd be smart and cut through a shopping village parking lot--blocked off with an official man patrolling. Had to retrace my steps. And my favorite way to come and go to West Fort Worth is blocked. This evening to avoid University Drive, I went almost downtown to get to White Settlement and retrieve my repaired car.
So glad to have my Beetle back. Grateful for the loan of a Passat but it felt stodgy and stiff to me, and I was never comfortable driving it. A friend told me in Germany all the old people drive Passats--oh good, just what I needed to know.
Enough rambling. I'm going to go fix breakfast for dinner--scrambled eggs and bacon. It's one of Jacob's favorites.
 

My two minutes of fame

I was flattered some time ago to be asked by interviewer Dan Schneider to be part of a program he planned on the life and work of the late Elmer Kelton, Texas novelist who transformed the western genre. TCU Press was fortunate enough to reprint many of his books, and I had the privilege of working with him on those reprints as well as a nonfiction title and writing a literary biography--which came out before its time because he went on to write many more books. Elmer died in 2009, but his legacy and his literature live on. Literary critic Jon Tuska called his The Time It Never Rained  "one of the dozen or so best novels by an American author in the twentieth century." He raked in honors--Best Western Author, chosen by Western Writers of America, Inc., Spur Awards, Western Heritage Awards, Lifetime Achievements Awards, even from the Texas Institute of Letters, which usually doesn't recognize westerns. He was simply a great writer, one who transformed genre writing into literary achievement. But he was always absolutely humble about the recognition he earned.
He was also a nice guy, cowboy throughout though he would tell you he never made a hand. But he retained that courtly politeness of the cowboy. A gentle man. And a terrific story teller. Those of us who heard him talk often grew to know his stories by heart, but we never tired of hearing them again. I was delighted to consider him a friend and to think that he considered me one.
We taped the show Saturday morning--after my mistakenly thinking it was Friday morning and sitting around waiting for the call that never came. On Skype with me were Steve Kelton, Elmer's son, Joyce Roach, my good friend and a fast friend of Elmer's, and Dan Schneider, the interviewer. Let's say I was a bit nervous--okay more than that. I was afraid of not getting Skype to work, afraid of relying on my memory--but what could I study? There wasn't time to review all of Elmer's work nor even my paltry book on him. So I winged it. But I did get Skype to work.
Joyce did not, so we have an hour and ten minutes of her with her hand on the nose of a horse. But her comments were spot on and revealed a deep knowledge of Elmer's sixty-some books as well as his personality. Afterward, Steve said hers was the most patient horse he'd ever seen--any he'd ever had would have knocked his block off by then. Schneider was well prepared to lead the discussion.
I thought we would only be visible when we were on camera--not so. You can see me scratching, checking something else, eyes wandering. But it was okay. I didn't realize how jowly I've become--my father's daughter. But all in all I was proud to be part of it and hope I held up my end of the discussion well. IF you want to watch it in bits and pieces--it's an hour and ten minutes--you can find it at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muhWkrEPquU or

https://vimeo.com/125382848. Dan Schneider Video Interview #14.

Steve Kelton summed it up best when he said, "It's strange to talk of Dad in the past tense. He's still with us." And through his books, he still is and always will be. Like many others, I think Kelton's work will easily stand the test of time.

There's a postscript to this story. I showed the video to Jacob this morning, and he went wild. "You talked to Dan Schneider? He interviewed you?" He went whooping and hollering about the house, stopping occasionally to give me unprecedented hugs and showers of affection. I had really gone up in his estimation. Turns out there are two Dan Schneiders--the one I talked to and one who writes for Nickelodeon productions. "My" Dan Schneider said the other one is richer and more famous, but he's the smart good-looking one. So there went my two minutes of fame.

An old-fashioned look at writing

A while back I was tagged in a blog tour or whatever and asked to post about my writing process. I don't remember what I wrote except that I am a pantser. I write a one-page idea of notes about where the story is going, and then I try to come up with a zinger of a first sentence--sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Then I take off and see where my characters lead me. Often as I write I go back and add to that page of notes.
"Listen to your characters" is advice I've heard all my writing life, especially from some of the writers I respect most. I remember the late Elmer Kelton saying that he started out to write a book about a buffalo soldier, but a Comanche chief kept taking hold of he story and running with it. Ultimately, The Wolf and the Buffalo, became a story about two characters--the Buffalo Soldier, a freed slave whose life is on the rise, and the Wolf, a Comanche whose world and way of life is disappearing. They are enemies who respect each other. Another of Elmer's books, The Good Old Boys, was inspired by cowboy stories he heard from his father and other old-timers, and the characters, he said, took hold of the story like a cold-jawed horse with the bit in its mouth.
Writing to me is an art that requires sensitivity and the freedom to follow where your imagination leads you. Good and bad writing should both be the result of inspiration.
Now along comes a computer program called Scrivener, which has been the subject of much discussion on one of the listservs I follow. I not knocking those who use it--God bless them if it helps them write a better novel. Scrivener allows you to save note cards, scenes, chapters, and move them around at will in the book. I think you can also keep notes (perhaps on the note carsd) of what color a characters eyes are and other details that sometimes dance around so frustratingly in mid-story. I've avoided Scrivener and other similar programs, in spite of hearing them praised up one side and down the other, because I simply don't have time for what is apparently a steep learning curve.
But more than that, I'm afraid I'd get so lost in coordinating note cards, scenes, chapters, that the novel would never flow. As I write new scenes, new complications, even new characters come to me--and I prefer to listen to my characters. Somehow such writing-aid programs, to me, turn writing into something mechanical instead of an art.
Now I'll admit two things--plotting is hard for me (probably why I write short) and I am forever going back to search for a detail or a scene or even a character's name so I'll stay consistent. I do keep a lot of characters, and I've considered keeping a log of chapters after they're written. But that's it. Call me old-fashioned--I probably am.