What is Glass Made of?

Somehow I am writing this on my elliptical, proud of my balance for the first time in my life as I hold a pen and paper in my hand and go at it. It’s a gorgeous day, sunny, mid-seventies, and I’m very happily sweating, loving every movement.

The door is open but I’m staring out the window at the orange tree in back. Sometimes I look out at it through the stained glass window my dad made for me when I was little. Sometimes I study the tree’s leaves, ripe oranges, and contorted trunk through the clear glass of the window that is splattered with the mud of a recent storm.

A fly is stuck. It’s trying to escape out the window. It tries to break through the glass. It keeps falling. I’m now at the height of my workout, soaking wet, muscles burning, loving it even more. But I watch the fly. It falls again and again, banging against the glass in futile flashes of energy.

I ask myself with each leg rotation, “What is glass made of?” The fly doesn’t understand either. And neither of us is looking for a scientific answer. We can see the sun through it, feel it even. The light has the power to penetrate through the glass. But we don’t. I feel like the fly, pounding into the glass over and over again.

I can see what I want, feel it, but there is always a layer of glass I am pounding up against. Sometimes I break through, leaving the shards of glass behind. But then it’s like a glass box descends upon me. I can still see, feel even, but the layer of glass is there at every turn. And I just can’t figure out what glass is made of any more than that dirty fly that is about to die on my windowsill.

Sleeping on Benches

One day it was a joke. The next it wasn’t. But maybe that’s a good thing. When I saw a man sleeping on a bench, he looked so peaceful in the afternoon sunshine I decided to follow suit. Of course I didn’t fall asleep, but I wished I could be so carefree. I actually felt rather ridiculous trying to emulate a serene public napper.

Oddly enough the next day it really happened to me. I lied down on a bench in the middle of the day and accidently fell asleep. My family was embarrassed but my grandparents sat at a bench across the way to guard me. It’s funny how when you’re truly relaxed or exhausted nothing else matters. I once almost lied down on the sidewalk in London and on some steps in Venice because I couldn’t walk any farther. I remember train trips in Europe where I would lie on top of my stuff so no one could take it and then fall asleep.

Bench sleeping has become a funny habit over the course of the month. Then again I have been sticking to the adage about doing one thing every day that scares me. Since the beginning of the year I’ve done so many things that have scared me that I’ve never felt so free and unsafe at once. This habit of challenging myself leaves me feeling like I’m floating and falling intermittently.

I know the world isn’t safe enough to make a habit of abandon, but it is a beautiful thing when our bodies overtake us, even when that just means falling asleep.

Happy Birthday with Barbie...And She's Blonde!?!?

It’s that yellow time of year again for me. March, my birthday month. I didn’t really expect Barbie to take any part in my celebrations, but there she was inside a box wrapped in pink paisley paper. My daughters got one for me so I could play with them. I haven’t gotten a Barbie in years but there she was, and my girls told me that they picked one out that looked like me. She was blonde.

I never really even knew I was blonde until a few years ago. I did grow up playing with Barbies, however, and had a whole huge boxful. Some I treasured, some I did mean things to, and others I played with until their heads fell off. My very favorites were Barbie and the Rockers. I had all of them and when I played with my friends or sister I was always this really gorgeous brunette with curly hair that I named Melissa. I could never really “be” any of the uber blonde Barbies even though I liked to play with them. They were either the friends or enemies of Melissa. They weren’t ever me.

Growing up, my mom and sister were the blonde ones. My hair was called honey or golden or was described at times in less pleasant terms. I felt like the different one for better or worse and I played accordingly. The up-side was that I never identified or concerned myself with dumb blonde jokes. I wasn’t blonde. It wasn’t until I was in graduate school and there was a class discussion about me being the only blonde in class that I really found out. It was strange. I never knew people saw me as having blonde hair. I guess I knew it was technically true but I still forget.

This may be the silliest blog entry I’ve written, but getting my blonde Barbie this week made me wonder at how different we see ourselves in comparison with how others see us. I don’t know if I’ll ever really see myself as blonde, but I think I’ll have fun playing with my new Barbie.

Someone Else's Time

When I was little one of my favorite books was From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. The idea of living in a museum, especially at night, fascinated me. It still does. While I’ve always loved paintings and am into sculpture, what really does it for me in some wacked out, time-travel kind of way is the furniture. I never think about it until I’m actually standing there, inside the museum or estate, surrounded by the paneling, clocks, candlesticks, sideboards, and beds of another era. It overtakes me.

If I ever feel mystical it’s then, when I’m taken into the past in a rare moment of silence, surrounded by someone else’s things from long ago. Last week I was at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles and it happened to me there. I looked into a gold framed mirror, the glass a murky black with age. I couldn’t see my reflection but I stared anyway, wondering who used to look into the same space, whose reflection used to smile back at her.

While I’m always a sucker for marquetry and those huge, oddly shaped aristocratic beds, what really causes me to stop and stare are the clocks. I’ve been searching for a wall clock for my house and after studying those jewel encrusted or elongated golden beauties, I wonder if introducing a little rococo madness into my environment wouldn’t actually be a good thing. Wouldn’t necessarily go, I know, but I can’t help love splashes of insanity.

At the Getty I was admiring another mirror, large and ornate, when a girl came up from behind me. She did a little dance, checked herself out, and said she wanted the mirror for her bedroom. So did I. Only I wanted it more to be taken back in time than to watch myself dance. Once I looked into a mirror that belonged to Marie Antoinette in her Petit Trianon and it happened to me then too. For a moment I wasn’t in San Francisco anymore, I was in someone else’s head in another time.

Clocks and mirrors. There’s something so personal about them that the ghosts of their owners seem to come back to them. Or else reflections must linger throughout time. Clocks and mirrors. They’re simple objects that we use every day, yet they end up defining so much of our lives for us.

In reality I don’t really want to live out anyone else’s life. But let me be transported to someone else’s time every once in a while and I’m a much happier for what happens in those rare moments. And I would love it if that could mean staying all night in the museum.

Book Rebellion

I have a horrible confession to make. Until a couple weeks ago I hadn’t been in a bookstore in what seemed like an age. An age of stupidity. Walking up and down the aisles made me smile even though I felt so out of it. Last year when I was signing I was in bookstores all the time and could keep up with what I wanted to read and what I didn’t. I’m not sure what happened but now I seem to view going to the bookstore as a luxury, something I only treat myself to, not the necessary nourishment to my mind that it is.

Maybe it’s this horrible pile I have going. There’s such a high stack of books by my bed and in my book bag that buying more books seems way too optimistic. It’s not really that I don’t want to read the books in my piles, it’s just that between the recommendations from friends and self-forced reading everything tends to be heavy nonfiction. Apparently there is a consensus that I am in desperate need of knowledge.

Well I rebelled. I left the pile one day and walked around a bookstore without the constraint of trying to make myself a more logical being. I planted myself in the fiction section and finally chose a book I had never heard of before, something beautifully tragic and utterly engaging. I bought the book and read it in a few hours. Liberating myself from the world of information brought me the knowledge I really needed in the first place. I rememebered that I learned faster and more deeply when my imagination was challenged. Living, breathing, thinking in someone else’s world for a few hours time put me in the state of mind I needed to face my own.

I’m still working on my pile, and don’t get me wrong, a lot of the books are great. Right now I’m reading books on Spanish linguistics, code switching in New York City, different spiritual topics and views, Costa Rica, and the history of Spain in the twentieth century. Wonderful, but I’m ready to rebel again.

Facing My Cold Demons: Trolls on Ice

I always thought of winter as a haven for my thoughts, a time to take life down to its pure, cold silhouettes without the tempting distractions of color and growth. This year is different. I’ve been running from the cold. I’m taking multiple trips down to Southern California, am going to Palm Springs for my birthday, and planning to head down to Costa Rica this summer. The reason? There’s something I need to write that I’ll only have enough strength to write in the sunlight. Hot sunlight. It would kill me to stain white pages with those particular thoughts in the cold.

But dreams are where I lose control. Mine take me back to my Norse heritage, cold, dark trolls and helpless, small me. I decided I finally needed to face those cold demons in my conscious mind. I woke up early this morning and walked through the ice covered countryside. My lip quivered and my toes felt naked in my shoes until they finally went numb. I kept walking. The crosses of the grapevines, the mossy oak trees, the white grass of the hills. Winter became beautiful again.

I’m still running to the sun, but I feel freer now after forcing myself to see winter as it is. When my task is done, and the seasons change and another year is spent, the cold may once again become a cradle to my thoughts. This year I may need the sun to burn right through me and kill off all remnants of my heritage, but the day will come again when the cold regains more power in my life than haunting thoughts. And with this morning’s walk I hope that day comes soon, before I’m white haired and wearing a soft cardigan anyway. I’ll get to work.

Running in Florida

I’m back in Napa. I just got home from spending a couple weeks in Florida where I stayed at a resort I hadn’t been to since high school. When I was there the first time at sixteen, I would wake up early in the morning and jog around the lagoon as many times as I could. It was track season and I had to focus, feel the burn, and run fast! Faster, Tyler! Move it! I love the competition, but this trip there was no one around timing me so I let my mood set my pace and how many times I circled the lagoon. Beautiful.

Lately I spend more time thinking forward than back, but running around a lagoon that had disappeared from my consciousness for over ten years brought back all the thoughts of a sixteen-year-old. Or maybe it was so easy to remember myself at that age because there were two hundred cheerleaders staying at the same resort. Not that I was ever a cheerleader. Nothing against the girls, but I had the same thoughts these past weeks that I did when I was in high school. Why would I want to be on the sidelines cheering? I’d much rather play. Give me a volleyball and I’ll be happy.

Running round and round the lagoon in Florida brought back thoughts I had buried somewhere over the years and I was surprised when they came back with each turn of the water’s edge. Maybe it’s immaturity or misconceptions of what I thought age was and what it would bring, but I realized so far I’ve been all wrong. Nothing has changed inside of me. None of my hopes, dreams or plans. I’ve had several detours from the sixteen-year-old Tyler’s path, some good, some not, but really no matter which way I go my core is my own. I was just listening to a song where the singer talks about how he’s strong on the outside but not deep down. I feel like the opposite. I’m always falling apart on the outside, tripping over myself, not knowing what to say.. It’s when I’m alone, breathing in the silence, that I remember that I’m solid at the core.

I’m not really interested in going back to the real sixteen. Sometimes when I substitute teach at high schools I get mistaken for being a student. I’ve been yelled at by French teachers, had to show my id so I could eat off campus, and asked all sorts of weird questions. But what I like about it is that sometimes I get to be around students who have hopes for their lives and big plans for their futures. This I can understand and appreciate even though I know that what is ahead of them isn’t as simple or as easy as they think. Apathy scares me more than anything. But really, where I was wrong at sixteen was that I thought that by this age things would be set. My life would be in order; I’d have it together. Maybe I’m smarter now, maybe less so. All I learned from the lagoon is that as everyone tells me how much I’ve changed I really haven’t changed at all. No matter, if running in Florida is what it took to get me back into volleyball, all the sweat is worth every drop.

Show Me the Door

Doors fascinate me. I take pictures of them and with them whenever I travel. Even if the various colors, styles, and levels of upkeep give clues to the worlds that lay hidden away inside, it really is impossible to know. Colorful, modern, stark, or ornate, doors feed my curiosity as I walk by. They’re oftentimes inspiring or enigmatic enough in their own right to keep from tempting me to even want to cross the threshold. Daydreams can be enough.

While physical doors remain a source of visual fascination for me, other doors have captured my attention lately. These new doors make me want to walk through them; in fact, they pull me inside before I can say no. They could almost be called portals, but that term makes me feel cold, as if the entryways were laced in metal. The most straightforward term for these new doors of mine is memory, but even that word is too simple and too complex.

Memories can be triggered anywhere and at any time without warning. A scent, a touch, a song, and off the mind goes into the past, connected to the present by one of our senses. This I understand. It’s inescapable. What is less explicable, perhaps, is why new vistas or the sun shining just so on a mossy tree trunk, will take my mind away to places I had forgotten. It isn’t memories I find through these doorways so much as thoughts that had long been forgotten or hopes that became buried through time without my realizing it. Why would the sight of two perfectly balanced Japanese maples on a rainy Napa morning suddenly shoot my mind into the sunshine of a Spanish courtyard? What connection does a kaleidoscope crocheted blanket have with warm stones under bare feet?

Whether I understand or not, the point is, I’m listening. When life gets too busy and I forget to think for myself, getting hit on the head with an acorn, or almost bashed in the face by two quarreling birds, pushes me through a door I never expected. And through the new doors, more often than not I begin to laugh. Through the doors I remember who I am, and then begin to see the future.

I'm a girl and my name's not Justin.

I never thought I’d be a guy pursued by a very determined woman. My phone somehow turned me into one. It’s not all that great. Unluckily, the person that texts me on the most regular basis is a woman that I’ve never met, “Erika”. She thinks I’m Justin and she is just not giving up.

A couple months ago I got the first strange text, a rather stupid riddle. It came from an area code where I know a lot of people so I texted back asking who it was. You never know when a friend might go crazy. Well, it wasn’t a friend and the woman who answered thought I was joking. I didn’t respond. Undeterred, Erika sent me several more texts, convinced that I was Justin. I never answered but continued to find out more about her than I ever wanted to know. She was never coy about coming after me or her life, even though she was in a relationship with someone else and Justin never responded. Justin was definitely not interested but she didn’t care.

Recently, after “Erika” sent a seemingly heartfelt apology (long story why) I felt bad for her and tried to convince her one more time that she had the wrong number. She accused me (Justin) of lying. After everything else she said during her fit I didn’t feel sorry for her anymore, and won’t. It’s not easy being a guy pursued by a psychotic woman.

Although I’d rather see a friend’s name appear on my phone, more often than not it’s Erika. The dirty jokes she sends are never funny and when she tries to be clever it’s just embarrassing. I’m not trying to be too hard on her but I have a hard time believing Justin is worth the fuss she’s making. In real life he’s obviously a guy who gave her a fake phone number (mine, thanks a lot!). Then again after being pursued by Erika myself I can’t say I blame him. She obviously can’t take no for an answer. Poor girl, that’s all she’s going to get!

Tillandsias: my air plant escape to warmth

When I went out to my car early this morning, instead of completing the miserable job of scraping ice off my windshield I felt a gust of warm air. It took me off guard. It was heaven. After a weekend of sunshine and mid-sixties air, to be met with warm Monday morning air makes me feel like this year is starting out right.

The cold has been killing me. I cannot keep warm but I’m happiest outside. To bring the outdoors in as much as possible I’ve been collecting tillandsias. Even though I have a couple of other favorite plants inside, air plants are my new passion. They are living sculptures that I can move around and surround my living space with.

Collecting a myriad of shades, shapes, and sizes of happiness-inducing plants without the fuss of soil is addictive. When it’s cold an indoor garden isn’t quite the same as walking through a Mediterranean garden or lying around in a tropical paradise. Still, air plants can be exotic and are inspiring enough to contemplate to be considered art.

It’s also easy enough to keep my happy little hobby alive. Sometimes I just bring them all into the shower with me to trick them into thinking they’re in the rainforest. When it’s icy outside, giving myself the illusion of outdoor living can be tricky. Still, with weather like today, my hope of day into night outside is tangible. Not to worry. It won’t stop me from adding to my collection. When the temperature drops again and I’m back to scraping ice, I need my air plants to remind me of desert air and time spent poolside.

But, really, seventy-three degrees today in January? 2009 is looking good.

In this year of 2009 I solemnly resolve...

I admit I have to be careful with New Year’s resolutions. I’m so competitive with myself that I will work to triumph no matter the cost…stupid girl. This year I’ve at least strived to separate my resolutions from my goals so that the people around me can have some peace. I don’t know if it will work, but I also limited myself to only a few. Resolutions tend to be a year-round experiment for me. Like it or not, some of us just aren’t happy without a challenge.

1. I will become more flexible (physically). My daughters always talk about a seventy-year-old woman that kicks her leg up over her head. I’m inspired. The splits just aren’t good enough anymore.

2. I will take myself places where I can think, whether that means quiet or noisy. I will go away to sit, walk, and listen and not limit myself by the limitations of others.

3. I will stop letting myself be made to feel bad about being thin, the unspoken American social crime. I will try to figure out how to ignore all the mean comments…somehow.

4. I will write more and more honestly. In my manuscripts. In this blog. In my emails. In any contact with others, but especially with what I write for myself.

After starting 2009 off with my tradition a long hike, I feel like I’m off to a good start. Here’s to a flexible new year filled with wanderlust, candor and sunshine. (I forgot to mention I only want to go to hot places this year!)

Taking on 2009

Okay, so in all honestly 2008 tried to kill me. I really think one of its main objectives was to take me out. I lost people I cared about, almost didn’t wake up from unconsciousness, faced heavy criticism, and almost forgot my name. Yes, I broke, but as 2008 turns into 2009 I can finally say to myself that I am not the worse for it. My body is stronger than it ever has been and my brains and heart are working hard to catch up. I realize that someday I’ll probably only remember everything good that happened this year, the places I went, time spent with friends, the sweet notes from my daughters, but right now the battle of 2008 is still too fresh for me to drop my guard.

A few nights ago I was watching The Dark Knight again and laughed, in kind of a sick way, when Joker says, “Whatever doesn’t kill you simply makes you…stranger.” Although I’m concentrating on getting stronger not stranger, sometimes it takes more courage to fall apart and then get back up again than to simply turn everything off and pretend like nothing is wrong. Strange is real. Sterile is not.

So while at first I didn’t want to think about starting a new year, it’s beginning to enthrall me. 2009 is a mystery. I’m scared and excited. I don’t feel ready to start another 365 days over again but I want to. Because, really, as I brace myself in the last of the chaos of 2008 I’m not so broken as to not savor the challenge of the future. I’m taking on 2009.

P.S. Right after I wrote this I had a slight accident (on foot), got a concussion, had to get stitched up, and a tetanus shot to top it off. Someone help me make it through New Year’s Eve!!!

Commercial-free Christmas

My television situation has been remedied. After all those movies on the laptop I now have the big screen to grace my living room. While it has been fantastic to watch movies for real again, the characters now as big as I am, I can’t help reflect on how great it has been for our daughters to be raised in a television-free home for so long. Since Vanessa and Tara have always been able to watch movies on their travel DVD player, I never realized how commercial-free their childhood has been. When they recently had a school assignment that required them to watch commercials and create their own, it was the first time their teacher was surprised that they did not outdo themselves with the project.

As I remember countless commercials from my childhood, it seems strange to me that my daughters will not. With Christmas a couple days away I can’t help be grateful that my daughters have had eight years of asking for what they’ve truly wanted, not those things a screen told them they ought to have. While commercials can be clever and funny there is such a freedom in not being told what we ought to have. It’s fulfilling to realize I have never seen an advertisement for anything on my list this year. Those are the things, born out of a desire of who we are as individuals, that are the best gifts. Whether it’s a telescope, air plants, marbled paper or an old steamer trunk, I hope you get something on your list this year that is truly for you, not for who anyone thinks you ought to be.

Wishing you a beautiful Christmas! Enjoy your celebrations!

Gardens in Common

This past week my husband and I celebrated our anniversary. In all honesty it was weird for both of us to look at each other and think twelve years. Even though we got married very young (Joshua at twenty-one, I at eighteen) and have been together over a third of our lives, twelve just sounds like too big a number at this point in our lives. We had to laugh.

Getting married young has its advantages. We bought our first house together when I was nineteen and were so distracted with each other throughout those college years that we stayed focused on what we wanted for our lives and out of trouble. Having children young also has its advantages. It feels good to be fitter after having twins than before and knowing that I’ll only be forty when our girls graduate from high school.

Still, the flipside of literally growing up together as a married couple is that while we’ve developed into who we now are over the last twelve years side by side, our interests and personalities have not always continued in the same direction. I write, dance, and love wine, travel, and Spanish. Joshua builds guitars, welds, and likes camping, cars, and silence. When I asked him last weekend what we had in common his answer was simple. “Kids.” After we both laughed, there was one other thing we decided we could completely agree on. We have gardens in common.

Landscape architecture and design is what we can talk about for hours. We’ve visited countless gardens together in California and Europe, some of our favorite memories made together when walking through different landscapes alone. While our preferences vary in style, music, and eye color, in the garden we agree. Outside our tastes meld together into one without much compromise. At home our garden is in a major transition, not exactly what either of us wants, but getting closer. Joshua sketches revised plans as we slowly transform our wild plot of land into a place to relax, cook, and play. Because when it comes down to it, we both are happier outside. One more thing in common.

“Yes” and My Orange Self: Ringtones and Character Play

While my orange self gets compliments my ringtone is another matter. An explanation is in order….

Although my writing is on a brief hiatus while I finish up a research project, in another month or so my laptop will reconvert itself into a portal to Barcelona. It always leads to a woman laced in orange. For those that know me or have read my writing, color plays a strong role in my consciousness. Color represents different aspects of personality, sometimes facets that are contradictory. Colors are not stagnant. They breathe, fade, deepen, take on meaning and then shed it, just as we do as humans.

In Ruby Rest, Edda was red. My new protagonist is orange. While I try to separate myself as much as possible from my characters when I’m not writing, I have found orange seeping into my life in spite of my initial efforts to keep it at bay. Why the resistance? I know the orange character could take me down. She’s stronger than I am and knows it. Still, her genuine fear of orange has become my love affair, an exploration of a complex woman I both love and hate.

Orange now speaks to me even when my head is not in the story. Its instability makes me feel safe. Since I’ve started the story I’ve bought an orange puffer jacket and an orange hoodie. I’ve also been wearing a new orange sweater a little too often this fall. But I must confess that wearing orange actually leads me to a lot of conversations with people I don’t know and I like it. The ringtone is another matter.

When I got my new phone at the end of summer I was in the middle of a Jack Black in Be Kind, Rewind type of week. Somehow I became negatively charged without knowing it and anything electronic broke in my presence. First my iPod fell out of my shirt to its death and then the computer crashed. When I switched to my laptop it refused to function and most of my email contacts were lost that week. My Bluetooth followed suite and fried itself and then my phone abandoned me. At least only machines were hurt and no humans.

Since this was pre-research time, I was writing in the midst of the chaos, or trying to. When I got my new phone I was engrossed in the story, my orange character predominant in my brain. Coldplay’s “Yes” became my ringtone in honor of her, but somehow when I was setting it up it became the song everyone who calls me hears as well. Reactions are weird but now I don’t care. I know I’ll be back in the story soon and orange will take hold. Say what you will, but it’s all about the story, the story I have to write or will die trying.

Cooking for My Name's Sake

I once admitted my secret desire to have the “fabulous cook” reputation. Although I love the change of seasons, without tomatoes straight off the vine and basil picked outside my kitchen door, good cuisine becomes a little more complicated for me, the dream vanishing into a challenge. Maybe autumn is the excuse, but I’m desperate to improve. When I saw that Tyler Florence was doing a cooking demonstration at Copia last Saturday I walked right over. While it’s true the name caught my attention, I didn’t honestly know who he was until I got there. I’m just not up on any cooking shows. (Sorry, but I’ve been saving up for a TV for the past year and am presently limited to movies on my laptop in bed. It’s not so bad…)

I was impressed at the demonstration and happy to learn about boiling potatoes in cream and making crepes. Of course, professional chefs make everything look faster and easier than my amateur hands can manage. I knew the real test would be at home later. Still, it was nice to meet another Tyler who I could actually get a cookbook from, even if it was a little confusing when I introduced myself. The name is a winner (I’m obviously biased.) so I knew my luck would subsequently be at its peak in the kitchen. I invited my grandparents over for dinner the next day and bam, that night I became "Tyler the fabulous cook". Tonight I try again, but no matter what, one night counts, right?

Dilemmas, Dilemmas

Of late my dilemmas in life are not simple questions of syntax, style, or travel. Questions swirl around my brain, impossible quandaries, and decisions need to be made. With all the mental upheaval, it was somehow fascinating to overhear the dilemmas of eight-year-olds instead of my own. On a recent field trip to Safari West I listened to my two third grade daughters and two boys from their class discuss their own predicaments, real and imagined. I had forgotten all about that game full of questions like “Would you rather catch on fire or drown?” or “Would you rather eat your eyeball or stick a fork through your arm?” As the kids thought up some horrible ultimatums and then happily switched to “Who’s cooler, Batman or Spiderman?” I wondered if discussing pretend problems really do help prepare us for real ones.

In any case, it’s still rather odd to me how many times we create our own dilemmas unnecessarily. My daughters and I were in Target a couple weeks ago when an athletic guy walked down our aisle.

“Look,” Vanessa whispered, tugging on me.

I glanced at the man and we went our way. I was surprised when at home she brought it up again.

“Did you see how strong that guy was in Target?”

“Yes.”

“That’s the problem. All the guys with big muscles have tattoos and I don’t want to marry someone with tattoos.”

She was genuinely distressed and I tried not to laugh. I assured Vanessa that there were lots strong guys out there without tattoos and that I was sure she would find one. Why as children and adults do we do that to ourselves? Why do we invent difficult choices that we don’t have to make and then torture ourselves over them? Real life decisions end up being so unlike the ones I’ve invented over the years that it’s debatable whether pretend or actual is more difficult. I have yet had to choose between walking the plank and being thrown into a volcano. Then again that would be very clear cut, something in real life that evades me.

I'm Back!

I feel like I've been gone from everyone and everything these past couple months. I'm sorry and I miss being in contact with people and not just books and words. With the start of school and then my decision to go back to school next year to pursue a Ph.D. life seemed to get out of hand. I'm happy to say that I'm back now!

Since I've been working a lot and I'm shifting back into Spanish I will not be writing for WritersNewsWeekly every week anymore. I do plan on updating my blog weekly because I will miss writing my column. I love hearing back from you and I can't tell you how many times I've thought about Lynne's comment contemplating which book she would want to memorize. I had never considered that question before and have loved to let it swirl about my mind. No answer yet.

While I anticipate being better able to write in a few days time in for now I at least have to say "hurray" that the GRE is over! First, yes, I lament that the mathematician in me ran away sometime over the past few years. I tried so hard to find her but she would not come back to me, even for one last rendezvous. I used to be somewhat good at math but as I studied over the past month I kept remembering that Barbie doll from when I was growing up that said, "Math is hard!" I wanted to prove Barbie wrong on that one but my inner mathematician never resurfaced. Without her I am now average or worse. Such is life. The verbal girl did come back full on however and I was thrilled to find myself in the ninety-eighth percentile. Yay!

I happily recovered from the test by spending three days with my whole family in a cottage in Carmel. With an injured wrist from volleyball I didn't prove to be much fun to play Frisbee with but the long walks were fabulous. I know I've said it before but I could seriously walk forever...especially in Carmel.

The "M" Word

I was sitting at my booth at the Sonoma County Book Festival when a woman approached to ask about my book, Ruby Rest. I said it was a mystery and she asked if it really had any murder. She apparently liked the cover, but after reading the subscript, she began to back away while looking me in the eye. She appeared startled and informed me that murder was evil and that she was, in fact, against murder. I told her I was as well, but she was seemingly frightened enough to continue backing away until she had safely escaped my presence. Her last words expressed her fear and I was left sitting there made to feel like a threat to peaceful mankind; a woman with murderous intentions wrapped up in novel form.

The anti-murder woman had the same reaction to Left Coast Crime at my neighboring booth. After reading the words “Aloha Murder,” she was obviously shaken up and I can still remember her wide eyes. Although her actions and admonitions to me that day in Santa Rosa were extreme, there have been a number of times over the past year that I have been treated with contempt for writing a mystery which contains murder in the plotline. In more than one bookstore I have been chastised, as if I had written a book on how to murder innocent human beings and was then sitting there with a smile trying to sell it to unsuspecting future victims. At least the people who really know me are not concerned for their safety. Whenever a stranger eyes me warily and rebukes me for defiling the sanctity of human life I always smile inwardly, if not outwardly, and take care not to make any sudden movements.

Do we really believe writers advocate every action of every character of their creation? This would be preposterous, yet writers are often treated as guilty of the words they have written. Scientists study disease not to become infected by it but to discover cures against it. Writers do not debase themselves by studying human nature but teach mankind about himself through their observations. Though murder itself is corrupting, its use in a plotline may be empowering once we understand the author’s purpose. We must always remember to read with our brains on and not label things good and bad without even grasping what they mean or how they are used. To censor something without understanding its content or intention is to lose our power of thought and give ourselves over to superstition and fear. Not talking about things, the “M” word included, doesn’t make them go away. It only makes us less able to deal with them because our eyes are closed.

Word obsessed: Psycho Vocabulary Girl

A few weeks ago I found out I needed to take the GRE. I’d like to enroll in a doctoral program studying Spanish linguistics and start classes next fall. Part of the application process is of course the GRE, essentially the SAT for graduate students. Since it covers math and English language skills that supposedly we all studied in school I didn’t think it would be that big of a deal. Then I looked through the review materials and became instantly depressed. I never realized how poor my vocabulary was until I read through some of the analogies and didn’t know a single word! First I cried. Next I got really angry. Then I became vocabulary obsessed.

Maybe I was just in the mood for a challenge, maybe I don’t like feeling not so smart anymore, or maybe I just didn’t like being told that it was impossible to learn that many words in so short a time. In short, I became determined to conquer this. My smarter friends assure me the exam is not based in reality and I shouldn’t worry so much about where I am right now. Still, I’m relearning as many Latin and Greek roots as I can and I carry flashcards with me everywhere I go. I really have become psycho vocabulary girl but I don’t care. The dictionary in my head needed a major joust and it got one, a very long one that fills my dreams with strange dialogs. I’ve learned about a thousand words over the past few weeks and I have two and a half weeks to go before the exam. A thesaurus is in my car for stoplights and I buy stacks of index cards every time I go to the store. I think it’s become a problem but it will be over soon.

I actually have started noticing some of the words showing up in real life. It’s amazing how many GRE words are in the John Adams miniseries. My husband and I have been watching the DVDs but I think Joshua is getting tired of me squeezing him every time I hear one of my vocabulary words spoken by Adams, Jefferson or Franklin. It’s just fun to actually hear them in context since the only other time I note any of them being used is by my Wines of the World professor. Honestly, most of the words haven’t made it into my everyday speech because they just sound a bit too stuffy for now. Still, some vocabulary like “legerdemain”, “curmudgeon” or “hinterland” is just too fun not to say.

Oh, and I’m still looking for a math tutor…

Not Ann Coulter

This weekend I was downtown having coffee with friends at Napa Valley Roasting Company. I like to sit in the windowseat to soak in the the light but this time it proved to be a bad idea. A man walked by, saw me through the glass, and promptly opened the door to the coffee shop.

He shouted, "Are you Ann Coulter?"

"Don't say that!" was my instant reply. It has been a while, but I absolutely hate being stopped and asked that. Although I know our demeanors couldn't be more different, it always irritates me to think that there could be some similarity in looks between me and Ann Coulter.

Even though my friends didn't know who Ann Coulter was they were still comforting. They pointed out that the man may have been a little daft.

As he left he shrugged and said, "Hey, you being Ann Coulter is like me being Frank Sinatra."

Whatever that means...

Pomegranates: The Writer's Crown

It’s early in the morning and I’m outside zipping up my jacket. Even though the afternoon will be sunny and warm, the days seem to be starting out cooler and cooler. I stop to stare up at the hot air balloon floating over my backyard. It’s so close I can see the people inside. While I was still warm in my bed they were drifting over the vineyards; the leaves on the verge of changing color as dark, ripe grapes hang heavy on the vines. I pick a fig off the tree by my shed and split open its purple skin, smiling at the red flesh before devouring it. As I walk downtown I notice pomegranates are beginning to blush. Change is in motion and it’s officially fall.

When we are taught Greek mythology, we learn that without the pomegranate we wouldn’t have seasons. Persephone is abducted by Hades and taken to the underworld. Even though Persephone knows that if she eats or drinks anything in the underworld she will never escape, Hades tricks her into eating a few pomegranate seeds. Persephone is doomed by the berries and her mother, Demeter, goddess of the harvest, mourns her daughter’s absence. The earth becomes desolate. Zeus must intervene. A bargain is struck. Each year Persephone is forced to spend a month in the underworld for each of the pomegranate seeds she ate. Demeter annually mourns her daughter’s absence during those lonely months causing plants to hibernate and die. Persephone must be down below now because I can feel the cold days coming ahead.

For the writer, the cold is nothing to dread. Although it’s hard not to mourn the loss of those sunny days in the hammock or at the beach, as the pomegranates ripen into heavy ruby red orbs there is a hidden abundance of juicy arils inside. We remember Pietro Aretino’s dictum, “Let us love winter, for it is the spring of genius.” As the landscape loses its lushness and we’re left with stark forms in the landscape, we will either be inspired by what was hidden during the overgrowth or we will dress the trees with our own imaginations. When it’s cold, our minds alight. We feel more than the cold.

Even physically I like to touch things when I write, feel their texture, study the nuances in color as I turn them around in my hands. Smooth, dense pomegranates are a favorite and I’ll soon be planting my own tree to be reminded of the nature of the seasons every time I’m out back. For now, I have my diverse and colorful hand-made ceramic pomegranates I’ve collected from Israeli artists over the years to inspire me. It’s said that King Solomon’s crown was fashioned after the crown of the pomegranate. Let’s let the cool months ahead be the writer’s crown as well. As you trade in your bathing suit for a blanket, allow your mind to be set ablaze in spite of the diminishing warmth of the sun. It’s nearly time to break open the deceivingly smooth outer layer to reveal the juicy red arils within.

Vote for Books: Sonoma County Book Festival

I got to spend this past Saturday at my booth at the Sonoma County Book Festival. It was a beautiful autumn day at Old Courtyard Square in Santa Rosa and since it had been a couple months since I had done an event for Ruby Rest, it felt really good to talk books again with the people who love them. Aside from always meeting a lot of interesting people, without fail book events bring me face to face with people whose comments I am unprepared to answer. Besides being accused of promoting murder…more on that in my next column…I heard other familiar remarks along with some new ones.

It isn’t uncommon for people to call me Ruby after looking at my book cover. You would think I’d be used to it by now but for some reason it always embarrasses me just a little bit. When someone says, “Hi, Ruby,” I instantly picture myself working at a diner in the middle of nowhere with short cutoffs and a nametag that says “Hi. My Name is Ruby.” I have no idea why that image pops into my mind, and nothing against the name Ruby, but I can’t help but turn a little red when someone looks me in the eyes and calls me that.

Midday at the festival one woman picked up my book and looked at me to say, “Well I guess you’re not voting for Palin.” I really had no idea romantic mysteries were political in any way. Of course I’m assuming she was referring to the rhetorical question of banning books, but for my part for the day I avoided any political discussions in favor of wearing my “Vote for Books” sticker on my chest and talking about mysteries, real life and fictional.

Hardcore Schoolgirl

Now that the mornings are cool and the leaves are starting to turn golden my inner schoolgirl is coming out full force. She’s always there in my core, but now that I have my new pack of yellow number two pencils and a stack of textbooks out to review I realize I am just one hundred percent nerdy and I don’t even care. Bring on the grammar because I want it.

As I take my daughters to school every morning in their uniforms and then wave goodbye to them as they run off to the playground, Madeline always pops into my mind.

In an old house in Paris

that was covered in vines

lived twelve little girls

in two straight lines…

All the yellow chapeaus are my favorite but so is Miss Clavel. I even got my closest chance to play her yesterday when I taught religion class at a private school. Aside from finding out my dress was short I did have a good day being the tall éducatrice like my nun model. Although I didn’t get to say Miss Clavel’s famous line, “Something is not right!” or run fast and then faster, I was grateful no appendixes burst and that I got to go home at the end of the day instead of working twenty-four seven in a house full of students…

While what nerdy exactly is is up to debate, according to Webster’s Dictionary a nerd is someone “slavishly devoted to intellectual or academic pursuits”. For me it’s nice to know that in the year 2008 the other part of the definition need not apply, although I happen to love it when it does. All nerds are not socially inept, unattractive or unfashionable. Some of my bibliophile friends have cool tattoos, nose rings, and femme fatale red heels. I may not have one collared shirt left in my closet, but nerdy or not, tweed is hot and so is the right pair of glasses. I know. It’s about the books and not the fashion, but it does feel better being slavishly devoted to intellectual pursuits when your jeans feel right.

For me, the classes I’m taking this semester are not exactly heavy on the performance of the pencil – Wines of the World and Flamenco. However, it’s not only my palate and body that are slavishly dedicated to learning this fall. No. My books are out all over my bed. I open up my Diccionario de términos literarios and then Fonética y fonología españolas and couldn’t be happier to be a hardcore schoolgirl this September.

Sheep as Nouns, Rams as Verbs

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Sheep as Nouns, Rams as Verbs
Tyler on the Move
Volume 9
Issue 22
09/09/2008
Tyler Oaks, author of Ruby Rest, at Domaine Carneros Winery.
There are certain fountains that I cannot resist running my fingers under. It’s as though the water is magnetic, and I have to feel it in order to experience the place. Each time I make my way up the steps to the eighteenth-century style chateau at Domaine Carneros, I stop when I see the ram heads. I always reach out to allow one of the two rams to spit a clear stream of water into my hand. It doesn’t matter that on this last visit, I was soaked by a three-year-old whose parents were out of view on the terrace drinking sparkling wine. Even the laughing child could not distract me from the water dripping from my fingertips and the dark rams.

As children, sheep are one of the first animals we sing about. “Mary Had a Little Lamb” and “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” run through our heads as we swing at the playground or construct towers of blocks on the living room floor. Sheep seem to be everywhere during those years in the nursery. Little Bo Peep lost hers, and you never could be too sure a wolf wasn’t hiding under all that fluffy fleece. Somewhere along the way, we’re told to count sheep to fall asleep at night when otherwise sheep would probably never come to mind as our heads hit the pillow. Later we become black sheep at times, and sheep take on a negative connotation.

Wherever we are along the way, sheep are never presented to us as brilliant. Cute, useful, idyllic even, but never as terribly bright or exciting. If we think back to Sunday school or even to George Orwell’s Animal Farm we know that sheep will follow each other in circles and are perfectly content to be, well, sheep needing to be led to be saved from nothingness or pure defenselessness. Somehow rams are different. Their very name is a verb, and a strong one as it forms on our lips. The mere mention of a ram and horns suddenly come to mind, not prey animals.

The ram is a symbol of several gods, including Khnum, the Egyptian creator god. Throughout mythology and both ancient and modern religions, the ram is a picture of strength, drive, energy and power. From the Phoenicians to the Babylonians and to the Greeks, the ram head symbolizes authority. In the Old Testament, it was a ram that was sacrificed instead of Isaac on Mount Moriah. Today, a ram’s horn is often made into the shofar. The ram not only creates but redeems.

Back at the fountain, the puddle of water in my hand represents another force symbolized by the ram. Carneros is Spanish for ram, the region of Napa and Sonoma that was once the pasture for General Mariano Vallejo’s flocks. The golden hills are now prime vineyards of pinot noir and chardonnay, but the rams are still here and they’re not going anywhere. My dress is soaked with their spit as I continue my way up the steps to the chateau. I can’t help continue to contemplate the relationship of rams to sparkling wine, whispering the verb as I feel the bubbles on my palate.

A Wall of Inspiration: Cookbooks

Tyler Oaks on the Move: A Wall of Inspiration - Cookbooks
Tyler on the Move
Volume 8
Issue 20
08/26/2008

Recently I was at Copia, the American Center for Wine, Food and the Arts, to attend the opening of an Ira Yeager exhibition. After the reception, I found myself downstairs in the shop, starting at the long wall of cookbooks. I contemplated the beautiful photographs on the covers, the section dedicated to Julia Child, the local foods wheel, book after colorful book filled with meals I then imagined myself cooking. I knew I was in over my head but I couldn’t help ogle a bit, flipping through pages of bouchons au chocolat, fried zucchini blossoms, and garlic sausage in brioche. Cookbooks can be as captivating as novels, an inspiration to the cook in us all.

I suppose it was because I got married so young but when we were newlyweds several women gave me the same advice on the marriage front. More than once when my husband and I went out somewhere a long married woman would begin to talk and pat her husband’s stomach. She would then tell me the same thing: the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach. I always glanced at the man’s stomach and then looked away quickly, happy that Joshua and I jogged together and could only spend forty dollars a week on groceries anyway.

Still, the wall of cookbooks at Copia reminded me of that secret dream, the dream of being called a good cook. While yes, I have the basics down, a repertoire of dishes I make well enough not to be shy about I’m still waiting for that breakout moment. It’s the moment where a big group of us is at the table and someone looks up into my eyes and says, “Wow! This is incredible. Now I can die happy.” You know, it could even be a child with a discerning palate; that would completely count.

Back at Copia, my favorite cookbooks are those of local restaurants, favorite to look at that is on that wall of inspiration. With the Napa Valley so abundant in good food, it’s hard not to be spoiled. Looking at the photographs of dishes at The French Laundry, Tra Vigne, and Mustards I’m happily reminded we’re more than just spoiled. Amazing food abounds, and buying local produce doesn’t make it too hard to make dinner taste good. Back at home as I flip through my copy of Thomas Keller’s Bouchon I finally admit to myself that I have no intention of making anything out of it any time soon. I’m really only trying to figure out what I’ll order next time we go Bouchon, and hopefully that will be very soon.

Missing Salzburg

What can I say? Just wishing I were back in Salzburg...

I'd love an orange suit and a cup of jasmine tea.

Road Trip: Getting Lost on Purpose

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Getting Lost on Purpose
Tyler on the Move
Volume 8
Issue 9
08/19/2008

I get lost all the time. Sometimes my head is far away and I miss turns, sometimes I get in the car without remembering to take directions and sometimes the directions I do take don’t make a whole lot of sense anyway. Getting lost is something that happens to me so often that I’m learning to let go and just accept it. In fact, last week I decided to get lost on purpose.
Even with long walks and spontaneous escapes outside, alone time is hard for me to come by. I prize the rare moments in this universe that I can sit and stare and not have my thoughts interrupted. That’s why sometimes I need to just get lost, and do. I don’t see how I could ever write if I didn’t just disappear every once in a while.

Last week it was for four days: just me, my car and the state of California. Driving from Northern to Southern California was something I hated as a kid (Disneyland aside,) but can’t get enough of as an adult. There is something about an all day or all night drive alone that frees my mind. Four hours into my seven and a half hour trip, I looked at the clock and realized how happy I was. It had taken that long for me to clear my mind of my daily life and finally have the freedom to think by myself for myself, and beyond.

As a rule, what I write when I get lost on purpose is only for me to read. Still, when my mind is freed from everyone and everything else, I find the strength to write as I should when I return home. Maybe my recent trip was essentially about searching out some questions for myself, being at the beach and not having any plans except those that I made for myself at the last minute. What I never expected is how well I would get to know a troublesome character I had been working on before I went away. Although she had tortured me at home, four days into my trip I realized I had everything I needed to know about her. All that was left was to get it down on paper.

Some people are scared to be alone, but as writers we know that being alone is not lonely. Getting lost is a way to be free; to think without the influence of those around us, both those who adore or hate us. Yes, strangers we meet along the way add their own thoughts into our mix. But the beauty is that there is time to think through anyone or anything we allow into our lost time. And of course, there is always that unparalleled seven and a half hour drive home to get everything else all figured out.

Radio Interview Tonight - KHRO 1650 Radio Free El Paso

Tonight I'll be interviewed on Ken Hudnall's "Tales of the Unexplained" radio show on KHRO 1650 Radio Free El Paso.

Listen in online at 6pm PST. Just click on "listen live".

www.khro1650.com

Book Expo Los Angeles Video Interview

Visit WritersNewsWeekly to watch a video interview I did at Book Expo in Los Angeles.

http://www.writersnewsweekly.com/interview_oaks.html

Sharing Books

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Sharing Books
Tyler on the Move
Volume 8
Issue 18
08/12/2008

There is a scene I’ve always loved in the 2005 movie “Walk the Line.” It’s when June Carter gives Johnny Cash the book she’s just finished reading. She doesn’t want it back because she doesn’t keep books; she shares them. I like the give-it-away outlook; the idea that in sharing a book, it will enter someone else’s thoughts after it has left your hands. Even though I have a tendency to keep my books, wanting them on my shelves to go back to, I want to be more like June in that scene. Lately I’ve been trying to share what I’ve read with the people around me, whether I think they will connect with the story or not. When two people are willing to read the same text, they share a bond that years cannot take away because the story remains the same, even after our perspective changes and we end up seeing the story differently.

When I was a junior in high school, a friend gave me a copy of E.M. Forster’s A Room with a View to borrow. Because our classes kept us more than busy with required reading and studying, I wasn’t doing much outside reading. My friend saved me by introducing me to a book that I didn’t have to analyze or write a paper on. I loved the story, and it quickly became one of my favorites. A Room with a View even helped one of my teenage birthdays become very funny. I chose for everyone to watch the movie version and shocked the room with the scene of three naked men running around a swimming hole together. “How d’ye do? Come and have a bathe,” aside, I recently reconnected with that high school friend who lent me the book after all these years. One of the first things we recollected about each other was A Room with a View. What we read together as human beings influences us, inspires us and connects us even when the years change us.

My neighbor recently let me borrow a stack of books to take on a trip with me. I didn’t end up getting to read as much as I had anticipated, but one of his books wrapped itself around my travels. I ended up talking about Masaru Emoto’s The Hidden Messages in Water with almost everyone I met. The photos were fascinating to show to people, especially the people that looked at me like I was crazy, or worse, who wouldn’t discuss the book at all. Discovering people who are willing to talk about books we may or may not believe in is worth the occasional glance from people that can make you wonder if yes, you are in fact crazy.

Becoming more like June Carter is easy if you let it be. Yes, it’s hard to bring up an interesting subject your reading about or a story that intruiges you, only to be stared at strangely in silence. But for the people who look up at you with eyes that actually get it, opening up about books becomes worth the risk. Almost every book I’ve been given is one I never would have chosen for myself. That’s what I love about sharing. That’s why I’m working on the June thing and loving it.

Castle Life

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Castle Life
Tyler on the Move
Volume 8
Issue 17
08/05/2008

“The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page.” - St. Augustine

Once, at the ripe young age of eighteen, I went away to work and live in a castle in Austria. I planned to stay a year, but my boyfriend proposed two days before I left. Always one to listen solely to my heart I left Austria only after a few short summer months. Even still, the mountains, lakes and twisted trails had their way with me in the few short months I was there. How could sleeping in the same barracks that the Nazi soldiers once lived in not fuel my imagination? How could I not wake up at sunrise before work to jog along the lake alone or walk through the village in the evening writing poetry in my head?

The closest castle to me now is Castello di Amorosa in the Napa Valley. Sure it’s a winery and it’s not old, but it’s built authentically and even has a genuine torture chamber with a used (!) iron maiden. I like to visit not just for the wine, but because seeing the rough hewn stones of the courtyard and turrets takes me back to other castles I have experienced. From the ruins of Nimrod’s Castle in Israel to the beauty of Warwick’s Castle in England, there is something about walking along walls that speak. From a soiled oubliette to a grand banquet hall, castles breathe the stories of former times into my ears. I walk along in silence, listening only to what the tour guide doesn’t say. If there are ghosts there, I’ve heard them.

Listening to stories both told and untold always inspires me to write, though I never write exactly what I hear and the settings always change. Although I enjoy period pieces I prefer to relate the past to the present; to write characters that breathe now but are connected to those who don’t. Since I’ll never be a princess, and hopefully not a maid, I probably will never live in a castle again. Still, the experience will always be with me, the memories of sitting up in the tower alone to look out over the lake or walking up the mountainside to discover a meadow of wildflowers. It somehow feels right to know that my own story, no matter how minor, will always be mixed in with all the others in the castle both past and present.

Who's Intellectual?

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Who’s Intellectual?
Tyler on the Move
Volume 7
Issue 16
07/29/2008

A few months ago, a friend drove me to a book signing I was doing in her town. After she had fixed her hair in the rearview mirror and applied her lipstick, she pulled glasses out of her purse and put them on. I was surprised.

“I never knew you wore glasses,” I told her.

“I don’t,” she said. “I just want to look smart at the book signing. How do I look? I’m going for that Michelle Pfeiffer with glasses, sexy-smart look.”

I laughed. Then I started thinking about all the bookstores I wished I had worn glasses to over the past several months. Would it have made a difference? Once last fall, I was in a well-loved independent bookstore in the Bay Area. Since it was right before the release of my first novel, I told the owner about my book at the cash register. He looked me over and said I had a lot of nerve to come into his store and talk about my book. He then gestured rather intensely to the book display of a Pulitzer Prize winning author that would be doing a signing the following week. The bookstore owner informed me that I needed to honestly ask myself if I really deserved to be in the same store as people like the other author.

With all obvious respect to Pulitzer Prize winner, what alarmed me more than anything was that the bookstore owner had judged me, my book and my future career without reading one page of my writing. How is that intellectual? Read first, talk later. When we walk into bookstores, how safe are we from intellectual snobbery, or pseudo-intellectual snobbery as I call it? Unfortunately, sometimes not very. Are only books published by Random House even worthy of being opened? If so, then as readers we’ve been reduced to labels instead of design; names instead of substance. Buying a dress for the label instead of the fit is no shallower, image conscious or materialistic than buying books because we are told that those are the good ones.
Northern California is full of bookstores that I love, and I can attest that what finds its way on the shelves isn’t as narrow-minded as the selections as the aforementioned bookstore owner. When I was on my book tour, I did discover places where people were real and wanted to talk about books, letters and ideas. In college towns like Davis or places like the Gaslamp in San Diego, people were more comfortable thinking for themselves, discussing literature in their own terms, sharing ideas that were their own and not necessarily mainstream or, the more serious sin, marketable.

Lately, the irony of superior intellectualism and the glasses-wearing image stuck to it has struck me. Because I was always bookish, a studious girl and woman, I always considered myself to be wearing glasses even though I wasn’t. I forever wished I could play one of those scenes where the quiet woman in the library lets down her hair, takes off her glasses, looks across the table and suddenly is the sexiest thing on the planet. Fun, but honestly, do we really need to wear glasses to be considered smart anymore? Apparently to some people, but I don’t think so. Still, maybe just this fall, I will try those tortoise shell readers I saw at Urban Outfitters.

More on Movies

My sister embarrassed me recently by burning a DVD of the movies I used to make when we were young. Zero budget, borrowed video camera, strange special effects, and big vision, when we watched them we laughed so hard that our faces hurt. My own daughters have told me since they were three or four they want to be movie makers when they grow up. One of my favorite gifts ever was the Mother’s Day movie they surprised me with when they were six. They played twin Wonder Women that saved Mother’s Day from the Nazis.

Last week when I was returning a movie to Blockbuster my girls told me that they wanted to have their own movie store when they grew up. They explained they would make their own movies and sell them in the store. That way they could be a part of the film from start to finish and control all aspects of its production. It sounded so much like Be Kind, Rewind, it was strange to hear since they had never seen the movie. Oddly enough I had had a similar thought when I was watching Be Kind, Rewind. I asked myself why I was sitting there watching a movie about other people making movies. I thought I’d rather be out making my own interpretations, no matter how ridiculous.

We did it. My daughters turned eight a few days ago so we set a film in Narnia, their current passion. I was the White Witch, hence the possessed, ill look in the photo. (And that’s sparkly ice on my face, not sweat.) I’m cold to the core. The girls wanted to play Peter and Edmund so I got to sword fight them both. Again, the results of making our own movies are embarrassing, but who cares? My biggest problem is getting out of character…but no worries. The evil witch glitter has finally all washed off.

Books on Screen

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Books on Screen
Tyler on the Move
Volume 7
Issue 15
07/22/2008

The maxim is to never judge a book by its movie. Readers’ opinions tend to be strong when they watch favorite books play out on screen. Even when it’s Hitchcock, Manderley just isn’t Manderley. When we read books, we first meet the characters and are inducted into their worlds, even allowed inside their minds. The reader vanishes and we become part of another life. We’ve really lived at Wuthering Heights, and when Catherine haunted Heathcliff she haunted us as well. Books provide an insider’s perspective. The audience isn’t made up of spectators but active participants in the story. Readers create their own film version of books in their heads and are entirely present as the story unfolds. Anyone else’s vision on screen can be seen as competition, good or bad.

On the flip side, movies allow readers to visualize aspects of books that are foreign to them, especially with period pieces or stories set in less familiar places. The screen version of a book adds the powerful sense of sight to give the viewer a clear understanding of what the setting is like or what people really wear; everything is a visual backdrop of the characters’ everyday worlds. How can Mr. Darcy not look like Colin Firth? Sound plays this role as well. Before watching “The Lord of the Rings,” I never imagined what a wraith sounded like. Even though there is a gap between what is playing out on screen and the spectator in his seat, devices such as narration allow private thoughts to be revealed, the character’s head read aloud, I had a farm in Africa. And of course, nothing beats good acting and portraying a character for who she is, especially when a look alone reveals the character and her intentions to the core. The British do it best.

Truthfully, I’m fully guilty of loving both books and film so I recently asked friends in both industries which books make the best movies. The reality of the transition is that less than one percent of books even get optioned for film. Even after that, it’s safe to say that less than one percent of those books ever make it onto the screen. Books that are action-driven make for better screenplays, and that doesn’t necessarily mean bullets flying. It can mean following the wanderings of Alice in Wonderland. Movie makers do need to be able to play visually, much the same way writers play with language. Books that are inherently visual make screenplays much easier to write and the transition from book to movie much smoother. If while reading a book a reader is able to see, taste, touch and hear everything as it happens, then the story is already that much closer to film in its original state. Think “Babette’s Feast.”

Different arts call for different modes of expression. It’s inevitable that books must change in order to be expressed through film. The screen version of stories can be quite different than what the author intended, and authors take this in different ways. Alan Moore publicly disassociated himself from “V for Vendetta” when the film version of the comic book series he co-created was released. Other stories such as “No Country for Old Men” change very little from book to movie. Large portions in the dialogue of Cormac McCarthy’s novel remain line for line on screen. No matter what the author’s take, successful at the box office or not, loved by critics or hated by the public, the simple truth is that movies are great for book sales. There is no argument against the fact that a movie, good or bad, offers incomparable publicity for the story in its original form.

Yes, purists love books in their original form more than their movies, and I suppose I agree with them most of the time. Because the attention of movie goers is short, movie makers are forced to tell a story in less than two hours, no matter how compelling the plot. While my vote is for reading and imagination first (since I like the movies in my head best,) films are inspirational in their own right because of their individual artistic expression, think “Casablanca” and “Room with a View.” Besides, it does work both ways; movies influence authors and thus their writing. Admittedly, my life and pen wouldn’t be the same without that Hitchcock obsession early on.

Writing on the Road

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Writing on the Road
Tyler on the Move
Volume 7
Issue 14
07/15/2008

“Experience, travel – these are education in themselves.” - Euripides

Airports, taxis, hotels, no quiet, too much quiet: Writing while traveling is nothing like home. When we write in the towns we live in we have our own unique rituals. We find the hours, places and environments that suit our lifestyles and stick with what is most productive. Writing on the road, whether on a book tour or on a trip to the other side of the planet, mixes everything up. Without a doubt, travel is both necessary and inspiring. That said, it does take skill and an open mind to work a story far from home.

Every writer does it differently. When I travel I never take my laptop; just a small notebook. I jot down impressions and ideas, swirling them around the pages in a way I can’t on the computer. While exploring new terrain or sitting on a train I’m less concerned with typing narrations than watching and using my senses. I record thoughts the characters have as I walk through neighborhoods or eat downtown. Scenes play out in front of me, and I’m aware how my characters would react. Locations become real; experiences, first-hand. Even without a computer nothing will be lost because I’ve walked through the story and place in the flesh.

I’ve heard several writers talk about writing scenes set in cities they have never been to. They admit to using the satellite feature on Google maps. Although technology can take you down to street level, looking through a screen can never substitute for living a place in real life. I get lost often enough to love map programs, but even 360 degree vision is deceptive. The view is silent; there is no sense of smell or touch. To write a believable story, the location has to be tasted firsthand, even if only for a night. If the characters are new to a place, then the writer’s first impressions are even more valuable. Longer and multiple visits are definitely necessary if any great portion of a story is going to be set in a location where the author is unfamiliar.

Where to write on the road varies as much as a writer’s style. I personally haven’t mastered the art of writing well in public, whether on plane or at a busy café, which just so happens to be where I’m writing this column. I get up too much. I walk over to study a leaf or run my fingers along the rim of my glass. That is why notebooks work so well on the road. I can sketch, write down a single word while I’m in line or record a conversation in scribbles only I understand. Everything I write or draw can be used later when I’m back at home with my laptop. To me, traveling is all about random thoughts that can be strung together later. I would miss everything valuable on the road if I were overly concerned with structure.

I realize that this completely clear-headed method of writing will disagree with this column, but writing on the road means being led as much as it means leading. Stories change along with the people in them. A long, grueling trip becomes worth the aggravation it brings if only for the quick idea jotted down on the napkin. As I was waiting for a friend to join me for dinner recently, I found myself seated alone next to a fish tank. An excessively large orange fish stared at me through the glass. I stared back for a long time. Her scales, her eyes, the lonely way she moved; the fish revealed to me more about a story I’m working on than any measure of forced thought. I took out my notebook, jotted down a few words, and smiled at the fish. That couldn’t have happened at home.

Alive Again

If you've wondered why my "Camera Dilemma" column is running again this week in Writers News Weekly I'll share with you why. Something scary happened to me last week and I was unable to write any new thoughts. Last Monday evening I was alive, optimistic, walking up and down hills in the countryside with my husband as we planned out the design of our backyard. Eight hours later I was unconscious on the floor, taken for dead, and then rushed to the hospital in an ambulance.

I think we've all had at least a few experiences in life where we really thought we were going to die. Once I thought I was going to be thrown off a cliff and another time I thought I would suffocate having an asthma attack as I drove myself to the hospital. Even though both times I was afraid, I had all sorts of fascinating thoughts - the "my life flashing before my eyes" moment. It was strangely beautiful. This time it was completely different.

The last moments I remember before losing consciousness can only be described as evil, like shadows descending on me. The pain in my stomach was so unbearable I didn't care if I was about to die to escape the pain. (Note: I had twins naturally and this hurt more.) The final thought I had before losing consciousness the second time was incredibly dark. I couldn't fight anything. My mind and my body were not my own for those terrifying minutes.

Ironically, since then I've found out I couldn't be healthier. Test after test everything inside my body is in great shape. The moments walking along the vineyards and breathing in the evening air turn out to be reflective of my health both physical and mental. Still, my recovery didn't come easily and I never knew "food poisoning" could be so severe. I don't know why; it is poison after all. But it's a strange concept to accept that something can enter a body and take it down so quickly, even shutting off into death.

I'm not a doom and gloom person so even after the horrible days of last week I cannot accept the pessimistic thought process of "everything is fine and then boom you're dead". My convalescence seemed like an eternity that was anything but beautiful, but I know that the beauty that is born out of suffering can take years to be revealed. As I slept and slept, and then thought and became hyper-reflective, I did decide to make three changes in my life and thinking. One is to be more honest in my writing, especially in the story I'm working on. Time will tell, but if defying death every once in a while can transform me into anything better then I'm all for it...as long as I recover. Sorry, Mom!

Tyler on the Move: The Camera Dilema

Tyler on the Move
Volume 6
Issue 12
06/24/2008

After a trip to India a friend told me about the one photo he did not get to take. One day in Mumbai, waste and litter lining the street, the polluted air intensified by the near 100 degree heat, he spotted a large, rusty tow truck. Though its tires were rotted out, the metal frame of the old truck supported two creaky chain swing sets. It was there that children laughed and played on the converted machine, lost in their fun in the middle of the city. When my friend described this untaken picture to me, it somehow became more real to me than the pictures of his trip that I actually got to see. I think he’ll remember that scene longer and more vividly than any of the others where he had his camera out.

I then started to remember all the pictures I never got to take because I was too busy living the experience to stop and click. It begs the question: Are the pictures that end up holding the most meaning those that we take with our minds alone? I was inundated with memories, remembering the times over the years that I had stared until an image became imprinted within me. Without a camera, senses other than sight take hold: crimson petals on the sand, deep blue eyes so easy to get lost in, piles of shoes at the door. The shadow of an oak on crushed gravel in my mind has the power to lead me beyond the obvious, taking me somewhere entirely different than a two dimensional 4x6. The photos in our mind lead us to faraway worlds that live inside of us that no technology can capture.

Physical photographs, both taken and developed, adorn my world, and I rely on them to trigger memories. Let’s take the pictures, especially during travel lest we forget, but only after studying and living it first. This means experiencing the moment; not just recording it. Allow the impression to come first-hand, and let the snapshot become a souvenir; not the main event. As writers, we must be touched in person. The most frame-friendly shots are not often where inspiration is found. Beauty may be harbored there; however, the thrill of the perfect scene may not necessarily be the most fascinating. Slant the shot away from the obvious. Skew the angle to the right or to the left down a side street and let your mind loose. What you discover there may not be as striking, but it will be much more interesting.

So often we are posing when we take pictures. Even buildings and landscapes can model. Certain angles give the illusion of a perfection that is not really there. Candid shots reveal the unexpected, intriguing angles we may have never contemplated before. As writers, that is what we must seek out.

There is always a camera in my purse, especially when I travel. I treasure my albums because the photos bring back to life details I have forgotten, and yes, they would be on the top of the list of my belongings I would rescue in the fire scenario. It’s just that I’ve learned that no other lenses but those of my eyes record memories that are so utterly vivid and breathed into with that first-hand contact. When I walk through life camera-free I find myself making up stories in my head while simultaneously real life stories are happening to me. I become real, and no scene gets lost in whether the lighting is right or not. I want to live more of those moments as I travel and write, sometimes with no camera, not even a pen; just myself and the sight. Only then can the impression of my eyes wrap itself so tight around the image that it morphs itself into something I cannot only see, but touch, taste and feel.

Cake Plate Local Artists Night

It was hot and balmy last night in Napa! Sweat aside, I loved being a part of the local artists night at Cake Plate, my favorite clothing shop in downtown Napa. The best part about doing events outside of bookstores is getting to meet such amazing, talented people in other fields. I encourage you to get to know the work of photographer Lindsay Garvey, musician Sean Garvey, and jewelery designer Molly of Molly M Designs. They are not to be missed.

http://www.lindsaygarveyphotography.com/
http://www.seangarvey.net/
www.mollymdesigns.com

Cake Plate owner Lindsay Kroll

Tyler on the Move: Let's Go Outside!

Tyler on the Move
Volume 6
Issue 11
06/18/2008
My love of walking seems a bit fanatical to people at times. It’s just hard to beat being outside, pounding the pavement, dirt, or sand with my feet, words floating round through my head. It’s impossible not to write mentally while I’m surrounded by the natural world. Scenes of books reveal themselves; stories, letters, and emails are easily composed. As the seasons change, leaves unfurl, and bees chase me, I bring olive leaves or moss back inside with me to sit on my keyboard as I type my ideas out. In the shades of green I’ll find the inspiration to keep the writing alive.

Author TA Barron calls nature “real world magic.” Nature connects the finite to the infinite. Although nature is sometimes used in books to merely set the mood, nature is a strong character herself, a presence that breathes directly into the reader. Nature causes us to see beyond ourselves, our smallness, and allows us to dream and grow bigger. Like sailing, books free us from all walls and lead us into the vastness of our planet, or further.

In childhood books are vehicles that take us outside, leading us into forests, gardens, and seashores. Thinking back to those days we remember the stories that took us outside with new vision. Once the books were read, the worlds on the pages entered us and we tiptoed around the garden pretending to be fairies or climbed trees believing them to be masts. I remember a branch high up in a tree that used to be the control for my rocket. When the neighbor boy accidentally broke the branch, I cried so hard I wanted to have a burial for it. I had to find another way to go to outer space.

At the recent Book Expo in L.A., Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods, urged authors to include everyday adventures kids can relate to in their books. As opposed to television, where most children are portrayed indoors, books ought to offer that wonderful role modeling, the sense that the reader can set the book down and run outside in search of something hidden in the roses or to make a secret hideout.

The way to inspire our children and the generations to come through nature is by becoming inspired ourselves. When my twin daughters were learning to talk they would tell me that they loved me “beyond”. Just as they had a sense that love was bigger than what they could communicate, we’re touched by the beyond when we stare up at the night sky or watch the sunset in silence. After we’ve been touched, we then touch others without even realizing it. Let’s get off the computer right now and go outside!

Another thought:
After I wrote this week's column for Writer's News Weekly I spent four days at Lake Tahoe with my family. This included my almost eight-year-old twin daughters and nephew, and my six-year-old niece. Spending four days outside with four children was the best way to start summer off right. During a long bike ride along the lake my nephew Harrison said that he felt like he was in the Boxcar Children Bicycle Mystery. I just smiled. As my daughter Tara hummed and hummed to herself while we pedaled through the forest it was sweetest sound I had ever heard.

Though these four children have been blessed to travel to more countries than they can count on both hands, for me it has been beautiful to watch nature draw them in wherever they may be. Whether that has meant searching for millipedes on the tels of Israel or chasing birds in Stockholm, I just love it that running across a stretch of lawn can be more compelling to the foursome than visiting the palaces of St. Petersburg. The single blade of grass is somehow more inspiring and worthy of inspection than all the treasure, gold, and gilt.

Though I certainly have no intention on weaning any of us off of cities - I love hearing my girls' commentaries on architecture and gold does have its rightful allure - I just love it that be it in Regent Park or down the street, geese and caterpillars are always strangely fascinating to the child in us all.

Cake Plate

www.tyleroaks.com June Newsletter

Friends and Mystery Lovers,

I hope your summertime has gotten off to a great start! Mine has. I was able to attend Book Expo in L.A. at the beginning of the month and had an excellent time learning even more about the book industry. The news is still spreading about Ruby Rest and I’m also looking forward to future projects in the works.

Come to downtown Napa on Thursday, June 19th! During the late afternoon and evening I’ll be signing at Cake Plate during the Chef’s Market. Cake Plate is a favorite clothing and jewelry boutique and is situated right next to all the evening festivities of Chef’s Market. I hope you can come into Cake Plate and then enjoy the chefs’ demonstrations, wine tasting, fresh produce, and music outside downtown.

I want to be sure to wish all of you dads a very Happy Father’s day. I think it’s hard for moms to forget how much we’re needed because when we’re away from home for any given length of time things tend to fall apart rather quickly. I hope dads remember this week how much their children love and need them. Your opinions, hard work, and support mean so much to us. One of my favorite parts of the day is listening to my husband Joshua read to our daughters at bedtime (currently The Hobbit). An extra love-filled Father’s Day wish to my dad this year…

Happy summertime!

Tyler on the Move: Who's in Your Bookstore?

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Who's In Your Bookstore
Tyler on the Move
Volume 6
Issue 10
06/11/2008
I’ve spent a lot of time in bookstores lately. Since the November release of my mystery, Ruby Rest, I’ve had the opportunity to sign at over twenty events, mainly in bookstores throughout California and Maui. While I’d spent plenty of time in bookstores prior to becoming an author, I’d never taken the time to look down the history aisle to see who was next to me or strike up a conversation with someone in the travel section. Although sitting at a table with a fountain pen isn’t quite the same as perusing novels or flipping through garden design books, it has given me the opportunity to actually look around the bookstore, major chain or independent, and see who’s actually there. What a surprise at times!

Yes, I’ve met plenty of the obvious; mothers with little ones in the children’s section, students studying in the café, retired couples who come in to grab a book for an upcoming trip. In fact, if you sit in a leather club chair and watch, just about any stereotype imaginable can be found in the four walls of your local bookstore. Those contacts with the atypical, however, are what stand out in my mind as I reflect over the past months. There was the seemingly dazed Northern Californian man who started unfastening a poster of me with my book to take it until his wife scolded him. Around the holidays I somehow ended up dancing with the Santa from hell, and once in Central California, a woman screamed she hated murder when she saw I had written a mystery. Happy surprise in Southern California, I told a woman I would be driving back up to Napa after my last signing that afternoon. She left the bookstore and returned later with a new stainless steel thermos filled with organic coffee and a tuna and sprout sandwich for me from the restaurant next door.

I mustn’t neglect giving one warning, however. Attention literary ladies: you may be surprised to learn how many non-reading men walk through the door of your bookstore. I cannot tell you how many have confided to me that they don’t read at all, even while we’re surrounded by books. I do usually point out that we’re in a bookstore, meaning, what on earth are you doing in here? The usual reason is to visit the café, although I met a few artists in the Gaslamp in San Diego who came in to sketch but could still hold their own when it came to literature. Just a word of advice to woman who take their books seriously: The guy across the new-release table from you may just be waiting for his coffee.

While I still wish I could be paid for every time I’ve been mistaken for a Borders employee, an experience I had in one of their Northern California stores has kept me smiling for many months. After a man came up to me to discuss my book, he told me he never buys books. I politely pointed out that he was in a bookstore (my new favorite line.) His explanation was simple. He regularly visits bookstores to use his psychic powers to lead other people to the books they ought to be reading. If you come across him in the mystery section I hope he leads you to Ruby Rest.

Tyler on the Move: Writing in the Middle

Tyler Oaks on the Move: Writing in the Middle
Tyler on the Move
Volume 6
Issue 9
06/04/2008
Most writers belong to the middle class. While definitions and statistics vary as to what exactly the middle class is, its title defines it simply and best. The middle class is the midpoint of our society, sandwiched somewhere between luxury and poverty. While we don’t live in mansions or take private jets to island retreats for the weekend, we do have milk in the refrigerator and personal transportation, even in the face of impossible food and gas prices. Although middle-class writers have the ability to write imaginative books about the rich and the poor, stories of high society or tales of slums, there is something to be said about our own backyards, average America.

Yes, it’s true that for writers and readers living in the middle there is a guilty pleasure in escaping to the other sides. Historical biographies full of power and pageantry lure me in, Catherine the Great being a perennial favorite. I’m also a sucker for Dickensesque tales of the underworld. Yet while we may gravitate toward the outer edges of our culture to learn about lives distinct from our own, or simply read up or down to dodge the mundane, can’t the ranch style home or florist shop on the corner offer us the same? When we sit in a café and watch long enough or listen to the conversations at the farmer’s market we discover that there is magic, craziness, tragedy, love, and, yes, intrigue all around us.

Perhaps books set in the middle don’t have characters with unlimited resources or unthinkable conditions for settings, but from teacher to engineer, barista to musician, we of the in-between walk through wild, inspiring stories day by day. This week I scanned the popular library in my dentist’s waiting room to realize how many authors take us into the wonderful world of the average. These writers give us the opportunity to see lives similar to our own in a new way, and by that I mean “interesting.” I know I’ll still always want to know what is going on inside that Victorian mansion or be inspired by those who make life happen in spite of unspeakable hardships. All the same, the middle is so varied and unpredictable that for now instead I’ll let my mind wander into the chef’s kitchen, the dancer’s studio, or the dressmaker’s closet, all part of this idiosyncratic, sandwiched-in class around me.

http://www.writersweekly.com/

Tyler on the Move: "Miserable" Cities and Creative Expression

Tyler Oaks on the Move: “Miserable” Cities and Creative Expression
Tyler on the Move
Volume 5
Issue 8
05/20/2008
Before driving back to give a speech at my alma mater, Grace M. Davis High School, I read that Forbes Magazine ranked Modesto, California as the nation’s eighth most miserable city. In fact, according to last year’s edition of Cities Ranked and Rated, Modesto was the nation’s least desirable place to live. Authors Bert Sperling and Peter Sander gave the Central California city where I spent several years of my life zero points.

Yet I’ve learned some important lessons about “miserable” cities as I’ve traveled and driven back to Modesto several times recently. Statistics aside, rejected cities are ripe with people who know how to create fascinating spheres around them. If the recent conversations I’ve had in snubbed cities are any of indication of the kind of company misery brings, I’m in. In fact, the writer in me was born in Modesto.

Last month, when I returned to my former high school to speak to its academic achievers, I was reminded of my love of literature formed there. Seeing Ms. Barr, my senior-year English teacher, I realized that after all these years I could still recite the Macbeth piece we learned in her class (applause to her). Memories of books we studied flooded my mind. The image of my bedroom strewn with pictures of other places I had also read about and that I wanted to explore for myself wouldn’t leave my mind. Teachers introduce us to books, books to other worlds. We travel through words and then are inspired to go, visit, and learn things firsthand wherever that may take us. Whether tourist destination or cast-off neighborhood, dreams can be made anywhere. Muses lurk in what others pass by.

On a hot May Saturday earlier this month I was back in Modesto’s downtown, a participant in a fundraiser for the Visually Impaired Center of Stanislaus County. There I talked with several blind people about literature. Their passion for stories and words inspired me. Equally fascinating is what they taught me about the singularity of voice and the unique experience of listening to a book read aloud. That night my friends and I read poetry to each other in the garden, the sound of their voices comforting to me as I missed the almond orchards. Again I could think and dream, lost in the words of the poetry.

Artisans, artists, designers, people who create and inspire, this is the Modesto surveys do not communicate. Whatever a city’s rank, imagination is born and can be expressed. Modesto was once my place to read, study maps, and grow until I was taken elsewhere. Even though I did not stay, by driving back to Modesto I’ve learned better than to only believe in status. I now have a hunch that other low-ranking cities across the nation are occupied by people I would like to meet, and they aren’t miserable either.

www.writersnewsweekly.com

Tyler on the Move: Paper and the Future

Tyler on the Move: Paper and the Future
Tyler on the Move
Volume 5
Issue 7
05/13/2008
I like dog-eared pages, the feel of paper, and old notes falling out of book covers when I open them. I like seeing colorful spines of books along my walls, each rectangle housing its own complete world that I’ve entered at one time or another. I like flipping through books in search of a favorite passage, knowing exactly where to find it because I can literally see the page in my mind and where the words are located.

Now I’m not promising that some day you won’t look into my purse and see a wireless reading device. What I am saying is that I’m not a present convert. I still want paper books, books that I can toss onto the hammock, give to friends to read, or write in the margins of with pen instead of a keyboard.

I simply don’t mind being old-fashioned, but after being told multiple times that electronic books are the way of the future I decided to ask them – the future that is. Because I visit a lot of school campuses I set out to ask students half my age what they thought of paper versus electronic books. My focus was various classes of high-school freshman and many of the conversations turned out to be more interesting than I thought.

While many students expressed an interest in electronic books, after they had finished shouting “Save the trees!” they admitted they don’t even read outside of school. More often than not, the fourteen and fifteen-year-olds I talked with who read at home preferred paper books. They want to keep those distinct worlds on their shelves as well, not store their stories in an electronic box where they couldn’t see them. They like sharing their books with friends and receiving books as gifts.

One fifteen-year-old student at Vintage High School in Napa, California explained to me that his generation would prefer electronic books exclusively because they were raised in technology and know nothing else. I asked if he would buy something just because it was more “technologically advanced” without even stopping to consider its merit. He said yes. Still, other students were adamantly opposed to something being considered the way of the future just because it was electronic.

One student argued that with the constant changes in technology it was wasteful to download books to a device that would be obsolete within a few years’ time. Other students told me that printed books were already complete in themselves, not needing to be changed or manipulated; the print would last their lifetimes and beyond. Another student was concerned about the carbon footprint she would leave by buying an electronic device that would need to be replaced.
To be fair I am ready to admit that devices like the Amazon Kindle e-book reader have great features that paper books do not, but like those students half my age I do have another very important question. What happens when you drop it in the bathtub? Paper is still my future.

http://www.writersnewsweekly.com/

Tyler on the Move: A Pencil in the Eye

Tyler on the Move: A Pencil in the Eye
Tyler on the Move
Volume 5
Issue 6
05/06/2008
When I was in Maui for a book signing, I bought myself a plain black magnet with an Eleanor Roosevelt quote on it. Hers is advice I seem to follow unwittingly:“Do one thing every day that scares you.”

While signing books in a bookstore in Maui certainly does not qualify as scary, I wanted the words on my refrigerator to remind me that I had taken one step that scared me after another to get to that place. Plus, I do need that daily prompt since I have a lot more scary steps to take in life…though perhaps not as scary as they could be.

With my twin daughters now seven, long gone are the days of child-proofing our home. Still, I had no idea magnets should come with warning labels. When my grandmother came over for a visit, Vanessa and Tara led her into the kitchen to show her all our magnets bought on travels. My grandmother read the Eleanor Roosevelt magnet aloud and was quiet afterward, as most of the family was after reading the quotes I choose to adorn my world. Vanessa and Tara, however, were ecstatic. My grandmother asked them if they knew what the magnet meant.

“It means doing something scary, like sticking a pencil in your eye,” Vanessa explained. “Or climbing way up high on a ladder and jumping off!” Tara added. Oops. With all the different combinations of words around the house, I realize I need to be a bit more thorough in my explanations. Still, children have a way of bringing everything into perspective. Scary step after scary step, that next phone call, presentation or introduction won’t seem so bad. At least I won’t be standing at the top of a ladder with a pencil in my eye.

http://www.writersnewsweekly.com/

www.tyleroaks.com May Newsletter

Dear Friends and Mystery Lovers,

When I was young I remember watching people with their children and thinking they were weird. I often wondered why adults were so obsessed with little creatures that were often rude to them. I didn’t necessarily ever picture myself with children, maybe one, but not until I was much older. Somehow early on two came…at once. Then it all made sense.

Moms have become the most amazing living things to me. At the sound of a cry they can literally pick up a car, fend off an attacker, or more impressively, get up several times a night for numerous years of their lives and still manage breakfast in the morning. The love a mother has for her children is still inexplicable, but it’s become a mystery I’ve experienced firsthand from both sides.

I often think about my own mom’s love for me, raising a child who didn’t seem to exhibit any of her own genes. Ironically, I have the reverse problem with my own daughters, forced to live with little people who bear the glaring traits I passed down to them. Still, whether a mother’s children resemble her inwardly, outwardly, or neither, she’s still mom: willing to get up again, become a milk machine, play the Ugly Doll game night after night, read the same book a hundred times, endure scribbles on the table, do homework, make never ending snacks, and for some, even drive a mini van.

I’m personally grateful to my mom for all those healthy lunches, tucking me in at night, no cavities, and for making my sister and I wear sunscreen. But to all moms, you are so beautiful to me, truly the strongest, most amazing creatures on the planet. Happy Mother’s Day!

Tyler on the Move: Pick a Page

Tyler on the Move: Pick a Page
Tyler on the Move
Volume 4
Issue 5
04/29/2008
Two gray-haired ladies walked up to my table at a recent book signing. They stopped and stood side by side in front of me, each picking up a copy of Ruby Rest. After the usual scrutinizing of the title and compulsory scan of the back cover, one announced she would read page forty-five to see if she liked the book. Her friend explained that she was born in 1945 and always read page forty-five to decide if a book was worth purchasing. The sixty-three-year-old opened Ruby Rest and started to read.

I immediately realized that not only did the page have to be good, but it needed to sound good too. Page forty-five was put to the test aloud, with others listening in. It is a strange thing to have your words suddenly read back to you in an unfamiliar place by a person you don’t know. I sat there wondering what it was about writers that made them willing to open up their minds for anyone to gaze in. Taking off layers physically isn’t nearly as intimate as inviting people into worlds you’ve created from the inside out.

The woman only got through the first sentence of page forty-five. When she read, “My eyes wandering over the surfers” she stopped and smiled. Her friend said, “Well now you have to buy it.” They both did. Surfers win again.

I haven’t experimented in a bookstore yet but I did try the technique at home. First I chose all my best-loved books, took them off the shelf and turned to page seventy-eight in each one. I was disappointed. Not once did I discover a favorite passage. Next I tried again with my stack of books to read. I wasn’t intrigued by page seventy-eight in any of them. While this method of book buying still fascinates me, it must not work if you’re thirty. Maybe other birth years will have better luck than 1978.

Since in the end I couldn’t accept that seventy-eight was a total waste of a book page, I had to find an exception. Lisa See’s Peony in Love saved me. As I read about a lovesick maiden taking several trips carrying the best books from her father’s library back to her bedroom, I wondered what those books entailed. Although I’m sure there was nothing about surfers in them, I still couldn’t help imagine that one of those books in her arms held the 17th century Chinese equivalent.

www.writersnewsweekly.com

Tyler on the Move: Poetry is Painting

Tyler on the Move: Poetry is Painting
Tyler on the Move
Volume 4
Issue 4
04/22/2008

“Painting is silent poetry, and poetry is painting with the gift of speech.” - Simonides 556BC

Is a still life really still? Frozen in time maybe, but life, even when still, conveys movement. Inanimate objects do not move by themselves, but could the bowl of peaches exist in a human-void room? Even a still life moves our minds to the past and future. Who left the wine glass on the floor? Is the woman coming back to her apartment? A painting is a story sealed in time.
The images I hang on the walls of my home take me to other places. I find that through these images I’ve lived out one story after another in my mind while putting on my mascara each morning. Paintings remind me of worlds I once walked through or take me places I will only travel in my imagination. Words do the same. Books are friends that lead us into other worlds, all the while teaching us how to relate better to our own.

While the paintings I have written about in my stories exist only in my imagination, one of my favorite artists painted scenes of Venice as romantic as my own. I had the opportunity to meet Thomas Pradzynski, famed modern realist painter, in October at a benefit exhibit in Carmel. He was kind and gracious, interested in my work as a writer while I admired the red hues of his Venetian canals. Several years ago I was given one of his paintings of a bookstore in Paris, long before I ever dreamed of being a writer. As I stood talking with Pradzynski in that Carmel gallery, I never could have imagined he would be tragically killed on the streets of Paris within two months time.

When I went to Pradzynski’s tribute exhibition in Carmel this past weekend, I realized that the artist had left a legacy of seeing the world through his own eyes. He painted those worlds for others to experience. There are stories in his edifices just as there are paintings of poetry in the books we read. We see characters and live with them as we turn each page. The images in our minds and the words that form them are clearly interconnected, the painter and the poet one.

www.writersnewsweekly.com

Tyler on the Move: Davis Soroprimist

Tyler on the Move: Davis Soroptimist
Tyler on the Move
Volume 4
Issue 3
04/15/2008
I have a theory about flip-flops, those inexpensive sandals so popular on the beach. People who wear them are comfortable, easy to talk with, and make life seem better somehow. My favorite book signings have been in places where flip-flops are commonplace: San Diego, Carlsbad, Maui.
Over the weekend, the Soroptimist International of Greater Davis held their Artists and Authors Fair to raise funds for women re-entering education. As I sat in my booth as a participant, Sacramento CBS news anchor Sam Shane walked in with copies of his children’s book, Rocky the Mudhen. When I glanced down at his feet and noticed his leather flip-flops, I knew he was someone I wanted to talk with. I wasn’t disappointed.

While drug scandals have stolen the innocence from baseball in recent times, Sam remembers his years of playing and wanted to give the raw enjoyment of the game back to children. Apart from the commercialism, scandals, and outrageous salaries, Sam takes children back to the why of baseball. Why do we play? Why do we love the game?

This is what authors do, reveal the world from a perspective worth seeing things from. Sometimes that means returning to the why of what we enjoy in life and then sharing that with our readers in a new way. In the same way flip-flops zap pretentiousness; when we’re honest with ourselves we can be honest with others, and that does make the world seem a whole lot better.

Flip-flops come off easily so we can feel the sand between our toes. They’re adaptable, bear the image of our own unique footprint, and somehow ensure straightforward conversation. Books should be the same.

www.writersnewsweekly.com

www.tyleroaks.com April Newsletter

Friends and Mystery Lovers,

Now that it’s officially spring for all of us I hope you’re enjoying the change in weather. I’ve especially been taken by all the white wisteria climbing over buildings and trellises. It has that gorgeous, haunted quality I seem to find irresistible.

When we talk about books we have a funny way of revealing parts of ourselves no one would otherwise discover. Through reading we put ourselves in other people’s worlds and think about what we would do if we were in their positions. Recently the book club I’m a part of came to Napa to visit. We’ve been together five years. Through that time I’ve learned things about each member, the way she thinks or doesn’t think. Stories have given us the means to discuss topics that never would have been part of our conversations. I’ve come to appreciate our similarities and differences. I love how we relate to women from different countries and then am sometimes baffled to realize I may be the only one to pull the trigger in certain situations.

I once discussed Edda with a reporter who told me candidly that she didn’t like her. The longer we talked I discovered Edda didn’t make sense to her, the decisions she made were not “logical”. For my part, I quickly determined the woman was no fun. In all honesty I’ve seen and felt too much craziness to ever make sense to a “practical” mind. So here is to all the Eddas and to all of you who have chosen Ruby Rest to read in your book clubs. Your honesty and “nonsensical” nature will always make perfect sense to me.

In March I had the opportunity to sign copies of Ruby Rest in Maui. Again, forget politics. The secret to a better world is flip flops. People who wear them make the world a much happier place to live in. It was great to talk with people on the island about Ruby Rest. Their hospitality was refreshing. My souvenir from the trip was a magnet with the Eleanor Roosevelt quote for my refrigerator. It seems I tend to follow her advice unwittingly.

For those who have asked, Ruby Rest is now officially available at Barnes and Noble.

www.tyleroaks.com March Newsletter

Friends and Mystery Lovers,

I know it’s still early in the year but my birthday month always breathes spring to me. Everything is spiked with yellow: blooming acacia trees, the dormant vineyards bright with mustard, daffodils popping up along roadsides. Yellow to the core, March fills me with hope as I get glimpses of sunny days in the midst of storms.

As I’m about to turn the big three zero I’m reminded of a paper I had to write in high school describing what my life would be like at this age. I remember imagining myself living in Paris as a translator and somehow a guy named Eric was involved… As I’ve thought about this it has been strangely beautiful to realize that I cannot plan out my life. While each day does shape the next, the sum total of all I really ever have is one, this moment to choose what happens next. I don’t know where I’ll wake up at forty but I look forward to where the next ten years will take me.

I’ve been reminded of what a gift each day really is. I’m grieving the tragic death of one of my favorite artists, Thomas Pradzynski, who was fatally attacked on the streets of Paris. Perhaps you recall the photo I sent out of him and me in front of one of his Venetian masterpieces in the Carmel gallery a few months ago. I feel horror that senseless humanity destroyed the hands and life of this brilliant man. Comfort is found in his life, that he did what he loved, that he imparted his gift to others, that he touched so many lives because of the unique way he saw the world and painted it.

Thank you for letting me share my creations, the worlds of my writing, with you. On my recent book signing trip to Southern California I was touched by so many people. Strangers welcomed me and asked me over and over about my work and I started feeling like maybe if we all wore flip flops more often and spent extra time at the beach the world would be filled with much nicer people. I got to spend one whole day alone, slowly driving down the 101 between Oceanside and La Jolla, stopping at whatever beaches I wanted. I literally walked along the shore for hours, watching the surfers while writing a good portion of the book I’m working on in my head.

I’ll be adding some additional events in the next couple months but here are a few coming up. I would love to see you if you’ll be nearby. Thank you again to Modesto for your support. It was great to sign again at Borders Modesto and see everyone who came.

Saturday, March 8, 2008, 2pm

Borders Kahului Maui, HI

Thursday, March 3, 2008
Grace M. Davis High School, Academic Block “D” Banquet
Modesto, CA

Friday, April 4, 2008, 6pm-9pm
Saturday, April 5, 2008, 10am-3pm
Soroptimist International of Greater Davis
Artist and Author Art and Books Sale
Davis Senior Center, Davis, CA