Chapter Two I think I fell in love with you

The title of this month's post is a tribute to Elvis Costello for three reasons:

1. It's Elvis Costello, do you really need a reason other than that? If so, we cannot be friends.

2. This summer, DB and I saw him in concert with the Imposters, and it was the best show we've ever seen, together OR individually. No contest.

3. He just released his memoir, Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink, which is already packed in my suitcase for this weekend's trip to Pennsylvania (because my nephew is getting married).

And, since we're talking about matrimony and Appalachia, I've decided to post a chapter from my magnum opus (she says sarcastically) that discusses both. Also, to my writing group, who, "Stood by me in the middle of Chapter Three," I know you think it's bad juju to share this since it hasn't been published; but, seeing as this story is also about the Blues, maybe Albert King is right, "If it weren't for bad luck, I wouldn't have no luck at all." With that...

Chapter 35: It’s a good day for the Blues. 

Not only is that one of the greatest songs ever written, Malford Milligan, Storyville’s soulful, sage, lead singer is right, “Sometimes you fly so high, you can’t find a place to land,” but still ... “It’s a good day for the Blues.” Well, I get it. Though I’m the recipient of countless, huge blessings, when I’m stressed, even a little, like I was while planning DB's and my wedding in 2011, I have a tendency to snark at people about any and everything. And frankly, it’s unacceptable. In fact, on that same trip home, at my nephew’s party, my mom was so exasperated that she called me on it and said, “Do you think we created language as a species to accommodate your inner need to whine? If so, do you suppose Mother Nature gave me feet to walk away from you while you do it?”

I ask you, in all honesty, do you understand how I became this person? Do you?

Cynicism notwithstanding, the worst part of that conversation is that she’s right. On second thought, the worst part is that she had our entire family jump on the bandwagon. And I don’t mean my brothers and sister with whom I actually will fight. I mean her cousins and aunts: women in their 70s, 80s and 90s. People you simply can’t debate, and not just because they’re deaf or because your mother will kill you for being disrespectful. Women you can’t bitch in front of because they actually have reasons to complain and still don’t do it. Women who have buried children and partners, witnessed more than one war, and fought for the right to vote, the right to fair pay, and the right to live their lives as they see fit. Women who did all of it admirably ... grateful for the things they had ... not devastated over the things they lost.

So, when they tell you that you’re missing out on the happiest times of your life, you listen. After all, like Woody Allen once said, “Life is full of misery, loneliness and suffering, and it’s all over much too soon.” The trick is to find people to share that desolation with, especially the big moments, which is why a few years ago, DB went to Pennsylvania with me for a wedding.

Just so we’re all on the same page, unless you’re a local, nuptials in Appalachia are like nothing you’ve ever seen before. Because, not only are the Blue Ridge mountains home to the world’s best Bluegrass music, they’re also a Mecca for mullets and preachers who handle snakes, all of which you’re likely to experience if you’re there for a special occasion.

Don’t get me wrong. Where I grew up is honestly one of the most beautiful landscapes on Earth. So much so that the natives say they only inbreed to, “keep outsiders from coming in and ruining it.” But, like everything in life, it has its pros and cons. Pro: Mountain people definitely know how to party. I’ve actually attended receptions where the bar served homemade moonshine then handed the empty jugs over to the band so the music could start. Con: After too much moonshine, I’ve played the jug ... on stage ... and there’s a fine line between being so drunk that you go blind versus being just drunk enough that you’re willing blow “whoo whoo ... whoo whoo” into a bottle while a large bearded stranger in overalls sings, “Billie Jean is not my lover.” Sadly, while you may be tempted to believe that’s hyperbole, it’s not. Nor is the fact that it didn’t just happen to me in Pennsylvania. It also happened to me in Mississippi at a barbeque festival. Though I remember neither incident, I’ve been told I’m a natural.

You know, it’s sad that Storyville broke up in 2000. I feel like we could have made really beautiful music together.

Note: Dear Mr. Milligan, on the off-chance a snowball landed in hell and you’re reading this, please call me. I’m totally available for your reunion tour, and (spoiler alert) I also play the spoons.  

Every day I write the book . . .

Happy 2014. With that, I have two things to share. First of all, I’m pleased to report that mkromd raised sixty dollars for Nathan Bransford’s annual Hooray for Heifer drive. Many thanks to those of you who posted comments (once or several times), joined my blog (you know who you are) or simply visited my karma ran over my dogma (the more the merrier). It was genuinely most appreciated.

Also, as always, we donated bees; because, let’s face it, the world needs them. If their job were left to people like me, everything on this planet would die. I’m not kidding. One could argue that I’m (literally) the Grim Reaper of gardening. Personally, however, I like to think of myself as a horticultural hospice worker, easing the transition, so plants can go to God without fear. They’re welcome.

Secondly, the manuscript is done, as in stick-a-fork-in-it-DONE. Since I’ve been asked to write a guest post about the experience, I won’t share too much here, only that I simply had no idea how hard it would be. All jokes aside, at each point, I thought the next phase would be easier and it never was. It was like Sisyphus, minus the cardio. Seriously, first you have to decide what to write. Then you have to write it. Then you have to muster the courage to submit it to an editor for style, flow, voice and grammar. If that doesn’t sound intimidating, keep in mind these are people who have absolutely no problem whatsoever letting you know the difference between, “you’re shit and your shit.” And the worst part is this: that’s their professional opinion, so it’s accurate. 

In any case, if you can survive making those edits and still have a sense of humor, you move into the next stage: the query letter and mini-proposal. Or, as I like to refer to this process, “shock and awe.” Not because of how fabulous it is, but because your writing takes ANOTHER pounding. You basically have to disregard everything you’ve learned from your writing coach, peer reviewers and editor. Then create a business proposal so agents and publishers are willing to look at the first fifty pages of your book, which have to be good enough to make them want to read the rest of it. It’s like a dysfunctional game of Chutes and Ladders with a pinch of Monopoly thrown in, “Your book didn’t get picked, go back to Start and do not collect $200 or a bottle of tequila on your way there.”

Anyway, as promised, when the guest post is released, I’ll share a link to it. In the meantime, thank you again for supporting Heifer. Talk to you later.

The Write Thing to Do

I’m sorry that I haven’t written for a while. Between what’s happening in the Middle East, the earthquake/tsunami/nuclear reactor catastrophes in Japan, and the fact that my house sold last week, I haven’t been able to hold a thought long enough to finish a sentence let alone a paragraph or a blog post. So, forgive me. That said - I also want to be honest. I haven’t known what to say… With so much horror happening to so many people in so many places, it somehow seemed wrong to write about myself.

At any rate… whatever the rhyme or reason, for the last two weeks, I’ve been “blog challenged”… until this morning, when I remembered something that Steve Martin once said about Writer’s Block, “When you’re stuck staring at a flashing cursor, get a book you love and steal your favorite sentence. That will get you started. The odds of being found out are very slim, and even if you are… there's usually no jail time.” And so, literary loophole in hand, I’ve chosen to pilfer Ben Franklin’s adage, “Laughter is the best medicine.” Actually, scratch that. For the purpose of this post, I’m going to quote SNL’s Jack Handy instead, “My dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis.”

Now… please let me clarify. I don’t think it’s OK to ignore or make fun of anyone’s suffering; however, given the current levels of chaos in our world, I firmly believe it’s alright to add some levity to each of our lives… And if I can make one person smile, then my work here is done. In other words, I shall attempt to be your karmic comic relief today, so please feel free to laugh at my expense as I catch you up on DB’s and my wedding plans...

Since this is our second marriage each, it’s been pretty easy to organize the event. We know When (this summer). We know Where (local). We know Who (family and close friends only). Hell, we even know How (Buddhist). The only things left to handle are the Whats (those miscellaneous and sundry details where the devil resides). This includes my dress, which I’m pleased to report I now have… regardless of how traumatic the process was for everyone involved (and believe me when I say that it was therapy-inducing).

However, before I can tell you that part of the story, I have to tell you this part first.

You see, a few weeks ago, my best friend, her daughter, DB’s daughter, and I went shopping. We each picked two gowns for me to try on and the dress consultant picked three. And while this female rite-of-passage is fun when you’re twenty-one, in middle-age it falls squarely into Dante’s ninth level of hell: Sins of Betrayal. Seriously, at thirty-nine, your body begins to sabotage you in every way imaginable. In fact, I’d say that middle-age has shot me in the foot, but I think it’s more accurate to say that it's stabbing me in the back-fat. Because, honestly, when you spend less on the dress than you do the shit that goes UNDER it so the groom wants get you OUT of it, your dignity has been compromised.

But I digress, and for the men-folk who read mkromd and have never been through this, let me explain.

When buying the perfect wedding dress, the bride-to-be is:
1) Put into a room the size of a gym locker.
2) Handed a slip and a corset designed to “rearrange your figure into something more aesthetically appealing.”
3) Given one not-so-perfect dress after another to try on.

Please note:
1) The room doesn’t have mirrors, so you can’t reject a dress until the world has seen and ridiculed you in it.
2) A corset is an extremely tight, Victorian-era torture device with fifty eyelets that has to be put on like a bra (think Hitchcock meets porn). You cannot put it on by yourself unless you turn it around… fasten every damn hook up the front… THEN turn it around AGAIN… so the eyelets are in the back… along with your breasts. And while that sounds horrifying… and it is… it HAS be better than having a complete stranger do it for you… which is the bride’s only other option… when her best friend says, “The group rate on therapy isn’t low enough for the two of us to try that together.”

Anyway, after navigating through that nightmare, I put on the first dress and walked out, only to hear DB’s sweet, beautiful, brilliant daughter whom I love to bits say, “mkromd, why is your boob under your armpit?” I wanted to explain the corset debacle, but I didn’t want to scar her for life, so I let it go. And, after doing this almost ten MORE times, the dress consultant said, “I think I have the right one for you… It screams East Coast WASP.” I’m not sure I know what that means, but I fell in love with the dress, as did DB’s daughter, my best friend, and her daughter. Now I have approximately one month to get into shape before the final fitting (yes, really), which leads me to another What (what music to play at the reception).

See, DB was a Blues Guitarist in Austin for a decade, so his tastes are pretty refined. He’s a purist who likes good Blues. Period. Me… my iPod is as schizophrenic as I am with playlists called things like:
Shout Out– Including The Ramones, The Sex Pistols, and The Clash

Chill Out– Including Bob Marley, Elvis Costello, and Leonard Cohen

Work Out– Including P. Diddy, Timbaland, and Eminem

Go Out– Including Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive,” Patti Smith’s, “Because the Night,” and The Weather Girls, "It's Raining Men." It should be noted that these three songs will turn me into a rock star inside my car faster than Lady Gaga can turn a homosexual man into diva at a gay club... in less than three snaps. But again, I digress.

My point is that it’s OK to laugh - even when CNN looks more like the Mayan Book of the Dead than it does the news. And so, as I was looking for books to pilfer sentences from (and help me shift some of my focus and energy towards something more positive and humorous), I stumbled across the Chick Lit Challenge. Here’s how it works, each participant has to read twelve books in this genre throughout 2011, two of which have to be from debut authors. It began in January, and the idea was one book per month; however, since I started late, I’m including Nora Ephron’s, “I Remember Nothing,” Elizabeth Gilbert’s, “Committed” and Meg Waite Clayton’s, “The Wednesday Sisters.” All of which I loved and would highly recommend. Next on my list, after Ekhart Tolle's, "A New Earth," is "Attachments" by Rainbow Rowell. I'll be sure to let you know what I think (of both).

My sincere hope in sharing is that each one of us can laugh, even if it's just a little until it's a lot, and I think this challenge will help us find witty, sweet, female-oriented literature that may heal some of our sadness… Because if laughter really is the best medicine, then a spoonful of sugar has to make it go down all the easier.

Talk to you next week (I promise).