Pitch Wars Bio

Pitch Wars is an amazing, fun, (and sometimes anxiety fraught) writing contest run by Brenda Drake. But it is more than a contest; it is a community--for both the mentee hopefulls and the mentors.

Mentors post a blog to help mentees make their submission choice. Some mentees do as well. (Mentee Blog Hop)

Here is mine:

I read and write kidlit from PBs to YA. I used to read and write grownup stuff, but not so much now--'though my pub credits are all for grownups. Wanna peek at the most grownup of my grownup pubs? I could never write like that now. Not that I want to. Ugh!

My Pitch Wars sub leans magical realism, but some might call it realistic fantasy. If you've read The Mostly True Story of Jack by Kelly Barnhill, mine wanders nearby, 'though a bit more on the mr side.

The "magic" is pretty close to my experience with nature beings. In that sense it is completely realistic, but most modern Americans deny nature beings exist making the same things fantastical.

My inspiration was wondering what happens to the kid after her brief magical adventure is over. All she has is memory and practices that she desperately hopes will bring direct communion, but that never quite work. That is also entirely realistic.

If you like my pages or my query, I need to share credit with the fantastic Scribophile Ubergroup managed by the incomparable Jerry Quinn, also the Ubergroup members who gave me such great critiques on both.

Sankofa Bone

Enough about my sub, what about me?

I far, far prefer editing to writing a first draft. Editing is like carving, shearing away the dross until the emerging form sings. I've carved both wood and stone, but mostly wood.

I'd love a mentor who is a fearless cutter of unnecessary words (and paragraphs and sections).

Do that for me and I will work my butt off for you.

Some other facts of which I am inordinately proud:


I've lived in 5 countries on 4 continents, 3 and 3 before I hit puberty, also 6 states including Alaska.


I was kicked out of a monastery. You already knew that if you read the header on my blog, but I am very, very proud of it.

Moon Over Jon Oriental

I loved Chicago as a natural environment: the orange-red brick cliffs, the wind tunnels, and the great majesty of the lake shore, also living in a white-minority neighborhood.

I don't miss the petroleum-fume-laden air.


Gifs confuse me.


via GIPHY

Sweet Honey

My first animal companion was Daddy Rat. I was three. 

Honey is my present animal companion.

Between Daddy Rat and Honey have been Lady (a dog), numerous mice, George (a terrapin that I smuggled into England from Nigeria when I went to boarding school), and Aijde (a cat).


My family also shared Dab Dab (a duiker), Aku (a West African grey parrot), and Sir Robin (an ex-champion race horse).


I dropped out of high school. While working on a kibbutz, I discovered how woefully ignorant I was, and since the only efficient way to get an education was college, I went--all the way to a PhD in a useless-for-getting-a-job field. After, I abandoned science for education.

Creative writing was my PhD survival strategy. 

Fav reads are far to numerous to list. Here are some recent ones:

TALL TALES by Karen Day. If you like Sharon Creech and haven't read Karen Day, you must.

THE JUMBIES by Tracey Baptiste

THE SINISTER SWEETNESS OF SPLENDID ACADEMY by Nikki Loftin (although, really, anything by Nikki Loftin)

TIGER RISING by Kate DiCamillo

THE ONE AND ONLY IVAN by Katherine Applegate

SPIRIT’S KEY by Edith Cohn  

BIGGER THAN A BREAD BOX by Laurel Snyder

BESWITCHED by Kate Saunders (a modern transport-into-the past story like Penelope Farmer's CHARLOTTE SOMETIMES that I loved growing up)

THE GREEN GLASS SEA by Ellen Klages

CURSE OF THE THIRTEENTH FEY by Jane Yolen 

WHEN YOU REACH ME by Rebbeca Stead

ELEVEN by Patricia Reilly Giff

SUN AND MOON, ICE AND SNOW by Jessica Day George

And I am in love with Junie B Jones if for no other reason than the way Barbara Park writes emotional cues.

When Compassion and Biology Collide

With a flash of annoyance, I drove up behind a car stopped in the middle of a suburban street. Then I noticed that facing me was another car in the opposite lane. Between the two cars a mom duck was crossing followed by her string of ducklings. A lot of ducklings, maybe a dozen.

They all crossed. As the cars started up, the mom duck jumped the curb. Her ducklings followed one by one.

The second smallest duckling jumped at the curb--and missed. The smallest also failed to make the jump. The two ducklings flapped their nascent wings, jumping at the curb again and again.

No luck.

They stumbled along the gutter, jumping and flapping, while the mom duck hunkered down on the sidewalk surrounded by the rest of her brood. A crow flew down to stand in the grass over the struggling ducklings. The ducklings would make a nice feast once they'd exhausted themselves.

Unaware of the ducklings that I was still watching, another suburbanite drove up behind me and honked. I had to go. I put my car in gear.

It’s just biology, I thought as I drove slowly away. What duck fledges a dozen ducklings? There is nothing to do except let nature take its course. After all, crows deserve to eat, too.

I drove a couple of blocks, then stopped. I couldn’t just leave. I had to try and help.

By the time I returned, the stranded ducklings had gotten pretty far from where the mom duck still crouched--the crow keeping pace over them.

I parked and got out.

Now I’ve lived with mammalogists and ornithologists. I know how to grasp a small wild thing: firmly, wrapping my hand around its body just behind the head. Hold it firmly, and it won’t hurt itself or you.

I know what to do. That doesn’t mean I can do it. My socialized fear of hurting interferes.

I scooped up the second smallest duckling. Although I held it too loosely, so it flailed in my hand, I managed to set it down near the mom duck. It ran to safety, tucking itself into the mass of ducklings. I felt the rush of warmth that philanthropy brings.

Then I went after the smallest duckling. It was way down the street, having run in total panic from my hand descending on its sibling. I was able to scoop it up, but couldn’t bring myself to grasp it firmly enough. It wriggled hard. I held it against my breast. It wriggled harder, falling from my fingers to the sidewalk. I didn’t hear it land, but imagined a sickening thumb.

Still, a moment later it ran to its mother. I smiled benevolently at it.

Only, something was wrong. This smallest duckling didn’t wiggle into the brood, but huddled into a small ball, separate from the others. Like it wasn’t sure of its welcome. Like it knew that that was as close as it could come and not be pecked.

No question: the smallest duckling was crow food. And although it was saved for now, how long did the second smallest have? It’d be an extraordinary year when a duck could fledge a dozen ducklings.

I went back to my car and my errands. I didn’t want to see the painful end to the smallest duckling’s story. I didn’t want to see biology at work.

Laying eggs is relatively cheap, and predators go for the weakest first. Perhaps the sole purpose of smaller siblings is to be a dangling bribe, insurance for those with a better chance of reaching adulthood.

If so, what price an act of compassion? Did I actually save one duck and give another a chance? Or did I just make myself feel good, while leaving those small ducklings to go through the same suffering all over again, later?

I don’t know.

But life is complicated and mysterious. If the value of helping is only measured by results, it means nothing when we don’t save the way we intended. But what if there is meaning in simply extending a hand, in trying?

If the purpose of the smallest ducklings is to protect the others by dying, then perhaps I did ok, even if my interference was naive. The thing is, my heart would not let me drive away. Of that I am sure.

Let nature go on clipping the string of ducklings, life by tiny life. I still had to put my hand in, all justifications aside.

That is also biology.

Rilke and Unemployment

I didn't get another job I wanted. If someone had taken all my greatest passions and all my skills, then designed a matching position, this one would have been it.

But no. I knew within two days of the interview, when they hadn't yet called my references.

I've made job application my priority for a long time now. Years. Yet, nada. Okay, that's an exaggeration. I have three part-time jobs, but even together, they aren't enough to live on. So...

The last time this happened was when I gave up on getting a research job in my science. I'd been on the job market for three years without an offer, although that wasn't a reflection on me. There were maybe five openings a year in the United States and 200 plus decent candidates. The average PhD spent ten years post-degree before landing a permanent job. I was actually doing better than most having had several interviews.

But it felt like I was running head-first into a brick wall expecting it to vanish. I'd slam my head, fall to the ground, then get up and do it again. Over and over and over. After three years, my bruised brain and butt had had it.

As soon as I turned away from research, I got every job I ever applied for. It seemed that the universe had other ideas for me than to use my degrees in the obvious way.

So is the universe sending me a message, now?

The only other direction available would be to put all my job search energy into writing and marketing my writing.

Big risk. Very scary.

So I think about Rilke who wrote in Letters to a Young Poet that writers need to decide if they must write to live. If yes, then they should stop whining about the difficulties and "build [their] life in accordance with this necessity."

I made a decision fifteen years ago to put my creative voice first - even if it meant giving up a tenure-track professor position. But somehow, I kept reneging on that commitment.

Perhaps, the universe has decided not to give me a choice.

Which leaves me to explore the difficulties.

Ps.97: Fire marches out in front and burns up all resistance.

My interpretation from the NIV, Vulgate in English, the Ancient Root Transliteration Bible, Masoretic Text, JPS 1917, & Young’s Literal 

Ready or Not in the Land of the Dying

I was sure he'd have died by now.

He was sliding fast last spring. I hoped he'd see his birthday in late June, but was positive he'd be gone by August.

Positive.

Come his birthday, and he rallied. I mean, really rallied. Not just ceasing to slide, but returning to a place he hadn't been in many, many months.

• He was awake for hours at a time.
• He looked people in the eye.
• He cracked his distinctive self-depreciating jokes.
• He laughed and sang.
• He thanked the caregivers for their help.

The visiting hospice nurse was shocked--pleased shocked. "Now I know why you all say he was such a great guy."

I couldn't help it. I began to fantasize.

• He isn't dying, at least not soon. We'll have years together, yet. Good years. Awake, aware, and happy years.

This went on for about a week. Then he rapidly slid further than he'd been before--barely opening his eyes for more than a few minutes--mostly staying distant and unfocused.

But the damage was done.

When we first approached hospice, I was not remotely ready. I only tried it because they evaluate you after three months. If you aren't clearly dying, hospice kicks you out again. I figured that would happen to us.

It didn't.

One evaluation. Two. He was certified dying--even if at slower than the proscribed, gone-in-six-month rate.

Since the beginning, I'd assumed that when the time came I'd say, "I'm fine. Don't hold on just for me. It's okay."

That would be a proper monk-like attitude.

Now the time was imminent, I found I couldn't do it.

I wasn't fine. It wasn't okay. I desperately wanted him to hang on for me.

My whole mind and body screamed, "Don't go. We were supposed to be together for many more years. Don't leave me."

Nine months passed. A third evaluation. Still, hospice kept us. And I changed. I began to feel that I could let go.

Listening to his cries of confused pain in response to the most benign bodily care--a wipe on the chin, for example--that helped. The stress of life with caregivers also helped --selfish as that may be.

Mostly, time helped. I just got used to the idea again.

Then came the day he said he was dying. Right then. I found myself saying, "Don't worry about me. I'll be fine."

It was true. With my whole heart and body, I knew I would be fine. I was finally ready. What a relief.

Until his birthday rally.

Now, that is a lie.

Five months and several hospice evaluations later, my only thought is: 

"Please, don't leave me. Not yet. I can't live without you."

*  *  *  *  *  *

Living with Strangers

For nine months, I barely tolerated my narcissistic weekend caregiver and his slovenly ways.

He never cleaned.

He broke my dining room chairs.

He wore his pants so low, he graced me with his bare butt when he bent over.

He grumbled, grumped and demanded that I meet his latest need.


Finally, I could no longer stand this man radiating bad temper through the house while my uncle was dying. Yet, the company who supplied my caregivers refused to replace him.

So, I decided to do what I should have done long ago: get my weekend caregiver from a different company. I'd put it off and put it off, not wanting to rock the delicate, care-giving boat.

I've gone through a lot of caregivers since my uncle has lived with me. I feel incredibly lucky to have a great person five days a week. What if I went to another company, yet got another dud?

      It's not easy being a live-in caregiver. It's much harder when
      a competent person is living right there. To succeed, my
      caregivers must do everything for my uncle - who can do
      nothing for himself - PLUS get along with me.

I sympathized that someone might find the situation stressful.  That didn't mean I should tolerate a resentful person skulking about.

Then, like a miracle, without my doing anything, the annoying caregiver disappeared. I was assigned an amazing man from Southwest Nigeria (the region Shell and BP have made into an environmental disaster area). Highly educated, experienced, and with an optimistic sense of humor - he was good with Milt and with me.

I couldn't believe my luck or blessing or whatever it was.

I felt more relaxed than practically since I started this gig.

Living with a dying man is an emotional wringer, but that is not so hard. Hard is sharing my house with an endless parade of well-meaning or not-so-well-meaning strangers while that emotional wringing is in progress.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *