News

Hey everybody, it’s me. First the event at the Schlafly Library here in St. Louis went well, despite the forecast of an ice storm. We got a about a hundred and fifeteen brave souls to challenge the weather and come out for my talk. Those that did come got to hear me read from the first chapter of SEDUCED BY MOONLIGHT, the new Meredith Gentry book. And this group is the only group that will get to hear me read it. There were children in the audience, like ten and under. I remember now why I police the first chapter so that it has no words that aren’t at least pg rated, and no situations that don’t work for a group of all ages. Merry is harder to police in that way then Anita is, but I now remember why I try for the first chapter to be calmer. First, I came to a word that I wouldn’t say infront of my daughter, so I won’t say it infront of anyone else’s children. It was used once in the entire chapter, but early on. I thought I’d changed it, but it didn’t really matter because of something that was later in the chapter. There is no sex in the first chapter, but the situations are adult enough and suggestive enough that I was not comfortable reading it infront of the under ten crowd. So I just had to stop reading and explain to the audience why. They laughed and thought it was cute, or at least amusing. People are welcome to bring their children to events, but I think in writing the first chapter I’d been thinking more about how to begin the book and less that I’d be reading outloud in public. I forget such things at the price of my own discomfort.
The questions and answers went well. We were being filmed part of the time by LIVING ST. LOUIS, KETC Channel 9. I’ve finally gotten comfortable infront of a moving camera. Comfortable means you no longer get stiff when you know it’s there. That you no longer worry more about the camera than what you’re doing infront of it. That you be yourself. Okay, yourself plus about ten to twenty percent more. Don’t ask me to explain the more, because I can’t. But I know that infront of you guys as a group that I am a little shinier, a little more on, then in the privacy of my own home. I much prefer talking and interacting infront of an audience then those static camera interviews where there’s just me and the interviewer, and the crew. I’m getting better even at those, but I don’t know if I’ll ever truly enjoy them. Not fearing them isn’t the same as liking them. You’re so at the mercy of whatever questions are being asked, and you rarely know ahead of time. I have started practicing answers to the more awkward questions so I don’t get caught with no answer, or one that makes whatever they’ve asked worse.
I heard from Darla that we had a couple of people that took offense at my herd blog. Sorry about that. As Darla said in her own blog entry, the herd is great if that’s where you’re happy, but I’ve spent most of my life being told that I’m bad for not being comfortable in the herd. There was a long period in my life where I would have given almost anything to be a happy herd member, to fit in, anywhere. But you’ve got to be who and what you are whatever that means to you. Be the Zebra if that’s who you are, or be the lion, or be the monkey. Be who you are, that’s the big message. Be who you are, and don’t let anyone make you feel bad for being the person that makes you happy, not even me, not even by accident.
I think one of the reasons that I did the herd blog, and some of the others recently is the publicity. It doesn’t take long for me to grow tired of questions that imply or outright state that there is something weird or wrong with what I write, and how my mind works, and, mustn’t forget, my morals. I mean I’m a woman that writes about sex and violence; there must be something wrong with me. There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m okay. But the seemingly constant questions that imply or outright state that there is something intrinsically wrong with sex, especially sex written by a woman, begins to get under my skin. I don’t get mad, mad is for private, and interviews are business. But you’d be surprised at the number of interviews that imply that just thinking this darkly, this violently on paper means there must be something wrong with me. That it’s a kind of sickness or perversity. Sickness, no, perversity, well, it depends on your definition. I’ve interviewed people that thought anything but missonary position (man on top) was perverse. I’m not making that up. Interviewers keep wanting to blame how my mind works on the death of my mother, the absent father, but I’ve been attracted to things that go bump in the night from my earliest clear memories. Scary stuff, flowers, and animals. Books followed when I was old enough to appreciate them. Okay, I guess truthfully the flowers, the animals, then scary stuff, then books. Yeah, those are the clear memories. I’m one of those people that has true memory from before I was two. True memory because no one in my family told a story I remembered, I went to my Grandmother and told her about remmbering purple bearded irises againts a fence. I was standing, looking up at the irises, and they were huge to me. My grandmother looked startled, then said, “You can’t remember that. We lived in that house before you were two.” It’s my earlies memory, and I still remember the wonder of it.
I guess I’ll leave you all with this. We never get too far from where we start. The things that bring us joy when we are very little, are often, the things that give us joy when we are all grown up. Remember your joy, don’t let the world tell you that’s it’s wrong. Be the widebeast, be the elephant, be the gorilla, be the meerkat, be whatever you are. For those who found their herd early in life and loved it, my envy. There is still a part of me that wonders what it would be like to have been embraced by those around me and been loved for who I was, not merely tolerated and puzzled over.