Show & Tell Tuesday: Christmas Playlist

So, I had a birthday on Saturday, and it was a darn good one.

I stayed in my pajamas all day long, and well into the next day. (Yes, I skipped church. No judging.) They were my really cute, Victoria Secret Fair Isle pajamas. And currently fit me a heck of a lot differently than when I first bought them, but that’s okay.

I lay on the couch in my pajamas with my dog, drank copious amounts of coffee and looked at the Christmas tree while my husband did the lion’s share of caring for our girls.

See–here I am. My dog really likes it when we twine up together on the couch. Man, I love that dog.

May I get up?

 

 I didn’t have to cook at all that day. Now, I realize that by writing this, it makes it sound like I cook a lot. But hey–putting ANY sort of food together is cooking, right? And I didn’t feel like doing it on my birthday. So we ordered out for lunch and dinner. And then I got to watch The Family Stone, which has become one of my personal Christmas classics movies. The casting alone in that movie is perfection. And the writing? Sigh. Just wonderful.

Moving on….

It was a pretty awesome birthday. A birthday, in fact, that I would’ve completely forgotten about if my husband hadn’t reminded me the day before.

Come the end of this week, things are going to get a little nuts in my world. We take off for Christmas travels to both sets of parents/grandparents, come home for a day or two, and then I fly to Vermont for my 11-day winter residency at the Vermont College of Fine Arts, and my MFA in Writing program.

This is what I think about every time I pack for Vermont in the winter:

So, there may be no regular posts here for a bit, seeing as how the day after I return from Vermont I begin teaching again, and am back to work on my MFA. Plus, you know, the parenting of the children.

Basically, I ain’t makin’ no promises. (Imagine I just said that in the voice of Sam Elliott. Whom I love with all my heart and soul.)

Which comes to my first thing to share:



filmous.com

1.) The movie Prancer

Yes, this is the cheesy movie from 1989. But I swear to you: watch it again, look past the cheese, and your sweet little Christmas heart will swell to its rightful size. I promise. And listening to gorgeous Sam Elliot in his gorgeous gruff voice and that sexy moustache read “A Letter to Santa Claus” won’t hurt.

Here’s a taste (skip to 2:00 to hear him read the letter):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yma8WXTjhS8

I turned 12 years old in December of 1989, when Prancer came out. We rarely went to movies as a family, but when we did it was usually at Christmas time. I will never forget walking out of that movie theatre and into the dark parking lot, my family laughing and talking about the movie. I looked up into the night sky, and there was a huge silver white moon, clouds streaked across it. It was magic.

2.) New Apple Christmas commercial

Late last night, when I was sitting at my desk, my husband came rushing in with his laptop. “You have got to watch this,” he said, smiling. If this ad from Apple, called “Misunderstood,” doesn’t make you wipe your eyes or even sniffle, I’ll eat my Santa hat. (After we watched it, my husband he told me he wanted more kids.)

3.) My Christmas playlist

I love a good Christmas song. Over the years I’ve collected Christmas albums, including mixed CDs from friends and family. Here’s an eclectic list of my favorites this Christmas season:

1. Darlin’ (Christmas is Coming) ~ Over the Rhine
2. Santa Claus is Back in Town ~ Elvis
3. Ave Maria ~ Harry Connick, Jr.
4. All That I Want ~ The Weepies
5. Beautiful Star of Bethlehem ~ Emmylou Harris
6. Winter Song ~ Sara Bareilles & Ingrid Michaelson
7. Maybe Next Year ~ Meiko
8. All Alone on Christmas ~ Steven Van Zandt
9. Donde Esta Santa Claus? ~ Guster
10. Christmas All Over Again ~ Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
11. Joy to the World ~ Aretha Franklin & the Fame Freedom Choir
12. I Saw Three Ships ~ Sting
13. Somewhere in My Memory ~ John Williams
14. Song for a Winter’s Night ~ Sarah McLachlan
15. Auld Lang Syne ~ James Taylor

A very Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to you all!

No Posts This Week ... Well, Except for This One

Hi, all. Happy December!

Hope y'all had a wonderful and relaxing Thanksgiving. Despite our epic trip to see my in-laws, we did. Hallelujah.

Just wanted to let y'all know that I won't be posting any this week; I've got a bunch of very long essays to grade, and they're due very soon. I'll hope to be back next week, to share some good stuff with you, and hopefully post a little about heading back to graduate school in snowy Vermont for my second-to-last residency at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.

For now, though, check out this series of film vignettes starring actors like Robert Redford, Cate Blanchett, Oprah Winfrey, Forrest Whitaker, and more. (It's about 9 minutes long. Pretty cool.)

A Winter Reading List

* Also published on my author website.

So, I’m boldly entering my 3rd semester as a graduate student in the MFA in Writing program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. I say “boldly” because I’m due to have Baby 2 one month before the semester officially ends. Maybe the phrase should be “nuts.”

Thankfully, the kind folks at VCFA, and my new advisor for the semester, have agreed to work with me. It means an accelerated work plan, and so I’m taking the semester off from teaching to try to make it all happen. And then Baby 2 will come. And my little world will spontaneously combust.

This semester is a bit different from the others: it’s the critical semester, which means along with producing new work (in my case, work on the new novel and hopefully-maybe an essay), I must complete a long, formal paper called a Critical Thesis. I’m okay with long academic papers–when I earned my MA in English I ended up finishing with two 75+ page theses–but it’s the time crunch that I think’ll get me this time.

Or, as Butch tells Sundance, “Are you crazy? The fall’ll probably kill ya.”

Oh, Newman. Oh, Redford.

But I digress.

My critical paper topic is going to focus generally on the role of place/setting in historical fiction. While my reading list isn’t quite as intensive as earlier semesters (I’m also using works I’ve already read to aid in thesis research), I still thought I’d share. And maybe throw in a few pleasure-books as an added bonus. Here we go:

1. Waverly; Or, ‘Tis Sixty Years Since by Sir Walter Scott

Published in 1814, Waverly is Scott’s epic account of the Jacobite uprising of 1745 (also known as “the ’45″), based mainly on all the stories he’d grown up hearing from his Scottish grandparents. He wrote it anonymously, even though by then he was already a famous writer. Apparently, popular novels were pooh-poohed in the “real” literary community. (Hm… sounds familiar.) Here’s what Jane Austen had to say about it, “Walter Scott has no business to write novels, especially good ones … I do not like him, and do not mean to like Waverly if I can help it–but I fear I must.”

2. Ironweed by William Kennedy

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Ironweed is the story of Francis Phelan, an “ex-big-leaguer, part-time gravedigger, full-time bum with the gift of gab,” who’s returned to his hometown.

3. The Last of the Mohicans or The Pathfinder by James Fenimoore Cooper

These are two of the novels in Cooper’s famous The Leatherstocking Tales, chronicling the adventures of the frontiersman Natty Bumpo. I read The Last of the Mohicans when I was far too young to be reading it, and so I say it’s time for a second go-round.

4. My Name is Mary Sutter by Robin Oliveira

My Name is Mary Sutter won the prestigious 2011 Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War fiction. Cool fact: Oliveira is a 2006 graduate of the MFA in Writing program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.

5. Walk Through Darkness by David Durham

Suggested by my advisor, who’s a friend of Durham’s, Walk Through Darkness is the story of William, an antebellum slave on the hunt for his pregnant wife. It sounds like nothing I’ve read before, which makes me happy.

And now, on to books I’ve read before but will be re-examining for my critical thesis this semester:

6. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

No explanation needed. I love this novel; have since I was a little girl. And as the protagonist of my work-in-progress is sort of a Southern “Jo March,” I’m heading back to the source.

 

 

7. The Last Report on the Miracles of Little No Horse by Louise Erdrich

Though I’d read quite a bit of Erdrich, I read The Last Report… for the first time last semester, and fell crashing into love. The story of a woman posing as a male priest on the Ojibwe reservation of Little No Horse, and of the adventures, foibles, and tragedies of her flock, it’s a novel that will stay with you long after you put it down.

8. The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje

Another work I read only last semester, The English Patient is a stunning, epic of a novel rooted in WWII history and drama. Ondaatje’s gorgeous, laser-like focus on each of his central characters, and of the settings they inhabit–an Italian Villa, North Afria–is utterly masterful. (On a side note, if you weren’t a fan of the movie, forget it. Read the book!)

 

Next, on my bedside table for pleasure-reading. I know, it seems nonsensical to be reading anything other than books for my grad program, especially since it’s not like I have a lot of free time, but I can’t help it. It’s my disease.

9. The Invisible Ones by Stef Penney

Penney is a Scottish screenwriter, and I loved her debut, The Tenderness of Wolves. In fact, now that I think about it, I may have to use that book in my thesis, too!

10. Letters from the Country by Carol Bly

A collection of essays about life in the small rural town of Madison, Minnesota, this is one of Bly’s best-loved works.

11. The Blueberry Years by Jim Minick

“A Memoir of Farm and Family,” The Blueberry Years was the winner of the 2011 Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance Best Nonfiction Book. It’s the story of a couple and their blueberry farm, and a look at food culture in America as we know it today.

12. Lions of the West by Robert Morgan

Robert Morgan’s Boone was one of the best biographies I’ve ever read, and I used it to aid in my research for Keowee Valley. When Lions of the West was released, I knew I had to have it for my personal library. Thank you, my favorite in-laws, for fufilling a Christmas wish! This book tells the story of westward expansion through 10 Americans full of adventure and land-lust, including Thomas Jefferson, John “Johnny” Appleseed, David Crockett, Sam Houston, and more. It’s also the story of the tragic displacement of Native Americans, and the roots of the Civil War.

If you haven’t noticed, I’m a book-a-holic. My list could go on and on. If I included my research list for Novel 2, you’d groan (and probably throw something at your computer). But there’s not much I like more than sharing books!

Join me on my journey, if you get a hankering.

 

Back in the Saddle ... Again

So, long-time readers here know that I really dig this title. I’ve used it before. But I can’t help it; it’s such a great song sung by the wonderful Gene Autry.

Back in the saddle again, back where a friend is a friend….

See? Now it’ll stick in your head. Sorry.

But this is how I feel, after being away from home for the holidays, and then traveling to Puerto Rico for my third residency in the MFA in Writing program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. (I skipped 12 days in snowy Vermont in lieu of 8 days in sunny–sometimes–Puerto Rico.) Finally home, I have busied myself with completing all the tasks laid out before me for the next few months:

1. Clean my house. There are still Christmas decorations up.
2. Organize my desk. I’d show you a picture, but you’d scream.
3. Write a big ol’ chunk of Novel 2.
4. Continue to share and promote Keowee Valley.
5. Complete my third semester (the critical semester, in which I write a doozy of a critical thesis in addition to producing new creative work) in the MFA in Writing program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.
6. Mama my 3 year-old. In a good way. (And, dear Lord, finally get her completely potty-trained.)
7. Team up with my husband to prepare our house for Baby Girl 2, set to arrive May 8, 2013.
8. Grow a baby. Yowza.

I’m sure I’m missing something, but I’ll get to that later. Tomorrow….

Okay, enough with the songs.

Later this week, I’ll share my Puerto Rico experience–and some photos–with those interested. One of the many reasons I’d applied to VCFA was because of their study abroad opportunites. (There’s an alternate residency every summer in Slovenia, and an alternate winter one in Puerto Rico.) As an undergrad, I longed to study abroad, and came close to heading to Australia for a semester. Then I decided to tack on a double major and became The Girl Who Reads Alot.

When I did the grad school thing the first time, earning my MA in English, I had the chance to spend a summer in Italy, and it was a life-changer. So I knew this was something I’d like to pursue during my MFA. VCFA makes it easy to attend: the residencies are held at the exact same time, which makes it more manageable for those of us with jobs and families.
But more of that later this week.

If you “follow” me on Facebook, you’ll know that one of the founding members of my family–my sweet black lab (and faithful trail partner), Scout–has been through a heck of a week.

Here’s a run-down:

hematoba on the ear
surgery
head wrapping
pulling off wrapping
blood
more blood
visits to the ER vet
more wrapping
Houdini-style removal of the wrapping (usually while we slept)
savings depleted
more wrapping
less blood
meds, meds, and more meds

Thankfully, though, she’s on the mend. And I really appreciate all you fine folks who wrote in to tell me you were thinking about her and us! I believe good juju makes the world go round. May you be blessed with an easy winter. And lollipops (my daughter insists).

That’s all for now! If you’re able, I hope you’ll tune in for my radio interview on the Blog Talk Radio show “Away With Words,” hosted by Victoria Valentine! 7:00 tonight!

Returning to Montpelier and VCFA

Our bed. In packing mode.

This is the state of my bedroom. For my Mom, this will probably bring flashbacks (or, as I like to call them, fond memories) of the state of my teenaged bedroom.

But no: this is my bed, now, as I pack for 11 days in Montpelier, Vermont, at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. I fly out Wednesday morning for my second residency, and thus the beginning of my second semester in the MFA in Writing program.

I'm looking forward to it: 10 days of lectures, readings, workshop, and just being around writerly people. I'll get a new advisor for this new semester, and I'm curious about whom it'll be. And as much as I'm a wee bit sad (and a bit anxious) about leaving my family for that long--namely my two year-old--I'm looking forward to 10 days of just thinking about myself.

Sounds supremely selfish. But it's true. Only having to worry about me, about where I need to be and what I need to do, will be heaven. It also doesn't hurt that I'm renting a house in Montpelier with friends I'd made over the last residency. I'm envisioning wine on the front porch, exchanging of book lists, lots of talk (okay, gossip).  

My first semester as an MFA in Writing student was an interesting one. It flew by, and I never truly felt like I'd a minute to slow down. Truthfully, it was a balance act--teacher/mother/wife/writer/student--with a landing I'm afraid I didn't quite stick. I'm hoping that this coming semester will be a bit more manageable, if only because I've done it before.

Running the gauntlet
(Photo credit; en.wikipedia.org)

Even as I write that--be a bit more manageable--I cringe. Because I know that won't be true. Happily, my novel comes out September 15th, which is obviously a dream quite literally coming true. But with it comes several months of promotions, some travel, and quite a bit of work. I'm also teaching classes. And, oh yeah, back being a grad student. Trying to coordinate these roles alongside navigating family life at times feels like running the gauntlet.

You know the gauntlet, right? It can be as fierce as the picture to the right--all medieval and brutal and sharp--or as ridiculous as one of those Japanese reality shows where the contestants are knocked by enormous rubber waterwheels into foaming florescent water. My life seems more like the latter--really, really funny at times. With an ouch.

It's been an exceptionally busy few weeks. Good weeks, but crazy ones. My daughter is out of school. My husband took a new job that has him traveling and working from home. (More on the two-people-in-the-house-working-from-home hootenanny in a later post.) We celebrated his birthday and our 8th anniversary with our first date in months, which was wonderful. We went to an early movie and dinner in Asheville, N.C.

My husband and me, celebrating our 8th anniversary

(The movie, Snow White and the Huntsman, which I thought I'd be ambivalent about but which I really, really enjoyed. Charlize Theron is fantastic as the evil queen, Chris Hemsworth brings surprising dimension and even tenderness to the Hunstman, and Kristin Stewart makes a darn good bad-ass. Plus, the abundance of Golden Globe, Emmy and Oscar-winning actors is a win: Ian McShane, Theron, and more.)

I've yet to figure out how to successfully navigate life as a fully-functioning (read successful) workingwritingMomwifefriend. I've read dozens of books and blogs on the subject, hoping that one would hold the magic key. Most say the same thing: get organized, schedule, enlist help, make time for yourself.  

Time for yourself. Bah ha ha ha ha.

Kidding, kidding. It is possible. It can be done. Just maybe not this week....



* I may post while at VCFA, I may not. I hope you all have a wonderful end of June!

Back in the Saddle

First residency at the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing program completed: Check.

Back home and procrastinating like the champion pro-cras-ti-NAY-TOR that I am: Check check.

It's 3:06 in the afternoon, and I'm still wearing my pajamas. Granted, they're whimsical, black and white, Fair Isle-patterned, Victoria Secret long underwear pajamas, but it's after 8 a.m., and I'm still wearin' 'em. The gas logs are blazing, my black lab is snoring on her Christmas-present new dog bed, and my toddler is napping. Finally.

It's not that I've been lazing about, as my husband likes to say, "eating Bon Bons." (What ARE Bon Bons, by the way? They sound like something French and dirty.) So far today, I've fed my dog and child, helped my husband find his wallet, made up a grading calendar and graded assignments for an online writing class I'm teaching, checked both of my work email accounts, washed several loads of laundry, finished a novel assigned by my faculty advisor at Vermont College, and prepped and started a big, fat crockpot of turkey chili for tonight's supper. Yet, I'm still in my pajamas. If Publisher's Clearing House arrives at the door--like I'm sure they will since I've been filling out those daggum envelopes for years--I will be That Woman. You know, the one in her housecoat with the greasy hair, covering her face and shouting, "Oh, law, I can't believe I'm on T.V. like this!" Of course, I'll be in my cute Fair Isle pajamas.

This is all to say that in spite of each of the aforementioned tasks being important, I'm still procrastinating. Here's why:

I arrived home from Montpelier, Vermont and VCFA on Sunday, January 8, exhausted from travel and desperately happy to see my family. At the airport in Greenville, South Carolina, where I last landed, my two year-old towhead of a daughter broke from her father and sprinted through a crowd of people heading toward baggage claim, and leapt into my arms. My God--what a life! Two days after returning home, two of our best friends in the world and their twin 16 month-olds arrived at our tiny house in the mountains, and we had a wonderful few days together, eating and drinking and chasing kiddos and laughing with more friends. Then, my parents came to visit for the day before leaving on one of their many jaunts about the globe (they've been burning up the mountain highway to our house for, oh, the past 2 1/2 years). Then my husband and I poohed out a bit over the weekend. Sure, we went grocery shopping and cleaned up and played with our daughter and hiked with friends and I began cleaning my Jabba the Hut of a desk, but we poohed out.

Which brings us to today. I gave myself last week, as a gift, to regroup after the residency and to enjoy time with friends. But now it's time for the heavy lifting. For the work on the many, many pages of creative and critical writing I'm to mail to my advisor in three weeks. But I find myself, home again, willing to do anything else that needs doing in my house, other than write. Because writing is hard. And I'm a big, stinkin' mess of procrastination. The Pro-Crass-ti-nay-TOR: able to avoid the-thing-she-loves-doing-most in a single bound. More on this at a later date. (See: I'm sneaky.)



The residency itself was a good one, my first with Vermont College. The campus was snow-covered and lovely, the lectures for the most part interesting and helpful--some downright inspiring. The new friends, especially, a joy. Writers are a ridiculous, wonderful, ego-centric, odd, irreverent bunch, and it's always nice to be in the company of my people. Even the dorm room I stayed in--though some may disagree--wasn't so bad. Though I did feel, upon entering, a swift urge to paper the walls with Matthew McConaughey posters and blast the Dave Matthews Band. And order pizza at 3 a.m. And wear flip-flops. And go to breakfast wearing the same clothes I'd worn the night before. But I digress.

See, the dorm:

Not so bad, right? Bigger than my freshman year dorm room at Clemson. (On a side note, I slept like a rock in Vermont, woke each day bright-eyed at 6:30 a.m. Wierd.)

And the campus, small and lovely:

And Montpelier, the state capitol, only a ten minute's walk down the hill from the College. I spent quite a bit of time there with new friends and alone, dining and shopping and wandering:

Around the State House...

 

across foot bridges...

 

at the oft-frequented Postive Pie 2, our unofficial residency hangout, with new writer-friends Rachel and Kim ...

through the streets of town...

wandering neighborhoods, admiring the old Victorian homes and added-upon cottages... watching the Winooski River slowly freeze at its edges, despite the unseasonably warm weather...

hiking in icy Hubbard Park, with my new friend, writer Amy Wallen...

climbing the old tower there...

utilizing the Port-o-Potty (cutest I've ever seen... and yes, I've seen a few Port-o-Potties)...

It was heaven, that time in the woods. Even though I slipped on the ice and thought I fractured my elbow. But I digress.

So now I'm home, trying like all heck to organize my life, my work, my writing, my schooling, my family into one neat, color-coordinated schedule. I'm trying to figure out how I can do it all, and do it well.

I may give myself one more week....