An Elite Member of the Zombie Horde

I have been pitter pattering away for NaNoWriMo, though some days are more productive than others. I don't know if I will make the daunting word count as of yet, but I will give it a fair go. I know if I am really going to make a run at this, I will have to sacrifice my most precious commodity to achieve my mad scribbling goal: sleep.
Despite my best efforts, my production during the day is not what it should be, I get what I can done, but it's not easy clacking away on the keyboard with a child who wants and needs your attention. While my children are awesome at playing by themselves I find myself chasing after them for snuggling because they are young and there are only so many years of snuggle time in them. I take it where I can get it. Perhaps if I can sacrifice an hour of sleep here and there, because lord knows I never wake up before they do, then the novel will happen, just with more coffee.
How ironic is it my subject matter is zombies this year :P

Sometimes I wish for a yurt...

I love being able to work from home. Truthfully, it is not easy, some days motivation is miles away, the kids are clamoring and clingy and I get nothing done despite the internal and external deadlines looming over me. It's days like that I wish for a place to vanish to, somewhere separate from our messy distraction filled apartment.
I wish I had a writing hut, or a yurt. This actually exists, Neil Gaiman, who is a favorite writing celebrity of mine, has a writing hut. I am envious.

Look at this thing, it's freaking beautiful. I can just see myself foisting the children off on my husband as I slip away to my writing yurt for a day of relaxing production. I don't even need something this fancy, a simple shed would do, rough and rustic, as long as I could make it cozy like Mr. Roald Dahl's hideaway space here.

I could procure a mini generator so I have power, a space heater for winter, hole myself up in there and write for a few blissful undistracted hours. Alas, I must fight to concentrate with small hands reaching over the lap top screen, a little face craning over to see what noise my fingers are making. It's an interesting tradeoff. As much as I struggle to write/edit/ do anything computer based that requires actual concentration, I get to look up at the silly curious face of my son. It's frustrating and far from perfect, and maybe I will strive to own a yurt someday, but for now, I shall enjoy the opportunity to tickle my child when he leaves himself wide open, reaching over my computer screen.

Beating the Summer Slump

I love my children, but nothing kills my writing drive like school letting out for the summer. I go from being able to write on and off most of the day while taking care of the 1 year old, to squeaking in time between the two of them. If I'm not too burnt out by the end of the day, I try to write before collapsing in a drooling heap on the bed.

While I have the relief of a summer school session to look forward to, making sure my eldest gets out of the house regularly and with friends, I must find ways of getting over the hit to my writing the heat season brings.
So instead of simply relying on my own gusto in the hopes my 'go for it' attitude gets me going, I've signed up for Write-a-thons! Two to be exact.

Clarion, the excellent resource/support network of the sci-fi/fantasy community hosts their write-a-thon for the next six weeks through the month of July. This one is intense, it's goal is to raise money so they can keep running their yearly workshop, which I hope to apply for next year.

http://www.clarionwriteathon.com/

Here's my own personal jobbie:
http://clarionwriteathon.org/members/profile.php?writerid=599895

I'm aiming high, setting myself some pretty hefty goals, a tri-fecta of editing, creating, and up-keep. It's a do or die summer, I'm finishing the edits on the novel, creating as many new chapters for the novel in progress as I can manage, and continuing posts for New Earth 6. Whew!

Aaaaaand once the Clarion Write-A-thon comes to a close, WeSeWriMo starts up immediately.

 Heard of NaNoWriMo? Same concept except this one focuses on Web Serial fiction, and it's a perfect kick in the pants commitment to keep me working through the blazing heat of August. This one is hosted by Epiguide, one of the heavily populated web forums for all things E-serialized.

I'm aiming to make this a productive summer, one way or another. If I can take the plunge and commit myself to these big projects now, hopefully it will string me along no matter how zany the kids drive me.

Pulp Production

Producing a weekly chapter has turned into an interesting animal. Despite all my good intentions, or maybe because of them, instead of working on the piece throughout the week, I usually slam it out Thursday Night/ Friday Morning, right before I post it. This leaves me with mixed feelings. I decided before I even started that for initial postings, I would do sight editing, try to flush out the big mistakes, but I was not going to rewrite a chapter five times every week, this is a side project, one meant to give me a steady creation outlet while muddling through edits with The Novel. That vicious beast. 

Going into it, I didn't have any illusions of producing something unique and original, more of producing an enjoyable pulp serial, entertainment for entertainments sake. Most of these chapters will end on cliff hangers, it is part of the schtick. I do have a mapped out outline of where the story is intended to go, but no chapter by chapter outlines, I'm mostly flying blind.

The unexpected side effect of my project is my snow balling obsession with giving it an audience. It's pulp sci-fi for cripe's sake! There is  nothing incredibly original about it, it smacks of themes often used in science fiction. Yet here I spend several hours a week plugging it on blogging networks, finding new places to drop it for notice. Why? Why bother at all? It's just a side project right?

Well, every one has to start somewhere. New Earth Six has evolved into a dual sided project, to keep up a writing regime, and to plant the seeds of a social writing network. If The Novel does find its way to the press, then I have the roots in place to begin an author's platform. 

There was also the interesting magic of blogs make into books. Quite a few of the fiction blogs I discovered on my journey have not only established an impressive network, they have gone on to create "novel" editions of their work. 

But I got really excited when I realized I have become a part of the pulp machine. It's not as sneer worthy as it sounds. Pulp fiction is a long practiced tradition that has changed forms over the years. Many writers considered classics of the 20th century were the pulp novelists of old. There are so many lofty ideas tied in with writing these days, if its not literary fiction it's genre aka trash writing. What happened to writing for entertainment's sake. 

That is what I want to do, that is what I hope I am doing with both my serial blog and The Novel. I find myself straddling the fence. Here I am polishing the crap out of my book, I want to produce a decent product for submission, while producing my pulp, my mildly edited, character driven, space opera. 

The pulp has been rather liberating.

Reading with Gremlins

I don't think I have to expound on the importance of reading to your children. I mean there are hundreds of books, documented proof reading to your kids is beneficial in tons of ways. Hell, I grew up reading, my father built a bookcase just for my room out of scrap wood, which I still have by the way. I love that fuckin' rough cut bookcase.
So when I eventually produced children of my own, I had big plans to make them readers. My children have taught me a great deal about the reality of reading with kids.

Lesson #1: Don't feel guilty if you don't read to your children every night. I think I went through an identity crisis when I couldn't perform this simple task consistently. I was all gung ho about making this part of the evening routine, to spend a good chunk of time every night reading a few books from the HUGE selection of children's books I have collected. ( I think I have as many children's books as I do adult books) I tried, I really did, but sometimes I was exhausted, sometimes I had ninety things to do before my own head hit the pillow, sometimes, my son was just too wound up to sit for a book and needed lights out.

Lesson #2: You will find the opportunities to read. They will present themselves, just make sure you shut up and take notice. The biggest hint will be when you stumble on them looking through their books. Derp derp, go read with them! Sometimes they will come find me with a book. I am fortunate to be in a situation I can stop whatever I am doing and read their precious selection. You will also make opportunities. In the long road to potty training, I purchased a old school wooden picnic basket from goodwill and filled it with books. It provides some protection from my splash happy kids and they now consider our bathroom story time central.

Lesson #3: Your gremlins do not consider books as precious as you do. I am guilty of going through a period where I hid most of the picture books in our bedroom. I have two boys, and no matter how much I stress "don't stand on the book!" "you're bending the spine!" "ah, ah, ah you're tearing it!", well shit happens. I shed a little tear for the books I had to throw away but if you aren't willing to sacrifice a few to the Toddler Gods, they don't learn how to treat books period. I was so proud the day my son learned how to turn the pages of his regular picture books properly, something his younger brother picked up from watching him.
There are still accidents, but I have calmed down quite a lot, now I leave out a good selection of picture books...and hide the rest in the bedroom for down the road.

Lesson #4: As much as you want to introduce them to as many new books as possible, they will latch onto a select group of favorites and demand to hear them over and over. Okay, so reading "The Very Lazy Ladybug" for the 100th time makes me want to grind my teeth, but I know this is how my son is learning to read. It is his go to book. It did take me forever to realize, hey instead of just reading this by myself, I can get him to read with me. Some books we have read together so many times, he has them half memorized and one actually reads to me. That would be Mo Willems's "Time to Pee".

Lesson #5: Books are fucking magic. It never ceases to amaze me which ones they attach themselves to. My older son has a rotation of about five or six he wants to hear all the time. Most of these selections have sound effects, like "Roar" which he loves to do with me. But curiously, his absolute favorite is a long story, one that leaves me flabbergasted. My son cannot sit through most Dr. Seuss stories, he has attention and learning disorders, but he will sit for "A Bad Case of Stripes" by David Shannon. He will also find it, no matter where I hide it in the house...



I read to my children everyday. Somehow, somewhere, we find a chance to sit a read together. Usually in the bathroom. Book love spreads, like a happy virus. As my youngest watched how much his older brother enjoyed these potty story times, he soaked up the book love. He now sits in my lap, pointing to the pictures, and picks his own book to join in. His current favorite:

My Mother, the Hole in My Heart

I have struggled with this post for days.
It concerns a very intimate pain in my life, one that has shaped the person I am today. It's emotionally intense, consider yourself warned.

Mother's day has always been a holiday of mixed feelings. Now with two children of my own, this emotional mess has reached critical mass.

The summer I turned 8, I lost my mother to organ failure. Her death was sudden and slow in the same breath, she grew sick and passed within a week, her final days spent in a hospital as her body stopped working a piece at a time. It was a terrible reaction to a pain medication, it blind sided our family, leaving behind her husband and daughter.

My memories of this time are fractured and nightmarish. I remember the night my father came home, awake to hear my uncle's girlfriend ran past my room sobbing.  I crept down the hall to find her crying in the dark guest room and when she pulled me into her arms, I knew. The revelation punched a hole in my heart, I just lost one the most important people in my life.

Grief is a tangible presence, it hangs over you, clouding your personal light, and it's form and focus shift as you grow older. At first, her loss drove a spike through me, I ached for her down to my bones. It wasn't until I went back to school the anger hit. Kids can be unintentionally cruel. Ignorance and unease can also make them incredibly mean. In the space of a month, I became an outcast, the crybaby, something was wrong with me because I had no mother. My peers did not know how to react to this, they lashed out with cruel words and cold shoulders. Hurt and Anger stayed with me for a long time.

My father met the woman who is now my step mother when I was 10 years old.
In retrospect, the relationship to my step mother is a complex tapestry we have spent years piecing together. She had grown two children of her own, and while it's rather easy to graft a new spouse onto an established family, it is far more difficult to add a younger child into the mix. The difficulties I had in forging a relationship with my step mother fall on both sides of the fence. I don't want to talk about them. I have dwelt on the bitterness and resentment that bled from my attempts to form a maternal bond with my step mother long enough. I will be 30 in two years and I still call her by her first name as often as I allow myself to call her 'Mom'.

I do call her on Mother's day, of course I do, despite our struggles and pitfalls, she has been a crucial part of my life, and she pulled my father from the dark pit my mother's death put him in. I will always be grateful to her for the love she has given my family.
But I know I do not have that maternal bond with her. It is a bond I have sought my entire life. I see it in the strong friendships I have with older women in my female circle, trying to fill a hole that feels bottomless.

My memories of my mother consist of her absence more than her presence.
I remember all the times I spent crying on the floor of my bedroom, wishing for nothing more than her arms around me. I remember milestones in my development where I needed her advice desperately. Health class aside, it took my years not to view my menstruation cycle with shame. How do I deal with crushes? How do I deal with cliques, and still be myself? I remember her not taking pictures of me when I attended my first dance, of her not warning me to be safe with my dates. I remember her not being at my high school graduation, or my college one.

I remember her not being there to see my babies when they were born.
But my greatest heartbreak, is I cannot remember her face.

I am afraid I will have trouble keeping a maternal bond with my children as they grow older, or that my bond with them is defective. I fear dying on my children. I cannot dwell on my mortality without dissolving into a shuddering bundle of nerves. I refuse to let these fears take over the memory of my mother.

Her loss is a pillar of my personality. You may not consider this a positive thing but I have come to see it that way. My mother encouraged my imagination and creativity until the end of her days, my imagination has become my solace, my power. From my imagination, I drew the strength to survive. I became a storyteller, a weaver of destinies, taking life into my inked up hands. From the loss of my mother, I became strong through struggle, hardened by adversity. I am still a weeper, I cry when I am angry, but I will survive whatever you throw at me. I have pulled myself out of deep depression over and over because my mother gave me a fierce will to live. Her loss has made me treasure each female friendship I have, they may have not filled the hole in my heart but they have formed the bandage over it. Even with great distance between us or swamped by the busy chaos of day to day living, I think of my ladies all the time.

Mother's day, truthfully any holiday, draws out the contemplation of the woman who gave me life, and whose absence I keenly continue to feel. My children are still young and I know they will grow up feeling the love of my husband's family, and my beautifully imperfect sewn together family. They will call my step mother 'grandma' and I am confidant she will love them as fiercely as she loves her other grandchildren. And as I sit here, typing with my son asleep against my chest, I know under all those irrational fears I have of being a flawed mother, I will be perfect for my children.

Someday, I will sit my children down and tell them the story of their other grandmother, the woman whose absence has become a presence in itself. I will tell them of the woman who shaped and influenced the person I am even though she couldn't be there.

My mother is a hole in my heart. It's been over twenty since her passing. This hole has never closed. Year after year, I have slowly filled this hole from the bottom up with memory, tears, dreams, love, and hope. It's not full yet, I don't know if it ever will be, but it is a part of me, a part I have finally accepted for the negative and the positive.

Happy Mother's Day, Mom.

“Didn’t you get tested?” A Rant, A Cry, A Hope

“Didn’t you get tested?”

There are so many things I could say about this article. As a mother whose son has been labeled Development Delayed, I actually broke down in tears reading it.
Whether you agree with genetic pre-screening or not, this speaks to a much darker issue in our society. I have often asked myself if I could terminate a pregnancy if I knew ahead of time my child would have down syndrome. To my knowledge there is still no test to screen for autism, since most forms of autism do not clearly manifest until the child is over a year old. I am a strong supporter of reproductive choice and rights, so it comes down to personal choice. For my answer, no I couldn't do it, I would have the child and shower it will all the love I do my other two children.
But what really bothers me about the whole issue, is

"Why has it become so agonizing to bring a down syndrome child into this world?"

We treat down syndrome like it's something shameful of, to pity the parents who have been "burdened" with raising mentally handicap children. To that knee jerk response I say "What the Fuck, society?" Why don't you put all that judgmental b.s. into improving the quality of life for all people with mental handicaps. People with D.S. or Autism are still people. If you judge these people based on how they were born, or their parents for "bringing them into this world", then you have just quantified a human life, their life is worth less than a 'normal' person.
Genetic perfection through elimination. Remember that Holocaust thing. Whoa, now,that's a little extreme, right? Perhaps, but remember, Hitler's plan was not to simply eliminate the Jewish people, they were just a part of the target population. He wanted to eliminate everyone he considered imperfect, which included physical and mental handicaps. He considered these people less than human and killed millions upon millions of people to achieve Genetic Perfection.

Fuck genetic perfection. Hey science, I know you are gung ho about solving these problems before they happen but this is what I want to see. I want to see science unlock the brain, the organ at the root of this issue. A true challenge, figure out how to rewire the brain around the neural pathways of D.S. Of all the organs in our body, the brain is the most complex, the hardest to understand, the organ that is incredibly difficult to repair and is so very easily damaged. We understand a great deal about our bodies, much more than we did even fifty years ago. Who knows, in another fifty years, perhaps science will access the huge percentage of our brains we don't use, find a way to cure autism and D.S. in adults. We have ways to give sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf, is it so big a leap to heal the brain? I, for one, would fully support that research. Need stem cells? Do it. If parents feel their only options are to abort a fetus or subject themselves to a lifetime of assholes, then I feel we have shoved science in the wrong direction. And we have seriously gone off the rail of what we should be as a society.

My son and I have difficult days. We are currently trying to potty train him, a task filled with many tears and frustration. My son constantly babbles, and it is hard to get him to string three words together. He still needs help dressing some days, and often doesn't listen. I feel like I lose my temper and yell at him too much. But...
He loves to sing, he gives these full body hugs, tucking his head against my neck, and sweet little pecking kisses on my lips. He still comes to me for comfort when he hurts himself, and loves to be read to. He has memorized several of his favorites and tries so hard to read along. Yes we have our difficult days, but if I had the choice to go back, I would still pick him every time.

Son, don't grab the honey bees...

Despite drinking an over abundance of caffeine, I'm constantly exhausted, restless sleeping at night, and my drive to do pretty much anything is zilch. Plus there is that random racing heartbeat thing which at first I attributed to maybe cutting back on the pot of coffee in the morning. At the urging of my husband, I finally broke down and sought out a doctor's office.
This is trickier than it sounds. I descend from French Canadian fur trappers, unless I'm losing a limb or dying, most illnesses and maladies can be toughed out with a band aid, neosporin, and alcohol. Don't get me wrong, I faithfully attended my OB while carrying all my children, and I will bring them to the doctor for a runny nose, but when it comes to myself, meh. I have sliced myself open with kitchen knives pretty good, wrapped them up in gauze and tape and went to work bleeding through my bandages. Rarely, unless I am hospital worthy sick, do I seek medical attention. Which can be a problem because when you only take care of the big things, the little things pile up. Which brings us back to heart palpitations, a twitchy eye, and maybe a rash I need to get checked out (relax it was just eczema). So I attempt to make an appt. Since I am a new patient, I get one weeks away. Funny how that works, when you finally break down and go for a doctor, it's an epic quest to find one.
When I finally get into that office, it's one of those startling little wake up calls. She starts throwing out words I don't like, the diabetes, anemia, I zoned out a bit after that. The racing heart beat worries her, (well doc, it worries me too, hence I have dragged myself in here). She even asks if I am nervous coming here. After the Fur Trapper explanation, she prescribes exercise, At least 30 mins a day.
Now, I am saying to myself "Duh, really?" I'm a writer, and a gamer, my people are notorious for their cave dwelling ways, but I'm also a mother of two very active little boys, which in my mind is plenty of freaking exercise thank you very much. Three days later I tried to take her up on the order and took the little guy out for a walk while big brother was schooling.
I carried him on my shoulders through the neighborhood, discovering a field at the bottom of the hill I didn't realize was there for the three years we lived here. As he ran around, decapitating dandelions and trying to snatch honey bees out of the air, I'm realizing I really do need to get out more. This is even more obvious trying to go back, which is all up hill mind you. Half way up I'm embarrassingly gasping for air like a fish on dry land while my son clings to my head. I have to stop midway to "let him run around some more" so I can find where I dropped my lungs.
Dear god when did I get so out of shape? But really, that Dr. visit was disheartening. I have no misconceptions that I have a body shaped by motherhood, I earned my scars and stripes, but I have not been taking care of myself. That's a terrible feeling. I don't feel healthy anymore. So after staggering back into the house, and drinking water (go, go, healthy me!) I firmly resolve to take my little tyke out bee chasing as often as I can if I have to throw myself out the door.
Though next time, perhaps I should wear sunscreen. I think I burnt my elbows.

My son feeds his stuffed animals...

I probably spend an unhealthy amount of time worrying about my first born.

After many agonizing years and withstanding the judgement of family and friends alike, I still have to softly explain he is not autistic, at least they won't call it that yet. Instead he has the all inclusive title of "development delay", which is as vague and frustrating as it sounds and comes with nine different kinds of therapy all in an attempt to get him "back on track."
Anyone who tells you kids just develop on their own is selling some horseshit. Once they miss a couple of developmental markers the dominoes start to fall. I know my son is different, he has difficulty speaking, often shrieks loudly for no apparent reason while playing, is fighting all attempts at toilet training like we dipped his hand in battery acid, and is extremely clumsy. In comparison, his one year old brother, half his size, has already caught up and passed him in some areas. The Freak to his Max, the little guy runs circles around him, knows just how to push his buttons, and I think is already starting to grasp sarcasm.
And while it's terrifying, faced with the difference between them everyday, wondering how he will grow up, I sometimes get a glimpse of something, a moment that lets me know: He is going to be okay.
He learned how to kiss and hug us long ago, but just started giving his brother kisses last week. His dinosaurs have a special place of honor, set up like soldiers on his bed rail to guard him while he sleeps. Sometimes I catch him trying to feed graham crackers to his stuffed animals, especially cookie monster. That little bugger loves cookies, and my son knows it.
I still worry mountains down to sand. There is a long, rough, path for him ahead, but he's got love and compassion in him, and a little brother who runs circles around him. Yup, definitely Okay.