What is it about her? 

Is it that we are of an age?

Or that various roles she played have created markers in my own life?

My first encounter with blonde Ms. Lumley was not long after my husband and I married, when she became the striking, afraid-of-nothing Purdey from The Avengers.

I’d always been an Avengers fan but Purdey captured my twenty-something’s imagination so much, not only did I have my hair cut in the Purdey style (no images of self  will be shown!), but we named our first Jack Russell after her.

Then of course there was Ab Fab – and no, nothing about Pats captured me enough to make me a drug addict or name my dog after her. But she made me laugh till my sides split and I sooo admired Saffi’s patience. (But I have been known to occasionally put the hair in a French roll although not as much air or hair as Pats.)

There have been the Miss Marples where Lumley plays Miss Marple’s best friend – a wonderfully portrayed eccentric. And there have been many roles I haven’t been fortunate enough to see… roles she describes with fresh honesty in her book, Joanna Lumley.

There’ve been other documentaries. Her Girl Friday documentary was impressive. Filmed off the coast of Madagascar it was laced with truth, no artifice, no makeup, no smart clothes – telling it like was – difficult. She did what I could never do! Survivor without the glitz and prizes.

Then the Search for the Northern Lights – enthusiasm, delight… such delight that it’s impossible not to share in the thrill. Each time, she peels aways the layers allowing one woman’s view of a particular event.

Her successful effort waging war on Parliament for the Gurkhas was covered internationally… she became an outspoken heroine.

And now the Nile.

So what is it about her?

For both my husband and myself it is, as mentioned, unbounded enthusiasm, sometimes the most delicious but miniscule naivety. She uses the wonderfully English word ‘thrilling’ to describe so much and one is quite capable of being ‘thrilled’ by her. She displays superb etiquette and respect for the cultures in which she finds herself and just occasionally a little bit of naughtiness – that tiny seductive glint – timeless flirting in action and men in every culture and of any age adoring her for it.

It’s so refreshing to watch television and see natural enjoyment of life displayed spontaneously, and especially by someone from my own generation.

Today, so much has the capacity to make one feel tired, disillusioned and bored.

Thankfully life through Joanna’s eyes is the complete reverse.

Turning Medieval

by Sarah Woodbury

Sometimes it’s easy to pinpoint those moments in your life where everything is suddenly changed.  When you look across the room and say to yourself, I’m going to marry him.  Or stare down at those two pink lines on the pregnancy test, when you’re only twenty-two and been married for a month and a half and are living on only $800 a month because you’re both still in school and my God how is this going to work?

And sometimes it’s a bit harder to remember.

Until I was eleven, my parents tell me they thought I was going to be a ‘hippy’.  I wandered through the trees, swamp, and fields of our 2 ½ acre lot, making up poetry and songs and singing them to myself.  I’m not sure what happened by the time I’d turned twelve, whether family pressures or the realities of school changed me, but it was like I put all that creativity and whimsicalness into a box on a high shelf in my mind.  By the time I was in my late-teens, I routinely told people: ‘I haven’t a creative bone in my body.’  It makes me sad to think of all those years where I thought the creative side of me didn’t exist.

When I was in my twenties and a full-time mother of two, my husband and I took our family to a picnic with his graduate school department.  I was pleased at how friendly and accepting everyone seemed.

And then one of the other graduate students turned to me out of the blue and said, ‘do you really think you can jump back into a job after staying home with your kids for five or ten years?’

I remember staring at him, not knowing what to say.  It wasn’t that I hadn’t thought about it, but that it didn’t matter—it couldn’t matter—because I had this job to do and the consequences of staying home with my kids were something I’d just have to face when the time came.

Fast forward ten years and it was clear that this friend had been right in his incredulity.  I was earning $15/hr. as a contract anthropologist, trying to supplement our income while at the same time holding down the fort at home.  I remember the day it became clear that this wasn’t working.  I was simultaneously folding laundry, cooking dinner, and slogging through a report I didn’t want to write, trying to get it all in before the baby (number four, by now) woke up.  I put my head down, right there on the dryer, and cried.

It was time to seek another path.  Time to follow my heart and do what I’d wanted to do for a long time, but hadn’t had the courage, or the belief in myself to make it happen.

At the age of thirty-seven, I started my first novel, just to see if I could.  I wrote it in six weeks and it was bad in a way that all first books are bad.  It was about elves and magic stones and will never see the light of day.  But it taught me, I can do this!

My husband told me, ‘give it five years,’ and in the five years that followed, I experienced rejection along my newfound path.  A lot of it.  Over seventy agents, and then dozens and dozens of editors (once I found an agent), read my books and passed them over.  Again and again.

Meanwhile, I just wrote.  A whole series.  Then more books, for a total of eight, seven of which I published in 2011.

And I’m happy to report that, even though I still think of myself as staid, my extended family apparently has already decided that those years where I showed little creativity were just a phase.  The other day, my husband told me of several conversations he had, either with them or overheard, in which it became clear they thought I was so alternative and creative—so far off the map—that I didn’t even remember there was a map.

I’m almost more pleased about that than anything else.  Almost.  Through writing, I’ve found a community of other writers, support and friendship from people I hadn’t known existed a few years ago, and best of all, thousands of readers have found my books in the last year.  Here’s to thousands more in the years to come . . . 

Links:

My web page:  http://www.sarahwoodbury.com/

My Twitter code is:  http://twitter.com/#!/SarahWoodbury

On Facebook:   https://www.facebook.com/sarahwoodburybooks

Links to my books:  Amazon and Amazon UK
Smashwords  BarnesandNoble  Apple

In this tiny cottage, we are lit by the full face of the sun in summer and winter. The original owner was English and he and his wife had lived in Sweden and had an intrinsic understanding of the value of light in life. Thus this little house has masses of windows facing north… and just in case there was the slightest chance the sun thought it could escape lighting the house at any point, there are windows facing the morning east and the dusk west. 

In summer the prevalence of light can be almost blinding, a true Australian light. In winter, with the sun low in the sky each room is the most perfect suntrap with window seats in utterly suitable corners. One’s mood elevates, ‘lightens’ and one feels more positive, able to achieve more, happier. And even on a grey day the advantage of House is that the light illuminates, casting an ‘it’s okay’ luminescence over everything.

But light also means satisfaction, I think.

Yesterday and the day before, I felt completely overwhelmed with a writer’s workload. My latest book is in progressive ‘final edit’, I needed to write a blurb that sells it, I have a first draft fantasy which is the fourth of the Chronicles that needs attention, I needed to catch up on my own blogposts and I needed to build more pages for the fantasy world on this blog.

Last night and this morning, I worked and worked, whirling like a dervish through the demands above. The progressive edits are going well, the blurb is looking like it might get a credit from the inspector, and more detail has been uploaded into the fantasy world pages here at Mesmered.

When I walked out the gate with the dogs a couple of hours ago, a curious sense of lightness hovered around me, a sense that the heavy load was actually reduced.

I floated along the beach… and the sun slid out from behind the clouds.

Holes.

I used to think I had to be perfect. Of course, I fell short of perfection on a regular basis so I frequently felt like a failure.

The only way to prevent failure is to hide. If we don’t put ourselves out there, we can’t fail.

To prevent myself from failing, I hid in a fantasy world. As a young child, I longed to be a ballerina. I loved to dance, but more than that, I wanted to escape into the fantasy world of the ballet. I wanted to live inside a fairytale, and in my mind, I did. I invented worlds I could escape to, perfect worlds that seemed more real to me than life. Meanwhile, I ate, and ate, and ate. Not ideal, if you want to be a ballerina. My reality never matched my inner world.

I created this pattern, this external and internal disparity, throughout my life. I brought it into my marriage, convincing myself that my marriage was perfect, while in reality it was a mess. Instead of leaving, I found escape in writing. I lost myself other times: ancient Egypt, ancient Greece, ancient Rome—worlds as far away from my reality as possible. In my writing, I disappeared for hours, days, years. I got a job working at an airline so I could travel and do research. I got an agent. I felt sure I would be published.

Then my world fell apart. After nineteen years of marriage, my husband wanted a divorce. I fought it. Divorce didn’t fit my idea of perfection, my fairytale. I viewed this loss as a disaster, but in truth it was an opening, a hole leading me to greater understanding and compassion for myself and others.

I was broke, trying to live on what I made at the airline. I was lonely. I had no time to write. Worst of all, I had to admit my life wasn’t perfect. I wasn’t perfect. Forced to accept myself with all my imperfections, I discovered that the more I could accept myself, the more I could accept others. Even my ex-husband. To this day, we remain friends.

Because I no longer had time to sit down and write for hours, the kind of time it takes to write a novel, I wrote short stories. I wrote about my experience, about my struggles as a woman of fifty going through divorce and entering the dating world. Initially, I wrote the stories for myself as therapy. Then I began to share the stories with my writing group. They encouraged me to submit the stories to magazines, and several were published. I read a couple of stories at our local library and people laughed. Then my good friend, Blake Crouch, convinced me to publish the stories on Kindle. A frightening prospect. What if my stories weren’t good enough? What if they weren’t perfect?

At first I resisted. I’d had two literary agents, and a longtime dream of being traditionally published. Self-publishing didn’t fit my idea of perfection. But, in reality, I no longer had an agent, and I hadn’t worked on a novel for several years. What did I have to lose? Nothing. So I published Dating My Vibrator (and other true fiction).

My world changed, not because I was finally published, but because I changed. I finally found the confidence to pursue my dream despite my imperfections. I found the courage to stop hiding and put myself out into the world. This freed me.

I rewrote my novel, Vestal Virgin—suspense in ancient Rome. Originally, my characters were a bit flat. Why? Because they were too perfect! I hadn’t looked at the manuscript for two years, and a lot had changed for me in that time. I rewrote the book with a cold eye: cutting, digging deeper. My characters became multifaceted, real people with flaws.

I became busier and busier, caught in a whirlwind, trying to hold down a full-time job, write, promote my books and have a life. Trying, once again, to be perfect.

And then the universe stepped in.

I had an accident at work. While moving a jet stair (which weighed over 1,000 pounds) away from the aircraft, my right foot got crushed. I fell, screaming, onto the tarmac while passengers onboard the plane watched. A coworker rushed me to the hospital for the first of three emergency surgeries. I suffered intense pain due to nerve damage, broken and dislocated toes and, ultimately, amputation of a toe. As I write this, I’m still recovering.

I spent five weeks at a nursing home, a good place for me (even though most of the patients were over eighty years old), because it would have been close to impossible for me to take care of myself at home. While there, I had a chance to meet a lot of the patients and residents. All of us had obvious holes.

I learned a lot from the other patients. And I was forced to face my own mortality. Aging offers us the gift of acceptance. In order to age gracefully, we must the release the idea of perfection. We learn there are some things we can change, and some things we must accept. And, when we accept what is, we may find the good in even the most difficult situations. We learn to accept the holes in ourselves and others. We even welcome imperfection.

Since the accident, I’ve been thinking about holes a lot. I’ve been thinking about being whole, in relation to loss. How can loss make a person whole? I’ve learned that loss can make a person strong, more self-reliant. Loss can make us more compassionate to ourselves and others.

Where I had a toe, there’s now a hole, and that hole reminds me that I’m not perfect. But, despite my imperfection, I am whole. I am me. It would be ridiculous to think that I am any less of a person, because I’m missing a toe, because I have a hole. Just as it’s ridiculous for any of us to think we must be perfect.

Physical wounds can’t be hidden as easily as emotional and psychological wounds. And that’s a gift. Physical wounds make us confront our mortality, our humanity. Physical wounds can’t be denied. They are tangible and force us to accept ourselves, with all our imperfections.

It’s impossible to get through life without being wounded. Some wounds are obvious. Others are internal, even spiritual: the loss of the ability to trust, to connect deeply, to hold a friend and know that you are loved.

We run away from wounds. Try not to look at them. We think they’re signs of weakness, but our wounds—the holes in us—provide a doorway, a soft spot in our armor. We walk around armored, protecting ourselves with platitudes and false smiles, never touching our own vulnerabilities, afraid to share our tender rawness with another or even with ourselves.

If we can touch the tender spots, allow ourselves to feel fear, sorrow, loss, we become closer to wholeness. The more we accept our holes, the more compassion we can have for others. When we feel compassion we are able to connect. We are able to expose our soft underbelly to another human being and share the salt of our tears, the sweetness of our joy. That’s what I want to write about, that’s what I want to share, because salt makes all the difference between a bland, protected life, and a true life: pulsing, bloody, messy, passionate and truly whole.

Flaws, or holes, are what make a character seem real—in life and in fiction. Perfection is impermanent, an illusion. A person who seems too perfect is repulsive. We don’t trust him. We know that person can’t be real. Holes speak of truth. Holes allow us to connect, to ourselves and to each other. Our holes make us human, make us beautiful. Holes allow the light to shine through.

If someone had asked me last spring, “Would you give up a toe in order to learn, in order to have time to write your next novel?” I might have said, “Yes.”

Funny, how life works.

My guest in the Red Chair  surprised me in our initial chat when he stated outright that he felt he was born with the ability to write. What surprised me was not that he said such a thing, but that I had never thought of writing that way. Some time ago I was asked whether I thought writers were born, not made and I sidestepped the issue by saying I felt at the very least, writers must have imagination and creativity. I remember saying that knowing all the so-called RULES of writing, didn’t necessarily make for a good story-teller. Was I saying the same thing as my guest? That writers are born with the ability? Read on and see what Matt Posner has to say…

1. To begin with why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself – where were you born? Raised? Schooled?

I was born in Glens Falls, NY, a small town nearby upstate New York’s famous Lake George resort area. I was raised and schooled in a number of places, including Durham, North Carolina and especially Miami, Florida, which I still think of as my home town although I have to say that about New York City also. My schooling was in Florida from age 8 up, all public and state schools, until I went for my second master’s degree in Alabama. So really I am a Florida person who has become a New Yorker by living in New York for a long time. That’s pretty typical for a New Yorker; the pace and the pressure do transform you, and if you meet me, you will find me to fit one of the typical New York personality profiles:  quick, brusque, impatient, harried, task-oriented, but good at heart.

2. What did you want to be when you were twelve, eighteen and thirty? And why?

At twelve I decided to be a fiction writer. At eighteen I was actively writing novels. At thirty I was newly married, had had writer’s block for years, and was scrambling for work while making the transition (education credits, experience) from teaching college in Miami to teaching grade school in New York. I always did some writing, but it took me a long time to find myself as a writer. Now I can always write when I have time and focus, but I was stuck from about 1996 (when I finished a painful MFA program in Tuscaloosa, AL) until about 2004-5, when I was in the home stretch with The Ghost in the Crystal.

Why did I want to be a writer? I think I was born with the ability. My early play was much more about narrative and character than the average kid’s. My parents are musicians, and I inherited a fraction of their musical talent, but only a fraction, whereas I am a natural with writing. To give you an idea what I mean, once I finish drafting this interview, I will probably not change more than a sentence or two:  it comes out the way I want it to be.

Matt Posner

Being a natural doesn’t make it easy; I think many successful writers are successful not because of any basic talent but because of a combination of strong effort and happening to be drawn to write what people want to read.  I often think success is mostly about luck, but the caveat is the Samuel Goldwyn saying, “The harder I work, the luckier I get.”

3. What strongly held belief did you have at eighteen that you do not have now?

When I was eighteen, I wanted to write on my dorm room wall “Literature is bullshit.” I felt that there was a distinction between Literature, a pretentious enterprise in which writers were deliberately obscure in order to intimidate others, and real writing, in which writers used their skills to communicate with readers.

I no longer believe this. I can only say now that there is stuff that people want to read and stuff that they don’t. A lot of Literature is stuff that people used to want to read but don’t anymore. And then there’s still the annoying crap, but in each case, the author was responding to the current conditions (the Zeitgeist) and to the conditions in his life and to the particular nature of his talent. My style (easy to read, with literary elements that you can find if you look) isn’t ever going to be how everyone writes.

4. If your work could change one thing in this world – what would it be?

I write mainly for personal, selfish reasons, but if I could indeed change one thing in this world, realistically speaking, it would be to give readers a sense of wonder and a sense of hope. The world is not devoid of meaning, but full of infinite fascinating variety. We are not limited to what is in front of our noses, but we can seek out amazement daily.

5. Whom do you most admire and why?

I’ve cited my influences in interviews before, so let me say something different this time around. Lately I’ve been teaching Shakespeare, so I’ll write about Shakespeare’s influence upon me. Even though I see the formulaic nature of the plays, I am still just stunned by the verbal facility, the power with words. Here is a selection from King Lear which I have taught in the last few weeks. The disguised Earl of Kent is insulting a servant of low character:

KENT
<I call thee> A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a
base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited,
hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a
lily-livered, action-taking knave, a whoreson,
glass-gazing, super-serviceable finical rogue;
one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a
bawd, in way of good service, and art nothing but
the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pander,
and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch: one whom I
will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deniest
the least syllable of thy addition.

Kent just pounds on the guy with insult after insult after insult, with withering words, at a dazzling pace. Most people couldn’t think of this many insults in a month of trying, all painful, and all well-deserved by the recipient. I put something like it in my fourth book of my series, but it will be a while till I can share that.

This is certainly not the only reason to admire Shakespeare — there are dozens of reasons — but it should prove serviceable in regard to your question.

6. Many people set themselves very ambitious goals. Do you believe in goal setting? What are yours?

A younger writer I met last year asked me if I expected to be successful. I said, “Within ten years. Not immediately.” While I know a lot of indie writers have rocketed to success, at least in terms of readership, I am not John Locke or Amanda Hocking. Those two authors’ career success is less a goad than a taunt to me, but I do understand that I will need to be awfully patient and build awareness of my brand, keep doing promotional stuff that has no visual effect and wait for a break. Again, “The harder I work, the luckier I am.”

7. What advice would you give writers?

I always answer this the same way:  get a well-paid career and write in addition to that that.  Trying to get established as a writer is a succession of frustrations and humiliations — you don’t need to add money stress on top of them. ‘Nuff said.

If you want advice about how to write well, I say that all story must emerge from characters, not from concepts. “Wouldn’t it be cool if this and that happened?”  Yeah, sure it would, but only if the people in the story are interesting. If people behave according to the needs of the plot rather than in a believable way, or if they are bland or unlikeable characters, the fiction won’t work well.

8. What are the last five websites you visited?

Facebook, Amazon (KDP, .com, .co.uk), Goodreads, Cracked.com, Tinyurl.com. And Twitter on my iPad as I can no longer log in on my computer without massive annoyance.

9.  What is your guiltiest pleasure that few know about?

I like to watch professional wrestling. I’ve given up watching wrestling in order to focus on building a writing career, but I used to watch a couple of hours a week and listen to pro wrestling podcasts from a subscription service as my primary entertainment while commuting. And before anyone asks, Andre the Giant.

10. If music be the food of love, what do you think art is and please explain your answer?

Art is a man-made reaction to life which provides some combination of entertainment, intellectual stimulation, and emotional release.  This definition encompasses the forms of art I like — film, drama, literature, music, visual arts (painting, sculpture), architecture — and the forms I don’t (dance, fashion).  Paradoxically, art depicts life by creating a falsification of it. The reality is that if a person considers something art, and has taken some sort of transformative action detectable by the senses, then it is art. It doesn’t have to fit any specific aesthetic standard. I may not care for certain artworks (“Piss Christ” by Andres Serrano, “F@ck Tha Police” by NWA, the choreography of Mark Morris, Two Broke Girls, any performance by Will Ferrell) and really like others (Michelangelo’s Pieta, the collective works of Rene Magritte, Pride and Prejudice, The Lord of the Rings, Unforgiven) but they all count as art.

Links:

Tales of Christmas Magic exclusively at amazon: US: http://tinyurl.com/84ezfrq and UK: http://tinyurl.com/7686u7o

Level Three’s Dream at Amazon US: http://tinyurl.com/3n29g6c

Level Three’s Dream at Amazon UK (I love my UK readers too!): http://tinyurl.com/3qvdbvk

Level Three’s Dream for Nook: http://tinyurl.com/3qehfgc

The Ghost in the Crystal at Amazon US: http://tinyurl.com/5wf5ypu

The Ghost in the Crystal at Amazon UK: http://tinyurl.com/3pepoby

The Ghost in the Crystal for Nook: http://tinyurl.com/44k8eto

The Ghost in the Crystal in Paperback: http://tinyurl.com/3gvapuk at Amazon or http://tinyurl.com/44j8klr

Kindle All-Stars Resistance Front, huge charity anthology with more than 30 pieces helmed by Harlan Ellison, Alan Dean Foster, Jon F. Merz, and others! http://tinyurl.com/7hqry37

The Evil Within charity horror anthology featuring stories by Kristyn West, Amber Scott, Kelli McCracken, Rachel Thompson, Patricia McCallum (my pal…) and me, 99C of real creepiness: http://tinyurl.com/3h8hmuu

After Dark charity paranormal anthology featuring Susan Roebuck, S. Ramos O’Briant, Stuart Nager, Isobel Herring, Gordon Bonnet, Gillian Taber, Lisa Voogt, and me: http://tinyurl.com/3hua6sy

With Love anthology for Japan at Amazon: http://tinyurl.com/3udh5kf featuring a supernatural story by me. Also in paperback and also sold at Smashwords.

Vampire Poet — featuring original poetry and photography designed for a Kindle screen: Amazon US: http://tinyurl.com/3zlv3ah Amazon UK: http://tinyurl.com/3wa72qn

For quite a long while readers have asked about the fantasy world of Eirie, and finally, after prompting from my digital publisher MWiDP, I am creating a page and sub-pages to illustrate the world as I know it. I hope it will help any reader who may want to get to know the world more.

It might give you an idea of world-building and what an intrinsic part of any novel it is. It can have as great a relevance in a historical fiction novel and more, as it does in a fantasy novel.

My partner in this endeavour is Pat Sweet from the highly respected Bo Press Studio but occasionally there will be others I shall introduce to you.

In the meantime, welcome to my world, Eirie, and in particular, The Chronicles of Eirie.

http://mesmered.wordpress.com/the-chronicles-of-eirie-2/

Mummy said to write and tell you of my latest adventure, but I don’t think it was an adventure. It hurt and I got very frightened.
I got bitten by a BEE today… or a jackjumper ant. Not sure which. But Grandmother T. chases bees and she never gets bitten and it looked such fun!

Swelling on left of screen, smaller after needles. He couldn't see out of his eyes, before the needles

I scratched at the door and Auntie C. let me in and I ran to Mum’s and Dad’s room and threw up THREE TIMES all over their carpet and then I think they saw my face and ran round like puppies, yapping! Mum picked me up and I couldn’t see her cos my face was so big and my eyes all scrunched and I felt really woozy and floppy.
Next thing I knew we were in a car and I was in Mum’s arms and she was cuddling me and kissing the top of my head I think, but I ‘m not sure cos I just felt funny and breathing was a bit hard.

And theeen,  we were in a doggy doctor’s and it was a different place to Auntie H’s because Auntie H’s surgery was too far away from where we were on holidays. The doggy doctor felt me all over. It hurt my lips but I was very quiet. They gave me two needles and I was SO brave… didn’t cry once cos I’m a Jack Russell and named after a famous spy from a show called Spooks!

My tail wagged after that and we went back to the car after they had peeled Dad off the floor when he paid the bill and we drove back to the cottage and I slept aaallll the way!  My face wasn’t as bad and all the other dogs welcomed me back and I drank lots and lots of water and wee-ed and wee-ed and wee-ed!

My face’s okay now but Mum and Dad said they’re tired and that Grandfather M. is channelling through me, whatever that means. I think it’s got to do with money as they call him the $6 million dollar dog. He’s a LEGEND!

Great Auntie J, did you know that dogs can be bitten anywhere by bees and their faces’ll still swell up like mine? Like a balloon. Dad said if he’d stuck a pin in it, I’d pop!
Anyway, I’m a bit tired. Before I got bitten I went swimming in the river with Grandmother T. and that was amaaaazing!

Lots of love and maybe you could tell Auntie H. (Pup’s vet)

Pup

Three years ago I was a fledgling indie with my first book in print. At that time I met a woman online who was destined to become a kindred spirit. She is an artist, a sculptor, a woodworker, an intellectual, a stitcher and best of all a wit. She lives in California and I live in Australia and yet more than half the time we talk as if we just live over the back fence from each other. Her former profession fascinates me, her current profession enthralls me. She is Patricia Sweet of Bo Press Miniature Books and she has agreed to be interviewed in the Big Red Chair…

Artist and illustrator: Patricia Sweet

Pat, to begin with why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself – where were you born? Raised? Schooled?

“ He was a farm boy from Way Down East and she was a dame from Brooklyn.” He wanted to teach college math, and she gave up her job as a  chemist to move to West Virginia with him and their baby (me).  I grew up surrounded by love, science, math, straight white Anglo-Saxon Protestants, and the Fanny Farmer cookbook. My father’s motto: “Hmmm. . .better not.” My mother’s motto: “You might as well laugh.”

My small-town childhood was idyllic, but it wasn’t a very intellectually  welcoming atmosphere for a smart kid, so I held my nose until I went to college, at the little two-year university feeder school where my father taught. There I discovered theater and costumes, and pursued them at West Virginia University, and after a couple years working in the costume shop in a regional repertory theater, I got my MFA at Southern Methodist University.

Illustration of Moncrieff Castle for Gisborne.

What did you want to be when you were twelve, eighteen and thirty? And why?

When I was twelve the only available professions for girls were teacher, ballerina, nurse, and stewardess. And of course, Wife and Mother. All I really liked to do was read, so teacher, I guess.

When I was eighteen, we were all given a list by our guidance counselor and told to pick a profession, and she would give us information about it. The first job on the list was archeologist, so I picked that. The counselor told me she had no information about archeology, and to pick something else.

Thirty? Now you’re talking! I wanted to take New York by storm as a costumer. I stayed there two years, realizing I would never have the ambition or nerve to live as a freelancer, and besides, my sublet was up. I got a job offer from an old grad school chum in California, and jumped at it rather than undergo the humiliation of having to move to one of the outer boroughs.

What strongly held belief did you have at eighteen that you do not have now?

That I had to solve every problem myself, from scratch. I still had the common teen-age belief that I was unique, or crazy, or Martian. It took me a long time to realize that I was just like everybody else, with the same dreams, fears and problems, and the more important knowledge that this was a good thing.

What were three big events – in the family circle or on the world stage or in your artistic life – you can now say had a great effect on you and influenced you in your career path?

My first college had a little theatre club, and I went to their first meeting. When asked what I wanted to do for their productions, I allowed as how I was too shy and stuttery to act, but that I could sew. Great, the director said, you can make all our costumes, and as for being onstage, trust me, you’ll like it. I discovered that my stutter disappeared when I was speaking memorized lines, but the great event was when the director complimented my first costumes and said the magic words, “You know, you could do this for a living.”

French fabric sample book

In grad school I realized that designing costumes was fun, but making costumes was even better. I grew to relish my increasing skills and mastery of pattern and fabric, and working out the technical problems of stage clothing was fascinating. When I told my committee I would be a cutter/draper and costume shop manager rather than a designer, they were disappointed, but one professor praised me for knowing my own mind. I still think it was a wise decision.

At the age of 55, after many years alone, I got married. This caused a cascade of new experiences and ideas that changes my life profoundly. I retired early and started making miniature books, first as a hobby, and then as a business.

Your work in the theatre could be called work in the large, in the round. So why go so completely the other way: to miniature?

Artistically, the problems of scale are surprisingly similar: both small and large designs benefit from simplified designs with minimum detail. But I think the real reason for my love of making miniature books is hand sewing. I didn’t get to do a lot of it in the theater, because what doesn’t show doesn’t matter, and time is money. I would have loved to lavish beading and embroidery and hand-sewn tailoring on my costumes, but it just wasn’t cost-effective.

And yet you don’t restrict yourself to the miniature field. You are challenging yourself with other work. Can you explain?

I learned to use Photoshop as a designer, and I make the illustrations and format my books with it. As with bookbinding, I’m self-taught, but I’ve been designing maps and illustrations for the Eirie and Gisborne books, and hope to do much more. Learning a new skill is the most fun thing I know.

What is your opinion of the electronic world and its vast social media and does it work in your career?

It’s been the life’s blood of my new career. If not for the existence of eBay, Etsy, and Facebook, Bo Press wouldn’t exist.  I use social networks almost exclusively for business, but I’ve also found new friends and pathways to new ideas and methods that wouldn’t have come my way otherwise.

Pat, I know you often have several different things on the go in the studio, please tell us about your latest piece of work or works.

The miniature version...

I’m working on a miniature version of French fabric sample books, using swatches of fabric from famous paintings as samples. It’s been a great education – I’ve looked at hundreds of paintings I never saw in Art History class. Painting fabric is one of the greatest challenges for an artist, and seeing how painters have handled it through history has been fascinating. I’m also planning more miniature library furniture: book stands, traveling libraries, map cases . . .

If your work could change one thing in this world – what would it be?

I hope it will give the people who see my work a few moments free of cynicism.

Whom do you most admire and why?

My mother and my husband, and for the same thing: bravery.

Also for inclusion in Gisborne on publication.

Many people set themselves very ambitious goals. Do you believe in goal setting? What are yours?

Whatever works, but I was born with no ambition. I work hard, and follow my nose. Sometimes I don’t know I have a goal ’till I achieve it.

What advice would you give artists of all persuasions?

Never apologize for your work. Never, never, never. If there’s something wrong with it, plenty of people will be glad to tell you. If you’ve looked at it closely enough, you already know what’s wrong with it, so fix it. If you tell people your work is good, they’ll believe you. If you tell people your work is bad, they’ll believe you. Never.

What are the last five websites you visited?

Google (for spelling, my downfall)

Coryographies: a new blog by a lady I met on Etsy, who just mentioned Bo Press.

Facebook: a friend’s puppy got stung by a bee!

PayPal: filling orders

Amazon: damn Kindle

Twelfth century map replica for inclusion in Gisborne in Februrary.

What is your guiltiest pleasure that few know about?

I’m dead to shame. All my pleasures are out in public.

If music be the food of love, what do you think art is and please explain your answer?

Music is to food as art is to _______? 

Music is the food of love as art is the food of _______?

Music is to the food of love as art is to the ______ of ________?

M x food/love = AX    Solve for X. Show your work.

I don’t trust myself to define “food” accurately, much less music or love. Or art. You’re on your own.

Links:

Bo Press Miniature Books

Bo Press Blog

Bo Press Etsy Shop

Gisborne in miniature... a short story.

I have an occasional partnership with Pat and between us last year we created a miniature version of Gisborne containing a short-story. What that tiny book did was make me realise a second volume of Gisborne could be in the offing and that has turned out to be the case. The miniature Gisborne sold well internationally with perfect Gisborne black leather binding and an arrow clasp… reminiscent of the man after whom it is named…

Pat and I are also working closely together to create a WordPress blog on the fantasy world of Eirie which will tie in with publication of more of the fantasy Chronicles. On the blog people will have a chance to become intimate with a world where shadow and magick shape the lives of all who exist there.

The Stumpwork Robe

Already the Bo Press illustrations have fired my own imagination. It is  incredible to see something from my mind interpreted visually and for it to harmonise perfectly with my writing. I can’t wait to see what else she comes up with.

Thank you Pat, for being in the BRC today!

I Burned My Bra For This? One Woman’s Fantasy…

By Cheryl Shireman

I’m a Baby Boomer. Which means that I remember bell-bottoms, Happy Days, and having only three channels on the television. I played Donny Osmond albums on a record player. My parents watched Gunsmoke, and on Sunday nights we all watched The Wonderful World of Disney. In the living room. Together. On the only television we owned. Imagine that! I remember the first time I saw Bonanza in color. I remember the first time I heard about remote controls for televisions. The whole idea seemed ridiculous. With three channels, really, how often would it be needed? I remember the Watergate hearings playing on the television when I came home from school.

I also remember watching feminists (does anyone use that word anymore?) burn their bras and march for equal rights. I grew up believing that a woman deserves equal pay for equal work and that a woman is not defined by the man she marries or by the children she gives birth to. In fact, we were told that both men and children were optional. The idea seemed revolutionary at the time. It still does. Women were mad as hell and they weren’t taking it anymore. We called it Women’s Liberation, and though it was never said, it was certainly implied (and believed in most circles) that a woman who did not work was a bit inferior to a career woman. That was when such women were called housewives and not “stay at home” moms. Women were divided into two groups – those who worked and those who didn’t. Back then, no one thought that staying home and taking care of a family and home was work. The women of my generation wanted more, demanded more, and believed we were entitled to just that – more. We sometimes looked at our own mothers, most of whom did not have real jobs, as women who simply did not understand that there was more to life than being a mother. If truth be told, we thought they were a bit simple-minded and we secretly vowed to do more with our lives.

And yet…as this Baby Boomer looks at her life, I realize nothing I have ever done, or will ever do, is as important as being a mother. Not career, volunteer work, graduate school, or any creative pursuit. Nothing else even comes close to being a mother. Period.

One of my children lives half an hour away, another is one state away, and the third is on the other side of the world in Denmark. Yesterday, my husband and I spent the entire day with our two-year-old granddaughter. She then spent the night. As I write this, I hear her gentle breathing in the baby monitor positioned atop the table close to where I sit.

To say that my children, and now my granddaughter, have filled my life with love and joy is an understatement. As children, they expanded my heart in ways I could never have imagined. For the first time in my life, I not only understood, but received unconditional love. As adults, they are three people that I know I can always count on. They will always be there for me. Just as I will always be there for them. Can you say the same about your career?

There used to be a television show called Fantasy Island. People visited the island and lived out their fantasies – no matter how wild (okay, not that wild – this was primetime family tv in the seventies). Not too long ago, my husband and I had a discussion about that old tv show and asked each other – What would your fantasy be? Mine was easy. If I could have a Fantasy Island day, I would relive one day with my children. My son would be 10, which would make my daughters 4 and 2. We would spend the day doing whatever they wanted. Going to the park, going to the movies, playing games, baking cookies, or just sitting on the floor playing with Legos and Barbies. I would hug them a lot. And kiss the tops of their heads. And take tons of pictures. I wouldn’t cook. I wouldn’t clean. And I wouldn’t worry about my career.

I would watch my son show his younger sisters how to do things, like he always did in his older brother sort of way. I would watch my 2 year-old daughter follow her older 4 year-old sister around the room, shadowing her every move. Just as she did, even through their college years when they shared an apartment near Indiana University. I would watch the older sister taking care of her younger sister, as if she were her baby. Which is what she called her when she was born – my baby.

Bedtime would be later than usual on that fantasy night. I would tuck them into their beds, fresh from baths and smelling of shampoo. The girls smelling like baby lotion. My son would hug me goodnight with his long skinny arms and tell me he loves me. And I would feel the truth in that. I would tuck in my girls and tell them it is time to go to sleep. I would take extra care in covering the older girl’s feet, because she always kicked her blankets off during the night. I would kiss the baby and hold her a little longer, because I would know that, as I type this she is in Denmark which makes visiting tough.

And, as I walk down the hall and turn out the lights, I would call out to all of them, as I always did… “Goodnight. Love you. Sweet dreams. See you in the morning.”

And that would be my fantasy day. Oddly enough, it has nothing to do with my career as a writer. Even though being a writer has always been my dream. My first novel, Life is But a Dream: On the Lake, was published earlier this year. The main character, Grace Adams, is a woman facing an empty nest and the possible demise of her marriage. Grace withdraws to a secluded lake cabin to redefine her life and try to find a reason to continue living. While at the lake, Grace not only finds renewed purpose and hope, but when things take a turn for the worse at the lake, she finds a strength she never knew she possessed. The novel is thought-provoking, sometimes frightening, and often funny (just like life). It is also, very definitely, fiction.

I’m not Grace. Even though my “nest” is empty, I am enjoying this time and this new focus on my career. I am not suicidal or lacking in purpose. My husband and I both work from home (he designs websites), we live on a lake, and our schedule is our own. It is truly a wonderful time in our lives. Sometimes I have popcorn for dinner. Enough said.

But, would my current life be as wonderful if I had not pursued career and graduate school and developed the skills I am using now? Probably not. I managed to combine work and school and motherhood. I believed I could have it all, and do it all, but to be honest – the kids always came first. And being a mother is the strongest and best part of my identity. It is the thing I am most proud of. My greatest achievement. And, once in a while, I miss those days when toys where scattered across the floor, the washer was always running, and we bought eight gallons of milk a week.

If you have children at home, cherish those simple every-day moments with them. They really will be gone in the blink of an eye – sooner than you can possibly imagine. Put this book down. Now. Go sit on the floor and play a game. Pop some popcorn, put on one of their favorite movies, and cuddle up on the couch. Live that “fantasy” right now. You will never be able to recapture these moments. Enjoy them now. There is no greater gift than the love of your children. Spend the rest of your day letting it pour over you. And pour your love right back over them. You can come back to this book tonight, after they are asleep.

As I type this, I can hear my granddaughter waking up. I am shutting my computer off. Right now, I am going to go upstairs and scoop her up from her crib. She will probably wrap her little arms around my neck and ask, “Play blocks, Bomb Bomb?”

And we will play blocks.

This is one story from Indie Chicks: 25 Women 25 Personal Stories available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. To read all of the stories, buy your copy today. All proceeds go to the Susan G. Komen Foundation for Breast Cancer.

Also included are sneak peeks into 25 novels! My novel, Life Is But a Dream: On The Lake, is one of the novel excerpts featured. It is available at most online retailers in trade paperback as well as e-book formats.

Amazon US

Amazon UK

Barnes & Noble