ollie the hood

Got up at 4am to deliver Mom to the airport, came back to get the family off to their pursuits. I love to see the sun coming up and the slow waking of the highways, and the birds chiming in like harps in an overture. I napped on the couch for an hour, until the piano tuner arrived. Although I envied his coffee I stuck to water and sat watching him, listless and reluctant to move. He told me about his army days, and I told stories about my reporter days as he slid the keys up a quarter to half a note.

Surprising that I remember Ollie so well. The ex-villian who inspired scenes in Butterfly Eyes, who taught me how foolish and naive I'd been, haring around the ghettos of London in my British-racing-green mini as if being a reporter gave me some invisible shield.

One of our regular assignments were 'death calls'. Someone dies, we hear it on the police report, the editor sends you to interview survivors. In the posher districts, death came via accidents, or dodgy fire alarms and rollup cigarettes that slow-burned the carpet. But in the dicier parts of North London, you got blown up or stabbed or firebombed. I'd pull out the A-Z street atlas, get into the Mini with my notebook and pencil tucked into my purse, and go knocking on doors trying to get quotes from neighbors.

In the nicer districts, neighbours would open the door, invite you in for a cuppa, and say a non-committal sentence or two. In the dodgy places, you'd stand on some dirty, crooked and cracked step staring at a door that hadn't seen paint in two decades, and knock. Years later when I studied energy work, I learned to recognize the feeling of static electricity pillowing out from a door as a warning signal.

It took a couple years on this beat to learn how British police work. They didn't run out and arrest a suspect. They let him (or her) marinate for a few days, and kept poking back for questions, biding their time, gathering evidence. Then at 5am, they'd pounce and make the arrest. It gave the villain a false sense of security. It lulled him. And it gave the reporter time to go knock on his door and interview - guess who? - the murderer! We'd be invited in, would make cups of tea for this "devastated" partner, get quotes about how wonderful the little spouse was and what kind of maniac would do this? only to find out from police later that the bloody knife was under the bed in the next room. Not a pleasant job.

Now I've got a guardian angel who's been doing double-overtime since my birth, and this spell in London didn't give the heavenly hosts much relief. I remember my first interview with Ollie particularly well. He'd come into the newspaper offices, wanting to see a reporter about a story and I got sent down, a little cutie in a size six skirt and a red bolero jacket with a pencil and a spiral-bound. He had a tale about an upstairs neighbour who tried to kill him with a shotgun as he lugged groceries off the bus and up 15 flights to his apartment in the aptly-named (because it was so damned depressing) Dylan Thomas block of flats. I couldn't tell which pissed off Ollie more: that he dropped twenty-quid's worth of vegetables onto the linoleum skeedaddling to his apartment, or that the man had the front to try to shoot him. I agreed to come hear the whole story on Wednesday, when we'd finished putting the paper to bed.

The day comes and I find myself staring up at this tower block of concrete and steel with drab curtains in each dirty window. The elevator reeks of pee and vomit, and as the doors close I get the feeling: I'm not supposed to be here. I make it safely to floor 15, and find his door at the end of the concrete corridor. My knocking creates a scuffle on the other side as he shoots back bolts and finally peeks out through two inches of brass chain, then apologizes for being so careful.

Inside it's a dragon's cave. He's got turkish carpets, parquet, black leather sofas, a smoked glass coffee table: understated, expensive, and careful. I sit perched on the edge of the sofa, and make chicken-scratches in my notebook as he talks about this man, who had been in The 'Ville, and their mutual criminal acquaintances. I couldn't print these allegations - no way to verify anything. Like the Ethiopian refugees I'd met who'd seen relatives thrown to the crocodiles, Ollie needed to tell his story to someone, and I was 'it'.

After giving me a fruit juice glass of orange squash, and answering a few questions, I got up to leave. It occurred to me, I might not get out. That my editor didn't know when I'd be back or Ollie's address or his name. And with all those locks and bolts and fifteen floors between me and the car...but there he was, all gentleman, bustling at the door. That's when I noticed a square box on the wall next to the door. Balanced against the lintel on top of this box was a long, sharp, cruel-looking knife with a wooden handle. He noticed me noticing the knife and explained: 'in case he comes again.'

That afternoon I turned a corner. That afternoon I realized that crime and criminals are cheap glamour, and I'd bought into that kind of excitement, at my own personal expense. That afternoon I stopped doing death calls. I'd drive by a house, but I didn't have the heart to knock and go inside. When my editor said: "weren't they home?" I lied, and felt like a weasel but nothing could make me go back.

Thank you Ollie.

Are you tired yet?

These past two weeks my dreams became intense and technicolor. Don't know if it's a spring thing (I remember my friend Donna talking about her dreams going to ten or twelve a night this time last year) or if it's an energy thing. According to fairy-Sue, we didn't rest enough during the winter months and so now we're day-napping and yawning to make up for the energy we didn't gather when the earth was still. Whatever the reason, come 1pm I just want to fall asleep. Love the nighttime dreams though...bits of them swirl throughout my day.

My Mom's with me this week. She loves to organize. This afternoon she's moved the lids to a new drawer, queried me about where the milk should live in the fridge, suggested my knife block needs a new home, and said the craft drawer needs to be moved so the heavy pots could live on the sliding shelf, which was (evidently, but nobody told me) made for that job. All that time I spent with the personal organizer before she came so Mom (past eighty) could have a relaxing holiday...and there's more to do. Ok fairy-Sue - that's why I'm so sleepy!

got the publishing blues?

Two weeks ago I went to a writer's conference in New York, and listened to 48 hours of speakers telling us how to make it as authors and journalists. I had my first novel Motherhunt published eight years ago, just as everything in the publishing industry began to change from a gentlemen's club to an industry focused on creating instant stars.

Publishers still talked about 'developing an author', taking a writer through three books to build a following, and breaking out on book three or book four. This means the author had a chance to learn what it's like to write over 80-100,000 words, how to work with editors and agents, and made a bit of money on the side (but don't quit the day job!) while they grew.

When I landed a two-book contract after networking my butt off, I received a sheet of paper which asked me to list, for publicity purposes, everyone I knew who might be influential in promoting my book. What a humbling exercise! The top editor I knew was in a woman's magazine writing a books column. I thought I had an ace in the hole.

Although the PR department of the publishing house made all the right noises about me, they wouldn't give me any information about how the publishing process worked: the role of the distributor, how the books got sold into stores, and how important it was that their sales team pitched my book to buyers. They didn't have a website, and barely knew what that meant. New PR companies sprang up to cater to authors as publishers saved PR budgets for stars. My single biggest mistake in publishing was taking the advice of my editor when she told me 'you don't need a PR company until book three' and not noticing that my agent was aghast.

Today, the PR company is a must-do for every serious author. You spend your advance on good PR. Sorry, the mortgage will have to wait if you've got ambitions to be writing for a big-name publishing conglomerate over the course of ten years. You will also need a website, a blog, and a support team which raises your profile through speaking engagements. It's best if you're an expert in a particular field (mine is holistic health) and write columns about it for national magazines and newspapers. So, in order to be a successful author, you need to already have cracked it as a writer and as a personality.

This suits people like me who live to write and like to talk to groups. But it also doesn't suit people like me who also want to spend time with a family and make a contribution to the planet, in my case through a holistic health practice. And who it really doesn't suit are those people with a day job, who slave over the Great American in the wee hours. Their best solution is to attend writer's conferences during their holidays, and get into the one-on-one sessions with the visiting junior agents who are trawling for new talent to build. Then, keep it professional with that agent. (Get a book on agents if you don't know what that means.) They are not your counsellor - get a shrink - your mother or your best friend. They do one thing - sell your book. Take their advice. Show willing. They know the business and it's tough.

However, that's traditional publishing. And it's more and more of a dinosaur. It doesn't foster great new writing over the long term. Savvy authors with business experience who come to the industry after researching their market, who provide agents and editors with forecasts of numbers of books they can sell (I have commitments from every Kiwanis club in the country) are like a box of Belgian chocolates to an agent. But we have a basic conflict in the book industry: authors are generally private people.

I know one man who has written NINE books between the hours of eleven pm and three am, and puts each one in a drawer (or on CD rom) because he doesn't want to confront the publishing juggernaut. We are not rock stars. We didn't get into this because we have big boobs, big personalities, and big hair. We were the nerdy kids at school, and we're generally nerdy adults, no matter how much the agents want us to be cool.

I love cyberspace. The click of the 'publish post' button. More and more, our really good writing is going to be found in the blogosphere, and then it will be siphoned off to agents and editors - or not. If you are not a big name already, and don't have the connections to become one in the next two years but you're sitting on a great book, why let your book be discounted on the supermarket shelves to $2.00 (assuming they get there) when you can sell it through your blog at $9, two bucks higher than the cost of per-book on your print run (try ipublish), and bank the money for yourself? It means handling stock and getting friendly with the gals at the PO, but it keeps you in connection with your readers. They comment to you, you're invested in them, everyone's excited to read the book, and your mileage to the PO gets written off against tax.

I always told my husband: if it's worth publishing, it's worth getting a publisher to do it. But I'm not so sure now. You can get a professional product by hiring your own editor and designers through a quality self-publishing company. And a relationship with readers through blog, website and podcast. This isn't the future, it's today.

Who wouldn't want to be part of that?

Crazy makers

Yesterday I was with a girlfriend who was letting go of a long-standing relationship with a man and it hurt. It reminded me so much of the year that I went through the same thing with M, that I scurried upstairs and ferreted out my diary.

I'd been angry with M and my energy healing teacher observed: 'you thought this man was a visionary; I saw he was a dreamer.' With hindsight I can see that neither is true; we were both stuck in our own despair, anger, and frustration. I prayed for guidance and felt that I had chosen to help M - he'd put out a call and I responded. My reasons for responding were full of shadows - self importance, ego, trying to be big in the world, ingratiation. And I lied to myself to hide this to my family and to M. Many veils. I wrote:

"On Friday night I diligently worked out the last weeds. Throughout the day the relationship - its beginnings, obscure little scenes, kept coming to me. As soon as I let these into the 'obsession loop' I had to turf them out. Sometimes they popped up spontaneously, sometimes they seemed called up as if I was trying to see if they still held power. I literally dug in the garden, rooting out dandelions and thistles, planting new seeds. A very curative activity! I put a rutilated quartz on the earth and dumped my thoughts there. At one point I just sat on the ground humbled and begged for mental relief.

I was taken back to the beginning of the relationship, and how I needed to fill an emotional empty space. I filled it with long, anguished, angst-ridden, gossip-spiked moans about my relationship. I got my needs met when M was also angst-ridden, gossip-spiked etc. However, if the power is siphoned away, it can't be used to build a strong emotional connection with my beloved.

I broke the lentils jar, and as it shattered, cut my left thumb and wrist. My son heard me and came into the kitchen and got a bandaid for me. He then announced: "I'm going to cook dinner Mummy, just tell me what to do." I mopped up the glass and tied an apron around his waist. He got the pasta from the fridge, put a pot of water on the stove, and made Angel Delight. I sat down and moaned, "do Mommys get to cry? What I really need is a hug." And my children put their arms around me and hugged me until I was full of little-people hugs.

For the past couple nights my dreams have been wakeup dreams - where I'm straining to open my eyes while I'm dreaming. At 3.3oam I called myself out of sleep with the imperative: 'Wake up Cynthia!' It's as if someone called to me from the room itself to wake me up.

I send M love and light and peace as we part, and always wish him well. I say to myself this little poem I've created: Light, come to me, transform this negativity; peace come to me, transform this negativity; love come to me, transform this negativity. Bring Light, Peace, and Love to me, to him."

The transformation that came into my home & family after I let M go into his destiny was radical. We each held a piece of the other's energies, and could not move on. I think what I instinctively did that day was a shamanic soul retrieval, but it felt like I was going nuts. Truly, the funny-farm looked like a safe haven. Was I competent to be in charge of children? I asked myself. Now I'm glad I had the courage to do the work, instead of burying my pain. I used that energy to help create a new life.

Detox, then re-tox

I'm doing this crazy detox which involves a white plastic tub of 'medical food' - aka rice protein powder. Caramel-colored, sweet and gritty it goes down like candied sand. The first day of the detox - no sugar, no wheat, no caffeine, no CHOCOLATE - and I was on the couch sleeping like I'd drunk a fifth of vodka the night before. Next day, felt like I'd been kicked in the head by a goat. Next day, felt like my legs had been run over by small children on bicycles. Next day, finally got some energy together and tackled de-cluttering the back bedroom. Why does a detox always bring on boughts of spring-cleaning? Like scrubbing out the gut means you've got to scrub out all the back entrances, starting with the garage and working your way into the attic.
My husband's overtaken the basement with wine barrels, so I don't go there no more. He's a 'garagista' - see the cute picture of him covered in grape lees and looking happier than in his wedding photos. He and four other guys have found the entertainment of their lives making natural wines, hence their company's name 'Via Vecchia' or old road in Italian.
Paolo brought the first glass demijohns with him when we moved from England. He's been stomping grape in his father's garage since he was old enough to climb into the vats, and his father stomped in his village in Tuscany, and on back it goes who knows how many thousand of years.
We do these fun, big-production lunches with mafia top-tens blaring in the background on the stomping days, everyone working hauling grape, squishing grape between their toes, or sorting grape. I'm always in the kitchen, overseeing the menus which are a combo between traditional Italian and American pot-luck, and include (of course) cheeses and grapes and crackers; mortadella, salami, olives; pickled red peppers, good bread, olive oil; pasta or polenta, and usually some barbecque. Mike and Marty (the brothers Huster) stop at the pie place and pick up fresh buckeye (pnut butter & chocolate), blackberry, and an apple.
When we're ready to fall over with tiredness and full bellies, we sit around with our wine glasses and speak dreams about Via Vecchia's success, and laugh alot, and revel in the companionship and easiness of it all.

Small things

Our lives are made up of the small things. The silver twigs of the maple unfurl tiny red leaves, sewed on for now, as if forever.
Our house deeds sit in a small, flat box, in a concrete room accessed by keys, protected by alarms. It's a dry, cool vault with brass edging each box. Our illusion of permanence: bought; mortgage-free; owner. Each hints at longevity but it's only tenure. Where will we fly next? And then, this place so dear now, slides past as slick as plastic photo wallets, their pages turning in bundles of white, slippery and thick.
We age before our eyes, time ellapsed. Our children grow teeth, lose teeth, grow teeth again. Soon there will be new faces to add - their loves.
I love to watch my face age. The little pooches at the jaw, and the wrinkles under the cups of my lower eyelids. My face is softer, more loving and lively with life written on it. I can smile at everyone now, and it means no more than happiness.
Sweetness, fondness and gentle stewardship; our memories of this earth.

who's the grandma?

This afternoon, sitting in the sunshine on my back porch content as the cat, I got a call on my cell. An elderly, Southern woman asked for Adriana.
"There's no-one here by that name," I said, fully expecting to press 'end' the next second.
"I'm your Grandma!"
She said it so forcefully, it took me a moment to realize this was my cell and not a call from Beyond the Veil. "I'm afraid not. I haven't got any grandmas. They're deceased."
"I am not deceased!" the disgruntled lady almost shouted her indignance in my ear.
"I think you have the wrong number," I insisted.
"Is this the McCoy's?"
"No, it's not."
"Oh, I'm sorry dear," she replied, a bit deflated.
"That's ok," I said.
"Love you," she told me.
"Bye."
My cell captured her number. Part of me wants to call her back and ask if I can be adopted. I sure hope those McCoys are nice to such a lovely woman. How often do complete strangers say 'love you'? I can think of only one other time in my life, and then it was me doing the saying.

you gotta write

It's an invitation. Write your heart out. Speak up! Let the Earth know you're living, and want to be part of the conversation.