Tag: writer

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IT SHOULD BE LIKE A HALF AN HOUR VOLUME 10

Okay, I am pretty sure this is the original Paul vocal, but not so sure it is the original music. HOWEVER, I am using this clip anyway because you get to see my boyfriends… and Paul gives me that conspiratorial wink at the end. Yeah, 1968 Paul wants to get with me. And you know what? He can. Oh yeah. The door is always open for that guy.

Sally Star, Philly peeps, always played this song on her show on her birthday. She had a crush on Paul too!

O-STARR — Sally Starr, the gun-totin’ cowgirl who rode a palomino with a silver saddle and introduced millions of children in the Philadelphia area to Popeye, Clutch Cargo and the Three Stooges.

My brother, Billy (nicknamed Ear to his friends, but always Billy to me) and I loved Sally and the Beatles. Hell, I wanted to be Sally. I mean, look at her! In fact I am sure my brother introduced me to Sally (and I know he’s responsible for The Beatles), and he and I loved The Three Stooges and Bullwinkle! My poor baby sister, Lee, came a lot of years later, and she missed out on all of that. 😦 But I know I definitely wanted a sister, not a little brother, and in that aspect I lucked out. And my brother, as usual, was gracious about me winning (we had a bet; he bet on brother).

I have NEVER liked being sung to. First of all… SHY PeRSON! For fucks’ sake, please don’t sing to me in a public place! OMG, people. Secondly the song Americans sing is almost a dirge; it’s slow and boring and awkwardly high in the middle. My favorite part of it is the “and many more” I always add. Otherwise it kinda blows. Birthday by the Beatles (like most British things over American things) is better. Waaaay better.

But the Beatles song, “Birthday,” makes me glad to be alive. And YES, shy or not, I will freaking karaoke and dance, while sober, if you dance with me! Can’t we go singing and dancing? OMG, why did all the singing and dancing stop in 1986??? I have more in me!

Today is also the day I first held Sophie (though I think it was 12/21 in China), and pretty late at night, after we flew 2-3 hours from Beijing to Nanchang in a plane that sounded like an old broken down escalator or monorail. We were sure we were going to die, but we had no choice but to get on that plane and go, and then drive 2 more hours through the cold dark to Nanchang proper to receive the best addition to our lives that we (Dave, my spouse) and I could ever imagine. Poor Sophie had been waiting in the lobby for 4+ hours, bundled up like it was arctic winter, so she was as red as a beet, and her nanny handed her to us, and then all the SWI staff headed out for the two hour drive home. Just like that, the only people Sophie had ever known left her and disappeared. Well and truly dumped, with us. They left her with the weirdos. And ever since then my birthday has been more lovely and more sweet, and less about me, which is good too.

Aw, my spouse brought me flowers this morning. Amazing!

And I am currently wearing about 8 new pieces of jewelry (why be subtle on your birthday folks?) that my life-long friend and talented artist Krissi made me, including this gorgeous bracelet (green is my favorite color too!):

As for this song… the lightly veiled reason for this shameless post about my own birthday, I could listen to this any time of the year, and all day long. It’s a great song! It’s all about rocking out, and so is this old lady! Listen to it; you’re gonna love it. And hey, you should own The White Album anyway. ON VINYL. That’s right, buy a record player and experience it!! I love vinyl! More snap crackle and pop than Rice Crispies!

So yeah, they say it’s my birthday ((my happy birthday as my sister always says), and it freaking is!!

I’m glad it’s my birthday… happy birthday to me…

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MEET MY FAVORITE AUTHOR OF ALL TIME

Anyone who knows me well has heard me rave about Tom Robbins. One story that I especially like about him is that, along the path of his career, he found drumming. Like Ringo, drumming, but more like a drum circle sort of drumming, as I understand it. Why?

If you know Robbins you know he is a slow writer. He’s not cranking out a book a year, and he is, for me, perilously old now… meaning I might not get another book out of him.

Robbins, one of the most unique writers ever, uses drumming to help him find the music and rhythm in his writing, and also to fight procrastination. When the mind wanders, as Robbins’ mind surely must, the drumming helps him refocus on his writing.

What can you do with a writing coach? You can meet, as often, weekly, or as little, every other month, as you like, but when you meet with me you will have to hand over some of your writing: a page, a chapter… you’re going to get there. We can work on your schedule; we can read your work to each other to check on the music and rhythm in your writing; we can try exercises; we can craft your online author presence. I help you give your writing the time, grace, and respect it needs, and I make you accountable so that you finish your damn novel. Robbins has a dozen books. That is not enough for me, and I wish he had more. Those books have gotten me through some dark nights, and some long days. Who is waiting for your book? Who will you rescue from a long dark night with your story?

Coaching is so reasonable and so worth it. For $50/hour, and you can split that into 2 half hour meetings if you like, you get editing, planning, encouragement, a clear head, and the friendship you need to get your book done. When you’re Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas, I can help you wake up and get to the keyboard. And it’s my favorite thing to do, after reading Tom Robbins, that is.

BTW, late bloomers, did you know Robbins was just on the cusp of 40 when he published his first book? And it took him 2 years to write it?

And did you know that all coaching inquiries come with a free hour-long Zoom meeting to talk about what you want and if coaching is right for you?

If you really want to be a writer, and you have an idea, or many ideas, but you just don’t know if you can do it… if you just don’t know if you are an author, but you want to be, coaching can get you there.

Good luck with your book~

Much love~ Dianne, possessor of an MA and an MFA, writing teacher and encourager for over 20 years, and Tom Robbins’ #1 fan. My favorite book: Still Life With Woodpecker.

Find out all about coaching, shoot me an email (dianne@devilspartypress.com) or fill out the nice form Dave made.

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IT SHOULD BE LIKE A HALF AN HOUR VOLUME 9

“Day After Day,” by Badfinger. I could listen to this song, and most songs by Badfinger, over and over and over again.

This one is particularly notable for it’s lovely piano, and the whine of the guitar.

My brother, Bill (nicknamed Ear to his friends, but always Billy to me) would have just celebrated his birthday, and he loved Badfinger and introduced them to me. Bill died in 2020 during COVID not from COVID, but from being really sick and also being afraid to go to the hospital because he might catch COVID and die. And so he stayed home and got sicker and sicker, and died. One of the tragedies of my life.

Badfinger, also, cannot be discussed without talking about their tragedy too. Shepherded to fame by John Lennon and Paul McCartney (and Paul wrote many of their songs) they were destined for greatness until their manager ripped them off, and two of them killed themselves in panic and desperation. It was a terrible loss to their friends, family, and to music lovers everywhere, as they were a very good band, and probably would have gotten even better.

So, the thing about Badfinger is, due to both their “sound” and their story, they are a melancholy band. And I tend not to be a fan of sad or melancholy things the older I get. I am really searching for the happy in life, whatever that means. For example, today I tossed some leftover dal on some leftover orzo and had that for breakfast. My mouth was not expecting the dal to slip and slide over orzo, so it was like a whole new thing, and it was amazing. That lifted my mood, ever so slightly, from the sad I still have very much so over our beloved Addie leaving us. Wow, did I cry a lot yesterday over that little Guinea pig. And so, today, I am ready for melancholy and sad, but a lighter form of sad, which I think is exactly Badfinger.

Another great song of theirs that almost seems to merge into “Day After Day” in my mind is “Baby Blue,” and I think that may have been my brother’s favorite of theirs. If you haven’t heard that one, you should give it a try too, and see if you could hear it merging with “Day After Day.”

Most people only know their song, “No Matter What,” which is their very upbeat song. It’s a lot of fun, but still has the same sound, so if you like one Badfinger, you’re probably going to like them all.

So, oh my gosh, is like 2/3 of this bad red-haired guys? How did I just realize this? Red-hair guys are my absolute favorite, if I could order a guy from a menu. Hello, Weasley brothers… I’m coming for you! The drummer looks like my first big love who, also, is sadly no longer with us, and who died in his own tragic way. Not that he and I were in contact by then as I’d been, long before, well and truly dumped, but still, I would prefer he were not dead. Life, as many of us age, can be like that, our universe gets smaller through a slow and persistent peeling away of the people in it. And that is a melancholy thought.

On a lighter note… the lyrics of “Day After Day” say, “… bring it home, Baby make it soon…,” but when I was 7 or 8 years old I would have argued for hours that what they said was, “…bringing home, Baby, making soup… I give my love to you.” And I imagined a good-looking 1970s style guy and his hippie girlfriend carrying baskets full of vegetables through a waving wheat field, and then in a kitchen stirring a big pot on the stove, two hands on the same ladle… .

Hey, soup equals love. Ha, ha, ha. No.

I remember when my mother was dating (an ill-advised escapade any way you slice it) she would always go on like two dates with a guy, and then have the guy over and make soup. And my sister and I were like, “Don’t make him soup! You want to be his girlfriend not his mom!”

In any case, I KNOW this… Now that I have told you, you will never be able to unhear it:

“…bringing home, Baby, making soup… I give my love to you.”

You’re welcome.

I love Badfinger; I hope you do too. I hope we all manage to navigate the loss in our lives, and balance the sadness with the sweetness.

I wish you soup.

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IT SHOULD BE LIKE A HALF AN HOUR VOLUME 8 : YOU SAIL AWAY FROM THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD ON THIS TRIP BABY

But you will pay…. you gonna pay tomorrow; you will pay tomorrow….

Ha! Maybe this is indicative of where I am in my life, but this song popped into my head about a week ago, and I cannot get enough of it. It is playing in the house constantly.

Today Dave woke me up to go running, which I think makes him a great guy, because when you move across the country there is a lot of fast food involved, not to mention that I have, really, two food obsessions only, Mack Mancos’ pizza (now called Manco and Manco after a bitter family feud, but for me it will always be Mack Mancos, and the bitter feud just makes it that much tastier. Delicious pizza made by questionable people… what could be better?), but that is in New Jersey, far far away, and my other food obsession is In-N-Out Burger, which happens to be never farther than five miles away at the moment. My daughter has a new friend who recently immigrated from China, and she does not have good English yet, but she knows how to say “double-double,” and she would eat there eight days a week if she could, and I’m not that far behind her, though my greed is limited to one cheeseburger, no spread, ketchup and mustard, raw onion, extra pickles. Man am I hungry! So, suffice it to say I was glad Dave woke me up to go running. But, I had trouble really waking up, and I lay on my side looking at him, eyes fluttering open and closed, and I thought, “preview to dying, here you go, it’ll be just like this, fluttering in and out until you flutter out. It won’t be so bad.” Ha! I’m not a dark person. Of course, Dave could always go first, in which case I’d be lonely, and I’d have to buy a Roomba.

“No! Save me, save me from tomorrow. I don’t want to sail with this ship of fools, no no.”

The singer, Karl Wallinger, also wrote the song, and the lyrics are just amazing, IMHO.

“Avarice and greed, gonna drive you over the endless sea.” What drives us all, except the desire to live better than we are currently living? And it keeps us going and going in an endless march of carrot and stick. If you’re not marching your either rich enough to stop, or you’ve given up.

Last night was my second night tutoring online for a new company, and it was a cluster fuck of experiences, beginning when the platform wouldn’t load and I literally had to delete it from my computer and re-download and install. Technology could not work if we weren’t all way more tech savvy than we give ourselves credit for; we’re all tech support now. But that’s Vanilla Sky, and we’re on World Party, not Paul McCartney. Every time I finished feverishly typing with one student a pop-up would appear advising me that there was another student and I had 14 seconds to prove I was there and accept the student. I imagine being the person on the other end of any chat service is like that, like when you chat with Amazon people, and I have a lot more empathy for them. I plan to be a lot less demanding in the future, which I think Karl Wallinger would probably be down with. It’s a rat race, driving me over the endless sea on a ship of fools I don’t want to be fucking sailing with. Karl, save me from tomorrow. I keep telling myself it’s only temporary, and I don’t have to show up if I don’t want to. But I’m gonna do it, “Drawn by the promise of the joker and the fool, by the light of the crosses that burned… you will pay tomorrow”

“Oh oh oh oh
Save me
Save me from tomorrow”

Which of us hasn’t had that sentiment?

“I don’t want to sail with this ship of fools”

It helps that Karl sounds like Mick Jagger on this track, and I love the way he smiles through the whole video like he’s having a great time prophesying my doom. And my doom is so damn catchy! This is an easy one to get stuck in your head over and over, but I don’t mind it being an ear worm, not at all. I can hear it in the shower, I can hum it to myself in the dark night, I can sing it while I pour the morning into the cup, dark, sugary, enticing me to keep rolling on the ship of fools.

Trust me on this one… get on board.

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FAREWELL QUEEN ELIZABETH

Above is one of the many photos of the young Queen Elizabeth.

Below is a photo of my Aunt Sara, probably when she was a bit older than the above photo of the Queen, but it’s the only one I could find of her easily (without groping through shoeboxes full of photos).

In my family we always felt like they could have been sisters. And both were, I believe, very dutiful and correct ladies in their lives.

It’s most certainly the end of an era, and I feel that these two women, both gone now, would have had much in common and been good friends, had they ever had the opportunity to meet.

My Aunt Sara was, I think, a sensitive creative person who was married to the wrong man, a man who was extra intelligent, and extra devoted to rules and duty, and not very loving to a creative and soft-hearted woman who did not manage to remain that way during their marriage.

My aunt was a gifted water-color painter, and sewer. She could make complicated clothing like lined suit jackets and silk scarves with rolled edges.

My aunt once told me that, in the year or so before Marilyn Monroe passed away, she had often thought of inviting her to dinner, because she looked, in the news, to be sad, and tired, and she thought she could use a place to take a break from her life. When Marilyn passed away, my aunt was sad but not surprised, she’d said. I tell this story because I always felt it was perceptive of my aunt, to clue into another woman’s pain, and I think it would have been lovely if that dinner offer had been sent and accepted.

In many ways, the Queen, because she had wealth and privilege, probably had an easy life, and in other ways, for those same reasons, it was probably hard.

My aunt was married to an incredibly smart, respected, and talented doctor, who was also very critical of her and unkind. My aunt had a lot of money, children who had little to nothing to do with her, a lot of time alone on her hands, and a sensitive artist side that was largely unfulfilled. She was, I believe, also deeply in love with the wrong man.

Prince Philip seems to have been a strong and controlling person, dominant, and I wonder, had Elizabeth not become queen, with all eyes upon them, if he would have been loving, kind, and faithful for life. My uncle certainly took pride in being faithful, but it was like it was a chore he shouldered with little complaint, when in fact he complained a lot, and often, and embarrassingly publicly. Many times my aunt spoke in front of me of how she wanted to leave him, but she was, I think, too in love to ever go.


Queen Elizabeth had her problems and missteps like all of us, but she was who she was, it seems to me, unfailingly, when I am certain there were times she would have liked to have been different than what was expected of her. I think she did a lot to bolster morale and, in general, help her beloved country through the challenges all developed nations have. In any case, she seems to have done more than a good job at it, and I hope she’s enjoying a cocktail now with her beloved spouse, and all their former corgis.

And I think it would be more than lovely if she could, now, in the beyond places whatever and wherever they are, get to meet her doppelgänger, my aunt, Sara.

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POEM WITH ME

Whenever possible I have a little fun with my creative writing classes with Magnetic Poetry.

This past semester, while cleaning up from our play-day, I found some nice word combos, and isn’t that the point of Magnetic Poetry?

So, c’mon, poem with me…

Comment with your creation!

No, you don’t have to use them in that order…. 😉

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POEM WITH ME

Whenever possible I have a little fun with my creative writing classes with Magnetic Poetry.

This semester, while cleaning up from our play-day, I found some nice word combos, and isn’t that the point of Magnetic Poetry?

So, c’mon, poem with me…

Comment with your creation!

No, you don’t have to use them in that order…. 😉

Posted on

POEM WITH ME

Whenever possible I have a little fun with my creative writing classes with Magnetic Poetry.

This semester, while cleaning up from our play-day, I found some nice word combos, and isn’t that the point of Magnetic Poetry?

So, c’mon, poem with me…

Comment with your creation!

No, you don’t have to use them in that order…. 😉

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RUN FOR THE ARTS

Hey y’all~

 
If possible, can you join Dave and I in running, or do it as a walk, or simply donate to the art league?
 
The art league offers great classes, including pottery on a wheel, and pottery classes in the evenings, with drinking!
 
Anywho, just putting’ it out there.
 
 
And Dave and I are guaranteed to come in last place, so no worries about your performance!