Month: May 2006

Our attendance at Conduit conflicted with at least 5 events that were important to the kids. Mostly the kids were happy to exchange these local events for a trip to stay with their cousins. The one thing that Kiki truly lamented, was missing Field Day at her school. Fortunately the problem was easily remedied because Link attends a different school and his Field Day was today. I just pulled Kiki out of school and let her attend with Link.

Field Day is a big deal to my kids. Last year (http://sandratayler.livejournal.com/2005/05/25/) I didn’t go to any of it. I just picked up Link and Kiki when it was over. This year Link spoke to me several times to make sure that I was actually coming. So it was this morning that I woke my Link and Kiki early so that they could be dropped off for the distance run. Then I hustled home to dress Gleek and Patches. I snarfed down the wonderful breakfast burrito that Howard made for me, urged kids into the car and we were back at the school by 9 am. I rendezvoused with Kiki by the big inflatable slides that had been rented for the occasion. Link spent most of the morning with his class, but the rest of us hung out by these inflatable toys.

I actually enjoyed Field Day this year. Perhaps it was the lack of frantic running and chasing. Gleek and Kiki were content with the inflatable toys, so I could sit in one place and just watch. Theoretically visitors aren’t supposed to be on the slides at the same time as school classes, but in truth no one minded my girls being there. No one minded any of the other kids who showed up for a turn or two either. Patches went up the bouncy slides a couple of times, but mostly he sat next to me huddled under his blanket. He’d worn a tank top and was cold. When Patches huddled into my lap I called Howard, who rescued the poor little boy by bringing him a sweatshirt and our stroller. Patches climbed into the stroller and fell asleep. Within 30 minutes I realized he’d been so cold because he was running a fever. Poor little guy.

Fun on the inflatable slide ended with a bloody nose. Turning around to see your child crying, blood streaming down her face is not the most pleasant of experiences, but after 4 kids and 5 years of parenting Gleek it isn’t all that alarming either. Blood alone does not phase me anymore. Noses can produce an alarming amount of blood very quickly. Fortunately while bloody noses are very messy, they generally do not indicate a truly harmful injury. It would be nice if I could claim foresight that Gleek and I were wearing old shirts today. It wasn’t foresight, it was laziness that didn’t make me dress myself and Gleek up this morning. In this case it works in my favor because after being baked by the sun for several hours, no way are those blood stains coming out. Gleek was very alarmed at the amount of blood which leaked from her nose. But when she realized that the next item on the agenda was buy to treats from the concessions stand, she cheered right up. She was also cheered by the awe that some of the gradeschool kids expressed at the sheer quantity of blood soaking her shirt.

The concession stand was a main focal point for the kids. They’d all brought their spending money. In Kiki’s case $10 worth of spending money. Kiki loves to buy things, so she cheerfully sprung for a ring pop and a babybottle for Patches. These “baby bottles” are candies that my kids always beg for. I hate them. They are hardened flavored sugar that is meant to be dipped into powdered flavored sugar. It is all formed into the shape of a baby bottle which encourages the kids to act like babies while ingesting highly refined sugars. Just looking at these baby bottles gives me a sugar headache. I’ll plan grocery shopping trips so that I won’t have to argue about buying baby bottle candy. Today I let them buy whatever they wanted as long as they spent their own money. All of them got baby bottles and Kiki came home with a box filled with stuff which she lovingly shared among the other kids. I did require them all to actually eat some of the lunch pizza that was served. They were pretty good about that. All except for poor Patches who licked his ring pop and then fell asleep with the baby bottle in his mouth and a layer of sticky all over his face.

We got home at 1:30 pm. Now they’re all quietly watching a movie. We’ve all had plenty of outdoors for one day.

One of the things I love about Howard is that when I tentatively mention that maybe I should possibly enter one of my stories in a contest… maybe, his instant answer is “You should do that.” When I mumble about maybe putting together a book of short stories, he tells me it is a wonderful idea. When I talk about maybe taking dance classes he thinks I should do it. Howard is fully supportive in all my creative endeavors. The fact that all my stories are unpublished does not diminish Howard’s belief in the value of my creative efforts. He wants me to succeed creatively as much as he wants to succeed himself. I love that.

I also love that we both have our priorities straight. Our family comes first. The needs of the kids and our marriage are primary. Secondary is Schlock Mercenary. The success of Schlock supports our family and opens doorways for other creative work. Neither Howard nor I consider my creative efforts less valuable than his, but his has the better chance for helping us live the life we want to have. For now business concerns are prioritized above creativity.

It is a delacate juggling act to keep it all in balance. I’m glad I have a wonderful partner to help me juggle.

I have returned home with the kidlets and the return was without incident. This is mostly thanks to the marvelous movie Zathura which seems to have unlimited power to hypnotize my children on long trips. Yay for movies in the car!

My next trick will be to sort out the housekeeping, accounting, and gardening which have all been neglected for two weeks while I was stressed over the release of Howard’s book. Two weeks ago today I was in a blithering panic, today I know that we pulled it all off. Now we get to take a deep breath. Then Howard dives into work on book two and I dive into shipping books routinely.

Also upcoming is the last day of school, after which I need to institute a summer schedule for the kids. There must be structure or we will all go crazy with six of us in a chaotic house. There must be order and cleanliness and vacuuming. Regularly. I can picture it so clearly in my head, unfortunately the pictures in my kids heads about how summer should be do not involve vacuums. sigh. I forsee a battle of wills in my future.

As always coming away from a convention my head is aswim with creative ideas. I want to make beautiful clothes to wear to the next convention. I want to write wonderful stories to share. I want to plan panels and convince convention staff to put me on them. Unfortunately all of these things need to be put on hold pending the housekeeping, accounting, and gardening. Regular life is hopelessly mundane sometimes.

I have just returned from Conduit and my head is swimming. I have so many thoughts to sort, so many possiblities for writing. Without a doubt the highlight of the weekend was the people I met. I got to have long conversations about writing with people who love it and who have books in print. James Dashner and Julie Wright were a joy to visit with. I could have spent an entire weekend just talking with them. L. E. Modesitt was a wonderful gentleman who is full of real experience and wisdom. We spent lots of time with Bob Defendi and Dan Willis with whom it is impossible to run out of conversational topics or jokes to laugh about. I got to visit with Newton Ewell and watch him draw the most amazing pictures. There are so many more names I can’t remember them all.

It was a joy to meet these people as peers. I love the fact that Howard’s creativity and diligence has opened doors for me so that I can meet such wonderful people on even ground rather than as a nameless fan. Someday I’ll meet them again and I’ll have MY book. Filled with things that I have written. I spent quite a lot of time at the art show looking to see if anything jumped out at me as potential cover art. Nothing was quite right, but I fell in love with a couple of pieces and I splurged to buy them. They’re going on my office wall just above my computer where I can look at them while I ponder what to write.

Now I am back at home. I need to settle back into regular life. But I don’t want to. I want to savor and sort and treasure. The next con I get to go to will be Life The Universe and Everything at BYU next February. Perhaps I’ll submit something to the short story contest there. I intended to submit to the Conduit contest, but I was too busy with Howard’s book to remember to do it.

Hmm. The scatteredness of this post reflects the scattered nature of my thoughts. Hopefully I’ll be more coherent tomorrow.

This morning was full of trip preparation, because today was my day to drive the kids to my brother’s house. They get to stay there for four days while I attend Conduit with Howard. The three hour drive became four hours due to road construction and a stop for “we will not go any further until there is a compromise that ends the screaming.” The trip included lots of pleas for food, lots of handing things back to Patches who was entertaining himself by dropping them, and lots of inquiries regarding the status of our travel. (Are we there yet?)

We arrived and the kids scattered gleefully to play with their cousins. I visited with my sister-in-law and my brother when he arrived home from work. I only stayed for about 90 minutes because I had to make the trek back to my house and prepare for a convention. I made sure to spend a minute talking to each kid individually before I left and I gave them hugs. Then at my moment of departure I just poked my head into the various locations where they were playing and waved a cheerful goodbye. They all waved cheerfully back and I left. No tears, which I keep assuring myself is a really good thing. Making a big production out of mommy leaving would definitely rank pretty high in the Bad Idea column.

As I drove away from my brother’s house I was very aware of the cavernous emptiness of the van behind me. I habitually count heads in the rearview mirror whenever I’m driving. All I could count were emptinesses. Yup. Still four. In an effort to give my brain a different occupation, I began playing CSI: Interstate. I examined the various splotches and skid marks as I drove past them. Some of them were simple, some complex. All of them bore mute testimony to the fact that someone had a very bad day on that very spot. I also played “identify the carcass,” but mostly I was only able to determine “avian” or “mammal” before I zipped on past. Interstates are not very cheerful places.

I confess that having three uninterrupted hours for thinking was rather nice. I composed most of this journal entry in my head during the drive. It was also a bit lonely. I wished for Howard to talk to. I like taking road trips with Howard. We end up having conversations about the road trip which is our life. Much of our long term planning occurs during road trips. But Howard wasn’t on this trip with me and talking on a cell phone while driving is something I try to limit.

As it got dark I found a new entertainment solution. I stuck in my Les Miserables cd, turned up really loud, and sang along as loud as I could. That was fun. I don’t get to do that if anyone else is in the car. Now I’m home and I’ve got piles of stuff to do before I sleep. Which is normal except that it’s all convention stuff and there are no kids to put to bed.

Howard and I are frequent patrons of our local Blockbuster. Renting movies is a fun way for us to relax together without having to pay a babysitter. Usually Howard is the one who goes to Blockbuster. He’ll browse the rows and chat with me on his cell phone while we try to figure out what he should bring home. But the other night I was the one to go to Blockbuster. I spent a glorious child-free hour browsing through the store. I wrote down the titles of every movie that interested me, so the next time Howard calls me and says “what should I get?” I can answer instead of saying “I don’t know.”

I brought home The Producers and Shall We Dance. Both of these movies feature dancing. I love watching dancing and dancing movies. The one drawback is that they make me want to dance. Which may not be a drawback at all really. I want to be a dancer. I don’t much care about performing or accolades. I want to move like a dancer. I want to be strong and lithe and flexible like a dancer. The only way I can be those things is to train as a dancer. Dance is a celebration of life and the human body. Dance is beautiful. I’d love to be part of that. And regular dancing might help me shave off that little bit of extra roundness that four pregnancies have bestowed.

Apparently I have lots of reasons that I’d love to dance. Unfortunately I know myself. Unless I have some kind of an appointment (like a class) I will prioritize other things above a daily dance session. A class seems to be the way to go, but I worry a little about the added stresses to our family. We already have so many scheduled events. Do I really want to add another one to the calendar? Dance classes cost money. Our finances are worlds better than they were before we released the book, but I’m not sure whether there is enough wiggle room for me to squeeze in a dance class for myself.

The question is mostly moot because most dance classes are on hold for the summer. I’ll be better able to sort my thoughts and answer financial questions in a couple of months anyway. In the meantime I’m hoping to do more stretching and see what kind of a home dance program I can pull together. Maybe Gleek and I can have mommy/daughter dancing sessions. I wonder if there are any how-to books or videos about ballet or modern dance.

Today is our recovery day. Howard and I are both in need of a day of rest. Howard needs it even more than I do because the book release party was half relaxation for me and Howard had to work hard through the whole thing. All the advance preparation and stress was worth it. Once we got our hands on the books everything went smoother than we had any right to hope.

I cannot say enough to express my appreciation for the people who showed up to help. In three days of working, not once were we short handed. We always had more people wanting to help than there was work to do. Not only did people show up to help, but they showed up with good cheer and made the whole experience a joyful one. Howard and I came away completely exhausted, but very very happy. I’m actually looking forward to mailing out the next book so we can do it all again. Only next time we’ll try to make sure we have books enough in advance so that Howard can spread out his work and spend more time relaxing and playing.

Today we rest. Tomorrow we finish the odds and ends of mailing. Then we start gearing up for Conduit next weekend. I’m looking forward to Conduit. The kids will all be at my brother’s house, so it will be just Howard and I for three days. Howard will still be working, and so will I, but we should be able to find a little bit of time for having fun as well.

Life is good.