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Montreal is a perfect city for getting the feel of being in a foreign country while still being able to communicate clearly with all the natives. All of the signs are in French first and sometimes (but not always) they have English subtitles. Everywhere I go I hear people speaking French to each other. Most adorable are the small children speaking French with childish mispronunciations. I’ve been here two days now and I find myself wanting to be able to speak French. I want to understand all those words rolling past my ears. I want to be able to order my food in French. I even decided to do it once. I figured I could just read the words off the menu, but as I tried to compose the words in my head I realized that I was not composing French I was composing Foreign which was parts French and Spanish. I realized this would be less intelligible to the Quebecois in front of me than if I used straight English. I’ve always been leery of traveling in a country where I did not speak the native language, but after being here, I can picture myself doing it and happily learning the language in question.

Tonight we ventured out into the city to a restaurant recommended by a local Schlock fan. We walked into Old Montreal which involved walking past some buildings with beautiful architecture. The weather was perfect and then we arrived at a restaurant that served amazing crepes. It was French style service with lots of long pauses between ordering and delivery of food. This was perfect since the point of the event was to visit with Schlock fans. Every time we have a chance to meet with Schlock fans I realize how very fortunate we are. Howard and I send out the comic and the blogs into the world and they find intelligent and interesting friends for us to meet. There is so much more to tell, but the hour is late.

I almost did not go out to the room parties last night. I am very glad that I did. I was reminded again that the best thing about conventions is the interesting people that I have the chance to talk to. The conversations were constantly losing and gaining people because that is the nature of party conversation, but we had fun. There were two particularly heartwarming moments. Lee Modesitt took the time to grab a Locus photographer and as her to photograph us with him. He then made sure she had our card with contact info. It was wonderful of him to take the time. It was lovely meeting his wife as well. The other heartwarming moment was when Jay Lake grabbed us in the hall and said wonderful things about Schlock Mercenary. Got to go.

Written in the afternoon on August 6th. Posted when internet was available:

On the leg from Denver to Montreal it felt like half the flight was folks traveling to Worldcon. We ended up sitting next to a fellow Hugo nominee Paolo Bacigalupi. We had fun conversations for most of the three and a half hour flight. This was wonderful. Those sorts of conversations are what I love best about convention attendance. The down side is that I didn’t do any sleeping on the plane. This led to the sort of fatigue that is so beyond tired that it manifests as an overwhelmed depressive state. Howard and I both elected to stay in the room and we were both asleep by 8 pm and we stayed asleep until 9 am.

Howard’s first panel was at 3:30, which left us at loose ends for most of the morning. Fortunately we had a lunch date and we keep seeing cool people in the hallway. Most of the conversations are brief because everyone is still orienting themselves. It is nice to realize that we do know some people in the vast sea of strangers. Self-doubt is very plaguesome at such a large convention. Because the moments when someone recognizes us are surrounded by long stretches when no one does.

3 hours of sleep
3 airports
2 plane rides
1 cab ride
An unfamiliar hotel and the sinking realization that I do not know where any of the event locations are. I am going to get turned around frequently in the next few days. Also the hotel is full of unfamiliar people wearing badges and most of them haven’t a clue who we are. It is enough to make one feel insignificant. I turned to Howard and said
“Right now it is hard to believe that I’m going to have fun this weekend.” He agreed.

Thirteen hours of sleep later. Things are looking much brighter. We’re about to head out to the convention and fun will be had.

Airports are great for people watching. It makes me realize how much of my life is spent in little eddies of the river of humanity. Even being at the airport only offers a cross section of people. This was more apparent on the first leg of our journey. Now we’re waiting for the Montreal flight and we’ve already discovered several fellow passengers that are also Worldcon bound. In fact we met a person who is heading to Worldcon, who is good friends with people with whom Howard and I are also good friends. It is always fun playing “small world.”

There are lots of parents here with their kids. It makes me simultaneously lonesome for my kids and very glad that I’m able to sit here with my laptop instead of managing small people. The plane will board soon. It looks like the plane may be overbooked. Not thrilled at the prospect of being delayed.

My children are not the center of my life. I know this is true because I am able to function even when they are not around. On the whole I believe this is a good thing. Children need to have a mother who does not revolve around them, but who would rather have them than not. Yesterday I delivered my kids to my brother’s house. Then I drove home alone. It is interesting the gyrations my brain goes through as I try to disengage the habit pattern that checks on the location of the kids periodically. For the first hour of the return trip I kept having a nagging feeling that I’d left something behind, then I would remember that I did leave four somethings behind, but that I’d done it on purpose. Here at home the absence of the kids is also very apparent. Sometimes this is cause for rejoicing (no noise!) and sometimes it is a little sad (no morning hugs.) But mostly I just note that I am missing them a little, remember that we’ll all be back together in a week, and then I focus on the task at hand. This is good because there are many tasks at hand today. Many things which must be finished up before we leave at o-dark thirty tomorrow.

It has not all been roses and sunshine. I had an anxiety attack for about an hour where I curled up and felt very afraid of all the many things which could possibly go wrong. It was rather like there was this little guy running around in the back of my brain and screaming. Locking him in the closet didn’t shut him up, so instead I pulled him into the center of my brain and listened to every terrified rant he had. He screamed of plane crashes, and lost luggage, and children lost, and children injured, and books not arriving to shows, and consignment deals reneged upon, and spending piles of money, and not getting any money back. Eventually he ran out of things to scream about and I made plans for managing each of these potential bad things. Then I got back up and went back to work. All it amounts to is pre-trip jitters. Once we swing into full motion, the anxieties will vanish and I’ll be able to relax and enjoy the trip. It is going to be a good trip.

I’d forgotten what a sane schedule felt like. For the past few days I’ve had time to clean the house, not a frenzied, must-get-this-done-fast cleaning, but an effort focused on organization and scrubbing rather than quick presentability. Even more important, I’ve had time to snuggle kids until they were done with snuggling. I’ve had time to stop and listen to them until they were done talking. I’ve had time to assist in their projects on their time tables instead of mine. Best of all, this little space of sanity is like an appetizer. Next week will be busy, but after that I look forward to even more of this slower-paced schedule.

I head to Worldcon on Wednesday. I don’t have much of a schedule once I arrive there. Mostly I’ll be acting as Howard’s handler, making sure he eats at appropriate intervals and gets to all his scheduled events. I’ll attend some panels as an audience member. The only three fixed points (beyond a couple of private meetings) are as follows:

Friday August 7
6:45 – late Schlocker Meet-up at Les Jardins Nelson 407 Place Jacques-Cartier in Old Montreal.  We will be departing the convention center at approximately 6:45 pm and walking over to the restaurant.

Sunday August 9
10:00 – 11:00 am Running a Web-based Business P-512DH This is a solo presentation by Howard, but he’ll probably call me up to answer any questions about areas of the business that I run.
8:00 – 10:00 The Hugo Ceremony. Howard will be in a tux. I’ll be dressed to match. We’ll try to get photos so that we can post them.

We’ll be back Home the following Monday. Howard will turn around and leave again, but I will put away my convention clothes and stretch out into the mom role. It will feel good. It already feels good. I’m looking forward to next week, and I’m looking forward to the week after.

Kiki clattered through the front door sun burned and grinning from ear to ear. She had just arrived home from a three-day adventure in living like the Utah pioneers who crossed the plains pulling hand carts. For the next hour she chattered, re-living the entire adventure out loud for me. It was a mish-mash, out-of-order retelling, as such recountings generally are. I sat and listened because experience has taught me that the best time to hear about someone’s trip is within the first 24 hours after they get home. After that, life moves on and details fade. I expected Kiki to use hard, tiring, miserable, and hot as the primary descriptors. Those words did get used, but not until she’d put the words beautiful, amazing, cool, and interesting to extensive use first. I can tell that this trip was one of those watershed events in her life. She got to see her youth group peers in new ways. She got along peacefully with people she did not expect to. She got to see the goofy teenage boys stand up and take responsibility. The talking wound down and she headed for the shower. In the next few days we’ll have to weather many a complaint about her 19 mosquito bites and her painful sunburn, but given the chance to do something similar again, she would go. Mosquitoes and all.

I wish I’d known the park had a duck pond before we left the house. I would have packed along bread for our lets-go-to-a-new-park adventure. Our lack of bread was only a minor impediment to our kids. They had no qualms about begging bread from the other pond visitors around us. I had qualms, but the bread was always in their hands before I had a chance to speak up. I decided not to make an issue of not begging for bread. Instead I watched them throw bread to ducks. And I felt the warm breeze and the pleasant radiance of the evening sun. I shared in their joy when they realized that some of the bread was being snatched by a school of fish. The sideways rays of the sun betrayed the fish in their murky hiding places, giving them flashes of shining color under the water. There is something fascinating and soothing about feeding ducks, and fish too. It requires one to be still and to observe, for boisterousness will scatter the creatures you’re attempting to entice.

After a time we wandered away from the pond to explore a big grassy field, a set of swings, a fountain, and a playground. Wandering was the point really. So much of our family life has been dictated by business needs and schedules, the kids were due an evening when I wandered according to their whims. I did have to do some maneuvering to get the whims of three children pointed in the same direction, but the schedule was theirs rather than mine. We eventually quested in search of a drinking fountain because Gleek claimed she was near death from thirst. Our park trip had been so impromptu that I didn’t even pack along water bottles. I’d only handed them sandwiches for dinner as we hopped into the car. (The crusts of which were sacrificed to the ducks quite gleefully.) Having quenched her dire thirst, Gleek collapsed on the ground. She sprang up quickly enough when Link and Patch decided to explore under the branches of a tree which drooped all the way to the ground.

I had a moment to myself as they disappeared into the tree. I thought a moment of Kiki who is off on her pioneer trek. I thought of Howard off at his gaming night. Then I closed my eyes and just absorbed the calm of the moment. For that space I had put aside all the tasks of my life just to be. I though how calm and happy I felt and I spent a moment pondering if I should seek more undirected time in my life. I know I need some, but not too much I think. Too much undirected time leads to boredom and dissatisfaction rather than happiness. I need my life to be full of things, but I also need to make spaces for just wandering and feeling happy.

When the kids were ready to leave, we stopped by the grocery store to buy ice cream. And peanut butter cups. and m&m candies. These treats were artfully combined into great bowls of sugar which we consumed while playing Uno. No one won. No one lost. There were some sad moments, just like any competitive game will produce when children are involved. Games are good practice for managing small disappointments. But most of all there was laughter and teasing. They went to bed tired. I had no concrete reason for not attending my Writer Girl’s Group this evening other than “I should be home with the kids.” Now I know why. I needed to be with them, to really give them a whole evening before we part ways for a week. They’ve had far too little time with relaxed parents this summer.

Anthology Builder is sponsoring a scavenger hunt at Worldcon and has asked me to help out.

See the pretty badge? I have a bag full of these to hand out at the convention. All you have to do is come find me and ask to see one of our books. But the badge has value beyond just being pretty. If one of the Anthology Builder secret agents spots you wearing an Anthology Builder badge you will win prizes. The prizes will be either a free book handed to you on the spot, or a gift certificate for a discounted book. My badges are not the only ones available. You should click that image above to see the full list of badges, how to get them, and the further prizes there are to be gained for collecting all the badges. So if you’re going to Worldcon, be sure to join the fun.