History: January through December 2002

November 1, 2002
Finished my first-ever screenplay, The Brickmaker's Son. Don't worry, I'll post the notice here when Spielberg options the script.

October 11, 2002
One of the best things about living "up North" is that you are so close to so many beautiful things. After a difficult September, I called my mom and said, "Why don't we just hit the road?" So with next to no idea what we wanted to do or see, we threw together some clothes, filled up the trusty Saturn, and headed north.

First stop was Niagara Falls. It was more spectacular than we could have imagined. We did the "Maid of the Mist" boat ride. Drenched to the skin, blinded by the spray, we joined in the hilarity with a group of Japanese tourists. I'm always amazed at how an experience like that can bring together total strangers. By the end of the twenty minute (too short!) ride, we were laughing together and even posing in their pictures for back home.

We are easily fascinated; little things can keep us happy for hours on end. We chanced upon the St. Lawrence Seaway and gawked at ships moving through the locks between great lakes. Waved at the sailors, flirted as they passed by almost at eye level. And the bridges!

One day we ate lunch on Lake Ontario, checking out abandoned ships. And we watched the sun set on Lake Erie. Coming home, we made our way through Mexico and Texas (towns in upstate New York) and spent the night in the Adirondacks, vowing to return and spend at least a month in a cabin there.

It's funny... Great architecture can be inspiring. Who has not oohhed and ahhed inside the Muenster in Ulm or atop the Empire State Building? But when our batteries need recharging, there is no better place than Nature. Nothing more refreshing than crisp mountain air or a sea breeze.

Especially when the trees are ablaze.

September 30, 2002
A difficult month, largely due to health issues. But our next big project is underway ~ a practical translation of an 1879 German cookbook. Turns out the Max Dade Institute is publishing a fairly literal translation of exactly the same cookbook, but their version will only complement ours. Our edition updates the recipes for the 21st century kitchen, while retaining historical information that make it more than just a cookbook. I'm helping with the translation work, but someone else is editing and working out the details. For once, I have the easy job!

August 16, 2002
Taking one of those welcome breaks to look at other back-burner projects and figure out what's next. I keep coming back to my sci-fi effort, The Generation. It's writing that makes me smile even as it's in progress. I genuinely like the people I'm envisioning.

And yes, all the strange things you've ever heard about writers "talking to" their fictional characters and letting those fictional characters "control" the scene... I hate to tell you this, but it's all true! You know you're a real writer when you can celebrate your strangeness.

May 31, 2002
Initial catalog mailing is done! (Note: If you are reading this and you have never received one of our catalogs, post a comment-question here and I will make sure the publisher adds you to the mailing list.) It's a double-edged sword, being this small. Tedious doing this kind of clerical work, but fun too, because we all pitch in. With laughter, even dull jobs are worthwhile.

June 21, 2002
Finished article on researching tools for Children's Writer Annual Yearbook (2003). Just ten years ago, our options were far more limited than they are now. We couldn't Google to our heart's content, dredging up minutiae on obscure topics. Now Herzl's complete Judenstaat can be read online from the library of the University of Augsburg, Yale carries the full text of the Treaty of Versailles, and Calvin College's Web site allows access to the dark world of Nazi propaganda. In 1992, finding those three documents would have required living in close proximity to a good university library. These days, you just need Internet access.

June 7, 2002
Quick update to Jotter's Blotter (creative writing workbook), for an odd (but welcome) flurry of orders all at once. White Rose isn't the only thing in life. We all need these other projects to keep us sane and focused.

January 31, 2002
If anyone had told me that being the executor of my grandmother's estate would be this much work, I wouldn't have believed them. She did not have all that much. She had disbursed her furniture and antiques in 1996 when she moved from her forever-home to a retirement center.

And she was only in the hospital four days before she died. And she had no debt.

So why is this so amazingly hard? Not complaining, as much as wondering aloud why corporations like Southwestern Bell and Time Warner Cable are incapable of handling easy transactions correctly the first time around. Maybe politically, this is the real story ~ "Al Qaeda" is merely the distraction to make us forget that customer service and quality assurance are nearly nonexistent in these United States.

January 3, 2002
My grandmother died this afternoon, so it may be a couple of weeks before I can update this journal. Heading to Houston tomorrow, driving a U-Haul back (hopefully not in the snow and ice). She had a long and relatively good life.