Image from pixabay.com

“All human suffering buttons itself to the pang of wanting.”― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

So there’s this style of sneakers I’ve been wanting for months now. I glance with ill-disguised envy at the feet of other women wearing them. I need a pair of those sneakers.

Well, okay. Not need, in the sense that I go barefoot in winter. Or that I don’t already have sneakers of my own. Several pairs, in fact, which are admittedly still serviceable.

But my shoes are so last year (or year before last, or maybe the one before that). They’re okay for walking the dog, but nowhere near as cute as the ones I have my eye on.

I have a trip coming up, and a pair of those new sneaks would be just the thing to clinch my capsule summer wardrobe.

The problem is, they cost what a similarly thrift-conscious friend of mine would call “a shiny penny.” Like everyone else who’s not a member of the oligarch class, these days my shiny pennies resemble the ones we placed on railroad tracks when we were kids. Back when lightly supervised Boomer babies did such things.

Like those ancient pennies, my present ones have been stretched and thinned under the weight of an on-rushing economic engine.

Also, while I know it’s old-fashioned of me, I balk at spending that kind of money on what we used to call tennis shoes.

So I’ve been stalking online shoe retailers, investing more time and energy than I care to admit in hopes of finding a flash sale on that particular brand and make, a smokin’ hot deal upon which I can pounce.

Of course, as those shoes are popular and in demand, their prices remain nearly equal across all the legitimate sites I haunt. My pursuit of them has become something of a low-level, in-between-real-tasks, obsession.

And that, reader, made me a perfect target.

I was actually close to pulling the trigger on a pair at full price, on an online platform I know and trust. But just to make sure, I did a quick Google search for the make and style number, and whaddaya know, there they were on another site for less than half what I was about to pay.

My fatty little bargain-hunting heart beat faster. But I’m no dummy (I thought). I was careful to investigate to make sure the offer was legit, even though the retailer was a well-respected one that I’ve purchased from in the past.

I won’t reveal their name since what followed was in no way their responsibility. They mostly sell scrubs (nice ones) to medical pros, a few sets of which I bought during Covid when I worked at a public school that had reopened before the vaccine was available. They also carry a limited selection of shoes. Including, behold, the very ones I lusted for.

At a low, low price! So much lower that I went a further step and checked their site with TrustPilot, which gave it a confident rating.

So I bit. I selected the shoes in my size (that part was oddly confusing, which should’ve been a red flag), and put them in my cart. The purchasing portal looked like any other I’ve used, so in went my credit card number and security code. Flush with the prospect of finally obtaining Those Shoes, I pushed the button.

And then, spinning. Spinning and spinning, just like my stomach had begun to do, until a message popped up saying my card couldn’t be verified and I needed to enter a different one.

That, I knew, was more than a red flag; it was a flag on fire. Looking at the url with a closer eye, I saw that it contained three extra characters than the real site it had, I now suspected, cloned.

I closed the browser tab and smote my forehead.

Then I went to the actual site — which, I’m telling you, looks precisely like the cloned one — and yep, there were the shoes I want. At the real price.

I didn’t buy them. How do I deserve such footwear when I’m too credulous to avoid such a swindle?

All I could hope was that, since the transaction hadn’t gone through, everything would be okay. There was, after all, no way to scrape back the data I’d just offered up.

For a few days, all was well. It did seem weird when I got a text from someplace called Boss Casino saying it needed to verify a $745 payment, but I quickly deleted that and reported it as spam.

Turns out there really is, or at least virtually is, a Boss Casino, a “social sweepstakes site” and I don’t hesitate to use its name because it and its ilk — online gambling hustlers, no matter what they call themselves — are evil and a blight on society.

This I know because the next day, as my husband was reviewing our online bank statements, he noticed that the credit card balance, which we’d just paid off in full, had nearly a dozen charges from, you guessed it, Boss Casino, including the one for $745. Together they totaled just under $7,000.

Once we’d both expended our reserves of expletives, I told my husband, “I know how this happened.”

Because here’s the thing, and this is the part that really makes me cringe. Not two weeks ago, a good friend of mine had to cancel her credit card because she’d been caught up in the same kind of scheme — this time, involving a hair color product she couldn’t find anywhere else that was now available online at a price so reasonable she bought it in bulk.

But instead of the sale going through, she got the spinning thing, and then the demand for another card, and a few days later, she realized her card had been hacked.

And she’d told me all this.

Luckily, we bank with a local credit union that is highly responsive and employs actual, compassionate humans. They immediately froze the charges and canceled the card. I was issued a new one that afternoon.

That means that whatever automatic payments I had set up on the old card will have to be rejiggered, which is a pain. But not as painful as being out $7K, or feeling as stupid as I do.

I’m telling this story because making their victims feel shame is a con artist’s most powerful weapon, and I refuse to take the blame for their duplicity.

Maybe I can spare you, or someone, the same experience.

One tip: if you find what you want at a price that’s almost too good to be true, it is.

I still want those shoes.

Image courtesy Disney-Hyperion Books

"All human wisdom is summed up in two words; wait and hope." — Alexandre Dumas

If you’re at all curious about what it’s like to get a debut novel off the ground, I’ve got some my-first-rodeo insights to share.

If not, the TL,DR here is that my debut novel Griffin Speaker has hit the market and I’m having a blast. Boise’s beloved indie Rediscovered Books hosted a launch party, where I was in conversation with the brilliant local librarian and literary champion, Huda Shaltry.

Yours truly on the left, answering thoughtful questions from Huda, pictured right. Photo from author

Next week, my husband and I are embarking on a road trip book tour from Idaho to our old Northern California stomping grounds, where I’ll be doing my first official school visit and bookstore appearances in San Francisco and down the Peninsula in San Mateo. If you’re in the vicinity, details on those are below.

And I’m thrilled to say that Griffin Speaker has been named an Indie Next Kid’s pick for May and June (not to boast, but that’s a Big Deal) — and I’ve just learned that Bookshop.org has listed it as one of the best new middle grade books for ages 8-12.

Screenshot, Bookshop.org

Also a Big Deal, and I’m proud and happy for my griffins and their people.

Now, for those curious as to what I’ve learned along the way.

Writing long-form fiction is not an occupation for people in a hurry. Especially when it comes to traditional publishing.

There’s creating the story itself, a back-and-forth process of incubation, planning, possibly outlining, drafting, revising, re-revising, revising some more, and polishing until a manuscript emerges that may indeed be suitable for human consumption.

Then comes the brave and tender act of seeking feedback from beta readers, critique partners, and eventually one’s agent.

Any agent worth their salt is more than likely to request further revising and polishing until they’re confident the story is ready to send out on submission to the acquiring editors of publishing houses.

With strategic positioning, excellent contacts, and a healthy dose of luck, the hopeful manuscript attracts an acquiring editor who feels strongly enough about the work to champion it to the sales team, marketing team, publicity team, and the executive team. If that all goes well, the project can proceed to an offer and then contract negotiations. At that point, “real” editing and book production can begin.

In my case, that part took around three years.

Waiting and hoping? They’re baked into every stage of the process.

But when your book gets the green light, it has a major publisher invested in its success, with resources including rounds of increasingly granular editing and proofing, cover art, illustration, interior design, and then marketing, sales, and distribution. And all on a level that I certainly could never hope to replicate even if I hired professionals in each of those disciplines on my own dime.

I don’t have that many dimes.

Yes, there are a lot of gatekeepers and a lot of hurdles to jump in traditional publishing. For me, it’s been well worth it.

Here are a few other things I’ve learned:

Good editors (mine have been terrific) possess a rare skill set. They are combination coaches, literary analysts, standard-bearers, industry experts, cheerleaders, and gentle but firm task-masters.

Copy editors? They can spot a stray punctuation mark or an out-of-whack timeline (like, “it can’t be Monday night in this scene if the character just walked through the door in the previous scene, which is on Sunday morning”) from 200 yards. Astounding.

Art directors? I can’t even. They possess talents that were absolutely not in my personal Gift Bag From the Universe received at birth.

Ditto illustrators and cover artists. I have the great good fortune to have been assigned Matt Rockefeller for those images, which literally gave me shivers when I saw them, as well as Virginia Allyn, who produced the map of my book’s world, Griffin Land.

Map by Virginia Allyn, courtesy Disney-Hyperion Books

It’s also been a thrill to see the photos and videos sent to me by friends, family, and fans who’ve found Griffin Speaker out in the wild — actually, at their local bookstores, from locations all over the country.

And I get to savor the heady experience of holding a realy-o, truly-o book in my hand, one that I wrote, in a bookstore where people I don’t even know are buying it!

As an avid reader since I was knee high to a peapup (inside Griffin Speaker reference, see what I did there?) that’s been my big audacious dream. I’m still pinching myself.

Also a delight is discovering more wondrous books purportedly written for the same age group but that I, at my seasoned age, absolutely love. A few recommendations: Simon Sort of Says by Erin Bow (a Newbery Honor Book); the Impossible Creatures series by Katherine Rundell; and Kiyash Monsef’s Once There Was and its sequel, Bird of a Thousand Stories. I'm excited to be in conversation with Kiyash Monsef on May 21 at Books Inc’s Laurel Village store in San Francisco.

One of the perks of being a reader nowadays is that you can, if you wish, truly become an active participant in a book’s career. Not just purchasing copies — posting reviews, sharing the book with friends, reaching out to authors via their websites, inviting local authors to your book club — you as a reader are not just a passive recipient, but a collaborator.

Thank you for joining Griffin Speaker and me on this journey, however far along the path you choose to go. Here’s where I’ll be next:

May 16, Boise: Author In-Store Event, Barnes & Noble Boise (11 AM - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 20, San Francisco: In-person presentation at Town School

May 21, San Francisco: In-store event at Books Inc Laurel Village location, where in conversation with the Kiyash Monsef, author of Once There Was and its sequel The Bird of a Thousand Stories. eventbrite.com/e/jan-m-flynn-at-books-inc-laurel-village-tickets-1977649020457?aff=oddtdtcreator

May 22, San Mateo CA: In-store event at Barnes & Noble, Hillsdale Mall, 6 PM, PT

image courtesy Rediscovered Books, Boise ID

I don’t make a habit of flooding your inbox, but I’ve got a quick post to share with you — and if you happen to be anywhere near Boise, Idaho, I’d LOVE for you to join me for this first in-store launch event! On May 9, I’ll be at Rediscovered Books in conversation with a local literary advocate and rockstar librarian, Huda Shaltry.

This event will be my maiden voyage, so to speak, and I’m fizzing with excitement. It’s free and open to all (of course!), but since space is limited, registration via Evite is recommended.

Below is the link to Rediscovered Books’ event listing and the Evite link:

Rediscovered Books Website/Calendar - https://rdbooks.org/event/2026-05-09/jan-flynn-author-event-griffin-speaker-huda-shaltry

EventBrite ticketing - https://www.eventbrite.com/e/jan-flynn-author-event-for-griffin-speaker-tickets-1987608577761?aff=oddtdtcreator

If you can make it, WONDERFUL — and if you know anyone in the area, please spread the word! Huge thanks for your support and encouragement.

image courtesy Disney-Hyperion Books

image from American Booksellers Association Indie Next Preview

In These Times we’re living in, and hopefully through, it’s a lovely thing to have good news to share. Even if it is of the own-horn-tooting variety.

But this is news that is absolutely worth splashing, and I’m not even going to pretend to be shy about tooting, or better yet, blaring it.

If you’re unfamiliar with IndieBound.org, as a reader and/or writer, here’s what you should know: IndieBound, an initiative of the American Booksellers Association, is a network of hundreds of independent bookstores that acts as a “local first” shopping resource. Dedicated to “making the world better one independent bookstore at a time,” its network shares book recommendations and connects readers and authors.

And its monthly Indie Next List has become a key resource, compiling recommendations from indie booksellers all over the country.

Making the list is a big deal.

So when I learned that Griffin Speaker is one of only ten middle-grade books selected for the May/June list, I fizzed like a shaken champagne bottle. For any author, let alone a debut author, this is a griffin-sized feather in the cap.

Launch date is May 5 — just three weeks away! If you’ve preordered a copy (THANK YOU!), it should land on your doorstep that day or very soon after. If not, there’s still time, just sayin’.

Here are upcoming events surrounding the Griffin Speaker launch — if you’re in the area of any of the in-store events, please join me and say hi!

May 9, Boise: Book Launch Party at Rediscovered Books in Boise (1 - 2 PM Mountain Time) — free, and open to the public!

May 16, Boise: Author In-Store Event, Barnes & Noble Boise (11 AM - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 20, San Francisco: In-person presentation at Town School

May 21, San Francisco: In-store event at Books Inc Laurel Village location, where I’ll be in conversation with the wonderful Kiyash Monsef, author of Once There Was and its sequel The Bird of a Thousand Stories, both luminous books. If you’re in the area, please join us! eventbrite.com/e/jan-m-flynn-at-books-inc-laurel-village-tickets-1977649020457?aff=oddtdtcreator

May 22, San Mateo CA: In-store event at Barnes & Noble, Hillsdale Mall, 6 PM, PT

photo courtesy Randall Duckett

“Diagnosed at age 6, I suffer from a rare genetic condition called multiple epiphyseal dysplasia, or MED, which caused my joints and bones to deform as I grew and aged . . . think of broken gears constantly grinding against each other and wearing down with use. . . . Every day, I ache head to toe . . . Pain infuses my body, which feels like a sponge dipped in acid . . . . I tell you all this not to get sympathy, but to establish my bona fides as someone who knows what it’s like to have chronic pain.” — Randall Duckett

Here’s my experience with intractable pain, which compared to Randall Duckett’s was a day at the beach.

It was the spring of 2008, a year that was like a capstone to a period of relentless stress. My first husband had died suddenly in 2002, leaving me with his niche business and a house he hadn’t quite finished remodeling, along with one son in college and another in high school.

With the help of my second husband, I’d managed to run the business for five years and groom it for sale. Once the escrow check was closed and we were all good with the Board of Equalization, we embarked on a long list of DIY projects to get the house completed and market-ready.

That meant eight to ten hours a day, seven days a week, of manual labor, with everything on the line and no other steady income. At one point, while unloading sacks of garden soil, I was pretty sure I’d tweaked my back. I was just as sure I couldn’t afford to stop; the real estate brokers’ open was only days away.

I should have stopped. I should have sat down with an ice pack and a nice big dose of ibuprofen.

The house sold, escrow was progressing, and we were packing for a move to a much more affordable state where we had extended family. Things would have been on the upswing, were it not for the increasing pain in my back.

I couldn’t sit for more than 20 minutes without being in agony. I couldn’t sleep for longer than 90 minutes at a stretch, and even that required a giant foam wedge beneath my knees.

My doctors offered me narcotics; I refused. I took so much Advil that I developed tiny red spots beneath my eyes, until a neurologist expressed horror at that and put me on gabapentin, generally an anti-seizure med.

What I had was a badly herniated lumbar disc. It’s a common complaint, and often fairly tolerable. In my case, though, the disc’s cushion of turgid goo bulged so much that it pressed relentlessly on my sciatic nerve.

My HMO required me to wait at least three months before they’d give me a referral to their pain clinic; the damage to my back wasn’t an emergency, and wasn’t serious enough to require immediate intervention.

Easy for them to say.

I learned just how debilitating ongoing pain can be, and how it can erode one’s perspective, confidence, mood, and even relationships. Physical pain that won’t let up becomes emotional and psychological pain, which can be even more exhausting than the original injury.

And yet I knew that in the chronic pain department, I was lucky. With a major injection of cortisone in my spine and over a year of physical therapy and careful exercise, I gradually recovered.

But those months humbled me big time. I knew there are millions of people all over the world who live with unending pain, and for many of them, it’s not a matter of a few months or even a year before it clears up.

According to the CDC’s National Health Interview Survey:

In 2023, 24.3% of adults had chronic pain, and 8.5% of adults had chronic pain that frequently limited life or work activities (referred to as high-impact chronic pain) in the past 3 months.

That’s over 50 million adults with chronic pain in the U.S., and another nearly 17 million experiencing the kind that limits their daily lives, often significantly.

And the prevalence rises with age.

So when I became familiar with the writing of Randall Duckett, I was eager to interview him for the Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age podcast. Luckily, he agreed, and our conversation will go live on April 8, wherever you get your podcasts.

Very few people can claim to have a more intimate knowledge of chronic pain than Randall Duckett. But that hardly limits his identity.

Randall is a journalist who has created, written for, and edited scores of magazines and who has authored articles for, among others, National Geographic Traveler, USA Today, and AARP: The Magazine.

He’s the author of two books: The Elements of Effective Writing; 41 How-To Tips for Creators, and — the one that drew me to him as a podcast guest — Chronic Pain Chronicles: inspiring and insightful stories of resolve, resilience, and relief.

Randall doesn’t sugarcoat the experience of chronic pain. He doesn’t offer simplistic affirmations. He knows the frustration of having one’s pain ignored, discounted, or misdiagnosed, and he understands the distress of having medical professionals who can’t find an easy fix or zero in on the source of pain resort to suggesting it’s all in one’s head.

But he also knows that chronic pain can be a very different beast than acute pain. It can take on a life of its own, and its expression and intensity can be as individual and unique as the person who suffers with it.

It is not something to address with a one-size-fits-all approach. Coming to terms with chronic pain can mean assembling a support team: doctors, yes, but also therapists knowledgeable about pain who can help address its very real emotional and psychological elements.

Just as important can be combating the isolation and stubborn stigma by connecting with a community of other folks who are also dealing with refractory pain and who know what it’s like.

Randall Duckett’s multiple epiphyseal dysplasia hasn’t magically gone away, nor has the pain it causes disappeared. But he has a different relationship to it than he once did, one that allows him to live a life that is full and meaningful, if not without limits.

And as we age, he has the experience, knowledge, and generosity to share his journey with us — and quite possibly make our own roads through our later years easier to traverse.

Please join me in conversation with Randall Duckett on the Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age podcast episode that goes live on Wednesday, April 8. What he has to say could make a real difference to you or to someone you love.

Too excited to fix my hair first; photo by author

“The weeks leading up to your debut launch are like nothing else,” said one of the best-selling children’s authors I met at the conference. “And you’ll never have that experience again, so enjoy it to the full.”

Advice taken!

My publisher, Disney-Hyperion, sent me to the Texas Library Association 2026 conference in Houston this past Sunday through Tuesday. And boy howdy, was it a good time.

The Disney Publishing booth . . . notice the Griffin Speaker cover in the middle of the upper display?

Everything about the conference was Texas-sized, from the hotel to the conference hall to the energy. Librarians, especially school librarians, are a lively bunch! And since they have both the power and the dedication to get good books into the hands of young readers, they’re worth celebrating and cultivating.

Thanks to the Disney marketing team, I was able to participate in three conference activities. The first was Monday morning’s “Texas Tea,” a sort of speed-dating event in which groups of two to four school librarians were seated at tables, and the authors were given 10 minutes at each table to pitch their books — or, simply to schmooze with lovely people who are devoted to both books and kids.

That’s where I got my excellent advice from the author I was paired with for the event, Amar Shah. By the end of the event, I was affectionately referring to him as Obi-Wan.

On Tuesday morning, I was a panelist for a session called “Imagination Unleashed: The Next Chapter of Middle Grade Fantasy.” With between 60 and 80 librarians in attendance, it was another high-octane event.

I was delighted to connect with four other wonderful authors on the panel, including the prolific, best-selling Brandon Mull, perhaps best known for his Fablehaven series — and he’s launching a new one with the first in his Guardians series. It just so happens that I already have my ticket to see Brandon’s author presentation at Boise’s Egyptian Theater later this month!

After the panel, I headed back to the exhibition hall for my first-ever book signing. This being my first rodeo (fittingly, in Texas), I didn’t know what to expect. I thought, maybe a small table at the Disney booth, where I’d hope to catch the attention of passersby?

No, grasshopper. This was a full-press affair in one of the aisles dedicated to author signings, with folks lined up (lined up, I say!) with pre-sale copies furnished for librarians by the publisher. I had a big line! I had assistants! I signed books and posed for pics for a solid hour . . . and yes, I felt like a celebrity.

video courtesy of author (and yes, everybody at the conference consented to a general photo release)

After that, I was whisked away by a car service to IAH (George Bush Internat’l), where the security lines had been notoriously lengthy — as in, four hours — thanks to the current governmental enthusiasm for using TSA agents like political pinballs.

Luckily, with spring break winding down and TSA finally getting paid (at least for now), I was in line for all of five minutes.

Two flights later, I was back home in Boise by 10 PM, happy to reunite with husband, cat, new puppy, and especially my bed.

I crawled out of the covers this morning, figuring it was time to come back to earth (insert Houston Space Center joke here). But after unpacking, working out, and sifting through emails, I settled down with a cup of coffee and the March 23 edition of Publishers Weekly that I hadn’t had time to read, the one with the luminous Ann Patchett on the cover.

I flipped through it and nearly did a real-life spit take when I beheld this:

photo by gobsmacked author

This may be my best April Fool’s Day ever. And now I promise to get back to work!

Looking ahead, here are upcoming events around the Griffin Speaker launch — if you’re in the area of any of the in-store events, please join me and say hi!

May 9, Boise: Book Launch Party at Rediscovered Books in Boise (1 - 2 PM Mountain Time) — free, and open to the public!

May 16, Boise: Author In-Store Event, Barnes & Noble Boise (11 AM - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 20, San Francisco: In-person presentation at Town School

May 21, San Francisco: In-store event at Books Inc Laurel Village location, where I’ll be in conversation with the wonderful Kiyash Monsef, author of Once There Was and its sequel The Bird of a Thousand Stories, both luminous books. If you’re in the area, please join us! eventbrite.com/e/jan-m-flynn-at-books-inc-laurel-village-tickets-1977649020457?aff=oddtdtcreator

May 22, San Mateo CA: In-store event at Barnes & Noble, Hillsdale Mall, 6 PM PT

This’ll be quick, because I have news to share . . .

Launch day for Griffin Speaker is getting closer — my debut, first-in-a-series middle grade fantasy adventure hits bookstores on May 5.

And as one of my wonderful subscribers or followers, I want to let you know about a real deal: today, March 24, through March 26, Barnes & Noble is having a sale on PRE-ORDERS.

Use code PREORDER25 at checkout to get 25% off your copy of Griffin Speaker — just click here to purchase!

If you know any authors — and since you’re on Substack, I’m betting you do — then you know just how much preorders mean to the success of a new book. And you know just how grateful authors are to the readers who place those orders.

Want an overview of the book? Here’s the publisher’s description:

Impossible Creatures meets The Giver in this unforgettable fantasy series starter perfect for kids 8-12!

When twelve-year-old Rain bonds with the last wild griffin, she has the chance to change her fortune—and possibly her world.

“Powerful, inspiring, and absolutely wonderful.”
—Shannon Messenger, New York Times best-selling author of the Keeper of the Lost Cities series

As an orphan on the lowest rung of society, twelve-year-old Rain is destined for a future of hard labor—until she meets a wild griffin and bonds with him.

An old law says that bond entitles Rain to an education at the elite Griffin Riders Academy instead of a life in the mines. But Rain’s Rise threatens to topple Griffin Land’s fragile hierarchy, and those at the top are determined to see her fail. So they task Rain with proving herself: Armed with just her wit and accompanied by her best friend and an unlikely ally, Rain must scale the highest peak in Griffin Land and defeat the monster at its summit.

Rain’s success could change the world. But with an impossible quest ahead, will she and her griffin even survive?

Filled with awe-inspiring black-and-white illustrations, Griffin Speaker is both a delightful friendship-adventure story and a hopeful tale of resistance in an unequal world.

I’m over-the-moon excited to see Griffin Speaker take off — and I hope you’ll join Rain and her companions on their quest.

If you’ve already pre-ordered, leave me a note in the comments — and know you have my deepest thanks!

Bandit wonders if we’ll ever get back to normal: Image by jugendweihebb from Pixabay

Indoors or out, no one relaxes
In March, that month of wind and taxes,
The wind will presently disappear,
The taxes last us all the year.
~Ogden Nash, "Thar She Blows," 1943

I never know how to feel about March. It’s the most in-between, neither here-nor-there month of the year. Its winds and weather changes are capricious, offering neither the solid coziness of winter nor the fragrant seduction of true spring.

Daylight Saving Time takes hold, depriving us of an hour of much-needed sleep. I struggle to forgive March for that.

There are no federal holidays in March, which for most employees means an unbroken slog of five-day weeks. This is complicated by schoolkids being out for a week of spring break. That’s a challenge for workers with limited PTO and who lack the disposable funds to whisk the family off to Hawaii.

This March, even Hawaii’s not a great option. Current forecasts for the islands include high winds and possible blizzards. It’s not just Hawaii; most of the U.S. is in for truly weird weather this month, from heat domes to atmospheric rivers.

Talk about coming in like a lion. No doubt about it, March is a challenge.

It’s Women’s History Month, which is a good thing, but I confess to mixed feelings. We don’t have a Men’s History Month, because it’s clear to everyone except maybe Groypers that there is no need for such a thing.

Also, Women’s History Month in the U.S. has to be instituted every year by presidential proclamation. The specter of our Current Occupant granting dispensation to recognize the contributions of women to American society makes me queasy, just saying.

As for the state of the nation and the world this month, let’s agree to politely avert our gazes, just for a moment. We all need a breath of almost-spring air from time to time.

Zooming the focus back down to the personal: In our ‘hood, the forsythia is bursting into chrome-yellow bloom. Daffodils are doing their sunny-faced thing. Neighbors are emerging from their winter cocoons, happy to sidewalk-schmooze while walking their pooches.

The local garden centers are restocking, intent on their annual campaign to get me to plant my front porch pots way too early (“No pots until Mother’s Day,” a wise neighbor advised me when we first moved to Idaho from California. I found out just how wise she was when I went ahead and learned the hard way).

And here at Chez Flynn, things on the brain-and-Bandit recovery front are coming along. In case you missed it, I recently posted a piece on the Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age Substack about my husband’s brain surgery in February, and the cat’s resultant distress:

https://substack.com/@janmflynn1/p-189657803

That piece has had something of a moment. I’ve had multiple requests for updates — some regarding my husband’s progress, but mostly about the cat.

I am happy to report that the vomiting and nighttime agitation, while not entirely gone, have abated. I am referring here to the cat, who has mostly resigned himself to having just me to sleep with, or preferably upon.

The husband is doing splendidly. He has enjoyed a honeymoon side effect from the surgery that has tamped down his essential tremor. His hands have been so steady that he was even able to type again for a while. The effect is beginning to wear off, though, as the surgeon warned us; this is a normal part of the brain healing.

The surgical staples were removed last week, so my beloved no longer resembles something from a Guillermo del Toro movie. He’s cleared to drive, which has reduced his post-operative grumpiness by about 95% because he no longer has to be shuttled around by me. His implanted device is scheduled to be switched on and adjusted in early April.

He has a tattoo in mind for the skin atop the implant. It’s designed to mimic the iPhone systems settings icon, which I find rather brilliant. We’ll see if his surgeon gives the go-ahead.

So, with brain and Bandit addressed, how about the book?

By book, of course I mean my forthcoming debut novel Griffin Speaker, which comes out on May 5 and is available for preorder now.

On that front, exciting stuff!

In most book deal contracts, the publisher agrees to furnish the author with a number of copies of the first print run, prior to the book going on sale. My copies of Griffin Speaker arrived from Penguin Random House (the distributor for Disney Publishing) two evenings ago. To say I was excited is an understatement.

The journey from manuscript to published book is long and fraught, so when a moment like this arrives, it’s worth jumping up and down.

I’ve been happily involved in some pre-launch activities this month. On March 5, I took part with three other (wonderful!) authors in a panel discussion for School Library Journal’s online“Middle School Magic” event.

On March 11, I was thrilled to be part of Disney Publishing’s spring/summer preview of new books for young readers on the American Library Association’s Booklist Webinar. If you’re curious, you can watch the recording here — I come in at 41:59.

More events and school visits for the end of this school year and the beginning of the 26/27 academic calendar are starting to line up, but here’s what’s on the schedule now:

March 30, Houston, TX: Panelist participant, “Imagination Unleashed: The Next Chapter of Middle Grade Fantasy,” Texas Library Association Conference (9:30 - 10:30 AM Central Time)

May 9, Boise: Book Launch Party at Rediscovered Books in Boise (1 - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 16, Boise: Author In-Store Event, Barnes & Noble Boise (11 AM - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 20, San Francisco: In-person presentation at Town School

May 21, San Francisco: In-store event at Books Inc Laurel Village location, where I’ll be in conversation with the wonderful Kiyash Monsef, author of Once There Was and its sequel The Bird of a Thousand Stories, both luminous books. If you’re in the area, please join us! eventbrite.com/e/jan-m-flynn-at-books-inc-laurel-village-tickets-1977649020457?aff=oddtdtcreator

February is the border between winter and spring. ~Terri Guillemets, "Outlines of joy," 2002

It’s not my favorite month, February.

True, it’s not January anymore, which is a relief, but it’s still winter. And by now, with the holidays firmly behind us, winter is like that relative you’re obligated to include in the party, the one who’s quirky and fun for a while. But who doesn’t know when it’s time to leave.

Especially this year, in snow-drought-stricken southern Idaho.

Some days have been blessed with the achingly blue skies and crystalline sunlight that only late winter offers. But more of them have been dreary, the sky dull and weighted by overcast, the landscape drained of color.

For a short month, February lasts a long time.

And this particular February has contained a whole lot.

With my husband’s planned surgery looming (more on that later), the January - February borderland seemed like a good time to get outta Dodge.

We’d long wanted to visit San Miguel de Allende, a city in the highlands of central Mexico famed for its culture and wildly colorful, well, everything. So we hopped on a plane (well, two planes) and crossed the border.

And indeed, it was balm for the world-and-winter-weary soul.

San Miguel de Allende, or as the thriving American and Canadian expat community refers to it, SMA, is a jewel box of a town. Its cozy warren of narrow, cobbled streets meander among connected, parti-colored walls draped with bougainvillea.

As we picked our cautious way along the rough, 18” wide sidewalks, every few feet we’d be enchanted by a door opening onto a stunning courtyard, a tempting eatery, or an art gallery.

The historic center of SMA sits at an elevation of 6200 feet, the same as Lake Tahoe. From there, it rises to altitudinous neighborhoods ranged along streets of lung-burning steepness, at least for us flatlanders. We were humbled, as we puffed our way uphill, to be passed by locals out for their daily runs.

Note to prospective visitors: all the guidebooks to the city recommend sturdy shoes, and they’re not kidding. A friend of ours who lived in San Miguel for several years warned us that one of its nicknames is The City of Fallen Women.

We walked (carefully) between five and eight miles a day, sometimes with a destination in mind and sometimes only to absorb the sights and sounds. The town is studded with art, and culture practically exudes through the cobbles.

We spent a day and a half exploring Fabrica La Aurora, a former textile factory that now houses galleries and cafés, all alluring. Enchanted, we bought a painting from a local artist. From where I sit as I write, I can let my eyes rest on its dreamy palette of blues, purples, and subdued yellows.

Rooftop bars proliferate all through SMA, with stunning sunset views. The food is amazing, and if you’re of the vegan persuasion, you’ll have no trouble finding mouthwatering options.

I did, however, politely pass on the roasted ants and worms offered as additions to the salsa prepared tableside.

One morning we happened on a funeral procession threading through town. The hearse and family mourners were followed by a truck carrying gigantic speakers that pumped out foot-bouncing music for the dozens of dancers who followed, all of them wearing delightfully macabre masks.

The next afternoon, as we strolled through Parque Benito Juárez, we saw a wedding party where the bride and groom, serenaded by mariachis, were joined by matching bride and groom mojigangas, 10-foot-tall papier-maché puppets worn by their operators.

A lineup of mojigangas, giant wearable puppets, in a San Miguel de Allende gallery. Photo by author

If you’re looking for an escape from American Ordinary (if ordinary is even a thing in the U.S. these days), I highly recommend a few days in SMA.

We returned home to a dismal winter inversion and wished we could get back on the plane. Or any plane, going anywhere.

But only two days later, we were humbled and honored to receive the award as Guardians of the Year for 2025 from Boise’s Family Advocates, which runs the CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocate) program. CASAs are trained volunteers who support kids in foster care as their cases go through the courts.

All dressed up for the big ‘do: photo courtesy author

We feel lucky to be part of Family Advocates, which does so much to strengthen families at a time when social and community resources are stretched thin, and to help kids in foster care.

Honestly, we were a bit fuddled to be so honored when we know how hard other CASAs work — but when an organization of this caliber offers you recognition, the only polite response is deep thanks.

After the gala, I plunged back into the novel draft that I’ve been working on for — honestly, I’ve lost count of the months. I’m hoping it will one day be the third book of the Rain Rising trilogy (beginning with Griffin Speaker, which hits bookshelves on May 5 (preorders available now!).

It only makes sense that each time you draft a novel, it gets easier. Unfortunately, very little about writing fiction makes sense.

"There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are."
— W. Somerset Maugham

This particular draft had bedeviled me with so many evil plot bunnies and digressions into the weeds that I’d begun to despair. But getting away from it for ten days helped clear the cobwebs, and I managed to reach The End at the end of this week.

Next on our February dance card: my husband’s brain surgery. Tomorrow, in fact.

Wait, brain surgery? Shouldn’t I be freaking out?

Only a little. My beloved has essential tremor that affects his hands. It’s not Parkinson’s, and it’s not life-threatening, but it is progressive, and it does make life more trouble than it needs to be.

He’s gone through all the more conservative treatments, and now the best option is a procedure called Deep Brain Stimulation. It’s a surgery with a long history and a very high success rate, partly because candidates are so thoroughly vetted before undergoing the procedure.

My husband has spent the past year undergoing all manner of testing to qualify: physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, therapy therapy, and a battery of cognitive tests that lasted a full day.

He aced all of ‘em. Yay!

Anyway, through the wizardry of modern medicine and assuming all goes to plan <brief pause to implore the Universe>, once healed up, my husband will have a rechargeable device implanted. It’s a bit like a brain pacemaker that cancels out the wonky impulses from the node in his noggin that cause the shakes.

And then he can type, mix martinis, and fill out forms again, all by himself.

The prognosis is excellent, the risks minimized, the upside certainly promising. Still, it’s scary.

On this day, the day before he puts himself and his precious brains into the hands of the surgical team, we’ve reached another border. We stand at the threshold between Pre-Op and Post-Op.

At this point, we just have to trust. And hope the doc is having a good day.

I’m primed to play recovery nurse for however many days or weeks it takes to get the hubs back on his feet (and a hat on his shaved, stapled cranium). We’ll see how long he lets me coddle him, though; he has a limited tolerance for being fussed over.

While I’m not plying him with tea and protein shakes, I will be prepping for Griffin Speaker’s release, and starting the next round of revisions on the second book, Griffin Rider (due out in 2027).

For now, here are the book launch events I have coming up:

March 5, Online: Author Panel Discussion, School Library Journal’s “Middle School Magic” online event (FREE to register and open to the public, but claim your spot now: see link!)

March 11, Online: Booklist webinar, highlighting Disney-Hyperion Books’ upcoming titles to librarians. This one is, I believe, invitation only — but if I find out different, I’ll let you know

March 30, Houston, TX: Panelist participant, “Imagination Unleashed: The Next Chapter of Middle Grade Fantasy,” Texas Library Association Conference (9:30 - 10:30 AM Central Time)

May 9, Boise: Book Launch Party at Rediscovered Books in Boise (1 - 2 PM Mountain Time). Public enthusiastically invited

May 16, Boise: Author In-Store Event, Barnes & Noble Boise (11 AM - 2 PM Mountain Time). Again, ALL are welcome, so if you’re in the area, please join us

May 20, San Francisco: In-person presentation at Town School

May 21, San Francisco: In-store event at Books Inc Laurel Village location, public most certainly welcome

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Image by StevenBuchanan from Pixabay

The image above is from San Miguel de Allende, a city in the central highlands of Mexico. With its cobblestone streets, colonial architecture, and artsy-historic vibe, it’s a different scene from the beach resorts of Cancún or Cabo. About 60 miles away is Guanajuato, tucked into a narrow mountain valley. Both cities are designated UNESCO World Heritage sites, and both are home to thriving American expat communities.

My husband and I are headed to both cities next week. We’d planned this trip before the U.S. invaded Venezuela, before ICE invaded Minneapolis, and before our delulu dictator-wannabe went all in on strongarming Denmark into giving him Greenland. Or Iceland; he can’t seem to keep them straight.

Also, before he started tossing out remarks about “land strikes” in Mexico. Which goes to show that there is no “away” to run to. We hope he’ll be sufficiently distracted with threatening to blockade Cuba, or insulting our allies — and by his increasingly desperate efforts to keep us all distracted from The You-Know-Who Files — to leave our southern neighbor in peace.

Normally, in anticipation of a trip like this, I’ve spent weeks investigating sights to see and wonders to behold. I’ve planned the perfect capsule wardrobe, consulted multiple travel guides, listed the can’t-miss cultural attractions.

But normally, I’m not witnessing federal storm troopers from my own government shoot mothers in the face, detain toddlers, or arrest praying clergy. Normally, I’m not listening to the Vice President insist that what I clearly saw and heard him say is not what I clearly saw or heard. Like Groucho Marx (“Who are you gonna believe, me or your lyin’ eyes?”). Except not funny.

Normally, I haven’t spent nearly every weekend at some form of protest or march, continually papering over the previous week’s sign.

I operate in the belief that action is the antidote to anxiety, and that’s proven true. Mostly. Lately, my efforts to protect my peace and keep a healthy barrier between All That and In Here have hit a wall.

A wall that’s permeable to the toxic plume drifting through the zeitgeist in my beloved U.S. of A.

I’m feeling its fallout in my temperament and my outlook. Lately, it’s an unrelenting effort to keep them both regulated, like I’m doing an endless workout with no rest intervals.

What worries me more is its effect on my writing. It’s not that I’m suffering writer’s block, if that’s even a thing; despite my malaise, I’ve managed to grind out between 1,500 and 2,900 words a day on the first draft of a new novel.

The operative word is “grind.” I’ve been working with gritted teeth, slogging uphill, feeling as though I’m drawing from a reservoir that’s suffering a drought. With bleary resolve, I resort more and more often to the thesaurus. Instead of slipping into the flow and immersion of telling myself the story, I writhe and struggle like a beached mackerel, hoping to flop into a puddle.

I’ve got my draft to 80,000 words, which was my goal before I headed out of the country. We leave in two days, and I expected at this point to feel that happy tingle of anticipation. Instead, even though I’m exhausted, it feels hard to step away.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m glad we’re going, and with a winter inversion entering its third or fourth week here in Boise, it’s a great time to get outta Dodge. But like doomscrolling when stressed — to which I do not claim to be immune — there is an addictive pull to stay in the stew, a dark siren call that seeks to convince me my attention is required At All Times.

So on Monday, I’m getting on a plane and leaving everything to the Fates (and to my endlessly patient husband, who has done all the planning). If I have a goal for this trip, it’s to have no goal except to allow the beauty and novelty of these cities to work their healing balm on my banged-up soul.

When we get back in early February, I hope to be refreshed and replenished, ready to jump back into writing, podcasting, activism, and living out loud in general. And a plan to never again, if I can help it, allow myself to get so parched before I return to the well.

I’d love to know what you do to keep up the deposits into your creativity and joie d’vivre accounts, and how you know when it’s time to take a break — we’re here to learn from each other, right?

Meanwhile, here are the book launch events I have coming up for Griffin Speaker, which hits bookshelves on May 5 (preorders available now!)

March 5, Online: Author Panel Discussion, School Library Journal’s “Middle School Magic” online event (FREE to register and open to the public, but claim your spot now: see link!)

March 30, Houston, TX: Panelist participant, “Imagination Unleashed: The Next Chapter of Middle Grade Fantasy,” Texas Library Association Conference (9:30 - 10:30 AM Central Time)

May 9, Boise: Book Launch Party at Rediscovered Books in Boise (1 - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 16, Boise: Author In-Store Event, Barnes & Noble Boise (11 AM - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 20, San Francisco: In-person presentation at Town School

May 21, San Francisco: In-store event at Books Inc Laurel Village location

Image by NASA-Imagery from Pixabay

Has it really only been a week?

The new year has already elbowed its way into the zeitgeist. Perhaps “bludgeoned” is a better word if you live in the United States. Or Venezuela. Or, for that matter, much of Latin America, including Mexico. Or Canada, Greenland, or anyplace at which the Great Orange Eye casts its hungry glance.

It’s been a doozy, and we’re just getting started. I’ve done my little bit to respond to the onslaught, calling my congressional reps nearly every day (“No, we don’t need your name and address, Jan, we’ve got you,” say their staffers by now, which I’m not at all sure is comforting), literally papering over protest signs from earlier in the week (U.S. Out Of Venezuela!) with new slogans for later in the week (ICE Out of Our Communities!), showing up to local marches, and trying meanwhile to protect my peace.

And every day, I remind myself I’m only one small human bean in the huge stewpot of history, and to treat everyone I meet with kindness.

But whatever else 2026 is or becomes, it is also the year in which my first full-length, traditionally published novel hits bookstores. And that is something I fully intend to celebrate, every chance I get. Here’s the cover, which still puts me over the moon every time I look at it.

And just for readers of this newsletter, here is a sneak peek at the publisher’s proposed inside cover copy:

As an orphan on the lowest rung of Griffin Land society, twelve-year-old Rain’s future is laid out for her: She’ll spend her whole life in dark tunnels, harvesting precious Root for the Corporation.

But everything changes when she stumbles across a rare wild griffin. Griff speaks to Rain, choosing her as his partner, and an ancient law says their bond entitles her to an education at the elite Griffin Riders’ Academy instead of a hard life in the Tubes.

But Rain’s Rise threatens the fragile hierarchy Griffin Land is built on, and those at the top are determined to see her fail. To prove herself worthy, Rain must traverse mountains, face bloodthirsty beasts, and unearth long-forgotten truths. She’ll have to decide how much she’s willing to risk—to stay with Griff, to change her life . . . and, just maybe, to create a better world.

Warm and wondrous, Griffin Speaker marks the start of an exciting fantasy series perfect for dreamers, animal lovers, and adventurers of all ages.

Griffin Speaker arrives in bookstores on May 5 — and if you want to be the first on your block to get your hands on a copy as well as earn the undying gratitude of a debut author, you can preorder it now from your fave bookseller, using this link.

Like John Green’s famous observation about falling in love or falling asleep, publishing a first book happens “slowly, and then all at once.” I wrote the earliest draft of Griffin Speaker while I was working in a Napa Valley middle school in 2019. It was another four and a half years before I had a manuscript that was polished enough for my agent to pitch to publishers, and it was August of 2023 when we negotiated the initial deal with an acquiring editor.

That’s a story in itself, involving my sitting on a deck overlooking Mt. Kenya on the afternoon of my husband’s and my 20th anniversary, enjoying a sundown cocktail on the fourth day of a long-dreamed-of safari, and finding myself in the midst of a conference call with my agent and my soon-to-be editor in New York. It was an I-won-the-lottery moment, and I still have trouble believing it wasn’t a fever dream.

The contract wasn’t finalized until the following November, and when I first saw the planned publication date of “Spring, 2026,” I thought maybe I’d lassoed a glacier. Which goes to show what a noob I was.

Yes, you can publish a book within a year of inking a deal, or even less. If your name is Taylor Swift, or maybe Stephen King, that is. And as I learned, the transformation of a manuscript into a pleasurable, immersive experience for readers — especially young readers — is a rigorous process, deserving of the time it takes.

Also there is the reality that your editor, as supportive and determined as they may be to see your book succeed, also has many other projects in their pipeline.

There’s been a succession of revision rounds, each dialing in tighter and tighter, along with reviewing sales copy, cover drafts, illustration drafts, map drafts, and at each phase I find myself deeply grateful and somewhat verklempt over the sheer volume of professional expertise being applied to what I dreamed might one day be a real book in the hands of readers, and is now set to emerge from its chrysalis in spring.

I don’t want to make your eyes glaze over by getting into the weeds, but if you are interested in the process, let me know in the comments, and I’ll delve further into the back-and-forth as Release Day nears.

For now, I’m awaiting the second round of revisions on the sequel, Griffin Rider, working on a draft of another novel (more on that later), and scheduling book launch events.

That’s a work in progress, but so far here’s what I have confirmed:

March 5, Online: Author Panel Discussion, School Library Journal’s “Middle School Magic” online event (free to register and open to the public, see link!)

March 30, Houston, TX: Panelist participant, “Imagination Unleashed: The Next Chapter of Middle Grade Fantasy,” Texas Library Association Conference (9:30 - 10:30 AM Central Time)

May 9, Boise: Book Launch Party at Rediscovered Books in Boise (1 - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 16, Boise: Author In-Store Event, Barnes & Noble Boise (11 AM - 2 PM Mountain Time)

May 20, San Francisco: In-person presentation at Town School

May 21, San Francisco: In-store event at Books Inc Laurel Village location

More to come — and if you, gentle reader, have a favorite bookseller and/or school librarian eager to book a visit with a real, mostly live author, do let me know!

Meanwhile, as a staunch advocate of intergenerational connection and creativity, I’m continuing my work with the Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age podcast team as one of the show’s rotating hosts. I’ll be producing two upcoming episodes with some terrific guests, scheduled to launch Feb. 11 and May 13 — but we release new installments every second and fourth Wednesday, so there’s plenty of good stuff before and in between those dates. If you haven’t listened in yet, I highly recommend you do, wherever you get your pods. Because aging is inevitable — if we’re lucky.

It sounds like a lot, I know. Here’s one thing I’ve learned as a late bloomer: I get more done when I remember to slow down and not take things too seriously.

I need a lot of reminders about that, so I’ll leave you with this one, gleefully stolen from the not-to-be-missed Substack Wilding Out by the wildly witty Robin Wilding. Fair warning; her humor trends toward raunchy, but here’s a safe-for-work observation that was listed as #20 in her recent stack, 42 Weird Ways to Think About Life:

Every corpse on Mount Everest was an extremely motivated person, so maybe relax a little.

There’s a whole lot of 2026 ahead (again, if we’re lucky). So take a breath, and enjoy all the good bits. Talk soon!

Image by Gundula Vogel from Pixabay

First of all, if you’re reading this, it means you’ve survived the cosmic buzzsaw that was 2025. You deserve a gold star, a glass of bubbly, a caramel macchiato with extra whipped cream, and a huge pat on the back.

Second of all, if you’ve subscribed, followed — or, heck, ever read — my “Sticking the Landing with Jan M Flynn” posts, you have my deep and eternal thanks.

And please don’t go anywhere. Just know that, for this writer, 2026 is bound to be a watershed year, and I invite you to stick with me as it unfolds.

“Sticking the Landing” is rebranding as “The Write Life,” as you may have noticed if this post landed in your inbox (if it did, thanks again). That’s because Disney-Hyperion Books is releasing my novel Griffin Speaker on May 5, 2026.

Art by Matt Rockefeller; image courtesy Disney-Hyperion Books

It dawns on me that being a debut novelist at age 72 is not a common experience. It’s one I’m excited to share, and not just because I’m thrilled to see this first-in-a-series book find its way out into the world.

What I also want to share is the journey to get to this point and what happens next. Because if you’ve got a dream that you’ve been incubating for longer than you’d like to admit, I’m here to tell you that — while there’s no guarantee on dreams — please don’t tell yourself that it’s too late; you’ve missed the boat.

It’s not, and you haven’t.

Where “Sticking the Landing” was a sort of clearing house for my personal essays, “The Write Life” will be more focused as an author newsletter. Although I retain the right to consider that a broad umbrella.

Seeing the ins and outs of being a new author in the publishing trenches will, I hope, be worth your time. That is an investment I never, ever take for granted. I also hope you’ll ask questions and post your comments so this Stack can become a helpful community for writers and readers.

And here’s a BIG DEAL! If you’re a writer or a passionate reader, then you know that pre-orders are like a super-powered booster rocket for a new book’s launch. Personally, when I learn of a forthcoming book by an author whose work I enjoy, I’m happy to pre-order it. It means I’ll get my copy as soon as it’s available, and it means I’m part of that book’s success.

Starting today, December 30, Barnes and Noble is offering an exclusive online discount on preorders, including for Griffin Speaker — with 25% off the regular price, and B&N Premium Members get an extra 10% off.

Honestly, it’s a terrific offer. But please don’t wait: the sale is only on through January 1, 2026.

I wish you as rewarding a new year as can be — while I refuse to sugarcoat anything about these Wild Times in which we live, I firmly believe that joy is the radical, life-affirming act we must all embrace. And look for “The Write Life with Jan M Flynn” on a regular monthly basis. Plus extra posts when stuff comes up that I just can’t sit on. Like I said, broad umbrella.

For now, Happy New Year, and may 2026 be good to you.

Subscribe now

This is what food coma looks like: Image by ClaraMD from Pixabay

. . . Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

That’s the line from Mary Oliver’s gorgeous poem “The Summer Day” which is quoted so often it’s sadly close to meme status. I mean, there’s practically an entire category of Mary Oliver merch, much of it bearing that line, just on Amazon.

Which I am not linking to, since Amazon is one of the three places, both literal and online, that I am staying the hell away from this Black Friday.

The other two are Target and Home Depot. No links to them either.

That’s because, in my own small way, I am registering my disappointment in all three companies by participating in this year’s “We Ain’t Buyin’ It” campaign.

From November 25 through December 1, I won’t spend a dime at any of those retailers. I have friends who work for Amazon, but I’m not happy with Jeff Bezos for his lickspittle financial support of the Trump regime. I’m unhappy with Target for dismantling their DEI programs and for getting rid of the LGBTQ+ products they used to center in their stores, which I thought were so cool (and I’m a straight, cis, old white lady, just sayin’).

And I’m pissed at Home Depot. Because ICE. Need I say more?

Going a week without shopping at those three giants isn’t too heavy a lift. I doubt any of them will register my absence, even though in the normal course of our daily lives, my handy husband finds it necessary to go to Home Depot multiple times a week (often within the same day, because there’s no going to Home Depot just once for anything, and where we live, Lowe’s is too damn far away), and I confess to having a bad Amazon habit.

I can’t pretend to moral purity anytime, but certainly not after December 2. For this week, however, any shopping I’m doing is going to be local.

Turns out there’s a locally-owned Ace Hardware store not too far from our house, and did you know they still sell rubber-band-powered balsa wood airplane kits?

Not to mention several shops downtown devoted to indie-made products, all produced here in Idaho.

But on Black Friday, I’m not shopping at all. Not even online. Again, this isn’t due to strength of character so much as my contrarian nature. If everybody else is doing it, count me out.

If I were an enlightened individual, I’d be spending this Black Friday (is it just me, or does anyone else have trouble with that term?), doing mindful and soul-enhancing activities. Hiking, journaling, writing poetry, baking bread (as if we need the carbs after yesterday).

Or better yet, non-activity. Meditating. Going within. Drawing closer to unity with the Great Whatever.

But I’m not doing, or not not doing, any of that. For my psyche, that’s all way too purposeful on this interstitial occasion, this not-quite-a-holiday.

There has been much written about the benefits of a post-Thanksgiving fart walk. I was yesterday years old before I’d heard of such a thing, but it doesn’t take long to get up to speed on the principles, which can be summed up with the phrase, “better out than in.”

Today, I’m going one better. I’m farting around all day long. My only quest has been for a really good latte. Otherwise I’ve been tinkering with batteries for the many, many electric candles of all shapes and configurations that I haul out this time of year.

That part involves some salty language, especially when I learn once again that some of the candles come with battery compartments that are sealed with eensy teensy screws which demand the deployment of an eensy teensy screwdriver, but not the one you use to repair your eyeglasses, which is just a tad too small. We actually possess a screwdriver of the correct dimensions because this is not our first rodeo, but locating it every year is just one of the character-building rituals of the holiday season.

It’s necessary, though, since I gave up using actual, live candles some years back after hosting a holiday open house in which a guest came close to immolation. She escaped the incident with only a gaping hole in the back of her Christmas sweater, but I’ve never gotten over it.

That’s a story for another day.

For today, now that I’ve got all the candles and lights sorted and my husband has figured out how to set the timers that stymie me every damn year, the deliciousness of a long, lazy afternoon spreads before me.

I might take a walk. Or not. I may stay right here on the sofa and let the cat use me as an adjustable mattress, which he controls with the use of carefully modulated meows.

Later, around cocktail hour, my husband and I may decorate the tree. I already set it up almost all by myself, and am inordinately proud of having found where the light strands plug into each other.

Then we can Netflix our way into bedtime.

It may not sound all that wild and precious, but it’s a nice way to spend the day. And we can do it without spending a red cent at Amazon, Target, or Home Depot.

Not that red cents are a thing anymore, since the penny has been retired.

Tomorrow, God willing, is another day. One with the potential to be wild and precious. Or just blessedly ordinary.

I’m happy with either.

What’s missing in this picture? Image from Pixabay

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, partly because of what it doesn’t include. It doesn’t involve wrapping a shipping container’s worth of presents. To the best of my knowledge, there are no Thanksgiving cookie exchanges, white elephant gifts, or themed muzak (although, admittedly, big box stores have been piping out Christmas musick since the day after Halloween).

Instead, this is a day centered around the things that make me the happiest: gathering with family and friends, expressing gratitude, and eating way too much.

Even better, on Thanksgiving, I can spend the day looking forward to the same dishes I’ve been annually pounding down since I was old enough for solid food.

Turkey. Dressing. Gravy. Mashed potatoes. Probably sweet potatoes as well. Some form of otherwise healthy vegetables rendered inexcusably decadent via an abundance of cream-of-something soup and possibly also actual cream and maybe topped with those crispy canned shoestring onions that we don’t eat at any other time of year. And of course, fluffy rolls or biscuits, like anyone at the table needs more carbs.

This year, like many previous years, I am confronted with articles, posts, Insta-whatevers, by those who profess to overthrow the tired, traditional Thanksgiving menu with groovier dishes. Grilled octopus instead of turkey! Kale and halloumi soufflé topped with parsnip ash! Roasted cashew and chickpea loaf!

No. Just no. Unless you’re a committed vegan, that’s wrong.

A major point of Thanksgiving is its comforting familiarity, its predictability. It’s not the day for foodie adventuring. Some tweaks to the basic menu and maybe some interesting additional sides are permissible and even welcome. I didn’t grow up having mac and cheese on Turkey Day, for instance, but I’m never disappointed to see it included.

Which brings me to cranberry sauce.

It has to be there.

A Thanksgiving spread without cranberry sauce is like a baseball game without hot dogs: it’s not the central feature of the whole operation, but its lack would make the table, or the stadium, feel empty.

I realize that lots of people never even eat the cranberry sauce. That doesn’t matter. It still belongs on the buffet table, a cheery, glistening crimson in contrast to the platters and bowls of beige and brown food.

Unsung hero of the holiday feast though it may be, according to a November 2017 blog post in the Smithsonian Library and Archives, the cranberry was a staple foodstuff long before European settlers arrived in North America. It can justifiably lay claim to being a Founding Fruit.

Indigenous Americans used it as a component of pemmican, a mixture of dried and chopped or pounded meat, tallow, and cranberries or other berries that was then shaped into cakes and sun-dried. Shelf-stable for months, highly nutritious, and perfect for travel, pemmican was an original power food.

Cranberries also had medicinal value to Indigenous peoples. With high amounts of Vitamin C and benzoic acid (a natural preservative), they fended off scurvy, were helpful in reducing fever, and were used in poultices to promote wound healing, swelling, blood poisoning, and indigestion.

In fact, if it weren’t for cranberries, the Pilgrims would have had an even dicier chance of making it through the harsh winters in Plymouth Colony. Also, it must have been a surprise to the Wampanoag people that the land they’d been living in harmony with for 12,000 years was called New England.

It’s regrettable, really, that most of us settler-descendants barely see a cranberry until November, when supermarkets start stuffing the end-cap coolers in their produce departments with cellophane bags of the small, scarlet spheres.

Cranberry sauce is deeply embedded in my Thanksgiving memories. As a wee tot in the Eisenhower years, I remember my delight as my mother coaxed a gelid blob of sauce onto a parsley-wreathed plate where it wobbled and shone, retaining the corduroy-like indentations of the can from whence it issued.

As I got older and my mother shed some of her Iowa-bred food habits and adapted her tastes to the San Francisco Peninsula, we switched from the canned glop to making sauce from fresh cranberries. It was not a heavy lift: all it takes is boiling the cleaned berries in a cup of water and a cup of sugar for about ten minutes.

Mom would immerse the berries in a big bowl of water to rinse them. Then it was my job to pick through them, discarding any stems or leaves and rejecting any berries that had grown soft or moldy.

It was a job that kept me busy and absorbed, so she could continue her Herculean task of preparing the rest of the feast, free from my constant interruptions for at least 20 minutes.

Once the fruit bobbed merrily in the bubbling sugar water, Mom let me do the best part: using the flat of a wooden spoon to rupture any berries that hadn’t split on their own. That was worth another ten minutes of happy absorption in a task as I hunted through the thickening, tart syrup for whole sphericals so I could squish them against the side of the saucepan with a satisfying pop.

That extra time may have accounted for why our cranberry sauce tended to be thicker than some of the soupy stuff I have since encountered.

Which, again, is wrong.

These days, with an extended family clan that includes young, accomplished, and enthusiastic chefs, my days of wrangling the whole damn meal are in the rear-view. I can’t say I’m sorry, as long as I can finagle access to some of the leftovers (gobbler sandwiches are the food of the gods).

But it’s understood that Aunt Jannie makes the cranberry sauce.

Nowadays, I zhush it up a little by replacing some of the water with orange liqueur, reducing the sugar a bit, dashing in a few drops of vanilla extract along with the finely grated zest of half an orange. At the end, I toss in some roasted pecans.

For those who like cranberry sauce and actually eat it, it’s always a hit. For everyone else (my husband included), it’s a nice visual component to the holiday spread.

I still love popping those berries. And thinking about how grateful I am to enjoy another round of the holidays.

May yours be peaceful, joyous, and abundant.

But don’t forget the cranberry sauce. After all, it’s good for indigestion.

Image by Petra from Pixabay

My husband was driving as I gazed out the window at the street just off downtown. We were heading to a writer friend’s signing event at our favorite indie bookstore. About three blocks from our destination, we reached a section that is quietly burgeoning with new cafés, galleries, shops, and a sleek coffee house.

As a coffee aficionado, I am always alert to venues that offer a perfectly blended Americano or cappuccino. We were moving slowly enough that I could see the place was quiet at this early afternoon hour. At the sidewalk tables outside, only two people sat, chatting over their carry-out cups.

Well, two people and their two small dogs.

And their horse.

To be clear, it was a miniature horse, so it took me a heartbeat to register that the fuzzy rump and swishing tail did not belong to a Newfoundland.

“That’s a horse,” I announced to my husband. “Park here.”

Before we moved to this city, I spent many years volunteering at a horse rescue, working with castoff race horses or show ponies who’d run out of luck until they found shelter with us. Throughout my life, I’ve ridden all manner of horses from 17-hand warmbloods to compact, fierce Icelandic horses (pro tip: in Iceland, referring to them as ponies is considered an insult).

But I’ve never owned a horse. So my husband knows that within my crone-adjacent frame beats the yearning heart of a ten-year-old girl who never got her own pony.

Not that I want one now. Well, only sort of. The point is, I will never not be excited at the sight of a horse.

Especially one peacefully hanging out in front of an urban coffee shop.

“Are you sure that’s not a dog?” asked my husband, who nevertheless pulled over to the curb and stopped. Just one more reason why marrying him was one of my better decisions.

It is always my policy to approach with respect and a request for permission before greeting other people’s animals. “We’re so delighted to see your mini horse,” I said to the couple. “Would it be all right if we said hi?”

Luckily, the humans attending Oliver — the horse — were friendly, generous, and also pleased that I hadn’t called Oliver a pony (not as serious a faux pas as misidentifying an Icelandic equine, but also not exactly cool). I offered a closed fist for Oliver to sniff, the gesture known as the horseman’s handshake.

Turns out Oliver has a fondness for shiny rings and was eager to try removing mine. His human mama gently corrected him.

Otherwise, Oliver, at only eighteen months old, was just as chill as he could be. Those who’ve spent time around young thoroughbreds or Arabians will appreciate how remarkable that is. He stood perfectly still on his tiny, shiny hooves as my husband patted his neck and ruffled his shaggy mane.

“He’s so calm,” I remarked. “Have you maybe considered using him for —”

“Therapy?” said the young woman, her eyes lighting up. “Yes, he’s gone to care homes, hospitals, and a youth camp. We’re just careful to set him up for success so he doesn’t get overwhelmed, but we’ve been working on that with him — we’ve had him since he was five months old.”

The thought of how adorable Oliver must have been at that age was sweet enough to give me cavities. But I went on to describe the foster youth organization my husband and I volunteer with, and Oliver’s humans were both interested in seeing what we might arrange in the future.

“We’d make sure it would be outside,” I said.

“Oh, he has boots, so he can go indoors,” she assured me, “and he’s potty-trained.”

Indeed, the sidewalk on which we gathered was completely poop-free.

After a few pleasant, horse-happy minutes and an exchange of phone numbers, we said goodbye to Oliver, his people, and his canine buddies (a talkative terrier and a shy Pomeranian puffball), and headed down to the bookstore.

What has any of this got to do with aging, other than the unfair fact that I never did get my own pony (or horse)?

When I was younger, in the throes of midlife adulting, I would have been too busy, too stressed, and too focused on whatever my urgent goal-of-the-moment was to stop and chat with a little horse on the sidewalk, or even notice him.

And when I was younger than that, even if I’d seen him, I would have been too self-conscious to approach his people. Just in case I’d somehow summoned the nerve, I wouldn’t have had the knowledge or experience to do anything other than offer a shy pat or two.

The encounter certainly wouldn’t have produced a possible partnership that could benefit some kids who’ve experienced trauma.

So this isn’t just a story about a horse on the sidewalk. It’s about having the time and space to pay attention, neither of which most of us have in abundance after we’re past the age of seven.

It takes a long time for some of us to recapture it. In my case, over seven decades here in Earth School — which has included some tough and grueling lessons, but I’m grateful for every one of them.

Who knows who I’ll meet on the sidewalk next?

Image by Dorothe Wouters from Pixabay

Halloween’s over
The real nightmare begins now
For kids on food stamps

In America
Where one in eight citizens
Depended on SNAP

(FYI: SNAP is
food stamps, in case you
weren’t clear). But, so what?

A gilded ballroom
Means more to our President:
Kids can’t even vote

Those who’ve never known
Hard times, bad luck, injustice
Know where to place blame

Simple formula:
Some people made poor choices
And that’s why they’re poor!

Why not round them up
With other problem people,
Put ’em all in camps?

Then we can focus
On cutting social programs
Wealthy folks don’t need

There are better things
To do, like meeting quotas
For deportations

Or sending soldiers
Into rioting cities
Where there’s no riot

Or testing live nukes
Like our President wants to
‘Cuz that’ll show ‘em

Show who? It depends.
A mad king’s shifting moods are
Tricky to predict

Best to keep him calm
Remodeling the bathrooms.
(Don’t say “Epstein files”

Anywhere near him)
Which should be easy enough
If you’re in Congress

And Republican;
You’ve been away six weeks now
Still collecting pay

Not too bad a gig
Why rock the boat? Wait —
Let’s not mention boats

Better idea: move
Like Miller, Rubio, Noem
To where it’s safer.

Military base
Housing is surprisingly
Quite comfortable

Alarmed citizens
Might think it’s not a good look,
Leaders in bunkers

But unless they read
Project Two-Ought-Twenty-Five,
What do they know? Squat!

We move fast, break things
The cruelty is the point
Empathy is bunk

Still, those hungry kids.
Hope their Halloween candy
Lasts them long enough

Image by Oliver Zühlke from Pixabay

1953: With forceps and squalls, I am ushered into the world, along with approximately 3.97 million other brand-new Baby Boomers.

1953–1961: The Eisenhower years. I’m a pudgy white girl growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area. Like every other kid I know, I want a coonskin hat just like Disney’s version of Davy Crockett, and a Daisy rifle. But I’m a girl, so I get a Tiny Tears doll, a Chatty Cathy doll, and finally a Barbie doll.

I am distantly aware that a genial old man, bald like my father but very much more even-tempered, is in charge of the country. Everything seems to be fine as long as the Communists don’t come get us. On this my friends and I agree on the rare occasions we think about it, even though I don’t know what Communists are or why they’re mad at America.

But there’s something called the Cold War, and also The Bomb. Some people build fallout shelters in their backyards. I ask my parents why we don’t have one, and they never really answer me.

At school, when Thanksgiving draws near, we make odd-shaped hats and turkeys out of construction paper as we learn about the big dinner the Pilgrims and the Indians enjoyed together.

Which is interesting, because on TV the Indians are always the bad guys. That doesn’t strike me as quite fair since they were here first, but I don’t question it.

We also have duck-and-cover drills just in case The Bomb falls on us.

The Fourth of July is my favorite holiday, except for Christmas. America is a shiny, bright place where anything is possible, and everything is only getting better.

1965: I watch the TV news, horrified, as state troopers bludgeon Civil Rights protesters crossing the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, Alabama. Maybe not everything is getting better. I have trouble sleeping.

1967–1971: I’m in high school, and now the Vietnam War plays out nightly on our black-and-white TV. Soldiers not much older than I am carry stretchers laden with their buddies, screaming in agony, dark stains spreading in the tattered remnants of their sleeves or pants legs.

The photo of the little girl, running naked, mouth open in a scream, her skin blistering from the napalm our troops use.

I sing along to Country Joe and the Fish’s “I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ To Die Rag,” loudly with my friends and under my breath at home. My dad has a bumper sticker: If your (drawing of a heart) isn’t in America, get your (picture of a donkey, AKA ass) out.”

At school, I wear a black armband until our principal says we can’t anymore. Some kids do anyway.

But in World History class, I learn about America’s role in World War II. I watch grainy movies of the liberation of death camps, skeletal bodies in striped uniforms, corpses being shoved into pits, the evil we fought to end.

But also, there is footage of Hiroshima after we dropped The Bomb on it. Skeletons of buildings in the rubble. More bewildered orphans, doomed by radiation sickness.

A boy who has recently transferred to my school asks me to the prom. He is kind and handsome and funny, and I want to say yes. But he is also Black, and I’m terrified of what my father will do if he finds out. So I tell the boy I can’t, and I feel sad about it for the rest of my life.

Janice Ian’s song, “Society’s Child,” is a huge hit.

1971–1976: I’m in college, a theater major, and then a year of graduate acting school. Lots of things feel more important to me than politics. But I know I won’t forget watching, with a sense of justice, as Nixon resigns in the summer of 1973.

Then Gerald Ford becomes president and pardons Nixon. I am learning, as friends of mine who fled to Canada to escape the draft are still afraid to rejoin their families at home, that justice in America is different for different people, even though it’s not supposed to be.

1976–2001: I leave college with two degrees that mean exactly nothing on the job market. I go to L.A. and get day jobs while I do the rounds of auditions, where I learn that casting directors also don’t care about my classical theater training. Oops.

In 1977, I start dating an artist from Pasadena. My lease is up on my crappy North Hollywood apartment and I move in with him. I run the Pasadena office of a temporary staffing agency, a job that allows me to sneak out sometimes for auditions. I start booking commercials.

The next year, I get my big break: a regular part in a new TV variety show. But during filming, a union rep shows up on set to inform us that the producer is unable to get a bond. I’m not sure exactly what that means, so I stay until shooting wraps.

The pilot never airs, and I never get paid. My agent disappears into the woodwork.

In 1979, I marry the artist. In 1980, we are morose as we watch the election returns and realize Ronald Reagan is winning. We switch to watching The Deer Hunter. It’s almost as depressing.

In 1982, we have our first son. Ronald Reagan is reelected in 1984, which we’re not happy about but we’re unsurprised, and anyway we’re too busy to think much about it. My husband starts a new, niche, specialty hardwoods business. In 1987, our second son is born.

Those years and the ones immediately after are a blur of strollers and Sears photos, soccer games and big family gatherings to mark every holiday and every milestone in the boys’ lives.

A new millennium dawns. The Y2K virus does not send us back to the Dark Ages.

And so it goes.

September 11, 2001: I am teaching eighth-grade English at a private school when another teacher knocks on my door to give me the news. A plane has crashed into one of the World Trade Center towers, obliterating it.

I concentrate on keeping the kids as calm as possible while parents come to fetch them home. The second tower is hit and collapses. I have one son away at college and one in high school, eight miles away.

That night, my family safely gathered together, I realize for the first time that the human beings I love most in the world, these irreplaceable, unique, absolutely necessary individuals, are considered by some people to be nothing but political pawns in a vast, sinister game I don’t begin to understand.

Like everyone I know, in the coming days I surge with patriotism and a desire to do something meaningful to meet this awful moment, to heal and strengthen our wounded nation. I give blood. I wait for further instructions, ready to do what it takes.

President George W. Bush declares a “war on terrorism,” which strikes me as nonsensical, like declaring war on evil intentions. Then he tells Americans to go about their business and keep shopping. Also, “if you’re not with us, you’re against us.”

Most of the 911 terrorists, we learn, are from Saudi Arabia. But we bomb Iraq. The weapons of mass destruction they’re supposed to have at the ready to use against us fail to materialize. Iraqi citizens do not, as Donald Rumsfeld promised us they would, greet American troops with flowers.

My husband and I hug each other in consolation as the bombs fall on Baghdad.

2002: On a hot afternoon in early July, my husband comes home early from the hardwoods shop, feeling tired and unwell. He lies down for a nap. I join him.

Less than an hour later, I’m awakened by his loud, strangled-sounding breathing. I can’t wake him. I call 9–1–1.

The paramedics can’t revive him. Neither can the doctors at the ER.

My boys are 14 and 20. Numbly, I stand in the emergency room bay, looking at my husband’s body, promising him I’ll get them through college and on their way, whatever it takes.

Two days later, I am at the shop, making out paychecks and helping to unload a shipment of lumber.

2002–2008: Years that contain brutal challenge mixed with joy and renewal. I remarry, someone I’ve known for 30 years. Together we wrangle the business into shape to be sold, which takes five years.

My older son graduates from college and begins the long apprenticeship to become a commercial airline pilot.

My younger son completes high school and heads off to college, happy to leave a home where the foundations have shifted in ways he couldn’t possibly be ready for.

In the evenings, my new husband and I wind down with a glass of Two Buck Chuck on the porch of the house my first husband remodeled but never quite had the chance to complete. We watch a bear shimmy down, butt-first, from one of our nine avocado trees.

Not that I have much bandwidth to think about it, but George W. Bush seems to be the worst president ever. Little do I know.

2008: We sell the business! We sell the house! We move to Idaho, where we have family who have settled on the outskirts of Boise. We find a lovely Boise neighborhood and settle down.

I go to work for a national nonprofit, in a job that feels right-sized, until it isn’t. Barack Obama sells out a stadium right here in Boise, and then he gets elected, and we are giddy. America is back on track.

2010: The midterm elections are a disaster for the Democrats. The Tea Party rears its collective head. This does not, we fear, bode well.

2012–2016: Thank God, Obama is reelected in 2012. My faith in American voters is at least partially restored.

Midway into his second term, my husband and I rent out our Boise house and move back to California. All of our siblings except one live there, and they’re all getting older.

Then Donald Trump somehow gets the GOP nomination in the 2016 presidential race, and we feel like we’re watching a nightmare-clown scenario in real time. This can’t, we keep saying, really be happening.

I phone bank for Hillary Clinton and get on a bus to Reno to canvass for Dem candidates there. My brother-in-law tells his granddaughters how proud he is that the next President of the United States will be a woman.

But Trump wins. Because electoral college. The clown-nightmare has come true.

November 10, 2016: I attend a candlelight vigil at the beautiful Episcopal church in our small Napa Valley town, where we silently walk the labyrinth in the courtyard.

Afterwards, I wonder if it makes any difference. It hasn’t changed the fact that Donald Trump is going to be President.

But it has changed me.

2016–2024: Think of one of those old black-and-white movie sequences wherein the passage of time is conveyed by paper sheets flying off a page-a-day calendar.

The first Trump term. It’s as inept, as appalling, as we imagined.

The Tea Party metastasizes into MAGA. Watching Fox News, which is kind of inevitable while traveling, is like gazing into a funhouse mirror. Except it isn’t fun.

In 2018, my husband and I visit the American Cemetery in Normandy, France. It is a place of deep reverence, true hallowed ground, as we wander in silence among the rows of crosses and Stars of David arranged on the bluff above the very beach where they died.

Later, in the interpretive center designed to be reminiscent of a bunker, one of the displays shows a life-sized soldier mannequin with the exact hand-held radio equipment my father-in-law carried up Omaha beach on Day 4 of the invasion.

We are deeply, deeply moved by this tactile evidence of America at her greatest.

Then, 2020 and Covid. America and the rest of the world are rocked back on their heels. Trump wonders if bleach or horse deworming medicine are the answers.

The Covid vaccine is made available, first to just some of us and then to all of us, and life begins to resume something like its previous shape.

George Floyd’s murder by police officer Derek Chauvin in May 2020 is captured on video, and the country howls with sorrow and outrage

Joe Biden wins the next presidential election. We breathe a sigh of relief, sure that the ship of state has righted itself after all.

And then there is January 6, 2020. I don’t think I need to elaborate.

The years unfold. Our older siblings succumb to COPD, to Alzheimer’s, to pancreatic cancer, to various forms of neurological disorders. With most of them either gone into care or simply gone, we move back to our Boise home.

2024: We steel ourselves for the presidential campaign, because Joe Biden is determined to run again, even after a disastrous debate against Trump, until finally agreeing to bow out and hand the torch to Kamala Harris.

I campaign as hard as I know how for Harris and wear a “Say It To My Face” shirt every chance I get. It’s amazing how many thumbs-up and grins I get from people in Boise, especially women.

But I also see cars in downtown Boise plastered with huge FUCK JOE BIDEN AND FUCK YOU FOR VOTING FOR HIM signs. One is driven by a woman who could be anyone’s grandma.

Still, the energy of the Harris campaign is infectious, joyous, uplifting — in contrast to the fear-mongering, hate-spewing rallies so beloved by the opposition.

Trump insists he doesn’t know anything about Project 2025. But I do, and it scares the bejeesus out of me. I phone bank, send postcards, and give money.

And then a bullet fired by some idiot whom the Secret Service certainly should have detected nicks Trump’s ear, and the blood-flecked image of DJT raising his fist into the air is everywhere, and I have a sinking feeling.

I go to bed on election night before the returns are in, refusing to give up hope.

At 4 AM, unable to sleep, I head to the living room sofa to avoid waking my husband. I’m only trying to find a sleep podcast on my phone, but I stumble onto the news.

Trump wins.

I haven’t wailed like that since my first husband died.

2025: The second Trump administration is not only far worse than the first one, it rolls out its damage and dysfunction faster than our darkest imaginings. Again, I see no reason to elaborate; it’s too exhausting.

But despair is not a luxury we can afford, and we resume activism to the extent our nervous systems and bank accounts can handle it. We write, we call, we donate, we refuse to give up, and we avoid watching TV news.

We attend every peaceful, credible protest we can.

October 18, 2025: On a gloriously sunny, crisp autumn afternoon, my husband, my sister-in-law, and I stand with our handmade signs and American flags and thousands and thousands of other people in front of the Idaho State Capitol for the second No Kings protest.

At an event that the Speaker of the House Mike Johnson characterized as a “hate America rally” perpetuated by leftists/Marxists/anarchists and pro-Hamas paid agitators, we are surrounded by a display of jubilant, determined patriotism. Veterans are everywhere. Flags are everywhere. People dressed in inflatable unicorn, chicken, T-rex and axlotl costumes wobble among the crowd.

Just as the organizers had intended, in Boise and everywhere else in the over 2700 events in the nation and other parts of the world, No Kings Day is a loud, joyous, and eminently peaceful display of what democracy looks like.

We wave at one another, cheer at the speeches, revel in the cleverness of people’s signs (one fave: “Trump is the worst president since Trump!”). Together with our compatriots, we chant “No Kings” over and over, and sometimes, “No Faux-King Way!”

When it comes time for the national anthem, we put our hands over our hearts. And together we all sing, full-throated, that gloriously impossible song. With tears in our eyes.

God bless the American Republic. If, as Ben Franklin said, we can keep it.

Not me, but eerily close: Image created with ChatGPT

As I may have mentioned once or twice, after over a decade of writing fiction and essays, my first novel will be coming to a bookstore near you in May 2026.

That makes me a debut author. At age 72.

I asked Google if that qualifies me as a debutante. According to its bloodless assessment, “a debut author is a writer publishing their first book, while a debutante is a young woman (italics mine) making her formal debut into society, often at a ball.”

How about dialing back the ageism, Google?

It’s not like I’m planning to crash a cotillion, but I only get to be a debut author once, and I intend to make the most of it.

Griffin Speaker is my very first novel to be published (Disney-Hyperion Books). It’s the first in an upper-middle-grade fantasy series (think ages 8 to 12 and up) — the very genre that sealed my love of reading at that age and forever more.

Here’s the publisher’s description:

When twelve-year-old Rain bonds with the last wild griffin, she has the chance to change her fortune—and possibly her world—if she can survive a dangerous quest.

As an orphan on the lowest rung of society, twelve-year-old Rain is destined for a future of hard labor—until she meets a wild griffin and bonds with him.

An old law says that bond entitles Rain to an education at the elite Griffin Riders Academy instead of a life in the mines. But Rain’s Rise threatens to topple Griffin Land’s fragile hierarchy, and those at the top are determined to see her fail. So they task Rain with proving herself: Armed with just her wit and accompanied by her best friend and an unlikely ally, Rain must scale the highest peak in Griffin Land and defeat the monster at its summit.

Rain’s success could change the world. But with an impossible quest ahead, will she and her griffin even survive?

Of course, I’m over-the-top excited. Check out the cover art:

image courtesy of Disney-Hyperion Books, with cover art by Matt Rockefeller

And wait until you see Matt Rockefeller’s interior illustrations, and the super-cool map created by Virginia Allyn. You will understand why, these past several months, I’ve been more than usually prone to hyperventilating.

I feel like Cinderella getting ready to step into my pumpkin-shaped carriage.

But I’m not out to woo a prince who has a thing for glass shoes. My dream, which I believe I share with most writers, is to reach readers. To delight, inspire, entertain, and maybe, just maybe, offer hope that even in a world where the rules have been rewritten by and for the people at the top, change is possible.

With a little less than six months to the launch date, I’m beginning my serious primping. I promise to spare you make-up videos, but if you’re curious about what’s entailed in getting a novel published, let me know in the comments.

I’m happy to share what I learn along the way — so henceforth, “Sticking the Landing” will be taking on more of the flavor of an actual newsletter in which I’ll include any events, ups, downs, and learn-by-doing, first-rodeo moments.

I’ve already got a launch party and signing scheduled at my beloved indie bookseller, and an invitation to participate in a panel discussion at a library association conference in another state. Not to be a tease, but stay tuned for the deets!

Right now I’m ordering some swell-looking bookmarks to hand out to the hordes of trick-or-treaters that visit our ‘hood on Hallowe’en. Along with the candy. This is no time to be shy, after all.

Do you think I should get a tiara?

Image by Melk Hagelslag from Pixabay

. . . with apologies to those who are serious aficionados of the form

Back when we were young
Summer was fun and freedom
Now it’s too damn hot

The leaves are turning
Red and purple, like our skin
When we bump our arms

Kids are back in school
Preparing for their futures
Keeping off our lawns

Time to put away
The dog-days shorts and T-shirts,
And thank God for that

From deep in closets
We unearth our old sweaters
Greeting them like friends

Let’s flaunt our colors
Before the year turns again
And winter mutes them

Image by freestocks-photos from Pixabay

There is a poem that haunts me: Lying in A Hammock at William Duffy’s Farm in Pine Island, Minnesota by James Wright. It’s only thirteen lines long, and the last one kills me every time:

I have wasted my life.

The speaker of the poem spends the first twelve lines describing what he sees from his vantage point in the hammock. A bronze butterfly drowses on a nearby tree, the sunlight suffuses everything with beauty, even last year’s horse droppings that “blaze up into golden stones,” while overhead flies a chickenhawk “floating home.”

Simple, lyrical, and life-affirming. And then, pow, that last line.

This is the poem that comes to me when I catch myself being too busy. Given that you occupy this planet at the same time as me, I suspect the same thing happens to you. A work deadline looms, or a big trip is coming up, or you’ve set yourself a merciless list of goals. Pretty soon you’re in a frenzy, hacking grimly away at a To Do list that grows with the tenacity of a jungle vine. Fed by your fervor, it only sends out more tendrils.

You don’t notice chickenhawks floating home, or sleeping butterflies, or that your loved ones are giving you a wide berth. You certainly have no time for a hammock.

Days can pass in this manner, or weeks, or even years. When you finally snap out of it, it occurs to you that you’ve barely registered your surroundings. You’re left with a collection of ticked boxes and the disquieting sense that time has passed you by.

I’m convinced this is what Wright means by that last line: I have wasted my life. The speaker is a guy who has finally taken a minute to lie in a hammock on his friend’s farm (note how the title itself sounds like it’s from a list of Things To Do On Vacation), and confronts what he’s been missing.

He hasn’t been lazy enough, and it has cost him big time.

You can hardly turn around without smacking into the latest life hack or articles exhorting you to increase your productivity through this or that method (or, perversely, through meditation!). In a world where “crazy busy” is such a virtue flag that even the absurdly wealthy want us to know how hard they work, being lazy is a radical act.

I believe that it is a necessary one. Life-saving, even.

Let me be clear: by laziness, I mean spending time doing nothing. Between social media, online shopping and the 24-hour news channels, contemporary life is crammed with all sorts of ways to distract yourself. You can easily fill up your time with activities that provide the illusion of doing something while offering nothing in the way of authentic satisfaction. It’s the psychic equivalent of junk food: a cheap and immediate pleasure, but easy to overdo, and it certainly does not result in time well wasted.

Take time — seriously, it’s your time, a treasure with an unknown but unavoidable expiration date, so please take it — to lie in a hammock and gaze at the clouds, or stand barefoot on the lawn on a summer night and regard the stars. Sit in a chair in front of the fireplace on a chilly morning and drink tea, and that’s all. Meditate, if you feel like you have to get fancy with it. Daydream.

If you’re a creative type — and I submit that if you’re human, you’re creative — the judicious application of laziness is more nourishing to your brain, your heart, and your soul than any ten day cleanse or 30 day challenge will ever be. And when you do get back to work, you’ll be the better for it.

Being alive, in this moment, at this extraordinary point on our extraordinary planet, is a rare and improbable gift. It’s terribly easy to overlook.

So don’t just do something; sit there. You never know when a chickenhawk might be up there, floating home.