Post Christmas actually

Recently, I saw a Norwegian mini series about people stuck in an Oslo airport on Christmas. It had a somewhat melancholy sentiment and yet weirdly was also heartwarming.

This Christmas, I am somewhat melancholy too. I feel the loss of my dog Frodo. I miss him so. And his loss brought up the death of my father and my pervasive sadness at not being able to have kids along with so many other things I have grieved. This week, I have been waking up at 3 am and staring at the ceiling.

Now I know, I don't show my sadness often. Even to myself. But sometimes, you must be present in the sadness and feel it, really feel it. 

So I picture my shih tzu Frodo, his black eyes staring at me, right before I had to let him go and I kiss his furry black and white face. And I remember my father's face on my last day with him, on the day he passed. In my mind's eye, I kiss his cheek and hug him tight, so tight. I remember the hope I used to have that I would have a child one day. And I remember letting that hope go, and I imagine the hope flying into the wind like a colorful plane and then crashing into the sea. I hug myself for that one. 

And that's all I can do. I can't bring anyone back. Some hopes die. But other hopes and dreams take their place, for me it's my writing. People pass away, all of us eventually, and we can only remember them fondly. 

And dogs die. Their life spans are such that we caretake for them knowing this. So this morning, I give Chewbacca extra snuggles and I talk to him about how hard it is missing Frodo, and I can almost see a glimmer of understanding somewhere deep in his caramel colored eyes.

The lil writer that could

Today is a good day. I'm feeling hopeful. 

I've been working on some projects for next year. I made a "to do" list and it definitely helped. One of the things I want to do is to translate my books to the screen. But I know that I need help, so I hired a coach. Maybe it's time to invest in myself and get this done. Plus, I know that I don't have forever. Turning fifty woke me up, as did Covid, to my own mortality

I have a feeling this is meant to be. Sometimes, you just need to believe. You see, I've always loved movies. The love of film and television was passed down to me from my father. And when I wrote my long memoir, I always pictured it being adapted to the screen. 

C'mon, I mean, for Pete's sake, there's a story in it called "Movie Time".  And although I've never written a screenplay, I do have a draft of a stage play of my memoir. Yeah yeah, I know, the genres are very different and I know there are action points you need to hit in a film. It can't just be family drama and dialogue. Or can it?

Some days, I wake up and tell myself, start your next book. Let these two books go and start your next project. Then a lil voice inside my head, and heart, which is the voice of my soul and intuition says, not yet, not quite yet... At other times, I hear my father's voice saying, "You can do this Jenny. You can do this."

So I will try. And keep on trying. The little writer that could. That's me. 

An IE boy

Morrissey is playing Ontario tomorrow! He's rarely played the IE and never in my hometown of Ontario. I've seen him in LA, Vegas, Hollywood, Pomona and even Bakersfield, but never Ontario. This is gonna be so special and heart warming. I'm going to be one dancing queen machine. 

You see, as you probably know, Morrissey saved my life in high school. The Smiths showed me there was a place to go with my sadness. My dark wave soul found a home in their music and in Morrissey's lovely storytelling lyrics which were melancholy but also hopeful at times. 

Friday, I will be on the floor in the Toyota arena singing along to every song, his solo stuff included. Morrissey's solo catalogue is underrated for sure. I'm hoping he sings "First of the Gang to Die" along with a host of my other Smiths and Morrissey favorites.

What to wear is the biggest question. Maybe my new combat boots that I've never worn. But they're not broken in...

So I'll probably go with my monkey boots along with a NY Dolls ripped tee (Morrissey's favorite band) and my leopard skirt. And when I see him in LA at the Greek on Saturday, I'll dress up more. I'll go pretty but Friday, I'll go comfortable. I'll be me.

Because, this is Ontario and I'm an Inland Empire girl. And for one night only, Morrissey is an Inland Empire boy... 

Believe

I am all about visualization. As a kid, I used to daydream. All the time. Part bookworm, and part day dream believer, I know that dreams do come true. 

I'm the proof.

Yet, right now, I need to figure out my next dream. Yes, I want to write another book, and that I know I can do. But I have bigger dreams too. Movies, plays, television, media and maybe even a talk show on a larger scale than my one woman video podcast endeavor.

The fact that I've been able to create everything I have with just my own two hands, and some support from good writer friends who have mentored me, is amazing in itself. 

What if I had a production company or a studio behind me? The thing I've realized is that I'm a true creative. A hybrid form person. A writer in all genres. And even a magician in a way because writing is magic. Just find the rabbit in the hat.

So my goal until the new year is to breathe, dream and manifest. Because big things are on the horizon. I just need to trust and believe.

Tonight on the inside

Tonight, I am seeing Danny Elfman live in the pit at the Hollywood Bowl. This is the epitome of Halloween. It is Danny Elfman for pete's sake. Former lead singer of Oingo Boingo and creator of the Nightmare Before Xmas soundtrack which is like a Halloween goth girl bible. 

So I am ready. Last night, he did ten Oingo Boingo songs. I'm hoping for eleven. My favorite "Oingo" song is "On the Outside". It's from their Only a Lad album and captures how us "outsiders" feel. I've written about that song in this blog before.

For me, Oingo Boingo is one of the backbones of 1980s music. It is new wave, it is a lil punk, and started out in 1979 as very experimental and theatrical. 

As a fifty something year old woman who is just finding her performing side, and true voice, I am going to use this night as inspiration to remember how music is, and will always be, my muse.

So let's dance! It's a dead man's party people!

Breathe again

I feel like I have to breathe. Just breathe. These last few years have been a whirlwind. Covid, a podcast, two books, so many events, appearances and writing performances and now, a new foray into post conviction at work.

It feels surreal. Dream like. Magical. I've been on a merry-go-round. Spinning round and round so fast it seems. I need a break so I'm taking a two month hiatus from events after a reading next week. 

Of course, I'll still do the podcast. It's all pre-scheduled. Plus, the more I do it, the easier it gets. And the less prep it takes. At this point, I'm more than 30 episodes in. Can you believe it? Plus, I gotta get back to my writing and working on my play. But that's for January. Till then, I'll be working, podcasting, and snuggling my shih tzu. And husband. In that order. 

All of this is just to say, remember to breathe. Trusting in the universe and yourself is key. So right now, that's all I'm gonna do friends. 

Breathe in. Breathe out.

That's Life

What is life? What's the point? What's the purpose? 

For me, I've recently realized, it's teaching. Teaching students, most of who seem so young to me that I would call them kids. But they're not kids, they are adults in community college.

I used to be one of them. Wait. I am one of them. We don't give up our roots by growing. The roots just get embedded deep into who we are. So my blue collar community college roots are me, both then and now. The UCR and USC law degrees were icing. In a way, transferring out of community college to university was my birthday cake to a new me you see.

The students so inspired me. They're hungry, and idealistic yet also made cynical by systems that hamper and hinder them, especially the incarceration impacted students. Those students were my favorite because they were fighting the odds, and were so resilient they shined bright. It made me cry. 

It made me want to fight for every single one of them to get to university and achieve their dreams. 

So that's life. That's my purpose. Now I just have to see this dream come true. Like almost all my other dreams. My first step is to help curate and moderate a reading by incarceration impacted students. It's gonna be something special. Promise.

Full circle

 Last week, I was the writer in residence at Pasadena City College. To write how amazing it was is something I'm not sure I can do. I was so present that it cannot be captured. I was super busy. Teaching a number of classes a day and doing a public workshop and reading along with a faculty and student lunch as well as writing one on one workshops with students.

It was a dream come true for me to be teaching the community college population that I used to be a part of. You see, these are the students I've written my books for. To give them hope and let them know they can succeed. 

It was the time of my life. One of the best parts was teaching a class of incarcerated impacted students. They were so open and honest and most of all, talented. I cried when some of them spoke. 

My last class really stuck with me. I taught about weaving in the personal and political into one's writing. I read a poem by Cherríe L. Moraga, and thought back to meeting her at Stanford when I had my first story published in a literary journal more than a decade back. She praised me and raised my esteem in a way I will never forget. Never ever.

I knew I'd come full circle in a way. I knew my job was to inspire other young writers and thinkers to do their best to tell their tales. And most of all, now I knew for sure that I could and would. 

Life goes on

Life is so wonderful yet strange. I'm 51 years old and yet, I feel so much younger in my head. If you would have asked me where I would be at this age, I might have said married with kids and a law career. Instead, I'm married with no kids and have two careers, a law career by day and a writing career on the weekends.

Now this might not everybody's cup of tea. But it's mine. Writing to me feels organic and cosmic. Performing feels true to me. I can lose myself in both and when I disappear and I am just in the moment and doing, that's where the magic lies.

This next year should be even more exciting. My goal is to start the staging of the play of my memoir. At the very least, I would like to do a table read. Then it's screenplay time. There are also more projects in the works. I have a fiction piece of flash that I've been working on, and I'll be helping to curate a few more events. There's my blog that I would eventually like to turn into a book of essays, as well as my podcast that I'd like to convert to audio so that I can stream it on different applications. 

What I have realized is that life goes on and we either roll with it or get lost in the mundaneness of life. So I'm gonna rock and roll with it. 

The heroine within

Growing up, I would always imagine myself into stories. First into my mom's Harlequin romance novels and Judy Blume's books then later, into Shakespeare's tragedies.

Books have always been my solace. So it makes sense that I became a writer. Perhaps me and my twin sister were born to be writers and creatives and tell our tales. Maybe it gestated in the womb.

Life has sometimes been hard to muddle through. I know I'm so privileged to have a great husband and job, an education, a house and the gift of writing, but I have had my share of dark times. The only way I've ever been able to deal is to escape into the written word. During my bouts of depression and anxiety, I wrote to calm my mind. 

When my dad died, I started writing my long memoir that was (finally) published earlier this year. When I had to reconcile not being able to have kids, writing saved me from a dark, deep well of sadness. Writing put light on the pain and healed it. When Covid hit, isolated at home for months and months, I wrote my chapbook. Writing has saved me time and time again. It is my everything and other than my husband and family, it is my priority.

This is just my way of remembering why I write. I write to understand myself and my life. It's a form of reconciliation. It's to find myself and the heroine within. I saved myself you see. And that's why I write.

It's about damn time

Last year, I was recovering from surgery on my fiftieth birthday. I was in horrific pain and basically sleeping all day. We had to cancel my Vegas trip. So this year will be the do over. It's my fifty first birthday in a day, and it's gonna be a doozie.

Vegas is my place. I love walking into a casino and breathing the filtered air. The clanging of the slot machines, weirdly I know, calms my mind. The girls dancing on the tables. The music in the background. 

Even the beforehand. Getting all dressed up in my room at the gorgeous hotel Circa. The rooms at Circa are epic, blue velvet retro Art Deco rockabilly fabulousness. Music playing loud. Horrorpops, then maybe some Buzzcocks or Cure and always Bowie. Doin my lashes. Lipstick, red of course. Thick eyeliner. New eyeglasses. Shiny, sparkly shirt with tight leggings. Boots. Then I'm ready and raring to go. A fancy drink in a roof bar before dinner makes it even more special.

It's sublime. Maybe I should enjoy going to fancy museums or walking the beach at 51, and I do enjoy those things, but there's something about sin city that just "gets" me. I even love waking up early to go shopping in the gift shop at the hotel. Later, out and about. Brunch in old town. Walking Fremont street. Laying by the amazing pool with the DJ playing 80s. Play my song DJ. 

So that's all I gotta say. And now it's time to go have some fun, and let go, and forget all the stress and trials and tribulations. 

To quote Lizzo, "it's about damn time".

Lifetime

Life is so strange. It goes by fast. Sometimes too fast. Sometimes too slow.

Friday night I was driving home from LA. I made the mistake of letting my navigation call the shots and took a route I didn't know. It was a little scary driving at night on fast moving freeways (with some scary overpasses that give me massive anxiety) that I was not very familiar with. I was on the 105, the 405 and I think a freeway called the 90 (not the 91 IE friends), all to get to the 605 freeway which I know well and which intersects with the 60, the I 10, and my usual freeway of choice, the 210.  

Well, of course, the minute I hit the 605, boom, there was a freeway closure. A police officer weaved back and fourth to slow traffic down in the lanes right ahead of me and I yelled out an expletive that begins with an F. Traffic was at a dead stop. 

By this time, it was 11 pm. I called my husband from the Bluetooth and told him, this is gonna be a while. Starting to get frustrated, I sighed. Huffed and puffed. But then, I took a deep breath and just surrendered. I put on a podcast and when that finished, I played some music (Lizzo, who I am obsessed with). Blasting the music helped raise my mood, and I sang along and the time passed. Within thirty minutes, we were moving again and I was home, like Cinderella, about midnight. Shoes intact. 

What that showed me was that life and time are relative. It's what you make of them. I could have ruined my beautiful literary night where I had a wonderful time by getting angry at the traffic that I couldn't control. That could have been the story. Instead, I just let go. And shined. And it was fine. So fine.

October Moon

Last night, I drove to Venice for an event at a literary theater/nonprofit called Beyond Baroque. It's a super cool venue. A few of us writers from the Macondo Workshop were reading stories about family and then we were doing a Q and A on craft. The event wasn't until 8 pm, but I left a little early to meet my friend for dinner. We had pizzas at a little Italian place down the street.

After dinner, we walked back to Beyond Baroque and I met up with everyone for a sound check. Then it was time to start. It went quite well. We had a nice turnout. The two hours flew by. The readings were incredible. Each reader had a different spin on tales of family. I was so impressed by the writers on the stage, all of whom I'd known and admired for years. I felt humbled to be included among them.

It is surreal really. That I get to do this. A community of writers is something I always dreamed to be part of and now that I am part of a writing community, communities really, I can hardly believe it. I don't feel worthy most days, but I'm trying not to block myself with negative self talk or imposter syndrome. Instead, I just tell myself that I am good enough. Because I may not be everyone's cuppa tea, but maybe, just maybe, I am at least some people's double espresso treat.

Today, my goal is to decompress, regroup and get ready for my birthday in less than a week. My goal is to visualize and meditate on what I want this next year to be. I think it's gonna be a big year. Not just because I'm turning 51. It's more a feeling in my soul that something huge is awaiting me, right beyond my view of the horizon. 

Amazingly enough, I'm very happy where I am in my life. Very grateful. Overjoyed really. Overwhelmed and over the moon.

Panic then a sigh

This has been a hard yet joyous month for me. In many ways, this blog is the most intimate of my writings. My books are curated, edited, and carefully structured. They are a version of me. From the past mostly. But this blog is the now. On the page for you to see. If you read closely, you'll see that it's just me, warts and all. At 3 am.

Earlier this month, I realized it was time for a change, mostly at work. If you had been reading my blogs, it was obvious that I needed something different. Yet, I also realized that I wanted to stay as a deputy public defender. 

Always a forward mover and thinker, and at times too reactive, and controlling, I decided to take it slow. I meditated and visualized. What did I really need and crave? What were the things that needed adjusting? 

While I was thinking, meditating and lighting my candles, and using my sage spray, the universe took control. That's what happens when you surrender. A door opened up (I knocked, it answered) and I walked right thru it into post conviction, still at my office, where I can use my experience in mental health to my clients' benefit. 

It going to be a life affirming experience for me. I have to change floors and departments, but I'll still get to try and save lives and do my part, small as it is on a micro level, to end mass incarceration.

So there it is. Panic turned to a sigh of acceptance. A surrender that led to resolution and change. This morning at 3 am, I realized that I'm right where I'm meant to be and there's nothing to fear. The universe knows exactly where it's taking me. And eventually so will I. 

Breathing Deep

This morning, I realized I hadn't posted in almost two weeks. There's been a lot going on. In my day job, I may be transferring units and in my writing, everything is coming up roses.

Anxiety is a hurdle for me. Always. I get caught up in worry which we know, or should know, begets more worry. It's counterproductive. 

The universe is telling me to just breathe and that I'm okay. I'm on the right path. I know this, but I think, repeat it aloud. So I do.

What is is. It just is. 

Something else big is on the horizon for me. Something positive and true. I just know it. It could be a year away, but it's there. 

Yet still, the now means something. Sitting here looking in my shih tzus eyes for a second. It is. We are. 

Then I write. What is writing for me? Reaching that place where I let myself disappear and lose myself in it. It is a moment when I can truly let go. I must remember this. Creativity is always there just waiting to be tapped into.

So I breathe deep. Daydream. Imagine. And breathe again.

Living the dream

Thinking about my dad today. About how he is gone except in my memories. I wonder what he would think if he could see me now. Perhaps he might drawl, "Jenny keep living those dreams."

Yesterday, I ran around all day. A signing at Barnes & Noble went till 4 pm. I met so many cool people that I didn't want to leave. Then I took my mom (who had went with me to keep me company) to a quick dinner at Cafe Rio and still had to get her home. 

I didn't walk in my house until almost seven and had another event beginning soon online. It was a lot. But also a lot of joy. And espresso.

Chewbacca (my shih tzu) was sulking from not seeing me all day, so he refused to guest host my IG with me. But luckily, my good friend Lucy really shined by co hosting with me and interviewing me! I was in the hot seat. Well not so hot thank goodness because it rained so my podcast studio was cooled down. And Lucy asked fantastic questions. 

Of course, as with all IG live, there were tech issues, but we went with the flow & we worked it out. That is what it's about. Being present, prepared and just doing it. Perfection is a myth.

Next weekend, I'm running around again. I have a reading in Pasadena on Saturday and on Sunday afternoon, another group reading at a brewery in San Dimas.   

Then I have a weekend off to spend with my husband Adrian. It's important that I balance my writing events with time for my love. He's everything to me and a big supporter. It must be hard at times for me to be gone all weekend, but he knows, I'm living the dream, one that I've wanted forever and ever. 

And on that note, today I'm applying to the residency at Hedgebrook!

So here's to you. Us. Life. What are your dreams? Share it with me. And how to visualize them into reality.

Cha cha changes

Things are changing. I knew it. Perhaps I willed it into being and manifested something new.

I'll be transferring from my mental health unit to a new unit at my office focused on writing and post conviction issues. That means I'll be looking at cases of people in prison. As some know, I worked at a clinic for post conviction while in law school at USC. It was something I loved doing. 

The new assignment will be writing intensive which is something I've been craving. 

It was a hard decision to seek change. I've been in my unit for years and years. I love my courtroom and my colleagues. But change is good. 

Change keeps us motivated and fresh. Stagnation equals staleness. Comfort is nice but challenging yourself is better.

So here I go. Wish me luck.

Today is the day

Today. The Now. The Present. Big P Present.

I've had a lot on my mind. I've been wrestling with some huge issues of who I am professionally. I've always defined myself by my public defense job, my writing, & my persona. But who am I really?

Last week, on the same day, I did a training at my office for new attorneys (along with a colleague) and an interview of a writer for my podcast. What I realized is that I really enjoy those parts of my professional life. But do I like the other parts? Do they bring me joy?

Being in court in 1368 land is something I've done for so long that I am used to it. I am really good at it even. Some days better than others. But it has taken its toll. On my body and mind. On my spirit. 

The sadness and trauma I've had to witness is quite overwhelming. Ask anyone, we manage that calendar and courtroom well, we do. We have a great judge and caring and diligent staff, but it's fucking hard. Thursday, after handling 16 cases, I came home and cried in my car. My head felt like it was going to split open. I said aloud. "I can't do this anymore."

But I did. On Friday, I went into court and it was much better that day. Less cases. I took my time. I could breath. But now I know for sure. Something's gotta change.

Dreaming

"Dreaming is free." Blondie said so and hence, it must be true.

Or maybe the only thing dreaming costs is expectation. Hope is useful you see. It lets us see what we really want. How important it is. 

On Friday, I attended an awards ceremony at LA City College for the 2022 International Latino Book Awards. My first book, "Portrait of a Deputy Public Defender or how I became a punk rock lawyer", was up for an award. 

Poor Adrian. I made him go hours early. That's how my anxiety manifests. It's like what was I worried about? We weren't going to LAX...

So we sat and waited. I drank a nitro coffee from the snack shop and ate chips. We met a writer from South America and I exchanged books with him. Adrian translated. I got more and more hyper. Starting to sweat, I registered once the ceremony opened (about 11:30 and we arrived about 9:30). I scanned through the program, and found my category called the Mariposa Award (butterfly in Spanish) for best new book, nonfiction in English. My award category was toward the end. Of course it was. This was a test. 

By noon, we were inside the hall. I fidgeted. Took pictures. Sat. Tried to be present as I watched the ceremony. Due to technical difficulties with virtual presenters, the ceremony went way over. By the time they reached my category, I was a wreck. Too much nitro coffee and too much perspiration. 

When they announced the bronze and silver winners, I started to shake. Visibly. And cry. My name hadn't been called yet and thus I knew. I had won gold. 

After my 30 second speech, and receiving my award (from the ambassador to Mexico & lawyer/counsel for the Mexican consulate!), I was finally able to relax. We had lunch and I networked and flitted around and was interviewed for a podcast. Met a few Latina writers who had also won and we hung out. I was happy. 

Looking back, I am so filled with joy. Everything seems surreal. Almost like magic. My dreams are coming true, you all see that right? I once dreamed of being a lawyer, and I accomplished it. But that law degree wasn't for me the way writing is and always will be. Writing hits me in my soul.

As a young girl, I would sit in the park and read and it was my solace. My haven. Books were and are my passion. And to have my dream come true of becoming an award winning author, well that's everything. 

It really is. 

Truth be told

I share a lot on here. I know this. This blog is a little window into my soul. It is a window I've created here. You get a peek. But no one knows anyone really do they? Or maybe they do. 

This has been a hard week. I've decided to take a semester off from school. With work, my health issues, losing Frodo, my podcast and my book promotion, it was just too much. I didn't have the bandwidth. 

Plus, even though it was just one class, it stressed me out. On my day off, I spent all day on homework. The unnamed teacher was vague yet demanding. Her book length syllabus and Moodle page were unintelligible and there were so many rules and different instructions and assignments. My foggy brain could not handle it. I read her syllabus multiple times and still did not get the homework right. I thought, was it me? I don't think so. 

And so I went with my instincts and decided, life is short, why pay money to be tortured especially when I'm doing this only for me. My advisor was understanding and after I jumped through a number of hoops, he gave me a leave of absence for the semester.

Now, I'm not criticizing the unnamed workshop professor, or maybe I am. Maybe that class just wasn't for me. Maybe, I'm just too old for this shit. Surely. I can't do nonsense. My goal is to make my life better not worse and if something doesn't bring me joy, and especially if I'm paying them to do it, forget it. 

So I let it go. Or maybe I'm letting it go now. 

Here I am. Telling my truth. As usual, probably too much information. But if you see me, you know why. It's because I have to share my words. On the page. I know no other way to be me. 

Thanks for reading. 

Morning Dorothy

Sitting here drinking my coffee, I think of how much I love the mornings. It's my time to hang out with my husband and dog Chewbacca (now flying solo as Frodo crossed the rainbow bridge) and write and promote on social media. The Pixies playing in the background or maybe Nick Cave, or Bowie of course. An espresso. Two sugar cubes. Toast with jelly. I need all of these. 

If only every day could stay at this time. Perpetually 6 am. Sunrises. No sunsets. Coffee only, no alcohol allowed.

Maybe I should write a story where the narrator lives only in the mornings. The rest of the time, she exists in never never land. Or maybe in Oz. Wearing a blue and white polka dot dress instead of gingham. With a dog named Chewbacca following her down the yellow brick road to an emerald city. 

If I had ruby colored slippers (I only have a red rose in my hair, one that has no magical powers), I might wish this into being. Or Frodo back to life. But I don't. There is no tornado to take me away.

Instead, I sigh. My early morning is ending and I must face the day. I must. 

Powerful beyond measure...

I've been up since 3. My sleep has been off since my dog Frodo passed away. I've been going to bed early as a result. By 8 pm, I'm spent.

The question on my mind is, who am I? I almost feel as if I am multiple people. My lawyer self at work, a wife and dog mom at home, my writer side in school and at events. But who am I?

The other day, I lost my phone. Then when I realized I'd lost it. I couldn't handle it. I found it after a lotta deep breaths. If a lost phone can put me in a tailspin, I'm in trouble. 

Maybe work is just too much. The shit is unrelenting. I'm a good lawyer, at times very good, and yet, nothing changes. It just builds and builds. Not enough support for sure. I'm coming to some realizations. It makes me sad. You either stay in the chaos or you bounce. Truth. Just speaking it. And hey, maybe it's just a bad day, week, month, or even years. Of too much. Just too much. Change can be good. I need to remember that. But don't hold me to this because I've been here before...

Then Wednesday night, I had a podcast. Everything went wrong. I had to rush my prep my interview questions early morning, run home from work after a hectic day, my computer died, my software failed, my guest got kicked out twice, and I had to interview holding my phone up with one hand. Yet still, it is one of my favorite interviews. Because I was present. Holding up my phone with one hand people (the angle was nice). That takes skills. 

Not worrying about my script. In the moment listening. Just present. It was beautiful. We talked about grief, loss, joy, fathers, mothers, and love.

And that's when I knew, I'm powerful beyond measure.

Goodbye Frodo

 I am so heartbroken today. My eyes are swollen from so many tears. I'm so sad. 

I can't even talk about how the day went because it was a very bad day, but yesterday my shih tzu Frodo passed away. He was suffering. I had to let him go. But I'm devastated. If I could only have him one more day. I would do anything for that. 

Chewbacca is laying here with me. We go downstairs. I watch him searching the house for Frodo. He walks all over the living room looking for his buddy. I tell him, "Frodo is in heaven." He goes to lay down on Frodo's blanket and puts his head on his paws and sighs and whines. Does he understand?

All I know right now is this. I'm shattered. 15 years. I had Frodo for so long. Once, he was here. Now he's gone. I thought with all of my losses that I had learned to grieve. But I haven't. Not a bit. 

I wasn't prepared for this kind of pain. Or for the emptiness of the house without my hobbit Frodo. A black and white shih tzu. A prince among dogs. You are missed. Oh how you are missed dear friend. My Frodo. 

Writing through

I don't know if you've noticed but I've been writing through. I've wrote about my surgeries, about work stress and finding my purpose, and about my dog's passing. It's what I do now. I often wonder, are people even reading my words? Or am I speaking into a void?

It's a form of therapy. It's a form of art, and it's a form of journaling. The best part of a blog is the immediacy of it all. I'm not working through it then writing it. I'm processing it as I write.

And I also appreciate memorializing it all. Maybe one day I can look back and go, wow I was really sad that day. Or really happy that day. I can see what my dreams were and see if they came to fruition.

Yesterday, I was dealing with work bullshit and at one point thought, wow, this sucks. And I wished I was a writer full-time. It's what moves me. It's what makes me smile and gets me excited.

I have a pretty full schedule of weekend reading events coming up and I know I'll get appreciation from my fellow writers and readers. Also, I know that I have to start on my next book. There's at least a few more in me. Maybe fiction. Maybe essays. Maybe poetry. 

So here's to writing through the pain. And writing one's joy. And waking up to do it again and again. Now that's bliss.

Happiness

I don't need a lot to make me happy. Coffee with half and half and 2 sugar cubes does it. That makes me happy. Concert tee shirts and scratchy cotton sweats. An ice cold Diet Coke. Popcorn. Toast with butter. Engaging TV. (Watch Reservation Dogs!) Good books. Watching my husband's face as he sleeps. Writing a story. That's happiness.

And my dogs. Now that Frodo is gone, I should say dog. But I still feel Frodo. Not only because I spent 15 years with that shih tzu, but I picked up his ashes. So he is quite literally here downstairs. 

Now I know I've been all gloom and doom, but for real, I'm more than a tad depressed. I have had bouts with anxiety in my forties but not a whole lotta depression. That was my teenage years and some of my thirties. Seriously, I forgot how draining it is. 

That said, I pledge to be happy again. Or at least content. Get a therapist. Focus on my health. Try and write an actual structured story for class.

Plus, work is busy, my calendar is full with readings and signings, and my niece/goddaughter Sophie is having a baby. So much to be grateful for. I know this. 

And as I sit here, drinking my coffee, I pick up Chewbacca who's curled up in a ball in the corner, and say, in his little caramel colored face, "We're gonna be okay. We're gonna be okay."

Grief

This is what I know. I know I'm grieving. I lost my dog Frodo. And for those of you who think, it's just a dog, just stop reading.

Frodo came into our lives 15 years ago. It was 2007 and I was still a big firm lawyer. That's how long ago it was. I spotted him at a pet store. That's how long ago it was. Our eyes met as I walked past a window. A little black and white fur ball of a shih tzu. He sucked a blanket. His black eyes and black nose just fascinated me. He reminded me of the beloved Panda bear stuffed animal I had as a kid. Plus, my cat Leopold had just gone missing and I was just so needy and raw.

Frodo and I played together and I couldn't let him go. Little did I know that in 2022, I would have to. 

We brought him home to our new house. He was my everything for me. Then Chewie came and I had two loves. Frodo was always there. Every day. Every night. Every morning was spent talking to him and Chewie. Feeding them. Walks. Dog parks. Petco visits. Vet appointments.

Then it got hard. Frodo had not been well for about a year. But I did my best. He was on meds. A lot of meds. So is Chewie. But I didn't think. I didn't see it. I didn't understand every day was precious. I hope he knows. I hope he knows how much I adored him. How sad our house is without him. The hole he left is just short of unbearable.

My grief is vast. It is deep and endless. I feel like I felt when my dad died. When I had my miscarriage. Like I can't deal. Like I can't come back from this. 

But I have to soldier on. Chewbacca needs me. As do others. My twin said, "Frodo would tell you to be happy" and she's right. But that's hard to remember as I weep writing this. Just picturing Frodo's little furry face. And how hard that day was when he died.

You see, I don't have human kids. I didn't get that blessing. But I remind myself daily of everything I do have. I do have a lot. But I don't have Frodo anymore, except in my memories. Always on my mind and in my memories. 

The Race

It's been a little bit. I went through a bout with Covid and have been in bed for ten days. Today was the first day I felt relatively normal. It's odd, because I slept so much, but I'm still tired. 

It made me realize a few things. I'm so lucky in so many ways. I don't have kids, but I have a great husband and family and friends. So many people checked in on me. I am also privileged to have a job that offers Covid time. I recovered and tomorrow, I go back to work. 

During the height of the pandemic, I was so scared. More for my mom and mother in law. But when I finally got Covid, it was over two years in and a lot of the fear was gone. Until I started coughing and felt as if my airway was closing. I made it through. But it made me think of the multiplicity of universe theory and I wondered if, in another universe, I didn't make it.

Not the most productive thing to think about and a morbid idea I know...

Still, that fear, of death, of dying, of not reaching my dreams, is what made me finally take my writing career to another level a couple of years back. Because I knew with certainty that my regret would be profound if I passed away before publishing my book. 

So I did it. Finally.

What is next? That is what haunts me now. I really have no clue. I'm asking the universe to show me. Where do I go now with all of this? How do I find my way? It's one thing to publish a book, but how do I find my path to my true passion?

What I have decided, in the midst of my uncertainty, is that I will focus on my body and mind and on taking care of myself health wise.

My goal is to start exercising and cutting down on my vices. Managing my stress. Because wherever this road leads me, the thing I do know for sure is that I want to be able to run the race.

Or at least give a good power walk.

Pizza time

I've written a story or two or three about food and restaurants. I've also written quite a lot about pizza and chicken. In my full length memoir, I have a story about a night at Pizza Hut with my dad. And in another foodie piece, I talk about my dad's love of Pioneer Chicken. The orange crispness that burst in your mouth like fireworks. Their mash with the golden gravy. Their little dessert trifles.

But have I ever written about Shakey's Pizza? Last night, my husband ordered it to be delivered. He got a large pizza, mojo potatoes and eight pieces of fried chicken. I bit into the chicken and it felt like home.

Back in the day, Shakey's Pizza was like church for the Mantz family, My dad would take us to the one in Montclair on Holt Street. They had a mini arcade and my sisters and I would beg my mom and dad for quarters. We would play Pac Man and probably Dig Dug or Burger Time. We would each get the buffet. And a pitcher of A & W Root Beer which we had to sip slowly because there were no refills. The other strategy was to down your first one and beat everyone to go for a second cup.  

My ritual was to first make a salad covered in ranch, cheese, black olives and croutons. Next, I would eat my fill of the crispy chicken and the salty mojo potatoes (dipped in ranch of course). At the end, I would sample each kind of pizza they had out. 

Dad could eat a lot and my mom would chastise him, "John, slow down. Remember your blood pressure." Dad would shake his head at her. He wasn't going to let an "all you can eat" buffet be anything but just that. 

Dad always wanted to take chicken home. It wasn't allowed. But that didn't stop him. Dad would hand my mom a few pieces of chicken under the table wrapped in an oil stained napkin and whisper to my mom, "C'mon Judy, put it in your purse." Mom soon learned to bring a big purse with her and dad would fill it up. At home, Dad would wait an hour or two, then open the fridge to eat his pilfered chicken. I would sometimes ask him for a piece of crispy skin and he would always oblige.

Those memories linger for me. They're unforgettable. Good food, family, arcade games and hiding a piece of chicken in a purse. What could be better than that my friends?

Stained glass year

When I lived in San Francisco, I started attending a catholic parish called St. John of God. The church was small and lovely with its own Irish priest who acknowledged that the Bible was a parable. The average age of a parishioner was probably 70.  They did a lot of work on the cancer ward at UCSF. They built houses for people. They raised money for the community. 

I started attending church masses early on Sundays. And then I started staying for the after church socials where adorable old ladies served homemade coffee cake and scones with coffee. And then, to my mom's surprise and delight as I was agnostic for a time, I started attending Sunday school classes to make my confirmation. Finally. 

Yes, I made my Catholic confirmation in my thirties.

I enjoyed the classes. Most of all, I just loved reading the stories and learning about the history of religion. We would debate in class over whether cats and dogs went to heaven. I'm sure they do and won the unofficial debate. At least in my opinion I did. But most of all, church was a community for me. I joined the choir and loved singing, letting my voice soar to the hymns with the guitar and piano in the background. 

The day of my confirmation, my mom, sister and baby Selena drove down to see it. I walked up the aisle, and grinned, knowing that this could happen nowhere else but in a progressive parish in San Francisco. And I felt a presence in the church that day. I looked around at the stained glass windows and felt it. The universe, Buddha, God. A rose by any other name. And it felt lovely and true. Later, my faith would help me through my dad's death.  And through my failed infertility treatments. 

So in the end, that confirmation was meant to be. Like most things. It's not that I needed to conform or anything like that. Like my MFA writing program in many ways, it was something I decided to do just for me.

And it felt good.

The girl is chasing windmills...

My next goal, after I recover 100 percent, is to get my books to the silver screen as well as to the stage. Some days, I sit and daydream of it happening. I can see myself in the theater in the front row, incognito by virtue of being a mere writer. No one knows what Jenny looks like now.

People may think it's weird, odd, or even "crazy" to daydream like this. Or night dream. But dreaming is what got me to my writing career. Although career is a somewhat congratulatory and inaccurate term as typically one makes money from their career. Yet, I have to say that, until recently, I never needed my writing to make money.

But now, well now, I do. I need the freedom money brings. I need the freedom to chase my dreams. I need to see the culmination of it all, which I think will be seeing my book translated as a film.

You see, I've always seen my memoir "Tales of an Inland Empire Girl" as a film cinematically in my head. Music soundtrack included of course. In my mind's eye, I see it, I do. 

Now I know that my book doesn't have much action or even plot, but I can fix that in the adaptation. Plus, some of my favorite movies like "The World According to Garp", "The Squid & the Whale", "The Glass Castle" and even, the very recent, "The Tender Bar", all of which are based on books or true life, are not action or plot driven necessarily, but character driven. 

So call me Ishmael. Call me a fool. Call me whatever you want because maybe I am chasing at windmills. But maybe, just maybe, these windmills are not imaginary but real and attainable. At least in my head.

Paying my dues

Yesterday, someone commented that I had paid my figurative creative writing dues. And yes I have. Oh have I.

Twenty years ago, I started writing creatively while living in Houston. I hadn't written for years and had just graduated from USC Law and I was working as a corporate litigator at the largest law firm in Texas. Late night, staring out the window of a Houston skyscraper, I would write poems. They would pour out of me. It was the first time I realized that I had a writer inside of me, one that was bursting to get out. 

In Texas, that writing voice was compelled by the loneliness and despair I felt in a new place by myself and an unfulfilling job. That's not to say I regret Texas or working at the big firm because I don't. The job was a huge opportunity, one that I'll always be grateful for, and I made friends in Texas that I'll have for life.

Later, in San Francisco, with my husband who was in dental school, I kept writing. I didn't write as much because I was working long hours at yet another law firm, and when I wasn't working, I was having the time of my life. Adrian and I spent weekends at Golden Gate Park and exploring the city and the wine country areas of Napa and Sonoma. We started looking for a house to buy, the market was extremely low, and then boom, my dad died. 

It was the defining moment of my life. I totally just dropped everything and moved back home. I quit my San Francisco law firm job and moved to Colton to sleep on my twin sister's couch. I had already interviewed and accepted yet another law firm position. This one in Riverside. Yet, I knew the day I started that it wasn't for me. I still felt like an outsider. 

Flash forward to two years later. I'm desperately unhappy. I dread going into work and often leave early to write at the Starbucks down the street. My husband, who has graduated dental school by then and is studying for his board exams, catches me there one day. He knows I'm unhappy.  But we just bought a big house.

So I apply to a workshop called VONA and it changes my life. I find my writing voice, and myself. Soon, I'm interviewing for deputy public defender positions and after interviewing in Riverside, Orange County and San Bernardino, I'm hired in Riverside. It feels like I'm finally home. It is one of the best decisions I've ever made.

I keep on writing. I'm working on a memoir about my childhood and the stories come out free standing, one at a time, for over a decade. I know there's something there. I go to Macondo. People love the energy and voice. A publisher likes it too but suggests I rewrite it as fiction. 

Finally, I find Los Nietos, and this press likes my memoir as it is and suggests I lengthen it to add more chapters from a high school perspective. Those chapters and the editing and collating takes two years. I finish the final story in a creative writing online MFA program at the University of New Orleans. At the last minute, I add in my poetry (some of the same poetry about my dad's death that I wrote at the Starbucks in Ontario that Adrian caught me at all those years ago). Covid has happened and I've started a podcast and written a hybrid chapbook about public defense and punk rock. My memoir becomes a kind of prequel.  But it all makes sense. It all makes so much sense. 

So yes my dues are paid and I'm marketing the hell outta both my books. For years, and years, I prayed to the universe to give me this, so I'm relishing it. Life gives you a chance at finding your true purpose and you have to grab it when it comes, lest it slip away. And for me, this writer thing, it's here to stay.

Plus size

 I recently did a FB post about what plus size is: 

"What is plus size? Plus size is being large in everything we do. From our aesthetic and fashion to our makeup & eyelashes, to our career & social justice writing. Plus size is being conscious of the way the world will try to fit us in a tiny box. Break free baby! Plus size is everything we do to be our authentic selves. It's champagne & a party in Vegas. Wearing a leopard dress & knowing, we look good. Plus size is sexy. Plus size is punk rock."  Juanita E. Mantz JEM

"Plus size is a big laugh, big plans, and big love!!  And in this Pic, it's a white biker jacket as a blazer and really bad hair 😂😂." Amy Beth Clark-Downing

"Plus size is Hawt!"

"I grew up with elder family women who were plus size, but we didn't have that term then, and we didn't think being plus size was something negative. I admired and respected these beautiful women. And their lonjas appealed to me. Different bodies for different people, that's how I saw it, still do." liz gonzález

"Plus size is more canvas for beautiful tattoos and fun fashion!" Marika Lopez

"Plus size means no cool bathing suits or latest trends. Plus size is us then making our styles and trends. Plus size is walking in a room and people saying, “wow, she’s wearing that, so brave.” Plus size is head up and confident no one else has that outfit. Plus size is women asking where’d you shop. Plus size is taking my pants in at the hips but not waist. Plus size is hemming every fucking pair of pants bc apparently we’re not only wide but over 5’10, NOT!  Plus size is wearing it, owning the look and knowing others are talking about you. Plus size is eating that lunch and not worrying my pants are too tight. Plus size is leaving the store pissed bc the largest size on the rack is a 12! Plus size is telling the cashier, “I’m a big girl with cash, tell that to your buyer.” Plus size is asking the sales girl,” do you have anything for fluffy girls?” Plus size is the sales rep telling you, “sorry we don’t carry your size.” And you thinking, girl how do you know what and whom I’m buying for! Plus size is buying off Etsy bc the designers don’t care what size you are!! Yay, Etsy! Plus size is finding your designers and thanking them for letting you feel “normal.” Plus size is me. Plus size is learning to love myself forever." Geneva Castro'Lichtenstein

 

Platform

I started this blog more than a decade ago. My first post was about my humiliation at doing the sprinkler dance at a work gala. The writing is just okay. Looking back, I think it had a nice energy. And a voice. That's the most important thing in my opinion. You can learn to write and hone your craft, but the question really is whether you have something to say. A perspective. An attitude. A lens.

My blog writing has improved. Looking back at at some of my blogs, I think, wow I wrote that? But blog writing is not about perfection, it's about getting it out there. For me, I think of it like a diary aimed at an audience. It's very personal and active. 

Everyone knows that I think in song lyrics and love weaving music in. There's a whole subset of my blogs focused on music and the intersections with my life. And occasionally, I sneak in a political essay. 

Every blog takes about a half hour to no more than an hour with editing. No more than an hour because that's the point. It should be quick and easy. Breezy. 

After all these years, I've written over six hundred entries. That's 600 stories people! I've memorialized my life and I'm so glad I did. 

In my blogs, I've dealt with death, grief, infertility, weight issues, body image, pain management, forgiveness, trauma, love, mental health, my writing path, relationships and more. The one overarching theme is really about how to find your path and purpose in life.

My blog became a way for me to process. It's something I can look back on to remember how it felt. How I felt. Who I was. 

It took me years and years to build an audience. At first, I was happy if ten people read a blog. Hovering around fifty hits a month for years and years. Then, something clicked. 

Finally, I have a following. A thousand hits a month may not sound like a lot, but when it's consistent, it's enough. It's enough to know that this blog matters. Plus, my lovely micro audience is loyal, educated, creative, super literary and a tad political. My audience is people like me, inside wise that is. 

So I'm writing this to urge you all to write a blog. I'm planning on producing and teaching a class soon about audience building and how to use a blog, along with a podcast and social media, to create a platform (what I call "an identity" in the writing world). I'll announce it here and on my Life of JEM Facebook page when it drops. 

Remember that this public identity is a version of you. It's really whoever you want it to be. Be authentic and true, and always vulnerable, or don't bother. Keep something for yourself too. I call JEM my alter ego. At times, she's my better self.

I didn't start out thinking about platform. It happened organically, but it's paying off now that I finally finished and published my books. 

So think about it. And then make it happen. You can do it. Promise. 

Rough

It's been a rough couple days. I'm recovering from surgery and have been in a lot of pain. It's not unmanageable like my last surgery where I thought I would stroke out from the pain. This is pain I can grit my teeth at, and try to breathe my way through. I'm not a big pain pill person so have been using pills sparingly. Last night, I woke up covered in sweat after taking a pill yesterday late afternoon and I hate that groggy feeling. 

Back to roughness, the world is rough man. So damn rough. The US Supreme Court, in an act of judicial activism that I saw coming, did the unthinkable. Never say never. They took away women's reproductive choices with the stroke of a pen. The scariest thing to me is the idea that they will prosecute women. The next scariest thing, or maybe they're equally terrifying, is that the US world will become a place where pregnancy is coercion. These are frightening times and we will feel and see the horrifying results for years to come. 

Yet, don't lose hope. The world went backwards but we will move forward. For in these rough choppy waters, all we can do is row. 

Feelings

I'm so angry. This is righteous anger. As a woman, as a feminist, and as a lawyer, I am appalled, terrified, heartbroken, and more. Words don't suffice really in times like these. These scary, dystopian and apocalyptic times.

I'll try to articulate how I feel.

This is how I feel. 

I feel as if the world is now irrevocably broken. Look, I know it already was broken. 

I'll say it again. In a whisper this time to myself. It already was broken. 

But for the highest court to take away a woman's right to choose. To say our body is not our own. To undo decades of binding precedent. To say there is no right of a woman to make her own decisions about her own body. It feels surreal. It feels horrible. 

Where do I go with my rage? Where do we go with our rage? 

There are so many who feel this way. 

I feel... helpless. Yet, I know I am not helpless, and we are not helpless. I am a lawyer, and a writer, one with a voice, and a pen, and a mission. 

Know this. We all have power to bring to the table. 

You see, the world is broken but we are not. So we need to mobilize and organize to be the heroes and heroines who will defend the marginalized, oppressed and persecuted. 

Because know one thing, know this, that this ruling will be used to prosecute poor women of color. Believe it. 

History has showed us what can happen, as have books, and we need to be ready to act. I feel it. The urgency. 

It's not a pleasant feeling, but it's real. It's now. So feel it. Feel it. 

The girl who sold the world

Life is so short. It is. Fleeting. Precious. 

And usually, at least for me, when I'm caught up in the day to day routine with work, it goes by like a film on fast forward. I can typically only remember fragments of my day. 

Yet, there are times when life moves slow, like now. 

Here at home, in recovery, time moves so beautifully slow, like floating on a lake, not traveling a rushing river, I linger. I have music on in the background of course. The Shins, Bowie and Queen. 

The moments come and I ease into them and am present. 

In these times, I notice the mysteries of life. The gorgeous cinematic quality to it all. The blue sky. The sun shining on me. My dogs' faces. I cherish my husband's quick kiss goodbye. His teasing me about the way I dance and I laugh after he leaves and give a tiny karate motion in the air. 

My shih tzu Frodo walks around the house, and he's doing much better this week. I sing along to Bowie as I sip my coffee. 

When it's time to feed the dogs, I sit and wait. There's no pressure. Taking my time, I make another cup of coffee. Two sugar cubes. Splash of cream. Sip. Sip, and sing.

Today, I have all time in the world.

Ode to Coffee (In recovery room post surgery)

 Ode to coffee

Oh coffee I love you so

Let me tell you how I like you

Black and bitter warmth

Or with a splash of half and half 

One sugar cube, ok two

Down the hatch

This addiction 

Started when I was little

I would beg mom for a taste

She would hand me the mug

And I would take gulps

Until she grabbed it back

From my greedy hands 

Making herself another

That taste of Folgers, 

or was it Maxwell House

Is a hallmark of my childhood

Sitiing at our small kitchen table 

It still sustains me every morning

I drink as many as I want 

Fiending for it 

I have no kids to ask me 

for a sip. But if I did, 

I'd definitely pass my cup

To let them taste what 

smells like perfection 

At 5 am in the morning

While I write

It's the best part of my day 

Sipping my double espresso 

While remembering France 

downing those tiny cups

At my cousin's house,

devouring buttery croissants

Dip it in 

Savoring the sweetness, 

the aftertaste lingers  

Today, post surgery savoring 

my first cup in 24 hours

It's bland heaven, 

smooth on my tongue 

Probably Folgers

Something that is hard for me

Sitting here, at 4 am after surgery, I am thinking about a prompt that I was given recently to write about something that is hard for me to deal with. 

Reconciliation is part of everything I write about. Writing my memoir was itself a journey of recollection and reconciliation. To remember, is to reconcile. You must. How you remember and frame the past is a way of recovering from your past trauma. It's not as if you can change the past, you can't, but you can change your perspective. 

People who aren't writers sometimes ask me how to explain what I write and often ask me if I write biography. Usually, I respond that I write creative nonfiction. Creative nonfiction is a broad umbrella that encompasses essays, memoir and other forms of "true" stories. 

My memoir pieces tend to focus on a specific time and place. These pieces, which range from essays, to poetry to stories, are always a way for me to write with purpose on issues such as what is memory? It is also a way for me to discover who I am now, and who I was back then.

Writing is a process and a practice and a way to understand the inherent fragmentation of memory and the challenges of how to capture time, place and character. It's not easy. Especially hard for me is the choice in my first person stories of whether to write in present or past tense. I prefer present tense because it's more active, but it's a fallacy because I'm writing about the past... get it?

Writing memoir is ultimately a way of capturing myself as a character back in the day and now. It's a way to bring my father back to life, as least on the page. Memoir was, and is, a way for me to forgive others and myself. It's also a way to celebrate the good times. 

What I think is ultimately hardest for me is not reconciling the past. What's hardest for me is being in the present (despite my somewhat ironic preference for present tense in my stories). As a writer, I'm always writing about what has happened, and as a person, I'm constantly focusing on the future, and on what WILL happen. 

I have so many goals as a writer and performer, and I try to visualize them into being. What some call manifestation. But I want to be in the now, in the here and now. Yet, the now is so fleeting. And it's more difficult to write about.

Here's to being in the now. The here and now. Right here. Not where I will be or where I was. 

Let's talk about where I am. 

Tomorrow tomorrow

I'm having surgery tomorrow. I'll be out of touch for a bit. So if anyone needs me that desperately, just message me. I'll get back to you eventually. For the next three or four weeks, I'll be focused on health and wellness! So give me a break! 

When I walked thru the open door

When I walked thru the open door of our community center, I saw the pool. The water was a deep sparkling aqua blue. There was no one else there. Just me. The sun shining, the water and me.

It was so inviting that I tore off my shirt and dove in and started to swim lap after lap. Swimming has always been my zen. My go to. I remember living in Houston and swimming in the pool in our community center. I was a depressed and stressed out corporate lawyer, so I swam after work. Laps and laps. Looking back, I swam to escape the lack of a life I'd made myself. My unhappiness with corporate law. My loneliness in a city with no family. My sadness.

Swimming started when I was a kid. My parents bought a pool when I was in elementary school. It was the greatest gift. Me and my sisters were so happy. We literally jumped with joy when we found out. We would swim for days. It was our summer. And winter. Even in the rain. Jumping off the roof into the pool. Racing each other. Diving into water on hot summer days after barbecuing. Those are the memories that linger. 

I can still remember laying on a floatie in the haze of summer for hours and hours. My skin tanning from the golden rays and then turning the floatie over to swim underwater. The coolness of the water rejuvenating me.

In high school, I was on the swim team. I loved swimming freestyle and backstroke. I wasn't the best swimmer but I was super enthusiastic and always amazed at how swimming freed me. It showed me the possibilities in life. Swimming helped me escape the chaos of those years. And when I quit the swim team, I lost myself.

Writing this, I realize that I want to find that joy again. Joy in my body. In being connected. When I was younger, in moving through water to find myself, I was able to find that connection with my mind and body. Now at 50, I feel like I've lost it. It's funny that at 30, I was miserable at work and needed a change. and that now at 50, two decades later, as a stressed out deputy public defender, I've come to understand that change is needed again. Perhaps what feeds us, does not always feed us forever. 

But swimming does feed me. Will always feed me. So into the water I will go. Stroke by stroke. I will go.

Writing with Magic

The other day I had my friend, teacher and writer Stephanie Barbé Hammer on my podcast. Check it out. https://juanitaemantz.com/life-of-jem-season-2-episode-9-writing-with-magic%EF%BF%BC/

She talked about using magical realism to allow oneself to write fiction in a freeing way. As a memoir writer I needed this inspiration, so here goes... part memoir, part fiction, but magic.

My shih tzus started talking. Truly. Not just in my head which is usually the way they talk. Which I translate into their voices occasionally for my own amusement.

But this was different. This was real. As soon as my husband left for work, Chewbacca looked at me and said in a quite human sounding high voice, "More toast please Mom." Then Frodo cleared his throat like an old man and said with an English accent, "I'll have some more too please." They both wagged their tales and acted like this was completely normal.

I shook my head and said aloud, "What the hell?"

Chewie looked at me, and waved his furry ears and blinked his caramel colored eyes at me. He repeated himself in that same high voice, "Toast please." 

Frodo walked up and turned his black and white back up at me to scratch and said, again in a strange English almost Cockney accent , "What are you waiting for my lady? Toast time. With jelly."

So I made toast. They never spoke again that morning or any other. I still don't know whether they ever will again. But at least I know Frodo sounds British and Chewie sounds like a high voiced pixie. 

You get what you need

You can't always get what you want. You can't. It's not always what the universe wants for you. In other words, it's not meant to be. Sometimes it takes years to understand why.

When I went through in vitro years ago, I wanted it so bad. So bad that I couldn't see any other reality in my future. When everything failed, when I had no more options of conceiving a child naturally, it devastated me.  I really thought for a bit that my life was over. That I didn't want to be here anymore.

But then with time and therapy, I realized that I still had a great life and a wonderful husband, fantastic friends and family and my beloved dogs. 

Now looking back, I totally understand why the world had something different in store for me. Having my books, finishing them and putting them out into the world, along with performing and interviewing other writers, is my life's purpose. It was meant to be all along. I just couldn't see why back then. 

Are there moments where I wish I had a little girl with curly ringlets and Adrian's eyes? Of course. Maybe in another world and universe she exists. 

But for the present, the here and now, I only have this world. This reality. And I'm good. I'm good.

Fro Fro

My dog Frodo has sundowners. When the sun goes down, he gets confused and will bark nonstop. He gets disoriented and paces the house. It's been a hard week of sleep interrupted nights.

So after speaking with his vet, we gave him Tramadol. The first night, it worked okay. He slept through. But tonight, he's even more out of it. He can barely walk and keeps losing his balance. His back is already shot so while trying not to panic, I take him outside and steady his legs for him. He nips me. Then he seems to calm down. He seems comforted with my presence.

I bring a blanket downstairs and sleep on the couch with him on his blanket on the floor below me. He's sleeping and I sigh, trying not to weep. While my mother-in-law watches Netflix, I listen to a podcast and meditate. I breathe in and out. 

Leaning down, I rub his back and scratch his ears as he snores. Snuggling his little black and white shih tzu body, I cradle his face in my hands and kiss his black nose, whispering to him, and to myself, "I love you Frodo. I love you dammit."

Tiffani

Yesterday, I attended a remembrance for my friend Tiffani Willis. She passed away a few months ago. We went to law school together. Lived together as roommates for a year. I will miss her so. 

She was such a good friend. I usually consider myself a pretty good friend. Usually I am. Not this time. 

Because I hadn't seen Tiffani in a few years. What with Covid and life, I hadn't reached out for a while in person. We used to meet in LA for lunch periodically. Have sandwiches and talk about life, books, and music.

Instead, for the last few years, we kept up on social media. Occasionally, I messaged her. Knew she was a librarian. She had quit corporate law to follow her bliss. Her bliss was books. Always. She went to UCLA for library school. It made complete sense. I admired her for it. To remake yourself in your forties is not easy, but she did it. With grace. She was so brilliant and a fantastic lawyer. but also a creative. 

Tiffani was also a wonderful writer. You could see it in her blog posts on passport books. She wrote about so many books. Beautifully wrought discussions and in depth reviews of an eclectic mix of books. 

So when my memoir came out I messaged her. I told her I'd love to see her at my book party at the Garcia Center. And she came. Walked in with long colorful braids. I hugged her tight and got misty eyed and wept to see her and my other roommate Bridget there along with our law school buddy Katherine. It meant so much to have her there. 

In retrospect, seeing her that last time was everything to me. So thank you Tiffani for being a great friend to me for all those years. For being a wonderful person. A terrific lawyer and teacher. A dear friend to Maggie Hall and so many others. A stellar academic. A beloved daughter to your mom Sjeanay, a supportive big sister to Tocarra and an awesome auntie to her daughter. You are loved. You are missed. We all know that. The world shines a little less bright now. I hope you're snuggled in a corner reading a book in the big library in the sky friend. 

Everyday is Like Sunday

Today is Sunday. I'm listening to the birds sing. I've been awake since 5 am and have had too much espresso. 

My mother in law sits across from me. It's quiet until Frodo starts barking incessantly. So I throw dry food on the floor for him. I call it our 52 pick up game. He's already eaten but he's old. Another round of food won't hurt.

I'm old too. But not too old. I'm not too old to focus on health and wellness. I'm not too old to go to concerts. Or write. Or play and perform. Most of all, I'm not too old to dream. 

Dreaming has always been my freedom in life. I've always imagined new things and adventures. They have, more often than not, come true. Some call this manifestation. I call it dreaming. Dreaming is free, as Blondie once said. It's everything. In some ways, dreaming is life.

And my next dream is to write a third book and then teach writing. Full-time. Not just in bits and pieces. Now, I know I still have things to do to make this happen. Change takes time. And I'm fine where I am. 

But I have to dream it first. So this Sunday. I'm gonna daydream my butt off. I'll light a candle and pray. Breathe. And dream. Then, I will dream some more. 

Crooked

When I was a kid, I had crooked teeth. I used to cover my teeth when I smiled. I also had impacted eye teeth. I remember people making fun of my teeth. Calling me a snaggletooth. My frizzy hair never seemed to curl right. I probably wasn't using the right product or conditioner. 

In my twenties, I was very insecure about my weight. Looking back, I was trim and slim but didn't know it. I got braces so that helped my smile. In my thirties, after law school and working at a large firm, I gained an extreme amount of weight after getting on an anti-depressant. 

In my forties, I lost the weight, some of which I've gained back during Covid and menopause.

It wasn't until recently that I've accepted where I am and tried to make the best of what I've got. I still want to lose weight, but know that I have to be happy where I am. Makeup has become my friend and I'm having fun with it. I wear what I want and try to be confident. 

I think back and wonder if my insecurities is why I never tried acting. To be on display. To be judged. It's something I was terrified of. But now, all that fear is gone. I don't know if it's turning fifty or publishing my books, but I have no fear of public appearances or speaking on stage.

That's not to say I'm not still insecure. I am at my core or I wouldn't be writing this. But I'm trying to be confident. And happy. Performing makes me happy so I'm leaning into it. Crookedly maybe. But leaning still. 

Boredom

There's a Buzzcocks song called boredom. I keep thinking of it as I sit here in my punk t shirt drinking coffee. There's this line that has always spoken to me, 

"You see, I'm living in this a-movie

But it doesn't move me..."

I feel like that a lot. As if I'm watching myself. And I'm so bored with all of it. With the 8 to 5 job, with the daily routine, and with the suits in court. 

The law profession can be very male centered at times, despite the fact of so many fabulous female lawyers. 

Men take up more space. They take it as their right. Their privilege. They define what people think of as a lawyer. A white man in a dark suit and tie is what people think of as a lawyer. That and an undertaker.

The other day, I was asked in court by both lawyers and clients if I was an assistant to a lawyer or a paralegal. I thought to myself, why is this happening? I'm fifty years old, I've been a lawyer twenty years, I went to USC Law and I wore a suit to court today. But it's not me, it's them. 

They're all so fucking boring. One of these days, probably when I'm near retirement, I'm gonna wear a plaid punk suit with zippers and safety pins to court just to show the absurdity of it all. They may kick me out, but it will be too late. I'll just give them the bird and sing a little song, 

"You know the scene, very humdrum
Boredom, boredom
B'dum, b'dum"

(Buzzcocks, circa 1977)

Breathe baby breathe

Right now, I am giving my mind space to breathe writing wise. No new writing project on the horizon. I did finally finish a first draft of my play adaptation. And I always have this blog which I update weekly to flex my writing muscles.

It feels good. To rest that creative side is important at times. Stories usually come to me. My favorite way to write is in a generative workshop with prompts. I am not an organized writer. I'm a scribble or type furiously for hours writer, then I take a breath slowly and edit later. 

Let me say this. Fuck outlines. For those of you who use them, goody for you, I'm glad they work for you, but for me, personally, outlines stifle my creativity and feel too much like my legal work.

What is so interesting is that even in my day job as a deputy public defender, which is hectic AF right now, I don't outline. I write openings, closings and motions in a fury then go back and organize my writing. Maybe I'm backwards that way.

When I was in college, learning how to write essays, which I think I already instinctively and naturally knew how to do, the thing that helped me most was the idea of a topic sentence and a theme. 

To this day, when I write an essay, which I can often do in a flash, I start with that and add my research after. Yes, things can change based on my research but my theme always remains the same. As Jackson Maine, a character in one of my favorite movies (the recent version of "A Star is Born"), said:

"Look, talent comes everywhere, but having something to say and a way to say it to have people listen to it, that’s a whole other bag."

Yesterday

Yesterday, I submitted my memoir/book "Tales of an Inland Empire Girl" to a "books for movie" contest. If your book is chosen, it goes to the movie studios to be considered. It was a last minute thing. It popped up on my calendar and I just made the deadline. 

I also started watching the "Pistol" series on Hulu. It's so damn good. The guy who plays Johnny Rotten is perfect. As is the Steve Jones character whose memoir "Lonely Boy" the series is based on. I'm about halfway through and it's so epic. You see all of the Sex Pistols in their beginnings along with their visionary and controversial manager Malcom McLaren, (who was also involved previously with the NY Dolls before the Sex Pistols) as well as the other characters pre rock star status of Chrissie Hynde (who had traveled to London from Ohio to be inspired) and Siouxsie Sioux. They're all obsessed with Bowie and hoping to create something. They're anti establishment. And somewhat anti Beatles and anti long guitar solos. They're pro chaos. They're blue collar and punk rock. They just don't have that name for it yet. 

It reminded me that not everyone, or mostly no one, thinks their dreams will come true when they're in the midst of it. You just have to focus on the tasks, whether it be touring or reading or workshopping or learning to play guitar, that get you there. To that place you can see, but it's an unknown. Then your life will change. Fuck the naysayers. Just do it. 

So here's to yesterdays. And tomorrows. Cheers.

The graduate

For Selena

The Graduate 

She walks like poetry

Across a stage

To cheers of family

Diploma in hand

She raises an eyebrow

Behind owl glasses

And smiles knowing 

This is only the beginning

Playin

My MFA online school semester just ended. I need to take the summer off. This semester was a doozy and I just took one class at University of New Orleans. Yes, everything is remote, asynchronous they call it. On a platform called Moodle. I've grown accustomed to it. The technology is not the issue. I am the issue. 

The biggest issue is that I can't give less than 100 percent. Seriously, it's a problem. My "Adaption" class this semester was with a pretty well known playwright from Louisiana. And I decided, on a lark, well not really because it was begging for an adaptation, that I was going to adapt my 200 plus page memoir into a stage play. Everyone else in the class adapted someone else's work. Some people did prose into poetry, and vice versa. And others did shorter pieces. A couple of others did a stage play, but they had very simplified clean concepts.

The teacher/playwright was clear. We could do as simple or as complicated a project as we chose and would be judged on what we accomplished of our goals at semester's end. 

Of course, I chose not just complicated, but downright fucking impossible. Impossible. A three act play adaption of my memoir.

Mind you, I've never written a stage play before although I've always wanted to. I didn't know how to. No idea. No formatting experience. And think about it, my memoir took 15 years, how in the hell did I think I could do an adaption in three months?

So I started writing this adaptation late night and early morning. On weekends, I would wake up early. I don't know how I got myself into this. It just happened. I told myself. You'll do a couple hours a day. You can do it. Then the first weekend, I spent one full day. A full day. 

Physically, it was hard too. I threw my fifty year old neck out writing it. Emotionally, I went through the wringer. Traumatizing myself about my dad's death, which is memorialized in my memoir, all over again. Crying. Hysterically at times. Some days, I felt like Diane Keaton where she portrays a playwright in that movie with Jack Nicholson and Keanu Reeves, the one where she's writing the play at the end sobbing. Most days, I wept into my computer. I'm lucky I did not short it out. Or myself. 

I cursed my ambitious self often. Saying aloud, more than once. Why do I do this to myself? I'm a masochist, a damn masochist. One night, a Saturday, after a full work day on Friday, I woke up at at 3 am, drank three espressos and worked straight through for seven hours. I was obsessed I must admit. Compulsive. A bit manic at times. Pencils in my messy bun. Notes and crumbled pieces of pink post it notes everywhere. Re read my own memoir twice. Or maybe three times. 

In the end? I did it. I accomplished the miracle. A workable first draft. Two acts, not three, but it's cool. Not perfect, but awesome as hell. I have a stage play. I don't know how I did it. Maybe, just maybe, I manifested that shit into being. Seriously. Something was working through me at times.

And importantly too, or maybe not at all really because I'm not doing it for the grade, although my long suffering husband might disagree, I got an A. An A. On my first adaptation. Most importantly, I give myself an A plus for effort and dedication.

Changin

There's a Stevie Nicks lyric that says "Well I've been afraid of changing because I've built my life around you. But time makes you bolder..."

That's how I feel about life in general. Most of us have plans. But what's that old saying? How do you make God laugh? Make plans.

I never thought I would be here. At this crossroads. Loving my writing life so much that it's overshadowing my attorney life. I have merged them to some extent but it's not enough. I'm a creative. A performer. An artist. It sounds a bit presumptuous I know. But I don't care. Fuck it. Because when I'm working on a story, I lose myself. It's not work. It's not. It's persistence. I'm present. And no one suffers, unlike in my work public defender life. It's joy. It's why I'm here. Know that.

So I just keep asking the universe to show me the way. I'm willing to do it. To jump. Maybe it's time to take the plunge. And fly free.

I just don't know what to do with myself...

What am I gonna do with myself? I just don't know. I'm done with school for the semester. I turned my final project in. I have no more readings scheduled or appearances for the near future. My podcast airs only once a month so that's not too bad.

It feels off putting to have nothing on the writing and promotion horizon. Maybe I just need to relax. Take the summer off from running myself ragged. Watch my health and wellness. Focus on work and my hubby and dogs.

Yet, I still need something creative to focus on. Or a performance to look forward to. Maybe just one more performance/reading... 

Why not? Life is short, fleeting, and for me, I love the connection I make when I read. Although I don't always lose myself in it. There are times I'm nervous as hell and self conscious. But when I can disappear, I love it. I get it now. I get it. It's intoxicating to lose yourself in your art. To feel yourself fade away. Yeah. Yeah.  

Better than any libation or drug. It's magic.

Because I do

Last night, we saw the LA punk band X in Riverside. We've seen them too many times to count, but this felt different. After a horrible work day, I felt free. 

It felt pre Covid. Unmasked, I sat outside with the bestie and our husbands in the atrium. My eyes kept drifting to band member (and legend) Billy Zoom in the corner. 

There were two opening bands so X went on late, about 930. I immediately ran to the front. The venue wasn't crowded so it was pretty easy to jostle about halfway to the front. Then, a pretty blond girl said, "I'll help you get up there" and she elbowed and pushed me to the second row of people. How I get so lucky I don't know, but I do. 

Near the stage, about a few feet from the band, I jumped up and down to the songs "Los Angeles" and "Blue Spark". Exene wore a dress and apron with cowboy boots and she was on point dancing and singing as only she can do. John Doe was as brilliant in his harmonies as ever with her. 

When their sad ballad "Come Back To Me" (a grief filled song I reference in my memoir) came on, I moved to the back with hubby and swayed. Teary eyed, I danced in his arms.

It was a night to remember friends. And Saturday is the Cruel World Festival! Rock on!

Truly

So I started writing this blog thinking of nothing. I'm on my phone just typing it out. 

It's been a rough couple weeks. I overextended myself. My work as a deputy public defender has been hectic and even tragic and sad. It kind of took over my mood. But, despite it all, my writing self had to honor her commitments. 

On Wednesday, I took the day off and drove to Pasadena/Altadena for a reading event at LitFest and didn't get home until late. The next day, I had court and after work, I hocked my books at a Cinco de Mayo street fair that took place at the Riverside library. I also got to watch the one man show/monologue play by Carlos Cortes. It was inspiring.

Yes, I was still melancholy but the writing promotion work helped. It lifted me out of my despair. I interacted with other writers and saw some old friends and just took some deep breaths. 

Then, my teacher in my MFA program gave me feedback on my semester long project, an adaptation of my YA memoir into a stage play. It was amazingly supportive feedback and suddenly I was happy again. It made me realize how truly creative I am. And I want to live a creative and artistic life. Truly I do. Truly. 

Workin girl

I had many jobs before I became a lawyer and writer. My first job at 15 was at Taco Bell in Upland where I was forced to wear a brown and orange polyester uniform with a visor. It was not flattering. It's where I learned how to customize my Mexican pizza. When I worked the back, I would stir the ground beef in taco seasoning and think, what am I doing? Is this my life?

Next, Round Table Pizza in Upland. My best friend Tracy and I worked the delivery phones in the back. We ate pizza on the sly and answered the phones and put the orders together for the drivers. To this day, I remember that the number eight stands for pepperoni. Then after high school, many more jobs, including coffee shops, steakhouses, a rib joint and a bagel store. I worked at too many restaurants to count.

I worked at the Rainforest Cafe in Ontario Mills when it first opened. Then, I spent a summer doing room service at a hotel. That was the most interesting experience. It always threw me off to wait for the door to open. It never failed that I would get an uneasy feeling when I wheeled the cart in. The money wasn't bad but I always got creeped out. Back then though, I really didn't have anxiety. I was in survival mode. And I needed the coin.

My first semester of law school, it was impossible to work. I had no time. But I was broke and didn't qualify for private loans. So I lived with my boyfriend, now husband, Adrian and his parents and commuted first semester. I would dip into his jar of quarters for my bagel and Taco Bell lunch money. Adrian gave me a working car and a gas card. Well, two cars really because I wasn't good at maintenance.

By second semester, my law school friends and I found a cheap apartment off Adams and Figueroa. We clipped coupons and ate at home. A Starbucks coffee was a luxury. I never shopped. I had a couple pairs of black pants that I wore with different tops to school. Most weekends, I would drive to West Covina to hang out with Adrian. 

My first summer of law school, I worked at USC's Post Conviction Justice Project trying to free a battered woman on a felony murder charge who was sentenced to life. We won her case and she was released. They gave me a five thousand dollar stipend which helped a lot. My second summer, I worked at two large law firms, one in Phoenix and one in Houston. I was paid more money than I had ever seen which I saved to get me through my last year of law school and my bar trip to Ireland with Adrian.

I think because I spent so much of my life doing other things to make a living, that I'm never scared of change. I know that if I had to, I could do anything to make a living, whether it's arguing motions or slinging hash. I have a strong work ethic.

So let's see what I do this second half of my life. Hopefully a creative second half full of joy. Writing. Performing. 

Living. 

Soundtrack

Listening to Bowie as I do every morning drinking my coffee, and then some Pink Floyd, & Queen, I think about the soundtrack to my life.

It starts with my dad who introduced me to Loretta Lynn, Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings, and some Buddy Holly. Then some girl groups from the fifties and sixties, some Elvis, Beatles, and then some bubblegum pop, namely Shawn Cassidy who I fell for hook, line and sinker. 

Next Olivia Newton John, Pat Benatar and of course, the Go-Gos and Joan Jett. Next, Duran Duran, Wham UK, and later The Smiths, Joy Division, Oingo, U2, Violent Femmes, and the Alarm. And of course, The Cure, the Sex Pistols, Adam & the Ants, the Buzzcocks, Patti Smith, Iggy Pop and Peter Murphy. The Replacements, and Pixies. Hello Siouxsie anyone? She changed my world. 

X. My fave letter of the alphabet. And of course, Bowie. 

I was so Radio ga ga. It was not background noise. It was everything to  me. Still is. Everything. It is the soundtrack to my life. 

One day, I'm gonna write a book about the memories around my favorite songs.... just wait.

Be yourself

Yesterday, I was attending another author signing at the Barnes and Noble in Thousand Oaks. Until now, I had only appeared at stores in the Inland Empire. This LA store felt different. Dorothy was not in Kansas anymore. Oz was scary.

And I realized, this is harder than I thought. Trying to be present. To be confident. To sell myself and my books required letting my insecurities go. 

To cope, I bought a double espresso. Downed it. That first hour, I sold a couple of books but mostly, I hummed to myself.

At one point, I looked at my watch. An hour left.  I shrugged with relief and thought, it's almost over.

Suddenly, it occurred to me, what the hell do I have to lose? I started chatting with people walking by. Using my personality and outgoing talkative nature paid off. I made so many connections in the last hour. I even stayed longer to sign more books for people stuck in line.  

I met a woman with her shih tzu disability dog, a man from Corona with three little girls, a cool couple screenwriter duo, two cousins from LA, a few theater kids and a grandmother and her gorgeous granddaughter. 

It was beautiful and in the moment right before I left, I took a deep breath and thought, I did it. 

What I realized yesterday was that if this self professed Inland Empire girl can let go and do LA bookstores, she can do anything. Anywhere. Anyhow. JEM needs to be herself. Be yourself people! Just be yourself. 

Shine on everyone. 

The glue

The glue was stuck on my fingers. The goblet I glued the rhinestone back onto looked fabulous but I could still feel the residue on my finger hours later.

That's what writing is like for me. It's the glue I used to put myself back together, but the residue is always there.

In my books, as a narrator, I'm whole, complete and relatively well adjusted. In real life, I'm tired, anxious, melodramatic and tend to perseverate. That's not to say I'm not happy, because I am. It's just the older I get, the more I obsess. Over little things, over big things, and over things that a week later won't matter. I find it hard to be in the present moment and often think to myself, am I really present at all? I'm always in my head, in the future, and in the past.

Writing helps. It's a healthy coping mechanism along with coffee. Writing quiets that nagging voice in my head. Writing allows me to be the person I want to be in the world. We all have a public and private side. My public side is in my books, and in my podcast. I try to be literary, erudite, passionate and kind and though I know I don't always succeed, I try.

So dear reader, I guess what I'm trying to say is, find your glue. Whether it's reading, family, religion, love or like me, writing, just find it. And fall into it. Lose yourself and your ego in it. Find your bliss. 

Talk talk

It's 3 am. I lay blinking at the ceiling.

Last night, after my podcast, I had a soda water and a tortilla with cheese. I don't call it a quesadilla because I was too hungry to let the cheese melt. Just a charred flour tortilla with a piece of cold cheese.  

No beer. Yes I was tempted but it wasn't needed. I'm trying to moderate and abstain when I can. I'm a work in progress on that.

Coming down after a show is hard. I'm amped up on caffeine. My andrenalin is high. Usually, I can't fall asleep until midnight. I used to drink a couple beers after to wind down. But no more.

Last night, I was so tired after a hectic full day of working through my lunch then afternoon court then readying for my podcast, that I conked out at ten pm. My neck was killing me. I'd spent all day hunched over my computer prepping today's calendar (my cases for court today) which is a doozie. I mean all day. Hours and hours reading reports.  Reviewing files. The day before I spent the afternoon at southwest jail visiting a high needs client.

So here I am. Thinking about the chaos filled day before me. Wide awake. Now it's 4 am. Lingering in the panic is not helpful. I breathe instead. Will my mind to stop spinning like a top.

What would I do without you dear blog? Dear reader? You take me outta my head. You help me clear my mind to write. You let me process it all. And document.

So for now, back to slumber I go. For another couple hours I hope. Then I'll awake to a busy day. Buzz buzz. 

Talk talk. Fizz fizz. Oh what a relief it is. 

To be

As I sit listening to music writing this blog, I keep on thinking, what is the point? We are all just running this rat race, jumping through hoops, and right now, I just want to be. 

Now I know I am privileged to even have time to wonder about life's questions. Growing up, my parents were always in survival mode, too busy to worry about the purpose of it all, and I know that I am comfortable, relatively speaking, and may have too much time to think. 

When I was younger, and putting myself through school, I don't recall worrying so much about what the point of life was. I don't remember whether I even thought about it. 

This last Thursday, I did an Ontario library reading event. It was a dream come true. I grew up in that library. The librarians were so kind. They bought coffee and cupcakes. They put my memoir in the catalog which was so special. 

I had a decent showing for a weekday event and even made a few new writer friends which was nice, but while reading, my rhythm was off for some reason. I rushed through my reading just to make it be over. 

It could have been the fact that I was sweating through my dress. Sweat pooling in my chest and under my arms.  Or maybe it was hearing what sounded like a grunt from my mom in the second row at my story. Or maybe I was just anxious and tired. Truth is, I'm more of a morning lark and it was an evening event. 

Regardless, it wasn't my best reading. But hey, I tried. I showed up. And maybe that's the point of it all. Just showing up and trying your best. Just trying. 

And trying again. And again. 

There's no such thing

There's no such thing as an overnight success in the writing world. If you even knew dear reader, the hours and days, months and years that writers put in. Reading, writing, workshopping, editing, and taking craft classes. It's such a labor of love, without much reward for years and years, that you can only do it if you must. If you must. 

I write because it's the only way I can breathe deeply. Otherwise, I'm breathing shallow, always.

When I write, I lose myself in the process. I've had one magic instance where I wrote a story in two hours that came out as a final draft. It was accepted by a well known journal that same weekend. But that's only happened once, and I've written so many stories. That story was about my grandpa and he just must have been whispering it in my ear. Looking down at me. 

But usually, it's not that easy. Usually, it's a series of frustrating fits and starts, with sometimes only a couple of paragraphs or pages after a few hours early morning for days... weeks.

Essays are easier for me. They're structured; researched, and the voice is different. It's more authoritative. For me, the stories in child and YA voice are the hardest because I must find that piece of my young self that still exists. It's part channeling, part craft but so much fun at times. 

The hardest part for me has been the rejection. Looking for an agent for years and giving up. Thinking I would never publish my book. Then it came together, finally, after so many years of hard work. I found not one, but two dream publishers who totally got me. Now I have two books. And I plan on more. 

So friends, remember that writers write. My advice is to write your stories for you. Then submit them to journals to see if they work. You'd be surprised at beginner's luck, you might publish something right away. And then, nothing for years. Don't give up. It's gonna be okay. 

If you can visualize it, it will happen. Maybe when you're fifty like me and you finally will it into being. You wished so hard for it that it came true. Dammit. It can come true for you too. I promise you. 

So write till your fingers hurt and your eyes blur. Write. Put blood on the page. Be true to your art. No matter what. 

Write. Then write some more.