Symphony

17 hours in the car in two and a half days.

We’re driving all over North Carolina – partly for a writing assignment, partly to celebrate a relative’s 70th birthday.

In between conversation we listen to CDs:

His: Saint Germain
Mine: City of Angels
His: Royksopp
Mine: Meet Joe Black

We pop in a sermon. We’ve been through all the radio stations.

“Do you want to listen to Beethoven’s Ninth?” I ask.

He does.

It’s an old CD. I’ve had it forever and got it from who knows where. Mostly it just sits in the case, but lately I've had the urge to get to know classical music.

I took a classical music class in college. Don’t remember learning much (probably cuz I didn’t study very hard), but I do remember there was a guy in class who wanted to write a symphony. It was the first day and the teacher asked each student why we were there. I’d heard it was an easy A (it wasn’t), which is the same reason most of the students had signed up – but this guy appreciated music. And he had his heart set on writing a symphony (one day).

The teacher tried to keep a straight face. Asked the guy if he understood what an undertaking writing a symphony would be. The guy seemed have a grasp of the enormity of his dream. The teacher didn’t - he kept talking, discouraging the guy’s idea.

I’ve thought about that guy from time to time.

I hope he wrote his symphony.

Buggy

Anyone have a pet frog?

Can we borrow it?

Our place is being attacked by flies. Gross. Big. Female ones.

We have no idea where they're coming from. We’ve only lived here since November. It’s been pouring outside and the windows aren’t sealed tight – is the rain driving them in? I set up an herb garden a few weeks ago – was there a nest buried within the soil? We generate about one small bag of garbage each week, so I’m pretty sure it’s not that. We are clueless.

I’m in the middle of reading 2nd Samuel right now, but this morning I opted to flip back through the Old Testament and read "The Plague of the Flies" in Exodus, just for kicks. I sort of got caught up in the whole Passover story and was reminded that there was a plague of the frogs too. So on second thought, don’t send us your pet amphibian.

~~~

In other news, I’m buckling down big time this month with lots o’ deadlines, so I need to say bye-bye to the blog until May. See you then. Um, then again, I cannot let a “fly” post sit on this site for two weeks (eww), so I’ll post again in a few days.

The Dream

Oh, Harry.

I’ve been waiting all year for your book, The Dream. (Actually, I’ve been waiting since I read the last page of The Invisible Wall.)

Walked a mile to the independent bookstore yesterday and all copies were gone.

Walked another half mile to the not-so-independent bookstore and they just sold their last copy.

Walked home. Book-less.

I suppose it is okay because I wasn’t even going to read it. Not at first. I was going to place it on my nightstand like a gift. And look at it a lot. Pick it up and hold it and set it back down. Pick it up again and flip through the pages and maybe glimpse at a few sentences, but not too many because I don’t want to spoil the surprises.

Then when the week was over and my own writing work was finished, I was going to dive in.

I have one more shot – a third store, about two miles away. This time I called in advance. They’re holding it for me.

Test Page

Okay – what do you think?

http://www.jennyrough.com/clips-test.html

The above link is a “test” page for my web site, not officially “live” yet, but since you’re my bloggy readers you get to view it first. I still need to fix some missing pictures and links. And there are some typos and spacing issues to work out, but it’s much more festive with the magazine covers, don’t ya think? I especially love the Whole Life Times covers (“They’re so striking,” says my hubby).

It’s hard to figure out the best way to make a clips page user-friendly.

I’ve been studying other writers' web sites like crazy.

Susan inspired me to categorize articles by topic instead of my old method – categorized by article type.

These two writers – Vince Beiser and Meghan Daum – inspired me to select a sample of my work instead of posting everything.

Jessica Ridenour and Ask Allison and Gretchen Roberts inspired me to include pictures of the magazine covers.

I think my favorite writer web site of all is Anna David’s.

If you’re a writer looking to put together a web site, I highly recommend my web designer friend Brooke. She created the new page (along with my entire web site and this blog), and she’s the greatest.

Pen Pal

Aw, you guuuuuys.

Today in the mail I received a letter. From my friend in San Francisco. An actual handwritten, pen-to-paper (well, pen-to-legal pad; she’s a lawyer) old-style message. Can you believe it? Not a “card” or a “invitation” or a “thank you note” - but a letter.

I almost threw it out.

My friend has perfect handwriting – flawless (to give you an idea – she addressed every single one of my wedding invitations five years ago). Anyway, I saw that immaculate blue ink that is often on those “letters” that look personal but are really junk mail, so I was about to toss it aside. But then I saw the stamps. I know that dog, I thought. That’s Henley! I glanced at the return address and sure enough . . .

I ripped open the envelope. Five pages, single-spaced. She started by saying she had wanted to write on beautiful stationary with a wax seal for the full effect. Yep, that’s my friend Pia. I devoured every word. It was just as a letter should be – wonderful news, the best news, and sad news, so sad. My emotions were swinging. Laugh, laugh, laugh. Cry, cry, cry. Vigorous nodding in agreement. Shaking of the head in disbelief.

After finishing, I was dying to race upstairs and pound out an e-mail in response. But of course I didn’t. I dusted off one of my old legal pads. And began to write.

A Closer Look

Brooke and I are changing the clips page on my website to make it more user-friendly. I’ll link to it when it’s ready to go, but the re-design process has caused me to review a lot of my old articles. Taking a closer look, it dawned on me -

I always assumed I knew how to pronounce the product in my piece Give an Iota, Drink Biota. But the other day I was thinking – what if it’s actually pronounced bi-oughta?

Good grief. My husband said I'd have to change the title to Drive a Miata, Drink Biota.

(Okay, I just checked the dictionary and it is bi–oh–tah after all. Whew.)

Still, I can’t believe my review of Al Gore’s movie An Inconvenient Truth says: “Although not likely to receive an Academy Award . . .”

Sorry, Al. My bad.

Speaking of Gore, apparently the floating stop sign picture that accompanies this global warming piece gave my friend’s little kid nightmares about the future state of our world.

I’d prefer my writing to influence the younger generation by sparking passion, not fear.

But the craziest realization of all? When I first established my writing career, I had a “number” in my head. A BIG number – or so it seemed at the time (now it seems small). I thought: “Well, when I have that many articles published I’ll consider teaching.” I’ve passed the number. So maybe, maybe, depending on how well this year goes, I’ll consider teaching an essay class in the summer of 2009. We’ll see . . .