Day 6 of Love…for the writers!
It’s officially Saturday which means today’s “Love” post is for the writers. My agent, Holly Root, is giving up a 5 page critique to one lucky writer!
Here are the deets again: You will have until … Sunday night at 9 PM CST at which time I’ll close the comments (cuz that’s about the time I go to bed!) to share those family stories. They don’t have to be long or elaborate and grammar isn’t an issue–this is, after all, a blog! They can be as simple as, “My parents brought me home on Halloween and that’s why they call me their little pumpkin.” By the way, that story is partly true LOL
This way you can enter but you don’t have to worry about fine-tuning a pitch and I don’t get comments like, “Please enter me!” The winner will be announced Monday morning sometime between 10-12 CST (I have a dayjob).
And after a conversation with some fellow writers, I’m going to give away some critiques from as well–another 5 page crit to one lucky person and 3 query letter crits to three other peeps. As with all the other 14 Days of Love contests, you MUST leave a valid email address–that way if you forget to stop back by, I can drop you a line. If you fail to leave a valid email address and fail to collect your prize (email me) in 24 hours (by noon Tuesday), an alternate winner will be chosen.
Tags: 2010 Love, 2010 predictions, Writers
My mom was a cool hippy chick who chose to name me "Demina Shemayne." Cool, huh?
Only it never happened.
Instead, she listened to all the naysayers who claimed that with a name that funky, I'd be scarred for life. Instead, she chose the name that I ended up sharing with no less than thirty girls at my high school: Jennifer.
But that's not the worst part!
My nickname–had she actually given me the the funky name–was supposed to be "Demi." (*sniffle*) (*sob*)
my e-mail address is jenny@jennytonks.com
A single mother raising two strong-willed boys…..sounds like a horror story, indeed!!! But, we managed to make it through, my sons and I. And somewhere between spur-of-the-moment trips to New Orleans (having sold my blood to get the money to do so and laying crossways on a Motel 6 mattress so we'd all three fit), just because my son wanted to see the city since he'd been studying Colonel Jackson in class, or the frozen fingers we endured as we treked through the woods for our own Christmas trees, or when my youngest wanted to die his hair purple as my eldest tried to sell hm on ebay! Thank God that tuna supplied the critical Omega-3 oils that these growing boys needed. WHO KNEW!!!!
Some great family stories so far. I have one that is often retold to cause blushes. When I was about eight, I overheard my mum booking my dad in for a vasectomy. I asked what it meant and she patiently explained it was similar to what we had done to stop the sheep having more babies. Next family dinner I told everyone Dad was having his balls cut off! The story is told every few years, to every boyfriend, friend and work mate.
These stories are so funny, I'm in tears. Especially 'my grandfather popped up from behind a piece of furniture and shouted "Get down, man!" '
When we were kids, my sister and I grew up alongside my two cousins as a unit of four, with two sets of adults (parents and aunt & uncle.) On New Year's Eve the three girls held a Barbie ball under my aunt's living room coffee table. My parents always went out for New Year's Eve, my uncle played in a band, and my aunt was the lucky one who got all four kids for the night. One Christmas my mom sewed individual Barbie ball gowns for the three girls, which we got under the tree and then had to wait a whole week before they could debut at the Barbie ball. Lots of romantic drama as the Barbies tried to win the hearts of Malibu Ken and Mod Hair Ken (he had removable sideburns, mustache and beard. Dreamy.)
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When I was about six my mother tried to homeschool me. It might've worked, except that I was an unusually stubborn child, and I hated learning basic math. She wanted me to practice addition and subtraction with these tests of a hundred simple problems I was supposed to do in two minutes. I think now that they probably just stressed me out, because even then I couldn't stand failure, but at the time I swore I hated them. In fact, I hated them so much that–
I ran away. I announced it, I stomped my foot, I–got handed my rain coat? The ugly green one, with the pink hearts on the lining. My mother opened the front door, and I went out, and then I stood dumbly on the porch for a few minutes. It was pouring.
I'd show her, I thought. She'd see! I'd run away–far, far away, like to the next-door neighbor's! The Lynches would keep me. She'd never find me again. Never mind that we lived on the main street of a village with 578 inhabitants. She'd be sorry!
It kept raining. I stayed on the porch for a few more minutes, watching, shivering. Then I tried the door handle, 'cause, y'know, just maybe…
IT WAS LOCKED! She'd locked me out! I was locked out! I was unwelcome! I sobbed and shouted and beat the door, which was promptly opened. I threw my raincoat down and went upstairs to my bed, where I laid facedown crying and tried to convince myself that nobody loved me any more. Not even God.
I failed. Even at six that seemed preposterous to me. But I sulked upstairs for a few minutes, and then my door opened. Without saying a word, my mother set the small television on my dresser and plugged it in, and set a stack of my favorite videos next to it. I spent the rest of the afternoon watching happy things all by myself, and when I was ready to rejoin the family I was welcomed back wholeheartedly.
My mother and I have been on good terms pretty much ever since.
About 30 minutes prior to the start of a chldren’s serivce on Christmas Eve, the air suddenly became less than breathable. My three-year old began loudly blaming his mother, telling her “she stinks and should go to the bathroom.”
After church, he admitted to the deed of fouling the air himself.
My wife is saving the story for the day she can get revenge.
Grandma’s Story
My grandmother met my grandfather when they were twelve at her first kissing party. Someone turned off the lights and the boys were supposed to kiss the girls but the boy who kissed my grandma was trying to do more than kiss so she ran into the bathroom. When she came out a little while later she sat on the couch in the dark. A boy came and sat next to her and they started talking. Towards the end of the conversation he asked her where she went to school. He kissed her and screamed out into the dark, "Yeah Lane!" since he went there too. After that she was smitten.
Over the next few years, a popular, handsome drummer, my grandpa dated a number of girls. But her eyes were only on him. She found ways to run into him, such as making sure their gym schedules matched as a member of the school student schedule planning committee. Every Friday the boys’ gym class and the girls’ gym class would meet for ballroom dancing and grandma made sure she was his partner. She did other things like that too, like finding out when he was going to the movies and make sure she was there at the same time to "just happen" to run into him.
By the end of high school the casual meetings paid off and they were dating by the time he was shipped of to war. The day he left was the saddest day of her life but as he traveled from New York to California he found himself missing her and when he arrived in California he called her and asked for her hand in marriage.
Grandpa spent the duration of the war in Australia. Grandma in the meantime, like many woman left behind, got a job and loud voice to match the strong spirit that landed her my grandfather in the first place. By the time he came home he found that his quiet shy fiance had be come a fiery independent, as he would say, broad.
They spent many years together but when he died in 2000, some of that fiery spirit seemed to die with him. Fortunately after a few years and a move to a new home, I am happy to say that she got that spirit back. She now lives in a retirement community, plays on a Wii bowling team, and runs her own one woman comedy show on her community tv station.
And my grandfather, he lives on in my son who was named in his memory.
Little Italy is almost gone. All the delis with the pasta hanging in the windows and the fat logs of mortadella and tubs of ricotta and oh, the cannoli, all but swallowed up. Elizabeth Street is still there, but I'd bet there's not a Sicilian left on the block. Once it was all Sicilians, including my father's parents, his mother's parents and her sister and her husband. That was before they moved out to the peace and quiet of Brooklyn, so they could build their own houses and grow tomatoes and figs.
And Elizabeth Street is where my father was born, in the bedroom off the kitchen in a tiny walk-up apartment. While Giuseppina labored behind the closed door, her mother and sister taking care of her, the men were in the kitchen. My grandfather Francesco had brought a friend of his back from the garage where they worked and was annoyed to find the stove cold and his father in law sitting alone at the table.
"Your wife is in labor," said his father in law calmly.
"And we are hungry," said Francesco. He started to knock on the door, yelling for my great-grandmother to come out and make them some pasta and then, my great-grandfather slammed his fist upon the table and shouted: "No one! No one will eat until the baby is born!"
And they didn't. The room grew dark and the stove stayed cold.
Then my great-grandmother came out, carrying a baby. "His name is Pasquale," she said, and showed him to his father. He nodded.
"Now can we eat?" he asked.
My grandfather was always first at the table and the last to get up. My grandmother never sat down while he ate. My father left home as soon as he could, joined the Franciscans so he could go to college and get away from his father.
But they named me for him, first born always named for the paternal grandfather. My father took a cutting of the fig tree they'd brought from Sicily and coaxed it into growing in a back yard in Queens. He keeps a picture of his father on his dresser and goes to Brooklyn every weekend to have his 97-year old aunt cook lunch for him.
Because family is family. And pasta is important.
These stories are FABULOUS!!! Ya'll keep em coming. You've got until about 9 CST tomorrow night to enter!!!
I remember my dad. He called me outside when I was three and punched a tree. It fell over. He opend the door when I was twenty-three and punched the young man who broke my heart. He fell over.
Thanks, Dad.
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Shortly after my aunt met her husband-to-be, he came to the house to meet the family. When he entered a seemingly-deserted living room, my grandfather popped up from behind a piece of furniture and shouted "Get down, man!" My would-be uncle didn't question, or hestitate, thankfully and took shelter behind the couch just before the explosion. You see, my grandfather was in the middle of one of his "experiments." He'd wanted to see what would happen if he set off a cherry bomb on top of an aluminum can. In the kitchen. It probably goes without saying that my grandmother wasn't home.
Strangely, this introduction didn't deter my aunt's suitor, and they remain married to this day. I think it was a sign.
I have two older brothers. I was one of those born later, surprise kids.
Fast forward about 15 years and my parents and I were in Texas visiting my Dad's family. We were at his brother's house and his two sisters were there also. One of them was going through a nasty divorce and the other one had been divorced as long as I could remember. They were both in a nasty mood for the entire visit, and at one point, one of them took the opportunity to point out to me that I had been an unwanted baby.
Really, to a teenage girl, this could devastate her! But while I was shocked and appalled that she would say such a thing to me, I didn't believe her for even a second. I knew, in my heart, that while I had been unexpected, I had never been unwanted. So while I haven't given you a singular example of family love, I know the value of a lifetime of love! And how being secure in the knowledge that you are loved can put a total look of shock and disappointment on one very hateful aunt's face when her zing misses its mark!
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All these great stories! Makes me think of many of my own — maybe the first one that came to mind was the one they told me about when my dear young mother was in labor with me. My father came home from work — equally young and scared — put Mother into the car, and they drove to the hospital. Only Mother wouldn't get out of the car. So my father, who adored her, drove her around the block seven times. Only then did he come to a stop right in front of the stairs leading to the hospital entrance.
"We are not having this baby in the car," he announced. With which he trudged around the car, grabbed a firm hold on her elbow, and marched her up the stairs.
Which was how I came to be born in Alta Bates Hospital in Berkeley, California, instead of in a Ford.
LOL Beppie….Im the youngest of three–and adopted–but through some wacky miracle ALL THREE Of us kids were born at Carswell AFB here in Ft. Worth. What are the odds? LOL
My mother always celebrated every holiday throughout the year. One Valentine's Day she had all of us come over and proudly announced she'd made two cheesecakes (from boxes). We all got little Valentine's Day decorated plates with slices of cheesecake. We all smelled something very…nasty. A couple of my nephew's, big strapping boys dug right in, only to get this horrified look on their faces. They ran to the sink and spat out the bites. We sniffed our plates and the smell was coming from the cheesecake. They were very rancid! We asked her where she got the mixes and she said in the pantry. We found the boxes in the recycling bin and the expiration dates on them were 1975. This was in 2008. We all laughed at Mom's expense, but she joined in. She never threw ANYTHING away.
Fun post! When I was about 8 years old, our babysitter let me and my older sister watch a scary movie called The Doll, about a doll who's come to life at night and kill people. For years after that, I had to put all my dolls in the closet with the door closed in order to sleep. Even now, porcelain dolls give me the willies.
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My dad probably loved his German Shepherd more than he loved us. The dog ate stewing beef or chicken for dinner, and was very protective of my dad as a result. When my sister and I were dating, mom had both our boyfriends over for dinner. Neither could come into the dining room when she called, because while the family filed in, the Shepherd kept both dates pinned to their chairs. My dad had to call her off. Didn't scare my date, though. We're still married.
So many great stories! As I read them, snippettes ran through my head – family trips, the Christmas Eve my daughter broke her front tooth (her first words when she quit screaming? I can't sing in church like this!), the cross country move…
We're Southern, complete with the totally messed up family and crazy aunt. To the horror of his family, my landed aristocracy grandfather married my very young (and NOT aristocratic) grandmother as soon as his first wife died. Two back to back boys later, he fell over dead, just as the Depression bit its teeth into the country. My father has been terrified I'll write this story ever since he heard I'd written a novel.
Cathy
My husband and I took our newly potty-trained daughter to a lovely little restaurant when she was about two and a half…she was SO well-behaved, we never imagined there would be problems. She didn't throw tantrums, she delighted in coloring, and "reading" her books. What could go wrong?
About halfway through the meal, I excused myself to my husband and went to the bathroom. I asked my daughter, who'd gone before we left home, if she wanted to accompany me. "No fanks," she said, busily feeding her doll. I walked across the room, stopping to say hi to a business acquaintance on the way.
A few minutes later, l exited the restroom. When my daughter saw me, her face lit up and she started clapping, LOUDLY.
"Yay, Mommy!" she yelled. "You go potty! You is a BIG GIRL!" I blushed and walked more quickly, past the table of businessmen. Then, the piece de resistance….
"DID YOU WIPE FOROUGHWE?" (her attempt at thoroughly) "DID YOU WEMEMBER TO WASH YOU HANDS?"
I slid into my seat, knowing my bathroom lessons had not been lost on my daughter. Nor on anyone dining in the entire restaurant!
Marjorie Light
marjorielight (at) yahoo (dot) com
When I was three and a half years old, God made a mistake.
All I had wanted from the moment I consciously realized I could want something was a sister. And a dog, actually, but that's not what this story's about. In any case, when my mother announced that my sibling would be arriving in some months time, I was gleeful with anticipation. Images of a real live baby girl lolling about in my baby doll carriage flashbulbed in my little toddler brain. I would show her Where The Wild Things Are and teach her how to sing. She would be the Flower to my Bambi, the Wendy to my Peter Pan; my faithful and obedient sidekick. And when the time for her debut arrived, I was ready.
I marched into my mother's imposing hospital room with my eyes wide and my head held high, ignoring the scary machines. I climbed up on the chair by her bed and peeked down at the little red bundle, half covered by a hospital blanket. My greedy little fingers itched, Rumpelstiltskin-like, to hold my new minion.
"Michie," my mother said "I'd like you to meet your new brother."
I drew back as if I'd been slapped. "I don't have a brother," I said.
My mother's face grew slightly nervous. "Yes, you do." She held up the little bundle higher, so I could see. "Here he is."
I looked around the antiseptic room with wild eyes. "Where is my sister?" I asked with increasing desperation.
"God didn't give you a sister, Michie. He gave you a brother."
And with unflinching confidence, I said: "God made a mistake."
And for a while, I truly thought He had. My baby brother could not wear the tutus and tiaras I had so lovingly selected for him. He couldn't even fit in my little doll carriage, although he was pleasantly flexible, as I discovered one afternoon when I rolled his soft infant body into a somersault on my mother's carpeted bedroom floor. My mother was not pleased with my discovery, and frankly, I thought it was a pretty weak consolation prize, too. My displeasure waxed and waned over the years as my brother and I, soon joined by a third sibling, (another brother, just my luck), immersed ourselves in the obligatory name-calling and beverage-dumping-over-head incidents. Somewhere along the way, though, that displeasure morphed into disregard as the Important Issues that accompanied high school descended on me. And once I was in college, I actually found myself missing the two boys who, despite belonging to the wrong gender, joined me in solidarity in ideological fights with our parents; who gamely participated in the skits I directed, and were dutifully horrified by episodes of Are You Afraid of The Dark I coerced them to into watching.
Now that we're adults, we're more like The Three Musketeers than any of the lame hero/sidekick Disney pairings. My brothers help me edit my writing and I help them edit their college and grad school essays. We've shared term papers, an appreciation of the macabre that I like to think I've instilled in them, and many a chuckle over the goings-on of our fabulous, hilarious family. We are separated in one case by thousands of miles, and in another, by oceans and continents, but we talk multiple times each week. And a long time ago, I realized with pleasure that it was not God who had made the mistake. It was me.
Though either of them would have made a lovely Sara.
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I've beenmarried for 23 years and the flame has never grown old. Here's just one reason why. One night not long ago hubby and I were busy. He reached around to the night table drawer and disappeard over the edge of the bed. Definitely broke the mood and nearly a few other things including my laugh-splitting sides.