While Waiting for Take-Off

Unless my thoughts hold a special remembrance of  a particular person or event, I tend to post my ponderings closer to the end of the month. That's because, despite my best efforts, most days charge by me, leaving me astounded that a week, month, or sometimes an entire season is already coming to a close. It seems just yesterday we were packing our car for Long Beach Island— how is it that my son has been in college a month? that already we are bringing in the lawn chairs and stacking fire wood?

This atypical, early-in-the-month entry is my best effort to stay ahead of the darkening days of October.  The next few months will be uncharacteristically busy as I trade my quiet, at-home writing days (with the occasional field trip to the library) for visits to Nashville, Atlanta, and Miami. I'll be packing for a sojourn to the Great Dismal Swamp, and traveling to festivals and bookstores across New York. 

I look forward to all these opportunities. I look forward to meeting students, teachers, librarians and other writers; I'm profoundly grateful for the opportunity to discuss the writing process and the characters I've come to love. This go round I will mostly be talking about Grace and her family, but I haven't forgotten Rebekkah, Matt or Serafina. Writing, like reading, changes us. It is impossible to enter the heart of another without gaining a change in perspective or a deepening appreciation for what it means to be human.

So here it is, late afternoon. The third of October. A copper sunlight shines through the still summer-blue sky. This month, my best effort is rewarded with the realization that no matter how swiftly the days charge by, or how crowded the calendar becomes, I am lucky to be doing what I love...I am lucky to be writing, to be visiting new places and making new friends...I am lucky to know that old friends - both real and imagined - are never far and will be waiting for me when the November sky grows dark.