250

 Happy 250th, to all of us. May we be worthy of our extraordinary potential. 🇺🇸

Saga of the North-Flights

I first saw Greenland on my first trip overseas, on my way to England and all my dreams. At thirty thousand feet we flew over Canada, which amazed me; then out over the sea, which I had never seen, vast and blue and indistinct from the blue sky and scattered wisps of cloud below the plane. After a time I looked out the window and saw land. It was the southern end of a large landmass, tapering to a point in the sea under the clouds. It was Greenland; I was seeing Greenland. I recognized the shape from the maps I had studied all my life, hoping for the chance to ever see the places represented on paper as mysterious lines.

Every transatlantic crossing is different. My second trip to England took a different route; I looked for Greenland but did not see it. Perhaps it was hiding under the clouds, or perhaps our route was too far south, or perhaps it was too dark by the time we flew over the point of land, silent below us. 

On my third trip to England I looked again, but did not find Greenland. I was disappointed, but after all, every trip is different; and many wonders lay ahead. But after an extraordinary time in England filled with many gifts, the flight home was not what I expected.

On this flight home we crossed England and Wales and headed over, I thought, the Irish Sea. I was pleased; I thought I would be able to see Ireland. I had visited Ireland on my second trip, but not this one, and I wanted to see it again. But Ireland was not where it should have been. After a time I saw an island, but it was too small to be Ireland. Then another island. I was puzzled; I looked at the direction of the sunlight on the sea-cliffs of the islands below me, and I looked at the coast of the mainland from the other side of the plane, and suddenly I realized we were flying over the Hebrides, the Western Isles, the long chain of islands off the west coast of Scotland. I did not understand why we were so far north, but I was thrilled beyond imagining. We were not yet at high altitude. We flew northwards over the Western Isles, and I watched as each island emerged from the sea in cliffs and crags and beaches, and watched the light fall through a green shallow sea to the seabed on the other side, as the cliffs fell down into the sea, and then away. My ancestors lived and died and are buried on some of those islands; I got to visit them, even though I do not know most of their names, nor the names of all the islands we passed.

Finally we passed northwest over the sea. I was stunned by my extraordinary good fortune; I thought perhaps we would fly over the southern end of Greenland again. But the trip had one more gift for me.

On the back of the seat in front of me was a map, showing where our plane was at all times. I had avoided it because I like to pretend I do not need such things, and because I become very airsick when I read anything on a plane. But as I sipped my ginger ale I glanced at the map, and I saw we were two hundred miles south of Reykjavik, at the southern end of Iceland. 

I was stunned. I could not imagine why we were taking such a northern route. I peered out the window, but by then we were at altitude, and I could see only the haze of the cold blue sea.

I kept looking. And finally I saw, not the distant pointed shape I had seen before, but the edge of an expanse of ice. Frozen rivers flowed from it, fanning out as they met the half-frozen sea. I was seeing glaciers with my own eyes. 

We flew over the interior of Greenland. It was a vast expanse of ice, broken into different levels, uplands and lowlands all crossed by the glaciers grinding down to the sea. Here and there was a small blue lake, geothermal, each with its own little puff of cloud above it. I saw no sign of human habitation or settlement at all. We were too high in the air to see what life must have been there, whatever white-furred creatures who must creep among the ice and the blue lakes.

We passed over the wondrous isolated beauty of this place, and then left it behind, and at length took a strange jagged course over Canada and then due south to land in Chicago.

O'Hare was in shambles and chaos, even for O'Hare, and finally we learned the reason for our strange northern route. A major storm raged the length of the entire eastern seaboard of the United States. We had flown north in a high loop to avoid it. Many other flights had been rerouted and we had great difficulty maneuvering our connecting flight, and then home.

But that strange flight home was the last great gift that trip gave me. I knew as I looked at the glaciers that I was seeing something that might soon be gone. Greenland's ice has receded since that time; I do not know, flying over again, if I would be able to see the difference at altitude, or if enough is gone only to be a cold eddy in the frozen air, drifting far below my plane.

I was a visitor only to Greenland, stumbling in from the sea, permitted to see splendors I had never looked to find before being ushered out of the ice and away. My only claim to Greenland is of the extraordinary ice-shattered memory it gave me.

We the People

The Constitution, in its original form of ink scratched on parchment with a sharp pen, was the work of brilliant, flawed minds who used their collective brilliance to hammer out a document in the hope of doing something good. Their ideas were not unique; they were based on English common law solidified into the Magna Carta. Yet the document they created was a unique formalization of ideas put together in a new way. These great, limited thinkers were wise enough to know that they could not perceive the future or the changes it would bring, so the document itself has a procedure for amendment. They knew things would change, and allowed flexibility so the document would not fracture under the stress of changing times.

But as great and pivotal as the Constitution is, in itself it has no power -- not the online reproductions and scans, not the many paper copies, not even the great original parchments. The Constitution is not a magical object. 

The power of the Constitution lies in the fact that every American, every day, decides to follow it. It is the basis of our law, our mythos, and our society. Without it, everything falls apart. And yet it is only an idea, an ideal, without reality or meaning until given form and shape by the decisions, every day, of those who choose to follow it. 

If we are to honor the Constitution, we have three choices. We can accept it as it was written, by white men who excluded women, persons of color, and those who did not own land. We can lawfully amend the Constitution, in order to refine its basic concepts, and in order to better serve citizens who, hopefully, are adapting to a more perfect concept of freedom. We can also interpret the Constitution and its amendments, with rational discussion and argument, and a knowledge of history, precedent, and the other writings of the Founders who often explained exactly what they were trying to achieve. 

These are our only options. If we ignore the Constitution, if we push through its barriers and shatter its boundaries, we will destroy it. It is fragile; it was scratched onto parchment with ink and sharp pens, a very long time ago. And remember that it is powerless in any case. It exists in the mind and heart and actions of every American, every day, who believes that a free republic, based on the will of the people and subject to no tyrant, is a worthwhile endeavor. We are the Constitution; its power lies in us. If it is compromised, if too many lines are crossed and too many boundaries broken, the keystone of the reality of our civilization will break, and all will fall with it. 

The words scratched on parchment with such hope, now protected behind glass, will fade with time, and break and scatter into dust, and none will remember.

The Sea at Mughain Mentioned on Wikishire!

Location of Dalriada. Source: Wikishire.

A few days ago I was having a really bad day, but I ran across something that made me feel a lot better. Hint: look at the "In Fiction" section of Dalriada--Wikishire.

My novella, The Sea at Mughain, was mentioned in the Dalriada entry on Wikishire. I did not know it was there. It made my day.

Part of the reason I wrote this story was to try to understand the world of my long-ago Irish and Scottish ancestors; if possible, to spin a thread between their world and ours. It makes me profoundly happy to find mention of The Sea at Mughain on a British website, in an entry about a legendary place so important to my story.

Jaleth and the Dragons, Now in Paperback

In 2017, I published Jaleth and the Dragons as a stand-alone e-novellette for Kindle and Nook. I did not publish it as a paperback because it is 50 pages long, a "long short story." I intended, at some point, to publish a short-story collection that would include Jaleth and the Dragons, in both print and e-formats. 

However, I realized my parents would not be able to see Jaleth in its e-incarnation, so I decided to put together a print version for them. (It is much easier, by the way, to do the print version first.) I did most of the work and then there it sat for six years. There has been a lot going on. But I finally finished it, got ready to get them copies, and thought . . . why not? I had done all the work and it was ready to go . . . so I went ahead and put it up for sale on Amazon. I'm still planning to do the short story collection, but at this rate it will be a few more years, so Jaleth and the Dragons can stay in print until then.

Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad!

  

Portrait

 

La Bella Principessa by Leonardo da Vinci

My favorite painting by Leonardo da Vinci surfaced a few years ago and was sold at private auction. It is a picture of a girl, in profile, with beautiful wavy hair. It is believed to be the portrait of a fourteen-year old Italian noblewoman, Bianca Sforza, commissioned for her marriage. She was married and then died just a few months after the portrait was painted, probably from complications from pregnancy.

Such deaths were common then. They are not common now in the developed world, largely because of a network of women's healthcare that includes, but is not limited to, access to abortion for those who require it. 

Bianca Sforza had few human rights. Noblewomen's marriages were arranged. She was, in essence, sold, just as her portrait was sold centuries later. Her father, and then her husband, made the choices about her body that led to her fate.

Many more deaths like hers will now occur, and there is now no da Vinci to immortalize them.   

Ghost Yoga

I want to do a show on the Travel Channel called GHOST YOGA. It will be either:

1) People do yoga at haunted places to see if they can feel the ghostly energy.

2) People do yoga with ghosts.

3). Ghosts do yoga. (Because ghosts are invisible, this one would be a camera pointed at an empty location for an hour.)

March

 March comes in like a penguin and goes out like an irritable penguin. 

Small Sanction

 In support of Ukraine, I have ceased distribution of all my Amazon book titles in Russia. 

Haiku for #CalltoEarth Day

The leaves fall like tears
Raining from the last bright trees
Of the last autumn

#CalltoEarth

On the Occasion of My Fiftieth Birthday

I have a Birthday coming up in a few weeks. I do not want to be this age. I have not accomplished everything I wanted. But looking back, there is so much light and beauty and love.

This past year I have seen things I never thought I would see, and made choices where every option was a bad decision. I do not think I am better or stronger because of these experiences. I am damaged. I am about to turn fifty and there are strands of moonlight in my hair; but then I have always loved the moon. My family is alive, and I am alive, and my trees are green and beautiful, and taller than last year.    

George Floyd Was Murdered

There are things I need to say. These things seem obvious and rational to me. But I am a white woman, and troubled by the concept of "silence is complicity." So I will speak, although these things have already been said, and said better.

George Floyd was murdered.

This was a particularly horrific crime, but it is one in a long legacy of similar crimes both remembered and forgotten. The black community has a right to their rage and grief. We must listen.

We all have the right to peacefully protest.

Some protests have become violent. That is wrong.

Some peaceful protests have been scattered by local, state, and federal authorities by violent means. That is wrong.

No one is above the law.

We must do better as a society. We must vote. We must value everyone the same. We must be kind and respectful.

George Floyd was murdered.

Rules

Rules

To be posted outside my house.

1. All small creatures are welcome to shelter in the yard.

2. Please get along peaceably.

3. You may eat all the grass and mosquitoes you like; please bring your friends.

4. Please do not assault the house.

5. PLEASE DO NOT ENTER THE HOUSE.

6. Those of you who are skunks, please do not skunk.

7. Those of you who are not skunks, please do not startle the skunks. 

Blink

A few weeks ago my husband Derek and I attended our nephew Benjamin's high school graduation. We were very tired that day because a woodpecker had been attacking our house since early morning. I sat in the stadium in a sleepy daze watching the pre-ceremony videos the class had put together. In the videos many of them wore 2019 t-shirts. I was thinking to myself, if we had done this sort of thing my shirt would have said 1989; and it slowly worked its way into my brain that there were 9's on the end of both dates, and that it has been thirty years since I graduated from high school. I found this surprising; to add to the impression, the girls in the class wore white gowns just as I had.

Blink. Decade. Blink. Decade. Blink. Decade.

The whole day was a bit surreal; here are some random impressions.

The security guard wished me happy Mother's Day (I have no children).

Graduations are always poignant with many emotions, with the consciousness of what you are losing mixed with the excitement of what lies ahead. At least Benjamin's class has social media to easily keep in touch with their friends. It was a bit harder for us.

A really beautiful "hat throw," with white and bright purple hats fluttering like confetti against the dark seats of the arena and the bright light of the floor.

Young women in white gowns bring to mind angels, nurses, spirits, saints.

Hecate is the goddess of magic and of the crossroads.

On the way home, Derek says (loudly, suddenly, without immediate context and to an unspecified audience): "Who doesn't like DuckTales? I will FIGHT you!" 

How Cold Is It?

#ItsSoCold I took my pet penguin for a walk.

#ItsSoCold my hashtag froze.

#ItsSoCold my snowman is glad he's so fat.

#ItsSoCold my snowman quit.

⛄

Wishes

“I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.
"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” 
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Jaleth and the Dragons at SCBWI Bookstop!

The SCBWI Bookstop is a place where Society of Children's Books Writers and Illustrators can showcase books published this year. I have a page for my e-novelette, Jaleth and the Dragons. I tried to have fun with this page -- there is a silly picture of me with a dinosaur! Please stop by! While you're there, have a look at the other great books by traditionally and independently published authors!

Jaleth and the Dragons, Now on Nook!

Finally have my e-novelette, Jaleth and the Dragons, available on Nook as well! It's just in time, because I will be participating in the SCBWI Bookstop next week (more details to come) and I wanted it available on Kindle and Nook before then. ☺

Jaleth and the Dragons, Now on Kindle!

Last year I had a short story, "Jaleth and the Dragons," published in an online magazine. I decided recently to publish it as a stand-alone Kindle title. It is about 40 pages long in print, so you could call it a short story, long story, novellette, or novella. I plan to release it on Nook as well, but probably not in paperback as it's not very long. If you'd like to see it, here's the link! Jaleth and the Dragons on Kindle

The Court Wizard, Still Available at Watermark Books

The Court Wizard will continue to be available at Watermark Books for at least another 90 days!

When the old apothecary’s shop blows up in mysterious circumstances, Winnifred brings him home to her aunt’s to take care of him. But when Galen wakes up, he tells her he must flee their country of Sedonia, and she must flee with him. Winnifred finds herself on a ship bound for Fortress-on-Sea, where they meet a handsome stranger, Beldon. Slowly, listening at doors and demanding answers, Winnifred learns the secret of her true destiny, and must decide whether to embrace it.

Winner of the Clare Vanderpool Work of Promise Scholarship, awarded by the Kansas chapter of the Society of Children's Books Writers and Illustrators 

 "Overall, Winnifred's tale has all the hallmarks of a fun coming-of-age adventure story. She's refreshingly less a damsel in distress and more an emerging leader as she grows up. I'd recommend The Court Wizard to any pre-teen interested in medieval fantasy novels." -- Renaissance Magazine