I drove her to school yesterday, because it was cold.

She hoisted her backpack and saxophone out of the trunk that she didn't used to be able to open by herself. It is a heavy trunk door and the struts to keep it open don't work anymore.

I see her every day, but something about the way she flipped her hair back and blew me a kiss reminded me of the way she looked when I dropped her off in first grade. But this isn't first grade, it's fifth grade, and she's told me next year she will rule the school.

Something about the way she flipped her hair and blew me a kiss nailed my gut to the back of my seat, and I actually couldn't move for a breath.

My mother told me about this love, but I didn't understand it.

Every night she says she loves me more. And I say no, that's impossible. I don't even make a game out of it. I know now it is impossible to love your mother more than she loves you, at least in my family.

She saw a while back that I was serious, and she stopped trying to win the argument. I wrap her in blankets and the promise that there is no way that I could not love her the most.

She clomps off toward the school in her winter boots, the backpack and the saxophone trying to drag her down but her long hair promising to catch the wind so she can fly.

It's a normal school day, but it's not.

Just like every day.

---

I like to write about young people. Enter a Goodreads giveaway now to win a copy of my young adult novel, THE OBVIOUS GAME!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

The Obvious Game

by Rita Arens

Giveaway ends February 20, 2015.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

 

Enter to win

I was driving to meet a friend for dinner when I heard a Robert Plant interview on the radio. I've searched in vain to find a transcript; I think it's lost to the winds of change.

---

I grew up on Led Zeppelin, as classic rock lives on in southwest Iowa today as it did in its heydey. Middle America is where time stands still for old-school rock and roll, as it does for mall hair and some forms of acid-wash jeans. There are places deep in the heart of Nebraska where I assume people are still pegging their jeans, similar to the Space Odyssey: a land where time stood still and perhaps the universe ceased to rotate for several decades. That, my friends, is western Nebraska.

Anyway, Robert Plant was talking about his creative process. He said if he listened to what people wanted him to be at this point in his career it would all be awful, that he had to create what he is now for himself. As I was driving deeper into Kansas and reflecting on my own tiny writing career, I thought to myself, wow, if Robert Plant has deep existential questions, then I am totally fucked.

But that's it, isn't it? This is all there is, for all of us, what we have in this moment. Lay down your swords, boys, this is who you are.

---

Today I worked with Laura Fraser on a session at BlogHer PRO all about putting together a book proposal, which I did for SLEEP IS FOR THE WEAK in 2006 or 2007. The book came out in 2008. If I did today what I did in 2008 for SIFTW, I doubt it would have been published. If I did twenty years ago what I did for THE OBVIOUS GAME in 2011, I think it would've sold better. The fact is, the world turns, and the publishing world turns with it, and none of us really knows what's going to happen next. What worked yesterday won't work today, and works today won't work tomorrow. It's a marathon, not a sprint. Being a writer is more about the career than the book. Save yourself the pain and absorb that truth.

(I really wish there was a typed transcript of this Robert Plant interview. You're going to have to trust the paraphrase here.)

So the host was asking Robert Plant about his career (and what a career!) and Robert Plant was basically saying at this point he just does what he likes and who cares what the bastards think? (Again, I paraphrase.) That at some point, people have an expectation of you, and you have to decide whether or not to fulfill it.

I have no idea if there is an expectation of me other than what I set for myself. I'm guessing probably not.

---

Yesterday, I lost a notebook with all my ideas for my next novel on Southwest flight 699 from Kansas City to Phoenix. I've filed a claim in the hopes that my little notebook with owls on the cover has been found. The first thing I did when I got to my room was open a Word document and word vomit everything I could remember from the five-hour drive home from Thanksgiving into it. The idea is so weird anyone who finds the notebook and reads it might think I am crazy.

I'm a little crushed that I lost that notebook. I may have cried in the Phoenix airport.

And as I dried my tears, I thought of Robert Plant.

And I thought about what expectations I have set for myself.

---

Today in the BlogHer PRO session I admitted, once again, all my writerly failures. How many times I have been rejected. My ongoing search for a career agent. My many projects in all their various stages. Laura actually called me out and insisted I would do better to work my network, and I admitted to myself and to her that maybe I haven't asked more people that I know in the field to introduce me to their agents because

I

am

scared.

Even after two books, I am scared.

I want to be Robert Plant.

I want to get to the point where I make my own art, and I do not worry about where the cards may fall.

I went into the session with the hope that people would hear my part of the story and understand that the artistic gig, the publishing gig, is fraught with rejection. I would have nothing, absolutely nothing, published without the sheer force of my will. Nobody else has ever cared about it like I have.

You get up, you send more queries, you get critiques, you revise, you query again. And so on.

Thank you, Robert Plant, for reminding me that in the end, nobody cares about my art like I do.

I spent last night at the Lawrence watch event for Paul Davis/Jill Docking's Kansas governor's run. I've known Paul since he married my best friend, and their daughter is my girl's unofficial little sister. So of course I wanted him to win. Beyond that, Paul's politics mirror my own almost exactly, only he is calm under pressure and I am not. He would've been a great governor. Kansas, I'm sorry. You're missing out.

I probably offended a room full of people when I said after the call had been made and the speech presented that I felt like I did when the Royals lost the World Series last month. That I would compare baseball to politics is probably uncool, but what I meant is this: Both were underdogs, both had worked very hard for years to get to the big stage, the nation was focused on both events, and I had spent months emotionally engaged in the events that unfolded before the big event. And in both scenarios, it was really close. There was no blowout. It got called late.

As I drove back to my hotel, I felt shell-shocked, amazed that he could've possibly lost. This morning, though, I spent the hour-long drive back home thinking about how dangerous and how satisfying it is to care, to hope.

I know what it's like to come really close with something and have it denied you. THE OBVIOUS GAME came thisclose to being picked up by a big publisher. In the immediate aftermath, it felt so awful I asked myself over and over why I was doing it to myself. Why bother trying to make a mark, share yourself in some way other than a Facebook status update? Why try when so many people live happy, productive, meaningful lives without putting themselves through such capacity for rejection? Why work so hard when there is absolutely no guarantee it will pay off?

Why do I start over every time I finish a book? Why do I get back on that horse that keeps bucking me off?

For the same reason I'm really glad I was at that event last night and for the same reason I'm glad I chewed my knuckles until the very last run of game seven of the 2014 World Series. Because it's good to care. It's good to have things you really believe in. Caring about things other than yourself make life worth living, force us to connect with other humans, be proud of who we are and with whom we align ourselves. 

Caring puts you at a much greater risk of heartache, but it's worth it, every time. 

I'm in the writing valley right now, shopping some projects to agents, wondering what will happen next. I've been in this place of a different sort of work for about a month now, grinding along, sending out queries, sticking my nose weekly into my color-coded Google doc of victory and rejection. I haven't been writing at all except very sporadically here and of course for my day job. I've been reading and training for a half-marathon and watching the World Series and lying in my hammock soaking up the last rays of this unseasonably warm October. 

A few nights ago, I had one of those television dreams accompanied by smell and sound and touch. When I woke up, I had the seed of a new story. I wrote the elevator pitch in my writing notebook. I write ideas for books in there all the time, but this time was different. This wasn't just a phrase or a scene -- it was a story.

I haven't done any plotting yet. I haven't written down anything but those three sentences. I'm not ready. My head is still in the projects I'm querying.

When my agent was shopping THE OBVIOUS GAME, I forced myself to start THE BIRTHRIGHT OF PARKER CLEAVES to distract myself from the waiting and watching and panic attacks, not because I really knew where I was going with it. PARKER CLEAVES started as a feeling I wanted to capture, and I hope my story wove around the feeling well enough to do its job as a vehicle. THE OBVIOUS GAME started as a series of stand-alone scenes I wanted to link together in a meaningful way to shed light on anorexia and bring hope for recovery. My process felt sort of Rubiksonian each time.

This story idea ... this is new. 

Since it happened, I've walked around remembering that I have something to be excited about the way I did when I first got engaged, first got pregnant. 

I have a story in my head! Will this keep happening? This is AWESOME.

Yesterday on Twitter, a blogger who had read my Dr. Phil anorexia post tweeted to me. I went over to look at her blog and felt the familiar stomach drop when I read this:

A month ago, in Flagstaff, SB had a Subway sandwich for dinner Friday night and at lunch on Saturday she had a few of the sweet potato fries I'd ordered for the table. Yesterday, when it was suggested she needed to drink Gatorade to combat the recent dehydration that led to her fainting twice and being rehydrated in the E.R. this past Sunday, she cried. And said no.

As a mother, my stomach drops for the blogger. As a recovered anorexic, my stomach drops with muscle memory. 

I'm reading THE MATHEMATICIAN'S SHIVA by Stuart Rojstaczer. In a book within a book, the protagonist's mother writes about going with only a tiny bit of food a day in war-torn Russia. Her description of hunger is spot-on:

I want you to follow my instructions. Take your eyes off this page when I tell you to do. Look at the room around you. Wherever you are, simply open your eyes adn look, listen, smell and think whatever thoughts come your way ... Then imagine all of your awareness disappearing. Your eyes work, yes, but they don't see anything. Your brain won't let you process such information. The smells, they are gone, too. Your ears, they work simply to warn you of danger. Your thoughts, all of them are so uncomplicated and pure ... All is about the numbness inside you ... You are truly in hibernation. Everything has slowed, because any processing, physical or mental, requires energy, and that, if you are truly nutrient-deprived, is precisely what you don't possess.

When I read that, I remembered crying from hunger. And I also remembered crying from fear of what would happen if I ate, because the hunger was easier to tolerate than the fear. The space between those places is anorexia. I wrote about that motivation and that place in my young adult novel, THE OBVIOUS GAME. Writing about it forced me to go back and experience those feelings again, and it was no fun. However, it's important for those of us who are recovered and feeling brave to talk about life after an eating disorder, because when you're in it, you can't imagine life on the other side of it. I keep writing. I'm here. I'm on the other side. It blows my mind that I still get 2-3 emails a week from people who love someone with anorexia. They are desperate. They have no idea what to do with this thing they don't understand at all. They want me to tell them what to do. I can't totally do that. I'm not a psychologist or doctor. All I can do is try to explain how their loved one feels so they can support that person in the best way possible.

My new friend Jenn told me about the March Against ED next week (September 30) in Washington, DC. I wish I would've known about it earlier, because I think I would've tried to go. If it happens again next year, I will be there. There is so much misinformation about mental health in general, and anorexia is one of the few mental disorders you can see on a person, which I think contributes to even further misunderstanding, because you form opinions without knowing the person at all just by looking at them. 

I have a list of ED resources in my Young Adult category up in the masthead. I will be updating that list with some more from Jenn. I was never inpatient anywhere (I threatened to run away and I was 18) and I ended up recovering physically in college and mentally in my thirties. 

They were deep ruts in my brain. Deep, self-loathing ruts. Filling them in was the hardest thing I've ever done, and it's what I want for every disordered eater out there. It can be done.

I'm relieved to hear Jenn's daughter is in recovery. There are many other people whose sons and daughters aren't. I know. They email me. It's best if you catch it early. It's often comorbid with other mental illness and therefore hard to separate or identify. (Is she not eating because she's anxious? Is she counting her calories because she's OCD?) If you think there's a problem, it's better to err on the side of caution, just like you would if your kid suddenly sprouted an unexplained lump in her breast or a persistent ache in her teeth. Please don't assume what you see on television is real. It's not dramatic or romantic or disgusting. It's someone who is hurting really, really bad. Someone hungry in every sense of the word.

Hello Everyone! It's that time again. We have less than two weeks until the YA Scavenger Hunt begins. I hope you reserved plenty of time for this one because there isn't just one team or two or even three. This time we have 6, that's right, I said 6 YASH teams which means more prizes, news, and fun for all you readers out there! So let's get started!

TEAM RED INCLUDES:

 

TEAM GOLD INCLUDES:

 

TEAM GREEN INCLUDES:

 

TEAM ORANGE INCLUDES:

 

TEAM INDIE INCLUDES:

 

TEAM BLUE INCLUDES:

  There are so many books here I don't even know where I would begin. I hope you all are as excited as I am! The YA Scavenger Hunt begins at noon pacific time on Thursday, October 2nd and runs through Sunday, October 5th. That means to get through the entire hunt you'll need to go through 1.5 teams per day!

Are you going to play? 

Today I'm over at Fiction Reboot|Daily Dose talking about how hard it is to write a believable teen character. Read it here.

Her hair flies back in the wind because the motor's almost shot in Vicki the convertible so the top stays down now. It has to be helped up like an old man out of a chair, and most of the time, we don't feel like dealing with it. We leave ourselves exposed to sun and sky and wind because the sun feels good when it's not raining.

We are talking about growing up, and I tell her the thing my dad told me about SEEs, Significant Emotional Experiences, the thing I put in THE OBVIOUS GAME, how you have to have two SEEs before you can really contribute to society, how some people go their whole lives without having two. You need two to understand other people's anger.

"You've had your two already," I say. "When Grandpa died and when Bella and Petunia and Buttonsworth died."

"Did you have two when you were a kid?"

"Yeah. When Grandma got cancer. And then when it came back. And then when my gran died. All that happened before I left for college."

"I've had more than that," she says, and her hair whips again around her face, her eyes shaded with sunglasses.

"What was the other one?"

"When Ka'Vyea got shot."

Oh. Yes.

I've been wondering how that affected her. We haven't talked about it. I've been waiting. She was such a trooper every visit to the hospital, and I have never been so proud of my daughter as when she walked into a room to see her friend with a feeding tube in his nose unable to sit up in bed and act completely natural, to play Connect Four instead of staring in shock at the machines surrounding him.

"Yes. That was really scary, wasn't it?"

She nods. There's more to say, but neither of us knows how to say it now. He's back at school part-time. He didn't die. We're very glad about that. But it's still not fair he can't walk. None of this is fair, and we are both gobsmacked every time we start to talk about it. So we stop.

I keep driving. Her hair streams out behind her.

Here I've spent the first half of 2014 thinking I could no longer run giveaways for THE OBVIOUS GAME on Goodreads because it was published in 2013. (The dropdown in the author tools area only give you options for the year prior to your pub date and the year of your pub date.) I was sad, because Goodreads giveaways are such a win/win. They are inexpensive for an author to run (you only pay for the books and shipping) and they provide exposure as each sign-up adds the book to the signee's to-read shelf, thus giving the author and the book exposure she wouldn't otherwise have had. Lately most of my dealings with THE OBVIOUS GAME have been either asking people to review it or answering emails from people who love people with eating disorders (in which really what can I say but, "Well, I wrote an entire book about what I want to say to you now, so maybe you could read that and then let me know if you want to talk more"). The answering the emails part is really hard. Really hard. But I am really glad I at least have the book to point them to.

And this is the part where I say, "Hey, if you've read THE OBVIOUS GAME, could you drop me a review on Goodreads and Amazon? It doesn't even have to be nice! Nobody likes everything." And then I follow that up by saying, "If you haven't read THE OBVIOUS GAME, mightn't you request it at your library, and if your librarian has trouble, she can contact me and I will get her the book with my author discount?" And then you might say, "But I really want to help you MORE." So of course I would smile sincerely and say, "Well, you could buy my book! Or even just share the giveaway so more people will know it exists." And then I burst into tears and throw my arms around you.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

The Obvious Game

by Rita Arens

Giveaway ends October 27, 2014.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

 

Enter to win