Having just returned from a month-long excursion abroad, I'm full of thoughts about what specific experiences worked for me while on the road, and what I could have done better. I've written several books after traveling, some trips planned specifically for research and other writing projects springing spontaneously from time away from home. Even though I've traveled quite a lot over the years, there are always new lessons to learn—here are some that have to do with being a writer on the road...

• 1. Experience. Instead of visiting a city and all its sites, I always try to get into the local flow, and experience life first hand. It's tough to incorporate bits on the Swiss Alps into a book if you only see them from the window of a car. While passing a mountain pasture, get out of the car, sit on a wall, breathe the air. Better yet, make inquiries before you leave, trying to find local people to meet—or be gregarious and sit in the village square or café and make friends. The best story stuff comes from walking in the shoes of a local. This last trip our family helped in the annual making of mountain hay. We spent two days cutting fields, turning the grasses, bailing hay and stacking it. We got to feel the wooden rakes in our hands, the sun on our back. We smelled the flowers mixed in with the grasses and saw the variety of plants that those lucky cows get to eat. In between work we ate with the families: fontina; polenta; sausages; wine... all of it homemade, with the smells and tastes and chatter that accompanies food. You can bet I'll find a way to get these folks and their mountain slopes into a book...


• 2. Become an Extrovert. To find out what life is really like outside of your home town it helps to be curious. Being more prone to hide away and write than to chatter with folks on the front step, I have to work extra hard while I'm away when it comes to talking. But the extra effort always pays off. Finding out the details for your stories is essential. Why are the grasses cut in the morning? How many cows does this field feed? What time of year is the fontina made? May I see the cellar where you make it? May I swing the scythe? Do you have any band-aids for this blister?! It's fine to do research from a book, or by interviewing others, but books and interviews don't give you blisters...


• 3. Journaling. This is a top priority while away. I always buy a brand new journal with lots of pages and keep copious notes. I've found that you simply can not write too much. Even though I format my journal day by day, recounting events, I do my best to write about as many small details as possible. Here's a bit from our time in the Italian Alps. When I walked into the pub in Valpelline, I smelled port and noticed that the group of 12 or so men were drinking from small stemmed, elegant glasses. Their gruff mountain hands contrasted so sharply with those small glasses. Outside it drizzled; though it was June, winter was still pestering the mountains and people griped about it non-stop, in every conversation. When we left more than two hours later, those same men had finished their drinks and had started lively games of cards taking up several tables. It now smelled of men, not port—of sweat and strong breath; and though I'm a typical American who doesn't like bodily odors, somehow the smells all fit the scene and felt comforting...


• 4. Photography. Just like journaling helps me to reenter a place when I want to write about it—so do pictures. But note this—it's the unlikely photos that usually help the most. Vast panoramas may help to give an overall view of the place—or of a specific scene you want to capture, but it's the photos of woodpiles, of the woman and her stash of bee houses in the corner of her yard, that help the most when writing. These aren't photos that you tend to share with family when you return, but they help when trying to recreate a scene in words. Photography is dangerous, however; you have to be careful not to become too attached to the camera, hence becoming the eternal onlooker. That lens gets in the way from experiencing the real thing, so solicit help from those you're traveling with, if possible.


• 5. Buy a New Pen! Ha! I don't think I'm alone here. Being a writer brings with it the sometimes absurd love of pens and paper. Though I can hardly afford to purchase some of the pens that I slobber over in specialty shops I do try to look for inexpensive but unusual pens, ink, or paper that I can play with. I believe having as much fun as I can with my craft helps me to be a better writer. So if that new orange fountain pen might help my brain turn some particularly lovely phrases, then it's worth the investment! This trip I found a new, inexpensive brand in Rome: Campo Marzio, and I purchased five pens: three as gifts; one for myself; and one reserve for something or someone yet undetermined.


• 6. Get Writing. I find it's good to mull over my experiences and process them before I really allow them to become a part of a story, but I try to get back to the craft of writing as soon as possible. Even if I'm simply continuing my journal entries—adding bits of certain experiences that were left out but still fresh in my mind. In fact, I think writing every day, despite my creative impulses, is important in order to remain a fruitful and long-term writer. I don't always abide by my own advice and I see the difference it makes when it's time to conjure the muse. So please excuse me, time's up, gotta get back to that story!

We were in London, and that day we were celebrating my daughter’s eleventh birthday. We had just visited the Globe Theatre, and followed it up by having a fabulous lunch near the Thames. Next stop: Herrods, to buy seven dollar sour jelly beans (all we could afford!). As we crossed through the side yard of St. Paul's Cathedral heading toward a tube stop, we spotted the child actor Skandar Keynes; he plays Edward in the Chronicles of Narnia movies, dressed in typical English schoolboy garb, chatting with friends. I felt my blood pulse and just knew I had to get a picture of him with my daughter as a birthday memento.

Backstory. I grew up in LA—the west side of LA, where actors are like palm trees, at least one on every block, sometimes whole strings of them, swaying in the wind, trying to attract more attention than the tree next door. My brother was a child actor, starring in more than sixty commercials. My grandfather was a prop master. I went to school with Charlie Sheen, Dean Cain, and Rob Lowe. Even I couldn’t escape Hollywood’s grasp. I was a stunt double in an MTV music video-a good/bad experience that convinced me of my distaste for most things Hollywood.

All my life I have ignored those celebrities who are not acquaintances. They're everywhere and they really don't need to be bothered by anyone's fussing. Let them drink their latte's and chew their panini’s in peace.

So what got into me in London when Skandar Keynes crossed our path?

We were having a fabulous day--every decision made to promote happiness for our birthday girl. When I saw young master Keynes all I thought about was getting a photo of him with my daughter-how we had just seen Prince Caspian the week before, and that it would make for a fun memory in the scrapbook. But by the time I'd determined to ask him, and my daughter had said that she could handle the embarrassment, he was on the move, across the street, heading somewhere fast. Armed with my camera, I ran to the street corner, but the traffic light turned on me and cars flew past. I sprinted the other way, my middle-aged skirt flapping around my legs, looking for a bridge, an underground tunnel, some secret, miraculous way to cross. My family was yelling for me, "Mom!"

I was star struck. My first time ever, by a skinny brown-haired boy... I zoomed in and snapped a series of photos across the wide street before he disappeared from view. Oh my. I slunk back to my family, defeated, feeling utterly silly. A papparazza in the making. My heart was still racing. I took a look at the photos and then tucked the camera deep into my bag. My daughter didn’t seem half as disappointed as I was. Hmmm...

We're home again now and I believe I've returned to normal. John Cleese and Oprah and the gang will be roaming the streets, and you know what? I think I'll make some plum jam.

Then maybe send a jar of it to Skandar...

What shoe are you? Are you a hiking boot, an espadrille, or a stiletto? Are you a sneaker or a riding boot? Is your shoe a certain color—maybe red? Or is it a particular brand? Or perhaps you’re a combination shoe, or an all-of-the-above, plus more shoe? An I-want-every-shoe, shoe?

I’m like that last one--with bags. And have to practice the virtue of self control often.

I live in Southern California, and I’m a sandal. I have six pair: one dressy, three beachy, one strappy and Greek, and one pair built for walking. I wear sandals just about every day. With skirts, with jeans, on the way to the gym, to church, and out to dinner. The only worthy exception to my sandal is saved for those truly wet and chilly days. Days when I sip tea in the afternoons, and dream of writing longer than I have time for, days when I pester my husband till he lights a fire in the grate. On those days, those infrequent days in my part of the world, I long for wool socks—and wool socks don’t do well in sandals. So I pull out and polish a pair of leather boots from the right hand side of my sandal pile, and they clomp me around town, keeping my toesies warm and dry.

I was thinking about my life with sandals just the other day when I realized that on my upcoming trip to Northern England and Scotland, the sandals will have to hibernate inside my bag until we arrive in Rome. Most likely my toesies will be having wool-longing fits, and unfortunately, those boots I have ain’t made for long days of walking.

I’m not a shopper. Even though bag shopping might get me excited, we don’t have the money or the space for purses galore, so what’s the point? So, buying a new pair of shoes became yet another chore on my to-do list. I put it at the bottom, where I tend to place those errands that are easily carried from one list to the other. Copied over and over again for days until the days become weeks, and I finally get so irritated with myself that I make a proclamation of sorts to my husband: "I need you to watch the baby—I’m going to buy a pair of shoes!" I say this, as if not wearing sandals for a ten-day period of time in England is truly torture...

Heading straight to a small local shoe store that I had been avoiding, I spend half an hour walking in circles, in my sandals, around the store. There, with the good help of Boris, I find a pair of good leather walking shoes that will play double duty with both pant and skirt. The deed was done. I got out my list and made a bold slash through my cryptic, "buy shoes."

Ah, but then I realize upon my return, as I try on my various traveling clothes, that, gasp!, shopping is once again imminent... I no longer own the right socks, to accompany the shoes with pants. I no longer own stockings, to accompany the shoes with skirts. I am living in a very small shoe world, indeed.

So, being a sandal, what else might that say about me? If my shoe world has become so narrow, if I am living without socks and stockings, what else about me has been squeezed as well? And is this a good thing—to be so specialized? Does it show a becoming—a honing--of who I’m really meant to be—or does it simply reveal a stubborn nature that sticks to me despite my age. I really have no answers to these (seemingly!) profound questions, and maybe this upcoming trip to places where sandals are only brief summer dreams will help answer them for me. Maybe this new adventure will open up worlds bigger than my feet—maybe these new shoes will take me places that sandals simply are not able to enter.

In any case, if I’m a sandal, a silly sandal who loves to ramble on about anything including feet, I’d still love to know what shoe you’ve come to be... Write to me and we’ll talk shoes. Anything’s better than shopping for them!

My older son, now 13, is hooked on books. He was born to love stories; I used to cuddle with him when he was only a baby and his attention span for tales of any kind, even lengthy books about owls or elephants, was endless. We have a lovely illustrated Bible by Dorling Kindersley-we read through it cover to cover three times before he was two years old. He liked Thomas the tank engine, and he enjoyed drawing with colored pencils, but more than anything he wanted to learn more about life from a page.

Ever since he has been able to read on his own, he’s been slurping books up, one at a time, one per day practically. His room is books, his backpack is books, his internet use is focused on books. “When’s the next Percy Jackson book coming out, Mom? You don’t know; I NEED to check!”

So, as a mother, how am I to monitor this obsession? When we were in the Read Aloud stage-it was easy-he listened, I read, and we spoke of the stories before nap or around the dinner table. The Easy Reader stage wasn’t so bad either. There’s not much to worry about inside the Magic Treehouse or journeying out on the prairie or laughing along with Freddy the pig.

But monitoring the reading of a young adult is another thing. These books range from lovely, to frightening, to provocative to outright I-don’t-know-what-they’re-trying-to-say??? And I can’t keep up. He reads so many books that when he runs out-either of the library supply-or of the gift cards his relatives give him, he reads his sister’s books. Mind you, at this point, either before-or after he gobbles up a Royal Diaries book about Cleopatra--we kick him out of the living room chair and make him experience the real world, telling him to ride his bike around the block, or trim the hedge, or play blocks with his little brother. Reading has its limits!

I try to read at least one book of a series, when my son seems particularly hooked in a new world. I’ve entered the domain of Harry Potter, Sam and Frodo, Narnia, Prydain and Redwall. I’ve met Artemis Fowl, Percy Jackson and the books of Shannon Hale, Jasper Fforde and Gerald Morris. So many of these books have been absolutely entertaining, with heroic characters and great literary qualities. But every now and then I come across a book and wonder, “Who in the world is this author, who was his editor, and what were they thinking?!!!”

That’s when I came up with a plan to buy really bad books back. The US publishers produced almost 300,000 new titles just in one year (2007)-- surely some of these books will prove to be skunks-too stinky for my children’s minds and souls... Plus, it’s a lot of money for my son to spend $18 on a hardcover, and usually he researches his books well, buying things worthy of being on his library shelf for a long time. But every now and then he is fooled, and I simply do not want a certain book in his life-in MY house! So this new rule, after some shifting and negotiating became: I read the book, decide that I desperately despise it, tell him why, and offer to pay for it. Once he assents, then the book is mine. Once the book is mine, it goes straight into the recycle bin. Burning books is passé; I’m not hoping to create a scandal, but I certainly don’t want the book to end up in another young person’s hands.

This last book that I bought took him months to decide upon. There was a certain appeal to the main character that he didn’t want to lose to the paper shredder, but after all, eighteen dollars is a lot of money. I now have the book in my blue bin, and tomorrow is recycle day. Hooray!

A Few More Thoughts...

I’ve only bought back two books, so this is serious business!

• I like to write in my journal a bit about each book that I read. I don’t worry about lovely sentences, or commas, or anything. I just write my thoughts, listing what I do and don’t like. It’s easy to be critical, and most books have some flaws, so I try to look deeply, especially at the moral content or message of the story and find the lovely-the truth, goodness and beauty as well. When thinking about offering to buy a book back from my children, the flaws in the story have to be wild and wooly. The book that I most recently paid for had a character who never changed. He was mean and intelligent when the book started and mean and intelligent when I turned the last page. Despite some conflict, despite adventure and hardship, he was always arrogant, self-serving and more brilliant than everyone who moved in his wake. Plus, the book had some mighty plot troubles, and the dialogue to me was stilted and unreal. Add to that the fact that my son thought this mean and intelligent being was fascinating, I simply couldn’t wait to get that book away from him...


• It’s important to be fair. I don’t want to control every word and every image that comes in contact with my children. They will have to face the world eventually. If my children read a poorly written book, or if there’s a controversial message, there may be parts of that book that will lead to growth if we talk about it together. For example, my son read Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials Trilogy. This is a controversial series within many circles and he had gotten through the first two books before I was able to really do any research or realized what was what. I then read the first book, to get a flavor for the story and the message, and I talked with my son about it once he had finished the trilogy. I had not offered to buy these books from him. Though it’s not my favorite style of writing, there is generally good quality, creative material there, and my son picked up on the same things that irked me. Just recently, he had a book he wanted, but no money. I then offered to buy this trilogy and he quickly ran to the shelf and gave the volume over easily to the blue bin. The books were a good learning tool for us, but I’m glad he won’t be re-reading them anytime soon.


• I said “buy a book back from my children” above, but in reality, I’m doubtful that this will ever be an issue with my daughter. She doesn’t read a book a day, so controlling the inventory is not such a challenge. The real difficulty lies in the sheer quantity of books that cycle through my son’s world. I suppose another way to approach this would be doing book research, maybe once a month, checking reviews, and recommendations from trusted sources. As an author myself, it’s horrible to think of books heading to the shredder. Anything, but that!!! Maybe if I can just be regularly proactive, my book buying days will be done?!

Epilogue

I can’t tell you how painful it was to put a book-barely used or not, however horrible--into the recycle bin. Even though I truly disliked the words and ideas that were held between the covers, it was absolutely tragic to think that all the work that the author toiled over was being destroyed-all that ink; those pulpy pages taken from some unsuspecting tree...

So... what did I learn? Maybe I need to lobby for better editors? Maybe it’s time for my son to take up lacrosse, or fencing, or backgammon (I love backgammon)? Or maybe it really is okay to have a few bad books on the shelves? As you can see, I’ve got a lot of thinking yet to do...