Some days...

it should just be enough to know you are not Tom Sizemore.

I'm home from the Winnipeg Writers' Festival. It was excellent. I will do a run down of my overwhelmingly positive experience soon, but for right now, I'm just enjoying not being Tom.

Oh, and I'm also going to spend a few moments feeling grateful for McNally Robinson's Tracy Howard's comments on Cowboy:

When is a horse story not just a horse story?

When it is a touching coming of age story that has a messy family, a lost soul and a great deal of love at the centre of it. Another Kind of Cowboy by Susan Juby has a heart as big as the rolling hills and mountains of British Columbia where the story takes place. I loved Juby's sly sense of humour, particularly in reference to Alex's acceptance that he is gay, and what that means to his involvement in the macho horse world of his small community. Delicately handled, much like the way Alex handles his horses, this novel is a beautiful read.

Thanks to...

Shelf Elf for a thoughtful (and very nice) review of Another Kind of Cowboy.

I'm off to the Winnipeg Writers' festival this week. To prepare to begin traveling with this book, I did the following:

1. Stop sleeping (see post below).

2. Buy large diffuser, which is supposed to attach to the end of a hairdryer so I can scrunch my hair into curls. The curls are intended to allow me to pretend I'm someone else, someone who is effortlessly entertaining and confident (see photos of me from the 80s, esp. those featuring my spiral perm). Discover diffuser doesn't fit ont the end of sub-compact hairdryer. Make a note to go and buy newer, larger hairdryer.

3. Pack. Take enough items for six weeks although trip will only last a couple of days.

4. When suitcase won't close (see notes about sub-compact hairdryer and apply to suitcase), repack, this time taking only enough items for one day. Hope no one will notice that I wear the same thing to every event. Remind self to tell people that the important items have been changed.

5. Check notes, stories, talking points. Discard them all as boring and inadequate. Spend the minutes before each new presentation frantically writing on napkins and on one's hands.

Okay. So that's my build-up. I hope to see you at Thin Air! If anyone in Winnipeg knows where I can get a good, full-size hairdryer that will fit into a tiny suitcase, do let me know. And if you notice that my hair is not curly, I'd appreciate it if you'd pretend.

The Wrinkling Hour

I am an insomniac. Not of the Christian Bale sort. Not of the suffering like Jesus, slowly losing my mind sort, but a sketchy sleeper nonetheless.

About three nights a week, precisely at 3:00 a.m., my eyes flutter open and I'm awake. I stay awake for an hour or two or, on bad nights, three. Sometimes I get up and putter around, but that makes me feel like I'm crossing into Christian Bale territory, so I try not to do that. I usually just lay in bed and think idly about all the things I have to do the next day. Or, if I'm feeling weak, I worry about things I cannot change, such as the incontrovertable fact of mortality and what a raw deal it is, global warming and what a raw deal it is, war, poverty, Britney Spears' career and abilities as a mother. Oh, and it goes without saying that I fret about whatever project I'm working on.

When I'm more centered I wonder what Tango might be thinking about in his stall. Apparently horses rarely sleep more than a few minutes at a time, so he's probably up and thinking about something. I ponder what Sean Penn might be up to and imagine it's probably something pretty interesting. My guess is that he is a bit like a horse in his sleeping habits. Same goes for Angelina Jolie. Then I get into reminiscing about old times, such as when I used to stay up past 11:00 intentionally.

But to get to the point, in the last few weeks I have woken up to find new wrinkles on my face. I've discovered a few new ones on my upper lip and today I found one on my forehead. It's actually more of a trench than a crease, especially considering it's such a young wrinkle.

My fear is that I'm creating these wrinkles because of all the faces I make while lying awake at 3:00 a.m., which, I should add, is the time of day you are statistically most likely to die. Something about the body's rhythms causing a sudden plunge in blood pressure at this hour. (This fact is probably bogus. Please don't repeat it to anyone who is knowledgable about death, dying, or sleep. Same goes for the bit about Sean Penn and horses' sleeping patterns.)

Anyway, I think what I'm going to do to stop further erosion of my face is to spend those sleepless hours doing anti-wrinkle face exercises. When I get up to use the washroom I may take the opportunity to apply an extra layer of moisturizer. I may also eat a small bit of avocado which apparently has oils that are good for the skin.

If I seem amazingly unlined the next time you see me, you'll know that my new insomnia skin care routine is working. If my face is instead ravaged like only an insomniac's can be, you'll know that I would have been better off using sleeping pills.

Finally, the site will be going offline for a while in the next little bit. Diane, my brilliant web guru, is going to give it a facelift. (Oh, that she could do the same for me! Actually, I've heard of vets giving Botox injections. Maybe I could ask Diane if she's interested in taking up a bit of light plastic surgery as a sort of artistic hobby.) When we come back, there will be no signs of the chronic insomniac about us. Either that or we'll have learned to live with ourselves.

September at YABC and

If you needed more evidence that YA Books Central is one of the most important sites for teens, here it is:

September is Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered month on the site. Kimberly Pauley is posting articles and interviews by a whole host of amazing writers on the subject. Teens are invited to participate in all kinds of fun contests and giveaways. Don't worry: allies are welcome!

I hope to write in about some recent experiences I've had with my new book, Another Kind of Cowboy, which features a gay hero. So far some offended teachers and librarians in the Calgary area have tried, unsuccessfully, to have me kept out of the Calgary writers' festival. Some people have embraced the book and written me touching letters about what it has meant to them. And today I learned that the book is about to receive a bad review in the Calgary Herald by a reviewer who feels I handled the entire issue badly and without tact. I am devastated, of course.

Now that I've finished weeping into my keyboard, I have decided that if I were to write a response, which I'm not, obviously, because writers aren't supposed to respond to reviews (ahem), I'd say that I tried to be as sensitive as possible when I created Alex. However, I don't try to hide or tiptoe around the fact that he's gay because I think it should be celebrated. He knows exactly who he is, even though he's very cautious about what he does with that knowledge. I'm saddened by the idea that being gay or lesbian or any variation of the above should be considered a "bomb". In a perfect world it would be considered more of a "gateau". I know, easy for me, as a straight woman, to say this, and I know the lived experience of many people is much, much different. In Alex I tried to create a young man who is self-protective but fundamentally at ease with his reality. And, lord help me, I never wanted to be tactless and insensitive! Anything but that!

People have asked why Alex is written in the third person and Cleo is written in the first person. Cleo is very open. Too open, in fact. She leads with her chin. Alex is quite closed and channels all his energy into his riding. I wrote him in third person because he lives at a slight remove from himself in order to protect what he sees as his fragile family situation. I doubt I'll write a sequel (although I do have an outline for one) because a) my editors might be tempted to jump off the nearest bridge and b)this book has been unbelievably tough from start to finish, but if I did, my plan was to switch the POVs, so Cleo was in third and Alex was in first. I should point out that Alex's sexuality is only part of the story. It's really a story about friendship and about horses. And aunts who don't cook very well. And dads who live in motorhomes. And, and, and...

But back to my main point. YABC is a great site for those of us who love teen books and those of us who support GLBTG teens. I hope everyone gets a chance to check it out.

And if you want a sample of the kinds of essays featured, check out this one by Brent Hartinger, who, to put it mildly, rocks. The Revolution

I don't just...

visit gossip websites. I also haunt eco websites. They are frequently so depressing that I need to look at some gossip sites afterwards. But one that isn't depressing is the Suzuki Foundation's. They are trying to gather a million signatures from people willing to take the Nature Challenge. I'm all about a challenge! As long as it doesn't involve a marshmellow eating contest. That shit is dangerous.

Ahem.

Also, I am a guest blogger on the very funny Deanna Kent-McDonald's website tomorrow. Check it out! Her MAC quest is most entertaining.

An embarrasment of ...

As I've probably mentioned before, James and I don't have any kids and we don't have any plans to change that. Oh, we've spoken about it. "Do you think we should have a kid?" "No? Yeah. Me neither." Once, when my biological clock was having an ADD moment, I decided that I better have a baby. James agreed. And then I went to have a nap. But as soon as I lay my head down I realized that if I had a baby, I would no longer be able to have naps when I wanted. I would have to time my naps to coordinate with my child's! The very notion sent a storm surge of anxiety through me.

No more naps! No more naps! Plus there were all the other considerations, such as... oh, I don't know. Being pregnant. Giving birth. Finding babysitters who aren't sly monkeys up to no good. Providing enough Legos. Hooooooo shit! And with a sort of clunk, my biological clock went silent. I got up and went out to the living room to inform James that we would not be having a baby. He said that was fine with him. He'd been worried that the baby would get into his fly-tying supplies and we'd be constantly at the emergency room having bits of feather removed from its esophagus.

Most of the time, I'm fine with our decision. I like other people's kids. I love most adolescents and teenagers. In fact, if a smart, funny 11-year old were to arrive on our doorstep in a basket, I'd probably consider taking him/her in. But once in a while, I get a pang about not having our own kid.

The other day, I was cleaning the house. This in itself is fairly noteworthy. I was dusting and I'd created a new music mix to help me get through the work. The mix was heavy to hip hop and electronic dance music. As I dusted, I danced. And as I did so, I realized that I am in my PRIME embarrassing years. I'm too old to be anything other than tragic-looking as I mouth the words to 50 Cent songs, but I'm not ready to give it up yet. I insist on dressing in clothes are are just a shade too young for me. I tell myself it's okay because I am immature. I'm also at an age where I could easily have a thirteen to fifteen year old kid. Think how embarrassed that kid would be by me! I could be one of the all-time most embarrassing moms! Damn.

I think of the bike-drawn cart I just got for Frank (who is fine, but sometimes prefers to catch a ride). How humiliating would it be if I pulled up to my kid's Grade Eight class with our dog in the cart behind me. I'd be all purple faced from exertion because Frank's quite heavy. "Yoo hoo, honey!" I'd call. "You forgot your cheese strings!" One stunt like that could scar a kid for life. (Or turn them into a writer.)And I'd have an endless store of such activities available.

Also embarrassing would be my tendency to parrot the language I read on the gossip websites, to which I've become seriously addicted. Between Go Fug Yourself and D-Listed (which I caution you is unabashedly R-rated and not safe for school or work. In fact, I bet it's banned in Texas! Just like me!)and Lainey's Entertainment Update I barely speak English anymore. I speak with all kinds of unearned authority about "Blohan" and "Parasite Hilton" and what "ass clowns" they are. This would be excruciating for a kid, especially if I started doing it in front of their friends.

But since I'm without a pre-teen or teen, I am left in a position of having to be embarrassed by myself. And I am. I was busting some hip hop moves to Fitty and had an attack of self consciousness that stopped me dead. For about four seconds. Until an Eminem song came on and I was back at it.

There are many reasons to have kids. First, because you want them and love the idea of dedicating yourself to them and their needs. Second, you are looking to continue your family line. Third, you want someone to look after you when you're old. And fourth, you want someone to torture with the embarrassing remnants of your youth. Who knew it would be the fourth thing that got me?

Happy Labour Day Weekend. I hope none of you have to labour too much.

Today (or actually yesterday) Another Kind of Cowboy is out in Canada. Early reports suggest that it hasn't yet shipped into the stores but it should be there momentarily. I hope you'll give my first non-Alice book a warm welcome. And I've created my first podcast. All I have to do now is figure out how to post it. It will be up soon.

xox

S.