Moving on

The last line of this quote by Kiese Laymon, brave and bestselling author of Heavy, Long Division, and How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America, stopped me cold.

"They bruise us. They buy us. That is why we are so tired. That is why we are awakened. We are fighting an enemy we've shown exquisite grace, an enemy we've tried to educate, coddle, and outrun, an enemy that never tires of killing itself, just so it can watch us die."

 An enemy that never tires of killing itself, just so it can watch us die.

As Senator Mazie Hirono of Hawaii says in a short, fed-up tone when appallingly bad actors obfuscate and refuse to answer the questions put to them in confirmation hearings: "Moving on." Mazie Hirono has absolutely no fucks left to give, and I love that for her.

We keep on.

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I turned in the first two chapters of the new book I am working on. The pages went first to the editor, who apparently liked them, assuming that is what it means when she says they "are working." She helped me solve an issue at the end of the first chapter, which I very much appreciated. When it comes to love languages, I'm a "words of affirmation" girl through and through. The editor on my last book seemed to be cut from that same cloth. She was always sure to praise something that was done well while discussing what might be improved. This editor I'm working with now, who I also really respect, is more like Mazie Hirono was back in 2020 and 2021 when I was writing her memoir. Like Mazie, whom I adore, this new editor is all: No need to comment on what's working, let's get straight to the parts that need our attention. 

When it comes to love languages, my new editor seems more like an "acts of service" girl. That is also my husband's way of expressing care—to roll up his sleeves and solve whatever practical issue needs solving. So I'm somewhat familiar with my new editor's approach. She has a very monotone delivery, the opposite of my last editor's natural effusiveness, which was rather endearing, not gonna lie. My new editor is really good, too, though. I just need to ask for the feedback I need if she doesn't volunteer it. So toward the end of our call going over the first two chapters, I asked, "Do you feel that these chapters offer emotional resonance for the reader." "Oh yes," she said, "you delivered that." I exhaled then, because as I see it, emotional resonance is job number one. Everything follows from there.

My subject now has the two chapters. She is traveling overseas this week, and wanted to take them with her to read in her down time. I hope she will think the chapters work, too, and that they feel true to her experience. The first submission of pages on a book project is always nerve wracking. The waiting to hear back never gets easier.

(Update: She loved the chapters! She just sent me the most beautiful note! I’m screaming.)

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As of today, Dolores is all moved in to her new apartment. Her bed got delivered this afternoon, so she is now officially sleeping there. I need to back off from trying to be helpful. I'm learning that she is one for whom it might actually be overwhelming to have people hovering and offering assistance. I guess I just need to trust that if she needs something as she sets herself up, she'll reach out. 

My daughter, one of my nieces, and I have a plan to take her to dinner tomorrow night at a Tom Colicchio fine dining establishment that is participating in New York Restaurant Week, thereby bringing the experience within reach of our pockets. It's supposed to be a welcome to New York dinner for Dolores, but she will only be able to join us if her delivery of Ikea bookshelves arrives in time. If she can't join us, we'll still be celebrating, as it will also be my mom's 103rd birthday, were she still with us. We'll raise a glass to her, mother and grandma, still guiding us gently from the other side.

Meanwhile here is a picture of a puzzle I finished, my beautiful sun-hatted woman, and here, too, is a puzzle my husband built, a 3-D Japanese garden. This is what we do instead of watching the news. We meditate on constructing things, flat or three-dimensional, instead of trying to drink from the firehouse of bad actors trying to mow everything down. We refuse to drown.