Today in the United States we celebrate Thanksgiving. It is easy to become consumed by the preparations for this holiday. To focus on the feast we will consume, while many in the world aren’t as fortunate.
But there is greater meaning–in our bodies, hearts, and minds–when we pause and recount what makes life satisfying beyond the things that adorn our days.
I am thankful every day for the love of family past and present, friends and neighbors near and far, good health and the ability to write and sing, gorgeous trees and furry critters that grace our lives, and most definitely the world Tom and I have discovered and created together inside and outside our Arizona home.
Wherever you live, thank you for joining me on this journey. I am thankful for the ability to connect with you–for this opportunity to share my voice through words, images, ideas and memories–every day.
The longer, hotter summer of 2023 in the Valley of the Sun claimed countless trees and plants–not to mention hundreds of human lives.
Now that November has settled in, we are reminded that cooler mornings and evenings–with warm, sunny afternoons sandwiched in between–actually exist in central Arizona from October through May. This is why we live here.
Unlike most of the United States, fall is a time of renewal in the Sonoran Desert. It is more like spring with an autumnal twist–minus the crunch of rotting leaves underfoot.
We desert rats can now focus on revitalizing our gardens and spirits. Perhaps a Barbara Karst or Torch Glow bougainvillea here–or a crested cactus there–to dress up the back patio in time for Thanksgiving.
Whatever your potting preference, it is growing season despite the advancing darkness. While old plants and trees lick their wounds, new ones pose with the promise of buds to endure winter–a foreign concept for most of the Northern Hemisphere reconciled to the shiver of ice and cold.
I know some of you are like me. You have positive, vivid memories–as a child and adult–of visiting your local library and leaving with a few titles that piqued your interest.
My earliest library memories lead me back to suburban St. Louis, where my mother drove my sister and me to the Tesson Ferry Library on summer Saturday mornings in the 1960s. It was her attempt to sustain our thirst for learning away from the classroom.
More recently, now that I am in my 60s and living in Arizona, Tom and I stop by our local library in Scottsdale to discover books. Sometimes they are contemporary novels, sometimes they are classics.
For instance, I had never read any of the writings by Willa Cather, so I picked up her book, The Song of the Lark. It probably won’t surprise you to learn that I’m enjoying reading her mostly autobiographical tale about a character’s quest for artistic excellence in the desert southwest.
Meanwhile, back to this blogpost … I’ve found that local libraries (in Mount Prospect, Illinois, where I lived for many years and now here in Arizona) offer important opportunities for me as a writer–agreeing to place my memoirs and poetry on their shelves and (when the time is right, and pandemics aren’t running rampant) share my stories with those who may connect to their themes of love, loss, transformation, truth, and triumph.
For instance, on this day four years ago, I hawked my books at the Mesa Public Library’s Local Author Fair at Dobson Ranch here in the Valley of the Sun. It was the perfect opportunity to talk with readers, sign a few books, and compare notes with other writers.
Just a few months after that experience, a little thing called Covid-19 emerged and paralyzed the world. Of course, face-to-face opportunities to do anything became impossible for all of us. Even though I continue to write, I’ve felt my literary presence shrink during the past four years.
Since 2019, I’ve exhibited my books on a few occasions, but the opportunities have become less frequent. For instance, the Scottsdale Public Library decided to discontinue their annual author event permanently. However, there is a silver lining for me to report.
On Saturday, December 2 (noon to 4 p.m.), I’ll be selling and signing my latest two books (completed between 2019 and 2023) at the Mesa Public Library again … this time at the Red Mountain Library location, 635 N. Power Road, Mesa, Arizona 85205 … for their 2023 installment of the Local Author Fair.
Arizona authors across all genres–memoirs, mysteries, science fiction, thrillers, westerns, children’s books–will be there.
If you live in Arizona–or plan to visit the greater Phoenix area in early December to escape the cold in other parts of the country–I hope to see you there, too!
Me sans glasses, standing outside the Mesa Public Library at Dobson Ranch for the Local Author Fair on October 24, 2019.Me on October 24, 2023 in Scottsdale, Arizona preparing for the Mesa Public Library Local Author Fair on December 2, 2023.
The quietest slices keep us whole and hopeful. If we let the snippets slip past without noticing, we are missing the moments, the essence, the connecting tissue, the story of life itself.
In October 2019, I puttered in my garden as I often do.
I had already begun to assemble tongue-in-cheek and serious stories about life in the Grand Canyon State. But I needed a creative hook to link the essays and my desert fantasies to the wide-open experience of living in Arizona.
Strangely, sagging citrus tree branches provided the stimulus for my book title. While they impeded our sidewalk, identifying the obstacle cleared a path in my brain. Tom stood by as seven words flew from my mouth and tumbled into the arid Arizona air: “I Think I’ll Prune the Lemon Tree.”
***
Nearly four years have passed. In early 2021, I completed and published my book. Folks near and far have told me how much they’ve enjoyed reading it.
Of course, I hope more will discover it and find meaning in the essays, including those I wrote about living in a global community we never imagined–a place I call Coronaville.
This afternoon I found myself in the same space outside my front door, examining the same tree, realizing it needed another haircut. I grabbed the loppers, pulled on my gardening gloves, and pruned only the most problematic branches that hung low.
Sadly, there were a few lemon casualties that fell to the earth looking more like green limes than the fully matured lemons they might have become in December.
Still, I think I did a good thing for Tom and me … and our neighbors and delivery people, who pass daily on the sidewalk of our mid-twentieth-century condo community and go about their lives under the radar.
And the lemon tree? It’s now shapelier than before and has inspired me to write yet another story about the possibilities at play in nature.
Nearly half drained, September–in the valley of fiery light where tiny lizards scurry–cues the hiss of early morning sprinklers.
They spray precious droplets that pool, surround, and saturate parched succulents, palms, and citrus trees.
The latter wonder if the fruits of their labors will prove less luscious when snowbirds return to snatch and gather golden orbs from sagging January branches.
Whenever the opportunity presents itself, I enjoy talking about the discipline of writing. Honestly, it doesn’t happen that often. But when it does, it’s generally in the course of an ordinary day.
For instance, last Friday–on the way out the door of the gym I frequent–I stopped to talk with the manager. He asked me about my latest writing project for the Phoenix Gay Men’s Chorus.
“It’s fun,” I told him. But then I went on to explain that creating a full-blown musical libretto is also draining. Such is the case for anything that pushes us beyond our comfort zones.
What does writing a libretto feel like? Well, I’ve never been a clothing designer or tailor. But it’s as if I’m sorting through a world of potential fabrics … selecting the right one … weaving it into a fictionalized story with smart dialogue and an emotional arc … and stitching it to music (which the chorus’ artistic director has selected).
Back near the entrance to the gym, another person joined the conversation. It morphed quickly into a discussion about the motivations and pitfalls of writing. She–a technical writer, who has dreamed about writing a childrens’ book–asked me about my creative commitment and impulses.
That’s when I felt my energy swell as I became creative mentor and cheerleader on the fly. I told her writing is like any discipline–exercise, yoga, boxing, for instance.
I told her I write something nearly every day. That–strangely–after my mother died ten years ago, a new door opened. I decided to take a leap. To write stories that were important to me, not some corporation.
Along the way–I told her–I discovered my true calling as an independent writer. It’s something I’m passionate about, though sometimes the creative process can be lonely.
I told her you have to make it a priority. You have to make the time for it. I told her that the childrens’ book she wanted to write was inside her, waiting to be written.
As I left the gym and walked to my car in the heat of the desert sun, I felt happy … content in the knowledge that I had encouraged one other person to step beyond their creative comfort zone.
***
In this world of raging fires, heat waves, social upheaval, and constant noise produced by snake oil salesmen, I believe the best thing we can do is to put down our phones and turn off our TVs more often.
To take back our lives. To talk with one another face to face–or at least voice to voice. To offer encouragement when opportunities present themselves. To write and read more books and poetry. To make time and room for practices and people who make our hearts sing.
If we do, maybe we can begin to restitch the underlying fabric of our society … one thread at a time.
I know. It’s odd for me to write about Christmas in August. Particularly because the temperatures outside in Arizona are oven like.
However, today–like a kid on Christmas morning ready to rip open presents–I jumped out of bed at 6:30 when I heard the thunderclap. I raced to the window, threw up the sash, and pressed my nose against the glass.
I didn’t see Santa or a team of reindeer but witnessed the next best thing. Actual rain drops pounded the sidewalk. They pinged on the top of our metal carport and disappeared into the thirsty mouths of malnourished cacti.
Get this. In addition to forty days of 110-plus temperatures so far in 2023, we hadn’t seen rain in Scottsdale since March 22. (Okay, evidently there was a brief storm here on July 26, but Tom and I missed it. We were in Flagstaff.)
The lack of moisture falling from the sky has led some of us in the Valley of the Sun to refer to the summer of 2023 as the year of the non-soon versus the monsoons that generally produce a few gully washers. Typically, they account for much of our annual rainfall.
Back in the winter wonderland of my creative mind, over the past month I’ve been channeling the holiday season. Why is Christmas creeping into my psyche? Because I’ve been writing about it.
I’ve just completed a draft of another libretto for the Phoenix Gay Men’s Chorus (PHXGMC) 2023 holiday show. This one is titled Thanks for the Memories: A Gay Christmas Carol.
In addition to writing for PHXGMC, I will be standing on stage, performing in the concerts December 16 and 17 at the Herberger Theatre in Phoenix.
It will be a musical mash-up–nostalgic, glitzy, whimsical, and spiritual–embedded in a story of a Scrooge-like character, who is transformed by the power of beautiful music, personal truth and a trusted community.
It will also be the final holiday concert for Marc, our artistic director for more than twenty years, who has decided to move on to pursue other creative endeavors when his contract ends next July.
Tonight, is our first rehearsal for the new concert season. There will be old and new members to greet and new music to hand out.
Of course, it’s just the beginning. But whether I’m concocting a story or singing the first notes of an unfamiliar tune, it is the creative process that has always captured my joy and attention.
Most of all, I am thankful for every magical moment that lies ahead with my friends on stage and off as we create another batch of musical memories.
