Home Town Pride and the Perfect Cup of Coffee

See? It doesn't rain all the time.

So this post has no agenda. I'm not going to tell you about business plans or writing craft or some book you really ought to read. For just a few hundred words here, I'm going to squee! Because I live in a pretty cool place - and that's not just because a certain football team pulled a miracle out of their collective asses on a recent Sunday afternoon.

Don't even ask me how many times I listened to Macklemore's Can't Hold Us yesterday.

A couple months ago, my agent Margaret hit Seattle for a brief layover on her way to a conference. I picked her up at the airport and we drove into town to meet one of her other clients for lunch. Tracy writes mysteries based around a yoga studio - her newest, A Killer Retreat, just released - and as the three of us explored the city, both Tracy & I pointed out locations from our books.

That's right. It wasn't, "Oh Margaret, look over there. It's the Space Needle."

We were all, "Hey, right there is where so-and-so got killed," or "Up that block is where Ryan's parents' live."

(psst...Ryan's parents live only in my mind, and in the pages of a book...)

When you think of Seattle, what comes to mind? Rain? Coffee? Flannel shirts and hiking books? My Seattle has all that, along with really smart people who like to read books and watch movies. There's an ocean, a Sound, islands, two mountain ranges, and a whole bunch of lakes that regularly blow my mind with their beauty. There's a culture of politely independent thinking that some call the Seattle Freeze, but I tend to think of as doing my thing without getting in anyone else's way.

There's a mosque a couple blocks from my house, and there's a country band that rehearses in my basement. (The Fentons...They're awesome.) There's a surprising history of police corruption I learned about in my research for my novel Aqua Follies, and there's a stronger history and tradition of good jazz music that I hope to explore in an upcoming project. Our basketball team was stolen - I still can't watch an NBA game without getting pissed off - and our football team's gonna play for the Super Bowl again this year.

And yeah, you can get some pretty good coffee in this town.

Writing forces me to learn a city in ways I otherwise wouldn't, and on one level, the stories I set in Seattle are more like love letters. This is a cool place, and I want to share bits of it people otherwise wouldn't see.

Go Hawks!
Liv

If you've got a favorite city, or have set a book in your home town, tell us about it in the comments. Or if, you know, you just like coffee...

Cool photo of a not-so-attractive building.

Mardi Gras

This morning I happened to catch a tweet from one of my new Triberr buddies, who said she wanted to eat King cake today. Yep, it's that time of year. Mardi Gras. That means tomorrow is Ash Wednesday. 

When you're Catholic, there are two pertinent questions on Ash Wednesday. When you're with your non-Catholic friends, they find an expression that's equal parts embarrassment and concern as they tap you on the shoulder. "There's something black smudged on your forehead. Did you know that?" Um, yeah I did. It's ashes, and the priest went kinda crazy. I may well be marked like this for a week, but I think I'll live through it.

Then there's the question Catholics ask each other. "What are you giving up for Lent?" Good question, that. What am I giving up for Lent? How 'bout I give up dealing with surly adolescents? Hmm. There might be laws against it, since I gave birth to them. Maybe I could give up the rain. I'd like to. No more rain, or at least a lot less of it. Hmm. I live in Seattle and it's February. Good luck with that one, too. 

Then I could give up dieting. The current incarnation involves avoiding grains - except for the pint of beer I have every Saturday night. It's for the nutrients, you know. If I gave up dieting, at least for today, I could have King cake. You know, that's not such a bad idea. I'll have King cake and beer for supper tonight, and then in the morning I can ponder something that'll be a little more meaningful. 

As crazy as it sounds, Ash Wednesday - and all the other weird little holidays the church comes up with - are really a gift. They help locate me in time, framing the year with traditions that go back centuries. The Gregorian Communion antiphon for Ash Wednesday translates as, "He who meditates day and night on the law of the Lord shall bring forth his fruits in due season." I like the image of bringing forth your fruits when the time is right. And tonight it's time to party. Laissez les bons temps rouler!
Peace,
Liv

Trust

When I was in college, back in 1984 in Honolulu, I wanted to be a writer or a singer.  What I ended up with was a nursing degree.  The loop in my head said, "you can't be a writer or a singer because those activities are too self-indulgent and you need to do something that helps people more."  Therefore, nursing. 

The joke's on me.  Though I have no doubt that along the way I managed to provide at least one human being with the kind of altruistic, self-sacrificial aide that the loop in my head required, that's not what nursing is about for me.  It's a job that's heavy on technology and science, where I get to work every day with really smart people who are willing to take on the challenges presented by fragile preterm infants.  And, though I swear this was never a goal when I started out, I make a pretty nice living doing it.

I thought I was doing what God wanted me to do.  I thought that the loop in my head came from God as it guided my decision-making.  Along the way I kept singing, and now my main gig is as cantor for my church.  See, he's using my gifts, right?  So what do I do now that the loop in my head is telling me to write, and what I want to write are little vampire romances?  It bothers me that there's not much Jesus in those stories.

I'm almost 50, and if there's one thing all these years (25!) of nursing has taught me is how little I know.  I don't know why some babies live and some don't.  I don't know why God is so perfect and man's organized attempts to worship are so....not.  I trust in something bigger than me to sort it all out in the end.  I'm going to do that here, too.  If I open myself up and let the words come (the way I maybe should have done 30 years ago), God will find a way to use them, even though they may not be overtly religious.  I trust.