A feast

I’m back in my Internet Cafe nursing a fresh squeezed orange juice and a toasted bagel with butter and cream cheese.  I tried Skyping Don, but the cafe is way more crowded and noisy today.  Perhaps on account of it being a Saturday.  Practically every table is full and the staff has the music on way louder than on weekdays, so we couldn’t hear each other very well, and after several minutes of “Sorry, what was that?“  “I can’t hear you,“  “What?  What did you say?“  And a few half-hearted attempt at lip reading, we gave up and decided that we would be seeing each other tomorrow anyway when I arrived back home.

I had the best day yesterday, ending up in a grand finale at a little Polish restaurant.  Megan and Lowen joined us and it was so much fun because we were ravenously hungry and so when I suggested that we order five kinds of perogies and Kielbasa and smoked salmon potato pancakes with dill and sour cream and some potato pancakes with sour cream and caviar that we could all share, they enthusiastically agreed that it was a splendid idea.  And the coolest thing of all is when it arrived, along with my wine and their gigantic thick mugs of Polish beer, not only was it delicious, but it was so tasty that our stomachs all agreed that even though we had just ingested a rather large portion of food, none of our bellies were in the remotest full and we needed to order delectable main courses as well.

“More potato pancakes!“ I bellowed.  (Actually, I didn’t really, but I did in my mind.)  I ordered the Hungarian Goulash, which of course were served on top of more delicious fried and delicately spiced potato pancakes and topped with decorative squirts of sour cream.  Yum!  I can’t remember what everybody else’s main course were because I was too busy enjoying mine.

Of course when we’d finished the main courses we were practically groaning.  We only looked at the dessert menus for fun. 

But you know how it is with fun…One thing led to another and before we knew what had happened we not only ordered desserts, but we ATE THEM TOO!  There is nothing like well cooked comfort food to make one feel like all is right with the world. 

We rolled our happy, rotund bellies out of that restaurant and I don’t know about everyone else, but for me, bed was the only viable option.

And tonight I get to witness my brilliant talented daughter read her beautiful poetry.  How lucky am I?  I feel humbled sitting here, basking in the warmth of all my blessings.

Posted by Meg Tilly on Saturday, April 05, 2008 in

Emily, dippin-dots, and Don’s sleepless night

I came back to the B&B in the afternoon with my daughter in tow.  Actually, I was in her tow if one is being precise.  And the bathtub was cleaned and the room remarkably warmer.  It made me wonder if the B&B owner had looked up my blog?  My husband had nightmares all night and called me at 6 AM his time, his voice all scratchy and sleepless.  That’s how I knew how worried he was.  Which is really sweet, but quite unnecessary.

“You have to move,“ he said.  “I couldn’t sleep all night.“

That’s when I realized that perhaps, in my no-wireless-fury, I had overstated all the other small, niggling, and really not a big deal “problems” with the B&B here on my blog.

Tucking into bed last night, I looked around me, thought about my childhood and really I couldn’t have imagined something this fancy and clean growing up.  And I have stayed at relatives and friends houses, with way less to offer.  I think it’s just that when one pays for things, one has certain expectation is all.  I was upset and so all the jarring notes stood out.  The room is very pretty, and now with the tub clean and the room warmer and me having found both breakfast and internet access at a café around 6 blocks away.  I’m totally fine.  Happy even. 

And part of me wishes that the B&B woman hadn’t read my blog and perhaps gotten her feelings hurt, but the practical part, is very happy she did, because I was nice and toasty warm last night.

“Honey,“ I replied to Don, in a soothing sort of way.  “Really, I’m fine.  It’s nice enough here.“  (What a wonderful thing it is to have a partner who has decided to carry the worry.  Now I can be all laize faire, and generous.)  And yes, I know I misspelled that, but there is no Oxford’s at this cafe.

It’s an interesting sensation, visiting Emily here.  Her all grown-up.  Picking me up in her car.  Me being in the passenger seat.  And not only in the literal sense.  She’s taking such thoughtful care of me.  Has researched and made reservations for lunches and dinners and every place we’ve eaten, fantastically good. 

And this morning she called me, as she was heading out the door to her workshop with a visiting poet and then the obligatory luncheon that follows, to tell me that she has located a place that has dippin-dots. 

How sweet is that?  I had mentioned in passing, a while back on the phone, the dippin-dots as something I was planning on doing when I was here because nobody sells dippin-dots in all of B.C. and they didn’t have any all the way up to Bend Oregon, and so I looked it up Online and found that yes, they do sell them here in this little University town that she lives in. 

I was just chatting, you know how mothers do.  Talking about inconsequential stuff, because they don’t want to intrude, budge in too close; breathe up all their children’s space and air.  But Emily, she remembered that I had mentioned it, and she looked it up and made a plan for us to go by a place that sold them this afternoon.  And I can’t tell you how it warmed my heart.  Made me feel loved. 

Sometimes, I feel all bumbly around my grown children.  All fingers and thumbs.  Inadvertently sticking my foot, my mouth in places where it would be best they stayed out of.  Places that seem innocent enough topics, but still, I miss the nuances and get it all wrong. 

It’s hard sometimes, letting go of that totally ridiculous notion if I was a really good mother I would know just how to act, in any circumstance that arose. I would be able to be supportive, but not crippling, loving, but not smothering. 

See, my impulse is to give everything to my kids, emotional, physical, and financial.  But whom would that help?  Who would that giving be for?  Not them.  They don’t want a wishy-washy-bending-over-backwards mother.  How could they respect that?  I have to fight my impulse to make myself small so that I won’t cast an impossible shadow.  They are talented and smart and will find, forge their own way in the world.  In giving too much, I would actually be taking away. 

Posted by Meg Tilly on Friday, April 04, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

Some B&B’s are good and some…

I am very frustrated.  I am at this stupid Bed & Breakfast that is seriously one of the worst Bed & Breakfast I have ever encountered.  And believe me, I’ve encountered a lot of them.

Generally, if I have a choice, I’ll choose the Bed & Breakfast over a hotel/motel any day.  I find it is so much cozier.  I enjoy the chance to people watch.  Find it interesting what people choose to say over breakfast, what they don’t.  Watching the interplay between partners, the unspoken dialogue. 

Also, quite often, you get a much nicer room than at a hotel, with a fireplace, and a cozy seating area etc.  Some of them have an afternoon tea, complete with cookies and little crust-less sandwiches.  Others have complimentary Port and chocolate covered strawberries before you tuck into bed.  Others spoil you with a welcoming wine and cheese tray, or warm chocolate chip cookies fresh out of the oven.

I’m always curious about who chooses to become a Bed and Breakfast owner, and the whys.  My children always tell me I would make a wonderful B&B owner because I am so interested in people, and make delicious breakfasts.  And if I didn’t used to be famous, I could see me being quite happy having a B&B.  Although, I wouldn’t like the extra laundry and the cleaning that would need to be done.  And I don’t think having to let anybody who pays march into my house and demand service would work for me either. 

Although honestly, sometimes Don and I feel like we are running a B&B with the amount of people who come to visit, but at least we have a choice as to whom we are agreeing to do all the extra work for.

But THIS B&B!?  Not good. 

First off, all over the website, “wireless internet in every room.“  NOT.  Last night I thought that it was just because I didn’t have the password.  So I had Don post a comment on my blog for me.  Then, when morning came, I brought my computer down to “breakfast” and asked what I was doing wrong.  The woman, who runs this place became very cagy, got busy fluttering around the kitchen, avoiding my eyes, poking at the pot of lumpy porridge that she had congealing on the stove.  Try this, she said.  Try that.  All the while knowing it was useless, because nothing worked. 

Now, how hard can it be?  You tell me what your wireless name is, you give me your password, I type them in and there you are, wireless. 

Nada. 

And I was planning on bloggin this morning. That is why Emily and I decided to meet up at 11ish.  Grrrrr…

Anyway, now I am sitting on my bed, that didn’t have enough covers last night, so I froze my ass off, thank you very much, typing on Microsoft word and hoping that I will be able to cut and paste this onto my site when I get to a wireless Internet café or something. 

Someone’s calling me.  Be right back.

Ha!  The truth is out.  The B&B lady (I know her name, I’m just not using it, because although she is inept, there is something kind of lost and sweet about her as well) just yelled up the stairs that she was sorry that I was having difficulty getting Online. 

I felt hope spring into my chest.  Maybe I was wrong.  Maybe it was just a weird glitch that occurred and I just needed to be more diligent. “Oh,“ I said scrambling to my feet.  “Maybe I should try again.  Am I the only guest who has had difficulty getting Online?“

There was a pause.  “What?“ she said.

“Am I the only guest you’ve had who hasn’t been able to attach to your wireless?“

Another long pause.  “I don’t know,“ she said. 

The hope that was flickering in my chest is doused.

“Oh,“ I said.

“What I meant was, if you like, you can come downstairs and use my computer.“  Which is nice of her to offer.  Well meaning, but the thing is, how am I supposed to get in that private space that is required to blog truthfully, in someone else’s space, on their computer?  It’s not like it would be an impersonal library computer or something.

“But I have a computer,“ I lugged the damned thing through a zillion airports yesterday, because her website said they had wireless.  It was one of the highlighted advertising points.  “So if you would just give me the…“ I paused.  “Your computer, it’s working on wireless right?“

“No…no…it’s on a land line.“

Now, I’m not happy to hear this, but at least it clears up a few things.  Like why she was acting so weird when I brought my computer down to the “breakfast” this morning, and was trying to get the access name and the password from her.

Sheesh.  Just tell me that you’ve had to cut back on expenses and don’t have wireless anymore, right from the beginning and save me all this bother.  Me struggling, last night, before breakfast, after breakfast, trying to get Online.  What a waste of time.

Okay, now I shall move onto the “breakfast.“  One of the things I love about B & B’s is all the niceties.  The ritual, the pretty settings, the themes, the matching plates, the centerpieces, the carefully prepared food.  I love seeing what kind of things other people come up with for breakfast.  The pampering.  Somebody serving me a lovely breakfast for a change, it’s a nice treat to have it done for me, since I have spent a lifetime doing it for others.

Well, at this B & B you can kiss that good-bye.  I felt rather sorry for the other two guests that stumbled downstairs this morning in their robes, looking sleepy-eyed and hungry. 

There was no beautifully laid table.  There were three plates stuck on a counter in a very crowded, messy kitchen.  It was a help-yourself kind of deal.  Water boiling in a pot on the stove if you want to make yourself some tea.  Gross looking porridge in a pot, and some fresh pineapple diced and sprinkled on the top of a fruit salad that had definitely been hanging around the fridge for a few days, everything brown.  Eww.  I took a little bowl of fruit salad and plucked the pineapple bits out. 

Oh!  Not to mention, when everyone was assembled in the kitchen, she waved her hands in the direction of the messy counter and said, “Help yourself.  I’m trying to be as much hands off as possible because I think I’m coming down with a nasty cold.“  Accompanied by a great throat clearing and snuffing.  Great.

So that explains why we are expected to root around her kitchen assembling our own breakfast.  Except for, I have a feeling that this is her standard stock-and-trade.  Just like the “wireless”.

Oh and here’s another thing, there are no washcloths in the bathroom, and the little bottles of shampoo and whatever…are half used.  It’s like she knows sort of what a B&B is supposed to be, but there is no follow through. 

It was quite funny when I got here.  The taxi driver from Somalia was worried about leaving.  “Are you sure this is the place?“ he’d asked.  I guess because of all the clutter on the porch.  “Are you going to be okay?“  “I’m fine,“ I’d said breezily, because the name of the place was posted right on the wall. 

“I’ll wait,“ he said.  “To make sure.“ Because I’d knocked a few times and no one was coming to the door.  I knocked again.  Nobody.  I tried the door.  It swung open.  Oh God.  I thought, this is not good, but I plastered a smile on my face, waved over my shoulder to the taxi driver and plunged inside. 

The odd sort of smell was what hit me first.  “Hello,“ I called out.  “Hello?“ 

A frowsy haired woman came lurching around the corner and approached me in a sort of shuffling sideways gait.  And that was my introduction to the _______ _______ Bed and Breakfast.  Yeeouwza.

***

Okay, so I finished my B&B rant to you, and still I had a half an hour until my daughter calls, so I thought, fine, I’ll take a little catnap.  The room is freezing cold, even though I have on my thick socks and am wearing corduroy pants, a long sleeved shirt and the green cashmere zip-up sweater that Jenny gave me.  STILL I’m cold, so I tuck myself into bed, with all my clothes on and shut my eyes.  And it is like a comedy movie or something, because no sooner do my eyes shut when the B&B lady decides to put on some music.

Not soothing-okay-to-snooze-by music.  No.  Of course not.  Her taste is in pounding pianos and shrieking violins.  Loud, passionate, dark music, like a storm of discord, roaring up the stairs. 

A catnap…impossible.

And to be fair, the room is quite nice, tasteful colors, pretty pastoral pastel drawings on the wall, nicely framed.  A mix of old and new furniture.  The sheets, thank god, were clean.  The B&B is centrally located.

But, I don’t know, I’m here visiting my daughter until Sunday, and I am seriously thinking about moving.  I’ve never done this before, and I’ll have to pay for the whole stay anyway, because there is a 7-day cancellation policy, and I don’t want to hurt her feelings, because she can’t help that she is no good at this.  But I really might have to. 

***

Okay, that does it.  I just looked into the bathtub.  The enamel is all chipped and there are some curly pubic hairs interspersed with a couple of longer head hairs clinging to the bottom and sides of the tub.  Gross!  That does it.  I’m going to have to try and find someplace else. 

A place with Internet and clean tubs.  It’s too bad, because there is something quite endearing about this rather odd woman.  I enjoy her.  Even though we don’t talk much.  She sparks my imagination.  I imagine she is enormously intelligent.  That she would be a fascinating friend, once you wiggled past the layers of other.  An unconventional, interesting friend, that might appear tucked into the pages of one of my books some day.  A good B&B owner.  Never!  Perhaps I should stay and just avoid her cold, the breakfast, wear lots of layers to bed and walk the six blocks required to get to this Internet cafe.  (Which I am, at present, enjoying a cup of hot steamed milk and a delicious gingersnap cookie.)  Because this B&B certainly hasn’t been boring. 

Well, my dear bloggers, I’ll keep you posted as to what I finally decide to do.  I’d better post this now as my daughter will be picking me up any minute now.  xo

Posted by Meg Tilly on Thursday, April 03, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

Hello, Don Here

Meg was flying all day and has asked me to write.  She just got back from having dinner with her daughter and can’t get the wireless internet to work where she is staying.  So here I am, letting you know that she will get it all straightened out tomorrow and write a nice long, chatty blog then.

Posted by Meg Tilly on Wednesday, April 02, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

I don’t know what this blog is about

I had the best intentions in the world today.  I was going to stick on the healthy track that I’d gotten myself back on.  Avoid candy, eat nutritious foods, exercise.  Hmmm…Well, I did exercise, so that’s something.  And I did eat nutritious food, but I also ate rather a lot of food that wouldn’t fall into the nutritious category.  And the candy situation?  Well, that good intention went to hell in a hand-basket.

What does that mean?  Hell in a hand-basket?  It makes me feel quite daring and cocky to say it, but what does it actually mean.  What is a “hand-basket”?  And why would a hand-basket go to hell? 

I’m going to look hand-basket up in the dictionary.  Be right back.

Okay, there is no “hand-basket” in the dictionary.  I wonder if the phrase is “Hell in a hand bag?“  I know what a hand bag is.  Everybody does.  It’s a lady’s purse.  But if the phrase is “Hell in a hand-bag,“ that makes no more sense than “Hell in a hand-basket.“ 

Well, maybe it makes a little more sense, because according to Webster’s Concise Dictionary there is no such thing as a “hand-basket.“  Although, what, pray tell are those baskets that the bunny leaves lying around the house on Easter morning.  Yes, they could be called Easter baskets…BUT they also could be called hand-baskets.  One does, after all, hold them in one’s hand.

I’m going to look the word “hand-basket” up in Oxford’s Dictionary of English.  It is, in my opinion a much more reliable dictionary.  Many times I find words in Oxford’s that the Webster’s doesn’t acknowledge.  (I use Webster’s more often though, because Oxford’s is so much thicker and has ever so many options to wade through.)

Be right back.

Humph…I was all prepared to return triumphant, to tell you that Oxford’s does indeed recognise the word “hand-basket.“  And they did have a lot more hand-whatevers than Webster’s did, but apparently the good folks at Oxford’s have not yet heard of a hand-basket either.  Oh well.  Sigh.

I have no idea what I was going to blog about.  I’m going to scroll back and check.

Scrolled back and I still have no idea what I was planning on blogging about.  That’s a little disconcerting.  Generally when I go off topic, all I need is a little prompt to get me back on track.  Hmmm…I guess I better go have another one of those unhealthy forbidden chocolates.  It’s not my fault that I’m eating them really.  My husband saved the box of candy that I received from Three River Schools.  I can’t just let it molder (is that a word?) on the counter can I? 

Posted by Meg Tilly on Monday, March 31, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

I’m baaaack…

Hello Bloggers,

I’m back.  Rested and rejuvenated.  Well, actually, as I wrote that, I realized that I’m not giving a totally accurate picture.  I am rested and rejuvenated, I also am wearing two robes, have the heat cranked up to 78, my hair is soaking wet, and my hands are thick-fingered and are moving slowly and hitting a lot of wrong keys because the cold is still deep into the core of them.

It was a gentle misty rain when we started the five mile hike, but then the skies opened up and soaked us through and through. 

Hold on, I’m going to pour myself another cup of hot tea.  Be right back.

Ah…that’s better.  A nice cup of green tea with a half a teaspoon of sugar.

I’m really cold, but I’m glad I went on the hike as well.  Walking up the mountain with Jenny, talking about life, childhood, our perceptions of ourselves, the rain picking up momentum.  Having to clear off my glasses so I could see the path.  Walking in the rain is not something I would ever think to do.  Like, Yay, it’s raining, lets go for a nice hike.  But the thing is, once you’re wet, you don’t have to worry about getting wet anymore.  Shoulders scrunched up and tucked in, like that will stop the rain from landing on you. 

Have you ever noticed how people do that when it rains?  I catch myself doing it all the time.

But today, when we were hiking in the rain, it was lovely in an odd sort of way.  Sloshing our way up the mountain.  I certainly didn’t have to worry about being jumped by a hot flash.  I would have welcomed one!

And now, I can hear Jenny banging around in her room packing, and it is a comforting feeling, like when we were kids, knowing she’s in the room right next to me.

I’m going to do a little bit in one of those improv movies she does now and then.  She asked me if I would play her sister and I said yes.  It’s odd really.  I have no desire to “act”  but when she asked me if I would do it, I remembered when I first came to LA and we took this Acting for The Camera workshop.  I can’t remember what it was called, but it was in the Valley, and we drove to it wearing the fancy Esprit, clothes that our little sister Becky had brought us from the Esprit Factory that she worked at in San Francisco.  Becky could buy things at an enormous discount and believe me, she did.  She’d save up all her paychecks to splurge on us. 

And Becky would arrive in our tiny apartment with the Murphy bed that fell out of a closet into the middle of the living room that was on Normandie Ave right off Hollywood Blvd, with a huge shiny black garbage bag hoisted over her shoulder.  “HO…HO…HO!“  She’d bellow in a huge voice, like she was Santa Claus.  While she stomped around our minuscule apartment in exaggerated big man steps, a huge grin on her face.  “HO…HO…HO!“  And then when we were almost dizzy with excitement Becky turned that enormous garbage bag upside down, holding it up high, over her head so that all the beautiful, brand new, gorgeous, fashionable Esprit clothes would rain down onto the floor, in every colour under the sun.  And then the excited squeals and shrieks would start and the ohhing and ahhing, Becky standing there, so proud. 

We were certain that we were the luckiest, best dressed girls in the whole of Hollywood. 

So, when Jenny asked me if I would do this film with her, my heart said yes.  Because we had so much fun, acting together in that Film Actors Workshop.  I remember one scene in particular, where we played sisters and were supposed to enter this room, and I can’t remember much about it, except that Jenny had a real good idea, and we did it and it was really funny.  I remember us slinking up to this guy. I don’t remember his name.  Jenny says she ran into him around 10 years ago, John Leveit?  Levin?  Something like that, and he works for ? Saturday Night Live, maybe?  Anyway, he still remembers doing that scene with us.  All of us with stars in our eyes, all of us succeeding.  Odd huh?

I find it really interesting.  Always on my book tours, the question comes up, “Will you ever go back to acting?“  “Would you consider returning?“  And I always say, “Nah.“  And I meant it too.  The only way I could ever foresee doing anything of that sort was if it would help my boy Will get his start.  Then I would.  But I never considered, the Jenny angle.  It never entered my mind. 

How perfect is that?  I took my first acting classes with Jenny and now I’ll finish up, playing her sister, just like the first thing we ever did.  And the good thing is, no pressure.  It’s a little tiny film that nobody will ever see, that all these actors do because apparently, working this way is so much fun.  This will be Jenny’s 3rd or 4th movie with this director.  They shoot the whole thing in three weeks.  A hiccup in regular movie making time.  Two weeks when Will in school, which Will’s dad is stepping in for, so that is wonderful, there will be no interruption of Will’s routine and so Don can come with me because he’s never been to France.  And then we shoot one week in the summer months. 

Which reminds me, my boy, David, has been asked to manage his department because his manager is going away on a trip.  Congratulations Dave!  Wow!  We’re so proud of you.  I have to remember to change the family vacation that we’d planned for that week when I get back.  (Rog and Jim, be expecting an email from me in the next few days to see if it can be done? xo)

Posted by Meg Tilly on Sunday, March 30, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

a breathing break

My dear bloggers,

I’ve decided I need to take a week for myself.  It has been such an exciting and busy and wonderful time and I have been enjoying myself immensely, but I think I need to step back for a breath, sit still, with no expectations.  I’m going to try to go for a week without blogging, without trying to wrestle my manuscripts into some kind of form.  I’m going to eat slowly, taste my food, take in the world around me, get back on the exercising wagon, and try to remember to breathe all the way down to the bottom of my lungs.

I’m interested to see if I can do it.  Go a whole week.  We’ll see.  Last time I was going to take a day off, I wrote three times.  But I am determined to give it a go.

Anyway, before I sign off, I want to thank all of the people who came to my reading Saturday night.  I still see many of your faces, the tidbits of life you shared, our laughter and conversation, they were with my last night as I drifted off to sleep and they are with me still.

And now, for my week of solitude.  One week and then I dive back in. 

Much love, Meg xo

Posted by Meg Tilly on Sunday, March 23, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

hello

Don is working on the edit of his book this morning and I just woke up from a lovely little cat nap.  Ah.  Then I ate a tasty chocolate from my box of handmade Goody’s chocolates that the Three Rivers School gave me.  And now I am blogging to you. 

After Don finishes his work, we are planning to go on another hike.  Deon gave us a guidebook “Bend, Overall”  and it is hard to choose which place to go to.  Another interesting (and rather surprising) thing about this guidebook is I would say around 1 in 10 of the photos have a naked person in them.  Which is always a good way to keep the reader from zoning out too much.  La…la…la… Here I am reading my guidebook, what shall we go to see…Gack!  A naked person.  Did I really just see that?  Or are my eyes making it up?  Nope.  Naked.  Hmmm…I wonder if there are more naked pictures?  Yup.  Cool.  I like Bend Oregon.

Oops, Don’s just finished his editing and is ready to go.  Bye everybody.  I’ll write a little bit more later.

Posted by Meg Tilly on Saturday, March 22, 2008 in

Sunriver

We were sitting at the B & B breakfast table when we happened to glance up and notice that it had SNOWED during the night.  Everything was covered in around an inch of snow.  Beautiful.  Impossible.  True. 

We ate, then I scraped all the ice and snow off the front windshield with my B.C. Care Card while Don worked on the sides and back of the car with his Visa.  Who would have thought we would have needed an ice scraper in the end of March?  It was kind of exciting, felt like we had been plopped down in the middle of an adventure. 

There was a lot of black ice on the road and we had to drive very carefully and when we arrived at the KBEND radio station, we had to shuffle-walk our feet so we wouldn’t fly up in the air and land on our derrieres.  I enjoyed talking with Kathy, we had a few interesting parallels, career-wise and there are somethings that someone else can only understand if they’ve been through it as well. 

Then it was off to bump around Sunriver for a while until it was time to meet Deon and Rich at Sunriver Books and Music.  We walked around the Village and it was really fun when we passed the bookstore, because right in the window was a huge display of pink Porcupines!  I wished it wouldn’t look egotistical to just stand there gazing at this exuberant display, but it would have, so I walked slowly by savoring it, out of the corner of my eyes. 

At 12:15 we finally entered the store and were greeted with enthusiastic smiles, and it’s odd, because suddenly I got really shy and tongue-tied, for no reason.  Couldn’t seem to do anything but smile inanely and nod my head.  I hoped Deon didn’t notice. 

I think what it was, was she had been so kind at The Pacific Booksellers Conference.  Rescuing me when I arrived at my first round-robin table at the same time as the first course did.  These booksellers had been on their feet working hard all day and I imagine they were hungry.  So when my butt hit the chair, the salad hit the table and I thought to myself, if I were them, what would I want to do, listen to an author babble about how great their book is, while I am starving to death?  Or eat? 

Well, I know what would have been my preference.  So, instead of wowing the table with how great and wonderful Porcupine was, I said, “Please, eat, don’t mind me.“  (I can hear my publisher groaning)  But Deon, she was an angel.  She took me under her wing, even though she doesn’t even handle children’s lit.  We had a great chat.  I liked her enormously, and talking to her, gave me courage to face the rest of the tables that I was bounced to for each course, because I thought to myself, certainly there will be at least one person who might not mind me sitting with them.  And so after that first table, everything changed, and I felt way more comfortable because of Deon’s generosity. 

So, when she asked me to come to Sunriver, of course I said yes, even though it meant 11 hours on the road.  And let me tell you, it was totally worth it.

All of you authors out there…if you are lucky enough to have Deon and Rich ask you to read at Sunriver Books, GO!  They sent out notices, she set up a radio interview, a newspaper interview, she wrote a lovely article for another one of the local papers, she steered Don and me toward a lovely walk that meandered by a river and it was so magical, with the mellow afternoon sun slanting across the tops of the trees, glinting off the field of snow.  We saw geese and ducks and a beaver swimming, and then boomp, he turn bottom up and disappeared.  It was very peaceful and romantic, and afterwards we went to South Bend Bistro (another Deon suggestion) and enjoyed a delicious dinner. 

Yes, my fellow authors and book buyers.  You need to know that Deon and Rich have a lovely bookstore and if you go there, you will want to come back again, and again, and again.

And Three Rivers School, oh-my-goodness!  There were posters, there was an author biography.  When we first walked in we were greeted by a smiling face, we signed in and (darn, I forget the name, but you know who you are) who said she’d been reading some of my hot flashes, excerpts from my blog and she said to herself, I like that woman.  And her telling me that made me feel so welcome and warm.  And the kids!  Such enthusiasm, such interesting questions, what fun we had.  I couldn’t believe how fast time flew.  I love that school.  I wish I’d know it was pajamas day, because it would have been so much fun to wear my goofy looking ones.  However, the school gifted me with a hat, in Porcupine pink, and since it was hat day as well, I plopped that hat on my head and felt right at home.  I love the Goody’s box of chocolate and I am embarrassed to say that already one-third of the top layer has been devoured. 

Thank you everybody for making me feel so special.  You were great!  Much love, Meg

Posted by Meg Tilly on Friday, March 21, 2008 in

road trip

I woke up at 4 with the usual.  What is it about a hot flash that makes sleep impossible.  It’s like the heat pours adrenalin through my body or something and my mind starts spinning on a million different things, and trying to hang onto my sleep wave just doesn’t cut it. 

By now though, after a few years of this, off and on, I’m much more accepting about the whole thing.  Don’t worry it into the ground.  I lie there for 45 minutes to an hour and if sleep doesn’t come then I get up and go downstairs and catch up on my Dow Theory Letters, or John Mauldin’s newsletter, or Postcard from Cape Town.  Or I write a few emails or, like this morning, made some more of my very delicious Oatmeal cookies. 

Because, how I figure it is, Oatmeal cookies are a healthy(ish) snack, what with the raisins and whole oats, and egg, and etc (I’m not going to mention the…ahem…sugar.) 

Anyway, it might seem strange to be up, rattling about the kitchen whipping up a batch of Oatmeal cookies, when it’s still pitch black outside and the whole city is deep in their sleep, but it made sense to me, so I guess that’s all that matters.

It was a good thing too, because Don and I were really glad to munch on them in the Customs line-up at the border, careening down rain-slicked roads, braving snow and hail. 

Such beauty we saw.  I’ve never driven over Mount Hood before.  Luckily for us the roads were cleared.  There is something so magical about all that snow, piled up, higher than the roof of the car, the trees ladened with winter white.  Huge beautiful stands of trees.  It reminded me of my childhood.  The world has changed so much in my lifetime that sometimes I just have to catch my breath.

We experienced hard pelting rain that would last for one minute and then be gone.  Misting light sprinkles, gentle soothing, continuous grey rain.  We had snow and sleet and hail pounding down, we had sunshine, and at the start of the drive, the black sheet of night, with the large moon, half-hid behind, turbulent clouds.  And then gradually, the darkness gave way to uncertain light, that grew cautiously stronger, but didn’t have that hot sexy boldness of hot summer mornings.

And as we were driving over Mount Hood, I marveled that just a few hours drive away, these tiny purple flowers at the base of the tree by the kitchen just opened their tight green bud filling my heart with the song of Spring.  Little delicate white ones, with dainty shy heads, by the gate.  Making me need to sit still for a moment and breath in deep.

And now we are here.  In Bend.  And tomorrow I will go to KBend radio in the morning, talk with Kathy, then on to Sunriver Books and Music to meet up with Deon and off to Three Rivers School we go.  I’m so happy she invited me.  What a wonderful day.

Posted by Meg Tilly on Thursday, March 20, 2008 in

a bit of this and that

Gold was in a free fall today, down around $58.  And is down another $14.50 in the after market.  Weird because the stock market was down 293 points.  I’ve found that these two markets generally don’t fall hand in hand.  Interesting. 

We’re off on our road trip tomorrow.  I love road trips, watching the topography change, eating penny candy, playing music, singing along sometimes other times not.  Driving through all kinds of light and shadow and cities and forests, farm land and tiny towns where sometimes one lucks out and finds a diner that serves kick-ass pie.  Stopping at rest stops, for the obvious reasons, but also to dance around to stretch out the legs and try to get the feeling back into the butt.  I have wonderful road trip memories of my children and me, with our old dog Sarah, her head stuck out the window so her floppy lips would fill up with air and flap around like a blown up balloon tossed on the floor with out being tied. 

(Em and Dave, remember the ducklings? That was something huh?  And “Butt Ville”?  Memories of your little faces and hands smeared with sweet ripe dusty blackberries, plucked from hot sunny roadsides.  Miss you.  xo.  Love you too Will.  Hope you are having a wonderful time on your trip.)

We are off, 5:30 in the morning.  And the rainbow at the end of the drive?  Three Rivers School, and Sunriver Books and Music store, where Deon has done such an amazing and caring job of setting everything up.  I feel so lucky.

Speaking of lucky…remember that good news I got that I wasn’t supposed to share until this week?  Well, Porcupine got Shortlisted for the Canadian Libraries Association’s Best Children’s Book 2008! Eeee…

Hi.  I’m back.  I just had to stop typing so I could hug myself.  So excited.  I really couldn’t believe it when I heard the wonderful news.  I don’t know why I am having all this good luck, but let me tell you, I am SO happy and grateful, and I know that life isn’t normally this charmed, but BOY am I enjoying this patch of warm, heart-filling sunshine!

Posted by Meg Tilly on Wednesday, March 19, 2008 in

A Northern Conference afternote.  Hmm…is afternote one word or two? Maybe it’s hypenated?

Ha!  I just looked “afternote” up in the dictionary and apparently it’s not a word at all.  Tra…la!  Yes, I am a literary sort.  Just call me Meg-the-wordsmith.

Anyway, on to the serious task of blogging.  On the CWILL listserve this morning, Kirsti Walkelin (kirstiwakelin.com) had posted a link to (oh, god, some kind of technical blog site, which I could go back to and look up the name of, but it seems like a big hassle, so I’m not going to.)  Anyway, I was curious, so I clicked on the link.  Then I punched in my website name and was surprised to see that there were all these links to my site. 

It was an odd sort of hot and cold and dropping stomach feeling.  I don’t know why, I mean I know some of my more dedicated family & friends read this blog and I know I get, what I think are a lot of daily hits.  But I had no idea that other blogs blog about me. 

Which when you think about it was pretty naive.  I blog about everything under the sun, why shouldn’t everyone else? 

I didn’t read the blogs, because I was scared.  I only clicked on one.  I guess that’s one of the reasons why I don’t have a comments section on my website.  The first blog I ever read was Rosie.com.  I started reading it after she had been so kind to me on the View when I was first coming out publicly with the truth about my life.  I kept the words she’d said to me after we finished taping, tucked into a pocket in my heart and took them out and held them close to me when the fear about what I was doing threatened to overwhelm me on Book Tour.  And I looked up her site and started reading her Blog because it made me feel like I had a friend on the road when I was traveling from city to city, many times by myself.

And although her blog became like a touching stone, I was shocked to read the nasty, cruel comments that people would send her.  It made my heart feel so heavy.  Like, yeah, Rosie might sometimes come off as loud and noisy and to some people perhaps brash and obnoxious, but that is because they aren’t looking close enough.  Anyone with a little common sense can see the soft vulnerability that this cover has been developed to protect.  Anyone who has access to a computer can, with a click of a button, access ALL the good she has done, funds she has contributed, to and for the world.  If these people would just look at the actions, the deeds, they wouldn’t be able to help but see what a wide open generous, caring heart she has. 

It horrified me to see the things people would write.  So when I was working with Susie Gardner and Travis Smith (and Matt of course I just didn’t sit in a room with him)  and they said you have to have a place where people can leave Comments.  I said “no way.“ 

Hmm…where was this blog going?  I forgot.  That is one of the joys of menopause.  Let me scroll back and see.

Okay, I’m back now.  I’ll just wrap this up quickly and then write about what I was going to write about.

The other reason I decided not to have a Comments section is because I was a guest blogger on The Debutantes Ball (an author site)  And although everyone was lovely, keeping up with the comments and questions asked took ALL day.  It seemed like the minute I answered one question there were three more to be answered.  I didn’t get any work done on my manuscript.  And I thought to myself, on one hand, the people who wrote in were really nice and their questions were thought provoking and they were all so kind…on the other hand, I am already spending WAY too much time blogging.  If I add a Comments section I will never carve out enough time in my day to actually write another book.

So that is why there is no Comments section on this site.

NOW back to what I first started to blog about.  I clicked on one of the posts about The Northern Voices Conference, and oh-my-goodness!  Nancy White, you have absolutely NOTHING to apologize for.  (She was the Stop blogging and Start Drawing presenter, when I had my unexpected mini-melt down.)  She gave a wonderful presentation, she gave us chocolate.  Good chocolate.  She was smart and funny. 

Nancy, if you are reading this, you did not abuse me in anyway.  Your drawing exercise unexpectedly touched on a memory, a wound that I didn’t even know I was carrying anymore.  I cannot have you carrying this in any way.  If anything, it shows that your drawing stuff idea, really works and it is a great way to get in touch with what is hidden from ones conscious mind.  As well as all the great things that it seems to do for people.  Everyone seemed to really be having a great time, laughing and joking and sharing pictures. 

Please don’t carry my hurt in your heart.  It doesn’t belong there.  And in acknowledging it, hopefully, I release it as well.  It is not for either one of us to carry.  It’s a memory is all.  And if it should settle anywhere it should rest in the laps of people who do not protect and abuse small children.

Much love, Meg

Posted by Meg Tilly on Tuesday, March 18, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

Writing through the hot flash, because sleep is impossible.

I woke up at four-fifteen with another hot flash.  I threw off the covers, leaving only the sheet, but even that was too much, so off it went.  I find it hard to believe that this was the very room that I was shivering in last night.  Leaping in between the cold sheets, squeaking slightly, and needing to wiggle around to try to warm them quicker, the down comforter pulled up around my ears and discreetly tucked under the tops of my shoulders, so that when Don got in bed, the covers wouldn’t fly up and waft fresh cold air under to assault my goose-bumped body. 

It’s amazing to me the extremes in temperature that my body is experimenting with.  All these changes.  It’s like all of a sudden my body realized that it had been sleeping on the job.  Forty-eight year old women weren’t supposed to look like this (that’s my body speaking), and so it’s been working overtime to catch up. 

First off, the skin quality is all wrong, we have to do something about that.  Boom, a multitude of tiny creases and lines.  Not just on my face, but the back of my hands, my forearms, and probably everywhere else, but I generally don’t wear my glasses when those other parts are exposed, so I can be blissfully unaware. 

Hmm…and that sprinkling of grey?  That will never do.  Women who have been blessed enough to reach the advanced age of forty-eight have way more grey hair than that.  How shall we deal with that?  I know, give her a crisis.  Voila, the friend situation in November.  Poof!  My face is framed in grey.  So much so, that I get surprised, startled when I walk past a mirror.  It’s like it’s me, but it isn’t.  It’s a combination person looking back at me.  I have to look closely to pick me out from the bone structure, the falling jowls, the age spots that have been gracing my face, I have to push all these memories of my mother and grandmother aside that are peering back at me from the mirror, to find the Meg that I know, inside.

And yes, I am aware of the beauty and the miracle of a nice well chosen bottle of hair dye, but my reasons for not dying my hair are two-fold.  First off, because my base hair color is a dark brown, if I started dying it, I’d have to keep dying it, because otherwise my roots would get that two-toned look of an old sweater.  And that would mean I’d have to visit a beauty parlor every three weeks or so to keep it looking decent.  Which is not something I would get around to doing.  It’s hard enough for me to drag myself to get my hair cut every 4-6 months, I can’t even imagine carving out the time to go every three weeks. 

The second reason I’ve chosen not to dye my hair is because, even though my vanity is screaming out, “Dye it!  For god-sakes, dye it! You’ll look ever so much younger.“  Is that I worry that if I start down the path of trying to erase the years from my life, my body, (which is a loosing battle, because if we are one of the lucky ones, we’ll get old, and then older, and then die.)  Then I won’t be aware of time passing.  It feels like it would be sort of like squeezing my eyes shut so that the Boogie-man won’t be there anymore.  Well I tried that as a kid and as an adult, and guess what, they didn’t go away.  They were still there and did whatever they d_____ well pleased.  So, they didn’t go away, just because I shut my eyes and temporarily erased them.

How I see it is that aging is a blessing.  Many people don’t get the privilege to watch themselves get older, see their children grown and on their own.  Several people I’ve loved have passed when they were around my age, but their children were younger than mine.  My friend, Pat.  She never got to see her daughter grown.

So, here’s the deal.  We each are given a finite amount of days on this planet.  We don’t know how many.  We don’t know when our time will come.  And so, me keeping, not erasing the badges of honor that I have won, earned through worries and loving and tired out caring, and experiencing all the joys and passions and disappointments that are present in everyones life.  For me, even though, sure I like to look “pretty” as much as the next person, I am trying to re-educate myself as to what “pretty” is. 

I am a woman who is aging, and I don’t want to forget that days are passing.  I want to experience all of what life has to offer and wear the proof proudly on my body and face.  This is what a forty-eight year old woman looks like.  And if I am blessed enough to reach my eighties, you’ll see what that looks like as well.

Posted by Meg Tilly on Sunday, March 16, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

an empty house

We got back last night.  Too late to pick up the dogs, so we’ll do it this morning.  It was nice to see Gerry, Dave.

The house feels so empty.  Huge, hollow spaces that seem cavernous and my inside light tucked in and contained around me.  Like I have to walk small and careful so I don’t make waves in all the stillness.  Will is away, the dogs too, Don upstairs sleeping.  Just me, poking at my keyboard, trying not take up too much room.  What an odd feeling.

Posted by Meg Tilly on Saturday, March 15, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

it’s me again

Oh my goodness.  I just got some very, very, VERY exciting news!  I’m not allowed to say anything until next week, but let me tell you this…I’m THRILLED!!  I can’t stop smiling. 

I should decide not to blog for a day more often.

Posted by Meg Tilly on Thursday, March 13, 2008 in Chewing the Fat

Page 24 of 37 pages « First  <  22 23 24 25 26 >  Last »