Everyone's a critic

Wow. This past weekend, I got the first two reviews of my book, "The Lyncher in Me." What a strange experience, to read what complete, unbiased critics think of one's work. I have to keep in mind that these reviewers read a ton of books, they don't have to write a full article on my book, and the fact that they chose to--and had so many complimentary things to say ("hauntingly beautiful", "riveting", "unflinching") is quite amazing. Even those few areas in which one writer was more critical were okay. It took me some time to be settled with it, but I understand it's one person's opinion, and one person might value what another person finds unnecessary. It's good. Really! And the great thing is, the review is all over the country, so I can't argue with that.

Back on the homefront: We're mired in a kitchen remodel, in limbo. Our carpenter was gone for a week on vacation, leaving us with a sink and a stove and not much else. I keep thinking back to an older "Amazing Race" episode in which the contestants were to put together a desk from Ikea. After a dozen cabinets, I could do it blindfolded, drunk on a shrimp boat during a hurricane.

Warming up to the Cold

It seems like I can't get warm lately. We're beginning a remodel of our kitchen; the work's been going on endlessly and we've not even started the kitchen, yet. The mudroom is now (almost) the pantry, a door removed and outside leading doors nearly all glass. Maybe it's psychological, but with the open space I feel constantly chilled. My sons huddle up to the wood burning stove (in their thin shortsleeves as I nag them to put on sweaters) and I find myself jamming log after log into the stove's open mouth.

In our living room is a mountain of Ikea boxes, kitchen cabinets waiting for me to piece together. I imagine that hell might be like that. I think that if there is such a place, the cruelest punishment will be an eternity doing that very thing that in life caused you to break out in a sweat and become anxious, snapping at loved ones and strangers equally. For me, it would be sorting dozens of boxes by code, unwrapping and trying to find a place for the sheets of styrofoam (and feeling horribly guilty about the waste), crawling around on my hands and knees as tiny metal fasteners dig themselves into my kneecaps, being buried under giant rectangles of discarded cardboard.

My son caught me in the walkway at school today, proudly showing me a tower of river rock he'd made in the garden bed. Someone had dropped off a large pile of smooth, gray stones and several students had taken to making a zen garden of sorts from them. I'll miss that in another year, seeing my son each day, his beaming face as he moves from classroom to classroom, his joyful play on the big toy as he calls out to me by my teacher name. I hope he remembers those moments when he's my age and that when he does, he smiles.