“Please can you sign my book?”

I'm having a book launch at

The Reading Shop, The Parade, Oadby, Leicester 

at 11 am on 16^th April.

The books are in

 A Children’s History of Leicester  ISBN: 978-1849931496

And they've put some of my Bathtime Rap books in the window display too

All we need now are some visitors to make my book launch a really fun morning... or is it? My pen is feeling nervous. It’s watched other authors signing books, their pens moving with a flash and a flourish and the signing is done. So why can’t my pen do the same? It seems to get tongue-tied (nib-tied?). It has no trouble when I write a manuscript. It works perfectly well when producing a covering letter. It even enjoys signing the contract but it has never managed to grasp the art of book signing.

So if you come along to the book launch (and I do hope you will) don’t forget, when you’re ready to have your book signed, to please go easy on my pen. It may be feeling just a little nervous.

    

What if...

What if I’d made different choices when I was younger? Where would I be? What would I be doing now? I don't think I'm alone with such thoughts. Robert Frost wrote about two roads diverging in a wood in The Road Not Taken. He took the one ‘less travelled by’.

I marked the first for another day.

Yet knowing how way leads on to way

I doubted if I should ever come back.

But what if he’d taken the first path instead? We’ll never know.

The song Crossroads, sung by Don Mclean, has a different take on this idea.

...there's no need for turning back

`cause all roads lead to where we stand...

The song implies that it doesn’t really matter what choices we make, life ends up pretty much the same anyway. We'll never know if that’s true either and it reminds me of the storyline for Gwyneth Paltrow in the film, Sliding Doors, but of course that’s a film. This is real life.

I often think ‘what if’. What if I’d never joined Val Moore’s creative writing class at Writing School Leicester? I’d still be teaching. I was never happy as a teacher but wasn’t sure what else I wanted to do. Creative writing was the answer but what if I’d never discovered that?

Then there’s the time I posted off a manuscript called Bathtime Rap. I almost didn’t bother. I’d received a few rejections that month and in my notebook I wrote, ‘posted off picture book ms to Franklin Watts today. What a waste of time!’ But it wasn’t a waste of time because it was accepted and became my first children’s picture book. What if I’d never sent it?

There’s a fine line between ‘what if’ and ‘if only’. When I was a teenager I was seriously thinking of moving to Israel when I met the man who became my first husband. I abandoned the plans and I often think ‘what if I’d gone?’ But I’d never, ever think ‘if only’ because then I wouldn’t have my two wonderful children.

There's no harm in the occasional 'what if' thoughts and I'm sure I'm not the only person who thinks 'what if'... am I?

Rod update: Thank you so much for all your kind wishes. Rod went back into hospital last Thursday with a high temperature, shortness of breath and chest pains. He has fluid on the lungs and heart. The doctors think this is due to an infection that could have been there for the last month but wasn’t picked up when he was readmitted a few weeks ago. The positive thing is that they’re now doing a whole battery of tests to identify the type of infection and hopefully will be able to eradicate it before they discharge him once more.

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The Benefits of Blogging

When I tell people I'm writing a blog they ask if it has an ongoing theme. The answer is in the title. I'm writing in the rain. Blogging is helping me to stay focussed on my writing. It's true that the more you write, the more you write. My children's novel is coming along very nicely. I may even blog about it sometime soon.

Blogging is also my therapy. It allows me to write about my husband's hospital visits, especially the amusing bits, and his ongoing treatment for Amyloidosis. Chemotherapy creates a frightening mental picture. The reality is often not so scary. He's doing very well. He's just got back from walking the dog in the snow... not bad for a man in the middle of a course of Melphalan and Dexamethasone.

I'm planning a number of blogs for early 2010... in addition to my weekly musings of writing and life.

Blog plans for early 2010

• An interview with the successful children's writer, Pippa Goodhart.
  

• What Lapidus means to me, plus quotes from other Lapidus members. Lapidus promotes healing and personal growth through writing and reading. Have a look at their website.

• The making of a picture book, from my initial idea, to its publication by Franklin Watts, to the musical rap on Scholastic's website.

I've only been on the Blogger circuit for a comparatively short time but I'm loving it. I'm building up a list of blogs to Follow. Thank you for informing and entertaining me.

I wish everyone health and energy on this, the shortest, darkest and perhaps the coldest day of the year. It'll soon be spring... won't it?
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There’s more to a name than signing a book

The publication of my first book, Bathtime Rap, in 2008 presented me with a dilemma. People kept asking me to sign their copies, but what to put? How to sign? Should I end with a flourish of wavy lines, like Queen Elizabeth? Should I sign my first name only, like Madonna? I thought of all the times I had asked authors to sign books for me. They had calmly written a well-rehearsed message followed by a well-rehearsed signature. How difficult can it be?

I find anything to do with names difficult. I’m hopeless when it come to remembering other people’s names. I know the theory. You’re supposed to see their name written on their forehead and you must use it at least three times as soon as you’ve been introduced. Impossible. Even when I think I’ve got someone’s name right I’ll do anything to avoid using it in case I make a mistake, not good practice for a teacher, and it might even have contributed to the high levels of stress that finally convinced me to leave the profession.

Names are a constant source of confusion and concern for me, even my own name. My mother has always called me Rosalind but my friends call me Ros. I try to be Rosalind at work and Ros at home but that causes confusion. As a teacher I was often called Miss which I hated and sometimes even Sir which was worse. I once worked at a school where the students called the teachers by their first names. For me it didn’t work. It changed the dynamics. The teachers were no longer held in such high esteem. Names are more than just titles. They give us our social identity, but they also give us something more. I can never hear the name Luke without remembering the ‘very naughty boy’ I taught in a Year 6 class. Sorry to all the really nice Lukes out there. I guess I’m the one with the problem.

It’s one thing having name problems at work but it’s far more embarrassing when it happens at home. About ten years ago my sister moved to another part of the country. At the same time she started to use her middle name, Rifka. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t refer to my sister as Rifka. When I visit her, all her friends, who have only ever known her as Rifka, must think I’m crazy. As a loving sister it’s the least I can do to avoid confusion but the word won’t come out of my mouth. The closest I’ve got is to say to Josh, the dog, ‘Take your ball to Auntie Rifka,’ (yes, of course he knows what that means!) We’ve now reached a compromise. I call her big sis and she calls me little sis. Problem solved.

But now I have a bigger name problem, my husband’s. I call him Rod. Everyone calls him Rod, except his doctor. On his birth certificate Rod is his middle name and it’s the same on his medical records. Because of his ongoing illness Rod has to make regular hospital visits but I don’t know the man who is being called out in the clinic and the consultants are talking about a stranger. Again I have reached a compromise. I have become regal. I refer to ‘my husband and I’. It would be so much easier if he could just tell them that he’s called Rod but he says it doesn’t bother him. If only I could be that easy going.

So what would you like to call me, Rosalind, Ros, Mrs Adam, and why does it matter anyway?