Susan M. Boyer

USA TODAY Bestselling Author
Agatha Award Winner

Susan M. Boyer

USA TODAY Bestselling Author
Agatha Award Winner

Wait–I Can Do Better Than That

in Blather and Profound Notions, Diets and Other Torture

Wow–where did that year go? Looking back at the blur that was 2017, my first instinct is to ask for a do-over. I know I can do better. Is it just me, or are the years going by much faster now? My grandmother once told me how fast time flew once you were past a certain age–let’s not talk numbers. Nothing good ever comes from that. But I didn’t believe her, and she was so, so right.

With time escaping as fast as it is, I want to make sure I’m doing things right, you know? So, this year, I’m going to spend more time with family and friends–and be fully present. I’m going to spend less and save more. I’m going to read more and write more. I’m going to get to church more often. (This won’t be difficult.) And I’m going to eat healthier and be more active. (This is the tricky part.)

What about y’all? Who’s got New Year’s resolutions?

Happy New Year!

 

Susan

 

Okay, Let’s Try This Again…

in Blather and Profound Notions, Diets and Other Torture, I Am Therefore I Write

Well, well, January, here you are back already. I know what you’re thinking–that I haven’t kept a single one of last year’s resolutions, and you’re right. But I think I’ve just been going about this resolution thing all wrong.

This year, I’m going to stick to resolutions I can, well, stick to. For example, instead of declaring my intention to exercise every day–which even I know is a joke–I’m resolving to exercise more than I did last year. (Trust me, this is an easy one. Even I can do this.)

Also, instead of adopting some exotic new diet from another region where people eat all they want of certain foods and stay thin, or one based on counting or measuring ANYTHING, I’m simply going to vow to eat healthier than I did in 2011–again, easy.

And I’m going to put first things first. Every day, before I check email, sign on to Facebook, tweet, blog, or any engage in any other form of electronic interaction, I will write. This is easy, because it’s what I really want to do.

For some reason, I’ve gotten into the habit of checking in with all things Internet before my day begins. This is a huge mistake, because once I’m online, it’s almost impossible to get off. I click a link on a Tweet to check out a blog, which leads to reading a few other blog entries on the same site, then clicking a link to something else that looks interesting…and four hours later it’s lunchtime and I haven’t written anything except a status update and a tweet or two. The only thing that comes before words on the page is family.

That’s it, January. That’s all I’ve got. So next year, you can forget all about being smug. I can do this.

Peace, out…

Susan

When Life Sends You a Fruit Basket

in Blather and Profound Notions, Evidence of My Insanity, Family

We all know what to do with lemons, right?  When life hands us lemons, we make lemonade and add our libation of choice. Common sense, that. When we have only one choice, we make the best of it.
But what to do when life hands you a basket filled with mangoes, kiwi, and all manner of luscious fruits? I’m ridiculously blessed, and perhaps, sometimes, have too many choices. If I fill up on figs and strawberries, I won’t have room for a peach, right? And I love peaches…

Saying yes to one thing always means saying no to something else. Saying no is hard for me. I spent years of my life so over-extended by commitments–okay, yes, I’m no longer talking fruit here, we’re on time management, please stay with the group–that I was in need of an intervention and regular doses of that spiked lemonade.

But the need to make hard choices, embrace them, and not look back applies to so many things. (Leaving time management, on to life choices…it’s all about the fruit…)

A few weeks ago, when I was explaining how Sugar and I are not cut out for subdivision living, I mentioned that we were working on a plot with our old neighbors–the ones we lived next door to for years in the house we loved, before I filled up on pears (decided we should live downtown, within walking distance to restaurants, etc)–to convince the interlopers who bought Barbie’s Dream House that it was in fact haunted, and they must move to satisfy the spirits and whatnot.

Well, I guess it worked. I got a phone call a few days ago from said dear friends next door, who we’ll call Wilson and Sandra, because those are their names. It seems the folks we sold our house to are interested in selling. Now, I have no evidence that Sandra or Wilson either one hid a tape player with a timer in the neighbors’ attic that played “GET OOUUTTT” at 3:15 a.m. every morning, so we’ll say no more about it.

Sugar and I have an appointment to see our old home and discuss details on Saturday morning. Right now, I so long to drive into OUR driveway when we get home from Indiana and be home again. Of course, there’s the detail of selling the subdivision house…

But saying yes to Barbie’s Dream House will mean saying no to some other things we really want to do. It will need new windows soon (two vacations we won’t be able to take). And Sugar wants to replace the paneling in the den with sheet-rock. The master bath needs updating… Already we have a list of projects we’re excitedly considering. The budget for all those projects would eat up a lot of travel.

And the time spent on all these projects could be spent enjoying family, volunteering, or taking up crop circle interpretation.

That house is special to us. We have so many wonderful memories there. It’s home. But saying yes to it will mean making choices. It will mean fewer date nights out, fewer vacations, and less time and money for a long list of things we enjoy.

But I suspect if we can come to an agreement with the very nice folks who bought it, we will buy our home back. We’ll eat the peaches with the juice dripping on our hands, having learned that pears are nice, but you simply can’t eat all the fruit in the basket. You must choose.

And there’s no place like home. (Clicking my heels together…)

Peace, out…

Susan

You Can’t Tell That Here

in Blather and Profound Notions, Family, Road Trip

I went home last week, to Faith, the little town of about six hundred, with one caution light, where I grew up, and where my parents, my brother and his family, and a slew of other relatives still live. I got into the whole ancestry thing about a year ago and was shocked to find out how many people in that town I’m related to and never knew it. I digress…

Dad is retired, and mostly he spends his days looking up imaginary symptoms on Web MD. He needs a hobby. Mom refuses to retire, mostly because staying home doesn’t look all that attractive. Anyway, Dad and I went to The Faith Soda Shop for breakfast one morning–several mornings, actually. Side note: One would think that somebody who spends hours a day on health-related websites would stop ordering sausage and egg sandwiches with mayo for breakfast, but not my daddy. I’m just saying…

One morning, we walked into The Shop, and the couple who’d lived around the curve from us my entire childhood sat in a booth just inside the door. I graduated with their oldest son (and played in the creek with him, and fought with him, and love him like a brother). Their faces lit up when they saw me. You can’t find that just anywhere…

I said, “I’d know these folks anywhere,” and went over to chat. I hugged them, and they hugged me back, and it felt like I’d never left. There were a few other familiar faces in The Shop that morning. After we’d eaten, Dad and I made our way to the register to pay. We passed another pair of faces I knew well. This couple, parents of another guy I graduated with, lived a block and a half away from the house my parents still live in.

We exchanged the usual hey-it’s-good-to-see-you kind of things. Then, Arlene patted my hand and said, “John just had a birthday, are you older, or younger than he is?” She was trying to pin down if I had already turned the same age as John, or if that was upcoming. She knew we were about a month apart.

I didn’t answer immediately. Age-related chit-chat is not my favorite.

She said, “How old are you?”

I didn’t miss a beat. I said, “Arlene, I’m twenty-four. That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.”

She laughed out loud and said, “You can’t tell that here.”

Now, in Greenville when I tell people I’m twenty-four, they look at me oddly, like perhaps I’m Not Quite Right, but no one has ever called me on it. In Faith, most people have a general idea how old I am, and many can tell you exactly what year I was born.

My eyes misted up. There is something so compelling to me about being in that place where, even after I’ve been gone more than…err…a few years, folks know me. Makes me think of that Cheers song…

I love Greenville. I do. We have friends here, and a lot of Jim’s family lives here. There’s a beautiful downtown, with a river running through it, and restaurants of every description. There’s culture. Diversity. Costco.

But, on any given day, if I walk into any restaurant on Main Street, odds are, there won’t be a soul in the place who knows me, or can tell you approximately how old I am, or remembers the time I painted the old shed in the backyard five different colors (on the outside) and turned it into a weird sort of clubhouse where I could have hang out with my friends with minimal adult supervision.

Lord, I’m homesick.

Peace, out…

Susan

P.S. This is NOT an invitation for my Greenville friends and family to discuss my age. The official age of all Jazzercisers is 24. It’s a rule.

It’s No Wonder We’re So Screwed Up

in Blather and Profound Notions

On long car trips, I occasionally wax philosophic. I ponder the big questions. Last Monday, as we were speeding along some interstate or other on our way to Nashville, Jim The Husband (AKA Sugar), remarked how it felt like SPRING was in the air, even though it was still cold, and the trees still bare. Something in the air smelled of possibility.

This made me ponder the whole cycle of life thing–new beginnings, things sprouting anew from the dormant womb of Mother Earth…okay, I know, I went around the bend there, but you get the idea. The cyclical nature of the universe captured my imagination. Everything important is round. The Earth, the sun, Godiva hazelnut oysters–okay, they aren’t really round, but they are roundish.

Things go ’round in circles… Everything has a natural beginning and end…

Of course, I went off on a tangent. If everything starts anew in spring, WHY DOESN’T THE NEW YEAR BEGIN ON MARCH 20th?

I asked Sugar about this, but he was busy fiddling with his Blackberry and wasn’t paying good attention just then. He did mutter something about the Mayan calendar actually being more accurate according to some folks

Now THERE’S a thought that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy. We haven’t seen the movie yet–it’s in our Netflix queue. But if the previews are any indication, it doesn’t end happily.

Now, you may wonder here if I paid attention in school, or perhaps went to school in one of those Southern districts that gets so much attention in studies and whatnot because children can’t read. The answers are yes, and no, respectively. Any gaps in my education I blame on that bicycle accident when I was eight where I got the bad concussion. It impacted my memory. Some things I simply cannot remember.

Which is why I am so thankful for Google.

For any of the rest of you who suffered head injuries as a child, daydreamed in class, or possibly attended a sub-par school district, January (named for Janus, the Roman god of doors) was not always the first month in the Gregorian calendar. March was, originally. Ha!

It was changed around 450 BC because that’s when counsuls were chosen or some such. (Yes, this is an oversimplification, but y’all can Google for the details if you want them.)

Between politicians monkeying with our calendar because of elections, and springing us forward to save energy, our systems are completely out of balance with nature. It’s no wonder we can’t solve the big problems like HEALTH CARE and WORLD PEACE. We’re fundamentally screwed up.

On a side note, I did get the Tweety Bird Yellow out of my hair.

Peace, out…

Susan

Twitter Not Your Tweet in Anger…

in Blather and Profound Notions

Lord love a duck, here’s another reason why high-strung females like me ought to reconsider the whole Twitter thing. Apparently, a high-profile author who I will not name because I don’t want to spread gossip and because I can SO easy see how this would (without a shadow of a doubt) happen to me if I were ever to work hard enough to become a multiple-time bestselling author whose books are made into movies, etc cetera…

Anyway, Famous Author got a not-wonderful review, and was not just ABLE, but perhaps COMPELLED to Tweet her frustrations to hundreds–probably thousands–of her closest friends. Imagine, being angry and having a megaphone, and really, that’s what Twitter is, a high tech megaphone with a long, long range.

Can I just tell you how bad I feel for this brilliant author? Impulse and technology are dangerous bedfellows. That’s so much worse than a reply-all accident, which is bad enough. (But really, who hasn’t done that?)

Fortunately for Famous Author, in our rapid-fire-communication world, we’ll all be Tweeting about something else in three minutes or less.

Peace, out…

Susan

Defying the Laws of Physics…Yet Again (Y’all REALLY Won’t Believe This)

in Blather and Profound Notions, Jazzercise, The Queen of Pain

The voices in my head are singing Keep It Loose, Keep It Tight by Amos Lee

What I’m Reading: Winter’s Child, by Margaret Maron

One of the most heinous tricks in the Jazzercise manual is where they take a perfectly good song, like Mary J. Blige’s Family Affair, and make you perform unnatural acts to it. The Queen of Pain currently has Family Affair in her set.

Visualize yourself doing this: Put on some ankle weights–about 4-5 pounds on each ankle will do. Get down on your hands and knees. Now, stick a leg straight out (either one, cause you’ll switch back and forth). Move your leg from the hip, and tap your toe out to the side, then straighten, lift, point, lower and repeat. Do this 5,000 times.

Now, with your leg still behind you, do PUSH-UPS while curling your leg toward the ceiling–yep–one of the two with a weight on it. Repeat, switch, etc. for FOUR MINUTES AND TWENTY-SIX seconds. Trust me, it will seem more like four hours. Try it.

On Monday, when I heard the opening beats of Family Affair, I reminded the QOP right off that A) my ankle weights have been mislaid, and B) I DON’T DO PUSH-UPS on account of the built in weights I sport on my chest make it impossible, from the whole gravity and physics perspective. She growled that I could do SOME of them, so I did. Three, I think. It was exhausting.

Yesterday, when the music started, she growled at me that I was going to do ALL FORTY-EIGHT push-ups. I laughed out loud. If she had asked me to run around the ceiling I would have taken her as seriously. I pointed out the obvious, and reminded her that she well knew this was not workable.

“Shut up and do them,” she said. “All of them.”

Here’s the part y’all won’t believe: I did.

Here’s what I learned at Jazzercise yesterday. Sometimes you should just shut up and do it.

At the beginning of class she asked me what I’d been doing all day. “Editing,” I said.

This was true–sort of–in a metaphorical kind of way. What I had been editing (or trying to edit) were my career goals. I’ve been rewriting the same novel for several years, trying to get the first one just right. (As I understand it, some writers put their first book or three in a drawer never to see the light of day and publish their second or fourth novel, and others write the same novel many times until they have it right. I’ve always thought of myself as being in the latter group.)

It’s REALLY difficult to get a first novel sold in a good economy. When the economy is tight, well, it just gets harder. So, I’ve been trying to convince myself that I want to do something else–anything else. I have had zero luck with this. I am a writer. I need to write. I need to publish what I write, because, as Leonard Pitts allows, “…a writer without readers is like shouting in an empty room.” That’s where you get your loons, and Lord knows, I teeter precariously on that brink to begin with.

So today, I will just shut up and do it.

Everything you need to know about life you can learn at Jazzercise…

Well, okay, maybe not, but you can learn to pole dance (which is a good backup career plan–it’s recession proof) and you get an occasional kernel of philosophy.

Peace, out…

Susan

Cramming

in Blather and Profound Notions, Jazzercise, The Queen of Pain

The voices in my head are singing Keep Me in Your Heart by Warren Zevon.

What I’m reading: Your Heart Belongs to Me by Dean Koontz

I came across a quote today that really struck a chord with me:

“If you stuff yourself full of poems, essays, plays, stories, novels, films, comic strips, magazines, music, you automatically explode every morning like Old Faithful. I have never had a dry spell in my life, mainly because I feed myself well, to the point of bursting. I wake up early and hear my morning voices leaping around in my head like jumping beans. I get out of bed to trap them before they escape.” Ray Bradbury

I think for too long I’ve been starving myself, always being afraid to read too much while I was writing. I had the idea it would mess with my voice. Don’t get me wrong, I devour fiction. But I’ve been in the habit of stockpiling books and waiting until I’m in an editing cycle before I read them.

I’ve officially abandoned that policy, and am going to gorge myself daily with everything imaginable. I’m hoping my morning voices will wake me and haul me out of bed to capture all their insanity. Right now I’m engrossed in Dean Koontz’s latest. He’s one of my three or four favorite authors of all time. Who are the others? Okay, I have eclectic reading tastes. In no particular order, I also get email alerts from Barnes and Noble when Carl Hiaasen, Sandra Brown, or Michael Connelly has a new book coming out. I also love John D. McDonald’s Travis McGee series.

Did I dance today? Well yes, I did. I have several sore muscles for my efforts, although, I have to say, I’m not particularly fond of the set the Queen of Pain is currently using. With one or two exceptions, the songs don’t speak to me. This is unusual, as typically I really like her music.

Note: If I were the alien on the stage, I’d pick the songs I liked, not some whiny, VOLUPTUOUS woman who shows up erratically.

But I have discovered that not liking the music is not necessarily a bad thing. When the music moves me, I forget my sore muscles, and what a spectacle I’m likely making of myself, and shake shake shake my…well, you get the idea. This is a much more exhausting workout. When I don’t like the music as much, I don’t push myself. It’s not a conscious decision, it’s just the way it works out.

It’s actually a good thing that she doesn’t have my favorites in. I might hurt myself. I need to work up to the funk.

Peace, out…

Susan

The Leading Cause of Brain Crud

in Blather and Profound Notions, Jazzercise, The Queen of Pain

The voices in my head are singing Where’s the Love Y’all, by the Black Eyed Peas.

What I’m reading: A Deadly Shade of Gold, by John D. MacDonald.

The Queen of Pain accused me this morning of suffering from Brain Crud, in response to my plea for sympathy on account of having the head and chest crud for eight weeks. Now, setting aside her complete and utter lack of sympathy, she has a point. I feel like I need to take one of those things the dentist uses to clean your teeth and scrape off all the nooks and crannies of my gray matter.

At first I thought it was just a holiday, family/mall/carb-overload hangover, but I now suspect it’s something far more insidious. I have television poisoning.

I typically don’t watch much TV–just a few favorite shows: Boston Legal (which won’t be a problem anymore as its last episode aired before Christmas), Monk, The Closer, Saving Grace, and more recently, Leverage, the new Timothy Hutton series. But over the holidays, I fall into bad habits.

It starts with watching a few holiday movies on the Hallmark channel with my mother. Nothing gets you into the holiday spirit quite like heartwarming romantic holiday fluff. Then, there are all those bowl games, and playoff games. Left to my own devices I wouldn’t watch much of that, but most of the family-and-friend pool like it, so we watch.

Before long, I have a customary place on the sofa that calls to me as soon as the dinner dishes are in the dishwasher. I start CHANNEL SURFING–looking for something to watch. I become far less discriminating, although, let me say right here that if I ever type the words, “I finally broke down and watched an episode of American Idol,” somebody just call up the nervous hospital and have them send a padded wagon.

Disclaimer: I mean no slight, aspersion, or snark to anyone who enjoys “Reality TV.” I just personally don’t care for it at all. I’m convinced it’s a vast Hollywood conspiracy to inflate profits. I like my escapism with a plot…you know, something that involves writers, some reasonably talented actors, and a set. I digress.

It’s not the shows that are really the issue, though I typically spend my leisure hours with my first love, books. It’s the commercials. Oh. Dear. Tara.

It’s so bad, that when a decent commercial comes on, I actually remark on how well it was done. This happens about once a week. The prescription drug ads are awful, but the really, really bad commercials–the ones that cause the maximum buildup of Brain Crud are the ones that include the words, “But WAIT!” You know the ones I’m talking about… the ads for things like Mighty Putty, Hairagami, and those plastic clips you put on your bra straps that guarantee to make you a cup size bigger and improve your posture. I’m also sick of seeing celebrities try to convince us that they lost 40 pounds eating Nutri System, or Jenny Craig food, or by drinking a bunch of Acai Berry Juice. Please, those people have a team of personal trainers and a kitchen staff to help them get skinny.

Now that I’ve figured out what caused the brain crud, it’s easy to fix. It’s not difficult AT ALL to turn off the TV once you realize you’ve fallen victim. If only all my unhealthy habits were cured as easy as picking up a remote and pressing “Off.”

Peace, out…

Susan

Stress Relief

in Blather and Profound Notions, Evidence of My Insanity

The voices in my head are singing Saving Grace, by Everlast.

Relax, it’s my iPod.

Here is a great way to relax when you’re in that moment just before running through the streets of your neighborhood wearing only a Happy New Year hat and argyle socks, with a bullhorn, announcing the arrival of the Mother Ship.

I am so there–or I was, yesterday. This helped.

Turn off all the lights and light a few candles.

Start your bath, running the water a little warmer than you normally might. Pour in half a bottle of your favorite bubble bath–lavender scented is great for this. Some Lancome Aroma Calm bath oil is also nice. Throw in a fizz ball. The more products you put in the tub, the better.

Get the champagne bucket and start some chilling by the side of the tub. Sidebar: I have a reputation of ALWAYS preferring the most expensive of everything, and yet, while I’ve had pricey French champagne that I enjoyed, Korbel Brut (yes, I know technically it’s not Champagne) is my favorite. This is an anomaly, as it usually goes for around twelve bucks a bottle.

If you’ve already had more than two glasses of wine, use Pellagrino instead of Korbel.

Crank up iTunes and make yourself a playlist of twenty songs that appeal. Resist the urge to fret over which songs to pick. Don’t sit there and try top make the perfect Bathtub Playlist, and don’t choose more than twenty. Remember, your bath water is running.

Transfer the new playlist to your iPod shuffle. The shuffle is best for bathtub use, as it’s easily clipped to your bath pillow.

If you don’t have a bath pillow, roll up a towel, clip the shuffle to it, and climb into the water.

Pour yourself a glass of bubbly, pop the earphones in, and turn on the iPod and the jets.

Your bath additives, activated by the jets will soon make mountains of bubbles, beyond which you cannot see. Close your eyes and sip the icy bubbly. When you start to feel too warm, hold your champagne flute over your face and turn it upside down, dousing your face, neck, and chest. Pour another glass.

Periodically peek at the mountain of bubbles. Just before they spill out into the floor, pull the plug on the tub. When the water level drops enough, turn on the cold water. This will keep the bubbles at a safe level.

Continue alternately sipping the champagne and pouring it on yourself until you feel human again.

After you get out of the tub, blow out the candles and go straight to bed. Sleep until you feel like getting up.

Disclaimer: Please do not try this at home if you cannot do it without drowning, scalding yourself, or experiencing an irreversible past-life regression.

Peace, out…

Susan



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