One Year, and…France again?

I ended my 11/16/2010 post with “Until next time, beloved France!”

“Next time” has come sooner than I expected. I wanted to visit Italy this year, the Amalfi coast. I’ve not yet been south of Rome, and I’d hoped to go in May but I didn’t return to work (after surgery on my hand) until late May. Hi-everybody-I’m-back-and-now-I’m-taking-vacation wouldn’t be beneficial to my employment, or my hand, for which I still attend physical therapy, twice weekly.

My friend and travel companion, with whom I traveled to Provence last fall, organized a trip to Paris this October for a group of friends, and piggy-backing this trip better fit my timing. The group will stay only one week, but my friend has enthusiastically agreed to stay on a second week. We’re throwing ideas around now, for that second week – up into Nord & Picardie or down to Bordeaux are two of them.

Past trips to France provided the stories in my recent submissions to Travelers’ Tales. What will it be this year?

- PJ

Happy Fathers Day

My dad passed away five years and nine days ago. When I was little, I used to lie across his lap every evening while he read the paper or watched TV. He rubbed and scratched my back, a task at which he was an expert. I’d lay there as long as he’d allow, usually until his legs went to sleep. There was safety and love in his touch. The years passed, and I continued to lie in his lap until I was too big to fit across his chair.

Here’s my dad.

- PJ

Lemon Balm Sunday – or – Experience was limited

A recurring theme in Half Italian is “experience was limited” for my Italian immigrant relatives. “Experience was limited,” in my presentation, refers to a wariness that lived in my relatives’ minds and hearts, induced by limited exposure to the world around them, from geography (traveling beyond their village walls) to eating (anything unknown). Anything unknown brought forth wariness and suspicion, until their exposure increased or someone they knew (and trusted) provided assurances. Don’t take chances.

My mother’s experience wasn’t limited – she was born in southern California (not exactly a medieval village) and she had firsthand exposure to immigrant wariness and its origins; yet, this didn’t broaden her thinking, wariness became learned behavior.

Last Sunday, my mother, nearly age 87, tasted her first lemon balm. In front of K-Mart, I pulled a tiny leaf from one of the lemon balm plants for sale outside and urged her to try it. Her face went through all the same doubtful contortions that my immigrant relatives often did, when presented with something they didn’t already know. What is this you’re giving me; I’ve never heard of it; where does it come from, and is it clean? With the corners of her mouth turned down, she tasted the lemon balm. Frowning, she decided it was okay. Sure wish someone else was here to provide me with assurances about this stuff.

(It’s only lemon balm, Mom.)

- PJ

Final TT submission is complete

I just completed my third and final submission to Travelers' Tales. Since they only respond if they're interested, and since submissions made now are for books to be published in 2012, and since many of their decisions are made last pre-publication minute, I don't expect there'll be much to report. But it feels good to have made these submissions, another step forward.

PERSEVERE, she said.

- PJ

Another submission and an inquiry

I'm finishing a third and final submission for Travelers' Tales. This one I call "Stress Test in France," a recount of a trip to Normandy and Brittany with several mishaps, including me putting contact lens cleanser into my eyes, instead of eye drops.

I also made an inquiry to France magazine, asking if they accept submissions from readers for one-time articles. Nothing on their website suggested they do, but I need writing credits, and have several good one-time stories to tell about traveling in France.

Excluding "Good morning" and "Thank you" my inquiry was 31 words, short enough to be read, don't you think?

- PJ

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I used to collect sets of books with beautiful bindings; leather, cloth, it didn't matter as long as I loved the bindings. I visited many used bookstores in southern California, sometimes as a break from studies, other times as a stress reliever, still others for just plain fun. My insides would churn with excitement when I'd enter a store with book sets I wanted, and could afford. My dream was to one day have a room, a library, where I could be surrounded by beautiful books.

Living in apartments for years, I had no library; there weren't even any built-in bookcases. In fact, I never had room for more than three store-bought bookcases crammed onto one wall at a time. Not exactly the library I'd pictured, yet, when someone asked why I didn't get rid of some of the books, I said, "Because some day having a room to put them in is a dream I'm not willing to give up, yet."

I still don't have the library I've always pictured, but I'm closer -- I now have a room that I can say I own, the study, we call it, and one complete wall is lined with those books. I'm sitting in the study right now, looking out at the sun beginning to creep over my little Tuscany.

And I'm not willing to give up on Half Italian, yet, or accept being overlooked by the industry simply because I'm unknown.

I'm not sure what's next, maybe a third and final submission to Travelers' Tales.

- PJ