Since I’ve been with Maria, I’ve gone to a number of art and craft shows, author and artist’s nights, gallery openings and fairs. Being an artist is very different from being a writer, and art is marketed very differently than books. Sometimes these events are dispiriting, artists sitting alone with their work for hours, writers sitting behind tables with their books lined up, trying not to make eye contact or seem to be pressuring people to buy their books.  Art and jewelry is stuffed in baskets, books stacked up in piles.  People move awkwardly past the books and the art and the crafts, not sure what to say, where to look. I often feel discouraged leaving these events, but that might just be me. I wonder about the way these works are presented so indirectly, so tentatively, with such little enthusiasm. It rarely seems to work.

We went to one of these evenings last night, an “author-artist” night in a Glens Falls cafe and my eye was drawn to one writer sitting alone in a corner, a table of her books in front of her. She was alone.  Something about her energy caught me, drew me over to her table and she smiled and looked away, to be polite. I picked up her book, a lovely looking paperback called “Backyard Beekeepers of the Bay Area,” and I asked the woman if she was the author and she said she was. Her name is Judith Adamson, and I asked her if she was a beekeeper and she said no, she was a writer, a personal historian who writes the histories of people and their families  – she just wrote a book (with beautiful illustrations by her sister, Lisa Adamson)  about the backyard beekeepers of San Francisco Bay, who are working to save the declining honeybee population by maintaining hives.

What are you doing in Glens Falls, N.Y., I asked her, and she told me she was from Berkeley, Calif. and in this area for a year for personal reasons. She missed the Bay Area, she said, and you could see that in her eyes. She said she wanted to go back, and she was seeking ways to sell her work, her books and her personal histories. Like many writers, Adamson is trying to figure out how navigate the new publishing world. Not easy.  Most commercial publishers would not think to publish so sweet and surprising a book as “Backyard Beekepers” – but that doesn’t mean it isn’t wonderful or can’t be sold or successful.

So then, this became a spiritual experience for me. Adamson had never thought of using a blog to sell her work, and she lit up at the possibilities. It’s great to go to fairs, I said, but there are also new and better ways to sell your work. She had never thought of using a blog that way, she said, something I often hear.  We made plans to talk about it. I bought her book for $15 and I was up half the night reading this very powerful, fascinating story about the lovely people who are fighting to keep honeybees in our world, and the mesmerizing stories they told Judith about these incredible creatures. I could not put it down. It was very touching to see these good but anxious people – gardeners, chefs, teachers – acquire their hives, and how much they came to love the bees they were trying to save,  often in face of disinterest and fear. Talk about buying local. Or healing the damage we have done to Mother Earth.  This is, I think, the new politics, perhaps the new writing.

“The comb itself is mind-boggling,” recorded one new beekeeper to Adamson. “It’s quite amazing that the bees can make these perfect hexagonal structures.  The hexagonal cell is the absolute best shape. Inside the hexagon is the circle that holds the egg…The hexagon is absolutely perfect. It’s the strongest, uses the least amount of wax and saves the greatest amount of space..” Subsequent passages on the mysterious life of the queen and her drones and field bees were almost hynpotic.

I hope to convince Judy Adamson to get a strong personal and professional blog going so she can sell her paperbooks and perhaps e-books too. She hopes to broaden the beekeeping idea and I know that could work. I am drawn to the idea of a writer who does personal histories, as Audio Cd’s, Video DVD’s, Narrative Videos and Bound Books. I bet that is just how writing was born. I also highly recommend her wonderful bee stories. I woke Maria up reading it to her this morning, and she loves it as much as I do. You can contact Judith Adamson on her website.  Or call her at 518-238-3806. Or e-mail her at [email protected]. Or buy “Backyard Beekeepers Of The Bay Area” on Amazon. Many of you have helped support the idea of the independent bookstore by buying your books from Battenkill Books. If you can, please take a look at “Backyard Beekeepers.” If you love animals and the natural world, it will touch your heart and stir your soul. And it’s cheaper than many e-books.  This is, I how, how the world will be changed. One good soul at a time.  And how good writers will emerge to tell their stories – one blog at a time. And let Judith know about the importance of blogs, too. She is ready to hear it, I think.

I believe that technology can bring writers like Judith Adamson, a pure writer in the most ancient tradition – telling the stories of people, and now, of bees – to the marketplace. It’s wonderful to sit at tables and talk to other artists. But there are new and powerful tools to sell our work as well. They work. Just ask Connie Brooks.