I’ve often written that there are people who know how the world really works and people who write about the people who know how the world really works and take their photos. A great team of big men in big trucks and tractors who know how things work came to the farm this morning, dug up half the back yard, moved tons of earth around, planted water pipes wrapped in metal sleeves, dug up huge rocks and chunks of slate and put almost all of it back together again by mid-afternoon.
I have to admit I took a deep breath when I saw the huge ditch in the back yard by Jay Bridge (an engineer by training,) Chad Vecchio and his father Vince (contractors, builders and excavators), and my friend Jack Macmillan (Jack-of-all-trades) know what to do, they scurried around in the mud and rain, punched a huge hole in our basement foundation, hooked up pipes and stanchions to the big barn. In the morning, they will return to tidy up, drop some stone and gravel off (for the Pole Barn and the yard) and get the frost-free water line working.
The frost-free is buried in four feet of dirt and wrapped in a metal tube or sleeve, when you shut the handle off, the water in the tube slides down into the ground and stays warm. We put it in the barn to give it some added protection, as the winter wind won’t get to it out there. This is an invaluable thing in a farm, where buckets of water have to be hauled out to the animals several times a day in the winter. It is a miraculous thing to have a frost-free on a winter’s morning in a storm.
I have to say I am unlike these men but I admire them greatly, they work unbelievably hard, they are among the world’s best story-tellers, they love to gossip, trade stories and laugh with one another. They make the world work, they move the earth around. I rarely understand what they are talking about, but they never tire of trying to explain it to me.
I learned early on when I came to the country that it is important not to pretend to know more than you do, the big men in trucks will forgive ignorance, but not arrogance. I gave up trying to know what they know, I just admit it and trust them, they have never failed to be honest or competent or fair in their dealings with me. Tomorrow afternoon, water to the pasture. I admit to a sense of urgency after my surgery, I can’t haul buckets right now and I don’t want Maria to have to do it now or down the road. This makes me feel good. Thanks to the big diggers.
I don’t dare walk into the dentist’s office in Cambridge without Red, they might toss me out. Red simply accompanies me through life, and fortunately, I live in a place where that is not only permitted, but celebrated. The Cambridge Dental Care office checks with each of the patients when Red comes in – he is a trained and certified therapy dog – and he visits people in the cubicles if they wish and then lies down outside the cubicle where I am being seen.
“I’d much rather see Red than a dentist,” one patient said. He lifts the spirits there, as he does in cardiac rehab and with the veterans we see.
It never ceases to amaze me what men and their trucks and tractors can do, they rearrange the universe. I gulped a bit when I saw this ditch. Vince Veccio and his crew jackhammered a hold in the basement and dug out a four foot ditch to the barn, where the frost free water line is going. It has started to rain, so a two-day project has become a one day project. Red was stumped trying to figure out how to get across the ditch. We found an older foundation around the house, there was another building there at one point. Jay Bridge has arrived and we are putting in the plastic pipe with sleeves and running it out to the barn.
I’ve been scheming to put in a frost-free water line to the pasture ever since we moved in here, but we ran out of money early on, there was so much to do. Vince showed up with his tractor (Jack Macmillan and Jay Bridge are working on this as well), we are digging a four foot ditch out to the pasture gate, laying plastic pipes in sleeves and installing a frost-free water faucet and hose. This will make a major difference in the winter, we have been hauling water buckets out to the donkeys and sheep, and that is no fun early on a cold winter morning. Hope to have this done by tomorrow. More later.
“One day at a time, we can learn to lease the past behind,
One day at a time,
we can look the future in the eye,
One day at a time,
We can learn to live.”
– Yusef Islam, “One Day At A Time”
Tonight, my homespun book tour for Saving Simon picks up with a visit to the much loved Petersburgh Public Library in Petersburgh, New York (7p.m.), a small agricultural community about an hour South of Bedlam Farm. I am told the library is very precious to that community, and I appreciate being invited there.
I am excited to be going on behalf of my little orphaned book, and on behalf of Simon, I love speaking at libraries and the audiences in small towns are generally wonderfully appreciative, as they rarely see authors. Random House would never have sent me to a place like Petersburgh, it is not worth their trouble, and I suppose a mid-list writer like me is not worth their trouble any more either, so it’s a good fit.
One day at a time, we can learn to leave the future behind. Not too long ago, book tours were very human, very personal affairs. My editor would call before a talk or a reading, we would go over the book, discuss possible questions, talk about responses. Someone would call me whenever a good review came out, they would would read it to me, congratulate me on it, we would get excited about it together, because we had all worked so hard on the book and wanted so much for it. There were hundreds of requests, we would all sort through them – bookstores, libraries, TV and radio interviews.
A publicist would call, make sure I knew where I was going, how to get there, and to suggest a car and driver if it was at night or more than a few miles away, they did not want me showing up to a reading harried or tired or distracted. I suppose you could say I was coddled, and this might be so, but a book and a book tour were special things, to be appreciated and treated in a special way. I think this still happens to authors who sell more books than I do, and who make more money for the publisher than I do.
But it happens less and less, most writers do not get book tours at all, their publishers tell them to get blogs. Fortunately, I did that a good while ago.
My book appearance came about because the chairman of the town library board in Petersburgh is a reader of the blog and she graciously joined in my Orphans book tour for Saving Simon. She wanted to support my book but also saw a chance to get a speaker for the library.
I do not lament my life, I do not care for struggle stories, but I will say the thing I most miss about the new and very cold and corporate world of publishing is the lack of human contact. I have not spoke to anyone from my publisher in person or even on the phone in a couple of years, I really can’t remember the last time I had an actual conversation with anyone about a book of mine. I get myself places, if it is late or I am tired, I pull over and take a nap or Maria drives me, I figure out the talk and the questions, and I am good at it, I like it. If it is sometimes lonely, there is also the great satisfaction of being independent, of being untethered and authentic. I like that too.
In a sense going to places like Petersburgh – that is where I will be going on this book tour – will help restore some of the lost humanity I feel in being a writer, the feeling that came from being part of a publishing universe that cared about books and writing and writers, not only about money. Times change, and I am changing with them, I am much happier than I was when I was a big shot and had a big black car waiting to take me places. It is a colder process for sure, except for the talks themselves. They are not cold. I will GPS the library, stop at Battenkill Books and haul some books with me to sell there, every day I do things I never did before and never really thought about doing.
People ask me what the publisher does now, and the answer is pretty simple: They publish the books and mail them out. And yes, many writers are figuring out that they can do that themselves.
This morning, I woke up at 3 a.m. thinking about my book tour and my trip to Petersburgh, I work out the details of my talks myself, I have to figure out how they will go. I put on my earphones and listened to the new album by Yusef Islam, once known as Cat Stevens. It is a beautiful album, wise and reflective, just what I needed to hear as I enter a new chapter in my writing life – books are only a part of it now, my writing is mostly done here, on the blog, a forum I love. One day at a time, I know, I can learn to leave the past behind, one day at a time I can look the future in the eye, one day at a time, I can learn how to live.
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The first 2,000 people who buy my book Saving Simon at Battenkill Books, my local bookstore. will receive a signed photo postcard of Simon and will be eligible – as will all Battenkill customers – to win free food from Fromm Family Food, photos, potholders and notecards. We plan to hit the 2,000 mark and said past it by Christmas. You can also call the bookstore at 518 677-2515. The Orphan bookstore celebrates things that are orphaned, but come roaring back to life. We can also support independent bookstores, a precious part of our past and our future. Thanks for your support. I will report from Petersburgh tomorrow.
