RIP beautiful Natasha

You will be missed. :(

Rules for life

So I go to pick up middle kid from High School. Cops are aboundin. Here a cop ...there a cop... everywhere a cop cop. I drive nice nice...crossing the cross walks carefully with aTTenTiveness.

I slowdown at the stop signs. I look both ways Twice. I signal lefT. I signal righT.

(They are everywhere)

I explain to my daughter how they put points on your drivers license, and when they add up they take that license away.

She says, " You mean you get points. That sounds like my school."

I say, "LIFE IS SCHOOL." You never graduate. There is always somebody there making sure you obey the rules.

I've never seen her look so terrified.

What's in a name?

I never knew until today that Ludwig Bemelmans based his Madeline books on his daughter so aptly and appropriately named Barbara ( I LOVE LUDWIG). He was of Belgian and German descent (I LOVE LUDWIG). He was forced to move to America because he shot a waiter and thus would be put in an institution for the artistically brilliant yet misunderstood mind (I LOVE LUDWIG). And then he became an illustrator for the New Yorker, etc.  (You are ours now wmahahaha... I LOVE LUDWIG). 

And Viking turned down the initial book but Simon and Schuster saw genius.

He never considered himself a writer (mheeuuh) but more an illustrator (huueehm). Poo poo.

Someday in my next life we will meet and discuss his brilliance.

Now to read the real biography of a great children's book creator.

Side by Side by Sondheim

"Keep away from her
send for Chino
this is not the Maria
we know
Modest and pure
polite and refined
well bred and mature
and out of her mind"

If you listen to this music you'll appreciate the stresses and "off" stresses.

A mild thrill for me when I think about writing. Simple pleasures...greatness.

When my husband's band plays bebop

I wanna drop

everything

and get up and

kiss Lee Morgan.

And they now have their equivalent of Paul Desmond. Nice new addition. 

I'm in love with a wonderful band. 

Another soft yet swift kick in the pants today

 REJECTION ...............but I believe. 

It is so hard to see agented illustrators get job after job. Especially in projects you've been working on.  It really isn't fair...but that is the way it is. 

But NO ONE will do the two I have out... with publishers. NO ONE. And especially the way I have done them. They consume me.  I am obsessed. And that is that! 

I hope to fall in a ball of velvet.  The real kind. (Not the fake velveteen.)

Pardon Me Boys is this the Chattanooga Choo Choo?

Well, shit. I don't know. You have to wait and see.

Bill is waiting on his cool jazz arrangement of this.

I just sent a ms package to an agent I met last weekend. Let the waiting beguine.

Charlotte is waiting to see if she got cast as Jo Jo in the high school (aka Broadway equivalent) version of "Suessical" and college apps (HUH???)

We are all waiting for Henry to get home from his PA trip

and for Emily to help with dinner so Bill and I can go to JAZZ HOUSE KIDS!! jazz, wine, d'oeuvres benefit for kids in need.

Everyone is WAITING. WAIting. Waiting.