My first book, The Denim Diet is going to be published by New World Library in Spring 2009. Nine months ago, as my last child at home began her senior year, I started freaking out. At 41, I was facing an empty nest. I’m a big fan of my nest and I’m a single parent so this meant I would be alone. Worse, all I’ve known my entire adult life is that before anything else, I’m a mom. I have a job…a cool job actually. I’m a wardrobe stylist and art director for television commercials and even though I really like my work, I hadn’t found that “thing” I was supposed to do with my life. As a mom, it didn’t really matter that I hadn’t found my purpose or life’s passion because there was always something more pressing or more important to deal with.
Last fall, I went to Chicago for a long weekend just to check out the city. While drinking a grande, nonfat, no foam, extra hot latte, I read a book review in the Chicago Tribune…the reviewer used words like bliss, passion, purpose, and personal destiny. I was intrigued. So I did something I’d never done before. I put on dark glasses and a wig and headed down Michigan Avenue to find a self help book. I ended up locating the book in the metaphysical section of the bookstore, which totally unnerved me as I had no idea what that meant, but I was determined to find my purpose, passion, and personal destiny or at least see if I had one. I didn’t really go to Borders in disguise, but I’m an avid reader and up to this point, I sought out books that had romance, sex, travel, and made me laugh. Escape books. I decided to stop running away from the fact that I had no clue what I was supposed to be when I grew up which kind of sucks considering that I’m all grown up.
So I took The Passion Test by bestselling authors, Janet Bray Attwood and Chris Attwood and still had no clue, but things were germinating in my head like never before. I made lists, meditated, talked to other people, and read other books on the subject of passion and purpose. I was on fire even though it wasn’t resulting in much…just yet. I was so energized I introduced The Passion Test to a friend of mine who in turn introduced me to a book that put him on a path of self discovery called The Rhythm of Life by bestselling author, Matthew Kelly.
Then I went to Texas for New Years. This was my first trip to Texas. I was going with a friend to visit his family in Amarillo for the holidays. Even though I’d never been there and knew next to nothing about it, the Texas Panhandle wasn’t exactly my idea of a vacation so we also scheduled three nights in Austin after the family visit. Okay, this was actually a boyfriend and we were going to visit his Mother and her husband. I’d met them twice briefly. Incredibly kind people, but very different from the folks I spend my days with. They are conservative Christians…that live in an eight-bathroom house with a mega-giant TV in their great room, which broadcasts Fox News all day long. I’ll shame the devil, what I was most concerned about was not being able to swear or drink wine.
I grew up with zero religion, ultra liberal parents from Oregon, one twelve inch TV for a family of six, organic food from a local co-op, and lived in houses with two and a half bathrooms and solar panels on the roof. I mention organic food because I’m obsessed with healthful eating. Not just healthful eating, but eating to maintain a healthy body weight. Eating to avoid being overweight. I got pretty heavy once, a long time ago, and ever since, I’ve been enthusiastically devoted to this topic…you might even say that I’m passionate about it.
On the plane ride to Dallas, my BF said he had a little crisis at work…one that he had to resolve by the end of the year, which was six days away. We’d been dating for a little over a year so I was well aware that I would be completely ignored and on my own until the issue was resolved. He couldn’t have mentioned that before we got on the plane? I was pissed, but from everything I had read in my new favorite books, I decided that maybe I should take a deep breath, let go of the tension, and see where the cosmic highway would take me. It took me on a six hour drive from Dallas to Amarillo. It took me to the Cracker Barrel for lunch. And it took me to the Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum in Canyon, Texas.
What I saw in Texas blew my mind. What I saw was the American obesity epidemic. I had to leave home to be reminded that we have a serious obesity epidemic in this country. My head was spinning…so much so that I needed to lie down. When I woke up from a four hour nap, I picked up a journal that I’d purchased at the airport in Portland. Looking back, the fact that I bought a journal strikes me as incredibly odd because I’ve never journaled a day in my life. I used to keep a diary of boys I kissed and what I was wearing at the time, but that’s as far as my diary-keeping efforts went. I woke up from that mind racing, midday slumber and realized that I had something I desperately needed to say and I needed to write it down immediately. I wrote the first draft of my manuscript over the next five days. Even the basic format for my book was crystallized at that moment.
I left Texas, but I was determined to stay on the cosmic highway. When I got home, I keyed in all the text from my journal, cleaned it up a bit, and decided to send my manuscript to the two authors whose books had inspired me to figure out my life’s purpose. Both books encouraged readers to ask for help from the Universe, or God, or even other people. I took that to mean that I should ask them for help. One author’s wife was due with their first child any day so the timing wasn’t great for him to spend several hours reading my very rough first draft. The author of the other book said sure, he’d take a look at it! Six weeks later, I got a brief e-mail that said he liked it and wanted to show it to an agent friend of his that’s based in Chicago (where this whole wild ride began) and not to get my hopes up. That agent became my agent and we sold the book within a couple of months. So thank you Matthew Kelly…for your inspiring book(s) and for your kindness and the gift of your time.
I find it fascinating that all the people who made this book possible are very different from me in terms of ideology, religion, and upbringing; from writing my first draft in a conservative Christian home, to asking for help from a bestselling author whose philosophy is largely based on his Catholic background, to my agent who actually works for a Christian-based literary agency who took me on as a client outside of his “day” job.
And in my book, I’m likely writing to an audience that has a completely different relationship to food than I do. Does that mean they can’t learn from me or I don’t have things to learn from people that think differently than I do? Call me naïve and hopeful, but I think that we’re all in this together and we all have something to share and say regardless of where we’re coming from or where we’ve been. I’ve been sitting in my beautiful, green oasis of Portland, Oregon where the food is local, organic, and sustainable and people bike to work and spend their weekends kayaking and windsurfing. Where the atmosphere is liberal and religion is hardly ever mentioned…at least in my family or circle of friends. It’s so good to get out and see and meet the rest of the country and hear what issues and triumphs people are experiencing. I’ve learned a lot and I hope I have something worth teaching and sharing next spring when my book comes out.
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the last few nights before bed is a tired, old-looking face. I’m thinking about having the mirror removed. I need my appetite back!
