December Stories

December is looking good. Got all my decorating done. We have a new tree this year and it is prettiest we’ve ever had. We put it up right after Thanksgiving, which we celebrated twice this year. Once with our Seattle family and once with my dad in St. Pete. It was wonderful to see our grandchildren. They are so kind and sweet and exuberant. Wish we lived closer but at least we continue to pull off a few cross country visits every year.

Mike asked about my writing.

“I saw your new book came out, but it’s not on the website.”

“Right. I haven’t figured it out yet. But I will!!!”

That was the short answer. Life has been complicated for the last several months. It’s easing up now, though.

“I can do it for you. It will just take a second.” Mike said.

“Cindy, watch him and take notes,” Al said.

So we did that. It took five minutes, tops. I wrote notes. They took ten minutes. My grandson also asked about my writing. He had overheard the grown ups talking about the time I asked Al if I could kill him in a book. That would be Jane in St. Pete. Somehow out of all the anecdotes, I had to pull out that one.

So my oldest grandson loves to draw. He says as he draws, he makes a story. “How do you make a story, Granny?”

“I get an idea.”

“Like how did you make the story about Grandpa?”

“Um well…first I asked him if it was okay. And he said yes. And it wasn’t really him, but I used similar circumstances.” He looked at me like “explain more.” So I thought about what I could say. “Well Grandpa had to dely retiring for two whole years and I wanted to move down here, but he didn’t tell me we couldn’t until he was in Michigan and I was still down here.”

“It wasn’t like he left me forever, he just had to get back to work and then he’d come down again over Christmas. So he told me over the phone that his retirement was delayed and I was disappointed. I was not mad. But I did not take the news well. It made me think of this idea, like, what if another husband did that to another wife, and what if he was fixing something electrical in the house, and electrocuted himself? And then the granny would be a widow and get to stay in Florida by herself.”

“Then I could be mad on paper but not in real life.” I knew I was in trouble and hope I wouldn’t give the kid nightmares.

“But who’s the killer?”

“It’s always a bad guy. A very bad guy. But you know what, I’m not writing those kind of books anymore. I’m writing about Christmas 200 years ago. Happy stories.”

“Hmmm.” He continued drawing his supersized snake figure. There was a little dot curled into the snake’s tail. “What’s that?” I asked. “It’s a person,” he said. I feared that person would get killed, but didn’t bring it up. He left me the drawing, which is very good.

I need to buy a frame for it. Also finish Christmas shopping. And revise my happy book. PS I am going to finish Jane 3 also. But maybe it won’t have a killer.