A Slice of Orange

Like hopscotch, anyone who is anyone (think Hallmark, Macys, my children) leap off Halloween, land firmly on Christmas and roll their broke â€“and- tired- of- celebrating selves into a new year with only a quick touchdown in November for Thanksgiving day. All this makes the month of November seem irrelevant, a step child, a wallflower at the dance. A chapter that one can skip without missing anything important to the story.

Case in point. The grocery store, November 1. Milk is the mission. To get to the dairy case I had to dodge the sale bins of Halloween candy (brown corrugated cardboard) and slalom around the even bigger full-price bins of Christmas candy (red and green corrugated cardboard) . When I finally got to the milk it was surrounded by little soldiers encased in waxy yellow cardboard â€“ the infamous eggnog..

To be fair, I did spy a display of cornstarch (bright yellow cardboard), Cornbread stuffing mix (brown cardboard) and pumpkin pie goop (hallelujia, a tin can). I suppose my brain should have registered Thanksgiving but the wreath display above the end-cap made me think Christmas dinner.

Which brings me to November and its one-day claim to fame â€“ Thanksgiving. Other months are filled with days of celebration. October is spent sewing costumes, watching horror movies, getting ready for trick-or-treat. Decemberâ€™s days come with luncheons, holiday parties, gift exchanges and cookie baking. Thanksgivingâ€™s frenetic cooking and eating is twenty-four hours long and the next day Christmas sales wipe November from our minds completely.

For me, though, ignoring November is like skipping over a chapter that really deserves attention. Sure there may be a hot love scene in chapter twelve, but chapter eleven gives you all the subtle little insights into why youâ€™ll care what happens next. So here is my November; here is what I would miss if, every year, I leapt over this chapter in my life.

November is the month when I first feel the bite of a cold wind that reminds me even California has seasons and that, in reality, Iâ€™m still a Missouri girl. It is the month when long days become short and the early darkness makes me feel like nesting. Cuddled under a quilt of my own making I take the time to truly appreciate the feathers of that nest: chicks who come and go, a husband who still finds this bird the most lovable in the flock after 31 years, a warm place to hunker down if the rain comes.

November is a month in which we celebrate the birthdays of my sisters-in-law â€“ a set of twins and one more. They have been my good friends for what seems like forever. It is the month I travel to see my own brothers and sisters half way across the country. I canâ€™t wait because seeing their faces â€“ even if it is only now and again â€“ makes me feel as if I am still young, my father is still with us, my mother will still rule the roost and all is right with the world.

November isnâ€™t the end, so I still have time to do things that will make me feel as if I am wrapping up the year well; it is not the beginning so there isnâ€™t the uncertainty that what lies ahead might not be as good as what was left behind.

A Veterans Day Memory…

by Jina Bacarr

On this Veterans Day, I’m reminded of a cold, dreary January morning when I wandered over the frozen ground in a forest in Luxembourg, the hushed voices of fallen soldiers whispering in my ear, begging me not to forget them. An unbearable chill settled into my bones, a shiver striking me between the shoulder blades when I heard the crunching sound of iron-shod boots behind me. Heavy boots. The same sound an American soldier would have heard during the long siege of the Battle of the Bulge that took place here during the freezing winter of 1944-45 in World War II.

The enemy. Ready to strike him down.

Was there no greater fear?

But today the boots belonged to my guide, a wizened old man with a pipe settled between his thin lips as he pointed out where different parts of the battle took place. I never forgot my tour of the battlefield then later the memorial site, where rows of white crosses mark the graves of fallen American soldiers, as well as the gravestone marker where General George S. Patton is buried. I also visited a similar field down the road where wooden German crosses mark the burial place of their dead. Snowflakes drifted down from the gray sky overhead in a peaceful pattern, scurrying from one marker to another before settling on the graves. It made no difference whether those graves were Allied or Axis. They were fallen soldiers.

War is hell.

Our military men and women fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan know that same fear, day in and day out. No wonder when they have a few moments to relax, they catch up on emails from home. They also like to read. Books have a way of taking the soldier’s mind off from his fear, his pain, his loneliness. And that’s where we can help. Send books to our fighting men and women overseas.

Best, Jina

Jina Bacarr is currently working on an erotic fiction novel set during World War II about a cabaret dancer who becomes a spy.

She is the author of The Blonde Geisha , Naughty Paris, Tokyo Rendezvous, a Spice Brief, and Spies, Lies and Naked Thighs, an erotic spy thriller, March 2008.

Jina writes erotic adventure for Spice Books. “Get Caught in the Act!”

THINGS THAT MAKE ME GO MMMRUH!

Stealing Back the Thunder

Geralyn Ruane

Recent conversation that took place in a supermarket parking lot between me and a homeless man:

Homeless Man: Do you have any spare change?

Me: (Giving him seven bucks) Here ya go. Hey, I have some old blankets in my car. Do you need a blanket?

Homeless Man: I could use a blanket.

Me: Okay. Iâ€™ll be right back. I just have to run to my car to get it. Youâ€™ll stay here?

Homeless Man: Iâ€™ll be here.

I run to my car, grab a blanket, then grab an unopened bottle of water off the back seat. I hurry back to the man.

Me: Here. (I hand him the blanket.) And hereâ€™s some water. (I hand him the bottle.)

Homeless Man: Thank you! (Takes the stuff then looks me in the eye.) Youâ€™re a Christian, arenâ€™t you.

Me: Actually, no.

Homeless Man: But you believe in the Lord.

Me: I believe in being nice to people.

Homeless Man: I can see in your eyes that you have the Lord in you.

Me: (Waving as I turn away) Take care.

Homeless Man: (Calling to my retreating back) The Lord is in you! I know it!

God is stealing my thunder and I donâ€™t like it. Or rather, people are stealing my thunder and giving it to God. Why does everyone insist on giving a Higher Power credit for the things I do right here on earth – or for the good things people do in general? What about my friend Kristin? Does God get her thunder, too? She gave me those blankets in the first place because she knows I dole out blankets and socks to the homeless once the whether starts turning cold.

I donâ€™t think the human race gets enough credit for its goodness. Sure, I actually know some people who help others because they are getting older and want to build up points for Heaven. But I know far more people who help others because, for them, there is simply no other way to live.

My ire on the subject of misappropriated thunder rumbles deep and strong, but not out of brewing jealousy or rankled pride. The big picture is far more disturbing, especially when you flip it over. Do you see it? Giving God credit for the good people do is the mirror image of making God the scapegoat for all the evil people do.

Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas, pickets the funerals of fallen servicemen, shouting at the mourners that God is killing U.S. soldiers in Iraq to punish Americans for their tolerance of homosexuality. Does God deserve to take this bullet? Or does such inflammatory rhetoric instead serve to distract from the reality of what certain people are doing to other people, and why? If we give God the blame, or the credit, we miss out on what our fellow humans are doing.

Like the woman who chased me into Trader Joeâ€™s the other day.

Woman: Excuse me! Excuse me! Do you drive the red Volkswagen?

Me: (Turning around) Yes.

Woman: You need to put change in the meter. I know itâ€™s Sunday, but theyâ€™ll ticket you. The car in front of you has a ticket.

Me: (I follow her back to my car and see both the other carâ€™s ticket and the sign Iâ€™d ignored posting the parking rules.) Thanks!

Woman: I just know that I hate to get a ticket.

Me: (Putting change into the meter) No, really, thanks!

Was God looking out for me by sending that woman to prevent my possible ticket? I prefer to let that woman keep her own richly deserved thunder. She helped me out. Mmmruh!

I steal back the credit or blame given to God whenever I can. No matter what Higher Power we believe in or how we pray, we should acknowledge the thunder of humanity. We need to recognize the good done by people, or weâ€™ll miss the sublime moments of mmmruh! that give life its pulse and light and hope. And we need to recognize the evil done by people, so that we can do something about it.

Mmmruh! It’s all about people. John Lennon could imagine it. Can you?

Geralyn Ruaneâ€™s favorite Hardy Boy is whichever one Parker Stevenson played, and these days she writes romance, chick lit and womenâ€™s fiction. Last year her short story â€œJane Austen Meets the New York Giantsâ€ was published in the New York Times Bestselling anthology The Right Words at the Right Time Volume 2.

It’s Worth It

SOMETHING EXTRA

By Kitty Bucholtz

Some days I can hardly wait to start writing. Last night I was writing right up until my husband turned out the lights. Other days I really needâ€¦something. So this month I decided to try participating in NaNoWriMo â€“ National Novel Writing Month (www.nanowrimo.org). With close to 100,000 people around the world writing their little hearts out to get 50,000 words down in 30 days, I figured that kind of motivation could be just the kick I need right now.

I’ve been writing for about a week and wow, what a week it’s been. Two full days were devoted to out of town guests. Nearly two more days had to be spent doing some “life stuff” that couldn’t be rescheduled. Yet I’ve still gotten nearly 7,000 words down, most of which would not have been written this week if it weren’t for my competitive streak and NaNoWriMo’s artificial daily goals.

Even though I’m behind schedule, I’m still excited! My November calendar is crowded with visits from family, an online class, and a usually-coveted four-day holiday weekend. Writing is work that constantly makes you choose between your writing goal and one of the numerous other things you’d love (or need!) to do. But I’ve found a joyful place inside where I can live and work, a place with magic and monsters and heroes and romance. I can’t live there without effort, but I say, it’s worth it!

Kitty Bucholtz writes romantic comedies because, well, she lives one! She wrote her first book in the NBC cafeteria, the second snowed in at a Reno hotel, and the third from a tiny apartment in Sydney. Even though she loves talking about, writing about, and teaching about writing, sheâ€™s pretty sure she knows at least three people who arenâ€™t writers.