Sheltering in Place – Day Who Can Remember
Pickled Penning For the past thirty-eight years, I have been a Mrs. Even though I held a job, actually ran a department at Stanford University, hubby was a hotshot performer. Being with a rock and roll band, a jazz duo, and with other musical skills, he outshone me. That left people always asking, “what’s it like to be married to him? It must be heaven to hear his singing all the time.” Occasionally, I would step down from the perceived cloud, sit in the background, smile, ever charming and demure, ever appreciative of his many talents. And if I could help a little with the load-out after the gig, so much the better. Simply put, at times being his wife was pretty much my raison d’être. But through the years it changed. Now I am a published author with fans who actually spend their hard-earned money to buy my books, for which I am unendingly grateful. I am a minor cause célèbre. I use more French words to make it sound grander than it is. But I think you take what you can get in this life. I’ve also noticed there’s a price to be paid for stepping into the spotlight. People feel compelled to tell you every detail of what they don’t like about your books, even if it’s only from their own frame of reference. For instance, my upstairs neighbor, a lovely lady of around 85 years old, read my books, mainly because I gave them to her. I don’t think she would have bought them, otherwise. But it was the neighborly thing to do, doncha know. She loved them, she said, and passed them on to her daughter. Of course, it would have been nice if she encouraged her daughter to buy them, but as I’ve mentioned, you…
