Breaking Up is Hard To Do

We've all had to say goodbye to something or someone that isn't working out well. I have a friend who shall forever remain nameless who goes through nannies like the rest of us go through underwear. I'm amazed there isn't a nanny network out there that doesn't have a No-way! list with her name on it. Well, my problem started young. I fall in love easily. Most people can't admit that. I can. I'm weak. Give me some of what I need and I'm yours, blinking and drooling forever. Recently, things got out of control. I began to get up at night seeking out my source. Looking for it, tearing into things I had no business being in, looking for my car keys, going to where it was. . .I had to have it right then.
Yep, I was hooked.
Spike Lee appropriately named his movie She's gotta Have It for a reason.
I had to have. . .
CANDY!
Yes, dangit. Candy.
Not a man, and not that expensive chocolate crap you other women are hooked on. I'm allergic. (I'm so thankful)
No, cheap, delicious dusty, melt in your mouth Smarties and Swedish Fish.
I would tear the candy drawer apart--hey, don't judge me. YES, I have a candy drawer.
I'd go to the car, hoping the kids had hidden the bag I'd bought. I'd go through their drawers, bypassing their diaries--who wants to read those anyway??
I searched and even used the flashlight and stood on the counter to look on top of the cabinets--that's when I had an intervention. Yes, with myself. Nobody else was home.
All I could think was what will they think when they find your dead carcass on the floor from falling off this counter? You saw a bear out the window? Get down dumb ass, and think about what you're doing! (Conversations with myself tend to get graphic)
So, I got down and went back to bed. It was 3:45 in the morning. As I sat in bed licking an apple pretending it was a Swedish fish, I thought there's no Candy Anonymous for you, so you have to kick this on your own. The problem is, I've been addicted to candy all my life. But just because you're right-handed doesn't mean you can't be left-handed, or just because you speak French doesn't mean you can't learn English, right? Anyway, I decided right then I was going to quit. The problem was, I like candy. So I had to have a ceremony. I gathered up all the candy I could find, and I would like you all to think I burned it in the oven, but I ate it, of course!
Then I didn't buy anymore. Not a single 3 pound bag.
It's been 10 days and I'm candy free. Yes, I have candy withdrawl. In my dreams male anatomy is covered with Swedish fish, and food tastes different. I miss it. The smell of candy. (sigh)
I joined the gym.
Now the delightful scent of candy has been replaced by the odor of my bones as they grind against one another when my feet are over my head in Pilates. I've started several fires.
That sweet sticky smell that goes straight to your sinuses as you pass the ab machine isn't in fact someone who's forgotten their deodorant. It's me excreting candy through my pores. I've got to go now. The ab machine is free. I think I'm going to cry.

Carmen

Deadlines

There are deadlines and then there are deadlines. I have to set deadlines or things don't happen. In my car is drycleaning, mail and newspapers. Obviously that trip to the drycleaner that might involve a traffic jam hasn't happened. I'm not sure how long those clothes have been there, but I am sure that I've bought new ones in the meantime. Whew. Crisis averted.

This past week I gave myself a deadline to finish a synopsis. Suddenly everything else in my life necessitated a high security level. Including watching the ducks in the pond with no water stand around in the mud. For some reason this was funny to me. Uh, I think I'm wasting time. Dang. Busted. See you later. My synopsis is due to me by tomorrow at 5.

Later, Carmen

Carmen's Books

Cool Slideshows!

The Femme Fantastik Tour

The Femme Fantastik Tour is a wonderful group of women who decided we wanted to do advertising for our books our way. Not that we're shunning help from our publishers, just the opposite. We're taking risks as authors to try to ensure that advertising and our books get into the hands of our fans. We're all trying to grow our readership.

This past year, Nina Foxx, Lori Bryant-Woolridge and I added another Femme to our tour and let me tell you, Reshonda Tate Billingsley is no shrinking violet. Not only is she a former anchor newswoman out of Texas, she's got mad talent writing Christian fiction, young adult novels, raising a family and a closet poet. Now she's Femme Fantastik! We're also proud to welcome Trisha R. Thomas of the Nappily Ever After and Nappily Married books, soon to be made into a movie, and several other ladies, Berta Platas and Wendy Coakley-Thompson. I had the auspicious honor to be in the company of Lori, Nina and ReShonda for an event in Austin, Texas, and let me tell you, these girls are funny!

I'm funny, I realized, but funny as hell when I'm with them. We have no-holds-barred freespirit stream-of-conscience banter, but you have to be careful around the sneaky-with-the-camera Nina. She'll catch you doing or saying something, and man, do you look crazy when you watch it back on YouTube. I've learned, carry some lipgloss and try to watch your damned mouth. You will have to explain that *#&% later. Watch for a clip on
http://www.femmefantastik.blogspot.com/

Soul Obligation

The Day The Words Came Back

Recently I suffered from grief so badly, I couldn’t write. My mother passed away and 93 short days later, my grandmother. It was as if the words I desperately needed to fulfill my Soul Obligation vaporized under my tears.

For all of you that don’t know what a Soul Obligation is, it’s the words that I must say or write everyday, that if unborn, will come out in my sleep. (You may all stop wondering why I don’t have a boyfriend, as this is my reason. Who can stand all that yammering?)
I talk a lot. Mostly to myself, but I have get the words out. Most times my talking is within the structure of a story, but when not written, I’ll yell at a dog, (I don’t have pets) shoo a bird for eating my grass seed or sing to my plants. Yes, I can sing, but not well. But the words must come.
Weeks passed and I couldn’t write. I’d stare out the window and try to describe clouds and end up asleep in bed. Goodness knows how that happened, but it did for days. Friends would call and want to take me out to eat, but I didn’t go. I needed to write. I’d sit in front of my computer and stare at words in the dictionary and type definitions, but they weren’t my words. I was borrowing them from Webster’s.

Then I decided to give up on writing. I thought, What The Hell?
Could I do such a thing? Me, Carmen Green give up writing? What would I do all day? Holler at the rooster that crows every morning? (Yes, I live in Georgia, there is a rooster down the street, so I guess that means that I’m a confirmed Yahoo.)
Could I give up my passion for who knows how long? Maybe never see it again?
Well, I could and I did. My Soul Obligation ceased to move.
For the first couple days I was afraid. I didn’t know what to do with myself, so I gardened. I built a retaining wall, then took to my bed. My rheumatoid didn’t like that activity. Then I started wiping things down. I swiffered. My house sparkled.
I grew restless. I got snarky with the kids. I ate and ate and ate. I slept and slept, and drove across the country several times.
Then I started reading. Journaling things that have absolutely nothing to do with making money. Weeks passed and I read some more, and to my surprise, people kept putting pens in my hand. Lori, Carm, I need this from you. Bryant, Carmen, write this. Tina, Mom, sign the bills. Carla, let’s go to Starbucks and write. Karen, read, sweetie, but write to me later. Bryant and Whitney and Madeenah and Lori and Karen and Carla, you don’t have to write right now, but when you’re ready the words will come, and with that, I sat down and wrote my first sentences.
Initially, they were a discombobulated mess. They didn’t connect to the stories in my mind, but then I stopped trying to fit them into the books I was writing and just wrote them. Eventually, they found their place.
To this day my Soul Obligation flows like a cup runneth over. I’m filled with stories and ideas and words I can’t find space for. My body and mind are in sync, at least when it comes to writing. I finished a book! And I write. I grieve a little more and a little less, and I write. I’ve found through adversity there is humanity and life. Now I write about it. I’m glad to be back. Please join me on this journey. I've got a lot to say so. . .stay tuned.
Carmen