...and churn out New York Times best-sellers at my leisure while living comfortably on my small ranch in East Texas.
The great thing about being such a well-known author is that I sell a ton of books! So when it comes to the crap ton of laundry and other things that must be done about the place, I can simply hire someone to do it. Mission accomplished! Except the mowing. I like jetting around on that go-kart of a mower. It's mine!! Mine, I tell you! Unless I'm at a book signing and then the....groundskeeper?....takes care of that.
As I've never seen myself any different from the maid (when I had one) or landscaper (again, when I had one) they are all invited to come in and partake of the coffee and whatever else the cook (def gonna have someone doing some of that) has laying around. We chat a bit around the table in the morning and then we wander off to our corners of the world.
Sometimes I write in my office in the corner of the first floor of the house. Sometimes I just take my laptop out to the porch and write there with it on my lap. I have to consult my notes occasionally, but they're a short walk from there. Other times I wander through the pasture trying to work out a scene or coming to terms with the fact that a character that I dearly love truly serves no purpose in my current project. Usually it's a character I've fallen in love with for their quirky wit and sense of humor. Familiar, no?
After I wrote my first book, I met Trevor at a book-signing party in New York.
"You put a lot of yourself in this book, didn't you?" He smiled but he really wasn't asking. He knew.
"Yes. Yes I did." I have a nasty habit of facing challenges head-on.
"So it's going to be tough to dig deep for an original character for your next book?" I remember his grin when he said that.
"Is that a challenge?" I confronted him.
"Why, yes. Yes it is." He smiled.
I signed his book with my name and date and "see you at my signing in one year." I actually saw him sooner. I say he stalked me. He calls it networking. We ended up at the same party two days later and talked most of the evening. Long story short, he married be before the book challenge ever came to pass. And it was one month in advance of the date I'd committed to.
Anyone who will move from a comfortable family home in Manhattan to "the sticks" of East Texas has to be an odd individual. I never said Trevor was normal. By-in-large he manages his family's fortune. But what he really enjoys is individual investment counselling. And he has more letters after his name than a surgeon. What I really like about Trev, though, is that he doesn't judge an account by the amount of money that's being managed. You could have $1,000,000 or you could have $100. He takes people as they are and likes people in general and his job in particular.
You'd have to take me as I am and just like people as they are to be with me anyway, right? Yeah...so needless to say there was a giant field test of Trev's go-with-the-flow-ness about nine months after we were married. I was deep into book three and discovered by some miracle (truly) that I was pregnant. This was NOT supposed to happen. So he patiently attended my come-to-Jesus meeting with the OB-GYN who had done the tube tying after Squib was born. We heard the odds. I was not pleasantly surprised. And Trevor was fabulous down to the very last detail--and excited to say the least.
We acquired an au pair and the housekeeper works more hours. I even got an assistant to help out with my writing along with so many other things to make "things" as laid back as they possibly be. Massages. Mani/pedi's. You name it. Time off. Whatever. Trev became psychic. I took naps. Did my writing. Ate well. It was the most enjoyable pregnancy I'd ever had. Litlle Jordan joined us with no complications--a miracle--and a few days later we were all home. Tired, but home.
Squib and Beanstalk love Trevor and just call him by his first name since we couldn't figure anything else out. They are fascinated with Jordan and hold him and feed him like big brothers do. Trevor is doing more with them since I am out of commission.
Two years ago I couldn't see such a wonderful life for myself, but...
Scat
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