Tammi Landry-Gilder, Author
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Let the Party Begin

3/19/2015

5 Comments

 
Here I am, just about to turn forty-five years old, starting a new career. I’ve always loved to write. I’ve been able to put things down on paper that I haven’t always been able to say with the spoken word. I was always a fairly decent writer, have had a couple short stories published in newsletters, and have had snippets of my writing included in a book, but I’ve never really done it all on my own. Until now.

I started by taking a creative writing class through my local community education department. We met once per week and shared our writing, giving each other tips and suggestions on how we could improve our writing and our stories. I wrote a short story for small children, read it to the class, and everyone liked it. It was fun, exciting, and it felt good to know that I wasn’t the only one who thought it was a cute story. I put the story away and pretty much forgot all about it. After all, I had two boys to raise, laundry to do, a house to clean, and I decided I had to be the PTA President at my sons’ school for two years.

My boys are still children, but at almost eleven years old and twelve years, they have become so darn self-sufficient, they rarely really need me anymore. I make lunches, occasionally help with homework (as long as it’s not math), still do their laundry, and give all the hugs and kisses they will possibly allow me to give. But they like their alone time. They enjoy sleepovers and spending time with friends. My twelve-year-old just told me that he no longer wants me to come up to his room at night and fall asleep in his bed. He says it’s “totally OK” if we snuggle and hug, but no more sleeping in the same bed. It’s just “weird.” Got it.

One day I decided I was going to dig up that old story I had written and work on it a bit more. I joined an online writing/critiquing group, and began rewriting my little story.  I mentioned to my husband that I wanted to start writing, and he gave me the best idea for a book I could ever imagine. I quickly began writing, and writing, and writing. What started out as a small picture book for younger children turned into a bigger chapter book for slightly older kids. I accidentally found a great editor who expressed interest in helping me edit and hopefully sell the book. Thus my writing career began. My editor is also an agent and movie producer, so I truly got lucky and am hoping I can impress him with my words.

At the beginning of this adventure, I thought, “How hard can it be; writing a book for children?” Holy heck, it’s a lot harder than I imagined. Did you know you can’t just pull out a computer and write a book in one sitting? Did you know it’s nearly impossible to write a book without doing a proper outline first? Did you know that your chapter book needs to be filled with conflict, excitement, struggle, feelings, emotion, and risk, and that the story needs to be told in the fewest words possible? It cannot be boring. It cannot be “regular”, and in order to get the thing published, it has to be much better than EVERYONE else’s books. And by everyone, I mean even the authors who have been writing books for decades. The competition is fierce.

As I write more, I find out more. I learn more, and I grow. Many times I have shut down my laptop and thought to myself, “What in the heck am I doing? I’ve clearly bitten off more than I can chew.” But then I remember these things:

-Nothing worth doing is ever easy.
-If you work hard and you truly believe in yourself, anything is possible. I mean, I tell my children this just about every day, so it has to be true.
-I’ve been through my father’s suicide, divorce, graduated from college (no small task for someone with ADD and dyscalculia). Surely I can write a couple damn books, right?

I decided that I needed to stop being a big, fat, baby and just put myself out there. I started this blog and declared myself an “author”.  I do realize that is a stretch, since the only things I’ve really ever had published are small stories or snippets, really, and no one even knows about them or even where they are located these days. Honestly, I don’t even think I can find them. It’s been several years ago, and quite honestly, my writing wasn’t all that impressive.

However, I knew that if I built a website, started a blog, and told everyone I was writing books, I would have no choice. I would have to do it. I wasn’t about to look like an idiot telling people I was an author and then not following through.

I have so many wonderful friends and family members who have “liked” my web site and author page. I have new followers on Twitter (six months ago I didn’t even know what Twitter was), and even my kids like my books thus far (trust me, sometimes they are my harshest critics!). I couldn’t be more honored and humbled by the support I’ve received from everyone. I feel blessed and certainly lucky. It’s amazing that there are people out there, some I haven’t even seen or spoken to since high school, who are behind me one hundred percent, who send me little notes or messages of encouragement, and who are genuinely happy to wish me success. What good people they are! I hope they all know how much their support means to me and how it is driving me to become better.

So here I am, with what I think is a great idea for a children’s chapter book, two short picture books already written and waiting in the wings, an editor who is just about three thousand times smarter than I am, and a red hot desire to start this brand new career. Can I really do this? I think I can. No, wait, I know I can.

I’m going to keep writing and learning. I joined an online critique group, and now I’m a member of a creative writing group that meets the first Wednesday of every month. I’m excited and ready. I’m terrified and doubtful, at times, but my desire to succeed is bigger than my worries.

A huge “THANK YOU” to everyone who has been reading my blog and are awaiting the publication of my first book. It may not happen overnight, but it will happen.

Let the party begin....




5 Comments

Just Follow the Damn Rules

3/15/2015

2 Comments

 



The middle school carpool may very well be the death of me. Honestly, either I’m going to have heart failure because it stresses me out so badly, or someone is going to beat me to death for screaming at them for breaking all the rules.

I like rules. They comfort me. If there are rules for me to follow, I’m going to honor them and I’m going to do the right thing. It’s just who I am. Call it boring or tell me I’m a “goody two shoes” (I have been called that, by the way), I really don’t care. I like when there are rules in place and I love it when everyone follows them. It’s called “harmony” people, and it makes the world a better place.

For example, if the middle school principal gives me rules to follow about the carpool, I follow them. In my eyes, the principal knows what’s best when it comes to all things school-related, so if he has rules, I’m going to follow them and I’m not going to question his reasons for those rules.

The rules for the afternoon pick up at my son’s middle school are pretty simple; drive slowly, park your car in a parking space in the lot (many spots are always available), wait for your child to exit the building and get into your car. You can then exit the parking lot in a slow, steady, and mature manner.

Here’s the problem; there are people who come to pick up their children each afternoon who do not follow the rules. From this time on, I’m going to refer to them as the “Non Rule Followers” or the NRF’s. Clearly, they are not comforted by rules as I am, and they must think the carpool rules do not pertain to them, no matter how many emails the school principal sends out reminding them to follow the carpool rules.

These NRF’s do not park in the designated parking spaces, no matter if there are fifty of those spaces available to them. Rather, they park as close as they possibly can to the front door, even if it means blocking the only exit we have to get out of the parking lot once we all retrieve our children.

The NRF’s must think their kids’ legs will shatter into thousands of pieces if they have to walk more than fifty feet to reach their vehicles. Don’t even get me started on the ridiculousness that occurs on the rainy days. Apparently, the NRF’s feel their tiny offspring will melt if water falling from the skies lands on them. Yes, all Hell breaks loose when it rains or, God forbid, it is snowing. The children will certainly freeze if they step foot outside and there are fluffy, white, icy flakes falling from the sky. These people DO realize we live in Michigan, right? It’s going to snow. A lot.

If a handicapped parking space is empty, you better believe it’s fair game. No matter that the non-rule following parent is NOT at all impaired in any way, shape or form. Just the fact that the space is available must mean that anyone can park there and remain parked there until their precious child exits the building.

My personal favorite has to be either the NRF who is on his/her cell phone while he/she is blocking the exit to leave the school parking lot, or the person who parks in the exit lane and then leaves his/her vehicle to enter the school. I’m not sure how this person thinks we’re all going to get out of the lot when his/her car is blocking the exit and there is no one in the car capable of moving it out of the way.

I also love the guy who parks in the exit lane and then proceeds to get out of his car, open his trunk, grab tools, and do some routine car maintenance while he waits for his kid. Dude- don’t you think you can just go to the gas station after carpool? I mean, doesn’t that make more sense?

I am intrigued by the people at the carpool in the very fancy cars who display on their license plates what kind of car they are driving. Don’t we all know? Do they really need to have personalized license plates that read “My Benz” or “My RangeRov” or “STANG”? Don’t get me wrong. I love driving my fancy car, but please kill me by stabbing if I ever personalize my license plate announcing what type of car it is. Nope. Not doing it.

I know I let this get to me way too much. I really need to chill out, take a deep breath, shut the heck up, get my son and be on my way. My head tells me that I should relax and let it go, but my heart tells me to raise some hell. It’s my heart that always gets me into trouble.

I can’t say my son loves it when I honk at the people who block the exit. He probably doesn’t like it when I give the people my “WTF?” look and mouth swear words. I am proud to say I have never said the swear words out loud, nor have I rolled down my windows to scream at anyone. But I will admit there are times I close my eyes and dream that I’m driving a tank and I just plow down that exit line, scattering random cars that are blocking the way as I go.  Ah… a girl can dream.

I guess it’s mainly about trying to show my child that rules are there for a reason. When someone is blocking the exit lane, and all the cars trying to get out are driven by people who are getting frustrated, who are trying to maneuver around the car in the way, and the drivers are not looking for the children who are walking out into the parking lot, it gets scary and dangerous. If everyone followed the rules, we wouldn’t have to worry that one of these days, one of those kids is going to get hit.

In fact, last week a woman was backing up trying to squeeze her car in between two cars right in front of the building. There was barely any room, but instead of just moving her car and parking in a space only a few feet to the left, she HAD to get her car right there in front of the school. My son exited the school, and walked out into the lot when the woman’s car was not moving. She didn’t see him, or wasn’t paying attention, and just as he got behind her car, she backed up. He jumped out of the way. He was almost hit. I wanted to exit my car and confront her, but in order to save my son the embarrassment of having a lunatic for a mother, I let it go. Had she actually hit him, I would have gone batshit crazy.

I hope it doesn’t take a child getting hit by a car in that parking lot to get people to change and realize what’s going on right now is dangerous and wrong. I’d like to show my son that when his principal e-mails out a set of carpool rules to the parents, we follow them. It’s just the right thing to do. It’s the safest thing to do for our kids, ALL of our kids.

It would be nice for all the children attending the middle school to exit the building each day and observe every parent following the carpool rules. As parents, if we don’t follow the rules that are set by the school principal, how then do we expect our children to follow them?

Just follow the damn rules.





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    Tammi Landry-Gilder

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