DWDLLC – Page 221 – Laurie Halse Anderson

March 23, 2006

the perfect high school?

First things first. Thank you, thank you to the students, staff, and parents of the Chadwick School (esp Kim Sonnenblick!) for making my visit so relaxing and enriching. I enjoyed the last two days so much!

Now I am in Cerritos. The ride from Palos Verdes here was mind-boggling; a typical LA mild-traffic jam kind of experience. I guess living out in the country is having more of an effect on me than I realized. I kept thinking who are all of these people? Where are they going? And how do they live so close to each other??? The driver of the car pointed out houses that cost millions of dollars that are – literally- separated from their neighbor’s million dollar house by only a few feet. I cannot get my head around that.

Today is catching up on work day, so I’ll keep this entry short. I have a question for you before I go: if you had a magic wand and were going to create the perfect high school from scratch, what would it be like?

Cali pictures

March 22, 2006

Chilly CA

It hasn’t been exactly warm here, but it hasn’t snowed so I’m not complaining. Had a blast at La Jolla Country Day and am doing it all over again at the Chadwick School which I think is just outside LA. (The geography of Los Angeles confuses me. The greater LA area feels as big as Vermont. All I know is that if you’re looking at the ocean, you’re facing west.)

Frozen Chadwickians. They aren’t quite used to the brisk temperatures out here. But they are really nice.

The Writing Workshop – highlight of the day for me!!

The best sign I’ve seen.

My hotel is interesting. The people in the room next door have deadly boring lives which they detailed LOUDLY on the phone last night for hours. Argh. And the guy who decided that it was a good idea to race his motorcycle around the parking lot when I was trying to sleep? I wanted to introduce him to the Boring People. Maybe they could have talked him to death or something. But except for those two things, this has been a stellar trip and I’ve had the chance to hang out with fantastic people, so it’s all good.

March 20, 2006

Airplanes are magic

It’s always hard leaving home, especially for a week. Sunday morning was last minute packing, tea-drinking, mild fretting. Because I had proclaimed Spring the day before, we were enjoying more lake effect snow.

The drive south to Syracuse.

But we got to the airport in one piece and my flight took off with no problems. I watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire in the air (movies in the air – amazing) and scribbled ideas and headed into better weather.

Let’s review yesterday’s visuals:

Mexico, NY

San Diego, CA

::great sigh::

The very, very nice people of La Jolla Country Day School took me out to dinner last night at a restaurant that overlooked the Pacific ocean and the setting sun… yeah, it had everything, crashing surf, beach, crazy freezing cold surfers, you name it. But the company was even better and it was a terrific way to end a long day. I leave here in a minute to go to the school. Tonight I fly to LA, tomorrow, the Chadwick School.

March 18, 2006

A rant-free post

No, really. I promise. Because I am in a good mood. A great mood. Georgetown won yesterday and SUNY Albany almost beat UConn. I love UConn, but come on – how can you not root for Albany in that situation? I love March.

Another reason for feeling so great today? The farmers down the road from us have started boiling their maple sap. It doesn’t matter how much it snows this week, Spring has arrived.

This means it’s time for me to hit the road again. Tomorrow I catch a plane to San Diego. (Tough, I know. Just pray that the Stinky Guy doesn’t sit next to me again.) I’ll be speaking in LaJolla on Monday, at the Chadwick School in Palos Verdes on Tuesday and Wednesday, and I’ll be giving a public presentation at the Cerritos Library on Friday evening. I come home a week from today.

One of yesterday’s highlights was a trip to the library that resulted in an armful of books for the trip. A lot of them are fantasies – it’s about time I read more of those. So I have the perfect Saturday lined up: writing, reading, basketball, and packing. OK, so it would be really perfect if I didn’t have to pack. But nobody gets a perfect life, so I can deal with it. I’ll get BH to build a fire in the fireplace tonight. That will balance out the sadness of packing my suitcase again.

What are the ingredients of your perfect Saturday in March?

March 17, 2006

Green Friday

I’d like to take this moment to say thank you to my Donovan and Foley ancestors for leaving Ireland, braving the Atlantic Ocean, and coming to America. Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all! I’ll be playing Celtic music and scaring the dog with my poor imitation of an Irish jig all day.

My friend (and awesome writer) Susan Campbell Bartoletti, and noted author Patricia Reilly Giff both have excellent books about the Irish Potato Famine.

I’ve been working on pictures books and shoveling the mountains of correspondence that precede a school visit trip. I woke up this morning and watched the sun crawl across the ceiling and came up with the opening lines of this new picture book that’s been nipping at my heels. (Details on next week’s adventure tomorrow.) It’s really nice when new stories start to talk to you.

The Oklahoma House of Representatives passed the bill that forces libraries to remove all books with sexual or homosexual themes (like SPEAK) to the “adults only” section of the library. The vote? 60 for, 33 against. The OK House of Reps doesn’t trust families to choose books for their children. Let’s see – wiretapping without a warrant is legal, book banning is legal… how long will it be before these fringe groups succeed in burning our Constitution to ashes and installing cameras in our homes to monitor our behavior?

If this upsets you, then ask yourself what you have done in the past month to participate in our democracy. If we do not take our government back, this is just the beginning.

And if any of you reading the above two paragraphs feel inclined to make assumptions about my faith or politics based on those opinions, let me state for the record that I am a Christian and I am more conservative than liberal. I am fed up with both political parties. Please let me know if you hear of a political leader who has common sense, who won’t take money from lobbyists, and who has a clue about our country’s history. I haven’t found one yet.

OK, end of rant.

Gerry MacNamara, hold your head up high. We love you and are proud. Did you see Adam Morrison at the end of the Gonzaga game??? Wow. Georgetown plays at 2:35pm on CBS…. might…have…to….wander….by…the…TV…