erin

now we are thirty-five

Today I am thirty-five years old, which means this blog is five years old (and flax-golden tales are four).

Five years sounds comparatively short but July of 2008 feels like a lifetime ago. More than a lifetime.

I’m not the girl I was then. I don’t think that girl could have imagined this particular version of “where do you think you’ll be in five years?” and that girl had a very good imagination.

I don’t think she even would have believed that I live in Manhattan.

And as much as life is overwhelming at times and I’m still figuring it all out, I know I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.

At some point over the last couple of years I starting posting less about personal things and I know that was partially because more people were listening and also because there was (and is) a good deal of negative personal stuff that doesn’t warrant talking about.

But somewhere in there I stopped talking about the positive stuff, too. And I think it’d be nice to start this fifth year of the blog, this thirty-fifth year of me, with something positive.

This is Adam.

DSC_0315

We met at the International Festival of Authors in Toronto while I was on that first whirlwind of a book tour in October of 2011. We got to know each other through emails and Skype chats and visits and vacations and then he was my date to my sister’s wedding last summer and I never gave him back.

He does handstands and takes fantastic photographs and reads more than anyone I’ve ever met.

I know I don’t have to tell the internet about my personal life and I won’t be oversharing or even sharing all that much, really, but I’m tired of saying “I” when I mean “we” and he makes me happier than I have ever been. He’s a gigantic, important part of my life and I love him. He keeps me steady on the crazy roller coaster that is life right now so that I can actually enjoy it. I thought the internet might like to meet him.

So this is thirty-five. It sounds strangely round as a number. I have no idea what the next five years might bring but I’m sure there will be reading and writing and cocktails and cupcakes and birthdays and stories and unimaginable adventures.

We shall see.

By erin, ago

flax-golden tales: the cat and the fiddle

cow

the cat and the fiddle

I was tasked with finding that cat who could play the fiddle because the band needed a proper fiddle player and the sheep were lousy at anything but percussion (including running their own errands). I asked around at pubs and shoppes and fairy markets and several questionable sources pointed me in the same direction but when I got there I only found the cow.

I asked if she had really jumped over the moon and she said yes but technically it was a moon and not the moon.

She told me that tale-tellers are prone to hyperbole, especially when rhyming.

I asked after the cat, hoping that part wasn’t also a rhyme-necessitated exaggeration. I explained how I was searching for a fiddle player and she told me the cat did indeed play the fiddle once but she gave it up, something about no longer finding the instrument challenging. The last the cow had heard was that the cat was studying the harpsichord, or at least that’s what the little dog said.

I told her that was a shame as I had been sent in search of a fiddle player and not a harpsichordist, and thanked her for saving me the trouble of looking further. She told me the cat always declined invitations to join bands anyway because the fiddle thing had given her a bit of a reputation and she preferred to be free to follow her muse.

Then the cow added in a whisper that the dish really did run away with the spoon but the fork was the only one who didn’t see that coming and he’s still in therapy.

 

About flax-golden tales. Photo by Carey Farrell. Text by Erin Morgenstern.

By erin, ago

horoscope

Cancer Horoscope for week of July 4, 2013

Thomas Gray was a renowned 18th-century English poet best remembered for his “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard.” It was a short poem — only 986 words, which is less than the length of this horoscope column. On the other hand, it took him seven years to write it, or an average of 12 words per month. I suspect that you are embarking on a labor of love that will evolve at a gradual pace, too, Cancerian. It might not occupy you for seven years, but it will probably take longer than you imagine. And yet, that’s exactly how long it should take. This is a character-building, life-defining project that can’t and shouldn’t be rushed.

Thank you, Rob Brezsny, for making me feel better about this not-yet-novel-shaped thing taking so long.

By erin, ago

flax-golden tales: not how love works

not how love worksnot how love works

I’ve been told it’s important to always be nice.

But nice can be dangerous.

It puts me in places I don’t want to be.

I don’t know how to get out of them and still be a nice girl.

He gives me flowers and demands which he mistakes for endearments.

I try to explain to him.

To make him realize that this is not how love works.

He doesn’t listen.

I don’t think he even understands.

I don’t know what will happen if I stop being nice.

 

About flax-golden tales. Photo by Carey Farrell. Text by Erin Morgenstern.

By erin, ago

post-ocean blue dress gratitude

Last week I got to wear a blue (blue! not black!) dress and interview Neil Gaiman and talk about The Ocean at the End of the Lane and admit in front of hundreds of people that I’ve never seen Doctor Who.

(I know. I’m sorry.)

I had planned on doing some sort of post-event blog post but then afterwards I really wasn’t sure what to say.

I had a lot of fun and though I was supremely nervous it went really well and everyone including Neil seemed very pleased with everything. He’s remarkably easy to interview considering he kept answering questions before I even asked them. Perhaps he’s clairvoyant. I met him for the very first time about an hour before we were on stage so the whole thing felt remarkably surreal.

There is an excellent writeup of the evening over on Tor.com (though I think a few of the quotes about whether or not we die may be misattributed).

I had many more questions than we had time for, though my main goal was to talk about things that maybe weren’t being talked about at every single stop on his tour, and we got tiny frogs in teacups and BPAL and Mythic Boy Jesus so I’d call that a win.

One of the last audience questions posed to Neil was “Who is your favourite living writer?” and of course it was a longer list than just one, and included a few recently no longer living writers as well, like Iain Banks and Diana Wynne Jones.

And I thought in that moment how incredibly lucky I was to be sitting there, when I will never get the opportunity to meet the other gigantic influence on my writer-brain I mentioned in my babbling introduction, the incomparable Douglas Adams.

There is a sentiment I am concerned got a bit lost in that babbling during that introduction (I was nervous), which is this:

I would not be the writer I am today without Neil Gaiman.

I’m not sure I would even be a writer at all without him.

I discovered his work at the perfect time for my developing story-brain and I am eternally grateful for that.

I’m not sure the gratitude got properly expressed then, so here’s an extra Thank You, Neil for good measure:

Thank you, Neil.

For your work and for asking me to do this event and for being a real live lovely person.

(Also I am sorry that I inadvertently stole the title of that Batman thing, but The Night Circus is indeed a really good title.)

Erin & Neil

By erin, ago

flax-golden tales: seagull

seagullseagull 

I hadn’t seen any birds at all for so long that at first the dark spot on the blue sky was a puzzlement. My eyes couldn’t sort out what it was until it came close enough that the birdness was undeniable.

I think he’s a seagull. That would make sense.

I expected him to fly away, but he’s stayed with me. I worry that he might be better off if he kept going, though I am glad for the company.

He cries, but most of the time the wind carries the sound away. Not that I would understand what he’s trying to tell me even if I could hear him properly.

He circles my boat, but he never tries to land on it. He looks at me forlornly, as though he suspects, like I do, that there is no more land to be found.

 

About flax-golden tales. Photo by Carey Farrell. Text by Erin Morgenstern.

By erin, ago