from the shadows

Is it really Monday? he asks, rolling over.

It is, I answer, placing a cup of coffee on the night table, and I return to editing at my makeshift desk. In the past two years, I have written five full-length novels. In forty-nine years, I have easily written twice that. 

Needless to say, there is a lot of editing to do. 

Q. What do you write? 

A. Rare books.

Monday, he says, stretching. Once again, following tradition, he's forgotten what today is, and it takes one of the kids to spill the news. 

Oh, is it really your birthday? he asks, standing in the doorway of our room, looking confused.

It is, I answer, raising my face from the light of the screen to accept a kiss. So, obviously, there's no cake or presents waiting for me, but don't worry, he has all day to forget again and keep the stasis. I'm in charge of all of our holidays. To say he's not good at them is gracious. But it doesn't matter, not after everything he has already given me; things one can't purchase in a store. He is the man who opened the door for me. The man who often has to shove me out of my comfort zone because left to my own devices, I would only exit my bubble through fictional doorways.

Do you feel old? My daughter asks via facetime.

I felt old when I tripped over my dog while running, knocked myself out, broke my knee cap, and tore both meniscuses. It's been an uphill fight from there, I laugh. But what I really feel is ready. Forty-eight was the most amazing year of my life.

When you turn fifty, can we get you an over-the-hill cake? She asks.

When I turn fifty, I want balloons that say get well soon, I answer.

I love getting old. I shouldn't, but I do. Sure, my body is trying to kill me, but there is freedom up here. A freedom I've tried to pass to my children, so they don't have to wait to be old to be themselves. 

When I was twenty-eight, I started writing my own stories because I was tired of being lonely inside other peoples' books. 

I couldn't stand to hear the description of one more beautiful woman running down a darkened street in heels. 

What if she wasn't beautiful? What if removing her glasses and letting down her hair changed nothing? What if every time she puts on a skirt, the same thought goes through her head, 'what if I have to climb a fence?'

Twenty years after I wrote my first full-length novel, I decided it was time to take a chance and share my voice with the outside world. 

It's a big chance among hundreds of others. Last summer, the minute the Canadian border was reopened, we drove the entire Alaskan Highway and then some. Utah to Alaska, camping along the way. We delivered a car to my son that he had to leave behind because moving a family during a pandemic is not easy.

I sent off my first query to an agent from my son and daughter-in-law's new house in Wasilla. I saw my granddaughter start first grade in her new school. We flew home, sent my stepson back to Moscow, Idaho, and sent my oldest daughter off to Scotland. 

Then our baby turned eighteen.

Today I am forty-nine, and I'm still the writer of rare books, a job title I'd like to retire by the end of the year. 

Fingers crossed.