Stress Ball

HALLIE: It's morning, prime writing time. I'm working away and the phone rings. I race across the house to get it, pick up and hear "Hi there! I'm looking for the woman of the house." "She's not here," I snarl and shoot the receiver back in its cradle (our house phone,believe it or not, has a rotary dial...my kids' friends don't know how to use it.)

Before I'm back in my home office, my office phone rings. A different woman's voice is on the other end: "I'm calling from the Patriot Ledger." Before she can go on, I say, "I'm not interested in getting the Ledger," and smack the phone down.

Instant remorse. Within seconds I'm agonizing--have I have just mouthed off all snarky-like to a reporter calling to interview me about my latest book? Probably not. But still, it's one of those lessons I've learned the hard way...even when you don't feel like it, BE NICE! Because you never know which call or event or person will turn out to be THE ONE who gives your career that little extra noodge. Not to mention the fact that there's entirely too much negative energy floating around in our universe, why add to it?

Sometimes you've just gotta suck it up and smile 'til it aches. Have you found that it pays to always always always play nice, and that breaks can come from the least expected places?

JAN: When I was in high school, I took a six week job telemarketing for the local paper. It was the hardest six weeks of my life. I'm always nice to telemarketers, even as I dismiss them. I'm a little harder on people looking for charitable contributions -- especially police or fire organizations -- since I've done a lot of stories about fraudulent charities and paid soliciters who get 75 percent of the take. I ask A LOT of questions and sound like a hardass, but I still try to be civil.

And yes, I think the world has enough negative energy in it to fuel a power plant. I think that both negative and positive energy are sort of contagious. So why not spread positive energy --even if it isn't even related to a big break.

I should add that I think its equally important to stand up for yourself. And not be "nice" when you need to be direct and honest. Ah,but determining which way to go.... that's the fine art.

HANK: The voice on the phone says--oh so casually, and friendly-like--is John there? My husband's name is Jonathan, and no one calls him John. So this ain't no friend. My hackles go up. Suspicious.

No, he isn't, I say. Hissing. May I take a message?

When they say no, I stop them. Who is this,I demand? And it's always someone raising money, and pretending to be someone Jonathan knows in order to get him to come to the phone. I truly hate that.

But when there's a little voice on the phone, a tentative person who's a telemarketer, I say--look. I know you're just doing your job. But I'm never never never going to buy whatever you're selling. SO you'll be better off calling someone else.

And if someone calls to ask me to take a survey, I always do it. I'm such a dupe. But I think they get money if someone answers the questions, and I figure, why not. They might be--a poor college student. And I am lucky and happy. So many times, you do something, and then it turns out to have roots and legs and ramifications. And you wonder--wow. What if I had...or hadn't...

But, yeah, Hallie. I can see where you would have a moment of wondering--was that the book editor who wanted to do a big article on me and now he/she is calling (insert competitor here) because I was rude? It wasn't, of course. (And a reporter would have called back, right?) But it may have been the universe sending you a little signal. So thanks for passing it on. We can all use it.

ROBERTA: Here's my new screening technique: When someone I don't recognize asks for me--or my husband--I say we're not home and can I take a message. The telemarketing types say they'll call another time. What are they going to do, insist I'm really me? And Hank, I never answer surveys unless it's related to a product I already bought. My life seems to be so full of tedious little time-wasters these days. And that makes me a little crabby...and that makes me rude when interrupted...which isn't good for the universe's energy...

I think I'd better go pop my yoga tape in right this minute.

RO: I had to laugh...I'm in Charlottesville VA now for the VA Festival of the Book. I called my husband last night and he picked up the phone and snapped "Don't call here!" I thought..that's it, he's finally sick of me and the endless tour..or wait a minute...is Bambi there? Did I interrupt something? Of course I called right back and he explained that he had gotten 3 telemarketers in a row and he was convinced I was a fourth.

Generally when there's a half second of silence before someone asks to speak to me, I just say no..assuming it's a telemarketer. I hate to talk on the phone anyway. I'm much more of an email person.

HANK: May I just add? If you call me at home I probably won't answer. My husband and I always have a litle flurry of--you get it. No, you get it. No, it's going to be your mother. No, it isn't. Then we let it go to voice mail.Why should we do what the phone tells us to do? (Hallie, how did we get to talking about this instead of about being nice?)

HALLIE: Because we're all stressed, and besides, it's so much more fun to talk about being snarky.

Shoes tell.....

Hank's post about nurses salaries being based on what they wear (see yesterday's comments) falls into the "as if we needed any further proof" category. Have you ever noticed how differently you can be treated based on what shoes you are wearing?

I'm in the habit of wearing black New Balance athletic shoes when I have a lot of running around (no pun intended) to do in NYC. I made the mistake of wearing them to a new hair salon - my colorist has just moved and whither she goest - and I'm convinced that they treated me badly because I looked like what in NYC is referred to as "bridge and tunnel."

The flip side of that was when I brought pointy, ankle strap shoes to a work thing and got looks that suggested "my god, there's a woman in there!"
What do your shoes say about you?

Guest blogger Blaize Clement

RO: In one of the first reviews for Pushing Up Daisies, some delightful person wrote in Library Journal that .."writers like Rosemary Harris and Blaize Clement were redefining cozy..."

Well call me happy. I realize I'm a newcomer, but how that four letter C word is still in use is a little beyond me..but that's another blog...

Anyway, I had read one Dixie Hemingway book (Blaize's series) and despite the appearance of the word catsitter in the title, Even Catsitters Get the Blues, the b0ok - and the author - are more edgy, quirky, a little naughty, and laugh out loud funny than you might think!
I was lucky enough to meet Blaize at Sleuthfest last month and asked her to come visit us at Jungle Red.

Here's Blaize's take on Inner Critics....something I know I can identify with and I bet you can, too.

Maybe mystery writers are harder on themselves than other people, or maybe we're just more willing to admit it. Whatever, it seems like any time I talk to another mystery writer, we end up laughing and/or groaning about our inner critics. Mine not only wakes me in the middle of the night to tell me I've given a singular verb to a plural noun, it also condemns my work habits. If I sleep late one morning and slog around all day in a ratty robe and slippers and don't write a lick but eat potato chips and watch some sappy tear-jerker on TV, my inner critic immediately scorns me for being a loser who sleeps late and slogs around in her robe and eats potato chips. It doesn't stop there, either. It goes on to say I'll always be a loser and there's nothing I or anybody else in the whole friggin' universe can do about it.

On other days, even if I set my alarm for an ungodly hour when birds aren't awake yet, my inner critic continues to sneer at my slothfulness. So I eat oatmeal for penance and work nonstop to demonstrate that while I may be a potato-chip-eating slob, I am valiantly trying to become disciplined, not to mention shampooed and flat-ironed. I'm perfumed too, because my inner critic says I should use up all those free cosmetic-counter samples before they evaporate. Not that they have anything to do with writing, but because scent evaporation would be wasteful and therefore further proof of my slothfulness. Besides, if I don't try them I'll never know how they smelled, which would be some kind of loss of an opportunity for research, and God knows being a writer carries with it a mandate for research.

There's also the matter of dress. My inner critic would prefer me to be the kind of writer who wears floaty hand-painted silk dresses with vague ruffles falling from them. That will never happen, of course, no matter how good I smell, but if a movie is ever done of my life I hope the actress playing me will wear things like that. That's one place where my inner critic and I are in agreement, although I doubt I'd be a better writer if my jeans didn't have shaggy edges.

The only good thing about my inner critic is that she's been around as long as I have, and both of us have become a bit less tyrannical. Sometimes I catch her shrugging her shoulders and rolling her eyes in a who-the-blip-cares way, pretty much like I do about a lot of stuff that used to make me rabid. My hope is that the next time I sleep late and slog around all day in my pj's and watch dumb movies and eat potato chips, she'll approve it as research.

Visit Blaize at http://dixiehemingway.wordpress.com/about/
Rosemary