It’s the time of year when most people put up inspirational messages, often about religious or spiritual subjects. I just wanted to share something similar, but a little bit different. The theme of this “poem” is the same as what I try to put into most of my stories.

By the way, for those who are interested, from December 5 on there will be a long interview on this site about my particular Next Big Thing, which is the book that came out of the dreams of STRANGE FATE (which I’m still working on) called THE LAST LULLABY.

THE STARFISH POEM

Once upon a time there was a wise man

who used to go to the ocean

to do his writing.

He had a habit of walking

on the beach

before he began his work.

One day he was walking along

the shore.

As he looked down the beach,

he saw a human

figure moving like a dancer.

He smiled to himself to think

of someone who would

dance to the day.

So he began to walk faster

to catch up.

As he got closer, he saw

that it was a young woman

and the young woman wasn't dancing,

but instead she was reaching

down to the shore,

picking up something

and very gently throwing it

into the ocean.

As he got closer he called out,

"Good morning! What are you doing?"

The young woman paused,

looked up, and replied,

"Throwing starfish in the ocean."

"I guess I should have asked,

why are you throwing starfish in the ocean?"

"The sun is up and the tide is going out.

And if I don't throw them in they'll die."

"But, young woman, don't you realize that

there are miles and miles of beach

and starfish all along it.

You can't possibly make a difference!"

The young woman listened politely.

Then bent down, picked up another starfish

and threw it into the sea,

past the breaking waves and said . . .

"It made a difference to that one."

And so it goes . . . Do what you can. Make a difference to someone, somehow. ‘Tis the season to put away old grudges, get in touch with old friends, and let your little light of love shine like a star.

. . . fish. You knew I was going to say that, didn’t you?

May all my readers have a wonderful Thanksgiving and may they each have something to be truly thankful for. I’d like to share something that has been attributed to Mother Teresa, and which I found very inspiring.

• People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
• If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
• If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies.  Succeed anyway.
• If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.
• What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.
• If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
• The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.
• Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.
• In the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.

Have a safe and blessed holiday.

Lisa

UPDATED: SATURDAY NOVEMBER 17, 2012

I sent another winner a CONGRATULATIONS message and she has checked in.   She will receive the "Good Witch" jewelry set.

(Drumroll) And here are the final winners:

• Diana L. of Oakland, CA, USA.
• Sime U. of Hollywood, FL, USA

Congratulations to both of them!

(Oh, yes, and a big thank you to the kind readers who have very sweetly told me that they liked the pics of me and Victor.  (Of course they were put up by our brilliant Administrator.)  I appreciate the compliments more than you can know, and flattery will get you everywhere.  No, really, I mean it: thank you.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By the way, I never got a chance to say Happy Halloween, as I was in the middle of several devastating migraines. I did, however manage to get a friend to snap pictures of me and Victor in our matching Halloween costumes. Naturally, we’re both vampires (and clearly I’m between headaches and wishing I had put on some makeup besides the $3.00 scarlet lipstick from the costume store—and poor Victor doesn’t know what to make of his cape and shirtfront). In any case, I hope you all had a happy Halloween!

As for the victims of Hurricane Sandy and the nor’easter, I can only extend my most sincere sympathy and prayers. I am so very sorry about what these super-storms have done. Also, I’ve made my donation to the Red Cross. I hope it does some good.

PHOTO CREDIT: CNNI’m writing this in case somehow some of my readers have missed out on the story of Malala Yousufzai, the fourteen-year-old girl who is, in real life, the kind of heroine I would like to write about.

I first saw Malala’s video on CNN.com, the day she was shot. I say an interview in which she was saying simple things about the simple rights that teenagers in the U.S.A. take for granted. She blogged about having those same intrinsic rights.

“I have the right of education. I have the right to play. I have the right to sing. I have the right to talk. I have the right to go to market. I have the right to speak up.”

But the problem was that she didn’t have those rights. Not in Pakistan in a city under the rule of the Taliban. There, they don’t want girls or women to be educated at all; they don’t even want them to have the freedom the leave their houses.

So they tried to silence this fourteen-year-old girl by assassinating her. She was coming home from school in the battle-scarred valley of Swat, Pakistan, when Taliban thugs burst into the bus she was riding and shot her in the head and neck, wounding two other girls in the process.

They wanted Malala to die and be forgotten. Instead, she is still alive, and was flown from Pakistan to a hospital in Great Britain, which has treated hundreds of soldiers wounded in Afghanistan.

According to a Reuter’s article by Ben Hirschler and Alessandra Prentice, "Doctors...believe she has a chance of making a good recovery on every level," said Dr. Dave Rosser, the hospital's medical director, adding that her treatment and rehabilitation could take months.

Moreover, Malala has become a global symbol for the rights of girls to be educated, and for her breath-taking courage and the Taliban’s monstrous, scandalous, and most heinous cowardice.

I know that anyone who cares about my books enough to read this blog will agree with me that Malala Yousufzai is the complete embodiment of what I consider a hero. She was living in a true Dark Dimension, and yet she had the guts to take a stand against blatant sexism and injustice, even knowing what might happen to her.

I hope that all my readers will keep Malala in their prayers and thoughts, and also think a little about the rights they enjoy as citizens of free countries, where their rights to education and mobility are not in question.

By the way, I found this blog very difficult to write because I am trembling with rage at the scurrilous, murderous, craven dogs of the Taliban who would try to kill a child for speaking the truth and who even now say that if she survives they will try to kill her again.

A few links to sites about Malala:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malala_Yousafzai
• http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49420507/#.UHxuO2dQCdk
• http://www.cnn.com/video/?iid=article_sidebar#/video/world/2012/10/10/sayah-2011-interview-malala-yousufzai.cnn

Half The Sky is a two-night event on your local PBS channel on Monday October 1 and Tuesday October 2.  As it says on its web page, http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/half-the-sky/ it talks about “turning oppression into opportunity for women.

If you know my books at all, you know that this is a cause dear to my heart. Please watch this. It’s so important that young people (and some older ones, too) understand that there is one group who are bullied and ignored and disenfranchised and hurt more than any other—and that they make up half the human race. You may not be a racist, an age-ist, a snob in any other way, and you may be a girl or woman yourself, but you may be contributing to the hardship of other girls or women without even realizing it.

The only thing evil needs to triumph is for decent people to do nothing.

There’s another site I’d like you to visit. It’s called Because I Am A Girl, at http://www.planusa.org/content2722639 and it tells you the shocking truth about what it means to be a girl today. Did you know that . . .

• One billion people live in extreme poverty—70% are women and girls.
• 67 million children worldwide don’t go to school, over half are girls.
• One extra year of primary school can mean 10-20% higher wages for a girl.
• When a girl in the developing world stays in school for seven or more years, she’ll marry later and have fewer, healthier children.
• There are nearly 60 million child brides worldwide. Some as young as 12.
• Girls who give birth before the  age of 15 are five times more likely to die in childbirth than women in their twenties.
• 150 million girls are victims of sexual violence and exploitation.
• Nearly two-thirds of new HIV infections among youth 15 to 24 are in girls.
• In a survey for the 2011 Girl Report, 43% of boys agreed with the statement: "There are times when a woman deserves to be beaten."
• And in the same survey, 60% of children interviewed in India agreed that if  resources are scarce, it’s better to educate a boy than a girl.
• $92 billion—that’s the estimated economic loss in countries that do not strive to educate girls to the same level as boys.

How many of those facts did you know? I was appalled to read about them. I’d say I only knew about half, and I think myself well-read on the subject.

Most of my readers are girls. In one way or another, they will run into prejudice just because they were born female. (I read a great fantasy story about two kids in the future laughing about the idea that back in the days when people were ignorant and thought that people born with an “innie” were inferior to those born with an “outie.” Maybe they were talking about bellybuttons—but I don’t think so.)

Please at least be aware of what girls go through, and what you can do to protect yourself and even help others if you like. Please know that girls and women own half the sky and half the stars and half the hope in this world.

Thank you for caring!

First, you certainly should have noticed it by now, but in case you haven’t, there is music on the Home Page of this site. The controls to turn it up or down or off are just to the right of LATEST UPDATES box, but I think it is quite haunting (a little eerie and a little sad and a little uplifting, too), and I once listened to it for more than thirty-six hours continuously (I fell asleep writing , as I often do, and slept on the keyboard so it was even in my dreams). It’s helping me finish STRANGE FATE. The tenth and last book in the NIGHT WORLD series is about Sarah Strange, who lives up to her name by having some pretty weird dreams. Poor Aradia, the blind seeress of the Night World, predicted the Apocalypse a long, long time ago. The epic STRANGE FATE cuts that long time down to a year, so that you’ll see all the soulmated couples as they are after about a year of living, learning, and loving. Some even get married—and one couple ends up expecting the patter of tiny footsteps. Don’t even ask who, because it’s a deep, dark secret.

So, anyway, the music. I feel a little eerie and haunted and so does Aradia and this music helps me write. It’s really called “Arcadia” but anyone who has read BLACK DAWN knows that this was Aradia’s pseudonym in the book so clearly it is Aradia’s Theme. It comes free from a fabulously talented guy named Kevin MacLeod who has about a thousand little musical pieces, including a number of his own works, like Arcadia, all completely free to anyone for anything. Royalty free. All he asks is credit. Here is his site, Incompetech: http://incompetech.com.  He has also worked on:

• Hugo (2011)
• Zakumi: The      Animated Series (2010)
• Simon and      Emily
• Dr. Who      (original series) DVD extras
• Colonial      Radio Theatre "King Solomon’s Mines" audio drama
• programming      for the BBC, CBC, ABC, A&E, and others.
• Ads for      Coke, GM, Subaru, and... many, many others.

You can search for the kind of music you want by the genre or the “feel” of it. I chose the feelings Mystical, Eerie, Unnerving, and Uplifting and got Aradia—I mean Arcadia. The word Arcadia, according to Wikipedia, “refers to a vision of pastoralism and harmony with nature.” That’s good, too. Kevin MacLeod will also score your YouTube video or your film or project . . . but that does cost money.  Hey, maybe I’ll offer a composition for a prize someday. Would anyone like that?

In any case, it’s been far too long since I said hello. Hello. More things than merely writing have been afoot in my fractured world, and if I can I’ll tell you about some of them in the next blog.

I’m back from visiting my Dad and found almost immediately a questionnaire with some witty and intriguing questions from a U.K. reader. Of course, I couldn’t let that go to waste, so . . .

From Ziggy:

1) Have you thought of writing more books like Night of the Solstice, or do you feel you have been there, done that, as it goes?  

The third book in the WILDWORLD series, MIRROR OF HEAVEN, is very much alive and kicking, trying to get out of my head and onto paper. In it, Alys and Janie (and eventually Charles, Claudia, the vixen, and Elwyn) go on a quest to find the magical stone, which is called “Mirror of Heaven” for its unusual properties and its striking color. This is a story that takes place within the Wildworld itself, as the questers travel from place to place tracking down rumors of what may have happened to this valuable but uncanny gem. And . . . they have competition.   Pub date: indeterminate, but it’s going to happen.

2) You mentioned that you were a teacher before a writer. Were you very strict and no nonsense? Would it be wrong envisioning you in a swively chair stroking a white cat with half moon glasses?

LOL. I was, for three years after grad school, a kindergarten teacher with a very high proportion of special ed. kids in my class. We were usually around 35 to 40 students stuck in a room that was built for 25, and we had no air conditioning in 100+ weather, and often no paper to color on because there was no budget for it. I bought almost all my teaching supplies. We spent most of our time dancing to Raffi songs (if you remember him you’ve probably been a teacher, too), listening to me read storybooks (ha! I had a captive audience) and learning to count to 100 or do a cooking project. I pride myself that in my third year of teaching (with two books out) I was my school’s Teacher of the Year. Every autumn I still miss the smell of chalk and tempera paint. But I kept my cats at home or they would have been tempera-painted, too. (Also, I swear I never used magic once on a student.)

3) Out of all your characters, which do you think resemble you the most, and why?

No fair. I can’t pick. Honestly, I couldn’t write from each girl’s POV if I didn’t feel exactly like her at the time. I’ve got a lot of Elena and Mary-Lynnette in me, but then I’ve got a lot of Bonnie and Gillian Lennox (from the NIGHT WORLD series) there too. I was never an evil manipulator (especially of young men) like Elena, but I’m stubborn and I plan. Also I’m far more shy than any character I have yet written, except maybe Cassie of THE SECRET CIRCLE trilogy. I suppose if you strapped me to the rack and brought out the red-hot toasting forks I would say, “Most like Cassie and Jenny (of THE FORBIDDEN GAME) but with delusions of grandeur of being someone brave and canny and competent like Dee (same FORBIDDEN GAME) or wild and reckless like Jez (NIGHT WORLD).”

4) Who inspires you in your writing? (friends, family and the famous all applicable)

Friends definitely. I have a few cherished friends who get to see my manuscripts before I send them to the people with the long knives and the red pencils. They give me everything from solutions to plot dilemmas to book titles. I use them mercilessly, taking like a sponge, squeezing them like oranges. (Just call me Inspector Javert.) But it’s so fun to talk about your problems to sympathetic souls. Famous? Who and what is famous? Well, I think everyone would agree on Jane Austen, Toni Morrison, and Alice Walker. They’re my idols, presenting things in that slightly skewed, satiric way—as if they were from another planet and reporting back on the habits and oddities of human beings. But there’s one more that will be as famous, who’s already been called “the modern Chaucer”: Terry Pratchett. Mr. Pratchett’s books are all about satire and everyone should go out and buy at least the books from GUARDS, GUARDS to MONSTROUS REGIMENT in his Discworld series.

5) What novels of your own would you recommend for fledgling L. J. Smith readers?

Don’t bother. Go out and read Terry Pratchett. You’ll be happier. I guarantee you’ll laugh out loud once a page (at least).

Oh, all right. My own books?

Umm………………………

Fledglings still in the nest: try THE VAMPIRE DIAIRES or THE SECRET CIRCLE. Remember that in THE VAMPIRE DIARIES I myself wrote up to MIDNIGHT, and then the series was taken away from me because of a clause in a contract I had signed over twenty years ago when I wrote the first four books, THE AWAKENING, THE STRUGGLE, THE FURY, and DARK REUNION. All written twenty years ago. NIGHTFALL, SHADOW SOULS AND MIDNIGHT I wrote after TWILIGHT rekindled a worldwide interest in vampires.

As for THE SECRET CIRCLE, I cannot comment other than to say that I wrote the first trilogy and then the books were given to a ghostwriter because of a contract that I signed over twenty years ago.

For the partially-fledged: anything. THE FORBIDDEN GAME, since I’m now actively planning the sequel. There’s DARK VISIONS, of course—I tend to underrate it because Disney tried to sue me over the name Kaitylyn Fairchild until I proved I had made up and disseminated the name before anyone else. And, finally, THE NIGHT WORLD series, which is really quite easy to understand. Basically, each story is about a vampire or other Night Person who finds a human soulmate . . . the penalty for which is death. But when did that ever stop young lovers? They’ve already lost their heads. I am, yes, I am currently writing as fast as possible on STRANGE FATE, the conclusion, and I’m hoping to finish it around wintertime. Note: the more enquiries I get about when it is coming, the longer it takes.

For those who actually can fly: my latest book, THE LAST LULLABY, over 700 pages, and once part of STRANGE FATE. It is the tale of Brionwy and her guttersnipe friend, Crispy, who . . . oh, here’s the blurb:

THE LAST LULLABY is the story of Brionwy, daughter of Branwen, a courtesan in the harem of the Lord Overseer, Rajan Adani, who is the head of a Great House under the rule of the Masters. In this post-Apocalypse story, magic exists, but is rarely seen. Brionwy befriends Crispy, a little girl, or fawn, who has escaped from the pens in which all humans but the serving slaves of the Overseer, the guards, and the “humble and pathetic” Beauties in the harem are kept like animals.

Crispy has named herself for the burns that cover half of her body and have withered one of her arms. She considers herself slightly abled because of her baby arm; it looks useless but is almost as strong as the other. Tough, cynical, and quick to laugh at herself or others, Crispy’s life changes the day that she peeps through a hole in the harem wall and listens to Brionwy playing her lute and singing a heart-rending lullaby. Together, the two girls who come from the most different backgrounds imaginable, and with the help of Crispy’s gang of dwarfed, misshapen, deaf, and otherwise abled misfits, solve the mystery of a strange prophecy that leads to the secret of the nearby caverns and of how to fight the Masters. Despite the fearsome Guntra, Head Dwenna of Brionwy’s Concubine Pavilion; despite the Overseer himself, Brionwy and Crispy find themselves leading a revolution that will change the lives of all who belong to the Overseer’s Great House forever.

When THE LAST LULLABY comes out will be up to the publisher who buys it. Unlike all my other books since THE NIGHT OF THE SOLSTICE, I wrote it before trying to sell it.

THANK YOU, ZIGGY, WHEREVER YOU ARE!

One more announcement: my $#@&*! computer has to go back to the shop because it will not back up my data without freezing about 10 percent of the way into the backup process. This means a lot of things will be on hold. Can you hear the scream bottled up in these simple words? Do the voices in my head bother you?

The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated. Yes, I am alive. I’m even writing frantically night and day. I’ll give more details about that later, but meanwhile I’d like to answer a question I get very frequently in my emails. It is “how would THE VAMPIRE DIARIES endgame have played out?” or “Who would end up with whom? Or “Who would Elena pick? So I’d like to share my answer to an email I got today, and maybe allow other people to understand the situation.

Hi Heather--

Thank you so much for your kind words about my works! I do deeply appreciate readers who have gone beyond THE VAMPIRE DIARIES and you and Dominika have gone waaaaay beyond! :) Thank you! Do you know, everyone asks me the question, what would the endgame have been like in TVD? Who would win the Grand Prize (Damon)? You may not believe it but there are many readers who would like to see Elena with Stefan and Bonnie with Damon. And since I wrote scenes showing that they care for each other, that's logical.

The problem with asking me "Who would Elena pick?" is that I had planned to write at least five other books--long books, not like the ghostwriter's--with a lot of switching and turnabouts and secrets revealed and surprises before the endgame book. (In between books like the one where Stefan comes to out of unconsciousness with an almost-exsanguinated Elena in his arms (exsanguinated means drained of blood--but you knew that!). He can't remember anything--how they started sharing blood that night or anything else but he rushes Elena to the hospital and after many transfusions the doctors save her. Then Stefan, confused, but (of course!) bitterly guilty, Influences Elena to forget everything about him and their relationship and to think that Damon (who's a grade above them in college in my world) is her boyfriend and always has been. And when Elena wakes up that's just what she thinks. Stefan has warned (well, threatened) Elena's friends to leave the situation alone, so Elena spends weeks believing that Damon's always been her boyfriend. Damon, although startled and a little skeptical about whether the Influence will hold is naturally happy to play along, although he does some detective work when Stefan confesses that he has memory loss for the night he almost killed Elena. Elena goes on believing that Damon is her childhood sweetheart until . . . well, a lot of other things happen, but eventually Elena does remember Stefan. (And hits him a lot with a rolled up newspaper for Influencing her.)

The problem is I won't get to write that book or any of the others I had planned. I am over being upset about this, although I will always love Elena and Damon and Stefan and Bonnie AND MEREDITH.

But since I won't be feeling the emotions of Elena as she goes through all these problems and interacts with the boyz I can't imagine what state of mind she would be in the end. So I can't say for certain who she would choose.   I'm so sorry. And BTW, do you mind if I use this answer as a blog post? I really should post and this is a question I get constantly.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

So, now I’ve posted and next I plan to start taking care of all my duties to the site that I’ve selfishly not been doing. I’m truly sorry about my absence from the site.

 ~ Lisa

I want to say “Thank you” for all those who prayed or sent their good wishes to Victor, or who asked about his health. It has a been terrible ordeal for my poor little yellow Lab. He almost died. He is a constant forager for food in any condition when on walks and when off the leash has gotten into some pretty nasty stuff. (Which is why he only went through the first nine steps for becoming a ten-step Guide Dog for the Blind; if he can smell food he pays attention to nothing else.) However, his foraging days are over now. Either something he ate outside or two small rawhide treats I gave him on consecutive days (they were not labeled rawhide, which the Guide Dogs for the Blind people said not to give him) caused him to bleed internally. He is so stoic that it was not until he began for the first time since I have known him to whimper and cry that I realized anything was wrong. Then he crashed. I took him to the vet, who recommended an Emergency clinic. I took him to the one she suggested.

The doctor there didn’t bother to look at his records, but simply suggested the most dangerous operation that could be done on him (and quite incidentally the most expensive procedure). When I asked if he could not accomplish the same thing by simply doing an endoscopy, he had to admit that it would be much safer to start with that first.

Fortunately, I was able to get on the Internet and looked up the reviews of this clinic. I found that many people had given it HORRIBLE reviews, saying that the doctors were irrational and only out for money. Others said, DO NOT TAKE YOUR PET HERE! I immediately had Victor transferred to a five-star reviewed Emergency Clinic just a few blocks away Sage Centers for Veterinary and Emergency Care where Victor spent over a week. The doctors at Sage never suggested surgery, but put him on an IV and pushed fluids, antibiotics, and other medications into him. The whole time is a blur. Their staff were incredibly loving and kind and I was allowed to see Victor three times a day for an hour each time. It brought back vivid memories of my mother’s long illness and death, especially as her birthday was March 30. But as always, she stood watch along with all the guardian angels she could muster, and though Victor had a close brush with death, he survived. Today he is back home, although he has twice weekly appointments with the doctors at Sage, and is on seven (7) ! pills a day plus medicinal canned dog food.

He is still anemic, pitifully thin (his ribs show and his collar is far too loose), and has some kind of kidney damage. Even the doctors at Sage aren’t sure what happened to him, but although he is still weak, he gets a little better every day. He can’t run and play or take walks yet, nor can he have any kind of treats: only his medicinal dog food. But soon I hope he will be allowed to do all those things. He was a universal favorite with the staff at Sage, where he wagged his tail and kissed all the nurses and doctors—and where he slept with his head on his stuffed bunny to sleep. I am just so glad to have him safe and well.

I hope you all have had a wonderful Easter weekend. Thank you so much for praying for Victor, sending him good wishes, or inquiring about his health. I can’t imagine life without my little yellow guy.

I wonder if, just for once, my blog will let me type in a message to you without me having to go through Admin.  Fingers crossed.  So far it's working.  I want everyone to know that I am on a writing SPREE and that this is the reason I have been late recently in answering emails or getting on the Forum.  I hope to be able to multitask soon, but right now I am riding the wave, because times like this are special and what I really figure you people want is for me to give you some brand new books!  Ash and I are sailing through STRANGE FATE, while Brionwy, the seventeen-year-old courtesan, and Crispy, the little girl who is burned over half her body and lives as a rogue slave, hiding in the shadows, have totally taken over THE LAST LULLABY and are racing toward the end of the book. I'm deleriously happy about this!

But the real point of this little post is to say to my readers, thank you for all the wonderful support you have given me, and for the marvelous stories you've emailed about how my books have impacted your life.  I feel so humble and so proud at once to have entertained you--and sometimes done a little more.

Oh, yes, and I was forgetting.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S

 DAY!!!

I’ve been sick for several days (sorry to anybody I was snippy to on Forum—I feel like you-know-what.)  But then I saw this article on CNN.com: http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/31/world/asia/afghanistan-strangulation/index.html, that is about a man who, with the help of his mother, beat and strangled his wife, Storay Mohammed, for bearing him a daughter rather than a son.  The cowardly guy is on the run but he left Mom behind to take the heat . . . and to say, unbelievably, that her son had not committed any crime, but that Storay, feeling guilty for being unable to give her husband a son had committed suicide.  Hands up, everyone that knows of a woman who has strangled (not hanged) and beaten herself to death.  (Squinting blearily.) No, I didn’t think many people would have heard of that one.

I’m going to give more to Amnesty International this year, and I’m going to research some organizations where women help other women.  I saw a bit of a clip on this story and a representative from an Afghani women’s group was saying that while it is better now than under the Taliban, that Afghanistan is still one of the worst places, if not the worst place, to be a woman.  Horia Mosadiq, a London-based Afghan researcher for Amnesty International, said the abuse inflicted on Storay Mohammed is not an isolated instance.

That means there are other women out there being killed because their husband didn’t make a little boy instead of a girl inside them.  (It’s the man’s sperm, not the woman’s egg, that determines the sex of a child.)

And, God, I just cannot get this horrible murder out of my mind.  I keep wondering how the baby in question will grow up—if she grows up at all. (I hope and pray they didn’t give her to any of the murderer’s relatives to be cared for.)  

I also keep thinking of the Pulitzer Prize winning book THE GOOD EARTH by Pearl S. Buck, in which the main character, O-lan, a poor woman so beaten down by life in general that I can’t remember if she was beaten by her husband or not—how one day O-lan worked in the fields all morning, went inside in the afternoon alone, had a baby, and returned to her husband ashamed saying, “It was only a slave this time—not worth mentioning.” (Chapter Seven.)   Nine months of pregnancy—and the result?  A girl and therefore a slave and not even worth having a conversation about.  This is not one of those books that cheers you up at night.

Then what does my mind jump to?  You know what the Japanese character for wife is?  The character for “woman” plus that for “slave.”

How did we ever come to this?  How did half the human race become slaves in so many places?  Of course, THE GOOD EARTH was published in 1931, almost a century ago.  The Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the good ol’ USA had only been made in 1920.  (That was the one that said: "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex," in case you don’t remember.)  Since then, on a relative basis some countries have achieved wonders—but even they still have a long, long way to go (If you don’t think so, check out another currently breaking story, about “Mark Berndt, 61,  [who] worked as a third-grade teacher at Miramonte Elementary School [in Los Angeles, CA] for more than 30 years. He was arrested at his home in Torrance on Monday, and on Tuesday, he was charged with 23 felony counts of lewd acts upon a child—[he did a bunch of things I won’t talk about to a bunch of little girls.])  I don’t mean any disrespect here to boys who have been molested, either—maybe I’ll do a blog on them, next.

But I’ll bet you that there is no country where the character for “husband” is  “man” plus “slave”  And right now in modern Afghanistan a modern man can connive with his own mother to beat and kill his wife for having a slave instead of a son, and it’s not an isolated incidence.  

The final little prickle in this chiller of a story is that they beat the poor woman, Storay, before killing her.  Why?  Just to increase her agony?  To prolong their enjoyment?  It certainly couldn’t have fed into the suicide theory.  Were they expecting any investigation by police?  Or, if this story hadn’t caught the eye of the international media . . . would the killer have quietly passed Go without anyone trying to jail him at all?

Today marks the five-year anniversary of my mother’s death, and it is, as it should be, a sad day for me. But also it is at the beginning of a new year, which I take as time to look back at the previous twelve months and meditate on them. The last year has been a very good one. I have had the amazing fortune to get a sympathetic, brilliant, dynamic agent, and I’m everlastingly grateful for his insights, his tenacity, and his gentle sense of humor. I’ve made progress on my manuscripts. STRANGE FATE is coming right along, and I have completely renovated the premises for ETERNITY and BRIONWY’S LULLABY.   And, perhaps best of all, I have made a new friend: one of those that you can tell will be friends for life. Who will be with you during the sad times (like now) and also during the times of triumph. Normally, this wouldn’t be anyone’s business but that of myself and my new soul-sister’s, or brother’s, but I’ve heard that there are some people who have nothing better than to try to disparage Christina’s character or to disparage mine rather than accept it. I’m afraid that anyone who has nothing better in their own lives to do than nitpick over others is a pitiful case indeed and unlikely to be swayed by the opinions of great thinkers, but I will mention that Plautus felt that “Nothing but heaven itself is better than a friend who is really a friend.” Of course there are also many quotes disparaging friendship itself; but these I will fend off with all my life’s force. I am a militant optimist. I choose to be one. I only wish I could be better and better friends with every single one of the people I meet: not just the people I meet through my website. But I will admit that the site gives me a head start because so many of the people who email me or are on the Forum are open, genuine, and willing to trust others. In any case, arguing over who is friends with whom is so childish that I find it hard to give any more time to—it reminds me too much of being in preschool. (As a matter of fact I can’t even think of a time in preschool when I did it or heard it done.) My real message is that thinking over the last year I can think of many more good times than bad times in 2011 and I have hopes that 2012 will be better than ever—for everyone.

Just wanted to let everyone know that I am back from my holiday vacation in southern California. Victor was an absolute angel on both the trip down and the trip up. He was rather depressed over the holidays, and I think he believed that he was once again being moved to a new house. When, after a seven-hour drive he began to recognize landmarks he started to dance in the car and once we got inside the house he tore up and down the stairs like a crazy dog. I had to take him into the backyard and throw his ball for him to help him get rid of his excess energy. He's usually so reserved that he seems all grown up, but he made it clear that he was only a puppy when he saw his old licked-to-death bunny and his bed. He now knows too many words to count and will understand and obey "Where's your bone," "Get your bunny," and "Where's Hedgy?" (One of his new favorite toys is a hedgehog which makes a disturbing noise when squeezed. He got lots of treats down in Villa Park, including many oranges which fell from trees and which he eventually threw up. He also learned how to thrash his head like a shark while pulling on a pull-toy . . . so hard that on my second to last day there, he managed to rip off my fingernail. Fortunately, the bit that came off was fake, and it will be a funny story to tell my manicurist.

I had the usual great time with my father, sister, brother-in-law, niece and nephew, and got some beautiful decorations for the new house (NO, I am still not moved in and I don't want to hear anything more about it.) I watched lots of lively football games and extremely conservative political rhetoric with my father, worked with my sister on a manuscript she has written about her experiences with melanoma, and caught occasional glimpses of my niece and nephew. I was amazed at how warm and peaceful it was at my mother's grave site--usually violent winds blow over Christmas decorations, but this year it was remarkably still and sweet.

I hope that my readers each had a wonderful holiday, no matter what they were celebrating, and I wish them all a great 2012!

One more thing that I wanted to mention is that starting with today, January 4, 2012, all contests will be held exclusively in the Forum. Members who have been contributing, you are about to get your reward. Your posting is appreciated, and I hope you like the first contest!

IIII