Bloodstream: Whoa… Where Did This Come From?

Was anyone else as overcome by Ed Sheeran’s Billboard Music Awards performance as I was?

I mean, where did all that raw emotion and aggression come from? I liked it, but I was shocked by the complete departure from the softer stuff he has been putting out.

First of all, Bloodstream, written by Ed and the British bass and drum band Rudimental, sounded like it stepped right out of the LSD era of the 1960s. As I watched Ed play, all I could think of was Jimmy Hendrix at Woodstock.

And what exactly is he singing about? Shooting heroin? Having your heart broken? Both? Or something more?

To find the answer, I first went to Lyrics.com to review the lyrics:

I've been spinning now for time
Couple women by my side
I got sinning on my mind
Sipping on red wine
I've been sitting here for ages
Ripping out the pages
How'd I get so faded?
How'd I get so faded?

Hard to say for sure, but it sounds like the character in the song is getting drunk and may be planning or have already had a threesome. That’s vague, but what is very clear is that the character feels guilty. The first line, to me, says he’s been thinking, trying to sort things out.

Same thing with ‘I’ve been sitting here for ages, Ripping out the pages.’ He sounds regretful, like he’s trying to turn the clock back and take back something he’s done.

Also, both lines refer to the passing of time. Is he (the character) tired of the constant all-night parties that musicians get caught up in? It sounds like he’s at the bottom of a very bad place, a place that he wants to get out of, but may not feel strong enough to do it himself.

Next, it sounds like he’s hurt one of the women, but then I start to think that he’s taken some kind of poison to commit suicide with these lines:

This is how it ends, I feel the chemicals burn in my bloodstream
Fading out again, I feel the chemicals burn in my bloodstream
So tell me when it kicks in
So tell me when it kicks in

As the song crescendos in the end, it sounds like the guy is dying. What ever it is that he’s done – whether he killed one of the women in the room or perhaps he just can’t find a way out of the dark place he’s in, he feels there is no other way out, no way he can escape what he’s done or obtain forgiveness. This is what I see when I read the words.

And the song is so intense, I feel like Ed should be completely wiped when he’s done playing it. Like he should collapse on the stage. Probably the only thing from preventing him from collapsing is his viral young age and constant touring schedule that keeps him fit.

This is my interpretation. Next, I will search the Internet to see if Ed has explained the song to any of the media and we’ll see how close I was to the real meaning behind the song.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Destiny: As Good a Book as Thornbirds or Evergreen

I love a good novel. And I’ve read dozens of them. But every once in a while, a book comes along that really moves me, that gets to my soul and I know that I will never forget it.

Recently, I read such a book. It’s title is Destiny, and it was written by Sally Beauman, a British woman. As a fellow writer, I have such respect for the depth of her characters, the way their lives wove together and their paths crossed.

Even more than that, I’m impressed by the history. The book was written in 1987 but much of the book takes places during World War II. Also, a great deal of it takes place in France in addition to England with supporting story lines in both California and Alabama.

Destiny was ever bit as good as Thornbirds and Evergreen and I recommend that any woman who loves to read get themselves to their local library or on to Amazon and read this book.

The first third of the book primarily centers around two brothers, Jean-Paul and Edward. There is a lot of sex, prostitution, lying, cheating, drinking, loneliness and pain and suffering. The usual stuff.

The middle third of this 838-page tome is like a coming of age for the boys. They graduate, go out into the world and find their way in life, with both good and bad at every turn.

In the final third of the book, there is a settling down, but that doesn’t prevent the characters from suffering pain. If anything, they suffer more.

I really enjoyed being able to visualize the beauty of both France and England. The details make it easy for the story to come to life.

In the end, I didn’t want this book to end. The characters, especially Edward and Helene, are unforgettable. I highly recommend it to all.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

"Lake News" Is a Story of Love and Justice

I finished my first Barbara Delinsky novel today and it was fantastic. When you read a 500-page book in four days while holding down a full-time job, taking a night class and handling a series of other responsibilities, you know it was good.

Lake News is the story of Lily Blake, a singer and pianist who lives in Boston. Her life is going well when out of nowhere, she is blindsided by a media scandal that not only is not true, but ruins here life and her reputation.

With her tail between her legs and feeling completely helpless, she moves back to the small village of Lake Henry, New Hampshire, where she is from.

Over a period of two weeks, she works tirelessly to build a new life for herself again, all the while trying to clear her name and here reputation.

Thanks to the help of a friend who runs the local weekly newspaper, she finds both justice and love simultaneously. Justice and revenge are one of my favorite themes for both books and movies, so anything that ends that way definitely captures my attention (think: Diary of a Mad Black Woman, one of my favorite movies.).

Barbara Delinsky has a talent for details. You not only can feel Lily's frustration, pain and humilation from being blamed for something she didn't do and then being harassed by paparazzi for it, but the scenes in and around Lake Henry just make you want to take a deep breath, like you can feel the fresh air in your bones.

Having written more than 60 novels, I'm surprised that I haven't heard of Delinsky before, but I definitely look forward to reading more of her work. You can find out more about Barbara Delinsky, who lives in Massachusetts, at www.barbaradelinsky.com.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Merry Christmas Double Glo

I took a memoir writing class in the fall at the Darien Library. I didn't know whether I would ever write a memoir, I just thought it would be fun to learn a new writing skill. Turns out, everyone had to write one piece and present it during the final class. I ended up writing something about my mother. Here it is. I hope you like it.

Lynn Russo Whylly

“Merry Christmas Double Glo”

I was sitting at a red light on Washington Boulevard in Stamford when I saw it. The sign for the cross street – Henry Street – loomed large in front of me. It was the first time I passed through that part of town in almost 40 years, and it caught me off guard, giving me chills.

     I turned my head and stretched as far to the right as I could to get a good look at building – it was long, and brick, with windows that went on forever. Of course, the building was completely renovated now, but from the outside, it still looked like the Christmas decoration factory I remembered – the place where my mother, Nancy, was the switchboard operator for the last 13 years of my childhood.

     My mind flashed back to a day when my brothers, sister and I had visited my mom at work. Diane was 12. I was 10. Jimmy was eight and Tommy was seven. It was the sixties and I remember I was wearing straight-legged knitted stretch pants with stirrups under the feet. They sound hideous now, but back then, they were all the rage and I had a pair in every color of the rainbow.

     As soon as we walked through the front door I could see my mother, off in the corner behind the small glass enclosure. Her tiny cubicle looked lonely and barren in that big empty lobby with its pale green walls and high ceiling. Sitting behind the black switchboard with the headset covering her ears and the microphone in front of her mouth, I watched over and over again as she pulled wires out and up, plugging them in little holes, criss-crossing one over the other to connect callers to their requested parties.

     She had that stereotypical nasal voice of a telephone operator when she answered the phone. “Paper Novelty, one moment. Hold plee-ehs.” “I’ll try that number for you now.” “Paper Novelty, one moment.” “Paper Novelty, I’m sorry, he’s not available right now, may I take a message? Thank you.” “Paper Novelty, hold plee-ehs….”

     Her pointed, cat-like glasses perched on the bridge of her nose. She was wearing her favorite belt – a wide black one pulled tight around her tiny waist, overlapping her dark green blouse and black skirt. Her black hair was pulled to one side. Her long thin legs and black high heels were crossed under the desk.

     During the Christmas season, she would answer the phone differently, saying “Merry Christmas Double Glo.” Double Glo was the nickname for the company logo that appeared on all the packages of decorations. An oval droplet with points at the top and bottom, the top half was green and had eyes and a smiling mouth; the bottom half was white. After Paper Novelty closed its doors in 1975 and my mother went on to work somewhere else, I kept up the tradition by calling her every Christmas season and saying, “Merry Christmas Double Glo.”  

     She decorated her tree well into my adulthood with vintage Paper Novelty ornaments and I loved seeing it every year. White angels for the treetop. Doves sprinkled with gold dust. Teardrops, pointsettias, honeycomb bells, and tinsel. Lots and lots of tinsel. The hooks came in little green and red boxes with Double Glo’s smiling face on them. Now, the ornaments are gone, and as a tribute to my mother I use the box as an ornament, hanging it on our tree using an original Paper Novelty hook.

     My memory shifts to January 2011; times have really changed. My mother is lying in bed in the intensive care unit at Scottsdale Shea Hospital in Arizona. We’re all there, two on each side of her bed. Her eyes are wide open but the ventilator prevents her from speaking. Behind closed doors, it took my brothers, sister and me several agonizing hours to accept the terms of her living will, and to take her off the ventilator.  

     As the holidays get closer, everything reminds me of her. Driving past the street where she used to work. Shopping for the holidays and remembering when the whole family was together at her house. Setting up my Christmas village and my manger, each individual piece a gift from her.

     A horn beeps and I snap back to reality. The light is green and I have to move, but I  strain my neck to see the old building one more time. My heart aches to look at it. “Ohhhh,” I say out loud, feeling the pain. “Oh ma, I wish you could see this.”

      My eyes well up with tears and I want to let them flow, but I’m on my way to a job interview at Pitney Bowes headquarters on Elmcroft Road. I can’t go with puffy eyes and a face blotched from tears, so I take a deep breath and blink a few times, gently dabbing at my eyes with my shirt.

Then I tuck the memory away for another day, another time. Merry Christmas, Mom, Merry Christmas Double Glo.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Amy Grant Puts On Moving Concert

I was blessed to see Amy Grant and Ellie Holcomb perform tonight at the Stamford Palace Theater. Amy's voice is incredibly strong still after all these years. She was wonderful. And every line from every song felt like it was made of gold because the words were so meaningful. She sang her hits, including I Will Remember You and Baby Baby.

Both Amy and Ellie, the gal who came on ahead of her, had beautiful voices and were great songwriters. They also both told some very interesting stories in between the songs and they were beautiful, inspirational stories. I would definitely see them both again.

Also, Amy mentioned that she and Greg, her guitarist, went bike riding down Cove Beach! Wish I had been there to run into her. Of course, I wouldn't have recognized her, but it would have been amazing all the same.

Thanks for coming Amy and Ellie!

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Introducing ... April Kry

For three years, I took voice lessons from George Evanish in Trumbull. Great teacher. I love how we would always start out with exercises. oh oh oh oh oh. ee ee ee ee ee. eye eye eye eye eye. ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh. Repeating each one on the next highest note until I couldn't go any farther, then doing the same on the down scale. My range is B to a high E, I think. It's been a while.

Anyway, all these years, we've kept in touch, and he would constantly talk about April, this student of his who he said, she's really got what it takes, I think she's really going to make it. And every time she had a special event where she was singing he would tell me about it.

So last week I picked up Country Weekly magazine from the supermarket newsstand. I don't usually buy it. But I love glossy magazines and I love country. So I thought I would treat myself. And I'm flipping through the pages and lo and behold, on page 23, there is April!

Oh my God! Turns out, she moved to Nashville -- her parents moved there for her career -- and now she has her first single out, "Beauty Queen." And it's really good.

I never met her but I feel like I know her because George told me about her so often. And I'm so excited! I feel like one of our own is making it big!

So I wanted to give her a shout out. Check out April Kry's first single, Beauty Queen, on Amazon or iTunes.

And go to http://www.aprilkry.com/ to read more about April Kry!

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

I Believe I've Been Hoodwinked

Last night, I was driving my mother-in-law home when she asked if we could stop at CVS. I pulled into the parking lot and sat in the car while she went inside.

After a few minutes, a young girl, petite, white and about 20 years old, came up gingerly to my window, and asked me for money. She said she was from Rochester and she was down here for a wedding for her job. She was wearing a short, strapless cocktail dress, so the outfit fit the story.

She looked visibly upset and scared, and had a large black mark on her shoulder that looked like either tar or marker. It was too black to be a bruise. It looked like she had been abused. She said she had no money and her gas tank was empty and she just needed to get home. I gave her everything I had, which was $12.

Her story was kind of original. Not the part about the empty gas tank and needing to get home, that’s as old as the hills. But if she wasn’t upset, she was a damn good actress. And she was wearing that cocktail dress. I didn’t have a line-of-sight to her car so I never saw where she went after she left me.

This morning I was visibly upset because I felt so completely taken advantage of. Last night, I felt it was a 50/50 chance. Right at this moment, I’m fully convinced that she was lying, and I spent the entire drive to work in anger and rage. You know those five stages of grief? Well I think there are also five stages of being taken advantage of too.

Now I’m writing about it to get the weight of it off my chest and to find some sense of closure. What I really want is to see her get caught. So I’m sitting here trying to think about the best way to get back at her and the answer is obvious. Put the scene in a future novel!

Someday, I may be a guest of a talk show and the host will say to me, that’s an interesting scene. How did you come up with that? And I’ll say, “It really happened to me.” All it is for me now is fodder – ammunition for my writing.

In the meantime, here’s how I would like this story to end:  I run into her again in the same parking lot and I say, “Oh you poor thing, you’re still here? My my. I would have thought the $12 I gave you last time would have gotten you home. You poor, poor thing. Here, let me call the police for you, because you certainly need help beyond anything I or anyone else can give you.” At that point, she runs like the wind, never to be seen again, at least, not in our neck of the woods.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Hunter Hays Rocks the Palace Theater in Stamford, CT!

I spent last night surrounded by about 2,000 screaming teens and 21-year-old girls and I loved every minute of it.

I went to the Hunter Hayes concert at the Palace Theater in Stamford, and I was screaming just as loud as they were. In addition to several parental chaparones, there were several other adults traveling sans children, so I definitely didn't feel awkward. There were even about 50 men, young and old, in the audience.

Hunter chose Stamford as part of his 24-Hour Road Race to End Child Hunger campaign (#HHRecordWeek), in which he was trying to break the Guinness Book of World Records by performing the most number of concerts in 24 hours. He needed to perform 10 shows in 10 cities, and we were number 7. He had just come from New Haven before climbing the stage at the Palace Theater.

This was the tentative schedule, according to USA Today:

May 9
8 a.m. - New York City, Good Morning America
9:15 a.m. - Boston, Paradise Rock Club
11:30 a.m. - Worcester, Mass., Palladium Upstairs (acoustic show)
1:45 p.m. - Providence, Lupo's Heartbreak Hotel
4:15 p.m. - New London, Conn., Garde Arts Center
6:45 p.m. - New Haven, Conn., Toad's Place
9 p.m. - Stamford, Conn., Palace Theatre
11:30 p.m. - South Orange, N.J., South Orange Performing Arts Center
May 10
2 a.m. - Asbury Park, N.J., The Stone Pony (acoustic show)
5 a.m. - Philadelphia, Trocadero

He actually came on in Stamford at 10:10 p.m. and played for 45 minutes. He was so charged and full of energy you would have never known that he had already played six times on Friday!

Of course, he performed his two biggest hits, I Want Crazy and Invisible, and he had the entire audience singing along. We didn't get to hear Wanted, his first big hit, or Somebody's Heartbreak, but it was still a great time.

What a rush! Country music is in my blood. I would definitely go see Hunter perform again!

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Band Perry has Heart

I was on the phone with AT&T today and I asked Teresa, the customer service rep, where she was located. She said Knoxville, Tennessee. I said, oh, that's where one of my favorite singers is from -- Kenny Chesney. And we immediately got into a discussion about country music and country singers.

That's when she asked me, did you hear about the nice thing that Band Perry did? And I said, no I didn't. She said that there was a family in Knoxville that died in a fire -- six people. The Band Perry paid for the funeral for all six family members. That was so sweet.

When you're blessed you need to share those blessings, and that is exactly what Band Perry did. Well done, Kimberly, Reid and Neil. God bless you guys.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Oh Beautiful, for Spacious Skies ...

I really love this Coca-Cola Super Bowl XLVIII commercial, where they sing America the Beautiful, most of all for its human diversity. I love that they brought in a variety of countries, cultures and languages. But I especially like that they kept the word "God" in the song. Bravo Coke!

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

A Great Read: Water for Elephants

I just finished reading Water for Elephants and what a great book it is. Not only did it hold my attention from page 1, but it brought the book to life for me. I felt like I was there.

Water for Elephants is set in the 1920s Prohibition Era. A young man, Jacob Jankowski, has his life turned upside down and finds himself in the middle of a traveling circus. As he begins to travel with the circus, the book unravels the inner workings of this mysterious, quirky business and the people who make their livelihood in it.

You get a sense of the incredibly hard work that goes on behind the scenes as they unload, put up, take down and reload dozens of tents 52 weeks a year and feed the animals every day. And they provide everyone with three square meals a day, under a tent, that requires the loading and unloading of hundreds of pounds of food with every stop.

There is love, there is intrigue, there is humor, and there is compassion in this book. If you're like me and you like your books to take you away to another place and time, this is the book for you. It's now on my top 10 list.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Honoring John F. Kennedy

Friday, November 22nd is a very nostalgic day for me as I am old enough to have lived through the shooting of President John F. Kennedy. I don't remember the shooting itself, but I remember the funeral.

I was just six, but I was drawn to the TV, watching the event unfold for several hours. I remember the day as clearly as if it was yesterday. I did not know, at the time, what was going on. I just knew in my little six-year-old heart that it was bad. Really bad.

It was before I got my first pair of glasses -- that was second grade -- and the TV was a little blurry, but even so, I couldn't take my eyes off our black and white television as I sat cross-legged on the floor in front of it.

It was a tumultuous time, but I hope the short time we had him made us a better country. President Kennedy, I salute you. May you, and your family, continue to rest in peace. 

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Three Cups of Tea: The Most Inspiring Book I've Ever Read

This book has changed me on so many levels. First, it is the first book to ever take us inside Pakistan and Afghanistan to show us the people, their customs and their culture. While I've always respected Muslims, now I understand them more than I ever did.

Second, through the book, after having "met" Greg Mortenson. I feel I am a more well-rounded person knowing who he is and what he is doing. I am so impressed, amazed and awed by him I would value meeting him as much as I would value meeting President Obama. The things he has accomplished in his lifetime are Nobel Peace Prize worthy and if he doesn't win it, I will be disappointed.

At first, I really enjoyed being able to witness the way someone else lives. I live in a big city and sometimes people tend to think that everyone lives the way we do. Greg Mortenson's life could not be more different from mine. The child of American missionaries, he grew up in Tanzania and as an adult, became a successful mountain climber. The mountains of Pakistan, where some of the tallest peaks in the world are, became a second home to him, a place where he was so comfortable, he fit right in, sleeping on floors, living without running water and dressing, out of respect, in their cultural clothing.

After mountain climbing and a career as a nurse, he literally fell into a new career, building schools for girls, first in Pakistan and then in Afghanistan, through a nonprofit he cofounded called the Central Asia Institute. While all of us over here have wondered about the people on the borders where we fought and dropped missiles, he was there, among the people, seeing it all from the inside out and fighting terror through education, not war.

I now consider Greg Mortenson an influencer I want to follow. My first instinct was to look for him on LinkedIn and Twitter. He's not there. My second instinct is to make a donation to Central Asia Institute, and that is something I will definitely do.

In the meantime, I highly recommend this book for EVERYONE. You can get it at your local library or at Amazon.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Say no to casinos in Long Island

Politicians in Nassau, Long Island (N.Y.) are advocating for the building of casinos to generate tax revenue. A good idea? I think not.

Let me use The Bahamas as an example. In the Bahamas, citizens are not allowed to frequent the casinos. Why? Because they would spend all their hard-earned money there. The whole point of a casino is to drive increased revenue -- notice I said "increased."

What do you think would happen if Bahamians all spent their weekly paychecks at the casino? The money would just go in a circle and there would be no growth.

That's the same thing that would happen in Long Island. We have plenty of casinos. We don't need anymore. Here's a better idea: Incentivize people to come up with their own ideas, to improve on ideas that already exist and to start businesses -- to build small factories, to build anything!

If New York approves the casinos in Long Island, we're just digging ourselves deeper in the "we don't make anything anymore" business model, and the money will just go in a circle in and out and there won't be any growth.

Instead of going in a circle, let's move the economy forward! Let's support people who come up with new ideas and stick with the casinos we've already got. We don't need anymore.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

A tip for effective proofreading

I like to describe proofreading in piano terms: when you read in "legato" format - that's smooth and steady - you can easily miss things. It's better to read in "staccato" - where you stop after ever word; so in your mind, that last part of my sentence would sound like: "where. you. stop. after. every. word." 

It doesn't have to be very slow. A half-second pause is enough. 

I find that's the best way to catch mistakes. Especially if you're a fast reader, you have to remember to slow down when you're proofreading, and reading staccato really helps.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Happy National Customer Service Week

October 7th to 13th is National Customer Service week. On this the 21st anniversary of the event, I just want to take a moment to thank all of the customer service reps who put up with people's tempers, impatience and aggravation every day.

And for all those who have solved my problems, helped me figure things out, corrected my bills, and answered my questions, here's to you.

Thanks for all your compassion, dedication to your craft and kindness. It's a job I've never felt I could do so, your talent is greatly appreciated.

Here's to you.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Deer in Your Headlights, Literally

According to the State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company, more deer-car collisions occur during the fall than any other time, so be aware, folks.

Altogether, they report that there are more than 1 million deer and car collisions a year. The state with the most deer-car collisions? Hawaii. Strange. Didn't know they had deer in Hawaii. Wonder how they got there. 

The states with the least? Montana, at 2, and Wyoming, with 13. You would think with all that land there would be more deer. There probably are, but then there are probably fewer cars running into them, I suppose.

What are your chances of having a collision with a deer? One in 174. Much much greater than your chances of winning the lottery.

For more information on deer-car collisions, check out the Insurance Information Institute.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Boycott Rolling Stone Magazine

How pathetic that Rolling Stone magazine chose to put a picture of the Boston bomber on their front cover. How about all the heroes and survivors of the Boston Marathon bombings? How about putting some of them on the cover?

This is clearly a ploy to sell magazines on the newsstand. Are they that desperate? Do they have no dignity?

First of all, the magazine is an entertainment publication. They don't report the news. So why now?

They should be ashamed of themselves. I hope everyone boycotts the issue and none of them sell. It would serve them right.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.

Fifty Shades of Wow

Well, I finally did it. I read "Fifty Shades of Grey" because I wanted to see what all the fuss and buzz were about. Now I get it. It's a hell of a book.

However, once I got over the initial shock of it, about 50 pages in, I have to say, it read much like a typical romance novel. Girl loves boy. Boy has commitment issues. Girl cries a lot. They break up and boy breaks girl's heart. Unfortunately, no happy ending in this one.

However, being a person who has read dozens of romance novels, I fully expected that typical happy ending. But once I learned that the book was the first in a trilogy, then I understood why the first book could not have a happy ending. Of course it had to leave me hanging. Or else, why would I pick up the second book?

Another interesting observation: very early on, I started to see strong similarities between the lead female character Anastasia and Bella, the lead female character in the Twilight series. They are both women who fell so toxically in love with their man that they would give up everything -- do anything -- to be with them. In both stories, the female lead characters fall in love with 'bad boys' and cross over to the dark side. The only real difference between Bella and Anastasia is that Bella wasn't afraid and she had no regrets. Anastasia was very afraid and, of course, in the end she had many regrets.

Now being fully committed to the characters and the plot, I am willing to read the second and third books because I have to find out what happens to them. Will they work out their differences? Will Christian ever tell Anastasia the deep dark secrets he's keeping hidden inside? And will telling those secrets free him from their burden forever?

The bottom line is, even with the hefty sexual overtones, it's still a romance novel. I want my romantic night-in-shining-armor happy ending, so I will be expecting it in the third book. Ideally, I anticipate Christian will fix all his problems and, in "An Officer and a Gentleman"-like style, sweep Anastasia off her feet and give her everything she wants (and nothing she doesn't want). Only time -- and a lot of reading -- will tell.

Please check out my novel, In Fashion's Web on Amazon.