Cecilia Tan's web journal, entries from 2001


December 11, 2001
I went Christmas shopping today and it wasn't too bad.

By "too bad" I mean that usually I end up sick of Christmas Carols, and feeling bombarded and beaten down by the intensity of commercialism and the hard sell normally poured on by retailers of all kinds.

It may have helped that I didn't go to an actual shopping mall. I walked through downtown Boston, Newbury Street, went to some local stores in Cambridge, and stopped in at Pier One. But I think in the wake of the 9-11 tragedy, people are toning it down a bit. The music is not as loud, the decorations are not as over the top. It's like in the face of insanity, there's an actual effort made to be saner about a lot of things.

Well, that of course would exclude baseball owners, who are just plain crazy with their surprise vote to contract and the ensuing hullabaloo they created. I'm praying for no work stoppage, but given the weird and inexplicable stand the owners are taking... how can you reason with crazy men?

In my own life I'm still feeling betwixt and between. My agent has several irons in the fire, but no contract yet so I'm twiddling my thumbs. Circlet is winding down with our old distributor, but won't see sales from our new one for a few months. corwin's new job is working out pretty well, but we have yet to settle into a routine, really. I feel almost like I have to wait until January to get on with certain things emotionally. Maybe it's just this year of bad news I want to be done with, and I can't quite move on from it until the calendar turns over. Or maybe it's that I just still don't know quite what life is going to be like in the future. I mean post-September 11, and also post-other stuff, too, things both big and small, like my parents moving to Florida, corwin processing his other relationships, fitting in time around his job, life with my new agent, our new distributor, the Yankees on a new radio station and new tv station ... so many things that were dependable, routine parts of life in the past are going to be different now and I feel I'm still waiting to find out just what it will be like. What's the same? I'd like to think I'm the same, but the truth is, I'm getting older. I'm not completely sure what that means internally. I've griped plenty about my bad back, bad knees, etc... but I feel my ways of thinking are changing somewhat these days, too. My modes of thought are maturing. No, I really don't know what that means exactly, nor can I quantify the change, but I feel it's there. Hopefully I'm changing for the better.

Hopefully we all are.


November 17, 2001
I was listening to the BBC World Service on National Public Radio the other night, and heard live the "liberation" of Kabul, Afghanistan. It gives a new perspective on the war when you hear Afghanis chanting "Death to the Taliban." Women threw off their burka and danced in the streets.

That was probably the first really good news I'd heard since the Yankees lost the World Series. Man, what a series. I'm still shaking my head in disbelief over both the way we lost and also the way we won games four and five! As far as I'm concerned, everything that happened in Arizona (four games, four losses) never really occurred. Only what happened in New York counted in my memory. Unlike Red Sox fans, I don't think Yankees fans will wallow in the pain of the loss, obsessing about it. Instead, we're already thinking about next year, and cementing for ourselves the memories of all the good and magical things that happened this October.

Right now my house is full of guests, some pre-Thanksgiving, and it is really feeling like winter now that the trees outside my window are bare and the sun starts setting around 3:30 in the afternoon... corwin and I will have a short reprieve from the onset of true winter though. We're going to Aruba for a real, genuine, not-also-a-business-trip vacation. Our finances continue to be strained, at corwin's new job they just had layoffs and everyone took a pay cut. Sigh. But we're not homeless and we're fed, so I am not going to complain. My Dad decided to pay for our trip to Aruba--and now he's officially retired. He and Mom move to Florida in a few weeks!

I think I'm going to take a nap now. The urge to hibernate is very strong.


October 26, 2001

I have a tremendous chocolate craving, plus a secondary beef craving. The only thing that keeps me from having mood swings is ... well, I don't know what's keeping me from having mood swings. Oh yeah, and my back hurts. I must be about to get my period.

Fortunately, that's nothing that ibuprofen, a cheesesteak sandwich from the corner pizza joint, and a trip to the candy section of the corner pharmacy can't fix. I'm so glad I live in a city where at 9pm at night I can walk out my door and find all the chocolate, sandwiches, and anti-inflammatories I want. While I was out I browsed the local video store, too. Hmm, The Life And Times of Hank Greenberg just came to video. Something to rent in a few weeks, when baseball season is over and I need something to fill that void.

Speaking of filling voids, I have been reading essentially no fiction for the past year or so. Why? I keep hoping that by not reading much, the urge for story will spur me to write more of my own. When I'm in a slump, as I am on Bambino Road, the baseball novel I'm trying to write, and not producing many short stories, I feel like reading something good only leaves me feeling too satisfied and comfortable. It's rare when something I read spurs me to write instead--more often it's some other form of media that spurs me, music, movies, trip to the art museum--that's what can sometimes jog my creative engine.

Sometimes it's hard to tell what is going to do it for me. I went to see the movie The Crow six or seven times, a few times by myself. For some reason it just grabbed me--the movie would start and I'd go into a trance almost. I wrote probably two or three of my best short stories around then, from whatever ineffable vein got tapped by seeing that film. Now I'll drive my biographers crazy by not saying which three stories it is.

I haven't been buying new CDs to listen to, or seeing many concerts lately, but that is mostly lack of money (and time). Saw Dr. Didg at the House of Blues the other night. But I haven't been listening to my old CD's very much either--I'm kind of in a rut. I'll put 5 or 6 discs into the player, and then hit shuffle play, and then not take those discs out for a couple of weeks. Just keep reshuffling them. I think that's related to the not writing, too, because it's sort of like, hey, if I'm not writing, what's the point of putting music on?

Maybe I should try putting the cart before the horse, load up the CDs, and then sit down at a blank screen and see what comes.

Meanwhile, Election Day is coming. I've been so focused on national and international issues thanks to the big wake up call of September 11 that I hardly know the names of the candidates running locally. We got a letter from the mayor of my city, who is running for re-election, and I didn't even know HIS name. It's funny, I can name the mayor he replaced--she's currently our state house representative--but until today I couldn't have told you his name. He seems to be doing a good job though, so should I re-elect him? Here in Cambridge, Mass. it's pretty much all liberals no matter what so I don't have too much fear of voting for the "wrong" candidate. In our last big election, for our national House of Representatives congressperson, all you had to do was vote in the primary--whoever won the democratic nomination was going to win by a landslide. And did. But school board? No idea who to vote for, but even before Sept. 11th I always felt a patriotic duty to vote. I better do some homework on the ballot questions first, though.

The World Series starts tomorrow, and for all the changes that have taken place this year, all the shocks and tragedies, corwin's cancer, our businesses failing in the slow economy, corwin having to get a day job, my parents retiring, our cat getting sick and a friend's cat succumbing in her long health battle ... well, thank goodness something is the same: The Yankees are in it for the fourth year in a row, and of course I want them to win. After all the changes, let something stay the same.


September 12, 2001

I can hear planes flying over my house. On any other day of my life, this would not be cause for note. But today I stand up and look out the window, trying to catch sight of them. I know they are military planes of some kind because the whole world is different now.

No, not the whole world, just my world, just the United States. Every writer on the planet is writing something about what happened yesterday, and I am no exception.

I learned of the terrorist attacks on the U.S. from my brother, who had called on the phone. corwin and I had been awake for an hour already yesterday morning, but we had been lying in bed, talking about our future, about our money problems, the bad economy, the likelihood that both of our companies (Jerboa and Circlet Press) may be driven out of business by the economic climate... the phone had rung repeatedly, but that is not at all unusual for our house.

When I finally picked the phone up, Julian's voice was there, asking if I was okay. I told him I was kind of bummed that we might have to sell the house if we don't find jobs, and he said "that's right, you don't watch tv, you have no idea what's been going on in the world." He went on to say hijacked planes had been flown into the World Trade Center and destroyed the towers, and that the Pentagon had been hit, too. I could tell by his tone of voice that he was serious and yet the logic center of my brain was trying to figure out why he would say something so preposterous. It must be a joke, I thought, and there's actually some other important thing he's called to say, and he's making fun of how I don't watch television or whatever.

Pardon me, there goes another plane. Okay, I didn't catch sight of that one either, but yesterday I saw a lone F-16 streak low across the sky and had to wonder where it was going. Later, on the tv news a reporter described a military plane circling Logan airport and I wondered if it was the same one.

Last night at two in the morning I heard a plane, too, and didn't know what to think.

We turned on NPR and confirmed what Julian had told us--we even tried to turn on our television and see if we could pull in a grainy UHF channel... I could barely make out the wavy image of the Trade Center collapse. A quick look at the CNN homepage showed a plain white page, a small, easy-to-load graphic, and a bunch of links. We decided we had to go somewhere with CNN, and made plans to go over to Kimberly, JB, and Ted's house.

First I visited some friends who were home alone. So it was a few hours later I arrived to find, much to my shock, that they were watching ESPN when I came in. They were listening to NPR but had been picking up the ABC video feed on ESPN. By the time I got there, though, ESPN's Karl Ravech was actually giving a sports-related take on the tragedy, about an employee of the L.A. Kings who had been on one of the planes.

The founder of JB's company (Akamai) had been on one of the planes, too.

I kept waiting for the tragedy to get closer. Who else were among those 266 in the air, or the thousands crushed in the rubble? When would I hear of someone I knew personally who was there?

Throughout the day, through email and phone calls, friend after friend checked in to say they were alive. Aaron had been in the financial district but was home now unharmed. Marni had been planning to go to a breakfast meeting at 8:30 in a cafe at the trade center, but decided to skip it and drive back early. A friend of a friend worked in the building, but had slept late.

As of today, we're still lucky. I keep thinking of the 1986 fire and bombing at the Dupont Plaza hotel in San Juan. That was the hotel where all the Menudo fans on travel packages stayed and in December of that year I knew dozens, maybe hundreds, of girls who were there for Menudo's annual holiday concerts. I was NOT there, but I almost was. I remember being home from college--I had decided to fly to Colorado to visit my new boyfriend Nick instead of going to Puerto Rico--and watching the tv coverage of the bodies laid out on the lawn of the hotel. As it turned out, everyone I knew down there either escaped the burning building, was at the beach when it happened, or was elsewhere. I felt lucky not to have been there and not to have lost anyone I knew, but it seemed like a hint from Fate that maybe it was time for me to move on. I went to Colorado and began the first truly serious love relationship of my life.

It's just a coincidence that we are in a period of change here and now, when this has happened. But as a friend remarked to me yesterday, there's nothing like a world disaster to put your own problems in perspective. Our problems are not trivial ones--corwin's cancer and surgery, his company going bankrupt potentially, relationship arguments--but I do agree.

In further proof that the universe secretly revolves around me, though, I must note that on the ticker going by on CNN, among the litany of death tolls and quotes from world leaders was the news that all Major League Baseball games had been called off. Julian had actually told me already, on the phone that morning, so it had been a part of the news of the day from the beginning. So maybe I'm not the only one.

There goes another airplane. Sounds like something really big. I still couldn't see it from my window.

I suppose I should wrap this up and attempt to do some real work. It's strange--technically there was nothing stopping me from doing work yesterday, and yet I knew I couldn't. It was as if it took every bit of my mental capacity to grasp the very idea that the Twin Towers are gone. I can't help but feel extra-affronted as a New Yorker as well as an American. Every time they showed a shot of the skyline I got a jolt, as if they were showing me the face of someone I knew and loved, horribly disfigured and yet recognition still dawned... I couldn't help but think there won't be a parade down the Canyon of Heroes for quite some time, whether the Yankees win the World Series or whether Mayor Giuliani wants to honor the heroic firefighters and police officers of the city, because it maybe be full of rubble.

The papers. All of the papers that flew out of the building, both when the planes hit, and when the towers came down. There is no doubt they were office buildings from the sheer volume of paper that they emitted.

You may insert your own conclusion here about the importance of life versus paperwork.

For me, the conclusion I came to very early on in the day yesterday is still with me. This is not a war between one country and another and the war in Israel is not a war between Israel and Palestine. What it is is a war between those people who believe the purpose of life on Earth is to live a good life, to have a safe place to raise a family, good food to eat, to live in peace, and those who believe that their reward will come in the next life, so they are willing to die, and to destroy what others have, for an ideal and a cause that ignores or disdains life in favor of revenge or hate.

This is true in Ireland, in the Middle East, in the Balkans, and now here on our own soil. What else is peace but the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? It appears we will have to fight for it.


August 28, 2001

I've been to Seattle and back, and to San Francisco and back, and had a wonderful time both places, thanks in small part to the indulgence of my baseball habit, and in large part to the wonderful friends I've got in both locales. San Francisco was one delightful string of delicious meals and, don't ask me how I did it, but I only gained two pounds on the trip. Gee, if I'd only gotten a little exercise I might not have gained any at all. Or maybe it was that late night excursion to the Krispy Kreme in San Jose...

While I was in San Francisco I got the tattoo commemorating the publication of The Velderet. It was done by Clif at Sacred Rose Tattoo (491-A guerrero street, between 16th and 17th sts.) and is definitely the finest and nicest of them all. Makes me wonder what I'm going to do for the NEXT one? Clif did great work with fine lines--I'll try to get a photo of it up on the site soon.

I have one more trip to make to promote The Velderet, to the World Science Fiction Convention in Philly, this weekend. Then it's Faire season and I'll be spending my weekends at King Richard's Faire in Carver, MA through October. So, no, things won't really be slowing down for me, not one bit.

Yesterday I was feeling a little sad, though, because for the first time in a long time I'm experiencing that "end of summer" sadness. I'm not sure why I haven't felt it much the past several years--maybe because there's always been so much to look forward to in the fall, like the Faire and the World Series. But yesterday was the final day of the season for New England Women's Baseball League, and also the last day of the Little League season, with the broadcast of the championship game on ABC television, and I felt kind of wistful about it. It's been a hectic, event-filled summer, and I guess I'm sorry to see it end, even if it hasn't all been easy.

Or maybe it's just a reflection of how I feel a lot of things are ending or winding down in my life right now, the end of a certain era of life. Just a few months ago I had a whole passel of close friends living across the street and around the corner. Now both households have split up and moved. I'm actively seeking a buyer for Circlet Press and looking to pass it on. My "little" brother (he's twenty seven) will be married in under a year and my parents will be retired and living in Florida. None of these things are negative--they are all changes for the better, but they are changes nonetheless. It feels like not just a new chapter about to start, but maybe a new volume.


July 24, 2001

Okay, so it's been since the beginning of April since I updated this page. Since then I've turned thirty four, baseball season is half over, the Yankees are in first place, I've published another book (The Velderet, see cover at left), I've written two short stories and a few chapters on another novel, the economy has gone south, the book industry has flip flopped again into turmoil, we're in dire financial straits, my cats are upset and peeing on things, and my house still isn't finished being painted.

Other than that, I'm great. No, seriously... I didn't update this page for a while because I felt like I had nothing good to say and maybe I'm just superstitious but I think good news breeds more good news (and bad news can breed more bad). Right now, as you can see from the list above, it's mixed, but I'm optimistic. I have been doing some writing, which makes everything easier to stand. The Yankees are in first place again after being under the Red Sox most of the season. The Velderet is out--even if it appears that our distributor has lost their ability to sell it into the chain stores. Or maybe it's just that the chains are pulling into their shells to weather the tough economic times, and not ordering anything from the small press.

Anyway, the result is, if you want a copy of The Velderet, it might not be on the shelf in the store you're accustomed to buying Circlet books in. Please ask for it!

Meanwhile, I am doing some readings in Seattle and San Francisco in the next few weeks, having some interviews... hopefully this will encourage people to pick up the book. It's a fun book--I worry that people may miss the humor in it, but I poke gentle fun at the SM scene here and there in it...

And I have been playing baseball! I even got "called up" to a real game in the New England Women's Baseball League. I hope to be good enough by next summer to play the whole season in 2002.

And my brother's engaged! We're going to New Jersey in a couple of weeks for Julian and Heather's engagement party.

That's everything I can think of right now. My plane to Seattle takes off in a few hours so I better go... I still have to pack.


April 6, 2001

This is going to be a very busy month. I have a half-dozen nagging injuries that have sprung up as a result of how much I'm working out--ow, I'm old. I'm not back in shape yet, obviously, because I seem to be able to pull muscles, bruise myself, and yoink my various tendons/joints/ligaments/etc... all too easily.

Which makes me think I'm asking for serious trouble playing baseball. But baseball is so much fun!

I went to an open workout of the New England Women's Baseball League (Find them on the web at http://www.wnebl.org) last weekend, and we played catch, then took grounders, soft toss BP, and live BP (batting practice, for those who don't know), and I had a ton of fun. My main problem is I have no baseball skills whatsoever. I mean, the last time I played in an organized game was in elementary school, which was back before anyone would explain the rules to me. Once I figured out the rules, I changed school systems and we didn't play baseball in the new one. A picnic game of softball here or there. Wiffleball... actually, I'll write at length much more about this in the baseball journal... But, anyway, even with no skills at all, even just doing drills, baseball is FUN. Fun fun fun.

Speaking of baseball, spring training was great, despite a bunch of rainy weather. (Complete details also in the baseball journal...) I turn thirty four in two days and am going to the actual women's baseball try-outs.

Plus, it's Passover. I'm trying not to get too sucked into all the family negotiating around the needs of the holiday (whose house, when, who cooks what, etc...) because I know I'll be happy with pretty much whatever outcome there is. So I'll let others who have various logistical and emotional needs do the figuring out and just tell me where to be and when. This year's challenege--what to cook for vegans? The solution came to me in the produce aisle the other day: eggplant.

By the time next month rolls around, I will have made a trip to Atlanta, and to New York, and baseball season will be 1/6th over. Time flies.


March 6, 2001

I am learning to kick ass again. After doing marginally better with exercise and tae kwon do workouts last year, as compared to 1999 (48 workouts in 2000, plus I played Wiffle Ball, versus 35 workouts in 1999), I fell into a bit of a slump in December, January and into February. Winter blues? Could be. Between feeling like I was always either getting a cold, or just getting over one, the entire winter, and various seasonal rationalizations, all I was able to motivate myself to do was get on the exercise bike a few times a week.

And I kept thinking, oh, when I go back to taking class, it's going to HURT! You're out of shape, it's going to be bad...

But the only thing to do was get back on the horse. So I did. I've now had three hard workouts in the space of a week, and I feel GREAT! Yeah, I'm bruised, sore, a little achy, but somehow it isn't anywhere near as bad as I thought it would be. Either that exercise bike really was helping, or my memories of how bad it can be have gotten inflated over time.

So, I'm kicking ass again. Of course, at the end of March and almost all of April I will be on the road, and won't be able to do it. But it will be that much easier to pick up the ball again each time. I hope.

Meanwhile, I've decided what I want for my 34th birthday. I want to try out for the Women's New England Baseball League. Yes, such a thing exists, and there so happens to be a tryout on my 34th birthday. On the one hand, I don't expect to make it--I can't throw further than from second the first, I can barely run, and on a good day I hit about .300 against the pitching machine. (The Little Leaguers who are often there hitting, hit more like .600...)

On the other hand, I figure that shouldn't stop me. It may be a humbling experience, but I want to try it. And I know if I go in there with the attitude that I'm not good enough to make it, that I'll defeat myself. So I'm trying to play the mental game of telling myself I'm going in there to be not just as good as I can be, but to be the best. If I were to make it by some miracle, I'd be one of the oldest players in the league.

Hmm, just occurred to me--I might have to get spikes to do this. I guess that's what I'll ask for as a birthday gift.

Meanwhile, I'm writing an eensy bit. Which is better than nothing. Slowly but surely.


January 30, 2001

Life returns to some semblance of normal after a January that had me fly to Las Vegas for the AVN Adult Expo (formerly associated with CES, Consumer Electronic Show), do the Arisia Science Fiction Convention, and hold the Fetish Fair Fleamarket. I'm happy to report that all three endeavors were successful, and fun. And I'm still in one piece at the end of it.

I don't know where I get this impression that January is supposed to be a quiet month of hibernation and creative production, because it doesn't look like it usually works out that way, does it! (Like the year Lawrence and I programmed OutWrite, for example...)

Anyway, it's just about over now, and I'm sick. I have felt like I've been getting a cold for months now, and it finally blossomed into the real sore throat thing about a week before the flea, parading through several symptoms, from swollen throat to scratchy, to a thin cough, to a runny nose, to a stuff nose... the cold then went into remission during the actual fleamarket and for a few hours I didn't feel sick at all. But there's nothing like very little sleep and a lot of running around to run down the batteries in the immune system... and today I'm stuffed up and coughing once again. Argh.

Pitchers and catchers report in under a month, which means my self-imposed deadline for research on my baseball novel is fast appraoching. I start writing sketches and plotting on Feb. 20th. And I start writing the thing on April 1st, Opening Day. Guess when I have to have I finished by? Last day of the regular season--which gives me the postseason as a fudge factor...



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