Column 8
What’s It Like Living in the Tropics II ?
Let’s take a look at what Jamie actually confronted coming to this little tropical island in 1980. It was one year after St. Lucia gained independence from Britain. The island was poor. It was not just a matter of there being some poor people. The island was poor. It also has to be emphasized that it was above all an island.
Most things have to be imported and no one is going to import goods when there is no one who can afford to buy them. And you cannot go down the road to another town and find what you want. Things are often sold out or never existed in the first place. No neat bistros. No major shopping areas. No fine restaurants and no night life. Jamie mixed her own paint and used other survival skills she found she had. You had to be adaptive to survive.
When Jamie went to Castries with Barbara there were six hardware stores in the capital. It was necessary to scour back rooms and search under shelves to find what might be available. When you needed wood screws you could not buy a box. They didn’t have a whole box. You bought each single screw you needed. When we set up our house we needed five toilets. We bought the country’s entire stock of toilets in one day.
You have to make do. It is necessary to find ways to cope and be self sufficient and it is essential to be comfortable with yourself. And you better have a plan. Remember Paul? He had no plan. Jamie came to the island with the plan to make a home for herself and Paul, build her marriage and have children. When that plan fell apart, she was adaptive and made a new plan.
On an island like St. Lucia there is always the sun, the sand, the ocean and the mountains. And if you are really lucky there is the one you love or you start a mad passionate love affair which you can hope is not too ill-conceived. Its all quite sensual if you can cope with it.
Fast forward. It’s now many years later and the tourists have come and have brought money. There are goods in the stores, some lovely bistros, shopping, fine restaurants and all those good things. Life is even better in this beautiful place as long as your plan for yourself is working out.
But there is always the need to adapt to scarcity. With more money on the island there are more things available. But scarcity remains an issue. Its possible you remember them calling out "de plane, de plane" on the TV show Fantasy Island. Its not "de plane, de plane" you watch for on a tropical island. It’s "de container, de container". Containers bring almost all the imports by ship and that’s most things.
Other than the fact that planes bring tourists and are the best way to get off and on the island, the plane is not important. It is the container that is important. On a tropical island there are what we have come to call "hatchings" from time to time. They come from the large shipping containers.
For example, there may be no plastic food storage containers on the island. They were "finished" some time ago and no one knows when they will return. Then comes a hatching. There are stacks of them in the stores. All shapes, sizes and colors. You buy lots of containers. Your other ones are largely gone. The plastic rotted. ( Its really strange but they do seem to rot.). The rats chewed them up. (Sorry. Fact of life in the tropics. Rats.) Whatever. They are gone. Oh, joy! Stacks of containers. And then they are finished again.
The next container brings what? WD-40? The hatching has brought shelves of it to the stores. You need a can. You buy six. You know it will be finished before long because everyone else is buying six.
No wonder you begin to look at containers with reverence.
Sailors say that sailing is hours and hours of sheer boredom punctuated with moments of sheer terror. One might say the same thing about life in the tropics. Where does the terror come from? The weather. The local drivers. Your lover’s husband or wife. Among other things.
But mostly the word which best characterizes island life after the initial excitement wears off is BOREDOM. Unless you have that plan for your life and are not still pursuing fantasy. And can just enjoy the sheer sensuality of it all.
Remember those luscious evenings we mentioned. They may be luscious or interminable. If you are a reader you can be in good shape. If you are a TV person and do not have cable in your area you are in trouble. The most powerful station on the island carries the Trinity Broadcasting Network and you may find yourself becoming engrossed in their hair and makeup. Then you know you are in trouble. Alternatively if you have just started a fabulous love affair you are in the right place and night is heaven.
It comes back again and again to recognizing that the fantasy has to be overcome. A tropical island can be a beautiful place if you are flexible, self sufficient and have a sense of humor. But if you plan to live a fantasy, you will find it isn’t paradise. Of course, then, if you should happen to meet your Jamie or Andre...
Tropical Factoids
Snakes
Yes, they have snakes. But, forget the movie Anaconda. There is a boa the locals call Tête Chien (dog head). Sometimes you see them draped from someone’s arm by the side of the road. He usually wants you to have your picture taken with it. For a fee, of course. But, we get amused by the thought that a tourist might buy it and show up at the airport or the cruise ship with one. But the lovely people at Air Jamaica can be very flexible. Then there is the fer de lance. Ugly and poisonous. They live deep in the rain forest valleys and we have never seen one.
Brutally Hot Summers in the Tropics
Not so. At least on the windward islands. It only varies five degrees winter to summer and stretches above 90 degrees are not common. In fact, at the height of summer it may be in the mid to upper 80s with a delicious breeze when it is a stifling 90 or over 100 in the States. And since most people assume it is hotter in the tropics they stay away and the islands are blessedly quiet.

For Much More Come Visit Us at www.annierogers.com

Maryland in the fall is my favorite time of the year. The Gulf humidity slips away and leaves cool evenings that demand the first fires of the season. Except this year. The entry into fall sucked as the humidity hung on. So, when we went to Aspen I was ready for a cozy evening. We found such an evening at The Wild Fig.
The warmth of the candlelight invited us in where we were greeted by the manager, Roy Toomey. He convinced me at once that I was an old friend he was delighted to see even though I had never met him before.
The restaurant had been described as "Mediterranean". If you are looking for a posh environment which gushes elegance, the Wild Fig is not such a setting. Mediterranean or Country French is a better description. It is a place where you go with good friends or your lover. The lights are low and the music just loud enough to enhance the ambiance. Share confidences or look deep into each others eyes.
The staff exhibited the art of fine service which is unobtrusive. We lacked for nothing when we needed it and the meal flowed at just the right pace to suit my taste. In fact, at one point they noted that we were lingering over a dish and asked if we wanted them to hold the next course for a while.
Then, of course, there was the food. Oh, no, let's not forget the food. Among the appetizers were two "family style" dishes which offered a sampling of many items. We chose to order two such dishes and were abashed to see how much food was there. But it was all so tasty that it did not go to waste. Then followed a salad my wife ordered. The greens were covered with a heated mixture of such things as gorgonzola and blue cheese, a mild sausage (I think), olive oil and balsamic vinegar. The dressing warmed but did not wilt the greens. My wife graciously shared it and the rest of us ate most of it. We couldn't help ourselves! What an art to warm the salad but not wilt it. Talk about timing and great taste.
On we went through the offerings of the Wild Fig. The broth on my seafood linguini was truly tasty and the lamb dish was among the very best I have ever tasted. Then there was my wife's dish. She ordered the duck confit ravioli which is evidently their "signature" dish. To die for. It seemed there were no bad choices, no failures. In short, at The Wild Fig we had exquisite food with great service in a warm and cheery setting. What more could we have asked for. If you are in Aspen, don't miss dining at The Wild Fig!

For Much More Come Visit Us at www.annierogers.com

I really have to do better about getting stuff up on this blog. My excuse is that there was a lot to get out of the way before Mala and I went to the SPAN (small publishers) conference in Denver. I'll do a separate blog entry on that later. First the trip which was pretty neat.
We flew to Denver, naturally. There being not much else to do from Maryland if you don't want to be on road eternal. It is always amazing to see Denver dumped in the high plains and the mountains beginning just at the end of the table. After the conference we went on to Aspen to visit one of our kids. We had thought about flying and monitored the possibility of deals. None emerged for the flight and it settled at $765 per person round trip from Denver to Aspen. Get real! Definitely time for a road trip.
I had forgotten how beautiful the mountains were. And every valley is different. When we first entered the mountains it kind of looked like a hollywood set for a western. It is obvious that there is mining activity and it looks dusty and quaint. No offense, folks, but it does.
This kind of travel makes me thankful for the interstate highways. There we were traveling quickly through the mountains snug and happy. All I could think of was the number of heart attacks there must have been when the pioneers first saw the Rockies. "You mean we have to go up there? Please Mr. Custer I don't want to go."
Coming from the East we are used to more intimate landscapes. Some might say you miss something when you travel at high speeds. But I would contend that in this environment which is so huge you can pretty much take it in. By the way I think the people of Colorado are quite sane. They have speed limits on the roads which are actually reasonable. The sections where we were allowed 75 worked well at 75-80. When they cut the speed limit down it was appropriate. We were able to make time without straining against artificial restraints.
It seemed that the colors in each canyon or mountain range was different. As to the vegetation, it ran to subtle earth tones which were quite soothing. And quite a range of those tones at that. My favorite canyon was Glenwood Canyon. Really remarkable rock formations up close and personal. Anyone inclined to slip some peyote could commune with a large number of spirits in there. But those days are over aren't they?
Then when the canyon ends the traveler emerges into broader valleys. At this time of year the aspen trees up high had already lost their leaves but many retained their shimmering gold leaves at lower elevations. Then there were other golden trees which had the shape of Lombardy Poplars. They looked like golden geysers grouped and dotting the landscape.
Then Aspen showed up. Interesting town. It drips money. If you have a few million in loose change lying around, they have a house for you. You can then spend the remainder in the upscale downtown shopping district. I couldn't resist going into the Baccarat boutique to look at the crystal which I think is beautiful. In contrast to the Waterford crystal which is fairly heavy, this French crystal is very delicate. Not good if you or your dinner guests have a bad case of the fumbles. Anyway, I looked but did not buy. The window shopping was great.
In our time in Aspen we sampled some restaurants. Two out of three were winners. The one that was not a winner served what I called my rubber ducky meal. I like duck but I like it crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. This duck was resistent in all regards. Oh well. Other dishes were much better. I'll just leave the restaurant unnamed. There are some following blogs for reviews of the winners.

For Much More Come Visit Us at www.annierogers.com

Column 7
What’s It Like Living in the Tropics I ?
That question is best answered by asking two questions in return: "Which tropics?" And "Why are you asking?"
The tropics" is nothing other than a region near the equator. The setting for A Dream Across Time is a windward tropical island in the Caribbean which is a very different place from a village in the interior of a country such as Colombia, for example. So, in this instance "tropics" refers to a small island relatively near the equator which receives the trade winds off the Atlantic Ocean.
The Caribbean is diverse and every island has a different character depending on its weather, topography and cultural background. St. Lucia has a blend of French and English because it was passed back and forth fourteen times between the two powers. Barbados is much more solidly English with lots of old English money because it was always a British colony. Martinique has always been French and is a department of France. All three of these islands had the institution of slavery which leaves a particular stamp.
In contrast the Cayman Islands never had slavery because the islands were not worth farming. And on and on across the region. Some islands are virtual deserts and others are replete with rain forests. It is a truly remarkable region with each island standing out as a particular kind of jewel.
It was one of these "tropics" in which Jamie Elliott landed by chance. But, we’ll get back to that experience in a moment.
The second question relates to why the reader wants to know about living in the tropics. Naturally living in a place full time is very different from visiting on vacation. If you want to know simply because you are curious - well and good. If you want to know because you would like to move there, the question is of a vastly different magnitude and the most fundamental consideration is that you are going to need a plan.
Why a plan? What kind of a plan? You need to be clear about why you are relocating and what you are planning to do with yourself. Are you trying to escape something? What is your motivation? And what are you planning to do with yourself? Jamie had a husband who happened upon a job opportunity and such jobs usually pay well. She followed him. She used her time to redo their house, engage in her artistic interests and ended up with a career of her own.
What happened to their relationship is not unusual. Generally it can be said that if there is a flaw in the marriage, it will probably get worse and if there is a substance abuse problem, it will probably get worse. Having a plan for creating a new stable environment for yourself and your relationship is crucial. Having a plan and a direction is important anywhere anyone moves. The trap in the tropics is that fantasy gets in the way and people commonly overlook the plan.
Now that you have your plan, you are ready to embark and reasonably want to know what life would actually be like. Think back to what Jamie confronted and lay aside some of the problems she faced ranging from Paul to loup garous.
Come morning, about 6 A.M., the sun will go "pop" over the horizon. If you are a morning person you will want to rush outside and get something done while it is deliciously cool. By 9 it is definitely much warmer although, if your house is placed properly, you will have the breeze always. You will spend a lot of time on your covered terrace enjoying the breeze and the flow of colors and light.
You quickly become clear that you are NOT going to spend a lot of time lying on the beach in the sun. Why would you want to do that? It’s ALWAYS there.
Whether you are oriented toward the idea of a siesta or not, the Spanish definitely got it right. A long nap after lunch is ideal. That way you skip the hottest part of the day which, nonetheless, with the breeze, may not be all that hot. Late afternoon you get energized again as things cool. Then around 6P.M. the sun goes "thud" over the horizon and the tree frogs open up with their chorus. You now have a luscious evening ahead. This 6 A.M. sunrise and 6P.M. sunset goes on all year with only a little variation. No more lingering summer evenings or dark forbidding winters. The nights are lovely.
But don’t forget having that plan for yourself. More to come.

Tropical factoids:

The Green Flash
There really is a green flash at times when the sun sets. It happens just as the last of the sun goes over the horizon. But the conditions must be right. The humidity must be low. There can be no clouds on the horizon. Generally you need a clear knife edge horizon.

Little Birds
The little bird, Rufous, Jamie talks to is a Lesser Antillean Bullfinch. The male is dark gray with a red breast. The female is mostly light gray with other subtle colors mixed in. They are very social and easily tamed. It seems they are always ready to keep you company at your meals but often do not appear to be interested in food. They listen intently to the sound of the human voice. So, they make great companions.

Next Column Posting: What’s It Like Living in the Tropics II?

For Much More Come Visit Us at www.annierogers.com

Now that we are deep into romance writing and self publishing I have some clear words of wisdom for people who are considering writing a book. There are a lot of things you should do before you write a word.
Buy all the major books about self publishing and marketing and read them cover to cover. That means such books as those by the Rosses and Kremer etc. Having read them and having gotten truly depressed you need to consider if you are that self destructive or into punishment. If you can truthfully say you are not self destructive and you are willing to do all that work and have the emotional and financial resources to do it, then you may want to consider beginning to write.
I am clearly getting the impression that most authors never even consider what it is going to take to get published. Sure they have heard the stories about rooms papered with rejection notices but it's not going to happen to them.
Now it may be that you like writing as a hobby and are pleased to have a book on the shelf. If you don't care if it ever gets published, then write on. But, if you want it published, that is another matter.
A major consideration is whether your book is nonfiction or fiction. Nonfiction is much easier to get published. Fiction is nearly impossible. We got two nonfiction book contracts just on the strength of proposals and they got published. Going into fiction is like going into a train wreck.
As I've written previously, publishers won't talk to you and agents mostly don't need your business. See a prior column about finding an agent if you must go ahead. Additionally, we were not often ecstatic about the services of publishers so we ended up taking it all back for us to do. Are you a control freak people ask? Maybe but things also seem to be working better.
Even after you get a book printed as a self publisher, then you go looking for a distributor. Only one title at present? They don't want you. So you get fulfillment but go looking for a publicist. They are more interested in nonfiction and many won't touch fiction. And on and on it goes.
It is sad to hear people who say they are so proud they just finished their novel and now they want to know how they get it published. The train wreck is imminent. I am in the process of clearing ours and things are looking better and better. It was clearly not what I anticipated. But being pissed off is a motivator for some strange people.
Don't spit into the wind comes to mind but I'm still going to say that writers, particularly fiction writers, need to be very clear what they are letting themselves in for.

For Much More Come Visit us at www.annierogers.com

Column 6 -
Bertille Deroche
In A Dream Across Time Bertille Deroche has many attributes. One of them is the loving caregiver for her family. Because of Clarisse’s emotional collapse Bertille had taken on the role of mothering Andre and Emile. She is one of those women who takes on the mothering role for all comers in need. Her lap is ample and all encompassing with love and security.
There is boundless physical comfort as well as security and she extends her love through the food she prepares. It is important to her that her "parrots" are well fed. For her the food preparation is not work but is a sacred fulfillment.
Bertille’s care of her family extends to her contact with the spirit world where she maintains intimacy with Mother Earth of whom she is clearly a representative. In her flights she seeks underlying understanding of current and future events so that she may better protect her brood. In her contact with the spirits she finds ways to clarify her own perceptions of her people and what is happening to them.
While Marcus is the Wise Old Man, Bertille is the Earth Mother. She represents all that we experience about love, nurturance, comfort and security with our mothers. As such she is a universal. But in the island experience she represents something else to the "civilized" world. She exists not as a symbol but in the here and now. She feels eternal and ancient. The keeper of the flame is, in fact, a priestess and, in modern life, is generally hidden. Not so much in the islands, where such women are more readily glimpsed.
And then, of course, we cannot forget that Bertille is deeply in touch with the mystery of women. While men have traditionally held what is called "power" and "ruled" there are more elemental powers and a rule of mystery which balances the rule of men. In fact, mystery is, perhaps, regardless of the age in human history, the more fundamental power. In the end it is the women who conquer the conquerors. And their mystery is implicit in everything that is important to humanity.
Whether you believe in astral projection or not, it is clear that people can project themselves. We have imagination and in our daydreams, night dreams or wandering in our imagination we project ourselves. Bertille travels with the spirits and seeks their wisdom. She is adept at these travels although there is always risk in such flights. That is why Marcus stands guard over her when she travels in the spirit world. Her travels are in the interest of love and wisdom; representatives of evil could disrupt her flight and her intentions. At the time of her travels she is fragile because she has given up much of her solidity in the physical world.
Bertille is unusual in being an adept in such processes. "Modern" peoples do somewhat the same thing when they clear their mind in yoga, meditate or enter a prayer state. She is both a fundamental human symbol and a real person in a society where the primal ways are closer to the surface. Her ability to move in both worlds makes her a truly powerful person. It is her power which overwhelms Jamie when she is in contact with her because Jamie is also a dreamer and can be pulled away into Bertille’s world. But Jamie would find herself in an unfamiliar place in which she is not in a position to be in control in the way that Bertille can be. So, she consults Bertille and does not travel with her.
We can only hope that the cusp between our primal world and our modern world does not disappear. The loss would be tremendous. We can already perceive the impact of the erosion of this connection in our hunger for meaning. And so we greet Bertille with wonder and affection. She slakes our thirst and stills our hungers. She offers truly great comfort and safety found in a living representative of Mother Earth.

For Much More Come Visit Us at www.annierogers.com

Small press/self publishing experiences are very similar to many other experiences in my life. It does not leave me resigned. The experiences make me more determined.
It is hardly a secret that the publishing industry has become consolidated in a few entities. But with the internet and other advances many of us no longer need to be satisfied with what the publishers have to offer us. Or, in many instances, decline to offer us.
I've already written about some of the drek the major publishers are publishing. At BEA I got another slant on the publishing business. A bright young woman who works for a major publishing house spoke at a presentation I attended and said she had told her bosses she had not read a single one of their titles last year. She made it clear that she perceived them as out of touch. I don't know if she is still working for them after what she told them and said publicly. It was a bold and revealing comment.
Her implication that the powes that be are often out of touch fits with my experiences in life. When I was in graduate school I was assigned to read material which had been produced by the big names in psychology. It was an experience I would not forget. Much of it was narrow, trendy and considerably less than profound. I concluded that once the big names had achieved a certain elevated status they could publish their toilet paper and have it acclaimed.
My disenchantment with established and the acclaimed names has been steadily reinforced throughout my life. When we had our travel business we kept the float in a brokerage account with one of the big five in that field. Fortunately I kept a close eye on the account and one day noticed that there had been a very large ACH withdrawal from our account which we clearly had not authorized. (ACH means automated clearing house. ACH withdrawals happen when routine bills are paid but the withdrawals must be authorized by the account holder.) We had never authorized ACH activity of any kind on the account. I called and had the brokerage house reverse the transaction and set up the account on line so I could watch it. Shortly an unnumbered check was cleared withdrawing many more thousands of dollars. The raid on the account continued and I learned that this major house could not control ACH withdrawals or bogus check withdrawals. If I had not caught the problem it would have been our loss. Not theirs. They had no routine way of handling such things and seemed to find my insistence that they safeguard our funds and handle the problem to be an irritant. Finally they suggested that I get lost. I wrote a carefully reasoned letter to the president of the company and never received a response. So much for the big boys in finance.
Recently I opened a small mutual fund account and found that a large family of mutual funds had a poorly designed site. I overlooked a crucial piece of information and they would not open the account. Rather than having a site where you had to correct the oversite immediately before going to the next page, they sent me an overnight letter asking for the information. They could have used my e-mail address but, of course, it should never have gotten that far. It took me days to open the account. Once again, so much for the lions of finance.
So, back to my beginning point. There is a bias alive and well in the publishing field that only the big boys can do it right and produce a quality product. Sheer nonsense! Having been published before I must say I was often less than satisfied with the "expertise" I encountered. In fact, one of the publishing houses made it clear that they were clueless about what sold.
In graduate school I was taught that psychologists should not concern themselves with money. Since I ended up in private practice such an attitude did not serve me well and I had to correct it. But then, of couse, with psychology's bias we were expected not to go into private practice. Now in publishing it seems the proper way to proceed is to write only "literature" and to have it published by a big house. But, small presses and authors are now being offered paid review services and paid promotional services. The new services offered helps to make us competitive. If we don't take full advantage of these opportunities then we are in effect going along with anticompetitive practices. Market economies are not perfect but they are the best we have.
The skirmishing as the small presses develop should be a sight to behold.

For Much More Come Visit Us at www.annierogers.com