3 Things You May Not Know About Me

Howdy, Campers, and happy Poetry Friday! (My poem, the links to PF and to my upcoming classes are below).

We in the TeachingAuthors treehouse 

decided to get personal this 'round, so hold onto your hats as we blog about the 3 Things You May Not Know About...

Carmela started our 13th(!)-year with a bang: 3 Things You May Not Know About TeachingAuthors and a Trimeric Poem which details our new posting schedule, new calendar, and her terrific trimeric poem; Mary Ann reveals the famous children's author/illustrator she kissed, a shocking newspaper interview, and the book series she--a former children's librarian--has never read. 

And here are 3 Things You May Not Know About Me:

1) About 700 years ago at a conference far away, Nikki Grimes and two of her friends I'd had dinner with, knocked on my hotel room door past midnight. 

I was in my pajamas. 

They plopped down on my bed. 

I did my best to wake up. (I felt as if I were thirteen again, this time with the "in" girls who wanted to talk to me...in my pjs...on my bed!) 

Three older white men had had dinner with us--possibly publishers or book sales reps--I don't remember now. Nikki asked if I was aware of the racial slurs they had flung across the table at dinner. 

Now I was wide awake. Whaaa...? 

Those remarks had flown invisibly past me. 

These women were sitting on my bed, in the middle of the night, to open my eyes.

Maybe those remarks were dog whistles, meant only for the ears of the three black women at the table. 

Or maybe I was focused on the salmon, maybe I was dying for another roll but didn't want to look like a glutton, or maybe my monkey mind was buzzing from the conference.

They did their best to help me see that night, but I don't think I really understood. Though my family--grandparents, uncles, aunts, mother, father, sister and I--had been activists first and foremost in our lives, I'd never endured what Nikki and her friends had.

I look back with embarrassment. But also with gratitude. 

Thank you, Nikki, for trying that night, though I didn't understand. 

I am just beginning to understand, 700 years later.

[Addendum posted 2/9/22: I appreciate Heidi Mordhorst's comment below (and our subsequent correspondence): The stories that we white people can tell each other of our ignorance, our safety, our privilege are really important, April. Thank you. I'm so interested in how you characterized the "dog whistles" as meant for Black ears, when usually they're meant from white mouths for other white ears. Some of the ignorance of us "good white people" is that we don't suspect others of being racist; we don't hear what they're really saying. Let us be owls in all seasons, listening for what's underneath the surface.  

I now realize that it may be hardest for those of us from activist families to shift from believing that not being blatantly racist is enough. It's up to me to become anti-racist, an upstander and an ally.]

2) My picture book, MORE THAN ENOUGH ~ a Passover Story, illustrated by the wonderful Katie Kath (Dial Books), is coming out as a paperback and an audiobook on 2/22/22 🌞What a happy date🌞 (You can pre-order it from an indie bookstore now!)

(For those of you with an iron stomach, here's the whole, bloody creation story behind More Than Enough...which you can wash down with these delicious reviews.)

3) I recorded the author's notes for the audiobook in a fancy Santa Monica studio!  (The author's notes are just seven sentences long.)

Moi, after reading the author's notes

from More Than Enough...stoked with coffee

4) A bonus fact you may not know about me: my intention this year is to be present. So my word for 2022 is presence. When we're truly present, our  presence is a present 🎁

About a year ago I learned something (which you'll read in the backstory) that made me appreciate how focused owls are...how present they are, which inspired today's poem:

OWLS
by April Halprin Wayland

They are a special breed,

those focused listeners

who block out all

 

as if they're owls,

who hear

a mouse's heart

 

beat 

under

snow.

poem © 2022 April Halprin Wayland
=====================
Backstory:

I heard on the radio that "Owls can hear a mouse's heartbeat under a foot of snow"!  Isn't that MARVELOUS?

I did a virtual cartwheel when I heard that.
======================
Thank you for stopping by today! One final note:

I'll be teaching Introduction to Writing Children's Poetry on Saturday, March 26, 2022 12 noon-3pm PST, and Introduction to Writing a Children's Picture Book on Saturday, April 9, 2022 12 noon-3pm PST. Both are virtual classes; enrollment is limited to 20 students.

Thank you, Elisabeth, for hosting Poetry Friday at Unexpected Intersections

posted by April Halprin Wayland, with love

Important Info for Email Subscribers

Here are two bits of important information for our email subscribers:

1) We're migrating to a new email subscription service

Google will soon be discontinuing Feedburner, which is the software we've always used for the TeachingAuthors email list. So we'll be migrating our email list to follow.it software. If you're an email subscriber, there are several things we want you to know:

• We're hoping the transition will be seamless. However, if you stop getting our emails, please visit the TeachingAuthors site and enter your email address in the sidebar box labeled SUBSCRIBE VIA FOLLOW.IT. Then be sure to verify your subscription when you receive the confirmation email.
  
• The "from" field of our future emails will now read "follow.it." That means you'll no longer be able to reply directly to our emails. If you have questions or comments that you don't want to post using the comments option on the TeachingAuthors site itself, you may email us via teachingauthors [at] gmail [dot] com.
• In the first email you receive from us via follow.it, you'll need to confirm that you want to continue receiving our TeachingAuthors posts. If you don't, follow.it will remove you from our subscription list. 

You don't want to miss our next scheduled post, which will include a book giveaway!  If it doesn't arrive in your inbox by Sunday, June 27, 2021, be sure to read it on the TeachingAuthors site.

2) What you may have missed from Zeena's latest post

Unfortunately, due to issues with our blogging software, video clips no longer appear in our post emails. That means that if you didn't read Zeena's last post online, you missed seeing some wonderful videos that really bring her post to life. (The large gaps in the email message are where the videos should have appeared!) When you're done reading this email, I encourage you to go to the TeachingAuthors site to watch the video clips. They feature the locations that inspired Zeena's book and the setting where the play based on her story was staged. You'll find them here.

That's all for now. 

Carmela

More About Favorite Childhood Books plus Teaching Authors at ALA

A few readers have written to share their favorite childhood books. Sarah mentioned Mama, Buy Me a China Doll; Free to Be You and Me; Pickle Chiffon Pie; Harriet The Spy; and The All-of-a-Kind-Family. Cynthia’s list included the Oz books, National Velvet, E. Nesbit’s Five Children trilogy, and Louisa May Alcott’s Jack and Jill. Pamanmat remembered Nancy Drew, Archie comic books, and Great Expectations. What special books do you remember from your childhood or teen years? We’d love to hear about them!

Out and About

Several Teaching Authors will be at the American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conference at McCormick Place in Chicago next month.

Esther Hershenhorn will be at the SCBWI-Illinois Booth, #1626, on Saturday, July 11, from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m., promoting her new book S is for Story: A Writer’s Alphabet, out this September with Sleeping Bear Press. The booth promotes Illinois authors and illustrators. SCBWI members, please stop by and say “Howdy!”

JoAnn Early Macken will be speaking on Sunday, July 12, on a panel of nonfiction authors called “Nonfiction Book Blast! Booktalks Your Reluctant Readers Can’t Resist.” Seventeen authors and a moderator will present booktalks librarians can use to interest young readers in nonfiction. The panel appears from 10:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. in Convention Center Room W181 (Level 1 of the West Building). Participating authors and their books include:

• Lisa Rondinelli Albert, Stephenie Meyer: Author of the Twilight Saga (Enslow, 2009), So You Want to Be a Film or TV Actor (Enslow, 2008)

• Mary Bowman-Kruhm, The Leakeys: A Biography (Prometheus Books, 2009)

• Laura Crawford, In Arctic Waters (Sylvan Dell Publishing), The Pilgrims’ Thanksgiving From A to Z (Pelican Publishing), Postcards From Chicago (Raven Tree Press)

• Jeri Chase Ferris, With Open Hands: The Story of Biddy Mason (Lerner), Arctic Explorer: Matthew Henson (Lerner)

• Kelly Milner Halls, Dinosaur Parade (Lark/Sterling Publishers, 2008), Saving the Baghdad Zoo (HarperCollins/Greenwillow, 2009), Tales of the Cryptids (Darby Creek Publishing, 2006)

• Amy S. Hansen, Bugs and Bugsicles: Insects in the Winter (Boyds Mills Press, 2010), Touch the Earth (NASA and NFB, 2009)

• Gwendolyn Hooks, Makers and Takers (Rourke Publishing, 2008)

• Katherine L. House, Lighthouses for Kids: History, Science, and Lore with 21 Activities (Chicago Review Press, 2008)

• Patricia K. Kummer, The Great Barrier Reef (Marshall Cavendish Benchmark, 2009), The Great Lakes (Marshall Cavendish Benchmark, 2009), North Korea, and South Korea (Scholastic/Children's Press, 2008)

• Suzanne Lieurance, The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire and Sweatshop Reform in American History (Enslow)

• JoAnn Early Macken, Flip, Float, Fly: Seeds on the Move (Holiday House, 2008)

• Carla Killough McClafferty, In Defiance of Hitler: The Secret Mission of Varian Fry (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008)

• Wendie Old, The Halloween Book of Facts and Fun (Albert Whitman), The Groundhog Day Book of Facts and Fun (Albert Whitman)

• April Pulley Sayre, Honk, Honk, Goose: Canada Geese Start a Family (Henry Holt, 2009)

• Anastasia Suen, Wired (Charlesbridge, 2007), The U.S. Supreme Court (Picture Window Books)

• Christine Taylor-Butler, Sacred Mountain: Everest (Lee and Low Books, 2009)

• Rebecca Hogue Wojahn and Donald Wojahn, Follow That Food Chain (Lerner, 2009)

Library media specialist Sharon Mitchell will be the panel moderator. Hope to see you there!

The authors have also collaborated to produce a wiki (Nonfiction Book Blast) that includes all the booktalks, searchable by title, author, subject, and intended age level. The front page includes links to the authors’ web sites. After the conference, other authors, librarians, and interested readers can add booktalks of their own. Check it out!

JoAnn Early Macken will be autographing Flip, Float, Fly: Seeds on the Move at the Holiday House Booth, #2138 in the West Building, from 1:00-1:30 p.m.

April Halprin Wayland and Carmela Martino will also be strolling through the convention center and exploring exhibits. Watch for them, and be sure to say hello!

Coming soon: the Teaching Authors!

I'll soon be posting an announcement about this blog, Teaching Authors: who we are, what we do, and what we plan to discuss here. So watch this space!