About Me
- Pamela Clare
- I grew up in Colorado at the foot of the Rocky Mountains, then lived in Denmark and traveled throughout Europe before coming back to Colorado. I have two adult sons, whom I cherish. I started my writing career as a columnist and investigative reporter and eventually became the first woman editor of two different papers. Along the way, my team and I won numerous state and several national awards, including the National Journalism Award for Public Service. In 2011, I was awarded the Keeper of the Flame Lifetime Achievement Award for Journalism. Now I write historical romance and contemporary romantic suspense.
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Monday, February 24, 2014
Verdun Battlefield — Day One
Verdun.
I suppose there are a lot of Americans who’ve never heard of
Verdun, and that’s sad. It is the site of one of the most historic defenses in
military history, the site of a defeat that helped to derail Germany’s military
plans during World War I, and the site of so much human loss that it defies
comprehension.
But let me backtrack for just a moment…
I didn’t know much about Verdun until Benjamin, my younger
son, who was then 8 years old, became obsessed about the French role in World
War I. He watched videos. He read books. He read more books. By the time he was
10, he was reading college-level texts about France in World War I. I would be
sitting and writing, and he would walk up to me and begin to describe trench
warfare in such detail that he gave me chills.
I put him in French lessons. He took French in school,
minoring in the language in college. Thanks to his college French professor and
a French government program (funded by French taxpayers), he was invited to
serve as an assistant language teacher in the Versailles school district for
this school year. I knew he wouldn’t be in France long before he went to
Verdun.
He has written a 9,000-word account of his visit, that you can visit here. I won’t attempt to recreate his account. His eloquence and
knowledge on this subject dwarf mine. But over the years, I’ve developed an
interest in this topic, too, because the stories he’s told of battlefield
bravery, human cruelty, and poignant survival have stirred my imagination and
made me cry. Truly, he has reduced me to tears at times telling me about things
that occurred on the battlefields of Verdun.
A quick historical overview: Germany launched an attack
against the stronghold of Verdun on Feb. 21, 1916. The battle lasted 10
horrific months. The German policy was to “bleed the French white,” i.e., to
kill as many French as possible in order to win the war.
But karma had a lesson in store for Germany (a lesson it
sadly forgot). Yes, they killed lots of French soldiers. But for every Frenchman they slew, one of their own was lost. At the end of those 10 horrific months, Germany had lost as many
of its sons as the French. Some 700,000 men were dead — that’s 70,000 a
month — while more than a million were wounded.
Verdun as a city was mostly destroyed, and the land
surrounding it was absolutely devastated, as millions upon millions of shells
had landed, blowing apart the forests, turning the land into a landscape of
shell craters, human bones, rotting corpses, and mud.
I knew I had to see this place, to feel it, so to speak. We
made plans to visit it long before I got on the plane to France.
Our visit seemed like it was going to be hugely
disappointing, as the tour buses to the battlefields do not run during this
time of year. We hadn’t realized that and were somewhat surprised, as Feb. 21
marked the 98th anniversary of the beginning of the battle, an event
that is usually marked by a ceremony. However, this year’s events were muted as
most people are saving up their pomp and circumstance for the 100th
anniversary in 2016.
As luck would have it, the woman who runs the hotel front
desk at Hotel Les Colombes in the evening and on weekends knows a man who is an
expert on World War I. A life-long resident of Verdun, Frédéric Radet is also
an expert on the forts, having purchased Ouvrage de la Falouse, one of the
smaller forts that was part of the massive fortifications of Verdun, and
restored it, turning it into a kind of World War I museum. He is also an author
on the architecture of these forts. A quick call to Mr. Radet resulted in his
agreeing to drive us around and answer our questions in exchange for a very
reasonable daily fee.
We were cranked.
This blog post will cover our first day of touring the
battlefield with visits to Ouvrage de la Falouse, Fort de Vaux, the Ossuary at
Douaumont, and Ouvrage de Froideterre.
February 20, 2014
OUVRAGE DE LA FALOUSE
The morning started with clouds and rain and a drive to a
place I’d never heard of — Ouvrage de la Falouse. Mr. Radet doesn’t speak or
understand English, and I understand a lot of French but speak it very poorly,
so Benjamin was the main conduit of communication both directions. Since
Benjamin was the one with the questions, I just did my best to understand what
was being said and to ask questions when I did not.
Ouvrage de la Falouse remained behind French lines during
the Battle of Verdun. It was used as a shelter for French troops when they
weren’t serving on the front lines and was part of a massive ring of
fortifications built around Verdun after the Franco-Prussian War.
The first thing I saw was the barbed wire, one of the
symbols of World War I. It was used to ensnare soldiers, who could then be shot
down by machine gun fire. At the forts of Verdun, it served that function,
helping to keep attacking forces from climbing onto the fort structures.
Here’s the thing about the forts at Verdun: They’re not what
you expect. Most of them are subterranean. They’re not like the forts of the
American West — wooden pickets surrounding a courtyard. They are heavily
fortified bunker forts designed to withstand shell strikes and to cover one
another with big guns. Counterscarp bunkers (or counterscarp galleries) enabled
soldiers to protect the forts themselves with anti-personnel weapons like
grenades or machine guns. They all had big gun turrets, capable of firing
shells great distances toward the other ouvrages and forts if/when they came
under attack. They are designed to protect soldiers from artillery fire while
enabling them to fire back with big, BIG weapons.
Sadly, the French had lost confidence in their system of
forts before the Battle of Verdun and had left many of them undermanned and had
even removed guns and taken them elsewhere. But we’ll get to that another time.
Suffice it to say that it can be costly to learn the right lesson at the wrong
time. Or the wrong lesson at the wrong time. Or whatever…
Falouse was behind battle lines. It was not attacked. French
and U.S. soldiers stayed at the fort, which has been beautifully reconstructed.
Seeing it enabled me to understand and better interpret what I was seeing at
the other forts later in the day.
What’s the difference between an ouvrage and a fort? The
ouvrages are smaller than the forts, like mini-fort outposts designed to link
the bigger forts together. Or that’s my impression of them at any rate.
Mr. Radet and his friends have included mannequins in
detailed uniform to help show how people used the fort. We saw reconstructed
barracks where soldiers slept four to a bunk , their kits and weapons kept at
the ready next to the beds above their heads on a system of shelves and gun
racks. We saw the collapsible benches that lined the main hallways, giving
soldiers a place to sit as they arrived or prepared to leave in large groups.
We saw the duct work that ventilated this large, underground structure and the
system of pipes and tanks that held water for washing and cooking. We saw the
kitchens, where meals and bread were prepared for 80 men a day. We saw the long
lines of phone and telegraph wires strung along the upper right side of the
hallways.
There were also latrines. The ones for the enlisted men gave
them a place to cop a squat over a hole behind a door. The officers got to sit.
No tubs. No showers.
Thinking of human waste, poor ventilation, and lots of
sweaty bodies made me wrinkle my nose, but the only smell in Falouse was a
vaguely musty scent brought on by the century that has passed — and by the
water that leaks through in places.
The captain of the fort had an office near the phone room
and the telegraph room. When you know the history of these places the way Mr.
Radet and Benjamin do, that means something. Benjamin learned that the heroic
commander of Fort Vaux, Major Raynal, had stayed there for a night, and I
thought he might swoon.
Now, it’s important to understand that the conversation
during our time with Mr. Radet took place in French. Benjamin translated for me
when I needed him to, but I also tried to join in the conversation, straining
for French words from my high school French classes. This invariably made
Benjamin grin or laugh or shake his head, as I asked things like, “How many
soldiers was they feedings here on the every day?”
The highlight of this fort for Benjamin was seeing the
intact machine gun turret that he was able to turn. These guns were made to
turn and fire where needed, and they were aided by multiple steel observation
domes where spotters could sight the enemy and, via telephone, direct fire.
The 75mm gun turret was not movable, but its inner workings
were still in place and amazing to see.
Mr. Radet showed us an outdoor latrine, one of the few that
still exist from this era. It had something special — graffiti etched by an
American soldier from Newark, N.J., who saw fit to scratch his name and town
into the metal while doing his business.
FORT DE VAUX
After Falouse, we went to Fort Vaux, which is bigger but
almost identical in its construction. Unlike Falouse, Fort Vaux was the site of
a fierce battle between French and German forces, and that was evident in the
damage around the fort and some damage to the fort. Outside, it looked like a
moonscape of craters, the mud now covered with moss and grass.
Fort Vaux had been stripped of some of its guns, so the
Germans entered the fort through its counterscarp galleries. But the French did
not make it easy for them. After a week of fighting, the Germans had only made
it a few meters down the hallway.
Standing near the entrance where the fighting occurred, it
wasn’t hard to imagine the rattle of gunfire, men’s shouts, grenade explosions,
and piles of dead and dying men as the two forces fought face to face for every
inch.
On the walls of all the forts were written something like, “It
is better to die and be buried in the rubble than to surrender.”
They continued to fight the Germans, who pumped diesel fumes
in through every ventilation port they could find. After a week, the French had
run out of water, and soldiers began to lick the walls, trying to drink the
condensation on the whitewashed walls.
Raynal, the fort’s commander, had been sending pigeons back
to inform the French command of his dire situation. Eventually, he was down to
one remaining pigeon. He wrote a desperate message, updating his commanders and
pleading for aid.
“This is my last pigeon,” he wrote.
But aid did not come in time.
The men who licked the walls began to die, their tongues
swelling in their mouths due to the chemical makeup of the lime-based
whitewash. And Raynal knew he had no choice but to surrender.
Had his fort had a machine gun turret, had it had all the
guns it was built to carry, it would have been able to fend off this attack.
However, those weapons were not in place, and he had no choice to but to yield.
As the story goes, the Germans were impressed with his and
his soldiers’ valiant defense of Vaux and gave them full military honors.
And that last pigeon?
Sadly, it was gassed. But it flew its little heart out,
arriving back at The Citadel in Verdun before it collapsed and died, its
message intact. It was named Valiant and given a medal.
Hearing of young men so desperate for water that they licked
the filthy walls of the fort and then died as they suffocated from their
tongues swelling breaks my heart. But thinking that little bird suffering due
to human depravity — gas is one of the most barbaric weapons ever devised —
flying its little heart out just to get home, not knowing it was caught in a war, not knowing
anything but that it was in pain and wanted to be home, always makes me cry.
They stuffed Valiant and put him in a museum.
THE OSSUARY
At the end of the Battle of Verdun, the French were faced
with a landscape of death. The “red zone,” the battle fields, were a charnel
pit of unidentified corpses, human bones, unexploded ordnance, destroyed
villages, and shell craters. Nine villages had been utterly destroyed, their
cemeteries blown sky high, mingling those long dead with those dead for a few
months, weeks, days.
The land was unfit to farm, and so the French let the forest
reclaim it. As you drive along the roads that cut through the battlefields, you
can see millions of shell craters in the shade of tall trees. Rainwater
collects in craters, as do fallen leaves. Moss grows on the trunks and on the
ground. Everything is green, peaceful, quiet.
Standing guard over this landscape, is the Ossuary at
Douaumont. It was built to resemble a sword thrust to its hilt in the earth.
The sword’s handle is the tower, and its hilt is a long silent chamber with a
chapel and dozens of alcoves, each representing a region or battle in the
overall Battle of Verdun.
The walls are covered with names, 4,000 names of soldiers
whose families paid to remember them, helping to fund the building of the
Ossuary. Each alcove has engraved in it the name of a battle/region — Vaux,
Douaumonet, Fleury, Côte 304, Morte-Homme and so one. Beneath those names rest
marble blocks carved to resemble coffins. It’s a touching display, but not
because of what you see. Rather it’s what you know that puts a lump in your
throat.
Laid to rest beneath those marble blocks are the jumbled
bones of 130,000 thousand unidentified French and German soldiers. Their bones
lay strewn upon the land and were gathered and placed in heaps according to the
region in which they were found.
In front of the Ossuary, are 16,000 tomb stones of
Christian, Muslim and Jewish French soldiers who died in at Verdun whose
identities are known.
These 146,000 men are a drop in the bucket of the total
killed at Verdun. They represent less than 20 percent of those who perished in
this terrible battle, a battle that raged over a very small region of earth.
Verdun, in turn, represents a fraction of overall French losses in World War I.
Let that sink in for a moment.
There are other cemeteries that hold Verdun’s war dead, some
German, some French, but none so large as the Ossuary and the national cemetery
that stands before it. So where are the rest of the dead? Where are the rest of
Verdun’s slain?
The French government estimates that at least 10,000 bodies
lie beneath the mud at La Côte du Mort-Homme, a place we planned to visit. When
shells fell, they sent up huge sprays of mud and dirt, giving thousands upon
thousands of dead unceremonious battlefield burials. They also liquefied and
pulverized bodies.
Walking on battlefields at Verdun means walking on the dead.
Periodically, a bone appears, freed from the mud by rain.
It’s placed in the Ossuary with the others.
Men fought this war to end all wars. They lived in hope in
the unendurable conditions of the trenches that no one would have to suffer
what they were suffering. And when their bones were placed in the Ossuary, one
word was inscribed above the structure’s wide front door: PAX.
Peace.
World War II came quickly enough to prove that the war to
end all wars had become the seed of continued conflict.
That alone is heart-breaking to me.
You can ponder the fact that French and German dead lie
together. You can look through the exterior windows into the crypts that hold
the bones and see what 130,000 dead men’s bones look like when their skeletons
fall apart. You can imagine the heartbreak of families who never knew how or
where their sons, fathers, husbands, brothers, and uncles died. You can try to
grasp the pain of dying by shrapnel or mustard gas or enfilading machine-gun fire.
You can try to imagine the soldiers’ daily fear.
But mostly I found myself grieving for the waste of human
lives.
Once Germany invaded, France was right to defend herself.
But in the days before the war, so many different decisions could have been made
that might have spared these men and given us all a very different 20th
century.
We lit candles at the Ossuary for the dead of Vaux, Fleury
and other sites. It was so cold inside, I could see my breath. But somehow the
cold seemed appropriate for a monument that offers a resting place to the bones
of the unknown.
The inside of the Ossuary is inscribed with words that
praise heroes, but the windows that look inside the crypts from outside the
Ossuary tell us that in war time, human life is cheap.
To me, the words “Support our troops” mean sending soldiers
to war only when it is truly necessary, which is not necessarily when our
politicians tell us it is necessary. Once World War I had begun, it was
necessary to win it. But before it began…
We have so much to learn about making peace.
OUVRAGE DE FROIDETERRE
After the sobering experience of Froideterre, we drove the
short distance to Fort Douaumont, the biggest fort on our tour. Capable of
providing shelter to 800 men, it had a turret with a 400mm gun — a huge weapon.
We were turned away by a grumpy, sour-faced woman who told us that 45 minutes
wasn’t enough for us to complete the tour and discouraged us from entering.
Mr. Radet took us to a nearby site I’d never heard of, one
that is not open, much less open to the public — Ouvrage Froideterre.
Ouvrage Froideterre was similar to Ouvrage de la Falouse in
its layout, purpose, and construction. But it differed from the other site in three
important respects: It was attacked by the Germans and was the site of a French
victory and it has not been restored. (There are other differences, as well,
but I won’t go into detail.)
We arrived in the rain and took a tour of the top section of
the ouvrage, where Mr. Radet told the story of the German attack. They’d shelled
the fort, creating a hole in the roof. When they began to swarm it, the machine
gun turret that might have repelled them was useless, as a chunk of concrete
had gotten wedged into the turret, preventing it from turning toward the
attackers.
German soldiers tried to force their way into through the
breach in the roof using flame throwers, grenades, and weapons fire. The
commander did not have contact with the machine gun nest on the other side of
the courtyard, nor could he contact the big 75 mm gun, so he asked for a
volunteer.
The volunteer was ordered to run the length of the courtyard
— that would be like running out your front door when there’s an army with
flame throwers and rifles on your roof — and run to the machine gun nest
and order them to blow the German’s to bits. Somehow, this brave soul managed
to carry out this command.
The machine gunners, alerted to the situation, turned their
weapons on the fort’s roof and began firing. Behind them, the soldiers manning
the 75mm gun saw what was happening and began firing shrapnel-loaded shells
designed to cut down the attackers without destroying the already damaged fort.
It worked, and the Germans were repulsed, their drive toward
Verdun cut short at Froideterre. A French force soon arrived and drove them
farther back behind their lines, halting their progress altogether. And the day
was saved.
Interestingly, when the Nazis occupied France, they burned
that 75mm gun but not the rest of the fort. I wonder if someone remembered what
had happened there.
After telling us this story, Mr. Radet pulled out a
flashlight and invited us to explore the unlighted interior of Froideterre with
him. In my head I was thinking, “He has got to be kidding! No. WAY!” But he
wasn’t kidding.
I took hold of Benjamin’s arm and stepped into the dank,
musty interior. It was pitch black. PITCH black. Mr. Radet was clearly familiar
with the layout and confidently moved ahead of us, the light of his little
flashlight of no use to our eyes. He showed us the place inside the fort where
the roof had collapsed and the French had been forced to face flamethrowers to
keep the Germans out. The whitewashed wall is gone there, and raw concrete is
exposed and blackened.
I thought, “OK, we must be done.” But no. He really wanted
to lead us through the place. We walked further, and seeing a little door that
opened to the outside, I saw my chance.
“I’m staying here,” I said. I crawled into that little
alcove and stayed put, while the light from the flashlight and Mr. Radet’s
voice and Benjamin’s faded away. I snapped a few photos of that front hallway,
shooting in the pitch black with a flash, and was very grateful when the men
returned and we were able to exit and go to the car.
Dark underground places? SO not my thing.
By then I was chilled to the bone and emotionally drained
and was eager to get back to the hotel for some dinner. Mr. Radet took us to
his house, showed some artifacts and books, including one he wrote, to
Benjamin, and the two spoke at length.
In an hour, we were delivered to the doorstep of our hotel.
In the span of about eight hours we had covered the ground where some hundreds
of thousands of men had died.
We went to bed early because the next day would be even
tougher. We hadn’t come to Verdun on these days by coincidence. Feb. 21, 2014,
marked the 98th anniversary of the beginning of the battle, and we
had a pilgrimage to make.
We were going to the place the battle began — Bois des
Caures.
Thursday, February 20, 2014
A book signing in Paris
Paris.
The name of the city conjures up more than a thousand years of history and culture. Arguably the cultural heart of the wold — “the cultural heart of the universe,” as one Parisian said — it is kind of a mythical place to artists of all kinds. To have a book signing in Paris...
On Feb. 15, I had the amazing good fortune to sign books at Café Bibliothéque at the François Mitterrand Library in Paris. The signing was put together by a small group of wonderful people, especially Karen Harroch of Au Boudoir Ecarlate, who worked in conjunction with the wonderful staff of my French publisher, J’ai Lu, and Fabiola Chenet and Les Romantique.
The experience was amazing. In my imagination, I somehow managed to brush up on French in time to answer all questions en français. Alas, although my linguistic skills were a disappointment, the event itself was not. The room was filled with wonderful people who asked interesting and fun questions. Bridget Costedoat, my new BFF from Great Britain, translated the questions I couldn’t understand or hear and then translated my answers.
So many of the French readers I’ve met on Facebook were there. It was a special privilege to meet them in person, to hear their voices, shake their hands, exchange bisous, to see their smiles. There were a handful of I-Team members present, as well, and we posed together for our own special photo.
It might surprise most American readers to know that the French love my historicals especially. The I-Team series is only now being released there, so many French readers haven’t read any of the stories.
I ended up signing books and bookmarks as fast as I could for more two hours until it was time to leave and was able to have photos taken with many of my reader friends.
It was extra special to have Benjamin there. He ended up having what looked like a lively and fun conversation with the wonderful women from J’ai Lu.
I wore my grandmother’s wedding ring to the signing. A talented student, she’d won some kind of scholarship to study in France but never got the chance. Her parents fell ill with diphtheria, and then she married and had six kids. She never got to see France, let alone Paris. Wearing her ring felt like having her with me, too.
Merci beaucoup, Karen! Merci, J’ai Lu! Merci, Fabiola!
And thank you, Paris, for giving me such a warm welcome and a wonderful memory.
Thursday, February 13, 2014
A day with J'ai Lu
The trip of a lifetime has begun!
I’m sitting here in a dorm room with my window open to let in a beautiful, cool breeze on a day when half of the US is buried in snow. And I’m not missing home one tiny bit!
I arrived in France on Tuesday at noon. Bridget and Rhiana met me at the airport and drove me through Paris to Corbeil Essonnes, where I’m staying with my younger son, Benjamin. I was exhausted, but not as bad off as I had imagined.
Wednesday we hit the ground running. Benjamin didn’t have to teach, so we accepted an invitation to meet with the staff at J’ai Lu, my French publisher, part of the Flammarion publishing group here in France. It’s a connection I’ve wanted to make for a very long time.
I love languages, and I’m not a huge fan of borders. I love the connection with other cultures that happens when you simply reach out. That’s one reason I have tried to connect as much as I can with readers from around the world. Having direct contact with the publishers who put out my book in translation is a pieces of that. Needless to say, I was thrilled to have the chance to meet the women and men who work hard to get my books out to French readers.
What a wonderful experience it was—far beyond anything I had imagined!
J'ai Lu sent a cab, which drove us to Gare du Lyon in Paris, where we joined the staff members who work on my books for lunch. They all introduced themselves and met Benjamin, and we sat down for a two-hour long meal and conversation that I won’t forget. The food was exquisite, the millefeuille with caramel that I had for dessert blowing my mind.
The restaurant itself was impressive, the decor dating to the Belle Epoch and as ornate and lovely as it could be, with the big train station a minute's walk from our table.
After lunch, we piled into taxis and went to the offices of J’ai Lu, where I got the grand tour and met other staff. It’s an impressive and ambitious operation, and I felt at home there, in part because of my years as a newspaper editor. The people were all very friendly and spoke English for my benefit. Although I can understand spoken French, it’s very hard for me to respond quickly enough to have a real conversation. Benjamin spoke a lot of French with them.
I spoke with the translator who has translated my I-Team stories. Right now, J’ai Lu is hard at work getting Unlawful Contact ready for publication this spring. Its French title translates back to something like “Dangerous Relationship.” They didn't have a cover ready for me to see.
Their marketing people spoke with me for awhile, and I think we’re going to coordinate more than we have on social media and such.
They also explained that my historical romances are so popular there because historical fiction is one of J’ai Lu’s specialties.
I am so grateful to everyone at J’ai Lu for the unforgettable afternoon. Even if I can’t remember everyone’s names — that was a lot of people to meet all at once — I do remember their faces and their smiles and kind words.
When we had a moment alone, Benjamin told me that the experience had blown his mind. “My mom is a celebrity in France,” he said, with a hint of “whoa!” in his voice.
I’m not sure I’d go that far. But I know for a fact that my books, each one of which is precious to me, are in excellent hands here in France.
And, wow, that just gave a whole new meaning to business lunch!
This Saturday is the big book signing and reader event in Paris, and I am so excited to meet my French readers face to face at last!
Monday, January 27, 2014
Annual I-Team “Favorites” Poll Results
Every year in the I-Team Facebook group, we have our "Favorite" polls. Here are the results of this year's polls.
Favorite Hero — JULIAN DARCANGELO
We’ve had major upset. For the first time since we started doing these polls, Marc Hunter (Unlawful Contact) did not win. He was beaten by a margin of three votes by Julian Darcangelo (Hard Evidence). Zach McBride (Breaking Point) got a fair number of votes to come in third, with Gabe Rossiter (Naked Edge) coming in fourth. The rest lagged significantly, with Javier Corbray (Striking Distance), garnering only 10 votes and coming in behind Reece Sheridan (Extreme Exposure) and Nate (Skin Deep).
Finally, Julian gets his due!
Favorite I-Team Heroine — NATALIE BENOIT
Favorite I-Team Heroine — NATALIE BENOIT
It’s Natalie Benoit (Breaking Point) by a landslide, followed by Sophie Alton (Unlawful Contact), Tessa Novak (Hard Evidence), Laura Nilsson (Striking Distance), Megan Hunter (Skin Deep), Kat James (Naked Edge) and, in last place, Kara McMillan (Extreme Exposure).
Favorite I-Team Couple — MARC & SOPHIE
Favorite I-Team Couple — MARC & SOPHIE
Marc and Sophie (Unlawful Contact) are the big winners, followed by Julian and Tessa (Hard Evidence) in second place, and Zach and Natalie (Breaking Point) in third. Kat and Gabe (Naked Edge) came in fourth, with Reece and Kara (Extreme Exposure) in fifth and Laura and Javier (Striking Distance) in sixth, Megan and Nate came in seventh (Skin Deep), and Lissy and Will (Heaven Can't Wait) eighth.
However, there was some general agreement that the official favorite couple of the I-Team series is a character known as “Marcangelo.”
Favorite Sex Scene — ZACH AND NATALIE IN THE DESERT AT THE WATERFALL
Favorite Sex Scene — ZACH AND NATALIE IN THE DESERT AT THE WATERFALL
The winner pants down is Zach and Natalie’s love scene under the waterfall (Breaking Point), followed closely by Marc and Sophie’s first sex scene after he’s out of prison (Unlawful Contact). In third place, is Nate and Megan’s first love scene when she kisses his burns (Skin Deep). Other notable mentions were Reece and Kara’s threesome with Mr. Jiggle Stick; Julian and his “sucky-swirly” trick and little strip tease; and Kat and Gabe making “snow angels.”
Favorite I-Team story — UNLAWFUL CONTACT
Favorite I-Team story — UNLAWFUL CONTACT
Unlawful Contact wins this year, with Hard Evidence in second place and Breaking Point in third. After that it’s Naked Edge, Extreme Exposure, Striking Distance, and Skin Deep. Novella Heaven Can’t Wait came in last.
Favorite Wrenching I-Team moment — GABE’S DEATH SCENE
Favorite Wrenching I-Team moment — GABE’S DEATH SCENE
Gabe’s death scene in Naked Edge won by a landslide, followed by the climax in Breaking Point where Zach flatlines. Marc’s death scene in Unlawful Contact tied for third with Laura’s final decision regarding Klara in Striking Distance. The ending of First Strike when Javier gets the news about Laura is fourth.
Funniest I-Team Moment — CONNOR AND THE JIGGLE STICK
Funniest I-Team Moment — CONNOR AND THE JIGGLE STICK
The winner is Connor showing Reece Kara’s “jiggle stick” in Extreme Exposure, followed by a tie between Javier’s quip about Marc and Julian being married in Striking Distance and Marc’s used of “Dickangelo” and “Dorkangelo” for Julian. Fourth Place goes to Kara talking with Reece while drunk in the bar in Extreme Exposure and fifth to Javier walking in naked while Laura was on Skype with her mother and grandmother in Striking Distance.
Categories we might add next year: Sweetest Non-Sex Scene and Best Cover.
So what do you think? How would you have voted?
Saturday, January 18, 2014
All too soon a farewell
On Sat., January 11, my former mother-in-law, Rachel, died after being in a car accident. Doctors told us she was going to be fine. But she took a sudden turn for the worse, and within hours she was gone. The shock was overwhelming to everyone in the family.
Today, Sat., January 18, we said farewell to her. It was heartbreaking, especially to see the grief of her daughter, my former sister-in-law, with whom she was particularly close, and the grief of her grandchildren.
Not long ago, I saw a video where a father turned 60 photographs of his newborn son into a minute-long look at the baby’s first year of life. If one were to do this with Rachel’s life, the video would be 73 minutes long — shorter than the average Hollywood flick.
We always say that life is short, but it really is. At today’s service, I saw a former brother-in-law I haven’t seen for a decade. He lives in another state, and we have not stayed in touch. His kids are now teens and young adults. In the blink of an eye, they’ll be parents, and we will be the elderly generation — if we’re lucky.
I don’t think I’ve ever been aware how quickly a life can pass by. I remember meeting Rachel for the first time, remember laughing with her, remember looking for wedding gowns with her, remember her holding my first born for the first time. It seems like yesterday.
Rachel loved my books. She read them — and then said things about them that completely embarrassed my kids. No one wants to hear their grandmother talk about sex scenes from a book, especially their mother’s book. But Rachel was always open and honest, holding nothing back, even when other people might. She encouraged me in my career and my writing and told me more than once how proud she was of me and what I had done. It meant a lot to me.
I didn’t get to say farewell. All I could do was look at her body in a coffin and say goodbye that way. It sucked. I placed a scroll inside the coffin that contains the dedication to my next novel — it will be dedicated to her — and a print-out of a poem that she and Benjy had shared and enjoyed together.
One of my sons, in tears, asked me what the point of it all is. If we all die, then what’s the point of living in the first place, especially when no one can prove that anything exists beyond this life. (Such things are a matter of faith, not proven fact, he points out. He wants proof, facts, hard science.)
I think it’s fundamentally human to struggle with that question, and I’m not sure I was able to comfort him. I told him that NOW — this precious moment — is all that we have. Rather than building castles to our egos and slaving to gain wealth or fame or anything else, we ought to do our best to make a difference in the lives of others.
In other words, perhaps we should quit looking for the meaning of life and start living it, giving in service to others so that our existence has value to our fellow human beings.
If nothing we do is permanent, if we are guaranteed nothing beyond the breath we have just taken, then our most profound purpose ought to be to ease the suffering and the burden of all the other people who share this life and this moment with us. As Dickens said, we are all “fellow passengers to the grave.”
If we make a difference in another person’s experience of life, then we have lived our purpose in that moment.
My father once told me something that I found oddly comforting. In this culture of individualism, we all carry with us this great burden of trying to DO something, trying to BE something. When I was struggling with a particularly difficult period of my life he said, “Your life doesn’t belong to you anyway, so quit worrying about it.”
In our culture, a statement like that runs counter to everything we believe about what our lives should be. We focus on what we want, our hopes, our dreams. The idea that a life of service might be the most fulfilling option escapes most of us. If my life is just a borrowed gift, then suddenly there’s a lot less pressure to become what I am not, and a much greater call to serve, to live, to enjoy.
As Gandalf said, “All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.”
Life is so precious, so brief.
Forgive. Love. Laugh. Drop the petty stuff — who said what to whom and what you thought they meant by it. Who cares?
Live like you mean it, not later, but now.
Because Benjamin was unable to be with us at the funeral today — he is still teaching in Europe — he wrote a poem that was read at the service. It expresses so beautifully the unconditional love of a grandmother — and the child’s tendency to take those who love them for granted.
Fortunately, Benjamin did not take Rachel for granted, going out of his way to spend time with this grandmother. Rachel knew he loved her, and he knew she loved him. The photo above was taken during their last hour together at his farewell party before he left for Europe.
Who knew it was the last time they would see each other?
Here is his tribute to her.
It takes a lot of things
And a very long time
To make a grandma.
Start when you are very little.
Lots of love is the first ingredient.
You don’t know why she loves you,
But you accept it
Reaching up to her with stained hands.
Add the wonder of a trip
to Grandma’s house,
Like visiting a foreign country.
A grandma is a special thing, but
You do not understand.
Now wait a few years.
You’re too old for kisses.
You’re a big kid,
And why does she ask so many questions?
About me, my life, what I’m doing.
You don’t know it yet,
But this is the next ingredient,
Even if it bothers you now.
This desire to know everything about you,
To be part of your life.
You push back because
You still don’t understand.
But she persists for years.
Then, in an unexpected conversation,
You stumble on ingredients
You missed all those years.
Passions and interests
You never thought she had,
As if grandmas weren’t people.
You love photography too?
You like that movie also?
Add conversations that last for hours.
You don’t mind the questions anymore
Because you see other ingredients now
The birthday cards, the phone calls,
The inexplicable interest in your life.
You begin to understand.
But not quite.
Now take away all those ingredients,
Every gesture, every question,
Even the ones that used to annoy you.
A silhouette, the lack of an image,
Is easier to see than the form itself.
It’s like that with grandmas.
All the ingredients,
Even ones you never recognized,
Stand out so clearly
Once they’re gone.
And it is only then that you see,
At long last,
What makes a grandma.
And you finally understand.
Rest in peace, Rachel. You are loved, and we miss you so much already.
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