Middle Age Plus

Did you see my head grow?

This has been a heady week for me. After months and months of waiting, my latest book finally got printed and sent to me. The delay was not because of the book, but due to a shift in the responsibilities in the publishing company. I had promised the book to some Elderhostel participants to be ready by November. It was almost the next November before I could package up the book and send it on its way.

My sister knew the books were due to arrive while I was away attending a School of Christian Mission at Central Methodist University in Fayette. She knew that several of my friends would be there who would like to see the book and she didn't want me to have to wait three days longer to see it myself.

So while my daughter Shirley and I were eating in the University cafeteria we looked up and there was Ellen with a big grin on her face. My first reaction before I saw the grain was that something terrible had happened and it was so bad she had to come tell me in person. But immediately I knew that was wrong because she looked so happy. She called over to us that she had my books! She had driven up from Lebanon to get them to me.

I was too excited to finish eating my lunch so I gave part of it to her and we scurried to her car where we all oohed and aahed as we looked at the book for the first time. (Of course I had known the contents, but seeing it printed was a big rush.) Shirley was excited because she had written one of the last chapters and said it was the first time she had seen her name in print as an author.

I guess I should tell you the name of the book. It is "Whither Thou Goest? You‚ve Got to be Kidding!" and is about my adjustments to becoming a minister's wife after fifteen years of marriage to Lester. He wrote the Foreword and each of our four P.K.s (Preacher's Kids) wrote a chapter at the end telling of their thoughts.

Some have told me this is my best book yet, but if it is, it is due to the additions of these family members.

Friends at the school began to ask for copies, and I had impromptu signing sessions on the campus, in the dorms and (shh, even in the Chapel!) It made me feel so big headed that I charted our route home to go through two towns where Lester had served the church so that I could drop off copies to friends along the way. When I got home and found the other two boxes that had been delivered to our home, I started mailing out the pre-ordered copies and the books I wanted to send my friends and relatives as gifts. It ended up that I gave away exactly the same number that I sold.

Now the excitement is wearing down a little but the thank you notes are coming in on my email and through the post office, and I get all keyed up again.

Over and over I keep hearing that they learned some things they didn't know before. I am wondering what it is that they have learned. I thought my life had been pretty much an open book, but even our own kids said they learned some things about me. I haven't had the nerve to ask them what it was, but maybe someday they will tell me.

Now begins the part of marketing my creation and that is both exciting and demanding. Nothing is worse than sitting at a book signing for two hours and not selling a book. But when the books do sell my head expands two sizes.