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A friend put it online for me. QUALIFICATION: I am not a great singer to begin with, but I am very shy so if I think people can hear me I get scared, and when I get scared my voice gets timid and shaky and FLAT. I did the best I could to sing past my fear, but you shall see the results.

ALSO, I didn’t mean to sound so sad! The point was, yes, life can be hard but you never know what’s going to happen next, like winning American Idol. The winning song is sung by the winner of American Idol, so the person singing this song is exemplifying what happens when you hang in there.

Anyway, here it is.

I am officially entered in the American Idol Songwriters contest. When you submit your song they ask for a bio about you AND about your song, and they only give you 100 words! This is what I said:

Everything about me and my song comes down to this part of the lyrics:

I’ve never written a song before, but I am a writer. Thank you for the opportunity. I had fun trying to write a song.

Okay, some of the time I fun. That part of the lyrics, by the way, came straight out of something that happened in my life, which I will explain later. Until I can figure out how to make the music audible in some way, here are the lyrics.

Falling With My Arms Wide Open

I’m falling with my arms wide open.
And I don’t know what happens next.
But it took everything I had just to get myself here,
and I’m ready for whatever comes next,
yes, I am ready for whatever comes next.

I push away from the table, yes the meal was fine.
The guests were funny and the wine divine.
Now it’s time to go home, and time to sleep
And dream this dream that I mean to keep.

And I’m falling with my arms wide open.
I don’t know what happens next.
But it took everything I had just to get myself here,
and I’m ready for whatever comes next,
yes, I am ready for whatever comes next.

Nobody ever tells you when dreams come true,
that some of those dreams will be bad.
When life knocks you down again and again
And it seems like you’ll always be sad …

Start falling with your arms wide open.
Because you don’t know what happens next.
You see it took everything I had, to make this dream come true,
and I’m ready for whatever comes next,
yes, I am ready for whatever comes next.
oh yes, I’m ready for whatever comes next.

Another in my series of, “Don’t You Wish Your Cats Were Cute Like He?” I mean, come on. Look at the guy.

My book is this close to being accepted. Just working on the teeniest, tiniest changes and fine tuning. It’s basically done and I will have a book coming out next year. Mind-blowing. Soon it will be on to the fun parts: the cover, seeing how they lay out the pages, getting the galleys, (a bound paperback version that is sent out to reviewers) trying to figure out how to promote it and get people to buy it (sometimes not so fun).

That reminds me of a totally not fun part. Publishers like to get quotes about your book from the most famous, influential people they can for the back cover. They’re called blurbs. So, every book you have to go through this process of begging people for blurbs, people you know, don’t know, begging your friends to ask their famous friends, it’s really horrible. Plus, I honestly think most people figure these blurbs are from friends (and they are, or people who are doing it because they owe someone else a favor, etc.). Which isn’t to say that the good things they said aren’t true. Anyway, I think that back cover is valuable sales real estate and could be used in much more creative ways. Every time I write a book I propose other ways to use the back cover and every book I’m shot down and told to get blurbs.

I just thought of something I might do for this book, for instance, and this is just off the top of my head so it might not be a good idea. But I could find some of the nastiest most over-the-top things ever said about the Duke parapsychology work through the years, maybe a good one from each decade, one from the 1930’s, 1940’s, 1950’s, etc., each leading up to now and something that says, “Well, all of the guys were WRONG. Read inside …”

I saw this picture online somewhere. It’s the corner of Christopher Street and 7th Avenue and it was taken in the sixties, I believe it said. This is only a few blocks from where I live so I took of picture of how this corner looks now.

It’s kind of astounding how little it’s changed. The lovely cobblestones are gone, there are a few new buildings, that’s about it. But some details are gone, some signs and things that are hard to see in the picture above. I’m going to try to dig up a picture I took of this very corner about ten years ago.

Whenever I pull out the ladder, which is often, for some reason light bulbs burn out constantly in my apartment, Finney immediately climbs to the top of the ladder. Good boy! Who’s a great little ladder climber? You are!

Big news! The pope has added some more sins! More ways to go astray. I like some of them, actually. They are:

1. “Bioethical” violations such as birth control.
2. “Morally dubious” experiments such as stem cell research.
3. Drug abuse.
4. Polluting the environment.
5. Contributing to widening divide between rich and poor.
6. Excessive wealth.
7. Creating poverty.

I like 4 through 7, and have committed 1 and 3. Maybe 4. And compared to some people in the world, maybe 5 and 6 (but for the record, I do not make a lot of money, I’m just saying). How am I doing with the 10 commandments? Not so good. I haven’t murdered anyone or born false witness against my neighbor or committed adultery. And I haven’t coveted my neighbor’s wife, but I have coveted her husband on occasion.

I am the Lord your God.
You shall have no other gods before me.
You shall not make for yourself an idol.
You shall not make wrongful use of the name of your God.
Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.
Honor your Father and Mother.
You shall not murder.
You shall not commit adultery.
You shall not steal.
You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
You shall not covet your neighbor’s house.
You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife.