Jenyfer Matthews

I had a rather eventful morning.

Most days start out the same: I get up, pack school lunches, take the kids to the bus stop and then by 8am I’m on my own until the kids come home from school. I normally come home, have a little breakfast, sit down and check email and then try to write something.

Not today.

Today, while waiting at the bus stop with my kids (which was late arriving), I witnessed a minor car accident involving a neighbor in my building and a local. My neighbor was attempting to make a left turn on to our street. The local was also trying to make left turn – local style: he pulled into the oncoming lane of traffic and started his turn from there, into what would have been the middle/right side of the street onto which he was turning.

Fortunately, the damage to either car was minimal but there was lots of confusion since none of us was bilingual. I put my kids on their bus, which arrived moments after, and went down to our building to find someone to interpret. After about fifteen minutes it was agreed just to let the matter go and each driver would take care of his own car. Since my neighbor only had a scrape and the other driver wasn’t even the owner of the car he crunched, I think my neighbor got the better end of the deal.

On the way back to my own place, I ran into a South African woman who was out walking her dog. She inquired about the accident and then announced that she was pretty sure that a bus driver who was parked on our road had just propositioned her. It seemed an unlikely thing to happen during the school rush at 8am, but what do I know? I don’t speak Arabic either. And it certainly worked as a conversation starter.

We got to talking and she invited me up to her (magnificent) apartment for a cup of tea. She gave me the grand tour and it turned out that we have quite a bit in common. We practically talked over each other for a little over an hour and I left with a standing invitation to come over anytime and the offer of a ride to a bigger grocery store I don’t often visit since I don’t have a car.

And just think, if the kids’ bus hadn’t been late I would have gone home sooner and maybe missed the chance to make a new friend.

Does it sound odd, the speed with which we bonded? I’m a friendly, chatty sort of person and have never had trouble making friends. I admit her openness – normally only found in Americans on airplanes – took me aback just a bit. But I think that when you’re living in a community of people who come and go so quickly, that you learn the art of making friends quickly. Who has time to be coy when either of you may be gone in a year?

My only reservations about this friendship at present revolve around the fact that having such a pleasant distraction so close by may cut into my productive time that much more…

I may have started out traveling light but I didn’t come home that way. All the summer sales were just too tempting and my children were showered with gifts everywhere they went. The children and I were entitled to two bags of 50 lbs each for a grand total of six bags and 300 lbs – not including carry-ons. I checked five bags that weighed a total of 180 lbs. I was quite proud of my packing since the largest of my bags was 50 lbs on the dot and any overage would have cost me US$50 excess baggage fee for every bag over the limit – or caused me a mad scramble of rearranging contents in the airport.

(I have since learned that my husband’s employer would have reimbursed us for excess baggage charges – within reason – but I’d have had to have more than two hands or at least another adult traveling with me to handle any more!!!)

I did have to empty the contents of one of my carry-on bags at the security desk however. It’s funny what will spark their interest. The security inspector requested that I not reach for the bag once he started to remove items. I asked him what he was looking for and he said “cups”. I was momentarily stumped – and distracted as I tried to put my shoes back on and the shoes of the children while simultaneously tucking my laptop and video camera back in their respective places. Cups? I had empty water bottles in their bags. Nope, he was looking for cups.

Suddenly the penny dropped – he was looking for a couple of ceramic mugs I had tucked at the very bottom of my daughter’s carry-on bag. Apparently it wasn’t the mugs themselves that attracted interest but the items I had packed inside the mugs – two stone topped cork wine stoppers. I suppose they looked pointy in the x-ray and he thought they were possibly knives. I guess it was a good call to pack the deer antlers sheds my father found in the woods and gave the children in our checked baggage!

All that was after we’d nearly scared him to death. If you really want to get a security inspector’s attention pack a rubbery life like lizard in the top of your carry on. The big man shrieked like a girl when his hand came in contact with it.

I have to admit I didn’t get into Amsterdam on my way back through – in spite of a 10 hour gap. I was just too tired and brain dead after the previous 12 hours getting there. I regret it now, the time would have passed much faster than it did if I had been able to do it. Instead, I found a quiet corner and passed in and out of consciousness laying face down on a table while my children ran up and down and shrieked. I’m sure that people were shooting me dirty looks but that’s the advantage of laying face down – you can’t see them.

I’m currently suffering from some pretty bad jet lag. I feel okay during the day, I fall asleep at a reasonable time in the evening, but then I wake up at 2am and lay awake for 3 or 4 hours. Just how long I can function normally during the day when I’m up most of the night as well is a mystery. The kids start school tomorrow – maybe I can nap while they are away.

Next time: pictures from my trip.

A bus trip.

Since I don’t have much to tell you about how productive I was in my writing while I was on vacation (I wasn’t) I think I’ll tell you about how I spent my summer vacation instead. I felt so cut off from everyone for so long I may babble a bit so bear with me. And I’m going to start with the last part first because it is freshest in my mind.

I left the north woods yesterday to begin my whole journey in reverse. I checked my email before we left the house just to see if there was anything I needed to know about changes to my itinerary. Nope. Nothing. So we started out on our three hour drive to the airport.

It was gray and drizzly – the first time in the twenty days I was in the area that it rained at all – but nothing alarming. It wasn’t until we were halfway there and my uncle managed to get a message to us on the vehicle’s “On Star” satellite phone system that I had any inkling of the trouble ahead of me: my flight had been cancelled. You know how it is to try and call anyone at an airline these days – we decided just to continue on to the airport and see what was what once we got there.

It wasn’t even raining at the airport, just a bit of fog, but all flights had been cancelled. Instead of the 45 minute hop I had been expecting, they put us on a bus for two hours to get us to Minneapolis where we could make our connections. Not exactly what I had paid for or longed to do after having been in a car for three hours already, but progress is progress.

We arrived in Minneapolis with enough time to get checked-in, through the LONG security line (where my new laptop was swabbed and inspected) and get a little take-out for me and the kids before we boarded our next plane. Then we sat in the plane on the tarmac for an hour while President Bush’s plane landed and he cleared the airport. He was there to inspect the recently collapsed bridge. I understand all about the need for security but the hour delay in our takeoff gave me all of 10 minutes to make my connection in Memphis.

If you were in the Memphis airport yesterday evening, I was the blonde running through the B concourse from one end to the other pursued by two small children. Amazingly enough, not only did we make the plane but so did our luggage! Is that lucky or what?

It wasn’t until this morning that I got the emails from the airline and my FIL telling me that my whole itinerary had been cancelled and rescheduled for today. No one mentioned it at the airport. Guess it just goes to show that their schedules are just a bit more fluid than they might let you think.

I arrived exhausted and wired at the same time.

I have a day of downtime before I start on part two of my journey back to Cairo. Another three legs. Can’t wait to see what happens next.

Only 13 more school days to go – 13 more quiet mornings – and my inner voice is stubbornly silent. Figures, huh? I did some research for the next little bit of my story over the weekend so now I’m just letting it…simmer.

In the meantime, I had an interesting email over the weekend from another romance author who also lives in Egypt. She’s the editor for a local expat magazine and would like to run an interview with me in their October issue – perfect timing for the release of my next book ONE CRAZY SUMMER. I’m both thrilled and excited but now comes the hard part.

Answering the questions in a way that actually makes ME sound witty and INTERESTING. I was working on it this morning and it’s not as easy as it might seem. (I know, hard to believe, isn’t it?) There’s a reason I don’t write paranormal/fantasy/sci-fi. My feet are firmly planted on the ground and even wrapped in the cloak of my alter ego, it’s still just me. I haven’t created a whole separate fully-developed super-persona – it’s just me with a different name. And it’s still difficult to find ways to sing my own praises without feeling like a jerk.

But “just” writing a great story isn’t enough – you have to find ways to connect with potential readers. Why should they read your book when there are so many others out there to choose from? How can you make yourself stand out in the proverbial crowd? Maybe they see an interview published in a magazine and think “Wow! What a (witty / intelligent / insightful / dull / moronic) person this is! I should (never ever) read their book!”

It’s a lot of pressure.

If I tell someone that I live in Cairo and write romance novels their first reaction might be “Oh! How interesting!” But really, dig a little deeper and my life is pretty average and normal. I get up in the morning and dash through making breakfast and packing lunches for the kids. I do my own grocery shopping and cooking, laundry, housework – in short all the usual dull details of regular life. Jackie Collins I am not.

Even the Cairo angle might even seem less interesting when presented to a group of people who themselves have also lived abroad for many years – and in many cases in more exotic locales yet.

I’ll have to give it some thought – it’s not every day that such an opportunity falls in my lap. Hmmm… I suppose I could lie…em…I mean accentuate the positives. I am a writer after all….