Ah, Mr. Peck, your memory is a blessing.
There are few people in the children’s lit industry whom I respected more. He was so active on behalf of his readers, and on behalf of we feckless new writers who were trying to break into the industry. I will always be grateful that I took one of his mini-writing courses at SCBWI years ago, and kept all the worksheets he handed out (He was ever an English teacher. He had a suggested reading list). I will always be grateful for the smiles he kept giving me, the encouraging twinkle in his eye, and even though I was my usual ridiculous self and mostly sputtered instead of speaking like A Reasonable Adult, he squeezed my shoulder and complimented my work. I hoarded his kind words like emeralds.
A true gentleman and a scholar. We will not see his like again.
Now, if children’s lit would stop having things happen whilst I was vacationing, I’d appreciate that… I am having a Twitter recess and mostly read the news by titles in my blogroll that I dismiss. Nothing stops the news cycle, but it is an untold relief to be able to legitimately ignore it, though. Sorry, cannot engage, am on my holiday… (Why can’t I manage that when I’m at home?)
We’d PLANNED to go on somewhere in August, but here we are in the Netherlands for three weeks and some change right now. We found an apartment (up 39 spiral, attic-style stairs, thankyouverymuch; that was a joy with two hard-sided suitcases) and we’ve settled in the little city/big town of Delft as a base for our wanderings. Since it’s not tulip season, it was cheap to be here now; high season starts a bit later in the year.
Today’s plan is to run away from home and move here.
It is surprisingly balmy weather – warmer than at home in California – and we are enjoying ourselves in this land of bakeries and water and bicycles. It is an idyll I didn’t know I needed. Wish you were here, friends.