Category: Celebration

The Fine Art of Letter Writing

Over this past weekend on our fun boondoggle of a vacation tour, The Good Man and I found ourselves up in Sonoma, California. Land of wines, a California Mission, and a fantastic historic plaza. Beautiful, wonderful Sonoma.

Another fabulous feature of Sonoma is that the writer Jack London lived there for many years. He and his second wife built an enormous home out in the tall redwoods, which sadly burned down, never to be rebuilt. They built a smaller cottage, and in fact, Jack London is buried there near the site of his home. This location, the ruins of the big house and London’s grave are all part of the Jack London State Historic Park due for closure in 2012 because of ongoing California budget woes.

Since both The Good Man and I are avid readers, we were thrilled to take a tour of the site.

One of my favorite parts of the museum was the many letters both to and from Jack that are on public display. He was quite the articulate one.

Here’s one that especially resonated with me. It’s a rejection letter from the editors at The Curtis Publishing Company in Philadelphia. I believe this was a query to the Saturday Evening Post.




Here’s what it says:

Dear Sir

We have found the “Sunlanders” a story of exceptional interest. We should wish to give it a place in our columns were it not our policy to exclude the tragic from the magazine.

We thank you cordially for giving us an opportunity to examine this manuscript, and hope that you have in hand some tales of a more cheerful manner.

Very truly yours,

The Editors


So, you know. Ouch. Your story? Rocked. But it’s sad. We don’t *do* sad. Write something happy, why don’t you?

Of course, this is also a very strong example, perhaps, of a writer not doing their homework before querying a magazine. I might be guilty of this.

This is but one of the many rejection letters that London received over the course of his notable writing career. He’d wallpapered his cabin in Oakland with them and there were many more to go. His first book was rejected 600 times.

Now that’s tenacity.

Then there’s this letter, a brief note included in the collection with no explanation:




It says:

Dear Comrade – I can’t read your letter. I’ve wasted twenty minutes, ruined my eyesight and lost my temper, and I can’t make out what you have written.

Try it over again and more legibly.

Sincerely yours,

Jack London

PS I can’t even make out your name

Oooh, rasty, rasty Jack. Love it.

But my favorite, far and beyond the best of them all was a two pager regarding some delinquent payments.

It’s a doozy.




Here’s the text:

Messrs M. Clark and Sons,

Gentlemen:

In reply to yours of December 26, 1913, addressed to Mrs. Shepard, which Mrs. Shepard has kindly forwarded to me. I am glad she forwarded to you the letter I sent her the other day.

Before we get to the business end of it, let me tackle the mental end of it, namely, your inability to understand my remark that if you had collected the $1000 when it was due, I would not be pinched for it now. The funniest thing is, that it is just that $1000 I am pinched for now. Put yourself in my place: Mrs. Shepard had charge of the house building and the bill paying. I earned the money. Mrs. Shepard always let me know roughly what bills and expenses were paid each month. Anything that was left over I spent. Naturally, since the $1000 was not collected at the time it was due, it was left over, and I spent it. You know what a dead horse is—–this $1000 is now a dead horse to me. I cannot unspend the spending of it in other directions. Please know that I am very busy, that I travel around a great deal, and that I do not keep up from moment to moment in the details of work performed for me by others. Not until the house burned down did I learn that a first payment due you had not been requested by you.

Now to the business end of it. Here is the situation in a nutshell: I have had what I call a real hard year. No drunken sailor ever spent money more lavishly than I have been compelled to spend it in the past several months on law and lawyers, in a battle line that encircled the globe. Every copyright I possessed was attacked, and I was being robbed by pirate motion picture companies, not only of motion picture rights in my stories, but of book rights, dramatic rights, translation rights, second-serial rights, reprint rights and all other rights whatsoever. I have just now won that fight. Please believe me when I tell you that I am still nursing my financial wounds. By the opening months of 1914, money will be pouring in on me. But I haven’t any $1000 cash right now that I can rationally afford using to pay a dead horse. On the other hand, if I should be sued, I would see my way to paying the money, plus the legal expenses and costs, and shrug my shoulders and get along all right.

But you have so far been so eminently kind and satisfactory (too eminently kind for that matter), that I feel impelled to make a suggestion builded upon your own suggestion, namely, of a note. If you will take a note from me for the total sum of money at stake, payable in six months, I will have that note lifted before the six months are up.

I can only tell you that we are going ahead as fast as possible for the rebuilding of the house. Men are chopping down trees at the present time, which will go into the new house.

Sincerely yours,

Jack London

This letter made me laugh out loud. Makes me want to take a few lines from his work the next time I have to write a gripe to someone who has ticked me off.

Here’s a good example: Dear Sirius Radio, it’s a dead horse, I’m not going to sign up with your service again. I’ve been spending money as lavishly as any sailor ever did (*cough*iPad*cough*) and I’m tapped out. Now go away.

Good ol’ Jack. One hell of a writer.


Pardon Me, Waiter. What Is this?

Over the past few days The Good Man and I had some things to celebrate, so we got out of town for a few days.

We headed up north and checked into a really fancy schmancy hotel. The Good Man had planned the weekend to be a surprise for me, and it was amazingly good stuff.

I’d been advised to bring one nice outfit for a night out, and so I did. Friday night I put ‘er on and off we went to dinner at a Michelin starred restaurant.

(In case all Michelin means to you is tires, a starred restaurant is a really big deal.)

So being the New Mexico hayseed that I am, I made sure I worked very hard to mind my manners, use the right fork and not laugh too loud inside this very expensive and fairly quiet restaurant.

Of course, that only lasted through my first Sidecar martini drink.

Once the sugary brandy took hold, all bets were off.

Which just happened to coincide with the end of appetizers, when our fantastic server began setting up our table for entrees.

Ok, so a nice sold fork was laid down. Good. Then kind of a funky scroll sided knife, but a knife nonetheless.

And then another utensil was put next to the knife.

It looked like this:



Shaped like a spoon, but flat like a knife. I was perplexed. I had NO idea what in the sam hell it was.

Then I watched the waiter lay out a similar place setting for The Good Man.

Before the server could get away I blurted out “Excuse me, sir? But what is this?” and held up the alien utensil.

He took a step backward. I reconsidered my manners.

“My apologies,” I said. “It’s just that my mother taught me all the forks, but I have no idea how to use this.”

He laughed, “It’s a sauce spoon, your entrée comes with a wonderful sauce and this will help you get all of it.” Then he showed me how to use it.

And, well, by god that flat spoon did work pretty darn good on that tasty sauce.

I mean, where I come from we sop up all the good sauce with a biscuit, but whatever. I guess if they want me to use a fancy spoon, I will.

Didn’t stop me from licking it when I was done.
.
.
.
.
.
(ok, no, just kidding about that last part)



Image from Connox Living Design Shop.


Same Venue, Different View

Over the weekend I got together with a longtime dear friend for a much needed girl’s weekend.

My friend is the full time mom of a very happy and rambunctious toddler, so she needed a minute to herself to remember the not-mom side of her life.

On our weekend away, we walked a well worn path. Over the decade we’ve been pals, one of our favorite things is to grab a room at a really high end hotel, get tickets to a concert at the outdoor Shoreline Amphitheater, and have a raucous time.

To be honest, we haven’t done this for several years. I got married, then she got married, then she gave birth and suddenly life and all that goes with it intervened.

We were both glad to reconvene and return to our tradition. It bears noting, however, that on this weekend things were markedly different than in the past.

Where once we talked of work, our insane boss (we used to work in the same team), worries about saving enough money to support being a single gal, our dating life both good and bad, and the latest fashion available…

This weekend we talked of her being a mom, of how work is still important but takes a backseat to what matters in life, how to save enough money to retire on, our husbands, and the latest styles of magnifying reader glasses available and where to buy them.

We asked each other if it is inevitable to end up with the same physical attributes of our mother, no matter how hard we try. We lamented the years that have passed so quickly.

Back in the day after we’d gotten caught up, we’d start at the hotel bar, move on to a local Mexican restaurant with a wide array of tequila, then go to the concert venue grabbing beers and more fun on the way.

My friend weighs about 90 lbs on a good day, and when she drinks takes on the demeanor of a linebacker. Our friendship has been a lot about her having three to my one margarita and then bouncing off the fences.

I’ve pulled her out of girl fights, away from skeevy guys, off the venue railing, away from climbing up on the stage and I’ve literally carried her to the car more than once.

Friday, she arrived at the hotel and asked “Do you mind if we don’t drink much tonight?”

I said that was fine (and inside I felt incredibly relieved).

We ate room service, forgoing the heavily crowded restaurant of our usual mode. Then we went to see a Toby Keith show.

You know…Toby Keith used to play at the country bar Cowboy’s in Las Cruces. I used to go dancing to Toby Keith and Easy Money (when they were just known as Easy Money and no one cared who Toby Keith was) in my college years.

On Friday I read an SFGate article about celebrities that turned 50 this year.

Toby is on that list.

Seems even Toby has lost a step or two. He looks road weary and his set was pretty uninspired.

We left before the encore. As we walked out, the crowd of a billion girls in Daisy Dukes and boots pressed in around us. My friend commented, “I don’t think I’ve ever been to a show here where I wasn’t drunk. I’m suddenly very aware of my small size. How come I never worried about that before?”

I replied, “Because when you drink you’re ten feet tall.”

She laughed, then sighed. Then she said, “I miss my cub.”

I put my arm around her and we walked out of the venue together, solid on our four feet.

Later we texted our husbands to let them know we’d made it back to the hotel safely.

Then we both went to bed before midnight. Turns out that my tiny friend now snores like a longshoreman.

Things change. I guess it’s inevitable.

While sometimes I lament the past, I think we are both a lot happier today than we were back then.

Mostly.



Where once this view fired me up, now I think “what happens if there’s a fire?”


Copyright 2011, Karen Fayeth



It might also be mentioned that my magnetic powers of attracting the most sloppy drunk Hispanic cowboy in the house are still strong. If they got white boots that are too pointy and a belt that’s too long, they will find a way to find me. He was harmless and I quickly pawned him off on a gaggle of drunk girls. I bet that he’d be barfing before the encore. My friend had more faith than I did and took the after. She won the bet.


Photo taken Friday night with the Camera+ app for the iPhone.


A Party For A Glass

There are a lot of adjectives that can be used to describe the City of San Francisco. Some flattering, some less so.

One word that always leaps to my mind is nostalgic. For a big bustling city, on the forefront of technology and food and lifestyle, the town can get really bundled up about the past.

From toppled clocks to fiberglass dog heads to the preservation of graffiti, the town will vehemently unite around a little quirky slice of the past. After the lamenting and handwringing, people will unite to lobby government, business owners and each other to put things back to right.

The latest example? Glasses. Plain ol’ glasses manufactured by the Libby Glass Co. of Toledo, Ohio.

But a special glass that oh so perfectly fits the town’s specialty of Irish Coffee. I, myself, have held onto many a glass of the type and shape that makes a perfect warm beverage. The same glass that the manufacturer decided to stop producing.

The City’s biggest purveyor of Irish coffee, the iconic Buena Vista at Fisherman’s Wharf, had stopped buying from the Toledo company and moved over to a Chinese manufacturer. With such a huge drop in business, the Libby Co. didn’t see why they should keep cranking them out. It just made good business sense.

Enter the tenacity of a nostalgic people. There was an outcry! There was vocal frustations. Pleading, begging and enough of a ruckus was made that the story hit the front page of the San Francisco Chronicle.

When the company read about the good people of San Francisco mourning the loss of the right glass, they made the decision to swallow some not-insignificant costs to resuscitate the glass mold and do a new run. If this stack of inventory sells well, they’ll consider doing another run.

And Irish Coffee drinkers rejoiced!

From the article in the SFGate:

“The queenly, petite glass…allows for just enough whiskey and not too much coffee, with barely room for three C&H sugar cubes at the bottom and aged whipping cream that floats like a halo on the top.”

Indeed. It’s another cool foggy summer evening in the City. Tourists and locals alike seem to get along pretty darn well over a perfectly poured Irish Coffee in the beautifully shaped, heat retaining glass.

For reference, in the photo below, the one on the left is all wrong. The glass on the right is our little beauty.



Photo credit: Susana Bates / Special to The Chronicle


Side note: A few years ago, the Buena Vista also changed their whiskey brand in favor of a private label. It was a shocking transition and the purists were not pleased, including me. The new whiskey isn’t as smooth as the other variety. Doesn’t keep me from drinking it, but it gives me something to complain about.


For the Love of a Good Cuppa

This year The Good Man and I had the chance to celebrate the Fourth of July with some good friends. There were six of us total (three couples), and we met at our friend’s house for a special treat.

One of our crew had just recently returned from a trip to Ethiopia. She and her husband are in process of adopting an adorable baby boy and she had to make a visit to work through the paperwork with the local courts.

While in country visiting her baby son and patiently working though the long process, she was treated on several occasions to the Ethiopian coffee ceremony.

On our Fourth of July holiday, she wanted to share this ceremony with us, her friends.

About the coffee ceremony, here’s a quote from Ethiopian ambassador Haile-Giros Gessesse:


“Coffee has social value in our society. It is deep rooted in our culture. The coffee ceremony in local areas is used mainly for social gatherings. In the mornings and evenings parents, especially mothers gather together for a coffee ceremony and also use it as a platform for exchanging information in their surroundings. It is a means of communication. When people sit down they usually spend three hours finalizing the ceremony, starting with the preparation, and then roasting to brewing it.”

Our friend had hauled home a big bag of green coffee beans, water hulled (the good stuff) not fire hulled, and we sat outside in the beautiful sun while she told us about the ceremony.

First, she roasted the beans on the grill. We watched as she shook and swirled the pan, much like a slow Jiffy pop motion.

When we all agreed that it looked like the beans were at a good medium roast we all took in a whiff of the fantastic aroma from the pan.

We then took turns using a mortar and pestle to smash the beans down to a nice grind.

It was satisfying work to smash, smash, smash those crispy beans and release the beautiful scent and oils.

The grinds were then put into a French press and once brewed, a round of coffee was poured into six cups.

Yuuuummmm! It had a floral aroma and tasted so light and delicious. So amazing with just a touch of sugar and nothing else.

In keeping with tradition, we had three rounds of coffee while we discussed our lives, the news of the day, baseball, and got caught up with each other. This is part of the ceremony, the community, the support, the friendship.

Now, I love a great cup of coffee, but I rarely drink caffeinated coffee. After three cups I was ready to clean my house top to bottom, jog a thousand miles, and throw a 98mph fastball.

But it was a happy caffeinated high.

I was honored to be a part of the ceremony and I can hardly wait until our friends bring home their baby boy. I hope to we can continue to give him a sense of community and family…maybe even over a cuppa or two…or three.





Photo and quote from a CRIEnglish.com article by Wei Tong.