I just completed the first leg of my book tour. It was wonderful and exhausting and enormously memorable. I suspect I’ll forget the horrendous travel, the layovers that lasted 6 hours, and the swollen feet and tired legs. But I will never forget the incredible people I was privileged to meet. From Cincinnati, to Chicago, to Milwaukee, to Wichita and to Augusta, I had the opportunity to talk with book lovers and share life experiences and our love of the written word.  Though I don’t yet have all the photos from the events, I wanted to post the ones I do have. I also wanted to say a big fat THANK YOU to everyone who made me feel so welcome. You are friends, and I thank you for your many kindnesses.

I had a joyous time at Watermark Books in Wichita. All the attendees were terrific. Here is a picture of me with a group of women I’ve been Tweeting with for quite some time. Oh, were they ever fun! From left to right: Terri, Jennifer, Deena, Beth (me), Dani, Deb, and Pam.

My dear friends Marie and Don (shown in the photo below) drove for over 1 1/2 hours to come see me at the Next Chapter Book Shop in Mequon, Wisconsin, and a new friend, Mary (a terrific book blogger I met online) came with her daughter, as did a lovely writer friend, Christi Craig.

The event at Joseph-Beth Booksellers in Cincinnati was a big hit, and it made me so happy to look out into the audience and see so many friends.

My sweet friends (Lynn shown on the left and Margaret on the right) came to see me at Anderson’s Bookshop in Naperville. We really made a great memory. There was a wonderful group of women from a Chicago book club that came to Naperville too, and I’ll put up those pictures if they send them.

And lastly, for those of you who know my love for historic buildings and my former career in interior design, this is a photo of the lobby at the Pfister Hotel in Milwaukee. It’s beyond fabulous!

Can you see it? I’m talking about the glint of humor in Molly’s eyes. It was the very first thing I noticed when I met her. And then there’s her laugh—an infectious laugh to be precise. And see that hand resting on her shoulder? HA! Even that makes me laugh. I suspect she cut her husband Charlie out of the picture, so now his hand looks more than a bit like that crazy old movie and thriller “The Beast With Five Fingers” starring Peter Lorre. See, that’s the thing—Molly’s funny even when she doesn’t know it!

Molly and I met on a Tuesday afternoon and instantly hit it off like two five-year-olds on a playground. We blabbed, and laughed, and segued our way through a conversation that ranged from books to life and death experiences.

Molly is one of the funniest people I know, and if you’ve not visited her blog Life With The Campbells, then please do—it’s terrific!

I wanted to introduce my readers to Molly and she graciously accepted my invitation to share a blog post here. It’s one of my favorites.

Chalk and Cheese  -  by Molly Campbell

It’s no secret that my husband and I are different. Opposites attract, as we all know. But nowhere is this more apparent than in our approaches to what we do in our spare time. My husband has prepared a Powerpoint presentation on “The Origins of Life,” which he totes around with him on his laptop and extols to unsuspecting people he invites out for coffee. Charlie ponders what motivates people to do the things they do. I like to read a lot of books, but I don’t particularly want to be in a book club. I don’t like to overthink things.

Charlie likes people who have vast compendiums of knowledge. When asked a “yes or no” question, he always answers by saying “Well, there are a number of issues involved.” Charlie likes to go to plays and then discuss their ramifications afterwards. I like to leave at intermission and get a good night’s sleep.

We once met a couple who both had their doctorates in some sort of ancient, historical or mythical subject matter. To add to their cachet, they hardly spoke English. We spent an evening with them eating wonderful food, but discussing something that sounded to me like sacrificing goats and then roasting the meat. Charlie just loved these people. He has wanted to have them over for dinner for the longest time. I just saw a “SOLD” sign in front of their house. I am ecstatic.

In restaurants, we can never place our order the first time the waitress asks, because Charlie STUDIES the menu. He orders exactly as listed. For instance, I order “The fried fish.” He orders “The fresh Tilapia, dusted with cornmeal and lightly fried, with sautéed apples and freshly baked biscuits.” For crying out loud, there is only one fish choice on the menu! Then he asks what kind of COFFEE BEANS they use. Sounds like a real epicure, right? But this is at THE CRACKER BARREL.

Charlie is intrigued by “BEAUTY.” It’s not what you think. He wonders what it is that triggers someone to call a thing beautiful, when that same thing might be uninspiring to somebody else. He tries to engage me in this subject:

HIM: Do you think that rosebush is beautiful?

ME: Sure.

HIM: No, really. Look at the composition of the rosebush juxtaposed with the fence.

ME: It’s fine.

HIM: But what IS beauty? Do you think there is a kind of beauty in ugly things, like that tractor over there?

ME: What tractor? And by the way, you can speed up; the speed limit along here is 65.

HIM: But what is beautiful to YOU?

ME: Getting home quickly. I have to pee.

Slow married fast. Deep married shallow. The long of it and the short of it got hitched. Chalk and cheese have managed somehow to stay together for forty years. Charlie is preparing a Powerpoint presentation on the subject—care to have coffee?