Gus is a really athletic corgi and he was willing to jump on any furniture at any time. And now . . . Voodoo is doing the same. He no longer cares if he asked. He just bounces up and then rolls around on the couch with evident delight. Or jumps up and walks across my laptop keyboard and lays down, covering one or all of the following: one arm, both arms, half the keyboard, all the keyboard, the touchpad, and the screen.

Is it bad manners if he’s so cute that you can’t stop him?

Now that’s bad enough, but Viggo has begun shoving the kids off my lap if he wants to lay there. He jumps up and lumps on top of them and licks until they have to retreat.

I believe both dogs have begun calling my laptop: The Interloper. Or possibly: The Invader. Both seem to hurry to get to my lap before it can get there.

In other news, I could probably make a dozen pillows from the hair they are losing. These are small dogs. Where the heck is it all coming from?

But what it made me think about today was black people. You might ask why. The subject came up with my children. They were talking about the civil war, and then my son says, “I call black people African-Americans.” I said, that makes sense, but you realize that not all black people are African-American, nor do they wish to be called such. Then my daughter pipes up with “Anthony is black.” I said no, he’s Chinese. He’s racially different from white and black. Then my son pipes up with another kid who is black, and I explained no, he’s Mexican.

Now the thing is that this little town I live in is mostly white. Very white. There are a few black kids and Hawai’ian kids at the college, and then a Mexican migrant population and a fair number of Native Americans. But frankly, the day to day experience with people tends to be blindingly white. That skews the perception that all the world looks like this.

Which makes it difficult to start explaining to children about people of color and their cultural histories and the way that white people are implicated in a lot of terrible things in history. The fact is, it’s a complicated subject and I can’t do it all in a day or even a year. But it is something that I have to talk with them about now and throughout their lives. I don’t think that this history is taught in school, but it’s tremendously important. On the other hand, my kids learn a lot about the real Native American history here. The Big Hole Battlefield is not far, and neither is the Little Big Horn. I’ve been to The Big Hole Battlefield and you can feel the spirits still there. It’s an eerie, beautiful place.

You should read Loenen-Luiz’ essay. It’s well worth reading and it digs into the complexity in a very short space. What I really find important is the way she talks about the friendship/betrayal/colonizer element. That there is a real difficulty in negotiating the tangle of emotions involved in being friends with the people who are oppressing you.

When I finish my Crosspointe books, this is part of what I mean to explore, and what I’ve been setting up all along with the Jutras. I have the Crosspointe people seeing them as invaders and a sort of monolithic evil in the first book, and then slowly they learn that the Jutras are human and eventually they begin to learn that the Jutras have good reason for invading. That good and bad is not as simple as it looks.

And yes, I intend to finish them. While Roc has decided not to publish the last books, I’m looking for a publisher who will, and if not, I will do it myself. I love these books and I want to get them done.

I’m thinking that I would never want to work on a crab boat (comment brought to you courtesy of The Deadliest Catch). I’m too much a wimp. Plus I’m betting I’d be barfing much of the time. You know, when I wasn’t being washed overboard.

I have some lovely flowers from my children for Mother’s Day. My kids are so freaking sweet.

We’re getting closer to The Demon Lovers: Succubi release. This is the Facebook URL. Go ahead and friend it for updates and special offers and so forth. I really like my story in this one and I’m hoping you will too. I’m told it will release June 1, so not far now.

Two different lookers are coming to check out our house this weekend. Send buy vibes, would you?

The curtains did not fall down last night. I consider this a good thing.

I also took the doggies walking. They made friends with another dog and ran and ran and ran and generally had fun.

Tomorrow I’m planning on planting things. Curb appeal, doncha know.

Terribly interesting post, isn’t it? You know what’s truly awful? I can go out my back door, take twenty steps up the alley, and be at Dairy Queen.

Also, tomorrow I will be installing new curtains/rods and such, with the help of my mom. This may be entertaining. Most entertaining will be my dad’s “help,” which will come in the guise of telling us exactly what to do, because he can’t get on the ladder to do it himself, though I wouldn’t put it past him to try. This will be fun. I perhaps should start drinking right now. Maybe I will learn patience. Is that possible? I’ve not hung curtains before without the man, so I will undoubtedly be learning new skills. This is a good thing.

I have a deep love of all things weird and parasitical (as long as they aren’t coming after me.) This is a zombie ant. How awesomely cool is that? I learned about zombie ants today.

How deadly is smallpox? I’m just curious. Anybody know? I mean, I know for the Lakota Sioux is was terrible given their lack of resistance of any kind, but in general, is it deadly a la anthrax? Or is it more like the old and young are likely to die, and others recover? I’m trying to learn about smallpox. Help a girl out!

I’m starting at a different point in the revisions of Blood Winter in order to develop some more of the story and to add a few action scenes to set up character. The thing is, the action stuff might not happen on the very first page. It might take me more than that to get things going. The question is this: is the stuff I think is important enough to delay the action really as important as all that? I might end up having to cut it out. At this point, I’m back to the drafting element of things where it’s more important to get the words down than to edit. I’ll see what it looks like when I get it done.

But what do you think? How patient are you in getting to the action? What books are your favorite for starting well?

I feel really helpless and really sad. She’s an amazing woman with so much fire and strength. She’s not giving up, by any means, but things are what they are, barring a miracle. Learning that really makes me take a step back and think about what’s important, what I want my life to be. I can’t help thinking about what I would want to do if I thought I might not make it to my next birthday. It’s a hard think.