Category: Creative Writing

The Crow

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tilt shift photography of birds
Crow nest hidden in forest

There he is again, on the same place in the road that runs through the forest. That crow, feet stepping in place, wings jerking open and closed, picking at an imaginary acorn, a speck in the road grasping then dropping it. Is it a small piece of gravel falling from its beak? He’s wooing passers by (human or other animals) with a treasure, “ Look here. Feast your eyes on this.” For the last two weeks he’s there displaying one tiny object or another, looking in my car window as I watch him. He directs my attention to a spot on the ground or, rather redirects my attention away from something else. He pretends, faking his own interest in an imaginary object, an actor on the asphalt stage. Because he’s there, pecking at nothing, I wonder, what he’s hiding. Where his nest is located. Is his mate sitting on eggs in the oaks there above the road? But, I won’t stop to investigate. I’ll allow him his bait and switch, let it succeed. I drive off every time, as if I fallen for his ruse. I don’t like to eat crow. Okay. Sorry.

Something about that crow resonates. We all pretend. Smile to mask a rough patch, spoke over a friend in class who is about to tell the teacher about a schoolyard misdeed, push a cool washcloth over a hot forehead and get a child to guzzle a cold drink on the way to preschool. A fever? Not today, please, I have an important client. Sometimes pretending covers for what’s real, lies close to an untruth. Is one. BUT, Sometimes pretending masks not yet knowing, covering for ignorance.

As a writer of a true story, my own true story, a story only as true as I reveal, I sometimes mask the truth. I divert the reader, either intentionally or because I may not yet fully understand the truth of a scene myself. Writing and revising, even after several drafts, continues to include diversions, doubts, hidden information, hesitancy and more discovery. Some of these are part of the character’s arc, as the character develops, scene by scene. She grows, transforms, behaves with new insight. But some places in my piece, in my manuscript, unable to hear my own story or read my own heart, I resort to self-deprecation when I, as the writer, am as befuddled as the character was at the time. Impatient with my own incapability. The writer must become wiser than the protagonist in a memoir. The writer of a novel must hold the wisdom of the story and characters, too. Discoveries are part of both. We must understand human nature, motivation, misbehavior and character innuendo and behaviors to demonstrate a character’s flaws, our own flaws. We write our own story as if we are not yet wiser and share a journey to gain some kernels of wisdom. We best offer ourselves compassion, tenderness and appreciation as we hold our own hand through the hard parts of a story. Love ourselves and let the reader in on that love. It is hard for me forgive myself and work my way through some of the hard places.

My Beta Readers, a few selected people who agreed to read this draft and offer feedback on the current version of my story, Fallen From the Nest, 25 chapters 350 pages, have been invaluable in nudging me to consider a few shared issues. Among them was that I lessen the incidences of self-deprecation, leaving self doubt as a motivator for discovery, when overwhelmed and confused, but to love for this struggling grandmother as she settles into her role with her grandchildren and her troubling son. Tell the story with more self-kindness and generosity, love her more. How can I be compassionate with myself when I made so many mistakes? Bad choices? One thing I know is that I’d  be kinder to others in this situation, more generous and understanding. This is where I begin the next revision, wrapped in tenderness for that old me as  a friend. Back I go into the weeds of words and ideas I planted on my own, scythe in one hand and a soft pillow and shawl in the other, a pot of tea for our journey.

Shall I enjoy myself, with laughter, puns, jokes and silliness? Might that help the reader want to spend time with me, like me more, enjoy hanging out? I’ll have to tease the reader, a little bait and switch on the crow’s road, the same one where my story begins. How can I make the reader care for a woman who kidnaps her grandson? To protect her son from losing another child or to protect her own professional reputation. It was never about my reputation. My beak plucks a tiny stone from the road, tells you its delicious, to try some as I sneak back home to revisit myself and write what I discover.

Send love and understanding my way as I dig a little deeper, tease out a thread of tenderness and weave it in and around softening, opening my heart throughout the manuscript. Nancy

black bird
Crow on the road

nancy

The Balm of Feet in Dirt

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Wyoming…a beautiful river at the base of mountain. Going this summer.
Meditative moment in a field of lupines

“The rivers flow not past, but through us, thrilling, tingling, vibrating every fiber and cell of the substance of our bodies, making them glide and sing.” – John Muir

This day, I will glide and sing. Want to join me?  The natural world has power, more than all of us. We step outside and there it is, go a little further, off the sidewalk, step onto a dirt path, a trail, the air changes, you change,  warmed by a planet beneath our feet, spinning round in the universe. The moment we shed the coat of the heated room, unfold from chair and screen, leave managing food, home and swiping everything clean, we are transformed. One last swipe at the dust thick on pottery once made by hand. Yes, long ago we put our hands to clay, slapped it free of bubbles and shaped it, fell into its trance, immersed our very being, became “one” with a gluey glob of earth, all hands and sensation- lost ourselves in the creative moment. Remember, losing yourself in clay, paint, poetry and dance? Or were those the very moments we found ourselves? Another high school shooter. Oh, once again our world in pain, self-inflicted, salty tears overfill our growing oceans. Head outdoors to unburden. Fresh sensation: birdsong, trickling water, wind in trees, feet on chilly earth, soft, hard or rocky heals. The smells of the moist earth are familiar, comfort, reassure. They are our scent, too as we are of her. Discover duff beneath the trees- ancient layers, trod for centuries by wholehearted wanderers like ourselves. Foragers, renegades, seekers who dared to wonder. Witness the wood rat build her dome of sticks, a bird carry a ridiculously long twig for its nest- watch as she weaves it with intuition and skill. A snake slithers to a stop on the trail risking its very life for a spot of sun. Outdoors we risk discomfort, grow tender with sensation. Commit to the experience. Let all else fall away, step out and keep walking, jog if you can. Feel your way touching bark, crunch leaves, grasp soft or prickly needles, furry leaves and granite boulders. Feel a vibration, a tumbling rage of something beyond. Wonder, seek and praise moments of beauty, notice what elicits joy, live for those moments, they fortify us, strengthen us as we will face, once again, what smolders in wait. We return with renewed presence and grace, clap our soiled shoes together and set them side by side like always. Head back inside renewed and connected.  As a child I was pushed out the door, with the slam of the screen, freed to roam, giving no thought to what my mother did while I was “out of her hair.” Today, after jogging up the roads, biking on rooted bumpy trails have left me in the dust, I walk. Walk and walk and walk. I move more slowly, but see more as the right knee creaks to limber, the left heel throbs, shoulders soften. In a grand outdoor amphitheater, a hawk opens the melody, calls our attention with an ominous whistle above the trees, a chorus of jays squabble in the oaks, ragged, a falling scramble of rocks and listen, its our own footsteps, 3:4 time percussive beat. This morning’s grand composition. On chilly wet days, misty mornings and warming afternoons our feet tap past familiar trees, narrow animal trails and tunnels through brush. We greet a bird, another, that squirrel, then there in the pasture, the same small herd of deer, a sprout of furred antlers, nubs sparkling with mist. Our neighbors. Now they stand and watch, casually bend to nibble grass.We are known.  Thank you to mothers who send their children out the door and slam the screen behind them. “Each step we take keeps our planet spinning. Seek her wisdom. Share yours. Walk slowly and tread softly.” Nancy Congratulations to Anna Shaw for winning my April sign-up contest. Your copy of @52 Reasons for Hope by Cathy Krizik is in the mail. 
Our hands in clay, our hands in sand, mud, water, our hands
 

The Photo Shoot

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A writer makes choices along the journey toward publishing with its fame, fans and riches (or whatever one’s goals may be). Those were the ones on my list when I was sixteen, again at twenty-six, but by fifty-six I’d wised up, and began to focus on one: publishing. But in order to get to that step I had to give up the idea of making a living as a writer, have had achieved a certain amount of fame and already an acquired fan-base. Not the kind of fame that has twenty year olds exclaiming, “Hi. Remember me? I was in your first grade class?” No, broader recognition than that. One must have a platform, which, like a soap box, serves as a place from which the writer speaks and is listened to, followed by thousands and following many more.

            Today, a writer, who by nature is often a loner, must get around, say things to thousands of people, and have more up her sleeve, no end of things to exclaim, post, tweet or toot. And that’s before the book release. A writer is a politician, pokes placards into lawns, prints up her own bumper stickers, free when you sign up online for her monthly newsletter, delivered right into your hands through your email: “Have you read Nancy’s book? Or you could request a custom license plate frame with her most recent working title and web address flashing in lights along the narrow strips, bottom and top.

            Recognition is a must before the writer can seek a publishing deal, before she seeks an agent: the earlier you begin gaining recognition, the better. Before she starts to write. Before she can read? Should parents get their child a website at birth? A Facebook account? A blog? Instagram and Twitter handles? Is that what you call it, a handle?  A baby you tube channel? People get their infants a wine locker, add a bottle each year or plant an apple tree fertilized by the placenta, many start a college fund, which, by the way, when the child is three is used up to get the child on the waiting list at the best preschool in town.

            Well, not me. As a child of the fifties we got none of that, and I started a college fund for my children that turned out to be good thing because after the divorce I needed it for rent. Facial recognition? Now there’s a topic. Maybe it was my family (or just me), but looking at myself was private. If I had a poppy seed in my tooth, I stepped into the bathroom, a pimple? Same thing. Was my hair okay? I avoided, at all costs getting caught looking in the rear view mirror to check my lip gloss. At sixteen I was gifted a tiny mirror in a velvet case for my purse, but gave it away after it sat unused. The last time I posed for a head shot was at graduation; my shoulders draped in black silk.

            Facial recognition requires a photo, posting it, maybe several versions in different outfits with different expressions. Not a “Selfie”, although some people have gotten very good at that. But for me, who never dared to put on mascara or lipstick in my car mirror. Groom in public?    I need at least one professional head-shot, dressing the torso for a sought-after image. Black jacket, silk blouse: real estate agent. Light linen jacket, rose shell, a large pendant necklace and a scarf for creativity. Hands at chin: psychologist. A yoga teacher in warrior pose, full body tights, a plaid shirt and felt hat for the western mystery thriller writer, a head tilt, lips licked, chin down, neck back, smile, not too big; smiling makes wrinkles. Do I dare ask her to airbrush wrinkles or match both eyebrows?

            The cost for a photo shoot comes due before I’ve sold the book, even the idea of my book. I decided to pay someone to help me set up my website, to keep it current, newsy and get back to followers. Oh, my, followers. I have been working on that list. I will offer a free gift when you sign up for my free newsletter, but need someone to tweet for me on topic, post relevant articles and the reviews I write and watch for topical news stories. I follow publishing trends, post blogs because once I have all that in place, my identity established, I am somewhat recognizable. I will publish a few stand-alones, pack my bio with lists of successes and then ready to seek an agent.

All of this assumes my story is a great one, literary, crafted skillfully and regularly revised and edited with the support of a brilliant critique group. No typos. Oh, I nearly forgot: hire an editor, struggle through revisions, pay her in full to cut 25% to meet a recommendation for a manuscript under 300 pages? Once confident, I can now to submit a set of queries, and include my spiffy web address. But wait, I need one more blast of confidence, lest I have missed something crucial: An online webinar that begins this month on preparing the manuscript, finding an agent, and how to get published.

            Look for my book, Fallen From the Nest, in the next few years at your local book-seller. Sign up to get my newsletter at gmabrown.com and read my blog at WordPress Letters to Montana Out on the street, say “Hey” if you recognize me. NancyKayBrown.com, gmabrown

Photo by Portia Shao, Positive Vista Photography & Art, Santa Cruz

We Were All a Wreck

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Two-year old Ryan hid behind my legs as “the snort” came up the driveway. The ground vibrated and rumbled. It belched smoke and steam, growled and groaned, engines grinding, treads clacking up the driveway. A suspended grapple with teeth appeared first, looming above the trees like a dinosaur, its hinged face bowed atop a tall neck called an arm, its body read, CAT. It clanked and roared to a stop, quieted before emitting one last cough. Our snort, the name inspired by a children’s book we’d read about a backhoe, had come to knock down our old house. After a final battle with rats in the floors and nesting in walls, we’d about had it with that old place; were ready to start fresh. Our snort was an excavator with a grapple that looked like jaws with teeth; very big ones. 

In the silence, Ryan eased out toward the machine, his hands cupped over his ears, tilted his head all the way back and looked up. The driver was up there perched in the seat, hardhat, red suspenders. Ryan called, “Are you here to fix our house?”

Just days earlier we had moved to into the rental unit near the house to manage the remodel. Ryan and his sister lived in a tent in back of the shop with my underemployed son (their father) and unemployed mother, Jan. Ryan was three and his baby sister nearly one. Jan and Liza stayed in the tent most days, rarely venturing out. So, Ryan spent a lot of time with me as I tended the place: trimming trees, planting a garden, climbing up in the seat of my own tractor to turn the compost, feeding the horses and looking after chickens. 

“Nope,” the driver stretched out of the cab to hook a hand around the grab bar and jumped down. Taking off her helmet, she shook out her hair. Dwarfed by the immense machine our neighbor Sharon was sleek and taught as an animal. “Sorry. I’m here to wreck it.”  Ryan burst into tears.

We were all a wreck at that time, our lives unsettled by disruption: getting ourselves and our household items packed up for the construction project, moving into the cabin, fighting with Jan and Tony, erecting a tent our back for Tony’s family to live in, Jan’s illnesses, medications and depression, social services complaints and we were bleeding money, twice as much as we’d planned for. But most importantly we knew by then that we had to do something about Tony and Jan, because they were driving over the line, heading in the wrong direction.

(This memory and the way the deconstruction aligned with our family’s situation, one deconstruction after another, like the house, was eventually followed by reconstruction. It seemed a relevant thought. Not quite an epiphany. Simply a moment when I paused while editing a nearby scene in my memoir, Fallen From the Nest.) (names changed to protect the innocent and the guilty)

Out of Sorts

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Today I’d say I’m out of sorts.  You may be feeling similarly.  We walked together to feed the horses and it started to rain.  The wind is terrific and very cold.  You couldn’t even make it without a rest back to the house.  You need a physical development intervention, buddy. I have to go to teach tonight at Cabrillo and I hope you and Daddy have power.  It’s so windy.  I told daddy to start a fire, to use the lantern, to hang out here and make burger patties for dinner with ketchup and broccoli.

They took the sink and the dishwasher and the washing machine, dryer, clothes hanging rods from the closets and some of the carpet sections for the remodel. I have heaps of hanger clothes, dirty clothes, dirty dishes and messy floors.  Its getting a bit harder each day to stay here.  But they aren’t done yet with the new old house, so after the bathroom fan, blinds, fireplace slate, finishing the plumbing and moving our satellite system, telephone, DSL and getting our beds set up, we’ll be there.  Probably Friday and Saturday.

But for now I absent-mindedly dumped a half cup of cold tea into the hole where the sink was-so I set up the wash tub, towels and drainer in the bathtub.  It’s confusing to remember  not do things that I do habitually.  Gathering laundry for another day, tossing it in the washer, washing off the table, rinsing hands and hanging my jacket in the closet.  That’s okay, but you and your daddy are here too.  And he keeps leaving to get air, he says, more like get poison in his lungs.  Yes he still smokes.  I think he thinks he’s fooling me.  He moves so slowly.  He is a slow unfocused worker.  He thinks he can sit and watch TV in the daytime.  UGH.  I got him outside moving things from the shed, stacking, and raking gravel after the neighbor brought a load for the leveling of the tent area. He isn’t very energetic about any of it.  It’s so hard to watch him dragging around.  It reminds me of his teen years.  But he just turned 29 yesterday.  Oh, dear.  maybe I have to stop being a teen mom.  Maybe I just tell him what has to be done and a timeline and let it be.  Not daytime TV, get a vasectomy, get a job, clean your feet, brush your teeth.   I need a break. Off to town, leaving Daddy and you to yourselves.  I should stop and get a massage!  Ha.  I love you, buddy and so glad to see you.  I am running on empty today.

The kitchen sink

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I pull the draw knife around the dull white porcelain sink in the kitchen so the plumber can ease it out tomorrow. He’ll move it to the new old house where we will wash, soak and play like we always have.  Your first bath, and the backwards chair pushed up close blowing bubbles with straws; on your nose a peak of suds.  I drag through a scratch of grit, perhaps fresh spinach from the garden, lettuce from the market, and sandy hands soiled from drying the dog’s muddy feet. The pull of a thready line of silicone, like Elmer’s peeled off the fingertips in sixth grade. Memories wash through. I am three bathing in grandma’s iron stationery tub, the place they clean the fish, at five bent over drinking from a school water trough, twelve, fifteen and a move across the valley to fiberglass enclosures, in college the old farm sinks were stained and chipped with use, a 1930s bungalow in Oakland, then Santa Cruz- its 1972 and a farm sink, stationery tub and concrete shower, then Bonny Doon was stainless; the hollow drip, clattering pots and I rubbed a patina with soft scrub.  We take this sink with us.  This was the sink I chose for daddy first baby, Mia.  It was to be a bath, to slip her from my arms, softened back, arms and neck, rigid legs, onto a warm, sopping towel there for traction.  She’d have cooed, smiled, rolled her head from side to side.  And I’d have lathered my hands, warming them first to wash her pale as porcelain skin.  Our newly installed quartz countertop has a hole sized for this sink, rounded at the corners.  It’s not in perfect condition, but still, it is just perfect. It’s the place we all prefer to wash our hands, chatting together over the day, and the place we’ll hang out at the new old house. love you, gma

Planning for Tomorrow

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Grandpa just drove off with the Echo Lake boat.  It needs to be serviced to get ready for a summer of driving across the lake.  Summer is just around the corner (Maybe the same corner that Frog and Toad took a peek and couldn’t see a thing). But now the boat house here (hoop garage that you used to play in) is nearly empty.  Geoff, the neighbor, can move in the pea gravel floor in so that we can set up water pipes, tub and shower curtains for our tent city.  We’ll do that when you and daddy get here.  The sleeping tent is in two big boxes in our garage.  The sink is outside your old house and will be used in our house’s old counter if we can get it out in one piece.  You can have our old stove for the mess tent (haven’t found that tent yet) and the sink from the bathroom for hand washing.  The tent city (sleeping, mess tent and bath storage) will get a start this week and probably take a couple of weeks to finish.  You’ll get to see it constructed.  Maybe you can help scoop gravel, ride on the tractor as I smooth it all out and paint some plywood!

All of this a little too exciting for my stomach this morning. So I am drinking your tea.  Ahhhh.  Want a cup?  I will go to the store today to find a ladder for you to get to the loft bed and also get you some food.  I will get cheese for daddy, beer and dinner and toastie O’s, bananas, yogurt that’s not as sour as mine and some more peanut butter. You like ham, so I’ll get some sandwich meat and daddy likes quesadillas, so we’ll be all set.  Tomorrow is daddy’s birthday.  Remember to make him a picture or give him special kisses and attention. You’ll have plenty of time hanging out all day on the flights and at Logan and Seattle airports.  You won’t see sissy for a bit, so I hope Daddy sets up the SKYPE so mommy and sissy can talk to you while you are here. I’d better get back to work making the beds for you and daddy and a few other things.  Love you, buddy.  See you tomorrow!  YES…TOMORROW. gma

Only a Handful of Days

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Only one more hand of fingers to count until I pick you up at the airport on Tuesday.  You and daddy will be flying all afternoon and arrive here about dinnertime.  He wanted to bring Pogo the kitty.  I asked him not to. It might be nice for you, but Pogo cannot live in our house, Georgia eats kitties and outside Pogo would be eaten by coyotes. I am sorry, buddy. We’ll go out and eat dinner when you guys arrive.  It will be daddy’s birthday. We’ll sing for him and he will blow candles.  He will be very happy to be back in Santa Cruz.  He said he packed 5 suitcases.  We should have flown on Southwest air, the first one is free.  Then he said that Tommy is coming for a visit the very next day.  Can’t he bring a suitcase or two? Five suitcases is 15 pus 30 plus 45 for each of you. That’s $180 for suitcases.  Yikes!  Silly daddy.  No way.

Today I painted a cabinet in the pantry.  I wanted it to be green, but the green paint I bought was too shiny, so I added a layer of glazed mixed aqua, now it looks better, but it took all day.  I wanted to do other things too.  Like clean out some kitchen cupboards. The cabinet is the white one that was very dirty and sat in the kitchen at your old house.  Its in the laundry porch now and will be the pantry shelf. That room is still messy but my-o-my you should see the kitchen! (pic)

I made a book about the garden today and wanted to share it with you, but I haven’t figured out how to do that yet.  On Tuesday morning, the kitchen sink will spout water.  The stove works today and the refrigerator still is over at my house.  We are getting close!  I think you will sleep here for a few days, daddy can help me move stuff and we’ll sleep in the the new old house on Friday.  In one week.  Its going to be very nice to get settled again.  But it may be hard to find all the things we need…your toys, books and jammies….those things are in a box for you.  You can help move them.  And your toothbrush, too.  I’m tired tonight.  Ready to sit and relax.  Maybe I’ll call you.  Okay.  Talk soon.  Then off to Sacramento for work for two days. Love gma

Grown up things

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Every so often I realize that I am a grown-up.  I mean I really know that what I am doing is what mature, responsible grown-ups do.  Like tonight as I am tired and ready for bed, I am thinking about tomorrow and what I need to do.  That’s a grown-up thing to do.  Plan for the next day.  I am trying to figure out how to plan for our move over to the new old house.  And maybe we sleep over there Tuesday night when you arrive.  Or maybe not?

It’s been a thought of mine for sometime that we will be moving over there by the end of the month.  Grandpa was never sure.  I got very sure when I heard you wanted to come and I planned the trip.  You will be here Tuesday evening.  Should we all be ready to sleep in your new old house? If we do; then here’s what I have to do…

Get the refrigerator cleaned and moved, the stove retrofitted for propane and turned on, the heater going, all the lights working and safety covers on them, the water working in bathroom and kitchen, the hot water heater moved over and hooked up, the sink removed and put in over there in the kitchen and the food, too.  Then we have to finish your loft area, move the beds, sheets and clothes dressers.  We’d have to have coffee, toast and oatmeal in the morning and some yogurt.  Then we could go back to Grandpa and Grandma’s old house and move more things.

Oh my gosh.  That’s just the beginning.  Such grown-up concerns, right?  I’ll have to think about all of this in the morning.  maybe talk it over with grandpa.  We’ll make it good for you buddy.  We will.  I love you, gma.

Harvesting

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Daddy and Mommy said they are going to stop smoking by May 15.  That is a good idea. They will feel better and you will probably think it is yucky to smoke cigarettes if they stop now.  Its a habit.  A habit is something we do without even deciding.  We just do it because we do, but with some habits, we can’t really stop very easily.  Like smoking.  They tried to stop before.  But you can help.  Tell them you are proud of them, that you want them to live to see your children, that smoking is for chimneys and they are NOT chimneys.

Mommy and Daddy are starting to plan the details of your family’s move.  It sounds like mommy is happy with the plans.  I haven’t talked to you or daddy yet about her ideas. But I can tell you that you and daddy will fly out here on April 20 on Alaska Airlines. You will play while daddy works; setting up your tent home, looking for a job and helping around here. Then he will go back to Montana.  Mommy says she needs a break from daddy and he does too.  It will be his birthday present, she says.  So let’s do our count-down….12 more days!!!!  Right hand pinky day again.  WOW.  That’s pretty soon.  Pack up all your clothes and put them in the biggest suitcase you can find.  I have to get to work here to be ready for you!

Today I am living without. (As if!)  I am learning to live with less.  Many things are up in the garage storage.  That’s the good stuff.  But the hard part is that the light fixtures are missing here- Jim pulled them off and the dishwasher got carted off yesterday.  We are harvesting from this house for the new old house.  So now its a little weird (even though when we move it will be great).  Metro sniffs around inside the cabinet slot where the dishwasher used to sit.  He looks funny sitting under there staring out. He is maybe asking; What happened?  Why didn’t I notice this cool place before now?  And at night the living room is darker.  We removed two wall sconces and took them over there.  We will take the refrigerator, washer, dryer, cabinets for the laundry porch and some of the best carpet for your sleeping loft.  I’d like to be done with all this by the time you get here so you can sleep over there.  We’ll see.  The closet has no light fixture and some of the things like electric sockets are going, too.  Its an organ transplant.  And we wouldn’t want them to get sent off to the dump with this old broken house.

Another thing that I have been planning is your tent house.  I am going to harvest “organs” for that, too. I ordered the tent today.  It will need a stove (ours) and a tub and sink (ours) and a kitchen sink (your old new house) and a countertop and cupboards (ours) Beds (ours) and couch (Grandpa’s) and chairs (ours).  Your daddy will choose what he wants and set it up.  You could use our woodstove, too.  This tent has a stove-flap.  We’ll put it down by the shop so you guys have privacy.  I haven’t gotten the toilet, yet.  I wonder if Grandpa bid on the one at Ebay. I bet we missed it.  Can you be a kitty cat and scoop out a little potty hole and cover it up?  NO.  Can you be a horsie and drop poo as you walk?  NO.  Can you poo in diaper like Liza?  NO.  Okay, I’ll figure something out.  Daddy will help.

Gotta go out to dinner-save water and me washing dishes.  Talk soon buddy, gma