Dear One Direction

Over the past two months, I've had the pleasure of working with an amazing group of kids at my summer job as a special education tutor. Sure, some of them mumble curse words under their breath when I ask them to get to work or prefer digging in their heels than their pencils - but these kids are brave and kind and true. On my first day, I found myself in a room full of blank faces, not sure where to turn. But as soon the girls discovered that I knew that "One Direction" meant something more than a point on a compass, I knew what I had to do.

Driving to work on my second morning, I was prepared: my iPhone was full of every album One Direction has ever released, my mug full of thick, black coffee and my heart itching to make a difference.

Over the past two months, I've learned so much. I've learned that being a teacher is both the most difficult and most rewarding job I can imagine. I've learned all the lyrics to Story of My Life and how to dance in the driver's seat without running someone over. And I've learned that when you care about something, when something makes your eyes light up and your pen move faster, you have to hold on tight until your whole world is made of that feeling. Even if that something is a British boy band.

Especially if that something is a British boy band.

I asked five students - five girls who are at once precious and determined and made of tougher stuff than I've ever seen - to write a letter to their idols. They looked at me like I was crazy. And then they got to work.

I've never seen these girls care so much about something as small as a sheet of paper. They practiced their handwriting for days. They researched fan-mail addresses and quotes from their favorite songs. They taught me how to spell the names of their heroes (Harry, Liam, Niall, Zayn and Louis, by the way). And they wrote.

Their letters went way beyond "Dear One Direction." Yes, they mentioned their favorite songs. And yes, the words "hot" and "cute" and the more ambiguous "good looking" may have been thrown around on loose-leaf paper and pencil crayon. But they also wrote about themselves.

One wrote about her alcoholic mother, another about her struggles with bullying. Their lives have never been easy and they've never had anyone to share them with - until now. They put their gratitude on the page, thanking complete strangers for making them feel strong and good and beautiful. Their post-scripts were full of promises that five British lads (yes, lads) halfway across the world and busy with their own lives and dreams coming true may never be able to keep:

PS I'd love to see you in concert one day.
PS Please come to Canada soon!
PS Don't ever change.
PS I love you.
PS Please write back.

Today I'm putting these words and more in the mail. The girls decorated a manila envelope with hearts and swirls and the number one. I've included six copies of pictures, self-address envelopes and international postage coupons. I don't expect the girls to hold their breath. I know that when you're eleven or seventeen, your life moves quickly and in a year's time they may have trashed their CDs and moved on. But none of that matters, not really.

Sometimes the most important thing is putting this excitement, this thrill, this love into words and sharing them with the world.

Dear One Direction,

Thank you for these and all your little things.

Love, Erika

Queen of the Daisy Chains

You can call me a lot of things, but a predictable driver probably wouldn't make the list. That's because I have this nasty habit of doing things like, I don't know, pulling over to the side of the highway with no warning because I saw a pretty patch of wildflowers on the side of the road.

But don't worry - I used my turning signal.

Making a daisy chain on the side of the road, waving at confused drivers that passed and choking on highway dust, made me realize something: Life is like a daisy chain.

It takes time to pick out the brightest blooms and the prettiest petals, just like choosing your friends, your passions, your dreams. You choose who and what you're going to weave the tightest, and those that you're going to throw back onto the grass.

Sure, not everything is as easy as picking wildflowers on the side of the road. Your daisy chain needs a back bone, a couple of strong stems to hold up the others. Your family. Your home. There are some things that you don't get to pick. But every flower on your daisy chain is there for a reason. And if it isn't, if it doesn't look right or it's crawling with those weird, black bugs that look like leeches, you can take it out and move on.

So I'm trying to choose carefully. I'm picking friends I can depend on and following dreams that make my heart pound. You choose what goes into your daisy chain - which flowers will catch someone's eye, which blossoms you'll show the world and which you'll hang above your bed to dry and keep safe for years - and you wear it with pride.

With the first day of summer come and gone and the prettiest wildflowers out to play, here's a quick guide to make your own daisy chain (the metaphor and the flower crown. But mostly the flower crown):

1. Find a patch of daisies - be it the middle of the woods or the side of the road. Go on a hunt. If it ends in flowers, it's been a good day.

2. Pick a daisy, leaving about ten centimeters of stem. Use your thumb nail to make a little slit at the end and thread another daisy (stem first) through the hole.

3. Repeat the process until your chain fits your head. Too small is better than too big - that way it'll sit on top of your head without slipping.

4. Once your chain is the length you're looking for, finish it up by linking the first and last flowers. Make a slit in the stem of the last daisy and threat the first daisy (flower first) through it.

5. Crown yourself queen of summer nights, big decisions and daisy chains, and be happy with your choices. Things don't always work out on the first try. Sometimes you have to toss a few flowers away, bend a few petals or just scrap the whole thing. But you get to choose. You get to choose who and what and where is worthy of a place in your daisy chain. And you weave them real close.

Made with ♥ Monday: Rhubarb Crisp

This weekend was full of good things. To name a few: friends in matching dresses, crowded coffee shops, sleeping in, pouring rain, farmers' markets and birthday cake. But tucked in between the pages are the beautiful bits that can't be described in words. Not exactly the things that happened - the way the air felt hot on your skin or his hair fell in front of his eyes - the things that you felt more deeply than anything. You know what I mean, those seconds that your heart graciously and without question catalogs. Because even if you don't realize it at the time, your heart knows that you are will look back and be struck by the overwhelming fact that this is your life and that it is so so good. Like sitting in the sweet spring sun and eating a bowl of rhubarb crisp.

When my mama made rhubarb crisp, I scraped the golden brown oats and sugar off the top and left the rhubarb at the bottom of my bowl. When my dad made rhubarb crisp, I balanced a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of my slice and licked my sticky fingers for hours afterwards. When I make rhubarb crisp, I do it quietly.

There doesn't have to be any ceremony. No flashing lights. No background music. Just me, chopping farmers' market rhubarb, mixing oats and butter, and remembering those seconds that I was unaware of at the time.

Rhubarb Crisp

You'll need:

4 cups rhubarb, cut into little 2cm pieces

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup flour

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1 cup flour

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup oats

1/2 cup melted butter

In a medium bowl, combine your rhubarb, sugar, flour and cinnamon. Pour them into a greased baking dish (preferably 8" x 8" but I used a charming circular ceramic dish, pictured below. Anything works) and let them get to know each other while you move on to sweeter things.

Mix together the rest of your flour, brown sugar, oats and butter, then sprinkle the mixture over your rhubarb.

Bake at 375F for 35 minutes.

Sweet and simple and undeniably summer. Serve in a bowl with a splash of cream and a moment of quiet. This is one of my favorite things.

French Macarons & Old Friends

Last night, one of my sweetest, oldest friends and I decided to make macarons - those beautiful, un-pronounceable French pastries that can't be that hard, right?

No. Wrong. Dead wrong.

We haven't spent much time together since I left to university and she spent the year in our hometown, working and taking classes at the local college. But thousands of kilometres don't mean much when it comes to zesting a lemon and measuring out flour. We spent hours in the kitchen, getting to know the different people we've both become after a year apart.

I estimate. I measure in pinches and handfuls and feelings. I never sift my flour and I've learned to live with the results. I am trying every day to be more spontaneous and flexible. But I always end up coming home to tried and true recipes that I know by heart. I am emotional and chaotic and I bake for comfort rather than accomplishment.

My dear friend, she makes bold choices. She spends hours researching recipes and always chooses the most complicated one. She is calculated, leveling and sifting (and re-sifting, I was told, because anyone who doesn't is basically a caveman. Oops!) and weighing ingredients, and if she doesn't get the result she wants, she goes back and does it again.

We are different. I love nothing more than deep, rich, chocolate cake. She prefers chiffon. She avidly reads baking blogs, while I keep a collection of stained and tattered thrift store cookbooks. We are different, but after two and a half hours attempting what looked like a straightforward recipe for lemon macarons, we were both laughing until our sides ached when our finished product turned out a little more like this:

I love old friends. The kind with whom you can sink into conversation so rich and powerful that you don't even realize your eyes are brimming with tears until the person sitting next to you asks for a tissue. The kind where you can start any sentence with "Remember that time" and finish it with a collection of memories, coming into focus in your mind like a Polaroid picture. These things aren't instant. It takes time (in our case, about fourteen years - something that still feels unbelievable but true) to find the people that will hold fast in your heart.

We've changed. We are no more the same people we were when we first met - all pig-tails and pencil crayons on the school yard - than those yellow blobs up there are French macarons. But I am so grateful for sweet and tangy, lick-the-spoon nights like last night.

Some days my heart beats out reassurances like: You need to accept these changes. You need to remember that no one stands still, that a year from now life won't look like it does in that Polaroid picture. That your macarons won't always rise and your friends won't always see the world in the same way that you do.

I need to remind myself that change is good and Thursday nights are sweet and if you ever need to talk, just say the word and I'll curl up on the couch next to you, with a glass of milk and a plate of dessert and my eyes wide open, trying to memorize your face like a photograph. I will be there for your joys and your failures, and one day we'll try again - macarons round two - and laugh and cry and whisper "Remember that time" when we did this all before.

If you're interested in more daring baking and picture taking, you can find my friend Kennix's blog right here.

Beta Reading and Big Things

Once upon a time, I signed up as a beta reader on an online writing forum. I love editing. It makes me feel like I should wear cat's eye glasses, drink black coffee and walk around New York City in pointy black heels. I dream about riding the subway with a red pen and half finished manuscript in my perfectly manicured hands.

Yes, I think about this a lot.

A couple years ago, my dream came true. (Well, minus the NYC bit - and the heels, I can barely hobble in those.) A lovely woman named Alison Kemper emailed me her YA zombie novel, Donna of the Dead, and I got to live out my wildest fantasies in red ink. Donna of the Dead is about a girl who hears voices, a high school crush, and, naturally, a zombie apocalypse.

Two months ago, I got another email from Alison - the first time we'd spoken in far too long - and some exciting news. Her novel, the one that I'd poured over on my laptop before bed, is published.

Alison is such a friendly and open person. She welcomed new ideas and criticism - not that I had much, her novel is as funny and fast-paced as she is. I cannot believe that someone I know - and a novel I've read - is published. This is unreal.

See that up there? That's an acknowledgements page. Scroll down a little to the fourth paragraph, last name. That's me. Little old me, Erika Loggin, has officially joined "the legion of super smart beta readers."

Excuse me while I scream and dance around the living room because someone I know has just done something incredible.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Okay, we're good.

I'm crossing my fingers so tight they've gone numb that one day, one day soon, the publishing world will be full of more familiar names. That more friends will see their dreams come true, and that I'll see my name in print again.

PS: You can put your name forward as a potential beta reader on the absolutewrite.com forums here and read more about Alison's novel on goodreads.com here.

I'll Be Your Travel Guide

Here is all the Czech that I know:

Ahoj - Hello/goodbye

Dobrý den - Good day

Děkuju - Thank you

Je to pravda - It's true

Je to v pořádku - It's okay

Jsem Kanaďanka - I'm Canadian

Nerozumím - I don't understand

Jahoda - Strawberry

I'll be honest here: It isn't a lot to go off of.

My mom moved to Canada from the Czech Republic after marrying my dad. He was a forester, she was a university student – they were both on exchange in Finland and, a couple years later, he whisked her away to the middle of nowhere. It's always struck me as an achingly romantic story. Giving up your family, your culture and your home to live in a small town in northern British Columbia.

Not to mention your language.

My mom tried teaching us bits and pieces of Czech when we were younger. My brother and I are fluent in please and thank you, but you're welcome is a hard one. We can say hello, goodnight and goodbye, but I've never been able to wrap my tongue around the rolling Rs in good morning. We are, by all accounts, completely hopeless.

I guess that could explain why, all my life, I've dreamed of learning Czech. I wanted to speak the language of cobblestone streets and red brick roofs, the crooked syllables that seemed like the gatekeepers of another world. A world that was exciting and adventurous and, most of all, far, far from home.

I’ve spent so many years wanting – wanting until my lips are cracked and my voice is hoarse from sounding out words in a language that has never seemed to belong to me. Until I decided, just for the heck of it, to apply for a Czech summer school in Prague. And then, why not, book my flights. And gosh, while I'm at it, might as well pay for tuition and accommodation in the sweetest little apartment building with a bright red door, within walking distance of some of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen. Sure, that seems like a good idea.

Exactly one month from today, I'll be hopping on a plane to spend my July studying and exploring and walking the footsteps of my forever dream. I'm bringing my trusty Fodor's travel guide, my phrase book (apparently a very good choice), my most chic, European clothes (not that I have any) and a ball of wonder so heavy I'll probably be stuck with an extra baggage fee for my wide eyes and thundering heart.

I'm a beginner at this. At Czech, at solo-travel, at the kind of summer that can change your life. I'm a beginner at this whole "When life gives you lemons," say no thanks and make yourself a banana split, instead. Or some potato pancakes. When in Prague, right?

One month to go. I feel like, in some small way, I've always been counting down the days. Every step I take has been leading me in this direction. Every deep breath has been my lungs reminding me to be patient. One month until this crazy thing comes true.

Book of the Month: Lost Lake

Suley, Georgia, is home to Lost Lake Cottages and not much else. Which is why it's the perfect place for newly-widowed Kate and her eccentric eight-year-old daughter Devin to heal. 

Kate spent one memorable childhood summer at Lost Lake, had her first almost-kiss at Lost Lake, and met a boy named Wes at Lost Lake. It was a place for dreaming. But Kate doesn't believe in dreams anymore, and her Aunt Eby, Lost Lake's owner, wants to sell the place and move on. 

Lost Lake's magic is gone. As Kate discovers that time has a way of standing still at Lost Lake can she bring the cottages—and her heart—back to life? Because sometimes the things you love have a funny way of turning up again. And sometimes you never even know they were lost . . . until they are found.

_________________________________________________________________________

Sarah Addison Allen writes the kind of books you want to keep in your mind and your heart long after they're done, just because sometimes it's painful to let beautiful things slip away. She caught my attention with two of her earlier books, Garden Spells and The Peach Keeper, but I fell completely head over heels for The Girl Who Chase the Moon. Allen's novels are strong but tender stories of women who refuse to abandon the pursuit of magic in their lives.

Lost Lake follows Kate, a recently widowed mother who wakes up after a year of living beneath the haze of grief. Kate is the youngest in a long line of Morris women who fall apart after losing their husbands, but she refuses to let her future be defined by her past. Kate's "awakening" is utterly relatable. Who hasn't experienced the desire to be better, the craving to be more. The sudden realization that the person you have been is no longer the person you want to be.

The pages of Allen's novels are museums of wonder. You think you're reading a book when a word or phrase sneaks up on you and changes your life.

I have to admit, I looked forward to Lost Lake for a long time and some of the plot lines just weren't what I was hoping for. Allen explores the back stories of at least a handful of characters, both major and minor, and while all are carefully crafted portraits of multifaceted people, the plot sometimes gets lost in all the voices. But if you're willing to be patient, Allen is a pro at tying together seemingly unrelated story lines into something cohesive and profound.

I'd recommend Lost Lake and Sarah Addison Allen in general to anyone who turns to books for comfort. Lost Lake is like a hug, hot and sticky in the Florida heat, that you don't want to let go of when it ends.