I'm a homebody at heart, but last week's trip to the D.C. area was something special. Thursday and Friday, there was the visit with Linda and John and our library program. Then I took the Metro from Chevy Chase down to Arlington (I know, I know--everyday stuff for some of you, but something new for this country girl), arriving at the Crystal Gateway Hotel just in time to meet Bill at the check-in desk, back from his afternoon sightseeing around the Mall. We were there to attend Malice Domestic, the annual mystery convention that's always held this time of year.
On Friday night, our publisher (Berkley) hosted a dinner for the Prime Crime authors (some 35 of us) at Ruth's Chris Steak House in Arlington. Here's the just-before-sunset view from the eleventh-floor restaurant window, with planes landing at Reagan International and the capital dome across the river.
We lingered long over dinner, what with wine and good fellowship and dessert and all, and we were feeling pretty rowdy by the time our stretch limo showed up to take us back to the hotel. I think even the most blase among us were impressed (although they tried not to show it). Some of the rest of us might have been just a teensy bit embarrassed (we didn't want to show it either), but it was fun just the same, riding in a limo with fairy lights in the ceiling and dancing lights in the floor and everybody giggling and being generally happy. (The photo is not exaggerated. This baby really WAS this long. One does not want to inquire about its MPG.)
The next morning was my panel--"Homocide in the Garden," or something like that, followed by a book signing, one of those gang affairs where thirty authors are arranged at tables around the perimeter of a large room and people crowd in with books to be signed. I think I might have appeared to be lucid but I can't quite remember (there really was a lot of wine the night before). Then Bill and I had lunch with our editor--a combination business/pleasure sort of thing, a highlight of the weekend--then went off to visit Bill's brother John and wife Gini for a family talk-fest and a visit to a nearby garden. The azaleas were incredible, huge mounds of flowering shrubs flowing in showy sweeps across the grass, and I discovered these lovely little Canterbury bells Spanish bluebells (Hyacinthoides hispanica--thanks, Leslie for the correction!), modest and sweet, blooming in a hidden corner.
And now back home, where I'm finally settling down to work on the next Beatrix Potter book, The Tale of Briar Bank. Ah, feels good. Feels very, very good.
Reading note. By the time you read these words, the I that wrote them will have forgotten what it was, though the it lingers on, haunting the paper, unheard until you happen across it and your energy field activates it.--Margaret Atwood