The first time I was on TV, the local news interviewed me in a Stop and Shop parking lot while I used a flipper to clear snow from my windshield during a blizzard. The roads were so bad, I didn’t get home in time to watch the evening news. My disappointment over missing my debut was way out of proportion to the situation.

The second time I was on TV was an entirely different story. I bugged followed up with the producer of Off The Page, a local cable show that interviews Colorado authors, a number of times over email until she scheduled an interview. A few days prior, I started to really think about the kinds of questions she might ask and practice my answers. A few hours prior, still unsure about what to wear, I raced through the racks at Violette like a coked up Supermarket Sweep contestant.

I worried I would look fat on camera. I worried I’d watch three seconds of the interview, cringe at the sound of my own voice, and have to turn it off.

When it aired a couple weeks later, Dan and I watched together. I was relieved to find that it was not cringe-worthy. It was fine. It was better than fine, actually. Except for one thing. I looked old. Up to now, I didn’t know I needed to worry about that.

I told myself maybe it was all in my head. But when I mentioned it to Dan, he agreed.

“You looked distinguished,” he said.

Maybe he thought he was doing the right thing by validating me. Maybe he thought it was a compliment. After all, George Clooney is distinguished and he is quite attractive. And like me, he has Bell’s Palsy. But I do not aspire to look like George Clooney.

“You think I look distinguished.” I spit the last word out like a bitter choke cherry.

“You know who is distinguished?” His smile was eager, optimistic. Was he really going to try and dig himself out of this hole with more nonsense?

“WHO!?” I demanded. “Ruth Bader Ginsburg!? My grandmother? Never mind. I don’t actually want to know who you think is distinguished. Just please stop talking.”

With that, he placed his shovel aside. Hot and sexy have been the only words he’s used to describe my appearance since then. In his defense, he later explained he was trying to use a word that meant both older and sexy.

And there you have it,  the story behind the story. I will never know if my second TV appearance was any better than my first. I do know that despite the ravages of time… or perhaps because of my, ahem, maturity, I said what I meant to say and I had a lot of fun.

Some topics we covered in the interview:

The unique story behind my book, There’s No Room For Fear in a Burley Trailer (see for yourself, here)
The meaning of the title and why the book was almost named You Could Be Homeless.
Why I started blogging
How I decide what to publish on my blog versus what I submit to other websites
My experiments with flash fiction, specifically Mash Stories
The 30-Day writing challenge my friend Susan and I created for ourselves—and the dreaded consequence for failure to comply with the rules.
What to do if you have writer’s block
How writing is like running
Why I’d be a fabulous guest speaker at your group’s next event
Where you can purchase There’s No Room For Fear in a Burley Trailer (Online at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or directly through me. Locally, you can find signed copies at The Mama’hood, Flatirons Running Inc., and Full Cycle).