Home, Sweet Home

There was no room for ruby slippers in my carry-on, and the Converse didn't seem to have any transport magic in them, but the United puddle-jumper was on time and San Francisco had clear skies, and I got a fantastic sky view of the Golden Gate Bridge, Golden Gate Park, and the City as the pilot circled and banked and gave us quite a show on the final flight of The Running Dream tour. I came home to flowers and a welcome-home cake and an impressively tidy house. And I just didn't want to stop hugging m'boys. If you've been following my posts for the past two weeks, you know that going on a book tour like this is not the glamorous excursion one might think. It's a lot of hard work. School visits during the day, presentations at bookstores at night. And it all starts to blur together, which can be disturbing. What day is it? What is my hotel room number? Who is my driver today? It gets pretty lonely. I only had one meal in the company of people I knew. The rest were on the run or in my room....or just skipped. So seeing familiar faces, or getting little comments on the blog, or mail in my in-box...it all helped more than you can imagine. Thinking back on the bright spots, here are some that buoyed me along:

• Having a former student show up at a Chicago booksigning. It was nice to just sit and chat and talk about writing. It was also great to see him again!
• Meeting my "twisty-tie" pen-pal and her family who drove 2 hours to meet me at a library event in St. Charles.
• Getting a picture of my two darling nieces (who I think are actually second cousins?) from my cousin in California (the picture posted) to let me know they'd bought the book and were reading!
• Getting messages from Mark and Roberta and Caradith and Elizabeth and Brenda and Greg and Mary-Mary and MaryLou...just checking up, checking in. Friends indeed!
• Seeing The Wadhams! Blueberry Hill Diner! Chuck Berry! The Duck Room! Burgers and PIE!
• Meeting optimistic4ever -- good grief. I can't believe you weren't going to tell me!
• Discovering "Amy" is...Amy! Good grief. I can't believe I can be so dense.
• Walking into Hicklebee's and hearing our Risky Whippet CD blaring over the speakers.
• My "homecoming" at Hicklebee's -- what a store, what a staff, what a home-away-from-home.
• Hugging Walter.
• Having my cousin Rolf and his family and dad show up at a booksigning. It's really nice when family doubles as friends and makes the effort to turn out.
• Having people in three different cities come because they read my post on John Scalzi's blog.
• Discovering that the two couples with big bags sitting near the front of the room during a bookstore event were collectors...and had first printings of all of my books--even How I Survived Being A Girl.
• Meeting Amanda and seeing Ryan. (who I met at an airport years ago)...and reading their package of letterboxing fun (Sammy Keyes and the Ham Sandwich!).
• Having a principal tell me I was a "firestorm of inspiration."
• Reading the comments posted on this blog--thank you for following along and for taking the time to write.
• Discovering that the audience at my last bookstore event held two sets of three-generation Sammy Keyes readers--Grandma, Mom, and Daughter--all having read every book.
• Hugging Mark at the airport.

Thanks to everybody, vocal or not, who traveled along with me through the past two weeks' posts. And thanks to my awesome in-laws for holding down the fort while I was away. It's good to be home.

For next week, if you're curious about some aspect of touring that I didn't touch on in the last two weeks, ask away -- I'll do my best to answer.

See you then!