On this, my “day off,” I’m working through writing three chapters for the book. While stumbling across some old writing, I realized that for today my three favorite words are “full frontal freakout.” I want to start a band so that I can name it that. I want to print a zine with that as a writing theme. I want to name the book that but somehow Full Frontal Freakout: One Untraditional Bride’s Guide to Weird Weddings just doesn’t quite work.

That said, I’m in no kind of full frontal freak-out right now. I’ve had the best day ever with myself, eating delicious vegetabley leftovers from my domestic dinner success on Friday, going for walks, drinking endless cups of Yerba Maté and cranking out chapters like my fingas are on fiyah!

ON FIYAH, MOFOS!

According to my geeky chapter map spreadsheet, I am 42.21% done with my book. That should be closer to 50% by the time I go to sleep tonight. Also: does the fact that I map my chapters on a spreadsheet make me some sort of cheat? Aren’t writers supposed to be tortured artists with needles hanging out of their arms? I guess those are just novelists. Those of us who do non-fiction might get a different stereotype. May I submit for your consideration the overcaffeinated, slightly cooked geek as the new stereotype? Thank you.

My book contract, originally uploaded by .Ariel.
… now all I have to do is finish writing the book! I’m a little over one third of the way through.

When I first starting thinking about book ideas, many of the revolved around my stories. I’m a writer: of course I want to tell MY STORIES. But as part of Offbeat Bride, I’m getting to hear about some of the most amazing wedding stories. The pair who married underwater. The couple who produced a whole stage performance called Wedding! The Musical. The couple who got married at Glastonbury and have great photos of them muddy and in love laying on the ground at the festival. Straight weddings, gay weddings, geeky weddings, hippie weddings, rock weddings, fucking awesome parties that just so happened to be weddings.

A few years ago I found myself, as an essayist, considering writing a book — a 70,000 word project seemed somewhat daunting. But now I’ve realized that’s because jesus: my stories aren’t THAT fucking interesting. Honestly. But when I have other people’s stories to share? HA! Why didn’t anyone tell me that not only would it make writing my book more feasible, it would make it a pure fucking joy. People do awesome things when they play with the concept of commitment and ceremony and weddings.

Think of it: supposedly the cost of an American wedding is currently averaging around $25,000. Even if you spend far, far less than that, when was the last time you threw a party where you let yourself spend even $1,000? Never. The only parties where you spend money like that are weddings and funerals. It’s not even really an issue of dollar amount — it’s an issue of resources like time and attention.

So, it’s really cool to see what my fellow freaks do with a party when they’ve got the resources to really do it up, even when it’s far, far less than the national average. These stories are far, far more delicious than the national average.

Now if only I had a little more time to work on the book … it’s getting to the point where I’m like a floating brain: all I do is write and think at work and then come home and write and think some more. I’ve barely seen friends since September, and Seattle Hermit Season has only just very barely begun and I’m already in full creative retreat mode. Please, won’t you tap the glass of my formaldehyde jar?

Take a minute to meet the lab rats

You can read profiles and see pictures of a few of the women quoted in the book by checking out the lab rats archive!

I had a busy morning catching up on all my chores and bills and then it was 2 o’clock and I looked at my list and what’s next on it? “Write STD Card* chapter of book.” But you know what? I felt about as inspired as a … as a … um, really uninspired person.

So, I defaulted to my favorite Plan B: I took a shower and then a nap. While I was sleeping I had a long circuitous dream about singing. (Tip for those who haven’t known me all my life: I used to be an active vocalist, even getting a vocal scholarship for college. I abruptly stopped singing in 1994 and haven’t done so much as karaoke since then.) In the dream, I was brainstorming for an album I was going to be recording, trying to compose the songs I would sing. I was forcing it, and nothing was working. Then I stopped and tried just freestyling and scatting and this perfect peal of joy came out of my mouth and the song made perfect sense and the clarity of my voice was surprising even to my own ears. The lyrics were something like ‘Baby, my life is un-defeatable …”

That’s pretty much the best dream ever in terms of lifting me out of an afternoon creative slump. A vision of finding my own voice? I’ll take it! I woke up and started writing immediately. No guarantee it’s great writing, but my writing is conversational and my process is all about verbal diarrhea. Once I can get the spigot of written feces flowing, things usually work out just fine. Added bonus: I slept through the hours that are consistently an energetic black hole for me: 3 – 5 p.m.

• STD Card is definitely the best wedding phrase ever!

Tonight I had dinner with a beloved old friend and she was asking me about my book. I was telling her about how weird it is, after years of writing for other people, to be writing for myself. I explained about how I told my editor how I’d need lots of feedback initially, “You know,” I said. “Until I nail the right tone.”

My editor reassured me that she’d give me as much feedback as I needed, “but you’ve already got the right tone,” she explained. “You’ve already got the voice for the book.” Buh?! I do? Really? Oh! Right! I haven’t been hired to take on someone else’s voice in exchange for money. This isn’t a word whore project. This is MY BOOK. I guess I use … my voice?!

Weird.

Then my old friend asked me what exactly that voice was. It was a simple question, and in trying to give her a simple answer I stumbled over a five word mission statement that pretty much sums how I write.

Conversational. Accessible. Profane. Funny. Pedantic. Not sure if that last one is good or bad, but it’s certainly apt.

In further navel gazing, I have yet to figure out how much I should write about the process of writing this book over the next 10 months. Writing about writing makes for some damn dull reading, and maybe it takes some of the magic out of the finished product to hear all the tooth gnashing and hand wringing that went into it. I’m not sure yet. I mean, it’s not that I won’t write about the process — it’s just whether to bore you lot with it, or whether to write it down for myself.

My book deal has been making industry newsletters, much to my agent’s pleasure.

Electrolicious.com blogger Ariel Meadow Stallings’s AND THE BRIDE WORE A HULA HOOP, helping brides-to-be buck tradition and create a unique wedding, to Brooke Warner at Seal Press, in a nice deal, by Liz Coen at Stuart Krichevsky Agency.

Hurrah!

After 18 months of incubation and hard work on various permutations of proposals, I just sold my first book! Seal Press will release my trade paperback debut, a memoir/handbook chimera with a working title of And the Bride Wore A Hula Hoop, in January 2007. Hurrah!

I’m not sure how much I can/should say just yet, but there are currently two publishers expressing serious interest in my book proposal. As you might imagine, this is very exciting news.