Post Number 1: Just the Basic Facts

Hello out there! Welcome to my blog!

Let's start with a couple of questions I might have if I were you.

1) What's with the title?

I was born and raised in Fort Worth, Texas, where tornado watches and warnings come with summer, which makes up half of the year. We did tornado drills in school, in which we all ran into the hallway and hid our faces between our knees while sticking our butts in the air, for fear that a tornado might come break all our windows. I never thought this was especially practical, but it was the standard procedure. We got used to the problems that came with tornadoes and the fear that grips you when one is in the area. The first few times you hear those sirens, it's terrifying. After a few years of it, you learn to just stay inside and prepare the candles. There's no telling when the power will go out, but it'll probably be out for a while when it does. If the tornado hits your house, no amount of sticking your butt in the air will save you.

I now live in Shiogama, Miyagi, Japan. That's just north of Sendai. A little over a year ago, we saw one of the biggest seismic events in recorded history. Earthquakes in Japan aren't new, which is precisely why so much of Sendai looks practically the same as before. Earthquake damage isn't what killed people here for the most part. The tsunami on the other hand...

The point is that earthquakes have become my all-too-constant reminder that mother nature has a temper and when it attacks, you don't really get to choose if you live or die. That's my opinion anyway. You can get under a desk. You can get out of the building. You can take cover. Nothing guarantees the success of any of these tasks. Earthquakes have taken over the place in my regular fear-generation-factory that tornadoes used to have.

In my first year in Japan, when I moved to a small mountain town in Gifu prefecture (central Japan, not near here at all), I came up with the title "Trading Tornadoes for Earthquakes" and figured it would be apt for an autobiography if anything interesting happened while I was out here.

That was more than four years ago now, and a lot of life has happened. Here's the synopsis: I fell in love. My company went bankrupt. I moved to the other side of Japan to live with my boyfriend's family. We had a three-fold crazy-ass disaster. Despite differences in culture, class, mother tongue, We got married. We continued living.

And that brings me to now. Follow me as I continue living in Japan and embark on the path to becoming a successful writer!

Is this blog personal or professional? Are you going to talk about writing or Japan or yourself?

I'm going to try to keep things professionally motivated in that I refuse to rant idly. I may post a good deal of impressions that I have of Japan as a foreigner living here. I will also keep you apprised of successes and failures I find as I make the journey toward established author-dom.

Other questions? Ask!