.SOMETIMES RAW.

So, I have done it again. My new book is in the making and will hopefully be published in August 2023. Fingers crossed. It gets more and more difficult to pass the proofreading requirements of diverse publishers so nobody gets offended. If you read my articles for a while or know me you will be aware of “my mouth” and that I love to speak up and point my finger at things that sometimes hurt. Even if it may be wiser to shut up?! Thankfully, I am good with words to still get across what I want to say, ha! So what is my new book about and what is the title you may ask?

The title: I was told there would be Cake. Essays.

Cool! And what is it about? It is a good book. Probably my best one. It has a cover and many pages. This book is endorsed by parents and is church-friendly. It is designed to offend no one. It does not mention war, sex, politics, depression, alcohol, violence, scantily dressed women (any mentions of women, really), smelly fish, hungry caterpillars, or drugs, except for the addictive power of prayer.

There is absolutely no pronoun ideology in this book. This is a sample sentence:

Daniela White is going to the park because the father of Daniela White is there. Daniela White and the mother of Daniela White are biologically women.

Big words? Not in here. This book operates on the understanding that education is hard and painful.

This book does not mention homosexuality or anything that could be construed as “queer.” There are no rainbows. The only colour allowed is a neutral grey.

I’m sorry—one publisher just informed me that grey is the colour of asexuality, and so the only colour now allowed is blank.

What colour is blank? It’s a beautiful cousin of eggshell white.

There are no strange or foreign-sounding names in this book. In fact, all the characters have good Christian names with clear and established Western European etymologies. They can be pronounced by anyone.

There are no opinions in this book. Only facts, like the sky is blue.

Daniela White is only interested in interacting with reality, which is what we call it when one woman follows all the rules laid out by her benevolent boss. This is a sample sentence:

Daniela White looked at an email sent out about how to address characters in her new book and says, “Hooray, this is so much fun. Let me rewrite everything because I forgot the pronoun and gender issue. But, Hooray!”

My book was crafted to live within any library and bookstore in the world. It was written so that it appeals and satisfies every single reader on this planet and no one gets offended. All additional explanations were clearly listed in the authors’ biography section, which I had removed just in case. In my book, no one leads children astray by the power of pink dresses for girls or blue t-shirts for boys, and everyone washes their hands after they pee without being reminded one million times a day. This book has no rising action or any kind of climax. There are no villains or anything morally grey—sorry, I mean morally eggshell. There are no character arcs or anything as pretentious as a plot.

This book has no illustrations. No headings. No fonts that might be too curvaceous or aggressive. No periods because that’s basically an abortion. No spaces because they might be unsafe. No underlining because it implies toplining, which implies a top and therefore implies a bottom—both of which are known to be gay directions.

There are no analogies in this book. No symbolism or any other kind of radical left or right ideology. Nobody majors in humanities, and gender studies. There are no metaphors like butterflies or uncaged birds.

No commas, parentheses, dashes, participles, gerunds, subjects, or split infinitives, as the only person who can split anything is Moses, are used.

What this book does have is a sturdy cover and pages filled with neutral abstract art generated in a tasteful colour of pale alabaster. It was formulated to match the words, which are printed in cream, blending in seamlessly with the background of blank.

When you pick up this book, you will see the ideal book form: page after page of pure, empty space.

That is why it can never be banned, and this is what makes it a good book according to certain unnamed publishers.

You know I am kidding, right?! With poignant candor, humor and thought-provoking articles, I write about emotional and powerful thoughts, parenting, and inspiration while chronicling my life with my own ups and downs. Smart, edgy, hilarious, sometimes raw and unabashed raunchy.

Stay tuned for my awesome sixth book to come out soon.

They say honesty is the best policy. But is it? It is. Actually, honesty is one of the qualities I find most attractive in a person. (Another one is nice hands.)

Honesty is so important and yet a lot of times it’s hard to find in people. I am not saying any of you are liars. I don’t know you. I am sure you are sweet and nice and have never “accidentally” dropped a speeding ticket down a garbage disposal. Maybe you have never uttered so much as a fib (unimportant lie) in your whole entire lives. But let’s face it, you probably have. We all have. Well, I haven’t. I am always honest. 

Okay, see? That was a lie. And I am sorry. We might not go around spewing huge, sweeping, outrageous lies, but in one way or another most of us lie every now and again. I actually read a statistic that on average people lie four times a day. I don’t know exactly what four lies people are telling each day but I do know that people tend to lie about their age, their weight, their natural hair color, and how cute their friends’ babies are. “What a cutie-pie. Look at those ears! They are…. oooooh s*** one can’t miss them! But so cute.” 

I also know that people lie on their résumés. People lie under oath. People lie to their doctors, which I have never quite understood. I know you might be embarrassed about how you got that bite on that particular part of your body, but you have to be honest about it so a trained professional can help you. 

I really try my best not to lie. That’s true. I try to give my honest opinion on things. I try to tell it like it is. Give it to them straight. Lay it on the line. Be up-front. Keep it real. Not say false… stuff. I don’t know any other sayings. I try not to lie. 

Sometimes it’s hard because I don’t like to hurt people’s feelings. So there have been times when a friend will get a haircut and I will see it and my initial reaction is “Oh my God, you look like a stray cat who got caught in a wind tunnel.” But I obviously can’t say that because that would be an insult to cats. So I have to say, “I love it! It looks great!” But when I say it my voice goes up about three octaves. “It looks greeeeaaaaat!” So I am certain they know I am lying. 

How come when we lie our voices go up so many octaves? It’s a dead giveaway. Every time, people! It happens when we dole out compliments we don’t mean and it happens when we say things like “You didn’t have to get me anything!” and “You haven’t been invited back to the house since the urn incident of 2004.” And it’s a mathematical fact: the higher the octave, the bigger the lie. “I didn’t even hear my phone ring!” is usually like a four on the scale. “You think I am sleeping with someone eeeeeelse?!” is off the charts. 

I can tell when people are lying to me when they start their sentence with “I have to be honest with you.” They may as well say, “Listen, I am about to lie straight to your face.” Why do people need to clarify when they are being honest? Does that mean everything else they have ever said has been a lie? Yesterday they said they liked my sweater, but they didn’t say they were being honest. Does that mean they hated it? 

It’s so strange to me. It almost feels like they are giving me the option to not hear the truth. As if when they say, “I have to be honest with you,” I might say, “No, no. Please. Only lies right now.” 

For the most part, we are honest people. Which is good because when you think about it everything around us is based on the honor system. Look at the airport baggage claim. We all stand around a conveyor belt totally unsupervised and all those bags are there for anyone to take. I know because I was at the a couple of years ago and I took four. I got some good stuff – three oranges, four mangos and a large man’s nightshirt. 

There are a lot of places that rely on us to be honest. Banks put out candy and hope you only take one or two pieces. Restaurants put out toothpicks. Libraries have those giant statues of lions out front. They are practically begging us to get a crane and a flatbed truck to cart those things away. 

Think of how honest we are expected to be when we go to the movies. We pay for one ticket but in theory, we can sneak into as many theaters as we want once we are inside. We can even pay the child’s price and sneak in our own popcorn and vegan appetizers. Not that I have eeeeeever done that. (three octaves)

And as much as certain people and places rely on us to be honest, we rely on others to be honest with us. I mean, in the U.S. you hand over your car keys to a complete stranger at the valet parking just because he is wearing a vest. (By the way, now you know why I wear a lot of vests and have too many cars.) It’s nice to think we can trust each other. It would be depressing to walk around every day thinking people are lying to us all the time. I prefer to believe people are good and honest and respect me enough to tell me the truth. It’s not easy to find those people all the time, but they are out there. They are usually the people who don’t hesitate to tell you when you look tired or that you have spinach between your teeth. They might be blunt and sometimes they might hurt your feelings with their candor, but honestly? You will in the end appreciate it. 

But especially to mine. I love you, mom. No matter what. And of course, to me.

This is a clarification on how urgently your mom needs to talk to you, based on what she left you on your voicemail.

Voicemail: “Hi, sweetie. No big news over here—and no rush to call me back.”

Urgency: I am bursting to tell you HUGE NEWS. (The township finally paved over that pothole.)

– – –

Voicemail: “Hi, sweetie, just calling to say hi. Nothing’s wrong.”

Urgency: Something definitely is gravely wrong.

– – – 

Voicemail: “Hi, sweetie. There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you, but it’s not important. Talk to you later.”

Urgency: We had to put the dog down. Two months ago.

– – – 

Voicemail: “Hey, sweetie, how’s it going? We’re good here. I have a tiny favour to ask, no big deal if you can’t—I know you’re busy.”

Urgency: Dad was in a terrible accident and lost a lot of blood. The hospital is out of the unusual blood type you and he share. He’ll die if you don’t come to the hospital to donate blood within the next hour.

– – – 

Voicemail: “Hey, sweetie, I have a question for you—nothing urgent. Don’t even bother calling back if you’re too busy.”

Urgency: Someone has accidentally pushed the button to launch one thousand nuclear missiles in every direction. Only you know the “abort launch” code, which must be input within the next forty-five seconds to prevent the extinction of all humanity.

– – – 

Voicemail: “Hey, sweetie, how are you? I miss you, hon. Okay, love you. Bye!”

Urgency: The second glass of wine just kicked in. Within ten minutes, I will forget I made this call.

– – – 

Voicemail: “Hey, sweetie—nothing big going on, but call me back as soon as you can.”

Urgency: Dad and I are both dead. This voicemail is coming from heaven, where children never screen their mother’s calls and always answer on the first ring.

– – – 

Voicemail: “Call me back right away. It’s an emergency.”

Urgency: Someone I think you went to school with is on the local news.