Howard
Christmas on Colony Island
Q: Do the residents of Colony Island celebrate Christmas?
A: Over the decades, there have been a number of attempts to bring the Gospel to Colony Island. While the Unitarians[1] seemed to make the most headway, the blank looks which all the missionaries received, when discussing things theological, were very discouraging. In the end, they left in search of an audience not quite as tough as the merfolk. The residents, meanwhile, resumed their folk religion centered on Poseidon.
The islanders are cognizant of mainland holidays to varying degrees. While they do not celebrate Easter, the Academy holds Easter-egg hunts – both on-shore and off – for the children. New Year’s Day is widely observed on Colony Island as the mer see the new year as a new beginning. The Tench Family has its own private ritual to mark the occasion.
Christmas is harder to avoid. Those Mer who have regular interaction with humans on the mainland are the ones most favourably disposed towards the holiday. They will often buy gifts for their human co-workers and friends.
Before Penelope chose her human mate, Christmas was celebrated – very quietly – by the only human on Colony Island and his family. Things will slowly begin to change once Peter MacPherson arrives on the scene.
[1] Ironically, many members of the Royston Enclave are active in the local Unitarian-Universalist fellowship.
Christmas: Threat or Menace?
Q: Dear Madison,
It has regretfully come to my attention that a certain household celebrated Christmas this year with garish lights on their house and, of all things, a Christmas tree. What is this island coming to??
It won’t be long before households from one end of Colony Island to the other will be doing this and the next thing you know, the residents will be acting more and more like – I shudder at the thought of it – humans. This will only encourage more humans will to come live among us, and pretend they’re Mer.
While it is flattering that humans want to emulate us, the reality is they can never truly become one of us, no matter how hard they may try. We need to nip all this in the bud before things go too far.
I am sure you will want to join my campaign to put an immediate halt to this nonsense and escort any and all humans who have tried to insinuate themselves, to the town limits. Once they are out of our sight, we can demolish that ridiculous little bridge and consider returning to the sea where we belong.
Sincerely,
Samia Marinos
A: Dear Samia,
You will, no doubt, be surprised to learn that Helen and Avery Johnson have celebrated Christmas ever since his arrival on the island. What’s more, their eldest son and his mate celebrate Christmas even though they are good Poseidonians like the rest of us. As I understand it, Avery’s family on the mainland was never much for decorating the outside of their houses for the holidays. Avery has so far followed suit though this may change in the coming years.
I’ve had a chance to interview the mermaid of that certain household on 9th St. and she revealed what a wonderful time they all had. According to her, Christmas has helped bring her family even closer together. Both she and her mate consider themselves very fortunate that their daughter chose a human.
We have had number of humans join us over the years and there are quite a few residents who thank Poseidon that Peter MacPherson has come to live with us.
As for the Christmas lights, there is a small number of households who are considering lighting their homes next year and the trend will no doubt continue. Like it or not, these mainlanders are here to stay and I, for one, am thankful for that.
Madison
Phagocytize
Q: What does phagocytize mean?
A: Phagocytize – or more properly, Phagocytise – means to consume or devour (something) by Phagocytosis. This is the method by which amoebae (pl. of amoeba) consume food.
If you remember your elementary school biology, an amoeba will engulf a food particle by extending parts of its body – called pseudopods – to encircle the particle and create a food vacuole within its endoplasam.
In the first chapter of Urban Mermaid, the author uses this term to describe how the surrounding vegetation is slowly engulfing the car park next to the boat ramp and dock.
For Extra Credit
The root word of Phagocytize is the Greek word, phagos, a derivative of the word phágein which means ‘to eat’. A phage is something that eats or consumes. This is regularly conjoined with the word, ‘bacteria’, to form bacteriophage which is a virus that eats or consumes bacteria.
In 1974, the author returned to the campus of North Carolina Wesleyan College following a week’s absence due to the death of his father. The author was taking Microbiology that year, and in his absence, a lab experiment with E. Coli – B and the T2 bacteriophage had failed to produce the expected results.
The author suspected that the E. Coli culture had become contaminated and set about creating a new, pure culture. Following that, he replicated the experiment and achieved the desired results. The author received an ‘A’ for the course and got to skip the final exam.
Several years later, the author was working on his master’s degree at Georgia State University. The lab for his course in Virology included the same experiment and, like so many others in that course, flopped. To be precise, it flopped for everyone in the course except the author.
Happy Holidays
Silly Humans
Dear Madison,
The other evening, my daughter was doing some research on the internet for her class project at The Academy. I happened to be looking over her shoulder when she pulled up a drawing of a mermaid. The depiction had a very silly sort of tail but what was even more shocking was the artist had covered each breast with a starfish.
At first, I thought it was just some fool of an artist’s vision of what we really look like but the more I searched, the more pictures I found of mermaids with silly tails and starfish covering their – usually huge – breasts. These pictures are not only ridiculous, they’re insulting.
Just what is it with humans and breasts? It’s just a nipple, for Poseidon’s sake! I didn’t see starfish covering the nipples of mermen. Can you help explain these outlandish drawings?
Baffled by Humans
Dear Baffled,
I’m still trying to wrap my head around the mind-boggling approach mainlanders take concerning female breasts. I can understand the silly ideas about our tails because most of them have never seen a real live mermaid and we want to keep it that way. But breasts? Really?
I put in a call to our resident expert on mainlanders, Peter MacPherson. While it did take him a little while to adjust to our rational attitude concerning our bodies – with or without our tails – he doesn’t understand why humans are like this, either. While we may be more like humans than we care to think, we are still oceans apart on some things.
What makes this whole thing hilarious is that these artists don’t seem to understand anything about starfish, either. As you no doubt know, members of the class Aseroidia have their mouths on the underside of their central disc. This means that their mouths are attached to the mermaid’s . . . well, you get the idea.
Madison
My Yiddishe Mermaid
Q: Do you think there could be such things as Jewish Mermaids?
A: Jewish Mermaids are well within the realm of plausibility. However, lighting the Shabbat candles could prove to be problematic. Perhaps they use bio luminescent jelly fish instead of candles.
Happy Hanukkah
The story thus far . . .
Urban Mermaid has been on the market for less than a week and I’m starting to see a few sales. Since book publicists cost an arm and a leg – I’m sure they earn every penny of their fees – I’ll be doing a lot of the publicity myself.
There’s a perfect opportunity to do this in Greensboro, NC on Jan. 2 & 3, 2016 and I’m going to have to miss it because of my regular job. I will go into work around 10:30 PM on Jan. 1st and will not be done until 3 or 4 AM. Driving directly to Greensboro from Richmond, VA might have been an option in my college days but it’s definitely off the table now.
The event in Greensboro is a sort of mermaid convention and is an ideal place to stir up interest and maybe even some sales. There’s bound to be other opportunities in other towns . . . just none as good as this one.
Besides putting up the tree and baking gingerbread cookies over the holidays, I’ll also be devoting a good bit of my time to working on publicity and getting the word out. After the first of the year, I’ll be running a series of give-aways here on ColonyIsland.com and plan to have some serious swag up for grabs towards the end of January. Just one more reason to stop by and see what’s happening.
Now Available
Happy St. Andrews Day!
I am pleased to announce Urban Mermaid, the first installment in the Tails From Colony Island series, is now available for purchase in both paperback and e-book editions. The book is published by Moonlight Gardens Publications, an imprint of Gazebo Gardens Publishing, LLC.
I would like to thank Shelly & Caitlyn Moore at Gazebo Gardens for all their hard work in getting this book ready for publication, Ilsie Om at The Woodsy Fawn for her wonderful cover design, Emm Cole, S.K. Munt, Pete Tarsi, and everyone else who contributed in one way or another to the pre-publication process.
Finally, I would like to thank Judi, my bride of 40 years for all of her encouragement and ongoing support as well as reading the first draft, even when fantasy books just aren’t her thing.
Given that the holidaze are upon us, I am forgoing the traditional launch parties, blog tours, etc. until after the first of the year. Everyone has so much to do between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day . . . including me.
Stop by colonyisland.com to keep up with The Latest.
ISBN
978-1-938281-72-3 Paperback
978-1-938281-73-0 E-Book
The Light At The End Of The Tunnel
Oh rapture! Oh bliss!
Seriously, I’ve discovered that there is light at the end of the tunnel and it’s not merely an oncoming train. Urban Mermaid now has a firm release date – November, 30th, 2015. Be still, my heart!
The thirtieth of November is St. Andrew’s Day. For those of ye wha’ may no ken, Saint Andrew is the patron saint of Scotland and since one of the main characters is named Macpherson, I think that the 30th is quite appropriate.
I had originally planned to hold a launch party on the release day but the Holiday season will be in full swing a week from today. Trying to shoehorn a launch party in everything involved with the run-up to Hanukkah, Christmas, and the feast of Mithras is a non-starter. Instead, I’m going to try and see if I can get something going on January 30th – maybe a launch party/book signing at Barnes and Noble in Charlottesville.
Meanwhile, there’s fruitcakes to bake and gifts to buy. Yes, Virginia, there is light at the end of the tunnel.
By The Way, I’ll make a formal announcement on the 30th of November. Stay tuned.
