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As an educator, I have spent countless hours in the classroom, and as a writer I’ve spent numerous hours in front of the computer screen as I try to come up with the right words to describe a scene or a character. I am obsessed with choosing the right word and tend to over-edit anything I’ve written—be it a chapter in my novel, an announcement to my students, or a blog post.

Never did I imagine that I’d be in front of a screen as much as I have been this past year. On March 12, 2020, while teaching a late afternoon class on campus, I noticed that an email from a college administrator had landed in my inbox. With the worry over COVID-19 and the news that other campuses in the area had already shifted to remote instruction, we’d all been checking our phones obsessively during class as we awaited the probable news that our college would soon close due to the pandemic and shift to remote instruction.

When I read that our college administrators had announced we’d shift to remote classes, they might as well have told me that a raging fire was headed straight for the campus and would soon destroy everything in its path. I made a few brief announcements in class and told my students we’d be having class via something called Zoom but that I’d probably see them in our usual classroom on campus a couple weeks after spring break.

“Be on the lookout for some class announcements sent via email once I have more information about the shift,” I told them as I hurriedly packed up my class folder and books as I tried to get out of there as fast as possible. After all, a raging fire called COVID-19 was headed our way.

After I answered a few questions from my students, I rushed to my office and grabbed some of my textbooks—expecting to return to the classroom in a few weeks. I saved some important documents on my flash drive then shut down my office computer. I didn’t think to grab the textbooks I use in my fall semester classes—because surely, we’d all be back on campus after spring break or by the end of April at the latest.

Nearly a year later, we are still having remote classes, except now we have a variety of modalities—hybrid, online, and fully synchronous through Zoom. Always resistant to teaching online, I quickly learned last year that online learning isn’t so bad after all because I realized something: Much of the learning and connecting happens in discussion boards and messages written from me to individual students. In other words, writing can help us connect during this pandemic.

My colleagues and I have spent countless hours learning all we can about teaching online. I took a class to become certified to teach online. My colleagues and I have reached out to one another to share ideas and seek advice. We send each other words of encouragement. What we’ve learned is that remote instruction can work. It has to right now as we get through this pandemic.

Years ago, I knew that teaching writing was my calling. I’ve been a writer for as long as I can remember. Even as a child, I knew that words strung together could form detailed sentences, which in turn could create imaginative worlds with vibrant characters and vivid settings.

Anne Sexton wrote a poem simply titled “Words,” in which she admits, “I am in love with words” and adds that “they are doves falling out of the ceiling.” Yet she also warns us that “Words and eggs must be handled with care.”

As I’ve learned during this past year, words indeed must be handled with care. Saying too much or too little is often a decision I face when reaching out to my students. Early in the semester, as a get-acquainted activity, I have the students write a six-word story. These six words often reveal so much about my students—their fears, their triumphs, their goals.

Years ago, when I was an undergrad student at SDSU, I learned simple advice from one of my creative writing instructors. The professor told us about the French writer, Gustave Flaubert, who coined the phrase “le mot juste,” which means “exact word” or “right word” in French. It’s true that writers are always trying to find le mot juste when they write. For me, words enable me to connect with others—be it in the novels I write or through the posts I make in class discussion boards or to students in private messages through our class site.

Although I sometimes miss the energy I feel in the classroom, I’ve discovered that words can bridge the distance between me and my students. Until we can safely return to campus, we will continue with remote instruction, and I look forward to connecting with more of my students through these words on the screen.

(This essay was written based on a writing prompt provided by Heather Sellers at a writing workshop at Esalen in Big Sur, California. With the three-year anniversary of my mom’s death quickly approaching, I thought it fitting to finally post this short essay that I wrote shortly after her death.)

There must be at least a dozen padded beige and white bras stuffed in the top drawer of my mother’s oak dresser. I’d already gone through the sock drawer and the huge bureau of sweaters and T-shirts last week—stuffing it all into large plastic trash bags and putting them in the Goodwill pile. Today it’s bras and underwear. Tomorrow I might tackle the make-up drawer.

My brother says to bag up the undergarments and toss them in the trash. The task seems easy enough—open the drawer, empty its contents into a trash bag, tie it up, and toss that in the trash bin outside. But once I open another drawer, I see my mother’s wedding veil from fifty-five years ago. I push the drawer shut with my knee then slump to the floor and cry–deep, wrenching sobs. I haven’t gone a day without crying since a few days before my mother passed when I knew she’d not survive her stroke.

But today I have a task: to empty the bras and underwear from the dresser and work my way through the rest of her belongings. I dry my tears and open the drawer, pulling out one bra at a time. So far, I count sixteen beige bras, some of them still with price tags from Buffum’s or JCPenney or Macy’s. When I realize they’re not my size (and not my color preference), I drop each bra into the huge black trash bag. Soon, the bag gets full, so I start a new bag and begin to fill it with beige bras and cotton underwear.

* * *

When you’re twelve and your mother buys you your first bra in the Buffum’s lingerie department, you’re embarrassed because you have to go to the teen section where the styles are plain and made out of pastel pink, white, or beige. In the other section are the lacy bras—in colors you’d never imagine wearing. It wouldn’t be until you’re in your mid-twenties when you add more color to your lingerie collection—plum, red, hot pink, black lace.

But at twelve years old, you wore beige—because that’s what your mother wore. After your mom grabs several bras from the teen rack, she carts you into the dressing room and tells you to try on one of the beige bras—size AA, the smallest size Buffum’s sells. When you’re twelve, you don’t want to be seen in the lingerie department at Buffum’s, much less have your mother join you in the dressing room, but you have no choice in the matter. It’s time for you to wear a bra, and you don’t even know how to try one on. You turn your back from your mom, ashamed of your developing body, and let her clasp the hooks in the back. As she stands behind you, she glances at the mirror and scrutinizes whether the cups are the right fit for your small breasts. After she tightens the straps, she tells you she’ll wait for you outside the dressing room. You stand in front of the mirror, perplexed at this image of you as a child wearing a bra.

* * *

As I empty another drawer, I get a call from the mortuary. I put the call on speaker phone and continue to sort through the drawers while I speak with the funeral director. He reminds me that he needs an outfit for my mom, says to bring it no later than this evening. His voice is gentle and calm, but it does nothing to soothe my anxiety as I envision my mother in the casket tomorrow evening at the viewing.

“We usually suggest something long-sleeved that goes up to or close to the neck,” the man says in a calm voice. “No need to bring shoes. The body is only seen from the waist up.”

I think for a moment and consider one of her favorite tops and slacks. “What about socks?” I ask, realizing I’d already bagged up all the socks.

“That’s up to you. That part of the casket is covered, so her feet won’t be showing.”

I imagine my mother lying in the coffin, her bare feet exposed for all of eternity. She has to be buried in socks. I’ll buy her some socks if I have to at the nearby Macy’s. I decide on black slacks and one of her favorite colorful tops—a patterned design with swirls of black, white, and royal blue.

Then I consider everything else she’d normally wear with this top—a necklace, bracelet, and maybe a scarf. And then I think about it but feel awkward to ask. I’m sure funeral directors are asked a variety of odd questions. So, I ask him: “What about . . . undergarments?” This territory of planning a funeral and selecting an outfit for the deceased is all new to me.

“Yes, I would recommend undergarments, at least a bra. It’s up to you if you want to bring underwear.”

I consider how proper my mother was her entire life, how she’d rarely go out in public without make-up. I pull a pair of beige panties from the trash bag next to the dresser and tell the funeral director that I’ll drop off the outfit in a few hours, and then I return to emptying the drawers.         

* * *

Wearing your new beige bra under the pink sweater your mother bought you last week, you sit across from her at a table in the café at Buffum’s, the restaurant your mother typically only went to with her friends when they’d spend the day shopping. But today is different. It’s just you and your mom. Normally you’d prefer to have lunch at Farrell’s or Ruby’s, the food there familiar and normal.

You study the menu but only see one item on the kids’ menu that sounds good: the grilled cheese. You glance at the adult meals and see lots of salads and items you don’t recognize.

Your mom peers over the top of the menu. “You can have a milkshake if you’d like. That usually tastes good with a grilled cheese.”

 From behind the menu, you study all of the entrees, trying to decide which one to pick. “What’s chicken cackatori?”

 “Chicken cacciatore,” she says and laughs quietly. “I’m not sure you’d like that.”

Again, you read through the items on the regular menu and tell your mom you’re thinking of having the pasta primavera. You’re relieved she doesn’t correct your pronunciation of this entrée. Pasta primavera sounds exotic and flavorful, except you don’t even like all of the vegetables included in the dish, but your decision has convinced your mom to order the same thing, except she gets an iced tea, and you get a root beer.

When the waiter sets the food in front of you, the aroma from the pasta wafts up onto your face. When you take the first bite, you realize this is far better than any grilled cheese sandwich off the kids’ menu. Suddenly feeling so grown up, you feel glad to be with your mom instead of out riding your bike with the neighborhood kids. The bra feels stiff to you, and you worry that people can see the straps through the pink sweater. You realize that wearing a bra and eating off the regular menu means you’re no longer a child.

* * *

After I fill another trash bag full of beige cotton underwear, I open another drawer. More bras and panties. But deep under the padded beige bras, I see it—a black lace bra, an anomaly that looks so dramatic against the plain beige bras.

I pull it out by the straps, hold it up like I’m admiring it in the lingerie department at Macy’s, and set it on the plush carpet next to the oak dresser. The task of sorting through my mother’s belongings and selecting an outfit for her burial suddenly feels immense—the grown daughter for the first time picking out an outfit for her mother. Black lace bras don’t belong in the rubbish bin, nor should they be bagged up and carted off to the Goodwill.

As my eyes fill with tears, I sit on the floor and adjust the straps of the bra and set it with the outfit I’ll bring to the mortuary later today.

Late last year, one of my short narrative pieces was published in The Sun magazine. Each month, they have a section in their magazine called “Readers Write.” My piece was published under the theme “Men and Women.”

My mom passed away in June of 2017. It took me a while to start writing about her passing. The following piece is about how my dad and I have moved on since her death. You can see other pieces like mine by clicking on this link:

https://www.thesunmagazine.org/issues/515/men-and-women

Here’s the piece from The Sun:

Ever since my mom passed away a few weeks ago, my dad has wanted to get a pedicure with me. It’s something I always wanted to do with my mom, but I didn’t have a chance before her unexpected death from a stroke.

When my elderly father and I arrive at the nail salon, he insists I get the deluxe pedicure — complete with a warm-towel wrap, massage, and sea-salt exfoliation. The women at the salon know my father by name and express their condolences about my mom. He would bring her there each month and wait patiently for her to get her toes done. Once in a while he would get a pedicure, too.

The only man in the salon, my father settles into the cushioned recliner, rolls up his pants legs, and puts his feet in the tub of hot water. I sit next to him and do the same.

“You have your mother’s feet,” the woman says as she gently massages my calves and soles, and my eyes fill with tears.

When the woman is ready to paint my toenails, she asks me what color. I usually prefer muted tones, but my dad points to a bright polish and tells me it’s the one my mom usually picked. I agree it’s perfect. My father closes his eyes as the woman rubs lotion on his feet. We sit, enjoying our new father-daughter ritual, both missing my mom in our own ways.

This is a blog post I wrote for Regal Crest Enterprise’s holiday blog post. I’m reposting it here on my website to share with my readers (with an added paragraph at the end).

For much of my young adult years, I worked in retail. This was long before I knew I wanted to be an English professor and years before I realized I wanted to pursue a career in writing. My first retail job was at a mall in a store called Kay Bee Toy and Hobby. I started out as a cashier, quickly realizing that a job in a toy store would be busy, especially during the holiday season.

We received two shipments a week during the holidays:  a huge truck filled with cardboard boxes full of Cabbage Patch Dolls, Barbies, Transformers, and Hot Wheels. Whenever we received a new order of Cabbage Patch Dolls during the holidays, we’d have a line outside the door, even before the store opened. Nintendo was also a hot item back then. The phone rang nonstop whenever customers called to ask us which new Nintendo games or Cabbage Patch Dolls arrived or which new Barbie was in stock. On rare occasions, we’d get customers coming into the store looking for classic games, such as Yahtzee, Monopoly, or Life.

But forget closing on time during the holidays when the mall had extended shopping hours. On Christmas Eve, the manager of the toy store would stay open until most of the shelves were empty, even if that meant we’d work overtime until close to midnight. As a young adult trying to save money for college, I never minded getting overtime.

It was during the holiday season when I worked at a mall that I realized that there was a distinct sense of magic in the air when children would wander down each aisle as they made their Christmas lists for Santa. Sometimes, if we were lucky, the mall Santa would make an appearance in the store. We’d tell the kids he was taking inventory of the toys we still had in stock, checking his list to make sure all the kids got what they wanted.

Once we would finally shut and lock the doors on Christmas Eve, we’d do our best to clean up the mess left from the frantic last-minute shoppers. This was my first real job, the first time I felt like I’d worked hard for a paycheck. At nineteen years old, I learned to be grateful for a paycheck to help pay for Christmas gifts for my family and friends. 

I often wonder what became of my fellow Kay Bee Toy and Hobby co-workers. The store has long since closed down, replaced by a cell phone store. Many of the people who worked in the store probably went on to marry and have families; some attended college. Back then, never did I imagine I’d be now working on my third novel and teaching full time at a community college. Like I did when I was just barely out of my teens, I still value hard work and dedication to my job.

When my first novel was just about to be released, I read about the importance of getting book reviews. I researched various book reviewers and read some of their reviews to see what I might expect. The reviews were mostly well-written and quite positive, but I wasn’t sure if book reviews were the key to more book sales.

Right after my novel was released, I realized I needed to get at least one review from a book reviewer. It’s one thing to have close friends say they loved my book, but to have a total stranger read and objectively review my book made me nervous.

With some trepidation, I reached out to a book reviewer. She wrote right back and seemed so receptive to me sending her the PDF of my novel. Mind you, I had fears that she’d release the PDF of my book online, thereby shrinking future sales of my book.  She was incredibly warm in her emails, so I quickly got over my fears and sent her my manuscript.

About two weeks later, the reviewer sent me a link to her review, which she’d posted on her website. The review was glowing and made me swoon with pride that my novel received such a  positive review. But as I read the review, I noticed that she’d revealed a couple surprises in my book–details I wanted the reader to enjoy when reading my book.

Notwithstanding my concerns that some major plot points had been revealed, I’m still pleased with how positive this review was. Here’s a brief snippet from that review:

“What you’ll find in Just Beyond the Shining River . . . is an enthralling mystery, a love from the past still alive in the present and the promise of a second chance at love, of having the kind of connection with another person that lasts more than life itself.”

A few months after my novel had been released, I reached out to a woman named Alice Lowe from the International Virginia Woolf Society. I’ve been a member of the Woolf Society for well over twenty years and have presented papers at Woolf conferences. Alice contributes to a blog about Woolf and is especially intrigued by Virginia Woolf sightings in contemporary literature.

After we discovered that we live only about an hour and a half away from one another, we decided to meet in person for lunch to talk about Woolf, writing, books, art, etc. I gave her a copy of my book, and a few weeks later she wrote and posted such a positive review of my book. Here’s a brief excerpt from that review:

“Lynnette brings London to life throughout the novel. As in Woolf’s own work, I was able to visualize so many scenes and sites, the Chelsea neighborhood of Gemma’s friend, their walks along the Embankment, back lanes of Soho, and more. But it was the story’s frequent surprises, its twists and turns—both Gemma’s and her grandmother’s—that kept me turning the pages.”

The full review can be found here:

https://bloggingwoolf.wordpress.com/2018/05/24/homage-to-woolf-in-lynnette-beers-first-novel/

What I’ve learned is that book reviews are important for any writer. Be it longer book reviews published online or short reviews posted at Amazon from readers, reviews are necessary as a way to spread the word about books.

I rarely meet other Lynnettes/Lynettes, so when I had the opportunity to do an interview, I was intrigued to learn that the person interviewing me was named Lynette (but with one n). As she and I conversed by email to set up the interview, we both got a kick out of emailing someone with the same name (albeit spelled differently).

Recently our very own local Laguna Beach paper, Stu News, did an interview with me about my writing process. I have been interviewed before by college students working on some sort of project for class, but this was the first time I’d been interviewed by a reporter for a newspaper. As a writer and a professor of writing, I often tell my students how important it is to do thorough research and to look at all different angles of a topic. When Lynette Brasfield sent me her detailed questions, I knew right away that she’d done her research. Her questions were specific, unique, and engaging. The questions got me thinking about what a reader might experience while reading my novel. Lynette read my novel and came up with unique questions to ask me about my book and about my writing process. Here’s an excerpt of the interview:

“Author Lynnette Beers talks about her novel, Just Beyond the Shining River, and her writing process” (by Lynette Brasfield)

Laguna resident Lynnette Beers, a professor at [Santiago Canyon College], is also the author of Just Beyond the Shining River, an engaging, lyrical novel set partly in London and partly in Los Angeles. In the book, not long after a breakup with her lover, Gemma Oldfield learns that her grandmother has died. She leaves LA for England. Once there, Gemma embarks upon a quest to understand why her grandma took so many secrets to the grave. In the process, Gemma meets an intriguing woman who has the potential to change her life – and, after shocking facts are unveiled about Gemma’s grandmother and mother, she is faced with making some difficult choices.

Getting published by a traditional press, rather than self-publishing, is extremely difficult these days. Congratulations on your achievement! Can you talk about some of the challenges you encountered along the way? At a writers’ conference a few years ago, I pitched my book to an agent. She cut me off right after I mentioned that my book takes place in the pre-smart phone era of 1997 and also when the AIDS crisis was plaguing places all over the world. The agent told me that wasn’t an interesting enough story. She mentioned that people won’t want to read a story about characters having to find a computer to check email and added that today, people get emails on their phones. She also said that 1997 is “almost-history,” which according to her doesn’t sell.  Well, she was wrong. The “almost-history” element of my story has sold lots of books so far. The 1990s were so different than today when it comes to LGBTQ rights. In the 1990s, same-sex marriage was not legal, and many were shunned by society for being gay. I wanted to tell a story about love between two people that hopefully transcends any sort of long-ago laws that condemned people who happened to be gay.

Did you have any goals/messages in mind with this book, or were you driven strictly by the urge to tell a good story in style? (Which you do, so I imagine the latter is the case!)
Initially, I had no messages in mind with my book, and as you imagined, I was driven by the urge to tell a good story. But in retrospect, I realize that there is a message in my story – that love is love, no matter the sexual orientation, age, era, etc.

And the book certainly does appeal to people of different orientations, I can testify to that. I enjoyed it very much – loved the elegant prose, the depth of characterization, and also the plot twists at the end. I wanted to ask, do you garden? I noticed so many wonderful references to the presence and scents of flowers, from jasmine/gorse/sweet pea/blackberries and so much more!
This is such a great question! I actually don’t garden, but my mother did up until about a year before she passed. As a child and teen, we had a vegetable garden each summer, but that’s the limited extent of gardening for me. However, I love gardens. When I’m in London, I wander through places such as Chelsea Physic Garden (which is mentioned in my book), Hyde Park, Kensington Gardens, and Battersea Park (also mentioned in my book). As I wrote my novel, I did extensive research about gardening, flowers, trees, blackberries, etc. I took a couple tours of Chelsea Physic Garden and asked a bunch of questions – especially about medicinal plants and about where certain flowers and trees grow and under what conditions. I even felt the bark of trees, smelled the flowers in the gardens, and examined the berries and thorns on blackberry bushes. There’s a sense of peace I get when I wander through a lush garden, like the flowers and trees feed my soul.

You’re an expert on Virginia Woolf. How specifically has she influenced either your writing or your approach to writing, would you say?
When I was in graduate school, I became intrigued with Virginia Woolf’s writing. I took a class focusing on modernism and twentieth century British authors. As I read novels by Woolf, I became more intrigued. My professor at the time, the late Dr. Terri Brint Joseph, encouraged me to attend the Virginia Woolf conference. I then became intrigued with Woolf’s diaries and letters. That’s when I got the idea for my own book – to tell part of the story in old letters. I ended up attending more Woolf conferences and presented papers. As far as Woolf’s approach to writing, I do think I follow some of her writing patterns or “habits,” one of which is to fully immerse myself in the story, characters, setting, etc. But I don’t follow the same writing style that Woolf did. Frankly, I don’t think the stream of consciousness style works as well today as it did in the early twentieth century. Prose today is much more concise compared to previous eras.

What do you enjoy most about writing fiction? Plot/characters? What do you find most challenging? I loved the twist at the end.
I usually have a rough idea of what will happen (location/setting, characters, etc.), but as the characters develop, often the storyline goes into way different directions. So, to answer your question, I think what I enjoy most is how my own story can surprise me.

What advice would you offer would-be authors?
My advice for would-be authors is to not give up. I think a certain level of talent/writing ability has to be there, but too many wannabe authors say, “I want to write a book someday” but never actually do it. Writing a book takes hard work and dedication, but for me I find that I can’t not write. I could be in class while my students are taking an exam, and I get the urge to edit a chapter or to jot a few notes down to add to my manuscript later. For would-be authors, I do find it’s a good idea to join a writer’s group if there’s a need for accountability. Some writers need due dates and nudges from a teacher or a fellow writer.

Where is your book available? And what are you working on now?
I’ve just finished a second novel titled Saving Sam. The genre of this book is romance-intrigue with much more mystery than my first book. This second book will be published hopefully by next summer.

Just Beyond the Shining River is available from Amazon–in print and e-book formats.

Thank you so much, Lynnette.