Please help us welcome our special guest Sarah Wendell, co-blogger extraordinaire (Smart Bitchy, Trashy Books blog) and co-author of the book, BEYOND HEAVING BOSOMS, an irreverent, sarcastic but always affectionate look at romance novels.

Sarah is one helluva smart, funny, gracious, lady, so please help us welcome her!

Reading, Writing, and Worrying: A Smart Bitch Mommy’s Ruminations

I’ve been thinking in circles about what to write here, because I make a constant and careful effort to keep my two children separate from my blog, my writing online, and anything having to do with my site.

For one thing, my children are very young. I have two little boys, one who is nearly 4 and one who is 2. I mention them from time to time by code names: Freebird and Baba O’Riley. A few people in the romance community have asked me regularly “How’s Freebird?” As much as I wish I could claim I’d named my kids after classic rock anthems that are so long in duration the dj can not only take a potty break but also smoke two cigarettes, alas, I do not have that level of cool.

I’ve joked that someday, one of my sons will bring me to Career Day and proclaim, ‘My mommy’s a BITCH!’ and then we’ll all get called to the principal’s office. Imagine the reaction when they fully understand what it means that “Mommy wrote a book” (Beyond Heaving Bosoms: the Smart Bitches Guide to Romance Novels). That could be big fun:  “Have you seen my mom’s Bosoms?” Or, better yet, “My mom can’t come to the phone right now – she’s signing Bosoms.”

But as I keep my online reviewing and writing separate from my children as much as possible, I sometimes worry if I’m keeping my dudes unneccessarily separate from the reason I write and review online: because I absolutely love to read.

Author Julia Spencer-Fleming once said to me in passing that having your children see you read for pleasure is as important as your reading to them. Knowing that reading is something you do for pleasure is part of building a curiosity about and a desire to read.

I had to think about my reading habits and wonder, since I read on an electronic digital reading device, whether they know I’m reading. It doesn’t look (or smell!) like a book….

And then I realized: I worry too much about dumb stuff. Does every mother do this? I mean, you bring two children into the world and suddenly you’re vexing yourself sideways about whether or not the pencils are thick enough for learning to write and your kids know you like to read and can there really be enough perfect proteins in their diet?

There’s no doubt that my children know that I love reading. There are books Ev.Er.Y.Where. From review copies that arrive in the mail (“Mommy! Wow! You get so many books! Can I have one?”) to the books I order from bookstores (“Mommy! What does ‘v-i-r-g-i-n’ spell?”) to the books I receive as gifts from readers who dare me to read this incredibly bizarre romance novel (“Mommy! What does ‘s-h-e-i-k-h’ spell?”), books are as much a part of my home as my children, my cats, and my husband.

Now that I think about it (and laugh at myself yet again for worrying about something that’s so absolutely doofy) the biggest mess they make in their rooms is when their books are off the shelves and on the floor. Toys are a distant second in the mess-o-meter. Baba O’Riley loves lift-the-flap books and Freebird adores books about animals, though his newest joy are the books he can read on his own. Reading before bed is one of their favorite times of the day. And more than once, Freebird has grabbed a pencil and a notebook so he can “write a book to read.”

Whenever I get too wrapped up in really silly, or not so silly worries, I read. Whenever I want to relax and be entertained and happy, I read. And when my sons want to have some quiet time with me or Hubby, they grab books and grab us and head for a chair.

So whether or not they are part of my online life or even aware of my site, they are definitely on the road to being readers like me. So I’ll have to find other things to worry about.

Do your children love the same things you do? Do they love books? And really, let’s be real here: do you worry about some absolutely doofy crap like I do? ADMIT IT. I’m not alone, right? RIGHT?!!