My thesis articulation was published on SSRN on October 7, 2015.
It can be downloaded here: Ayres – thesis articulation
The abstract is here: Ayres – abstract
My website
I started this website because I thought it was an easy platform to answer questions about my book and my performances. It turned into much more. The reaction to Before You truly amazed (and continues to amaze) me.
Re: the 2nd book (sorry, it was in fact due in October of 2014). I’ve written FIVE 2nd books. I know the title is “With and Without You” because I know that moving forward, Emily is without Daniel. That is clear. What happened to her after? I don’t know. I won’t know and I won’t be able to write about it for some time.
I hope all of you that signed up because you loved the book, the book’s soundtrack (please follow Jackson Henry on Twitter, his website, etc. because he is a true artist), and everything having to do with my beloved book, Before You, will continue to follow me.
I won’t write about the book for about a year. The next year of my life needs to be devoted to reading and writing a…thesis about something you’ll read on either Monday or Tuesday after this post.
The interactions I’ve had with people all over the globe have astonished me. I truly am a girl from Texas that does not understand why my mom read the book, much less all of you. Thank you from the bottom of my boot. π
Moving forward. I need to be real. I’ve always been real with you guys and gals. You know lots! I was beaten, I got up, I was a bit down again, and again, but I got up again because of this. It’s just me, but it always helps to know there is someone with you in the dark.
I’ll work on the next book from time to time. For now, they have me on a “hold” and that’s just, sorry, so very necessary.
Maybe Fall of 2016 will see Emily happy again? Maybe, prepare yourselves…she’s alone. And okay with that. Maybe she’s too busy saving the world to worry about a silly thing like romance. Romance didn’t work for Emily, as you all know. Maybe she throws herself into her job. Just think about how cool that might be?
Stay tuned. I’m so sorry if I’ve disappointed any of you. I promise, Emily’s next chapters will be even better than the first. π Maybe no Daniel, but you never know who’s she’s met lately? A very handsome guy a mere two days ago, by the way…
#staytunedWithorWithoutYou
“Don’t Quit” is a poem by Edgar Guest and it’ll change you
Heard these words echoing in my brain today and thought I’d share them. Edgar Guest was known as the “People’s Poet,” and you’ll soon understand why.
Tempted to give up? Don’t. Read this. Print it out. Memorize it. Let it speak to you when you need the reminder.
Donβt Quit
By: Edgar Albert Guest
When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit-
Rest if you must, but don’t you quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a fellow turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out.
Don’t give up though the pace seems slow β
You may succeed with another blow.
Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering man;
Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victor’s cup;
And he learned too late when the night came down,
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out –
The silver tint in the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It might be near when it seems afar;
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit β
It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit.
I was exponentially blessed to have a grandfather with the brain of an engineer and the heart and eyes of a poet. He introduced me to Guest and I am glad to pass one sliver of Guest’s work along.
Here’s to Pop, still getting his Princess through tough times.
Important Lessons from a Swiss juridique Konferenz
September 11th and 12th found me sitting in a breathtakingly gorgeous room in St. Gallen, Switzerland attending a legal conference the presentations of which were in two languages which were both foreign to me a mere 6 years ago.
Yep. Same girl that wrote that book you all love. Now, I’m attending legal conferences. Go figure.
Regardless of my green status, I held my own.
Well, maybe not on day one. My brain didnβt trust itself. I translated everything that was said into English and wrote my notes in English, as well. I left with chicken scratch about most of the presentations (thankfully not the one given by my new professor, who was amazing and thankfully did not speak at the speed of a Texas bullet) and a gigantic headache.
I wasnβt sure if there was a point in attending day two. At three oβclock that morning, it hit me – let go. Listen to the words and write your notes in German.
I tried it and it worked. Thank God because one of the presentations yesterday changed the way I will approach my thesis (if it gets approved). Thanks to the Swiss guy who sounds like he’s from Luzern, but is actually from Solothurn/Cambridge, Mass…go mighty Crimson…moving on.
Swiss people do something by nature that continues to astonish me. They easily flow from one language to another. They can, and do, seemingly seamlessly answer a question posed in French with an answer formulated in German (and vis versa). Above that rests a familiarity and comfort with English that blows my mind given how complex this language is (for example, I can say, “The money I had had had had little worth in the end,” and this sentence is a perfectly acceptable sentence utilizing double past perfect. It’s also a perfectly acceptable reason to drink Vodka shots. Moving on…). Anyway, the ease of linguistics was my first lesson this weekend: keep my languages (specifically words and thoughts) flexible.
The second lesson was something Iβve seen in both conferences this summer (the other being the remarkable conference on Internet Jurisdiction, hosted by the University of Geneva in June). The Swiss rarely dig their heels in and, instead, will find a way to say βperhaps, Iβm not sure, itβs possible that, well have you consideredβ in the most flowery way and end it with βyou might be wrong?β We all will be at one point and time! Second lesson: keep my βfeetβ nimble and ready to move. Not easy for a Texas girl, no matter how liberal she has always been.
What Iβm learning about these two particular βSwissβ approaches is how crucial both are to moving forward. We can no longer (especially in the area of law in the digital age) continue to sit still, review data, and βwrite legislation.β The majority of legislation in this field, for the foreseeable future, has the lifespan of a fruit fly. It needs almost constant reworking, rewording, amending, reviewing, re-creating, etc. The moment after it is accepted as law and applied, chances are good it will already be obsolete or facing obscurity. Let me put it this way for all you Torah/Bible folks out there:
Each of us owns a tablet, but the age of stone tablets is over.
Donβt dig my heels in. Stay agile. It’s common for me to be dewy-eyed and optimistic, but I remain optimistic about my thesis and what it might add to the landscape. I learned many things this weekend that will help me a great deal.
This country continues to teach me life lessons.
I’m cross-stitching with Grammy (no, I’m not seeing ghosts)
In early April of this year, I unearthed Grammy’s sewing box. Inside it? Nothing much. Thimbles, some gnarly thread and then I found three little treasures.
Three very simple pieces. They were unfinished cross-stitch pieces, but she’d done the red flowers and the words “I Love You.”
Clearly, they were meant for her daughters – Candy, Linda, and Carol.
I gave the sewing box to Carol, but not before I snagged the “I Love You”s, which I brought in my hand luggage (they are that precious to me) with me to Switzerland. I can cross-stitch and I enjoy sewing. I know, I know…how very ’50’s housewife of me (I swear, I would have killed the PTA meetings…me and my sippy cup of Bourbon and Coke).
I tried to find a way to make certain each girl will know which part Grammy did (uh, it’ll be clear if you flip it over, dolls) and which part her niece/daughter did. I’m using 2 strands and I think Grammy used 4.
I brought them back because I wanted to make my mom and her sisters happy. But, something else happened tonight.
I miss my grandparents every day of my life. I am constantly wishing for dreams with them. As I was working on the first one tonight it hit me.
Grammy was holding this. At some point, her fingers, which were even smaller than my midget fingers, were pulling a needle through each tiny hole, just as I am doing. Perhaps she was thinking, “I wish Candy wouldn’t work so hard at the school” or “It’s nice to have Carol back in Dallas for law school” or “I hope this will be an easy week for Linda with the kids.” I don’t know because I don’t know when she started them.
I don’t know what she was thinking, but I know she was holding them and thinking about her family, which is what I’m doing. We’re doing it together.
When Granddaddy died, I took on his monthly contribution to St. Jude’s. Every time I see that charge, it feels like something we are doing together. And, sitting her with her unfinished work in front of me…I feel like this is something Grammy and I are doing together.
I will treasure the next few months with her. And I’ll treasure the moment her daughters have a Christmas present under the tree that says “From Mom.”
Will Travel for Good Church
I get asked a lot, βwhy do you travel so far for church?β It used to take me 2 hours and 30 minutes round trip to get from my village in ZΓΌrich to my beloved kirche in Luzern. It is more like 3 hours now and I will go every Sunday, if I am able.
Why? Because I go to a church that is a living, breath extension of Godβs constant adoration and grace toward his children on Earth. All of them. We donβt care who you are, what you are wearing, with whom you are sleeping, in which language you recite the Lordβs Prayer.
And Iβm an addict for that kind of authentic expression of agape. I consider myself lucky because the only thing I have to do is put my shoes on and start walking. I feel sorry for people who do not experience what I experience almost every Sunday (and other days) in that church.
This past Sunday was really something. There is some serious discussion in this world about how we view βforeigners.β Switzerland is not immune to this and there are seemingly constant votes on what to do about the foreigners. Sometimes, the discussion is civilized when βweβ discuss foreigners in our countries.
But, sometimes it is not. And even that which is civilized is not always germane. A pertinent discussion about foreigners, in any country, would involve topics like quality of life, integration, procedural hurdles that might be intimidating, etc. Right?
On Sunday, Father L. stopped just before the end of the sermon. The very rough paraphrase into English is below. I do not do justice to his eloquence, nor are my words on a computer as powerful as hearing them from a Catholic priest standing in the hallowed sanctuary of the oldest building in Luzern. Nonetheless, I think these words explain βwhyβ I travel so far for worship.
When we look at a foreigner as anything other than a living, breathing child of God, we turn our back on our Christianduty. I have never used this word βChristianduty.β Before today. Foreigners are not a subset of humans. They are fellow pilgrims, travelers who have left their homelands. They deserve compassion from us because it is not easy to live in this country, to be labeled βforeign.β Anyone judged as βforeignβ is immediately branded with the label of βnot belongingβ in this world. To not belong to the place you live – it is sad, frightening, lonely. And it is not what we stand for here, for hereβ¦it is our Christianduty to make certain we do not contribute to this feeling of not belonging. Everyone belongs here.
Amen.
The Rollercoaster’s Lesson
Ups and downs. Tension and release. We rise, we fall…only to rise again.
How do we process the curve balls? When it was time to say “goodbye” to Wyatt Walter on Sunday, he burst into tears. What do I say when the blue eyes of one of my favorite things on this planet fill with tears that are my doing? We won’t see each other for one year, I can’t change it. What do I do to make it better? He wears a cross that says “WYATT LALA,” but I know it’s not enough for him. He needs hugs. (So do I.)
How do we process the high-as-a-kite moments? I received keys today. They unlock a future – a life – a chance for a career, love, happiness. How do I take it in stride when there are a million Nadia ComΔneci-butterflies doing somersaults in my stomach? I’m feeling excited about my future in a way that feels almost selfish. So many of my friends and family members are struggling and I am feeling only excited about what comes next. Shall I instead say “cautiously optimistic”?
That’s step two for me. How do I ride the rollercoaster, this time, without feeling broadsided by the downs? In this current apartment and this current life (both of which I will be shedding tomorrow), I have learned how to deal with despair. It was the hardest lesson.
I lost both of my “God”fathers here. I lost Granddaddy. I lost L and fled to Luzern for 2 weeks. I lost him again. I lost him a third time. I lost Hope. I lost it again. I lost it again (7 times, in total). I met the Csendes family. I said goodbye to them. I welcomed them. I said goodbye to them again. Ups and downs. Over and over again.
I learned a hard, but valuable, lesson – my Faith is stronger than my Hope. Faith is in the air. If I am breathing? (and, according to the paramedics, I wasn’t at one point in this apartment)…Faith is refilling me with what I need to take another breath, another step, another journey.
There will be a day when the blue-eyed, 8-year-old is visiting his Aunt LaLa (technically, he calls me “Wala” because it combines both of our names) in Switzerland. There will be a day when what seems “full of wonder” is a bit clouded by the harsh and not-so-picturesque reality of law school. I’ll find a way to take the Rollercoaster’s exciting journey the way this guy does…That’sLifebythePro
I’m a bit stuck in the Angry Phase
Of course, now I write “angry” and hear Lewis Black’s voice, but anyway.
Personally, I think I’ve been doing fairly well for the past month. True, I was 90% ready to join a convent (not hyperbolic) and I cancelled my new couch, which I loved, because it shared the same name as Asshat. Other than those two things? Oh, and I did scream at my Wonderful Slovak Brother in the middle of ZΓΌrich. Other than those three things. I’ve been doing well.
Until the anger came last week.
I’m seriously angry. Not at The Violent Ex and not at Asshat. I’m angry at God and I’m angry at myself for being such an idiot.
I’m a decent person, I’d say. It’s not that I go to Mass every Sunday and that makes me decent. It’s that I make it my life’s mission to give out as much kindness as I possibly can before I go to Mass every Sunday. Then, during the service, I take deep breaths in, make the sign of the cross, and go out to do that same thing again. Every week. I actually practice what I profess. It’s shocking, I know.
But, given that I’m at least a 5 on the “good people” scale, why didn’t God protect me? I had one man that I loved almost kill me and another one that actually hurt me far worse, which I didn’t know was possible. After church one day, at the beginning of our “relationship,” Asshat said to me, “I want people to say about me that I always do the right thing.” I thought, “Wow. This is the guy for me. He’s seriously grounded in his faith. Lucky me.”
There was a day when I could barely move, the back and neck pain were beyond excruciating. Asshat was coming over and it took me an hour just to get some food prepared, to open the Asshat door, and to get back on the couch. He came over, ate, watched some TV, fooled around with me (remember, I was in major pain), and left me on the couch at 3 in the morning. We hadn’t argued, he just decided he wanted to drive to Bern because he felt awake. All the lights were on, he kissed me and walked out of the door. I couldn’t sleep and I couldn’t move myself to my bed.
I had hours to sit on the couch and look at Asshat’s mother’s pigs all around me. I remember thinking, “He’s lost. He’s a good man. He will find his way. Just be a patient, positive part of his life. That’s what he needs after all he’s been through. Show him the compassion he lacks.” Augh. I just sigh now. Thinking of how clear it should have been that it was all a lie, this “Super Catholic” character he was playing. It wasn’t real, but I was too busy being compassionate and giving him my Texas sunshine to see the truth.
I think the Angry Phase is the worst for someone like me. It would be easy if I was angry at either of the men. I’m not.
I’m just angry with myself and with God, and to be angry at God is difficult. It’s also not new, I’m not even the first one today to share these thoughts, I guarantee you. Feeling abandoned or left vulnerable by God. People turn their backs every day. Not me.
No, we will get through it, me and God. There is only one thing that will always be constant in my life and that is my faith. Until my last breath. I actually think a faith crisis, which is what this is, makes people of faith stronger in their beliefs, not weaker. A nun told me two weeks ago, “Scream at God, He can take it.”
No problem with that, Sister.
And, I’m an opera singer, so I hope He can not only take it, but that he has some fancy pants Bose headphones. He’s gonna need ’em.
Is the American Flag synonymous with weapons?
You may be tempted to stop reading. Please don’t.
Big fan of the Constitution. Largely supportive of the Founding Fathers (minus George’s predilection for using his slaves’ teeth to enhance his own wooden teeth). However, like many, I’m not sure they had assault weapons in mind when they wrote this and THIS is what it says:
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
I can’t provide you with a photo of a man holding this because we don’t really have photos from that time (PS – “man” is not a sexist stereotype), but this was a typical “weapon” in the days of our Founding Fathers: 
I can provide you with a photo of a man carrying one of today’s weapons (that is not as uncommon as one might think) because I used Google and found this image immediately:
Given that Alexander Hamilton was killed with a rather unextraordinary dueling pistol, he would probably have a few choice words about the gravity of the decision to express one’s thoughts via a grenade launcher, regardless of the militaristic or non-militaristic grade or agenda. In addition, if the founding fathers had know one of their own would be shot in rather cold blood…might they have considered a somewhat stricter definition of “the right of the people to keep and bear arms”? Even Jefferson must have been saddened at this gun-related tragedy of his Federalist rival.
We are in a unique position as Americans. Today is July 22, 2015. The following facts are current US statistics. How did I get them? Sadly, we have a website offering us a grotesque picture of gun-related violence. Heroes offer this website, which is a desperate appeal to stop this deadly insanity: http://www.gunviolencearchive.org/
There have been, so far, over 27,000 gun-related incidents. There have been over 7,000 deaths. There have been 180 mass shootings (and that number has been reported AND verified). Here is the horror, and prepare yourself. If you have a heart, this will rock you.
404 children aged 0-11 have died from gun-related violence in the United States in 2015 (we are only 6 months into it) and over 1300 children aged 12-17 have died from gun-related violence.
Let it soak in. Imagine sitting in the Pirate or Hello Kitty – themed room of your child after he or she has been killed. Imagine that happened because he or she was attending, for example, SCHOOL.
Ready for something else?
Every Sunday, I attend Mass in a fairly small community in Lucerne, Switzerland. I have noticed before, there is a store that sells “Waffen,” which means weapons. I know literally no one in Switzerland that has a bullet. I know men that have their service weapons (so did my grandfather), but no one that actually owns ammunition. No one and I know tons of Swissies.
On Tuesday, I was in Lucerne during a weekday and at my church to light a candle. When I walked past the Waffen storefront, I saw the display.
Let that also sink in.
As a nation, our flag has become synonymous with weapons. Not only here in a small corner of a rather small town in Europe. Also, in the Middle East. Also, in Africa. Everywhere. As Americans, our flag is not synonymous with peace (like the white cross flag flying in my eyesight right now) or Olympic glory or bravery. Our great nation, established by our beloved Founding Fathers, is now associated with unbridled violence.
It’s no secret why the Founding Fathers established their new home – religious freedom. You can like that or not, but it’s a well-documented fact. Good news if you don’t like it, you’ll love the hypocrisy coming next. The foundation of Christianity rests in these words:
Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.
So, how would John Jay or Benjamin Franklin feel about the civilian purchase of a machine gun falling under the protection of the words they used to craft the 2nd?
Fellow Christians, do you find my reference to the Golden Rule in this context cliche or trite? Okay, what about James 4:12? Isaiah 33:22? What about that pesky commandment about not killing other people? Does your eye-for-an-eye because “Vengeance is mine” argument still hold fast? What about “blessed are the peacemakers”? Because, now, we are arming the actual peacemakers –Β priests, educators, doctors. What would the singular member of the clergy who signed the Declaration of Independence, John Witherspoon, think of that?
And here are two more sobering statistics: 1,034 people have died in 2015 from accidental shootings and (only) 668 people have died from actual defensive use of a gun.
What do we do? Support candidates that do not support the NRA (which is the very tyranny the Founding Fathers feared, by the way). Get behind anything Gaby Giffords is doing (here and here). Why? Because she was shot, but she is not arguing for an elimination of weapons. She is sensibly arguing for “safe and responsible gun ownership.” This public servant and former Congresswoman has a LOT of good ideas.
Stop buying or promoting gun-based video games and stop finding it normal to watch a movie that has guns in every scene. That’s not normal to anyone in any other country in the world.
Speak and write. Write on FB. Write on Twitter. Speak at dinner parties. Stop being passive and let’s get Old Glory representing exactly what Old Glory should represent – bravery, courage, freedom.
August 10, 2015
I remember a few years ago, L said something to me. It could have been during a moment of frustration? He told me it wouldn’t really matter if I could live forever in peace in Switzerland because I still would have problems and be unhappy (like I was then).
Oh, he was wrong. He was so wrong. (About so many things.)
I have a day and it’s August 10th. And I have a key to pick up. It is everything. It is the end.
The end of living next to an abuser and below a bully. The end of being afraid to speak my mind to people face-to-face when they purposely, willingly, knowingly cause me pain or hardship. The end of craving attention and feeling empty during “bravo”s. The end of all of that.
It is someone (some ones) opening up the golden birdcage and saying, “See the sky? It’s yours. Here’s the key.”
I think about the legal eagles, the politician, the Texan-sounding German, the Brit that wouldn’t hurt a fly unless someone hurt me, the fierce teddy bar of a Dutchman, the Indian healer, the church in Luzern and the Hospice in the Valais, the WSBFK, the Swiss sister, my German school bestie, and so many more. I think they will all hand me this key – together. They all helped me free myself.
It’s a big day for this blackbird and now, as of today, I know exactly when it will happen.
August 10, 2015
The World of Before You 