Pitch

Okay, you guys, here's the first draft of my new and improved pitch. I hope you have time to read it this weekend and give me some ideas. Remember I'm going to Madison next Thursday for the Writing Conference. I know, I know, way to plan ahead. (Sorry about the asterisks. Blogger wouldn't let me indent the paragraphs)

*****GAIL LOGAN (POV), widowed and just retired from her elementary school secretary job, begins the story sitting on her front porch watching the sunset as she has so many days before. Many sunsets find her there throughout the story. The once white porch railing is totally black, painted one strip at a time to mark both momentous and ordinary times. She smiles to remember the first mark and its accompanying note on the slat below, “Esther the chicken died.” That is a tame, almost silly note for the beginning of a life change. That was the day she read about the first watercolor class she took at the craft store, the first time in her whole long life she did something she really wanted to do. Gail can’t believe that one small step, picking up a paintbrush, freed her the way nothing else had, and that it has taken so many years to be brave enough to live her life for herself.
*****When Gail first starts painting, her neighbor and best friend, CLARA complains that Gail will find new friends and leave her behind, and for a while Gail does. They struggle, Gail pulling toward change and Clara pushing Gail to stay the same. They argue in the Ladies’ at Wal-Mart in one memorable scene but eventually their friendship stands the test and they end up better friends than before.
*****Gail’s oldest son, SAM is very unhappy with her life changes. He is ready to move back home to make sure Gail stays the mother he is used to. Her middle son, AARON, is a bit thrown by everything but his wife, SARA, also an artist, reassures him. Gail’s youngest son, MATT, is happy for his mother and teases her about turning into a hippie.
*****Early in her transformation Gail meets ABEL BAKER, a retiree who works at the garden center and writes a gardening column for the local weekly newspaper. Abel is immediately attracted to Gail but she decides he’s too bossy and overbearing, so she tries to avoid him. He shows up one day when Gail is replanting flowers and offers to help. She begrudgingly accepts but begins to change her opinion of him when he compliments the banana bread she serves him and exclaims over one of her paintings he sees in her kitchen. After months of refusing his invitations, Gail finally accepts. She finds him a charming and interesting man and begins to think she might like him after all. Abel widens Gail’s world by taking her to a foreign film, cross country skiing, and an art fair. Knowing how reluctant Gail is to commit herself the physical part of their relationship grows slowly and teasingly. Gail treats herself to an armload of sexy lingerie at a Victoria’s Secret sale, wears it on every date, but it’s almost a year after they meet that Abel gets to see it. Abel knows a gallery owner in Door County, a resort area, and takes Gail and her paintings to meet GIL. Gil agrees to take a few of Gail’s paintings, she and Abel go back to their motel room, and finally they have sex.
*****Gail’s art wins a prize in a contest, she enters a few summer art fairs, and things are going well. She decides to introduce Abel to her sons, who know they are dating but have no idea of the depth of the relationship. By accident the sons discover that their mother is sleeping with a man other than their deceased father and confront her. Gail stands up for herself and tells her sons to mind their own business. There are hurt feelings and angry words but eventually they all come to respect each others’ independence.
*****In the end, Gail convinces Abel that their dates are more fun and the sex is more exciting if they aren’t married. She relishes the independence she fought so hard for. Rather than being hurt or angered by this Abel calls them “the butterfly woman and the renaissance man” because Gail made such a change coming out of her cocoon and he feels like a new man too. Gail ends the book sitting on the porch watching the sunset awaiting the arrival of Abel for a glass of wine.