Jolyn Young

Hello! I hope this finds all well and wonderful with you and yours. Me and mine are hot and hiding in the house during the mid-part of the day, since summer in southern Arizona is a tad on the hot side. I decided that July is the new December, and my daughter and I have big plans to make quilts, potholers, and assorted other sewn goods we usually produce in the dead of a Nevada winter.

So, I did my first solo public speaking gig last weekend. Whew! I’m glad it’s over and can’t wait to do it again. I spoke to a wonderfully supportive and welcoming crowd at the American Horse Publications Equine Media Conference in Tempe, Arizona about my path from working cowboy to published author. I was nervous, but (thank God) the audience laughed at my first joke. They also laughed at some parts of my presentation that weren’t intended as jokes, but hey – I will take a laugh any way I can get one.

When I reached my last PowerPoint slide, I realized I hadn’t planned a strong concluding statement. The picture on the screen was one I took of my kids a few years ago. My son was four years old and standing sans clothing in a muddy stretch of dirt road. My daughter, age seven, stood nearby wearing only underwear. The family dog, a wood rail fence, trees, and sagebrush hills in the distance rounded out the photo. I said something about my upcoming book, Never Burn Your Moving Boxes, revealing the truths of ranch life, whether they were decent or not, then concluded on the fly with, “Because who hasn’t been naked in a mud puddle?”

The friendly crowd laughed, then I realized they may have thought I was saying that I, too, have been naked in a mud puddle. Have I? Maybe, maybe not. Will I ever reveal the truth? Only if you sit in the front row of my next public speaking engagement and promise to laugh either way.

I also met my publishers, Rebecca Didier and Martha Cook of Trafalgar Square Books, in person for the first time. They live back East and I live way out West, so we have communicated via Zoom calls, phone chats, and email for nearly two years. They read my memoir and know more personal details about me than some of my close friends. It felt new yet familiar to hug them hello in the hotel lobby.

After dinner, I insisted that longtime friend and accomplished writer/editor Jennifer Denison take a picture with me and our “awards.”

Jennifer won her well-deserved award (and several others) for excellence in writing over the past year. I won my Breyer model horse in a table-wide raffle. Not gonna say I didn’t enjoy the undeserved thrill of hearing that last number called out on my winning ticket, though.

The whole weekend was surreal. On the drive up, I realized that five years ago I was feeding the neighbor’s dogs to earn money to attend a writing conference and now I was on my way to speak at one. So, then I had to navigate four lanes of traffic while trying not to ugly cry. It was bizarre to watch people jot down notes when I answered questions at the end of my presentation. I’m just a mom who wrote a book while her kids were asleep; what do I know about anything that might be valuable to anyone else?

But then maybe that’s the power of the written word. Because while our stories might be “just” something to us, they can be powerful to other people. And that’s what keeps me sharing mine and hoping others do the same.