Chapter 1

If Life Hands You
a Lemon,
Make Margaritas

"In the beginning there was nothing. God said, 'Let there be light!' And there was light. There was still nothing, but you could see a whole lot better."
--- Ellen DeGeneres

If you saw me today in my full Pulpwood Queens Book Club regalia featuring hot pink, leopard skin, and a diamond tiara, you might not immediately think of me as a bookseller. You might think "hairdresser" first. And you would be right on that score. But the truth is that I am both. What you have here is my story, for better or for worse.

I never knew what I wanted to be when I grew up. I ambled along, taking my lead from others. My father had run the city pool, so my sisters and I were taught to swim as babies. I took swimming lessons from kindergarten to high school, and during my high-school years I worked during the summer lifeguarding at the Eureka Country Club. Since I had never heard of anyone becoming a professional lifeguard (this was years before the television show Baywatch), I saw lifeguarding simply as a way of getting a great tan. Very important in the 1970s. I socked away all my paychecks toward my savings account for college (my parents had informed me from the time I was knee high to a tadpole that I was going to go).

Now, I did not have a clue as to what I was going to be in life. I just knew my mother insisted --- no, commanded --- that I get an education. When I graduated from high school, I did what most of my friends did: I went to college. I enrolled at Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas, home of the K-State Wildcats.

I attended college at K-State without much direction. After a few years, I dropped out to attend Crum's Beauty College in Manhattan, Kansas. At the time, I figured I could become a hairdresser and then go back to school when I figured out what I really wanted to be in life. I worked in several college salons in both Manhattan and Lawrence, Kansas, before I moved back to my hometown in Eureka to open my first salon, Town & Country Headquarters. Named after my favorite magazine, Town & Country, I thought the name was brilliant because Eureka was the county seat so I did both town folks' and country folks' hair. Unfortunately, I was always getting calls asking, "Do you sell John Deere or International Harvester tractors?" Callers were very surprised when I told them my shop was a beauty shop, though it was still a far cry from the glamour and elegance of that magazine.

Eventually I closed down Town & Country Headquarters and spent the next few years in and out of a few colleges, working in several hair and makeup jobs, and even moving out to California? forever searching for my life's work.

I found California absolutely beautiful but I missed my family, my friends, and the weather back home. Where is a good thunderstorm when you need one to curl up in front of the fireplace and read a good book? Unable to face another Christmas spent going to a double feature at the movies and having my holiday feast be a couple of hot dogs, I made up my mind. I was heading to Texas for a real Christmas to visit my sister.

"Texas is a state of mind. Texas is an obsession. Above all, Texas is a nation in every sense of the word. And there's an opening covey of generalities. A Texan outside of Texas is a foreigner."
--- John Steinbeck, American novelist

My sister Karen was living in historic Jefferson, Texas, which is set on the banks of Big Cypress Bayou. Karen and her husband, Richard, had recently purchased a fixer-upper Victorian home built right after the turn of the century. I could not wait to see it, and being with them was always a very special time. Needless to say, my plan for a holiday visit turned into something weird and totally unexpected: I fell in love with Jefferson, Texas!

Two weeks later, I had moved to Texas and purchased a historic home built Louisiana-steamboat-style right next to my sister. That following May, I opened Heart of Pine Cottage Bed & Breakfast, named after the home's beautiful heart-of-pine floors.

I ended up marrying a hometown boy. After a whirlwind romance, we eloped (which could be a story in itself). Then a couple years later, after having our first child, I decided I was going to pursue a job that was --- besides hair --- my other true passion. I love to read and I love books. I decided that I wanted to work in a bookstore.

Starting as a lowly bookseller, I began working from the ground up in a nearby independent bookstore. Several months later, I was promoted to children's manager and buyer. I read everything I could get my hands on --- books, trade magazines, and book-publisher catalogs. I absorbed the book business like a sponge. I lived and breathed books and began to feel as if printer's ink was coursing through my veins. I commuted back and forth to the bookstore even through my second pregnancy, and worked there for most of my children's formative years. Then I was made an offer I could not refuse. I accepted the job of a book lover's lifetime: I became a book publisher's representative.

I loved working in the bookstore. Not only were books my friends, but that bookstore and my coworkers became my second family. I compare those years at the bookstore with my first twelve years of schooling and being raised by my family. I had learned everything I possibly could, but now, with my new job offer, it was time to graduate. Here would be the job, the career, that would be my lifelong profession.

Being a publisher's rep was my dream come true, and I would have happily done that job for the rest of my days. You know the expression "Every cloud has a silver lining"? A friend of mine once reversed it. She said, "Every silver lining has a cloud." I am here to tell you that, backwards, it is every bit as true.

As luck would have it, back in the 1990s, independent bookstores had begun facing serious competition from the big chains. The mega-chains could offer customers lower prices than the independents around the corner, and soon these giants were just siphoning off customers. By the end of the decade, many independents had been forced to close their doors. You cannot blame folks for wanting lower prices, but it sure was and is sad to see those independent bookstores go. These stores, like mirrors, reflected their customers' tastes. They were community centers and the lifeblood of their readership. I have never walked into an independent bookstore whose staff could not tell me about the books they shelved in their stores. Talk about passion! I have spent many hours deep in conversation with booksellers, such as the famous Mary Gay Shipley of That Bookstore in Blytheville, Arkansas, or Jean and Jerry Brace of Brace Books and More in Ponca City, Oklahoma, or Frances Comegys and Ginny Hill at Tower Book Shop in Shreveport, Louisiana, and J. Michael Kenney of the Book Merchant in Natchitoches, Louisiana. These book people are all literacy leaders in their communities. To me, these die-hard booksellers are national treasures, and they are my heroes for tirelessly crusading for literacy and overcoming all the adversity in bookselling today.

With each independent bookstore closing, I mourned that death as surely as a death in my own family. Faced with a shrinking account base, I doubled efforts in my remaining accounts, kept up my sales, and didn't worry. Heck, as long as I had anyone to sell books to, I was a happy camper. Then, one fateful day in October, I was sitting at my desk, stuffing order forms into the spring 2000 catalogs, getting ready to hit the road for the accounts I would visit that week, when the phone rang.

"Good morning," I said brightly. My boss, Jack Richards, was on the line. I sat up a little straighter in my chair.

"Kathy," he began earnestly.

I wondered what was up. I knew that tone. Jack called only when something was really, really wrong, or really, really right. I smiled to myself thinking, Maybe another bonus.

"As you know, Kathy, sales are down in your region as a result of all the store closings." He paused, as if expecting me to say something. If he was hoping I would get where he was headed, he was wrong. I did not have a clue.

"As you know, Kathy, sales are down in your region as a result of all the store closings." He paused, as if expecting me to say something. If he was hoping I would get where he was headed, he was wrong. I did not have a clue.

"We've got no choice, Kathy. We've decided to eliminate your position."

"You're firing me?" I asked, incredulous.

"As of today, that's right."

There was nothing but stunned silence on my end. For once in my life, I could not speak.

"Kathy? Kathy? Are you still there?"

If one big ole door slams in your face, a new window of opportunity will open. Give yourself wings and fly right in.

My head was spinning. This could not be real. I was a good rep. I had kept my sales up. Sure, my numbers had not increased, but I thought I was doing a good job under the circumstances. I was a model employee, although I could not deny that, with only two years in the field, I ranked lowest in seniority.

"Yes, I'm here," I said weakly.

They say it is bad management style to fire an employee over the phone, but I was glad there was no one around right then to witness my reaction. I was trembling like a leaf; my stomach turned cartwheels. My mind flooded with nightmare fantasies: mountains of unpaid bills piling up on the kitchen table, creditors banging at the door. I silently screamed, Oh my God, what about our insurance premiums? The holidays are coming up! Not even to mention not one, but two car payments, which we had been carrying ever since I'd bought the damn minivan. I had needed it to haul around all the heavy boxes of books and catalogs for my sales work, a job that my previous car just was not equipped to do. My swirl of emotions included a quick burst of indignation --- Wait a minute; I bought the damn minivan for this job and traded in my beautiful amethyst Intrepid! --- which instantly gave way to helplessness.

We'll never make it on one salary, I thought. I felt sick. Vaguely aware that my boss was still talking, I came out of my trancelike state long enough to hear him thanking me for my top-notch service.

"It's not you, you understand, Kathy. You're a great rep, it's just --- "

Right, I thought. I'll be sure to take that to the bank. (Funny how sarcasm will survive even the bitterest of blows.) I decided against an overt display of hostility. I muttered something in response, trying to meet his attempt at kindness with kindness of my own. Then the line went dead. So that was that. My dream job --- my life --- was over.

I don't know exactly how long I sat there frozen in time, not wanting to go forward, knowing I couldn't go back and recapture a past that was just a few seconds old. What felt like hours was probably just a few minutes. I looked down at the order forms and catalogs I had been preparing. Suddenly they looked foreign; they had nothing to do with me. I thought about finishing.

"Not my job anymore," I said to myself, scooping them up and tossing them onto a nearby chair. Then I picked up the phone to call Jay, my husband, to tell him that our world had just turned upside down.

As it turned out, the company agreed to let me stay on another couple of weeks, so I could keep my scheduled appointments and take care of fulfilling orders for the all-important Christmas selling season. I said my good-byes to my beloved accounts and my colleagues, and called friends and family to let them know, trying not to reveal that I was devastated. It was my Elvis Presley moment; I felt just the way I felt the day the King died: inconsolable. After all, whenever anyone asked me how much I loved my job, I'd say, "How much do you love Elvis?" (That says it all to a Southerner.)

I was not exactly rolling in money, but we --- Jay and my daughters, Helaina, nine, and Madeleine, five --- got by. I had thought I would be selling books forever. Along the way, I would save enough money to be able to send my girls to the colleges of their dreams. That was the extent of my financial ambition. I had thought this job would never end.

"Now what am I going to do? What am I going to do?" I wondered aloud, over and over, until those nearest and dearest to me started wishing I'd get a grip. Sure, I could try to find more work as a rep, but no one was hiring. It was more like the opposite. Every rep I knew was hanging on to his or her job for dear life.

I gave in to depression. Crawling into bed with books and my other favorite creature comfort, chocolate, I stayed there, neglecting my housework, my family, and myself. Jay wasn't exactly thrilled by this reaction. He would come into our bedroom and give me that "Now, Kathy, you know this isn't going to solve anything" look, which only made me dive deeper under the covers.

Though this is a cliché, come on, let's face it: I was seriously down in the dumps. You know the expression "mini-violins"? That was me all the way, having my own little pity party. Jay knew that any attempts to cheer me up --- those things people say to reassure you like "Sometimes these things happen for the best" and "You've got so much to offer" and "You'll be just fine" --- would just make me feel worse. Never mind that all those things are (usually) true and that the people are trying to be helpful. These were things I did not want to hear.

Jay was as worried about money as I was. I knew I would have to get another job. I just could not think about that yet. As far as I was concerned, I had hit the heights, career-wise. There was nowhere to go but down, down, down.

Jay picked up the slack, getting the girls off to school in the morning, cooking dinner, helping with homework, and putting them to bed at night. Meanwhile, I buried my sorrow in reading The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Bank and The Nudist on the Late Shift by Po Bronson under the covers. Books were the balm to my wound.

Then, one day, after I had read every book waiting in stacks on the nightstand and consumed I don't know how many boxes of Russell Stover chocolates, I woke up feeling completely fed up with myself and the whole melodramatic scene. Not wanting my life to go into diabetic shock, I put down the chocolates and did what I usually do in times of trouble. I reached for my "torch singer" Barbie phone on the nightstand and dialed my sister Karen. Two years younger in school than yours truly, Karen is the level-headed pragmatist of our family.

"What on earth am I going to do, Karen?" I moaned, not yet completely divested of self-pity and clearly without shame. "Reopen your hair salon, Kathy," she said matter-of-factly, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. She did not say it, but I swear she was thinking, Duh.

"Oh, Karen," I said in a pathetic voice. "I think I'd be so bored doing hair again."

She was unfazed by my whining. "Well, do the book thing, too."

I can honestly tell you that, right then and there, bells and whistles started ringing --- no, clanging --- in my head. To quote from one of my favorite children's books, "the light went on in the attic." A picture formed in my mind: a small beauty salon, with one, maybe two, stylist chairs and stations. Bookshelves stocked with only the best books, including all my favorites. To my knowledge, no one had ever tried this before, a hair salon/ bookstore. I immediately saw the possibilities.

Looking back, I have to admit that this was one of the times in my life when things really did turn out for the best. Bookselling was intense, and I thrived on the challenge of helping a buyer select the perfect books for his or her customer base. But being a book rep involved a lot of travel, which meant days and sometimes weeks away from home. I would have to spend almost three weeks in the spring and three weeks in the fall at book publishers' sales conferences in New York City. I have never felt more alive than I did in my days in New York, but at the same time, I spent many sleepless nights tossing and turning, worried about being away from my girls. At that time, I was torn between career and home.

Sometimes when I wasn't on a business trip and I was working out of my home office, I would have to leave in the middle of the night to get to my accounts by nine in the morning. Kissing my girls good-bye as they were sleeping like angels usually made me bawl like a baby for the first hour or two on the road. I realized that as much as I loved that job, I also wanted and needed to be closer to home. I was soon to find out I could have the career of my dreams and still be a "good" mom.

Lainie and Madeleine were getting older. More and more, I felt they needed their mother at home. Now that I was away from the job, I could feel that tug --- make that yank --- on my heartstrings. I realized that if I worked closer to home, I could be there more for my family. Doing hair would give me a steady income that I could count on for cash flow. I could still talk books all day, and if a customer wanted to read a book I was praising to the high heavens, she could buy it right there in my shop. I could have my cake and eat it too.

Then it dawned on me: What about authors? I could invite authors to my store for book signings and do their hair and makeup first! I had helped with many author events in my years with books, and --- no offense to any of my writer friends, past, present, or future --- many of the authors I had seen just screamed, Makeover! I had a dozen more ideas, each one more exciting than the last. Suddenly, I was convinced that the world (well, Jefferson, Texas, at least) just had to have one beauty shop that sold books. Not only was I going to have my cake and eat it too, my cake was going to be frosted, big time!

You can have your cake and eat it too, but remember: You have to buy the ingredients for the cake and bake it first.

"Wow," I said to Karen. "This is a fantastic idea. Why didn't I think of this? This could be my perfect job!"

As I hung up the phone and threw back the covers, I jumped out of bed to hit the shower. I did not have to think about it twice. I was on a mission.

Many people questioned my sanity.

"It will never work, Kathy," they said. "Get yourself a real job."

Jay, who had majored in business finance at the University of Texas, was one of the naysayers. Whenever the subject came up --- which was often --- he grew exasperated.

"Kathy, do you know how much money it takes to start a business, let alone a bookstore? Too much, that's how much."

Years earlier we had done a business plan for starting a bookstore, and financially the prospects of making a living selling books looked bleak. At that time I had abandoned the dream. Jay considered a hair salon/bookstore a financial impossibility. But now I was determined.

It's funny: I wasn't born rich. I may never see wealth in this lifetime, but when you look at it one way, I swear I act like someone born with a silver spoon in her mouth. You see, I believe I can do pretty much anything once I set my mind to it. I always remember that famous exchange between Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

"The rich are different from you and me," says F. Scott.

"Yeah," answers Hemingway. "They have more money."

People will often repeat this when they want to tell you that money isn't the be-all and end-all of life. I agree: it's not. Though if you read between the lines, I think you can find in this exchange something a little more life affirming. I think these statements also mean that when it comes to the things in life that are really important --- family, friends, community, our health --- we are, all of us, rich, poor, and in between, on a level playing field. If we set goals and make choices based on the things that truly matter, the sky is the limit on what we can achieve.

"No one can possibly achieve any real and lasting success or get rich in business by being a conformist."
--- Unknown

Through good times and bad, I have held on to one belief. I believe that with the help of our faith, anyone can achieve anything. I am not saying be ridiculous about your dreams. You can't go dreaming of being an opera singer if you cannot carry a tune. But we can all take our passion and talents for something and follow those attributes where they lead. I suppose that is why so many of my favorite books teach us not to be afraid to dream.

Of course reality intrudes, even for optimists like me. To realize this particular dream of opening my own hair salon/bookstore, I needed capital. Capital was what I did not have at the moment. Luckily for me, it didn't take too much persuading to get Jay onboard. After just a few weeks of my constant wheedling, cajoling, and --- let's call a spade a spade --- begging, Jay took the $2,000 he had been saving to buy a golf cart and invested it in my crazy venture instead. Here was my knight in shining armor and what a princely deed indeed.

If life hands you a great big lemon, forget making lemonade. I say grab a lime, invite over your girlfriends, and make some Marla-ritas!

Marla-ritas!

This recipe was given to me by my good friend and cocosmetologist Marla Keith. You've heard the saying "It's five o'clock somewhere"? Marla-rita would say, "It's five o'clock somewhere --- let's make some Marla-ritas!"

Ingredients:
1 ounce Cointreau
1 ounce Grand Marnier
1 ounce Jose Cuervo Gold tequila
2 ounces Jose Cuervo bottled margarita mix
¼ lime
margarita salt

Mix all liquid ingredients in a glass pitcher. Take one large margarita glass and rub lime around the rim, rotate in margarita salt, add ice to glass, and pour in Marla-rita! Toss in the lime. Welcome to Marla-ritaville!

To give you an idea of the measure of his devotion, at the time Jay felt about golf the same way I feel about books. Almost every time I stop Jay as he is about to go out the door to tell him something, he stands there and practices golf swings. I can assure you I do not have his undivided attention. Just as when he is trying to tell me something, I usually have my nose stuck in a book. To give up his golf-cart money, my friends, that is true love.

If that was not enough, by November we had begun converting Jay's former office on the ground floor of our house into my new business adventure. He had given up his private retreat and moved his desk into the family room, sacrificing his domain for his fair maiden. My daddy then came down from Kansas to help me put in the shop, just as he had when I'd opened my first salon in Kansas.

I have a father who can do anything he sets his mind to, from fixing a car to plumbing for beauty-salon equipment. I don't remember an outside repairman ever fixing anything at our house or a mechanic ever working on our cars. The only other person who came to our house to fix something was my daddy's father. We called him Papa. He was an electrician by trade, and he always fixed our black-and-white Curtis Mathes television when it went on the blink.

When I called my father to tell him about my new hair salon/bookstore, I told him, "Daddy, I can't pay you anything, but I sure could use your help."

He was there the next day, and it's a nine-hour drive from Eureka, Kansas, to Jefferson, Texas.

"You've got to sing sometimes like you don't need the money. Love sometimes like you'll never get hurt. You've got to dance, dance, dance, like nobody's watching. It's got to come from the heart if you want it to work."
--- Glenda Jackson, British actress and politician

I really got to know my father those months of working side by side, getting the shop put together. I learned that my father may have had his faults, but he would do anything for us girls. He would work for us to his dying day, and he would give us his last dime. He may never tell me that he loves me to my face, but he told me that silently every day by getting up and going to work on my shop. He worked long and hard helping me get the shop together, and he is not a young man. If I had not lost my job, I probably would have not gotten to know my father in this way. Lookie here: that was just one of my wonderful windows of opportunity.

In January 2000, Beauty and the Book, the only combination beauty salon and bookstore in the country and maybe even in the world, opened its doors. Thanks to my King and Prince, Daddy and Jay, we were ready for business.

My crazy little venture succeeded beyond my wildest dreams. If someone had said to me back then that in five years I would move Beauty and the Book from my rural home to a historic house in downtown Jefferson, Texas, I would have said, "No way." If someone had told me that my book club, the Pulpwood Queens of East Texas, which started with six brave women, would grow to chapters running all across the United States and many foreign countries, I would have told him, "You are flat crazy." If someone had told me that I would work with companies like Redken and International Paper to promote literacy in communities throughout East Texas, that I would get to hang out with the writers who have for so long been my idols, and --- the icing on my cake --- that I would make an appearance on Good Morning America with Diane Sawyer and Charlie Gibson or see myself flashed on the screen during The Oprah Winfrey Show, I would have looked him straight in the eye and told him he was plum dee crazy. And yet, these and so many other wonderful things have happened since we opened Beauty and the Book.

Some days I still have to pinch myself to believe it's real. But it is real. Do I want to become famous? People ask me all the time, "Now that you've been on these television shows, how does it feel to be a celebrity?" I assure them that my upbringing has me securely grounded. Being on national television does not change your life --- at least it did not for me. I still put my skirt on one leg at a time like everybody else, and guess who cleans the toilets both at home and at the shop? Le moi, the Pulpwood Queen herself, with toilet brush in hand!

Does it all mean that I am special? No sirree, Bob. All of this has come from having a deep faith in God and myself, the love of my family and friends, and hard work and determination. I took that great big old lemon that came from getting fired from a job I adored and just stirred up a big ole batch of margaritas --- me and my Pulpwood Queens girlfriends. We have been having a beauty of a book-loving party ever since.

Throw yourself into good work and good things will come to you. Don't expect anything, and only then will the rewards for a job well done be yours.

The Pulpwood Queens' Tiara-Wearing, Book-Sharing Guide to Life isn't a book that will tell you the seven secrets of happiness. We all know that true happiness is fleeting. What my book will reveal is how one woman followed her passion and made her dreams come true. Mine is no Cinderella story, even though I do get to wear the tiara. I even went out and bought me some glass slippers, too. In my life, I have felt more like a Dickens character than Cinderella, if you want to know the truth.

In this book I will share the beliefs and values that are the foundation of everything I do. It seems that these values are in short supply today. I believe that, if I am able to live this dream of being "Hairdresser to the Authors" and book-group leader to many, then these values have had something to do with my success. We live in times where it seems like money --- getting it, keeping it, and spending it --- is the only thing people really care about.

I can tell you that I married for love, not money. I may be a Queen, but I was never a princess. You know the expression "Necessity is the mother of invention"? Isn't that what life is like for most of us? Like most women today, I have to work to help contribute to our family's day-to-day living. But I like working, and I like having my own money, and working gives me a feeling of self-worth. I figure that if I am working, I need to do something that my girls will see as important. You can talk until you are blue in the face about how you should do this or how you should do that. I just happen to believe that children learn more by your actions than by your words. I want them to see that you can pursue your passion and be rewarded, too, with things far greater than the almighty dollar.

There are four things I do believe helped me --- five, if you count hardheadedness. The first is that I know that Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior and that my having a spiritual belief in God will carry me through to life's final destination. Second, I have found my passion for reading and I let it be my lodestar. Third is having just enough faith in myself to get me through the hard times. The fourth is that I actually enjoy hard work and serving others. No one in this life gets something for nothing. It is far better to give than to receive.

"We do not have a money problem in America. We have a values and priorities problem."

--- Marian Wright Edelman

My parents and my grandparents taught me that if you do a job right, you will be rewarded. I also watched them work hard at everything they did, and they made work seem fun. My grandfather Dirt always whistled while he worked on the farm. My grandmother Mudd sang as she worked in their shoe-repair shop and hoed the garden. My grandmother Murphy never smiled more than when she was sewing away at her Singer sewing machine. My other grandfather, Papa, always seemed happiest when he was tinkering on a television. My mother always sang when she did dishes and the housework. She taught us to dance while we helped with the housework. She would put on a Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass album or a stack of forty-fives and we would all dance away as we dusted and cleaned. My father believed that hard work would always provide for his family.

How do you go about finding that sort of satisfaction that comes about by doing valuable and enjoyable work? You can start by asking simple questions. What am I passionate about? Do I have a special talent or gift? What part of my life gives me the most personal satisfaction? The trouble with most of us women is that we are just so damn busy taking care of other people all day that we forget what we like or don't like. If we have talent, we downplay it. We hide our passion for everyday things such as taking care of children, mowing yards, cleaning house, or being a hairdresser. We think people will think less of us for enjoying those things. Let me tell you that there is absolutely nothing wrong with serving others. The sooner we realize that, the sooner we can give respect back to those who make our lives easier and more enjoyable. Caring for others is a calling, too.

Don't fall into the trap of thinking that success means having a big paycheck and the corner office, a big McMansion and a fancy car, or finding your fifteen minutes of fame. Every day since I opened Beauty and the Book has been a blessing. I may not have much money, but I am doing what I love, so I am rich in life. I've got plenty of riches --- my faith, family, friends, my Pulpwood Queens, my books, and the deep satisfaction I get from promoting literacy in communities across the country. That's my story and I am sticking to it.

Excerpted from The Pulpwood Queens' Tiara-Wearing, Book-Sharing Guide to Life © Copyright 2012 by Kathy L. Patrick. Reprinted with permission by Grand Central Publishing. All rights reserved.