The Book Club

Shy and lonely. Those are two words I have often used to describe myself. I could start a conversation with the cashier at the grocery store but not with a stranger at a party. Being timid made it difficult to make friends. And the few friends I had quietly disappeared over the years I was married.

My life revolved around my daughter.  When I wasn’t focused on her, I worked a lot of overtime and I read a lot of books. These were my escapes to avoid facing reality. I was miserable. My marriage was troubled and my husband was emotionally abusive and controlling.

Eventually I could no longer deny my sadness. I was becoming angry and it was affecting my daughter. I knew I needed to be a role model of a strong, happy woman for her. I filed for divorce and we moved to a beautifully sunlit apartment in a suburb with a great high school. Life was going to be wonderful. We were just two girls in the world making a fairytale life.

Boy was I wrong! My loneliness grew steadily. Although my daughter was the center of my world, she was a teenager and her life did not revolve around me any longer. I had a boyfriend I saw occasionally and I made friends with a cashier at the local gas station. The cashier worked in the evenings and my boyfriend was busy raising his own kids so I still spent many nights on my couch watching TV in the dark.

Loneliness sounds like it should be so easy to fix. Just make a friend. That’s effortless in kindergarten. You see someone on the playground and you talk to them. If only it were that easy as an adult.


My boyfriend and I were enjoying a picnic lunch one summer afternoon when – in a melancholy moment – I described my loneliness. I wanted friends and a social life. I needed someone I could call just because. I longed to be a part of the groups of women I saw at the restaurant while I was picking up my take-out. I ached to share descriptions of the butterflies this the caring new man stirred in me with another person who would understand.

My beau suggested a book club as the perfect solution. Book clubs are usually formed by friends who read rather than by readers who become friends but I was willing to try anything. I spent that evening at home researching book clubs online but I could not find one. Instead, I found a social networking site that helps facilitate meeting others with similar interests in real life. I signed up!

That same evening, there was a knock at my apartment door. I opened it to find a process server. My ex-husband was taking me back to court to renegotiate his visitation schedule with our daughter. I took this as a sign and searched the newly discovered social networking site, found a divorce support group, and immediately joined. Someone in this group must have experienced this return to court before.

My beau was concerned when I described this group to him. He worried the group was going to be a bunch of people sitting around on metal folding chairs, drinking coffee, and talking about their problems. He was also concerned this might be a hook-up group. I wasn’t interested in either of those things. I told him I would try it out and leave if it wasn’t what I was seeking.

I signed up to join a group of about 20 others at a comedy club in the city. When I arrived, the club was wall-to-wall people milling about with drinks in hand. I didn’t know anyone and I couldn’t find the group I was meeting so I left. I sat in my car in the parking lot and submitted to my melancholy feelings. I sobbed from the pain of loneliness.

I don’t tolerate self-pity so I wiped my tears, blew my nose, and vowed to try again. I returned home and emailed my apologies to the group for being a no-show. I explained I could not locate them but I promised to try something else.

Eight of us arranged a small gathering for a trivia competition a few days later at a pub near our homes. I found this small group with ease. We did not mope about our divorces. The topic never came up. Instead, we spent a couple hours laughing, talking, and enjoying ourselves. And we won the trivia contest! The very next night I joined a much larger group for bowling. They were easy to spot because I already knew a couple people from trivia the previous night. I was greeted with hugs that made me feel like I belonged.

I decided this would be my year. I mentally committed to spending 365 days with this group. I participated in every activity that fit my budget. I introduced myself to every new person and I embraced every new experience.  Jim Carey’s movie “Yes, Man” was released halfway through my year. His character was doing the same thing and I hope he enjoyed himself as much as I did.

This was a year of bowling, trivia, and football parties. It was a year of dining out with large groups and meeting for drinks with small ones. There were picnics and holiday gatherings. This year of friendship and fun continued well beyond my initial 365 day commitment. I met about 200 new people and I grew my circle of close friends from one to more than thirty.

The most surprising transformation was the shift in my boyfriend’s attitude. When we first began dating, I spent a lot of time waiting for him – waiting for his phone call, waiting until he had time away from his kids, and waiting for the ten minutes he had to meet me on our drives home from work. Suddenly I wasn’t just waiting. I was out expanding my horizons and living my life. He began to treat me as a prize he did not want to lose. Instead of finding time to spend with me, he made time.

Five years later he proposed to me and we married less than a year after that. Six people stood up in our wedding. Three of those wonderful people can be tied directly back to that first trivia night and that first bowling night.

My life was transformed by a book club I never wanted to join.

I am a Brand

Hi. My name is Aviva and I’m a brand.

That sounds like the typical introduction at a 12-step meeting. Much like an addict, this is not something I ever intended to become. I didn’t wake up one morning and decide to create this persona but this is where my choices led me.

It all started innocently enough. When I began writing for fun and profit, my topics were mainly my personal life – my horrible first marriage, my incredible second marriage, and the antics of our beautiful blended family of seven. My husband and our kids did not sign on for this life and everything it could entail so I selected a pen name to protect their anonymity.

When I established this pseudonym on social media, I was very clear about how I wanted to portray myself. Politics were immediately off the table because it could turn off a large group of potential readers. The same was true for religious discussions. I do my best to remember to post about all the groups major holidays but I could certainly be better. Swearing was an absolute no on my social media. Unless I hit my thumb with a hammer or I’m around a small group of very good friends, I don’t typically swear in real life. Doing so under my pen name would be a major turn off for the parents who could potentially purchase my children’s books.

As I connected with other writers on social media, I discovered a large group of potential authors who feel they can self-publish a book without editing. The most common reason given is they can’t afford an editor. Rather than saving up for this service, they rush a poor product to market. One man even said he didn’t care if the reader didn’t finish the book because they can’t return it and he still has the reader’s money.

I was shocked by this cavalier attitude. I tried explaining that an error-ridden book damages your brand. You may have the reader’s money now but you won’t dupe them into buying a second book. The author’s brand may never recover from this rush to market with a less than stellar product.

Brand? That was a light bulb moment for me. Although I’m not a Kardashian, I am still a brand. Every action is carefully thought out for how it may damage my brand. My reputation.

This is how real life goes. Even if you aren’t marketing a product, you are still selling yourself. Your social media can be viewed by potential and current employers. Your family and friends judge you by what you post and how you act.

Call it what you will – brand, reputation, or character. One bad decision will impact how others perceive you for a very long time. Think about your actions and decide if that is really how you want people to know and to remember you.

I am as proud of my personal reputation as I am my professional brand because, even though they are different names, they are both mine.