Tag: Tom Petty

You belong in a boat out at sea

You belong among the wildflowers
You belong in a boat out at sea
Sail away, kill off the hours
You belong somewhere you feel free

– Wildflowers, Tom Petty

Once I met a bloke who lived on a boat named after a Tom Petty song.

His name was Paddy and hers was Wildflower and they must have made an impression because nine years later they are still in my life.

Wildflower the boat

Wildflowers – the song

Nine years later and the Captain and I were privileged enough to  see the man himself in concert. We had no idea it would be our last opportunity.

I’d always quite liked Tom Petty, but he certainly played a bigger part in my life after I met Paddy. The first time he came over to my house I tried to impress him with a best of Tom Petty CD casually playing in the background (smoooooooth…)

He still gives me shit about that.

Petty for Paddy is like Bowie for me – a massive part of his life for most of his life. He has a Petty lyric for just about every situation. He’s dealing with the loss of his idol in a typical Kiwi bloke fashion, but I can tell he is hurting. We both are. We have so many memories wrapped up in TP. In the end even my cat (the late, great Mr Pies) was a fan.

The best of those memories was earlier this year when we actually got to see a Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers concert.

Paddy was turning 50 and our initial plan was to head to Hawaii – Hawaii Five-0 styles. Our plans changed pretty quickly though when I spotted on TP’s official Instagram that he was touring the United States at the same time we were going to be over there. My fuzzy American geography decided that our best bet was to detour via Texas, and so the adventure began.

When tickets went on sale I found myself at 4am mashing keys and refreshing my browser in a bid to secure our spot. I was mildly hungover after a few drinks to celebrate the end of the working year and all the usual things went wrong. The internet dropped out, my computer froze, the website got confused because I was in New Zealand trying to buy tickets for a concert in the United States.

But I got there in the end, waking Paddy up to crow about my success. (He muttered something unintelligible and went back to sleep.)

TP didn’t disappoint – the distance we traveled, the adventures to get there – the frisking Paddy got at the airport trying to leave Hawaii (a story for another day) were all worth it. The man still had it. It was an absolutely amazing concert and you could tell he was loving every minute of performing.

The crowd were loving it too – quite a bit judging by the funny smelling cloud of smoke that appeared over the stadium when he played Last Dance with Mary Jane.

It was amazing and we were both so freaking happy (and not because of the funny smelling smoke).

And to make the night even more perfect, out of all of his massive back catalogue, what did he play? Wildflowers.

Paddy probably won’t admit it, but it was quite an emotional moment.

Here’s my wonky recording – ignore the wobbles, the sound is good!

Margarita slushie – essential Texan concert fuel
Pre concert excite! (Yes Paddy is wearing a laser kiwi T shirt. NZ represent!)
The man himself
Waving celphones is the new waving cigarette lighters
Post TP glow – and awesome T shirts!

Paddy says losing Tom would have been so much worse if he had never got to see him play. It’s like the best thing and the worst thing happened in the same year. I’m so sad, but happy at the same time that I could help make this happen for him.

I’ll leave you with another favourite of Paddy’s from the 2010 Mojo album

I know that look that’s on your face
But there’s somethin’ lucky about this place
And there’s somethin’ good comin’
For you and me
Somethin’ good comin’
There has to be

– Something Good Coming – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

The waiting is the hardest part

Wildflower was named after a Tom Petty song

 

which I think is just perfect for her and Paddy, but it is another Petty song

 

that’s haunting me right now.

The first question I get from people I haven’t seen for a while is ‘so when is the book coming out?’

If I had my way the answer would be tomorrow.

Unfortunately, the answer is still – next year.

Getting a book published involves large amounts of agonising waiting. There’s the wait after you pop your baby in the post and send it to various publishers. Did they get it? (that is normally answered by the first rejection letter) Did they read it? (also answered by the rejection letters) Do they think it’s a stupid idea?  – I was lucky in this respect. A lot of people warned me not to expect to hear anything back from the publishers, not even a rejection. But those I did send material to all got back to me in some form or another and gave me reasons and helpful advice (none of which, thankfully, was ‘it’s a stupid idea’).

If you are fortunate enough to find someone willing to take a punt on you (thank you David Bateman Publishing!) then there is even more waiting in store.

It’s a hard wait too, because you have adrenalin coursing through you. You’ve run hysterically around the office, squealing and waving your arms in the air like Kermit the frog. You’ve told all your family and friends. Your dream has come true, you are going to be an author – and you want it to happen now, now, now!!!

kermit-arm-flail-1392075955

However – while your book may be the center of your universe, at this stage it is only on the periphery of your publisher’s. As one of my publishers politely told me on our first meeting “I have about seven books  in different stages of development on the go at the moment. The one closest to being published is the one I love the most. When yours gets to that stage, you’ll be hearing from me every day”.

While that gave me a bit of a reality check and stopped me freaking out over long periods of silence, it didn’t make the waiting any easier.

The first really nerve-wracking wait was the wait to iron out the contract – as far as my paranoid brain was concerned until my signature and the publisher’s signature were on that piece of paper there was every chance they could change their minds.

It's real!
It’s real!

After everything was signed and sealed it wasn’t so bad. There were still things I could do – arrange photographs, send them in. Then it was back to waiting.

 

Patience is a virtue I struggle to posses however – so about a month ago I dropped the publishers an email (trying not to sound too needy) just to get an idea of where everything was at.

They were kind and humoured me – giving me late June – early July as my next milestone. That’s when editing will start in earnest. They’ll go through the book decide if they want any changes made and whether they want me to add anything. I’m a little bit nervous about that, but also intrigued as to how the whole process works. Then we start thinking about things like the cover and hopefully by Novemberish there should be an actual, physical book to hold.

It takes about nine months to get a book out into the wild (not counting the time it takes to write it) – and then you have to think about the best time to release it.

This bit I found kind of fascinating because it’s something I’d never really thought of. Christmas is the time that jumps immediately to mind, but for a newcomer into the market it’s not actually that practical. Yes there are more people out there buying books, but there are also more books out there. At Christmas time you are competing with cook books and All Black biographies – even a relatively well-known writer risks getting buried.

Other than that – the next biggest book-selling days are Mothers Day and Fathers Day. Not exactly days I would have thought of, but it kind of makes sense. You don’t really buy books for Easter or New Year, everyone’s birthdays are on different days and books are often the perfect gift for Mum or Dad.

So we are aiming for Mothers Day next year – which means this time next year you could be holding a copy of Which Way is Starboard Again? (or whatever the book ends up being called) in your hot little hands. The aim is to have the book in shops by March and get promoting after that – so I apologise if I am insufferable for few months round about then.

But for now, it’s back to waiting. I’m not complaining – this has already been an amazing ride. I still can’t believe it is actually happening – but I do wish it would happen a little faster!