itesser ink: progress, uncensored

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2010-04-12T15:54:00.001-07:00

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Going in blind

2010-02-25T10:49:00.001-08:00

I had a great reading experience over the past couple days. I've never read anything by Dennis Lehane before, nor seen Mystic River (though it's been on my list for ages).

I didn't even know he wrote the book Mystic River until I was partway through Shutter Island.

Late Tuesday night Kazu tweeted

Shutter Island (the novel) is a good read. Not everyone is going to like the ending, but most of the build up is brilliant. A page turner.

My initial thought was "by saying some people won't like the ending, I'd probably be one who does."

Like I said, I'd never heard of Shutter Island, the book or the movie, prior to Kazu's mention. His recommendation means a lot to me, though, so I looked for it on Amazon. Not only is it Kindle available, it's currently at the price of a discounted mass market paperback.

Without pausing to check the synopsis, genre, or reviews, I downloaded the books sample. Within minutes of finishing the sample, I bought the whole thing. All from the comfort of my own home! xD

I read until I fell asleep that night, and in the morning until I had to leave for the theater. Actually, at one point, fearing how nightmarish and dark the book was headed, I strategically put it down, so I wouldn't be going to sleep scared. But for the most part, I dove in and read without pause.

Which, I think, is how Shutter Island is best experienced. While reading, I didn't stop and have the chance to analyze the story. Not in the sense of picking apart the past, but predicting what was going to happen. I was too concentrated on squeezing everything out of the current moment and getting to the next page to worry about what happened farther along.

Also, due to reading on the kindle, I had a percentile bar telling me how far into the book I was, and a "page" count, but I never really stopped to look at how many pages I had left. I never pulled myself out of the narrative to feel the thickness of the book and ponder what needed to be wrapped up by the time I was done.

Starting a book (or movie) ignorant of the content (though not quality) is an experience I know I like, and Shutter Island is another example that it's a good policy to have.

Messy, messy, messy

2010-02-18T23:34:00.000-08:00

I have an abnormally strong desire to watch an episode of Better Off Ted right now. But I'm under the covers and relatively warm and don't want to jeopardize that.

The past couple days have been stressful and emotional, but not for anything happening close to me. Amanda Palmer launched a project yesterday. It's a lighthearted carnival-punk muffin frosted with kiddie porn and child exploitation.

If you're saying to yourself, "but I don't frost muffins!", that's kind of my point.

The idea that those two topics should not intermingle that way is not the only thing about the project/launch, but it's the biggest part to me. Other bits are "crip drag", nonconsensual fiction, and AFP's 'open mic' gaff (tweeting something she really should have filtered before it reached her fingers).

I've engaged in the discussion in public, in a limited-access way, and in private, and it really gets to me.

It gets to me that there are so many touchy subjects in play that the whole thing is a tangled mess.

It gets to me that my main probelm right now isn't even with AFP, but with the people who passionately disagree with me. (Amanda admitted that the traumatic backstory should have been a secret ingredient in the muffins, not the frosting on top, which I thought was a good move, but it got lost in the roar over other things.)

Overall, I don't have anything new to say about it. The whole experience of being caught up in the discussion has been pretty disheartening. Especially the part about Art giving an Artist license to be unapologetic.

I think criticism and analysis is something in orbit around Art that can't be loved or hated. I don't want Art to be without it, but I don't want criticism to be the stronger of the two. But there are no rules in their relationship.

Why does it all have to be so messy?

not just bad, but boring

2010-02-12T00:33:00.000-08:00

Earlier today I went through a phase of cognitive dissonance. I wanted to write, wanted to enjoy it, but the thought of sitting down and typing repulsed me. It was a nearly psychosomatic pain. Some message from my subconscious was trying to break through, and I couldn't quite hear it.

The Absolute Write forum has been a decent place for me to go for writing advice. Like Mur Lafferty said in a recent podcast, there's no new advice, generally speaking. Practice-wide breakthroughs don't happen. There aren't new developments about the science of writing, and there's a lot of overlap in the habits of successful writers.

Especially at the rough draft stage (where I am), advice is rudimentary: butt in chair, fingers on keys. This is basic story time, worry about the style and prose later. "Give yourself permission to suck" is a common chunk of wisdom I'm working at accepting. Permission to suck kept me going when the prose was painfully flat and--what's the opposite of clever?

Today I enhanced my license to suck by adding on a clause that gives me permission to be boring.

While telling Reagan about my writing sorrows, I realized I enjoy treating this current story like a documentary. In this rough draft stage, I've outlined the "what" of the plot, and now I'm detailing the "how". When something related to unicorns happens in Bethany's life, I want the footage. When something goes down with her friends at school, i want the footage. I want to know every turn in the story, every inch of character development, inside and out. That won't happen if those twists and turns aren't on the page.

In the larger scheme of things, I want to have good pacing. Amy recently advised "make every paragraph interesting", and someone on the AWForum dropped the gem "Start a scene late and leave it early" (actually, I think that's from a famous writer). Also, the woman who wrote a blog ripping apart the first two and a half Twilight books hammered home to me the point that describing daily routines and movements are boring. (And that adverbs are bad, but I'm not worrying about that yet.)

All those things, I take them to heart. I understand the value, but when I try to apply those lessons to this manuscript, they drag me down. Giving myself permission to be the patient documentary director, to shoot the full length of every relevant scene of my main character's life, takes a load off my shoulders. I like spending time in these scenes and watching the characters closely in my mind.

So that's today's development.

I figure the first draft is for plotting anyways. Second draft will be for editing and story revision. Third draft for polishing the language. That's the ideal, anyway.

Permission to write boring. And to relax.

scheming, scheming, scheming...

2010-02-09T23:20:00.001-08:00

Well, I paid for four more years of domain hosting, so that's decided. Still going back and forth on the site redesign/blog change.

"Are blogs dead?" is a question I've noticed here and there in the past months. A lot of the time it seems like this one is. Despite the long history, I don't post regularly right now, and I never post art anymore, so it's just navel-gazing with the occasional bit of Writing thrown in. And I don't read blogs either (she said with much chagrin). Not even the ones that I consider dear to me.

I had a really bad jag of emo-ness go on earlier this week, and as I howled over my failures, I asked Reagan when my failures would be "enough" and I could give up for good. He said four years.

Of course, all the lessons and methods he has for his art don't apply the same way to writing... or do they?

On the surface, the hustle is different with writing. People don't browse fiction on the internet the same way they browse art. And I'm supposed to (by my own decree) be dedicating this year to writing. Instead I'm BSing on the internet.

This hour and a half before bed I said I was going to get some words in, but I spent the first half hour cleaning house and the second half hour taking care of business.

Necessary evils, necessary evils.

*hangs up "under construction" sign and goes back to work*

Painful decisions.

2010-02-03T12:39:00.001-08:00

Blogger and I, we go way back. But I have a long history with my own hosting and my own domain address. But this love fest is breaking up. Blogger doesn't want to hang out with my server anymore, and my domain host is getting needy.

Strange that all this is happening at once: my domain name expires and blogger stops supporting FTP, all within a month.

While this is a welcome invitation to scrub down to the basics and start over, I'm not ready to shake things up.

Not like I have anything to lose, though.

I beat time I set. I rejoice.

2010-01-28T00:43:00.000-08:00

Strider is one of my favorite books. It's in my kid's lit pantheon with Tangerine, The Westing Game, and A Wrinkle In Time.

Children's literature, writing, and objective failure/subjective success are all on my mind today.

I've determined that UA is what "they" classify as 'middle grade', and therefore have been thinking about it differently. Today saw a lousy number of words, but I made strides in structure, themes, and characterization (sic; no spell check on the iPtouch, and I'm not sure that looks right.)

Today also found me crunching numbers and breaking my big million word goal down into categories and projects and giving them ballpark word quotas. It seems like I evolve my process once a week, honing day by day to find out what works for me.

Speaking of the big million word goal, i'm starting to believe I won't make it by the end of the year. For one, January is nearly over and I'm 25,000 words in the hole. That's more than a week's quota. Spread out over the remaining days this year, it's only 70 additional words daily, but considering the struggles I'm having keeping up right now, that's more difficult than it sounds.

On the side of subjective success: I've written at least 300 words every day since I started this project on January 3rd, and my running total is over 40,000 words for the month. The project is working. I'm taking writing more seriously. Even if I keep fumbling along at half my daily goal, I'm still going to get a heck of a lot done this year. The million word mark isn't just something to do for 2010, it's also an assignment for me to get the "crap" out of my system and put a few practice novels in a trunk. Even as i fall farther behind schedule, I don't despair.

I beat time I set.

It hurts, Annie! It hurts!

2010-01-26T20:31:00.000-08:00

Lines from The Miracle Worker, such as the one above, keep running through my head.

It does hurt, but I'm too tired right now to do anything about it.

Writing was awful all day. I don't know if it's just a matter of exhaustion or what. Today's just been weird. Everything I wrote, I wanted to smack myself in the face, but I didn't want to throw in the towel either.

Surviving January 26th was a masochistic endeavor. (First line, anyone? Or maybe it should be May 3rd...)

Example of how worn out I am:
23:29 - close firefox to take one more stab at writing before midnight
23:31 - deem writing fiction a lost cause for the night.
23:33 - want to blog about the day, but starting firefox again is such a feat, BLOG FROM iPHONE.

Because typing with two fingers on a touch screen is the easiest thing ever.

All my works in progress bore the crap out of me.
I have no idea where the current scene in UA is going.
I haven't touched TUMORS in over a week.
The short story I wrote last night was total wankery.
I have no desire to give up on my writing goals.

Those are all complaints.

I bore the crap out of myself.

That is also a complaint.

But my biggest complaint right now: crappy blogger/iPhone interface.

just to be.

2010-01-22T23:26:00.000-08:00

Still confused and struggling, as usual. It feels a little different these past couple weeks, since I set out on an epic writing project that thwarts me at nearly every turn.

Emotional moments from today: frustration at the lack of spontaneous expression in my work. My art wings are still so small. I don't have my own voice with it. Writing is good, but it doesn't feel expressive. I imagine that dancing or playing music (or painting) could scratch that itch, but-- Actually, stompy dancing would do quite nice. Good thing I'm my own downstairs neighbor.

Neat trick how explaining something in a poetic way offers a solution.

Other emotional moment: frustration at my inability to turn off the recording device in my brain. Not the one that makes memories, but the one that takes not on what I see and hear and processes it into something more. I needed to relax, but books made me think about writing, and music made me think about drawing, and I just needed to let go.

Speaking of letting go, I crunched some numbers and reorganized my database of writing goals. I'm giving myself Saturday off. It means bumping my wordcount the other 6 days from 2800 to 3250, but I think it's wise to give myself a day off. Writing won't be verboten on Saturdays, just not required.

I've taken to writing 400 words at a time using Write or Die. The desktop edition is nice because it has a word meter and a time meter stacked on top of each other so it's easy to see how words-written compares to time-left. In the New System, 3250 words = 8 "sessions". That's pretty much my workday. I should probably start spending the other 30 minutes each work hour doing other, you know, writing. Or reading.

Instead, this past week I spent those in-between times watching the fantastic second season of In Treatment.

But come Monday another weekend of performances will be behind me, and I'll start setting my alarm for 9:30, and we'll see how things go from there.

Turning in

2010-01-09T19:34:00.000-08:00

After three days of good progress on my project, I'm writing today off as a "nil".

Quite little sleep happened last night, followed by a good dose of Museum, a great dose of Social, and an epic dose of Cooking (curry). Now I'm just blasted worn out at 10:30, and have to be up in 10 hours.

Correction, today's not a nil, just 21%.

...

...

Upon reconsideration, my laptop is coming to bed with me. Twenty one percent is a good deal more inspiring than a blank page. With the little bit of evening remaining, I'll try to work that up to a 40% or so.

Soupy twist.

half-edited flash

2010-01-06T21:36:00.001-08:00

Palette cleanser between midnight snack and going back to the novella. Half-prompted by my own prompt to Correspondence Chapbook Collective for Creativity to Try Writing an omission.

"That's really what you want?"

The fish looks half dead in the water, rolled on its side to show a pale belly to the equally pale sky. It looks half dead, but I know it is alive because it waves a fin in the air, mirroring the fin underwater that keeps the fish beside my boat. That, and it speaks with me.

Laying on its side is the only way the fish can look at me with its dark, gaping eye as we converse about the weather, the lake, fishing, and, of course, my wish.

Reeling it in, though no easy feat in itself, hadn't been enough. No, besides locating the most singular fish west of the Rockies, besides luring it, besides pulling it out of the water (all twenty six inches, then I was allowed to let it back in the lake), I also had to charm it. Ladylike. Luckily, that part had been in my study materials, so I had come prepared. At least I didn't have to kiss it.

When magical creatures like this fish are discovered, treasure hunters make a cottage industry of pamphlets, ebooks, and guided tours. But few outside the business realize how much trial and error experimentation goes a verified discovery.

Some creatures need gifts, some need favors, some need validation. Some needed to be haggled with. Some need kisses, some need tickling, some need blood. Some need a stiff drink. Each creature of wonder has its own rules and rituals that must be observed, and unlike the combination locks securing the vaults that hold the world's gold, magical beings can't be defeated by a stethoscope, a good ear, and a deft touch. Very often. Less than one percent.

I had researched diligently to find something to grant my particular wish (magical entities aren't immune to poisons of bigotry and jealousy). Every listed creature within three hundred required more sacrifice, money, or vacation time than I had stashed away. Stumbling onto the possibility for a local, magic fish--and an easygoing fish at that--was a boon.

Truthfully, the discovery was more tripping over than stumbling onto. A story of the wish fish was printed in a newspaper wrapped around a jewelry box beneath a stack of Spanish language National Geographics in the junk room at the end of the hall on the third floor at an estate sale in the house that Jack built. I was there looking for cast iron.

And damn if the paper wasn't older than my mother, but the report was succinct. It said all the lucky wish recipient had done was catch a massive fish with black eyes and green fins, reel it in, hear its voice, toss it back, then have a nice chat with the magical, socially-starved individual.

Where I'm from, people don't really talk, so that last bit was harder than it sounds. I practiced chit-chat at a local coffee bar for a full month, but eventually the owner asked me to stop making the other customers uncomfortable. I wasn't comfortable either, but practice wasn't helping so I set off to talk. To. That. Fish.

It's passed now, though. The slimy, scaly conversation is heaped in my mind's junkyard of useless memories alongside how to get to my elementary school, the combination of my brother's bike lock, and the number of trees on the northern bank, which I counted while waiting for the fish to take my bait.

Now that fish is floating gently and staring at me, as though willing my body to tip from the boat and drown in its deep, black eye.

"You're sure?"

I nod.

"Well, alright then."

With a flick of its emerald tail, the fish wriggles back into the darkness far beneath my boat.

I don't notice any change, or feel any different. But I don't suppose I would.

Did you know that to be called a fish, an aquatic vertebrate has to have at least two pairs of paired fins? I need to revise some doodles, and stat!

This is quite a bit more edited than the 10k words of the WIP I have going. Less than 1000 words are more forgiving for proofreading in that way.

I want to go on about everything I'm discovering by writing so much this week, but I'm too busy writing.

Yay letters that make words.

2010-01-06T19:43:00.001-08:00

Sometimes I try to avoid proper nouns, namely names, in my work. This most commonly happens in slush work, like the novella I'm currently plowing through. From the outside it seems a little contradictory due to my interest in identity and name magic, but sometimes I'm just playing with concepts and don't want to invest in fully clothing my characters. (That sounds way worse than I meant it.)

This can be solved by picking generic, nondescript names, like the Billy, Bobby, Evan, Jack and Frank who star in one line of this novella. Find-replace will be my friend when I evolve these characters, or maybe when I do a full rewrite they'll have different names.

Other solution: picking out random letters from something nearby, or playing with pleasing sounds in my head. Sometimes this doesn't work for the best, like the "Burbull Bolt" my character is exploring in a collaborative project. Occasionally, however, a name like "Echston" pulled from a bag of dehydrated veggies brings a degree of serendipity to a story.

This Echston bought up a lot of property in a city, beginning with an orphanage, then the surrounding buildings until he owned everything around a public square. He closed off the square and hired people to be part of his secret project. They all lived/worked in Echston's buildings around the square. Yes, it's a bit cult-like. Especially when you find out the people living in that area are calling themselves "Archstones" and the orphanage at the center of it is called "Keystone". It works so well, it amazes me that Echston was the first piece, not the last one, mutated to make the others fit.

...
...
Well there's 300 words and 40 minutes I won't get back.

Double edged sword cuts both ways

2010-01-05T23:59:00.000-08:00

I've undertaken a new project that I will be referring to a lot (especially on Twitter), but not talking about much. Bits of it will be posted from time to time as well, but it's all very rough. If I was at my computer right now I'd show a bit of tonight's work, but I'm in bed on the Touch again.

Correction: if I was on my laptop, I'd still be working on the blasted thing.

I modified a NaNoWriMo spreadsheet to keep track of my daily progress (quantity, not quality, dearies!), and determined that my system will count by calendar days rather than wake/sleep days. Two nifty benefits of this: first, my push for end of day numbers happens while I still have a couple buckets of energy in me, and second, as long as I make use of those post midnight hours, I have a headstart when I wake up in the morning and am at my worst.

Suffit. Any more and I risk tipping my hand.

New toy!

2010-01-04T23:04:00.000-08:00

My mom got a new iPhone for christmas, and kindly sent me her old 1st gen to use as a Touch.

In the past ten minutes alone it has made my life better by providing a flashlight so I didn't trip over Reagan's slippers while he was sleeping, and then made my life much MUCH better by introducing me to the possibilities of silent, handheld blogging.

You see, it's around 26 degrees F outside, and the basement where my computer is has an uninsulated sliding glass door, and I leave the thermostat (one floor above) set at 60 (I'm paranoid about really high heating bills, unprecedented due to spending my first 25 years in temperate climes). My eyeballs get cold down there.

Up here, however, our bedroom is the warmest spot in the house. I'm curled nicely under blankets, benefiting from my husbands body heat, and noiselessly returning to a beloved pasttime.

Oh, the joys of an iPhone. If only it could act as a remote for my 'lectric blanket...

2010

2009-12-31T21:54:00.000-08:00

I'm feeling very good about the new year. Not in any excitable way, but chill and confident. Well. Chill, at the very least.

The Moment was spent curled up on the bed with Reagan, a plate of special cheeses between us and glasses of Strongbow in hand. We were watching a live feed of Time Square. When the countdown was in the 40 second range I commented on how anticlimactic the new year was going to be for us. I didn't mind much, some of late 2009 was spent discovering that I'm a person comfortable with anticlimax.

We watched the giant screen in New York via my small screen balanced on my knees as the east coast reached single digits. We didn't count along, but let the crowds call out "six, five, four" for us. Then the connection slowed, leaving us with a frozen picture that didn't pick up again until the confetti was falling.

Yes, my New Year was defined by lag. We laughed, kissed, then toasted with our hard cider.

Happy Decades. A cheer for surviving the old one, and a fierce wish for the one to come. Let's all make the most of our new tomorrows.

Colorblind

2009-12-26T17:20:00.000-08:00

Life hasn't been normal since before my last post. Hm.

Life hasn't been normal for a touch over two weeks, but these two weeks have felt longer. First came the Long Night with Reagan being away (preceeded by a weekend of Togetherness), then the snow came, driving us out of the basement to the close-quarters, third-floor warmth of our bedroom.

And I haven't left yet.

I've left physically, to do dishes, to romp in the snow (that washed away today :( ), to go to the Base with Reagan, and for one long, freezing day when our windows were replaced. Daily operations, however, still take place from, well, bed.

Until today I bore the confinement with relative grace, and even today I wasn't too cranky about it. But it took me until to day to realize that The Long Day (which I'm calling this past week) is the other side of the coin I minted during The Long Night.

When all my time is spent in one place, there's no clear division to the days and hours. Even when I'm not keeping on the same schedule as my husband, the weekdays are clearly divided into Reagan At Work, Reagan At Home, and Reagan Asleep, which gives me structure, and things to do. (For some reason he assumes the duties of cooking any time he's home... and I don't really argue.)

This past week I've let my days devolve into little bits of many things. A little writing here, a little writing-theory there, a handful of doodling when I feel the need, and a lot (lot) of aimless wandering around the internet. But wandering to useful things (I tell myself). The result is not being able to tell when I'm "working" and when I'm "playing", which brings me to a moment like this when I need to force myself into something, but I can't tell if I need to relax or close down some distractions and get something done. Often I want to kick back, but can't justify it since i haven't accomplished anything substantial.

Now that I have made this discovery, I feel the rest of the day and the rest of the weekend will go more smoothly.

keeping busy

2009-12-17T02:45:00.000-08:00

last Thursday

tonight

Behind me you see just one of the six cabinets I put a coat of paint on. I ran out of masking tape before I could get to the seventh. Second coat goes on tomorrow.

That's not right!

2009-12-11T00:22:00.000-08:00

The last thing on my todo list today was scanning art.

About 40 minutes ago I discovered the scanner wouldn't talk to my computer unless my computer had drivers/software installed. I didn't want to take the time to find the CD and install the software, so I decided to make use of my tablet and approximate for you a sketch from my new sketchbook.

I put on Pandora and had fun with.

Don't think it was faster, though.

Frustrathon

2009-12-10T00:38:00.000-08:00

I am peeved that Firefox did not restore my session. I had some good recipes open! (I think)

Before Firefox did not restore my session, I was frustrated because...
1) I'm 20 minutes from Extended Bedtime and 40 minutes passed Normal Bedtime
2) I only finished 4.5 of the 6 things on my ToDo list for today
3) The next two prompts in 3am Epiphany aren't things I can reasonably attempt in 20 minutes (even if it is near the titled 3am)

Soon I will be annoyed because I'm not communicating clearly, or my bread starter is separating, or I'm too excited to fall asleep, or I realize how much miss blogging, or... or... or...

But all those things are minor. I play them up to the audience, saying how angry or frustrated I am with a great big smile and a laugh just under the surface. When I have an emotion other than "good", "fine", "happy", or "utterly depressed" I parade it around like a prize I've won, and marvel at what chaotic turmoil it's causing in my brain. Maybe because those "troubles" are problems I get to solve.

Short, explicit summary: Things are going (very) well.

Some time in the past couple weeks I turned a corner and had a series of... more determinations that epiphanies.

The first behavioral breakthrough was beginning to ask myself "what's the little thing I can do right now to improve the situation?"
Second was planning out cooking way in advance.
Third is very recent: limited ToDo lists. Crossing things off is fun, and by only putting a handful of things on the list, I can accomplish a high percentage and still have time in my day to do other things.

Three (relatively) big things I have going on:
- Signing up to help a local Community Theater for their next production. I volunteered for sets and sound-tech, and expect to start next week, maybe the one after.
- Helping write a historic superhero comic for a friend of Reagan's who lives in the area. I'm still in the early stages. I did a draft of the pilot issue's script and am doing background research.
- Starting a chapbook exchange group! This is possibly the biggest risk, as it's the only project of the three I'm completely in charge of. I set up a facebook group for people to join a small group, put together some recent writing, mail it to the other group members, get (and give) feedback, then start the process all over. I guess it's "workshop: lite". The response I've gotten is thrilling!

(See?! it's already past my late bedtime! and I'm worked up!)

Major event of the past worth mentioning:

Lots. Of. Cooking.
Except for last week (due to a prolonged headache), I cook something new about four times a week. Usually with a recipe.

Today I also cooked cranberry... sauce? relish? chutney? (it did have a dash of curry powder!) and mixed up some pie dough for hand pies with cranberry as the filling. Very tasty with a little cream cheese.

At this very moment I have a yeast bread sponge at my elbow. Tomorrow I'll bake my fourth loaf in the past month, and my second this week. Acquisition of bread flour and a cooking scale really amp up my baking. I'll probably go off the charts when Reagan buys me a stand mixer.

But with all this cooking and baking, I need to redouble my efforts to exercise.

Event of the near future worth mentioning: Next Monday Reagan leave will spend the work week tramping around in the snow, shooting guns and jumping out of helicopters. :(

Actually, I'm just going to pretend he's asleep and the week is an unending night that I can spend being hyper productive. Cabinets? Painted! Boxes? Unpacked! Kitchen island? Assembled! And other such things.

Sigh, blog, you are a bad influence on me. It's 20 past four and my teeth aren't going to brush themselves. I must hasten away, lest Reagan wake up and leave for work before I get a chance to steal his warmth.

Diurnal

2009-11-17T20:14:00.001-08:00

I miss the floating stasis of night time. I miss staying up late and feeling cooperation and harmony among my motivation, my emotions, and my mental state. I miss how productive I used to be during the midnight hours when I was blinded to the impatient dimensions like sun and supper.

These days time passes before my eyes, not beneath my feet, and I seldom feel my consciousness relax enough to fill the vacant sky. I think it's a lack of solitude.

Don't get me wrong, I have plenty of alone time during the day, at least a solid six hours of idle time while Reagan's gone, then another, scattered three when he's home in the evenings. But during daylight, no matter the weather, I feel the presence of the rest of the world. I feel the trees and the birds, the neighbors and their pets. I feel the cars and the kids and the noise and the work; the huge, lit reality out there is oppressive. I see it, I hear it, I feel it, and I can't shut it out.

But the shadow blacks of nighttime are a blank canvas to me and for me. Silence pulls me out of my head and belittles my inhibitions. At night I find my focus better than I ever feel it during the day; it's just my nature.

I've taken decently well to daytime living, though. I wake up before six and fix Reagan some breakfast. I clean the kitchen and pass my day, watching the sun so I can move my flowers, watching the clock so I can time my shower, errands, or at the very least plan dinner. Structure is good. Going to bed at the same time my husband does is good. Those last minutes of shared awareness are treasured every day.

Tonight, however, I left him upstairs to sleep alone.

I'm down here missing the darkness.

Bounce-back day

2009-11-11T09:48:00.000-08:00

A day off in the middle of the week is like an extra long autumn daylight savings day. A holiday without the obligations of a weekend. A snow day without snow.

But that was yesterday. Today is still rainy and delightfully overcast, and I'm determined to get things done (even though I slept in again).

Actually, all I want to do right now is play Andy Goldsworthy in our little backyard, with its drooping grass and purple-gray leaves

In other news

2009-11-10T20:59:00.000-08:00

My old everywhere-sketchbook is full, and in it's place I've taken to carrying around a Memoranda book Reagan was issued sometime during his training. (Firefox doesn't recognize "Memoranda" as a word, but it's clearly printed on the front of this federally supplied notebook.)

In any case, I ripped out parts of the first 5 pages that R had written on. Nothing interesting was lost or remains, but it's a way to keep the source intact and still be able to find the beginning of my own scrawlings.

It's mostly lines of poetry and story ideas based on things I read. None of that is fit for public consumption, but there is something I'm willing to share. In one of my writing magazines there was a short humor article about the two sentence biographies that follow articles in most publications. I started writing some of my own to have on hand in case I forget how to blurb myself between now and becoming a real published writer.

Annie Rush...
... (assuming that is her real name) hails from next door (as long as you live in a suburb), but spends all her time writing in a moving car. Her husband does the driving, of course.

... is a pseudonym adopted from her cats. They dictate her short stories and articles, but she's on her own for the poetry.

... started writing at age six, stopped at age nine, and has been rehashing those ideas ever since. She has no sense of humor.

... and her self description will never fit into this space, much as her feet will never fit into that perfect pair of Mary Janes she had in the third grade.

... mixes metaphors for your enjoyment every Tuesday at her basement comedy club. Please tip your waitresses and mail carriers.

... would like to level with you. She's only good at writing, so take a look at her novel: Spreading It Out in a Nutcase.

... was born a girl, grew up a bear, grew into a jackal. She is now a young adult author.

... is the real-life inspiration for Nancy Drew. She gave up detecting adventures to sit at home, chew pens, and, occasionally, write.

.... can't decide if she would rather read everything or write everything. People keep sneaking off with her ideas, so it will likely be the former.

What's your blurb?

Checking my work

2009-11-10T18:59:00.000-08:00

I finished the first draft of this about 11 hours ago, so unlike many of my postings, it's been proofed and lightly edited!

((Reagan's going over it. While he does, I'll report that dinner was excellent and I got my google wave invite today. Not sure what I'm going to do with it, but I'm an early-ish adopter!

R's laughing. I think that's good. It's meant to be comedy.

I'm suddenly craving lebni cheese.))

Mom pulls the cover off the serving platter with triumph glistening on her face. We all hunch forward for the reveal, then turn to Mom and watch the triumph run from her face like watered down mascara, to be smoothly replaced by mortification. Taking our cue from her, the rest of us are horrified by the dinner we are being served.

This side of the apocalypse, pink and gray are not appropriate colors for food. I cover my mouth with my napkin, just in case.

° ° ° ° °

I won't lie about this. The smell coming from under the lid is gross. It smells like something died, in the wrong way. I want to leave, but "dinner" has me locked in its tractor beams, and Dad would holler if I left without permission. No way I'm taking the first bite, though. Or the second or the third. Not even on a dare.

Jessie looks like she's gonna puke.

= = = = =

I know the kids are looking to me to be the brave one and throw myself in front of the gelatinous horror that looms in front of us, but Sandi's counting on me, too. I can read those eyebrows clear as semaphores, and she couldn't stand it if I rejected this meal she spent all day on.

Everyone's waiting on me, but I can't bring myself to say a word, so the silence has a field day in our midst. Sometimes it's a layered tension binding us in our seats, sometimes it's a thin wind whipping around the room, both obvious and invisible. At some point it shifts from anticipation to quiet, dumbfounded curiosity.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

They're all waiting for what's next. Clearly, nobody has any intention of eating what I cooked, or rather ruined. I can't say I blame them. The kids looked from me, goddess of the kitchen who betrayed them, to their father, hero of evenings, fixer of things, but this culinary disaster is beyond his powers.

I cover the dish again. "Kids, go back to your homework. Dinner is postponed."

"Can we have pizza?" Of course Colin is leveraging my misfortune for his greasy gain.

"No, Mom, order Thai."

Jessie's never had Thai food; the odd request just prolongs the silence which hasn't completely left the room.

"Go... do... your homework. Your father and I will figure something out."

= = = = =

As the kids scatter, I go to my wife and kiss her cheek tenderly, in case whatever happened to dinner is contagious.

"Thai food?" she asks me, query punctuated with an incredulous eyebrow.
"She's seen it on TV. People are always having it delivered."
"I guess."
"Is there anything I can do?"
"No, no." Sandi is resigned to launching a second attack on hunger with one of her plan B contingencies. "You can go back to whatever. I'll make something quick."
"Mac and cheese?"
"If you're lucky."

I give her another kiss and follow the kids upstairs.

* * * * *

But we can't stay away. I am the first to arrive by mere seconds, but dinner#1 is laid bare again, its shroud nowhere in sight. I stand in the doorway held in thrall by the slick rosy slopes. Dad appears in the opposite doorway, serving the food a hard stare with a side of frown.

Colin joins us, almost as though the casserole of crap had summoned us to the table side to gaze upon its splendor again. "What _is_ it?" he breathes.

I don't even notice he is gone until he returns. The squirt climbs up to stand on Mom's chair. I don't pay much attention to him, preferring to watch how the light wraps itself around the gray lumps on the table. A white flash interrupts the warm light on our cooling dinner.

Colin brought back a camera. My camera!

° ° ° ° °

I'm focused on the rubbery mass centered on the table. Focused and capturing its horror to warn my friends and any future dinner guests... but not to focused to notice Jessie's face tighten when she sees what I'm doing. Mom senses danger--or returns to collect the leftovers... leftunders... whatever you call untouched food--or maybe she, too is beckoned by the mystery.

Mom comes in from the kitchen and hollers, "Back to your rooms! Let it rest in peace."

Jessie launches an attack at me, saying I took her things, but Mom pulls me off her chair and deflects Jessie. Much like an eagle snatches a squirrel from a wolf... then eats it. I'm hauled into the kitchen and set on a counter while Mom shuffles around, opening jars, boiling cans, and however else she cooks.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Nothing seems to be quite normal tonight, so I prefer to corral my space alien when I can keep an eye on him, often two. His heels kick the lower cabinets, but today I don't care. I'm simply happy the boy still behaves like a boy, even if chicken doesn't behave like chicken or potatoes like potatoes. And the boy is also behaving like not-boy, seeming to nibble at something square and shiny in his hands.

"Jessie's camera?" I hold out my hand rescue the gadget.
"Pepperoni?" Colin does a keen imitation of me, seeking a bribe for his compliance.

"Clear the.., uh-humm... off the table." I say, dropping a couple over-crisped slices in his hand.
"Okay, Mom."

I check on the pizza in the oven, then sweep up the meat crumbs in Colin's wake. Before the door to the dining room has stopped swinging, he's in the gap again. "It's not there."

I try to take the news in stride.

"Tell your sister to wash again, we'll eat soon." Colin stops abruptly as I grab his shirt. "And return this."

He takes the camera and I call my husband.

= = = = =

Sandi yells for me when I'm right around the corner. She doesn't know I'm heading for a third examination of the dinner that was not food.

"I'm here, I'm here".

"Did you do something with the--" She coughs and glances significantly at the white expanse of our dining room table.

"No, why would I..?" I notice then that it is gone.

"Why would you throw out inedible food?"

"Well, that's the logical thing to do with it, but I haven't yet. Didn't you?"

"Would I be asking if I did? If I didn't chuck it, and you didn't, and Colin didn't...."

I say "Dingoes?" the same moment she says "Jessie?"

But neither of us are confident.

"Then where is the dish? The lid, even? Your mother gave those to me for our wedding."

My wife is troubled, but there's nothing to do now, when none of us have eaten supper. And a timer is ringing in the kitchen.

* * * * *

Mom and Dad both glare at me when I come down for dinner take two.

"What?" I give them my best impression of an annoyed teenager.

Mom starts "Did you---" But Dad steps on her line.

"Help your mother get supper on the table."

There's nothing to do but follow Mom into the kitchen and stand next to her at the oven.

I can tell she's still nervous, hoping her kitchen magic didn't fail a second time. Her knuckles are white on the heavy door's handle.

"Courage, Mom"

She takes a deep breath and opens the oven. The pizza inside looks marvelous. The edges are black and crispy, and the toppings are a bit past well done, but the smell makes my mouth water. Her triumph is shy--but pure--as she carries the steaming pie to the table. I grab the cheese and pepper in her wake.

We sit down again, usual places, usual faces, and dig in.

I think I fulfilled the exercise's demands, even though I neatly exceeded the word count by half. Without Mr Brian Kiteley here to check my work, though, I'll never know for sure.

The voices for the four characters aren't as differentiated as I'd like. Each section is preceded by a special header which indicates the next narrator, though, if you want to mental-map out that kind of thing.

Other themes for today:
- apartment vs. house, both in terms of our current living space and my various pursuits... am I renting or buying the mantles of writer and artist?
- binging on writing magazines. I dropped some cash on three different writing magazines, and unsurprisingly, they are both inspiring and demoralizing.

Royal We

2009-11-09T19:13:00.000-08:00

I counted the words I wrote in this exercise. 707. "Dead on!" I thought to myself. But when I checked the book, the "Royal We" prompt was only for 600. Unedited story text follows. Blah blah blah at the end.

We escaped the night they forgot to put a guard on duty. Normally one of them hassled Paul when he went out to take a piss around three, but that last time no rifle nudged him harshly in the gut. No thick-gloved hand shoved him in the direction of the piss-pit, and no gravely voice made rude remarks about his bodily functions or about his wife. We took advantage of the oversight and escaped.

Susannna was skeptical, saying first that it was a trick, then later that we shouldn't leave the others behind. The crowing of a cock awoke her instincts, though, and our four feet shuffled cautiously over the dirt threshold. Her conscience struck again halfway between the cover of the bunkhouse and the freedom of the back fence and we had to spend a few seconds arguing in harsh whispers. Paul threatened to go alone, saying he would go back for no man and would wait for no woman.

For the next fifty meters, all we heard was the crunch of our own footsteps on the crust of snow littering the yard. Tears fall lightly and make no sound.

We'd never discussed escape, alone or with others. Paul seemed to know what he was doing, though, when we reached the fence. Before the night's chill could fully seep through our worn out sweaters, the wire curtain parted for us, and swept closed again in our wake.

Freed from the oppressing depravity of the camp, Susanna releases the chokehold that had clamped down her emotions for the past several months. Without even moving into the trees, beyond the sight of the tilting buildings of the camp, she breaks down crippling the momentum of our escape.

We are lucky that the snow swallowed the sound of her sobs, but the cold was little encouragement to move farther towards safety. Paul tried coaxing in soft words, but his voice was too comforting. Movement on the barren side of the wire fence forced his hand.

We both reeled from the pain of the slap. The shock of violence was sharpened by the cold, then dulled by adrenaline. Susanna found her feet as the torrent of emotion shifted abruptly from exhausted relief to indignation and anger. Progress came swiftly then and we were beyond earshot then eyesight of the camp within minutes. Susanna was chasing revenge, but we were both leaving the bellows that fueled that fire far behind.

The anger died out as quickly as it had leaped up; our concentration shifted from the quarrel to the struggle across rocky ground in the darkness. Paul led the way over ravine filled with sticks, across broad slippery boulders, and skirting the frequent patches of snow. We labored silently in the moonlight for a thousand frosty breaths before the pace relaxed.

At the top of an embankment Susanna hesitated. Paul already slipped over the side onto a ledge several feet below. We looked at each other for a moment, struggling to climb out of the too-familiar mode of survival and return to a mindset of interaction and humanity. Paul reached it first, lifting his arms to assist his wife.

Susanna reached the same awareness after our feet were once again planted side by side. Our eyes locked, each reading the whirl of thoughts and emotions in the other, waiting to fall into the right gear for our predicament.

Susanna's emotions picked up where they had been left, furious about the violence inflicted by the person most precious to her. We struggled as she tried to pull away. Paul tightened his grip and murmured the sounds of our private language, hoping to cut through the confusion. We argued in short, wordless bursts, exchanging glimpses of fear, worry, and protection.

Paul was watchful. Paul was brave. Paul rescued.
Susanna was caring. Susanna was devoted. Susanna supported.

We gave up our tension a fraction at a time, forgiving each other, reminding each other of the love that had brought us together and kept us together.

After one final squeeze in the embrace we had worked ourselves into, we shared a level, sober gaze. Danger was behind us. The frosty dawn was around us. We could see nothing before us on the path we traveled but black, wet trees.

Hand in hand, we walked forward.

This was hard. And awkward. The idea was the easy part, even though I knew I had to write in the odd "we" point of view. I even have a list of three other ways I want to use the format, though I doubt any of them will be easier to implement.

I picked this version of the prompt to write out first because it's most true to the exercise description in the book. Some of the feeling might've been different if I had re-read the prompt at any time during the writing process (it was several hours, if not a full day, between reading the assignment and starting to write).

Something I avoided in this was using both names in one sentence. Whoever wrote the two line example use both names; had I re-read that bit, I might've done the same. In general, though, I think it's a practice that weakens the "royal we". Unless I weakened it by allowing each sentence to legitimately be able to come out of one mouth or the other.

Maybe I should try again with a duo and permit both names in one sentence (all my other ideas involve large, shifting groups as the "we"), but I don't think those tries will be worthy story attempts. This style falls into an uncanny valley of writing. I think it's a legitimate style to refer to oneself in the third person, or to use the royal "we" as an individual, but using "we" for a finite people and never using "I"... is just uncomfortable. (An exception to this would be someone on the sidelines in a group, where the narrator never does anything alone, but others do.)

Anyhow, the attempt above is very loosely inspired by a scene in the movie Katyn. Despite going 107 words over wordcount, I left out a lot of description and detail in the action covered above, plus have a second act I could add to it. We'll see.

I had a cool title for this post that covered both today's writing and today's dinner, but I can't remember what it was.

Dinner was late and in a hurry. I dumped white rice and a few roughly smashed cloves of garlic in the rice cooker to be our starch/side. We don't have a meat mallet, so I filled an empty salsa jar with water and used it to pound a chicken breast flat. It was a pretty messy way to go. Flat chicken breast was wrapped around some diced onion and fresh rosemary, then the whole thing wrapped in bacon (4 slices). Popped it in the oven. Boiled then cooled some fresh green beans, tossed them in a skillet with sauteed red bell peppers to keep warm. Salt and pepper.

The bacon was slightly under cooked (for how we like it), but the chicken was perfect. All plated up, dinner looked wonderful. Tasted good, too.

These days I usually prefer to use a recipe than just cook on the fly like this (not because I screw up regular food, but because I want to try more different things and expand my skill set), but it's nice to know I can make a good dinner out of fresh ingredients, even if I'm clueless 20 minutes before I start.

Perfect is the Enemy

2009-11-07T20:23:00.000-08:00

Thinking out loud. No pictures here. And the thinking isn't even original.

I'm suffering from information overload again, caught between the desire to cast a wide net and the desire to actually catch anything in the net. I'm starving for my inability to eat fish for need of sorting fish. (I love my convoluted metaphors.)

I finally connected my consumption compulsion (with regards to media/information) with the handful of posts about Barry Schwartz'sParadox of Choice a few minutes ago. I nearly bought the book (yay kindle!), but read the reviews and decided there wouldn't be enough "help" for me in there.

It's a struggle to grok that I won't become who I want to be overnight.

At "lunch" today I said that I don't think in the long term, and that's true. Despite my "complaint" that one of our democracy's difficulties is its inability to make long term plans and decisions, I realize I don't do that on my own either. Perhaps it's a byproduct of moving an average of once a year for the past 8 years, but I can't really map out my future more than a little bit at a time. Gannon (more than a decade older than I) mentioned things he wants to do with his art over the next ten years, and that kind of foresight, that distance of vision, was outside my zone of familiarity.

It shouldn't be, but I won't change this overnight.

As part of that lunchtime discussion I brought up cultural pressure to be an instant success, or at least one that reaches viability and maturity within a couple years. Even though I can't think of life without my creativity, I also can't think of what my creativity will be in ten years. How will it change? Where will I go? What will I reach?

Ach, mea culpa. It's about the journey, not the destination. Even if there is a "there", I won't reach it overnight.

Nothing happens overnight. Even if I can sculpt a reasonable 25.5 year old version of myself in the next few hours or days, I won't make the habits I want to have as soon as I imagine them.

But what are those little change I need to make? How will I find the quiet time for rejuvenating and the spare time for stretching? How will I exchange breadth for depth? How will I always remember that I can't read everything, so it's better read and grok a few things than skim and bookmark many things?

Limit your choices. Limit your choices. Limit your choices.
Good is good enough. Good is good enough.
Output is more importance than input.
Perfect is the enemy.

Pardon my overstating mantras.

It's not a joke that I need to let go of the road not traveled, though, and stop fretting over missed opportunities. (Heehee, there's a story in this somewhere.) Even if I have benefited from obsessive skimming and gleaning, I don't think it's going to bring me a cure from obsessive skimming and gleaning.

Where's my f$*%&($#*&in discipline?!

Another small thing from lunch that I think will help in some way: I had an opportunity to explain, to other and to myself, why I don't do more inked/colored/finished drawings. I like the quantity and physical progress of drawing in a sketchbook and working my way through photo books, a certain satisfaction that doesn't come from digital work, even if I post it online. I need to work out quantities to be printed and posted in my room... or in a dark dark folder never to be seen... to give myself the same feeling of accomplishment and progress. Maybe I can apply that to this other messy instream of info somehow that will maximize my productivity.

Good thing tomorrow's a Monday. The beginning of a workweek is a great time to experiment on myself!