An Inspiration Passes

Been feeling meloncholy the last two days.  Tears choking my throat, it's been a long time since i puked tears and i could now...

It's surprising.  I mean in the way that i wouldn't have expected puking tears from this, i wouldn't have expected to react to this particular death in such a heavy hearted, choking way.  maybe it's because i would have never expected this death.  maybe it's because we had unfinished business, he and i, only he never knew it.

He is the reason Third Bed exists in the way it does.  Before he walked past me that night, i had only bare-bones on a post-it.  Then he passed, on his supervisory rounds and all the pieces fell into place.  i knew the story i wanted to tell, i knew the characters and i knew their love.

and i never got the courage to show him what i made from that little bit of nothing that he did for me... I never got to thank him, and in the end i never really got to know him...

For Chuck:

" She was a sexual creature; she’d known that from early on and her life had progressed along a line she felt was true. Still, she had been astonished by her own primal reaction toward him that first time she’d seen him. No, ‘saw’ was not the right word; reaction to the sight of him hadn’t been what lit her up and made her take such immediate notice of him. She had breathed in the scent of him and known that she was lost.

She remembered the opulent, glittering ball, where they’d been introduced. She could hardly recall the face of the diplomat who’d purchased her services for a journey to the city by the sea. She had been out of her own element, beyond the lines of her comfort zone among the high-class wives who would have snubbed her in her own city. But her borders had never before broken from a little strain. She let herself be consumed by a persona she would normally only wear for a night. She’d lived it and breathed it for weeks without pause.

She had noticed him first while in conversation with one wife or another; he was nearby, speaking with her diplomat escort. Though they shared a brief glance, they were not introduced. Not out of rudeness, but due to no available opportunity before he was off to meet another guest. He passed quite close behind her as he moved away, putting a gentle hand to her elbow to warn her to not turn about suddenly. The touch was only one of a thousand jostles and embraces in the night. It meant little, but the air he’d stirred up around her was a different story. She was struck by the scent of him that lingered after he’d gone.

She followed him with her eyes as he crossed the room, unable to tear her attention away as the smell filled her, finding a home in her belly and roaring to be noticed. It was a roar she recognized from her long life of promiscuity, but she had never known it to be so astoundingly strong; so deafening, so undeniably true. She learned later it was no special soap or cologne, only the smell of his skin and hair and breath. It was him.

Eventually, he asked her to dance. She accepted him and they shared two dances that night. She didn’t know how she’d managed the steps, how she’d remembered to smile and laugh and seem pleasant while engulfed by his irresistible odor. She hadn’t even been sure if he understood how he was affecting her. But then when he left her for good that first night he’d whispered five words in her ear that both terrified and thrilled her.

“I know who you are.” "

Don't Forget to Title Your Post

I feel like i start my blogs with the same sentence sometimes.  here's one of those times.

i don't know what the fuck i was worried about.  i'm just being stupid.  i've got this under control.

I forget how i'm working at this, slow and steady.  i forget that i've fixed things, i've figured things out already.

And i etched out another little specificity that irked me by its absence.  I feel that i have finally found the whole of the insane rationalization of my "bad guy"

Because so much of what happens hinges so much on a series of events that happened long before my characters were born.  But i have to keep it neat and clean and short, yet still show what's up with the bad guy and the character who is basically me.  She's in all 5 stories, even after she's dead.  She does pretty much my job... twists events to fit her fancy.

that's not true.  that's treating her worse than she deserves.  she gets a bad rap.  no one really appreciates her.  poor dear.

Anyway.  i'm working on the first two at the same time right now.  editing 1 at home and rewriting 2 at work.

And I'm still waiting to hear about Third.  Coffee Companion took a long time to come back but i feel like this is mayblonger.  maybe cuz they're giving prizes in this one?  maybe cuz i totally rocked it and i'm getting one?

that'd be awesome.

The Meryl Streep-athon

I don't know if it can really be called an "-athon" but that's what i'm calling it.  i made the list of all of her movies that came from books.  here's the list:

Kramer vs. Kramer - Avery Corman
The French Lieutenant's Wife - John Fowles
Sophie's Choice - William Styron
Out of Africa - Isak Dinesen
Ironweed - William Kennedy
Evil Angels - John Bryson
Postcards From the Edge - Carrie Fischer
One True Thing -Anna Quindlen
The Orchid Thief - Susan Orlean
The Hours - Michael Cunningham (ha! that's my cousin, sort of)
The Manchurian Candidate - Richard Condon

That list does not include Julie and Julia and The Bridges of Madison County (both of which i've read but not seen) and The Devil Wears Prada, which i've both read and seen.  Sophie's Choice i've seen but not read.

So, now i have to track down all those books.  i don't know which one to do first... but i should probably start carrying the list around with me so when i go to the book store i can find the books.  i couldn't remember all those authors' names if it was my life depending upon it.

In other news, Smashwords!!  The Third Bed is almost completely reformatted to be uploaded.  wait, scratch that.  it's completely converted and ready to go, except for the cover photo.  i'm hoping my cousin (not the sort of cousin from above, the other one) will do me a cover page, and that will be awesome.

I like that i started with something simple like The Third Bed because i just had to do the formatting and i also managed to learn some stuff about my new Word program that i didn't know before.  because everything got changed and moved and i couldn't find jack shit.  But since it's a short story and there was no italics or chapter breaks or font changes or anything crazy like that to deal with it was a quick conversion.  Shade and Shadow is five chapter with breaks within the chapters.  all that shift-shimmer shit is gonna drive me crazy.

but i have a background with which to start and not pull all my hair out... at least not immediately.

So I Lied

I did manage to both work and do some writing over this long, long week off.  I typed up the rest of the bits that i'd written for The Guide.

I also read through The Third Bed.  I so very much want to get that up on smashwords and considering that i only changed maybe a dozen words on this read through i think it's ready.  I just have to format it and that's where i lose focus.  there's so many steps!

maybe i need to go to the coffee place and sit down and do it.

and then i can do it to Shade and Shadow, cuz that's the other one i want to put up there.

but now i have to work some more.  and i have to go back to the real job tomorrow so i have to figure out what i'm going to work on or what i'm going to read...

Caterwauling

the story has gone caterwauling, bouncing off the walls of an empty room and i sit in the middle of the floor thinking to myself, "I don't feel like chasing you anymore."

that's the signal. it's time to move on. i really like the way i'm doing it now. working a little here, a little there, till something draws me away. it doesn't get forced.

but what do i want to work on next? The Pilot is the logical choice, it's the only one that hasn't been looked at yet. but i would also like to get both Shade and Shadow and Third Bed on Smashwords. and there's always the two past years of unfinished Nano stories. I'd love to see more of Darbin and Dax, but then again, i want to know what Vincent does with his books...

decisions, decisions.

The Man In Black Fled Across the Desert and Other Opening Lines.

~The man in black fled across the desert and the gunslinger followed.
~Call me Ishmael.
~Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
~You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; but that ain't no matter.
~Through the fence, between the curling flower spaces, I could see them hitting.
~All this happened, more or less.

once again i must begin a post with the words 'it's been a long time'

And it has. but november is coming soon and i feel like i need to do a little practicing. And this isn't even me forcing myself because i actually want to write. Just a few weeks ago, after a mighty puking epsiode on my couch the husband said to me "have some wine, i'll take the kid"

so i had some wine and i sat down with The Third Bed and cleaned it up. I remember once before i went through that story and pulled out as many words as i could, and it seems i didn't do a well enough job because that's what i did this time again. I don't know what it is exactly that i did to it, but it came almost under a different light. There's something better about it now. it inspired me to keep going (and to drink more wine... or maybe that's old christine's doing...)

When i was still looking forward to my maternity leave, rather than back at it, i knew that i probably wouldn't have a whole lot of time for writing, or crafting. In the beginning that was true, but as i got better practiced i found that once in a while i DID have time for myself. to do my things. I've wanted to write this post a million times and it's funny that i'm writing it now that i've gone back to work (and kept my second job) and have so much less time than i did before.

But in just moments i will probably open up a new document and get a start on my rewrite of the Prequel. Yes. I'm rewriting it. Why? Because just like the Third Bed i see it under a different light and i just can't get it from what i already have. I know i can salvage much of it, but i just feel that i need a clean slate. I have my first words. I had so much trouble during the editing process trying to figure out what i wanted it to start with that having that first line just seems to open up the whole story.

And it's laid out for me under this new light, which isn't so bright. Not to say the story has become a dark one, but it most certainly has become something else...

Some Stuff Done

Yesterday I sat down with my short story editing binder and the newest printout of the 3rd bed with every intention of editing it. I did a little work on it, mostly with my highlighter and arrows, moving stuff around.

And instead of continuing on with 3rd bed, I flipped through to the story called Elsinore Compound which is one of the apocalypse stories and edited that instead. Which was cool since i tried to before and just couldnt get very far into it. If i hadn't run out of ambition i probably would have also done the story about the Priscillas.

but i did something, and that's awesome.

A Task

I've thought of a way to work myself back up to it. I want to go back to my very first copy of Third Bed and redo my edit - with almost none of the suggestions from the Scribophile members.

I have really not been back since before nanowrimo but i only sort of want to go back. I feel like i got more critques on my STYLE rather than important suggestions on like story line, grammar, overall understandability. all they wanted was more dialog.

maybe some of them should read some Jane Austen, some Robin Hobb, Terry Brooks, even sometimes some Stephen King. books with huge paragraphs of delicious narration and dialog only when it needs to be there. that dialog thing really bugged me. i dont like it. i dont like writing it, i don't like transcribing it once its written. i dont like anything about it. i use it when i need it most.

I do want to put Shade and Shadow up on scribophile, even though i don't want to go back. but now that i know how people are i can ignore all their idiotic remarks and focus on the informative ones. But that's jumping ahead. first i must print my very first copy of Third Bed (I there must be a version of the original or as close to it as comfortable somewhere)... sit down with it and see what happens.

And i really do want to revisit those two characters. i hearted them very much.

so it turns out...

i was right to write the don't think about it story. i finished it at work yesterday and it definitely could be longer, but it is actually quite nice as it is.

the funny thing is, i never was able to come up with names for either my main characters. i complain constantly about not being able to name completed stories, but coming up with character names is actually rather easy. i chose a first letter from the alphabet that i haven't used in a while and then start putting random other letters after it, coming up with quick fantasy names.

but there was nothing for these two. so i wrote the entire thing without a name for either of them, expecting to figure one out when i'd finished. but i got to the end with only one confusing bit where it was hard to determine which 'he' i was talking about, but i got that sorted during the retype. so we're going to leave them nameless, because i do love them that way.

and the funniest thing is, i knew the name of it from about halfway through. i'm calling it The Third Bed.

this story is an anomaly. no character names and a title to boot. taking it to work today to edit. perhaps. we'll see how the day turns out.