follow the white rabbit

Matelda, Noe Bordignon

Ravishing sunshine today–oh my! Summer’s hit the stage before her time and slapped spring silly-93 degrees. But it won’t last past the coming week. Spring will pick herself up, kick summer in the shins, and send her scurrying back to her cave until she’s supposed to show up.

Since I’ve not been posting regularly or even semi-regularly lately, shutting down pendrifter has been on my mind, but I won’t do it. I like the blog. It’s a part of my writing practice, a part of me, and appallingly self-centered. I’ll take a break away from blogging for a while. I’ve got too much thinking and too much writing to do–the rabbit hole beckons.

I’ll continue to visit friends’ blogs, maybe post a great painting found in my wandering about online now and then, but for now–see you next time–whenever that’ll be.

nightmare

Dolce far Niente, John William Waterhouse

OMG, I would’ve had to be sedated and carried off the plane…

“Spare me”

kicking the can

Bridge with a Sluice, Jacob Ruisdael

Spent Easter Sunday at my sister’s, enjoyed a nummy dinner, enjoyed even more watching the sibling rivalry between my two young nieces aka the demonettes. The youngest (4 years old) is a quick study, already witty, already irritating the hell out of her older sister, who does a pretty good job of getting her prickles and pokes in too. This particular moment they were engaged in the usual–aggravating each other.  Demonette the Elder got into trouble with her Mom, got yelled at, laid the blame on little sister; Demonette the Younger immediately declared Demonette the Elder, “Loser!” , forming her little  forefinger and thumb into an “L”, wagging it in big sister’s face. Sure glad I live two hours away.

So it’s Tuesday already! What have I been up to?

1. Working on Gaius’s storyline, finding it easier to write it  entirely as a novella

2. No recent work on the Riley short story; it’ll keep.

3. Thinking about my screenplay, SHADOW  WALK, worked out some more of it.

4. Editing LOOSE DADDY

I seem to be making progress.

bejeweled

Soul of the Rose, John William Waterhouse

“A novelist is on the cusp between someone who knows everything and someone who knows nothing.” –Jane Smiley, 13 Ways of Looking at the Novel

The game Bejeweled–whenever I’m stuck on a sentence, I play a game or two of Bejeweled. Eliminating strings of jewels, seeing the field of play reshape into a new array of gemstones reminds me of the way A Lamentation of Swans changes in the writing. The more I work on this novel, the more it undergoes a metamorphosis, shaping and reshaping itself  like the Bejeweled field of play. I don’t mind. Now that I’ve dropped all other storylines except Gaius’s, the story has strengthened. Those other storylines may still play a part as background to the action surrounding Gaius, but the focus is solely on him. That’s how I began the novel years ago and now I’ve come back to it full circle.

Gaius’s quest to save Annasara’s life leads him to challenge the stability of time itself, and gives me an intriguing theme to work with. Being on the cusp of knowing everything and knowing nothing, I only just realized this. 

Meeting with Michelle today for our monthly Writing Saturday. Two things on my agenda:

1. Rewriting and completing the Gaius and Nakuru scene in Chapter 4

2. Adding another paragraph to the Riley short story

scatterbrain

Oedipus and the Sphinx, Gustave Moreau

Is it only Thursday? Was I really off on Monday? Feel like I’m caught in ambergris here. Why isn’t it Friday yet? Is Friday coming? Are you sure? Okay.

Got an  uptick in my lovely word meter that I made myself, illustrating it with Leon Spilliaert’s Swans. Something went wrong with the Zokotou I was using so–I like mine better.

As I write A Lamentation of Swans I’m paying attention to how I like to write a book, my way of doing it, so that I understand what the hell it is I’m doing so I can keep doing it without driving myself crazy.

The way I go about it seems scatterbrained,  undisciplined, unmethodical, crazy quiltish–but there is a certain pattern in all that discombobulation, I think. I like to start with notes–lots and lots of notes about anything to do with the story–character, or setting, or ideas, or just stuff–and I’ll fill notebooks with these maunderings and mumblings, might spend months or years doing it, then I’ll write a few scenes, maybe a few more, a few might be connected, most will fall somewhere farther down the storyline,  not much coherency going on, no clue as to where it’s going. But at some point the story starts to take shape and the novel begins to form–somewhat. That’s how it’s been with Swans and how it’s been with everything I write, even my short story attempts.

I’ve been trying to impose some order, some method ’cause I like making measurable progress, but monkey mind tends to run away with my attempts at disciplining the material so I can get pages done. I hate that running in place feeling but it seems to be the only way I get anywhere.