lifelines

I have to write a biography for 2nd realm, and it's been - interesting, and mildy depressing and suprisingly enlightening. We have to write it in 3rd person (to distance ourselves from the subject matter) and - it's slightly less heartbreaking.
It's not that I had a BAD childhood - it was just - sad. At least the bits that I can remember - there isn't much joy there. But isn't that how memories go so often? The minor wounds stay with you forever, but the minor joys that go along with them are lost in the mists.
It's one thing that I like about journaling - the fact that most often here, I'm sharing - and saving - the tiny joys in my life - the things that happen on a daily basis that make me smile, and that make me think. I don't need any help remembering the upsets - those, my brain will hold onto of itself.
So far, I'm only up to 15/16, and I totally skipped the years between 13 and 15 - ever had a book that you LOVED, but had a horrible, sad, miserable episode in the middle that while it ADDED to the book, you only needed to read it once, and the next time you read the book, you skip over that section because you know what happened? Yeah, that's about how I feel about 13, 14, 15.
I fell asleep last night trying to remember as much as I could about those years - the actual details, and not the details masked by the miasma of depression, puberty, and abuse the way they have hidden in the back of my head. It was interesting, the things I remembered that I had forgotten - esp. how many of my 'dream' homes (as in the homes I dream about) are actually bits and pieces of places I've lived in before that I've forgotten.
I still haven't worked up the gumption to write about it - I think a large glass(es) of wine might be required to numb me enough to really write about it. I also haven't continued past highschool - I KNOW I can't until I fill in that gap. *sigh* I might have to write it as fiction, that might be easier.
I'm also - oddly enough - considering sending it to my mother when I'm done. I realized that I really don't know much about my personal history - we don't talk about the past much - and I assume in her mind as well, the joys from those years have faded into the background, and the bitter regrets might be all thats left.
Last night also, as I was falling asleep, Sade's 'Someone Already Broke My Heart' came on.....which is one of her songs that I've been humming and singing for a while - TheBoy and I were making jokes about how all of Sade's songs are DEPRESSING, and that particular song was my example.
I realized though, last night, as I was thinking about my dark years, that it could be a song of hope - someones already broken my heart, and I know that pain, and I lived through it that time, so I'll be able to live through it again.
Then, I wandered into the thought that everytime a heart gets broken, it gets bigger. You can't mend something, without adding a little something extra, even if it's just glue. And that something extra makes your heart bigger, stronger, upgraded, ready to handle the next thing.
I don't want to focus on the fact that my hearts been broken - that's in the past. I want to focus on the fact that I've healed. Even if it's not fully healed, I've started healing. I've taken things I valued, and I've mended my heart. No, it's not the pretty, simple, smooth heart of a child anymore, but then, ain't no other part of me still childlike, why should my heart be any different?
And in the fact that I've healed - I've proven I can heal. I've proven that no matter how horrible the heartbreak, I might want to die, but it won't kill me. I know that if my heart is broken, I'll mend, and I'll move on, and I'll grow.
In turn, that means I don't have to fear heartbreak. It'll hurt, yeah, but I'll be okay, really. And without fear, I can go further - I can push down at least one of the bricks in the walls that segment me, knowing that I don't NEED it. My hearts not some fragile, unproven thing. She's (we've) been through some pretty rough spots, and we are all the more for it. And the next rough spot - though I might want to die in the midst of it - it'll make me more, just as the joyful spots that seem to fade away have made me more, as well.

I want to include two poems in my biography as well.....I think they fit the - interesting - times I've lived in. I kinda wanna rework both of them - the first one is almost 9 years old, and the second one is 8? 7? something like that - and while I still like them, they don't catch me the way I want/need them to.

And yeah, dragon stories are still bubbling away on my back brain burner. 9000 words? I can bang that out in a day, but a GOOD 9000 words? *sigh*
I think I'll start writing, again.

I've decided to keep track of the little nudges of serendipity that I stumble across, roughly as they happen. It'll be fun to see what sort of joy falls into my lap (new label!)

Sunday (12/30), I'm headed to the recycling center, and I figured I'd swing by Lori's and drop off the forsale sign, since she didn't come to Yule. I'm there, and slightly twitchy as I was ready to get going, but I stayed and chitchatted for a while. I offered to take some stuff to the recycling center for her, and as we are carrying it out to the car, a friend of hers shows up to help fix her computer.
Come to find out, he's a publisher, and has a current submission call open for dragon stories - Lori had already mentioned to him that I was the First Realmer who could write.

So. The deadline isn't until August - I think I should be able to churn out several iterations of a 9000 word story by then, eh?

Myths in Time...

The time before the First Time was the Golden Age. All that existed in that time were the Ogdad - the Eight Gods and Goddesses of everything that is and was not.

Long before even the conception of the idea of existence, the gods stood at the points of the compass and the goddess stood between them - the frog-headed gods and the snake-headed goddesses repeated and frozen, fixed into place by the force of the balance they embodied.

Time went on and never moved, and the Age stood still, mirroring the frozen gods.

The Eight possessed memory and minds which thought, and they grew restless and crafty and begin to think on what would bring variety to the never-ending sea of darkness filled with unseeable things.

Perhaps seeing would bring us amusement roared Amun in a voice that was all and nothing at once.
We cannot force sight, as we hold power over that which cannot be seen, whispered Amaunet.
And the Eight were silent.

Kauket challenged her - We control the dark - without darkness there must be sight.
But without darkness, what power would we have, questioned Kek.
And the Eight were silent.

We have all the time there ever was, pondered Heh.
And as long as we remain balanced, we hold all the time that ever will be, rejoined Hauhet.
And the Eight were silent.

The waters contain the all, Naunet added in a voice of oceans and space.
We could part the waters, and perhaps, perhaps then something new would be revealed, responded Nun.
And the Eight were silent.

All around them, there was a maelstrom of sound, as the waters rushed back from them, leaving them frozen, hanging in a sea of nothingness. The waters drained, and the waters dropped, and finally the waters stopped moving, leaving an empty space between and around the Eight, but nothing changed.

There is still timelessness.
And there is still dark.
And there are still the unseeable things.

The darkness wavered, something not light but not dark either danced along the edges of the water, leaping between the open space and the Eight and the Water, but nothing appeared.

There is still timelessness
And there are still the unseeable things.

Heh moved, spinning in a slow pirouette, turning his face away from the circle and whispered - I can see what was.
Hauhet moved, spinning in a slow pirouette, turning her face away from the circle and exclaimed - I can see what will be!

But the unseeable things are still here.

Hauhet sighed, seeing what was to come. There is now time and I see change. Wait.

Naunet groaned as the waters tried to return to their place. Now that movement has begun, there is little time left.

Kauket focused and the notlight/notdark changed, growing stronger. I see - I see - what is it that I see?

With a crack, the waters broke open and flooded back towards the Eight, and Amun screamed - I see them! Amaunet countered - no, no, I see IT!

And as the waters returned to their place, for the first time since the Age had begun, the Eight moved out of the places they had stood since they came aware of being.

And the all shuddered. And the waters rushed. And time moved. And something grew - grew from the waters that rushed in beneath them and all around them, and between them, and into the places they no longer held.

It leapt from the waters, bearing the Eight upon its height - the Mound that is Khmun.

Nun and Naunet moved away from it, retreating to its edges, and to the touch of the waters they controlled.

It is not water, it is the land. We are powerless over it.

The Eight stared at this new thing - the first new thing since they themselves appeared.

The waters lapped around the mound, and something like a soft wind blew. It was silent again, but only for a moment.

The Mound shuddered, throwing the Eight to their feet, and cracked open, and from within it came something never before seen.

What is it? What can it be? they whispered, eyes wide with the experience of seeing.

Kek and Kauket retreated from glow emanating from the mound.

Is it not dark - it is what pushes the dark away. It is light and it reveals new things and we are powerless over it.

As the light bubbled and rolled out of the Mound, something else arose.

A lotus flower, rising with the light, and blooming as it rested on top of the Mound.

It is change - it grows and blooms and must die, and we are powerless over it.

Heh and Hauhet stepped away from the Mound, stretching out time between them.

The wind blew again, and a bird’s call broke through the silence.

In the light of the Mound, above the lotus, something was seen.

It is the unseeable thing, made visible, and we are powerless over it.

Amun and Amaunet stared, unable to control the bird that swooped and dived above them.

The ibis finally landed, its curved beak arching high over the mound, and with another call, it laid an egg upon the lotus.

The ibis, and the Eight waited, and watched, and time flowed on and on, inwards and outwards, as the waters lapped the base of the mound.

The egg shook, and cracked, and a brilliant beam of light shot out from the cracks. The scraps of shell fell into the waters around the mound, and swam away.

The egg opened, and Re stepped from it, fully made and young, with eyes that glowed with light and hair that flowed like water and garb that was visible only to those who could see the unseen, and a voice that echoed through time.

I am Re.
And I have power over the lands and the waters.
He made the waters into a bridge over the Mound, and sat Nun and Naunet upon it.

I am Re.
And I have power over the light and the dark.
He shaped the dark, and made shade for Kek and Kauket upon the Mound, and sat them beneath it.

I am Re.
And I have power over time and eternity.
He curved time, and pulled Heh and Hauhet onto the Mound, fixing time between them into an ever turning wheel.

I am Re.
And I have power over the seen and unseen.
He summoned the ibis to him, and bound it to Amun and Amaunet to ride upon so that they could see the seen and unseen without sight.

I am Re.
And I will create the world.

Who, Me?

Funny sometimes, how things pile up, one on top of the other, trying to encourage me/plant a solid foot in my ass.

So, yesterday, as I'm driving to First Realm class, there are these huge, fluffy, gorgeous clouds in the sky, and it took me back to being a little girl, and wanting to learn how to paint. I had a book that had those same huge, fluffy clouds in it, and I tried - oh, how I tried for WEEKS to get the color shifts just right, and tried to mimic the glow of the sun and the sheerness of the clouds, and I ended up with a white/blue/yellowish-grey mess. I think right around then might have been the time that I convinced myself I had about as much artistic talent as a brick.

Over the years, I've tried other things - and largely, they ended up being just other bricks - other failures, other perfectly shining examples of just how unartly/uncreative/unskilled I was.

I've built up a wall - a rather nice sized one too, around my own creative energy. I had help - oh, I won't claim that I did this all by myself! - and it's been - safe. It's been comfortable, telling myself that it's okay not to try, because failure is the most likely result.

And of course I'm going to fail! I don't really think I can succeed with that brick wall - or, at least not my current definition of success (which I have no clue of what it is!).

I get to class, and my teacher almost immeadiately starts asking me if I ever considered writing professionally - based solely on a (in my mind) slapped together paper that took me all of a day and a half to complete, that she RAVED over. It was - honestly, it was possibly the most emphatic 'Holy Shit, Woman, you're GOOD!' I've ever gotten on something I've done - ever.

And - looking forward down & through the years, I know that once I start staying at home, and once I get into the groove of being at home, I'm going to want to start writing. At that point, I will have no reason to NOT write. At that point, the 'roadblocks' that I've had to writing will be gone. Yeah, I'll be dealing with a whole NEW set of roadblocks, but in my mind - those will be energizing ones, not draining ones. And that time is getting closer and closer - whether I'm knocked up right now or not, I soon will be, and - *deep breath*

My teacher also happens to be part owner of a publishing business.

So. Yeah.

I found that whole series of events - interesting, to say the least. What will I do with it?

I don't know.

But I think the mortar is starting to powder.

Hah! And Hah!

We aren't going to talk about Nano, and that's all I have to say about that.

It's rained everymorning this week - and since it's only Monday, that's not saying much - but at least the sun peeks out a tiny bit for around 15 minutes at roughly 2pm - when I'm usually in some meeting or another.

I got measured yesterday - and I've lost FIVE inches from my waist - not so much from the hips (like a 1/2 inch) and hardly anything from the boobs (1/4 inch - no suprise there) - I'm turning back into an hourglass.  I'm still - meh - about my progress rate. I know, I know, it's only been eight weeks, but STILL. I'm desparately fighting the urge to eat LESS - I know that I'm barely eating as much as I should now (we aren't even going to TALK about my protien intake) and eating less isn't GOING to help - so. Breakfast is GOOD! Dinner is better. Yum.

I've been busily domestic diva'ing it up over the last few days. Over the weekend, I envisioned, measured, purchased, and put together 10 window insulators. You know how people usually put plastic over their windows in the winter for insulation? We have teh old house, so we really did need to do that - but 1) I hate taping stuff to the windows - we have enough nice days that sometimes we might WANT to open the windows in December and 2) I'm far, far, far too cheap to consider having to buy more plastic EVERY year - besides it being utterly environmentally heinous. So.  I built wooden frames, attached the plastic to them, and put foam all around the outside, so that they fit snugly in the window. Easy, inobtrusive, cheap, easily removable, and can be reused until the plastic rips - and then I'll jsut have to fix that one....so YEAH!!

The other thing I have been working on has been installing the sewing machine into one of the sewing tables that I have. It's been a riproaring, growling swearing, cheering experience, I'll say that much. I strongly suspect that I'm doing this the HARDEST way possible, but hell, it's fun. I have to swing by Home Despot this afternoon and pick up some shorter screws and a couple of wingnuts and something else (I made a list) so hopefully, I'll be able to finish installing it tonight, and then be able to clean it and get it working tomorrow.

I've found that I REALLY enjoy putting stuff together/installing stuff/fixing stuff. It's - fun starting with a bunch of STUFF, and ending up with something - functional and useful and CHEAP. Mwuauaahhhaaa!!

Though, I think I might turn into more of a tool queen than my hubby  - I finally gave in and admitted that yes, we could use a dremel tool (and a saw, and a sander, and a better drill, and a worktable, and........)

I've already figured out the first thing that I'm going to make - a simple floor pillow for my 'nook' upstairs.

Ummm... what else? Getting geared up to go to my mommy's house for THanksgiving - I'm excited - looking forward to seeing my mom and my grandmom and friends..... It should be loads of fun - more fun than we would have at the in-laws, that's for bloody sure.

I think that's it, guys and gals...... let the sun shine in.....

Notes for [Nano]

• "It was thought if a black cat jumped over a corpse, the corpse would
  turn into a vampire and the only way to prevent that from happening
  was to kill the cat. However, since it was also considered bad luck
  to kill a cat, people realized they needed to lock away the dead
  bodies so a cat couldn't find them. This is how the first stone crypts
  came to be built underneath churches."
• 
  It listed a whole bunch of different ways one could become a vampire (desperately trying to find it now). One of such ways was to sleep with your grandmother.

Low Tolerance

Is it possible to have POST-menstural syndrome? Or, is my tolerance for idiots, assholes, and stupidity just gone down, once again??

I don't know what it is, but I have been in a 'bite your head off' mood ALLL damn day. Okay, not all day - I was sunshine and light leaving home, and driving to work, but I got here and I feel like the Dark Cloud o'Doom has settled lovingly over my shoulders. And I've eaten (and eaten, god, how sick I am of eating) so it's not like my blood sugar is low. I wish I took a tae-bo class or something, because whoopin some ass sounds like a GOOD idea right now...and I'd LIKE to be somewhat pleasant once I get home, as my husband has one of his rare midweek days off.

Anyhow!

My utterly insane tail has decided to do NaNoWriMo this year - I don't make any promises to the likelihood that I will finish, but meh - at least I'll start. I'm trying to figure out where I'm going to write - I might do private entries here so that I can access my WIP anywhere I am. Maybe. 

ETA: I'm MindOfKiya over on the NaNo side.... so if ya see me, say hi!!! :)

Maybe I'm just tired.

*growl*

Wonderment

So - I managed to get sucked into Dallandrah's offer to join her online writing group, and I treid my hand at the 'BOC' thingy, and then I went to read my old writings.

And serisouly - why don't I finish ANYTHING? I've been telling myself that it's like steam - I don't ever have quite enough of a head to slam it through to the end, and the second I hit a sucky part - I quit. Maybe I'm a quitter. I don't know - but I do know that I start out STRONG. It's just a matter of - finishing.

I'm going to be off for a while - ah, lovely vacation. I'm going to 1) clean the house from top to bottom and 2) write. If I'm not cleaning or cooking, I'm going to be writing. I figure that I should be able to get back into a groove with at least ONE of my stories (maybe I'll freaking finish the iLlium) and - *sigh* at least do something with it.

*blinks* I'm tired ya'll. I'm tired of working at a job that doesn't attract or motivate me. I'm tired of not doing what I want to do in order for me to do what I 'should' be doing. I'm tired of - not being myself! Dammit.

My boss was telling me today about a book called 'Living what you Love' about this couple who decided that if they didn't LOVE what they were doing - they wouldn't do it. *nods* that's what the hell I need to be doing.

 

Huh? Monday already???!!!

*deep breath*

All I need is 100K. Hell, 50K would do it for right now. That's it - really. *deep breath* But patience is a virtue, and who knows what coming around the corner and...and....and.....dammit. *breathes*

Umm - let's see - this weekend was - good. It's amazing how much time flies when you aren't doing a damn thing. Friday was a non-day, as I developed the headache from hell while browsing the thrift store (more about my scores there later) and left work around 3:30. Was home and sleep by 4:00pm, didn't wake up fully until around 9am Saturday morning. Yup - a full seventeen HOURS of sleep. It was the best rested I've been in - years. Years, I tell you. *sigh* Yet another thing that'll be a fond memory of the past once kids end up in the picture.

Saturday - I was a busy little bee! After the hubby headed off to work (he closed this weekend) I finally got outside and finished off my compost pile - *wrinkles nose* cut grass that has been left in black plastic bags for a few weeks is NOT the most pleasant variety of green things to be around, that's for bloody sure. But now, I've got a HUGE pile over in one corner, a much smaller 'mound' over the strip where the strawberry plants are going, and a wire cage half full of spare leaves to cover the kitchen waste as it goes out. I think I'm about done for the season - though, if any of my close neighbors toss out a bag or two of leaves - oooohh - mulch & additional cover for kitchen bits throughout the winter! Then, I cleaned the downstairs, washed the kitchen floor, baked two loaves of bread (STILL denser than I want - what's the secret to FLUFFY bread??? - damn good stuff though) and *thinks* then I crashed. I refused to leave the house at all on Saturday or Sunday - nope, nope, nope. I made up for the busyness of Saturday by not doing a damn THING sunday. We sat around, drinking beer, chitchatting - he played video games most of the day, I read *Thinks* 4 books? 3?? Not sure....but it went by WAYYY too fast. I looked up, it was 10pm, I was yawning, and I hadn't even tossed a load or two into the washer. *shakes head*

But speaking of books - the thrift store scores!! I went to pick up some wine glasses - I was hoping to find something kinda kickass and different, but eh - ended up with two plain old stemmed glasses. The first score consisted of two heavyweight GLASS loaf pans in almost perfect condition for five bucks (for BOTH! one was 2 and one was 3)!  I've been making bread in all KINDS of differently shaped containers, because I wanted the 'larger' sized loaf pans - and I didn't really WANT the non-stick ones, as I know they lie. So, I had been keeping an eye out for some glass loaf pans - but to find TWO - and in almost perfect shape! *nods* Thrilled, I was. Then, I strolled over to the book section, and found a reference manual from the editors of 'Organic Gardening' all about how to maximize the yield from your garden - organically! It has listing of companion plants,  planting times, digging patterns, compost suggestions - this book is a GREAT resource - 2 bucks. *delighted sigh* I SOOO do enjoy the thrift store. And this was the one by work - not even the one by U of M where I found the breastfeeding books at! I'm thinking that I might swing by the Goodwill near U of M and see what they have to offer- it's right around the corner from the Y - maybe I should start parking in their parking lot (as the Y almost NEVER has parking available) and then walking to the Y - it's barely a block, and it'll get me a little loosened up - besides giving me a chance to see what they have. Hmmm. *grins* But really, the last thing I need is an excuse to spend MORE money.

What else? Work - is -  boring as HELL. Do ya hear me Big Brother?? I can do my responsibilites, as well as those of two of my coworkers, on a daily basis with one HAND tied behind my back. Argh!! And ya know - I can't blame anyone but myself, as I knew when I TOOK this job I was overqualified - I did. I knew that it would be slow, slow, slow. But - I still took it, because of the money (oh, when will I learn) and I'm gonna stick with it (because of the money - still haven't learned) for at least another 16 months. After that - *shrugs* who knows?  The Access project I volunteered for is more or less done - I just need to write up a users guide, add a small subform, and let everyone get a good look at it and beat the bugs out - and I think I'll be done with it. 3 weeks, like I said - 3 bloody months! Indeed! I've been trying to drag it out though - simply so that I'll have something to DO here on a daily basis. If I had - any damn sense at all - I'd finish writing the book while I'm bored out of my head - funnily enough, I don't want my pseudo-boss to hear me typing all day. Heh. Stupid excuse, I know - but that whole 'thing' is something I'll have to hash out in another entry.

Speaking of writing - this is the first year since I found out about it that I consiously did NOT do Nanowrimo. Last year, I planned on doing it, but time got away from me, I looked up, and it was like November 21st, and while I'm occasionally demented - never THAT crazy. *laughs*
Had a recent conversation with myle, in which somehow I got into a conversation with my 20 year old self. I had excellent responses to ALL of her 'what in the hell happened????' questions except for the one around my art. I've just - laid it to the side. I don't have a URGE to create - it's - dormant, almost. I still know that I can - it's just that the need isn't there - and I don't know how to wake the sleeping beast. Anyhow - I don't know. I've started one weekly ritual, maybe I will be able to kick off another. 500 word or poem minimum?? (and why do I get the eerie feeling that one of my faves is doing this, and the idea has been mouldering in the back of my head for a while...). I'd most likely cheat, and go for a poem most of the time. *thinks*  Need to consider a subject - maybe I could go to one word and get something from there.  But once again - it's something that I feel like I SHOULD be doing, not something that I WANT to do. Eh.

 

Damn - that was fast

Okay.... I knew all I really needed to do was to sit down and FOCUS for a second... here's the synposis of my first book (in progress).

The iLillium Chronicles - Book One
Dark Moon City

One downside of being abandoned and then adopted is that you have no clue who your biological family is - and for the last 25 years, Jacy Waycand has had no problems not knowing who gave birth to her. There are others, however, who know exactly whose descendant she is, and who will have no reluctance in using her to futher their quest for the ultimate power. They are the iLillium. Every faith has a secret sect - the Catholics have Opus Dei, the Muslims have Ikhwan , the Hindus have Thugee - and the Jews have the iLillium. Inheritors and users of the magic of Lillith, Adams’ first wife who refused to be subjectgated, they ruled the medivial world from the shadows with magic and sorcery, but they were always limited by not having access to the full knowledge that Lillith held - and they could not find a way to coerce her to reveal the full list of Words of Power. 600 years later, they’ve finally discovered a mothers weak spot as well as her final resting place, and they plan on using Jacy as a pawn in the ultimate power play.

 

Fridaze....

Ummm. Hi?

This week has gone by in a blur of blurriness. My family arrived yesterday (sans my uncle, as usual *roll eyes*) and I spent the whole evening getting them settled in. It was very nice seeing them though - I've missed my mom & gramma. *pppppppphbt* Uncle.

This weekend? Um........hanging out with them, I suppose.  They are most likely coming over the house tonight - we are thinking about grabbing some takeout/something to go, and eating at our house - which should be fun. Hah. We soooo have no food in the fridge, so yeah - it's good that we plan on bringing something back.

Um. Bored STUPID at work. Stupid I tell you, stupid. And the consistent/persistant sleepiness doesn't help. Of course, if my ass got to BED before 1am, that might help a lot, ya think?

Talked to my doc yesterday - she confirmed that my IUD is remarkably low in the uterus, and it's NOT that it doesn't work anymore, but the efficienty is severely reduced. Going to see her MONDAY to get it yanked (ouchie - I hope that hurts less than putting it IN did) and to get a script for the NuvaRing - it makes no sense to get another one, as the shortest time they have is five years (which is the one I have now) I refuse to do Depo *shudder* and I'm even slightly nervous about going back to the hormonal stuff, as I became a miserable raving bitch on the Pill, but we shall see. Condoms suck. Gah, how I wish we could afford for me to get knocked up. It would be so much simpler. I wonder how that sponge thingy works.....maybe I should try that? But messy....ew. I've loved not having to THINK about it. I'm gonna miss my little tin man.

Umm....good seafood in Memphis?? Any suggestions??

*blinks* I've actually been writing  - I've got about four chapter of one of my favorite ideas done. Okay three and a half. I'm trying to write the adoption story now, and my brain is too damn dead to be properly creative - the right idea hasn't tweaked me yet. I refuse to think about what I'm going to do after writing it - besides rewriting it, of course. If I can keep up this rate of writing, I think I'll be done with the first draft by the middle of next month - which as I understand, is the easy part. It's odd - even considering how much I read, there are lots of things about WRITING I'm utterly ignorant of - like how the heck to do write dialouge? What's the proper punctuation? I've been really anal about keeping track of some of my most hated quirks in a book - weird timing, and....something else. Hell, can't remember what it was now. I think that today, I'll write the synopsis. Every time I tell someone I'm writing - they ask (naturally) what it's about - and I stammer and mutter and finally pull something out of my ass. So yeah, doing that. What genre? Fantasy, I suppose you would say.

Okay - now that I've gotten something short and basic to focus on, I'll do that.

I think that's another reason I've been writing here less - I'm usually actually writing, so journaling is like - eh. I try to note - but sometimes....brain fart. I think I might start leaving blank notes - I'm thinking of ya'll.....

Writing it Out

So....I've uploaded my unfinished writings to this computer, and I've decided which one to work on. I want to dig back into The iLillium Chronicles - it's one of my favorite mostly undone ones - and it's also one that I've done the least work on.
I've got a full outline - climaxes per chapter (or so) timing and all that jazz. I've got most of my characters laid out. I've even got the first paragraph or two written - it's just digging into the rest of it. I'm still debating whether I should do it shorthand (on the PC) or longhand - I honestly think that long hand would be more likely to get it done faster, as I would be able to take the book with me anywhere - and maybe every weekend I could type up what I've written. *shakes head* It's always a matter of consistency - and heaven knows, I can't wait til C has a job and is out of my hair for a little while when I'm at home.

I'm going to share my 'synopsis' so to speak - just to give ya'll a taste of my brain, as well as the little bit of Chapter One I've written. :)

The iLillim Chronicles
This novel is about a woman discovering the roots of a secret sect of magicians called the iLillim as well as her own family heritage.

Chapter One
As I look back over the events of the past few months, I realize that true to the spirit of the god who got me in this mess, my only offering was a burnt one.

Really, it all started late one Monday afternoon. I was preparing my usual mid-afternoon snack - a fresh bag of Jiffy Pop. It had been a long and busy day, full of irate researchers who couldn’t seem to stand having this slip of a girl watching them like a hawk as they perused the Rare Book section of the Morgan Library. Normally, the researchers who visited us were quite used to Uther Anderson, the curators, iron hand on anything that went on in his library. Regretfully, it was time for the yearly influx of new teachers and researchers at the University, and thus the stacks were suddenly filled with hordes of young, brash, rude, researchers and teachers of antiquity.

so much, yet so little

So....I'm not sure what made me do it - maybe the fact that I've had some story ideas pop into my head, but I went through and gathered all of my ideas into one document.
I've got 19 different story ideas floating around - some of them are halfway done - and some others are just very rough plot concepts. I'm not sure how to start -  but I am seriously considering trying to write them out in long hand. I've always said that writing in longhand was too muchwork - esp. since I'd have to retype them -but at least then I'll always be able to carry a story along - all I'd need is a pen.

*sigh* I'm so fearful of my own greatness it's aggravating. I mean - okay - not that all of what I've written is good - but some of it is quite good, and I just - back away from finishing it.

I'm a woman of plans, and I've learned that I tend to use my plans to give myself permission to procrastinate. But - how can I just - leap?

*sigh*

scaredycat,scaredycat.

no clue what to title this dross.

I've been writing a lot of really disjointed entries lately.  Just hopping & skipping from one topic to another - and it's a fair reflection of what's going on in my head - jumpy, jumpy, jumpy.

I'm amazingly impatient - have always been - and because I'm aware of it, I'm not really trying to change it - just to temper it. How that relates to anything....oh. So - I hate waiting for this vacation time to start. It sucks, to put it mildly. Esp. considering the fact that I really don't feel like working.

I did my hair over the last few days, so now it's all tight and sexy. I just realized that I've been sitting here for the last 20 minutes running my fingers through it over and over again. I love my hair. It always feels alive somehow - and now that it's longer (every time I tighten my roots - esp if I wait for a month or two like I did this time, I gain about 1/4-1/2 inch of length) it's just plain fucking sexy. and it feels SOOO good. *sigh*  I stopped conditioning it for a while so that the locks would tighten up again - my ends were getting all loose and fuzzy -but I think I'll condition it this weekend. Oohhh...super soft, super silky, super good smelling hair. It's a damn shame I'm broke and can't show it off to total strangers.

Speaking of strangers - I don't think I've talked about our sex life much. This whole 'new explorations' has been a hell of a lot of fun, esp for me. C gets the aftershocks -but, I get to call first dibs on stuff. Heh. I still haven't been able to get him to go to a party, and I've realized that I'm a hell of a lot more of a homebody when he's HOME than I am on my own. So. That's what's up there. I still don't like this city - there are freaky deaks here, but good lord - they aren't my kind of freaky deaks. *sigh* I'm so damn picky.

I'm sleepy too - our pitchin was today at work, and oohhh. So much food. So much yum.

See - this is me trickling down to an end - I want to write something else - but I have to go someplace else to write it, and as only I'll see it - why I am telling you about it?

*blinks*

I've been really fucking foggy headed lately. and tired. *slow slow slow blinks*  Gah. need vacation. Badly, badly.

I'm considering starting writing again.

Gah! How wishywashy was that?

Let's try again.

I want to write.  I'm just too much of a lazy bum (I'm feeling very vulgar today too - just want to cuss up a storm) to actually finish it.

We aren't even going to TALK about how many unfinished ideas, stories, concepts I've got (had - as they were on the old harddrive) that just never go ANYWHERE.  I've got my old filebox FULL of everything I've ever written (by hand, and some stuff I printed out) that I keep 'meaning' to read to energize myself.

I don't know if I'm lazy or afraid, actually. Afraid to - create something? that's truly mine? and then - expose that? Shit - maybe I'm just not self confident enough - don't have the balls to really get down into me and pull that dynamically creative diva out.  When it's for others, I can create almost on demand - I'm talented, imaginative, and stubborn. But this - what I've been doing in one way or another since I was fucking 12 - this scares me.

And yet sometimes - usually when I'm not even trying - I'll bust out with something that suprises even ME. Like 'parched' that I wrote when I was first going through the 'cycle 1 of married life' period - it was soooo damn expressive and SO damn spontaeneous that it hurt. Why can't I plan that shit out?

See? Vulgar!

I blame my mother, personally. Pounding the whole 'art won't make you rich' concept into my brain from a young young age.  Back when I was too young to scream back 'but it might make me happy!' which, really, matters more.

I need to play powerball.

Going to go read 'parched' again.

And you know the funny thing about that? I accidentally deleted it the first time I wrote it, and I recreated it entirely from memory (which normally, I CANNOT do).  Rereading it - it actually seems rather - juvenile now. *sigh*

Maybe that's the problem - like me looking at myself, I can't possbily be an objective judge.  And I don't trust anyone else to be able to fairly judge either - besides bastards like editors and agents who would laugh in my face both before AND after they crushed my tender heart into a few million hangdog pieces.

*gah*

 

*snort*

Failure, failure, failure.

I haven't written a SINGLE bloody word. Oh Well. I guess it wasn't meant to be......

Wow!

That was fast - it's 8pm the day before Nano - and I JUST realized it.

I haven't thought much more about my book - I've given the main character a last name, but other than that - that's it.

And oddly enough - I'm not going to think about it. I'm just going to - run with it. How utterly unlike me, and I think I'll give it up in about three weeks and 25K words but I think I'll have a shitload of fun doing it.

I'm going to aim for 2K words a day - I'm sure there will be points where I won't be able to work on it - or where I just give up, but - I'll try my damnedest.

planning

So.... I signed up for Nano. Like I say each year - I think I might be crazy enough to do it this time.

As usual, when I signed up, I had no clue what the hell I am going to write about - but I still had to come up with something to put in the 'title' box. I put in 'No Earthly Clue' - and over the next day or two realized that could actually be a pretty interesting title to a book.

I don't think I'm going to try to write fantasy this time - or at least not the out of 'this' world kind, even though with a title like that, it almost begs to be used prettily - bt, I think I'm really going to go straight beach reading.

So far I've got Jessamyn - the main character - she's got a quasi-live in boyfriend, a ferret, and she used to have a very nice job.

I'm thinking of it kinda as a novel of self-discovery (and yes, I'm going to be writing a hell of alot of me and the thoughts and crap I'm dealing with now (plus some wishful thinking) into it) with a little bit of adventure and sex thrown in for good measure.

I know where she's going to start, and I have a rough idea of a few things that shes' going to encounter - but I still don't have a really clear idea of where she's going to end up - which makes it a little more interesting.

I usually plot out almost the entire book BEFORE I set down to write - it takes shitload of time, but it's my way to organize. However, I've noticed that I'll do some sort of freaking plot change in the first third of the book that almost invalidates the road map I've created - which therefore leads me more towards wasting huge chunks of time than really getting organized.

So this time, I'm jsut going to do the high level stuff - character sketchs, climaxes, and maybe a pre-thought out plot twist or two. I already know she's not getting pregnant, raped or married......*grins* maybe briefly kidnapped though - that might be fun. She's definitely going to travel - and I think she might sketch. Hm.

*grins* So - I'm getting excited - it's going to be a real struggle not to Mary Sue her - I have to be sure to come up wih some real faults when I do her character sketch.

Hm. :)

Keeping company.....

I'm violently jealous of one of my friends, yet I wouldn't trade places with him for a couple million - at least. He's an artist, a man of peace, a writer, a playwright - and he has glorious, spacious, uninteruppted periods of time to focus on himself and his art - largely because his girlfriends takes care of the 'worldly' matters, if ya know what I mean....

 

Now - being a kept woman isn't something that I would mind - so that's not why I wouldn't trade places with him - but when you are 'kept' by someone who seems to either loathe you or love you, and you feel the same -  but a little heavier on the loathing side - and can't escape due to a lack of cash - shiiitt. No thank you. I reallly, really don't think so.

 

Talking to him at work and he broke off to go and do some walking meditation - WALKING bloody meditation - such luxury there is in time to one's self - which started me thinking about women in the last century, and how the greatest blessing for a woman of mind and intelligence was to be barren, because otherwise all of her time would be taken up with bearing and taking care of children.

 

And I promptly shied away from even mentally placing myself in that position - but I'm not sure which one I was more afraid of - breeding so much that I have nothing left for me - or being barren and never really feeling like I reached a personal marker of having lived.

 

I feel - nebulous somehow. I feel like I'm coming to a turning point - I FEEL like something is about to come to pass and it's going to rock my world. And no, I'm not pregnant - but it just feels like that - like SOMETHING hanging over me, creeping in closer and closer. It's not necessarily a bad thing either - just a thing - a large interesting changing thing - and I can't wait for it to get here.

 

At least if I'm shaken I won't settle.

 

Hi Ho, Hi Ho....

Tommorow is our ONE MONTH anniversary. *giggles* Can ya believe it? I - we - will have been married for a month. *grins* That rocks in so many different ways I can't even BEGIN to explain it. Everyone keeps asking me 'So, how's married life??' and the FIRST response that come into my head is 'Well, if we hadn't been shacking up already it might be a bigger difference - but as it is....it's pretty much the same.'  *grins* but I mange to condense that smart assedness into a quick shrug and a muttered 'Bout the same....'

 

The differences I have noticed aren't really things that I was expecting  - things that I never thought I would consider doing. For instnace, looking back on it, I'm not sure what kinda smoke I was inhaling while I was arguing that we should have separate bank accounts. If he gives me HALF a chance, I'm going to start paying all his bills for him, and we might as well kitty our money as we're GOING to spend it, one way or another. Of course, I can imangine all sorts of screaming matches over who spent what and dear god why (mainly from me to C, as he is the money dunce) but - *grins* it still makes more sense. I even offered to let me drive MY car. Every day. for an 80 mile roundtrip drive to work and back - since his car is a wee bit under the weather. *grins* I'm not sure who was more suprised - me for considering it, or him for hearing me offer it. So - the whole married life thing is cool - I really FEEL like we are partners now - more than I ever did before...and that feeling akes me feel even better about waiting for kids. I want us to be a rock solid unit before we bring another entity into our lives. I want us to always have that special - connection - to each other that was there before the kids - will sustain us and keep us together through the kids, and then that will let us glide into our older years together without the kids. We - me &  c - will always be the base of the family - and I want that base to be rock solid.

---

 

 

What else? C starts his new job today! YAAAYY!!! BOOOO!!!! I'm happy about it - more money, more quiet time for me in the house, a job that he's thriled about, but I'm sad too because I REALLY enjoyed our last month together - to have him home and awake every night when I got in - it was SO wonderful. To actually have time to intereact with each other while we are both FULLY awake EVERY night of the week is a treat that I don't think we've ever had consistently - and definitely never this long - and the fact that we weren't worried about money made it so much easier too. So - I'm going to miss him. I'm certainly not going to be able to stay awake late enough every night to do anything more than smile sleepily at him and get a kiss before I'm off to bed. *sigh* Well, at least we'll always have Sundays.

 

Still working on the book with X. *sigh* I soooo do want to strangle the boy sometimes. I'll give it to him, he's a greater writer, and has a deeper connection to the arts than I do. I, however, know more off the top of my head about how to set up a  REALISTIC fantasy/sci-fi world than he could learn in a month of watching Sci-Fi Channel - and he's being very snide about the fact. *shrugs* I've forced him to back up, and for us to create the world first, before we create the characters that are going to inhabit the world - which is s tep he's never one as he normally writes in the 'real' world - whereas I NEVER write in the real world. This is truly going to be an exercise in communication.

 

I think that's all for right now.

Confession

Okay. I've got a confession to make. I created another diary. :) I started missing just WRITING here - not just wedding writing. And at first I was just going to leave em separate - but dammit I've got WAYYY too many faves under this name and I'm lazy. So - If you see some chicky called A'ishah leaving you smartass notes - that'll be me.

jasmyn