Another Year (or Point A to Point B Makes a Line)

Birthdays are sort of like New Year’s Eve – a day to take stock of where you’ve been and where you’re going. This year’s ‘event’ has loomed a bit like a train speeding down a tunnel where there’s no pinprick of white at the end. And now, the day is here and all I can think is, ‘Wow, I breathe. I walk. I think. I talk.’ No big deal, really.

So Point A of the past year started with the sense I needed change, not immediate, not even mid-term, but long-term change. This time last year ennui filled my days, a restlessness, and a desire for something ‘new’. Mid-life, I suppose, and not easily fixable with a sports car (well, maybe a Maserati 420) and certainly I have no desire to trade in my husband or kiddos (I love them all dearly). That caged-in feeling dwelled deep in me, so it was up to me to figure out that hollow-sounding clanging below my diaphragm.

This is what I learned:
--The work I do for pay is satisfying, but it is just… work.
--I get my greatest joy and satisfaction with my family – even if they are individually or collectively driving me bonkers.
--Friends are not what always seem.
--Those who you do not consider friends will surprise you – in the best way – if you remain open to the possibility.
--Happiness comes from within, not without; it is all about attitude.
--I am too quick to anger (hormones).
--Writing is my passion and the single thing that anchors my life beyond my family.
--The best things in life take time.

Point B starts now.
Today. A new beginning, and one heading up to Point C, which is a Big Point. The next year holds a lot of promise. Once again, it all begins with me. My resolutions for this upcoming journey include:
--Let the crap roll off my back (where crap = office politics, other people’s bad manners, kids’ temper tantrums, rejections).
--Spend more time listening (and save money on the cream I use to reduce wrinkles around my lips).
--Strive for better balance between demands, and always do what is important first (my father always said – pay the piper first).
--Spend more time with girlfriends.

And to zap the ennui, I am applying to graduate schools for writing. I have four ‘top tier’ programs in mind -- three low-residency, one a local part-time. The application process evokes all these horrible memories of college and graduate school applications – official transcripts, essays (why I want to go into a writing program, blah-blah-blah), and what really terrifies – letters of reference! Ack! This is one time when I truly wish the ‘writing is everything’ adage held true.

I’m looking forward to a productive year and one less filled with inner turmoil. Thank you for sharing the journey with me. Peace…

P.S. If you are looking for my #fridayflash #52/250 #napowrimo weekly contribution, please wander: HERE

Windmills

For some reason, windmills tinge my mood with melancholic nostalgia. Not sure why - I'm not Dutch - but seeing these strong yet graceful structures flail at the air reassures me. Perhaps it's that windmills turn something invisible - the air - and transforms it into power that intrigues me. We visited Williamsburg on the way home and this mill was my first glimpse of the village.

Spring break took us down to North Carolina to celebrate my father's 71st birthday. He still looked frail, though better than three months ago, his spindly arms listing at his side, the skin of his face drooping from the 7 weeks of radiation and chemo. But he stood there, stalwart, stubborn, pushing his breath over his candled cake.

A good trip.

The Reading... The Nudgers are full throttle again, running our novels through each other's discerning eyes and itchy red pens. So far I've read the first chapters of Among Us, a sci-fi story; Under the Devil's Club, a mystery; and Flashes from the Hot Zone, women's lit/comedy. All great stuff.

The Writing... Twelve pages away from finishing beta-reader revisions on Brighter than Bright; tomorrow, the book will rest before a final run-through for typos. I find myself emotional as I near the end, as if parting with a dear friend. The first chapter of PURE almost ready for posting to my Nudgers. And of course, a poem a day. Fell behind over vacation, but caught up late last night.

I leave you with inspiration found in the garden and in response to the prompt: a memory.

Mother Memory

Cutting rhubarb in the rain,
the mottled leaves
thick with mud and slugs,
I wonder if these five plants,
robust now, will stand
another season
in this shaded corner.

If not, next spring
my husband will surprise me,
bearing rhizomes, golden
gifts, then plant them
so my garden will be
as my mother’s, and her
mother’s, and, perhaps, all
our mothers’ before.

Later, like my mother,
I’ll slice the stalks
into chunks for pie.
Mine has strawberries,
though she says
‘ruins the rhubarb’,
so she’d make sauce
and eat from the pot,
still warm, spoon
clanking against the sides,
a sigh of a smile
trespassing her face.

In her eyes, my mixed fruit
splendor makes me a bit
of a rebel; she taught me well.
But tendering these stalks,
making the pie,
heralds me a holder
of apron strings,
honoring our history
unmarked with words
or trophies, and therefore,
all the more important.

I wonder how my daughter
will make her pie.



Peace, Linda

A smattering of celebrations: birthdays and fleeting fame

Two years ago I began birthing my third child: BRiGHTER THAN BRIGHT. The book came about because this pesky character (Benjamin) decided to squat in my wee noggin a few months earlier and never left. Writing a novel was not on my 2006 to-do list; indeed, I was going to focus on my silver and glass jewelry. But Ben is a persistent fellow, felt he had an important story that needed telling. The only way to exorcise him was to write him out of my mind and onto the page. So on January 2, 2006, this is exactly what I did - started writing...

“For as long as I can remember, I have always felt different, been different."

Here's the first line now:

The world stops; a whorl of white surrounds us, hoots and gossamer wisps suspend in air, kicked up to the shocking blue--

Over time, more than just the first line has changed; now, two protagonists tell their stories, 61k words are carved, forever, from the flubbery original (!!!!!), the result of nine full revisions and countless mini-revisions.

I celebrated the day by working on my second novel under construction. PURE explores the ethical dilemmas facing academic scientists in their quests to ascend to the heap of their respective ivory towers. Here's the first line of PURE:

Later, much later, when the shock wore off, people always asked, "Where were you?"

I am sure, of course, that this will NOT be the first line in two years, but you might as well start writing something somewhere...


It's been an amazing journey, and a fulfilling one. Thank you my dear friends for reading draft after draft without groaning, applying your red pens and track changes to my pristine pages, for giving me the tough love I need, for reading to the end, again and again: Deborah, Kim, John, Steve, Marg, Chrys, Jimmy, Mark S. Here, my gratitude and a cupcake. No worries - fat- and calorie- free, I'd never destroy your resolutions this early in the game.

The fleeting fame... Woke up this morning to find myself cited in the Associated Press exclaiming on a study describing racial disparities in access to pain medication in emergency departments. I'd forgotten about the interview with the reporter; usually, nothing comes of it. 'Twas exciting to see my name in the AP and the local rag. If only the reporter was able to add to my credits: aspiring writer seeking representation...

Back to work. Peace, Linda