9:22 a.m. - 2008-04-20
about writing

Urgh-I hate this editing process. I've cut 25 pages. There's no way in hell I can take another 125 without just randomly slashing pages, or rewriting the entire thing. It won't even make sense any more. I have this constant creeping sense of unease, and worry that my book is going to be ground up in a blender, reconstituted and fed to the masses, nothing like my original work.

So I promised myself that I'd cull 75 pages, and explain to her that I can't take any more without compromising the book. Actually, I have no clue how I'll pull another 50 pages.

Anyway, it's boring, I know, but I don't really talk about it much because I know it's boring to everyone else.

Yesterday, I was in one of my little fits of despair again, realizing that I was a weird kid who became a weird adult. It's funny, because I feel like I seem so ordinary and dull, yet have these constant reminders that I am strange--mostly people telling me, I can't count the number of times that I've been called crazy, which rankles me.

I'm not crazy-crazy-my life is normal, I have two good happy kids, a long relationship, a steady career etc. etc. I'm just an artist who doesn't know any other artists. Well, my bro, actually. He and I share our morose ruminations about art and music and writing and the nature of destiny, etc. I need to find some other creatives. Even the wonderful women in my writer's group are pretty normal.

Trimming my book is like having all my hair cut off, knowing that it will never grow back.

This must be the "be careful what you wish for" part of my publishing experience.

And it does become isolating to not have any artsy weird friends who can share my horror at the amputations. DH is a musician but even so, he's pretty grounded.

I spent a lot of time looking for other artists/writers when I moved here but I've just made peace with the fact that I probably won't find anyone with whom I can connect on that level. This is a very provincial, boring town, filled with a lot of ordinary folks. In SF, there were a lot of artsy people but they were the pretentious, can't-keep-it-together types. Grumble grumble.

This is a bit like trusting a doctor. You hope that they know what they're doing and that they will make good choices that benefit you, and so you turn yourself over to them in full faith. However, I've been treated poorly by doctors, prescribed the wrong medications, overdosed (even when I said "That sounds like a really high dose-are you sure?" then accepted her reassurances and was so overmedicated that I couldn't wake up or speak. I think this caused a miscarriage, even though they all assured me it wasn't so.) etc.

Professionals are just people who make short-sighted choices, who can't see beyond their own perspective and who work to promote their own agendas.

Anyway, I'm really looking forward to the kids being older in a few years so I can get out more and start traveling, doing more.

Must start cleaning house, sorting our junk and preparing for our move. We are scheduled to close in less than 2 weeks.

May will be a month of frenzy.

9:34 a.m. - 2008-04-14
Stupid PMS

SO unfair! I am actually looking forward to life after menopause if it means my moods will stabilize. My body's fluctuations are so annoying. I envy men for their stability and sameness. When they are in a bad mood, they can just enjoy it without administering a quiz: am I really in a bad mood? Everything is fine so why am I so snarly?

I say this because I've been paying attention to my panic levels and yes, the week before and during Aunt Flo's visit (gag), my nervousness is worse. Before that I'm great and it's manageable but then it starts to escalate and gain power. It makes me so mad! Leave me alone, hateful hormones!

Poor DH. He must get lonely and very early this morning came into the room and flipped on the bedside light, I sprang up from sleep and said "Goddammit!" Because I wasn't able to get back to sleep so got about 4 hours last night. Now I'll have to apologize for cursing at him. Just as some people are angry drunks, I'm an angry sleeper.

Started working on my revision this weekend and felt pleased for shaving off 20 pages just by condensing sentences. I've decided that I'm just going to refuse to cut as much as she wants. Especially after realizing she wants me to dump a pivotal scene, a vital scene which is set up from the very beginning and is mentioned throughout as an unsolvable riddle.

That made my heart sink a bit and I have been worried that she is going to be careless with us (me and the book). After spending most of the weekend railing about how she will strip me of my language, my story, I forced myself to back off and detach again.

Now that we're committing to live here and my hope of escape further diminishes, I keep getting knocked over by waves of disbelief and shock. I have only ever wanted to get away from this city and yet am further and further rooted. Sometimes it feels like DH and the kids are anchors--they keep me from sailing away. Not that it's bad. Without them I'd just be a tumbleweed.

9:25 a.m. - 2008-04-10
a kid-sized portion of grumbling
Knowing that my editor wants to cut more than a hundred pages from my precious book is looming over me like a scheduled amputation. Mostly I'm fine, then I have a moment where I get righteous and rage inwardly and have to grit my teeth while reminding myself that this is exactly what I wanted and its wonderful and it's just a (highly coveted) job.

The past year has taught me that feeling special or entitled simply because I can write is a lot of bollocks. All the time I've spent reading, writing and studying my craft is no different than someone in any other profession, going to school, educating themselves and honing their skills.

Again this morning I marveled at the phenomenon that artists have the least say in judging the value of their work. Imagine having to do something and then just hand it over to a biased and fickle committee to decide whether it's worth $10 or $10,000, whether it merits attention or should be buried, whether you are breaking new ground or just being crazy.

It's also very strange to me to entrust my story to a total stranger I may never meet in person, about whom I have no intuitive sense as to whether she is bright or dim, clever, kind or caring. I'm sure she probably is all those good things, and perfectly capable, it's just maddening.

I could trim 50 pages easily but 150?
Phew--deep breath.

Next year my ambition will be to network like mad and meet a lot of artsy, intelligent folks and start a salon.

LB has developed a new facial expression. I saw it for the first time a couple weeks ago. I always bring him a snack when I pick him up from school and he really looks forward to this. Sometimes it's something yummy, like a drumstick from KFC or (once) an apple pie from McDonald's. Usually it's just crackers or a cheese stick. One day I offered him a whole orange and he looked at me with the most intense expression of indignation and disbelief, I just started laughing out loud.

"That's it?" he yelled. "You brought me an orange?! I don't want an orange!" He was so disdainful, it was hilarious! Oh, it's making my eyes water because I want to laugh right now. It was as if I'd just slapped him with a glove and challenged him to a duel after insulting his lady's honor. Lordy, lordy.

12:11 p.m. - 2008-04-08
Deep breaths, deep breaths!

Oh my god, I knew this would be painful. Today I received the official critique from my editor, and with it, my first mortal wound. Of course, most of the comments are dead on and the snags easily repaired, but still the whole process has the odious implications of a make-over, fixing and masking. Ergh. Do not rebel. Be a good girl!

Augh! I am having a moment of panic-it's a lot to juggle-editing book one and writing book two, only because I still have to go to my day job, and work for my client and take care of kids single-handedly, which leaves me little time for thinking.

I'm not getting much done today. Need to get buzzed on beer and eat chips and salsa in the hot sun, go dancing, eat drippy ice cream and have a good belly laugh to recover.

Last night my daughter took a conference call with her friends. I think only teenagers and middle-managers use 3-way calling anymore. Concerned by the length of her call, I put my ear to the door in time for her to tell her friends, "My parents are nice." Astonishing! She takes endless pleasure in telling us how mean we are, but I'm glad she knows otherwise. She also mentioned a family secret, and I can't figure out what it could be-we don't have any family secrets. Then I decided that she was fine and quit eavesdropping.

George Michael is touring, will get tickets if any are left. Never thought I'd attend a GM concert, but I'm really looking forward to it.

I think we close on our house in two weeks. Can't wait to actually have the key in hand.

11:16 a.m. - 2008-04-07
Ugh! Mondaze.
Monday, ugh. We need a buffer day between Sunday and Monday. What am I complaining about? This week is a 4-day week for me, I have Friday off to write. Last week I sent my agent a small gift--after prevaricating and waffling about it for three weeks--and after wrapping and rewrapping it several times when I decided the paper I had wasn't nice enough and bought some new--and she was delighted. I was thrilled. It was a very small gesture but her genuine happiness was a delicious reward. I think I may be developing a sort of weird relationship with her in my head, something that smacks of therapeutic inappropriateness and violations of doctor/patient privilege (I do so love inappropriate relationships!). But then I also enjoy thinking of her as my pimp, because it makes me giggle and feel dirty, which I also enjoy. She is though, isn't she? Pimping out my brain? Anyway, turns out that the gift was something she bought for a friend but secretly wanted for herself, leaving me feeling like a mysterious agent of wish fulfillment. Told a friend about my silliness and the whole debacle of the wrapping paper-we were laughing hysterically- and she said "You know you're a little bit crazy, right?" Barely slept last night, stayed up too late reading then LB woke me several times grinding his teeth loudly and DH was snoring. The alarm sounded at 5 am, I had to pee like mad, and I dreamed that Jodie Foster was making me pancakes. This weekend I realized that I could embed secret messages within my books, just to speak to certain people. That's a bit creepy. I thought of this because I was considering using a phrase that a former friend said a lot, then worried that she would think I was deliberately communicating with her through the medium of the books. Then realized that I could actually do that and how weird it would be if I did. This weekend, (again) I made peace with the fact that I am not producing great literature and must be satisfied with telling an entertaining story. Song of the Day: "I Wanna be Adored" by the Stone Roses.

9:39 a.m. - 2008-04-03
Comedy gold

1:58 p.m. - 2008-04-02
what do you do when your dreams come true?

Something funny happens when your wishes come true. The noise dies down. Panic abates, the pool foams less chaotically and settles into a sedate burble.
There is quiet. Less to think about, no, less to worry and fret and kvetch about, less of the high hurdle and more of the triumphant landing.

I graduated college. Got an agent, sold not one but two novels! We're buying a house. What else could be happening?

It's awfully quiet inside. I've really given myself permission to check out and settle into my cozy little niche, a ratlike headspace lined with chewed bits of books, pretty trinkets and stolen crumbs of cheese and cake.

I'm sliding into the writing process, like swimming through pudding or syrup. It's not arduous, just slow-going, sensual, thoughtful, deliberate. I've already been surprised a few times, which I always enjoy, as secrets reveal themselves to me and the story ferments into a fine wine. I am giddy-grateful, and not allowing myself to make comparisons deathly to creativity and spontaneity, not allowing the joy to be sucked, just bowing my head to the paper and closing my eyes.

When I was little, I was hugely interested in the paranormal, read ghost stories by the pound and all manner of material on supernatural physics. Anyway, there's this technique of going into a trance to summon a soul from beyond the veil, spirit writing I think it's called.

You surrender to a force outside of yourself which in turn uses you as its vessel, its medium to communicate otherworldly messages. I think of my own process this way. The pages do seem to write themselves, though clumsily.

Anyway, took LB to see the Wiggles and he loved it. I was surprised-they put on a really entertaining professional show, though I spent much of my time there analyzing their marketing strategies and marveling at the way this modern concept of childhood has become an enormous industry unto itself.

More reasons to enjoy Cary Tennis:

"Now there are many kinds of friendships, sure. Some friends like to argue with each other. Some friends like to fight with each other. That's why we have Fight Club. But Fight Club is Fight Club and we do not fight about Fight Club.
As for me, I am not raisin bran, nor am I Christopher Kimball's marvelous North African lamb stew with tomatoes, chickpeas and spices I made a few weeks ago with 7 pounds of bone-in lamb shoulder from Guerra's. I ate the lamb stew. I did not become the lamb stew. We are what we are. We eat what we eat. In the end, we do not become steaks or bacon or flowers. We become dust."

11:35 a.m. - 2008-03-31
a day at the shore
Click here for ten krazy kat photos! There! I’m an official D-land blogger now. I hope you are happy, Soma. ; ) Took the kids out yesterday to see the ocean. Saturday was my mother's birthday, she would've been 67, holy cow. She is forever 48 in my mind and the closer I creep to that number, the more the gravity of her terrible and early death weighs on me. Must've been why I was feeling morbid-kept thinking about what it would mean to only have 11 years left on earth, what it would mean to my kids, how DH would survive if I was gone.

My mother was cremated and her ashes sprinkled into the Pacific, so I told the kids we were going to see Grandma. It ended up being a nice way to 'spend the day' with her. It was also completely gorgeous out, we visited this little lighthouse which was preserved inside as a museum complete with fixtures and furnishings from the last inhabitants about 100 years earlier. I have ALWAYS wanted to live in a lighthouse, imagining the lonely winds, the sea crashing against the shore, the banks of rolling fog and mournful wails of approaching ships. A perfect writerly place.

Come and enjoy our lovely day.