I’m feeling too scattered to write one cohesive piece (if, in fact, we agree that my pieces are usually cohesive). Yet I’m feeling guilty that things are so crazy busy that I’mfalling asleep on the “posting every day” job. So, in compromise, I’ll just post random anecdotes and observations and not try to make them fit together.
First, I think “Ctrl” “Alt” “Delete” discriminates against one-handed people. I have to hit “Ctrl” “Alt” “Delete” every morning to start this computer. How would I manage that with one hand?
Second, I got the weirdest comment this morning on the walk to work. It was this: “Mmmm, she got some titties.” A statement of the obvious, as anyone who has gazed upon me knows.
My upstairs renovation is to blame for my titties turning heads, actually. When I moved all the things out of every bedroom to what will now be the spare bedroom (formerly my daughter’s bedroom), I did not think the laundry situation through and put all the clean clothes WAYYYY in the back behind bureaus and bed frames. So I’ve been scraping bottom on clean clothes (I am actually buying new underwear in three-packs at CVS at this point). And I put on a bra I don’t usually wear, one that, shall we say, enhances my assets much more than the usual sports bras I wear. So, yes, guys notice. As I walked by their eyes bugged out of their heads like I was draped in hundred dollar bills.
Alas, apparently my reaction to, “Mmmm, she got some titties,” was unsatisfactory. (My policy is to completely ignore, obviously). Because after that, his friend said, “Yeah, but she stuck up.” So a girl with titties and an attitude. AND a computer with which to mock them. AND two hands with which to hit “Ctrl” “Alt” “Delete.” Poor guys were so outmatched.
On another topic, I’m reading an amazing book called Why We Write. It’s my bus reading. Possibly it’s only amazing to people who like to write. But for me, it’s like I get on the bus and join a group of my dearest friends who understand everything about being blocked and scared but also transported by the written word in that sublime moment when writing is flowing to the extent it feels like taking dictation. Friends like Isabel Allende and the author of Water for Elephants who have sold millions of books and who can call over through their rarified air to my side, my first-time-novelist-I-hope-someone-buys-my-book side. A book that is making me oh-so happy.
Which leads me to the list of posts I mean to write but who knows when I’ll get to. From a partial list on my iPhone:
- Why I write. Of course.
- How I finally got over gossip websites and why I’m not happy I am about it.
- Channel Thirteen’s new advertising campaign. Genius.
- It’s official – we killed English
- What’s wrong with this immigration bill.
- How totally irrational I’ve gotten about people crossing in front of me while I walk. Manhattan is making me insane.
- Stop and frisk. Argh.
- The little coleus growing in the crack of my steps.
- My agent story. I keep meaning to write this and I somehow never get through it.
- Support and expansion of the “author’s note” in my book. Resources, etc.
- Taking apart the marriage bed – an essay on the zen of handyman work and getting rid of the bed I slept in with my husband.
- A total gush on my upstairs remodeling job. It feels so… mine. So beautiful. So like imagining something for a long time and then making it happen. God, I love my house and I am so proud I have been able to keep making it my children’s home. I was so afraid after the divorce that I wouldn’t be able to keep it. Seeing that I can do it on my own has been greatly empowering.
Then there’s novel # 2 at 26,000 words and the memoir, also at around 30,000. And the other project! The one I’m really excited about but won’t start until I finish these two books. Plus the other 5 books I have in various stages of outline. Where will I find the time?
Darn, I need to get up earlier and write more in the mornings. Or at night. Or… when will I write for a living? That would be its own wonderfully hellish brand of heaven.
