Fruit of the Vine

Ouch

2009-12-30T03:42:02Z

jaylake and the_child and I went to Muir Woods today.

Before we even got into the Woods, I fell down.

Ouch!

I also skinned up the palm of my right hand, and generally jarred the body, as one does when one falls down in the road. It’s all surprisingly unsore right now, though–in fact, it hasn’t really hurt much at all–so I think I might have gotten off easy. Only the palm bled, briefly; the knee’s bleeding is all just tiny bits underneath unbroken skin. I iced it when we got into the park, and then we walked (easily) for a while, and so it’s not even swollen now.

We’ll see how I feel tomorrow. We have museum walking planned, and I hope to go to yoga in the morning. All subject to cancellation, if need be.

_______________

After our little adventures in and around Muir Woods, we went to Muir Beach, had a lovely lunch at the Pelican Inn, walked on the beach, and then meandered back to the city. markferrari is in town and came by for an hour or so; it was lovely to see him, even if the_child objects to his presence because he makes her laugh too much. (And even if jaylake objects to his presence because he made it necessary for jaylake to explain to the Child that “Spotted Dick” does not in fact contain dicks.)

(Okay, I guess you had to be there.)

And now it is raining here, snowing (so we hear) in Portland, and that is all I know about matters of weather.

And more mundanely, the laundry wars continue, and I think a skirmish is afoot, so I must go rescue my precious towels and yoga pants. Be well, everyone!

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Vacation Is Exhausting

2009-12-29T03:27:07Z

Such hard work! Going to movies, hanging out with friends, shopping…Sigh!

jaylake and the_child and I went to see Avatar today, in IMAX SUPER OMG 3D WOW. It was made of visual win, and had a perfectly serviceable story, I thought, and that’s all the film critique you’re going to get out of me. A totally enjoyable time spent.

Then we went to Chinatown and had lunch and spent some small bits of money on some nice things; and the_ogre came over this evening and we all went to dinner.

And now I’m thoroughly, completely, utterly exhausted, and I didn’t even have surgery recently. So you can imagine how jaylake feels.

Witch, over and out.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Jay Starts a Movement

2009-12-27T18:24:24Z

This morning, jaylake posted another one of his cancer nitty-gritty TMI posts...this one about, as he puts it, digestive health.

A few friends have already posted responses and personal information of their own--those things we all wished we had known but nobody writes about publicly. I said, "Well, I should write about what happens after a hysterectomy."

jaylake said, "Have I started a movement?" Followed immediately by, "I can't believe I said that!"

Once I picked myself up off the floor laughing, I thought, Yeah, I should post that. So my TMI below, cut for those who don't want to hear about bloooooood:

I had a hysterectomy in 2003 after years of miserable periods (and bleeding between periods) caused by fibroids. On the fruit scale by which the medical profession loves to express such things, I was diagnosed with a "small lemon" in my early twenties, which grew over the years to "large orange" and ultimately "larger than a grapefruit".

I've written elsewhere about the process of deciding to have the hysterectomy, my lifelong desire not to have children, the surgery itself, the healing, etc., so I won't rehash that here. Suffice it to say that I researched the whole process a great deal, I asked a ton of questions, everything went very smoothly, I've never regretted it. My life is so much better now.

The word "hysterectomy" can describe a number of slightly different operations, though. In my case, the surgeon removed my uterus and fallopian tubes, leaving my ovaries and my cervix.

Now, the cervix isn't actually a separate body part. It's merely the end of the uterus.

Healing from the surgery, I experienced a small bit of bleeding. Which was normal, unremarkable, unworrying. Then it stopped.

Imagine my surprise when it started again, a few weeks later. A panicked call to the surgeon yielded up the information that, Oh yes, since you are still having menstrual cycles, and the cervix is merely the stub end of the uterus, it will still slough off a bit of lining every month. Which, gee, nobody told me that, in all my research. Not that I would have decided not to have the surgery: no. But it would have been nice to know. All I'd ever heard was, No more periods, ever!!!

So: yeah. I still have periods. I can (and do) track my cycle by them. They're pretty tiny periods--way too small for a tampon, and I don't even bother with a pad, although sometimes I sort of regret that. (Though I'm sort of stubbornly clinging to principle here, since I took so much joy after the surgery in scouring the house and all my purses and throwing away "feminine products"...)

I'll also go through menopause, some day. I think I'm perimenopausal now--the cycles are sort of erratic, and the amount of blood varies widely from period to period. And I've had an increase in other kinds of shifting-hormonal symptoms, like yeast infections and the like.

Maybe we need a new term for TMI. This kind of thing is not "too much information," if it's something relevant, important, something that happens to our bodies. Or to the bodies of our loved ones. Information is power, information is useful; it helps allay that panic. It makes us feel less alone. Maybe we just need a, "Not at the dinner table" kind of warning. You think?

Okay, that's mine. Who's next, for jaylake's movement? ;-)

A Two Hour Drive Is As Nothing To Me

2009-12-27T03:34:25Z

Drove back down to the Witchnest this morning, where jaylake and the_child were already ensconced (though somehow they’d neglected to turn on the heat, and were sitting around shivering in sweaters). Mom, Stepdad, and Auntie followed a few hours later, and we all had a nice lunch out in the neighborhood, followed by an adventuresome walk in the Haight (plus bonus! rain). Then our three elders hied off to yet another party/family gathering, while we young’uns lazed around, napped, and were generally slothful. And I had pie for dinner. Yep. Pie. And ice cream.

My half-brother is doing incredibly well–I phoned to check on him when I got home, and he answered! Which, since he basically wasn’t talking all week since the initial surgery, is progress indeed. So, maybe we’re out of the woods there. Hope so. What a Christmas ordeal… Poor guy.

And now, since it’s been like an hour since I’ve stretched out on the bed with a book, I’m off to do just that.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Never A Dull Moment, Not Even On Christmas

2009-12-26T03:09:33Z

Background: on Tuesday, my 19-year-old half-brother had outpatient surgery to remove his tonsils. They’d been giving him nothing but trouble for some time, and reasoned medical opinion held that he might as well have them out.

The surgery went fine. He went home and started recovering.

But it hurt a lot. As surgeries do. And he couldn’t eat anything, could hardly swallow. So it was decided that he would probably miss Christmas dinner. He would just stay home and recuperate.

Then this morning, it got lots worse. And he started feeling queasy, nauseous. And then some more things happened that you really don’t want to hear about. And so my stepmom took him to the emergency room.

When Dad called and told us this, he said he (Dad) would still be coming by, with the salad they’d agreed to bring. We were all, Forget the salad! It’s fine!

At the ER, they took Half-Brother into surgery, where they determined that yes, the sutures had opened up and he’d swallowed a lot of blood. They cauterized and added another stitch. During all this, Dad and Stepmom were able to at least get some turkey dinner here (the hospital is about 5 minutes away); after dinner, Dad and I went to see the poor kid. I was happy to get to do that–I wasn’t going to be able to see him otherwise.

He was doing great, at that point: the power of modern painkillers.

At about 5pm, they released him, and his folks took him home. And we all kept eating, here. Because, you know, what else are we supposed to do?

My other brother (my whole brother?) has a cold, with a sore throat. He feels horribly, horribly upstaged. He asked me to mention here how much his throat hurts. Sorry, guy. No hospitalization? No respect.

Merry Christmas everyone! Hope your days were all emergency-room-free.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

The Traditional Yule Pizza

2009-12-25T04:53:45Z

Here I am, enjoying the lovely new wireless internet at La Casa de Mi Madre (y Step-Padre). Woo hoo! Writing from the living room!

Other things going on in this very room right now: A Christmas Story on TV; narration about same; comparing of the various schedules that Mom and I created for the upcoming few weeks; my auntie reviewing the Fay Weldon book she bought after she met Ms. Weldon on the street in Italy; discussing our now-defunct family tradition of passing the Jack Daniels bottle around on Christmas morning; and, most excitingly, I am typing all this without a bandage on my left index finger. Wow. {and, jaylake just popped into chat, so I am also chatting with him as I post. Tech. yep. Busy busy!}

We are quite full of pizza, and red wine, and Christmas cookies. Le yum.

We’ve compared new technology (computers, i-things, the diagram of the devices being controlled by the new wireless, a multimedia slide show of old family slides), but there will be a whole new round of that tomorrow, when my brother and dad get here, I predict…

And that’s pretty much all the news from here! Merry Christmas, everyone, if you do that kind of thing.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Flyby

2009-12-24T04:45:26Z

Aunt retrieved from airport: check

Returned to nest with her: check

Last-minute freelance work accomplished: check

Dinner, delicious and home-cooked by an excellent Italian chef: check

Car exchange with the_ogre, both directions: check

Packing for Points North: um…..

Well, we don’t have to leave till tomorrow morning… Anyway, if the blog goes dark for a day or two, I know nobody will worry. Right? Good. Then again, my mom just got wireless at her house, so, maybe I will post! Just for the novelty of it!

Happy Dark Winter Feast Days, everyone…

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Demons and Such

2009-12-23T03:52:58Z

When you drop something small and precious–like a ruby stud earring, for example–just stand still and watch it fall. Don’t grab for it. Watch it, and see where it lands, and then you can find it. Even if it falls into the bathroom trash can, which is disgusting from the kitchen incident of last week.

I mean, ew.

Anyway. Crisis averted, earring recovered; and the crisis with the kitchen incident of last week is healing itself, finally; the cut opened up and started bleeding again on Saturday, which was disturbing; but it’s been fine for days now, and the bandages are getting smaller and smaller, and sooner or later there will be no bandage.

__________

I finished my read-through “edit” of Demonhead today. There was a whole chunk about three-quarters of the way through where I thought the story had gone completely off the rails; but then it recovered nicely, and even some of the stuff that I thought WTF??? about as I was reading through, I’d made it work at the end. So the repair job may not be as bad as I thought. It might even be clever. Even so, there’s certainly things to smooth out, things that need to be better executed. But it ended strongly, and I was surprised at a few things.

Yeah. Even though I WROTE THE BOOK. Funny, that.

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Auntie Susan comes tomorrow, I am excited to see her, it’s been far too long! She’s been staying in LA for a few days with other relatives. When I called there earlier, she said, “Oh, we’re sitting here drinking wine.” Oh REALLY? At least I come by it honestly.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

And Back

2009-12-22T03:27:03Z

Flew back to SFO today, returned to the Witchnest. I do love coming home, though it means leaving jaylake behind (for a few days at least). Oh, life. Why do you have to be so complicated?

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This will be disjointed, because I am full of small thoughts, and I got up at 4am to make the very early flight, which was only a little bit late, and made up the time in the air, which, how is it that they can do that, and why don’t they always do that?

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After I landed, I went straight out for errands and groceries before I even drove to the nest, which made me feel So Very Accomplished. Then I went straight up to Ye Olde Day Jobbe and *finished* (for some value of “finished”) the freelance project for Boss Man, which, yay! Now I have all day tomorrow to do all those other things I have to do…you know, like Christmas shopping and stuff. For my friends–because my family, most wisely, gave up on Christmas gift exchanges years ago.

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My building, with 12 apartments, shares one washer and one drier. I lost the Laundry Wars this afternoon/evening: it took me four hours to get one load through.

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But my time wasn’t wasted. I had a lovely talk with my dad, as I called him for his birthday (happy birthday again, Dad!). We will see each other on Christmas, but there will be many people there, including my fascinating aunt from Italy, so it was cool to talk one-to-one.

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That’s about all I got for now (see above re. getting up at 4am…) Happy solstice everyone!

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ETA: Oh and I "edited" two chapters of Demonhead! Though, the book is totally needing more work the deeper I get into it, and I am marking things like "fix this" and "go back and check that" and "take tour of SF City Hall" and "fly to Bangkok" and the like as I go... -)

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Whirlwind Tour

2009-12-21T01:57:47Z

Back, briefly, at Nuevo Rancho Lake. I leave many hours prior to the crack of dawn tomorrow for SFO and the Witchnest….and then some more free lancery and some Christmas prep.

Seattle was so much fun, even if the drives up and back were rain-drenched and white-knuckle-driving-ish. tbclone47's birthday party was a blast... it was the first time for me that I've been in such a large group of writerly folks and I knew nearly all of them. I will forget many names, I know, so please forgive. But, briefly... I had a great time talking to criada; it was wonderful to see shelly_rae again, and to meet her cats later; it was also fantastic to get caught up with markferrari again; kenscholes and jensfire were there with the wonder twins; I sat with jkoke and karawynn and had fun and silly conversations; bravado111 gave us an ARC of Black Blade Blues, and Mrs. bravado111 had the day's best hat; jackwilliambell helped round out the superabundance of Jacks at our table; and scarlettina took embarrassing pictures to document it all.

tbclone47 had jaylake give a brief discussion of his novella The Specific Gravity of Grief, which Fairwood Press will be bringing out soon; he had a mockup of the cover art on display, which is gorgeous, utterly gorgeous, and very moving. And I say that with no bias whatsoever. Nope.

What a year it’s been.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Here and Gone Again

2009-12-19T15:58:19Z

Early morning at Nuevo Rancho Lake, preparing to drive up to Seattle environs for tbclone47’s party, and more festivities to follow…I will bring my computer, but no promises that I will get back to it for any further posting today. I might be having JUST TOO MUCH FUN.

jaylake and I had a lovely hour-long walk in the rain and dark, talking about life and everything…he is now sitting in his chair working on a long thoughtful post. Me, I have not so much the deep thoughts this morning.

And that’s fine.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Arrived

2009-12-18T21:19:23Z

Safe in Portland, had lunch, getting settled in here at Nuevo Rancho Lake. Someone has tidied up; someone has baked an apple pie. Who, oh who? (thanks shelly_rae! Yum!)

jaylake was so thrilled to see me that he has had to go lie down.

No, seriously, he is just taking a little nap before we get on to the rest of our festivities–a walk, his first shower since Wednesday’s procedure (which may be a challenge with this bandaged finger, but we will prevail!), and then a family party this evening. So I thought I might as well blog now, since I probably won’t get another chance.

Tomorrow we’re up to Seattle; Sunday back here; Monday I fly back home. Go go go!

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Back to the Skies

2009-12-18T04:20:34Z

I fly to Portland tomorrow morning…somehow it feels like forever since I’ve been there. Heh.

I think I’m all packed, except for the morning stuff.

Otherwise, busy productive day–went to yoga, did two more chapters of Demonhead, did four hours of freelance stuff (up at the old office–it sure is funny going to work there), emailed people all over the world. Talked to jaylake a long while, he is doing very well, for feeling as physically crappy as he does.

We’re all learning so much through all this. You know?

____________

Not much more to say…my finger is still bandaged, so it’s hard to type. It doesn’t hurt at all, but the slice is so near the tip, I don’t want to take the bandage off. It’ll catch on something and start bleeding all over again, and I just don’t want to go there.

I am reminded of the time when I was 11 or 12, at home alone at my dad’s house way out in the country, and was running up a set of stairs made from old railroad ties. Going full speed ahead, I stubbed my big toe so hard, all the flesh on the end of it just popped off, hanging on by only a tiny flap of skin. Horrified, panicked, I slapped it back on and bandaged it hard, tight, and then didn’t look at it again for like a week. It grew back together. Not even a scar.

Yay, bodies and their healing power.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Kitchen Follies, and Such

2009-12-17T03:04:28Z

So I bought these wonderful new kitchen knives recently.

Wow, I don’t have to say anything more, do I? You know *exactly* where this is going.

Which is good, because it’s really hard to type with the bandage.

__________

Despite all that, today was better than yesterday. I slept well, and late, it being a New Moon (and therefore no Ashtanga); edited two chapters of Demonhead (and by “edited” I actually mean “went through the printout marking places that need editing when I do this again on the computer”); got a pedicure; did not solve the freelance problem but went up to the Former Day Jobbe and worked on it there (where I found that they had not closed out any of my accounts or given away my office or anything…heh); and then had a lovely dinner cooked for me here by the_ogre (rescheduled from last night)–OMG the deliciousness. Even with all the blood. Ahem.

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And jaylake’s procedure went fine, as we knew it would; he was home resting when I talked to him, preparing to go out and have his hair washed. Washed clean of blood. Today’s post is all about blood, isn’t it? Sorry. Some days are just like that, I guess.

_____________

And that’s enough typing, without my left index finger.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

I Got the Mood

2009-12-16T03:01:23Z

jaylake had a hard day yesterday. I was strong and capable and understanding and encouraging and sweet.

Today he feels better. Today, I got the mood.

I have no history of depression, and that isn’t what’s going on with me now. I know what depression looks like; I lived with a loved one with it, for years. It’s not what happens to me. I am positive and cheerful and upbeat and optimistic, generally. I mean, not to a fault–I react to circumstances like anyone else, and everyone knows that there’s hard stuff going on these days. I get in bad moods. And things get me down. And all that.

But today was just crappy. Nothing worked. I’m tired, low energy, hungry all the time; the freelance work I was trying to do (that Former Boss Man is eager for) is just Not Working; the sky is gray; everything is just sideways. And, after I pulled it all together and edited three chapters of Demonhead and went to the store for dinner…my evening plans canceled. Which, meh, although I understood why, and there are no hard feelings, and it would have been foolish to go ahead with them under the circumstances, but….. well, it would have been nice to be cooked for.

So I will drink this wine and go to sleep early, and tomorrow will be another day, a better day. jaylake has his port implant procedure tomorrow; I still feel like I should be there, although we talked it over at length and decided it made more sense for me to go up on the weekend instead. But, I feel very far away. From everything. You know?

Meh.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Oh Write

2009-12-15T06:36:46Z

Today was the first day of the rest of my life.

Or, rather, it was the first day since leaving my job that I actually had the sort of “normal” day that I’ve expected, envisioned, planned for. As in: woke up at 5:30, went to yoga; did morning email and internettery; wrote a bit on project A (a short story with a Very Cool Collaborator); edited a chapter of project B (Demonhead); did some research for a freelance job; went for a nice walk up Buena Vista hill; talked with jaylake; did some reading, crit work, and more internettery; talked with markferrari; and now this and then bed. All unrushed, unhurried; all very satisfying.

And, let me just say again: I wrote! It felt so satisfying, I cannot tell you. I have no idea if it was any good or not–but, I wrote! It’s been far too long.

More tomorrow!

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Weekendery

2009-12-14T05:17:52Z

Just got word that markferrari made it safely back to frozen Seattle. It was a very nice weekend here, if rather rainy; but, “we need it,” I know.

We didn’t get any writing done, as we had hoped, but talked about writing a lot–process, and our particular stories, and WRPA–so that is good.

The work party was fun too, and the dates were a hit, as usual. And so simple! Medjoul dates, pitted and filled with mascarpone cheese, and topped with chopped pistachios. Sweet salty creamy crunchy yum! Assemble them as close to eating time as possible; if you have to travel a ways, consider adding the nuts when you get to the party (or whatever your destination). They suffer from hanging around on the cheese too long…

Tomorrow, I write. Promise.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Seeing My City

2009-12-13T00:20:16Z

It’s fun to have out of town guests. They get you out of the house to see things in your own city that you’d never do on your own. Like, the Japanese Tea Garden in the pouring rain.

Gorgeous.

__________

Tonight is the Boss Man’s annual Christmas party, and even though I don’t work there any more, they’re going to let me go. It’ll be nice to see everyone after…well, three weeks.

And for that, I must go make stuffed dates. And that’s about all I’ve got to report!

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Details, Details

2009-12-11T03:08:52Z

I swear, more of today was taken up with figuring out the schedule between Christmas and mid-January than anything else.

Well, it didn’t help that I woke up with a horrible headache and the shivering chills, and maldigestion, so that I was certain I had come down with some deathly flu, even though I’ve had every flu shot known to man. Anyway, after a long sleep-in, turning on the heat in the apartment, some Advil, caffeine, calories, and a shower, I felt much better. I’m forced to conclude that, as the maldigestion has been going on for a few days, the dehydration caused by that, in combination with, er, last night’s really very modest glass of gin, created the unhappy problem.

Be that as it may. So I turned my attention to trying to figure out how to organize picking up, driving around, and visiting with my aunt from Italy (and her Very Large Suitcase); Christmas at my mom’s; jaylake and the_child visiting; me going to Portland for the start of chemo; my aunt renting a small cabin at Sea Ranch after Christmas; a holiday get-together with a separate branch of the family; and about fourteen other smaller pieces of the puzzle that we fit in as best we could. Between a handwritten day-by-day flow chart, two phone calls with jaylake, and three with my mom, I think we’ve got it. Whew.

So now it’s 7pm, and that’s my biggest accomplishment of the day…I’ll be off to the airport in a bit to pick up Mark, whose flight is delayed, alas, which will make it a very late night indeed. Good thing I slept in!

Maybe I’ll write tomorrow. I remember writing. I think I kinda liked it.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Just a Tiny Drop of Gin Before I Sleep

2009-12-10T05:34:57Z

It’s nice to be back home.

Today was all about getting things done–watered and fed the orchids (and apologized to them for being gone so long, and for how cold it is) (relatively speaking–it actually feels fine to me, compared to 17 degrees in Portland, but what do orchids know?); bought groceries; checked the PO box and paid bills; unpacked; sorted and dealt and organized and all manner of boring but very necessary and satisfying things.

Oh, there is still more to do–much more! I have to do laundry. I have to update my website. The apartment is not really all that clean. I haven’t even begun to look at my various writing projects. But…I feel a good sense of accomplishment anyway.

When it really hit me–well, here’s how it went: I set the alarm and got up at 5:30 to go to yoga as per usual. I got home from yoga, had breakfast and coffee, and started fiddling with the interwebs, all as per usual. And when it got to be 9:45 and I hadn’t rushed off to the shower, much less run up the hill to the office: that’s when it hit me, that’s when I realized, Oh, I don’t have to go to work. Ha!

Lovely. And I get to do it all over again tomorrow!

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Am planning further trips north, of course. I’ve already bought tickets for the weekend of the 18th, and I’ll certainly be up there for jaylake’s first chemo in early January. I think I won’t risk driving again, not in the dead of winter–I feel like I got pretty lucky with yesterday’s drive. Plus, meh. I am now officially tired of 11-hour drives.

Ask me again after my next FlightFail, though. There will probably be a different answer…. (sigh)

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Another 650 Miles

2009-12-09T03:18:57Z

In my head, round about Vallejo:
“The sun is riz
The sun is set
And here I is
Driving yet.”

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Mt. Shasta, from the rest area just north of Weed

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Today’s play list:

Pink Floyd, Ummagumma *
Neil Young, After the Gold Rush
Santana, Abraxas
Soundtrack: The Blues Brothers
The Alan Parsons Project, The Turn of a Friendly Card
Talking Heads, Speaking in Tongues
Led Zeppelin, Physical Graffiti (disk one only, due to I spaced that there were two)
Soundtrack: Twin Peaks Fire Walk with Me
Neil Young, Harvest
The Rolling Stones, Beggars Banquet
Led Zeppelin, I {zeppelin cover}
Nirvana, Nevermind
Pink Floyd, Wish You Were Here

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* The second (studio) CD is not very suitable driving music.

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Dear Other Drivers: Okay, I get that you are going to use me as a pace car, and there’s nothing I can do about it. Fine. But could you please at least pay attention and not box me out in the slow lane behind a semi? Thanks.

Dear Guy in the White Truck: I don’t care how long you paced me, I am not going to follow you into a rest area. Sorry.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Interstate of Broken Dreams

2009-12-09T03:06:24Z

Last night, as I was finishing up packing at Nuevo Rancho Lake and getting ready to go to bed so I could get up this morning at the crack of crack and drive 650 miles home to the Witchnest after being gone for over two weeks, I checked my email and found the final agent rejection for Nightcraft Mother.

It’s the final rejection because I’m not going to send out Nightcraft any more. And I’m not going to work on it any more, and I’m not even all that interested in thinking about it any more.

I had a lot of time, alone in my head today for 11 hours, to think about this. I’ve been working on the tales of Calendula Isadora for five years now–I started the original, 250K version of Nightcraft Sister in the fall of 2004. Yes, I’ve written a whole bunch of other things in that five years as well–including a handful of other novels–so it’s not like it’s been all Nightcraft, all the time; but this has been my sort of basic, core project. Callie’s story is fully formed in my head, the whole series, all the way to the end–the five or six or seven books it would take to tell it all.

They’re not going to get written. I’m done. I’m sick of this.

It’s just not hitting, for some reason. And/or I’m just not a good enough writer to pull it off. And/or I’m a better writer now and my fresher, newer stuff will sell. (I do get short stories published, in major markets…) And/or it’s just tough to break in. Or whatever.

But I just don’t feel the love for the project any more. I’ve worked so hard on it, revised it so many times–cut that first book into three, and then two; dropped the first half and made NCM the first in the series; edited it within an inch of its life–it’s too hacked up now, it’s been gone over too much, I think. It’s time to let it go.

Time to let Callie go.

__________

I don’t usually post about rejections, because it’s tough stuff, and also so common. To everyone, I know. But this one is different. I had a lot of excitement about this particular agent, about this particular version of the manuscript. And her rejection was very kind, and very detailed; she pointed out several areas where the book could be improved, and offered to take another look if I edit it.

But… I can’t. I’m done. I can’t climb that mountain again. I’ll send her Demonhead, when I’m done editing that. Callie’s going on the shelf.

Sorry, Callie.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Today’s Appointments

2009-12-08T00:49:45Z

jaylake writes of them here.

And…folks are here visiting now, so this is brief–just wanted to get it out there. And I have to pack and get ready for a long (cold!) drive tomorrow…so, don’t expect to hear a whole lot from me for the next little while.

At least we have a plan and a schedule. Pretty much. Onward…

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

In His Natural Habitat

2009-12-07T02:03:36Z

Took his jaylakeness out in the world today, in the car–well, not the Witchmobile, which would be a challenge; but a different, more reasonable conveyance. (And this, of course, after another hour-long walk.) We went to a video store, and then out to dinner.

Looks pretty normal, don’t you think?

_______________

Tomorrow we meet with the surgeon for the post-op follow-up, and then the oncologist for the “What’s Next” discussion. Needless to say, there’s some angst and anticipation there. Not much to be done but wait for it…then we will know the deal, and can plan from there. shelly_rae comes down about mid-day; then I leave for points south at OMG-thirty Tuesday morning. Hoping to dodge deadly weather as I go…

That’s all I know for now. More tomorrow!

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.

Oh Can He Write

2009-12-06T01:22:30Z

I just finished proofing the galleys of Pinion…brought tears to my eyes. Again.

You’re all in for a treat. Next year.

Originally published at Shannon Page: Author. You can comment here or there.