Sunday 19 April 2015

Digging in the Dirt

As you all know by now, I've been working on my tome about the Great Recession since it was underway. I've mostly concentrated on the moment of terror when I realized my HUGE mistake and the digging out from it after that, but at a recent writer's meeting, I was told that I really need to give the background leading up to the TERRIBLE MISTAKE so that the audience can empathize. They need to see me go through the process of wanting to leave one town, feeling secure enough to buy a place in Winterville, and then run through my money so that when the recession starts, my terror and fear are justified.

Well. If I must.

(Oh yeah, and one of the reviewers said I used the word "well" too often; when I brought this up to Diva, she said, "Well..." Ha ha ha, I can't get away from it. It's the way we talk in Florida!)

(Another one of the reviewers said, "There's just no way that a sinkhole could swallow a road! Maybe a small chunk of it, but a whole stretch of road!" I'm going to email him some pictures. Seriously. And how is there ever "a small chunk of road"? I give up.)

So take a wild guess as to the side effects of my recent efforts. Choose from the following list:

1) Periods of mental concentration, followed by recalling details of my former life that I'd repressed. Examples: 1) recalling the popping sound of the wood frame of my townhouse as it "settled." Would not have been so traumatic if I hadn't been surrounded by sinkholes. 2) the hilarity of finding out that not only had I lost tens of thousands of dollars in value over the first year I owned my place, but also that they cheaped out on the fire alarm batteries so that they started chirping at me after about 8 months in my "new" place on a day that I was, naturally, home sick from work. 3) calling the builder to fix a roof leak twice in the first year. 4) seeing the guy who sold me my townhouse driving around in a new BMW shortly thereafter. Glad to know my stupidity lined so many peoples' pockets! Sigh.
2) Fitful sleep, from which my husband wakes me up and tells me I had shallow breathing and writhed around as if in a wild panic.
3) Illness descending upon me from who-knows-where. An actual need for an afternoon nap (putting it off wasn't an option).
4) Finding respite in sleep. Looking forward to it as much as I did when I worked full-time. Getting lots and lots of sleep. My time now is part unemployment, part writing work, and part therapy (without the benefit of a therapist, but with the benefit of playing my ukulele, which is probably better for me in the long run anyway).
5) Realization that the surgery and post-surgery drugs haven't erased my memories of 2011-2012 completely, but they did a good job of hiding them for a while!
6) All of the above.

So this is where I'm at right now. I wanted to get the book out by early summer but it may take longer, and if I've learned anything in this crazy life, it's that I can't rush things. Anyone who got engaged at age 40 knows that you can't hurry love. You can't push the river, they say. But hopefully the words will come and flow out in the right order!

-Jane