Hiiiii, I'm not DEEEEAAAAD!

So, it's been a while.

How've you been? I've missed you.

I'm still at 50 pages and holding on my book.

Between extra music rehearsals, hands-on sessions and working on the radio station schedule, my time to write has been compromised.

That's right, non existent. Though I did find time to edit those 50 pages a little...

But now, I am back.

I am rededicated, and it's only May 21st, so I guess that means I've been MIA for... fifteen days... that's a day and two weeks... that's TOO DAMN LONG!

J told me that his friend C told him that HIS lady friend wanted to know when I was going to post more of the novel.

Well... if I knew anyone was reading this lil' blog o' mine, and I knew that the readers like some posts more than others.... I'd know to put more of whatever you like up here. As it stands, I have no idea if this is just floating around the ether, collecting dust-like-particles of electrons, being read regularly by 4 people and 4 people only...

Back to my business. My busy-ness more like...

The book is taking a few different directions. I'm fairly sure I could happily write more than one novel with where I'm going...

Perhaps it will just be a LOOOOONG book... Terry Pratchett style, with everything coming together to resolve at the end.

Or, maybe I'll write one story and then the others in sequence, as in the Pellinor series.

However, mostly what I've been doing lately is: not sleeping; drinking lots of tea; not stretching; not dancing; singing a lot; making a lot of phone calls (ugh); forgetting to cook; remembering to cook; cleaning; driving to the airport; washing things; and performing.

Yay. Me.

Anyway, I'm back now.

Fear NOT!

If you want some more of the 50 pages I have thus far, let me know and I'll post a book update.

I have nothing witty to say today, I admit it.

Nothing. Witty.

I DID miss you though.

Cross my eyes and tongue to my nose--- I did.

So, HAPPY MAY and more to follow.

Cheers!

ARMAGEDDON and Other Incapacitating Sounds...

Two people are asleep after a very, long and good but exhausting day. 
Two cats lay at the foot of their bed: each respectively warming the feet and calves of their human charge. 
Suddenly, a piercing noise slashes through the air. 
One of the people sits bolt upright. 
The other curls into a ball. 
J identifies the noise as the fire/smoke alarm: the new mandated ones that are the latest thing-- hardwired into the electrical system of the house, and connected together. 


Surprised and frantic, J realizes that now ALL of the detectors are going off because if one alerts, they all sound. 


From J's perspective, the noise was scary at first, then irritating and it made his ears ring a little bit. It wasn't pleasant, but he could handle it.


These are not your "normal," annoying beeping machines. No.


 These are decibels above that. 


These are not clanging bells that can be refuted with hands over your ears, or pillows, or earplugs.


 These are louder than a ship's clangon, as loud or louder than a bullhorn.


 These are distractingly, disorientingly, ear-drum bursting if you're over exposed loud. 


I cannot handle it.


J found me curled up in a ball, not able to hear him clearly or speak to him well. 


I didn't even realize that I was crying until the noise had been stopped for a few moments.


Until he'd gotten the ladder from the garage, climbed up to reach them on our 10.5' ceiling heights;


Until he'd opened the cover and removed the unit from the hard wiring in the wall;


Until he'd had to come back to each unit a second time to remove the battery because they were still going off even though disconnected;


Until then with the batteries bouncing next to the units, he'd taken everything OUT OF THE HOUSE to the garage in a bag because they were STILL holding a charge and pulsing.


All I could see were flashes of red and white. All I could hear was the ear-splitting noise and scream. All I could feel was PAIN. 
Pain in my head, behind my eyes, in my jaw, in my throat.
Searing immobilizing pain down my spine.
I couldn't THINK.
I was unable to COMMUNICATE.
I was completely IMMOBILIZED by these alarms.
I couldn't hear properly for the rest of the night after these alarms went off, and my ears were still hurting/ringing/fuzzy the following morning.


And there wasn't even a fire.
No smoke.
No danger.


What set them off was a small water leak in the basement that we would have found the next morning anyway. It set the combination fire/radon detector off when it got wet. 


The worst part is, we had to pay for our electrician to come back, check over the system, and reinstall them. It's the law. It's the fire and safety code. 


Except that I'm not safe.


I was outside the house on the front porch when he tested the units. 
It didn't matter. I still cried, felt horrible pain, and couldn't move. 
Even though I was three rooms, two doors and a porch away.


J and I don't know what to do about this, because if I'm alone in the house and there IS a fire, there's probably no way I'm going to be able to get out. 


What if after we're married we have children and these alarms go off? How am I going to be able to save them and myself if I can't move or speak?


The only solution we can see, is that we're going to find an auditory specialist and have my hearing checked and diagnosed with hyper-sensitivity, or whatever this phenomenon of sound is. Then we're going to look for an alternate alert system that can be installed.


The problem is, that from what I've been reading, even the systems that vibrate under your pillow (for the hearing impaired) still have an auditory component-- and it's LOUDER than the "normal," units.


Smoke and fire alarms have been getting louder and LOUDER over the years.


J and I think is because there are so many false alarms --- in schools, office buildings... we're taught as children to line up quickly and quietly single-file to evacuate the building in case of a fire.


But can you remember a time in your school when there WAS a fire, and not a drill? I remember people enjoying fire-drills because we got to get some fresh air outside, and take a break. I remember the alarms going off so much in high school that we were told to ignore them (an impossibility for me... I've always been mildly disoriented, felt pain and cried). I know that frequently people do ignore them because they're a nusiance. 


Therefore, louder and louder... but a smoke alarm at home used to be different from a siren at school.


The fire safety experts tell you to practice in your own home. To go over and over what to do in case of a fire-- have your own drill. 


Let me tell you. If those alarms go off, it won't matter if I'm drill-team perfect on evacuation. I won't be able to move.
Or speak.
Or hear.
Or communicate at all.


I will be curled up in a crying, muscle tensed ball, feeling nothing but pain and seeing nothing but flashing white and red. I will be hearing Armageddon. 


And right now, there's nothing I can do about it.


I hope the auditory specialist has a doctor's note and ideas for us. 


I hope there's an alarm system out there that can calmly alert us at a NORMAL decibel level to evacuate the building-- a stern voice saying "There's a fire/hazard in the kitchen/front bedroom/office/back bedroom/basement/whatever. Please leave through the nearest exit as quickly as possible. There's a fire/hazard in the..." 


Otherwise, we'll just have to live without fire and smoke alarms; which is a pretty scary thing to a couple who's wanting to have children some day. It's also illegal. All we can do is have them installed and then uninstall them after the electrician leaves.


It doesn't matter that I'm a musician, auditory learner, light sleeper and that I have always had sensitive ears and better hearing than most (higher and lower range). That's why this issue is mildly concerning. The real problem is...


I've been afraid to go to sleep and walk under the alarms.
I'm scared that a thunderstorm will set them off, that they'll go off again for no reason (they did this the first time they were installed, and again 3 months later, and again 4 months later...).


If I'm in a building other than my home, all I can do is hope that when I stop moving and hit the floor, someone will drag me with the rest of the single-filers out of the place to safety, because I sure won't be able to save myself. I just hope I don't block the stairwell and risk other people's lives too.


I'm frightened that if there IS a fire in our house, I won't be able to move. Not because I wasn't alerted in time, but because that very same alarm is going to KILL me if I'm alone.


Right now, there's nothing I can do about that fact.

Cambrics are delicious and so is the Tattered Cover...

"May I help whomever's next in line?" the light voice spoke cheerfully over the counter of the coffee shop, a sweet round face surrounded by dark curls appeared above the shiny rows of danish, cakes and other pastries in the large case.

"Would  you mind telling me how you make your cambric?" I asked politely, secretly hoping that I would be assured of a high quality delicate earl-gray and steamed milk tincture...

"Well, it's traditionally Earl Grey tea, but we can do whatever you like, and that's with your choice of steamed milk."

"Lovely, I'd like a cambric with soy milk, and I've brought my own cup," I replied.

The woman behind the counter, who was standing on a box so that her chin could've rested on top of the food display glass, but not much else, gave me a winning smile as she took my mug.

I adore bookstores and old libraries. I do. I love them, and often I wish that I could live in one. They're wonderful and delightful places most of them.

J and I have been building a lovely library in our house, and I wish it was bigger. As it is, we only have two real bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room, a tiny office and what would be the dining room had we not recently transformed it into the library.

It is one of the three places in our house that the ceilings are slightly lower (as opposed to the 10'5' or 11' that make up the rest of our dwelling) and it is painted in gold, with scales fanning out and gleaming like a fish undulating above our heads.

We have put shelves on every wall. One is currently covering part of our intake vent: our HVAC fellow told us to move it, but we have apparently conveniently forgotten, or we're being stubborn because it's in our library. We can't mess with the library.

Back to what I was blathering about before: The Tattered Cover is an especially wonderful bookstore because of the warmth of the atmosphere and the expanse of the building.

I was supposed to do massage sessions all day for some students on J's research research team.

However, their esteemed (and really nifty and nice) professor neglected to ask his lab partner professor if such a thing would be accepted, so now I sit down the road from J's school in a delightful setting, preparing myself for a lovely day of writing instead of massage (though both are fun for me).

Mmmmm... cambric delicious cambric....

Is 8:00 AM too early for dark peppermint chocolate?

I think not.

Now, back to work.

What's the story Morning glory? What's the tale, Nightengale?

Dust. The smell of clean earth, blown in a cool wind across the shade trees of the plains.

 Mile after mile along to the horizon, the bright-blue sky highlights white fluffy clouds and open fields dancing in the breeze, bordered by rows and alcoves of shade trees.

Oak. Elm. Black Walnut. Redbud. Soapberry.

The plains are open without being desolate. The open space is vast, expansive and comfortable to the mind, soul and body.

The wind often howls and whistles on the plains: true.

Dust is blown around in swirls, the same as autumn leaves in the gusts of their season.  Mini whirlwinds twirling and spiraling; lifted up around and over the heads of the children, on the playground which smells of gravel.

Then the leaves settle again, floating down to their bright-eyed, disappointed features.

Thunderstorms that boom and rattle the shelves and the windowpanes. Lightening that crackles and splits the night sky in charcoal, gray, white and purple bruises. Sweeping rains that dance and sing their lament on the roof; drumming so loudly that one must place one's lips to a companion's ear to be heard.

The scariest of all: tornado.

Sirens screaming and blaring through the silent still before the storm.

The calm that isn't.

The richness of the shadow that builds, smelling fresh and exciting and electric.

The seemingly unnatural dark that floats over the land, which should be impossible given that the sky is lit gently from within; glowing, like a light-box covered in opaque paper, brighter shades where the cover is thin-- but we on the ground looking up are still in shadow, though our eyes are bathed in the eerie, muffled, glow.

Water is the most important on the plains.

Shade is too.

Without water the heat lightening storms that ravage the land and the people will strike fires in the tinderbox of the plains.

Drought happens almost every year, but some years are worse than others.

Here in Colorado, we're always on water conservation watch. There are whispered words of ice-flow,  snow pack...

Rain-barrels are illegal in Colorado, which even though I've lived here a number of years, still seems stupid to me. As long as the rain in the barrels is used on the lawn, it's IN the water cycle. There is no danger.

In Oklahoma and Kansas rain-barrels are an absolute.

In Colorado, wild-fires are the scariest of all things. The air is dry, the altitude is high, and the conditions are ripe.

In Oklahoma and Kansas, there is also danger of fires, but tornadoes as well, and flooding when the rains finally arrive... though some years, they don't.

In Oklahoma and Kansas, a season's crop can make or break a farmer and a family.

In Colorado, a fire can destroy too many, too quickly.

In Vermont we worry about flash-floods, washed out roads, mud-season, ice and snowstorms and the elements; freezing to death.

In the plains, we worry about surviving the summer and the storms that come with it. Also about the ice-storms that can destroy trees and ground lines and close highways.

In Colorado, we worry about FIRE.

Every place on the map has its worries. Every region has hazards of its own particular and peculiar nature.

I love these wild places I've lived, quite dearly.

Nature is fierce; and she serves to warn, comfort, ravage and release us.

Above all: We must respect where we live to survive.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
In OTHER news...


I have about 40 pages of the book written.

YAY!

I've been taking a break these last few days, because I'm not sure where I want things to go. J tells me to "keep writing and see what happens, then revise after you get it all out," but being the proofreader enthusiast I am, I go back and correct little things as I go.

Today though, I'm back letting the word flow as soon as I publish this post. :-)

The Mist Also Rises...

An Exercise in Description and Setting the Tone of the Thing to Which I Apply Myself...

Peeking through the screen door, three sets of eyes gaped out into the charcoal gray of morning.

 Four paws leaned up against the faded red carvings edging the screen.

Fresh, crisp air, smelling of rain rolled through into the house like waves in a gray, misty ocean of atmosphere.

The warm, golden glow from the kitchen seeped through the doorway into the library like a backlit honeycomb.

Shapes spoke softly inside the house, whispering to one another.

Shifting, the shadows beginning the new day were filling up the crevices, moving through every nook and cranny, chasing out the thick cloak of the evening and night.

No birds could be heard outside the house.

The barren trees surrounding the dwelling stretched upwards. Thick, corded trunks splitting into multiple armed branches tipped with spindly fingers, twisted in a pleading agony of frozen motion.

The trees held a memory of past pain.

A letter, delivered to the wrong person at the correct address, lay on a carved, footed table by the door. Its green envelope seemed to glint angrily in the beginnings of the morning light, as though it knew the folly of its outdated correspondence.

A small boy pressed his face further against the screen; his cheeks against the crisscrossed weave with his hands resting in his pockets.

The larger of the two enormous cats, standing on his hind legs and pressed up against the boy's left side, was head level with the child; as long as he was tall, like a small mountain lion leaning into the smells on the breeze. His golden head gently rubbed against the boy's ear, and a throaty purr began to fill the silence.

The other feline, dark tabby-striped with intense green eyes, dropped gracefully from the screen door and sat motionlessly, stick-straight on the boy's right. The top of his head came to the child's chin.

The boy was five years old, tall and wise for his age, though slender and handsome for a child so young. Having met him, one would assume he was perhaps a year or two older; his hazel-eyes betrayed an intelligence that some mistook for arrogance.

A soft, kind-hearted voice whispered to the child from within the depths of the house. A figure stood in the doorway of the kitchen and beckoned him, a hot cup of liquid held out.

With a sigh, he nudged the great golden cat down and fondly scratching his furry ears, the boy wondered how great a dog would be as a companion. The animal padded along beside the human, smiling to himself and half-knocking the boy over by frequently rubbing against his legs.

The huge tabby stayed at attention, facing the front door, almost part of the woodwork, his sinewy body lined up against the deep carvings.

As the boy crossed into the library toward the figure in the kitchen, he was suddenly and quickly scooped up mid-stride into the arms of a tall man who nuzzled him to his chest in a bear hug.

The two were obviously related.  Both had curly dark hair streaked with cinnamon lights, golden-green eyes that shone, and the same toned build: handsome and well-proportioned, if more slender than most men. Their bodies held a strength and flexibility that tied them together; one could not look at them but see resemblance.

A soft laugh escaped the lips of the woman standing in the kitchen holding the cup. Her eyes dark and twinkling, she beamed at them openly and grabbing her husband's arm, pulled the two into the light.

The child swung down expertly from his father's arms and wrapped his own around his mother's waist in a firm squeeze. Tousling the top of his head, she set the cup on an old, scarred kitchen table and rubbed his back.

Leaning casually against the counter, opposite the doorway, the man reached around for a mug and poured himself a fresh cup of coffee from the pot warming by the stove.

I'm not sleeping, but at least my books are being read.

I lay wrapped in the darkness of our room. The sheets and blanket were like hot, stuffy clouds trying to tangle my legs and body. They were preventing comfortable slumber. 


The moon shone brightly through the shutters of our bedroom. I flipped over and lay on my back, gazing up at the ceiling with a sigh.


"J, I'm gonna' go read for a bit, I can't sleep," I whispered to the silent, slender form on my left. His body seemed heavy, but then again he was completely relaxed, so why shouldn't he sink gently into the bed?


"Mmmmphhhhok," came the reply.


I slid out from the hot sheets and my toes hit the cool of the hardwood floor below. 


Tiptoeing to the cedar chest in the library/living room (which is right off our bedroom) I grabbed a quilt and wrapped it around me. 


Shuffling over to the shelves, I grabbed a book at random and padded over to the long couch beneath the window. 


I could most-likely read by moonlight, but my head hurt a bit, so I flicked on the reading lamp. 


I began to lose myself to the first few pages; the glossy black of the cover warming in my hands, the smell of the ink on the pages comforting like the cool quiet of a true library on a hot, busy, summer day. 


The weight of the hard-cover was grounding against my knees as I curled up to enjoy myself.


-----------------------------------


Books are a rescue for me.

They are an instant relaxation, an escape, an enjoyment, a companion and an inspiration.

Lately, I've been having trouble sleeping, but it's not of the night-terror variety (I've had my fair share of those) it's more of the mind-on-the-wheel type.

The gerbil wheel.

Sometimes at night, I simply cannot shut my brain off. I list things over and over in my head until there's a running strip-- a worried commentary of 'To Do's,' that whirls inescapable.

Lately, I've been reading a lot.

Since I was a child, I've loved books. My folks used to come into my room late at night and confiscate my flashlight because I'd promised "One more chapter," and instead was about to finish the novel.

I always had something in my bag to read during unexpected moments of waiting: for the dentist, to be picked up, in-between classes, at the bus stop.... my book was always there for me.

I remember when I broke up with my first boyfriend... and my second... and my third... I read every single book on my shelves twice. On those occasions I couldn't sleep because I could think of nothing except the giant hole that was pulsating in my chest around my heart.

Books also got me through the death of loved ones, the birth of new ones and everything in-between.

I've always wanted to write a book  and I think I may start today.

 I've no idea what I want to write about, but I'll simply begin.

Maybe someone, somewhere will want to read it.

I probably owe all the authors (past, present and future) and should thereby contribute my own pages to the aid so generously offered by others.

I think it's time I gave something back.

Something beyond poetry, short stories, play plots, bits of dialogue and description.

It's time to write a book.

If only to write instead of read on these sleepless, pleasant nights, and give my bound pages of fellows a break... and a new companion to join their stacks.

Ah, I love the smell of pavement in the morning...

Wet rain-soaked flagstones give off a particular scent. They glisten and reflect in their tiny grooves and crevices; sparkling up the sidewalk and cement that serves to frame their edges.

Something about the smell of wet rock, earth and trees is extremely attractive. Not, as it were, in the same way that chocolate chip cookies spreading thickly as they bake in the oven would, but in an open, extending universal way.

Cookies smell good in a close, bringing home, wrap you up way. Wet stone smells good in an expansive, free and let you out way.

The same way that the ocean calls to my senses, and the grass on the planes, and the balsam of the woods, and the dust of the horses.

This morning I went for my walk about 6:45 AM. There was an opalescent light glancing off the buildings trees and pavement. Something pearly and glowing - as a backdrop on a large main-stage would be if it were set for sunrise.

Everything outside had that wet smell to it that I love so much.

I remember that early mornings in Oklahoma were always Dad mornings.

No one else would be awake, (save the cats) but Dad would already be in the kitchen as I padded downstairs in my bare feet and pajamas. He'd step into the dining room and open the glass door to the back porch, his body warm as I approached, his blue robe framed in the first light of morning, a hot cup of English breakfast tea in his hand, his hair mussed from sleep.

Then, he'd turn to me and smile, while the first, fresh morning breeze blew through the trees and into the doorway where we were standing. With a wink, we'd close the back door and holding hands walk to the front, out onto the porch, our feet slapping silently on the cool flagstones. We'd pass the swing and head out along the front yard walkway, down the rough textured driveway to get the paper; waiting for us in it's plastic bag-- always with beads of water glinting like little glass jewels on the outside.

He'd chuckle and shake off the water and we'd walk in, usually with our yellow tabby female, K.C. winding between his legs.

I loved to smell the newspaper; the fresh ink was comforting and inspiring, same as the smell in books, or freshly sharpened pencils, with their gray, slippery, smudgy smell of lead.

The train went by on my walk this morning. I went a different route than I normally do; just because I felt like heading clockwise instead of counter clockwise around the block.

I walked into the coral gold backlit morning and just as I was getting to one of my favorite streets; the kind with sweet old houses, lampposts and big trees.  I happened to pause because the train was growing louder and louder on it's approach; booming in the whispery breeze of morning, competing with the birds and insects to announce it's awakening.

I reached the west side of the park, which has the tracks as a border on it's east side, just in time to hold my breath as the rumbling beneath my feet reached a climax.

The train burst through the atmosphere; lights flooding like circular fires behind glass as it came barreling through, it's hot whistle hollering loud and heavy, screaming the morning to any who could hear.

My Mimi used to live about a quarter mile from the train tracks... or if not that close or far, near enough.

I remember feeling the vibration as it went by; comforting, not far away, but not next to us either.

I love trains.

I would much rather travel by train than by plane. I also love boats. These older methods of travel have a romanticism about them; as though something exciting or magical could happen. Though I DO absolutely adore  the moment on a plane, when everything is quiet but the hum of the engines as you part the clouds and emerge from the misty gray-blue in to a world of clouds and sunlight covering everything. It's like flying through the sky of a painting.

This morning I walked home, with the train hurtling through, with the smell of sparkling wet pavement in my nostrils, with my Dad in my head.

I remembered what it was like to smell the pavement being 7 years old, followed by a ginger cat and swinging a heavy wet newspaper and I remarked upon how much I love mornings.