Here is a picture of Nuala snoozing from overhead. She’s taken to this style of rest since her ACL repair.
Notice the distinct “L” shape.
L is for love.
That is all.
Melanie Marttila
The Writing Process Blog Hop
Yes, it’s actually happening!
I had a bit of a false start back in April when Gemma Hawdon originally tagged me, and now that Claudette Young, A.K.A. Claudsy has tagged me for a second time, I actually found a couple of fellow bloggers who hadn’t already done it 🙂
First, I must thank my nominators:
Gemma Hawdon lives in Melbourne, Australia with her husband and two children. She writes articles, short stories and web content for clients. She’s just completed the first book in a two-part children’s fantasy series and writes a blog http://topoftheslushpile.com/ about – funnily enough – trying to get to the top of the slush pile. She loves hot coffee, long walks and sneaking off to the movies when everyone else is at work.
Public Contact Details:
Twitter: @gemmaleehawdon
Facebook: facebook.com/topoftheslushpile
Email: gemmaleehawdon@gmail.com
Claudette J. Young began writing seriously in 2008 and continues to write in multiple 
genres. She strives to learn something new each day—a new poetry form, new writing technique, new foreign word, or whatever strikes her fancy. Her primary genres are poetry, science fiction/fantasy, flash fiction, children’s literature, women’s fiction, along with creative non-fiction, essay, and memoir. She tries to cover all of her bases by writing for audiences that range from young children to senior citizens.
Claudette has been published in numerous online publications for poetry, fiction, and non-fiction, as well as print magazines and two international poetry anthologies. She continues to hone her craft by working on multiple projects, including book-length ones. Her regular work can be viewed on her collaborative website and blogs at: http://2voices1song.com/ as well as www.claudettejyoung.com/
Now for the hard part
I have to answer four questions all about—you guessed it—my WIPs and process. I’ll apologize to my followers, for whom some of this will be a repeat of my Next Chapter posts, but I hope there will be some new, tasty stuff in the mix for you too.
What am I working on?
Several projects. This year, I decided, inspired in part by Rochelle (one of my nominees – see below) to attempt working on multiple projects at once.
First is my epic fantasy, Initiate of Stone.
An aspirant mage is betrayed by those she trusts most, but when war razes her village, she loses family, friends, and the possibility of initiation. The secrets kept from her may be the keys to stopping the mad god intent on enslaving her world and her quest for power leads to a confrontation with the man who tore her life apart.
Yeah, still needs work.
It’s currently out with betas. I have a couple who are very thorough/detail oriented, and that’s just fine with me, because I’ve been able to use the time to make some major decisions about the novel, remap it, make editing notes, a beat sheet, and reverse engineer the plot. When I hear back from my peeps, I’ll be ready for one more massive rewrite, and then it’s onto querying.
Second is a young adult urban fantasy titled, Figments.
Her father’s murder sends a girl spiralling into depression, and, she fears, delusion. As her figments turn out to be real, she learns that everything else she thought she knew is a lie, opening the door to the terrifying possibility that her father was a modern-day Frankenstein, and she is his apocalyptic monster.
Figments was last year’s NaNoWriMo project and I am currently mapping it out, then I’ll get to the beat sheet, edit notes, and reverse engineering. This one has a few revisions ahead.
My third project is Gerod and the Lions, a middle grade, traditional fantasy.
A boy’s father sells his little sister to the Child Merchants and he sets off, alone, to rescue her. Clever, but small, he fails his first attempt and finds shelter in a circus where he discovers a talent for talking to lions and allies who help him track the Child Merchants to the capital, where a royal encounter and a daring rescue bring the boy face to face with his sister and her new owners.
I’m still drafting this one, but I expect to be finished by the end of this year.
Finally, there’s Apprentice of Wind, the second book in my epic fantasy series.
She’s come into her power through an act of murder and now a rogue sourceress (it’s not a typo), in the company of the half-brother she never knew and the avatar of the goddess, must defend the king’s city and then race to battle the mad god. If she can’t become powerful enough to defeat him, her life and her world will be destroyed.
The draft has been assembled and mapped, but will require substantial rewriting because of the revisions to IoS.
How does my work differ from others in its genre?
What’s that saying? There’s nothing new under the sun.
The only thing that distinguishes my work from other fantasy novels being written and published is me. It’s my writing and my voice that will set them apart.
The epic series is pretty standard fare, but I have what I hope is a truly strong heroine who drives the plot and some compelling secondary characters all of whom I torture mercilessly. None of the characters is purely good or evil—except the mad god, he’s just psychotic—so it’s complex and dark and unrelenting. And there’s a lot of vomiting, or so I’ve been told by at least one reader 😉
The YA novel features a gargoyle, but I think in the search for “original” beasties, this ground has already been trod, as has the Frankenstein angle, but not, perhaps, in the way I have approached it.
The MG might be fairly original, a young lion tamer who takes down a child slavery ring? I might have something there.
Why do I write what I do?
The main reason is that fantasy and science fiction were what I started reading: C.S. Lewis, Lloyd Alexander, Susan Cooper, Madeline L’engle, Ursula K. Le Guin. It was also what I started watching: Doctor Who, Star Wars, Star Trek, etc.
As I read or watched, I imagined myself as a character in the story. Sometimes I’d even dream about it. These derivative, or fan-based, works were some of my earlier stories. When I grew older, I understood that I wanted to help other people feel what I felt as the consumer of these creative works.
How does my writing process work?
Sweet Jebus.
The thing about my process is that it is . . . a process. It’s what happens between my head and the page. The two words I might choose to characterize my writing process are organic and evolving.
I generally shoot from the hip. I write first and ask questions later, but I’m also addicted to learning. With every writing craft book or blog post I read, or workshop I take, I learn something, and I incorporate bits and pieces of everything into my process. How do I choose which bits and pieces? It feels good or right. It fits.
I’m an unapologetic pantser, but I generally outline after the first draft, and even though I may not have a formal outline to write by, I always know where my story is going. I know the end and major events before I begin. I may even have sketched out scenes and characters before I get to the actual drafting. I do a lot of preliminary work in my head (read, incubating).
According to some coaches, that’s a form of outlining. *bats eyelashes endearingly*
I’ve tried alpha readers (who read an early draft), beta readers (who read later drafts), professional editors, reviews of the first X pages, first act (some of this done with Jenny – see nominees, below) . . . I generally give everything a try once and decide by the results I get whether I’ll do it the same way next time or not.
In this moment, here’s how my process works:
Ideas:
Ideas emerge from dreams. I, like many writers, dream in story. It may be a bit surreal, but they’re full-colour movies, sometimes even in three acts. This used to happen a lot when I was a kid, but now, I might get one or two story dreams a year. Still, that’s a fair backlog of ideas.
Ideas emerge from journaling. I started keeping a journal in university when knowledge from different disciplines kept colliding in my skull. Now, I find that my curation is taking the place of journaling. I share the articles and posts that make me think or feel and that becomes a kind of record. I also use Evernote.
Ideas emerge from reading. I’m a “clip-rat.” If I read something physical that makes me think, I clip it, or make a copy and save it in my idea file.
Ideas emerge from exercises or prompts. This is not as frequent as I’m not keen on exercises and prompts, but on a few occasions, it’s worked. Gerod and the Lions resulted from a Natalie Goldberg prompt.
Drafting:
I used to draft long hand because that was the tool I had most easily available to me. The idea that became Initiate of Stone filled two large spiral-bound notebooks.
Then, I started to type.
That gave way to word processing when I got my first computer. Those were the DOS days of black screens and orange text.
Now, I rely mostly on Word, and though I have purchased Scrivener, I’ve found that the process of importing and formatting is a bit cumbersome. I’d rather be writing. But I have enrolled in a course, so that may change.
Revisions:
After drafting, I let things sit for a while and move onto other projects, or work on short stories, or do something completely unrelated like home renovation or gardening.
I print out my draft as economically as possible and read it through.
I “map” my novels out. It’s an outline of sorts and I can easily rearrange, cut, and rewrite based on my map. Mapping is done long hand and then transcribed into a computer document.
Beat sheets and edit notes are generally long hand as well. I usually relocate to the living room or some other place than my office to make these notes.
Once I have all my structural work and edit notes completed, I’ll launch into editing the draft, copying each chapter into a new document and rewriting/editing it fully before moving on to the next.
This process repeats until I’m satisfied.
Alpha or beta readers, or editors might come in around the third or fourth version.
And that’s pretty much how it’s gone to this point.
My process is continually subject to change.
And finally, my nominoms (da-doo-da-do-doo – yes, I’m a Muppet at heart).
Jenny Madore (writing as JL Madore)
JL Madore didn’t find writing so much as it found her. Waking each morning with a vivid cast of characters tangled in chaos in her head, it seemed essential to capture them on the page. With Blaze Ignites and Ursa Unearthed published and receiving rave reviews, she’s turning her attention to Watcher Untethered, an unpublished paranormal/erotic romance manuscript which just won 4th place in the Toronto Romance Writers – The Catherine. Aside from spinning tales of elves, weres, demons and fallen angels, she’s also Vice President of the Writers’ Community of Durham Region, a 300 member writing organization just outside of Toronto. www.jlmadore.ca
Rochelle Sharpe (writing as R.L. Sharpe)
I’m many things: A reader; a writer; a mother of 2; a wife of 1; Christian; Australian.
I’ve been telling stories since I could talk and started writing them down when I was 8. It will take an awful lot to stop me – like death. Some say I’m a dreamer, and I have my head in the clouds, but I say that’s better than having two feet planted firmly on the ground.
I define myself as a storyteller. Writing is my life. Through writing I get to record all the worlds I have been blessed with discovering, worlds I would love to share with you fully one day, as soon as I can convince a publisher my worlds are worth sharing 🙂
I spend most of my time in fantastical worlds with fantastical people, both I have created and those created by others, and there is no other way I’d rather spend my time.
I work hard on making my dreams come true. And I believe in myself, because if I don’t, who else will?
http://rlsharpe.wordpress.com/
The next chapter: June 2014 update
Hey all!
I must say that June was a blockbuster month for me.
It started with the publication of my science fiction short story “The Broken Places” being published in Bastion Science Fiction Magazine. Still so excited about that.
I attended June’s @M2the5th Twitter chat with Roz Morris, focusing on her Nail Your Novel series. I’m learning quite a bit from these, and though we cancelled July’s because, Independence Day, we’ll be getting back to our monthly schedule in August.
A comment on last month’s update had me a little concerned about what my readers might be taking away from these posts. It seems May’s update was taken as a warning about social media. If the warning was timely and helpful, great, but it’s not the message I hoped to convey.
I have now finished reading my ARC of K.M. Weiland’s forthcoming Jane Eyre: Writer’s Digest Annotated Classics. I’ll be posting a review later in the month, so stay tuned for that.
The adjustable desk is working out very well, and I’m now standing for longer between rests. At work, I read a post from a learning and development blogger in which he discussed his experience with his standing desk, which he described as continual fidgeting.
He uses a kitchen stool to take a periodic break from standing and has discovered that he can’t write while standing (!) Thankfully, that hasn’t been my experience.
CanWrite! 2014 was a great time, as usual. I’ve been blogging the panels, sessions, and workshops I’ve attended on a weekly basis.
Another piece of exciting writerly news arrived when I returned home from the conference: another speculative short story, “On the Ferry,” made it into the top ten in the When Words Collide writing contest.
This means I’ll appear in their chapbook anthology, In Places Between, though I’ll have to wait until the conference to find out if I’ve placed. Still. Squee-worthy.
Last month, I had a blogging disruption around the arrival of my desk and spent most of my non-blogging writing time working through Initiate of Stone, all of that work in long hand. Though I completed a lot of work on IoS, I wasn’t able to capture a word count from it.
In last month’s update, I mentioned I would be getting back to countable writing.
June’s total word count: 18,471!!!!!
13,425 of those words were on my blog, but 5,046 were written in Gerod and the Lions. I set myself a goal of 5k for the month on that project, and I made it. The draft is now just over 10k words and I’ll have a workable draft by the end of the year 😀
I only just started working on Figments (my NaNo project from last year) as I had worked on IoS last month. In all fairness, I have a little more to do with Figments than I had to do on IoS.
First, I’m mapping it. This is something I picked up from reading Donald Maass’s The Breakout Novelist. For each chapter, I list the title, page count, word count, the first and last lines (both hooks, one to draw the reader into the chapter and the other to propel the reader onward), the purpose of the chapter, in story terms, the internal and external conflicts, and finally, what changes for the story, and for the POV character as a result of the chapter.
These are actually from several separate exercises in Maass’s workbook, but I’ve cobbled them together to create my map. These are like index cards and I can rearrange them as needed when I work on the structure of the story. I can see where I might have to divide longer chapters, and fairly easily pick out plot points, pinch points, reversals, etc.
Once I get the mapping done, I’ll fiddle with Figments’s structure and tighten things up, work through a beat sheet ala Roz Morris, and finally reverse engineer the plot with Victoria Mixon’s holographic structure.
June has taught me that I can’t draft one project and then work by hand on another project simultaneously. I’m going to try alternating and see how that goes.
And that is all the Writerly Goodness I have for you tonight.
How are your works-in-progress coming, my friends?
Coming up this month: An interview with author and editor Mat Del Papa on his new anthology Creepy Capreol, I take another shot at the writing process blog hop, the review of Katie’s book, more CanWrite! reportage, and a couple of poems with creation stories.
Sundog snippet: Another piece of the office puzzle falls into place
Since it’s not the end of the month yet, I’m not going to put out The Next Chapter until next weekend. That way, if anything else happens in the next day or so, I can capture it for you 😉
Also, I’m only going to dole out the CanWrite! sessions once a weekend to draw out the suspense learning. There’s one more panel, two sessions, and the wrap post to go. Why so few? I’ll tell you all about it in the wrap post, which will have some tips for preparing to go to conferences. Stay tuned!
So this is just a quick post to show you that Phil finally installed the new ceiling fan in my office (yay!). Actually, the ceiling fan was purchased a few years ago, when we renovated our bedroom. It’s been sitting around, languishing in its box since then.
You don’t want to know how long it’s been since I renovated my office . . .
I still have to refinish my office door, but that has to wait until I have some dedicated time.
Isn’t she sweet?
It’s much better than the old one (as the Ikea commercial says) which is about to be chucked to the curb. The old one still worked, but the motor had a nasty hum that made me doubt I could safely use it for long periods of time. It’s free to a good home, and I’m sure it will disappear long before garbage day. We have a lot of wise and environmentally conscious scavengers in the area.
And I’ve really needed it this weekend. It’s the first really hot weekend of the year (in the 30 degree Celsius range, plus humidex) and we don’t have air conditioning. It’s made the house bearable.
The gazebo in the back yard is still in a state of chaos and now has wood (from my mom’s deck reno) piled up for storage.
This weekend, Phil and I also went out and priced landscaping stone, crusher dust, gravel, and recycled rubber patio tiles. Over the course of the summer, Phil is going to construct a retaining wall around the patio, filling in the gaps about the concrete footings he poured (and re-poured) last year, and resurface the patio with the rubber tiles.
Then, he’s going to make a raised garden for me in the back yard with the stone, and create a stone (or possibly rubber tile) path between our two sets of entry steps. It’s a lot of work and a fair amount of cash, but if he works away at it in dribs and drabs, maybe he won’t exhaust either himself, or our bank account.
That’s all for today.
See you again on Tipsday!
BTW, like my new bit of Canva art?
The end of my season of sorrow
Fathers’ Day.
Last year I wrote at the beginning of my season of sorrow about the landmark moments marking my father’s decline and eventual death.
He was still very much on my mind, it only being the second year following his death.
This year, it’s been a little different.
His birthday, date of his admission into the hospital, final, precipitous decline due to congestive heart failure, death, funeral, and Fathers’ Day, all spanning the time between March 14 and the third Sunday in June, did not have the same impact as in previous years.
In fact, this year, though I was conscious of each date, I did not mark them in any way. I didn’t even discuss any of them with my mom.
This year, Dad’s been more or less continually on my mind. The dates meant less, the overall absence, more.
I’ve kept these things to myself, though. This remains my grieving process.
Phil’s father died recently, too, but that’s not my story to tell.
Fathers’ Day, however, is not just about my dad, or Phil’s. It’s about all dads, everywhere.
So, to commemorate the end of my so-called season of sorrow, I’m going to wish all dads a HAPPY FATHERS’ DAY with these two, lovely links:
Five dads who made us laugh and/or cry from People Magazine.
50 funny and/or inspiring quotes about dads from Parade.
Muse-inks
One of the comments I received on my monthly writing update, The Next Chapter, has prompted me to write this post.
The comment was:
I’m learning a lesson from this, have seen it happen to many others, how the blogging/social media/screen time eats up the creative writing time. Writing must come first, thanks for this warning.
I’m glad when anyone takes anything useful away from my blog and so in one sense, this is great.
But…
That’s not what I intended in writing the post. At all.
I had to go back and check. Was I inadvertently whiny? I strive for a factual reporting. Things are always open to interpretation, but I don’t think I was complaining about anything.
It’s true, every one of my 7503 “new” words I counted last month was written on this blog, but that wasn’t all the writing I did.
I edited a short story for publication, which ended up reducing the number of words in the story, so I couldn’t properly count those. I went through Initiate of Stone and made notes for my next revision, fairly extensive notes, as they involved the elimination of a character from the story. I have flags, and notes in different colours of ink in the ms, and pages of handwritten notes, which I inserted into the binder after.
I did a reverse structural analysis of IoS as well, also by hand, and I had to go through about three attempts before I actually had something that both satisfied me and made sense.
Though I wasn’t successful, I attempted to write a piece of creative non-fiction. This was done by hand, and I’ve decided not to count those words, because, frankly, it’s a pain to keep track of anything I don’t write on a computer.
So it was a productive month, it just wasn’t productive in the usual way.
Plus, I wrote about A Rewording Life, a wonderful project I have been privileged to become involved in, and my opportunity to review an ARC for K.M. Weiland. I forgot to mention my continuing involvement in @M2the5th’s monthly Twitter chats with Roz Morris focusing on her Nail Your Novel books.
When I’m not at my day job, I’m writing, or thinking about writing, or learning about writing. It’s the way I roll.
Since I began these monthly updates, the preponderance of words has always been on the blog.
And I don’t begrudge a single one.
Back in February, I attended WANAcon, and one of the sessions that has stayed with me was Kristen Lamb’s Blogging for Authors. In that session, she said that blogging teaches discipline. It teaches the writer to produce quality content on a schedule. It teaches you to ship.
I don’t begrudge the time I spend on social media either.
I read articles by fabulous writers every day and share and curate what I think are the best of the best. I’m not telling people about the last meal I ate, or playing endless games. I use SoMe with purpose, and I’m happy to say I have developed some legitimate relationships with some truly talented authors.
My SoMe activity is as much about my development as a writer as attending conferences and workshops, reading writing craft books, and, yes, writing.
I’m addicted to learning and SoMe is just one manifestation of that.
I don’t want this post to sound defensive, but sometimes, I assume things when I blog (and you know what happens then). I just want to be clear, and completely factual about why I do what I do.
Nor am I saying that everyone has to do what I’ve chosen to do. SoMe is not for everyone. Blogging is not for everyone. We all find our own ways to get the words on the page. It’s just been something I’ve taken to. And it works. For me.
My commenter took my post as a warning, and maybe that’s what she needed. While I’m happy my post spoke to her, I’m also a little sad that the rest of my message was not received.
The rest of my message?
I’m doing well, and, yes, I’m writing. Writing is a lifestyle for me. It’s a spiritual practice. It’s a kind of therapy. Everything I do, even my day job, funnels into my writing. The word count is only the tip of the iceberg. That’s why I write a post to go with it, to share all the writerly goodness of the past month.
Thank you to all of my readers and commenters. YOU. ARE. ALL. FABULOUS!
Be well.
The next chapter: May 2014 update
This is going to be a short update.
All of the new words I produced this month were from blogging (7503), even though I didn’t blog for a whole week because of chaos. It was good chaos, but nonetheless.
I worked on revisions for the short story I submitted to Bastion Science Fiction Magazine, “The Broken Places,” at the beginning of the month, but that was actually trimming and, just for sanity’s sake, I’m not counting negative words.
By the way, the story is now in the June issue, available online here: Bastion Science Fiction Magazine. You can also get a single issue through Amazon, a subscription through Weightless Books, or just donate to a cool publication.
*Hint, hint. Nudge, nudge. Wink, wink.* Bastion is also a great place to submit if you’re into that speculative fiction stuff 🙂
Needless to say, there is much happy dancing on Marttila Drive.
The biggest part of the non-blogging writing work I did was on Initiate of Stone. I executed my plan of going through and eliminating the one character, giving all her important bits and pieces to other characters, and making notes for the revisions. I also went through my novel in reverse order, using Victoria Mixon’s holographic structure.
This is a technique she recommends in her Art and Craft of Story, and after Roz Morris posted that she’s had to draft her scenes out of order for her latest WIP, Ever Rest, even working backwards, I had to give it a try.
It’s a very interesting technique, and allows you to make sure that plot events and foreshadowing are in their proper places. It’s great for consistency too. I caught a few things that I hadn’t taken into account writing forward.
In other news, my adjustable desk is working out great. If you haven’t been following, the arrival of the desk and the necessity of reorganizing my office to suit it was one of the reasons for my blogging vacation. I can stand for an hour and a bit before I have to sit down for a rest. I’m training myself up.
I’ve also purchase a summer membership for the yoga studio I’ve joined, and I’m hoping that the desk and the yoga will help me stave off future back issues.
Totally unrelated to writing, Phil and I had to purchase a new clothes washer this past week. Our’s was pooched. While at the store, Phil decided he also wanted an upright freezer. He was getting tired of losing stuff at the bottom of the chest freezer we had.
So that’s a chunk of change down the drain.
I tried to write a couple of non-speculative pieces this month, and my interest just wasn’t there. I had ideas, certainly, but the one contest required me to write from a prompt, which I’m not overly keen on. I couldn’t find one that really helped me get anywhere. The other would have been a non-fiction piece, or perhaps creative non-fiction, but again, the idea just couldn’t sustain me.
Sad but true. I guess I’m way beyond the SF/F pale. There are worse places to be. Trust me 🙂
Two opportunities came my way this month that I have to share.
The first kind of blew me away. K.M. Weiland emailed me and asked me to read and review her new book, The Writers Digest Annotated Jane Eyre. Of course I said yes! I love Jane Eyre and have read the book a couple of times. Plus, I’m really attracted to the way Katie analyzes a piece of fiction. It didn’t hurt that she said she respected my opinion (head inflating, unattractively).
So far, it’s great, and I’m learning a lot about how to read as a writer.
It’ll be out July 19th. Watch for it.
The second opportunity came in another email, this one from someone I’d recently started following on Twitter. A Rewording Life, is Sheryl Gordon’s project in honour of her mother, and all those afflicted with Alzheimer’s disease.
She’s recruiting logophiles and creative, wordy people of all stripes to contribute a sentence to her book. I did, and my word was psychopomp 🙂 A portion of the proceeds will be donated to Alzheimer’s research. Check out her site. Follow her on Twitter @ARewordingLife.
And here I thought this was going to be a short post 😛 I am a wordy girl!
This month, I’m moving on to work on my other two completed (more or less) drafts as I did with IoS this month. The Canadian Authors Association’s CanWrite! Conference will be June 18-22, 2014. I hope to bring back lots of Writerly Goodness from that event.
I’m going to try to get back into the fiction writing swing of things. Most of my ideas these days are trending novel length, though. Maybe I’ll just finish the draft of Gerod and the Lions before starting another new project. That sounds like a plan.
How are your projects going, my writerly friends?
Caturday quickies: Springtime in Sudz
Just dropping y’all a quick note today. I’ll be doing my month-end writing roll-up (the next chapter) tomorrow.
Usually, the pin cherry trees are in bloom for the Victoria Day long weekend (weekend before last), followed within a week by the lilacs. The tree blooming is, for me, the true sign of spring here in Northern Ontario.
This year, due to our long, cold, and snowy winter, the ground frost has been slow to leave (hence our flood issues). So everything was delayed , just a bit.
The pin cherries came in to bloom just this past week. This picture, on such a bright and sunny day, does not do them justice, but here they are …
And just below are the hostas, bleeding hearts, ferns, and scads of forget-me-nots.
Finally, by the house, the monster rhubarb is growing like mad. We’ve already had to cut off three “flowers.”
Everything’s dusty, as you may be able to see, because of the road construction in the area. Can’t be helped.
This week has been wonderful weather.
Everybody up here is hoping for it to continue.
TTFN! Off to a bridal shower. ‘Tis that time of year 😉
Hell month, meet the week of epic . . . stuff
A.K.A. Where the hell has Mel been?
To preface this, admittedly lengthy, post, I have to admit that my “problems” are all of the first world variety. Also, as with all problems, I’m generally the author of my own misery. Even with events over which I have no control, I can still control my reaction to them. While I’m usually good at this, occasionally things stack up in such a way that I end up overwhelmed and unable to function. Then, I simply have to reposition, admit that the universe is trying to tell me something, and adjust my attitude appropriately.
Sometimes that means letting a few things go for a bit.
That’s the short version.
The long version follows.
What I thought I Mothers’ Day weekend would look like
At the beginning of this month, all I knew about Mothers’ Day weekend was that a friend was doing a Twitterview on Saturday at noon, and that I would be heading out to my sister-in-law’s for Mothers’ Day supper Sunday afternoon.
Outside my house
The city has started to work on Regent Street, the main traffic artery that borders the west side of my property. This has been a minor inconvenience, but since they’ve been tearing up a different part of the street every day, it’s been difficult to know which detour will actually get me and Phil home after work.
This municipal project will be ongoing until the snow flies and the ground frost shuts things down. I’d accepted the inconvenience. This work has to be done. All the catch basins, storm drains, and water supply lines will be replaced. The traffic and street lights will be replaced. It’s just going to be very dusty and noisy in the interim.
Google’s auto-awesome is so cool. It made a panoramic shot out of my pictures!
My mother is getting some work done at her house. The roof of the carport, upon which a deck had been built years ago, was leaking, and in a driving rain, water would run down the wall in her entry and on two occasions, it has trickled through to the light fixture in the hall and burst the bulb.
Construction at Mom’s
She got several quotes and settled on a solution which involved removing the wooden deck and the gravel and tar beneath, sloping the surface for drainage purposes, installing cement backer board, new membrane, a thin layer of concrete, a non-slip surface, and new, aluminium railings. All of the new materials will be water-tight, up-to-code, and weigh much less than the layers of tar, gravel, and the substantial wooden deck that was there.
On May first, I signed up for an introductory month with myoga.ca. Having thrown my back out last month, it was important that I start doing something to get back into shape. Though I haven’t attended a tonne of classes and have had to rearrange my schedule a few times, I’ve already seen the benefits with regard to the way I feel. I’m strengthening my core and stretching my joints. It’s a good thing.
Early in the month, I had also looked into changing insurance providers (house and automobile). I found a quote that Phil and I were happy with, and had planned to call on May 10 to finalize things.
So I expected a busy weekend. I just wasn’t prepared for a confluence of events to derail my plans.
Complications arise
At the end of last month, I applied for membership in, and was accepted into, SF Canada. I soon learned through the listserv that the online annual general meeting (AGM) would be held on the afternoon of May 10, starting at 2 pm. No problem, I thought, there will be ample time for me to attend both the Twitterview and the AGM and still get the insurance finalized.
Then a friend’s spouse died and the viewing/funeral was also scheduled for Saturday, at 1 pm. At that point, I knew I’d have to miss the Twitterview, but I had to go support my friend. I also set aside the insurance. Though there might have been time, I didn’t want to cram too many things into one day.
The final straw was good thing. The weekend previous, I finally ordered the adjustable desk I’ve been thinking about for a long time. The company, Candesk, is Canadian and offered the best value for the quality and price. I had only paid for standard ground shipping, but shortly received a notification from FedEx indicating that they were handling the shipping.
I can only think that the Guy Viner, the man behind Candesk, upgraded my shipping. Many thanks for that grace.
I got the call on Friday from my mom. The desk had arrived. I emailed Phil and suggested that we not spend all of what was already promising to be a busy weekend dealing with the deskage, but Phil wanted to get to it, he said, so we wouldn’t be tied up beyond the weekend.
Plans change
Upon arriving home, I promptly cancelled my yoga class, and got to work emptying out my existing desk. The plan was for Phil to set it up in his office space downstairs. He needed the real estate, he said. Phil also got to work emptying out his old desk, dismantling it, and taking the bits out to the pick up for a future trip to the dump.
Then, he took a nap.
After a brief break, I continued the emptiage, storing the contents of my desk in tubs and boxes and in stacks on the dining room table and coffee table.
I decided that I wouldn’t go online that night.
Out of the box
Mom was going out for brunch with friends and cancelled our Saturday morning breakfast date. So that morning, after a breakfast of bacon and eggs (there have to be some compensations), Phil and I got to work dismantling my big desk and moving its parts into the basement. We started to put my new desk together, but I then had to get ready to go to the viewing.
Upon my return, I promptly fired up my computer, temporarily relocated to the dining room table, and joined the SF Canada AGM. It was three hours. It was also very interesting, and I may have gotten myself noted for a committee or two. No word yet on when said committees will be struck, who will be on them, or what work will be required.
The desk assembled
Phil had, in the meantime, finished assembling the desk, and after the AGM, we relocated it in its destined position.
I then started working on rearranging the remainder of the office, moving book shelves, dusting, and emptying out the wooden filing cabinet I got from Kim last year.
That jewel has been sitting in the living room, serving as storage for CDs, DVDs, and board games. Now it would be moving into its proper place, in my office.
I determined that blogging was probably not going to happen that weekend.
Checking email, I noticed that I’d received a request from the editor of Bastion Magazine for further revisions to my short story. I made a note and hoped not to forget.
On Sunday, after French toast with Mom, I resumed the work. I attached the computer cradle and cable minder to the desk and set up my computer. Phil had to help me move the filing cabinet into the office. Then came the work of trying to get all the stuff I’d unpacked from the old desk into the filing cabinet.
The desk at sitting height
The desk at standing height
My old/Phil’s new desk
I didn’t get it all done before leaving for my sister-in-law’s.
Mothers’ Day dinner was lovely and the day was so pleasant that we ended up sitting outside until the sun had almost set. We also got a bucket of potatoes and some eggs. My sister-in-law’s partner is a farmer 🙂
We got home in time to watch Game of Thrones, and then I set to on the revisions to my story.
Off to the races
The week at worked promised to be a hectic one: meetings, overviews of the new performance management process and program, training, the onset of monitoring, and working group meetings.
Hectic might be an understatement.
It was also raining. All week long.
When we got home from work, I went into the basement to put a couple of winter coats in storage and find Phil’s spring jacket. I also found an inch of water on the floor.
I later confirmed with my mother, who had lived in the house since she and my father bought it from my grandparents when I was two years old, that it was the first flood she’d ever known about. The first flood in 42 years.
I grabbed a mop and bucket while Phil got the sump pump in order. Though we’d had it for 15 or 16 years (since a basement repair required its installation), we’d never had to use it. The pipe expelled into the garden, and Phil had to dig it up and extend it to the driveway.
He temporarily rigged up an old vacuum cleaner hose, ran across to the hardware store, and got the tubing and clamps he required.
Phil later explained that with our unusually long, cold, and snowy winter, the ground frost was high enough to prevent the water from running through as it normally would.
Monday night, work on my office resumed at a much slower pace, I went to yoga, and then revised my story one last time for Bastion.
On Tuesday, we had a vet appointment for Nuala. Good news there. Nu is on a reduction plan for her prednisone, and her ears have continued in fair health.
The contract for Bastion arrived and I filled it out and returned it.
By Thursday night, I had almost everything sorted, but by then, the week of epic stuff had taken so much out of me, I got sick. Go figure.
I made good use of my day at home and finalized the insurance arrangements.
And today, I was ready to get back on the social media horse and resume blogging.
So that’s the story of my epic week of stuff, a week that wore me out more than hell month. Some of it was good, and some of it was bad, but all of it was epic. It’s always a mixed bag here at writerly goodness.
Sweet mercy, it’s another pupdate
It’s been a while since I’ve posted on this topic, so I think a brief revue may be in order.
This has not been a good year and a bit for my poor Nuala.
In January 2013, she ruptured an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) and had surgery to repair it. Recovering from that, Nu got a urinary tract infection (UTI). She received antibiotics, but a follow up revealed that the problem was not limited to a UTI.
To address what now appeared to be kidney issues, we changed her food to a kidney diet, and started another medication.
She had been on a hypoallergenic diet due to food allergies. Of course, the kidney issues took precedence, but that meant an increase in overall itchiness.
She gave herself an aural haematoma.
Things seemed to get better for a while and Nu behaved as she had when she was several years younger.
Then, in the fall, she got some strange infection in her eye and nose. We went through a couple of rounds of treatment for that, and then Nu injured her other ear with another aural haematoma. Now she has cauliflower ears.
Again, after she recovered from her eye/nose infection, Nu seemed to be happy and well.
In January this year, her kidney function and enzymes were checked and it was determined that she should remain on the kidney food and medication.
I asked for some Mometamax, because I noticed her ears smelled funky. Usually, that’s the first sign of infection. Likely linked to her allergy issues, Nu has problematic ears.
I completed her course of treatment, but as soon as the drops stopped, her symptoms returned. I tried to keep up with the infection by keeping her ears cleaned.
Then came heck month (A.K.A. March), and I was away so much, I couldn’t keep up with the cleaning.
By the end of March, she was clearly in distress. She was shaking her head and her ears were swollen and they smelled purulent.
The first appointment resulted in more Mometamax and an EDTA ear wash to be administered daily.
A week passed and while pus was draining out of her ear (and apparently down her throat), she was definitely not feeling better. It looked like she’d developed pustules in her right ear. She refused some of her favourite foods (another support for the theory that the infection was draining down her throat – how could she enjoy anything when it all tasted like pus?). She was also hacking a lot in the attempt to clear her throat. She started losing her balance.
A second appointment adjusted the topical antibiotic and added an oral antibiotic as well. On the chance that the ear drum had been pierced or ruptured altogether, the Mometamax had to be discontinued.
A third appointment was scheduled and while there are days when she seems to feel better, Nu was not showing signs of marked improvement.
At the vet’s I had Phil weigh her, and Nu had lost 2 KG (approximately 4.5 pounds). We had started feeding her a full can of food (she usually only had a half-can) because that was the only food she’d eat. Her kibble was what she wasn’t eating, and she got a cup morning and evening.
We got an extension on the oral antibiotics to see us through until next Tuesday, when Nu’s been booked in for a full-day stay, light sedation, aural irrigation, her vaccinations (they’re due), and then we’ll see how she is when we pick her up. They might see if they can express and test the fluid from some of the pustules in her ear as well … ick.
Phil and I suspect the eye/nose infection in the fall, that some of the infection may have taken root in her sinuses and stayed dormant for a while. A sub clinical (no physical symptoms) thing.
Nu sleeping in my office (foot of my desk) and healing, I hope.
Since Thursday’s appointment, Nu has been sleeping most of the time. She’s still shaking her head, and now she’s also started whining a bit when she eats biscuits and other harder foods. Unfortunately these are also some of her favourites (carrots).
Phil and I are distressed to see our little dear so sick.
I’ll let you all know how she’s doing in a future post.
Always Looking Up 