20150803 Library?
- To-do, copy all the
Psion Files from all the Psions onto Harry Potter.
Monday, August 3, 2015, 4:35
PM I am walking to the library, but I forgot to check the days and hours they
are open, and in the summer, their days and hours are reduced so by the time I
get there, they may be closed, dang it.
When I realized that, as I was leaving the house, it was so late that
decided to just go. If they are closed,
I will have to go again tomorrow. I hope
not, but at least I'll get my exercise.
My hip hurts too much to run in
attempt to get there before 5. I am
afraid running would make my hip collapse and I might fall and injure
myself.
I finally did a smart thing today
and copied all the files on the "D" drive on Comfort onto Harry
Potter so I can access them any time I want at home. I need to do the same with
Aamira and all the other Psions.
Keith just called to say the social
worker called and they are not moving her to rehab today because she is having
atrial fibrillation. He worked ten hours
today and is now on his way to go see her and find out what is going on.
I had a dream last night which I
don't remember, actually several dreams, that I remembered earlier but never remembered
to write them down.
I remember part of the dream about a
little rabbit-like animal, which I record below.
Speaking of rabbits, the first of my
rabbits was posted to a facebook page, "Draw me a rabbit,"
today. That may have been what
stimulated the dream.
I just realized I forgot to start my
watch. Oh well, it noamlly takes 23-25
minutes to walk to the library. Or longer.
I am walking fairly fast, for me.
I guess I can pretty well count on getting 45 minutes, anyway.
A woman sitting on a front stoop
said, "Hello" in a cheery voice.
I hadn't seen her and we exchanged pleasantries about the delightful
weather as I hurried past. Two young
women, white women, walking in the street, walk past me as if I am standing
still, even though I am walking as fast as I can (and still be able to write.)
The Psion, Comfort, says 4:55 but my
watch says 5:01 and the church bells are ringing, so they must think it's
5:00. I am still a block from the
library. I hope they don't close at
5. If they do, I will rest briefly and
walk back home.
It annoys me that I can't plan
better. ;-( I started the say missing my exercises
because I wanted to jump right into the novel and be sure I went through it,
and then, after working on the novel, I had a late breakfast and worked on
another novel. First I worked on LHI
(Little Hog Island) and then on Rema and Romula. Then I had a latish lunch and checked my email
etc, and had a pile of dishes to do and had put away the dishes in the
dishwasher etc, and wash up and I talked to Keith on the phone and then emailed
Sarah, Neil, Graham etc the news about ML, and then got on my shoes and left
and it was late! AK!
5:00 PM (OR 5:06, or whatever time
it is, I am inside the library and they do not close until 9 PM M-F. Phew .
5:44 I am home, it took 28 minutes
to walk home. I worked on
R&R below.
Tuesday, August 4, 2915, 5:08 PM, I
am walking home from Rolandale, but since I haven't walked at all today, I am
walking away from home on the long route.
I had clipped the water bill to Keith’s glasses, but he left without his
glasses and thus without the water bill, so I have the glasses clipped to the
inside of my tank top, which looks terrible (along the chicken grease) and the
water bill in my back pocket. Hope I
don't forget them. I mean, I hope I
don’t forget to give the water bill to Keith, hope I don't lose it or
them. (later: I did remember to give him both.)
This has been a somewhat upsetting
difficult day. Erin wrote and said that
Brian is involved with another woman and is leaving her. Keith's overtime was canceled and he came home
early. Keith's Mom, ML, is being
discharged from the hospital and sent to rehab and
we need to go up there, but because I was expecting Keith to be working
overtime and then going to the hospital, I had supepr planned to be late and
hadn't walked yet. And to further
complicate things, while I was talking to Erin via email, the 3 cups of water I
had put in the chicken soup and let on high, not realizing I would get involved
in a conversation, boiled away. I threw
it away, and THEN tasted some and tasted GOOD (all concentrated and only slightly
burnt, but it was too late, it had gone down the drain. Keith was going to cut
vegetables, but he's on the phone with Graham, who had been planning on coming
home soon, but who may have gotten Keith's upsetting letter about the car
insurance, the tickets etc.
Did I mention I got chicken grease
all over the front of my blouse, did not do my exercises and did not work on my
novel for tomorrow AT ALL yet today?
Keith said I could go to NY York if I wanted to be motherly and
supportive, but I'm not sure how I could help.
Of course, I am worrying about custody, the house, etc., etc.
There's a good chance I will be
going with K tonight to check on ML, so I may not get to work on my novel at
all today, which wouldn't be so bad except that tomorrow is class, though I may
not get to read anyway, and I do have something nearly ready.
Wednesday, August 5, 2015, 3:45 PM,
out walking headed for Village around the block. Graham is supposedly in town, but, other than
a brief glimpse last night of him descending the stairs in the dark, I haven't
yet seen him.
Keith has gone to American House to
pick up clothes for ML, which he will take to Heartland rehab tonight. He has not returned. I've been alone all day, which is primarily
good, because I've been working on LHI (Little Hog Island) for my Ewald writing
group tonight. I may not get to read,
because there are 7 readers, and nine attendees. I made ten copies, one for Keith.
Sky very blue and fall-like with
puffy white clouds with grey bottoms.
Maybe as many clouds as clear sky space.
Sun variable, warm. Small breeze.
I am walking fast, as fast as I can,
within reason, without too much pain, because I still have a lot to do before
leaving for class.
I have to make a wide detour out
into the road for someone watering the sidewalk with a hard heavy spray.
I need to prepare for class, shop,
make dinner (unless we go out to eat), and maybe even walk more. Plus I have about a Zillion other things to
do. Things that are weighing on me.
At least I do not have to try to
outrun any tigers. Not that I could.
4:18 headed home. I didn't get everything on the list because
it occurred to me that Keith had stopped and gotten some of it (bacon,
cauliflower, various other things. What
I didn't know is if he got grapefruit, but we don't need it until Sunday, so I
can ask, or look.
(He did NOT get a grapefruit).
Friday, August 7, 2015, 3:46 PM I am
walking to VM. I did NOT get a walk at
all yesterday and the day before, I only got 15 minutes, so I am down an hour
of walking, but it is late in the day, so9 I'm not sure if I will be able to
walk an hour and 45 minutes. Or even an
hour, to start adding 15 minutes a day until I catch up.
The library emailed me yesterday to
say I had an overdue book. It was, The Quick. I don't have it. I called them, after looking at my book list,
to say I had finished the book July 7.
We had some back and forth calls as a librarian looked on the shelves,
it wasn't there; she called to say, after several other calls, "stop
looking." She told me someone else had taken the book out. She told me not to worry. But today I got an email from the library
saying the book had been missing and that someone had suddenly returned it, and
if it was me, thank you, but one of the discs, #16 was missing. ;{
Naturally, this threw me into a
tizzy and I wrote back that I had NOT recently returned it. (Depending on how they define recently.) I HAD, in fact, just returned a pile of audio
books, but i honestly did not think that was among them, first of all, because
I thought I'd already returned it, and secondly, that audio book was big and
thick and the three I returned seemed thinner.
I forget what they were.
However, after they emailed me, I
was thinking about it, and it seems to me that I was maybe listening to THAT
particular audio book on my trip to NY and NH.
I am not of that, however. I need
to look at my Psion journals and see if I recorded what I was listening to.
I did check my book list and had
recorded having finished that book July 7.
However, if I was listening to it on the trip, that would not make
sense, because the trip was after that. Unless I made a typo and meant to write
July 27??? I need to look on Goodreads
and see what date I recorded it.
I wish my memory was better.
IF I had it in the car on the stop,
I could have misplaced it, except for this odd thought. I am pretty sire, almost positive, that I did not finish the
book on the trip (Keith says that whatever book I was reading (listening to) on
the trip, I announced I was within ten minutes of the end when I got there. I
believe I fished that book, or whatever book, at home, and therefore, the last
disc would not be in the car, but I looked at it wasn't there. Not in the bedroom or in any trip bags, I
looked in them all.
6:04 PM I am walking away from home,
from Rolandale up Kingsville on my way back to Moran from R'dale. I am walking slowly, hobbling. I took Meloxicam, acetaminophen, and put
voltaren on my hip, but I can hardly walk at all. I'm hoping it gets better and not worse, or I
may have to call for Keith to come and pick me up.
I had a bad night last night, ate
out at some restaurant --Atwater Brewery, in the park. It's in a church, a pretty place, but cold,
loud and with lousy food. Between that
and eating nut for the first time in a while, I don't know what caused the
problem. Sleeplessness, itchiness,
constipation, unhappiness. Feel
rotten. Complain, complain, complain.
Anyway, it's a nice day. Sunny, not too hot, not too humid. Cicadas buzzing, rap music in the streets
(loud), It's Friday evening. I remember
when that meant party time. Now, it's
just another day to get through in hopes of feeling better tomorrow.
I didn't get weighed today, but
after losing slowly ounces at a time, I gained it all back with the one Wheaties
binge night Graham came back from Kalamazoo.
So now I have start all over. Difficult work.
And I am not making much progress on
my projects. Including my thank you
notes.
Yesterday, when I left the Atwater
Brewery, I sat in the car waiting for K and G to return, I drew a picture on
the Bluewater bridge little notepad of Peggy Hartwell. I got the star on her forehead crooked and
one eye a little bigger than the other and one eyebrow higher than the other. I got up very late this morning after a
rotten night, and then, instead of doing my exercises, I scanned the little
sketch and cloned out the logo of Bluewater bridge and lowered the high eyebrow
and shrunk the slightly large eye (they are both too large, but I left that)
and then printed it on watercolor paper and will attempt to paint it with
watercolors and if that doesn't work, I'll attempt to paint over it with
acrylics.
However, it also occurs to me that
if I ever publish or self-publish this book, having black and while illos may
be beneficial, because you have to pay extra for color illos—a LOT extra,
because in some cases, you have to pay to have the whole entire book done on
color paper even (98o2'1) even if you only have a few illos. (I tripped and nearly fell and those numbers
indicate my catching the Psion before it crashed to the ground.)
The guy who lives in the house where
the bird-killer used to live is out by the street picking up trash. There are two dead, flattened birds, but they
look old.
I should be working on a novel, but
I am SO exhausted.
Monday, August 10, 2015, 3:42 PM I
am out walking to VM. I was planning on
starting the meatloaf at 3:30, but lo and behold, I'd forgotten there was no
eggs, dang. So then I had to pee and put
on my shorts (was "dressed" except for PJ shorts, which are more
comfy.)
I haven't walked at all today,
because when I was free to walk, it was POURING rain. It's luckily stopped, but everything is wet
and puddled and the trees are dripping.
It's warm and very humid and I
should not have put my short-sleeved shirt on over my tank top.
When we visited ML with Graham, he
was very, very good with her. When I
mentioned that, Heidi reminded me that Graham can be super manipulative when
feeling cornered and Sam said it showed he has a really good heart,
underneath. I was so pleased at how
sweet he was with her. I'd like to
believe it was love and caring and not manipulation, but it is difficult to
know for certain. I want to believe the
best about people.
The Village Market delivery guy,
who's name, dang it, I can't remember, just drove by (fast) and we waved to
each other. I had the wish that I could
just call and have him deliver eggs, but that would be silly. I need the exercise. It is, however, raining again and I hope it
doesn't rain as hard as it was earlier!
4:19
Well, I did get rained on, it rained harder, quite hard, briefly, and
then continued raining sort of lightly all the way home.
4:44 Well, I got the meatloaf and
the weird squash and the sweet potatoes in the over and am trying to walk
again, but it's raining, so I will have to put away the Psion.
5:16 PM Well, I am out on yet
another short walk. The sun was out
briefly, but it's gone again. Keith came
home and left again to get his blood drawn.
This will be the last of my 45 minutes of walking, but I wanted to walk
an extra 15 minimum toward the missed walks when Graham was here. I am currently down a half hour, not counting
today's time.
I will not be able to walk again
immediately, because I need to start the vegetables as soon as I get back. Green veggies, hopefully. Because I have to cook and eat, I may not get
out again. I wanted to walk early, but
got distracted posting an old (written in mid July) Cowbird story I'd never
posted. It always takes me so long.
Tuesday, August 11, 2015, 11:41 AM I
am walking, hopefully, over to Rolandale.
It is deliciously coolish and windy, fallish. Blue sky, white clouds. I will water the plants, check and harvest
the garden, have my lunch there, work on my writing, hopefully Little Hog Island.
I am carrying a backpack in which I
have my lunch. The lunch is leftover
stir-fry, sauerkraut, psyllium, and an avocado.
The avocado is fairly soft, hope it's not ruined. I wrapped it in paper towels and put it in a
jar. (later—it turned out to be fine,
almost perfect except a few small spots.)
My trip (outing, walk) to R'dale was
delayed by the arrival, just as I was getting ready to leave, of a man from DTE
who wanted to change the electrical meters.
He wanted me to turn off the TV, the computers and the air
conditioner. We don't have a TV, the
computers were on, and I had no idea how to turn off the air conditioner, and
had to call Keith.
Keith said to push the button the
right, which I did. It said
"Hold". “No,” he said, “not
the arrows.” It wasn't an arrow. :{
Anyway, I pushed various buttons,
and it was the one on the right of a series of three on the bottom that turned
it off and the minute it went off, the phone stopped working. The guy must have seen the blades stop and
immediately unplugged the old meter and the power.
So, here's the thing, before I left
to walk to R'dale, I went out and looked at the two new meters, one for the AC
and one for everything else. They did
not appear to be working. They were
flashing and one said not reg. But the
guy was gone and before I left to walk to R'dale, I turned the air back
on. The hold thing was still on. I didn't know what to do about it. I decided it would probably be ok until K
gets home from work. Hope so. Hope that meters are actually working OK and
there isn't some issue with them and we don't have some kind of hassle, hope
the guy doesn't come back while I'm away and want the air off again.
There is now a lawn where the green
house used to be, grass with Queen Ann's lace and Deptford Pink etc. Butterfly weed in flower.
It may not actually be cool
out. It may just be the breeze, a good
steady one most of the time, but there was a lull and it felt hot.
A lady passing me tells me I have
pretty hair. I tell her thank you, have
a nice day. The ladies in Detroit often
comment on my hair.
As I am walking past the house that
used to be Canyon Bob's, the man who supposedly watched his father blow his own
brains out with a gun when he was a kid rides by on his bike, mumbling and
talking and looking around suspiciously. He has grizzled red hair and a bright
fluorescent orange and yellow vest. I
wonder about the bicycle man with the dead father, and about Canyon Bob. Where he is.
How he is. "I'm not an
alcoholic, alcoholics go to meetings.
I'm a drunk." He's the one
who told me about the man who talks while he rides his bike. Is the story true? I don't know.
In a court of law, it would be hearsay, and from unreliable witness.
I see a horse, a black horse with a
rider. Two riders. The horse minces along the edge of Balduck
Park, with four white stockings. Then, I
see it is two people with black tights, black shirts, white socks and white
shoes carrying something. I am the star
witness. I would take an oath that I saw
a horse, that is, I would have, two seconds before I realized the one horse was
two people.
I stop to rub the scabrous surface
of some elm leaves. I study an ash tree
that is dying of the ash borer disease and has dead branches sticking out of a
cluster of leaves. I notice porch lights
on in the blaring sun. Two cars both
nearly run me down at the stop sign on Chandler Park Drive. They whiz past on either side, spinning my
braids.
I am hungry and will probably eat
lunch shortly after I arrive at Rolandale.
I feel a little sad that I will not be eating lunch listening to Life Before Man or reading Armageddon Summer. Maybe I will eat on the back porch. I could also listen to audio books I have
there, but I'm not there enough to follow through.
I'd like to be there more.
I like working there in the peace
and quiet. If Keith retires, I may spend more time at Rolandale. I dearly love Keith, dearly love him, but
need to be able to do my work.
Now I am walking past the old lady's
house, with her beautiful gardens, her huge pink, white and red hibiscus
flowers, monkey vines and all the other plants.
I wonder how she is. Last I heard
he was sick. There is a wrecked car in
front of her house. Keith has been complaining about it. It blocks his view trying to cross Moross,
which is what I am doing now.
Moross has one lane blocked off with
orange cones; traffic is piled up. I
scoot between the cars. And while I am
doing that, a block truck on Rolandale scoots through from the other direction,
waving a thank you to the cars that waited, which I suppose I should have done
instead writing while I dash.
And now I am arrive at R'dale,
removing junk from the front door. A
paper we never look at, an ad from a grocery store we never go to. Then I see that I never started my watch
after I stopped it at Mack, for the light.
It is 12:19. I started at
11:41. That means I walked about 38
minutes, but some of that time was waiting for lights. So probably about the average 35 minutes it
takes me to walk here.
The Black-eyed-Susan's in the front
of the house are resplendently flowering.
The fern is looking puny and pale.
It is cool in the house. The air-conditioner is running, which seems
wasteful. Until I am here, and hot. I am happy to take the backpack off my sweaty
back.
1:11 PM Because I was hot, I decide against eating on
the back porch. Walking with a backpack
on has heated me up, in spite of the breeze.
Instead, I bring down The Outer
Banks audio book from the player in the study/studio and start it over at
the beginning (I was into the 4th tape), because it has been a while. I listen to Outer Banks while I sat at the little card table eating my lunch. I am grateful for the boom box already
plugged in, and because they are tapes, I could continue listening upstairs, if
I were going to paint or clean. But I
was going to write, or edit. Or
both. After I go out and check the
garden. Harvest whatever needs to be
harvested.
2:04 PM WOW!
I've been out harvesting the garden for almost an hour and I am sure I
did not get everything. There are more
tomatoes, for example. But I am all hot,
itchy and tired and quitting for now. I
will not be able to carry everything home in my backpack, too much stuff, won't
fit, too heavy!
Phew, hot work.
* * * *
EJ End Journal EJ EJ EJ
( ( ( (
Dream, small animal
I have a small animal, shaped like a
rabbit, but without obvious long rabbit ears.
It is soft and fairly tame and I am caring for it. Someone, a child I thinks, lets 2 large cats
into the room where the animal is wandering around. I am very concerned about the rabbit's safety
(the small animal's) and also worried that the large orange cat is using something
as a litter box that is not appropriate.
Took me 25 minutes to get here.
5:13 PM I got 5 audio books. One, Life
before Man, is a Margaet Atwood book.
I am sitting outside in the sun.
Just for a moment, to rest. I
probably should have used the rest room, but I did not.
It's sunny, breezy, fairly low
humidity, pleasant. I should have gone
over to R'dale today to check the garden, but I did not.
I did start my watch for the walk
home. As soon as I et home, I want to start cutting veggies for dinner so that
when Keith arrives, he can begin the pork chop which we will share.
* * * *
end dream
* * * * Rema and Romula R&R * * *
BS, Brainstorming:* * *
So I have this idea, instead of setting the
R&R novel at Grosse Pointe Academy, or at South, neither of which I am very
familiar, why not set it at Ewald Library, where I meet with my group and where
I had my class? OK, new rule, class setting, is at
Ewald.
And why not have class discussion
right on facebook? A facebook goup. Of course. if Facebook fails, it will date
the novel. But let's do it.
We need to limit the number of characters. Not end up with too many.
Kylie* * *
Kylie: Jam's letting me use his cell phone to work
on my novel exchange homework for Avarice.
We're out in his boat. We had to
take Keisha with us, of course, but she's sitting in the bow, alternating
between looking out "to sea" (to Lake St. Clair) and writing on that
little computer that Antoine gave her.
She's carefully avoiding looking at us, which is her primary job, of
course. That's what we pay her for and I
think Mom's paying her, too, for the opposite reason--to watch us. It's good work if can get it, spy and counter
spy.
I'm sure she'd rather be with Antoine,
but he had to work today, anyway.
I think Antoine is a creep. He's cute, don't get me wrong. He's got huge greenish eyes, hazel, I guess,
with long dark lashes and zillions of short little braids all over his
head. But there's something about him that
skeeves me out, and I hate that he follows Keisha around. I'm glad he's not here right now, though,
although I'd feel better about necking with Jam if Keisha was necking with
Antoine or preferably someone else.
Every time I ask her what she's doing, she says, "working on my
novel."
Anyway, Jam is drinking a beer that
he hid in the cooler among the cokes he brought for the rest of us. So, since Keisha's working on her novel, I
thought I'd work on mine.
Keisha's got a partner who I think
is a guy, Argiki, Argiki Jones. Maybe
he's related to me and Keisha, but I doubt it.
There's too may Joneses in the world.
My partner is named Melody Johnstone and I'm pretty sure she's white and
female. Which is okay, because I already
have a boyfriend and want to keep him.
He's white, Jam, but doesn't seem at
all to mind that I'm not.
I don't get the assignment to write
about ourselves. I mean, how is that a
novel? A novel is supposed to be fiction and if write true stuff about
ourselves, isn't that NONfiction?
Avarice says that every character should have character flaws and
strengths, and that that the flaws and strengths of the protagonist, or main
character in our novel (each of us has to write a novel before the year is up)
should, for optimum writing power, be the same or similar to our own character
flaws and strengths. I'd prefer to say
strengths and flaws. I'd like to put the
emphasis on the positive. I asked
Avarice why she insisted on saying flaws and strengths, and she said it was
because people had a tendency to downplay their flaws and up-play (is that a
word?) their strengths, and that good character flaws were pivotal to the
structure of the novel.
But then again, I pointed out, in
front of everyone (oops, bad me, sorry Avarice, I mean Mrs. Averick), that strengths
are also pivotal, because without strengths, how can we overcome our
flaws. It has to be the balance between
the two.
So wait, is novel writing some kind
of therapy, if we use our own strengths and flaws and do battle like good and
evil? Is that why there are so many
stories about good and evil? Character strengths battling weaknesses and flaws?
We're supposed to list and elaborate
our own flaws, as opposed, Avarice said, to listing and elaborating the flaws
of others, although Julie says that often, those flaws that bug us most about
other people are often the flaws we fail to see in ourselves. That is, our
shadow selves, she says, come out in what we project onto others. I don't quite get what that means!
When I said so, Julie said that we
see our own darkness in the shadows of others.
Sounds a bit like a poem and I never did get poems that well.
(Julie is the woman Mom takes care
of, only sometimes, Julie takes care of all of us.) (I mean, it's Mom's job to take care of Julie, that’s what she gets paid to do. Julie's handicapped. Not mentally, she's sharp as a tack. Wait, wait, that's a cliché, isn't it? Sorry Avarice, I mean, sorry Mrs. Avarick.)[1] OK, until I think of a better way to say it,
let me just say that Julie Grant is intelligent. Extremely intelligent. And although it’s Mom’s job to care for her,
she’s also Mom’s friend, and ours, Keisha’s and mine.
Julie’s smart, except about certain
things, which I may or may not elaborate later.
I’m not sure it has bearing on the story I’m supposed to be telling for
Avarice. I’m with Keisha on this, Mrs.
Averick, I liked it better when everyone called you Maverick; it suited
you. Avarice does not. I am going to talk to Keisha about trying to
get kids to call you Maverick again.
Mav’rick.
Facebook post, in the Ewald novel
group: “Hey, y’all, let’s quit with calling Mrs. Averick Avarice. She’s not greedy or covetous. She’s nice, and weird enough that Maverick
fits her. I vote for Mav’rick.”
Now I interrupt Keisha, because that
little Psion she’s writing on does not connect to Facebook, I mean how lame is
that? (Of course, I can’t connect,
either, without Jam’s phone.) I hand her
Jam’s phone, point, and she knows immediately what to do.
“<3 :D Great idea, Kylie, I
second the motion. Wish I posted it
first. Go Mav’rick!” She forgets to sign out, but I’m so pleased
she agrees (with her own idea—and mine) that I don’t mind signing her out and
me back in.
So anyway, back to smart. Me, I'm smart, too. That's why I am in this gifted and talented
program where a select few of us are supposedly going to learn to write a
novel.
I don't have any flaws though. None.
I'm perfect. Except I'm not as
pretty as I wish I were. Not as thin or
gorgeous, and not as rich.
"Hey, Jam," I say, poking
him in the ribs, "Do I have any flaws?"
I'm hoping he'll say no. Instead, he says, "Yeah, you won't let
me in your pants, you're a cock tease."
"No really," I say. I am thinking no way can I post this on the
site. We're required to, of course. I mean, we're getting credit. I may have to
edit severely. We're supposed to "free-write"
our thoughts. Does she think we're
crazy? Who’d want her to read their
private thoughts? Not me; I don't think
so. Maybe I will wait to post mine
until I see what other people are writing and what Mav’rick says. We have to post everything at this online
writing site where EVERYONE can see it, and we can everyone else's, and comment
if we want, but we only HAVE to comment on our partner's, for me,
Melody's.
I'm going to see if I can find her
on facebook and friend her so I can see what she looks like.
"Hmmm, faults," Jam says,
"How do I hate thee, let me count the ways." Up in the bow of the boat, I hear Keisha
muffling a snort. She must be
listening.
I could ask her. She wouldn't be as gentle as Jam. Jam's probably afraid to say anything I might
consider mean for fear I won't let him cop a feel.
Speaking of which, he's finished his
beer and is starting to grope. He's
trying to take the cellphone away.
I say, "Wait! I have write down a fault before you take the
phone."
"Cocktease," he says
again, laughing, grabbing my boob in one hand and the phone in . . ."
. . . "the other. Well, huh.
I just got kissed like mad.
Felt good, if I do say so myself.
Kisses and groped. But when he
started reaching inside my bra, I hit his hand and said no, and Keisha turned
around and gave Jam the evil eye. He
already had a hold of my nipple (no, I did not just write the word
"nipple!") and tugged on it, which sent shivers through me, but he
withdrew his hand.
"Cocktease," he said, for
the third time in a row.
"I'm not a cocktease!" I
said, feeling annoyed. "If you were
being a gentleman, I wouldn't have to keep saying no."
"You can turn around now,"
Jam says to Keisha, who gives him the evil eye and does not look away.
"It's OK, Keisha," I say, “Jam's
going to be good new."
"What kind of good?" she
mumbles, but turns around.
So, yeah, my faults and
strengths.
Strengths first:
•
I'm
smart
•
I'm
a pretty good writer, not that you can tell by reading this.
•
I'm
a pretty good artist.
•
I'm
a pretty good singer.
•
I'm
pretty. (But wish I were prettier.)
•
I'm
a good runner and good swimmer (better than my twin, Keisha, at both of those.)
•
I'm
a pretty hard worker (at least in school.
Sometimes, Mom says I am lazy, because I don't make my bed. Keisha
always does.)
Now
my weaknesses and character flaws:
•
maybe
I am lazy; I don't like to work. That is, I don't like chores.
•
maybe
I am oversexed. I love kissing Jam,
really love it and some of the other things he does. I kind of wish it was ok to do more. I'm not sure, though, that this is what Mav’rick
is looking for.
•
I
like to gossip. Keisha says that is
really bad, but she does it too. A
little.
•
Um, some of my faults are things I don't really want to advertise to the whole
world. Maybe those aren't relevant.
•
I
get cranky easily when I'm tired or hungry.
I
wonder if Mrs. Averick has a list of faults relevant to novels.[2] Because I sure as heck do NOT want to write
my faults down for everyone to see. I
mean, some of them people will probably have noticed, like my tendency to talk
too much, especially when I am nervous, but some feel personal and private.
Maybe I should go back and read the
assignment.
It occurs to me that if I give my
protagonist my worst faults, then everyone who reads my novel and knows the assignment
will know what they are!
Jam is sticking his tongue in my ear,
which feels half good and half gross. He
wants me to give him the cell phone and pay attention to him.
Jam's having another beer. He says I have 30 seconds to look up the
assignment. Here it is, 1)keep a
free-write journal for at least 15 minutes a day. 2)record your character flaws and
strengths. Which of your character flaws
would most likely get a protagonist into a difficult situation. Journal about some difficult situations
you've found yourself in. 3)post a
minimum of 300? words a day to your shared online writer's journal. Remember, your private online journal will
not be reviewed by teachers or other students.
Teachers will only be given an automatic word count.
Aha.
So we can pick and choose what to post.
But if we don’t list our worst flaws in the shared part, how will she
know if we did the assignment?
Jam is still drinking his beer. I'm going to see if Melody has posted
anything. First I’m going to post on
Ewald Facebook page my question about relevant flaws: “Dear Mav’rick, are their special flaws that
are particularly relevant to novel writing?”
Chapter
?, Melody Johnstone, assignment 1?
I told Dad that I needed an iPad for
my Gifted and Talented Novel Writing Class at the Ewald Library. He said novel writing was a waste of time and
that woman just get married and have babies.
He was joking, teasing me, or still living in the dark ages. With him, it’s difficult to tell. Hasn't he heard of Margaret Atwood? Amy Tan?
(author of a and Y), (author of potato peel pie), etc. I mean what about Charlotte Bronte?
(etc) I didn't bother enlightening him, because
he was either not serious or it's a hopeless cause.
So, I called Grandma, told her I
needed an iPad for English, and she came on her motorcycle and took me up to
the Apple store. Pretty cool. Only the iPad doesn't have word, it has some
dumb substitute. I guess that's OK. Steve says apple is the best and doesn't get
viruses and he's jealous that I have a new iPad. His is Gen 1 and doesn't work that well with
the bloated software, he says. He can’t
afford to get himself a new one because of all the movies he takes me to, and
the popcorn and cokes he buys me, and the flowers. And Starbucks. I smile my Mona Lisa smile. I won’t explain if you’re too dumb to figure it
out. J Y
My iPad is thinner and smaller than
Steve's. It's pretty. I want to get a skin for it. Leopard, pink and black. Or frog, or toad or snake or alligator or
dinosaur, as long as it's fake and not made from any real animal. That would be too gross. I gotta wait a couple weeks and then ask
Grandma, after I write her a nice thank you note. And mail it, and she has time to get it and
put it up on her fridge.
So I'm supposed to list my flaws and
strengths, but if I understand right, I don't have to do it in the public (“shared”)
post. At the moment, I'm writing on the
iPad, not on the Facebook Group page itself.
Actually, the only people who can see our shared posts are other members
of the Ewald group. (((NO WAIT, there
need to be two groups.)))
So, why would I mind talking about
my flaws, anyway? Probably everyone else
knows what they are as well as I do, maybe better than I do. Oh, except maybe Kylie, my new partner. I wonder what her flaws are. Before I list my flaws, I am going to check
her post and see if she listed hers.
* * * * end R&R
* * * * begin Unreliable witness
On Becoming an Unreliable Witness
As I walk past the house that used
to be Canyon Bob's, the man who supposedly watched his father blow his own
brains out with a gun when he was a kid rides by on his bike, mumbling and
talking and looking around suspiciously. He has grizzled red hair and a bright
fluorescent orange and yellow vest. He
sits tall and straight on his bike. I
wonder about the bicycle man with the dead father, and about Canyon Bob. Where is Canyon Bob? He no longer lives in this house; someone
else does. How is he? Still drinking? "I'm not an alcoholic; alcoholics go to
meetings. I'm a drunk." He tottered when he said that, clutching a
glass. He's the one who told me about
the man who talks out loud while he rides his bike. Is the story true? I don't know.
In a court of law, it would be hearsay, and from an unreliable witness.
Looking from Canyon Bob’s ahead down
the street, I see a horse, a black horse with a rider. Two riders.
The horse minces along the edge of Balduck Park, with four white
stockings. Almost dances. Then, I see it is two people with black
tights, black shirts, white socks and white shoes carrying something between
them on their shoulders. I am the star
witness. I would take an oath that I saw
a horse, that is, I would have, two seconds before I realized the one horse was
two people.
I stop to rub the scabrous surface
of some elm leaves. I study an ash tree
that is dying of the ash borer disease and has dead branches sticking out of a central
cluster of leaves. I notice porch lights
on in the blaring sun at the small white house on the corner. Two cars simultaneously nearly run me down at
the stop sign on Chandler Park Drive.
They whiz past on either side, their wind spinning my braids.
I picture myself up in heaven. I am dead, and the heavenly police are
questioning me. Who struck you? They
ask. Duh, I say, I think there were two
vehicles, a black SUV and a small white car.
Make and model? Gender of driver?
Duh, I repeat. There was a stop sign, I say.
They were supposed to stop. I had
the right of way. It’s true; there was a
stop sign. They were supposed to
stop. But being right doesn’t help when
yr dead, and an unreliable witness to boot.
I step from an alternate universe
back into this one, where I am safe, if slightly shaken. Here the sun shines on black, black clouds
and the cicadas celebrate summer. I take
a deep breath and keep walking.
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