Settler words&music in S'ólh Téméxw, (leanpub.com/upsun) living where privilege meets precarity in MST country. she/her/they———– Novels: Midnite Moving Co., Upsun; Sweep Off Those Waves coming soon, Hair Sinister after that. —Restore All Indigenous Lands!
So I’m off to Ottawa and then rental car and then Red Deer Log Cabins and then a quick dash down to Cornwall to see Tish and Terry and then back to Red Deer and then home.
I’m not taking my computer. If I post it will be on a borrowed computer somewhere.
I’ll be back next week, then going away again for the first weekend in October to a restorative justice conference in Nanoose Bay.
I’m happy. Despite everything. You’ll see.
Went walking with Keith yesterday, and I doubt very much that I’ll be doing that again very soon. I have a high tolerance for aberrant behaviour, but the only time I can deal with Keith these days is when there are other people present. Otherwise he yells at me. Not all the time, but once during lunch (which I paid for) and twice while we were walking. The animus in his voice is primal, and it’s time I recognized things.
So I pick up the phone and call him. I make sure he’s awake, able to take the call privately, and tell him that I don’t want to spend time with him alone, because my mental health is hanging by a string, and if he’s angry at me – hey, no problem. I’m not strong enough to walk down the street with my pubic symphysis be grinding like a rock crusher while a twenty-nine year old man who has not lived on his own yells at me to tell me that he doesn’t think he’s a member of my family. *
Sample speech, “Oh that’s typical of something your family would say,” which, when, you know, you pushed him outta your body and all, makes you think of the picture of Amanda Fucking Palmer and Neil Gaiman, who just gave day to an heir. “He’ll grow up to be all shouty and entitled too, you poor dears.”
I mean, Paul was there, in the delivery room. He saw Keith being born and I suspect if I asked him he’d corroborate the story.
Anyway, I don’t like being yelled at while I’m feeling this crappy already, so I told him no alone time with mumzie (that is how I will refer to myself in the third person in future so as to be distinguishable, and that’s my errant spelling of Jim P’s most lovely spoken version of it) until I’m feeling strong enough for it.
I told him that I make heroic efforts not to make my mental health problems other people’s. I have to avoid situations that will prostrate me. I came home from the walk yesterday anguished mentally and physically tired (although not destroyed) and believe me it was the mental anguish that was at the top of the stairs.
I can’t deal with intimates yelling at me, and I’m trying really hard not to yell myself these days although Jeff’s eyes just popped out at the very notion that I am making any effort at all. He has, I believe, contemplated buying me a t-shirt that says, “I’ll quit yelling when I’m DEAD” with one of those 50’s women in a helmet of hair with her mouth open and her eyes shut and her hand to her mouth — but has held off because it’s not in a colour I wear.
Keith was very dignified during the conversation, which was mercifully brief and civil. I have asked for a boundary, feel much relieved, and now we’ll see.
And I’m happy. Being depressed means being happy that you were able to do something taxing, but necessary. If I’m going to be a punching bag, I want to get paid.
And with that, Moar Words, but elsewhere.
Also did a mockup of the cover for the first novel and sent it around to various folks, most of whom have responded favourably.
I did an immense amount of laundry yesterday and I haven’t finished putting it all away so that is where my spoons will go today.
Very nice walk with Jeff early yesterday morning as we went to IHOP, So a total of 3 k walked yesterday. As is normal I didn’t start feeling it until coming up that damned hill.
NDP candidate canvasser wanted me to put up a lawn sign, and I respectfully refused.
I’m reading Steven Pinker’s The Better Angels of Our Nature, which weighs in at a hefty 800 pages, so I’m taking it slow and marking up my mother’s copy (with her permission). He argues that human society is less violent overall than it used to be and the Enlightenment (including novels, woo hoo and yes I’m truncating one tiny part of his overall argument scandalously) is largely the root cause of the drop in the death rate due to violence (current outbreaks of horror notwithstanding).
I’m finding it very persuasive, learning a great deal, and it’s filling me with lots of thinky thoughts.
There are those who argue that he’s full of it (including a really head scratching review by John Gray in Prospect which includes having at the argument by mocking Pinker’s excessive use of statistics, which I find an appalling thing for a public intellectual to do, but whatever.)
I liken the inability to see the drop in violence (how many people per 100000 die due to murder and intra and interstate violence, which has dropped substantially since 1800) to what’s going on with alcohol consumption. There is still lots of alcohol being sold, lots of alcohol being consumed and lots of alcohol involved in premature death. But there’s less drinking and driving causing death than there was when I was a kid, because behaviours have changed, and children learn not to drink and drive as part of their education.
Alcohol, like violence, is still here and there’s still too much of it, but education and opprobrium continue to work their harm reducing wiles.
Also, the quality drop from Season 4 to Season 5 in The West Wing is like being flung from a cliff.
Also, I did 5 loads of laundry yesterday including the kitchen rugs, ran the dishwasher and swept the kitchen floor, which really needed it.
MR2 is still in the Krankenhaus waiting for parts. He is leaking coolant.
No words yesterday but I’m comfortable with that.
Before we either throw Harper out or he steals the election, one or the other.
Only edits yesterday.
I tried to make oatmeal cookies yesterday and it was NOT an unmitigated disaster. (I didn’t use Granny’s recipe, pace Jeff.) We can scoop the caramelized oatmeal goo out of a container if we’re so inclined, and eat it.
So anyways I’m getting to that point where I’m starting to think about self-publishing and e-publishing, and I start looking for help on line, regarding formatting and such. A sentence from one of these articles, apparently from a self-publishing guru, goes like this:
“I don’t want to get into the importance of your cover and how it plays a HUGE role in the reader’s choice of book, or how it should look good big and as a thumbnail on the Amazon page, or how most users can pic an armature cover from a mile away.”
Okay buddy whatevs.
I realized that my opening scene needs more justice (I mean, what’s the point of carrying a tired old flag for social justice non-combatants without anyway you know what I mean). Okay off to twitter to unload that 140 characters, back now.
Madawaska next week. I’m supposed to be here this weekend. I do not believe I’ll be going to Anita’s memorial service though as I am still in talks with mOm about visiting. I JUST HATE THE BUS SO MUCH SO MUCH SO MUCH and I’m not asking for a lift because Mr.2 is not a good candidate for a highway trip right now and my last rental was 250 bucks so unless I’m getting a lift with Paul I’m not coming ‘cross the Salish Sea anytime soon.
I am so pissed off. I could have been a stand up comic at 11, but I was too busy reading Harlan Ellison and watching moon landings.
650 words yesterday, about 100 today. Still working away on The Better Angels of Our Nature, and also a book on restorative justice called Returning to the Teachings.
We blasted through Longmire, are rewatching Life (I remembered as being a lot of fun, and it is, and Sarah Shahi WITH FFFFFRECKLES omg.)
To my mOm’s chagrin and lightly tousled horror, I have commenced the third book without finishing the second one, which is what I did the last time, so she should quit worrying. Also, the first sentence, which unlike the last two novels is action packed and follows all the rules about grabbing your reader by the nose and yanking them forward into events, kinda came out of nowhere.
However I’ll be back at the Old Number Two today, so she can quit worrying.
Alex still has no interest in me picking him up. BUT and this is enormous, he initiated play with me yesterday, and that is very happy making. (It was peekaboo.) Katie and Alex and I had a lovely walk and lunch at the Heritage (which is open for lunch on weekends, but not during the week any more.) Then Keith, to make the circle of descendants complete, came by and talked about some writing that he’s doing, and was cheerful, but I crashed. Fed him chocolate rice pudding though… he liked it.
Also I picked up a book about restorative justice to help with Paul’s talk in October in Nanoose Bay.
WHY DO I SET THE SIXER TRILOGY in VANCOUVER? Because.
I have given up on Firefox. My computer runs ten degrees C cooler on Chrome, although it’s just as much of a memory hog, so there you go. There’s stuff all over the internet about how recent changes to Firefox are murder on MacBooks.
I hope to do better today. Paul and I are talking about travelling to Ontario, since I haven’t heard back from any employers.
…the charity I’m interviewing at today is faith-based. That doesn’t necessarily mean bad, not at all, as I know from personal experience, but I’m hitting the pause button on my enthusiasm until I understand a bit more.
456 words yesterday. 77.5k words so far. JUST TEN K MORE and I can go on vacation and start the next one o doodie.
Judy Carne is dead. She was a lively critter.
Tomorrow Queen Elizabeth II will be the longest reigning British Monarch. I used to think she was awesome, but I’ve grown out of colonialism.
Confessions of a word geek. I was going to use rebarbative in a sentence, had an attack of common sense, and looked it up. I had a strong memory (alas, false) of having seen this word in Patrick O’Brian’s works, in the context of deeply restorative, as in sleep, or a cuppa. Well, no.
Rebarbative means repellent. So I’m thinking, O. Crap. What was that word?? It’s not like I can scan the entire oeuvre looking for it, unless I have nothing else planned today. Or tomorrow.
Okay, maybe it starts with rebor- rather than rebar-. So I start mashing keys, and eventually Google resentfully hurls up roborative, and now… well I was awake anyway. But if I HAD had more sleep, I’m sure it would have been roborative.
Jeff, Mike and I went to Brooklyn’s yesterday afternoon for beers while looking at the Mighty Sto:lo. It would have been better without the train whistle and wasps, but it was still pretty spectactular.
And I wrote. I’ll be off to feed Ayesha shortly.
Jeff is the best at many things. However when he volunteers for a horrid task, especially when I am so unbendy, I am very grateful.
Last night only Mike, Cassidy and Shad came but that was enough. We sang and played until 10:30.
Last night I had very broken sleep. As you can see from the time stamp I slept quite late.
Last night I dreamed I was carrying around my manuscripts and they made me happy. I was showing them off and saying how proud I was of them. In real life right now they feel like a boat anchor so I have no idea where that came from.
Last night I dreamed that a bunch of women and their children were being forced away from their homes and they were moved to a land where they could be food for zombies. The zombies were grabbing sleeping children and eating them.
Today off to Paul’s to clean for the musical evening (invite yo’se’f – if you’re needing an address ping me) and get some food underway. Yesterday a nice walk on the new end of Westminster Quay with same and then a stop in at Galloways for bean salad ingredients. Only 200 words so far today but progress is progress.
Very happy with the latest tune, too. I have almost completely flipped over to composing instrumentals; I’ve lost interest in listening to myself sing. Lovely long chat with Carrie today, it was so good to hear her voice. Oh, and some other things. Sue put me in front of a job opening and I applied and I have an interview Tuesday morning, thank you Sue.
BrO found the source of the ‘something is dead’ smell and my gratitude is as powerful as the smell. So blessed by love and friendship
Feeling hopeful!
People who have been asshats to me over the last ten years are going to get a reminder of Anne Lamott’s blessed line “…if people wanted me to write more warmly about them, they should have behaved better.” Best part of all? They dislike me so much they won’t read what I wrote, and they’re so narcissistic they wouldn’t recognize themselves even if they did. Sweet revenge, sweet revenge, without fail.