Yes, It Is All My Fault!

Wasn’t quite ready to be done yet, so woke up early-ish (especially if you consider time to bed) and ate oatmeal while watching my fellow sf&f fans, readers, editors, and writers check out (the internet connection in the lobby was horrible for my laptop so I moved around a bit), getting to say final thanks and give happy smiles to those passing by.

I’d say it was a life-changing experience except I was already changing my life along these lines, so I suppose it was more an affirming experience for me. Hearing thoughts I’d thunk for months come out of multiple intelligent other mouths as people bounced ideas back and forth and explored new ways of putting them together was thrilling. Having so many people thinking along similar lines definitely encouraged me to keep running at what I’m chasing.

I also had a great experience Saturday, two panels after the one the Society of Voluptuaries members were on (Advice from new writers), where an audience member called me out by name and told me that my ideas were a “pipe dream” and I was “incapable of succeeding”. I, of course, was grinning like a loon as he was doing it; a strong angry response is categorically no different from a strong positive, both mean you provoked other people to think (and sometimes thinking new thoughts is uncomfortable for folks). Plus, about the biggest mistake someone can make with me, in trying to discourage me and crush my aspirations (heehee), is to tell me I can’t do something.

But my (and other peoples’) grand plans certainly can’t be accomplished in a creative vacuum. We met tons of great people and connected to many brilliant minds over the course of the weekend. My personal universe is going to explode again, hopefully just in the creative realms this time, as I process and synthesize the awesomeness that was the 4th Street Fantasy Convention 2008.

Cant wait for 2009.

…not always, of course. Sometimes it’s external and obvious, like a brown recluse’s venom slowly necrotizing flesh, numbly. More often, it’s an overlooked speck grown gangrenous from within that threatens the limb or organ.

Worst is when it’s the sort of decay that doesn’t show up on med-scans. Putrefaction of the emotions is one of the most feared symptoms. None of these were the the sort of thoughts I wanted to be thinking to myself after a night spent up until 5 a.m. finishing King’s uncut version of <I>The Stand</i> while eating pretzel crackers and cranberry juice. I tried to watch my lab-mate this morning in my peripheral vision for any unusual behavior with no luck. He complained about a bit of indigestion from last night’s takeout during lunch, and I haven’t seen him much since then.

We’ve all felt a little nervous with some really weird memos that came out this morning from the big bosses, and no one has really seen them around today either. Can’t remember when the last time all of the bosses called in sick at once. It must be a friendly stomach bug, half the parking lot was empty when I arrived this morning. And my lab-mate is taking an awfully long time returning from his bathroom break.

You just can’t subtly prepare for a zombie infestation.

EDIT: Conversation on this or any entry posted here is strongly encouraged if you’re interested.  Let me not speak into a void!  I prefer comments here rather than on the LJ feed but if you just can’t click through I’ll take the LJ comments rather than none.

Has it really only been a month since I wrote? It seems like so much longer. I feel voiceless.

Love, love, adore the new house. Pictures soon. When we clear these boxes away, there’ll be tons of room to stretch and dance. And I’m pretty sure enough room for Nolan’s massage table when he visits, too!

The backyard is insanely huge. Kit’s looking forward to a garden. My mom is sending us another easy-gardening article she found. My mom kicks ass, and has joined our Sekrit Projekt team as our ceramic artist. I’m very excited! It sounds like she’s really letting the inner artist out in playing around with this.

In creating worlds, I keep coming back to the art; I can’t escape its pervasive effects. Art, Art, Art. Thou, Art, God. Ahem. Brain burp. (Haha, typoed brain buro. Brain burros! Help, they are grazing!)

Both with the novel and with the collaborative project, a lot of creating the world is coming at it from the angle of questioning how the people in the world’s cultures define their space, and the art that manifests from that seeking defines the culture. It’s intimately intertwined with the land, the people, the point of time-in-history you’re viewing…The art that arises from a people living among the cliffs and rock of mountains will be distinct from a people enmeshed along a coastline, hunter-gatherer cultures will likely have different art tastes than modern urban dweller. Or maybe not; that’s another beauty of art, sometimes you tap into something larger than your little point in space-time.

Also, a lot of the art I envision involves skills I don’t have yet (or sometimes, technology that doesn’t exist yet). If I throw the idea out there in a story, perhaps someone else with those skills and with passion will be inspired to create the art I experience. I’m perfectly fine with this; it’s most important for the art to exist, whether I’m the creator or just the catalyst matters little.

I forgot to mention I would be dropping off the internet for a bit to move, but we are now in our glorious much larger new residence. Ahh, space!

This is a great house too. It’s haunted! I’ve never lived in a haunted house or a house with history before, I’m really looking forward to the experience.

Plus, we already have the hot tub! Delicious decadence (and theraputic too! )

So anyway, I was gone, but now I’m back. Great things are coming soon to a blog near you, stay tuned!

have not-written for hmmm…many days now.

still need to cry, too.

I’ve figured out more of the problem. It’s not a words thing, it’s an energy thing. When I sit down to brainstorm, ideas come. When I sit down and actually outline or write, words come. I can feel the characters alive in my head when I go looking for them. But everything is beyond the gray wall, across the crevasse, and my flyer’s out of fuel. The energy that creativity takes, the physical toll on the body, is daunting right now. I can’t be sick any more, please gods and perverse imps.

The will is here. The muse is ever-near. The energy is fucking drained.

the household is running more smoothly, but I don’t feel any better. Everything is stressful and tiring, and the good things I miss taking the time to appreciate.

I suspect a dog’s evil work, here.

Ah ha! Tirma’s evil twin, the Half-a-Poodle!

Credit for the picture goes to: Kit, for the taking; Jennifer for the poodle sculpting; and Tirma for providing the raw art materials