Skip to main content

Hello February!

Hello!

On Wednesday night at exactly 11:55pm I finished writing my novel, MAPS. OK, so a manuscript is never really finished until it's published and I know the word-count is lacking a couple of thousand words and perhaps I'd used too many swearwords towards the end there but that's part of my protagonist's evolution. Nevertheless, I sent it off to a UK based literary agent who'd requested the full manuscript over a month ago. Done and dusted. It's second draft quality, and I know I will have to rework it a third time. That's just the nature of novel writing. But I love it.

Music

During this last stint of sticking to an actual writing schedule for the first time ever with a deadline in mind, I discovered new music, good music. Here's a playlist for your enjoyment:

Angus & Julia Stone - Chateau
Lord Huron - Meet Me In The Woods
We Are All Astronauts - Ether 
Louis The Child - Love Is Alive ft. Elohim 
SYML - Where's My Love
Tom Odell - Another Love
Daughter - Youth
Lo Moon - Loveless 
Susie Suh + Robert Koch - Here With Me
Fleurie - Hurts Like Hell
Cigarettes After Sex - Nothing's Gonna Hurt You Baby

I've found that music can be distracting while editing, but when I need to write something new or flesh out a particular scene, music is essential.

Creating art in stolen moments

I came across this excerpt yesterday, from a book I've been reading for last couple of months. Clarissa Pinkola Estes, author of Women Who Run With The Wolves, writes:

“I've seen women insist on cleaning everything in the house before they could sit down to write... and you know it's a funny thing about housecleaning... it never comes to an end. Perfect way to stop a woman. A woman must be careful to not allow over-responsibility (or over-respectability) to steal her necessary creative rests, riffs, and raptures. She simply must put her foot down and say no to half of what she believes she "should" be doing. Art is not meant to be created in stolen moments only.” 
It'd occurred to me after reading these lines that this is exactly what I've been doing since my daughter was born. I've tried to make art in stolen moments. And it's been exhausting. And while the "modern" mother would raise an eyebrow at my "archaic" way of raising children, I am doing what I do because this feels natural to me. These foundation years are the most precious years of a child's life. This is where I've been, at my very young daughter's side, where I'm supposed to be. But as we near her third birthday which will happen in April, I can feel something stirring deep within me. It is the call of the Wild Woman. This year will be different than the last, I just know it.

"Bone by bone, hair by hair, the Wild Woman comes back."

2018 


I don't know about you, but for me January flew by. I celebrated my birthday on the 22nd and it was lovely, low key as usual. My husband always says about this day when it comes around, "on this day you were born for me." What more could a girl ask for, really? I'll be blogging more this year, mostly about my writing journey. I've applied for a scholarship with the Paris Writers Retreat which commences in March. It's a 12 weeks online Masters course so I am holding both thumbs for this one. But in the meantime let me get back to mothering. I can hear my toddler causing nonsense in the kitchen as we speak. And with that my stolen moment ends.

 Till next time. 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Wild Woman

Dear Reader, The Wild Woman has been on my mind for some time now. My husband and I had a discussion this past weekend about the premise of the book Women Who Run With The Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés. I'd been fervently devouring its pages when I recently realised this book shares a similar theme with a manuscript I've working on for the past couple of years. When I tried to explain to him the need for women, the need for me, to be wild and free, he asked, 'But what is it that women want to be freed from? What does it mean to be wild?' I've married a good man. Unlike those who came before him, he's never tried to tame the wild feminine out of me. Not only does this unique man embrace every aspect of my wildness, he encourages it. I've never met a person who "gets" me like he does. Men like him are few and far between and I can say this with a fair amount of certainty, because experience. I know what every male representative of ...
4 comments
Read more

Short Story Monday - The Day The Applebaum's Met

The Day The Applebaum's Met Being part of a family which consists of an inventor for a father, an artist for a mother, and five siblings which differ from each other on every imaginable level might sound delightful. I can assure you, being in the company of this particular group of Applebaums is everything but a delight. We try our very best to avoid gatherings. We keep it simple: a one-on-one meeting is a lot less volatile. There’s not much potential to get into a heated argument with just one of us. And if the pawpaw hits the fan the possibility to outrun only one was far greater. The odds would be favourable in such an instance. And we have all run away from each other at some point or another. I must admit, when I see other families getting on like a house on fire I am envious. And when I say like a house on fire I mean it in a good way, not in the Applebaum way, like the day we attended our grandmother’s funeral. It was Francis who had started it. Even though she is the ...
Read more

Confessions: I Often Disappear

The hours of my days and the days of my life belong to a tiny individual with a big presence. Some days are tougher than others. There is no me, only her. I disappear. On other days I receive rejection letters from literary agents as well. During those tough ones it feels like even the memory of me too will fade and no one will remember that I'd ever lived. On those days I have to actively seek out the happy.  So here goes. My happy is in the sound of notes resonating from the strings of my husband's guitar. It's in the sweet scent of fresh blooms and in the taste of a slice of cake for breakfast. It's in the blue of the ozone, the fragile guardian of our planet. It's in the golden glare of the setting sun over the mountain. It's in a cool breeze carrying the smell of the sea through my open window. It's the latest New Girl episode. It's  Bad Lipreading . The adoration for me in my husband's eyes. My daughter's giggle and the way h...
Post a Comment
Read more