Strange, disjointed and fragmented language? I can do that! Ahem. So here goes:

The lithe she-angel gracing my left shoulder just smiles smugly: she already knows I am going to indulge a craving for recognition. How could I not? The way I want to go about this is enough to make the demon on my other shoulder grin; he's squealing so high it's out of my aural range.

So here's an exercise for you:

How about you try to write a short but convincing blog about the qualities of your own writing while downplaying that of others? And I'm warning you: no hedges!

Come on! I know you can do it. Your usual tender writing conveys such wonder and marvel while lacking any hint of contrivance; I know you can write (and I'm still waiting for you-know-what); and so do the rest of LM. And so do you.

(And just between disjointed brackets: Time is not on your side. The more popular LM gets and the more members subscribe, the more difficult it will be to post your initial attempts.)

I'd say you'd been wetting your chest long enough; it's time to stop sitting at the edge of the stream dangling your feet in the water. You know the water's cold and you have spotted the biting barracudas. You have heard the tales about the caymen's voracity and the treacherous subsurface reefs. But you also know that you simply have to get through this. We all have to. Just jump in already. Trust the Words: they will guide you relatively unharmed through the waters, and they will shine ever more strongly the farther you make it. And you're not alone in the river: there's strength (and safety!) in numbers. After all: Writerdom and all the alluring satisfaction it offers lies on the other side of the river, and it will let you grow back more limbs than you'll ever lose to the predators in the water. They're all mouths and no love for words anyway.

That may be too much romanticism and too much off-the-top-of-my-headness and not enough sense, but you know what I'm talking about. Anyway: would you like us to help you in any specific way? Is there anything we can do for you to make it easier for you? Shall we send you money to hire a babysiter and a stripper so you can find time to write? In other words: please state explicitly what it will take for you to upgrade your notebook or notepads to a WIP, and we'll see what we can do.

Will you force me to start a "Get JennyWren Writing" drive? Cause I will...

I had a childish dream of walking past apple trees in bloom, to a small mountain cemetery. We walked along with angels
— Prolapse, Essence of Cessna

Ah, Petroglyph, you do know me well! :lol:

I love the image of the river...my own Amazon to cross.

No campaign needed, although the babysitter (preferably not a stripper, thanks :lol: ) would be nice.

This really is a wren's nest; I plan on building it with all of the rough, coarse weeds and chaff I can find, and then lining it with bits of fluff here and there. ;)

Don't have it in me to talk about "my" writing yet, since I HAVEN'T WRITTEN!!!

I concur. Pulling the feathers out of the stripper's chest would fail to imbue your nest with a sense of home. Good point.

But seriously: no stress. Nevermind our expectations getting raised ever higher ;). When you're ready.

I had a childish dream of walking past apple trees in bloom, to a small mountain cemetery. We walked along with angels
— Prolapse, Essence of Cessna

Here are the notes I had for the mood exercise...I started rambling, as usual, and had to take my virtual scissors to them, before I could enter. See what I have to deal with? :lol:

Well, it's official. That's it. We're here to drop off the key, and have one last look around for things we might have missed.

I've vacuumed and dusted as well as I could. This house always did generate dust at an incredible rate, even when we were moving in, I noticed it. I could sweep and sweep, and there would just be more. It was like trying to sweep away time; the house had stood too long for that.

The rooms seem so strange, now, empty. The sound of our walking on the wood floors echoes, I remember again: moving in, standing on a chair to wipe down the tops of the windows, and discovering that echo while I was singing.

The striped, brown and tan wallpaper in the livingroom is peeling, the landlord will be have to replace it. You can see where, when Brandon was two, he tore a large piece of it from the wall; we used to hide that spot with the blue armchair.

The windows bare, the house so quiet. Too quiet. I hope they do some nice touching up. New carpet, paint. New folks might be too quick to judge, if they only saw the cracks in the plaster, or the funhouse sloping of the door frames.

I spot a bit of tape above the livingroom door, from hanging a garland last Christmas, but look away.

So much space without our stuff.

I thought I would go through each room, on this last visit. But I won't. I don't need to. I've paced these floors enough, I will know them forever.

The sun on the old wood of the stairs. Stickers placed by the kids. I peeled them all up, I think. I won't go in the kids' room, I'll end up poking in cracks for any little thing they might have left.

There's some white paint on the wooden mantel in Paul's old office, He was painting the kitchen cabinets for me, and leaned the doors there to dry. They did look nice when they were done, with blue gingham cloth replacing the inserts.

The work Paul put into sanding and refinishing the floor in the hallway, and baby Hayley trying to help.

Sunrise in that front room, excitement that first October morning, waiting for it, it so cold I could see my breath, and frost on the windows.

It was all about light.

Sun coming into our bedroom - they painted it for Mother's Day, Hayley's little socks got yellow paint on them.

Morning sun in the front room - piano, front porch, plans for a school room.

Yard, kids. Rock that was the entryway to Hayley's hideout. Bluebird houses. garden. Hayley's first bike. Painting the shed red, except for the back, because we ran out of paint. The door, we painted white. Backing into that shed with the old white Buick, while Hayley and I were running back and forth over walnuts in the driveway. She was little, probably three, and leaned out of the car window to check our progress. I grabbed her, but didn't put my foot on the brake, and so we slowly rolled…right into the side of the shed.

How surprised we were when the rabid squirrel we were sure was behind the flue cover turned out to be a poor, waylaid duck, that had somehow fallen down the chimney.

Going up those beautiful stairs, and automatically feeling the need to lift a bit of my skirt, even though I was wearing jeans.

The house wonders why we're leaving, and I can't answer.

I won't be able to come back.

Random notes:

From notebook, 3-27-2007 (Ever have someone else's story show up in your head? This is what she said, but I haven't fleshed out anything yet.)

Women With Children

When I was young, I laughed at them. I had no intention of ever subjecting myself to slavery. Besides, weren't we overpopulating the earth already? I needed no one, expected nothing.

In my twenties, I began to envy them - they were in on a joke I couldn't get. I even envied them their complaints - their every minute called for, needed. The sighs over trying to sneak time away from the kids to be with the hubby. God, they were smug. They were Grown-ups, no longer only playing house. They had the real deal. They were mothers.

Then the day came. Iit was my turn, I was married. I had my own house, my own domain. That was focus enough for a while; I knew that it would only be a matter of time before I was one of Them.

But the babies never came.

We tried. Gave up. Tried again, with a doctor's help. Joe didn't want to adopt. Eventually, we accepted it.

And so, all these years later, I'm free, I'm alone. Not even Joe stayed.

I got what I'd expected, what I'd wanted, even. Then why do I feel so cheated?

--------------------------------------

5-19-2007

I won't mince word with you tonight, and plenty of words there are; that would seem to be part of the problem.

Inspired by the King of Ambiguity himself, or at least his current avatar, I consider:

In all of us ambiguity/ambiguousness reigns, it would seem. Fully recognized in certain areas; as yet undiscovered in others. Some [In some venues this is more easily accepted?] are more easily accepted. The most [vehement] [devotion to an ideal, desired or not (or is it desired?), breaks down under the gaze of that Observer.

Me, for example: "Who am I?" More a proclamation than a question. I am no one, I am nothing. I am fervent in my belief. Yet in me boils an arrogance that screams, "No! I AM!"

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A gardener, who loses his place, and therefore his gardens. Hmm…what did he put into them?

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Okay, he was there again. I had just finished commenting to someone in an offhand way, that I hadn't seen or heard from either of them (Sam and Lily), and what a shame it was, because of course I would have liked to have written their story. But then I saw him, out of the corner of my eye, and realized that no, he had been here all along, and in other dreams, too, moving alongside in a hallway or side room, passing unseen through walls and people. Waiting.

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The plump woman in the white apron stood in the doorway and shook her wooden spoon out into the night, while the two young people hid inside. "There'll be no one in need of your doings here tonight!"

The three shades moved on.

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I reached out with my hand, but saw the chance fall away...

Ugh. This was really bad, and I don't know what I was thinking. So I'll keep going. :D I am feeling rather exposed this week; have opened up parts of my self-exploring, elsewhere...am feeling the sting of another's gaze, and trying to bear it. It's a test; I want to change the way I relate to those around me.

Blah. Emotional upheaval and drastic (or not so drastic :D ) change inspires writing, right?

We'll see.

Writing is writing is writing.  Whether or not you rewrite and mold, and edit, and leave it or work on it all night til something says "it's done" is something else somehow, I agree.

     Hey, I love a good mind-wanderer as much as the next, but , well, imo,

W  is W is W is....Your last visit to the house piece?  Like buttuh!  Rhythm, shape, meaning, trueness, balance.  It could take all kinds of forms but you stopped where you stopped and it felt done to me.

New blood, and all of the hens start preening, ruffling, rearranging their feathers. Puffed up, each peers first from one eye, then the other, lays her head on her shoulder and croons modestly.

And I'm glad you're back on!