Farewell, Bodacious Redheads of Seabright

[dr_pretentious]

soleilfire and paganpilgrim threw their parting potlatch party tonight in an effort to unload even more of their worldly goods before they go adventuring. paganpilgrim's going to work on a sailing ship from Thailand to Gibraltar by way of the Maldives and the Suez Canal, and soleilfire is going down to New Orleans to work at an anarchist food bank. I suppose it's not surprising that, when FEMA barred the Red Cross from feeding the hungry in a disaster area, the anarchists were undeterred. Anyhow, there's still plenty of misery left down there to keep busy anyone who wants to alleviate it. Nobody knows when either of our bodacious redheads will return, once they take off, or whether they'll ever come back to stay. I'm downright melancholy about that.

I like to imagine that if, when I was just cresting thirty, I had been single and able-bodied, I'd have taken off on that kind of grand adventure. But then, it's kind of hard to imagine what it would be like to be either single or able-bodied, at this point. At least the good fortune more than outweighs the bad on those two scores.

Other reasons it does not suck to be me:

1.
Within five minutes of our arrival at the party, three different people demanded more of my work to read. soleifire doesn't want to leave town until she has the last two chapters of Vol 1 Pt 2. vgnwtch is most wroth with me that I haven't finished the first draft of that short story, because she's already read all the Beltresin bits that are fit to circulate. Another covenmate lamented that she'd only ever had a chance to see Vol 1 Pt 1, and why did I not remember to bring her the rest of the manuscript? That took some of the sting out of the post-bookum depression, all right.

2.
The stuff our hosts pressed us to take away in the potlatch portion of the evening is Really Spiffy. Some of it was too large to fit into Dan's little car, so tomorrow vgnwtch is going down with me in the big station wagon to help me load up a steamer trunk, two massive potted plants, and, astonishingly, TWO KAYAKS! Okay, the kayaks are only fostering with us until next time paganpilgrim's back on this end of the landmass, but still. Boats! O! Jubilation!

3.
Best of all, yesterday, I finally reached the point in my planning and free-associating where I could map out the plot of The Traitor of Imlen, my Nanowrimo project. The whole thing fits onto 21 index cards, with one major incident or incident cluster per card. I may not be able to lay down the bones of all the chapters in 30 days, but the far more important thing is that I can hope to fit the whole story into a single volume of under 100,000 words. The story can be kept small enough. If I can also write it so that it does not suck, a career might conceivably ensue someday.

Comments

[wayzgoose.livejournal.com]

Glad to hear you are progressing on your Nano plot. Had dinner with an acquaintance who had just returned from a tour of duty in Biloxi providing medical support for the volunteers and relief workers. He showed a video of what he saw as he drove through Biloxi. Just about ten minutes and almost more than you could bear. I'm glad your friend is headed down to help.
Also discovered from this post that we have other things in common. I for one am looking forward to Samhain.

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

Well, who knew?

Do you practice in any particular tradition? I've been with the Blue Star branch for a little over a decade now, though my personal theology includes a little more Shinto and Starhawk than is common among my denominational fellow travelers.

[calene.livejournal.com]

Sometimes the pressure for more manuscript from those close to me drives me nuts. Other times it's the only thing that keeps me writing.

Awesome on the NaNo plot! I wish you the best of luck with writing it well and within the size constraints. You can do this!

[puckmls.livejournal.com]

So glad to hear that The Babes had both a terrific party and a fabulous giveaway of goods.

As for your writing, I don't think you have it in you to be sucky. You write too well and have high enough standards to keep your work from sucking. I can envision the possibility that some of your work might be less wonderful than the rest, but I can't see it descending into suckitude. ;-)

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

You'd be amazed. I make frequent use of my delete key, and there are many files in my Half-Abandoned Bits folder for passages that sucked quite a lot, but not quite enough to merit instant oblivion. A whole book that was uniformly as bad as my worst would be pretty sucky. I just have to hope that's not what I end up with when I crank out 50k words in 30 days.

[reynaud.livejournal.com]

I just got to this.

50,000 words in 30 days?! Good lord... I think I'd have an aneurism if I tried to do that.

[reynaud.livejournal.com]

Congratulations! I hope they have fun on their jaunts. (Although "fun" may not be the most appropriate word for working at a food bank in New Orleans right now...)

I'm sure that you've said this before, but considering that my memory has a life span that would make a fruit fly think, "Man, that's short," I just have to ask ... uh, what was I saying? Oh, yes! What's Nanowrimo?

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

All the information you could possibly desire is here (http://www.nanowrimo.org).