Back at the dorm, I struggled to rewrite my planned last new story submission. I wanted this one from inside the person's head... the very thing I've been unable to accomplish earlier. The plot may have suffered from my rewrite, but I like to think it feels real. I sent some hurried messages to my mother for information on life back in the Smoky Mountains. Where was the spring house from the real house? The main inaccuracy in my story is that the barn dance was in a barn whereas in the mountains, the barns were small sheds and the dances really took place on a platform outside. Think Woodstock, only smaller. That inaccuracy wasn't sufficiently important, imho, to rewrite. Someone could have had a barn big enough and the only thing real in that story is the setting. Once again, I failed to establish a historical time. I tried to imply and doubt the clues are storng enough. OTOH, this kind of story could happen two hundred years ago or yesterday and still be valid. The use of horses rather than automobiles should be a clue. I don't think it needs an exact date.
I barely finished the story in time this morning and went to Greg's informative lecture about openings. Afterwards, I headed out to the mall by myself because no one else wanted to go and I was looking for an escalator. No escalators in the mall. They were having a sidewalk sale. This was expensive. I now have now bought FIVE tennis shoes since arriving. They're beautiful. I love them all. This is outrageous as I don't even own five shoes at home. All I can say is they were half off and incredibly comfortable.
I'm considering all this a birthday present to myself. I'm buying one more Handeaze glove (didn't realize they were sold individually) and then my shopping days are over until about Christmas.
The galley proofs arrived for the SFF.NET anthology today. I fear I'm going to hate the story now and see a thousand opportunities for improvement. Too late!
I lost the key to the dorm. No big surprise. I hate birthdays because bad and stupid things always happen to me on my birthday. It will cost $30 to have the door rekeyed so unless it fell out of my pocket in the car, it's probably lying on the floor at the mall. Drat!
Off -- hopefully -- to tag along with Angel and Jennifer to the gymn and then I will stop using advoidance techniques and start work on revising the Stetson hat story.
The best laid plans and all that. When we returned, Mark wondered if I'd been to Meijer yet and since I wanted to go back for the second glove, we took off. About half-way there, the clouds opened and dropped rain and hail onto the car... and me, later. Meijer only had the gloves in a medium size and I needed small. I tried Office Max and then Best Buy and neither had the gloves. Mark thought we should just walk across the parking lot to Taco Bell since it was such a nice day now and we no sooner arrived that the clouds burst open again. We finally walked/ran back to the car through it.
The good news is that we found my dorm key in the car. With the $30 savings, I might be able to buy another pair of shoes... right?
I really, really don't know why I've become addicted to colorful tennis shoes with good arch support. I think it's a stress-related thing. It feels so very, very good to walk into a store and be able to buy a pair of really good shoes. There was a time when that was a faint dream and thus it's a real thrill to walk around in those really good shoes that look nice and yet have arch support, too. Paying retail price is just something I try to avoid doing and thus a sale in which the best of the best shoes (in my book) are just a little above my usual treshold is a temptation I cannot resist.
I've finished proofing the galley proofs for WHERE ROBOTS GO TO DIE One necessary correction.
It's almost midnight and time to close off this day's journal. I'm about 800 words into the revision of the Stetson hat story that was chosen for rewrite and it's sort of a funny thing about this one. I'm pulling bits and pieces from memory of my own life and then reworking it into memories that never were. This is not my father. This is not my mother. This is not my sister. And the I in the story is not me. Yet the story works best when I put myself into it and revise my life as well as the written word. I suspect that when I'm finished, I'm going to have afalse memories firmly implanted in my mind about a shopping trip that never happened as well as a particularly bad Sunday. This little girl is a budding feminist and I never even heard about the womens movement.
Some aspects of writing are most assurredly flowing much, much smoother. Thoughts rolled out of my head and into my hands better than before. Not an undefined place to stop for ice cream. Dairy Queen. Not I got off the escalator and found my daddy. but I jumped off the escalator while it was still three steps from the floor, and pushed past a woman in a floral green dress.... If there's too much detail, I can always fix it later.
I'm the kind of writer who has too many voices and ideas in her head and sometimes it's hard to stay focused. Maureen and Greg said that using details is a tool to help both the reader and the writer stay focused. It's hard to stray in your thoughts when you use details that keep pulling you back into this one, specific world. They're right. Specifics keep me in that mindset and I don't drift away nearly as badly.
IMHO, this is a difficult story to write. It's supposed to be evocative. It's supposed to stir up childhood memories. (Mostly for women. Men probably are going to be uncomfortable with this one.) I"m uncomfortable writing it.
Mega thanks to Caroline Austin Hazen who sent Paula and I a care package. I'm considering mine my birthday present and Caroline was unusually perceptive to realize my birthday was close.