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My poor ole’  iBook has been on its last nodes for many months. I’d been losing various capabilities, one by one, kinda like Tom Hank’s raft in Castaway. First I lost youtube, then, my camera for skype was next to go. Last week I lost my printer. Maybe it’s time, my friends and family said, gently and compassionate. I can still write on it! I exclaimed. But that little grey rectangle message, the one in multiple languages, telling me to turn off the power and restart…. Ohhhh, that little message felt like the beginning of the end. Maybe I’ll write a letter to the Public Relations department at Apple, I told my friends. They must have programs where they send refurbished laptops to school classrooms as a charitable act. I will write them a letter and ask them very nicely for a refurbished laptop so that I can continue writing my novels. It’s not that I think I “deserve” one– only that I truly need one and I’m not too proud to ask! Also, what if they say, “yes!” ?! The worst they can do is say, “no”, and I wouldn’t have lost anything. My Wilson is almost gone, anyway….

Do you know how to use a PC, my sister asked. I’ve worked on them at the last three wirs, I said. I don’t do anything special. Just write stories, look at photos, go to youtube, and Skype. I’m a simple online creature…. My sister and brother-in-law have sent me a new Dell! It is so sleek and blue and the letters aren’t faded off the keyboard! I am deeply grateful and so touched. You can use it until you’ve saved enough money for a new Apple, they said. I’m gonna use it until the letters have faded off the keyboard like Wilson! Now I can do research at various sites and it won’t freeze. (My daughter informed me, when I told her that she shouldn’t go to dubious sites because it’s gonna pick up bugs, that the toad-licking site I went to was the worse kind of place possible. <teehee>) (Note: licking the toad will not make you high.)

I wonder if writing on a PC will affect subject matter and content? Who knows? I mean, a road trip in a camper trailer is gonna be different from a trip taken in a convertible. (And I’m not saying which is which, either! (~__^)

Thank you, sister and brother-in-law!

Note to folks who are considering writing as their career: even with numerous books and lovely gigs like writer-in-residencies, you might not be earning enough income to easily go out and buy a new laptop when the old one bites it. This is not a sob story– it’s just real. But if you have friends and family who support you, who are cheering you as you keep on reaching, you will be able to make the long haul…. I mean, it’s not like I go drop by friends’ houses right before dinner time in order to score a free meal…. Heeheeeheee. (Tho I would if I had to. Okay, maybe not! I dunno!). You gotta really love the work that you do for it to be “worth it” (how one measures is subjective). And, if you’re blessed with family and friends who also believe in the work that you do, ohhhh, how amazing. A gift immeasurable.

I don’t think I properly understood what the Forest of Reading events will be like at Harbourfront Centre…. Apparently there will be THOUSANDS of children and youth, there. Wah! That’s a lot of people! I dinna know. My friend and poetry collaboratuer, David, will be my guest during the festivities. (If we’re all lucky he will dress up as Alice in Wonderland, and steal the entire show!)

Thursday and Friday are the library readings and Friday evening David and I will be launching our little poetry book at Toronto Women’s Bookstore. Please join us for boozy poems, treats and a little drinkie. Please make a donation for the bookstore at the door!

Later this afternoon, I’m heading out to get new author photos taken by Kiely Ramos. I love her photos– usually I hate the pics people take of me (you know how it is: that negative voice that tells you, “You look too_____ ….”. Well, Kiely has this way of capturing something that most other photographers miss. I don’t like getting my photos taken, but I end up having to send author photos several times a year for publicity reasons, and I have this big Pet Peeve (hmmm, I wonder if Pet Peeve were an animal you kept in the house, what he’d look like? Furry. Prone to disgusting habits, etc. Hairball. Shitty butt. Etc.) about authors who keep a younger photo of themself for their publicity image for perpetuity…. What’s up with that? They don’t look like that anymore! Are they trying to keep down their promo costs, or is it a denial of aging/age phobia?

1) Professional photographers are losing gigs big-time because of the proliferation of photos online. Magazines/journals/dailies/publishers/etc. can duck into these publically accessible photo storage sites and sift through amatuer shots and buy them for super cheap rates. Fewer and fewer professional photographers are being hired for specific stories/projects. It’s a bad situation for them. So– if you need publicity photos, hire a pro! You’ll look great, and, it’s keeping money in the professional arts!

2) As my father used to say, “Be Pu-LOUD!” Be proud of your age, the experience etched upon your skin, the lines of character, suffering, and yes, even sun damage that’s a part of aging. Aging faces are interesting and beautiful, distinct and complex. I hate beauty products that are called, “anti-aging”. Against aging?

“Do you want to live forever?” Valeria, from Conan the Barbarian

The morning howled, and spring was pelted senseless. I trudged to the bus stop, bent over like a question mark, my red mental illness toque barely visible in the gusts of white out. I had to run across the road with my eyes closed because I was facing the wind, and the pellets of snow were scoring my eyeballs. “Wahhhh!” I shouted, as I lurched Russian roulette-like, through the slush.

The poor yellow and red tulips in front of the house are covered in gingerbread icing snow. The new tender leaves on the trees.

(My red mental illness toque doesn’t signify that I’m going through a depressive stage– I bought it when I was depressed, and it kept me warm, then, because I was so very cold. When I had to move to AB I thought, hey, it’s gonna be damn cold in Edmonton! Where’s that mental illness toque? Some people get tattoos to mark their significant moments. I got a toque!)

I had told my daughter that it was too warm and utterly unseasonal to make any more oden (Jpnse stew) until the late autumn…. Looks like there’s time for one more pot!

* * *

On May Day I was invited to the Edmonton Institute for Women to visit with the book club there. It was an amazing experience and the women had read Half World with such care– I was totemo arigatai…. On May 8th and 9th, weather permitting, there will be a book sale fundraiser with all proceeds going to the Edmonton Institute for Women Library. If you’re out and about that day please stop by at 10706 -84 Ave. 10 AM-6PM.

It all slipped between my fingers as if I had been cupping water. Obi Wan, can you make a difference? Last weekend I was  in Calgary for a book club meeting at Monkeyshines. The book club participants ranged in age from 4-5 years old to in their late 50s. Generations of readers and eager, inquiring minds. I could not keep up with their fast-paced questions and I left, bemused, and happy. I also found out that Leonard Nimoy was in town for a comics con! Leonard Nimoy, I screamed. I loved SPOCK! Spock saved  my LIFE as a child, because through him I could see a better world guided by calm and reason rather than the unwieldy mess of rampant human emotions. Should I go to the con? I wondered. Should I stand in the 3-hr line up to see my childhood savior???

The actor is not the character, my daughter said in her dry voice.

I know that! I said, more than a little defensive.

Sometimes it’s better to keep our childhood heroes in our memories and not meet them in person. Because then it will alter  everything, my sister said.

Damnit, Jim! Why must they be so logical!

everything in relief or cut-out silhouettes. blackness. a house across the street is only there because of the orange light of the window. imagine.

only a window.

night.

how dark this room. the reflection of red tail lights suggests the car. a silhouette walks along the sidewalk. if he sees the glow of the laptop in my face.

a pale moon inside a black window.

how still

I love pyjamas. They are the most comfortable form of home lounge wear. And, I’m certain, the working outfit of many writers. 

The door bell rang late this morning. I glanced down at my pyjama-clad self. Well, I shrugged, it’s the weekend, and they are coming to me, so. My terms. 

I could see, clearly, one tall 50+ yrs old white male on the other side of the door. A stranger. There was someone else beside him. A little shorter. Same age. Both wearing econo suits. Probably religious, I thought, but it would be rude to not open the door, so I did. 

“Hello, we’re out here today to talk about the Lord Jesus Christ,” he said. 

“No, thank you,” I smiled, and began to slowly close the door. 

“What language are you?” he cried, trying to play another hand. 

“Clearly, I am speaking English,” I said. And closed the door faster. 

“No, I mean– never mind…” he said. 

I’m always a combination of bemused/annoyed/curious/wondering/appalled when this kind of thing happens. It clearly underscores the human tendency to create a flash narrative, unthinking, but instantaneous. The flash narrative is built upon all the narratives and biases assimilated throughout the person’s life. It does not matter what actually happens in the interaction– the flash narrative is overlaid atop of the event to recreate the existing beliefs of the subject. This kind of situation happens a great deal around race, gender, sexuality, body. 

Two Christmases ago I was vacationing in San Francisco with family members. The streets were busy with tourists and seasonal merry-makers. At one busy intersection we were waiting for a traffic light to change. A man beside me was rambling on, a monologue, that was difficult to decipher. I thought he was mostly talking to himself. He began talking to me, a mishmash of ideas that I could not follow, that made me slightly uneasy. I didn’t respond. 

“Do you understand English?” he asked me. 

“Not very well,” I replied. 

And he left me alone. 

<GRIN>

Well, my daughter and I had to move because we were in a sabbatical house (not christian nor jewish) and the folks came back. Luckily, we moved Right Next Door, in the exact same type of late 1940s house. Where the last place was blue, this house is orange! An older woman lived here, alone, for many years. There is a heaviness in the rooms, a kind of psychic imprint of emotions that are clearly not our own. 

What does sadness smell like? What is the smell of loneliness and boredom? 

Smell is such a primal sense– I think a lot of writers under-utilize this in their work because for the sighted, we privilege vision over our other sensorial experiences. But nothing can get an immediate and stronger response than a powerful odour. 

Larissa Lai integrated odours to remarkable effect in her dystopic novel, Salt Fish Girl. 

In a very animal way, I’m intent on scent-rubbing our new home space. I’ve opened the windows and screen doors so that the wind blows through. Last night I baked one of those frozen stuffing-filled turkey breasts for our little easter dinner. M, who was here for a little while, burned some incense in the open window. The smell of rich, dark coffee. The odours of laughter. The scent of conversations, tinged with emotional inflections.

It was a physical move, sideways, to the house next door– we’re trying, through the sense of smell, to climb up diagonal ladders, but sometimes we snake down into the memory pockets of a stranger.

(Who’s the fool?) 

<WideCatGrin> 

I’m very excited! This is my first book-length American publication! Rock on! 

I’ll be at WisCon, the best feminist SF conference in the world, the May 28th weekend, to promote Half World. Sharyn November, my brilliant editor at Viking, will be there, as well as the most amazing feminist sf writers, readers, thinkers, dreamers….

Maybe, in my next life, I’ll be able to write sf…. It’s a special talent, to bring in science and speculation, in a meaningful and integrated way, into story. It’s not simple. First of all, you must know the science. Otherwise, “science” is just a costume. This is the same in writing fantastic fiction. Elements of the magical need to be systemic and logical and consistent throughout, otherwise it can devolve into gimmick or the worst kind of deus ex machina. I have such a profound respect for the writers of good feminist sf! I take my hat off to them. <dapper bow> 

Meanwhile, I’m working every day on Darkness…. 

(And, reconsidering my resistance to Twitter…. <grin>)

Paper birch. Distant roar of the wind rocking the tall trees, the sound of the sea. The strobe of light and shadow breaking through the branches. 

I’m  at the Leighton Studios at the Banff Centre. A generous component of my writer-in-residency, it is such a privilege, a treasure of time and space! The studios are single detached specially designed buildings placed amongst trees. Each studio is kitted out with a kitchenette and washroom. The last time I was here I would stay up until 3 or 4 AM, walk back to my room in darkness, between the creaking night language of trees. This was way back when, when I was working on The Water of Possibility. It was a prime example of circumstance/environment working into the text. I wrote, mostly at night, in the dark. So, I ended up writing a lot of scenes in the novel set underground, in caves, tunnels, etc! 

This time I’m working on my companion novel to Half World. The working title is Darkness. <grin!> 

I’ve decided that since this is a retreat I will not read any online newspapers while I’m here. I usually read several every day, rather compulsively. And it’s an important part of my reading/research day. But it can also distract as well as take me into a psychologically tired and sad place– there is much woe, suffering and injustice in the world, and the news foregrounds this. 

I will let the roar of the wind, the language of the trees guide me.

Today I woke up at 5 AM to make a one-day trip to UNBC in Prince George. I had time enough for a shower, coffee and a drive out to the international airport in the snow without speeding. Took off fine, had to reconnect in Vancouver. Saw the blush of spring leaves on deciduous trees as we flew over the city. When we reached PG airspace the captain’s voice, tinny, calm, and slightly apologetic, informed us of a fog bank. We will try to land, he said. Moments later we plunged into the soft white folds. I peered out the window, fingers crossed, begging that the air would clear, let the captain see! But the engines roared as the captain pulled up, Abort! Abort landing sequence! The acceleration pressing us into our seats like the Gravitron. And the Six Million Dollar Man theme song starts streaming through my head… Na naa naa nahhhhhh, nanana na na nana na nahhhhh.

“He’s not going to make it!”

“I’m burning up! I’m burning up!” 

(If Steve Austin cost $6000000.00 to rebuild in the mid-70s, how much would he cost now?)

We had to fly back to Vancouver and I disembarked at the same gate I had returned to just last month, when I was fogged out of Edmonton! This had never happened to me before in my travelling life, but twice, now, in consecutive months! Aside from a 12-hour-day basically travelling for nothing, I’ve left an enormous carbon footprint to top it off. 

On a happy note, while I was flying around willy nilly, I got started on my goal of learning to write with my left hand. (Just in case I won’t be able to write with my right hand in the future.) This is not such a nutty plan, I tell you! I was getting repetitive strain mousing with my right hand, so I switched to my left. No problem. Also, writing with the left hand will use different areas of my brain! How neat is that? (One can grow tired of using the same sections over and over again….)