In Which Wishes May or May Not be Granted.

I've been working on the previous Sunday Scribblings prompt off and on since last weekend, and finally finished. This story is a little more ambitious than the other stuff I've posted, as well as longer, and a bit darker. So it took me more time to finish, and it gets a page of its own. You can read it here if you wanna: Three Wishes.

(Just for the record, if I had three wishes: flight, time travel, and invisibility.)

In Which I Say Some Stuff About Stuff.

It's almost the end of J weeks, isn't it? Hm. Hmmm. Well, I saw an old J friend today. And... um... yeah, that's about all I have to report. Wouldn't you think J would be an easy letter? I did. But then I didn't eat any jam or Jell-O, watch any films by Jim Jarmusch, or learn to juggle. Oh well. Maybe I'll do better with K.

Stuff I've been up to lately:

I bought some stuff from a virtual yard sale, which is worth checking out if you live in the Portland area. Dan and Annika are leaving their apartment to live in a biodiesel bus while they share their neo-medieval music with the rest of North America. So they're selling most of their possessions. Note also that they're really nice people, and that this is a fun and efficient way to decide whether you want someone else's possessions before actually driving to their house.

I've signed up for a month of Bikram yoga, which is essentially yoga performed with great intensity in a sauna-like environment. I've only been to three sessions so far, and they say it starts getting much less torturous after that. I sure hope so. I know I'm a wimp, but I hate being reminded of it so vividly. The carrot on the end of this stick, of course, is that at some point I will become somewhat less wimpy. In the meantime, it's kind of throwing everything else off. I'm really, really tired right now, which is why I'm home blogging instead of at Bee and Spider's cookout with ah.

Speaking of the latter, I have a new roommate, and she has just painted her bedroom orange. Excellent.

And guess what else? I've been doing some creative writing lately! And posting it here! On my blog!!

What's that? You already knew?

Oh. Okay.

(Thanks for all your positive feedback. I'm overwhelmed and honored.)

The Decemberists - July, July!

The Books I Would Write...

Complete this sentence: "The books I would write..."
Notice it isn't "the books I WILL write." That would be too much pressure. No, this is a daydreaming exercise, pure and simple: Ask yourself, if you were to write books, what kind of books would they be?

The books I would write would require call numbers that haven't been invented yet.

The books I would write would float like balloons on a string.

The books I would write would reach into your skull and turn your brain around backward, so that you would speak in esrever and wear your shoes on the wrong feet.

The books I would write would make clocks obsolete.

The books I would write would scream when they were burned.

The books I would write would make you dream in color.

The books I would write could be chopped up and planted like potatoes, to grow a fine crop of new books.

The books I would write would ambush you in a dark alleyway and demand all your pocket lint.

The books I would write would be printed on seaweed, in luminous ink.

The books I would write would read you.

My Shoes

Of course I would rather have picked out my own outfit. But she did very well, considering. Not this year's fashion, I suspect, but certainly presentable enough. Who knew she had such good taste? You certainly wouldn't guess it to look at her. Not that I can boast much of a wardrobe myself, but I imagine she has more... resources.

I ran in to the house for a glimpse in the old mirror before I left, so I know that the corset slims my figure down unbelievably, that the neckline plays a flirtatious game with my bosom, and that I don't look like me at all anymore, or not like I'm accustomed to looking -- rather, like someone who has stumbled out of a storybook. She did something outrageously intricate with my hair, involving a lot of pearls and ribbons, that I'm not sure is possible by natural means, and there seems to be a bit of extra color around my eyes and lips. As I said, the effect is not like me at all... and is all the more pleasing for that.

So here I sit in this coach that isn't a coach, bumped and jostled about by the heavily rutted road into the city, trying not to bite my very round, very smooth fingernails. I can't recall the last time I saw them so clean. If only she could have smoothed over my nerves as well. She did a fine job with the clothing, I admit, but I can't help but feel that all of this is a terribly bad idea: dressing up an uncouth country girl like a fine lady and sending her off to crash the biggest party of the decade. What could possibly go wrong? Everything.

I think I can fake the dancing, at least. I don't know the dances of rich folk, but I'm a quick learner and light on my feet, as nimble with a jig or a reel as any farmer's daughter. I expect the banter will be more of a challenge. I'm afraid all the time I spend with swineherds and milkmaids will show in my manner of speech and choice of idiom, just as all the time I spend with books makes it obvious that I'm not really one of those people, either. But I have an alias ready, and I know enough to smile and keep my mouth shut whenever possible. Most people are more than happy to provide the talking part of a conversation, so long as you appear to be doing the listening part.

I think she had it in her head that tonight would be some sort of husband-finding mission, which I found incredibly funny. The party is a matchmaking soiree for the Crown Prince, I gather, and certainly my stepsisters were all in a tizzy imagining that he'd fall head-over-heels for one of them (and in a jealous rage at the thought that he might fall for the other of them). There will be far too many hopeful young ladies there tonight for him to give more than a word to each, and I can't imagine what I would say back to him even if he could spare one for me. Oh, there might well be some eligible noblemen hoping to pick up the crumbs that fall from the royal table, so to speak. There are possibilities there, I admit, but the possibility of... unpleasantness seems far greater. I must keep in mind that a fine lady doesn't reward a frisky-handed gentleman with a hard right to the jaw.

The dress definitely helps my courage, though. I rearrange its generous, shimmering skirts over my legs and, in doing so, catch another glimpse of my shoes. Oh dear. My shoes. What was she thinking? She seemed so very proud of them. I've never seen anything like them before; I can't decide if they will be the envy or the scorn of every woman there. They look like they're made of brook ice, swirled and bubbled, but you can see my feet right through them. It's a strange effect. There are my toes, lined up in a neat diagonal row, already getting a little clammy under the smooth, cool surface. The shoes look like they could crack as easily as ice, too, and I wonder how practical they really are for dancing. It's a good thing I won't be doing any running this evening.

In Which I Explain the Previous Post, and Some Future Ones.

I've been doing this thing for a couple of months now called Illustration Friday. It's a website that introduces a new theme (like "robot" or "feet" or "under the sea") every Friday, and people create visual art based on the week's theme and post it in their blogs, and then put a link to their site on the IF page so everybody else can see. I love the idea of it, but I'm not much of a visual artist (and I hate messing with scanners), so I just doodle something into a notebook and then feel slightly more creative for the rest of the day.

Illustration Friday always made me wish there were some sort of writing equivalent... and now there is! Sunday Scribblings offers a prompt every Saturday, so you can post some writing and then send your link to the site to be read. (I think the idea is that you'll have it ready by Sunday, but I doubt mine will be done by then, most weeks. I just did last Friday's illustration today, too.) This kind of low-key weekly writing challenge appeals to me quite a bit, even though (or perhaps because) as I look at the other submissions for this week's prompt, I notice mine doesn't quite fit in with the rest.

Note: If you're concerned about getting my fiction confused with my reality, Sunday Scribblings posts will not begin with "In Which".

Why I Live Where I Live

Write the story of why you moved to the place where you currently live.

I moved here after my parents divorced. That was two years ago. My mom said she was tired of taking care of me, and now it was Dad's turn to be a parent. I wasn't supposed to hear her say that, but I did.

I didn't know what to think about moving here. I used to live in Chicago, in an apartment on the fourth floor with Mom, and with Dad when he was around. At night I fell asleep to the sound of traffic. In the daytime it was always easy to find other kids to hang out with. I liked it pretty well, I guess. I didn't know anything else to compare it to, so I couldn't imagine whether living somewhere else would be better or worse. I wasn't all that excited about moving. Some of the other kids said they were jealous, but I didn’t believe they really meant it. Chi-town was my town -- we used to say that to each other, all proud, like we lived there by our own choice or something. When kids said that, they said it like they meant it.

We could have gone to live with Dad a long time ago, but Mom didn't want to leave. I guess Chi-town was her town too. I used to wish my dad was a lawyer or a policeman or a trash collector, so he could be around all the time like other dads; but now that I know him better, I can't imagine him ever being anything but what he is. Mom used to say he is a man with a one-track mind, and then she would shake her head like she does when she doesn't want to talk about something anymore. Now I can kind of see what she meant. When I see them together now, I can't figure out why they ever got together in the first place. Sometimes I wonder if the distance wasn't the only thing about their marriage that worked.

One of the first things I remember, when I was a little kid, is my dad taking me outside at night and pointing out the constellations. "That's where I work," he said. "Up there." Back then I thought maybe he was responsible for taking care of the stars, like keeping them in the right order and working properly, maybe like some sort of electrician for the night sky. I was just little; I didn't know any better. But now I do, of course.

Now I eat dinner with Dad every night that he doesn't work late, and sometimes he helps me out with homework, and sometimes we play chess or racquetball or watch a movie. He is a pretty good guy, my dad, but he gets distracted a lot, like he's working out problems in his head even when he's off work for the day. He really loves his work a lot. Sometimes when he explains it to me I think I can almost understand what he's talking about, but mostly what I understand is that it makes him really happy. Our apartment is a lot smaller than the one in Chicago, but it's still pretty nice. And I have a rabbit now. I could never have pets before, because my mom's allergic.

Instead of a whole neighborhood of kids, there are only eight of us here -- ten if you count Rosa, who is three, and Gaurav, but we never see him. So when you get in fights it kind of messes everything up, because you can't just go find some other kids to play with. And some of the other kids hold grudges for a long time, especially the girls. Especially Monique. At night -- well, we call it night, but we're really on East Coast time, no matter if we can see the sun or not -- at night it's very quiet in our apartment, so quiet that I have to play music to fall asleep. When I first got here I had trouble sleeping, even with music. I had dreams about falling through space with nothing to hold on to. So I would get up and push back the window screen and look out at the earth, and try to imagine houses and cars and playgrounds and grocery stores in that big blue smear. I couldn't really do it, but after standing there a while staring into the blue haze, remembering what it was like to live there, I could usually go back to sleep again.

We went back last Christmas to visit Mom. It was weird to be back on Earth again, and to know that I was walking around on the big blue thing I used to watch out my window. Mom lives in a different neighborhood now, in the suburbs with her boyfriend, so it didn't really even feel like going home at all. Nothing looked quite like I remembered it, not even my old street in the city. And I got this weird feeling when I looked up at the sky at night. It's hard to explain.

I'm from that place, but I don’t have a place there anymore. But the weirdest thing is, my home now isn't really a place either. It's basically a big box that floats in circles around the planet. It's all right, living here. I like the pool and the gardens and the zero-g room, and even Monique when she's not mad at me. But it doesn't feel like a real place to live in, a place I that can tell people is my place. I don't think this is a real story either, so I guess I've pretty much flunked this assignment. Sorry Ms. Baranski.