NaNoWriMo Day 1

Donnor was bored. The hospital staff wouldn’t let him dance, or play interactive vids or ping his friends, or even pull his feeds and sort the news from the trivia. In fact, his brain-tenna was automatically tuned out when he entered the facility and would not resume broadcast until he left the building. No wonder so many people died in this place – boredom is a killer!

Leaving his Mother at his Grandmother’s bedside, Donnor wandered the halls looking for anything to take his attention off the mind-numbing quiet. No music. No background commentary, not even any ad-vids to break the monotony - just corridor after corridor of artificially homey décor, steroid enhanced plants and soothing colors.

It was completely rankerous, Donnor thought, that the hospital employees were allowed to keep their brain-tennas tuned in – even if only to Government approved channels. He slouched down the halls kicking out at random planters, carts and dispensing stations, wishing he was anywhere rather than here.

Turning a corner Donnor came up against a door clearly marked ‘White Coats, Pink & Whites and Mothers only beyond this point’.

Finally! Here was something to get his mind off the lack of brain-tainment. Donnor had never been able to resist the temptation of the forbidden. From the time he was a little kid he was drawn to the things he was denied by his Mother or the Watchers. Tell him he was not to climb trees and he went into full monkey mode. Mention that the school was off limits after dark and it became his night-time haunt.

“One of these days,” was his Mother’s constant litany, “you are going to get into trouble you can’t get out of.”

Shaking off the ghost of her warning, Donnor considered the security pad on the door in front of him. It was a flex-plastic palm reader that read not only the lines of the palm, but the contours of the hand. Not easy to fool. Of course, in the vids you would just mob some unsuspecting Doctor, knock her out (or chop off her hand if you were violently inclined) and use her hand to gain access.

There was no real way to just sneak through when someone else opened the door – the entrance censor would sound the intruder alert. He moved back to a position across the hall and slid to the floor next to a giant violet. The 2 meter high blooms gave him great cover, and if anyone did notice him, with his spiky black hair and slumped posture, he would just look like another bored teenager.

The longer Donnor stared at the door the more intrigued he became. Unlike other similar passage doors in the hospital, this door had no plexi-panes to allow you to see the hallway beyond.

Whenever a Doctor approached, they checked the hallway behind to ensure they weren’t watched before pressing their hand into the flexi reader. The doors slid open for the briefest of moments, revealing a flash of electra-sun washed space before sliding firmly closed again.
For the supplies carts the doors did not slide back at all. As the self propelled carts arrived, a port appeared in the left hand door only fractionally bigger than the cart itself. The cart whisked through, and the port closed seamlessly into the door once again. The fit was so perfect that not even a glint of sun-light bled through.

Donnor sat and studied the door for a long time. By now his Mother would have finished her visit with his Grandmother and would probably have headed to the Vac without him. He had been riding the Vacuum cars on his own since he was 8, and she was used to him disappearing. As long as he made it home before general curfew was sounded she never worried too much.

As afternoon turned to evening an idea gradually began to dawn – it would involve some vandalism and destruction of hospital property, and it might mean a spell in deten if he got caught, but the intrigue was too much to bear. Donnor had to see what was on the other side of those doors – he would take his chancequences.

NaNo Officially Begins

This year's novel:

Unwilling Donor

Donnor was bored. The hospital staff wouldn’t let him dance, or play interactive vids or ping his friends, or even pull his feeds and sort the news from the trivia. In fact, his brain-tenna was automatically tuned out when he entered the facility and would not resume broadcast until he left the building. No wonder so many people died in this place – boredom is a killer!

Leaving his Mother at his Grandmother’s bedside Donnor wandered the halls looking for anything to take his mind off the mind-numbing quiet. No music. No background commentary, not even any ad-vids to break the monotony - just corridor after corridor of artificially homey décor, steroid enhanced plants and soothing colors.

It was completely rankerous, Donnor thought, that the hospital employees were allowed to keep their brain-tennas tuned in – even if only to Government approved channels. He slouched down the halls kicking out at random planters, carts and dispensing stations, wishing he was anywhere rather than here.

Total of 500 words today - that is a poor start, but I will be up at 6 am in the morning to write.

Wish me luck!

Things That Stop Me From Writing

Work
Stress
Work
14 Hour Days
Excuses
Work

But NANO is coming - I must get control of this!!

This year's novel - an alternate reality vision of the future - with Pirates!

How to Get Back to Writing

I have written over 300,000 words since April and I haven't written a thing.

Colon Cleansing
Dermatological TV
Puppy Training
Escort Services in London
Automating Your Home
More Colon Cleansing
Snake Oil of Many Types
Domestic Violence
Prostitution

Sigh - all those words wasted on things, excepting the occasional bright spot, that have no meaning.

I think free-lance writing is not so good for a novelist!

Bad Dreams of Unfair Justice

I dreamed bad dreams all night.

Of standing before a disapproving judge.

Of getting the evil eye from an unforgiving former friend.

Of trying to bear up under the unrelenting hatred of a hostile DA.

I despair and dream of slitting my wrists and collecting the blood to mail to these people with a note that simply says "Are you happy now?".

When o When can I Write?

I am so good at overbooking myself. I currently have bubbling on my writing stove:

Words for a Christmas Cantata (or an Easter Oratorio)
Words for 12 hours of Opera
Words for 2 Lullabys
1st novel revision/finishing
2nd novel plotting and brainstorming

So - I have LOTS to write and almost no time to work on it.

Instead I write about lawyers and colon cleansers and puppies. Yes, this writing pays the bills (just barely), but still... I want to write fun stuff!

Maybe the fact that I am starting a new job tomorrow will help.
Part time work, but at a really good rate of pay.
Should mean I have to do less freelance writing so hopefully I can swap that time out for fiction and musical writing.

Wish me luck!

Life in a Corpocracy

The book that is stirring around in the back of my mind for this year's NaNo is based in the future. When Corporations have taken over all of the 1st and 2nd world governments. You know, the stuff of science fiction...

Until my son points out this...

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090323_america_is_in_need_of_a_moral_bailout/

Ah brave new world...

Between Parachutes - What I Learned

I don't like writing about my personal travails. An author must play God and put her characters through challenges, set backs and travail - this is what makes books exciting. Unfortunately, when it comes to my own life, I seem to prefer waiting until after the challenges are done so that I know 'how it ends'. I am a storyteller - I tell dozens of stories about my own life - repeatedly. My friends tease that they like listening to my stories to 'find out what happened this time'.

So - as an update - I am still between parachutes, but there are good things on the horizon. My husband starts his Master's degree in a week and we have settled into an apartment in Denver. I am looking forward to beginning work again on my novel. And I have begun to anticipate NaNo 2009.

I'll probably start popping up here again more often now, trying to tell the stories that are my life.

Between Parachutes 1

You could not have told me in advance that I would find any city home. I am a country girl. I like open spaces and trees, and rivers and sky. All the things that are generally in short supply in a city. A normal city. But Edinburgh is not a normal city!

Edinburgh is a city of green spaces, parks, the 14 mile walk along the River of Leith, gardens and hills (7 of them to be exact - all still undeveloped). Edinburgh is a city whose very architecture leads the eye upwards to the sky. Edinburgh is very 'walk-able' which means that I spent more time outside - walking to and from work, the grocery store, the cinema than I had in all our years in California where it is necessary to drive everywhere!

In Edinburgh this country girl became citified. I regularly went to the art galleries, the museums, the concert halls. I went to music festivals, film festivals, book festivals! And still spent more time outside than any time since my childhood.

I learned a lot in Edinburgh. I gained by Bachelor's degree in music, I found my voice as a writer, I deepened my love for my husband, I gained a more worldly perspective in politics, I discovered a passion for film, I discovered a talent for arts development work. I was still learning. That is why the call to vacate the country was so devastating. I did not feel ready to end that learning process.

I feel the loss of Edinburgh as a deep cut. I am terribly homesick for the chimney pots, the closes, the daffodils. It is spring there now, the snowdrops have come and gone, the carpets of crocuses in purple, yellow and white are giving way to the daffodils - hundreds of thousands of delicate yellow blooms draping Castle Hill, coating the Meadows, filling your heart with sunshine.

For now, my heart sits in shadow.

The Writer Attempts to Articulate her Thoughts

Well. Here I am again. Staring at a blank page. Trying to think of something witty or bright to say. I am a victim of my own ideas. Too many. Too complicated. Too unformed. But then the impulse will take me and my fingers will seem to fly over the keyboard and before I know it I am writing - really writing - and I am lost in my imagination.

I am hoping that the musings I place on this page will be a catalyst for those times that I submerge myself in the flow of ideas. A place to limber up before each day's writing, to loosen the imagination muscles and get the creative juices flowing.

To start with, I will be journalling my current personal life in a series of articles I am calling Between Parachutes. I was happily ensconced as an ex-patriot in Edinburgh Scotland until my VISA extension was denied and I was given 14 days to vacate the country. Now I am homeless, unemployed and living with relatives while I sort myself out. So - tune in here for the saga, the musings, and the general chatterings of my overloaded brain!