December « 2009 « Journals of Journeys

10Dec/09Off

Knots

I learned to tie a new type of knot today.

I was fascinated by it. The straight line of one part of the cord. The rounded, looping curve of the other half and how it wound around the straight side as if hugging it.

The harder I pulled on the looped half, the tighter it wound around the straight side. The stiffer the straight side seemed to become, as if it had been threaded around a bit of wire, when the looped side squeezed over it.

If I pulled the end of the looped side, it would slide up the straight side like a merry-go-round horse rides a pole. But then, all my work disappeared. The looped became straight and the straight seemed to taunt me. I resolved the issue by weaving a finger in at the top where the straight side bent into the looped side. Whenever I tugged at either end of the cord, the bend at the top remained.

My finger, however, grew purple and hurt, then tingled.

Tingly. I like that sensation.

Devoid of pain. Pleasant, actually.

Did you know that if you push past the pain, you can actually begin to tingle? It's a fascinating experiment. Each time I tried a new form of the exercise, the results were always the same. Sooner or later, the tinglies would come and on its heels, a sense of euphoria.

But then, after the tingly sensation and the euphoria, both would go away. There's nothing left. No pain. No tingles. No euphoria. No headiness. Nothing. It's like the complete absence of being.

I think I may have liked that better than everything else.

Some say that absence is death. Or the equivalent.

Possibly.

I would know about those kinds of things, wouldn't I?

I learned a new knot today.

I studied it closely. I tried out several ways to move it. Up. Down. To the very end when it would disappear. Tight against my finger. And then a stick. Finally, I fashioned a neck tie.

The tingles brought the euphoria.

After that, the blankness stared straight into my open eyes.

I think that's the last slipknot I'll ever tie.

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December 10, 2009

© 2009, Kathie Leung. All Rights Reserved.
No portion of this may be copied, transmitted, printed, or otherwise disseminated in part or whole without the express written permission of the author.

Filed under: 2009, Journals, Kathie, Thoughts, Wishing, Writing, copyright No Comments

2Dec/09Off

My 2009 NaNoWriMo FAQ

2009 National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) is over, 65,229 words later. Yes, it wasn't the full out 90K words I intended on reaching (what the hell was I thinking), but at least it's a good start.

iRONicSuicides-sm What will come of iRON-ic Suicides, your 2009 novel? (It's pronounced Ironic Suicides for those of you stuttering with the name like my mother did; which, by the way, she became a character in it because she helped sponsor me through her charitable donation to the Office of Letters and Light.) It goes on the back burner for now. I've plotted and stayed fairly true to the plot, so it won't be so hard to pick back up and finish the first draft.

Did you finish the novel? No. A decent sized novel is roughly 250-300 pages (paperback). A trade paperback has an average of 300 words a page, therefore 75-90,000 words. I'm about 2/3rds done - with the first draft.

When will you finish iRON-ic Suicides? I'll go back to it after I take care of some other irons in the fire. Right now, I have another manuscript, MSD (sorry, that's all I'll reveal about the title right now for a number of reasons) which came from my first NaNo novel, then titled And Then There Was Sam . . .. Once I have that one done and sent out, I'll probably pick up last year's NaNo novel, The Haunting of Mira Beck, pound the putty out of it and ship that out.

msd-small AD-Summers-sm haunting-sm

MSD/First NaNo // Dani Summers (2007) // Haunting of Mira Beck (2008)

What about your other NaNo novels? In 2007 I wrote one that started out as a mainstream mystery but then came back, tweaked it and wrote it as a young adult novel. Yet will need a lot of work to get the voice right in it. Or possibly rework the main character and torque the plot a bit to turn it into a mainstream mystery. I'm not sure yet, but as it stands right now, that one doesn't seem to be working as I'd hoped. iRON-ic Suicides will probably be finished up long before the one about Dani Summers. Or was it Sommers? See? I don't even remember!

Did you give in and tell your husband you were participating in this year's NaNoWriMo? No. The good news is, this year I managed to fulfill my goal of NaNoing without telling my husband I was participating. Mom likes to think I'm keeping secrets. No. I'm surviving, Mother. It was merely a test. Had it been a real emergency, I would have thrown him a life preserver and told him to have it on stand-by, demanded he take off the entire month of November and sequestered myself in the back storage shed along with my handy espresso machine and bars of Trader Joe's dark chocolate. The kidlets knew and I had them promise me they wouldn't spill the beans. However, when my mother pointed out that if I got them to keep secrets from my husband, I couldn't complain in a vice versa situation. So the very next day I qualified that and said that they weren't to volunteer the news but if they were asked, they could certainly tell him.

Does your husband know, now? Yes. And that's all I'll say.

Why do you do the NaNoWriMo if it takes away from getting a manuscript out and published? I ask myself this all the time. Usually the time NaNo comes up, I'm already getting frustrated with the current manuscript and look forward to taking the month off to create an entirely different story. But this might change soon. I might participate in NaNoEditMo (February or March, I believe) and forego WriMo. I'm still undecided. February is a very busy month for me, odd as it seems.

Got a question about my participation in NaNoWriMo? Ask away!