What One Girl Knows

Reg just called. His flight is getting in an hour and a half earlier than he thought, which means I have to be at the airport in less than five hours. I'm only a fourth through my to-do list. Don't think I'll get in much writing today, which puts me in a bad mood. I am really entrenched in Stephen King logic right now. To paraphrase: write every day, or your novel-in-progress will feel less like play and more like work. I've written 50 pages of Sugar, my young adult novel, since quitting the dreadful R+R. I don't want to lose that momentum, even if I am getting married this weekend. Quitting my job was like dousing myself in cold water. Suddenly, my priorities are clearer. I can't be a writer if I don't finish my novels. Conversely, I can't be a published writer unless I start sending my stories out -- something I'm going to need work on.

J. and I are getting a windfall of books in the mail, though. I love used books under $1.00. Some of my titles include:

Our bookshelves are schizophrenic. Jason reads a majority of male writers, a good deal of poetry and philosophy; I read almost exclusively female writers, mostly fiction, almost rarely poetry.

I'm stalling. I don't want to clean the litter box. I don't want to walk to the grocery store for grenadine. I just want to write. I'm midpoint through my novel, introducing new characters. It's an exciting period. My Anna (main character) is wandering around Honolulu, coping with the alienation of coming back to a place that was once home, but is now altered, a strange mixture of the familiar and the foreign.

My family will be in New York in 12 hours. !!!!!!!!! Still have to do the laundry, buy cat litter, return videos, sweep and mop, and maybe clean the bathroom a little. Oh, and write at least five pages. I know the apartment isn't up to my mother's standards of cleanliness. Probably not up to anyone's standard of cleanliness, actually.

Think I'll wear my hair in pigtails today. That seems appropriate for repeat visits to LaGuardia in the evening. Why couldn't my mother and brother come in on the same flight, or at least the same time? That might have made things too easy.

Tomorrow we're doing Manhattan in a huge sweep. The DMV for Jason's replaced driver's license, the farmer's market in Union Square, Time Square and Rockefeller Center gawking for my mom. Maybe even the Japanese toy store for my brother.