A Good Week for Ideas, Inspiration, Inbox Folders and Projects
Some weeks are big good weeks, some are just ordinary good weeks. This last week or more has been a good one for lots of big and small reasons. They include strange and small art, some spring cleaning, a door opening moment and some wisdom from my mum. There have been ideas, some preparation for the future, and even a whole day spent in my pjs and dressing gown reading books, eating home made bread and only being nearly caught out once (for the pjs, not the bread-eating). Aah yes, the life of an author.
Artists at Work
Recycling or Layering?
There’s a restaurant/cafe not far from here that also doubles as an art gallery. The building it occupies was once a bank, then a ‘Sailor’s Rest’ and even features a chapel, complete with vaulted ceilings.
There are two big paintings, one in the front section, the second in a chapel. The chapel one features a charcoal drawing on old pianola role paper. The one in the main part of the restaurant is painted on sheet music.
Is it recycling? Or is it layering – giving an extra level of meaning to the work? I have no way of knowing really. But I liked the painting, so to me it doesn’t really matter. It opens the discussion about whether it is necessary to know the artist to understand the work fully, or whether the work must stand alone.
In the Smallest Room
There are some who would bin those empty rolls…but not in my house. This is what happens here…
and then…
Who says no artists live here?
Declutter and Springclean
Clearing out the Shed
We have a big shed. Big. It’s even got a big loft, for the storing of more treasures. Give it time, though, and the biggests of sheds seem to fill. As did ours. We spent the long weekend clearing it out and booking a hard rubbish collection. Yes, we did it in that order…sometimes you gotta seize the moment and do the paperwork later. We managed to empty and tidy and reorder without drawing blood. Close, but no blood.
It was a journey of discovery. Benches gave up their secret stashes, piles revealed lost treasures. The homemade go cart was uncovered, batteries stolen from the broken electric scooter and trips around the block made. The table tennis table had an outing, although as this used virtually all the regained space, it soon returned to its now more accessible spot. But the point is, once gained, the space has been in almost constant use. In the months (did I say years?) preceding, the shed, with its tools, raw materials etc had been used less and less until even the bikes struggled to find a place to sit.
Sometimes my brain gets a bit like that. Too many ideas, too much information, everything jostling for space, and none of it seems to be accessible or useful for anything. Take some time out, even a short time, and suddenly so much becomes clear. For me, swimming mindless laps with goggles and earplugs, or walking a familar route will provide the time to clear the clutter, file the keepers and work out just what the heck I’m doing.
Now if only I could find the words for what the doohickey needs for it to be fixed to the whatchamacallit…I’d be sorted.
The Inbox Folders
Anyone who knows me well will attest that my name and ‘spring cleaning’ are seldom linked in a sentence, unless it’s by something like ‘anathema’ or ‘what’s that?’. But in fact I have been spring cleaning this week.
My computer threw a hissy fit early in the week and refused to start. First aid measures failed and I high-tailed it to the computer shop, where some of the first aid was pronounced to have made things potentially worse. Computer man did some tests and pronounced the computer comatose rather than dead and sent me home with advice on how to avoid similar unwellnesses. Days later, computer data backed up and almost everything reloaded, I decided it was time to clean out the email. No one’s email folder should be THAT big.
Slowly and not quite surely, I’m culling the inbox folders. Some stuff has to stay but quite alot of it doesn’t. Already it’s leaner and quicker and it encourages me to continue. Next stop, some of those old ideas that just never developed…
And as for the other sort of spring cleaning, yes the house does need it, So what am I doing here? Doing what writers seem to be so good at. Procrastinating, of course.
Ideas and Projects Emerge
In the last little while I’ve been working on a few projects. One is a second story in what may one day be a series. The others are in the research stage. The first is a story set in early Melbourne, but not to do with gold. The second is around traditional stories. The third is the differences between sheep and goats.
The first draft of the contemporary story is almost complete. In all three of the other projects, research is proving a little more challenging. The local library provided the starts, and the internet helps but I think I’m going to need to spend some time in town at both the Immigration Museum and the State Library.
Should I be pleased that I’ve discovered an opportunity to fill a gap, or concerned that perhaps the interest/market for these topics isn’t there? Who knows? As my mother would say, time (and some more research) will tell.
I don’t know whether it is that the moon is in the right part of the sky or just one of those things, but this week has been a good one. Not crack-the-champagne-I’ve-sold-a-mega-series-for-millions good, but more quietly so.
It’s not even that everything has gone right – I forgot to take the folio on the train when that was the purpose of the trip. Â I’ve reworked three manuscripts and feel good about them all. Â I’ve read some wonderfully diverse ms from some writing colleagues.
I’ve even had some possible maybe perhaps ideas about a new project.
Roll on.
More Distractions and What will happen with the Dog Door?
Our dog is about two years old, about three years newer than our extensions. We didn’t factor in a dog door when we planned our extension, because at the time a dog wasn’t on the agenda. But now we have Emmi and she’s an inside/outside dog. For the past two years that’s meant that we’ve had to leave the back sliding door open. Good for her, not good for heating in winter, or cooling in summer. Particularly not good for keeping flies out. Because of the design, it’s been very difficult to work out how to incorporate a dog-door.
But Eureka! We found one. At the curiously named ‘Pig in Mud’ online store. But our troubles were not yet over. Our door is too tall for the standard ‘Patio Dog Door’ and too short for the tall door. Of course. It was even too tall for the standard door plus the extension piece. Sigh. Many phone calls, a custom extension and delivery woes later the door arrived yesterday. Magic. It fits easily, keeps the flies out. What more could we want?
Well, it’d be nice if the dog would use it. So far, she’ll use it if we lift the flap for her. But otherwise? No. So today, when she wants to go out, she calls me, as yesterday, the flies called me. To mangle a proverb…you can lead the dog to the flap, but double-sigh, you can’t make her go through it.
Fingers crossed that she works it all out.
There is a parallel to writing, but I’m not going to explore it. I’m too busy helping Madam in and out of the back door.
I will (try to) stop being impatient
Of course our dog managed to work out the dog door…mostly. Did it take long? Not really. Longer than I wanted it too? Yes. Sigh.
She occasionally forgets the dog door is there and comes to fetch us to open it for her, but mostly, she’s now zipping through the door like it was always there.
I will stop being impatient. I will stop being impatient
…………….all in good time……..
Wisdom from my Mum
My mum brought these roses when she and my dad came for tea last night. They were pruning and thought they were too good to just discard. I have to say I agree with that! They are lovely. Blousy, some of them almost overblown, but scented and glorious. They make me feel good just looking at them. Thanks Mum.
There are lots of inspirations, distractions, procrastination, good ideas, projects and frustrations for a writer. I will try to be more patient!
I’m grateful for this good week