Good-bye to what has been one of the busiest months I can remember (among ones that didn’t involve adding members to the household, anyway). I was somewhat startled when I sat down this morning to review the calendar and write up my monthly look-back. Events two weeks ago seem much more distant, the lensing effect of many things crammed into a short period of time.
Today, however, things are quietly balanced. All of the chores I intended to do today are done. Dinner is marinating in the fridge. I finished reading Kafka on the Shore this morning, and while I would like very much to talk about it, I also feel like I ought to read it again before I even try. There’s a lot going on in that book, and I don’t think I understood half of it.
I am making a cup of lemon tea, which I will have in the handsomely glazed mug I bought from LJ Cohen at Boskone. While the water heats, I have been dipping in and out of Roger Zelazny’s Isle of the Dead, a book I haven’t visited in a long while. I don’t remember anything about it, though I do remember the short story he wrote in the same world. The younger children are off doing something edifying with their father for the afternoon. Ordinarily this means that silence reigns in the kitchen, but I am in the mood for something to listen to, and the TV is broken, so I have some music on. The weather is indecisive.
Once I hit Publish on this entry, I’ll poke at the novel for a little while — 54,040 words right now. I wrote three whole sentences last week, but I think I know what to do now. I have a volunteer project to work on this evening, and some knitting to do–I had a promising job conversation earlier this week, so with luck I will soon have a deadline for finishing this gift.
Events in the world continue, of course, but this afternoon I am going to be quiet.
R Jean Stevenson 