My Four Muses of Summer
Summer is a season of imaginative recharge for me. A time when the muses grow strong and the furies of duty fall away. It is a time of family, hiking, hammocking, playgoing, and geekery.
My beloved family at Gasworks Park
Historically, it’s also been a time of hardcore writing binges. And this summer would have been the same, except for two things: 1) broke my ankle; 2) I’ve been waiting for my last beta readers; 3) I am a cinder.
1) BROKEN ANKLE
“So what?” I hear someone say. “Broken ankle is a perfect excuse to sit and write.” I myself though that, at first. Then I learned what a time-sucking, buzz-pinching frustration fest it is to be unable to perform even the smallest tasks–tasks that were unconscious to my whole-ankled self–like getting up on my crutches to refill my water bottle or fetch a book from upstairs. You can’t carry anything when you use crutches, so you have to don a pack or do an awkward armpit maneuver with one crutch while you hold something in your arm. I have learned also to simply throw things down the hall ahead and then crutched after, but you can’t do that with a cup of coffee or a computer.
Normally effortless things like rising to pee, fetch ice for my leg, return the ice pack to the freezer, or search for one of the myriad things I set down or misplaced on one of these interruptions becomes a sweaty and awkward epic crap wagon.
The one time I optimistically sat in a cafe for my usual six hour stint, my foot swelled up like a throbbing red meat baloon. I could have prevented that if i had stuck it up in the air like the red flag while balancing a computer on my lap at the cafe table, but, manners. And even at a table at home that is a really uncomfortable position.
2) YOU CAN’T RUSH THE BETA READERS
I’ve been waiting for the last of my beta readers, including the Closer (though maybe I should call him the Cleaner?), my blood brother in writing, Craig Holt–aka Ivuk Ivukson, whose kickass “jungle noir” novel, Hard Dog to Kill comes out this fall. Craig delivered his notes last week. I had begged him to make his comments on paper so I could revise on paper, a task much easier to do than on computer when one one’s leg is elevated above the heart. I await only one more beta reader.
COULDN’T I START REVISIONS BASED ON CRAIG’S COMMENTS?
Yes. I am now walking on my ankle boot. Things are much easier. But…
3) HONESTLY, I’M BURNT OUT
Too much Knave for too long, and my imagination feels like a wrung-out sponge. My body too, is a shambles, and not just the ankle.
THE POINT IS
I haven’t written much this summer, and that’s going to have to be okay. Instead, I have made it a Summer of Imaginative & Salubrious Recharge. While I wait for betas and healing, I’ve let my Four Muses have rein–the four muses of Family, Nature, Shakespeare, and Dreaming. Plus, I have returned to exercise.
