Dear Reader,
Word Raccoon was at the gym at 5:30 this morning.
Recently we were at the gym and met the new coach, who asked if that was the time we generally came to the gym.
WR laughed.
No, no, Angie. We go to the gym whenever the spirit moves us or whenever Word Mom (that’s me) puts on her shoes and says, “Let’s go!”
What WR is not telling you is that sleep is apparently optional nowadays. Since I was awake early and trying to solve the day like it was a damn equation, I let X = Go to the gym NOW.
Then I came home and addressed my craving for Vitamin C with neither the oranges I wanted nor the lemons our grocery delivery guy apparently thought were a brilliant substitution for avocados??? but pineapple and applesauce.
Meanwhile Herbert, the grumpy ol’ Muppet who tries to live rent-free in my head, started up his Muppet Show chortling and informed me that if I keep this up, I will end up doing zero writing today.
He knows that’s what happened yesterday.
Well. Sort of.
I did finish Hollywood, Ending right before my coffee date and questioned all my life choices, damn you, John Green. With about fifty pages to go, I thought I had it all figured out and worried I might be disappointed.
Reader, I did NOT have it figured out, and I was NOT disappointed.
I started the novel in Writing Craft Mode and had to get past hearing John’s voice instead of the characters’, but eventually I willingly followed Juniper and Kai wherever they wanted to take me. And they took me somewhere I was not expecting.
That is all I am saying. I am militantly anti-spoiler. (Usually. Sorry about the Their Eyes spoiler the other day.)
But what did I do yesterday instead of writing?
I accepted an offer for a free week of a newspaper archive.
Friends, this was a mistake.
Or maybe it wasn’t.
I went deeply down the rabbit hole and looked up anyone who had ever interested me.
I found newspaper ads from when my dad offered an attic/basement cleanout and hauling service when I was a young child. When I saw our old New Jersey phone number, I closed my eyes and discovered I could still recite it immediately, like I was in kindergarten memorizing it all over again.
I remembered how my dad took the secondhand items he didn’t want to end up in a landfill and, for a short time, opened a shop.
I remember spending time there, carefully sorting through the toys and playing with them. I can’t remember individual toys, but I remember the textures and colors: vinyl, blue, orange, wicker, polyester, pink.
Maybe that’s why I’m such a believer in donating things if they’re at all salvageable.
I found the announcement of my birth. I found the announcement of my mom’s release from the hospital after having me.
My mother was named when she was released from the hospital, but in the announcement of my birth, she was a “Mrs.”
I know that was the convention. But damn. She had literally just given birth to a human being and apparently did not merit a first name.
I found so many things. So many word goodies.
I treasure the details.
So no, I didn’t write yesterday.
But maybe I did something writers also have to do.
I seeded my imagination.
And apparently this morning I harvested a blog post from it.
Now Word Raccoon would like me to stop analyzing all of this and get ready for the penultimate day of writing at the café.
At this point, I think I’m beyond sadness about its closing and have arrived at: Okay. What’s next?
It’s not like life is asking my permission anyway. (On another day, when I’m more awake and more caffeinated, I will view this as an opportunity to rethink my writing spaces/places. Just not today.)
Drema