Springtime Signs of Renewal

It's a springlike morning again today. It was a wee bit chilly as I went out to my car but at least today, the condensation wasn't frozen as it was yesterday. It's been getting up into the 70's over the past couple of days. I went walking over lunch and it seems to be a fact that Spring has arrived early. While I'll miss my hot-chocolatey, snow-covered days, I like the fact that I can open my patio doors and let the breeze come in to freshen up my living room. The grass is almost completely green again. It's such a contrast to a few weeks ago.

And, of course, it helps that I'm in a fantastic mood. I'm actually flooded with a ideas for new stuff to write at the moment which is something that hasn't happened in a while. I have a new novel teasing me in the back of my mind. I'm trying to decide if I want to make it the story of one of the anti-heroes, Gaz, from my latest novel Sleep (concidentally, the one that's a quarterfinalist in the ABNA contest and, seriously, I would love your reviews if you have time). It's a story that would work great for this character; it actually is eerily fitting him but to write it would mean that I'd have to redefine our world a little for him; do I make it a world where the impossible is real or do I let him live in a normal world and create that world for a completely new character? It's a good question and I've asked him to help me figure it out and while sometimes he doesn't stop babbling in my head, it's never when I want him to talk. He's always a little contrary, that one. He's fiercely loyal to the people he cares about and hates everyone else. He cares about maybe 3 people in the world. If I hadn't already written about literary schitzophrenia, I'm sure that would sound a little batty. However, I can't help it. It just happens.

I always get a little giddy around the start of Spring; it's always been my most fruitful writing time. When I look back, I think, honestly, most of my novels have started in late winter/early spring and been finished in the autumn. I never thought about it before but usually I'm at the rereading/editing stage when Daylight Savings Time ends.

Which means, being that it's spring, it's right to look at starting something new. It is, after all, a time of renewal of life, hope and nature and, for those of us who do so, writing. This weekend, I plan on cleaning thorougly; the problem with the new, longer days and brighter sunshine is that dust and smudges are a little more visible and you realize that there's probably a reason people do actually spring clean.

I love the change in seasons; everything always seems so fresh even though sometimes the transition is so subtle. The grass has slowly greened up and is now starting to show it's spring colours; thes snowdrops are already blooming, the daffodils, hyancinths and crocuses have pushed up and are getting ready to introduce us to the new season. For my part, I feel as though the writer part of me that has been hibernating, been hiding from starting something new, is ready to start again. I think maybe I need those darker periods in my life to let my writing lie dormant for a while, to allow myself to recharge. If I could just learn to accept that there are ebbs and flows of writing without trying to push myself all the time, I think it would be easier. I think part of me is afraid that, like with exercise, if I stop, I won't start up again. But I don't think that's likely. Exercise is a necessary evil if I want to feel better about myself; writing is just necessary in order for me to be...me.

I'm looking forward to starting something new, to writing with the breeze blowing into my room, the smell of the springtime in the air. I'll keep you posted on how it goes.

Happy Wednesday.

Signs of Spring

It's a gloomy, dark Monday morning. I've already complained about not liking the earlier Daylight Savings Time. All I'll say is that it's been a week since the clocks moved forward and it's not any easier to get out of bed.

However, Spring is almost here. In fact, on Saturday, it will be the official first day of Spring. While I've enjoyed my first winter back in the Midwest after eight years, I am now looking forward to Spring. I went to my parents' house this weekend. They live out in the country and have a lovely big yard to walk around. The weather was mild enough that I got to take a few walks around it. Whereas a few weeks ago, the landscape was a bleached, muted sea of yellows and greys, there is definite signs of Spring creeping through.

I noticed that the grass is starting to subtly start to green up. It's hard to see unless you're looking for it but under the surface of dried winter-worn grass, there is a flash of green beginning to push through. Soon enough the lawn will be a fresh new green but its happening so covertly it's hard to notice unless you're looking for it.

The flower beds are starting to renew themselves too. Green shoots of daffodils are pushing up through the dirt, getting ready to bloom just in time for Easter. Crocuses and hyacinths are also getting ready to add their purples, whites and oranges to the sea of yellow daffodils. I love daffodils, their happy yellows a promise that warm days lies ahead. Soon the garden will be completely alive. I especially love my parent's garden in spring and summer. There's always something to eat. My absolute favourite is picking tomatoes from the garden and eating them when they're still warm from the sun. They always taste so much better than the ones you buy at supermarkets.

The birds are starting to build their nests. I watched one intrepid sparrow fly to the same spot at least eight times, a different piece of construction material for her nest in his mouth each time. It's nice to see them build their nests somewhere safe from the brutal wind. Too often I've come across nests that have been victims of strong gusty windstorms and the eggs lie broken on the ground.

I also almost got divebombed by some sparrows yesterday. My parents have this little shed in which they store their flowerpots and statuary during the winter. One year, we went in there only to discover the corpses of at least 12 sparrows. It was a little eerie. This year, I went in there to see what type of pots my parents had and discovered several sparrows frantically trapped in there. They seemed a little giddy from panic and thus, they flew at my head. It was, naturally, rather alarming. They didn't seem to know what to do to free themselves. The poor things kept throwing themselves at the same window, the 'clunk' as their heads hit the glass quite heartbreaking. I finally tried to herd them towards the open door and after one last kamikaze mission to fly into the window, two of the three birds found the open door.

That left one sparrow. This one seemed to have flown into the window one too many times or it wasn't that bright to begin with. It didn't want to leave. I felt bad for it, knowing that the safety of the shed was probably quite comforting to a little tiny bewildered creature but I also knew that if it didn't get out, it would die. I spent ages trying to herd that bird out. Finally, when I had my back turned, I think it found the open door. I didn't actually see it leave but I couldn't hear its thin, reedy chirp anymore and I think that means it had been freed. The thing is, we don't even know how the birds got in there in the first place. I've resolved to check that shed every time I'm home, just in case more birds get trapped.

It was nice to be able to walk outside. It's very muddy at the moment, boglike in some places but being able to survey the garden and not be freezing while you're doing it is a treat. I know we can still have some more winter weather; around here the danger of frost doesn't pass until early may. Yet even if we do have snow, it won't stick around. Spring is on its way, there's no doubt about it. Even if it is still pitch black in the mornings, the days are getting longer, the nights just a little shorter. Once the daffodils bloom, Spring is here.

I'm looking forward to it.

Happy Monday.

Icy Days and Mondays

Once more, 'tis a Monday. It feels like a Monday already and I haven't even been up that long. When I went out to start my car this morning, I realized that the parking lot of my building had turned into an ice-rink overnight. It was warmer yesterday and a lot of ice started to melt. Naturally, since the temperature dropped below freezing last night, it all froze again. This makes it very difficult to wear my heeled boots that I'm wearing 'round the office this week. Since our company is being sold, our potential buyer (and, hopefully, employer) is in our offices for the next week so we're forbidden to dress the way we normally dress which is to say that we can't just wear jeans and sweatshirts. We're having to look nice and, for me, that means my heeled boots.

So, as has been my habit, I wore my snow boots to start my car and to drive to work. Once again, I ran into my stray. He was not ice-skating around the parking lot. If he had been, I might have been more pleased to see him. The problem is, I can't get away from him. There are at least 25 people in my building. The only one I ever see is him. Don't get me wrong, he's perfectly nice but he's also very friendly. He lives with three other young men and from the sounds of it, they're a little frat-boy-ish, at least judging from the noise that comes from upstairs. They're young. Very young, compared to me. On Saturday, I was coming home and it was almost 12:45 a.m. He was just going out with his buddies and asked me to join them.

Now, it was a nice invitation but here's the thing. I'm in my thirties. Getting in at 12:45 a.m., for me, is really late. I like to go to bed at a decent time and wake up fairly early. I'm not a night owl anymore. Needless to say, I declined. Also, now I feel old. Really old.

My ice-skating stray also likes to knock on my door to see if I want to go get coffee. Again, it's kind of him but being a rather private person, I'm not big on drop-ins. I like my privacy. I lived in a college dorm in which it was normal to knock on a neighbours' door to see if they wanted to do something. Now I'm an adult, I tend to like to have my uninterrupted time at home to do what I want. If I plan something, that's different but when I'm home, I'm home and unless it's someone I actually want to see, I don't like surprise knocks on my door. And yes, I am aware that this makes me into an official Old Grump but, well, it's true.

I should probably defend my grumpiness and remind y'all that I call myself a writer which means I...say it with me now....write. When I'm home and I'm writing, I don't like to be interrupted. It's difficult to get a flow going when there's people around and even a friendly knock on the door can be a stumbling block.

Yesterday, I spent a very long time getting my manuscript ready for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest. It was finished but I had to give it a polish and since I never could hold of my edited hard copy, I had to do it from scratch. On the plus side, I'm really happy with how it's turned out and I think it's definitely my most polished novel. It's the last one I finished which is quite a contrast because I had originally intended to enter the first novel I ever wrote and until two weeks ago, I'd been editing that manuscript like crazy only to discover that losing 15,000 words was just not going to be possible to meet the contest rules. It's amazing how much my writing has changed over the last eight years. It's definitely more mature and I use bigger words now, take the time to describe things rather than rush at the story like there's no tomorrow. I'm not sure what's best, only that I love all of the stuff I've written, especially when it's been edited.

I'm hoping to get it entered tonight. Since I had to get a pitch ready, I got to tweak an already existing query letter and, I have to say, it's better. It means I have another letter to send to agents in hopes that just one of them wants to take a chance on me. If not, well, I suppose I'll just keep trying and hope that the urge to jump off a cliff doesn't strike me during the rejection process. The timing of those cliff-jumping urges can be incredibly bad.

Seriously, though, I'm going to try and be more positive for the rest of the day, even though it's a Monday. It's a new week, a new month, actually. It's the shortest month of the year which means I'm a little closer to my next paycheck and we're a little closer to watching the daffodils bloom amidst the melting snow. As much as I love my snow, there's something cleansing about watching the final heavy layer melt and reveal the refreshed world beneath. As a child, those days were marked by getting to wear knee socks with my skirts rather than the heavy winter tights my mum liked me to wear. As an adult, they're marked by the freshness of a spring breeze, the green of the grass and the buds on the trees.

Yet for now, there's a chance of snow tonight and I'm hoping it will make for more traction on the ice outside my building. In the meantime, I can always hope to find my stray ice-skating outside.

Hey, there's nothing wrong with hope, right?

Happy Monday.