Writing The Journey

I’ve heard it said that writing is a journey, but what does that mean exactly? Does that mean you might as well prepare for an arduous, uphill trip? Or maybe they simply mean writing is like a marathon race, a long, slow road, with stops along the way to grab a cup of water?

So far, my own journey is more like a surprise, a box you open, and inside isn’t a prize, but another box, and you open it, to find yet another box.  And another, all of them increasingly smaller and smaller, until the very last box is so small your fingers and thumb dwarf the teeny box.

But you open it anyway, because Pandora lives in each of us, that need to know what is on the inside. And inside the box is a seed, a kernel, perhaps even a bit of stardust. But just enough to keep us going, to keep writing,  keep trying.

Have you opened your boxes yet?  And when you came to the very last one, what did you find?

A Generation Gone

Dad and Mum with one of their race horses. Circa 1954.

These last few days I've been at my mother's small apartment, going through photos and other belongings...all her little treasures.

Even the most mundane of things, an address book, held hidden glimpses into my mother's daily life. With each new discovery, I felt both excitement and sadness. Today is the final moving day.

All her precious items, now boxed and marked, must be moved to someone's house or garage, to be sifted through yet again. My unasked for winter project is now scanning all her photos into my computer so I can burn CD's for all the family. Some I will print out and others will require special care and retouching, like a rare photo of my great grandmother I didn't realize mum had kept safe in one such album.

As I looked through some 50 photo albums and 75 envelope packets of photos, I came to a harsh realization. My mother was the very last of her generation in my family and now my sisters and I are the oldest generation.

I thought of what my mother must have felt as her sisters and brothers passed before her, her husband passing too. And I looked upon my sisters and knew we too would go through the same thing, as each of us passes into shadow and leaves behind the next generation. I can only hope that they will be as proud of the long line they come from as I have been, and that they share more than the physical family traits passed down through the centuries. I hope they also share the magick and the love.

Daze Go By

 I am in the writing cave, feverishly working on a story that should've been finished weeks ago, but between mum in and out of hospital and other personal problems, time simply slipped away and now I am hustling my backside to recoup lost time—wah! Also kinda worried. My next youngest sister is undergoing surgery today and I am fretting about her. I keep looking at the clock and wondering when my brother-in-law or nephew will call me and tell me she's in the recovery room and okay.

Yes, my focus is divided. But deadlines are deadlines and I hate missing one, so I'd better get my mind back on my characters and stop looking at the clock. But before I go, could you help me? I need to refocus and that means I need someone to crack the whip.

Ahh, much better. lol. Thanks. :D