The Next New Thing…
“Summer Daydream”Taken August 9, 2008 with Canon PowerShot A550
“They’re fictional
characters,
Mom. Fictional
characters. Am
I getting
through to you
at all…?”Lots happening…
Ky’s finally sleeping again, and is back to school for her morning classes, which is good. I’m assured by the school that she’ll manage to get those credits without a problem – music class, which is hardly surprising (the principal tells me she’d have passed that one based on her talent, never mind that she doesn’t bother with any assignments – I don’t know whether to be proud or pissed off), and geography. Now, that surprises me.
Two credits is better than no credits, though, I guess, isn’t it? I’ll try to be proud.
My own sleeping is not happening again, now. I’m a little concerned about my job. I’m getting there, but it’s difficult. Luckily, I don’t have to drive to get there, so no lives are in danger – unless I blow the place up, but there are safeguards in place against idiots, so maybe that’s not such a big worry…
Much of what keeps me awake is my upcoming legal fight – I can’t get in to see my new lawyer until the second week of June. The lawyer that originally authored my separation agreement won’t touch this problem. I worry that it’s because it’s an “unwinnable” case, but the new lawyer will only say that not handling this new/old problem is more likely to cause a problem for the old lawyer.
I wasn’t sure what that meant, and when I asked, I was only told that the old lawyer “should be taking care of this.” Wonder if that means I can sue the old one? Moot point; I won’t. I think by the time this is all over and done with I’ll be pretty sick of lawyers…
Other things that are keeping me awake are the interrupted plans I had. A few nights ago, I got up out of bed to revamp my “Big List o’ Life”. It looks like this now:
1) Get out from under this house. If I can’t get free and clear of it, I will be fighting to get The Sire free and clear of it, so that I can be free and clear to sell it. If I can’t sell it, I’ll be not only more in debt than I’ve ever been in my life, but adding more and more debt borrowing money so I can tear the F-ing place down in order to sell the property.
2) Find more lucrative employment. This one I have to kind of work on at the same time as #1, obviously. I love my job. A lot. The money sucks. A whole lot.
I tried working two money-sucking jobs over Christmas last year, and all I managed to do was burn myself out. I sell the odd article online (ghost writing mostly) and the articles are fast and dirty, writing-wise, but the money isn’t really worth the time I have to put in to research some of them to get them done by deadline. It leaves little time for the writing I want to be doing. Please see #’s 4 and 5….
3) Get out of debt. Scary, when I don’t know how deep the hole will be in a couple more months. I refuse to consider filing for bankruptcy, as some folks seem to think I ought to do.
“You can start over with a clean slate…”
Bankruptcy feels like cheating to me. It feels like I’d be saying, “I don’t want to pay this off; it’s too big. Make it disappear.” And the debt would really almost kind of just disappear. Poof! Feels like stealing.
4) Finish the latest novel. That’s that “hard” one I mentioned a while back. It’s still got a lot of the same elements that the sitcom had in it, but the entire pilot plot has pretty much disappeared, along with a character or two. I’ve kept the bare bones of what would have been the first season. I tried to change the main characters’ names, but they just will not be renamed. All I’ve managed to do is steal away their last names completely.
I had a lot of false starts trying to pick this project back up again. There was a time that I ate, slept and breathed it. That turned into boozing and smoking it, and I think I just wanted it to go away. Working on it kept bringing up nasty, bad thoughts that I didn’t want to think.
I lamented about this to Ky one day, and she surprised me by telling me I should be getting it done and over with. When I told her I didn’t want to listen/watch/write my main characters anymore, she rolled her eyes.
I told her I’d noticed she wore the one and only promotional t-shirt made for the project all the time, even though she’d once told me she was glad it was dead in the water so what’s up with that, huh?! And then, she made me laugh by paraphrasing Holden McNeil: “They’re fictional characters, Mom. Fictional characters. Am I getting through to you at all…?”
So I’m working on it. And it gets a little easier (and a little closer to done) every time I sit down to it.
5) My blog is turning back into a place to air my grievances, and although that’s part of what it’s for, I really want to get back to telling the Ruby stories (there’s a ton of them), and The Father Chronicles (there’s a ton of those left, too).
And I talked to my Mom today, and she’s feeling a little lost and lonely without my Dad. She said it’s gotten worse, lately, and she’s been rereading his letters from World War II. At first, they made things worse, but now she finds them a comfort and is glad she saved them…
Wait a minute…. “You have letters from Dad during the War…?”
“Yep.”
All his letters…?”
“Yep.”
Wow. I didn’t know this….
“Can I read them…?”
“Sure!”
“Really?!”
“Yep.”
“Ummmm…… can I blog them…?”
“Yep.”
So as soon as I can get myself down to Teeny-Tiny Town, I will have a new category here: Dear Maude…
6) My imminent move. Far, far away.
I’m not certain how imminent it is, now, considering this new and ugly turn of events that may (shudder) bankrupt me (not if I can possibly avoid it), but I will be moving to Vancouver and will be there for at least a year, once I manage it.
I’m going to be going back to school (yes, again), in an accelerated screenwriting program at the Vancouver Film School. I chose this program, because a Canadian school somehow seems more “doable” than trying to get into one in the States – although I’d rather be in the States. I have more friends there. 
It’s going to cost me a mint, though. I don’t know where the money’s going to come from, yet, but then again, I bought the Prissy-Van with money I didn’t have yet, and so far, so good, she’s still mine. I’ll manage this. Somehow. Gulp…*
I didn’t think I’d be able to convince The Evil Hypnotist to go with me, so was working out an alternative arrangement for her, but when I told her about it (actually, I let it slip in a moment of upset over this house business), she surprised hell out of me by telling me she would love a change of scenery. It’s amazing how fast things change.
She could never understand me suddenly wanting to travel. Never wanted to leave this town. This was home, dammit. Turns out “home” was where her father was. And her father isn’t her father in her eyes, anymore.
She thinks maybe a year across the country for us will either smarten him up, or give her a way to realize that life does go on without him. I’m not sure if those are her own words, or if some of it comes from her new counselor, but either/or, I think this new adviser is making a difference, for both Ky and me.
I don’t do anything but sit out in the waiting room and read old copies of “Psychology Today”, but every now and then I hear the most spectacular laughter coming through the door, and I realize it’s coming from my kid. It helps me realize that we’re going to be okay after this crap is all over – however it ends.
Random Song-for-the-Day: “Black Coffee” – Ella Fitzgerald
See Les Becker’s
“Vistas” Gallery!
On this date in a whole nother year, I wrote...
- Colour Me Embarrassed... - 2008
- Beam Me Up, Scotty... - 2007
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May 23rd, 2009 at 6:14 pm
Glad to hear the news about Ky, a little bit of weight off your shoulders at least.
Fingers crossed for the new lawyer!
Les Says: Thanks, Jayne – yeah, it’s a weight that I didn’t know I had. I’ve had “Ky concerns” for longer than I care to admit. I guess I got used to that extra weight. Hearing that laugh, though; the kind of laugh I don’t think I’ve heard out of her in YEARS…! Man, that was an incredible “freedom” kind of feeling.
May 24th, 2009 at 7:07 pm
Hey, Les,
Don’t know how you found my blog, but wanted to write back to you because, although you can’t possibly know this, my maiden name is Becker. I’m also writing fiction and have a few letters my Dad wrote my Mom during the war (nothing worth blogging about though). I’ll be interested to see what you have to say about your Mom’s letters.
Les Says: Wow! How cool is THAT?!
“Becker” would have been my married name, had I married the guy… instead I took my daughter’s for my own. Thankfully. Ahem…*
I’m going to post my Dad’s letters here on the blog. I have a couple of WWII buffs that may find them interesting – not sure if it’ll be a weekly or not, but I do need blog fodder while I try to whittle out time for the “real” writing.
Found your blog through Entrecard, BTW – and I’m glad you clicked back, Patricia. It’s always interesting to find people with something in common with me. Hope to see you here or at your space more often…
May 25th, 2009 at 7:13 am
Well betch, at least you have a list of what’s sitting in front of you. I’d be doing well to list some stuff out, but then I’d have to look at it and realize it is there much as I’d like to imagine it’s not.
Vancouver sounds like a good time. Isn’t it funny how with this blog I just move with you. Yeah! I want to see Vancouver, do it!
Les Says: See, I was thinking exactly that… I can get away from the people I don’t want to be bothered with, and stay just as close to the ones I care for. Granted, it’d be down to phone calls with my Mom and Ruby, but, like I say – it’s only for a year.
Maybe.
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