Like Lost Lovers?

You've heard me mention the permanent attachments I hold. Facebook has connected me with at least three people I pined deeply over (all before the age of 16) and a handful more for whom there was once a spark, or even brief fireworks.

Each connection, in spite of my (mostly) happily married status, brought a small thrill at the connection. Oh, don't worry. Nothing threatening. I just think the ashes continue to smolder, even when you are fully attending the main fire.

But that's not really what today's Blog is about. Psych!

I fell in love again yesterday. A letter from a man I'd never met, a note really... in email.

Dear Mr. Johnson,

I would like to see a 20 page sample of Confluence. Please mail it to the address below:

(note the cross-dressing thing is working for me. Hart is gender ambiguous... more blokey, just like the JK of a certain genius. I HATE that it matters, but suspect it does—women reading from both men and women equally, but men much less frequently crossing sexes for authors they read [/digressional rant for another day])

You got it! Poor CONFLUENCE, relegated to back burner since mid August, replaced in my heart by LEGACY, has won me over anew. Adrenaline rush. Butterflies. I AM SMITTEN!

He didn't ask for much, and process-wise, I think that was helpful. Had he asked for fifty or a hundred pages, I likely would have just printed an already prepared file. But my six weeks or reading blogs, participating in discussions, and writing another work had me feeling like I maybe had some tools to make that the hardest hitting 20 pages possible. I sat down to clean it. I shortened chapter 1 by 250 words, and unlike my LAST shortening, I feel like this made it better.

It compelled me to revisit CONFLUENCE once again. [note: accompanying map was an early iteration—I need to redo it, but my naked dancing has failed to call for my art muse again.]

The bad news is computer time is finite, so while I will continue WRITING LEGACY, probably the typing of LEGACY will take a hiatus. It may not be Mari-ready by the time Mari reaches Michigan. I should still be able to get the first 10-15 chapters done because typing, unlike editing, requires little thought, and sometimes I just prefer to disengage my brain, but my concentration time will be geared at a full clean up of CONFLUENCE.

I completely grasp that a first request for a partial is MILES away from a book contract, but to me it's like completing the swimming portion of a triathalon... it's only one mile out of 37, but it was the mile that might have killed me. And now it's over with.

MY BOOK IS NOT CRAP!!!!