Hi and new writing

Hi everyone... well, it has been a long time. A quick update -- now living in Vermont, left the corporate world for a boarding school where I'm Director of Marketing and Communications. An interesting switch with its own challenges and rewards.

Still writing... working on a novel that feels manageable...Light Year 365. Quick synopsis: You meet a woman on the day she decides to kill herself. One unit of time is "That Day" and everything that happens. On that day, she decides she's going to recall every memory she has and determine why she remembers it. She hopes that her memories will shed light on the purpose of her life (hence light year.) Her memories are divided into three time periods and contained by a baseball term: Childhood = fundamentals, the lost middle years = Benched or Sacrifice (can't decide yet) and the previous year that leads up to the decision to kill herself = Full Count.  Every page is a self contained work. I love that I have to consider every word to make what I want to say fit...it's very disciplined. One challenge will be how to order the pages... for now, just writing as it comes.

And you guessed it... there will be 365 pages in the book. I'm trying to write a page a day (you'd think that wouldn't be so hard... LOL.)

I hope you enjoy the pages -- please feel free to leave feedback. This is the "first page" -- but by the time I get to the end I'm sure I'll write it differently. Thanks!!

Full Count – how memories work

            Life breaks away in pieces, shooting us to a distant place until we’re a glimmer in the darkness. Memories wash over my legs, stomach, and chest, lapping against my throat. I tilt my head back on the pillow. My chest rises and falls, heart thumping inside my head. I heave a panicked breath over the hummingbird flutter in my chest, fearing that focusing on the fist-size muscle pumping five quarts of blood a minute through my body may cause it to just as suddenly give out.  

            Being lost is cold and bleak like one of those grainy films from the first moon landing. There is nothing that can help you. You’re on your own. Tears hover, pressing beneath my eyes like stones. In those middle years between then and now, I felt nothing—devoid—every messy realization pushed down so I wouldn’t unravel.  Now, every feeling is magnified. Tears come at will. I see a therapist. She says I’m grieving, that it will take time. I gaze into her comforting brown eyes and resist the urge to take her hand. She has no idea. Time is the great Houdini. We lean in and watch closely for the trick, but its slight of hand is untraceable by mortal man.

            The moon streams through the window and illuminates my dresser; Castle Freeman’s novel, All That I Have, intensive therapy hand lotion, a vanilla bean candle, a pill bottle cast in amber glow. Together, the small blue pills have the power to transport me beyond the stars.

            I clasp my hands across my chest and close my eyes. What if everything we remember—what our brains choose to brand into our memory’s flesh—reveal the reason for our existence?