The Stuff of Summer
I made my first pesto ever, out of basil from our community garden. We have amethyst basil and green basil. So I call my pesto amethyst-and-emerald pesto. It is better than eating jewels.
Last Thursday we went to a gathering at the community garden, met some other gardeners. I felt slightly sheepish there, as I'd only ever gone a few times. My mother's really the greenwitch of our dynamic duo. I have a Burnettian fondness for gardens. That is, an impractical, literary, with-a-Broadway-musical-soundtrack affection that does not translate to scraping grubs off the squash and getting hellishly muddy.
However.
The Westerly Community Gardeners are adorable. And they make good food. And REALLY good iced tea. (This was spearmint and lavender and chamomile sun tea. THERE IS NO BETTER DRINK IN THE WORLD.)
And one of the gardeners, an older woman who has trained morning glories up a trellis, and who'd heard me singing the last time we were there, asked me, when were all gathered at table and eating, to sing for them.
SING FOR THEM! On a summer night, eating organic food. JUST LIKE THAT.
So I did. I dithered for a while, wondering what to sing. "Mostly I know Broadway musicals and folk."
"Folk!" someone yelled.
So I pulled "Mr. Fox" out because it's relatively short and I could remember most of the verses. And I hadn't even remembered there's a lot about GARDENS in it, and right away too, so it was immediately appropriate.
What's more, it was appreciated. And I felt that, while I might not be any good with grubs, I am pretty good for five minute's entertainment. It's what I do best. It's what I do RIGHT.
And I was happy.
***
I am finished re-drafting Bone Swans of Amandale and have emailed it to the Injustice League. My brain is creaking back into Story Brain. Hello and welcome, you! You stranger! It's been so long! You took your sweet time refueling, didn't you? Reading all those novels, watching all those movies, going to bed earlier than the curfews most children under 12 have imposed upon them!
I think of what I accomplished the first few months I was here, and how little I accomplished in the last few months, and how I seem to be moving back into the mindset of productivity, and then I throw up my hands and toss around the word "cyclical" to explain my own process to myself, and berate myself for a lack of discipline. One can't have cyclical discipline, can one? Isn't discipline, by its nature, a stomper on the neck of nature?
Bah.
***
Three friends are very much on my mind. I've got to get my head out of my butt and start paying closer attention to them, because I think they're out there, needing me, and here I am, self-concerned and nose-drowned in pesto. Postcards ought to be sent, at the very least.
But boy. The summer has been very, very, very busy.
***
P.S. ISN'T THIS POEM BEAUTIFUL???
http://strangehorizons.com/2012/20120730/ness-p.shtml
Mari Ness, I salute you.
ETA: When I asked her (on her own blog, in comments) about the myth that inspired it, she said:
There's a couple of conflicting versions of the myth, but it basically goes something like this:
Danaus, who had fifty daughters, was forced to marry them to the fifty sons of his brother, Egyptus. (Apparently both brothers had a lot of wives.) In the version of the myth I used for this poem, the fifty sons were raiding the coastlines (this doesn't appear in all versions); in other versions they were defending the coastlines and demanded payment.
Whichever story you believe, Danaus did not want his daughters to wed the sons, so he gave every daughter a knife and told her to kill her husband on her wedding knight. All but one did. (In that case, that husband agreed to spare his wife's virginity.)
As punishment for murdering their husbands, the sisters were forced to spend eternity carrying leaking jugs of water to a basin that continually leaks. They will never be free until they fill the basin.
***
P.P.S. I just finished reading the most wonderful poetry collection in order to blurb it. Rest assured I will shout about it from the rooftops when the time comes. BLIBBITTY-BLOBBITY-BLURB!
***
Last Thursday we went to a gathering at the community garden, met some other gardeners. I felt slightly sheepish there, as I'd only ever gone a few times. My mother's really the greenwitch of our dynamic duo. I have a Burnettian fondness for gardens. That is, an impractical, literary, with-a-Broadway-musical-soundtrack affection that does not translate to scraping grubs off the squash and getting hellishly muddy.
However.
The Westerly Community Gardeners are adorable. And they make good food. And REALLY good iced tea. (This was spearmint and lavender and chamomile sun tea. THERE IS NO BETTER DRINK IN THE WORLD.)
And one of the gardeners, an older woman who has trained morning glories up a trellis, and who'd heard me singing the last time we were there, asked me, when were all gathered at table and eating, to sing for them.
SING FOR THEM! On a summer night, eating organic food. JUST LIKE THAT.
So I did. I dithered for a while, wondering what to sing. "Mostly I know Broadway musicals and folk."
"Folk!" someone yelled.
So I pulled "Mr. Fox" out because it's relatively short and I could remember most of the verses. And I hadn't even remembered there's a lot about GARDENS in it, and right away too, so it was immediately appropriate.
What's more, it was appreciated. And I felt that, while I might not be any good with grubs, I am pretty good for five minute's entertainment. It's what I do best. It's what I do RIGHT.
And I was happy.
***
I am finished re-drafting Bone Swans of Amandale and have emailed it to the Injustice League. My brain is creaking back into Story Brain. Hello and welcome, you! You stranger! It's been so long! You took your sweet time refueling, didn't you? Reading all those novels, watching all those movies, going to bed earlier than the curfews most children under 12 have imposed upon them!
I think of what I accomplished the first few months I was here, and how little I accomplished in the last few months, and how I seem to be moving back into the mindset of productivity, and then I throw up my hands and toss around the word "cyclical" to explain my own process to myself, and berate myself for a lack of discipline. One can't have cyclical discipline, can one? Isn't discipline, by its nature, a stomper on the neck of nature?
Bah.
***
Three friends are very much on my mind. I've got to get my head out of my butt and start paying closer attention to them, because I think they're out there, needing me, and here I am, self-concerned and nose-drowned in pesto. Postcards ought to be sent, at the very least.
But boy. The summer has been very, very, very busy.
***
P.S. ISN'T THIS POEM BEAUTIFUL???
http://strangehorizons.com/2012/20120730/ness-p.shtml
Mari Ness, I salute you.
ETA: When I asked her (on her own blog, in comments) about the myth that inspired it, she said:
There's a couple of conflicting versions of the myth, but it basically goes something like this:
Danaus, who had fifty daughters, was forced to marry them to the fifty sons of his brother, Egyptus. (Apparently both brothers had a lot of wives.) In the version of the myth I used for this poem, the fifty sons were raiding the coastlines (this doesn't appear in all versions); in other versions they were defending the coastlines and demanded payment.
Whichever story you believe, Danaus did not want his daughters to wed the sons, so he gave every daughter a knife and told her to kill her husband on her wedding knight. All but one did. (In that case, that husband agreed to spare his wife's virginity.)
As punishment for murdering their husbands, the sisters were forced to spend eternity carrying leaking jugs of water to a basin that continually leaks. They will never be free until they fill the basin.
***
P.P.S. I just finished reading the most wonderful poetry collection in order to blurb it. Rest assured I will shout about it from the rooftops when the time comes. BLIBBITTY-BLOBBITY-BLURB!
***