My biggest Enchantia snippet so far

It's about time I answer that burning question that many of you must be having - or not, but I'll ask it anyway - what kind of name is Enchantia? I think you'll get an idea through this scene:

“First of all I should tell you that my name isn’t really Megan. Megan is the boring girl that lives in a stupid house with my Mom and stepdad and spoiled little sister.” Her voice had gotten shakier with each word, and she took a moment to take a deep, calming breath. “But my Enchantian name is Mialee,” and she looked around at The Woods. “Mialee is so much more.”
“Mialee?” I asked after a few silent seconds. “So you’re like a whole other person in Enchantia?”
“Not a whole other person,” she said, and looked at me again with those wide eyes. “I’m always Mialee...that’s the real me. ”
“Oh,” I muttered.
It was then I realized how little I knew Megan. I wasn’t just surprised or incredulous anymore. I looked into her emerald green eyes, and saw all these sparks, all these mysteries.
“Well...Mialee is a beautiful name. Should I call you Mialee?”
“Only when we're in Enchantia, because everything having to do with Enchantia is highly secret. If word ever leaked out about Enchantia--you don’t want to know.”
“I see…but we? What do you mean, we?”
“Well, an Enchantian sorceress can make a regular person into a sorcerer or sorceress through a special ceremony,” Megan said, and then she grinned. “Would you like to be a sorceress?”
It’s not every day you get asked to be a sorceress, so I thought about it for a minute, twisting my finger through a piece of hair. I looked into her eyes again, and I was caught.
“OK, I guess.”
The game was beginning to sound like it might be fun. But it was more than that. I wanted to know this girl who had become my best friend. I really wanted to know her. And I would be lying to myself if I didn’t also admit that I was thirsting for some excitement in my life.

**

Three posts to the deadline and this week has been alright- somewhere around four hours, I think. If I spent every minute of that time being productive that would be great, but I spend a lot of time sipping on coffee or tea (I write at Starbucks) and spacing out, or reading through a chapter ten times trying to come up with ideas. But I don't leave unless I feel like I've accomplished something, so I suppose it's coming along. And I hope I'm making sense as it's been an exhausting week and all I want to do right now is crawl under my desk and sleep. Have any of you seen that Seinfeld episode where George makes this whole sleeping compartment under his desk? That's like my dream. Anyway, have a nice weekend.

A cat article by the catgirl herself

I wrote this article a few years ago, and sent it to some cat magazine. It was rejected, because the magazine doesn't approve of cats going outside unless they're on a leash (cats? On a leash?). And after reading the article again after all this time, I'm sure it also could've been written better, but how could I not share my one cat article with you?

A Cat Who Thinks He’s A Dog?

My cat, Hobbes, is a real character.

A long haired tuxedo, who I found in my childhood as a stray, he has since been an indoor-outdoor cat. I have a dog, Willy, too - a long haired collie mix found by my brother as a stray (we have a talent for attracting strays in our family). Like many an owner, he is taken for walks- usually by me and my father, and my mother when I'm not in town.

I can’t remember exactly the first time Hobbes began tagging along when I walked Willy.

At first, he’d go in our direction, though usually keep his distance, running behind the bushes of various neighbors’ lawns.

This only happened infrequently, but then a few years passed and my family moved from Dayton, Ohio proper to the suburb of Centerville. We kept Hobbes in the condo, much to his agony, for the required six weeks.

And then, it started again.

I’m not sure how long after, because I was away at college, but he started going for walks with Willy, more and more regularly. By the time I had graduated and arrived home, he had a set routine, which continues to the present.

During the day he usually does not come along the whole way. He stops at a certain point, before an area that is a little noisier and busier. As soon as Willy and I turn around and head back, Hobbes comes back with us, jogging along when he gets a little behind.

All this is the talk of the neighborhood, or at least of the complex of condos where I live. People see me walking Willy, and then Hobbes comes trotting along a few feet back, and they can’t help but chuckle, or tell me how funny they think Hobbes is.

But it doesn’t end there.

At night, Hobbes gets braver. He’ll often try to come along for the walk the whole way, because it's much quieter. And when Willy and I get too fast for him, he’ll do something almost as funny as going along for the walk: meow, rather pathetically. From the sound of him, you’d think that he ran up a tree, or was in some kind of dyer trouble. And though it is funny, when I actually hear him meow I can’t help but pity him.

Is there an official explanation for all of this?

“It is uncommon for cats to go for walks with their owners,” explains T.J. Dunn Jr., DVM. “But for some reason, there are a few cats that do enjoy tagging along. In your cat's case, he may become slightly anxious about being so far from home base, and start to lag behind. Then, seeing itself somewhat isolated from his ‘family’, the cat vocalizes during a heightened state of anxiety. This could be looked at as a mild case of separation anxiety and the kitty is seeking contact and security with his ‘family.’”

So there you have it: a cat with separation anxiety. And though the vet didn’t say it, must think he’s a dog.

**

That was back in the days when I was in Ohio a lot more often, and Willy was alive. But Hobbes is still kicking and has taken on some of Willy's other ways, like begging for food in the same spot Willy used to. They definitely have some kind of strange connection. I miss Hobbes...here in New York the only pet in my apartment is my roommate's hamster. Not quite the same (though I freely admit he is very cute in his hamster way).

Four more posts to the deadline, and this week has not been quite so productive. I didn't even make it to three hours. But I plan to make up for lost time over the long weekend. Have a great Presidents Day!

Happy Friday

So here's another Journey of a Year poem (see my first poetry post for more details). I'm not exactly proud of this one, but since I've put off posting till Friday, I can't help myself…

Office, October 24,
10:46 AM

Friday

Every day is a countdown
to the day you come.
Like long lost friends
we embrace each other,
and I chide you for taking
so long to arrive.
You lead me to the gates
of freedom called
Weekend, then turn
your back and flee,
yet you’ll come back,
like a regretful lover,
and we’ll embrace again.

Deadline is five posts away. I spent about six hours revising this week, which for me is really good, as I don't have much of an attention span left after work. But like you care. As Austin Powers would say, it's almost the weekend, baby. So have a smashing, groovy time!

Another Enchantia post, plus a confession

I just looked at my last post again and wow, I'm the biggest dork. Here I am trying not to be literary, and yet within two sentences I manage to use the words theme, metaphor and carpe diem. Why did I stop there? While I was at it, I should have thrown in some other lit terms, like alliteration, simile, or one of my personal favorites, onomatopoeia (and I only spelled that right because of spell check).

But in all seriousness - if that's possible now - my next Enchantia snippet. And sorry, this is a really small one, but there are more posts to come (and if you want a better explanation see my first Enchantia post). I just wrote this last week, and want it to be on the page before the first chapter. It doesn't have much to do with the plot; more to clearly establish who the narrator is:

She walks off the path, between the trees, clutching an old book in her hand. A young woman of seventeen, her childhood lurks in every shadow of this forest, every whispering leaf and blade of grass. She wears a yellow sundress, and her long brown hair ripples in the wind as the memories flow in and out. It’s a long, sunny summer afternoon. She sits down and opens the book. She looks at you. She has a story to tell.

Now for my confession - and I hope you weren't expecting it to be really juicy. I have a love/hate relationship with Enchantia. I want to see it published, like sooo badly, and want to keep working on it till it's perfect. But at the same time, I've been working on the manuscript for so long (like a few years on/off, and I'm not exaggerating) that I'm more than ready to get it off my hands and move on to other things. So I've set a deadline to finish my revisions: March 15. Sounds like a while, but that's only six posts away. The countdown is on.