It has finally happened. The three novels that I have been writing on-line are all starting to converge.
In this novel, SWITCH!!, the story has a narrator named Gina Morrison, who is in the company of her friend Xandra, and the two women have just arrived in a kind of spooky redwood forest
in northern California. They are just about to meet a healer in one of those redwood tree fairy rings -- where redwood tree sprouts grow in circles. It is a lovely setting and when I last left it, in Chapter Sixteen, I promised I would get back to it!Well, so, now we are back to it. Or should I say, I am back to
sitting here, writing three books at least
one at a
TIME EXPLODED ALTOGETHER IN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I don't know whether I can WRITE THREE BOOKS ALL AT
1) SWITCH!!
2) SISTER MYSTERIES
3) CASTENATA
ALL AT ONE
thing is the three share characters RENATA ANTONIE BEING TWO PRINCIPALS IN EACH
are you beginning
HAVE I BEGUN to confuse you yet
you will keep reading?
It doesn't matter whether or not I've got readers. I know it is and always has been my job to free you, RENATA, because who else will but me but how? Now I know of course by now I KNOW THAT I HAVE GOT TO FREE THE NUN AND SOON BECAUSE THEY WILL HANG HER JUST AS SOON AS SHE SHOWS UP AT THE JAIL (to find out why she is headed back to jail just read you must you need to read the last few chapters or at least this one Chapter 66 with links to others.)
My job is to free her, and also free me, but I cannot see it how can I possibly write it, the next scene, unless until I have some image fixed between my eyes in my third eye IS IT MY THIRD EYE or just my mind, my imagination what exactly is that part of the mind that spills out fiction anyway?
the scene I'm trying to write is between Renata and some authority figure or figures I am just not sure how it happens
I think the courtroom is sunny, I can see the shadow that the large pained paned? window makes on the floor, and somehow Renata is flooded in light, she might be sitting at a table in the courtroom, but how did she get there, the LAWYER DELURIA PETITIONED THE COURT FOR A HEARING BASED ON NEW EVIDENCE
As much as Renata didn't want to bring in the lawyer, Teresa was write write write the scene between Deluria and the three of them
in the last chapter, the three of them, 1) Renata was riding in the wagon between 2) Teresa, her wonderful friend, and 3) Arthur, ART HER? (He was the man who found her in a wretched state after she fled the jail.) NOW SHE IS HEADED BACK TO THE DREADFUL JAIL, she is turning herself in, toward an almost certain death, OH GOD, OH MARY, help HER HELP ME HELP US BOTH
she's going back to give the authorities the missing journal pages, the pages that show very clearly that she did not kill Antonie, he basically killed himself with a little help from
READ THAT CHAPTER, READ THE MISSING JOURNAL PAGES WRITE NOW WRITE THE CHAPTER
It happens this way. It is mid-day, beastly hot, Arthur is pushing the horse at a fairly slow pace, which is not making Renata any less nervous. At one point she reaches over and takes Teresa's hand. That's when Teresa raises her right hand in which she is clutching rosary beads.
If Renata had known that Teresa was saying the rosary, she would have asked to join, the two of them would have said the rosary aloud. Teresa bows her head, and squeezes Renata's hand.
OK, I can't write the next? the last scene? the next to the last scene? in this novel, I WOULD LOVE TO FINISH IT ALREADY and have something else in my head besides Renata FACING THE GALLOWS but
be patient, it's not there yet, not yet but I can write a letter to my dear friend Suzanne, she is wise beyond her years beyond belief she is one of the most amazing poets I have always loved her work, ever since we met in 1996 at a writer's colony called Montalvo, in those days I felt like a real writer, I had my first novel Dreaming Maples finished, more or less, I still hadn't changed the ending (in which I save the baby, Grace, which may be relevant to what I'm going through in therapy with Mary.) But back in those days I was writing a new book I called CASTENATA or SISTER MYSTERIES it seemed so easy to write it, I was writing about characters two sisters HEATHER RICOCHET A rock singer who performed in lewd ways on stage but who at age thirteen had wanted to be a nun or a saint or something crazy. And her overweight buffoon of a sister, clumsy Malvina. These two characters absorbed so much of my time, wasted? Well, it depends on how you look at it, that writing is part of the many thousand pages which got me
HERE. EIGHTEEN YEARS LATER trying to finish SISTER MYTERIES/CASTENATA.
This is the latest version of so so many, I would begin, I would begin, I would begin again and over and over. Finally I began writing this version of SISTER MYSTERIES in November, 2010, November 14th to be exact and NOW I AM ACTUALLY DETERMINED TO WRITE THE ENDING, TO FREE RENATA FROM JAIL ONCE AND FOR ALL, TO REVERSE HER CONVICTION. But meanwhile this letter is what I am writing
Dear Suzanne, I'm sorry I can't come to NYC today I woke up with such a wicked headache, I have pain in my head my neck my shoulders my back my legs. Aygh. I have to write you though because I came to the realization just this morning just a few minutes ago that I have to face my feelings once and for all. I have to try to figure out a way forward. As I wrote in my journal, every time I hear those interviews with authors on the BOOK SHOW they always bring me into the lowest spirits, it is awful to listen to those interviews with REAL AUTHORS knowing I will never be in the position to talk about my book(s.) I feel this morning that I have to look steadily and unflinchingly at this hard reality because it is/was a core issue in my depression. Can Mary my therapist help me understand or accept this reality? (YES SHE SAYS TO STAND BY YOUR WORK< YOUR CREATIVE SELF DON"T GIVE THE EXTERNAL WORLD DOMINION OVER THE WRITING) I know I don't want to be depressed any more not for a moment I went through hell this past year it was so so so so
hard, no more please God please MARY PLEASE NO MORE! (I am not going back there anymore.)
I want to celebrate my writing, I want to send it out into the world with joy and pride. It's taken so much out of me to be depressed about my writing it might actually be the reason I got sick with the lymphoma eleven years ago but that is another story I really don't want to tell, another hellish episode ]
MARY SAYS EVERY SINGLE THING IN MY LIFE MUST BE CELEBRATED IT ALL ADDS UP TO WHAT I'VE DONE I'VE USED THE LESSONS AND WILL CONTINUE TO DO GOOD BECAUSE OF THEM> OR IN SPITE OF THEM, IT IS IN HER WORDS NOT WASTED TIME.
"in my life.
"IN MY LIFE I'VE LOVED THEM ALL" THE BEATLES SPEAK TO ME
Mary says to me over and over that I must love my inner self, my "baby," she tells me repeatedly that I have to love and nurture my baby, pick her up, hold and comfort her, accept her feelings listen to them, dwell in them, accept and hold them near my heart, no matter if it's scary, no matter if she's sad and depressed, no matter if she's frightened or insecure, never abandon her no matter what feelings she brings to the forefront in me. Mary keeps telling me that is my main job in life, it is my first and only duty, my first and foremost and eternal job (SHE SAYS IF YOU DO THIS LOVING OF THE BABY YOU WILL GET DIVINE HELP AND SHE'S WRITE I MEAN RIGHT I HAVE HAD THE EXPERIENCE OF GETTING DIVINE HELP) my job is to pick up the baby, hold her and reassure her, let her feel what she feels, never turn away or abandon her.
This morning it hit me for the first time: my first novel Dreaming Maples is all about mothers who abandon their babies! Candace, Eileen and even Lucy, Eileen's mother, who doesn't abandon or leave Eileen (I LEAN? I LEAN? I FALL I FALL?), not technically, not physically, except she does abandon EILEEN I LEAN emotionally, because Lucy is an old fashioned Italian woman who has no idea how to mother a modern young rebellious woman like I LEAN (EILEEN.)
Curious that just today, for the first time, I'm thinking about D MAPLES and all the time Mary has been telling me not to abandon or PUT DOWN my baby I never thought about Candace and Eileen and Lucy who put down who abandon their babies. ONLY AUDREY X, CANDACE"S PATERNAL GRANDMOTHER, SHE'S THE ONLY ONE WHO STANDS STRONG ALMOST A SACRED FIGURE A KIND OF GODDESS OF MOTHER NATURE AN ASPECT OF THE DIVINE FEMINE? Perhaps, in any case Audrey X DOESN'T ABANDON HER CHILDREN, ONLY HER HUSBAND.
In the end, the so-called NEW ENDING I WROTE AFTER THE REVISED VERSION I PRODUCED FOR THE SECOND AGENT, AFTER TALKING TO THE VIKING editor
IMPORTANTLY Eileen saves Candace AND Candace's baby (GRACE) and maybe that is/was me saving myself (or the aspect of my psyche I am calling Baby C) and my art, my inner life, my art, my writing, I used to call my writing my fourth child, it's so hard to have your child rejected by the world, I must I LEAN I LEAN OVER THE BABY AND I MUST SAY TO THE BABY, it's OK THE WORLD MAY REJECT YOU, THE PUBLISHERS MAY REJECT YOU THE PUBLISHERS MAY PUT DOWN THE BABY MAY BE BUT I LOVE YOU ANYWAY I LOVE YOU NO MATTER WHAT!
Is that it, is that what I need to do, to find freedom must I love and "feed" and nurture my baby my art no matter what, no matter that the publishers will have none of me or it I sit here with my shoulders aching and my head and my back. AYGH.
I want so much to write. I want to feel as though my writing matters, that I can make art/writing that people read, I want to be inspired the way I used to be when I wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote. In those days I felt genuinely hopeful that the world would receive and read...sigh.
Then when I published the second novel, SEEING RED, I began to see I began to dread I began I could not sell many books and then I WENT KIND OF DEAD INSIDE. MARY SAYS I HAVE TO CELEBRATE MY INNER SELF, I CANNOT LET THE OUTER COMMERICAL WORLD DICTATE MY ART.
Dear Mary, I still need help with this. I really need guidance. I know what you will say, embrace it face it with love love love love love your self enough to STAND UP FOR YOUR BABY YOUR ART
A I am writing this I am thinking/singing the Beatles:
ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE
ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE
ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE, LOVE
LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED.
And then I sing the other song:
"When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me, whisper words of freedom/wisdom, let it be, let it be. Let it be LET IT BE (LET ME BE ME A WRITER) or let it be oh let it be, Whisper words of
(How do I encourage to myself?)
WHISPER WORDS OF FREEDOM HOW TO FREE THE NUN HOW TO FREE ME FREEING RENATA I AM FREEING MYSELF, SISTER MYSERIES SISTER MYSTERIES is all about me freeing this nun in 1883 and me freeing me in 2013. ONLY 130 years separates us, HA!
SO SUZANNE, THANKS FOR LETTING ME RAMBLE VENT ON THIS WAY SUZANNE I WOULD BE HAPPY IF SOME DAY YOU WROTE BACK AND RAMBLED ABOUT YOUR WRITING TO ME!! :)
Have a happy day it's beautiful and blue out, a powerful blue, the color of the VIRGIN MARY'S veil.
Love,
Claudia P.S. MARY MY THERAPIST INTERPRETS MY DREAMS, SHE IS A JUNGIAN ANALYST SHE IS AMAZING WHAT SHE SEES IN DREAMS! Last night I dreamed I was in a classroom again (God save me from that :) and I kept wanting to write/teach/understand the word "INTRANGIENCE," I COULD SEE THE WORD ON THE BLACKBOARD or MAYBE INTRANSIGENCE (or INTRANSIENCE )which I just looked up IT MEANS "the quality of being intransiGENT uncompromising hostility, irreconcilability unwilling to compromise unwilling to negotiate or make any concessions I UNDERSTAND I THINK I THINK THAT THIS FEELING ABOUT WRITING BEING REJECTED is a feeling that I cannot change or compromise. But now I realize I want to change, I do INDEED I REALLY NEED TO want to transform my intransigence. Mary says I should meditate on the word, that it might be my psyche wanting to change from a rationally-oriented mind to one that is more spiritual.
