Everything is sharp blue and green outside, the valley framed by buff hills speckled with red barn roofs and white houses among patches of darker green forest. The teasing bright sun offers no real hint about the bite the air will take from my face when I step outside to take the dog out, or walk, or watch clouds, so Im back inside by a fire made of a red-hot rib cage of coals beneath the huge douglas fir log I just wedged into the rectangle wood stove door. The fire this log generates will last all afternoon. Im flanked by my animals, and next to me are two flat gift boxes covered in old maps of the world—one box is filled with notecards, each with a story-seed written on it, or else blank and ready; another box is filled with a short stack of yellow notepads and a spiral-bound drawing pad, the first page sprawling over with multi-colored mind maps, the outline for a first novel!
Posted on: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 21:59:51 +0000