Jonesing

It’s 5:17 pm. I’m back home, blogging in bed as usual. The children survived our absence in good shape; we came home to a spotless house and three innocent faces, along with most of the money we’d left with my 19-year-old for emergencies. These kids are the bomb-diggity, I’m telling you. Either that or they’re presenting a united front against the parental units. Which is not the worst thing in the world, actually.

Photograph by Hedi Slimane

As for me, I feel a bit adrift at the moment. I sent the final draft of my manuscript off to my agent before we left for Portland, and presumably he’s shopping it around, trying to find it a home. So all that is good, but after months of daily writing, I’m jonesing for something to work on. All week I’ve been trolling through old pulp fiction, obscure French films, top-10, -25, -50 lists of psychological thrillers and film noir–anything that will light me up and get this party started. This morning I watched Cape Fear; last night I went to bed with Elmore Leonard. Later it will be a Hitchcock double feature: Rear Window and Vertigo, and if that doesn’t work I’ve got another De Niro film cracking its knuckles on my hard drive.

Surely in all these stories there’s something for me. Two or three movies I can twist together with a modern cast of characters, a gender swap to freshen up a tired old trope, maybe a way to get inside a classic by choosing a different point of view and following the characters into the bedroom. There must be something. But for now I’m lost, and starting to get that full-body tremor of the junkie without her fix.

I’m in the dark country.

How nervous do you get between projects?

Home

We did it! We found a house and passed the background check (thank god they’re looking at credit worthiness and not moral rectitude), and we’re signing on the dotted line tomorrow morning. The house sits on a cul-de-sac across from a neighborhood park and a small lake with a walking path all the way around. It’s cobalt blue and has a nice backyard on a triangular lot, with a big wooden deck and plenty of space for my herb garden. We couldn’t afford that writing room I dreamed of–the one with a door–but I can put an armchair next to the kitchen fireplace and relocate the TV to the other side of the downstairs living space. I think we’ll all be cozy and comfortable and safe. What more could we possibly want?

Having put the house hunt behind us, Drew and I drove to the coast and spent the day beach-hopping. It was a gorgeous afternoon, so while he was digging up agates, I set off with my camera into the forest. There are so many things to see and photograph, unfurling fronds and raggedy pines, and flowers like a little girl’s earrings, hanging at hip level along the path. I wandered over a footbridge, up a long trail with my sneakers silent on the loamy soil and the air clean and still, and I stopped for a minute to look around. A squirrel hopped by, gave me an amiable tail-flick, and scampered up a tree to get a better look at me. The birds began a call-and-answer overhead.

I didn’t cry for happiness or hug myself or do that little joyful float-down like Snuffles the dog after a biscuit; I just stood there alone on a path in the woods, filled with sea-scented breath, and thought:

I am home.

Pockets

It’s Monday morning. I’m sitting by the window of our hotel room, looking over the rain-slick parking lot at a train passing by across the street. I’ve got my hotel coffee. A map. Our notes from yesterday about all the homes we saw.

Dinner at Suzy’s house was lovely. She made this amazing Indian stew (oh please, Suzy, the recipe; Drew can’t stop talking about it) and showed us around. Her home is backed up to a park, studded with pine trees and laced with tiny white flowers over a carpet of soft grass. What a place. We sat outside and ate and talked about books and writers and Portland, and the evening flew by. I hope she’ll come for dinner at our place the next time we get together.

And the hunt for ‘our place’ is on. We spent yesterday in the car, working our way from Cornelius inward to Hillsboro, Beaverton, Bethany, Tigard, and several points between. My favorite house was, of course, the untenable one. Four bedrooms, brand new, perched at the top of a winding road, surrounded by orchards and a postcard view. It’s no place for a ten-year-old, but I made Drew promise we’d live out there in Bumfuck once the nest empties out.

Of the towns, I loved Tigard best so far (which is like saying I like the caramels best of a box of chocolates). We saw some wonderful houses in hilly old neighborhoods with thick trees and pockets of forest, the lawns so neat, every flowerbed an orgy of color. No one was answering the phone yesterday, but hopefully we can get inside some houses today and see if we can find one that feels like home.

What’s the best part of your town?

Fly

Portland, here we come!

Gimmick

During this last rewrite, it occurred to me that I’ve been seeing the name of my protagonist–Lexi–all over the place. This same thing happened to me with each of my kids, but of course with an actual person you are committed to your original choice, what with the birth certificate and embossed baby book and all. However, a fictional character is different. Prior to publication, the character’s name can be changed (and the book title too, as I am discovering) and no one’s the wiser.

Also, in choosing the name Lexi I had neglected to work the name angle. There should be an element of manipulation involved in naming a character, in that as a writer you are constantly trying to bend the reader’s experience to your will–and any gimmick is fair game. I’m not above subliminal trickery (and Joe has a terrific post up to illustrate some cases of authorial conniving), though I have to say, I prefer a fairly straightforward name. It should indicate an ethnicity, a place and generation, and perhaps a twist of personality that might not be clear until you get further into the story and understand who you’re dealing with.

I’m not going to tell you who Lexi Martin has become. Let’s just say her new name is darker, a little more witchy, and a lot more her. 

Have you made a last minute name change to any of your characters? What made you do it?

Photograph by Hedi Slimane