I am making progress on this book.
I am thinking about Frost and Ginsberg and the aphrodisiac powers of cinnamon.
I am thinking about fathers and daughters and if being a hero on a small scale is any different than being a hero on a large scale. Intent is intent is intent.
I am thinking about when you are so alone in this world that you only have one friend left, and that one friend is your lover, and what happens after that? That’s a lot of power to give one person. That’s a lot of pain if you get left behind. How angry would you be if you got left behind?
I am thinking about cooking with love.
I am thinking about ants.
Someone was telling me something bad that happened to someone I used to dislike and now barely even consider, and when she told me I said, “I guess I don’t even know how I feel.” Which is weird, because I always feel something. How can you feel nothing? Even as I type this, still: nothing.
But I am also thinking about having more than one feeling at a time, and how we often want people in our lives to be done with the past and live in the moment. But how can you just wipe away the past completely? A feeling leaves behind an imprint, a fingerprint at the scene of the crime.
Last night I said that when I wrote fiction I had no perspective on what I was learning about myself because I was caught up in the characters and what they were going through, but when I wrote non-fiction I was able to make conclusions about myself. Because you have to, you’re required to make a point in a really clear way. Fiction can be fuzzier. It’s not cheating, though. It’s art. Ha.
I disliked her but also I think I pitied her and then the two things canceled each other out, so it became like she didn’t even exist.
I am going to finish this book someday.
