finishing a manuscript and other news

Updates to this blog have been sketchy in the past months because I have been trying to finish a novel. Words delight me endlessly--writing, reading, email, snail mail, blogging--but there's only so much time I can spend with them before they start to play tricks on me... changing meaning mid-sentence, playing hide 'n seek with homonyms, jumping the queue, getting maudlin and gregarious when I want them to be clean and concise.

The novel is now finished--as finished as I can finish it--and I can spend more time here. Or somewhere.

Maybe too much time--be forewarned--since I've also decided to leave the hospital clerical job I've been doing since... far too long. I stared hard at the numbers, my necessary expenses and frivolities, decided that I can walk instead of take the subway, cannot cut back on books and visits to Nota Bene, the wonderful Italian papeterie where I buy notebooks, will stop getting my hair cut, will keep using my ancient laptop--and can still afford food, electricity and taxes. Well, I might not be able to afford the latter, but I'll have to pay them.

I have my new rebuilt heart and am even (sort of) growing accustomed to its clackety rhythm. My chest sounds like a longcase clock on a mild dose of amphetamines.

I want to go cycling when the weather gets warmer, learn Spanish, weave on an eight-harness loom, visit  friends, translate more Grimms', get back into slow cooking, write another book.

I feel like I'm beginning a new life, which is unexpected and fun, given that I'm surely more than halfway through my life.