My Daily Tea

Coffee drinkers may not comprehend this, but tea is as much a ritual as a habit. It either defines or complements the moment. It’s something to be savoured, if not treasured, and if it doesn’t taste good, there’s no point to it. Even the vessel can be specific to the blend. Today, a writing Friday, I would normally use my tea tumbler; however, I bought a new flavour yesterday and it wants to be steeped in my glass pot, then sipped from a little tiny cup. It’ll take up more room on my desk, but when tea speaks, I listen.

This one is called Ginger Pear and is the Tea of the Month at David’s. White tea with ginger, pear, cinnamon, vanilla, apples, rosehips and a few other boosters—how can it go wrong? White tea is a delicate thing, though, hence its desire to be sipped from a daintier vessel than my clunky chunky tumbler. Being new to my collection, it hasn’t been assigned a character yet … but in a way, it sorta kinda has.

My first thought this morning was to start a piece called “The End”. The vision was so strong that it was like a movie playing in my head. I got all excited to hit the computer and let the magic happen … and then my mind turned me toward all the unfinished projects, listing each by name and suggesting that I at least attempt to complete one of them sometime before the Second Coming and certainly before I start yet another story.

Sigh.

Actually, I’m in a good spot with each of the unfinished stories; I could pick up any one of them and do something worthwhile. That said, my other plan for today was to have a Newsroom marathon if HBO would oblige with the last three episodes of the second season. I watched the same three episodes twice last week, so surely the final trio would be scheduled for today.

Nope. No joy. Rats.

Hey, wait a sec. Shouldn’t I be happy about having a whole day in which to write? When I remembered that, I got pumped up again—and a little confused about what to write. My stupid schoolmarm mind has judged me guilty of neglect, but I’ve decided to go ahead with “The End” because it was the first thing on tap when I was still half-dreaming and every guru Ter has read agrees that the first thought of the day is the most important one, the real one, the one that will set the tone and be the most successful if you surrender to it.

So, Ginger Pear has just been assigned to Cassandra Stannard. She’s serial novel material, so I’d better get enough GP in stock before it’s discontinued …

Romantique, Moi?

I sneer at romance. Chick flicks make me nauseous. Lusty males and swooning heroines send my eyes rolling heavenward. Pink hearts and bridal shows give me migraines. I dunno. Maybe itʼs my Virgoan hardwiring, but what many folk – particularly women – call romantic is what I call cause for a diabetic coma. Kill me now.

So, if I am so adverse to romance, how is it that last Sunday, when Will McAvoy chased down Mackenzie McHale during an election night newscast and clumsily asked her to marry him, I damn near burst into tears? Once I dried up, I had to think about that. Maybe I have been mistaken about romance.

It isnʼt about new love or young love or even strangers exchanging glances across a crowded room. For me, romance is the reward of a punishing struggle to overcome hurt, of lovers who fall out of each otherʼs arms and find their way back again. Romance is an elderly couple holding hands as they walk across the mall parking lot. Romance is the reunion of those parted by war or misadventure or misunderstanding. It is deep and passionate and painful and gorgeous and triumphant and enduring. It is not fluffy or silly or a comedy of errors. Romance is seriously potent stuff. It deserves respect because it overcomes. It surpasses honeymoons and arranged marriages to become something rich and pulsating and radiant. Romance is epic. Legendary. Unstoppable.

True romance is also on the endangered species list because these days love is disposable. Too few couples make the effort anymore. I recall a saying from years ago – I donʼt remember who said it: Love never dies from natural causes.

I am almost always working with lovers in my writing. Julian is my most romantic character, but my most romantic lovers are probably Lucius and Analise. Theirs is the eternally flaming passion that will not die because it has survived loss, conflict, separation and a somewhat volatile reunion. Romance is not for the faint of heart. Romance in its truest form takes time to reach its full potential.

Sometimes, it takes a recovery from the blow that shatters it. Will and Mac were broken for years, but they never stopped loving each other. They cannot go back, but they can certainly go forward. And if itʼs right, if it is a true romance, they will emerge the stronger for it.

But Iʼm not a romantic. Honest.

It's a Boy!!

 

 

I admit, I’m a Royalist, so I would be delighted about the newborn British prince anyway, but the added bonus to yesterday’s arrival of Will and Kate’s son is that it shoved all the bad news in the world aside for a while.

 

Isn’t it nice to hear something good on the news for a change? To have the anchors and reporters be smiling as they report it? There is already so much negativity in on the air: kill-or-be-killed cupcake wars, the Real Narcissistic Housewives of Whocares, scratching-and-clawing competitions to be the best of a bunch of losers, serial murderers outwitting the good guys – and that’s just prime time entertainment. I can’t speak about the news so much, not since The Newsroom has taught me how to watch the evening news. It’s the fall of the Roman Empire, man. Death, destruction, plague and flood and a host of other Biblical weather bombs … even the planet is trying to win ratings by outdoing itself in extremes.

 

Sure, the little prince is only one of three hundred thousand babies born on July 22, 2013. Every baby should be celebrated at birth. So many aren’t, and I feel for them because they get no press at all. There is so little happiness on the air these days. The networks rarely report random acts of kindness. I guess the focus groups indicate that they want to be paranoid and fearful about everything and everyone.

 

I don’t. I’m happy to hear about Kate’s little guy. I’m glad to know that one child in the world is loved by his parents, that he will have all that every child deserves (except the paparazzi hounding his every move, of course). I’m happy to watch people celebrating a royal birth rather than destroying a city over the loss of a sports trophy. Yes, there is tragedy and loss and illness and politics and all manner of reasons to slash your wrists if you let it get to you … I’m just saying that once in a while, some good news is welcome.

 

The Prince of Cambridge has a lot to live up to … but for now, he’s just a newborn babe who has managed to make the world (or most of it) pause to smile.

 

We now return you to our regularly scheduled chaos …

Pour No Sugar on Me

I wrote not a word on the weekend. I slept a lot, though. Sugar fuzz. I indulged in such dietary naughtiness the day before my writing day that the best I could do on Sunday morning was lie on the sofa and listen to David Usher. I fell asleep to Bryan Ferry in the afternoon.

The day wasn’t a total waste, however. I learned something that I’ve always known but consistently deny in the face of immediate gratification: sugar is bad for creativity. I proved it to myself yet again because I started to pull out of the fog at lunchtime, then I downed a whole can of San Pellegrino grapefruit soda and promptly had to take a long nap. The pop wasn’t even that good – it tasted like I was drinking marmalade. Worse, it started me second-guessing about my writing. Stuck in a chemical funk, my will to create actually dissolved, so I let it go for the day in hope of a sunnier outlook when I finally emerged from the mire.

It took a full 24 hours. The socked-in sense lingered well into my Monday; it began to lift yesterday evening and this morning I woke up clear-headed and hopeful again. Feeling more like writer than a fraud and thank the gods for that turn of mind. I brought the Gatsby soundtrack to work, which is proving to be a horrible distraction but I will persist because I need the infusion to get me through the worst day of my week. I’m off on Friday, with no commitments beyond cramming three episodes of The Newsroom before season 2 premieres on Sunday, so I’ll be brewing more Gold Rush and seeing if I can make something of a story that, on the weekend, I feared was beyond my capability to write.

My mission until then is to steer clear of the white stuff.

Twitchy Tuesday

You know how I believe that Tuesday is the worst day of the week? Not so during vacation! En vacances, it’s perfectly positioned – deep enough in to have had a few days off and far enough out to have a few days left.

I’ve taken a week off work to wrestle with vampires and angels, so naturally I’ve checked the HBO listing and discovered a rerun of The Newsroom is on this afternoon (perfect for a tea break), assessed baking supplies for next weekend, and intend on a couple of loads of laundry before the day is done. I also discovered it's a bad idea to take your blog log to the beach; it gets in the way of meditation. I did take a few pictures, though. This one is my favourite, snapped a few feet from where I was sitting.



 



I'm running hot this morning, finding it hard to settle, so I'd better get my tea together and boot the writing computer. Jake`s story has a working title now - "Between the Storms" - and it's coming along quite nicely despite my interference. I reckon once I get into the rhythm, I`ll stop being a jumpy twitchy time-waster. A day this precious should not be deloped.