october 17

a year ago, there was a plan made for this date that is now today. when that plan became beyond attaining, new plan was evoked. instead it’s just another day on the surface, though finally cool and october-like. cloudy with wind, some rain in the air ready to meet a thirsty earth and a crazy silver lake.

10/17. i’ve been in Europe on this date on three occasions: 1998, 2000, 2003 (i didn't even plan for it, it just turned out that way). wonder if the north east autumns are like the autumns in the austrian lake district of salzkammergut. the alps appear on fire with yellows and reds. i buried something in the mountains there, somewhere beneath the earth of a cliff-side village called hallstatt. (everyone owes it to themselves to visit hallstatt at least once). i wonder how my buried "treasure" is, if it’s survived a winter and the seasons gone round. will it survive the years until someone, perhaps myself, digs it back up and peers inside?

this past week, i wrote 7,000 words on my “writing experiment” called "clockworks." thank you nagging friend and quote on desk. i started "clockworks" over a year and a half ago. never ceases to amaze me how a story will take you on its own journey, develop and change right before you eyes. an inkling, a little glimmer of story, if followed like a dark path in the forest will bring about the most amazing adventures.

trust is first in writing i think. you must trust the story and go along down those paths even if you eventually change course, even if it looks like a dead end.

and then truth. this i struggle with. some truths are hard to tell. you worry about responsibility, reactions, misunderstanding. i'll follow truth for now, then step back and see how honest to be. i mean, don't we do that all the time in life. we have a truth inside but must determine how much of it to expose. truth can be the deadliest weapon.

even with 7,000 words, i wish i’d written more. getting sick pretty much kept me in bed all weekend, and i have very little patience for physical weakness in myself. i should’ve gone to the doctor, still should, but i like home on a cloudy day with the water wild. i have a good book besides, and direct tv has been quite entertaining.

yet a new week begins, i have to keep writing this story. even if it's for my own expression, never shared with someone else. sometimes you have to do that, you know. write or do something because it won't leave you alone, even if you don't know what in the world to do with the result.

and why, i can't say, was i thinking of prozac, cialis, lipitor, viagra, fior...
synthetics to make singular worlds go round. amazing to think all people need today. not that i'm condoning or condemning, just stating my amazement over it. some people need drugs to survive the pain of living. some need secret lives. some need a sense of power or importance or purpose. some need to write or sketch or sing or act. some need a clean house, a secure savings, a dependable car, a bridge to sleep beneath for the night. needs we think essential. and most often what we really need is sufficiently ignored.

i'm tossing things out, left and right. think i need to go back to bed. a blog at your fingertips can be more dangerous than even truth perhaps. or not. all i know is it's october 17. did my plans fail, or where they wrong to be planned. god knows. and it's good to be here today. it's not autumn in the alps. but 10/17 did give me marvelous wind and clouds and rain in the air.