Too much TikTok, too many sausages, not enough exercise, not enough greens, too much time sleeping... how did I ever get so much done?
This has been an summer of excesses and deficits. I knew coming up to it there wouldn't be much money for big trips or major concerts attendances, so I kept my expectations modest. I'd paid ahead for a concert at St. Alban's Church to see Julie Doiron play, which is always a highlight (though I really wish I could have seen Robert Plant and Alison Krauss at Bluesfest!). Also paid ahead to see the new Syd Barrett documentary at the Bytowne Theatre and used my Scene points to go see Oppenheimer though I am waiting for its Greta-Gerwig-directed (and media-conjoined) counterpart to come out online, as much as I love Greta and everything she's done.
To all these, I've been accompanied by a partner, one Marie-France, who has lured me out of my apartment for walks, meals and musical events, once witnessing Brian Greenway of April Wine in a open mic blues jam at The Atlantic Pub in Alexandria. Another highlight was the fireworks display put on by Casino du Lac Leamy from which we were sufficiently smudged in firecracker debris thanks to an errant gust of wind. There's also been deep-chasm pyrotechnics of the heart happening because of her, rumblings deep down, tunneling into cold rock, approaching my touchstone, shining like gold, radiating like uranium, flooding me like springwater. She's the kindest, most loving person I've ever met and she's like a kaleidoscope in my life now, adding colour and warmth, magnifying everything, including my own self.
In between this all, fighting distractions and impulses to sleep the day away, I've been working on the first draft of my novel LefTturn. All summer, I've been trying to smooth all these notes into a cohesive narrative, killing darlings and adopting kindreds chapter by chapter in numerical order, as a reader would encounter them, discovering incongruities and deficits in the plot, pruning paragraphs and transplanting them elsewhere or omitting them altogether (though retaining them in a file that I've actually labelled 'pruned paragraphs'). It was my aim to get all eighteen chapters smoothed out to at least resemble a complete novel and I managed to achieve that, almost perfectly in time. What what comes now will be a succession of passes over the script, tweaking and tightening. A tune-up, if you'll allow an awkward automotive analogy. And maybe by next summer I will have a polished product to show editors and potential publishers.
Also on the literary front, I've also been creating query packages for my short fiction collection O Anthropos to send out to those aforementioned potential publishers, dedicating entire folders in my OneDrive to their specific guidelines, ready to go when their submission seasons open. I've paid money and brainstormed with many good people (thank you Zilla Jones and Janet Reid, especially) to get my query letter right so I can put my best foot and face forward without the two body parts colliding with each other.
This summer also saw the publication of two short stories in two different lit journals. The first was "Hour Nine" which was included in the latest issue of Flo. Magazine. The launch party was August 3rd to a capacity crowd at the Art House Cafe and though I was nervous before my turn to read, it was fun to inhabit my 'writer persona', tell a couple jokes and share the story with the room. It was so good to have Marie's soothing presence there as well. It would be the first time in all the years I've been reading in public that someone was there with me.
The second story published this season is "Lion Argent", in the online journal NonBinary Review which has just come out this week. This acceptance was an especially happy one for me, as "Lion Argent" was my newest work, utilizing a new approach I'd been taking to my writing, getting more meta, and leaning more into postmodern influences. It was exciting to have the piece picked up on its first submission. It tells me I'm on the right path. Both magazines have links in keeskapteyn.ca if you want to purchase them.
So a summer of intense work of the heart and brain has been evened out with lazy, procrastinating days where I would spend them and part of the night at my desk, stationary and writing and/but distracted by TikTok, Facebook and a new account with the BlueSky platform (Twitter/X for progressives). All the while thinking if I have eggs and sausages every morning with a big meaty supper at the other end, skipping lunch would be a wise choice, but no. My gut was not happy with my fat-rich diet and my scale does not hesitate to remind me that I'd gained another 15 pounds. To make matters worse, a twenty-year old elbow injury was starting to become a 24-7 hassle, and a painful one at that until I smartened up and booked a physiotherapy appointment. Now I'm strengthening tendons and a group of muscles so this recurring nuisance will be the thing of the past it was supposed to have been.
So now merging into September, I'm about to start a new school year and I'm not left with a feeling that it went by too fast. Though I didn't spend much money, I still had a balanced summer with just the right levels of work and play, decadence and health, music and silence, solitude and good company.
It brings back a truth that always shows up in my life time and time again and it's why I always like to say, and I truly believe I've coined this phrase:
Life does indeed move in integers.
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