Post-election malaise...

 The Blue Wave crashed over the GOPedophiles, yesterday, and the next couple of months will be interesting, to say the least. The current Congress is in power till just after the first of the year...so has nearly two months to fuck things up. And I would not be surprised if they get truly vicious with it.

But it's pretty much set. Mississippi and Alaska are too close to call, yet, and will probably go through recounts. Some other tight races have the Red Party wanting recounts while the Blues are being cool.

Pundits are suggesting this is an extinction event for the Republicans, though I doubt it. Hate runs too deep in those people and is harder to get rid of than cockroaches...as we are already beginning to see. Oh, they're blaming anyone they can, like Felon47 and the disastrous war in Iran, but I have yet to see anyone acknowledge it was their stupid one-note culture wars to deflect from inflation and the obvious corruption in the administration that really hurt them.

Democrats are already planning to elect two of the most weaselly members to lead, as well...Chuck Schumer, who thinks writing a strongly worded letter means something important, and Hakeem Jeffries, who loves the sound of his own voice lecturing the other side more than actually doing anything about them. So I'm not sure anything serious will happen, yet.

Oh, there's talk of subpoenas and investigations, but I'm not convinced this is anything more than posturing by those two and a couple of their sycophants. I hope I'm wrong, but my gut says wait and see.

At least I'll be going into the UK on a high note.

Too rushed...

A packing job I thought had been postponed till January suddenly exploded to life, this morning, and now I'm off to London on Sunday. Startled the hell out of me. I'll be gone a week. And then two weeks later I'm off for Hong Kong. Zoom-zoom.

But it meant rushing things, so I got a bit sloppy in my scheduling and wound up getting screwed over by a company that was really sneaky.

In order to travel to the UK from the US, now, you have to have an ETA -- an Electronic Travel Authorization that gets linked to your passport and is good for 2 years. I looked online for who to submit it through and the organization that I connected with sure seemed like it was part of England's government, but it wasn't. 

They charged me nearly $125 for them to do the form, when it would have cost me nothing had I connected with the correct agency. But when I mentioned it to some coworkers, they were shocked...and the company refused to cancel the application and refund the money. At least I already have the ETA.

This is the first time I've dealt with needing one so I plead ignorance, in this case. Live and learn, right? Take it off on my taxes.

Next I set up a hotel room by Heathrow Airport for 2 nights, thinking I was doing it through the hotel's website. I wasn't. Again, it was a third party...and they pre-charged my card for the two nights.

My one saving grace is I booked it as cancellable so could have just dumped it...but then I'd have had to deal with setting it up, again, and the final cost was the same, so since I'm leaving so quickly...I just let it slide.

But I don't like being rushed into having to set up travel. I drop into this mood of just get it done and on occasion it bites me in the ass.

At least I learn from these mistake, somewhat. I don't book non-refundable anything, anymore, thanks to getting screwed over by a Holiday Inn in Lisbon...and by having American Airlines steal $400 from me, once. But it's getting harder and harder to catch out those nasty little sneaks running around trying to mess with you.

Another reason not to rush.

Just to be clear...

Adam is not going to be a sad dead faggot. I idicate that in the very first chapter. He's happy and in love when he dies, and his only regret is that he can no longer share his love with Dair. He will even do what he can from his new existence to help Dair finally move on with his life.

You see, Adam dies a hero. He saves all but one girl in his skiing class from an avalanche, and she is, in fact, the reason he's killed by it. She doesn't understand the danger and thinks she can outrun it. He tries to catch up to her...and they both die.

That plays into the story, later, when another character lies about what happened and Dair goes berserk. Yes, there is sadness in the story regarding Adam's death. But him being gay has nothing to do with it. The situation is more tragic in that his life is cut off when he's only 25.

If anything, Adam's willingness to live his life on his own terms, and refusal to be apologetic about having done porn and been a sex worker, is admirable. Or, at least, I intend to make it so. It provided him a living when many less-well-paying avenues were denied to him. And how he works within it shows he's intelligent with it. 

He is aware it can be a trap, and sees other performers get beaten down by the hypocrisy from society about it being something shameful. Falling into drugs and other corruption. But as he says, "You do what you must to live. Would you shame a lioness for taking down an injured gazelle when her only thought is to feed her pride?"

His entire life is a rebuke against the two-faced attitude so many have about erotica, and it drives a few people crazy. But he doesn't care. Nor does Dair. They had a pure love and wanted only to be left alone to live it. Now Dair needs to rejoin his life and fine new love...and reconnect with his art.

Still I have to wonder...am I still being a bit two-faced, myself, about this and my attitude about sad dead faggots? Because what happens to Adam is sad...

Thick head unthickened...

I finally understand why I was having such trouble with The Murder of a Quiet Man. Simon was going to wind up a sad dead faggot...and I hate that in all forms. Movies. Books. Music. TV. Plays. Any form of entertainment. That or being a killer queer. And I was trying like hell to ignore that reality because...

Shit, because I don't really know why. I'd blinded myself to that reality of it. I've read books that have gay men and women killing themselves or others because they can't handle life in a disparaging society...or they're self-loathing...or someone kills them because they are self-loathing...and it always rankles me.

Yet here I was writing one just like it. How fucking ridiculous of me.

What kicked the blinders off was seeing the uproar over a British series called Tip Toe. I started getting ads for it on Facebook, like crazy, focused on the lead being Alan Cumming, an older gay man who runs or owns a gay bar in Manchester and is having issues with his straight neighbor...and something about it put me off.

I don't know why. I didn't know much more about it than that. And I would have had to sign up for Starz to get it, so that wasn't going to happen. But the ads kept coming and snippets of scenes and my wariness grew to where I needed to find out more about it. Because I had to know if there was going to be somebody dead in that thing.

Finally, I tracked down a treatment for the series...and sure enough, it's got a murdered faggot at its center. Lynched by a mob in Manchester. Which angered me.

So for certain I was not going to watch the damned thing...but that got me to thinking and realizing I was going to do that to Simon. He's an old gay man who refuses to back down and winds up in a grave in the woods. And I was trying to find some way to work it out so it wasn't the same fucking thing. Which was stupid.

Oh, God, sometimes I can't believe how myopic I can be...

Slow motion...

I feel like I'm a bit underwater, here, because I'm not pushing this draft to come together too quickly. I can see the surface and head towards it, but without the urgency to breathe, yet.

I want it to build naturally and steadily, and considering all that I have already written, completely. So I may not have this ready to even begin to consider publishing it for another year.

Which might be pessimistic of me. I have the characters set. The locations. The basic structure. I'm adjusting the time period, a bit, and will be including another couple of characters, but overall it's in solid shape. It's just too...well, too busy.

And by busy I mean lots of info and details that are neither important nor interesting. Conversations that help me clarify the characters and situations in my head but add nothing to the story and won't be missed if removed.

I am also working in more of Adam's references to various poets he loves...and some of his own poetry. Like...

Into my room, came he.

The silence as his key.

No dream allowed, you see,

Or life still said to be...

My own

That one just sort of popped up out of nowhere. I know it refers to his time in a foster home where he had his own room but was used by older men, in it.

I'm also a bit uncertain as to how to handle the sexual molestation of underage boys in this. It's important to explain Adam's development and he would not shy away from discussing it, but I have to be wary of laws against it being too graphically discussed. Maybe I should talk to an attorney.

Guess we'll see how that goes...

Jenga writing...

While working on DW I decided to add more to the beginning of the story--when Dair and Adam first meet...and where. First, I had Adam describe the town and then had him working at Dair's mother's lodge when Dair returns from living in Europe for three years.

Adam's shirtless, gleaming with sweat from replacing some siding on the building, and knows he looks damn good. He also knows the second he sees Dair that he's gay. But to his surprise, Dair pays him zero attention. No gaze of appreciation or reaction. Which irritates Adam...to his surprise.

Then Marion introduces them and Adam realizes Dair wasn't ignoring him; he was just so focused on seeing his mother, again, he had blinders on. And Adam understands he could manipulate Dair into giving him anything...and plans to do so.

Which segues into him revealing what his life had been like and how he has become the type of person who uses others to take care of himself.

It made so much sense to do it this way, I'm embarrassed I didn't think of it earlier.

I'm using a gay porn star, Jarec Wentworth, as my image for Adam. Partly because he's attractive but mainly because of a certain wariness in his eyes. He's also the near opposite of Derrick Davenport, whose image I'm using for Dair. Not just in looks but in feel and attitude.

Now comes the fun part, trimming down Adam's story about how he became a sex worker...something he still does, even while working for Marion.

You never know where ideas come from...

Monday I was driving around the Kitsap Peninsula looking for a seafood restaurant when I went down a side road that led nowhere...until I saw this tree loaded with moss and ivy shooting straight up from a mass of bushes and shrubs.

It almost seemed magical. So I stopped and took some photos of it all...none of which really do justice to it...and what hit me was how Dair would love to see it.

He's at home in mountains of Western Washington. The thick masses of trees and the back roads. Leaves changing colors and blanketing the ground. Snow soon coming to soften everything, even if it's via a blizzard. It's where he grew up and became who he is...

Became someone Adam could come to love and trust and want to protect. Not a man who's perfect, but who is decent.

Adam is not, at first. He knows the world too damned well. Knows how people can be...and often are. And he has a journey to undertake, both in this life and the next.

That's when I finally realized that telling the story gives the the title a secondary meaning.

Dair will still build a window for his grandfather's church. But there is also the window Adam will now find into Dair's heart and soul, before he dies. Which will lead him back to being human.

He had become something feral and selfish, thanks to how he was treated by others. And he starts out to misuse Dair's trust and decency...but slowly finds that he cannot betray them. It won't be a conscious decision on his part. It's just one that will happen, and his mind will take a bit of time to catch up to his new understanding.

So today I dug through the folder I have of past drafts, information, images and ideas. Streamlined it down to a manageable level. I still have more to go through, but it's begun to make sense to me. Thanks in no small part fto finding Dair's tree...

If that makes sense.

"Dair's Window" returns...

Dair slipped up to walk beside me, today, letting my mind drift over his story. I'm using Derrick Davenport as my visualization of him, and he likes that.

Strong but not overpowering. Right age. Cuddly, even. A bear cub, really. Maybe a bit big for an otter. And caring....

I could see a man like him comforting Adam out of his shell. See him help Adam past the pain of his life and bring back to alive and caring, again...adding to the tragedy of him being taken away so suddenly.

I'm going to finish Adam's story, first...everything that is seen through his POV, even after he's dead and his parents are suing Dair for half his estate.

Then I will dig into Dair's story from the point where he's about to join Wallace in a commitment ceremony to where he's tried for attempted murder and finally has to acknowledge the support he thought he had from certain members of his family does not exist.

I'm unsure about having him track down Joseph, Wallace's former lover, and reconnect. That story seems a bit too pat, now. I'm also uncertain about him shifting his studio from his home to a warehouse in Seattle's warehouse district. That area is really desolate, and I can't see Dair being happy or creative there.

I have a lot of research left to do in many ways, but a plan for the story seems to be coming together in my head. Write it and consider shifting scenes about to make it more like stream of consciousness, at times, as well as work in what that window is, of Dair's.

That part is very important...

Brain dead...

I'm back home after a lot of rushing around and adjusting things on the fly...as is normal. The job in LA wound up being larger than expected, of course, but I still got it done and it's set for delivery on Friday.

Met with friends in LA, which took a lot of work...but was worth it. Got those relationships back on track. I don't have many friends, mainly because I don't really try. I've known these for more than 40 years.

Then came Seattle, which was actually pleasant...and where I did some research for Dair's Window. The book fair took up Sunday, but my flight home wasn't till after midnight Tuesday morning, so I got a car on points to get mobile all day Monday.

Hit a Barnes & Noble to find a couple books on Seattle, then ran over to Gig Harbor, scoured a couple of bookstores for more on the city, hopped a ferry across from Bremerton to downtown and checked out the train station and bus terminal for part of Adam's story...

Which I'm glad I did, because the Greyhound terminal is like a prefab building stuck under the freeway not far from the Seahawks' stadium in a very industrial area. Really depressing. However, the train station is really nice if a bit awkward to deal with.

But overall, I took a break from thinking about The Murder of a Quiet Man...and I think I'm done with it. At least for now. This visit to Seattle has nudged me back to DW.

So arrived home at nearly noon, slept in a while, then worked out my expenses to take in, tomorrow, with the paperwork from everything.

And then it will be back to DW.

Off on another roundabout...

Heading for LA, tomorrow, then to Seattle...and then maybe NYC. The last bit depends on what happens while I'm in the air. Such perfect timing, since I'm dealing with some lovely indigestion and acid reflux and shit.

Seems I need to step back a little from the spicee that make life worth living. So far the only foods I've eaten that aren't trying to tear a new hole in my stomach are cantaloupe and buttered toast. I did do okay with some cream of mushroom soup, but my quiche was not conducive to a gentle evening. Even tea with milk and honey is being snotty.

Anyway, today was taken up with laundry and packing and trying to plan out what to do if the NYC thing comes through, and none of it really makes me happy. I'd be staying at a hotel by LaGuardia, which is treated like an unwanted cousin by the city. No restaurants. No easy way to get around. It's absurd.

My brain is still twisting and turning in all directions regarding MQM, Same for my pamphlet on book packing. And getting myself to just hunker down and work through them is like asking to win a million bucks in the lottery. Ain't happening...probably because I don't play the lottery.

I'm taking Barbara Tuchman's A Distant Mirror with me to read on the flights. Go into forced solitude. Let everything go chaotic in the back of my head. Remind myself of how horrible mankind has always been to itself.

And will always be...