Gone Writing

Lilly’s ranch is nestled on the North side of the Saguaro National Monument, in the foothills of some mountain west of Tucson. I am currently here. I left four days prior to my scheduled departure because Marty offered to handle Buckaroo’s morning commute (still at 5:45 a.m.; still a 60 mile round trip). I tried writing at home this week but was continually interrupted with requests for help finding someone’s red sock, or the dog, or the Amazon truck, or three other adults at home who all want to talk, or even a particularly maddening encounter with one of my offspring about a can of chicken. And the list goes on.

 Anyway, I am currently sitting in 115 degree weather—Tucson is not 10 degrees cooler, despite the rumors to the contrary--in a ranch house/Air BNB where the only gate to keep out the critters is the gate across the main driveway, closed at night so the javelina will play elsewhere. Apparently anything with small legs, or no legs at all has free rein of the three acres. Which brings up this interesting tid-bit: Lilly handed me a piece of plastic then told me to please open the hood of my car at night and place the piece-of-plastic motion-detector light underneath so the packrats will stay out of my car. Yep. Can do.

I finished the first draft of the latest Great American Novel on July 19, 2017. The next day my bonus mother of 30 years died suddenly and the emotional upheaval of dealing with her death has always been tied to “What if I hadn’t been so busy working on my story I could have called to see her that day?” (though I happen to know I would not have been allowed to) has sent me into a tail-spin.

Finally, I am ready to tackle my story. At this point, I want it out of my life. I have four or five others I’ve got outlines for and they are more pressing than this one, which I’ve lived with on and off for 10 years. I want to move on.

Currently, I have zero plans of moving away from my computer for the next several days—though I did bring a dress and found the local Catholic church. Plus, I posted on Insta where I was and I suspect a Tucson friend will be reaching out shortly to ask when I can see her. Oh yea, I guess I will be heading over to Lilly’s food truck on Monday, which will be somewhere in Tucson. Hopefully it won’t be 111 degrees. Otherwise, the gate is staying locked and I am writing.

 I am here on and off until further notice, though I am heading back to the Valley next week for a long weekend and to visit with my family (thank you dear friend who let me reschedule next week so I can see my father). If I’m not done, I will mosey on back and work again. Currently I have a few first readers lined up and I am thinking I should be ready to hand this over sometime around mid-July.  

There are no illusions of grandeur, I’m not thinking this is best-seller material. I’m thinking this project needs to be done.