river_kate | Entries tagged with novel

August 23, 1967

There are many charming cottages in Collinsport and I continue to become more familiar with the lay of the land here. Not only am I looking for a rental home but also a place for the artist’s cooperative. In the end, I’ll probably meet with a leasing agent for Collins Enterprises.
My neighbor upstairs in the penthouse is rather aggressive and displays big city behavior and attitude and is no one that I care to meet. Mr. Wells continues to be kind and generous with information about Collinsport. Yesterday afternoon I stopped in at a popular local drinking establishment called The Blue Whale for a beer. I sat at the bar with the intent to make it clear that I wasn’t looking to be picked up but no one bothered me. The few people in there seemed to be locals who knew each other.
Much later in the evening I walked by The Blue Whale as they were closing. There were two men leaving and it seemed very odd seeing them together. Both seemed to be sophisticated men-of-the-world. One of them was the penthouse guy, who seems very modern and looks like he might have ties to organized crime. The other appeared very theatrical, as though he were from another century. I had forgotten all about the warnings to be indoors after dark until the theatrical-looking gentleman gave me a look that chilled me to the bone.

Chapter Two: At the Inn

August 22, 1967

My small suite of rooms will be adequate for me here and I’ve made myself familiar with the restaurant menu. There was a mix-up with my reservations. Apparently the penthouse suite has been occupied for some time by a business tycoon who has roots in Collinsport. A clerk substituting for a Mr. Wells, the man I had originally spoken with, thought that the penthouse would be available at the time I made my reservation. It is straightened out; I am comfortable with another small suite; I can see my van in the parking lot from my window, I don’t need a large sitting room and the small kitchen will work for a week or so.
Unpacking just a few things, I’ve been looking at a newspaper, going for walks along the waterfront and resting after the drive from Boston. There are some treacherous roads in this area, a bit different from the roads in Colorado. People have looked at me as though I’m oddly dressed and not a typical tourist, but they’ve been friendly. One of the first things I did was put up the wreath that grandmother sent. It was fixed to the inside of my hotel door and then this afternoon Mr. Wells kindly informed me that it had frightened the maid, so I put it back in the van. Father told me that some people still tended towards superstition in this part of the world.
Usually I am rather reserved around new people but I sensed that the coffee shop waitress was feeling down so I drew her out a little after the lunch crowd had left today. Her name is Janine and she’s lived here all her life. She’s very shy and is an aspiring jewelry maker and there’s no living to be made in that according to her, so she must work at a job she dislikes for the time being.
She seemed quite taken by the old Victorian necklace I was wearing. I told her that beaded jewelry sold better in other parts of the country and that in time it might sell better here. We talked about the artist’s cooperative that was hopefully going to become a success here and I offered to look at the pieces she’s made at her convenience. She brightened up a bit when I suggested she might think about building up her inventory over the winter.
It seems that part of the challenge with her job is that she’s an introvert and has replaced a popular young woman in the small restaurant. The woman had gone missing, was declared dead and suddenly returned a few days ago with no memory of where she’d been. Janine said she was doing her best but it was discouraging when tourists who’d been there seasonally in years past kept asking where the woman was. She had felt the need to tiptoe around the facts and it just wasn’t her personality to be dynamic like the outgoing Maggie. We talked a bit more about the importance of being oneself in a world that seems to want everyone to conform and she looked prettier and seemed more cheerful by the time I left.
Both she and Mr. Wells have cautioned me about staying outdoors after dark. Apparently there have been attacks on animals and women in the area recently and the authorities had been unable to stop them so far. Collinsport doesn’t seem to be the type of place for crime and violence but I’m keeping in mind the cautions from my parents and grandmother about this area.

This was a very peaceful day and I slept for most of it. I am experimenting with taking a natural product that was formulated for use in bioterrorism, I believe. Some people with chronic fatigue and Lyme disease are trying it with good results. It has goldenseal in it which is not meant for long term use. I am on day three of a two week trial and it is certainly doing something. I have less pain, odd twitches and I am very sleepy during the day.

When I wake up from these naps, I realize that I've had strange dreams; I can't even begin to describe them.
This evening I wrote a paragraph for my fan fiction novel. It is slow going lately. I decided to give my heroine a love interest, which will be tricky for me because, well because I can barely imagine what that is like anymore. I have the man's name and I will give him a mansion to live in based on Lockwood Mansion in Pennsylvania. I just watched an "Old House Tour" video of it.

Reading some other random journals here I see that my writing is way more deliberate than the writing of other people. I am unable to think of other descriptive words; deliberate is the only one that comes to mind. Well, I am grateful that I can even put sentences together. When I walk it often feels like I am walking on one of those swinging foot bridges. Many times it feels like I am doing something in a dark room with someone flicking a light switch on and off continuously. It usually isn't that extreme but close enough that I choose to be careful and deliberate.

August 20, 1967

My father is well and we have been enjoying my visit to Boston. He has been filling me in on some of the family history and sharing information about some of my relatives in the area I’ll be moving to.
He has a cousin, a Professor T. Elliot Stokes, in the area and has arranged for me to call on him once I am settled. Another cousin on his mother’s side was married to an artist named Samuel Evans. She is deceased but has a daughter in the area. My father doesn’t know Mr. Evans at all, but with him being in the artist community I may eventually meet him.
My grandmother sent a small, protective wreath from Vancouver when she learned that I was moving to Maine. It is to go on my front door, either outside or inside. Tomorrow I leave my father’s house and make the drive up to Collinsport.

August 16, 1967

The northeastern United States is beautiful and I’ve been stopping the van to make quick sketches of scenes that really draw my interest. This is something that used to annoy Evan when we were married; he preferred me to use most of my attention on him. We should have never married. He is fourteen years older than I and we were very attracted to each other when we met in San Francisco. A fling would have been acceptable to me but he had never married, wanted to settle down and cared about his professional image. His idea of settling down turned out to be taking long, frequent business trips. I loved him and believed we could make the marriage work.
What is it about people who think they can change their partner after marriage? It’s that old story. Evan is very successful and wealthy. He loves accumulating money and making deals. He was free do as he pleased with that but I did not share his enthusiasm. Then there was the matter of my appearance. I love to dress in Victorian clothes, velvets, ruffles and vintage jewelry. I look good in them and wore them when we were dating. After our marriage the subtle remarks about my personal style began and then they became stronger and more frequent. I am an artist, writer and herbalist among other things and eventually those occupations became suspect and even ridiculed by my new husband. Willingly I attended business functions with him in attire he approved of but I was not agreeable to giving up my life and my style for him. Then there were my natural gypsy tendencies and my restlessness that complicated things.
When I want to feel invisible I wear gypsy style clothes. My other clothes tend to be shaded colors and I look beautiful in them. People actually see me. When I wear the gypsy clothes and jewelry, people see them and not me. They’re only aware of what I’m wearing and either hate it or love it. Mostly they dislike it. I am therefore rather invisible to them which is sometimes what I want to achieve.
The thing that finally finished our marriage was my refusal to have children. We had agreed on that before we married but then Evan changed his mind, wanting someone to leave his fortune to. I was willing to adopt to avoid the affliction that comes with my bloodline but that was not acceptable to Evan.
There is madness in his family also. Generations ago, his ancestors lived at Collinwood. The Collins that Evan is descended from was away at school with his siblings when they got word that their parents were dead. It was in the early 1800’s and their father, Gabriel, had murdered his own father, their mother Edith, his brother-in-law and who knows who else. It was all hushed up and covered over by the Collins fortune and the three children were removed as far as possible from Collinsport. They seemed to become obsessed with removing the taint from their lives. This has been passed down through the generations and has affected Evan’s business dealings. He is scrupulously honest and an overly law-abiding citizen and expects others to be so too. That was fine with me but after awhile, his being so uptight and rigid began to wear on me. We remain friends and he is mildly curious about what I might discover of his extended family in Collinsport.

The last few days I've been a recluse, reading, napping, snacking and working on my novel. Sometimes it just feels awful to be out among people. I don't know what I'd be doing if I didn't have the novel to focus on and keep my mind in somewhat working order. Yesterday I checked the word count in the document I'm preparing for my little vanity Blurb book and it was less than 9,000. I'm recalling how daunting the 50,000 word requirement to win NaNoWriMo can be.

This morning I was having some of those really strong snapshots and films from my past. It's like I could close my eyes and be there. Some of it makes me curious because one event is about something someone else may have done, yet it's like I carry the burden of guilt. Just as I cleaned up the kitchen full of dirty dishes a little while ago, I could use some of my energy clearing tools to let go of some of this debris. It's something I'll need to coax myself into doing but this day is by no means over.

When I stayed with a friend in Hawaii two years ago I adjusted to the ways of living out in the bush. Water for showering was the rainwater caught in catchment tanks. For drinking water, we took big glass jugs and drove to areas where they could be filled with city water from taps that were out at the edges of the parking stations that were there for that purpose. There was a compost area in the backyard, an area to burn things and the rest of what they call rubbish was collected and taken to a huge landfill. You'd drive up and wait your turn to throw your rubbish down huge chutes.

During the last few years I've let go of many people who used me to dump their problems and unpleasant emotions on. I was raised to allow that and as an empath it's been a challenge for me to learn skills in dealing with this sort of thing. When my health began to be my number one priority it became even more important; I had no choice if I wanted to stay alive. Some people just don't want to let the dynamics change at all.

One day when I was carefully explaining my need to take better care of myself to a dumper, I saw a vision in my mind of a huge landfill with a sign on the barred and locked wrought-iron gate saying that the landfill was closed. There was a another sign set away from the gate that said "future home of Kate's abundant garden of friendship". That helped me get through the conversation. One of the tools I use to clear my aura is imagining a violet flame burning away debris. A few days after this conversation, I saw a huge violet flame burning up the rubbish in my imaginary landfill. That's what I'd see for awhile and then I gradually forgot about it. This morning I saw a lovely park and gardens with benches, flowers and little nooks for having tea. There aren't people there yet but this is way better than a rubbish heap.

August 12, 1967

Last night with the help of friends, I finished boxing up my belongings to be put into storage. I’ve reserved a suite of rooms for two weeks at the Collinsport Inn and have easily found someone who’s more than happy to rent my place and take care of it here. It’s a small log cabin that sits near a creek in a Colorado mountain town. It will make a wonderful vacation retreat in years to come and a part of me will always be here. It’s easier to communicate with nature spirits in a place like this than in a city where the thoughts and emotions of people are so overbearing. Not only am I to travel a long distance in miles but also in altitude, from high on this mountain to the sea level of Collinsport.
I’d like to fly to Boston to see my parents and have my things mailed to me, but I have too many cooking utensils and then there are my herbs and potions and all the paraphernalia that goes with working with them. So I’m packing my VW bus with all that it can carry and am going to drive east. I’ll need a vehicle in Maine anyway and there are so many great memories associated with this van. Actually, I could sleep in it when I get to Collinsport; I’ve slept in it before, but I’m aware of the impression that I want to make in the community. Staying at the Inn will better serve my purposes.
My herbal recipes and knowledge came from my mother Elise, who is a descendent of gypsies. Working with potions and remedies is like any relationship, it needs to be carefully attended to and nurtured for the bond to remain strong. I am looking forward to meeting the plants, trees, birds and small creatures around Collinwood as much as I am the people.

August 13, 1967

My mother, Elise, is the descendent of a long line of Collinsport fishermen on her father’s side. Her grandmother was a half-gypsy orphan who was born in the area. As an infant, the orphan was cared for by a local woman. A gentle, elderly couple from the Bedford area adopted her when she was seven years old. She was told very little about where she came from. Her father was a local gentleman and could only offer financial support and her dead mother was a gypsy singer named Jenny. She’d always felt she had a twin brother somewhere but was told it was her imagination. She didn’t know where her mother was buried or why her adoptive parents were so secretive about her father. Perhaps they didn’t know who he was. As a happy child, she didn’t question much and so the facts have been lost to history.
My mother has few relatives. There is a rare genetic disease that affects the males in the family which results in insanity, violence and death. My mother has told me the little she knows about it and that is why I’ve chosen not to have children, which is one of several reasons my marriage to Evan didn’t last.
The inherited disease was attributed to a gypsy curse. It was tragic for the women in the family as well and as a result they tried many remedies to alleviate it. That may be why my grandmother married a banker named Trask who was from an old, established, New England family. My grandfather Trask was a handsome man but was unattractive because of his coldness and perpetual scowling.
Raph tells me that much of what is hidden in darkness cries out to be healed and that true healing cannot occur by blanketing the pain with a more socially acceptable form of darkness. I cannot judge my grandmother for her choice of a husband. Trask appeared to come from a respectable family but they had their own brand of darkness and dysfunction. It was a disaster, of course. Elise was ten when my grandmother left her husband. She took Elise to Vancouver where she opened an apothecary shop which she still runs today.
Believing that children should know their grandparents, my mother took me to see Trask a few times. The last time was when I was twelve and beginning to experiment with make-up. My grandfather kept squinting at me and finally told me that he could see the devil in me. That didn’t insult or flatter me; I merely found it interesting. Having been raised to freely speak my truth, I told him that his perceiving the devil in me must mean that it was my inheritance from him. My mother and I left shortly after the visit began to deteriorate.
He’s still in the area and there’s a chance we will meet with recognition but I don’t intend to seek him out.

August 14, 1967

I’ve been on the road for about a day now and am enjoying the trip. There’s an 8-Track player in my van and I’ve been listening to Aretha Franklin, The Doors, The Jefferson Airplane, The Supremes and The Rolling Stones. Also, I picked up a hitch-hiker who’s going to Ames, Iowa.
Just before I got on the road, I called my father from a diner’s pay phone. I learned that my mother had left Boston for a trip to Mexico to search for a special kind of clay with a particular mineral content. He said she sent her love and would visit when I got settled in Collinsport. Not everyone has a mother who would just take off to a foreign country in search of some dirt.
My great-great Aunt Magda had shared some of her gypsy wisdom with her niece, my great-grandmother. It took awhile for the adoptive parents to trust Magda. They were afraid she’d snatch the child away. They began to trust her after they saw how much the child enjoyed her company and after Magda had told their fortunes for free. The gypsy told them with heart-break in her voice and manner that she’d already ruined the child’s life enough and promised she would leave the girl in her new home. The couple had no idea what she meant by that but felt it was sincere.
Not all of Magda’s knowledge was shared, of course, just what she deemed necessary for the girl to live the best life possible. This knowledge has been passed down through the matriarchal line and I have learned much from my mother.

August 10, 1967

Destiny is paving the way for me to arrive in Collinsport with a plausible reason for being there. As soon as I made my decision to answer my inner calling, I was recruited to go to the small coastal village. Thanks to my professional credentials and experience I am qualified for the opportunities. Because of the connections of my father, Germain Stokes who is originally from the area, the inquiring parties learned of my existence. The mere pittance being offered eliminated my competition and my recent and very lucrative divorce from Evan Collins enabled me to afford to accept the positions.
While I do have extra natural abilities, in this case I am unable to see what lies ahead of me. All I know is that I must go. Two of my invisible companions, Raph and Rose, are eager to go with me. Three for the price of one, way more than my future employers have bargained for.

August 11, 1967

All morning I’ve been packing up my paintings to put into storage. Fortunately I don’t have to depend on them to earn a living. Most of my things will be put into storage to be sent for later if things work out for me in Collinsport. I’ve been carefully selecting the belongings to take with me, holding them in my hands for a moment to feel if they contain the vibrations that I want with me there.
My father wants me to visit with him and Mother in Boston before I go. He is a professor and many in his family have academic careers. I grew up reading books that most other children didn’t read and was disappointed when I went to the university and found it to be dull. My father’s family came from very humble beginnings in this country, his ancestor being an indentured servant who could neither read nor write until mid-life. He was patiently taught by his employer and came to deeply value literacy and the sharing of it with those who are sincerely interested. This has been passed down through the generations in the Stokes family.
My antique restoration and appraisal experience partly came from my father; I learned some at the university and I also apprenticed with a young couple, the Todd’s, in their antique shop. There I learned more about the market value of antiques, profits and presentation but I have my own standards for what is of value. There are empty spaces between the particles in objects and these spaces hold vibrations which I can feel. I would rather have a simple object that has absorbed the good feelings from a harmonious home than to have a rare, expensive item that carries depression and anger. The Todd’s, while enthusiastic, had no knowledge of this. They were very much in love and paid little attention to me. I believe they planned to move to the east coast at some point. I’ve lost touch with them and suppose they will live a long, pleasant and boring life together.
Another activity I’ll be involved in is helping to organize a local artist’s collective. That will be as a volunteer and I have experience. These different and diverse avenues will give me flexibility in my schedule and will allow me to mingle with the community while I discover why I’ve been drawn to the area. I’ve already been able to casually brush off my last name of Collins as a mere coincidence to the people I’ve communicated with so far. Now I must get back to my packing.

Chapter One: Journey To Collinwood

August 7, 1967

Here I will record part of my story, which is the truth as I experience it in the moment. I will also embellish the truth at times, shine light into some of the darkness and also hide selected areas in the shadows, from myself and from you. Anyone reading this will not really know what is true and what is not. I have just written the above lines to break the ice, make myself at home and to dip one toe in here and begin.
I am aware of connections to my extended family. Many of the living ones are not aware of me. I am also aware of my ancestors and many of them are able to tune into the vibration of me. I feel their stories in my DNA and I work with those energies for the purpose of my own journey through this life like the artist and creator that I am.
There are other people that surround me and I have only superficial connections to them. If they notice me at all, they see an eccentric artist who also dabbles in and restores antiquities. Some have suspected me of being a witch but I do not consider myself to be one. While I do commune with nature and love the beasts, plants and spirits, I am too undisciplined to structure my involvement. Also, I don’t care to compromise myself with involvement in groups and all that they entail.
I have some gypsy blood and do not feel comfortable planting myself in one place and staying there long after it’s fresh and vital to do so. When I find myself not bothering to look at my natural surroundings, I believe it is time to move on. That is what many of the Native American tribes did in the part of the country that I live in. Being mobile and moving with the seasons feels natural to me.
Lately however, I’m feeling called to a part of the country that I have never even visited in this lifetime. It is the home of my ancestors when they first arrived in America and settled on the coast of Maine. Many of the family still reside there although they don’t know of my existence. There are many of us that have been flung to the winds by the occasional careless Collins.
I have no desire to attempt to meet the present family members. I just feel that I must go to the area where the spirit of the ocean seems so different than the ocean I have known in the west.

In my attempt to eat as healthy as possible, I often rely on snacks. Green grapes, mozzarella string cheese, kefir, gluten-free crackers, almonds and such are way better than eating in a restaurant when I am too weary to cook. My diet is extremely important right now and I buy almost all organic, especially meat. Sometimes I prepare a meal in the slow cooker by just dumping the ingredients in. I love to cook but can't manage it lately.

The last few days, I've been lethargic. Exhaustion is more of a depletion and physical thing; lethargy is like when a huge part of me is busy in some other dimension and a shell-like creature is left here, not exactly tired or numb but not involved in life. Malaise has more soul involvement or lack of it and I sometimes experience that too.

Nibbling on food all day, I figured I might as well do just anything and I chose to do online research for the home my fan fiction heroine is going to live in. Right now, she's staying at the Collinsport Inn; I wanted to get a little Maine coastal cottage for her. Vaguely, I must have thought something along the lines of the English cottage that Kate Winslet had in "The Holiday". I was surprised to find that I thought the decor of the cottages online are hideous. Being attracted to many styles of interiors and loving most Bed & Breakfast's, it is difficult for me to choose a favorite; New England decor is not it, however. Finally, I found something that will have to do and I may post the photos on here soon. They are of a rental, this blog is not widely read and I'm not claiming the photos are mine so I'm guessing that will be O.K. It took awhile to look and makes me wonder how writers managed before the internet.

My heroine is into antiques. I like the look of them and have very little knowledge. I subscribe to a feed from Rare Victorian and look at the pictures mostly. Recently I described an Elijah Galusha chair from the Rare Victorian blog in my novel and will occasionally use that kind of research again. The kind where something just shows up in front of me.

I rarely drink but have a fifth of premium tequila evaporating in my cupboard. A few days ago I tried a mango rum mojito at Old Chicago and it was O.K., but expensive. I got some mojito mix from the health food co-op, put a little water in it, put it in the freezer to get slushy and then added the tequila. I liked it just as well as the one I had a few days ago. That's the lethargic lady's mojito recipe. Being creative with what I've got to work with at any moment is my life right now and I'm calling this a successful day.

A little while ago the FedEx lady delivered the one copy of a Blurb book I created. It brightened my day although I can see how some things could have been done differently.

After being unable to figure out the requirements for the complimentary Create Space book for last year's NaNoWriMo novel mentioned in the previous post, I attempted to figure out how LuLu works. The novel, which is in a Word document is a combination of copy/paste from a LiveJournal account and direct writing in Word. The formatting was not acceptable to Lulu; it seemed there was a question of owning fonts.

No one I know is permitted to see this novel because the usual part about resemblance to people and places living or dead is not true in this case and there is some wicked, unflattering resemblances to people who have been, and some still are, in my life.

Next I registered for a Blurb account and downloaded the free software and through trial and error I created one book. Since everything about the process is so new to me, I could have messed with it endlessly. In the end, it came down to fun and curiosity over moving closer to better quality.

I chose a style that is meant for slurping a blog into a book and is set up for printing numerous 4-color photos. When I attempted to download my Word document into a black & white text book, all the different fonts I'd used showed up. Being unmotivated to retype the novel in Word and unwilling to spend $200(!) on having someone format it for me, I just slurped the blog; the size of the book is not the best for fiction.

Not having a digital camera, a few months ago I had photos I'd taken with a one-use camera put on a picture disk. For the first time, I downloaded or uploaded or whatever, the pictures and played with the cropping, etc. software. I added a few of those to my blog plus three I found on Flikr that only asked for attribution.

The text can be edited right in the bookmaking software and I accidentally deleted a whole page and simply left it out. The most glaring thing I would change is that the text is only right-aligned and the left side is raggedy. The new fan fiction one I'm writing is being done in a blog because I use two computers; I'm also typing it in a Word document where I can have the text aligned on both sides and use comic sans MS font. Online, I've learned that some people despise comic sans and there is even one group focused on getting it banned. It is my favorite.

Anyway, this has been worthwhile for me and I think my next effort will appear to be even better.