Thursday, December 8, 2016

Gastronomy

I don't know what this meal is, or where it's going
it isn't what I asked for. I don't know why it's here.
A meal so strange... this is not the nine o'clock news.
I didn't even know I was hungry, and yet,
here is a feast, without familiar foods,
and I'm not sure which fork to pick up next.

What I forgot is we don't have to move
but can enjoy the main as an everlasting sweet,
ever-surprising and unexpected,
never going near dessert.
We will not dare discuss dessert.
And then the main can remain, remain,
timeless, unending, and exactly what we needed to eat.

I wrote this a while ago, forgot I had it in my drafts list. I didn't quite know what to do with it or whether it should ever see the light of day. It comes from a pretty confusing time in my past, something I was reflecting on, long after the events unfolded.

I think the time is right that it gets published now. The main meal goes on. The dessert, never even considered. The line, never even approached, let alone crossed. Friendship is a wonderful thing, and I am so incredibly grateful for it, unexpected though its arrival was.

Sometimes we over-think things. I over-thunk it at the time, terribly, and wondered at my friend's motives, couldn't understand how someone would have so much time for me without expecting "more", and if I'm honest, I was expecting that would happen, and dreading the time that the "more" would come up in conversation, because I'd have to shut it down and hurt someone badly.

It never did come up. And I am so honestly, incredibly grateful, and so thankful to keep calling this person my friend, a friend who knows me inside and out and just knew never to push that agenda. Thank you.

Oh, horror

I started another work. (Kill me now.)

I don't know whether it's because I'm some kind of disturbed creature, but I can't get my head away from the idea of a character who is an abuse survivor but ultimately sort-of ok. I think that's some kind of abomination to be truthful... not to mention appropriating someone else's culture*

*inb4 someone begins to yell that abuse is not a culture, I'm quite sure that people could get just as righteously angry at an author telling a story that isn't "theirs" to tell.

I've also wanted to write about a sex worker for a long time. In this novel that I began to plan, the sex worker isn't even the main character, it's her mother. There are so many works sensationalising sex work - or painting it as a world of drug addiction and exploitation - I wanted to write a character who does it because the work suits her. These people do exist. It's true that the lure of drugs is a tough thing to ignore in that industry, but sex workers are not all cookie-cutter broken human beings devoid of aspirations or personal strength.

Also, the main char is going to be cold. Heartless. Ruthless. This might be a difficult sell, I'm not sure. I'd like her to be a char who soldiers on despite it all and carefully cherry-picks her battles, displaying an uncanny head for life and for business in general, right from very young. Sure, we have a thousand books emerging right now of the superstar female who don't need any man... but this one, she is not a bitch who steps on people to get to the top, she is just a girl who goes after what she wants and uses brains to get it. I think I'll need to re-read some Jackie Collins, the true master of strong female protagonists.