I haven't updated in a while and although I've been without the internet for the past 5 weeks, I know it's not just that. I've been lazy and I deserve a slap on the wrist.

I am working on a few projects at the moment. Semester 1 is coming to an end so I'm swamped with assignments but enjoying the opportunity to write. Still working for Armidi but feeling guilty about disappearing for 5 weeks without warning. I've been doing some research into short story publishing opportunities and I'm planning to send some stuff to some Aussie literary journals and accumulate a nice collection of rejection letters, you know, so I feel like a real writer. I also have a little magazine project (second life related) in the works that I don't want to say too much about yet.

Oh and I like two guys at the moment.

First 200 words of my short story for Creative Writing: The Short Story. Currently untitled.

Peggy does her washing in the small, three-walled room behind the house. The machine whirs into action somewhere between 9.02 and 9.13AM every three days, excepting when that day falls on a Wednesday. She works early on Wednesdays and can't wash her clothes until the afternoon. Every six days she washes her bed linen and every 9 days she spends a little longer by the machine – hand-washing her most delicate items in a white plastic basin balanced on the edge of the trough.

When I sit on my bed my window looks onto the back-yard. And the laundry. I flick ash from my cigarette out the window and watch her broad shoulders move as she swirls something in her basin. When she turns she has slightly androgynous features. I like that but I duck my head back inside my room. I wonder if she saw me; I wonder if she waved. I hear the soft hiss of the hose waking up and smell the sun-warmed chlorine. Today is Thursday so she's tending to the garden.

I had a pot-plant once, a fern. It died. I stub my cigarette out in the empty pot and slide off the bed.

I'm back from mum's. Feeling ill and tired. I did fiddle with a bit of writing, it could still do with some polishing but it's something. Critique more than welcome.

Lots of writing related thought today. One of the groups I joined in a burst of enthusiasm for all things writing-related, project_finish, has encouraged me to set a word goal for this month. As it's already the 10th and I'm out of practice I've set it as 7,000 words. I'm hoping to make a start on an assignment for my novel writing subject even before the semester officially starts. I like the idea of adapting a play I used to be so passionate about for the assignment. It will make it easier to avoid writers block and will hopefully rekindle some of my old enthusiasm for the story.

The first 15 words of my 7k:

Flocks of black clad youth
in the womb of smokey mall
mourning for no one.

I'm having trouble organising my thoughts at the moment. Talking to Shay.Happy but tired.

I hate that the largest tag in my tag-cloud is "dylan", we broke up over a year ago. Speaking of things from over a year ago, I found this scrap while reorganising my writing folder. It's dated 26th November 2006:

I just wrote 196 words that weren’t for Uni. That’s 196 words more than I have done for quite a while. Re-reading it is 196 words that have been put together fairly poorly and say basically nothing. A character studying their hands and playing a computer card game for 196 words.

The last short story I wrote was for Creative Writing: The Short Story; that’s the kind of sentence I highlight angrily when I’m critiquing. “Unnecessary.” The last short story, Equilibrium, is being critiqued on Monday but I have already gone in a new direction with it, I think. I talked to one of my classmates, Mick, about it when I was meant to be getting ready to meet Rook at the Guild Bar. He kind of fixed the problem I was having with the story, I just have to re-write now.
I sent my parents the story and Dad’s comment was, “Not your best.”
Mum agreed, “It’s not up to the standard of your poems, or that story about the dog.”
“The dog that drowns?”
“Yes, that one.”

I’ve been clicking through the files in the folder labeled My Writings; it’s all kind of… crap. And lame. I don’t know whether to re-write something or start fresh. I need a project, one that isn’t an assessment piece. I think what I really want to do is finish my play.

It's a little depressing that nothing has really changed since then.

This year will be a better year. I'm feeling hopeful and motivated. My therapy is going well; my weight-loss too. My new writings sorting system makes me cheerful. Four main folders:
- 1. Work In Progress
- 2. Completed
- 3. Polished
- Ideas and Scraps
Eventually there'll be sub-folders for poetry, prose etc but as the folder for my third step is currently empty there's not much point. This year I'm going to fill the third step folder... or at least the second step.

I've had too much diet coke to drink so I'm awake when I'd normally be asleep (I tend to go to bed early for my mental and physical well-being). So, what to do with my awake twitchy time? I'm sorting through my writings folder because I want to polish/complete the old stuff being stored in that folder. Get things up to submission standard so I can consider sending them out... or at least have the sense of self-satisfaction that comes from having a large body of completely finished work.

I'm noticing that I have quite a lot of pieces with family themes, interesting but maybe not unexpected. Two short poems, both autobiographical. Written for my mum and dad, respectively.

Mothering
During a lull in the evening
the writer is discussing her apprehension
of starting life
at university.

Her mother lays aside
her literary dissection to offer
praise. You are
already a writer.

I Write Trees
The father will draw
the girl's attention
to the ruddiness of fleshy infant
leaves, like a wound,
on the Syzygium.
To an insected leaf he will
drag her eyes and she must
scent the leaves crushed in his soil
stained hand.
Again he presents
her with the texture
of a seed-pod, or the thrill
of the first petite
flower growing
beside feet.
She takes it in. She writes,
landscapes. And
trees. She writes the
detail her father gave her.
My father brought loveliness,
she writes trees.

Please crit and comment as you see fit. I'd like to be done with them... maybe work on an anthology of poetry and prose around the family theme?

I'm going to read some more of Fashion Babylon (Imogen Edwards-Jones & Anonymous) and try to sleep.