Why One Plants Bulbs

I didn’t know this when I planted my bulbs, but you plant bulbs precisely for days like this, when you’re feeling like crap and you feel like you’re never going to feel better and because you’re never going to feel better, your yard is going to look like crap. And then you go out and you wander around and you see that the garden is going ahead and getting started without you. Daffodils are blooming. Peonies are poking their dark pink shoots up out of the ground. The willow has small leaves. The roses are happy. The lilacs are showing signs of life. Last fall, I planted alliums in my garden to remind me of my mystery benefactors who sent flowers after my family had run over my garden. I thought the alliums were the most ridiculous, wonderful whimsical things I’d ever seen. And today, I saw that they were up.

I still feel like crap and just walking around the yard took a lot out of me, but man, I’m glad to see things happening.

How I Spent My Weekend

I was really, really hoping to feel better today than I do, but it occurs to me that I haven’t really felt right since last Monday when my head tried to kill me, so, a gradual decline is probably going to be matched by gradual improvement. Yesterday was shot, really. I spent it sleeping and reading through my manuscript. Which was good, you know, because I had been worried about when I was going to get a big chunk of time to do that. But on the other hand, it means we have no dishes, no groceries, and the bathroom is developing sentient life.

Well, let’s hope that whatever’s growing in the bathroom will grow into something that can clean the bathroom, because I’m in no shape to get to it and it’s my turn to do it.

I also spent a great deal of yesterday looking at agents’ websites and agents’ blogs. One thing that strikes me is how many people want there to be some magic formula. And I say this as a person who wants a magic formula. Okay, learn all the right lingo, throw around the right phrases, meet and greet the right people, and bam you’re in. It’s actually a relief to see how many people are fretting about the same things I fret about.

Of course, I’m fretting about that–trying to find an agent–because it’s a ways off and I don’t want to fret about the obstacle close at hand–which is finding people willing to critique this draft. I have a couple of people I’ve already asked and I now find myself kind of mentally undermining myself about who else to ask, because I already owe pretty big favors to everyone I know. Ha ha ha. You’d think it’d be easier to ask people to be hard on me–after all, I write at Pith, where people are hard on everyone as a hobby. Posting there is asking people to be hard on me.–but it’s different to ask people you like and respect to do so.

Ha ha ha.

Whew.