What have I
been up to?
Lots,
actually.
I’ve been
rather busy in both the areas of pleasure and work.
First off, I
suppose I should talk about the drawing here.
Obviously it’s just the ‘cartoon’ of me from up on the left tweaked to
reflect my new haircut. I didn't seem know what to do with it these days, and I’d been letting it grow out. A few months back the joy of it became a
chore and -sinp- cut. I'd rekindled my passion for hats. Since then,
I’ve made a new friend, Darling. He
suggested I go shorter. As I said, I
didn’t have any particular way I wanted my hair to go at this point, so I
ventured. I like it. I don't use the hats anymore, at least not right now. I’ll change the upper left picture
eventually.
So some of
my time is filled hanging out with Darling, and that, coupled with the general wonder,
events and surprises one encounters in Life accounts for the pleasure I spoke
about.
On the “work”
side I re-read two of my novels. Is that
work? Sure, when your intention is polishing
and revising. A bittersweet sort of
work. I of course, then, needed the
queries to go with them. One never knows
and it’s easy to get too close to it, but I feel them to be solid. Many approaches, angles and the like. Special thanks to Doodles who took an axe to
one of them. So much better! And so,
I am now ready begin the grueling process yet one more time. I already have, in fact. Did the required homework and I’ll be
submitting any day now.
I’ve also
been working on, for a lack of a better term, a special edition of Peter Pan’s NeverWorld. It will include annotations, other artwork
& more. It’s often on the backburner. But I do return to it. Right now I’m focused on the querying.
And in the
category that’s a little of Column A & a little of Column B, Darling and I
had become mildly obsessed for a time
with “Princess Alice” – a character from a serious psychological study by Jesse
Bering. It’s designed to examine how children’s behavior
is affected by an invisible person watching over them. The Princess Alice Effect
shows that children are less likely to cheat when they believe in an invisible
figure looming over them. There's more to the study than that, as it also explores at what age and how complex cognitive processes form.
After all, the chatter of other characters is never (thankfully!) turned off. Always plunking away at the other books in my head, too… more tales of the NeverWorld and other books’ sequels. I’m leaning toward one in particular. In fact, it would be book three of the very book I’ll be submitting. I found some writing scraps lost in the shuffle and it rather got me thinking…
By the way,
here’s a link to how the study appeared on Through
the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman.