By the light of day, and in all sobriety Dana Feminita noticed that her husband was profoundly antsy all of a sudden. He\u2019d be pounding away on that battered laptop of his, and then he\u2019d pop up and pace. Usually, he just pounded without the pacing. Creative process? Couldn\u2019t hurt to inquire.
\n\t\u201cJulian.\u201d
\n\t\u201cYep?\u201d
\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s the third time in this hour you\u2019ve gotten up to pace. Are you having trouble passing a passage?\u201d
\n\t\u201cMan! Woman! Mother of god!\u201d
\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s a yes, I gather.\u201d
\n\t\u201cI\u2019m reading what I wrote in summer, and I\u2019m trying to make it over so that it doesn\u2019t make me either want to puke, or put me to sleep.\u201d
\n\t\u201cThe life of the novelist?\u201d
\n\t\u201cPitiful.\u201d
\nHe sat back down and went back to pounding. It was true, after a fashion that he was working on a novel. It just wasn\u2019t the one he\u2019d written over the summer. It was some new crazy thing that was unfolding in real-time and there seemed to be actual skin in the game. His mind was working on the implications of having Lana\u2019s phone number. Did he even dare to talk to her in extreme real-time, voice to voice, without the benefit of a backspace? No way to cut and paste on the phone. Also, with the holidays being dead center, how could he call with Dana lurking about the house? He turned now to his blog and let Andr\u00e9s rant. <\/p>\n
In Parkersburg, Lana was thinking up another \u201crecipe.\u201d Amy had more to say, as she usually did. She sat on the couch, and now that Scott was gone, the cats had re-emerged. She got her fingers in their fur, one at a time, probing for wounds. She thought to herself, \u2018if I catch that man torturing my cats, I\u2019ll either kill him or leave him, maybe in reverse order.\u2019 She found nothing but smooth skin under the fur. They purred in turn, and got as close as they could. When she took up the laptop, Tory took off on rounds. The investigative Abyssinian cat, getting into everything, making certain all was well. If the cats could tell her what they knew, she\u2019d be more careful. In their way, of course, they did tell, and she did know. Mea flipped herself upside down and let her paws fold down. Contented cat, at home in her keepers care, her worries abated, her needs attended to, her life before her certain.<\/p>\n
She wondered whether Julian would get up the gumption to call. She worried that he might find it too soon and too forward. Instead, Julian had every intention of dialing the number, but he had to find a way to do it. Sneaking up to the bedroom was not going to work. Hiding out in the garage was also fraught. Dana was an empath, a counselor Troi. He had to mind his step, or he\u2019d be stepping right in it. Lana took it out on Amy, took it to the public in her ship full sail. Julian again rose and paced.
\n\t\u201cDana, I really need to stretch my legs. I\u2019m thinking if I go over to campus and stroll around, I\u2019ll break my logjam.\u201d
\n\t\u201cOK, Babe. Go for it. You\u2019re driving me crazy here with all your pacing.\u201d
\nHe went for his hat, gloves, and coat. He put the laptop in its luggage, slipped his cell phone in his pocket and pecked Dana on the cheek. He was out the door on his date with tomfoolery, part one.<\/p>\n
Having accomplished another pithy post, Lana called her father.
\n\t\u201cHi, Dad.\u201d
\n\t\u201cPumpkin patch!\u201d
\n\t\u201cSorry I\u2019m not getting to you until Boxing Day, but Scott was around and we were at it. Now he\u2019s gone, and I have my mind back.\u201d
\n\t\u201cSweetie, that might be too much information. When you say \u2018at it,\u2019 do you mean doing the deed or having a spat?\u201d
\n\t\u201cA little of both. It\u2019s complicated.\u201d
\n\t\u201cYou can tell me. I\u2019m your father.\u201d
\n\t\u201cI would tell you if I could make sense of it.\u201d
\n\t\u201cOK. Well, you set the pace and the tone.\u201d
\n\t\u201cThere is one thing I need to tell you.\u201d
\n\t\u201cGo for it.\u201d
\n\t\u201cI\u2019ve been corresponding with a professor at Blue Ridge.\u201d
\n\t\u201cA rinky-dink little outfit in Winchester. What of it?\u201d
\n\t\u201cWe\u2019ve been going back and forth. He kind of reminds me of you.\u201d
\n\t\u201cUh oh.\u201d
\n\t\u201cNo, I mean, he\u2019s a wordsmith, an appreciator of me, a good reader. An admirer. I need admirers.\u201d
\n\t\u201cYes, you do. Are you in need of a lover?\u201d
\n\t\u201cOh, Dad!\u201d
\n\t\u201cI wasn\u2019t born yesterday, you know.\u201d
\n\t\u201cI know. It\u2019s just that I can\u2019t answer that question. At the very least, Scott and I have hit some serious turbulence. As for the professor, it\u2019s a back and forth exchange, on blogs, email, Facebook. I gave him my phone number. I want to hear him talk. I\u2019ve never met him face to face. He\u2019s married, so am I\u2026\u201d
\n\t\u201cSo, as usual, it\u2019s complicated.\u201d
\n\t\u201cVery.\u201d
\n\t\u201cWell, I\u2019m sorry, but not surprised about Scott.\u201d
\n\t\u201cI know, Dad, I know. You never understood what I saw in him.\u201d
\n\t\u201cOh I know what you see. He\u2019s a stud muffin. It\u2019s just that he\u2019s so technical, non-verbal, anti-culture, not appreciative of your soul or your art, and, increasingly, domineering. Have I got most of that right?\u201d
\n\t\u201cOh, Dad.\u201d
\nShe felt herself go over the edge and into tears. Her father had put the finger on it. Again.
\n\t\u201cAre you going to try to meet your professor?\u201d
\n\t\u201cI don\u2019t know. I need to talk to him. It\u2019s up to him whether he calls or not.\u201d
\n\t\u201cOh, he\u2019ll call. I guarantee that.\u201d
\n\t\u201cDad, there\u2019s one other thing I\u2019ve got to tell you about.\u201d
\n\t\u201cWhat\u2019s that?\u201d
\n\t\u201c\u2018Harper\u2019s is going to run one of my blog posts.\u2019\u201d
\n\t\u201cWhich one?\u201d
\n\t\u201cAre you reading it?\u201d
\n\t\u201cOf course!\u201d
\n\t\u201cSo, if that\u2019s true, you\u2019ve already heard about the professor.\u201d
\n\t\u201cI assumed you were, as you said, fantasizing.\u201d
\n\t\u201cI was. Anyway, they want the \u2018M\u2019 Word, for \u2018Readings.\u2019\u201d
\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s fabulous, honey! An honor, of course. They never took any of the countless things I sent. But I didn\u2019t think to write a rant about spanking the monkey. And look at you, they find you, and put your thing in an honored national magazine.\u201d
\n\t\u201cWell, after they run that thing, under my pen name, \u2018Amy Lissa,\u2019 the honored part might start to slip just a bit.\u201d
\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s too funny. But, no, you earned it. They sometimes print some crazy stuff in \u2018Readings.\u2019\u201d
\n\t\u201cI miss you, Dad.\u201d
\n\t\u201cI miss you too, Lana. Happy New Year!\u201d
\n\t\u201cOh, same to you\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
In his office, Julian sat down with the laptop. He checked Facebook first, and then \u201cAmy Tells All.\u201d Her latest was another acidic gem. It etched its lace on his mind, and made him think twice about his mission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By the light of day, and in all sobriety Dana Feminita noticed that her husband was profoundly antsy all of a sudden. He\u2019d be pounding away on that battered laptop of his, and then he\u2019d pop up and pace. Usually, he just pounded without the pacing. Creative process? Couldn\u2019t hurt to inquire. \u201cJulian.\u201d \u201cYep?\u201d \u201cThat\u2019s the third time in this hour you\u2019ve gotten up to pace. Are you having trouble passing a passage?\u201d \u201cMan! Woman! Mother of god!\u201d \u201cThat\u2019s a yes, I gather.\u201d \u201cI\u2019m reading what I wrote in summer, and I\u2019m trying to make it over so that it doesn\u2019t make me either want to puke, or put me to sleep.\u201d \u201cThe life of the novelist?\u201d \u201cPitiful.\u201d He sat back down and went back to pounding. It was true, after a fashion that he was working on a novel. It just wasn\u2019t the one he\u2019d written over the summer. It was some new crazy thing that was unfolding in real-time and there seemed to be actual skin in the game. His mind was working on the implications of having Lana\u2019s phone number. Did he even dare to talk to her in extreme real-time, voice to voice, without the benefit…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-119","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chapters","comments-off"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ken-beck.com\/bloggers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}