I am trapped, of my own free will, in a strange house in a strange city with an alien cat while its owners are away. I usually do well by voluntary confinement, and I hope to do so this time. I remember a story told about Barbara Hutton, the millionairess, called the "Poor Little Rich Girl", whose first husband, on their honeymoon, locked hr in her cabin on board a luxury ship and didn't let her out for the duration of the crossing, to help her lose weight. She lost weight and health and love and trust. I suppose I might lose some weight, too, although my friends' freezer is full and I brought lots of vegetables with me, but my purpose is not loss but gain. I intend to go home with a completed manuscript of a book I have been working on for five years. I'm very close, with about 20,000 words to go, not straightforward words, though, but fill-in the gaps, explain and enlarge, clarify and embellish words. That's why I need to be trapped, to force me to focus. And remember to feed the cat.
it's still today
According to the date I seem to have missed yesterday but I haven't, not yet. It's the middle of the night, halfway between yesterday and tomorrow, but I suppose I'll have to write two for today's date. So - yesterday was busy. I finally did my planting and my fingernails are ringed with mud because I didn't wear garden gloves, sort of on purpose. I remember Scarlett O'Hara ("Scarlett O'Hara, yo' hands is like a field hand's." "I am a field hand.") That doesn't happen often. I have a writer's hands, and feet. I also have a writer's spread (like a secretary's, sorry - personal assistant's - only broader. I'm not good at gardening but I'm better than I was. I used to have a withering thumb. Given water, sunshine and fertilizer, the plants I touch begrudgingly forgive me. What else did I do? I re-read a lot of material pertaining to a play of mine that I have to fine-fine-tune very carefully. I'm trying to stuff enough key words into my head to let them simmer and come up with something I can use. I have to leave it now. I am preparing to go away for a week to finish a book. I hope the plants survive without me....