And today I am off to the airport to head up to Bethesda for Malice Domestic. How exciting! I’ve not been to Malice in a very long time; I don’t remember what year it was, but it was also my first trip to New York for the Edgars; the two events merged into a single trip. It was quite fun. There were a lot of friends there, and I know we had a lovely after-party on Saturday night post-banquet that was so much fun my sides hurt from laughing. I don’t know that this Malice will live up to the great time I had the first time I went, but I am glad I decided to go, after a little push from Catriona McPherson once the Agatha nominations were announced earlier this year. And while I tend to not make a big deal out of award nominations, I also realized when are you ever going to be nominated for an Agatha again? Never, that’s when so bearing that in mind I decided what the hell, I’ll spend the money–which I will regret later, undoubtedly–and go.
And let’s be honest; I am not traveling for book business again for the rest of the year other than Bouchercon. (note to self: start tracking expenses for the year so you can keep up and be ready at the end of the year–something I say I will do every year and never end up doing) I’ve already checked in for my flight (huzzah!) and have my boarding pass, and it’s a nonstop, coming and going. I used to not mind changing planes when I was younger; now that I’m getting older it’s just one more ordeal as part of traveling. As much as I want to go back to Europe–we’re thinking about Amsterdam and Berlin next year–the thought of all that flying and all that time in airports just exhausts me. Maybe I can get my doctor to prescribe something for me just for the longer overseas flight that will knock me out immediately.
I have to finish packing in a moment. I was tired last night when I got home from work, and had to do stuff–laundry, the dishes–after working on the book and then tried to start gathering what I need to take with me. I have almost everything clothing wise gathered already; I just need my dress shoes and some jeans, my slippers and some sweats…and I also have to gather all the technology I need to take with me–cords, chargers, accoutrement for my laptop–as well as the books I am taking on the trip with me. I really don’t want to get ready or do anything; all I feel like doing is going back to bed, in all honesty–but I am sure once the coffee starts kicking in, I’ll light a fire under my ass and get me going. The weather is supposed to be rainy today; I think I’ve packed the right clothing for the trip. It’s going to be warm during the days and chillier at night; I am not taking a jacket with me so any out of doors ventures after dark will probably wind up being terribly cold for me.
I’ll live, I would imagine.
I do wish I would have had more time to work on getting the house cleaned and organized; I’m going to hate coming back home to a messy house. But I also took off Monday so I can have a day to reorient myself back to my life again, run errands, and so forth. I also have a doctor’s appointment in the afternoon that day–I’ll probably swing by the store and make groceries on the way home from that. And of course, next weekend I will be driving up to Alabama to see my dad–long story, too long for now–so yes, there will be lots of pressure and time issues when it comes to getting this manuscript finished. And I have another one to edit, great.
And on that note, I need to get back to preparing for the trip. Have a great Thursday, Constant Reader, and tomorrow I’ll be checking in from Malice.
Saturday morning. I was incorrect about the department meeting; it’s later this month (when I’ll be in Bethesda, actually) so I went to the health fair, was told I should increase my exercise (duh, since I do none now) and other than that, I appear to be perfectly healthy–or at least per my vitals and blood work, at any rate.
How fortunate they weren’t testing for mental stability, eh?
But it was a lovely day to work-at-home. It was still cold overnight, but the high yesterday hovered in the high seventies, topping out at a solid, spring-like eighty degrees at one point in the afternoon, which was also nice. I filed and cleaned when taking breaks from work; laundered the bed linens, finished off the dishes, and straightened the rugs as well as sweeping and vacuuming. We got caught up on Yellowjackets and The Mandalorian, and while I was waiting for Paul to come home from the gym, I rewatched this week’s Ted Lasso with the captions on so I could catch things I missed on first viewing (something I do with every episode, as I did with Schitt’s Creek), and I have to say I enjoyed it a lot more on the second viewing than I did on the first. I am very curious to see where the show is going and how it’s going to end–but unlike everyone else, I’ve decided to not theorize about it or jump to conclusions predicated on my interpretation of what I’ve seen; instead I just want to enjoy the ride and trust the writers to do their jobs, which they’ve done superbly on every step of the journey thus far.
I slept really well last night and feel very rested this morning. I have to get the mail today and I should make a small grocery run while I am out, but ugh, how I hate the grocery store lately. It saps my strength and will and makes me want to curl up with Scooter and pretend the rest of the world doesn’t exist anymore out there. There’s not much we really need, to be completely honest; but I need to know what I want to make for dinner this weekend and what I am going to be taking for lunch next week. Decisions, decisions–but it feels good to be rested and clear-headed this morning. I don’t know that I feel particularly inspired this morning, but that’s okay. Once I finish this, I am taking my coffee and repairing to my easy chair to read Scorched Grace, which I hope to finish this weekend.
Anne Perry, a very successful author, died this week. She had an unfortunate past, having committed the crime that Peter Jackson’s film Beautiful Creatures was based on (also known as the film that gave us Kate Winslet and Melanie Lynskey) as a teenager, and served her time. I didn’t know Ms. Perry, nor have I ever read any of her work. This wasn’t out of any sense of oh I can’t possible be supportive of her! She killed someone! but more because they weren’t the kind of stories I particularly enjoy. I did ride in an elevator with her once at a Bouchercon, and she was polite, reservedly friendly (understandable), and seemed kind. I’ve been thinking lately that I’d like to read more historical crime fiction, particularly around the first World War (looking at you, Charles Todd!), but that TBR stack is already way too deep and tall and wide. However, Ms. Perry’s death has, of course, brought all that about her teenaged crime back into the news and onto social media to be rehashed and discussed and, well, frankly beaten into the ground. Ms. Perry’s situation also is key to a broader discussion about criminal justice, and our criminal justice system and how it operates. (Ms. Perry’s crime was committed in Australia, I believe.) I see a lot of people talking about how they don’t believe in redemption, and how they could never bring themselves to support someone who’d done something so terrible, etc. etc. etc. And it’s very true; we as a society tend to look askance at people who’ve served time in prison–and tend to judge them harshly.
How can you believe in a criminal justice system if you don’t believe in the potential of human redemption? I’m not an expert on any of this stuff, let me make that very clear at this point. I am merely examining this from a layman’s perspective and coming from a logical place to try to dissect all of this with nuance and rationality; what can I say, I took Geometry in high school and was on the debate team. I don’t think you can believe in our criminal justice system if you don’t believe in redemption, which seems kind of Old Testament to me; once a criminal always a criminal is what that boils down to, and if there is never even the slightest possibility that someone can be redeemed, what is the point of jailing them? Punishment? That seems kind of draconian and not very humanist, frankly. The odds are stacked against convicts as it is when they are released; as most of us will always keep an eye at them in askance, just waiting for them to commit another crime to prove that they belong in jail and should never be released. I understand the sex-offender registry–women and children are vulnerable and should be aware someone who may be a predator is living in their area now–but at the same time, it feels….punitive. Sex crimes are horrible, to be sure, but if they are so horrible and the offender is statistically going to commit the same kind of crime again–why let them out in the first place? Getting one of those flyers back when we lived on Camp Street is what inspired me to write my short story “Neighborhood Alert,” which is one of my favorite stories that I’ve done, and tried to use the story to illustrate the potential consequences that can come from such alerts.
I also think it’s interesting that people are so unforgiving in real life while they will read–and root for–characters like Tom Ripley or Hannibal Lector or Dexter. But that’s fiction, they say in response, to which I say so you would be repulsed by them if they were real, but you root for them in fiction? Make it make sense to me.
Ultimately, she did her time for her crime, and then spent the rest of her life writing crime novels successfully. Enough people either didn’t know about her past, or didn’t care enough to make them give up the pleasure of reading her work. As I said, I’ve not read her work but it’s not out of any sense of moral outrage or superiority, but because they aren’t the kind of books I ordinarily read–although now I kind of want to read one, to see how good she was. If you don’t want to read her, or didn’t, because of her past that’s your choice and your decision. But please don’t think for one moment you have the right to tell me what I can or cannot read, or what I can or cannot enjoy–because then you are no better than right-wingers trying to ban books and close libraries, and that is something I will not, do not, and cannot, support on any level.
I also kind of believe that redemption is possible, but not unless there is atonement and a desire to change. If I didn’t believe that, well, I don’t know how I could live with myself. This is a question I explored in my nasty little story “This Thing of Darkness”–can you atone for something terrible you did as a teenager? Especially if you are never punished for the crime itself? How do you live with yourself with such a thing on your conscience? (This is also the theme for one of my favorite books of all times, Thomas Thompson’s Celebrity)
And on that note, I am making another cup of coffee and heading to the chair with Margot Douaily. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back here again tomorrow, as always.
I bit the bullet yesterday and decided to go ahead and attend Malice Domestic. It was expensive, but it does count as a business expense, and really, will I ever be nominated for an Agatha again? Probably not very likely, and even though it is just as likely that I will not win, it’s not like I’m not used to sitting at a banquet and hearing someone else’s name called. Plus, it’s always nice to be around writers, and I’ll get to see friends–including some I’ve not seen in quite a while (looking at you, Sara J. Henry) and the one time before that I went–like ten years ago–I had a really great time. So, I will be coming to Bethesda that last weekend in April, y’all. (Of course I just had a paranoid moment of wondering if I booked the flight and hotel for the right dates, but DUH, I went to the hotel link from their website after registering.) Now I just have to figure out how to get there from Washington National…I’ll probably spring for a Lyft or a car service rather than trying to drag my luggage around on the Metro.
Yesterday was a pretty good day, actually; I didn’t get as much done as I would have liked but I did make progress and progress is always appreciated. We watched the figure skating yesterday (Ilia Malinin got the gold; Jason Brown the silver) and then caught up on Servant and Mayfair Witches (which is getting more and more off-track from the book, but will save those conversations for when the show has finished, when I will talk about both book and television series), and then we started The Recruit on Netflix, which sort of reminds me of Killing Eve in some ways, but it’s different. The first episode is a bit much, but as the show continues it starts hitting its stride and I very reluctantly had to stop the binge so I could go to bed. I do look forward to tuning in again, too–hopefully Paul won’t be working super-late every night this week.
It’s hard to believe that I am heading up to Birmingham this Friday, and the next weekend is when the parades start. #madness. February will be over before we know it–and then it’s March and suddenly spring is over and we’re back into the brutal summer months of three hundred dollar power bills. I slept really well last night–the weather has changed again and is warm, which means it’s super-foggy at night and in the mornings, burning off a bit in the afternoons before descending upon us again as the sun goes down. I need to get the draft of the book finished this week and sent off; I am hoping to spend the rest of the week before I leave for Alabama Friday morning working on a short story that I need to get finished for the ever-patient editor.
I slept really well again last night, which seems to be becoming a recurrent theme for me in 2023, and one that I am deeply happy and grateful for. I’m feeling a lot less anxiety this year, and I think the relaxation and lower anxiety has everything to do with me doing all this writing, which has been wonderful. I am always happiest when I am writing and producing–even work as rough and raw as this manuscript currently is–and it always puts me in a better frame of mind. Writing, as much as I always have to force myself to do it and sometimes even hate it while I am doing it, is my happy place and as long as I am writing I am in a better frame of mind, which is something I really need to remember going forward with everything in my life: writing is what centers you and makes you happiest.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a most lovely day, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow.
Queer and Loathing in America 