This Writer's Diary
The first two weeks back in Canada.
Saturday 25th April
A week of readjustment, not only to the 5-hour time difference, but to a shorter day length, different bird songs, different wildflowers and trees, and the demands of my much busier life here.
We arrived home about 2 pm on Sunday, the 19th of April.1 Immediately I went out to buy a few groceries, then did some of the unpacking, a load of laundry, cooked a simple dinner (or maybe Brian did, I don’t actually remember) and collapsed into bed about 8 pm EDT. Up the next morning at 4 am, but with eight hours of sleep — and straight into chairing the community newsletter meeting, followed by a second meeting in the afternoon. Apparently I was both coherent and creative in both. Tuesday morning I wrote a short story to the writing group prompt, led the discussion in the afternoon, and somewhere in there went birding briefly as well as dealing with a lot of household admin. More birding on Wednesday — it is spring migration, can’t miss that! — more admin, topped off by hosting an Open Mic night in the evening.
Jet lag dealt with — after nearly 4 decades of travel, what works for me is simply getting outdoors, eating on the appropriate schedule, and staying busy — I spent a lot more time birding on Thursday. The first warblers are back: yellow-rumped and pines; flickers cackling high in the trees; phoebes fly-catching and tail-flicking. The maple swamp resounded with red-breasted nuthatch calls, and I counted a dozen ruby-crowned kinglets in the spruces. Wood ducks rose from the beaver pond; red-winged blackbirds buzzed in the small marshes; the osprey added sticks to its nest. Sparrows — field and swamp, white-throated and song, and the ever-trilling chipping sparrow — were everywhere.
How quickly my mind brought Ontario birdsong to the fore, and relegated UK birdsong to some mental archive amazes me. The same with the forest floor wildflowers, and the expanding leaves on trees and shrubs.
(There are moments of confusion, though — but those tend to come in the kitchen: where does the colander live here? more than anywhere else. And occasionally with vocabulary — I nearly ordered a ‘white coffee’ at my favourite cafe, not a ‘coffee-with-two-milks’. Luckily, after all these trips, we make the side-of-road driving switch with no problems.)
Friday 1 May
The busyness didn’t subside; I haven’t done a lot of birding. Migration is still slow, as is to be expected this early; clear nights and a full moon makes for perfect migration conditions, but night temperatures dipping below zero mean insect-eaters are hanging back a bit. There are frost warnings, and concerns for fruit-tree blossom and the subsequent crop.
What I have done, remarkably, is a fair bit of writing. The subplot extraction is nearly done, replaced by a different one (two characters had to die: how they die and the fallout from that has changed). Every so often my brain kicks out a modification or addition to a scene almost at random, too (and often in the middle of the night).
At this point I’m still adding words; in the next pass, I’ll probaby add more as I focus on setting and atmosphere, and perhaps more interiority in places. Then I need to decide: one book or two? Or one and half? I’ve never written anything quite as sprawling as this story before; it’s an adventure, and an education.
In Victoria Woods, the trilliums, red and white, are flowering.
Saturday May 2
Frost overnight, and a sprinkling of snow during the day. Our birdfeeder is innudated with pine siskins; the hummingbird feeder hangs untouched, although there are hummers reported close by on e-Bird. At the farmers’ market I buy rhubarb, and am surprised by local asparagus, grown under row covers.
Over coffee and a muffin at one of the downtown cafes, I reread my first ten chapters, fixing continuity errors, tightening, ensuring the theme (as always, divided loyalties, and the choices they force) stays central. The subplot change demands a different reason for two of my characters’ actions and reactions, and I’m just not quite sure of it yet. It will come.
An email arrives from the owner of the Norfolk cottage we rent, telling us it is open for bookings for 2027. Fifteen minutes later, we’ve got our winter weeks reserved and the deposit paid.
Sunday May 3
Clear night, two days past the full moon. A frost, the temperature dipping to -3C overnight. Half an hour past sunrise, the first hummingbird of the year at the feeder.
I’m behind on linking to the books by authors of the upcoming anthology as reviewed on Patricia Furstenburg’s blog. Here are the latest: all are intriguing historical fiction.
Ascent: Cathy Dunn Hell Hath No Fury: Judith Arnopp Hunting the Sun: Jean Gill
My books are can be found here.
For those wondering if, indeed, there was a decent movie or two on the flight, I watched one: The Roses. I’d give it three stars, but it kept me entertained and interested, and that’s all I want from a plane film.