The Return of the Earnest Communicator

Whew! I’m finished with my nonfiction narrative,

Heart Island: true tales of an unnatural naturalist (new title!)

I feel like popping the cork! And I would–but i don’t drink! So last night my consort Carter and I whooeee! went to the movies (yuk! George Gloom-y in “The American”…don’t bother!) and I had a double chocolate malted milkshake. yummmmmm. Better than champagne! Much better for us who can’t drink (and believe me, it’s not a pretty picture when the ol’ Lordflea used to pour the booze down the gullet!).

In honor of my completion of this enormous task, three yeas in the actual writing, years and years in the “incubation stage”…I offer you this drawing that I did in honor of Annie Liebowitz’s great quote (which she got from Kafka: hey! nothing’s new, everything’s been said, all great art, literature, dance and music has been around: we’re all just borrowing and recycling from each other, all the time). Nonetheless, here’s what Annie has to say about why she makes her art, astounding photographs and portraits:

“You have to make art stronger than life so people can feel it. Like Franz Kafka says, ‘You have to take an ax to the frozen sea in people’s hearts.'”

opening people's frozen hearts

for the last three months i’ve been working on the final final final edit! This was the hardest chore of all. After at least five readers’ comments, I weighed their comments, and set out thinking what needed to be tossed out from my last edit, and, possibly, in some few cases, expounded upon: issues that were not as clear as they needed to be. In other words, decisions decisions, decisions. No longer the creative process of the first draft, where you let out what you have to say, like one great vomit (inspired, of course!); or the second draft, where you’re fine-tuning the plot, the characters (some of them fall to the wayside) and the timing of revelations, back-story, time-line or no chronology, etc; or even the third and fourth drafts in which i think out the logic of sequence, the presentation of the overall theme: the “IT FACTOR” (to be explained in my next post, folks! coming attractions!). No, none of that fun stuff for this last final edit. This past three months has been a chore. Painstakingly slow. Methodically mechanical in some parts. First I had to read and make my corrections, and then i set out to do the monkey-work, the transcribing of each and every tiny itsy-bitsy little change (oops, don’t need that comma! and no, I didn’t mean daily, i meant “dilly”…you get the drift).

So now I’m done and I’m celebrating! Here’s another way of putting it, in my visual language for those of your who know that’s how lordflea communicates: song, dance, hugs, images:

yeah! yeah! yeah! I'm through! I'm done! It's finished! Let's PAH-TY!

So now I’m cleaning my house because we’re having our glorious monthly chanting and meditation meeting this saturday. My spider farm will be relocated to the bag of my vacuum, to be transported to a happier, safer place to breed. The dustballs running amock under every surface will be swept clean and every reflective surface will sparkle with my heart’s gladness. There’s NOTHING quite like finishing a looooooonnnnngggggg project. So, you’ll be hearing from me more often (yea we’ve all heard that before, lordflea! i can hear you snicker!) because i’m going to up the anty and put more effort into getting all this hard work i’ve been doing out there—to the public. And this blog is a great medium for spreading the word.

So thanks for all of you who come and visit! I can tell who and what and where and when, even though i’m not great at reading all the techno babble…i see i have some faithful followers reading, or at least checking in if you HAVEN’T SIGNED UP for this nifty notification device: check out the top upper right of the blog and sign up for easily discovering when i’ve gotten my ass off the meditation cushion and onto the blogger’s keyboard. Don’t worry though: everything is perfect.

You’re perfect.

I’m perfect.

The world is perfect in its imperfections.

We’re all together on this journey of Spirit manifesting in the Physical…and all is happening in due time. I am filled with love and enthusiasm for all of it! This magical mystery tour we’re all on.

For those of you who haven’t yet read “Female Nomad” please do! I’m with Rita in Bali right now. Have downloaded “Freedom” by Jonathan Franzen on my iPhone’s kindle (gee, Obama, what’d ya think?) and….we’re getting ready to give peace and Light to the anniversary of 9.11. At our home, we chant and meditate and join our hearts with others in praising the GOOD things in life. The bad, well, we’ll just let time sort it all out. And prayer. And doing the next right thing, each and every one of us.

One last image? Why not! ha ha, love and Light from your pal, lordflea