Temptation

M is out with a friend at the cinema. His yellow legal pad with his novel notes is just a few feet away from me, lounging naked and inviting: Read me! But I can't give in to temptation. It's better and right that I'm surprised on November 30 when National Novel Writing Month is over and he shares the more "baked" version with me. At least, I hope he will. I do know that the odd recurring character in his story is modeled after our infrequent mailman, the one who maced Rex soon after we moved in, traumatizing him against mail carriers and their trucks everywhere. Well, M hasn't helped. He's driven into post office parking lots when Rex is in the car, laughing and encouraging him when our poor mutt freaks out at the sight of all those mail trucks.

But I digress. It was lovely meeting the other Pointy Pals at the Applebox today. I felt that writerish feeling again as I roughed out my own outline, that one I haven't had for a while. Later in the afternoon while walking Rex, I recalled that my very first career choice, I think the one that even predated librarian, was novelist. That pull has stayed with me for so long, you'd think I'd pay a little more attention to it.

In other not-so newsworthy news, I did think I was going to get a lot farther in the moving-back-in process this weekend than I did. There's really not that many boxes left in the garage to be cleaned and repositioned inside. But it's all in the details, isn't it? Yesterday I got sidetracked shredding all of my bank statement from a decade ago. They used to print my SSN on the statements, so I didn't feel comfortable just stuffing them into the recycle bin. The cheap shredder I picked up at Target kept jamming, and then it was amusing to scan the statements to recall my monthly rent and my paychecks from NYU and then later from Martha Stewart Living that seemed to increase/decrease at cross purposes. I also found a fairly substantial check to the husband of one of my friends from the NYU poetry program for some artwork, and I saved it from the shredder. For some reason it makes me feel like a true patron of the arts, as well as a participant.

While at the Applebox, I had my first bowl of soup of the fall season and was inspired to simmer up my own tonight, a lentil stew concoction. I'm out of practice, so it all turned into a pretty but similarly textured pot of carbs, unfortunately. But I have months of soup ahead of me, don't I? It's funny how much the season dictates consumption, isn't it?