Inner Monologue

The house was robbed and they took my computer and flash drive.

I came home ALONE to everything gone and turned up-side-down. I have the first 50 chapters on my e-mail, but unless by some miracle we find they tossed a drive somewhere...I will either give up on Artemis or start the last 25 chapters from scratch. I don't even know right now.

To top it off one of the cats got out, she's still missing, and she's afraid of everything.

I'm at my parent's right now, they're away on a family vacation, and when I called them to ask them for help, I was met with no support at all. After talking with Robbie we decided that the best thing to do would be to save up enough to get us back to Michigan with his family. They immediately offered us a place to stay while we got back to our feet. Robbie is working on getting his job transferred, I would be starting from scratch with my school loans to pay...of course he keeps telling me that he'll support me for as long as he has to, even if I never go back to work.

All the sweet things make me cry even more.

At least I get internet on my phone, so my email is raintree.willow@gmail.com, my phone number is 614-580-4551. Text, call, email. It makes me even sadder that most of the people that I've been there for here aren't there for me. I'm lucky to have friends who live far away that I email, who listen to me, but I don't think I'll ever stop crying.

I feel like I'm living that moment of coming home over and over again.

Don't comment on here, I won't be checking my LJ for a LONG while.

For 14 days, it started on the 13th and it still hasn't really sank in yet. Probably due to the fact that I usually have 4 days in a row off anyways, I think by next Sunday I will start feeling a lot better.

The whole reason why I put in for my vacation and wanted it all at once was so I wouldn't rage/quit, so I'm slowly unwinding and then the 13th, the day my vacation started, I was already getting phone calls asking me to pick up hours. WTF? There is a giant R next to my name until the 28th, meaning I requested time off and I am getting paid for that time off. DO NOT CALL ME. As if that wasn't enough I got on FB today and checked my inbox to find that one of the day shift wanted me to pick up 4 hours for her on Friday. First off, I don't work days. Second, VACATION. Third, I have plans that day. This vacation is me trying to convince myself to not quit, its having a reverse effect thus far.

We're up in Michigan until tomorrow morning, we got here early yesterday and I have to admit...I'm a city girl. I need to have everything at my fingertips. I'm not okay with the classiest restaurant being Olive Garden, Wet Seal being non-existent, no tea salons or 24 hour coffee houses, and Twilight being considered the epitome of modern literature. I did miss the kids though, and we've been over at Robbie's sister's house often in the past 24 hours.

Speaking of kids, why is it that EVERYONE up here has an adorable toddler? I swear my uterus is screaming at me, and at this point I only have to look at a kid and then back to Rob for him to get the hint.

Concerning Artemis, I discussed the issue with Chapter 50 with Samm and she suggested going along the same route as I had used before, where you have to know what you're looking for to catch what is going on. Kyle suggested blacking out the pages to give the reader an "ohshiiiiiiiii" reaction. But the fact of the matter is that I'm not going to be able to get around writing this part, the whole book leading up to this the reader thinks that there's a line Van Dean is trying to stay away from, and then he actually crosses it.

Why do all my protagonists DIE? I'm seeing a pattern here.

No excerpts today, the content is too graphic.

“Aren’t you the guy who was pointing a gun at me yesterday?”

“Thanks for reminding me how mean you were to me. I really hope you aren’t like that to all of your guests, you won’t have many friends for very much longer.”

Robbie brought an air conditioner back from Michigan when he went to see his parents, I was glad he was able to get up there to visit, he's been wanting to see how his grandmother was doing. We got it set up in the office because we were worried about the computers overheating, now the cats spend all their time in here and I'm thinking they like it more than we do. I closed off the windows in the rest of the upstairs and set up the fans to create one cold airflow.

I don't go back to work until Thursday, so I have some time to get some writing done, but I'm more worried about getting Chapter 21 fixed up before I get it posted, the time doesn't flow as well as I want it to...I think. It could just be another one of those chapters that I've read over so many times that the problem gets glossed over by my disinterest. Kyle's been living with his mother for the last few weeks and I haven't seen him much because of it. I was waiting for a day or two that I could have him over to take a look at a few parts, but I haven't had much time off. I might give him a call today to see about doing something tomorrow.

I wonder if he would be opposed to taking a copy and a few red pens to a tea house instead of sitting around at home.

I had a slightly disturbing dream last night. Rather yesterday. I was napping before going in to work last night and the dream time seemed considerably longer than what time actually passed. Which for me, my dreams usually seem to be brief and scattered. I haven't had one like this in at least two years. It was the usual for the way it used to be, giant maze-building of some sort and me trying to find someone.

But it was the same person that used to appear in my dreams, I've never come in to contact with this person in reality, and to be quite honest he is who I based the character Caspius Van Dean on. In this instance it was a building that was nearly identical to the new COSI, except there were no exhibits and large black curtains were drawn over the doorways of where the exhibits would have been to block off construction.

There are 4 floors to the building itself, but without a key-card you cannot reach the 4th (in reality), it was my task to reach the top without a key-card. So I was running all over the place trying to find a fire-escape to the top, or to find a ladder on the outside. I was feeling downhearted when an old lady comes out of nowhere (its ALWAYS an old lady or crone in these types of things, right?) and says, "In all of this did you ever consider the scaffolding of the construction?"

So I go behind one of the black curtains, and first I'm worried about being stopped by one of the workers, but they don't even bother with me they're too busy with welding random stuff. And for even more reassurance I get this image of the one I'm looking for giving the order to not "hinder" my arrival. So my trek becomes a maze of scaffolding and catwalks until I finally find the right ladder and push through a door on the ceiling.

Above its all white and he's there waiting for me. But he used to be menacing, he wasn't this time. He still had his smirk, and was as presumptuous as ever, but it wasn't the same thing that turned every dream into a nightmare before. I don't remember what was said, but I woke up just as I was about to start asking questions.

Which sucked, because I can never get back to that spot on my own. I used to be really good at controlling where I went in my dreams, but I could never get back to him in them. Still can't. And I would like to, just to ask some questions, see what he says.

ANY-who, I wonder if there's any meaning to it. Maybe that I shouldn't eat so many cookies before I go to sleep...

...On second thought *eyes cookies*...