So Much to Read, So Little Time

Most of my down time lately has been spent reading. Studying is more like it. Up to my ears in non-fiction reading. Here's a sampling of titles, all from the local library:


Secret Lives of Boys: Inside the Raw Emotional World of Male Teens by Malina Saval
*Graphic language at times—the first chapter has it the heaviest.*
Over-all, a fascinating read. Boys are a lot like girls when it comes to worries/fears.



Exiting Nirvana : A Daughter's Life with Autism by Clara Claiborne Park
It's refreshing to find a book dealing with an older child on the spectrum. And one that's artistically inclined, like my son. Since I have so many informative books to read right now, I'm using this one as my light/nighttime reading. As interesting as it is, I look forward to some fluff.


1001 Great Ideas for Teaching and Raising Children with Autism or Asperger's by Ellen Notbohm and Veronica Zysk
Lots of good ideas: some old, some new. Taking notes...



The Everything Homeschooling Book by Sherri Linsenbach
Need I say more?


On a good—possibly pathetic—note, I've written over twelve chapters of Corroded. Eleven of those (89 pages) have been through the mill in the awesome critique group I'm in. Thank you, QuillMasters!
My main character is based on me as a teen, but amplified. The more she stretches her limits, the more fun (and harder!) it is to write. It's almost like reliving high school, thinking about all the “what ifs” and if I had that chance, would I have been brave (or stupid) enough to do or say something... For the most part the answer is no. And, an enormous NO for ever wanting to actually go back and live through it again.

Speaking of me as a teen: back by popular demand (well, all four people who voted wanted to see more) is a random poem from a seventeen year old me.

Lost

Crashing waves against the sand.
The tempest whirls in my head.
A soul
dragged down
by Satan's grasp
Has left the world
victim of the
sacrifice.

Numb no More

I've felt emotionally numb off and on over the years, especially since becoming a mother. It's difficult to draw the line between mother-fatigue and depression but either (and most diffidently the combination of the two!) could be counted as a cause of the numbness.

Since my WIP is a teen novel, I felt the urge to reconnect to my younger, emotional self. Pictures from the era provide an opening but it's my poetry that drags all the emotions back—kicking and screaming.
And, wow, was I in touch with my inner angst!
Check out my brooding self in Pebble Beach, 1992....

Oh, I miss my hair!

I thought it'd be fun to start adding a few poems to each post—providing a flash-portrait of some of the imaginings of my former self. I'll even put the desperately awful ones up.

I'll start things off with a poem which I turned in to my Creative Writing teacher and he wrote a “please see me” note on the bottom of it. I was too embarrassed to confront him, thinking he might be suspecting abuse or something. But he never followed up on it, not sure if that's good or bad... hmm.

The poem, written by my sixteen year old self, was inspired by the movie ___________.

Wait, you tell me!
(Hint: 80's fantasy. No, the movie title is NOT in the poem/title.)


Mask

Illusions surround
my every move
Walking through the corridor of eternity
I feel tampered with and used

Down the path I see someone I know
look again
it isn't who it seems to be
A face turned and twisted
in my mind
to become fantasy

But after all
what is a face
environment
or a smile?
They are things we hide behind
truths we run from for miles.


What movie do you think it is? Comment!
The first correct person might win an autographed copy of the poem. :)

And don't forget to vote.