Imbolc Bloodroot Moon
Several years ago I asked the naturalist at Cedar Creek Ecological Station, a UofM site here in Anoka county, what he considered the first sign of spring in Minnesota. Without hesitation he said bloodroot. When the bloodroot blooms. That’s why this moon is the bloodroot moon.
Imbolc Bloodroot Moon
Watching Margin Call while I workout. This 2011 movie with Kevin Spacey, Demi Moore, Stanley Tucci and Jeremy Irons and a wonderful supporting cast gives me chills. It sets
itself in 2008 in a company that sounds a lot like AIG or Lehman Brothers. A rising young analyst, really a rocket scientist gone over to finance for the money, discovers the company has already passed its margins of safety. A coldly calculated retreat then follows.
What struck me, more than the historical period piece about the biggest financial disaster of our time, were some simple shots. Demi Moore and the CEO of the local branch walking down a darkened corridor to a meeting with the chairman of the board. They’re serious. Their world is about to come apart, a world they’ve worked their lives to achieve.
And I thought. Gee, step outside that darkened corridor. Go down and walk on the sidewalks of New York or the trails of Yosemite. Wander the blue highways of Minnesota or board a boat on Lake Superior. The world in that corridor does not matter. It’s not existentially important. It’s a constructed, artificial world no different from an amusement park or a video game. Everybody agrees to treat it with gravitas, putting it in a movie with serious music in the background and tension building. That’s all it is, another way this animal lives its life, and not a particularly significant part of that life.
Kate and I got the first disc of Homeland a couple of days ago and we’ve watched the first four episodes of this Showtime series about the CIA and the war against terror. Claire Danes, a favorite of mine among young actors, and Mandy Patikin, a wonderful and sensitive actor, give the series bite. It’s an interesting peak into the world of spies and terror and contemporary events. In that regard it’s similar to Margin Call.
The two works together summarize defining moments of this very young millennium, moments that have had a huge impact on all of our lives and will continue to effect us for years to come. They will be historical documents a hundred years from now, a Rorschach on our hopes and fears, mostly our fears. They’re both high caliber, sophisticated presentations worth your time.
Imbolc New (Bloodroot) Moon
All morning reading Missing. I’ve taken the Finding Your Writer’s Voice advice and decided to read through the whole thing, not revising, just taking in the story, marking spots where the pace/action sags, taking notes on characters and places, but mostly getting the story firmly in mind before I begin revising.
As I read, I have the thoughts of my beta readers present to me and the ideas those thoughts have generated. When I get to the end of the reading, it should be clear what I need to do for this third, and I hope final, revision. Final before a line-editing one, I mean.
Reading my own work is peculiar. Sort of like a mechanic working on a car she built. At each point I think, gee, I could have designed that differently, better. The desire to tinker can get in the way of reviewing the overall design. Feels good to make progress.