Smash?

   For those of you who might be new to my blog, I ran away from my life last fall and moved to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, to be a full-time writer.  Needless to say being a writer didn't pay off because I ended up moving back to Missouri, but I did write a memoir about my experience called "Life Gone South (when I ran away to live at the beach and be a writer)."  Catchy title, don't you think?  Anyway, I have been in the final phases of editing my memoir and am still trying to find an agent interested in representing my work.  The piece I was editing today I thought was particularly humorous but how the heck do I really know because no one sees it but me?  So I decided to post the piece I was editing and see if I get any comments.  Is it funny?  Am I truly crrr-azy and should just give up being a writer??  Don't answer that last question, because I don't have any health insurance and can't afford to be truly crazy and I don't know what I'd do if I can't be a writer.  But if any of you out there can play nice and give me a fair critique, tell me what you think.

Day Seventy-Seven

December 29

Revelations

My folks are back at the trailer in Joanna, South Carolina, Daddy's hometown. I'm nearly 50 years old – dayum, the closer I get, the worse I hate the sound of that – and I didn't know, until a few weeks ago when they planned this trip, that Mama hates the week between Christmas and New Years like a gyno exam. Says she feels stuck in limbo, dreads it every year. Huh? You never really know everything about a person, even your own Mama, do you?

   So they headed out at O-dark-thirty (what we call leaving before daylight on a trip) on Christmas morning for South Carolina to escape Mama's limbo. And to see me. They've been there since Monday and every day I get asked, “When you coming up?” So far I've had illness as an excuse. Don't want to get them sick, too, or keep them awake with my hacking and blowing. Plus, a bonus of their trip is to carry some of the God-awful amount of junk I brought with me back home to Missouri. Which required me having sufficient energy to decipher which junk I can live without, pack it, and tote it to my car. Which I have not had until today. So they've let me slide on coming to visit.

   But the better I'm feeling and the more my energy is returning, the less I can stall packing and making the trip. Which smacked me upside the head today with another revelation – packing makes it real that I'm going to leave here one day.

   Even though I put the majority of my junk in storage back home, I purposefully brought as much as I could stuff into my Chevy Cavalier and Daddy's pick-up because I never intended to go back to Missouri. Not to live, anyway. For instance, I brought every pair of panties I own and I don't even wear panties except on a have-to basis. My vision was to finish my New-York-Times-bestselling novel, get a huge advance on the mega-millions it would earn, buy a Shangri-la beach home, and continue life as a writer here and pop back to Missouri for conjugal visits with DMan and to visit the fam in between book tours. That was my #1 Thank-you-God vision anyway. Of course, I entertained lesser visions, I'm not totally delusional, but they all involved finding a way to stay in Myrtle Beach, even if it involved getting a j-o-b besides writing.

   As much as I hate it and the conscious me is fighting it, the subconscious me keeps whispering that I will want to go home. Sometime. To live. I wish those two cons would get along and leave me alone. I know what Mama would do to them. When Sister S and Sister K used to fight when we were kids, Mama would knock their heads together. Then they'd cry and hug each other and forget about their fight. I'd try it, if I knew how to get hold of them cons and smack them together without causing myself brain damage.

The subconscious whispers I keep hearing say:

• Psst. You miss DMan. Even though you've regained your solo mojo after his visit, you enjoyed sharing space with him and those everyday moments that are precious and can't happen when you live here and he lives there. This long distance love can't keep working forever, no matter how good the phone sex is. (That subcon wench is taunting me especially loud about DMan today, since it's our 19-month anniversary.)
• Psst. As much as you love Myrtle Beach, things are coming that you don't love. You think the temperatures are cold already, but it will get even colder before spring. You will hate being cooped up in these three rooms, not even getting to beachwalk because you're such a wussy and won't go out when it's too cold. And your homicidal leanings are bordering on psycho with the “holiday resorters” now. Wait until March hits with the drunken “spring breakers” coming in. Then comes the congestion and cacophony of biker weeks. Might as well turn yourself in to the Myrtle Beach Police Department now, while your haircut and color are fresh for your mugshot.
• Psst. Nothing is happening with your work. Nada. No interest from agents or publications; no “Congratulations, you've won our writing contest” letters; no freelance offers. You can't even get an article published in Elle and you have a dayum subscription. You are not getting anywhere with your so-called “writer purpose.” And you have no money coming in. But that debit card is sure getting a workout, isn't it? Are you going to spend every last dollar you have chasing this dream and then be forced to crawl home and mooch off the fam? or DMan? (The subcon wench is sounding a lot like my I Suck Demon, isn't she? I can't catch a break.)

   I mulled over my subconscious's ravings and faced the more-probable-than-not possibility that I might be moving back to Missouri to live sometime in the who-knows-when future. So this afternoon I packed up the Cavalier with my DVDs – can't believe I brought all my DVDs, enough for a mini-Blockbuster store, and then the dayum DVD player quit working and my lackadaisical landlord hasn't sent the replacement he keeps promising – and deep summer attire I won't need anytime soon and two plastic totes of shoes and any other clothes I deemed I-can-live-without-wearing-that-for-a-while. Other than actually finding something I want to wear among what's left in my closet, I'm all set to hit the road to trailerville (aka Joanna) in the morning.

P.S. Just so you won't think I've given in to subcon completely, I kept Sex and the City The Movie, SATC Seasons One through Six, and my Big Bang Theory DVDs here. I just couldn't survive without my girls and my geeks.

   Well, that's the snippet of my memoir to give you a taste and see what you think.  Please comment if you're moved to.  Right now I've got to get ready to watch the season finale of "Smash."  My fabulous cousin, who actually performed on Broadway, turned me on the this show and how true-to-life it is of the Broadway experience.  And I love the show, it's fabulous!  I'm devastated that it's over for the season, and if there is any justice in this world it will be picked up for another season!  (And my memoir will get published!!  Please, please, please let it be a smash, too!!)