Convoked

May 27 & 28

It's getting to be that time of year again, when my garret is never cool, when the heat of the day lingers oppressively in what is, lest we forget, essentially a half-finished attic, until the early hours of the morning, when sensible boys with day jobs should be sleeping. And yet here I am, beginning a journal entry that I know full well I won't finish today and very likely won't finish tomorrow, after midnight. Why? Well, mostly because I want to, and I'm able to because I seem to be wholly over my cold! And while my gums are still in the healing process, they no longer hurt, they're just a bit swollen. Good health returns! (Knock wood.)

I suspect I'm going to go non-chronological in my thoughts on the weekend. I am normally ploddingly linear (in my non-fiction and my stories both -- there are exceptions, true, but I mean mainly). I think this is because I do not have a very sophisticated mind; I usually default to the sequential when seeking to organize my thoughts. In this case, I'm going for the more cobbled-together, hit-the-highlights approach, though, and let chronology go to the devil! I'm taking this radical departure from my usual technique because I am very, very tired, and because I did not make any notes at the convention about the convention itself.

***

It was a Magnetic Fields kind of weekend. Fair Susan picked Heather and I up from the airport after a fairly painless flight (in contrast to the flight home, ugh), and from her tape deck wafted the strains of "The Book of Love" and "The Luckiest Guy on the Lower East Side" and so on. It occurred to me that this could be good novel-writing music, and that it would most definitely be good Fury-story-writing music. Later, when we saw Jenn, she told me that she had a gift for me -- 69 Love Songs, by the Magnetic Fields, which she'd seen on my (woefully unupdated) Amazon wishlist! What sweet confluence! What a wonderful woman! Is there anything better than getting a just-because gift from a dear friend? Mmm. I had a great time hanging out with Jenn -- if we'd been stuck in an elevator together for five days, and not been able to talk to anyone else, and forced to survive on bottled water and pez, it still would've been worth the trip, just to see her.

***

That first afternoon at Karen's was marvelous. Heather and I napped, and we sat in the back yard sipping drinks, watching Jeremiah hurtle through the air in his rope swing. Later I sat back there alone and worked on my Fury story, writing longhand in the slantwise afternoon light. I want a backyard. I think it would do good things for what is conventionally called my soul.

***

Pär makes a lasagna that puts my paltry efforts at creating same to shame. I could've eaten the entire pan myself.

***

The slumber-party at Karen's was immensely fabulous. I'd never met Kristin before, and she's just as sweet and smart and pleasant to be around as I'd imagined she would be (that is to say, very sweet and smart and pleasant!). I'd met Alan before, but only briefly. We all sat around in the living room -- the above-mentioned, and Jenn, Karen, Susan, Mary Anne, Ted, his girlfriend (whose name I remember but hesitate to attempt to spell), Pär, and Jeremiah. Lots of little conversations, some big conversations, an altogether cozy and convivial start to the long weekend. Jenn and Heather and I stayed up late talking in the guest room, probably keeping everyone downstairs awake with our mumblings. Karen had to come in to shush us, once, because we were being loud and disturbing Jeremiah; a very slumber-party moment.

***

Books Heather and I bought:

• Rabid Transit: A Mischief of Rats (I read it, very good, especially "Wally's Porn" and Nick's dead funny "joanie.bloggermax.com")
  
  

• Say... What Time Is It? (Read it, too (the stories, anyway, not yet the poems) -- Greg's story beautiful and minimalist, a perfect gem; Kelly Link's story quite bizarre and lovely; Kristin's "Saga of the Raiding Team" perhaps my favorite of the bunch, as I told her the last night of the convention, but all of them well worth reading. Chris Rowe outdid himself on the layout, too -- it's a gorgeous 'zine. Buy it. Even though I'm not in it.)
  
  

• Trampoline, edited by Kelly Link. (An anthology. One afternoon I read Chris Rowe's "Force Acting on a Displaced Body". I had no idea he was a brilliant fiction writer. It's one of the best stories I've read all year, easily. That night I heard him read the same story. He's a damned good reader, too. I was rather effusive in my praise of that story when talking to him later, but sometimes it's so good, that's all you can do. I wish I'd written it, and that's about the highest compliment I can give. I look forward to reading the other stories.)
  
  

• Lord Stink, Judith Berman (A chapbook.)
  
  

• The Journal of Pulse-Pounding Narratives. (A 'zine. I read a couple of the stories from the copy at work, and decided we needed a copy of our own.)
  
  

• Time Gypsy, Ellen Klages (A chapbook of a single story. Pretty good. The characters accepted wildly improbable things a bit too readily for my taste, but that's a sin I'm guilty of having my own characters commit, so... still an entertaining read.)
  
  

• Everyone in Silico, Jim Munroe (Because it's ridiculous that we don't have it already! This is the man who wrote Flyboy, after all! And in addition to being very tall, he is very nice, and remembered meeting us last year. He told his partner that Heather and I were among those who welcomed him his first time at Wiscon. A role I'm pleased to have played.)
  
  

• Verging on the Pertinent, Carol Emshwiller. Oddly enough the only Emshwiller collection I don't own. I got into her stuff during college and bought the others, and now I have them all... though a couple of them are in a box in North Carolina. They must be. Though at times, when I think of all the books that must be in boxes in a shed in North Carolina, I begin to think the boxes resemble a sort of Borgesian literary repository, books within boxes within boxes...

***

Overheard: "I didn't know Gwenda Bond was a blonde bombshell. She looks like a 1940's movie star." I didn't know that, either, but it's true. And both hers and Chris Rowe's accents make me miss home; though Kentucky and North Carolina accents aren't the same, they're close enough for jazz and nostalgia)

***

Restaurants where we ate:

• The Angelic, a rather nice pub, that first night, after the guest of honor readings at A Room of One's Own. I talked to Gavin a lot about 'zines, and Buffy, and books, and bookstores, and other nice things. I drank stout and ate a chicken sandwich with bacon and avocado on. I talked to other people, too, of course.
  
  

• Stillwaters, a pub with surprisingly good and dirt-cheap publike food. Lunch with Mike Canfield, Jenn, and Heather. We marveled at how cheap the food was. The bill was under $30 for the four of us. It boggles the mind.
  
  

• An Italian place, the name of which escapes me, with Jenn and Heather. Enormous quantities of very good food. I couldn't finish my meal. Those who have eaten with me in the past will recognize what an astonishing statement that is.
  
  

• Hawk's Eh. Sandwiches. Nice location on State Street, though, in the sunshine, with people playing folk music across the way. Heather and I discussed the idea that living in Madison would be nice. Then we noticed the cigarette smoke even in dining areas, and the astonishing blandness of her food, and the people wearing American flag t-shirts without irony, and, well, there's winter, of course, which neither of us much likes the sound of. Which isn't to say that Madison isn't a wonderful place to live -- I've heard almost nothing but good things about the place, and I believe it, and I'm charmed every year when I go there. It's more that Heather and I realized how much we like living where we do, in many underappreciated ways. And, again, I can't stress this enough, there's winter. I've done snow, and need not do it again. I don't discount the possibility of living in a place that has winter, but it does give me pause. I wouldn't mind snow and ice if I didn't have to go out and drive to a job in it and so forth... For lo, I have tasted the fruit of paradise, and despair to go back, and so forth.
  
  

• The hotel Sunday brunch. We've done it every year. It's expensive (especially for Madison), but I get my money's worth in bacon, I bet.
  
  

• A Nepalese place, with Nick and Jenn and Heather and Susan. (Thus thwarting Nick's wish to eat only food from Imperialist countries.) I had momo! Which is essentially balls of beef in pastry. Mmm. Can't go wrong. Mango lasses, too.
  
  

• Bagels, and much coffee, at Michaelangelo's, the charming café next to the hotel. I wrote a good couple of scenes on the Fury story there one afternoon, when I was burned-out on trying to talk to people intelligently.
  
  

***

I met Theodora Goss, and tried to express my admiration for her work without coming off like a lunatic (because I love "The Rose in Twelve Petals" and "Professor Berkowitz Stands at the Threshold" to a lunatic degree). We were standing in line to register (since Heather and I sorta forgot to register earlier) behind her, so I got to chat a bit even on that first day. She knew who I was, which I always find vaguely astonishing. Later I saw her on a wonderful panel with Charles Vess and Terri Windling and Greg Frost about the Border in fantasy -- she teaches a class about such borderlands. Many of the things they had to say applied to my Fury story (I'm at the in-deep point of writing where every scrap of insight I can gather is fed directly into making the story better). I wanted to talk to her more than I did (though I saw her at lots of parties and such, even rode the shuttle to the airport with her on the way home) -- the thing is, I wanted to sit down with her for several hours and talk about fantasy and short fiction, because I think based on her stories and hearing her speak that I could learn a lot from her. But how do you ask a person you don't know to run away with you for several hours at a convention? Answer: you don't. See, I know that. So I'm not a complete lunatic. It was quite nice meeting her anyway, though.

***

The thing I love about Wiscon is that there are incredibly talented, brilliant, cool people there, and the con's small enough that, if you make an effort, you can actually talk to them. How cool is that? I'll tell you how cool. It's amazingly cool.

***

I went to a poetry open mike in a small hot room, and it was quite good, a very high level of quality in the readings. I gave away copies of Star*Line, and told people to send me poems. I read a few "A Bestiary" poems. La. Poetical goodness. I talked to Richard Chwedyk and his wife (both talented versifiers!) afterward. Reading poetry always gives me a nice rush...

***

Parties I attended:

• The Ratbastards/Jim Munroe party. The Ratbastards provided kegs (which Alan and Kristin nobly drove from home, I think). Mmm, beer. I got drunk, the perfect amount of drunk, happy and talkative but not sick and minimal-hangover drunk. I don't think I danced, but there was dancing, very good dancing; I remarked to someone that any convention where you could see Terri Windling dancing was a good one. I talked to the ever-lovely Amy Beth Forbes a bit, about 'zines and such, but I did not hit on her the way I did last year, because I am capable of restraint when restraint is appropriate. I met Barzak's wonderful girlfriend Jackie -- they're a good couple, two good people who are good together, that makes me happy to see.
  
  

• The Tor party, Saturday night. Always loads of free beer and munchies. Nick and Kristin brought in a stereo, though it wasn't working by the time I went to bed, alas. I talked to people in the hallway, ran into Hilary and J. Laurel Winter gave Heather and I flashy blue things, which was sweet. I didn't drink so much as I did Friday night, because, as I mentioned above, I am indeed capable of restraint.
  
  

• The Strange Horizons tea party was immensely pleasant, as always. Mary Anne announced that Susan is now in training to be editor-in-chief -- yay, Susan! I sat in a corner, mostly, and talked to people as they wandered by, eventually wound up sprawled on a bed with Jenn leaning on me, talking to her and her friend Lisa and to Heather and others as well. Very cozy. It's a cozy sort of convention.
  
  

• The Small Beer party, Sunday. I sat on the couch and talked comics with Mike Canfield and Dave, um, Schwartz? I think? Also chatted a bit with J., and with Karen Joy Fowler, who taught me and Mike and J. at Clarion (though she seemed surprised that we all came from the same class -- she remembers individual students, she said, but has trouble placing them in order...). We talked about making Clarion into a reality show a la American Idol or Survivor, with participants being voted off, and the American public choosing the winner, who would receive a publishing contract. High silliness. Eventually got tired of couch-sitting, and mingled among my people, the Ratbastards, the Small Beer people, the Fortress of Words people, Karen and Jenn, and Heather, of course, always Heather; I have so much fun with her at Wiscon, I fall so in love with her and our life of writing and reading and talking and all the other good things we do...
  
  

***

We bought two pieces of art; a print of "Dryad and Friend" by Terri Windling (my choice), and a nice fire-fairy print that Heather liked. (I like it, too, though I preferred the darker swamp-fairy by the same artist). Mmm. Art. (That phrase would work as a motto for the whole weekend, actually.)

***

I could go on and on and on, and the temptation is to do just that, but this is getting a bit on the long side. Other isolated things: Nick telling us about his old career as a term-paper writer at the dessert function. The very short Hiromi Goto putting the Tiptree Tiara on the very tall John Kessel's head. The speeches: Emshwiller's was funny and personal, Miéville's deliberately inflammatory and funny, Kessel's rather eloquent (and the only one of the three to directly address the subject of feminism). The Gathering, which I have some pictures from (Heather took them; I'll post them later this week, probably), a sort of weird indoor fair, with hair-weaving, assorted forms of divination, balloon-hats, massages, and so forth -- all fundraising for the convention and the Tiptree, of course. Barth Anderson, looking oddly suave with a balloon-sculpture hat. Being introduced to K.Z. Perry. The hot hot hot hot hot hot room where Heather and I and Susan and later Matt slept, with the unworking air-conditioning and the suicide-proof window that opened only a bare crack. Talking with Karen and Susan and Heather about how nice it would be to live with our friends, all together in a place where we could write in proximity, have dinners and coffee and conversation; oh, and talking about flaming falafel and the beauty of burning air, of course. Standing beside China Miéville as he examined his action figure, which was later auctioned off. Trying to explain to Kristin that I'm not really such a fast writer anymore, that I used to be, but now I just plod along, that I'm steady, perhaps, but not incandescent. Trying to convince Jackie of the same thing, at a different time; it seems the legend of my vast word-producing abilities continues, and when I tell people it's greatly exaggerated, they think I'm being modest. Realizing that I'd only bought books from the Small Beer Press table, and being oddly pleased by that. Gavin agreeing to sell our Floodwater chapbooks at his table, gratis, from his pure generosity -- he sold two, and we made $8! Whoo yeah! Eating breakfast at Karen's, a few sausages, some danish, some juice; looking around and thinking what a good place it was to be, with what good people, how lucky I am to be among these folks. So many funny little moments (Nick, of course, was constantly hilarious, constantly argumentative, a pleasure to talk to). Jed and Mary Anne, both in drag at a party -- they were beautiful. Wandering our Karen's delightful huge ramshackle house, thinking I'd like to have a house, someday, to make my own as they're making that space theirs. It's hard to do that, when you can't paint the walls or change anything, which is the case when you're renting, at least in my case. Talking to Barzak about grad school and writing around the obstacles in life. My brain is melting. Recall is breaking down, confabulation is creeping in. So, enough of this. I've certainly left things out, for which I apologize, but the hour grows late, and this captures a bit of the whirlwind inspirational flavor, I think...

***

Coming home was rough, with our flight from Madison delayed, making us miss our connecting flight, so that we had to wait two hours and get on a different plane, actually a different airline, which necessitated going through security again, and of course we were "selected" and our bags rifled through, and the broken zipper on my bookbag didn't want to zip again after the guard was done pawing through it, and, bleah, enough about that. We made it home, and our luggage even arrived in San Francisco at the same time we did, albeit on a different plane. Jenn and Lisa were on our same flight from Madison, and they were ultimately delayed something like 4 hours to our 2, and had to go through 2 connections, so I shouldn't complain. I read Tithe by Holly Black on the plane; good stuff!

***

And post-con? It's incredibly hot in Oakland. I got a rejection from Realms of Fantasy on a story I really thought they'd buy, which shows that I know nothing, which is hardly a surprise. No checks in the mail. Precious few bills, either, though, so it's all right. Work is workish. I spent Monday and Tuesday night both working on my graphic novel reviews -- I'd written 2 1/2 before Wiscon, so had another 2 1/2 to do. I'm pretty pleased with what I accomplished, though, and now I can get back to working on my Fury story, and then the Frog novel, or else Rangergirl revisions, or... at least I'm actually caught up with Star*Line for once. Tuesday night I made salmon with pasta and lemon cream sauce. I knew, intellectually, how lemon cream sauces were made, but I'd never actually made one. It came out well. Heather and I ate and drank wine and lolled about on the couch. Wednesday night, Heather made tortellini, and we snuggled on the couch, and later made love under the mosquito netting in her room, beneath the open window, the night breeze cooling the room. It was a wonderful convention, but oh, it's good to be home.

Words written since February 1, 2003: 56,400

Words written since last entry:
4,000

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