Just The Facts: Donald Mecklenberg

Donald Mecklenberg is the intersection of reason and faith: he's a devout Christian inasmuch as he was raised to believe, but his dayjob, which is still a mystery to me, is logical and doesn't have much in the way of scenery. He has a love of water and boating that he has tragically little time to express. He loves Louise (and she him of course), and is willing to discuss and compromise when she's in a fit. This doesn't mean he doesn't feel frustrated at her sometimes or like he should escape in a number of ways. Louise's parents like Don mainly for being such an unthreatening, stable presence in Louise's life. I don't know enough about Don's family to describe them in any detail.

Louise enters Don's subconscious either the night after his 'coma' or two days later, when she accidentally takes his "little blue pill" and enters Don's mind. I've got his mind pretty well mapped by now, and what she finds there will turn her from indifference into a warrior who sees a man worth fighting to fight for.

Donald is an Average White Male (5'10" and European ancestry), but where his logic ends his ability to read people begins -- this is a near-worthless skill in Louise's mind, however, where nobody plays by the rules of manners he's learned in life. The angel statues in his back yard are regular friends to Don, offering silent companionship and each bearing a unique name.

Just The Facts: Louise

What do we know about Louise, one of the two main lovebirds-gone-awry in Chewing On Eden?

We know she's about 5'6" with long, dark, curly hair, and appears to be 1/2 Hispanic (dark eyes, tan skin). She loves red wine but hates when it's sweet, and is unaware that she has epilepsy. I am interviewing a friend with epilepsy to see what lifestyle details can be slipped in for precise readers. The metaphor of severing the corpus callosum applies well to the Don/Louise relationship throughout the story. Also, I'm pretty sure she and Don won't experience their "trips" at the same time; she'll simply have a seizure while Don's conked out. She is the catalyst for the first coma trip when she cooks dinner while angry at Donald and her emotions are absorbed by the lettuce, turning it purple and poisoning Don in the process so that he winds up in her subconscious (and half the nanowrimo novel :D).

Louise has gone by several names in her life - Louie, Lulu, Louisa, Lois - and each represents a different relationship in her life. She's had ex-boyfriends before, but one of the earliest and most threatening presences around Don is a boy she only saw for several minutes on a bus but imagined to be a southern charmer. She loves her father in a spoiled sort of way, but isn't pervy about it. She has a detached relationship with her mother UH OH I WONDER WHY HMMMM. I haven't decided on her family beyond that, though she probably has an older brother and discouraging grandfather.

Donald and Louise have a fight over vacation spots. He wants to travel by boat, she wants to see national parks. These vacation desires will be reflected in their dream-states, along with other personal desires, regrets, and cherished memories. It's extremely important to me that Louise not seem to actually hate Don, but just be in a period of doubting her feelings. A phase, if you will.

Louise is a creative type, and marked by faithlessness. She's not necessarily despondent or despairing, but she's definitely an atheist at heart and sees things for their ends/endings. This does not impede her love of nature and the search for beauty, of course. But she hates beaches and will not budge on that point.

Nanowrimo Writing Exercises

This blog is now about poetry AND prose. And will cover NaNoWriMo progress for a good while.

THe "creativity kicker" was really fun, and brought out my improvisation side in a right-brain-charging way. Here are some of the exercises I did, based on the sample words/phrases I was given as starting points:

"She opened the trunk"

After opening her umbrella to shield herself from the dark mists descending from the crags of Mount Persephone and its sirens' spells, she opened the trunk to find a curling, squealing mass of entrails and thick, warm splotches bursting from the spare tire that was no longer in its place with the Goodyear wrench, jack, and bolts.

"The dog crossed the street"

Away went the meatball, over the edge of the lemonade stand, past Bobby and Ricotta's horseshoe sand pit of worms and plastic army soldiers dusted with mace and firecracker ash, and into the sidewalk where, in full view of the rooster, box of kittens, and three buzzing hummingbirds, the dog, with its tongue dragging along the pavement, crossed the street.

"She raised the knife"

Lightning flashed and the lights went out just in time for the man to raise his knife, but he still had a split second to consider what he was doing: here, beneath the 10-foot portrait of his wife and children sailing a boat into a kraken, he was about to end of the life of the one woman, his stepmother, who had ultimately summoned the great beast to wipe out their adventurous lifestyle and to this moment remained completely unaware that her plot had been found, goose had been cooked, and knife, with great precision and care, sharpened to a vengeful point.

"The child ate his dinner"

The child ate his dinner in the main stereo-gyro-scoping hall of the Eatinarium Laboratory, as scientists in dazzling purple robes studied him on hundreds of monitors, measuring how close the fork came to his enamel with each bite, with what frequency his knees bobbed and shook, how much sauce he would allow to accumulate around his lips before licking them, and when, as the morsels disappeared from his plate, he would raise the dish and ask for dessert.

"pirate, Greek god, quill pen, tiger wants to eat character, street corner, character drinks water"

Another old man passed by the street corner, laughing his wrinkled chin off at the young man seated beneath the cold gaze of Poseidon. In front of them, a Burmese man-eating tiger licked its jaws, salivating at the opportunity to eat another sea-salted pirate. The pirate shook in his boots, scratching his parchment with a quill pen as he brainstormed the Greek god's riddle. A small confederation of child-scouts assembled before the pirate, and Poseidon nodded with approval.

“We came back as soon as we could,” their leader gasped.

“And, and?” the pirate asked, nodding hysterically.

“We asked the oracle at Delphi if she knew your fate and how to free you of your curse.”

“That's great! Does she know the answer to the riddle of Poseidon?”

“She said you're a dumbass,” and the lieutenant child scout tossed a clump of dirt at the pirate's head, nailing him between the eyes. Poseidon chuckled and ruffled their hair beneath his massive blue palm.

“That was your last lifeline, pirate. There are only moments left before you are swallowed up by the sea you so love.”

“But my first lifeline didn't count. My cousin in Troy--”

“There is no more Troy!” Poseidon roared. Already, storm clouds gathered in the distance. From the moment that the pirate pissed in a clamshell that happened to be the great-great-great-granddaughter of a fairy who had a one-night stand with a stalactite nymph, Poseidon had stalked him across the Mediterranean coast, waiting for the proper moment to capture him and make him pay for his rather quasi-offensive gesture against the regal citizens of Olympus.

He had captured the pirate in a bar at his greatest moment of his weakness: namely, when the pirate had heard that a 150-foot tall godhead was hovering beneath the surface of the sea moaning the words “MY VENGEANCE IS MANIFEST” and headbutting various ships in the harbor. Before word of the angry god reached the pirate, he had drunk two liters of brandy and gin. Once he was informed that, more specifically, he was the sole target of divine retribution, the two liters left him and his sober fear was paralyzing.

The pirate looked up from his parchment. A list of drinks, both grand and cheap, natural and refined, was spelled out from his memory. The riddle had only one minute left to be answered. What did the god of the sea drink after a long night's sailing? Was it ambrosia? That's the only thing gods drank, right? Or did Mars drink the blood of his enemies? The gods turned into animals from time to time – perhaps they had a favorite watering hole they liked to visit, or a berry tree that they pulped every year to make sweet wine.

“Your time is up, vulgar mortal,” Poseidon said, crossing his bulky arms.

“Is it ambrosia?” the pirate asked in front of a morbidly curious crowd, all of them hanging on the final answer.

“Nope! The king of the sea drinks only water!” Poseidon laughed, flicked the pirate's head off his shoulders, and rode away on a rainbow. The tiger ate the remains.