Spring, writing, and being sick

I'm in a mood for spring, though it is snowing today.  I'm sick again - this is the third day.  I'm feeling better, but my head is still heavy and my muscles are still tight and throbbing.  I'm drinking camomile tea, which is helping them all to relax, but boy, am I tired.

In the last two days, I rewrote 15 pages of a story I'm working on.  It's a story that has been bugging me for a while.  First of all, I was confusing it with another story I started called 'Super Short Super Villain'.  That story, however, will never get off the ground.  The plot and conflict is similar to this other story, which I have temporarily called 'Mis-Muddled'.  So on Wednesday, when I looked for something to do and realized that these stories were actually two separate stories, I decided to combine them.

But the main reason 'Mis-Muddled' was bothering me is the style.  I couldn't seem to write it in a way that suited it.  Yesterday, I started rewriting it and loved it much better.  See if you like this:

Mule-pulled carts passed Kate Mitchell’s house routinely on the packed-dirt roads of Wassying.  Their drivers loved to pass by the fresh cottage on their way to and from the center of town, as strong and sweet smells of all kinds of flowers and herbs wafted up to them.  It was a very simple cottage.  Miss Mitchell had slipped into town without ceremony not quite a year ago.  She had bought the cottage of an elderly couple who were moving in with their youngest son and who had neglected to renovate the cottage as time went on and invention improved.  To be fair, it did not well lend itself to improvement as it was made of wattle-and-daub, but though the thatched roof could easily have been replaced with a more modern material, its previous owners never took that trouble, and its new owner never did either.

Up until now, Miss Kate Michelle lived alone and no one knew much about her, but no one suspected this deplorable situation would last for long as there was now a man in the picture.  Kate was a pleasant sort of girl with long, golden hair and blue, sparkling eyes.  When she smiled, warmth filled the hearts of the smile’s admirers.  The man was none less than the town’s very pride and joy Cedric Price, the apothecary’s apprentice.  Not only was Mr. Price the most handsome of young men but he was also a part of the underground rebellion against the tyrant Octavious, and he was admired for his bravery, wit, and cunning, although nothing yet had been done to remove Octavious from his rule.

But as implied, Miss Mitchell had little opportunity to be lonely.  She gave the women prone to gossip something to gossip about since she was such an oddity to their town and quite a secretive girl.  It was clear that this Miss Mitchell came from genteel origins and had probably lived in high society, so why she should suddenly appear one day in their humble village, unaccompanied, was quite a shocking and frustrating mystery to them.

Nevertheless, no one begrudged her hardly anything.  Noontime strollers, as was the general wont, felt more than welcomed by her flourishing daisies and rhododendrons that they felt no scruple in stepping through the gate and walking right up to the open door to inquire if its mistress was in.  Of course that was the other odd thing about Miss Mitchell, that someone as well-off as she should not have some kind of hired help to answer the door for her.  Either Miss Mitchell was in, or she was not.  And if she was not, you waited in vain on her doorstep.

But even on those days when she joined in the saunter down Main Street, Miss Mitchell was often sought out at all times of the day for advice on herbs.  She became the one to consult for flower arrangements and herbal remedies.  That isn’t to say that the apothecary lost his use, but even he occasionally sought her advice on such things.  Miss Mitchell was glad to humbly offer her advice and know-how, which she reportedly learned from her mother, but she did not much like the sight of blood and said she could never be a surgeon’s assistant.  In the eyes of her friends, the question was, could she be a surgeon’s wife?

But knowing that this style works better doesn't make the story easier to write.  When I tried to continue the story, it didn't work.  I've decided that I have to write the narrative and dialogue and then implement the style later.  Which was so much easier when I have Scrivener.

If you've never heard of Scrivener, I recommend it.  They have a version for Windows now and you can get a free trial for thirty days or something like that, but now I have to buy it and I miss it so much.  It takes a little getting used to, as most new programs do, but I absolutely loved it for writing stories.  It made it so easy to have a whole lot of related documents open at the same time.  I could have a character sketch open in half the window and the story open in the other half, and so on.  I simply loved how many ways to store information there were.  It isn't really that expensive, but what with college in the fall and saving up my money to pay for ballet lessons while I'm there, I haven't been spending very much lately.  I even have a debit card, so I could buy it myself if I wanted, I'm just scared to spend the money I've been saving - you know what I mean?  But my birthday isn't until July and I didn't get it for Christmas so....

Well, I could go on.  I could tell you about my vegetable plants or the annoying habits my dog has, but I'll do that later.  I should tell you about the movies I've been watching lately, so I'll get around to that as soon as I can.

For now - 

Watching the snow fall,

~Meggy