Avalon | S. A. Hussey

Today boys and girls, ladies and gents, (readers peering out from the portal beyond), I have decided it’s time to get myself in order. No, I’m not dying. I’ve been in a funk. Listing said details of why, is moot. Nobody understands (or cares) about the why anyways.

Somewhere along the way I lost sight of why I do this thing called writing. I enjoy it. I love spinning and weaving a story web (alluding to spiders WTG I hate spiders). I see or hear things and my mind just goes into another world of my making. The people are real. The things they say and do are real – if only in my mind. I guess to some that’s a crazy mind, but I do know the difference between reality and fantasy. I do. I’m truly sorry you missed seeing Pegasus land on the pier in Swampscott Harbor. It was tres’ cool the way he came out of the mist and landed on the rustic, wooden dock. A majestic sight to behold and not something you see everyday either. He came for the Hostess cupcakes, but now they’re all gone…just like him. (sad, huh?) I digress.

My meandering muse and I have decided that I’m going to keep writing, even if it’s ludicrous crap that makes no sense. I live for white backgrounds and black letters. I think even some of you do to. I can jazz it up too and make it sparkle like a vampire by changing the font and color. Oooh pretty isn’t it.

Anywho…I’ve found myself making a mess of my story, Remembrance. I was trying to make it work, and was very hard on it. So much so, that my characters shut down on me. They went into a funk. (poor things) I’m so lost with the story that I’m stuck between worlds with it and I have no idea where to go. I can’t ask another soul about it because that would just add to the chaotic hell I’m already in. One says do this, another says do that, and yet another likes it as is. So what is one to do? Who’s right, who’s wrong? Am I fooling myself here? Do I have what it takes? Am I any good? Self-doubt is reality people and it’s hard to pull yourself out of it. I was making myself crazy. I even put limits on myself and refused to write anything else if I didn’t finish the story. All that did was depress myself further. The funk was in da house.

Now it’s time to move it on out. I’m starting over – completely. I’m going to separate my two blogs. I have this one and that musical one (Rock-it-Write). Not that music needs to be separated from writing but I really do want to keep that beautiful musical lane special. Bluebird Reviews showed me a path and gave me the opportunity to combine two passions of mine: writing and music. Like my stories my musical meanderings deserve their own place and I gave them two, a blog and a website (check it out here: Rock-it-Write), and when I write for Bluebird Reviews they get posted there as well. So here is a shout out to Bluebird Reviews for all things magically musical – Keep up the FANTASTIC work!

As for my first love it’s time to feel the passion again and write. Remembrance is a great story filled with amazing characters, but I have to let them go. Someday I’ll go back to Aiden, Tiernan, Ari, Owen, and Vaz, but right now I can’t. (Insert dagger to the heart here) It’s depressing me because I don’t know how to make them shine the way they should. I have a lot of ideas but which is the write one? I’m thinking I have to let it stew to make it better. I don’t relish (well I do and I ketchup and mustard too) the idea of re-doing this story, but it may be something I’ll have to do. Again, it’s a fantabulous story if I do say so myself. 150,000+ words is nothing to sneeze at. I don’t suck (yay), well…I tell myself that (boo).

A lot of time went into the making of Remembrance but (doncha hate that word) it’s too many words for a publisher, too many POV shifts, too many dis and dats and everything in between. Something’s wrong. I think when I took that left in Albuquerque on my way to California…that was it, that’s where I went wrong. I don’t know. And, if I don’t know what it is I’ve done, how can I fix it? Insert beta readers…but are they right or wrong? And where do you find them? Are they willing to commit to my mess? So many questions? Perhaps, I’m better off not writing but I can’t imagine not writing so there you go (double bind).

I figure before I completely trash Remembrance or make mincemeat out of it I’ll leave it alone and go write something else. I have other story ideas I’ve wanted to work on but I put them to the side to commit to Remembrance. Bad idea Stephy (ain’t that the truth muse baby). I have to listen to my own voice. Follow my gut instinct. Yada yada yada, etc. (ad nauseum) Plain and simple…I have to write.

So, how many of you know there’s a portal to Avalon smack dab in Salem Harbor? And, how many of you know how to open it? Hmmmm…I’ll give you a hint how. Tree speak, yeah that’s right, tree speak. That ol Willow at the north end of the commons knows a lot. Only wish I knew that before I sent Shaelin out on that boat ride. I mean seriously, who knew, that if you went into the Astor vault in the Old Cemetery that a hidden door existed which would lead you to an underground city, and somewhere within that city was a journal and not just any journal, it holds within its pages the words (and secrets) of Avalon. Cool huh?

Going to try and keep up with this blog and start posting more frequently; even it its a rehash of the days events. Today was uneventful. Like chewing bubblegum. Same ol, same ol. I did not edit on Remembrance yet, I say yet because I do intend on editing later on for at least an hour. I can do something with it in one hour.

In any event I slept in, did laundry, picked up lil chick from her dads, took the girls out for dinner, now having coffee and contemplating on which story to work on. Decisions, decisions. Anyways, decided to post the opener to New Avalon here. So when I mention it you’ll have something to go oh yeah that story. Uh huh.

I think I’m going to go get another cuppa of joe and have a nice chat with Aiden, and if he doesn’t want to talk, well I’ll leave a gap in his story part and move forward. I still have to fix the dialog between Ari and Owen, Vaz and Ari. Hmmmm so I guess I’ve answered my own question — I’m editing Remembrance tonight.

I think I have to set a goal. Let’s see 21 days to remove 20,000 words and clean up the story. That’s doable right? OK…Stop shaking your head no..it’s doable, really. Well I’m going to try it.

Perhaps with a time-table Aiden “might” talk. Yeah right. I can hear his chuckle now, and see him rolling his eyes. Not boding well. Anyways, enjoy the excerpt. I’m off to edit. Wish me luck – Aiden’s laughing and conspiring with Vaz – this is not good – really not good.

NEW AVALON
Excerpt
©2010 by S.A. Hussey
Not to be posted or reprinted without permission of the author.

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Journal Entry:
February 1994 ~ After Midnight – The Sphere

My radio had been blasting out Zeppelin music as I made the drive over the Salem/Beverly Bridge. I sang and my hands tapped the steering wheel in rhythm to the beat. My jeep chugged along as I neared the bottom of the bridge. I maneuvered the car into the right lane and travelled down route 1A, or as us locals call it, Bridge Street. Nearing my turn onto Winter Street, I had noticed the streetlight up ahead was green then it turned yellow then red then back to green, all within seconds. It did this twice more then stopped.

That’s when IT happened.

Everything around me had gone black. Immediately I had thought, power outage. A transformer must’ve blown somewhere. Shit! Thank you National Grid, now get the power back on. I continued to drive on but noticed no other cars and no people milling about, which was odd for a Friday night in Salem, Massachusetts. Right then I realized something else, the music had stopped playing. Every preset button I pushed on the radio had nothing but static coming over the air waves. It was eerie – scary eerie. The only thing moving in the dark was my car. And, of course IT; the massive, swirling white matter that hurtled up from out of nowhere, blanketing me and was reaching upward for the stars.

When it happened, I stopped and had parked the jeep smack dab right in the middle of Bridge Street. That’s also when I felt the vibration. At first I thought, holy shit earthquake. Then I realized it wasn’t the road shaking – it was me! I couldn’t stop. The vibration was internal. An intense, continuous energy coursed through every part of my body making me feel as if I could shoot to the moon and beyond. There was a buzzing sound in my ear too. You know the kind, like when a bee passes to close to your ear, or the sound a hummingbird makes as it whizzes past. That’s what was needling into my brain. Neither would stop, in fact it was getting worse.

Between the mind-numbing buzz and the adrenaline pushing energy, I thought my body was going to explode. IT was intense. I got out of the car and in the darkness I saw my body glowing. My aura was a myriad of shades ending with a blue tinged white. The glowing concerned me but I was shocked by the fact that I was buzzing and charged with much energy. Right then I was the epitome of a human lightning bolt. If I had touched something right then, they’d be electrified or burnt for sure.

The sensations running through my body at that moment were like none I’d ever felt. First, there had been the fire within me. A consuming heat so intense it threatened to set me aflame. Then there was the warm coolness of a turbulent wind, like an angry vortex was spiraling out of control inside me. It shook my body in an uncontrolled fit then immediately stopped to be replaced by an intense dryness and heaviness. I felt like dirt and sand was filling my body, as though I was an over-filled hourglass with my time running out. When it reached into my lungs I began to cough and sputter; I was suffocating, but on what? That sensation was immediately replaced by a sense of liquid rushing through my veins. My blood seemed to thin to water. When I moved I could hear the sloshing within. The fluid was pulsating through me like a shower head on high. I fell to my knees on the ground and begged for whatever it was to stop.

Oh, please. Someone, anyone…make it stop.

IT did.

Ask and you will receive. It was odd, I thought. I still felt the energy and vibratory hum, but it was soft now, tolerable. I looked myself over and found I was still intact but filled with immense peace. A sense of love, unity and oneness with the world enveloped me. I smiled. My senses became sharp and crisp. Right then, it seemed as if the universe had kissed me on my third eye, opening it to see the world in front of me but in a whole new way.

The tree on the corner was no longer just a tree but an entity. A living, breathing species that would tell you its tales if you stopped to listen, and I did. I heard its whispers. The majestic oak was happy, as was the elm, and the willow. They conversed. And, I could hear them!

“Welcome home,” they said in unison.

I paused. I wasn’t home yet. Unconcerned by my pause or thoughts they moved their wondrous branches to and fro as they giggled and laughed happily. I sniffed as the acrid smell of smoke and incense wafted through the air. Familiar smells to my awakening senses, but where was it coming from? I looked up to see if I could see the smoke, but instead what greeted my eyes was some kind of spectral field. Almost unperceivable to the eye but yet, I could see it. A clear film of sorts, that arched high and as far into the darkness of the night sky as I could see. It reminded me of a liquid bubble. Iridescent yet, around its outer edge was a white-blue that shimmered. An energy field. I felt its vibration and hum. Boy had I felt it. I gazed up in wonderment – I was baffled.

What was IT?