Monster hike
On Saturday, a break in the showers and Greg and I took a killer hike at Medoc Mountain State Park. A wonderful chance to leave the grind of home and work and instead, live among beautiful, wild surroundings while simply putting one foot in front of the other.
Routines are comforting, but they sear boundaries into the mind. I forget there's a larger world out there. The images of that day were stark and inspiring and remind me that the countryside is the emotional seat of my novel.
Still busy with projects these days ... grateful for the work as always ... worried about getting back to the novel.
I read a good one last week ... Frankenstein's Bride by Hilary Baily ... it was well written, very artful, as a tribute to Mary Shelly's original Frankenstein.
That original monster tale is next on my reading list. I remember the heady days in college when I read Mary Wollstonecraft and the early feminist writers. How brave they were to challenge the perceptions of their day ... that women could not own property, should not live on their own and were too brainless to make their own decisions.
Today we laugh but these were accepted ideas for many years. Unfortunately, these deep-seated perceptions still influence the way people respond to women. We alter our behavior ... act like men, or ultra feminine ... trying to get around it. Some women mistake sexual power for real power and that's equally tragic.
AHEAD: Shelley's Frankenstein
