Monday 21 February 2011

Preparing for the forest

I like to prepare for the forest. To prepare is to make ready beforehead for a specific purpose. I like to prepare for the forest. I enjoy the beforehead as much as the journey and the holiday; it is the leading-up to, the equiping and the planning, the composing and constructing of an expedition. I have always enjoyed packing. Transitions; the pieces inbetween. The packing is the warm-up, the laying of the table, the awakening of a dream. I fold small trousers, bend tiny socks and roll tights into balls. I place clothes in suitcase corners as I dream of trees. I put together the ingredients for miso soup and special breakfast porridge. As I drink green tea, I pack Chinese Heaven dollars to surprise my girls, envisage secrets and paints for idle moments. For writing, I select sharp pencils and tie the knots around the folder that contains my manuscript. Words will be stitched into pixeled screens, characters and plots determined. The book is almost finished now. I think of birds cries at dawn, black coffee drunk on frost and wearing wellies kissed by icy grass. I think of a horizon of trees, infinite green and the freedom of a running child. I gear up, arrange the outside and the inside of my world for life lived at the pace of trees.

3 comments:

PG said...

That's lovely. I hope your stay in the forest is wonderful.

cynthia said...

Ohhhh, off to the forest and the pace of trees--that's what I need. And I love packing. And suitcases, I love them too.

And congrats on being almost through with your manuscript.

lasuza said...

Thank-you Cynthia and PG for your comments. I wrote to the pace of trees, spent blurred mornings after slightly sleepness nights and then imagined and wrote more during children's naps. The forest held me tight in a green embrace, we lived softly to the crunch of pine needles.