masquerading as a man with a reason

I'm absolutely obsessed with this image at the minute.

I was saving an update until I could get my new layout up & running but that’s turned into rather more of a drama than first anticipated. But, thanks to the incredible genius that is my brother (biased? Me?) I now have my own hosting, I just purchased my new domain name & I’ve been promised a schmick Wordpress theme as a layout. The header I’m working on, but it’s meant the entire issues been almost resolved. Finally. I hate leaving things hanging. So, keep your eyeballs peeled for a new address coming up pretty soon!

I’ve decided to take part in (ok, slavishly follow) Steph Bowe’s idea of visual inspiration for my second book, The Rising. So I’ll be posting images that are currently inspiring me for The Rising. Some of them are absolutely haunting. I wish I’d picked up on visual inspiration sites like weheartit.com so much earlier. They’ll be interspersed with regular posts. I’m quite excited about it. I think I’m a voyeur at heart (not that kind of voyeur)

On the 25th October, tune your eyeballs to paperbackdolls.com where I’ll be guest blogging to review Zombie Blondes! I’m so glad I got chosen to review on there & it’ll be great for my writing credits. Plus Paperback Dolls are just an awesome site, ran by women who clearly, like me, read far too much. Zombie Blondes is all kinds of win too. I have other writing credits on the go too & you’ll hear more about those as they come to fruition.

Just joined Goodreads. You can find me on there under Emma Butler. You can submit writing on there, which I only just discovered. I uploaded an excerpt of Anubis from The Rising & am just about to go and check if there’s any feedback. I’m not sure whether that says I’m curious or obsessed?

carry on my wayward son

Saw this on Steph Bowe's site & thought it was a brilliant idea. My current inspirations for The Rising:










In other news - new blog layout coming soon!

she only smokes when she drinks

Dreams do not come true, this much I have learnt. Disney films have lied to you

Actually they do, I just really liked the line.

Just discovered Rimmel's 'Your Majesty' nail varnish colour. Cant believe its taken me 24 years to find it, has to be my perfect colour. Looks like I dripped my nails in diamontes!So much win.

For anyone wanting inspiration, you have to check out weheartit.com . It's a website where people contribute photos of anything and everything. I've been addicted to it for about the past week & its amazing. Because of The Rising I've been searching 'Italy' and 'Mexico' and coming up with some beautiful images that just wow me. And then I found one particular image that gave me the ending of The Rising. Totally. Completley. Anubis and all, here's the ending. Just from an image. You must check it out!

Feeling rather ‘writerly’ today. I think its reading Margaret Atwood that does it. Spent this morning driving round the uni & surrounding streets swearing like my hero Saint as car after car filled every available parking spot. How do so many cars get there so fast? When I finally found one, it involved a trek through the Botanic gardens to actually get to uni. So, being of a very lazy disposition I decided to stop and read my new Atwood novel at a bench. Covered in sunlight, looking up over the pages of Lady Oracle, which is an amazing thing in itself, I’ll never understand how Ms Atwood can nail life so perfectly, I watched the trees sway in the wind. Until of course, my reverie was broken by a seagull wanting my salad. When I waved a fringed thong at it, it cawed, or whatever they do. Evil little beggar. After that I packed Lady Oracle away and went on into uni.

The curse of prac has finally been lifted – for how can we be creative when we all look the same? I no longer have to wear that bright blue uniform and march in step. So today I celebrated by wearing denim leggings (jeggings? Whats the difference?) A black tulip dress with sparkles on the shoulders bought solely because it reminded me of Blair Waldorf, my latest obsession. A neutral loose cardigan cause Spring has not yet sprung properly and tried a new hairstyle. Of which I’m incredibly, stupidly proud. I tried to copy Serena Van Der Woodsen when she goes to that White party, with the silver scarf wound through her hair. I picked up my own sparkly silver scarf and attempted to wind it through my hair similarly. Forgetting Serena’s hair is much longer. So I wound it round and tucked it through my bun, then let it fall and the result is half Serena – or enough that people will recognise it and not think I forgot where my neck was – and half vecchio Signora. The effect put me in mind of the Signora leaning over the fence, bawling her dark haired, wifebeater wearing husband out for drinking the grappa and playing poker on the steps. So I look creative as well as feeling it.

left me to that solitude that suits abtruser musings:

When I was little I had this tent. A triangular, green one that must have stayed in our backyard for weeks. I also had this kitchen set, which came with a toaster & fake toast, pans, plates, fake vegetables, the whole shebang. I spent whole days in that tent playing.

My dog, a gorgeous German Shepherd called Zac used to get sick of being left out of the game, having to be where everyone else was. That dog came in the tent and sat there for hours on end, patiently being fed fake toast and made to enact stories. A breed that’s trained to kill, sent into war zones etc laying quietly in a tent and listening to me talk. Later, I decided to grow flowers & made little snowpea pots. I lavished so much attention on those flowers my dog got jealous and smashed them. When I was a little older, he ran onto the road & was hit by a car. Every other car on the road stopped bar one speeding woman. If I ever meet that woman again I’ll punch her in the face. Zac started crying and both my mom & I started running for him. I got stopped before I reached him but I’ll never forget when my parents brought him to school the next day after he came home from the vets. His eyes were filled with blood, he had cuts & bruises everywhere, but he jumped up and wagged like nothing had ever happened. Later he chased Mick & I along the tiles, forgot to brake & hit the wall. He was present at every Christmas, knew every time I was crying & spent so many hours alone with me in my Dad’s workshop.

He passed away on Monday at 15 years old. He couldn’t get up & wouldn’t eat. And Zac ate everything. I mean, everything. Chocolate, steaks, bananas, bagels you name it. My brother took him for a walk and Zac couldn’t. I went to my first day of prac and couldn’t shake this feeling, like a presentiment, that it wasn’t going to all end okay. Zac had been ill before, been weak but he’d always gotten better. But something in me knew, the same way something in me knew when my kitten died. So when I came home to find my family sitting in some council of war to tell me Zac had gone it was a confirmation of what I already knew. I was praying on the drive home from prac, praying Zac’d be okay and even as I did I knew he was gone because something didnt feel right. I don’t want to say how much I cried, how much writing this is making me tear up. He was an awesome dog. He didnt need Cesar Milan because he was perfect.

We’re not a family that can live without a dog for very long and the hole that was left was awful. My parents went to see a German Shepherd puppy Thursday and I honestly didn’t think they’d get her. My mom was so low, I thought she’d see them and come back home again, saying they weren’t right, didn’t fit, whatever. I’ve found most breeders don’t produce pedigree Germans either so I expected they’d be crossed with something and Mom’d pick it up. This is the woman who swore over and over to Zac if he didn’t quit attacking her flowers she’d kill him.

So I came home on Thursday expecting nothing. I opened the door to see my Dad holding a beautiful German Shepherd puppy girl. She has a black face and huge paws. Nothing will ever fill Zac’s spot but she’s so quickly carved out her own spot in my heart. Her head is the perfect size for kisses. Little Meg has a bark far too big for her and is already almost perfectly trained. She walks beautifully on the lead, she sits, she knows to go outside, she’s the ‘perfect energy level’ for us (thank you Cesar.)
This morning I was getting ready, finding the conditioner & looked down to see Meg sat in my room watching me. I gave her a pat & went to find my toothbrush. She was there at my side, sat down patiently, looking up at me & the vanity. We just wrapped Father’s Day presents & tired of not getting any attention, she came in and helped. Well, if you can call helping chewing on everything in sight, licking an ugg boot and licking photo frames.

I know this isn’t my usual post about progress on my writing & Black Rose but I needed to share this. A pet holds such a special place in your heart. I had Zac for 15 years and while it’s a silly idea, I had the idea he was immortal. I didn’t think anything would ever happen, especially after he survived an idiotic woman with a car. Meg hasn’t replaced him, if she had I wouldn’t be tearing up writing this. Meg is a whole other spot in my heart but I love her. I love the way a puppy looks at the world. Like everything is amazing & new. I love how she responds to my Cesar Milan commands, well, so far. And not without whingeing. I love how she came running for a hug and cuddled up on my shoulder just now. There’s nothing about her I don’t like. She’s a perfect, gorgeous, amazing dog. They show such beautiful unconditional love that it makes me stop and think. If we started thinking like a dog did, there’d be so much less crap in the world.

to the barricades of Heaven where I'm from

Barricades of Heaven - Jackson Browne.

There’s a reason behind what we do. There’s a reason why writers write, why painters paint & a whole host of others. I found out the reason why people work in mental health this week. There’s a patient on the ward I’m at, who came in suicidally depressed, previous suicidal attempts, with both suicidal and homicidal ideation. She’s a wee woman who doesn’t really take up much room. I had to go through her belongings , de rigueur for mental health, feeling like the worlds’ worst cad as I pawed through her stuff, plucking needles (sewing, not IV) from her bag. She sat in the chair, slumped in it rather, like all the world had fallen in on her shoulders. She didn’t care about anything I was saying & the inane chatter you use to cover up long silences just echoed. I’ve never seen anyone so fundamentally depressed. Anyone who thinks depression is fiction should have taken a look at this woman, it was written in every bone of her body.

As the day went by she laid on her bed, turned her face to the wall and that was it. She cried and slept. A little later she came out of her room but she curled up on a chair and went to sleep again. When she didn’t sleep she cried. I felt sorry for her, it physically hurt to know someone was in so much pain they could react like that. The next day her depression began to annoy me because it wasn’t changing. She didn’t even seem like she was trying. It frustrated me because I was making all the effort and she wasn’t doing anything in return. I wanted to grab her and ask her if anyone was home. Obviously I didn’t.

On the third day I was chatting with another patient, discussing how writing is cathartic. She started to listen in. I was talking about a stream of consciousness & how interesting it would be to read some of theirs. She asked what a stream of consciousness was & startled me. I wasn’t expecting her to initiate a conversation. When I told her, she smiled, laughed and kept talking to me. It wasn’t the fact that she’d kept talking, it was that smile and that laugh that got me. It was like the sun coming out. All of a sudden I could see the person underneath the mental illness, all of a sudden there was hope. All of a sudden someone lifted the cloud on depression & I realised that was the reason why people work in mental health – to see that smile. I’ve never been so impacted by a smile before. It made everything worthwhile to see her grin at me.

I’m a student nurse so I’ve done a few pracs by now. I’ve seen babies born (which is NOT all flowers and beatnik love. There’s blood EVERYWHERE.) I’ve stood at the foot of a patients bed and tried to keep from crying when I knew the diagnosis and they didn’t, not yet. I’ve talked to a man who died three days later. I’ve watched pregnant women with needle marks up their arms ask for a cigarette and valiantly tried not to strangle them ( I ended up walking away from the patient & refusing to deal with her) but nothing hit me as much as that beautiful smile on my patient. That’s the reason why we do it. Everything made sense.

It made me realise there’s a reason behind it. I love mental health because I love that smile. I love writing because it feels like its woven through me. And in moments when I read back over my stuff & wonder if its any good I think about what Paul said to the Ephesians – ‘live the life God called you to live’. I want to live a life of purpose, my friend Denise asked a question on Facebook recently – were we living lives you could tell stories about? I want the life of purpose where you can tell stories. A purpose is a reason. My reasons are falling into place.

Oh & the fact I get to spend hours with a hot gangster doesn’t hinder either.

I want to love you with all the madness in my heart

Beautiful isnt it? Thinking of changing the banner over to this.

you and me honey, baby we were born to run

Under the pretence of ‘research’ I bought the best Mob movie ever made – Goodfellas. Stars Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta & Joe Pesci. Directed by Scorcese. It just doesn’t get any better than that! Or, it could, but only if Al Pacino was in it. I have the flu & am kind of drugged up on Sudafed so my plan is to tuck up & watch Goodfellas. It’ll also help with Santangelo & Vin.

Speaking of the two gangsters, The Rising is coming along nicely. The progress is different from HN but I think it’s because I have no preconceived notion of The Rising, it’s just spilling out. I’m hoping some heavy Mafia lore might inspire me too. It’s just odd at the minute because I know what to write & how I want it when they arrive at the hospital but right now, they’re driving there and Grayson’s revelation seems to be taking forever.

Along with Goodfellas I have True Blood S2. And Eric Northman/Alexander Skaarsgard is seriously becoming an inspiration for Saint. I think it’s in the way he holds himself & the way he keeps all his emotions in check. Northman is a pretty awesome vampire. Don’t get me wrong, the Vampire Lestat is good, but the Vampire Eric is all kinds of amazing. There’s an underlying menace to everything he does that I just love. He’s definitely an inspiration.

Speaking of inspiration, I sat down to read Unholy Magic by Stacia Kane this arvo in the freezing cold sunshine. Bathurst is the only place on Earth with freezing sunshine. I love her writing anyway, but I started reading it & it inspired me. Not inspired as in slavishly copy and just change names around, but inspired me with Saint. So far – and I’m 5 chapters in – it’s an awesome book! I’m most definitely a Terrible shipper though. Lex is a fascinating character but Terrible. Terrible’s perfect. Right down to the description of the car. I also love the way Ms. Kane does dialogue. The language in the Downside series is not strictly perfect English but it works so well for the world that she’s created. That’s what I hope to achieve with Saint & Vin.

I would desperately love to write more of The Rising this evening but thanks to my lovely flu that I’ve been landed with I have what feels like a needle of pain right behind my left eye. So I’m going to go to bed as suggested & watch Goodfellas. Expect a post about how great the Mafia is sometime in the near future!

Also, I’ve noticed a disturbing trend. Nothing to do with my writing, more to do with my fashion sense. Since watching Gossip Girl S1 my wardrobe appears to be taking on a distinctly Blair like appearance. So much so that as I was browsing the shops today I found myself holding a top & thinking I’m sure Blair had one like that. I know Serena is meant to be more popular & I do like her, truly I do, but Blair holds more interest for me. I think it’s the whole Queen Bee mentality. I see shades of Ronnie I think.
& now off to bed...cough...cough...splutter...insert gratuitous sympathy here: