Fannie Lou Hamer | Marilyn's Room

Ah, what could be better than using the royal “we”?

I do, of course, refer to myself as the one who was not only persuaded, but also who did the persuading!

I’m talking about the cold open vs. Act One issue (see post below). It finally became glaringly apparent that we were already into Act One from the top of page 2, so I just went with it and then made great progress.

One thing that has sort of stymied me, though, has been watching the new CW television show, Riverdale. That show (which I am really enjoying, although I can’t really see in what way it is related at all to The Archies…) (ha ha).

Anyway, Riverdale takes a full ten minutes in its cold open. I’ve been timing it! It feels like the show is practically over before they roll the opening credits! Even though it does a great job of drawing you well in to the storyline, as a writer, that means you get maybe 45 or 50 pages to present, circle back, and tie-up the entire episode.

That feels way too restrictive for me, even though I love how it comes across in Riverdale.

Anyway. I got past it! And now I feel pretty confident that I will have the revisions for Cleveland’s Burning (aka Untitled Cleveland Drama) completed by mid-February! Yay! Then on to all the other stuff that needs revisions…

On another note:

Another wonderful thing I’ve discovered about living here in the hinterlands of Ohio (or in any State’s hinterlands, I’m guessing) is the ready and constant access you have to farm-fresh produce!! Wowie. I have an indoor farmer’s market within walking distance from my house. Literally, I can drive there in under 2 minutes, which means that, if I’m driving, in less than 120 seconds, I am standing amid farm-fresh produce! And in spring & summer, the outdoor farmer’s market is only 10 minutes away. (I’m a vegetarian, and of course prefer either really fresh or organic produce whenever possible, so you can imagine my delight over farmers’ markets.)

Also, I finally bought a cheap, hand-held spiralizer the other day. I love it. I made zucchini “spaghetti” last night for dinner and it was incredible. (I didn’t buy the zucchini at the farmer’s market, though. They didn’t have any. Of course, I hated to ask myself why zucchini was available anywhere in the dead of winter because the only answer that came back to me did not include the words “natural” or “organic.”)

Anyway, it was just too cool! A whole bowl of “spaghetti” that only had about 200 calories — and 140 of the calories came from the olive oil. I ate the big bowl of spaghetti while watching a 47-year-old re-run of Laugh-In. A show I loved as a kid, and I still love it now! The sun was going down and outside of the enormous picture window in the living room, I was a bit spellbound to see how magnificent the endless sky looks when one lives in the hinterlands.

Good food. Quietude. Nature. Peace. And Laugh-In. It doesn’t get any better after a long day of re-writing a story I am really passionate about.

Okay, gotta get moving here. I’m going to leave you with a choice here today, gang:

The sublime (the song that inspired my opening scene in Cleveland’s Burning):