Switch
11 June 2007
How long does it take to flip a switch? That's what I wondered, as I waited - it seemed interminably - for the broadband connection I had been promised in our new house.
It finally came 8 days late. By then, we had forgotten where we wanted to put the computers and changed our minds about which walls we wanted to knock down. An architect friend came to visit and was bursting with ideas. I think we need to nibble away at it for a while and ponder ...
In the meantime, we've been visiting the network room at West Dean College to try and keep track of life.
Of course, you do discover, in these circumstances, that some things can wait a few days and some can't. Limited access gives you a clear sense of priorities.
One prioriity was, of course, the debrief from a fantastically successful Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction and a brilliant winner - Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
You will be pleased to hear that the printer now works, allowing me to send change of address cards - an oddly therapeutic activity that combines well with 'thinking time' on my Sepulchre edits. (Talking about 'thinking time' always reminds me of Joseph Conrad and his 'months of earnest meditiation' before putting pen to paper.)
Another pause in rewriting will happen at the end of ther week, when Greg and I drive to the English midlands to speak together at the Althorp Literary Festival. In fact, 'together' is the key word as the subject we are going to address is, precisely, 'working together'.
Next week I intend to add a couple more pages to the Sepulchre site, including some wonderful new Tarot images designed with my publisher - Orion.
I suppose patience is also a virtue in the Sepulchre.
