MY NEST
Usually my "nest" is my chair with all my research books, laptop and laptop desk, pens, papers, notecards, manuscripts I need to endorse, and everything else necessary for a writer's life strewn around it. But hooray, I just turned Fire Dancer, so now I'm in the phenomenom known to us writers as "nesting." In other words, I'm in a flurry of cleaning activity.

I haven't quite figured out why we do this. I mean, subconsciously we know the place is going to go to pot again as soon as we enter the next book phase. I think it might be a reaction against the days I blank out the fact that there are three days worth of dishes in the kitchen or that my husband is wearing clothes from 1980 because that's all that's left in his closet. It's a way to prove to myself that I still have some small homemaker gene left hiding inside.

We've been laying tile and painting the laundry room, so all the miscellaneous stuff had ended up in my office. I could throw a handful of wildflower seeds on top of my coffee table and watch them grow if I wanted. It wasn't pretty. So I rolled up my sleeves yesterday and got to work. Now the house is all clean and sparkly, but I'm about to start Dangerous Depths. I fear my house may be dangerous by the time it's all over. So far no one has injured themselves walking through here while I'm writing, but I know it's going to happen one of these days. Then I'll have to write from a jail cell.