Inversion

I have neglected the blog lately, not undeliberately. (Not undeliberately...A former English professor absolutely hated the use of double negatives; if he saw this, he would cross out "not undeliberately" in adamant red ink and write, above the slash, "deliberately." And for the rest of college, I dutifully became more assertive in my essays, cutting out any hint of equivocation or hedging.) But here, I use the double negative quite deliberately (take that, professor!), because it is the only appropriate way to convey the ambivalence I have been feeling about updating the blog. You see, things have been happening very quickly since the last time I wrote, so while there's a lot to update everyone on, it is also a lot to process.

A bare-bones account of what's been happening: Evan, Susie and I motored a few hours south of Vero Beach (finally left!) to Fort Pierce. Then we drove Susie back up from Florida to New York where my friend Tommy will be taking care of her for the month that I am in Wyoming for my writing residency at Jentel. I leave for that in a few days.

What's really been happening: It has been a difficult period of taking stock. My last post, it was taking stock of the pluses and negatives of expired food cast-offs. Since then, funny enough, it's been me trying to figure out whether and for how long certain things in my life are tenable, sustaining, or desirable. Will Susie be further traumatized by my absence? Can I afford to continue sailing with Evan? What exactly is my career at this point, what do I want it to be, and am I cultivating it as much as I should be? Those kinds of questions...(i.e. kind of big personal ones).

The word "inversion" has several definitions, of which these are resonating with me right now for some reason:

• anastrophe: the reversal of the normal order of words
• (counterpoint) a variation of a melody or part in which ascending intervals are replaced by descending intervals and vice versa

Cryptic, I know, but voila.