moving on...

whew. survived art fair. barely. i actually almost lost my voice from trying to make myself heard over the masses at the bucks. i got off work yesterday at 5:30, and by the time i went back out a couple of hours later, the tents were gone, the art on a stick nowhere to be seen. it was like the whole thing never happened. bizarre. went to an after art fair party with a bunch of alicia's co-workers. who, by the way, are so much fun!! free--and really good!!--wine, cheap sangria, pitcher of margaritas. lots of general bitching about art fair and trading stories about the absurdity that is life in this town in the service industry. it was good.

i'm still trying to figure out where i fit into all of this, but i am occasionally hopeful.

still trying to get situated at home--and readjust to living with cats!!! it's actually ok, as long as i don't sleep for more than four hours. greeeeeat. it's also really hard to type with a cat AND a laptop on your lap, but everytime i sit down to try to type something, linford climbs into my lap like it's his new favorite thing... his other new favorite thing is my suitcase, which i finally emptied. it's still in the middle of the living room floor, but at least now there's nothing in it, except linford, occasionally.

now that the art fair craziness is over, i'm, at least theoretically, job hunting. which is... frustrating. but also...what's the word--not inspiring, exactly, but encouraging, i guess, in that it's reminding me of all of the things i WANT to do, even if i can't do them--not yet. and i've been reading. and being read to. most recently, from The Silver Chair. i'd quote the whole thing, but i'm too lazy, and really, you kind of need to read the whole book anyway, but here's the bit i'm holding onto:


"Now the Witch said nothing at all, but moved gently across the room, always keeping her face and eyes very steadily towards the Prince. When she had come to a little ark set in the wall not far from the fireplace, she opened it, and took out first a handful of green powder. This she threw on the fire. It did not ablaze much, but a very sweet and drowsy smell came from it. And all through the conversation which followed, that smell grew stronger and filled the room and made it harder to think. Secondly, she took out a musical instrument rather like a mandolin. She began to play it with her fingers -- a steady, monotonous thrumming that you didn't notice after a few minutes. But the less you noticed it, the more it got into your brain and your blood. This also made it hard to think. After she thrummed for a time (and the sweet smell was now strong) she began speaking in a sweet, quiet voice.

"Narnia?" she said. "Narnia? . . . There is no land called Narnia."

"Yes there is, though, Ma'am," said Puddleglum. "You see, I happen to have lived there all my life."

"Indeed," said the Witch. "Tell me, I pray you, where that country is?"

"Up there," said Puddleglum, stoutly, pointing overhead. "I - I don't know exactly where."

"How?" said the Queen, with a kind, soft, musical laugh. "Is there a country up there among the stones and mortar on the roof?"

"No," said Puddleglum, struggling a little to get his breath. "It's in Overworld."
But the witch's magic eventually dulls their minds:
"No. I suppose that other world must be all a dream."

"Yes. It is all a dream," said the Witch, always thrumming.

"Yes, all a dream," said Jill.

"There never was such a world," said the Witch.

"No," said Jill and Scrubb, "never was such a world."

"There never was any world but mine," said the Witch.

"There never was any world but yours," said they.

The Prince and the two children were standing with their heads hung down, their cheeks flushed, their eyes half closed; the strength all gone from them; the enchantment almost complete. But Puddleglum, desperately gathering all his strength, walked over to the fire. Then he did a very brave thing. He knew it wouldn't hurt him quite as much as it would hurt a human; for his feet (which were bare) were webbed and hard and cold-blooded like a duck's. But he knew it would hurt him badly enough; and so it did. With his bare foot he stamped on the fire, grinding a large part of it into ashes on the flat hearth. And three things happened at once.

First, the sweet, heavy smell grew very much less. For though the whole fire had not been put out, a good bit of it had, and what remained smelled very largely of burnt Marsh-wiggle, which is not at all an enchanting smell. This instantly made everyone's brain far clearer. The Prince and the children held up their heads again and opened their eyes.

Secondly, the Witch, in a loud, terrible voice, utterly different from the sweet tones she had been using up till now, called out, "What are you doing? Dare to touch my fire again, mud-filth, and I'll turn the blood to fire inside your veins."

Thirdly, the pain itself made Puddleglum's head for a moment perfectly clear and he knew exactly what he really thought. There is nothing like a good shock of pain for dissolving certain kinds of magic.
Then Puddleglum says this to the Witch:
"One word, Ma'am" he said coming back from the fire; limping because of the pain. "One word. All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder. I'm a chap who always liked to know the worst and then put the best face I can on it. So I won't deny any of what you said. But there's one thing more to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things - trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones..."