(4 february 2011)

i am keeping crazy hours.

going to sleep at midnight. waking up at two. working with jackie until 7 a.m.

it isn’t intentional and it isn’t ideal, nor is it as bad as it sounds. as onassis himself said once: “jackie is a pleasure in the morning.”

i’m working on something new. well, in truth, it’s old. but now it’s new. ish.

if that makes any sense.

much of what i’m doing right now does not make sense. i am often talking of things i know nothing about.

it would’ve been wise to have taken a feminist theory class somewhere along the line, because i am making a point that, i see now, is deeply feminist. it is the sensation of pulling a hot pan from the oven only to discover you’ve no surface on which to set it.

i don’t know that i want to be a feminist, i just really need to borrow their theories.

and so, as though it qualifies as a legitimate theoretical work, i’ve thrown gloria steinem’s marilyn book into a pile of reading that was already verging on schizophrenic. she looks awkward there. gloria. sandwiched between kierkegaard and sweet valley high #17. too awkward. i throw mercy onto the pile too because, clearly, dworkin makes good company.

i don’t know that i want to be a feminist, but maybe it’s too late for that? maybe i’m fleeing an inevitability? maybe i’m running from what i already am?

but then i’ve been on the run for awhile. because it’s difficult to face what i’m doing.

i am using biography to argue the validity of fiction. i am writing the real life of a fictional version of a real woman. i am using that fictional version to argue that the real woman- who has been marginalized by the feminist movement- was, in fact, one of its central players.

i am holding one idea and a million fictions.

i have no surface on which to set them.

but then every once in awhile there’s a glimmer. a good sentence. a good paragraph. an early morning hour of writing where three pages come easily. and, every once in awhile, there comes a moment, a moment almost too fluttering sweet to be substantial, where those three pages are enough.