Normally saving the cat is a literary device where a
character, early on in the novel, saves the cat so that we bond with
that character.
But, how can saving a cat play havoc
with novel editing?
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| Ozzy, our cat |
I've been on a real push to finish
editing my novel Prophesy (book 1 of the Antigone series -- yes, I
finally decided on a name). A few weeks ago, I even had some time to
myself when my husband took the kids to go visit their grandparents
for a few days.
However, the cat (an older male cat
named Ozzy, short for Osiris) had different ideas. One morning, I
heard him meowing loudly from the back yard, so I went to
investigate. I saw him balancing precariously on the branch of a
tree, with one of his back legs stuck between two fence boards.
Without thinking, I ran up to him, wrapped one arm around him, then
tried to ease his leg out from the fence.
This did not go well.
Ozzy proceeded to scratch my arm to
ribbons. I didn't want to drop him, so I stood there and took it,
trying to talk soothingly to him through my pain and calm him down.
When he stopped, I decided to grit my teeth and try a little more
force to get his leg out. His leg didn't seem to be broken and he
didn't look like he was in too much pain and I had to get him out of
the fence.
This did not work. At all. Ozzy
actually bit me several times on both hands. At one point, I had to
pry his teeth out from my hand. There was blood everywhere. I was
stuck. He was stuck.
I tried to perch the cat back in the
tree so I could get a towel to wrap him in and something to pry the
fence apart. Nope. Ozzy was not cooperating.
With nothing else left to do, I
screamed for help at the top of my lungs. Surely someone nearby had
to be home or walking by or something. Before long, one of my
neighbours from across the ally came running into the yard and
quickly took in the situation. She asked if she could go into my
house to get a towel and a crowbar and I said absolutely and told her
where they were.
We wrapped the cat up in the towel and
my neighbour pried off the fence board. Ozzy jumped away, like
nothing had ever happened, not even limping.
My neighbour and I looked at each
other. I was covered in blood and my hands and arms were already
starting to swell up. "You'd better go get a tetanus shot,"
she said, then disappeared. I wanted to thank her, but I'm not even
sure which house she was from.
I went in to get cleaned up when a
delivery guy knocked at the door. I answered, looking like hell,
covered in blood. He dropped the parcels, said I didn't have to sign
for them after all, then ran off.
Next I called the doctor. Yes, she
could squeeze me in that day.
After giving me the tetanus shot, she
also gave me antibiotics as my wrists were swelling up so badly I
could barely drive. Then she advised me to make sure the cat's
vaccinations were up to date. All I could think of was Why, it's
not like I bit the cat back.
Then, I went home and collapsed.
By the time my husband and kids got
home later that day, my hands looked kind of like latex gloves that
had been blown up. I could lift nothing. Typing was out the question.
I decided to watch movies.
All in all, it took about two weeks for
my hands to heal (oh, and my arms turned green from bruising up, so I
even looked like the hulk).
So, this is a long story to say that I
am behind in my editing, blogging, etc. However, I am back in full
swing now, working to catch up. Not being able to use the computer
also gave me time to think about what I want to do about some issues
in my novel that were nagging at me.
I also used this time to read more
about self publishing. Wow, I am excited about this!!! It makes my
heart race even to read about the process of self publishing. Has
anyone else gone this route? Or can recommend some good indie authors
to read? I would love recommendations of books, blogs, or forums to
read. (If you are looking for a good indie middle grade/young adult
read, check out my review for Double Cross in my previous post).
Thanks for bearing with me through this
long story, but I couldn't resist telling it as one of the adventures
on the road to writing my novel.
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