Notes from Maine - 2024/10/27

I’m writing this at my “finished” kitchen island. The quotes will remain around that word until I have the drawer faces mounted and the electric outlets installed. Those are just details. Structurally, it’s done and it has a new quartz top to make it look official. The counter people showed up on Tuesday and capped off all the horizontal surfaces. Once they came over to take their measurements, everything moved very quickly. From what they described, other job sites on their list weren’t as well prepared, so I got bumped up on the schedule. My next step is to prioritize the doors and drawers and then I’ll move on to the upper cabinets. 

One day, I’ll go a whole week without thinking about this kitchen. That will be a glorious time. I’m already looking forward to this winter. Regardless of the outcome of the next two engagements, I will be done with contractors by the time the snow flies. If I can go another 20 years without having to hire anyone (electrical, roof, counters, fence, tree trimming) I will be filled with joy.

 Another 20 years without hiring contractors—I know that’s a ridiculous notion. More projects will have to be done, and sometimes the scope of things will just be beyond my dwindling capacity. Somewhere in the back of my head I’m already preoccupied with the old part of the cellar. It would be great to have that leveled out, the walls shored up, and maybe some nice clean stone put down. We had that done at my grandparents’ house and it made a world of difference. But I can’t imagine hauling a thousand wheelbarrows full of dirt out and then a thousand wheelbarrows full of rocks in. If that gets done, it won’t be with my hands.

A million years ago, in another life, I used to write software. The company I worked for sold hundreds of thousands of boxes of CDROMs. We toiled over those things, trying to make them perfect. Now, in my lifetime, they’re gone and forgotten. You couldn’t run those if you wanted to, and why would you want to? But the barn I built out back is still something I (and the horses) need every day. It’s deteriorating, just like the software, but at a slightly slower rate. Still, one day I’ll have to accept that my work was temporary. Earl (Shire horse) is 7 years old. He will outlive that barn, I sincerely hope. I don’t think I’ll be putting up the next one myself.

It’s tempting to think that one or two of my books might outlive me. Maybe there are some print copies out in the world and one will catch someone’s eye after I’m gone. Compared to the barn, the kitchen, or software I’ve written, I wonder how the books will hold up.

I re-read Dracula a few years ago and the blood transfusions jumped out. In 1897 (when Dracula was published), the concept of transfusions was established, but it was dangerous. Karl Landsteiner didn’t publish about blood types until 1901. Stoker didn’t know why some transfusions were helpful and others harmful. At the time, he might have thought that some blood was better than others. Lucy didn’t die from the transfusion, but she could have. It was just luck that a mismatched type didn’t send her into shock and result in a quick death. It has been a few years—did she die immediately? I don’t think so. But I do remember shouting at the book in my hands. 

All that said, it’s still a great book. It doesn’t matter that one bit of science was quickly outdated, the story holds up fine. We get the cultural references, although they’re outdated. In some of my books I’m careful to do no heavy lifting with technology—it changes too quickly to be a relevant plot device for long. Sometimes it’s fun to write a story that’s a snapshot of a moment. In Battle for Rockhold one of the kids has a cellphone that will cry like a baby if it’s not held often enough. I still think that might happen one day, although there seems to be no need for cellphones to beg for attention. Somehow you can be in the middle of a conversation (with an actual person across from you) and be interrupted by nothing more than the buzz of a vibrating notification. I know that I’ve done it myself. If I write that into a book, I sincerely hope that before I die someone will read the passage and say, “No way—nobody would be rude enough to reply to a text message while they’re actually talking to someone.”

One can dream.

I just looked through the window and realized that there are all kinds of clouds out there that I haven’t shaken my fist at yet.