turn off the lights – leaving just the reading lamp by your chair – light a gardenia candle – and close your eyes (that’s what we’re doing right after we t y p e t h i s l i n e).
*pauses*
wasn’t that WONDERFUL?
makes you want to weep, non? (in a Very good way.)
we *almost* run out of supplies so we went back to the Library (we Adore a Library) and found there were quite a few more pieces at the Requested Materials Desk (thank goodness).
it’s so delicious the way one can Request materials and there they are – at some point – when brought in from Another Branch (via what mode of transport? are they all low tech and Metro these days? or a Large Van? Limo?)
firstly there was a sudden urgent desire to hear a harpsichord:
and then there was a need for chandeliers and foreign films and beautiful dresses rustling silky-sharp-with-wit and wisdom and the dark nature of desire….
and then turning right and past the sentry at the gate and up the winding canyon and up some more until – yes – right up there – we *exhaled* and wondered at the View
and, because there was one there – which we knew before we turned right for we have been here before, but not for many years – we walked the labyrinth.
have you walked a labyrinth recently?
it’s Such a fine way to focus and be quiet and generally walk out all the frustrations of the year and think a little while – or not think, actually – and just concentrate on the next moment and suddenly the mind clears and you look up and there you are – in the middle – and everything is completely as it needs to be. and so you slowly retrace your steps, a lot calmer now, and smiling, and then it is done.
the year is almost over.
we listened to more sunny southern california music on the drive home.
and then – because night has fallen on this part of the world –
it was SUCH FUN being in our first magazine shoot!
we drove to a secluded inn far down the coast into the gorgeousness of Malibu (don’t you just adore the word Malibu?)
and the kind, talented, welcoming crew were waiting for us: there was a fancy photographer – a lady one – very modern, a stylist with a rack of clothes and suitably constrictive underwear – for us to wear – and a steamer and a clever silk scarf so we didn’t get the clothes smushed because Yes! there was a make-up and hair artist and she made us look all pretty with lipstick – so strange – we don’t own one in RL – and an Assistant who had excellent taste in music mixes and told us jokes to make us Laugh on the Beach (that was the shot they were all going for).
we tried on clothes (and were Not Allowed to wear black) – the magazine had specifically asked for bright colo(u)rs* so it’ll be strange and yet wonderful to see this peacock self when the magazine goes-to-press.
*the last time we wore “something in coral” was probably at boarding school (the “summer” – quotes used advisedly, twas England after all, we Froze) dresses were white with coral splodges or perhaps tiny flowers in a Victorian style bell-skirt with fitted bodice (agony for burgeoning breasts) and tiny buttons and pasty legs (no fake tan allowed). Or we also had to wear that coral/pink voluminous skirt for our saturday job in the shoe department at Miss. Selfridge in the Churchill Square shopping Centre.
back to yesterday *farofflooktocamera*
and the poor shiny patent leather (black) doctor martens shoes had to stay in the Inn as well – we took ballet flats (which we have Not worn since April 26th 2012 for a then-day-job-event at the Casino in Madrid) – black – of course – but they did not appear in shot as they liked our lilac toes instead.
and this is El Matador State Beach – there is not a State called El Matador – at least not in Los Angeles – but some of the beaches in Malibu are private and this one is State and thus open to all (but if you’re doing a professional photo shoot you need a Permit and so the Crew had one with them to show an Inspector just in case).
500 shots later “That’s A Wrap!”
we frolicked in the sand, walked slowly towards the camera, did lots of sitting on the sand and smiling (soft smile, shy smile to giggling and then a broad laugh – all the Options, you see) and generally doing what the magazine needs – a happy English person living in L.A who got sick, walked away from a corporate job and wrote a book and is now having a splendid time – that’s the shot they needed.
apparently she wrote a story and *slightlymistysadlook* you know, talked about Tobias (we almost miss him) and his sisters (they didn’t feature very heavily in the narrative, Tobias did most of the attention-seeking) and she even wrote about US – as in you behind the screen over there *peerswinninglythroughtheinterweb* and how writing as teamgloria (or allowing us, rather, to speak through her at last) and getting all your nice comments and help and support when (few of) you didn’t know who-we-are-in-RL-actually-was Got Her Through It All (we hesitate to say one piece because of course several bits of us are Missing post-surgery).
it’s a lovely story.
so they’re going to publish it.
not for a while – November issue (that means, confusingly, October, right?)
we can’t tell you which magazine yet.
because then it won’t be a surprise.
we adore surprises.
not as much as we adore butterscotch angel delight but there you go.
we must Not Leave The House.
we have to sharpen pencils and Get back to Work (three deadlines fast approaching which is delicious and Terribly Grown-up).
we are Too Too Tired to Type – and we are Expected somewhere with our work-face on in an hour or so – but we have returned to Los Angeles and had a Most Delicious time south of Oceanside and then North of Malibu (yes, it was a LONG drive home) where we were given hot mint tea to sip and a view of the sunset for the second day in a row but 100 miles in the Opposite Direction.
but life is good.
delicious, in fact.
this was the cloudy view Very Early yesterday morning (we awoke at 5.45 and headed out in the car shortly after dawn) as we took a constitutional on the Beach before we needed to be Smart and Alert to support who-we-are-in-RL during her (most interesting) Day…….
and then – MANY hours later – we drove back up to Los Angeles and across to Malibu for an evening’s engagement up high in the Canyons (not the Joni Mitchell Canyon) but another one that climbs and climbs and climbs up to a Very High Elevation *vaguelooktocamera*)
thankfully there was hot mint tea and friendly faces (not shown) at the top and we stayed until nightfall making it very carefully down the Canyon again feeling kind and happy and rather sleepy so we stopped in at a late night cafe in pacific palisades and had a little snack to make sure we got home safely.
and now it’s friday.
isn’t that splendid?
what will You be doing first thing Saturday morning?
visual descriptions most welcome (if they’re pretty – you know we like pretty visuals).
so we woke up Very Early (it was 5 something AM) and went for a Walk to greet the day (and be energetic enough for a Work Call with Europe – can’t be sleepy and pre-caffeinated just because it’s a Different Time Zone, darlings ;-)
and the world looked beautiful at Dawn.
yesterday we found ourselves on a Hollywood Studio Lot (which we ADORE doing). and then watching the oeuvre of Mr. Steve(n) Martin — because, you see, we have an Idea for a piece about L.A and so we’re catching up with his Other homage* to this fine city (as opposed to the-tale-of-here).
[*which was very affecting and vulnerable and beautiful actually – we had no idea.]
on the Writing side – who-we-are-in-RL is having some deep(ish) Thoughts about one’s virtual self (but she doesn’t mention Us once – *sighs*)
If you don’t have a room of your own on the Internet, you don’t have a voice in the modern world.
we *did* help with This one – she couldn’t possibly get from Edward Hopper to Ms. Jackie Collins without our influence, love.
but you knew that didn’t you?
and now she’s next door (drinking more coffee – there’ll be Tears Later) because she’s on a Deadline apparently (for something we can’t talk about) and so we’ve been told to be Quiet.
“Twice in her life she had mistaken something else for it; it was like seeing somebody in the street who you think is a friend, you whistle and wave and run after him, and it is not only not the friend, but not even very like him. A few minutes later the real friend appears in view, and then you can’t imagine how you ever mistook that other person for him. Linda was now looking upon the authentic face of love, and she knew it, but it frightened her. That it should come so casually, so much by a series of accidents, was frightening.”
~ Nancy Mitford, The Pursuit of Love
“Mother, of course, takes a lot of exercise, walks and so on. And every morning she puts on a pair of black silk drawers and a sweater and makes indelicate gestures on the lawn. That’s called Building the Body Beautiful. She’s mad about it.”
“Spring came late, but when it came it was hand-in-hand with summer, and almost at once everything was baking and warm, and in the villages the people danced every night on concrete dancing floors under the plane trees…”
because That’s the Sort Of Thing one does in Malibu on a saturday after Tea.
just so you know.
what’s that?
oh we’re Sure Miss. Nancy Mitford would have adored a labyrinth (but only in the sort of shoes one wears to Garden and wearing a headscarf in suitably muted shades, of course).
when we had finished our Tasks for the Day we decided to head to the Ocean because it was promising to be Such a lovely evening and we wanted sand-between-our-toes and salt-on-our-skin.
and so we did.
because we can.
which is completely Extraordinary.
this is what the evening commute looks like on the Pacific Coast Highway
and this is where they are all heading with those surfboards.
and then who-we-are-in-RL got a delightful Request via email (so Modern as William would say)
Hi Sophia
I’m one of the founding editors of a new online magazine, The Brooklyn Quarterly. For one of the short stories we plan to run in our preview issue (launching next week), we have been scouting for potential images to pair with the story, and the author sent us a link to one of your photos of the Chandelier Tree.
We’d love to use this on our website, with your permission and full attribution, plus a link to your website. If you could let me know whether this works for you, we’d really appreciate it — we have a week to the issue release and look forward to hearing from you.
Do let me know when it’s live and I’ll write about it.
Best of luck for the launch!
Warmest regards from sunny southern california
_sophia
it’s not EXACTLY the Times, of London, writing a letter (requesting use of an excerpt from Nancy Mitford’s The Blessing), that goes in the Diplomatic Pouch to the British Embassy in Paris and then someone sends a young person on a bicycle to her apartment and she opens the door and invites the Young Person in for tea while she finds some decent writing paper and an ink nib (the last one just broke) and pens a Response.
do you think they might be using our chandelier tree to talk about Serious Things like the downfall of the frivolous Rich?
gosh.
carry on.
we’re delighted with the Exposure to a new crowd – especially such a serious crowd in probably nice scarves and the sort of overcoat that Truman Capote wore to the Library.
we are “Mid-Edit” with The Publisher of the forthcoming (can February 2014 be counted as forthcoming? or far off? so hard to tell in this fast-paced-interweb-world) BOOK and it’s a thrilling back and forth conversation with learned copy editors and design chiefs – a whirl of loveliness about “what did you mean here?” and “can you expand?” and “Andrew McCarthy wasn’t in About Last Night” (we got our Movies mixed up in the List section of books-we-read and movies-we-watched while on medical leave!)
it’s delicious.
but the Most Glorious moment happened when we went through all the bumpf that that they use to Make A Book – like copyright line and so on.
we stopped dead in our tracks with our fingers poised over the keyboard.
there. it. was.
our very FIRST ISBN NUMBER.
*shivers*
we must return to our Notes but we just wanted to visit you Here and leave a few pictures from yesterday.
*wavingfromlosangeles* (we’re lying back on the vast pillow-y-pillows as it feels very Lady Author to edit chez one’s boudoir ;-)
a few notes between pictures and then we Really must Dash…….
yes, the sky turned pink the other evening – like a night in a small Tuscan village.
we’ve been sleeping badly as it’s Just So Hot at night (not hot flashes – as yet – although those will be exciting when they arrive but it was 90 degrees whatever that is in old money last night) – the air conditioning unit is Very Loud so we avoid it – but needs must – hot milk with a cinnamon stick is a good pre-sleep-soother.
as is a satin throw and soft white cotton sheets and something small and sprigged in the flower department on a pillowcase, darlings.
in MALIBU yesterday for an appointment with destiny.
beautiful pink roses.
and cool waters.
and lamps as if from a carriage house in a grand country Pile In Sussex.
softly blowing lavender in the side verges along the roadside.
and Bougainvillea everywhere!
and now to our newest passion.
neil jordan.
we watched Breakfast on Pluto – how had we MISSED THIS BEFORE?
it was unbelievable – joyful, painful, glorious and oh-so-wickedly-funny and then heart-breaking……
here’s the trailer (hope you can see it in NZ or do ask Mr. Google for a local version!)
so we decided we needed to learn more about Mr. Jordan’s work (yes, yes, we had heard of him – The Crying Game was ELECTRIFYING when we first sat in that darkened cinema in brighton and wept at the screen – but we didn’t know whether we’d read his novels……..we’ve read a Lot as you know so sometimes we forget….)
so we went to a bookshop and there it was – a copy of Neil Jordan.
……………………..SIGNED.
it’s a sign.
we’ve decided we need to work on his next film.
so we’re going to Write To Him.
of course we’ll let you know, love.
we tell you everything.
(actually that’s not True – we leave a Lot Out – but the basic Plot is here).
then we drove up to Hollywoodland to meet with Miss Jules Berlin as it was her last day in Los Angeles *sighs* and brought her a copy of Mr. Raymond Chandler‘s quotes.
some of the quotes were So Good that we had to photograph them in our car before we meet up with Julia.
and there you have it.
we are in possession of our first ISBN number.
a letter is forming in our head to write to Mr. Neil Jordan because we want to work for him.
and Raymond Chandler’s Los Angeles is still very much extant.
