Got My Submission Ready...

It's my turn to hand out a manuscript to the group so I spent last night trying to make a story I've been working on for 3 years into an acceptable shape to give them. It's been rejected twice so I think it's time to revisit it and see what else I can do with it. I don't want to abandon it, it's one of my favorites, but I've either got too much of it or not enough. I look forward to hearing what the Crazy Writing People think of it in this incarnation. And I want to dig around the 'Net to find an exercise since we're easing into a new rotation with new members so we're not into in full swing just yet. I think as the instigator I should be responsible for bringing something, but I'm saying right here and now, in two weeks when we're fully into the new rotation leadership will pass from member to member and I won't be "the mom" every week. Cross my heart. It's hard for me to let go and it's hard for the others to take the reins, but I have faith that we can all do it. I need to make sure to say that tonight.

May 12--Darwin Island, Galapagos. Kai struggled to keep his chin above the churning water. With depressing irregularity the waves crashed over his head, driving him below the surface, filling his nose, ears, and eyes with burning salt water. He was so cold. He had foolishly thought that the waters of the Galapagos were warm; they weren't. The current traveled clockwise up the coast of Asia to the Arctic, then it plunged down the west coast of North and most of South America shedding heat as it went and the nutrient-rich water that made the islands so biologically rich came welling up the sides of the islands from the cold depths. His thin wetsuit, barely suitable for snorkeling off the cruise ship, was no match for prolonged immersion. He didn't know how long he had been in the ocean. The current was pushing him into the storm's maelstrom and he was powerless to swim out of it. Soon he would pass through the rocky arch he could just see through the spray, and he knew that he was a diminishing speck in the vastness of the roiled water. No one would find him unless he suddenly caught on fire.

Huh.
--Barbara