In effort to keep the mess at a minimum, the following plans are being entertained by Ruby O’Degee Glenfadden. By the way I am considering keeping the third name always. It is my theory that one can’t slough off knowledge or *names. It is forever with you (no matter how hard you try to deny it); all those experiences that make up a person for better or worse. This will be no different, because the truth is “you can’t go home again.” You can go physically back to the place you started, but you are at a butterfly’s mercy – a tad revised, especially when that revision comes through story, which is 12,000,457 times more affective than being told anything atal.

When Scout stood on the doorstep of Boo Radley’s house at the tale end of To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee told the metaverse, she’d learned what she needed to know. She didn’t have to live her character, Boo’s life. No, she only needed to absorb his experiences into every cell of her being. Lee did, and I did, when my storyteller of a father took me to the movies to soak in what Lee called the best adaptation of film to book, she’d ever seen. It is a rare happenstance when I can say a book is manna, and the film that goes after is manna too. When folks tell me they want to read minds, I hand them a book. “Here it is,” I say. “The origin of all thoughts are in these pages, and you will need to spend a lot of time reading them. Sit down by the fireplace over there,. Take your shoes off. Get comfy and bring some snacks. You will never come back from where you are going, always. And mind you, if you try to come back, you will require a prescription of an elixir more potent than hot triple chocolate cocoa. Caution. Caution.”

Footnote*A Little known aside is that Ruby absorbs almost everything through her thick bull head. No matter how much she protests the name Glenfadden will accompany her where ever she goes, but that isn’t what this chapter is about dear explorer. This chapter is dedicated to best laid plans that will never come about exactly in the way Ruby plans them. It doesn’t work that way, regardless of what bubble one lives in.

Plans 505
1. Check – find office space on desert. Check – set up office. Checkmate foiled – office partly laid across neighbors parcel, and needed to be moved 1 foot to the north (presumption here – no idea which way Eder D’Uru is pointed – but, I always place the door facing due north where my faith resides and makes a promise).

The moving of the office, requested by the resident engineer and manager, resulted in a major disaster of the Ruby sort. Now she will need to spend time with the tape measure, because she previously, without knowing, unlinked the boards, floor, roof top, juke box and sound control booth. “Oh for the love of Yahvo,” she screamed to the wind, now rustled by a thousand butterflies, “why now?! Just when I am finding my footing, and I’m clearing a path to my destiny.”

Making a mess is one thing. Allowing others to see your mess is an entirely other storytelling device. Devices have their place along and along, but LY words, dialogue that use other verbs than the word said, and obvious editing notations should be used sparingly. Talking to the reader is unseemly and untidy, if there are no mental images to draw out the relationship between the giver and the receiver. Before an author talks to the readers, an author should know the readers fairly well. Coming to a dig was one way Ruby got to know her readers. Teaching readers is another way to get to know the reader. Living in the confusing, overly advertised, not what it appears world with her readers is the best way Ruby got to know her readers. She is her reader, always.

2. Check – find a home in a quiet, craggy, mystic meadow on an island in the middle of the sea – A W.B. Yeats kind of place – an Innisfree that needs no further pontification. Check – done and in the midst of renovating and personalizing the beloved house with the garish purple door windows that can’t be changed, or the windows will stay forever open, or forever closed. Ruby notes, as do I dear reader, that we cannot every detail in any plot. That is the joy of lateral storytelling and the mystery of linear storytelling; what you can’t or wouldn’t change, if you could. Most of us, for example would like to be more attractive, but still “me.” Others of us would like to be rich, but not live in the glare of scrutiny and envy. The glare kills the most talented amongst us. At first it looks like a rainbow, but later it looks like death. I know that sounds harsh in ages where no one falls to a permanent end, nevertheless, glare is the final blow to many a survivor.

3. Check – revive the much beloved The Cavern Players. There is nothing I am more proud of in the D’niverse. Pulling together the players is having a party in your own backyard. It is the carnival, circus and theatrical production done as a child with sound effects, explorers rushing here and there, directions being called out by Veralun, the film producer, who tends to be charmingly gruff on cue. It is nirvana piecing the voices together. Even with every argument that ever came to light, it is a blessing to listen to the remnants of what I have left in the sound arsenal. Never did I see such a bunch of talented amateur actors and voices. Now I’ve laid down the stage, as I always envisioned it in the backyard behind my house. I did it early, before everything else came into focus. As the anthropologist, Margaret Mead, said, “get those pieces of art up on the wall. Forget about the forks, toilet seats, china, every explorer’s relto hut rug or Maytag washing machine. They’re not going to make a your find a home yours.”

Note: Dear explorer, strictly by serendipity and more than likely destiny, I took my anthropology, philosophy, alchemy and all other pertinent sophies from a professor, who studied with Margaret Mead in the flesh. I suspect, like adding a name to my other list of names, I can’t or don’t prefer to slough off any knowledge I absorbed during my professor’s rush to gold or rainbows.

4. Check broadcast CCNE Find a Home Companion. Unchecked the same. The program continues to haunt me, but there are technical glitches and costs that need to be considered. The good outcome is the live stream, and it works well to telecast from any point. The problem is the sound and the limitations of the Linden transportation and property management system. Their bandwidth issues are of great concern. When other matters are addressed Ruby will get back to working out the details, even it means a small outlay of Linden $. Up to this point, she has managed to carefully consider every dime spent. She has a locked in budget to keep.

5. Partially checked the Seanachai Book Publishing Business. This business is set up in the Eder D’Uru mall, and will be partly done in the studio at home. It is planned that books of an appropriate size will be distributed, once this enterprise is completely learned by curve and practice. The kits are in my hands. There is no limitation on how many books can be produced, given away or sold, depending on the sort of book published. Other items “sold” by the seanachai include scrolls, story weavings, illuminated journals, children’s picture books and replicated ancient texts.

6. Partially checked the Ruby’s Sewing and Design Studio. This came about, because laterally story needs a few directions to take. Since I like designing my own garments, and I’ve learned some sewing for dummies tips along the Gimp way, I thought it might be nice to share my learning with others. It seems like there has been Much Ado made about Nothing. It’s not that I am denigrating the wonderful designs I’ve seen, while shopping for garments and costumes until I drop my clicking fingers. It is that basic items are not difficult to make, once the lens is wiped clear of the jargon and hyperbole. In other words, I am embarking on a learning to make clothes myself, and plan to offer my help to others struggling through the mire, mist or myst like I am – always.

7. Checked joining other groups that relates to my ilk. It is my opinion, and this is a strong opinion that I’ve only recently made concrete: explorers, like myself don’t get out much. If we are to bring explorers to the dig, we must get out more! Who will know what wonder yonder lurks. Word of mouth is the viral way net communities are recognized. Advertising in a subscription, pull me, technical metaverse is only effective when the populations, who click are aware of the use for it. It is why I am “sold” on net activities and not television that blares at me, when I flicking channels for something interesting to watch and learn from. 57,045 channels and nothing on continues. It is getting worse.

8. Checked writing my book – working title: Violet’s How to Tell Your Own Story Adventure. Purpose to teach third graders what a story looks like, and to encourage them to write their own along with me. The process of teaching in this way is much like teaching explorers how to sew, while I learn with them. It is the best and only way to teach. It is present, and by that I mean I don’t teach in the past tense or the future tense (which is not accessible or assured). I teach in the present tense, always.

Of course I can talk about the past, and the future, but I am sure to call both notions dreams. Yes, it is a wee bit wacky, like slipping through celtic thin space stones, or falling down a crack when the earth shakes, but it so far effective. In the Violet story, she (an eight year old girl with snarly hair and odd timing) loses her words to fairies, after the death of her seanachai father. Violet inherits the mantel of storyteller, but has no idea of how to complete the mission, until she meets Fergus and they go on a wild romp through a camping trailer park’s hiking trail. As is true of many a Donegal traveller tale, the children can’t access the trail or trial, until they find the fireplace in the cart. Without a fire to look into and through, there is no transparent viewer to be found.** Like Scout and Jem, who found the figures in Boo Radley’s tree, it requires careful reading of a text to find ancient and true fireplaces, but once found the ride that comes after is scary, thrilling and flies through universes unknown without any limitation forever and always.

**Footnote, Dear reader the rest is for reading, and will not be addressed here, (copyrighted and legal such), but I did want to explain the fireplace metaphor for those of you, who are partial to wardrobes.

9 and 10. Check, partially check and discovering the check mark to get all of these initiatives done, before there is a plot development I am not aware is coming. Lateral storytelling is the sort of storytelling we all fear, Josh, but it is the sort we live out, and work around with our limited amounts of time, no matter what the written end (or not). Harper Lee did this when she was a young woman, never required herself to water down another word that diminished her masterpiece, and continues to live on into the age of wisdom, mercifully for me!.:whistle: Mercy. Mercy Me!

**A last author’s note to Dear Explorer: There is no such thing as scarcity in the story world. When there is no scarcity, there is no end. It is not possible to end a story always. Every story is a story within a story, or bits and pieces of an author’s journey added to another soul’s story, or an interpretation of a story, or a new age of the same story, or tribute to another story. There are twists to stories that require copyright and good “no trespassing” sense without credit, but there is no blank page, no completely original work by a writer. It is a soup, one big Desperaux (a classic that should be front and center of anyone’s bookcase) soup, period and without end, always.

Oh dear one more note to readers: bullheaded I am, and what you’ve read herein is only the tip of the ice pile. There is more. Another one of Ruby’s mores is that there is no original invention, only discovery of what is out there for us to plunder. Plunder we will. It is the apple we bit into, but in rare instances out of the plundering comes a thing of beauty and stability. It is the age I am interested most in; The Age of Reason.

Ragpie Rita reported to no one that she was extremely sour about the fact that the office was lost.  She had spent a lot of time tightening the bolts on the wireless connections and was a wee bit more than miffed that she had to start over.  When she can find the wires again, she said, she would tie them to “those roots over there in the ground.”  What roots she meant wasn’t clear since no one was there to look to where she pointed.

Tyion tried unsuccessfully not to attend the non-meeting.  He had been on the surface improving his directorial skills so that his directions as director would be more direct.  Since no one came to the non-meeting he wasn’t yet been able to try out these skills.  Nevertheless, he directed the staff not to worry if they missed the non-meeting and for once everyone followed his directions.  It was only much later, after the non-meeting had ended, that he discovered why Rita was so upset.  Apparently Madge has learned to read the dictionary, and thought she understood the meaning of the word “non.”  Unfortunately, she confused non-attendance with non-existence and so thought she’d help Tyion out in preparing for the non-meeting.

No one was quite sure just what it was she did….

——————-

Veralun announced he was taking a vacation from these non-meetings.  He said he consulted Dr. Brains about his loss-of-office trauma, and had to watch Dr. Brains sit there, thinking hard about the logic of needing vacations from not-meeting rather than office-losing.  After an hour, his patient, Veralun, lost patience with his doctor, Dr. Brains, and de-occupied the office.  This isn’t the office Veralun lost, no, that office was the reason he came to Dr. Brains’ office.  His office was well worth the effort to occupy.   The office he left was Dr. Brains’ office that rightly deserved to lose its occupant.  Dr. Brains muttered something about “poor lost stubborn so-and-so” but his words were as lost as the CCN offices because Veralun’s ears were already out of range.  Dr. Brains was at a loss for words.  Shortly thereafter, someone noticed a sign on his door that read “unoccupied for loss of occupants.”

Ghaelen said “what meeting?”

Tyion tried to direct her to the directions regarding this meeting he had left on the directory wall, but since the wall was lost with the rest of the office, she never did find the memo about the non-meeting.  Turning around several times in the same place, convinced that there was really nothing amiss, she finally sat down (on her trusty crate, which she carries everywhere so as never to actually be without an office) and didn’t think about it any longer.  She did get some of the CavernCasts uploaded to the web blog and out on ITunes (which she told no one about at the non meeting).  And she didn’t speak to Veralun or Tyion about an evil idea regarding characters, offices, and scripts, none of which had anything to do with non-meetings.

Altydwarber was almost at the non-meeting, then caught herself in time and said “Why should I go to a non meeting?  I have better things to do.”  So she did them although she did miss the tea and had saved some Kirel Baked Treats for the company snack.  She also almost saw Ghaelen sitting on her crate, so she did sit down with her for a while and they laughed about explosions, balloons, bosses, and they wondered what Veralun was doing out there in the wilderness looking around as if he had good sense.  He grumbled something about smart people with no brains and lost buildings (none of which they could quite understand) and then came to sit and not-meet with Alty and Ghaelen on the crate.

Mr. Jules wasn’t at the non-meeting for the first time in a row.  If he hadn’t been the boss, Tyion would have given him the what-for.  As it was, Tyion was able to pride himself on knowing not to attend, while Mr. Jules simply didn’t know not to attend, and wasn’t even aware that the office itself had disappeared.  Or maybe he did and thought he had lost it so was out looking for it so the staff could not meet.  Since no one was around to see him not there we can’t really say where he wasn’t or what he wasn’t doing.  He could be lost with the office and no one wouldn’t know.

Ruby completely missed the meeting too, although everyone knew she was working very hard to not meet wherever Mr. Jules might be.  She didn’t tell everyone she was writing a new storyline and that she might know where the office was but didn’t really want to say.  Last we heard she had collared a third-grader who was lurking about near the door not-marked “bathroom” and whining because he couldn’t get into it.  She tried to tell him it had been lost but that concept seemed totally foreign to him because he really needed that door to exist and to be open.  Ruby lost her mind as well as her office and told the poor child that if he could find Madge he would most certainly get a door with the words “bathroom” on it.  She then thought it might be nice to have some tea with Alty and Ghaelen.  So she came over to sit on the crate and not-meet with the rest of them.

(It’s a very large crate.)

Marten was absent from the non-meeting.  We’re not sure where he is other than at the Messengers surface site, and everyone at CCN misses him terribly. (Especially Madge, who finally understood about the word “extra” and very much wants to know more.)  But since no one met to share their sentiments, Marten wasn’t able to hear them.  Someone said he had finally fixed that “hole” at rel.to.com, but could not explain what the hole meant.  Staff members thought briefly about calling him to communicate these things, but since the phone was nowhere to be found, they decided they needed another plan.  They tried crate-to-crate skype calling, but since there was only one crate that didn’t work either.  So they tabled that topic until the next non-meeting when, they hoped, Marten would attend.

Lord Chaos was a non-meeting absentee.  Rumor had it that he was fighting a just war somewhere against something and creating non-order everywhere he went.  Or maybe he was fighting to creating order out of non-order.  Well, it didn’t matter because no one met to question it, but everyone who wasn’t there and couldn’t find the office was sure they heard beautiful strains of music wafting through the air.  A flash of light went by where they weren’t and slowed down just enough for non-attendees to catch a glimpse of his friend Lady Chaos in her newest and largest duds.  Rita took off to get some duds for herself, and no one didn’t see her again after that.  But the music stayed, and everyone had a great time on the crate with the tea not talking about meetings or offices or other very important things.