The artistic endeavor is contemplation twice rewarded.

I wrote that line in a long-ago post about exploration and discovery. So often our creative impulse springs up from an emotion or idea – and then our attempt to express it leads to others that surprise us.

In a discussion with fellow creatives a while back, one advice-giver urged that we talk about our projects with everyone we encounter, even in line at the grocery store. Her point was that it feeds our own energies and may find us a few interested “followers.” The suggestion didn’t ring helpful for me, maybe because imagining myself on the receiving end in that checkout line makes me feel sort of put upon. 

It’s true, though, that in my everyday interactions, if others ask what I’ve been up to, I’m only too eager to tell about it. This post is an iteration of that, because if you are a follower of this blog, you have, by implication, already asked. And if you’ve been here long, you’re aware my creative energies have been diverted for some time to a separate longform project.

In other words, I’ve been out exploring.

Here is a brief description of the results:

An old box of papers, saved for decades and never reopened, is the portal into an improbable ocean-crossing love story at the dawn of the internet age. In the late 1990s, the author’s tech support request led to a delightful correspondence with the computer programmer who responded. Her box holds printouts of the hundreds of emails they exchanged, the record of blossoming friendship which deepened into love – through the written word alone – and ultimately took this neophyte traveler to Europe to meet him in person. A Confluence of Rivers: A Memoir Through Digital Love Letters opens with her recounting of the adventure from faded memory. Then, with mysteries to resolve and emotions to confront, she brings readers along as she cracks open the cardboard treasure chest to read and relive the exhilarating, painful story — in the process making shocking discoveries about herself and what she’d misremembered.

Getting to the other side of the completed manuscript took more out of me than I imagined it would when I first took to the waters. But oh what it gave me back in discoveries and other treasures! 

The book is not yet available; it’s gradually making its way to publication. I’ll be keeping you posted here, of course, and will soon be able to point you to a website dedicated to that endeavor.

Do you know the sounds windchimes made from seashells make? I’m hearing the subtle strains as I ponder the Rivers experience so far. It’s been a long trek, bending to pick up the most striking natural trinkets from its banks. Now they are strung together and hung, and the delicate clacking and clinking sing out amazement – softly mournful, above all hopeful.