Fish Stories
August 17, 1999
6:29 a.m.
Brigid has fish now. We went to the pet store twice late last week, once to get the gravel and filters and all the essential hardware and the second time to get the fish themselves. It's all my parents' fault, of course. A couple years ago, they took Brigid to McNealy lake down in Kentucky, and they came back with a small collection of minnows in lake water. Well, to make a long story short, I accidently killed the fish when I put them in city water before letting the water stand long enough to get rid of its chemical content. It was a mistake, honest it was. Somehow, though, we managed to slip past Brigid's questions as to whether she could have fish or not since that time. Until, of course, now. When she asked for fish, I decided to make her a deal. Before she could have fish she would have to learn all about them, and would have to understand what all equipment was needed, and all that stuff. She immediately demanded to be taken to the library, whereupon she checked out four books on fish care. The next day she made her mother take her to find out when the pet shop ran aquarium classes. Did I mention that Lisa has taken a decidedly hands off approach to the fish thing? Perhaps I ignored mentioning it lest one get the idea that she's much wiser than me. Anyway, some hundred dollars and a couple nights' work after the fact, Brigid now has a tank of starter goldfish sitting in her room. Shadow is the darker one. Neon is the bigger, bright orange one, and Mini-ne is the tiny orange one. She's having a great time. Right after she got the tank filled she could hardly stand the excitement, and that night she slept with the fishtank lights on so she could watch them swim around. The next day she was glued to the tank. I watched her for a little while, staring at her fish. When I was a boy we got fish, too. I remember we got a red-tailed shark, and a silveryblack catfish that swam with a really cool wiggle. And I remember being entranced. Yeah, I know. She'll be bored with them in a month. But I think that's fine. Having fish is a rite of passing, I think. It's learning what it's like to be responsible for something and someone. The only question is whether the lesson is meant for Brigid, or for me.   I changed the title to the fantasy story I'm working on. It's now "Separated by Sky," a phrase I picked out of the the because it seemed to fit what I was trying to do with it. I finished the first draft this morning. It comes in at 2,700 words, or about 12 manuscript pages. This puts me a day ahead of the schedule I laid out three weeks ago. This is a good thing because I think the second pass on the story prior will take a little extra time, and I can certainly use the extra day. I also finished a pair of critiques yesterday. (Garry--if you're out there, where's your story?) And, for those of you following the Wizards of the Coast thing, I received a letter from them asking for my social security number prior to them cutting a check for the reprints they're going to use in their CD. I'm still not counting my chickens, but I'm taking this to mean that they've accepted the few modifications I made to the contract in order to make it more acceptable to me. Have a great day.  Daily Persistence is © Ron Collins |
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"There is something in this process that resembles the dynamics of addiction. The practice of most arts is very hard to give up once you've started, and few people ever manage to stop doing it." Charles Baxter Letters to a Fiction Writer |
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