So! What on earth has the woman been doing?
Sorting through photographs, and Steve’s papers, and making some decisions thereby. Fanac.org was kind enough to take the box of fanzines I gathered, and will be digitizing and putting them on the site as time and volunteers allow.
Steve’s papers include some correspondence with interesting people in the field, and a file drawer of handwritten, unpublished poetry. Steve had been a traveling poet before I knew him, and he wrote poems like you and I doodle. By contrast, his fiction is — surprisingly sparse, mostly seeming to be many iterations of the same five or six stories, along with a couple that I dimly recall seeing, that had apparently been pitched in a box in frustration after gathering too many rejections.
The majority of what he left, though, are photographs. Steve was very rarely without a camera, and thus I am left with many (unsorted) glimpses of cats, daily life, cats, moments from the Liaden Universe® World Tour, time spent with the Friends of Liad, cats, and, err, me, along with pictures of us, and pictures of Steve, because he insisted that I have a camera, too, that being one of the markers of a civilized person to him, though I was never as prolific on film as he was. Oh, and pictures of cats.
Because of a combination of things — the sparseness of his papers, the convention badges and program books that I had no idea what to do with, the proliferation of personal letters, cards, and photographs, gave me the idea of making what I first conceived of as “a scrapbook,” but which will probably be three, or four, scrapbooks by the time I’m done. I’m thinking that there will be narrative, written by me, because the pictures are jogging my memory — never robust — and of course Steve left no notes of his own.
I have already sorted some of the photos into the existing album, which is what opened my eyes to the fact that a single album, with dividers, was Just Not Going to Do the Job, and I spent what was probably a stupidly long time looking at how many pictures there are of me, and questioning their part in this project. In the end, I came to the conclusion that, yes, the pictures of me are part of the narrative; after all, the photographer considered the pictures worth taking.
In addition to the above, I’ve been writing — not as quickly as I’d like, but that’s usually the case — and going to gym, and mostly keeping up with daily life, in this vastly changed environment. The coon cats are keeping a very close eye on me, which I can hardly blame them for, considering the number of A-List players we’re lost lately.
One thing I haven’t done is an InfoDump, and I really ought to. Some people will have missed the news about Steve, and there’s the Ribbon Dance eARC to promote, and the upcoming Salvage Right mass market because Life Does Go On, and books are in a very literal sense, my life.
Well. Maybe this weekend for the InfoDump.
I think that catches us up for right now.
Thank you all for your patience, and for your support down many years through many stories.
Hugs
Your plan sounds well thought out. I am very glad you are keeping the pictures of you. I believe Steve would approve, since, as you said, he considered them worth taking. I am glad the cats are keeping an eye on you. That is their job after all.
Pictures of you. Sigh. He loved you. I’m glad you count yourself as part of the narrative.
You’re doing so well considering. Hold the cats close and know we all send our love.
I’m glad you’re including the pictures of yourself in Steve’s “scrapbooks.” His narrative would be impossibly incomplete without you in it! YOU are important and loved.
In honor of Steve and Sharon, and because I really wanted to, I have begun the re-reading of the Liaden Universe novels. as I first read them 20 years ago, they feel somewhat new. What is entirely new is my response to them. I wept with Davv and with Shan and Priscilla. I expect that will continue. I never met Steve, but I know that feeling of loss. I think Sharon is one the bravest humans on the planet. My heartfelt condolences for her and her family.