While struggling with the painting last night, I had a minor epiphany. Partially inspired by both "The Moon and Sixpence" and "The Razor's Edge," as well as the construct for the Dylan movie, "I'm Not There," and with a little bit of influence from Styron's "Darkness Visible," I am going to re-organize and re-imagine my novel, which I started last February.
Originally, the novel was going to focus on and project a single path, which would include a local political career and different relationships and friendships with different women. Of course, that was a projection from February, when I had just started the new life.
While painting, it dawned on me that this new artistic path should be integrated into the novel...somehow. And, as I write, I might pick up a bunch of smaller canvases and paint as I write, so that both activities are going on simultaneously.
Instead of focusing on a singular path, I might structure the novel to have lives depicted through parallel paths: poet, politician, painter...possibly pornographer.
I am not totally sure, but it will be different and less linear than what I had originally planned...it will still likely begin with the death and end with the 40th birthday.
And of course, having had the virtue of time, having met new people along the way, there is much more to write about, much more to explore than there was 10 months ago.
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