Note to self: don't let so many days go by without saying hello to one's faithful readers--whom I appreciate more than I can say.
Did another drive-along through Ben Lomond tonight to look at Christmas lights and think. I found myself once again on the street where Asha's killer lived. No Christmas lights at that house at all, as if a permanent blight has settled there. I thought of his family, how he lived there among them, all the while planning a murder--this man whom I categorically believe had killed before. I think of the people who covered up for him, for a time. That didn't last long.
I tend to take my drive-alongside on the same route--to the McClish house, to Asha's final residence, to the site where her car was found, to the market where they both worked. I do not go up Love Creek Road where she was found. It is remote and dark, and I am afraid of getting lost or stuck up there.
I expect that Truman Capote revisited several places in Holcomb repeatedly when he was writing In Cold Blood (not like I am anywhere in Capote's league). I don't feel quite so bad about revisiting some of the places I'm writing about.
Writing a book like this is sheer, hard work. I am grateful for those who have spoken to me about Asha--through them, I feel as if I know her, as if I can write about her in a way that will show the importance of her story. Through them, I know what courage is: I cannot imagine the courage it takes to tell me about a person lost in the worst way imaginable.
Women die all over the world, every day. Every day, another woman's story is lost. I can't hold all those stories, can't tell them. There are days I feel as if everything I have ever done as a writer is like running around with a teacup, trying to catch a monsoon: but it is what I do. If the last book I ever write is Asha's story, I will feel I have done some good in this world.
When I drive around to the familiar places, I feel I have gone to my touchstone and can go home to work once more.
My name is Joan McMillan and this blog is, as Emily Dickinson says, "my letter to the world." I am currently working on a nonfiction book about the murder of a young woman, Asha Veil, born Joanna Dragunowicz, and her unborn daughter, Anina, on September 9, 2006. My book is meant to honor her life and illuminate the need to create a safer world for women and children.
To read an excerpt from the book, please click on the following link:
ashaveilbook.blogspot.com
An excerpt from The Pleasure Palace, my romantic comedy, can be found here:
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