Yesterday the Saône River at Auxonne rose quickly. It has been raining heavily for several days and the runoff from upstream is having trouble keeping within the river banks. Last evening there was a break in the weather and my view out across the cockpit showed the river to have nearly overtopped the marina breakwater.
This morning the water is over the top of the breakwater and the access road along its top was under several centimetres of water with only the grasses separating the river from the Port Royal basin. Half the marina is now an island, requiring wading for access to and from barges and the mainland. Fortunately, the float Zonder Zorg is on is attached to the other side of the basin, where the land is a bit higher.
We've had some patches of nice weather this spring, but there has been a lot of rain. In mid-March I hunkered down inside and began building a wooden model of a skûtsje.
While waiting for glue to dry, on 19 March I began writing a novel. I had no idea where the story was going, I just started writing. I’ve read quite a few novels, but I have no real concept of what a novel’s structure is. Four weeks later, after about 80,000 words I arrived at its finish.
Since then I’ve done a lot of content and text exiting, I've created front pages and put together some ideas for a cover. My writing background is non-fiction and editing, so I have no idea whether this piece of fiction has any merit, or is simply a bunch of babbling. One way or the other, I need to get the characters out of my head and get on with living. It's off to the printers this week.
The flood of words is over, but the flood of water isn't. The glue on the model is probably dry by now, I haven’t checked for almost six weeks.
I'm waiting for a hard copy of the proof to arrive, and if things go well, the book will be up on Amazon and other places around 20 May. In the meantime, if the river calms and recedes, Zonder Zorg is heading north, toward the Netherlands.
