Ring Out the Old!

New Year's Eve. End of a decade -- the "aughts." They've been a wild ride for me, probably for most people. Some stark changes, like a divorce after 34 years, a new city, and then another move to this place, learning to date after all that time -- as I said to one of them, "The last time I had a date the Vietnam War was raging" -- then meeting the man who has changed my life so completely -- once again. Meanwhile, 9/11 came and this whole country looked at things differently. We endured the Bush years, and survived them, barely. Health care and medicine began to take a huge chunk of my personal finances, as I eased into my 50s. I had several hospital stays, new prescriptions and ailments, both minor and not so minor. I traveled the world.

A few years ago I made a bucket list and have been able to check off two of them, traveling to the Canadian Maritimes, which I did with my son and his partner two years ago, and escaping to the Caribbean, which I did with my SO this past May. Both were memorable trips. Many other things I still haven't done, or maybe found the courage to do. Still, in the aught decade I managed to see France, England and Wales, all but the mid-section of Canada, Alaska, and the Bahamas. I saw Niagara Falls. This past year alone I journeyed to or through Colorado (three times), Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, Wyoming, Montana, Florida, Maryland, and Virginia. The SO says it will be remembered by us as the year where the economy went to pot and we did all that traveling.

As a lifelong journal-keeper, I have on past New Year's chronicled the prices of certain things. It's made for some fascinating entries to look back on and compare. So I will continue that tradition:

Gasoline - $2.55 a gallon

Soft Drinks - $4.35 for a 12-pack carton

State and Local sales tax - 8.75%

Postage - $.42 for a first class stamp

Doctor's visit - $80.00 for a general checkup

Ground Chuck - $2.58 per pound

Eggs - $2.19

Soon I'll compare that list to one of my earlier lists and see how much things have gone up, despite the government's claim that we have had zero inflation in the past 12 months.

The holidays seem to me to have begun at least three months ago, probably because all the stores put things out so early. I went to the Dollar General yesterday to buy some tissue paper to wrap up the Christmas decorations. They had everything moved and on for 50% off. The shelves where the Christmas items had been were filled with -- guess what -- Valentine's Day crap. I realize that retailers are struggling through this economy, but this is getting ridiculous.

I have just about de-Christmased the house, only lack taking down the outside lights which we will tackle tomorrow or the day after. We're celebrating the New Year with friends, old friends of my SO's, new friends of mine. I'm making a quick trip to see my grandson this morning, taking him to lunch and catching up. When we talk on the phone I always feel so out of it -- don't have a clue what he's telling me half the time -- X-Box this and that, as well as all the accoutrement. He said he liked the camera I sent but hadn't taken any pictures with it yet. Maybe I jumped the gun on that one but I do know other 12-year olds who are into photographing the world.

Next week I'm getting back to work. We're both ready to, I think. For the last three days my SO has been on the telephone making appointments to see people in the coming days. And my mind has been wandering back to my children's book, and even further back to the long-languishing novel. I may have to dust it off soon and see what it's about.

And so here's to the last decade, may it never return (don't think that's likely). And here's to the many friends and loved-ones I've lost and to those I'm still blessed to have in my life. And here's to anyone who may be reading this -- Happy New Year! May there be many more, and may happiness prevail.

Onward ....

Merry Christmas -- Finally!

Woke at 4:30. I guess I'm like a kid. Stockings are all stuffed by the fireplace. I'm trying to wait until the rest awaken. The boys are here, out asleep in the guest room. Sun is up but they aren't yet. My love wanted to give me his gift last night, after the others had retired, but before lights out. A pretty diamond love knot ring. It's a bit too big, but I will have it sized. I cherish it, for the sentiment, and because he thought of it all on his own. And he "wrapped" it inside a teepee cookie jar, with a bow. I think he had the hardest time finding the perfect vessel to present the ring in to me. And there's a story behind the teepee.

When we were first discussing moving in, before we ever went house hunting, he told me he didn't need a great big house, that he'd be fine living in a teepee. Well, we found this place -- luck was with us. It had been seriously neglected, as I have posted, and one of the things that had to be replaced almost immediately was the broken ceiling fan in the master bedroom. I went looking, and looking, and in one store as I looked up, my neck tired from craning, there at the end of one row was a teepee ceiling fan. It had a "nightlight" shaped like a teepee and drawn with teepee symbols on it, then three drop down lights, laced with leather strips. I'm sure it was meant for a child's room, but I had to have it. The store ordered one for me, and I called an electrician to have it installed. This was before we had moved the first lick of furniture in here and the next time the SO and I were here together, I presented him with the teepee fan. He cackled, then laughed outloud, then hugged me, obviously pleased by the fun of it.

And so the teepee theme continues with this new little teepee cookie jar.

Merry Christmas!

Onward ....

Christmas Eve Morning

A cold steel gray dawn, with chipping sparrows at the feeder. My SO had a hard night, snorting fits, sniffly, stuffy nose. Cedar fever. So early this year. He won't admit it's allergies, but I recognize all the signs. He keeps saying he's never had allergies so why would they start harassing him now? I have a theory about that. I consider myself a semi-scholar on the subject of allergies, having done battle with them for most of my life. I think in his case radiation damage has caused his nasal passages, indeed all of his sinuses, to become more receptive to histamine production. A leftover from the throat cancer that laid him low seven years ago. He has more leftovers than just this one. Another subject for another day. He managed to get back to sleep. I crept out of the room a little before six.

It's Christmas Eve. A blustery norther is set to arrive, as are my oldest son and his partner. In an ideal world their plane will arrive at 3:30 this afternoon, and then they'll face a three hour drive in a rental car to get here. Fingers are crossed that all goes as planned. But it's Christmas Eve, and half the country is buried under a blizzard, so we shall see how their travel proceeds. We think if they can get to and out of Baltimore, things should go well from there.

The anticipation of this day has left me feeling somewhat subdued now that it's here. I think the big Sunday we had, full of people and food, and laughter and noise, has made everything else about the holidays somewhat anti-climatic. But my son is such a pleasure to be around -- I say that not just as a proud mother -- but as someone who has observed him for these long 38 years, and it hasn't gone unnoticed that he has an abundance of friends, both old and new, and an aptitude for making things fun and meaningful. He is and has always been a bit of an amazement to me. Even as a baby, an old soul in a tiny body, somehow wiser than he should have been, witty and wonderfully sensitive to the needs of those around him. I am awed that I should have -- could have -- raised such a person, although he never needed much "raising" in the strictest sense. It's been five months since I have seen him, and so I will tick off the hours until the two of them arrive.

We'll save the big Christmas celebration for tomorrow, an oddity for our family. We've always tended to do the most celebrating on Christmas Eve. But travel days are throw-away days, and we'll wait it out until tomorrow, with everyone refreshed. Daddy and his dog will be here, and we plan to cook steaks, weather permitting. No provincial stuffed turkey for this bunch. We're having rib eyes, corn pudding, and baked bread. My only nod to tradition will be the green bean casserole, or should I say, THE green bean casserole, because it's different, more substantial and better, than the one everyone else makes. Ours has bacon and cheese and bread crumbs and sauteed onions included, and no one can eat this particular green bean casserole and ever look again at the one the rest of the world prepares with anything but contempt. Yes, we are smug about our green bean casserole.

My son has requested pecan pie. I don't think they make many pecan pies up in the DC area. Or else, as he says, they "f" it up with raisins or some other silly ingredient. So I'll make that today, and maybe the time will go by a bit faster.

I hear my SO stirring in the other room. The cat at my feet has also stretched and wakened. The sky is lighter than it was when I began this. Sun a big butterscotch wafer rising over the oak trees lining the creek below our place. Time to get the day started.

Merry Christmas to all!

Onward ....

Food and $$$$$$$$$!!!!

Ham, cans of sweet potatoes, mini marshmallows, sweetened condensed milk, cheese, butter, eggs, evaporated milk, buttermilk, egg nog, half and half, whipped cream, French sliced green beans, French fried onion rings, cream of mushroom soup, cream of chicken soup, cheese, butter, eggs, chocolate chips, coconut, dark corn syrup, sugar, flour, bread crumbs, chili meat, chicken, tomatoes with green chiles, cheese, butter, eggs, tortillas, tortilla chips, bean dip, sour cream, ranch dressing mix, pork sausage, cheese, eggs, butter, creamed corn, kernel corn, corn bread mix, cream cheese, green onions, ritz crackers, wavy potato chips, veggie chips, sour cream, cheese, eggs, butter, milk, spice cake mix, candied fruit, pecans, walnuts, chocolate pieces, brown sugar, powdered sugar, vanilla, shortening, vegetable oil, dried cranberries, german chocolate, cheese, eggs, butter, milk, sugar, baking soda, yeast bread, lunch meat, rib eye steaks, cheese, eggs, butter, milk .....

When did all this stuff become necessary? Why do we wonder why our waistlines are expanding? When did groceries get so expensive? Why does Washington insist there is no inflation? Why does everybody descend on the stores all at one time? Do we really need fruitcake, german chocolate pie, pecan pie, fudge, magic cookie bars, glazed ham, fancy sweet potato casserole, dips, chili, tamales, cheese balls, sausage balls -- and all of it during a 30 day period? What happened to simple holidays?

That's it! I'm not buying another grocery item for at least a week.

Next year I'm going to the Bahamas. I think it'll be cheaper.

Onward ....

Marriage, Fruitcake, and Family

We talked about getting married, back before we moved here, and again right afterwards -- twice just to make sure we were on the same page. We have decided against it. On purpose. Both of us have done it before, more than once, and we both have had disappointments, betrayal of trust, heartbreak. Call it what you will. We have decided that we must not be that good at it -- marriage -- either of us. Oddly, because both of us are domestic. We enjoy that sense of belonging, the responsibility that goes with it, and the dedication to making life easier, kinder, calmer. We are both drama-adverse. As he has said so plainly, "I've had enough bickering to last me a lifetime." Ditto.

That's not to say there haven't been bumps. Anytime two people in the second half of their lives begin a relationship, there are bumps, caused mostly by old habits, old lessons learned hard and not given up easily. Almost every misunderstanding we have had has been because of baggage that we carried into this relationship. But even those skirmishes have been minor, talked out and gotten rid of quickly. We are old souls, delighted to have lucked into each other. We've let go of the stuff and made room in our hearts for each other. We keep each other centered. We're aware of each other's likes and dislikes. We've suspended criticism and are open to trying new things. So far it's working.

We've having a big Christmas to-do here later today. His side, plus me and Daddy. He has one living brother, and one who was killed in a car wreck 15 years ago. The living one, his wife and grown children will be here. The one who was killed's widow and her grown children and grandbaby. All will arrive around 11:00. His mother is, of course, the main reason for the gathering, and for gathering here. She had Thanksgiving at her house, and she's 86. It was hard on her, plus we have more room. So there will be 14 of us for lunch. Mexican food. Everyone is bringing a dish. We'll exchange gifts, drawn by number. It will be fun. I like his family. His son and daughter-in-law especially, and his granddaughter. I think they like me, too.

And so yesterday we worked in the kitchen together, getting things ready. He made his chili, I made a pie and a chicken dish. We pitched in together to clean up our messes. He swept. I mopped. He washed dishes. I wiped down the counters. He balked at me scrubbing the bathroom in our bedroom. "Nobody will be coming in here," he said. I get on these cleaning binges and have a tendency to think things have to be perfect. He knows this failing of mine and reminds me, gently, that nobody will care if it's less.

I have been wrestling with sleep. Excited about today, and about seeing my son in five days. It has been an almost effortless Christmas so far. Painless shopping. Easy decorating, a little here and a little there. I've baked some, but without the frenzy of years past. We tried our hand at a fruitcake and it turned out better than good. I'm not a big fan of fruitcake but I like this one. Because it was a joint affair. The decision to make one, the decision on ingredients. Neither of us like dates, so those were out. I like things nutty, he likes them fruity. We doubled up on both, and used a spice cake mix as our base, adding apricot brandy and vanilla, a brandy glaze. It's the best (I unashamedly admit) fruitcake I've ever tasted.

It's Christmas ... or almost. And now that it's here I don't understand why I was dreading it so much. Even the weather is cooperating so we can have a fire glowing in the fireplace this morning when the family arrives. But the sun is supposed to keep shining so the young people can go out exploring after we eat. And they will as they always do when they're here. In the country. Things to look at and places to wander, an opportunity to get away from the grown-ups.

Tonight, when they've all gone, the dog and the cat will lounge near us, happy to be just the four of us again. The television will be on again, the leftover mess will be only half tidied but who cares. Contentment. In our element. Whatever else may come will just be gravy.

Onward ....

Things That Matter

A blue norther is blowing in as I write this. I barely made it down to get the newspaper. The wind chilled on my way. The dog was frisky, bounding through the velvet flush of rye grass in the front meadow. The cat, skittish with the wind and hesitant about his morning sip from the ground birdbath, vanished inside before I was halfway back to the house.

Ruts have pocked the driveway from all the rain. We'll have to buy in more gravel. The SO's in charge of that project. He says we must wait a while for things to dry up first, if they will. It's supposed to rain hard with this norther, and from the looks of the sky this morning that's likely. After 8 o'clock already and the photocell-run floodlight is still burning. Birds have taken cover. Boughs of the trees are swaying, and occasionally a dead limb falls on the roof with a clang.

The house has lots of windows, high and low. It's an eccentric house anyway, so why not have crazy windows, too. The center of the house is a geodesic dome with wings jutting in three directions. The main part lies under the dome, the kitchen, master bedroom, and in a loft upstairs, one guest bedroom and my office. The livingroom has it's own wing with wide exposed beams. The sunroom makes another wing, as does the garage and outside guest room. There are four skylights with wooden spokes like wagon wheels beneath the dome, and other windows of all shapes and sizes throughout the house. I'm sure it won't be an easy house to sell one day. It sat vacant for several years before us, and this was during a housing boom. But I love it here --we all love it -- and that's all that really counts.

Home. A place where a person can be themselves, feel comfortable inside, say anything within its walls, snug and cozy. Home is one thing that really matters.

Love. Something so hard to find and hold, to define, to understand. Having it, feeling it, returning it, believing in it. Love is another thing that matters.

Purpose. Nobody is exempt from it, and purpose is the thing that defines someone. It's our job to carry out, aside from, in addition to -- or perhaps those are one and the same -- the thing one does for a living. Purpose fulfills, it makes us thrive and gives us drive. It's the thing that propels us through life. "Find your purpose," to quote words of wisdom from my mother long ago. Purpose is another thing that matters.

Joy. "We cannot cure the world of sorrows, but we can choose to live in joy," as Joseph Campbell has said. It's that choice I'm concerned with, a lesson so many never learn, and one that I continue to learn and relearn: That it is a conscious choice a person makes, to be joyous, to allow yourself the freedom of happiness. Otherwise what is the point of living, if all of life is only misery? I suppose a fair amount of sorrow is required to fully appreciate joy. Who was it said sorrow and joy go hand-in-hand? Joy is a full heart and gratitude of mind. Joy is another thing that matters.

Gratitude. I am grateful for my beautiful home, and for the man I love, and for my animals, for my sons, and my grandson, for my dad and my good friends. I'm grateful for a healthy mind and a sound body, imperfect though it may be. I'm grateful for some success in doing the things I love to do, and for the promise of a future that's even brighter than my past. I'm full of hope and personal peace, and I'm thankful to be alive. Gratitude is another thing that matters.

It's Christmas, and close to a new year, a new decade, and it's seems to me to be a time for reflection and for valuing things that matter. I'm sure there are other things that would compliment this list, but there are so many that don't, and sometimes it's the things that don't matter at all that consume us, that cause us anguish, or that make us bristle in our attitude towards others, and that keep us from fully recognizing the preciousness of the life we are given.

Onward ....

Holiday Blitz

Feeling a real disconnect from my writing. I'm sure it's probably all the activities surrounding the holidays. I'm trying not to resent it, and one part of me really loves the holidays, although you'd never know it from the things I've posted here. All the pomp and circumstance, decorating the tree, putting up the outside lights, baking goodies, parties and get-togethers -- I'm still looking for a choral performance I'd like to attend. And my son and his partner are arriving on Christmas Eve. Just that makes the holidays worth having. It's been five months since I've seen them, and I miss this son terribly. He's always been my light.

And so today we're going to the SO's mom's house to help her make tamales. Tomorrow I'm making a fruitcake. Sunday we're going to try -- like hell -- to finally get the greenhouse put together. Monday the SO has an early dentist appointment to find out if he can save a tooth he has bothering him, and we'll spend the afternoon finishing up the greenhouse project. The weather is supposed to foul up again after Monday. Tuesday night a Christmas party in the city. Wednesday a doctor's appointment to see about this pain in my left foot. Thursday and Friday, house cleaning for the weekend company. Plus, we're having a Christmas party ourselves for the SO's family on Sunday. His son, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter will be down again. Then four days later, it's Christmas Eve. When could I possibly work in any writing time?

Yesterday we learned that dear dear friends are going to be alone for the holidays. I suggested last night that we invite them over for Christmas Eve. The SO didn't seem receptive to the idea, but I'll work on him a little more. This is his lifelong friend who was in a coma a couple of months ago. I'm crazy about him and his wife, and I understand about lonely Christmases. They stopped in last night. They were over here having dinner at our nearest restaurant, and also doing some shopping. They stayed a couple of hours. My SO was squirming for them to leave after the first hour. He hadn't had any supper and they were hardly down the driveway before he was in the kitchen whipping us up a meal. I love that he takes these matters into his hands, gets what a stove is for, and will cook up something without prompting. He's lived alone much of his life and is quite self-sufficient.

I think my kitty isn't feeling well. He takes it in spurts. Maybe the cold weather has his little old bones aching. All he wants to do lately is lay on my lap, or cuddle up next to me. Not that I mind a cuddling kitty, but I do hate to have to dump him out of my lap to get my next project done. Oh, to just slow down a little. I haven't even tended to all the freeze damaged plants in the yard. We need to have a load of gravel hauled in for the driveway. I've still got packages to wrap and get in the mail. And Christmas cards to send. It's just never ending right now. Then mid-January, it's off to Denver again. I WILL take the laptop this time. I'm beginning to long for some down-time, to get lost in the writing again. It will happen. Soon. I promise myself.

Onward ....

Killing Frost

It's been a week since I posted here. A busy one, too. I've hardly had a minute to stop to think let alone actually put some words down. First it was going to the Coast to batten things down for the bad weather we were expecting. While we were there we had breakfast with my aunt and uncle and visited for two hours aboard their sailboat. They were about to move the boat to a different harbor to watch a lighted yacht parade. The weather turned against them, though, and they never made it there. We had originally planned to go along, and we're glad we didn't. They got as far as the ship canal and decided the wisest thing would be to turn back. So I think they missed the parade as well, but at least everybody stayed safe.

We had snow flurries on Friday. Highly unusual for early December in this part of the world. Along with all the other unusual climate events that have been happening over the last decade, I think the case for climate change is pretty well clinched. We stayed in and put up the Christmas tree. I made some 9-bean soup with the Thanksgiving ham we had leftover from my SO's family gathering last Saturday. It was good but it made gallons. We froze some, and took some to Daddy. We're going to have to have a smorgasborg of leftovers from the freezer soon. We've been labeling things, but I was looking this morning at all the little containers in there: stuffed cabbage, shrimp carbonara, etoufee, cowboy stew, Bahamian rum cake slices, orange spice cake slices, corn pudding. It will be a mini-feast when we finally do dive into all this food.

In fact, I'm getting kind of tired of all the eating we've been doing. Both of us need to lose weight, me more than him, and we've both been saying we planned to lose at least ten pounds before Denver the second week in January. Obviously, that's not going to happen. I need to pull out the treadmill but don't seem to ever find the extra time it would take to get on the thing and spend a half hour. I guess I'm not dedicated to it at the present moment. I look enviously at all the clothes in my closet I cannot wear but for some reason that just hasn't been enough of an incentive. I guess I'm just destined to struggle with this from now on.

The cold weather took its toll on the flora outside. After a record low of 26 for the day, we ventured out to survey the damage. The esparanza at the end of the patio looks as if it might be dead. The foilage and flowers are dark green mush now. I'll keep an eye for bark damage, but think I might have to chop this one off at the ground. The pecan tree lost all its leaves overnight and they blanketed the part of the driveway where they fell. Out on the long part of the drive, two durantas I planted in the spring look to have fared about as well as the esparanza, and most disturbing, the three little crepe myrtles we have babied along since we moved in, through last winter and this summer's serious drought, also look like they're swabbed in green mush. I had the foresight to bring in the gorgeous bougainvillea basket and it actually seems to be thriving in the sunroom, but I'm sick over these losses. First it was the drought, then the roofers, and now this freak snowstorm.

However, when you're dealing with three acres, there's just no way to save everything. On a positive note, the rye grass the SO planted is lush and green and seemed to repel the killing frost that lay on all the rest of the ground yesterday morning.

Meanwhile, three more volunteers have read the children's book. It's always odd to see the different perspectives one reader will have from another. I have a tendency to doubt myself, and am often too ready to make changes against my better judgment. I did that and the very next reader complained about some of the new changes. So I'm back to the original and just a little confused. The third readers were parents of two preschool children. I probably got the best feedback from them. But I'm going to let the thing set for a while yet. The book is however, 99.9% finished, and at this point, any changes I make will be minor. I plan to get the manuscript into a submissions format, and send it off the first week in January. It's time for the thing to fly or fail.

Onward ....

Woe Is the Holidays

I've read about the "holiday effect" on mortality rates. Statistics from a study done in 2004 show that death rates spike during the holidays by as much as 12 percent over other periods of the year. Explanations given are overeating and postponing needed medical care until after the holidays are over. But I also believe melancholia is a reason for the increase in death. I personally have already begun to fight with bouts of a creeping melancholy that often comes over me as this time of year approaches. It's a lifelong problem I've had to deal with, for some reason.

My grandmother suffered terrible depression during the holidays, but she had just cause. Her first child died in infancy at or near Christmas Eve, and it was a black memory she was never able to shake. And in fact, she herself died on Christmas Eve. I find that during the holidays I miss her more than at other times of the year. I long for those long-ago family gatherings, singing carols and eating around her table, my grandfather handing out the presents piled so excitingly high beneath the tree whose limbs were dwarfed by comparison.

I miss my childhood. I miss my grandparents, and my mother. I miss other people who have died or gone missing from my life. Around the holidays I find that I become a sadsack, longing for the ghosts of Christmas past. Or something like that.

My dad has a thing he says about making new memories, and I know it is true. Every day we're making memories, and there will probably come a time when more recent memories cause me melancholy. They already do. Just this morning I laid in bed yearning for the newness of last year's Christmas, the excitement of our first Christmas spent together, here in our house, the relish the SO got from hanging lights outside, designing the display, and so diligently turning them on each night at dark. He was super excited by Christmas and it was fun to watch him, like a child, glorying in the decorated tree in the corner, his first one in 17 years, he said. We hung stockings for the dog and the cat on the mantle. We made a fire almost every night.

The three previous Christmases for me had been pretty miserable, despite my older son's attempts to save them. There was the one spent in Florida, in 80 degree weather, swimming in the swimming pool on Christmas Eve, which somehow didn't feel right. Neither did the absence of almost all the other "traditions." Me and my SO were new and his phone calls caused a yearning I fought hard to overcome. But that Christmas was an improvement over the previous two ruined ones, when my marriage was coming apart, and when divorce was impending.

Before that, well, there had been many big family gatherings, immediate family and extended family: the year it snowed and we built a snowman at midnight, the year we rented a cabin in the mountains of West Virginia, the year my grandson was born and we all lavished gifts on a baby who could just barely sit up, the year he spent Christmas Eve in the hospital with pneumonia, the year Mother was sick with cancer, the year my dear mother-in-law was in the nursing home, the years of the kids growing up, turkey dinners, cookie-baking and candy-making, nights playing Santa Claus till nearly dawn, and before that, me with a child in my belly and great hope for the future.

The holidays are a marker for the passing of the decades, the changes a person's life takes, for all the memories which seem to be felt so much more acutely than at other times. And mine have often been messy, both my life changes and my holiday memories. It's easy to fall into despair over the missed chances, the mistakes made, the great disappointments, and yes, the betrayals. All of those emotions are also in the mix of the holidays.

Maybe the key to getting through is to recognize that the holidays are, after all, just another time of year, another day, a week, a month. It's partly because of when they fall, just as the season is changing, dead leaves on the ground, the world fading to shades of brown and gray. Birds are mostly gone. Flowers have stopped blooming. And it's also because they go on for so long, added to by the in-your-face advertisements and the way Christmas decorations go up in stores before Halloween now. What happened to carolers? Where have the greetings of "Merry Christmas" or "Happy Holidays" gone? And people shop all year now, so it's really not a big deal to give and get anymore either. I miss hearing a school choir. Maybe I should find one and go listen. They're bound to still have Christmas concerts somewhere.

I guess it is what you make it. Memories should be a happy thing instead of a longing. Yesterday morning my SO said when I'm down I bring everything around me down, too, because it's such a contrast from my usual laughter and sunny outlook -- his words not mine. He said I don't wear depression well. It shows so obviously on me. I asked him for help, to remind me how important it is to live each day for its own sake, for the gift it is and for the time that will never be recaptured. He said he wants an easy button to push. Love is compromise. So OK -- I'm searching for that easy button to give him.

Thank God for this man, for his patience and soft touch. I owe it to him to find a way through my holiday woe. I will try harder -- beginning today.

Onward ....

My New Greenhouse

For the last couple of days I have been with my SO at deer camp. We took the RV out there, so the accommodations are better than at your normal deer camp. And this week the food is better because I've been doing a lot of the cooking. We've had some actual vegetables, which the SO's son commented on last night, with appreciation. But today I had to get back home to be here for FedEx to deliver my greenhouse. I can't wait to put it up.

The people who lived here before us raised dogs. Our neighbor told us they were bulldogs. So there is a dog pen and exercise yard out on the north side of the house, against the high game fence that surrounds the next door ranch. We've been keeping the riding lawn mower out there, and using part of it as a storage building. My SO took down the wire fence around the exercise yard and plans to expand his garden this spring. On the other side of the tin shed is a concrete pad that also had a wire fence around it, and the SO has removed that fence as well. The greenhouse will go on the concrete pad.

Last week, when it rained so hard, we went out there several times to make sure that concrete pad drained well, and it does. Within a few minutes, all the water was gone off the concrete, so I think water from the greenhouse will also drain. And out here in the country, I would much rather have a greenhouse on concrete than attached to the ground where snakes and other creepies can find their way inside. I'm sure we'll have some of that even with the concrete foundation, but maybe it will be less. And I know it won't be as muddy. Now, I want a composter so we can make our own soil. We have a compost pile, but a real composter does a much better job.

It's going to be nice to have a place to put up all the hanging baskets and small foilage plants for winter, and also it will be good to be able to take cuttings and start seeds. Daddy is probably more excited about the greenhouse than I am -- a good excuse for him to come over, and he does love to grow vegetables from seeds.

This greenhouse comes complete with shelving, a heater, and an exhaust fan, plus it has hard sides so you don't have to change out the plastic every couple of years. The concrete pad has a good cover of shade trees, and we may not even need shade cloth in summer, although I have a big piece of it in case we do. There are also some T-posts that are already embedded in the concrete, I suppose for the former owners to cross fence little dog runs, but we'll use them as tie downs, to help secure the greenhouse so it doesn't blow away in our high winter winds. But it's made of aluminum framing, so I think it will be sturdier than the PVC greenhouses I've had before.

Anyway, it will be a big day-long project putting it together. Might try it on Thanksgiving, or the day after. The weather is getting colder so I'm in a kind of hurry to get it done. I have a lot of money and time invested in potted plants and foliage basket. Some of these plants are 15 or more years old, and have flourished out under this motte of oak trees we live beneath.

Of course, the next thing I'm going to want, although I haven't mentioned this to my SO yet, is a walkway from the house to the greenhouse. But I've been known to built a stone walk all by myself, and can do it again if he balks too much. I'll have to sink it low enough so the lawn mower can go right over it. But that's not impossible either. I love it so much here, and have so many ideas for making it even more magical than it already is. In so many ways, it's the home I've always wanted.

Feathering my nest, I guess.

Onward ....

Sunday Morning

Foggy morning -- and still -- as I walk to get the paper. A crystalline spider web trembles on the gate. Dewdrops glisten on the delicate strands as the gate opens on its automatic hinge. The dog is in heaven, bounding through the wet grass. It’s cool for us. Forty-eight degrees. Deer apparitions move in the fog down the road. By the well house, the cat slurps from the ground birdbath. Have to keep that clean now that he’s decided it’s his watering trough. Everything is damp from the recent rains.

Another huge spider web hangs attached to the electric wire leading to the barn. The spider is a black dot in the center. Mysterious creatures. In a while the web will be gone, once the wind picks up. Spiders consume their own silk and spin it out again in the night. A cow across the fence bellows and the cat runs in through the open sliding door. Scaredy cat. He meows at me to come in, too. He must think I’m in danger.

The mustang grape I thought was a casualty of the long summer’s drought has a few green leaves appearing. Wrong time of year but the vine must not know that yet The other grape vine flourishes on the inside fence. Freesia shoots are starting to push through the earth in the south-facing bed. Wrong time again, but I hope they’ll make it through the winter. I take down the hummingbird feeders. Birds are long gone, leaving the remains of nectar for the yellow jackets. The SO’s mother says the wasps are beneficial. They eat aphids and web worms. She’s probably right but I don’t like seeing the greedy things feasting on the red juice that was meant for the tiny birds.

I call my SO outside to see the huge web on the high wire. He’s as interested as I am in such things. The black dog darts past us, pretending she’s a real shepherd. She ducks her head and charges at the cows across the fence. A comedian. Back inside, she gets her Sunday bone. The cat finds a Christmas catalog on the floor and settles himself down for his first nap. My SO takes the newspaper to his easy chair, and I turn on the computer to write this down, sipping my coffee.

Ah Sunday morning, home .... nothing like it.

Onward ......

"Buy a Ticket"

Been thinking today about my continuing good luck in life, and with a little bit of awe and a little bit of realism. I had a happy childhood, was reasonably good in school, had lots of friends, gave birth to two healthy children, finally met my soulmate when I was 54, and have succeeded in almost everything I tried, except I never could learn to play the guitar well and have always envied people with a musical talent. I get along with most people I meet; I'm adaptable. I never won any big important awards, or hit a gambling jackpot, but I never have shied from sticking my neck out. There have even been times when I've been a little audacious.

When I started seriously writing I had no idea what I was charging headlong into. My 8 to 5 job had nearly ground to a halt. My kids needed less but they liked for me to be home. I liked being at home. We were thinking of moving. So I quit my job. I wanted to write. All my life I'd been a heavy reader, and I had grown disgruntled with fiction I selected. I remember clearly thinking one day at the end of an atrocious paperback novel, "I know I can write better than this." And so I decided to try it.

What I quickly found out was this -- it was hard! Everything I put down on paper sounded like a third grade creative exercise. It was not easy to say what I wanted to say, to say it clearly, to make sense of anything. I wasn't even sure what the hell it was I was trying to say, or meant to say. But it challenged me. I wrote my first novel, from start to finish, in four weeks. I gave it to my brother. He'd come to stay a weekend with us. He had a degree in screenwriting. He was the perfect first reader. He made it through about 10 pages, and said, "Well, it's not ready for publication."

I was crushed. I threw out that manuscript and started a new one. This time I took a whole three months, start to finish, and gave it to my best friend to read. She was so patient, sat there reading with me staring at her, waiting to see her reactions, and they disappointed me. She didn't laugh when I thought she would, and she didn't cry at the end like she was supposed to. She smiled at me as she turned over the last page. "It's good," she said.

What?! Good! That's it? Just good? Well, that was not enough, hardly the words I was longing to hear. I chunked that novel in the back of the closet with the other one, and decided to write short stories. I wrote. And wrote. I sent them off with SASE's inside manila envelopes. I got back form rejection letters. I pasted up corkboard squares in my office, and thumbtacked the rejections up there as they came in. I nearly covered the whole room with rejection letters. And then, one day, a little handwritten note was at the bottom of one of the rejections. It said, "Try us again."

Wow! I stared at the words. A thrill went through me. Somebody had actually read the story. I could even sort of tell that the corners of the pages were bent. And they liked it enough to tell me to try again. This was real progress!

One thing that was happening as I created this storm of stories and their accompanying rejection letters is that I was beginning to reread each one as it came back, imagining myself as the first reader. And each time I did that, I changed a little something, tweeked a word or two, moved a paragraph around, cut a sentence. Slowly, so so slowly, I was learning to rewrite. And what began also to happen was more and more of those rejection letters started coming back with little handwritten notes: "Too slow to develop." "Character lacks motivation." "The ending is too abrupt." All of these little bits of feedback helped me find my way to the story that finally, after I had already almost forgotten about it, convinced an editor to publish it, and to pay for the privilege. A whole $40. For days I walked on air.

After that first story acceptance, things began to happen a little faster. I was still awash in rejection letters, but every now and then, just often enough to keep my level of encouragement high, an editor would find something of merit in a story I had sent, and it would be published. These were obscure publications, with names like "High Plains Literary Review," "The Gettysburg Review," "Crosscurrents Magazine," what is called, grouping them all in a category, Quarterlies.

When I finally wrote a novel worthy of publication, it was these Quarterly publications listed in my cover letter that got my manuscript out of the slush pile. My editor was familiar with some of them through her work editing the Best American Short Story series for Norton. She told me this later, after she had offered me a contract for the novel that would eventually be called LILY.

So is that luck? In some ways, I think yes. But I also do believe that we make our own luck. I believe if a person sits on a chair out in the middle of a field wishing for luck to strike them they will go through life disappointed. It's like the old joke about the man who prays for God to let him win the lottery, week after week, prays again and again to win the lottery until finally God speaks from on high and says, "Buy a ticket."

You've got to buy that ticket. And you've got to keep on buying.

Onward ....

Boots & Shoes

How many pairs of shoes does it take to make a woman happy? That’s the question on my mind today. I’ve been on a spree this week, ordering online, mall shopping, and now am down in the Valley with my SO buying boots. Well, he’s working. I’m the one buying.

He’s a manufacturer’s rep for a boot company that’s located in the Rio Grand Valley, and we’re down here because he needs to stop in at the factory once or twice a year to visit, see what’s in production, what’s in store in the way of advertisement, and because their big trade show in on the horizon in Denver.

While he was working, I went into the retail outlet store at the front of the factory, and found two pairs of boots I couldn’t live without. Then while we were walking through the factory, found another pair I couldn’t live without. The manager measured my foot, and put in the order for me. These are the nicest people you could ever want to meet, always make me feel welcome. In fact, the manager and his wife are actually fans of my LILY novels, so he always asks about what I’m working on.

Truthfully, he seemed less than enthusiastic about my children’s book when I mentioned it, but then the average person doesn’t understand how much time and work a whole big novel takes, and it’s only right that they shouldn’t know or care. It’s the writer’s job to make it look effortless.

I’ve brought the laptop along on this trip, just to see if I can work and play at the same time. Doesn’t seem to be going too well. Last night we had dinner with my aunt and uncle who live down here. I haven’t seen them in a year and the two hours we spent with them flew by in a welter of conversation and laughter. They seemed to have the grandest time telling my SO all about me as a child, which I secretly liked but sort of felt sorry for him, too. But he sat there smiling, looking handsome, and making little comments now and then.

We’re going to spend tonight at the Coast on our way home, sort of break up the trip a little. He’ll get up tomorrow morning and call on some more customers, and I will stay with the dog and try to work some more on the children’s book.

I really wanted to have it done by now, and there’s no reason in the world that I shouldn’t have except that I’ve just been too busy having fun, visiting friends, seeing plays, going to dinner, etc. I am ready to be home for a few days, though. I do better at home, although my office situation is less than optimum. I probably need to figure out some other arrangement. I’ve thought about a small desk for the guest room. I’m not sure yet, and can’t bring myself to completely convert it to a working space, but it’s actually the perfect solution, separated as it is from the rest of the house.

It’s just so hard to retreat into self-imposed exile. But that is absolutely what has to happen if a writer actually hopes to write. Or anyway, it’s what a writer like me, who is so easily distracted, has to do if I want to be productive again. And yet, I think there’s this part of me that feels I have to chose between living a REAL life and writing a PRETEND one, and I balk at that. I don’t want to sequester myself away from the world right now. Do I really have to? I just don’t know the answer to that yet.

Onward....

The Gamble of Life

Life is unpredictable. And at my age, it's also a gamble. I find myself at a stage where I'm having to make decisions now about my future security. It can be something as simple as deciding whether to take a weekend trip. Or whether to stick away the money a trip would cost for later years. I have one decade to save for retirement, and I haven't done much in that direction so far. I waffle back and forth between having it all now, taking trips while I'm still young enough to enjoy them, or pinching my pennies and socking it away for my elderly years.

Here's the rub: What if my elderly years don't come? Who knows what will happen between now and then? My mother socked it away, she took trips, too, but she invested her money and had all the retirement programs that came with her job. She did all the essentials financial advisers tell you to do, and what happened? She died at 64. I think about Mother a lot when I start thinking about financial security. She was disappointed that she had worked so many years and would never even collect on her Social Security. She mentioned it to me, in her last weeks before lung cancer finally took her. She said it was the thing that made her the angriest about dying, all that careful planning, basically for nothing.

My SO also has a sort of laissez-faire philosophy about retirement, and he's closer to it than I am. But he has also had his cancer-death scare, and feels reluctant to deny himself anything because of it. He says when you're lying there, the radiation mask over your face, you make all sorts of resolutions about things you're going to do, if you can just make it through one more week of treatment, if you can just beat the disease. And I do see the senselessness of saving for the future if that future never comes.

We had friends over last night. This is the friend who went into a coma after knee surgery. He's so much improved, but his ordeal is clearly marked on his face. And he still has moments of confusion. He's not ready to resume life as it was, not quite yet. He, to me, is the poster child for the slender thread we walk in life.

I bought a greenhouse kit. It's supposed to arrived via FedEx the middle of next week. My sweetheart is dreading the prospect, but he's so patient with me and my tangents. He seems to always want to make me happy. I can't believe how I lucked out finding such an affectionate and caring man. The gamble of life again, I guess. Anyway, I need someplace to put all my established foliage plants, and it will be fun to start seeds there, maybe take cuttings again. I enjoy growing things from cuttings, and you need a greenhouse to do it properly. Daddy's excited about it. I think the greenhouse will give him an excuse to come over more, and that will be a good thing, too.

Think I've finished the children's book. A friend whose an elementary school teacher read it and really bragged on how much she loved the character, said she would definitely read it to her class when it's published. She seemed so certain it would be. She made a suggestion for the ending, said it was a little too abrupt, and so I have worked on it and think I've made it better. I might be ready to submit it to a publisher now. Don't know why that's scaring me a little. Got to man up, as they say. Be brave. I've been down this road before, after all. It's just been awhile.

Onward ....

Writing for Children

My SO read the children's book yesterday, after I had -- I thought -- polished it as much as I could. Everybody needs a first reader and he was interested in what I had done. He knew the story, I've talked about it enough. In fact, I got the idea for it on a trip we took to West Texas back at the beginning of the year. So he read it, I felt, with care. He must've gone through it twice, said it was cute, but he had some problems with the ending. I could tell he didn't "get" some of the things I had tried to make clear, which is always an indication that I haven't done my job well enough. He also raised some questions I assumed a reader would understand from context. So it was a productive read and discussion, and I will incorporate some of the ideas we threw around. Also, I'll see if I can find an effective and succinct way to fix some of the problems, but I have decided to let it sit awhile yet. We're going to the Coast tomorrow, and so it feels like a good time to put the manuscript back in the cooker. When we return in a couple of days, I'll pick it back up and work on it once again.

This is a book for young (preschool) readers, a picture book, and I have so many ideas for illustrations. I wish I could draw. I understand that the publisher most generally choses the illustrator, so I probably won't get much input. But I wonder if the writer is ever consulted for ideas. If the thing is accepted for publication, it will be so much fun to see what an illustrator might do with the story.

One of the things I have read over and over is that a children's picture book should be 32 pages, and that every page should lend itself to an illustration. So yesterday I broke the paragraphs down into logical pages. It easily came to 32, and I think there are tons of illustration opportunities. I'm not usually so enthusiastic about things I've written, but I have really enjoyed this writing project much more than anything I've done in a long while. I'm anxious to finish it and send it off, just to see what might happen. I don't think I'll be crushed if it doesn't find a publisher quickly. I feel like I'm learning something new and I'm liking that a whole lot. After all, I wrote dozens of short stories before I had one accepted, and four novels before LILY found a home.

Meanwhile, the weather has warmed way up again. We're in the upper 70s today and it's muggy. There's a hurricane in the Gulf -- on November 9th! I think that's what has made our weather screwy. I am really ready for winter.

We met the man who owns the high-fence ranch behind us today. He was over at the only other (empty) house around here. The SO saw his pickup and thought we should go check to see who was over there. Turns out the man who owns the high fenced ranch, named Miller, also owns the land that house sits on, and the acerage adjoining our place on the south side as well. We talked to Mrs Miller for most of an hour, found out a lot about the history of ownership on this place, which also was at one time a part of the larger ranch surrounding us. It was surveyed out in the 1990s for the ranch foreman and his family. That man raised dogs on the side, and also shortly after moving in, divorced his wife. Apparently, he got custody of his two sons, and they lived here, the three of them, for a few years, then moved to another ranch, leaving this place to sit vacant. So it's no wonder the place was in such a terrible mess when we took possession. We still have lots of things to do.

The SO planted a new tree this afternoon -- like we need another tree -- but this is a Golden Rain Tree, a sapling from a large tree that he dug up over at his land a few miles from here. I like these trees, too, and we have plenty of oaks. Don't need another. Hopefully, we can keep the lunch bunch from devouring it before it can get a good start.

Onward ....

Opening Weekend - Deer Season

Opening weekend of Whitetail Deer Season in Texas: there are hunters in this state who live the rest of the year for this one weekend. I'm not a hunter but happen to be in love with one, and so this is my second year of inclusion in this rite of passage of a segment of Texas men. Or maybe a certain segment of men period. Maybe it's this big of a deal in other state's as well. I am decidedly un-enamored.

It really begins on the Friday before the actual shooting can start. On my SO's deer lease the rule is "if you shoot it you have to mount it." In other words, if it is not a trophy deer, let it live. The idea, I guess, is to keep trigger-happy hunters from shooting anything that walks out of the woods and into their gunsights. While I was there the only thing shot was a large feral hog. There is no season on these creatures. They have become such a nuisance, and so overpopulated, that the season on them is year-round. I have come to believe that every hunter in Texas could shoot a hog every day of the year and still not put much of a dent in the population, they are that pervasive. And they are destructive, as well as dangerous. So my soft heart did not bleed over the humongous hog in the back of one of the hunter's pickup.

But back to the rituals. Friday evening, after everyone who is going to participate in the opening weekend festivities has arrived, each hunter goes to his designated blind to sit with binoculars and see what comes out in front of them. Each blind is accompanied by a feeder, usually set with a timer to go off and scatter corn at a certain time. If the hunter has been rigorous through the year with keeping his feeder full, the deer are used to the noise of the timer as it performs it's job, and in fact, they often stand nearby waiting to eat the corn. They seem to have some sort of internal clock and begin to congregate around the feeders within twenty minutes of the mechanism throwing out corn. While I was with my SO in his blind, there was once a large buck standing directly under the feeder when the timer threw corn, and the buck simply sidestepped a couple of feet and let the feeder do its job. Within three or four minutes all the other deer who have been standing around waiting, came in to gobble corn, and others appeared from other pastures, either having heard the spinning wheel that flings the corn, or from prompting by their own internal clocks.

The hunters dutifully watch the deer as they eat the provided corn, and some, like my SO, take notes on the deer they observe. The SO leaves his notebook in his blind, and so we were able to compare opening weekend 2009 to opening weekend 2008, and found that weather conditions were similar and numbers of deer had slightly increased. By the way, any conversation that takes place inside a deer blind is done in a whisper, even though I accidentally dropped my binoculars, they made a loud bang, and none of the feasting deer even so much as flinched at the sound.

After the sun goes down, all the hunters come into camp, which is a collection of motley buildings, campers, etc. Deer camp is the place where the dead or worn out accoutrement of life end up -- things like ragged towels, bent chairs, crapped out bedding, etc. It's part of the spirit of "roughing it" that reigns at deer camp. There is also a lot of cooking that goes on, and a required camp fire, even if the temperature outside is in the 80s. Everyone stands around discussing in great detail the deer they witnessed that evening, paying particular note to the male deer and their antlers, using technical terms like beam length, spread, the presence or absence of brow tines, symmetry, and of course, number of points. The points are all important, as is body mass. Guns are also discussed, the best options, the age of the guns they are each using, the older the better it seems, and scopes are also all important.

Then the eating begins. Meat is the main dish. Meat of all kinds, pork ribs, spare ribs, roasts, steaks, brisket, fajita meat. Vegetables are not part of the menu, except for the odd jalapeno pepper or bag of potato chips. There is also dip, manly dip like bean dip or cheese dip, with tortilla chips or possibly even jalapeno chips. Desert is a storebought pecan pie or nutty brownies, if there are deserts at all. I made the mistake of taking an orange cake. Only one piece was eaten. Cake requires the use of plates and forks, which is also out when it comes to camp food. Unless it happens to be chili. There are always chili bowls available. The single piece of my cake that was consumed was eaten out of a chili bowl with a spoon. Ahh mee.....

On opening day, the hunters are up at 4:30. The smell of coffee is strong in the air. Nobody speaks much. They climb into their vehicles and drive slowly to their blinds. After daybreak, gunfire can be heard and you speculate on who did the shooting and what they might have shot. Most of the gunfire at our camp came from too far away to be any of our gang. The only nearby shot opening morning came from one of our group firing at a coyote, which he apparently missed.

At about 9:30, everyone heads back to camp to eat breakfast. Bacon and sausage, eggs mixed with onion and potatoes. There is euphoria even though nobody shot anything. Tales of antler points abound. If anyone needs to go to town, now is when they make their trips. Others take naps. Someone keeps the camp fire going, and all the jobs just fall in place without assignment.

That evening was when the large hog was shot. And it was also when I decided to go home. I was tired of just meat meals. And tired of the radio broadcasting one football game after another. Our group were not drinkers, but there were also no cards or dominos played like at some deer camps. I enjoyed sitting in the blind and watching the deer. I even got to see a fight between two bucks with larger racks. But I was a little worried somebody might kill a deer, and I didn't want to stick around camp for that.

The SO just came home. It's Sunday morning, and he reports that no deer were killed. Thank goodness for that. Maybe those gorgeous creatures we watched through our binoculars will go on to live through the season. My fingers are crossed for that.

Onward ....

The Healing Power of Pets

My mother died in 1995. She was not an easy woman, to put it mildly. She had her moments of sweetness but she was troubled by self-doubt and feelings of inferiority as well as a mistrust of people and a negative outlook on life in general. Daddy endured 49 years with her, and when she died he was liberated. This may sound like a degradation of my mother, and I don't mean for it to. The liberation line came from Daddy himself.

Other than a couple of obligatory dogs for my brother and me, along with the odd turtle or two, for most of their married life, my parents were petless. Mother liked it that way. She was afraid of most animals, and didn't understand the ones she knew well. Daddy, on the other hand, was raised on a farm and craved the connection to animals that he had lost when he married Mother. So when she died, practically the first thing he did was get two puppies.

On a trip to K-Mart, he saw a sign on a telephone pole advertising "free puppies" along with an address, and he came home with Buddy and Sister. Like all puppies, they were adorable, and almost instantly, he became obsessed with them. They provided laughter and companionship, both things he needed after losing his spouse to lung cancer. Even though she was difficult, she was his partner and they had weathered a lot together. The sudden aloneness was awkward for Daddy at first. And losing a loved one to cancer is not only appalling, but also exhausting to those left behind. Two cute, frolicking puppies were just the ticket to bring Daddy out of the funk of becoming a new widower. Those two pups grew up and gave Daddy fourteen years of purpose. When they died, within four weeks of each other last December, I worried that Daddy might die, too.

Sister was the first to go. Her decline was rapid and unexpected. Buddy had been the one in bad health for a while. And it seemed unfortunate that she would also die of cancer, like Mother had. Sister's cancer was in her stomach. Daddy needed a lot of help coping through her quick death. Me and my SO were the ones who took her to the vet her final time. We knew Daddy was suffering. What we didn't expect was how Buddy would grieve for his littermate. He become ill almost immediately, and after four hard weeks, the SO and I made a second final trip to the vet on Daddy's behalf. He was just too overcome with depression to be the one to put his beloved Buddy out of his misery.

This sad story has a happy ending, so don't stop reading now.

About the same time as he was losing his pets, Daddy was also losing his eyesight. I had noticed how erratic his driving had become. Daddy was always was a careful, steady driver, who to my knowledge, has never had so much as a fender-bender, but suddenly he was running stoplights he didn't see, and swerving towards curbs, running over obstacles in the road. In addition, he spent way too much time sleeping. When I went to check on him, I almost always woke him and at all times of the day. I have a key so I could let myself in when he didn't answer the door, and twice this happened. Both times he was wadded up in his bed, so still and quiet I felt compelled to shake him awake. He was obviously deeply depressed and I felt powerless to do anything about it. I prepared myself for the inevitable.

One of the reasons I chose to move into this house in the country is because it lies just outside the small town where Dad resides. Now in his 80s, I could see the time when he would need me nearby and I was only three miles from him here, rather than the twenty-six miles away I had been before the move. I had made a deathbed promise to Mother that I would take care of Daddy. Not that I needed that promise to make me see to Daddy's welfare, but still, I had told her I would look after him, and I intend to make good on my word. This house has an extra room across the garage, with its own bathroom and sort of modified kitchen area. It seemed like a place where Daddy could live with us and still have a kind of autonomy. During his depression, just after the dogs died, I broached the subject of him moving in with us. He flatly refused. I can't lie and say that I was disappointed; I was relieved. If he still wanted to live alone, then he still had some of his old spirit left.

We got through his eye surgeries, and they worked miracles. He no longer even needs his glasses on most days. Just last week I was thinking about how I haven't known him without glasses for at least forty years, and he looks a little funny to me still, a little naked without them. Now he needs only cheap reading glasses, and uses them sparingly.

So it was time, I thought after he had recovered from his surgeries, to approach him about a new dog. He was instantly receptive to the idea. Four months had gone by since Buddy's death. Daddy was ready to think about having a dog again but he had stipulations. He only wanted one dog this time, and it must be a female. She had to be grown, already housebroken. He couldn't see himself starting over with a puppy. He would be 85 on his next birthday. A calm, older, smallish dog would suit him best. We started looking online at the shelters in our area. We found a few prospects and made a date with each other to go around and meet our online choices in person.

The first pet adoption was a disappointment. They'd had one dog we had liked online, but once we were there, the people told us she had behavior problems, would often snap and bite for no apparent reason. Still, I could see the light coming on in Daddy's eyes. I think he would have liked to have given her a try. It was me who nixed that idea. The truth was, Daddy would have taken the whole roomful of dogs home if he could have. We drove to the next place.

Right away I had a better feeling. It was clean and neat, the dogs had roomy kennels and an outside play area. The dogs looked happy and cared-for. Information about each dog was posted clearly on the outside of their kennel. The border collie-cross we had seen online was bigger than I'd expected, and she growled when Daddy approached her door. However, there was one dog with unusual brindle markings that caught Daddy's attention. I'm not sure what it was about her really, who understands love at first sight? Her name was Heidi, and I saw right away that she was only 8 months old. And she was already big, so she would end up much bigger than our small Dutch shephard. They said Heidi was a Labrador cross, but I said then and still say now, she has next to no Lab in her at all. She looked like a small greyhound to me. The attendant asked if we would like to see her in a private room. Daddy's face lit and he nodded without taking his eyes off her.

Once we were in the private room, with Daddy holding a bowl full of milkbones, I asked, almost hesitantly if he realized she was not even a year old yet. He was laughing so hard at the dog's antics and her enjoyment of the bones that he barely nodded. He said, "She has charisma, don't you think?" Well, what do you do? Yes, she seemed sweet-natured, and she took right to Daddy, but she was only 8 months old, a really REALLY large puppy. The attendant said she was house-broken, and that seemed like enough for Daddy. I hadn't seen him smile so big in such a long time. I was not going to nix this dog for anything. We signed all the papers, paid the adoption fee, and they brought her out to us cleaned up like a new bride.

That was last Spring. Heidi is firmly ensconced in Daddy's heart and home now. She has destroyed every pair of houseshoes and flipflops he owned. She has dug holes in his yard and shredded papers in his office. She has chewed his couch. She has unloaded his closet several times over, strewing his things across, not only the house, but all over the backyard as well, because he leaves the sliding door open for her to come and go as she pleases. She has the run of the place, but ... she has also saved him.

When I talk to Daddy on the phone now the conversation is all about Heidi and her latest pranks. Sometimes when we're talking, he begins to talk to her midway through, and laughs. He laughs and laughs. A lot. He's full of wonderment about her intelligence, about her ability to remember and respond, about her affection. He tells me that when she wants him to get up she stands by his bed and stares him awake. I love her for this. She motivates him to stay out of that bed. She has given him a purpose and new enthusiasm for living.

I've read all the reports about how petting a dog or cat can lower your blood pressure. I believe in it. I've seen the healing power of pets with my own eyes, and felt it within myself, too. My cat has mustered me through many a hard time. Now, I have both a cat and a dog to lift me and give my life a little added joy. When the SO goes out of town to work, I have their company and their attention. We have our morning rituals and habits. Neither the dog or the cat care for much variation, and our routine gives me focus as well. I advocate for pets. What a kickstart they give us!

Onward ....

The Lunch Bunch

The lunch bunch has been arriving every morning just after daybreak. So far we've counted nine does. There are a couple of bucks lurking, too, one slick spike and one mature male with a nice set of antlers. With the binoculars I counted 10 points on his rack. We have noticed pickup trucks out on the road slowing down or stopping whenever he shows himself. The SO says he probably won't last long.

It's opening weekend of whitetail season this Saturday, and all the local hunters have itchy fingers. Personally, I don't see how anyone could shoot such a beautiful creature, but I've been around it so much that I suppose I'm sort of immune. I will go with my SO to his lease this weekend. I went with him quite a bit last year, but all we did was take binoculars to the stand. We also took books, and read in tandem, with one or the other of us keeping half an eye out for deer to come out into the oat field so we could view them through the binoculars. I got tickled thinking of us both deep into our books, and the deer coming out to dance while we weren't looking, maybe sticking out their tongues and laughing at us. A nice thought anyway.

Started editing the children's book today. Now, I'm second-guessing myself, wondering if I should do away with the Christmas theme. That would certainly change the whole thing if I do. But I don't want to limit the appeal. Just don't know. I always read Christmas books to my kids year round. They loved Christmas and wanted to hear about it even in summer. Just so uncertain working in this new format. Oh these doubts, they always haunt me.

Onward ....

Montana

Been a while since I posted here. We left on the 23rd for the much-anticipated Montana trip. We had agreed beforehand to leave behind the accoutrement of our everyday lives, like the laptop, and just use the time to be together and groove on Montana. We certainly did do that.

Can there be any more beautiful place in the country? Unless it's the coast of Alaska or the Grand Tetons in Wyoming. Both of those places blew my mind when I visited them, but Montana ranks right up there. Breathtaking sights at every turn. Seemed I spent a good part of every day with the camera in my hand.

I was surprised by how much history there is up there -- western history, the kind that tugs at me, that pioneer history thing that starts stories simmering in my mind. Lots of stories to be told up there, and so different because of the terrain and the weather, than Texas stories. It's somehow even more western than here, more rugged and individualistic. The population, what little there is, seems younger, more genuine in their friendliness. I don't know, I felt that I could live there. I understand more and more the reason my fellow is so in love with the mountains. He has had his three years of living there and I think he wants more. But we both love Texas, too, so what do you do?

Hit the lottery?!! Or write something shamelessly commercial? Something aimed at the people who just can't seem to get enough of vicarious adventure, the same people who spend hours tuned into reality shows, something sordid and purposely controversial. Hmmmmm. Don't think I'm that kind of writer, unfortunately. My finger is definitely not on the pulse of popular American culture. I didn't even like "Titantic" for god's sake. Oh well .....

We did go to the Book and Author Luncheon the day before we left on our Montana trip. It was more fun than I thought it would be. The SO had an absolute ball. He went around glad-handing the featured authors, buying their books, and discussing mystery writers he likes with them. I'm so happy he enjoys these sorts of outings. I think he might even like them more than I do. Later, after we were home, the friend who had invited us to share his table commented that the SO and I just seem to fit seamlessly together. It pleases me to hear because I certainly agree.

The trip to Montana, on top of being an investigative vacation, wanting to find a place to retire someday, or to have a summer place to retreat from the brutal Texas heat, was also a celebration of sorts, or a commemoration. While we were up there, our two-year milestone came, a remembrance of the first time we met for dinner at Olive Garden. We didn't find an Olive Garden to mark the day, but a pretty good substitute presented itself in Butte. My SO asked the hotel clerk if there were any country-style Italian restaurants in town and got a recommendation. It turned out to beat Olive Garden by a mile, and we drank a toast to ourselves and our future.

Onward ....

The Measure of Success

Well, the good news is, I finally put the children's book onto the computer. I write my first drafts in longhand, always have. So by the time my work gets put on the computer, it's already been through two drafts. So now, I have a second draft of the children's book, and it's not nearly as awful as I had imagined it to be. I think there is great value in letting a piece of writing sit. Or cook. Giving it a time out, so to speak.

This book was written right after a trip to West Texas at the beginning of the year. It's been cooking now for about six months. When I first wrote it down, I really had no idea what I was doing. I had never, at least not on purpose, written a children's book. I have had many ideas for one, just never actually tackled the beast. As soon as I had the first handwritten draft, I understood how difficult it is to write a children's book. It's a mistake to think that because it's a short piece it's easy. Short writing is often the hardest kind. In the beginning I was so unhappy with the thing, I just took the pages and stuck them inside the laptop case and forgot about them.

And then I started reading about writing children's books. I made a list of books to read, even though I've done a lot of that already, having raised two children myself, both of whom loved to hear me read books. When reviewing books for the newspaper, I would often get assigned the children's books that came in, so I have done a bit of reading for children. But still, you can never educate yourself too much. So I have a list of books to read, and will do that as soon as we return from the trip we're about to go on to Montana.

I'm actually excited about this book, now that it's gone through it's second draft. There's still work to be done, but I decided Sunday, after I had worked on it all afternoon, that I would not reread it again until we're back from the mountains next week. And yet, I find myself wondering if I still have a few contacts that matter at a couple of publishing houses I've dealt with -- and wondering how to find out about that, too. Things change so quickly, and have changed dramatically since I've had a book published -- any book. But that's putting the cart before the horse, something I've preached against in past workshops. Get the thing written, a final draft, then worry about a publisher.

Why is it that writers, many writers anyway, don't consider any kind of work that doesn't result in a published book to be "real writing?" This puzzles me. It's as if the only measure of success is to have something between hard covers. I am constantly asked when I'm going to have another book published. Answering that question is one of the reason I've sequestered myself away from people and places where books and writing are commonly discussed. Most of the people around me now don't really think of me as a writer, at least not a writer of books, and that's OK. That's actually much more comfortable for me. I feel less pressured, and the outside pressure has been one of the things keeping my writing at bay. And anyway, isn't there real value in just writing for pleasure, maybe for posterity, or even just for yourself?

We are still not done with the roofers. I cannot believe how long it has taken them to re-roof this house. Yesterday I made a list of things they had destroyed along with replacement costs. I intend to present the list to the contractor when he asks for his final payment.

Onward ....

Squirrely Sunday

Back to almost normal this morning. The dog and I scared up five deer as we walked to get the newspaper. She was mostly oblivious, running her squirrel route -- running her traps as we call it. She's become obsessed with squirrels. Before we moved here, she fancied herself a cowdog, in love with circling and herding the cows at the SO's land. Now, she doesn't even notice when the neighbor's cattle have grazed over to our fence. She only has eyes for squirrels, and when she spots one, leaps like a gazelle with her head in the hair, whining and howling. We joke that she's going to have a heart attack one of these days, because she comes back from one of these episodes panting and slobbering, thirsty, and will collapse in her corner behind the rocking chair to take an extra-long nap.

The squirrels, of course, act as though she's a minor nuisance. Sometimes they stop their aerial acrobatics long enough to flap their tail and bark at her. Mostly, they seem to think she's comic relief, as they fly among the treetops, surefootedly. They seem to have a route they run. Think I've mentioned before that we live in an oak motte, so there's no shortage of trees for the squirrels. They can go from the front gate to the back pen, tree to tree, without ever having to descend to the ground. Almost daily we spot a new bag-shaped squirrel's nest in some tree here. However, all of this said, they are doing a pretty crummy job of vacuuming up all the acorns we have this year. It's like walking on ball-bearings to go across the yard to the car.

The flowerbeds are decimated. The amaryllis we brought over from the SO's place the summer we moved in, are flattened, most of the foliage has been broken off at the ground. The agapanthus I planted in June are also broken at the ground. So are half of the daylilies in the back bed, and the society garlic has been smushed by an air compressor. This is especially irksome to me because there is a sidewalk six inches from the society garlic, which would have made a much more sensible platform for the compressor than my flowerbed. We have also picked up two nails in the soles of our shoes, and one in the back tire on my car. The roofing contractor assured me that there would be no rogue nails left on the ground, and that the flowerbeds would be protected. So much for promises.

And yes, I'm angry about it. We nursed this place through the worst drought on record this summer, with 61 days of over 100 degrees, and in two days the roofers managed to destroy all we worked so hard to keep alive. Nothing is sacred. I picked up cigarette butts and empty Coke cans they left strewn around. If the roof hadn't been leaking so much, I would've rather done without replacing it, but we were starting to have a nest of Tupperware on the floor every time it rained to catch the drips. However, this has been a good reminder to me of what a pain it is to have workmen around. I have been sort of hankering to replace the carpet in the bedroom and the tile floors in the two downstairs bathrooms. Now, I'm convinced I can live with it as it is for a while yet. The guest room on the other side of the garage, however, needs some attention. This is the room where company usually stays, and I want to repaint the bathroom out there. It's not a big bathroom, and I think I can do it without help even from the SO. Gosh, he hates to paint. Didn't realize it until we painted the sunroom last year. Thought we would divorce over it, and we're not even married.

He left after breakfast this morning to go do some of his land chores and to visit his sick, possibly dying, boyhood friend. With the alone time I've decided to do what I said I was going to do at least a week ago. I'm going to put the children's story on the computer so I can get to work on it.

Onward ....

SKY IS FALLING!

Roofers are here -- day two. Should finish tomorrow. I hope I can bear it that long. Sounds like termites from hell up there. This morning they were here at the crack of dawn. Didn't even get a chance to walk down to get the paper. The animals are both traumatized. Who knew something like this would be so disruptive. I can't even think, let alone get any real work done.

SO left for his land as soon as the workers arrived. I pouted a while, then dug into cleaning out the closet. The master bedroom is the ONLY room that is bearable. Even the cat is hiding. Can't wait until this is over.

My poor flower beds will be destroyed. The hummingbirds have given up, and the bees all over the heather have also fled. Mayhem .....

Book & Author Luncheons, Past & Present

Got home from a long weekend at the Coast. I didn't take the laptop, kind of wanted to, but we have been up to our eyes in duty and it just seemed like a good idea to veg for the weekend. I always sleep so good there, and it was especially good sleeping this weekend with the rain and dark overcast. Had a fun time with some friends, slogged around SeaFair and bought some tacky folk art, some cute things, too. Shouldn't be so judgmental. We have a lot of kitchy stuff down there anyway, so just added to the collection. And I keep thinking that I will go down there alone sometime and write, but that never seems to actually happen. Besides, I'm not in the mood for alone. Had plenty of that already in my life.

The deer have been marauding here while we were gone. There are tracks everywhere. Rained a good bit here, too, and it seems they grew fond of the mudhole in the driveway. The tracks were piled on top of each other, like they'd been dancing there in the night. Lots of small tracks, an occasional larger one, so we know it's mostly the yearlings who frolicked. There should be plenty for them to eat without roaming through our place, but they're in the habit of it by now, and besides, I'm sure they consider it their home not ours.

We also have fragile, pale rye grass shoots staining the open ground green. Pleased the SO to see his tractor work has been fruitful. Johnson grass surrounds the big oaks out in the front "forty." As soon as the rain stops I'll get out the backback sprayer and let them have it with some extra-strength Round-Up. It's just almost non-stop work to keep on top of unwanted weeds. I planted some daffodil bulbs in the bed beside the sunroom this evening. Fingers crossed they come up in early spring. I've had luck with bulbs in other places I've lived. I'm hoping that luck holds here.

Tonight an email came from an old book buddy inviting me and the SO to share his table at the San Antonio Book and Author Luncheon. My first inclination was to refuse, I've been doing that sort of knee-jerk-refusing for the last several years. But then I thought about it for a while. I was one of the "authors" featured at the very first SA Book & Author Luncheon. In fact, it was my first speaking engagement after the publication of my first novel, and there were 900 people there. I was up on the dais with Steve Allen, and John Erickson, and Richard Condon, and others, chosen because the Express-News book editor liked my novel. She recommended me to the UTSA board. I was really happy that I was the first speaker because I would never have been able to calm down enough to actually eat the gorgeous lunch they served that day. And it truly was gorgeous to look at, in particular the little book-shaped cake with buttercream icing.

It's taken longer for me to write all of this, of course, than it took for it to go through my mind after getting the emailed invitation. These memories have become fonder to me than they once were, for some reason, and I thought it might be fun to go as part of the audience. Michael Connelly is the headliner this time, and although I've never read one of his books, the SO is a big fan of the kinds of serial mysteries Connelly writes, sort of gritty LA stuff, and he liked the idea of it being a luncheon that we can go up and do in one day and come back, since we're leaving the following Friday for Montana. Anyway, I emailed my friend back, said thanks and we would love to go, so it's on. Now, I can't sleep for thinking about what I'll wear. Such pitifully mundane thoughts keep me awake at times.

As I said, for the past several years I have avoided anything writer-related, sort of figured my writing career was over, fire in the belly long gone, as I've said in earlier posts. The SO says I've just got lazy. He says it as a joke, but could be he's right. I know that I've felt the push beginning lately, and also am starting to get a little tired of being so directionless. Maybe going back out there, even as an audience participate will inspire me to knuckle down. I've never thought of myself as a quitter.

Onward ....

Resonance

Resonance: When something echoes something else and deepens it. Makes it mean something more than it meant at first.

Pondering this morning "the novel," the long-stranded stack of papers asleep somewhere in my office, or in several places in my office -- boxes, wire baskets, file cabinets, on two computers, in my mind, locked in the recesses. I've told myself that the novel was irrelevant to my life now, that I was uninterested in writing a long piece of fiction again, that I had moved on, that writing fiction seemed too mundane, too overly intense, too frivolous in light of world events. Oh, I've given myself lots and lots of excuses. Excuses have always been a forte of mine.

Here are some of the truths: It's hard. It takes more time than I've been willing to give it. More concentration, keeping all those details corraled in my head. I haven't felt I wanted to exit the world long enough to finish a novel, any novel. I'm disappointed with the business end of publishing, don't like the "appearances" a writer has to make, don't like the fact that my hard work isn't mine anymore once a publisher takes it on. It's partly fear of failure, and it's partly being a control freak and not liking when something so personal is taken out of my control. But it's also not knowing how to finish the damned thing.

I've said to myself so many times that it would only take about three months of pure concentration to get the thing done, and that's probably a pretty fair estimate. But there has also been this roadblock, this wondering just what in the hell the thing is REALLY about, feeling it needed that kernel of truth that would make it worth reading, that would make it resonate for any given reader. And not knowing how to give that, if it's even in me to give.

So here I am this morning, before daybreak, reading someone else's work and thinking about resonance, what it means, why it makes a piece of fiction work. It depends, of course, on why a person reads, and I can only speak for myself. But it's the stories that resonate, the ones that stick around, the ones that make me feel I've reached some new level of understanding, and it's this resonance that the "endless novel" doesn't have. Right now, it's pretty much of an exercise in history, of research, of character building, but it doesn't have any deeper meaning, anything that would cause it to especially stick in a reader's mind.

It opens with an unexpected death, and continues with what that death causes the primary character to do, choices he makes, the road he embarks upon, but nowhere is that death, or the propulsion it causes, echoed. Nowhere is there a deepening of meaning, a new understanding. And it has never occurred to me until this morning that it's really this thing that's lacking that has caused this novel to abort and languish.

Should it take ten years for a writer to figure such a simple thing out? No, not one who is focused and I have been completely unfocused for a long time. But just figuring out a way to express what's wrong with the thing doesn't fix it. Pondering the significance of this morning's revelation, there's still the fact that I have to devote real time to it if I ever want to see it to fruition. Think I've been too busy actually living life.

The friend I mentioned a few postings ago, who went into the hospital for knee-replacement surgery and ended up in a coma, has gone home and he is damaged. Everyone is hoping it isn't damage beyond repair, that in time his brain will finally right itself, but he's still confused, barely ambulatory, and maybe more upsetting, he's angry and depressed. My SO and I are driving over this morning later to look after him while his wife goes to the beauty shop. She needs the outing, but both of us are dreading the trip. Up until last night just the SO was going, but I could see how he was longing for me to offer my time, so I did. He jumped on it, and so I will set aside writing once again and help him with his good old friend. And I don't mind this, certainly not the way I probably should. There are times, though, when I do feel superficial, personally unproductive. And more troubling, it would be very easy for me to continue along this path. It's an easy path, it's fun, it's a lot less stressful than making myself vulnerable, which is what any writer does when they decide to open that proverbial vein and lay it all out on paper -- or more appropriately for the times -- the computer screen.

The first real norther is on its way. Windy as hell yesterday, and already gusty this morning as the sun starts to lighten the sky. For some reason we've had an outstanding crop of acorns, and they were pounding the ground yesterday as the wind threshed the limbs of all the oaks. The bed of the pickup was layered with them. They're underfoot wherever you walk. With the serious drought we've had the last two years, so many acorns are a shock, another example of nature assuring its continuance.

Onward ....