the cat

I can't believe I didn't mention this in one of the earlier blogs today:  On July 9th, at about noon, my husband took our dear pet, Acie, to the vet.  She hadn't eaten in a few days, and she'd been just dragging herself around for a couple of days.  We knew there was something seriously wrong with her, so as I put her in her carrying cage for the ride to the vet, I said "Good-bye, and thank you".  I went in the house and cried, while my husband struggled with his own tears and drove away.  It turned out that she had had a stroke, a blood clot had settled in her back, and her temperature was 4 degrees below normal.  Frank had fifteen minutes with her, to say good-bye, and then they took her from him and put her to sleep.  She was 17 years old, and a very dear firend.  We miss her.
Oh--I mustn't neglect to tell you about the giggle she gave everyone during this tough time:  You see, her cage and her litter box were always kept side-by-side in the bathroom.  In the cage, I kept a folded towel and her food and water dishes.  So, for her, the cage was her dining room and a place of comfort and refuge.  At the vet's office, then, she kept trying to get back into the cage every time the vet tried to set her on the table.  Eventually, the vet had to turn the cage to the wall in order to keep Acie on the table.  Apparently, cats don't usually like their cages.  Acie loved hers.

trying to write

The "nanorhythm" writing method lasted a while and then fizzled out.  It's not that I'm especially busy, it's just that I can't tell from one minute to the next when I'm going to be busy.  Ken keeps track of his meds pretty well, but there's one procedure (a Fentanyl patch) that has to be changed every 72 hours.  Seventy-two hour blocks have never been part of my life, so they have been missed a few times.  This is serious because they are pain blockers for my son, and when we (he and I) forget that "today is patch day", then he wakes up in pain.  ----- Now is a good example of what I started to say--about being busy unexpectedly from time to time.  Here I am, sitting at the computer, getting ready to blog, hoping to get the writing juices flowing if only a little, and the phone rings.  It's Ken.  He'd like a yogurt, and the creamsicle that's in his freezer and the orange crush in his fridge.  He's going to make himself a float with the creamsicle and crush.  I'm delighted to jump up and oblige, because it means he's going to eat a few calories.  So, I'm back now, and am about to leave off blogging for a while (you know that could be for quite a while) and maybe get some writing done.  I still haven't visited my novel for several weeks, or is it months.  Can't be helped.

care-giving update

When Ken was diagnosed with "advanced lung cancer" last January, he was given "2 weeks to 2 months" to live.  Praise God for miracles.  No, he isn't cured--nowhere close to it.  He weighs less than 100 lbs (6' tall), and is in pain and suffers nausea.  But his spirits remain pretty good, considering.  He loves company, and gets lots of it.  He doesn't have enough energy to work on his book, and that grieves him.  I certainly understand that grief, and wish there were some way I could help him with that.  But, here it is six months after the devastating news of his illness, and he's still with us.  I celebrate every day that we have this blessing.

new look?

The trouble with computer "geeks" is that they keep fixing things that ain't broke.  Like blogger, for example.  I haven't posted anything on my blog for a while, so I thought I'd pop in and jot a few words of wisdom or foolishness.  And what do I find?  When I just go to read the blog, everything looks the same, but I have to sign in so as to post.  Then what?  I don't know.  I eventually found a little thing to one side, along with a whole lot of other things, that says new post.  So here I am.  I wish things wouldn't get fixed that don't need fixing.  It makes the computer so much more mysterious than it needs to be.  Cyberspace is mystery enough, without the constant tweeking that the geeks do to justify their jobs.

submitted today

For the past few days (except the weekend) I've been at the computer in "writer's mode" every morning.  The goal is to be started by nine o'clock or soon thereafter, and write for 20 minutes, break for ten, write 20, break 10, etc., until noon.  So far, this has produced two short stories.  (I still can't get my head into the novel I'm supposed to be writing.) 
The goal this time was to have a middle grade mystery story (900 words) submitted to the contest at Children's Writer by the April 30th deadline. 
The first story I wrote was okay, but I realized when it was done that it was not a mystery.  It was an adventure.  Okay--the next day, I used the same characters and wrote a mystery called "The Case of the Missing Baby-Sitter".  I polished it a few times, and this morning I submitted it online to the contest.  Fingers crossed!
Writing again, through the mushy brain.  I find the write 20/break 10 routine works for me.

Easter season

Easter promises of warmth and flowers are slow to appear this year.  A day of sun here, followed by a day or two (or more) of rain and chilly breezes.  A real downpour yesterday. 
I had hoped that by starting my blog again, I might be prompted to do more writing.  The blog got stalled by its heavy message, but I have been trying to write.
I can't get my head into my novel yet, so I've been trying to write a short middle-grade mystery for the Children's Writer competition.  I need to submit a 900 word story by April 30th.  I've been toying with an idea for the story for a couple of weeks, and this morning I actually wrote the story.  Well, A story.  It needs lots of work before it can be submitted.  But I remembered that when I wrote my nanowrimo story, I followed a pattern someone suggested, and it worked today as it did then.  It's simple:  write 20 minutes, take a 10 minute break, write 20 minutes again, take another 10 minute break, and so on until you've written the number of words or the length of time you planned.  I planned to write from 9am until noon, but got interrupted about 11am.  That's okay, because my 900-word story was already at 920 words, and I was busy trimming it down.  Now, whether the story line stays the same throughout other rewrites (assuming I follow the same regime tomorrow), that's the big question. 
At least I'm writing again.  Ken prefers that I don't fuss over him, so this keeps me out of his hair, and within calling distance.

Lent

Lent is in full swing. Usually I like to work on the psalms in Lent, also my pet Sunday project.  This year things are different.  This year, my brain is mush.
This is the second time that this has happened. 
The first time was May 2005, when my 22-year-old grandson Derek drowned on his sister's 19th birthday.  Stricken with grief, I could not think. I certainly could not write.  The young man's death was bad enough, but what made it even more tragic was that his father, my eldest son Frank, was nearing the end of his ten-year battle with esthesioneuroblastoma, a rare cancer that took his life in November of the same year.  That was six years ago.
This is not the sort of thing that one gets over.  You simply get through it.  Life somehow carries on.
Now, my brain is mush once more.  The nightmare is recurring, believe it or not.  Now my second son, Ken, is afflicted with advanced lung cancer which has spread to his lungs and kidneys. This is a different person, and a different cancer, but my brain is the same mush.
Perhaps returning to blogging with help me move through the mush.  Without my faith in God, I really don't know what on earth I would do.  Please pray!