MY FIRST LOVE

This is my first blogfest. I'd like to thank Alex J. Cavanaugh for the opportunity.

There are four areas specified by this blogfest: books, movies, music, and people. Since I'm new at this, I'm only going to choose one.

I intended to choose a lover/boyfriend/unrequited love but, in thinking back, I remembered my very first love of all. Memories popped out at me with images so clear and striking and heart stopping, I felt as if I were there.

The years melted away in a heartbeat and I was five years old again waiting for the front door to open. Like a wriggly puppy unable to physically contain my joy, I would run to him the moment he stepped inside the house and be swept up in his big, powerful hands, tossed into the air to my exhilarated squeals, heart pounding wildly. He'd catch me like a football, hands around my belly, then fly me through the front room, Peter Pan style.

"There's my girl," he'd say as he carried me into the kitchen where mom burned dinner in her 1950s apron and gingham house dress. They would hug and kiss with me squeezed between them floating in the cocoon of love they wove around me. Safe in my cozy little world.

Yeah, it may be cliche, but my first love was my daddy.

That safe little world is gone now. I'm sixty, just got laid off and feeling deeply alone and vulnerable in the harsh reality of a hostile world. My father is almost ninety now, stooped and frail with cloudy eyes, a failing heart and a mind that struggles to be some small part of what it once was, but sometimes I still see him through the eyes of that little girl--tall and handsome and strong and with love shining bright in his blue, blue eyes.

He was my first hero. He flew me to bed so I could feel like TinkerBell. He read me stories of wonder as I fell asleep. When I wanted to touch the stars, he stood me on his steady shoulders to help me get closer and told me to reach. And when I asked questions he not only answered them but set up demonstrations and drew diagrams. He was never too tired or impatient to listen. He's the man I've compared all others to in my life.

He's my dad and he was my first true love. I am and will forever be his little girl.

Love ya, dad.

Not-So-Happy New Year

I thought the end of last year was bad and eagerly looked forward to 2011. I just knew that life would settle down and I'd be able to get back to normal. Now the new year is here and things have gone from bad to worse.

So far, since January first:

1. A close family friend is hospitalized and not expected to live out the week.
2. I'm really sick with a fever/flu/cold and can't visit him in the intensive care unit to say goodbye.
3. The love of my life just found a lump on one of his testicles.
4. My elderly father's dementia has suddenly worsened. He got lost driving to a friend's house and can't remember the combination to his postal box. Last weekend he left the hose on and drained the water tank--twice.
5. My elderly mother, who is in so much chronic pain they want to give her a morphine drip, may now be losing her eyesight.
6. My cat, who has been beside me through thick and thin for twenty years, is fading away.
7. With all the stress I've been under the last six months, I've succumbed to eating whatever I can get my hands on and my blood sugar is spiraling out of control.
8. The brakes on the truck are squealing.
9. My supervisor told me he plans to quit next month when he gets his degree. He's the only buffer between me and the Big Bad who took over our department.
10. I haven't been able to write one word of fiction.

I've lived long enough to know that all this will pass and I'll survive the outcome (or not). Either way, Life is change. Sometimes the change is good, sometimes it sucks.

I'm so ready for a good change. When is that going to happen?

Not My Hand

I looked down at my hand today and I saw it. Really saw it. It's not the hand I remember having. Suddenly there are lines and wrinkles and freckles. They can't be age spots; they have to be freckles. It isn't my hand but I did recognize it; it is my mother's hand.

The shock spiraled me into a memory from my twenties. In a creative writing class I took in college, the instructor was encouraging us to write and never stop. He told a story about an elderly women who took his night class and how frustrated he was with her because she had waited too late to start writing. He encouraged her to quit because developing talent as a writer takes time she didn't have and memory skills she had already lost.

I remember thinking that would never be me.

And now here I am getting old and feeling it's too late to be a writer.

When I took that class, I thought the instructor was an idiot. Words and ideas gushed from me at that age and I couldn't imagine ever losing that. Now, I think he might have been right. Writing is hard work now. Words and ideas merely trickle.

Is there a point in life when you are just too old to write? Or, like everything else with age, it just gets harder to do, but not impossible?

Bits and Pieces

The month of August went by and I didn't write any fiction. No excuses, but I've spent most of my time trying to find the bits and pieces of my mind and put them back together. Between work stress, health stress and home stress, my little brain exploded.

I work for a school in California, so I'm just lucky to still have a job. I'm very grateful; I am. But if there was any way I could find another job, I would. My name's on this blog, so I won't go into details. Suffice it to say it's hard to get to sleep at night because when it's quiet I start worrying about my job and around 3:30 in the morning I realize I'm still awake thinking about the job.

I've tried writing in the wee hours of the morning, but I end up just sitting at the computer, the pieces of my brain jangling around in my head. By 5 a.m. I'm tired enough to sleep.

The alarm goes off at 6:30 a.m.

I'm severely sleep deprived which makes my job even harder. I fell asleep driving home one night. I woke up thinking I was home, but I had gotten off the freeway on the wrong offramp and was seriously lost. Now I worry about driving home at night.


My dog died after major surgery to remove tumors and her spleen. She was the last dog I will ever have. I miss her.

My health? My feet are swelling, my blood sugar is high and the biopsy the dermatologist did on a bump on my leg has turned into a sinkhole that won't heal.

Is it just me, or do other writers have a hard time writing under stress?

I hate to whine, but, you know, I think I feel a little better.

Where's the White Space?

I got a check this weekend for a newsletter I do the layout, design and composition on (Friends of Corona Public Library Quarterly Reader). They put out a web and print version. Getting the check made  me think about my old career as a typesetter and (untrained) graphic artist. Looking at my blog, I realize I violate a very important rule: always provide plenty of white space.

First, I apologize. Apparently, I've gone widget crazy. Every available space is jammed with some kind of blogger widget.

Second, I have an excuse. I'm fairly new to blogging and I had no idea there were so many gadgets available. Every time I see one I have to add it to my blog because it seems so perfect to share. I'm outta control. I haven't had this much fun since show and tell in grade school.

Don't worry. I'll settle down and start deleting things, eventually.

Until then please hang in there. Like everything, it's a work in progress.

Life Premise

Creating a premise for my story made me think about what the premise for my life would be.

A few possibilities:

• I write therefore I am.
• A life lived in fear is a life not lived.
• Believe you are and you will be.
• If you never try, you'll never succeed.
• Procrastination leads to stagnation.

Okay, now I'm depressed. This is making me think of all the things I wanted to do in my life and never got around to.

Like write.

The best thing to do would be gather what's left of my self-worth and go do at least one of those things.

Like write.

So, I think I'll make some cinnamon toast and hot chocolate and curl up with a good book! That will comfort me and make everything all better.

(And that's exactly how I got to where I am today: chubby and unpublished.)

Starting Over

I'm reinventing myself...again.

As I get closer to retirement it's become obvious I won't have enough money to sustain my trailer-trash life style. (I thought I was going to die before I turned 30 so I never saved money or invested in a nice house.) Since I already write, even if just in my head, I plan to write to supplement my income. Something I've never tried before. I hope keeping this journal of my progress will keep me on track.

The first step: start small.

I'm taking an online short story class given by Anna Hackett. She's written several ebooks for Nocturne Bites. Check out her website and her ebooks on the Harlequin website. Great teacher and I'm a fan of her writing.