The squeaky wheel is not getting the oil.
Dwayne calls everyone involved in his case every week, and today he was told by the surgeon's office that it will be the end of March or beginning of April before he gets his surgery.
Reason? Cancelling OR times for Workers' Comp cases.
What a crock.

My mother is making an epic return to Nova Scotia.
A three day trip if you're rested and the weather is good; Mum will be lucky if she is here in five days.
After leaving Georgia on Sunday, she spent an entire day resting in Stanton, Virginia. I talked to her last night where she was in Massachusetts, south of Boston. She's still a long way from home since New Hampshire to Oxford is 12 hours, and she might be driving into freezing rain. Might. If she reaches New Brunswick late today, it should have changed to rain by then. Saint John is only three hours from home but that's a loooong three hours when it's seven in the evening.
Tomorrow, though, they're calling for rain and 110 km/hr wind gusts over the Tantramar Marsh so whenever she shows up, she's being welcomed with typical Maritime winter weather.
How white will her knuckles be?

Seriously, if Dwayne could wear the Angry Bird fleece pajama bottoms he got from the kids at Christmas all day...
I call this photo "Angry, Sleepy and Grumpy". Although Grumpy looks pretty happy in his fleecy pajama bottoms.

January days...

I have a love-hate relationship with Facebook, although actually I rarely love it. I'm only doing it because it's expected writers will promote themselves this way so I was delighted to find this article today. (I edited for length)

Is Facebook envy making you miserable?

By Belinda Goldsmith

LONDON (Reuters) - Witnessing friends' vacations, love lives and work successes on Facebook can cause envy and trigger feelings of misery and loneliness, according to German researchers.

A study conducted jointly by two German universities found rampant envy on Facebook, the world's largest social network that now has over one billion users and has produced an unprecedented platform for social comparison.

The researchers found that one in three people felt worse after visiting the site and more dissatisfied with their lives, while people who browsed without contributing were affected the most.

"We were surprised by how many people have a negative experience from Facebook with envy leaving them feeling lonely, frustrated or angry," researcher Hanna Krasnova from the Institute of Information Systems at Berlin's Humboldt University told Reuters.

Researchers from Humboldt University and from Darmstadt's Technical University found vacation photos were the biggest cause of resentment with more than half of envy incidents triggered by holiday snaps on Facebook.

Social interaction was the second most common cause of envy as users could compare how many birthday greetings they received to those of their Facebook friends and how many "likes" or comments were made on photos and postings.

"Passive following triggers invidious emotions, with users mainly envying happiness of others, the way others spend their vacations and socialize," the researchers said in the report "Envy on Facebook: A Hidden Threat to Users' Life Satisfaction?" released on Tuesday.  

"The spread and ubiquitous presence of envy on Social Networking Sites is shown to undermine users' life satisfaction."

Men were shown to post more self-promotional content on Facebook to let people know about their accomplishments while women stressed their good looks and social lives.

The researchers said the respondents in both studies were German but they expected the findings to hold internationally as envy is a universal feeling and possibly impact Facebook usage.

"From a provider's perspective, our findings signal that users frequently perceive Facebook as a stressful environment, which may, in the long-run, endanger platform sustainability," the researchers concluded.

What a relief to read these words on an agent's blog...and think, "I'm already there."
I created this mini-poster at work (and did a similar one about painting for my best friend). Another plus about my job.

(Click on the image to make it larger for easier reading.)

According to the Humber School for Writers, which offers a correspondence course for fiction writers (hey, that's me now!), a participant needs to produce 300 pages for the program. That's ten pages a week -- 3000 words -- which over the course of 30 weeks (7 months) results in 85,000 words. Since I plan on having a first draft already written (trust me, first drafts are SO rough, they can't be submitted), that simple timetable for the course shows me I can have that first draft completed by the time my session of the correspondence course begins in September (assuming I am accepted, that is).

The characters are already taking on a life of their own and I haven't "officially" started writing the book. Just this morning, during my yoga practice, I had to stop and write down a scene. That's my conflict: Yoga is so good for my creativity but on the other hand, I'm not supposed to be thinking during yoga. Ah, well, it's a conflict I'm happy to live with. 

What a fabulous weekend!
Snowstorm yesterday. Walked down to the in-laws' house with Abby for a visit and ended up getting their iPad -- yes, these 80-somethings have an iPad -- set up so they can "Facetime" with their great-grandchildren who live 2 hours away. Ended up writing a funny column about it for this week's paper, which is nice because the original idea for this week was rather earnest and I've done serious ones for the last while. Nice to mix it up and be amusing. 
Today was sunny and mild. 9 degrees! Had two long walks in snow that was deep enough to be a workout but not too deep as to force one to give up. This morning, Abby followed deer tracks and disappeared so that before-breakfast walk became a long hike through the woods. Would have been lovelier if I hadn't been wondering were the hell she'd gone! But the incident proved that Dwayne is the better tracker. I already know that if I'm going to get stranded somewhere, he's gotta be with me if I'm going to survive.
Wrote the rest of the day with frequent breaks to talk to Dwayne, who was plowing the yard and trying to ignore the extreme pain he's in (his shoulder is now getting worse by the day; I don't know how much more he can stand. He may be forced to take the Percocet several times a day instead of holding off till bedtime). He still managed to whip up a lovely pork roast Sunday dinner. What a guy.
Jane came out at 3 o'clock for another long walk. This was the best Stella has been with Jane's dog Sam. Nice to see the old girl chilling out a bit.
Such a happy weekend, I don't want it to end. Why does it seem that the worse things get for Dwayne, the better they are for me??

There are three things I can count on in this world:
1) the love and support of my mother, my husband and my friends;
2) my glass is always half-full
and 3) when I ask the Great God of Creative Flow for help, I get it.

Last year, I listened to an interview with one of the judges for the creative non-fiction category of the CBC literary awards (now simply called Canada Writes) and he commented on how many essays were about cancer and Alzheimer's, about disease and death and caregiving. Well, since I'd submitted two essays about Alzheimer's, I knew I was hearing an important message to heed.
Wracking my brain to think of something different to write, I couldn't come up with anything that I could write about with more punch than that. Like a story, any essay needs to have a twist, some kind of tension, a change in the author. It doesn't have to be a shocking rape in the second to last paragraph like last year's winning essay but there has to be something that keeps the reader moving along, wondering what is going to happen. As in, why did this person write this essay?
I wandered through my files to see what I have but I'm also hampered by the fact I'm not a literary writer. Compared to some of the essays that these CBC judges chose, my stuff is like Chicken Soup for the Soul.
But still, with the deadline looming, I just couldn't bring myself to not submit, especially now that one of the few magazines in this country to publish memoir-style essays has folded (argh! I had something on submission that wasn't health/disease-related and figured they'd pick it up). So I sat on my yoga mat with my eyes closed and Stella breathing on me (in ten years, she's learned that when I finally sit in lotus position, she's 15 minutes away from eating breakfast) and I asked for guidance.
Voila!
Checking a artist friend's blog yesterday, she'd posted a poem which goes right along with an essay I'd written for Canadian Geographic two years ago (but they didn't pick up). It was in my mind because I was going to submit it again. When I saw the poem, I knew I could expand the essay with the poem.
Not done yet: when I sat on my yoga mat this morning, I realized I had no tension in that essay, no way of competing with a shocking rape or the f-word. So I waited...and an idea came to me.
It's enough. It may not be good enough to make the short-list but it's enough for me to submit. This is why my glass is always half-full. I never give up because you just never know.

How I Go to the Woods
by Mary Oliver

Ordinarily, I go to the woods alone,
with not a single friend, for they are all
smilers and talkers and therefore unsuitable.

I don’t really want to be witnessed talking to
the catbirds or hugging the old black oak tree.
I have my way of praying, as you no doubt have yours.

Besides, when I am alone I can become invisible.
I can sit on the top of a dune as motionless as an uprise
of weeds, until the foxes run by unconcerned.
I can hear the almost unbearable sound of the roses singing.

If you have ever gone to the woods with me,
I must love you very much.


(To read more of her work, simply Google her name. Lots will come up.)

or

There's that saying that whatever it is that you fear is what you need to do next.
When I decided I had to write a novel, I felt dragged down by the whole prospect. For the past year I've been wondering if that was something I had to do in order to get the memoir published and I'd been resisting it because I know how much work it is and that it would use up what little spare time I have now.
When I knew what novel I wanted to write and the fire in my belly ignited, the resulting creative energy almost knocks me over. I had an excellent day at work yesterday. I whistled all day. I was in such a good mood, I was annoying myself. This morning while making coffee, I was singing the Bibbity Bobbity Boo song from "Cinderella" -- and I don't even know the right words. I went for a walk yesterday afternoon and my next column for the paper came to me so when I returned to the house, I made two pages of notes.
This is the magic. This is what happens when the project is the right one. The more creative energy you use, the more you generate. This is what makes it possible to write a novel in a couple of months, to even think it's possible to do that.
Obviously, this particular novel wants to be written but it also comes back to fear. When I stopped fearing the hard work and began anticipating the act of writing, I was free. All the energy needed to make this happen was free.
Who knows if this novel will be any easier to sell than the memoir -- the market is tough in all genres -- but there is no way I can give up now.
All a writer needs is talent and persistence -- and a husband who says over and over, "You can do it.

This might be the quickest bounce back in history.
I've decided to write a novel. Now, I really thought I would sell the memoir first then perhaps a collection of essays and that way, buy myself the time to write novels. I wanted to enjoy the process. Having to write a novel, being forced to write one simply to see if that is my avenue into publishing drained any anticipation. Walking with Jane and the dogs yesterday afternoon, I was telling her about the novel I planned to write and I said, "I have the title and the characters but no idea of plot or theme. There is no fire in my belly for this book."
When I arrived home, I learned there had been a minor yet upsetting incident for Dwayne involving his estranged, and strange, daughter who, upon driving by with her boyfriend and children, had proceeded to flip the bird at him. Such trailer trash. If you cut someone out of your life, the classy thing to do is simply ignore. To give him the finger? I am very glad she is out of our life; we didn't need such a toxic person around.
But by god, that was the spark! Not for the book that I was telling Jane about (will leave that for future) but for one called "The Lies She Told" based on the events of the past summer, the events put in motion by this awful daughter of Dwayne's (who is simply the next generation of her mother, his ex-wife). Oh, sweet revenge served cold! The whole damn book has been sitting in my head for a couple of months; at my full-day cleaning job, I had to take a break and write down a whole bunch of ideas -- including the ending -- for this novel. Last night, I sat down right after supper and wrote the prologue.
Oh, the fire is burning, baby. All this stuff I avoided journalling because it was so awful, so orchestrated by one bitter, faithless, narcissistic ex-wife will now have its release and I don't have to relive it per se. It will be for the noblest of causes and the best thing is that when it's fiction, I get to make stuff up and change things so no one will be able to sue me. No scores will be settled, no truth will be revealed; just a wonderful source of inspiration, a story I need to get out of my system in the best way I know.
As my mother says, "Don't these people remember you're a writer?" And Mum was here for the whole fabricated drama; she is the best eyewitness to act as my editor and main critic. Yeah, she's tough, too.
As for the memoir, I have contacted the editor who helped me over the hump last year to work with me on my query letter and proposal. That book will still get pitched only now my entire dream of writing books full-time is not hinging on something as precarious and potentially insurmountable as "the market. Because that's what I realized while driving to work this morning: If I don't write another book, if I simply let everything ride on this memoir that no one, so far, has taken on because "the market is tough", that means the end of the dream. If I want that dream badly enough, I must do whatever it takes to make it happen. Ergo, this book I will write. Sometimes you're thrown through a door whether it opens or not!
This means, of course, that for the next six months, I will be an even worse correspondent! FB and this blog, folks, will let you know I'm alive. But it will be worth it in so many ways. Trust me. We're in for a ride on this one!

The response from the agent came Saturday, via email. As soon as I saw the email in my inbox, I knew it was rejection. If she had wanted it, she would have called.
I have to admit this came as a shock. I really believed she was keen on this book. 
This is what she wrote to me: 

I’ve now read Safe at Home, and found much to admire in it. The writing is solid; the comparisions, juxtapositions, and use of irony are deft; and the emotions conveyed are brave and true. Nonetheless, the market is very tough, and I’m afraid that I don’t have the required conviction that I could bring this manuscript to the market successfully. This decision was difficult for me because I have the utmost respect for how you detailed your family’s journey with Alzheimer’s. I do hope another agent feels differently, and I wish you every success with your writing.

So I've had the "writing is solid but the market is tough" line before and that's what freaks me out. If good writing and a good story -- what agents claim they are looking for -- can't trump a tough market, what am I going to do?
All I can do is provide adjectives for how this makes me feel:
overwhelmed
nauseous
scared
I fear this is the "Alzheimer curse": agents see that word in my query and roll their eyes, hit delete because they are simply inundated with pitches about Alzheimer stories (it's those spouses who kept a journal and think typing it up makes a good book that are messing me up).

I can't not do anything, however, so I just emailed the editor who helped me with my manuscript last year. I'm going to get her to evaluate my query letter and book proposal and see if there is some way we can get around that curse. Having her do this evaluation will give me some time off, time away to do other things, not panicking being one of them.

I suppose this means I should write another book, write a work of fiction, use that to launch my writing career then publish the memoir. But you know, I thought I'd be able to relax and enjoy the new adventure of writing fiction, of discovering my voice there, not feeling forced to rush and complete something with the pressure of it having to be my big break.
That just makes my stomach ache.

So enjoy this quote from Junot Diaz, a Pulitzer Prize winning author:
"In my view a writer is a writer because even when there is no hope, even when nothing you do shows any sign of promise, you keep writing anyway."
It took him 10 years to write his second novel.

I'm immersed in the world of Alzheimer again and you know, I don't mind. I need to be here, I want to be here. Honestly, I wish I was doing more.
I NEED TO SPEAK OUT but I don't know how to get started. I'm not a natural joiner, not someone who easily gravitates to those kind of situations that would give me a platform (ah, that word again) to voice my ideas, to make my experience heard, to have an impact.
This is what I hope my book will be, that opening I can slip into, widen, blow wide open but I STILL H AVEN'T HEARD BACK.
(insert sound of my head exploding)
But that's okay. No news is good news, really.
I've been reading Oprah's interview with Caroline Myss in the January issue. In fact, I've read it three times because it's saying what I believe, what Oprah's been pounding into me for years.
Myss says, "Your spirit is the part of you that seeks meaning and purpose. It's the part drawn to hope, that will not give in to despair." This is how I feel, and what keeps me going.
(Otherwise, I would have thrown myself in the duck pond months ago.)
"You know we say things like 'I just have to be true to myself'?" Myss says. "What does that mean? Great people always say, 'There's something I was meant to do.' That knowingness is what the soul understands. You have fundamental agreements that you simply feel. You can't put your finger on them because they reveal themselves to you within the context of your life through coincidence, synchronicity and obligations you can't get out of."
Reading this interview, and needing to read it several times, tells me I'm getting there. Makes me feel like my egg is cracking and I'm ready to tumble out of it, all wet and slimy, those feathers matted, legs wobbly but beak open. Squawking.
(Must work on metaphors. Again.)
What am I trying to say? That this Alzheimer stuff isn't going away, is in fact growing at one diagnosis every five minutes, so my words need to be found, my story needs to be shared, my voice needs to be heard. There won't be one person out there who isn't touched by this, even if it's to understand what a friend is going through, that a friend needs that lasagna TODAY. (I will never forget the kindnesses of my friend Shelagh. They're in the book; Shelagh's good deeds deserve to inspire others.)
Those people who say, "Oh, god, she's going on about Alzheimer disease again," are simply those who have never taken care of someone with the disease. If you've seen what I've seen, you can't not care. Once normal cognitive function starts to go, it's a whole new ball game. If you don't know how to play the best game you can, you're screwed.

Rotten winter weather today. Really bad. Windy, too. No one should be on the roads today so of course, this is the day Dwayne sees a new surgeon in Halifax and I have a CAT scan on my back. Both appointments are later this afternoon so hopefully, the freezing will be either rain for him and snow for me.
However...until then, this is the perfect writing day. If only I could find my notes for that article pitch I'm supposed to be working on. Too many piles of paper around my desk. Such brilliance comes from all this chaos!

Here's the thing about my job: It's totally self-directed, which is what I love about it. That and working with Jane. I made her laugh so hard today, I think she peed a bit. See, that's the kind of person I like to hang out with...so I don't pee my pants alone.
So at work, I have my list of responsibilities and I do them at my own pace, knowing when the deadlines are. There is no one looking over my shoulder, no one reviewing my work (well, no one but the more than two thousand people who read the paper, including my aunt). Plus, I get to write whatever I want.
What makes this kind of freedom work is that I am a perfectionist and a pacifist; I want everything to be right and I don't want to create waves, at least not big ones, and preferably ones that don't roll over me.
Second after writing and publishing books, this is the very best job for me.
Can't even complain about the low wage today because I received a raise.

I need to embrace my Eunice because I'm starting to feel...a low level anxiety thrumming through the bottom of my belly.
I'm tired. Of poor sleeping and of waiting. Waiting for Dwayne to have his surgery before his right arm simply falls off. Waiting for the agent to phone with an offer of representation or send an email saying "I just don't love this book." Which might help you understand the anxiety because we know I only want Option 1 on that.
After a day like today at work -- the old print machines banging away all day and two people smoking out back without the courtesy of opening the door -- I come home feeling polluted. Headache from smoke, metallic taste in mouth from print. Should just start closing those big double doors. They wouldn't get it, though. Dirty work for a man with no leadership skills and no publishing sense.
So in response, I'm working on an extra-long column this week that will make people cry. Take that, you silly bugger. Take this award and -- Getting ahead of myself. But brought home a year's worth of columns because the call for submissions to three, 3!, newspaper writing competitions have come out. My favourite columns aren't necessarily my best and choosing is making me cranky.
Need sleep.
Need to walk. Doing laps around the yard in snowshoes is not the same thing. Snow is deep enough that Abby insists on walking right behind me which means she keeps stepping on the back edge of my shoes. Maybe a face plant into cold, light snow is just what I need to wake me up. Could shake this doldrum off like white flakes.
Eunice, Eunice, Eunice. Where are you, Eunice?
(Inside my new fleece pyjamas, I bet. I'm going to look for her there...)

Photos at Araminta and Jason's new house in Atlanta, from our family Christmas on December 28 (delayed by one day since our arrival was delayed by a day) through to Vinnie's dance show on January 1.

Today, I wanted to post photos from our trip to Atlanta, including some fab pics of the boys doing some Wii dancing, but there was a priority today: I had to write a church service.
One of my responsibilities at the newspaper are the church notices and I saw that the River Philip Pastoral Charge was struggling to keep the pulpit supplied, not simply by a minister but by anyone. So, because I wrote for the United Church Observer for ten years and am now a local columnist, I offered my services as a speaker.
What I forgot was that in rural areas, there isn't the crew to support a guest speaker; if you're providing the message, you're picking the hymns and writing all the prayers, too.
Yikes. But I took the challenge anyway because I know how to do this, as rusty as I am, and it's part of the plan. The platform plan. I have things to say, more than can be contained on a blog or on Facebook. It's a sense that's been gurgling around in me for the past few months, since "platform" became a necessity, an obsession, a frantic attempt to create a broader world for my writing and those things that want to be spoken out loud.
It's also a personal growth experience: Verily I say unto you, I suck at speaking extemporaneously. My mother nearly drove off the road from laughing so hard at my account of my last attempt to do so (ever supportive she is). I spent this morning writing my message then I practiced speaking it. I so badly wanted to ditch the notes, just use a guide so that I could be free to speak to the congregation, not read to them. My natural inclination is to walk, to gesture. But in public speaking, I'm not merely rusty, I'm seized up; getting a chance to speak at a small country church is my way of lubricating those hardened skills, of relearning something that I am not particularly good at to begin with.
(There is a great bit in Susan Cain's book on introverts about this, how some introverts simply don't have the ability to speak without notes, without reading. It was liberating; I'm not the only one.)
The good news (no pun intended) is that there is some genetic material to tap into here. As students, both of my parents won awards for their public speaking -- my mother for speaking extemporaneously about magazines; and I have my father's trophy, should take it with me for inspiration -- and three of my great-grandfathers were, according to my mother, great orators. One was a Baptist minister. They were dudes who knew who to talk.
Every great orator must start somewhere so on Sunday morning when I stand up in that small country church way the hell out in Millvale, I shall channel my inner Rev. Mode. With notes.