cozy green nest

Somewhere in our woods, there’s a squirrel curled up right now in a nest made super-cozy by an olive-green knit headband. The squirrel worked that headband round and round with its clever little hands, after it dragged it all the way up the tree, unsnagging it from bark and little twigs on the way. And then the squirrel turned it this way, that way, until the big floppy flower part came to rest at just the right angle for squirrel’s little head, big eyes closed tight and dreaming.

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the frog

I have not been feeling myself lately. I think this feeling started last week, but got stronger and stronger in the last couple of days. Truth is, too, that I definitely have a cold today, so that’s part of it. But I just feel so weird. I was so clear for a while there, so solid, and now suddenly I feel unmoored, unhitched from me, like I’m Peter Pan’s shadow stuck in a drawer somewhere, needing to be stitched back on.

And you know why?

Because I haven’t been writing (enough) every morning.

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perfectionism is poison

credit:Lori MyersWhat I'm about to share is far from an original thought. Certainly I'm not the first, nor will I be the last or even the best, to say that perfectionism is a scourge. That the sooner we put off perfectionism, the better.

I think what I've been learning, daily, for a couple of years now is that

Perfectionism is poison.

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life since NaNo

Who knew things would be so dull after the big push, the month-long all-consuming National Novel Writing Month? Yes, I wrote 50,000 words, so glad about that, but also:

I have post-NaNo blues.

And also a lot more time to read.

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the Magical Neighborhood of Pain Relief

When you have chronic pain and you need drugs, you learn early on that there’s a balance to be struck between complaining just enough and demanding. 

"Wait," my doctor said. "You mean you haven’t been to the pain clinic in Neurology yet?”

“No,” I answered. “I called earlier today and they told me I needed to see you about the two momentary losses of vision this afternoon and for a referral. That’s why I’m here now.”

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