New Mantras

Well, I guess isn't a daily blog. Weekly, yeah, that's it.

Here's my Monday Post:

It was a rather sucky week here. And yes, sucky is a word--at least around here it is. It accurately described my week.

My health was sucky, the weather was sucky, finances were sucky...

I had some kind of minor GI bug that gave me a low-grade fever and a case of nausea that rivaled my fourth pregnancy. Fever is not a symptom of pregnancy, and neither is my monthly red-blood cell depletion, so I wasn't worried about it. I just felt lousy. And to put the chocolate-covered cherry on top, it started on Valentine's Day.

The weather, while a massive snowstorm everywhere else, was just rain here. In the middle of an artic freeze, we have one day of 40º weather - the day it was supposed to snow. So, I had to deliver my little one and a dozen double-decker heart-shaped cookies to nursery school while extremely nauseous in the bitter cold pouring down rain. So much for romance.

It took days for me to feel better, but as soon as I did, my cat started getting sick. He's prone to urinary blockage because he's deformed in the genital region. Poor little deformed kitty. He's a sweetheart, but he's costing us a fortune with his convoluted urinary tract. I saw the bill and felt nauseous all over again.

It was this vet bill, and my immense desire not to return to work that led me to seek some new inspirational writing mantras. I found two incredibly motivating quotes. I posted them by my computer because I need constant reminding that LIFE IS SHORT! No, that's not one of the mantras, but it is the truth.

One of my inspirations in the writing world, Marion Dane Bauer, lost her son recently. My heart goes out to her and her family. Peter Dane Bauer was 42 years old. I will be forty in two weeks. Those two things together are unsettling for me. He died of something similar to what my mother died from. What if I only have two years left? Or no years left? We never, ever know.

"A sobering thought: What if, at this very moment, I am living up to my full potential?" - Jane Wagner

"Nothing is as far away as a minute ago." -Jim Bishop

I am off to write, write, and write some more. It is my dream and my passion. I will only have more time to write if I take more time to write. You can quote me on that :)

-PLB

"I do not want to die... until I have faithfully made the most of my talent and cultivated the seed that was placed in me until the last small twig is grown." -Katie Kollwitz