Why Do You Write?

What am I working on?

I’m wrapping up (HA ha…sigh) a novel right now. I started it on Nov 3rd during NaNoWriMo. I didn’t write 50,000 words in 30 days. I wrote +75,000.
I’m not bragging. It completely got away from me. It was like being dragged backwards through a hedge by a Great Dane.

I didn’t have it planned out at all.

A summary. “A successful woman writing a torchy historical romance trilogy grows to hate her characters and kills them in the final book. Not everyone is happy with that decision.”

Now the blissful early days of me saying ‘Ooh, a writing contest. That sounds like fun…’ are behind me. And I’m paying for it. Turns out I know how to use the language but I don’t know how to write. There’s something, there must be something, that makes this easier to keep track of, right?

I have to get the ending right. I’ve gotten everyone just where I want them. (It’s like herding cats) The denouement is at hand! But…but…wait a sec. I have another idea. I’d have to re-write whole chapters, sure I would, and introduce another character and it could use some editing, of course. But it could be done! It WILL be done.

Right now, I could end it in 5 pages. Why don’t I just end it? I don’t know….

SO…I decided to put it aside to percolate. Right now I am working on a young adult novel on behalf of my tween niece who is fascinated with all things magical.

It’s very fun to write it but I am not making the same mistake twice. Oh no…not THIS time. I’m going to plot this thing. I’m going to have a list of characters and NO ONE is going to come wandering in and screw up my nice neat plot line. Unless…unless it’s a really great character. And the plot calls for some action. But only then…

How Does My Writing Differ?

This is an easy question for me.

My writing doesn’t differ.

There are a million other writers who struggle everyday to put what gives them joy into whatever language they speak best. Whether it’s a cookbook or a mystery novel or a blog, I’m not different. I struggle to find the sweet spot. I grapple with the intricacies of the english language and walk around swearing and staring out the window and drinking too much. Sometimes I pretend I have a cigarette. God, I miss smoking.

I’m not Tolstoy. I’m not Austen or Cather or Faulkner or Pynchon. I’m not Thomas Hardy or Henry Fielding or Salman Rushdie. No. Because I’m not destined for greatness. The hand of God (or whichever deity you prefer) has not reached down and touched me with genius.

My writing is sometimes about how much the same we are. I write about love, joy, heartache, fear, sickness and the mundanity of the day to day. The stultifying frustration of routine.

Those things, unfortunately, I know about.

So, like millions of other writers, I escape. I do just what I shouldn’t do. I write about what I don’t know. I don’t know what it’s like to experience magic first hand. Unless you’re talking about the guy doing card tricks on the Amtrak to Portland OR. I couldn’t tell you how to behave if you come upon a body in a locked room. Personally, I’d immediately feel as if I were guilty of something. If a tall, dark, handsome stranger gave me a penetrating stare, I’d look over my shoulder to see who was behind me.

So I pretend. I pretend there’s a special place somewhere here on Earth that magic happens.

And I’m there to see it unfold.

Why Do I Write What I Do?

I write what I do because…ha. I just sat there for 15 minutes staring out the window. It’s a good question.

ummm…it’s the only way I can experience magic.

The horrid, boring blender that life dishes out can be slightly mitigated when I write. I know that because other writers have taken me out of my scary, nasty, real cancer life and transported me places I’ve never imagined.

I want to DO THAT. I want to forget this day. I want to pretend I’m well, and young and beautiful.This isn’t MY life, this one with illness and poverty and exhaustion. Fuck it. I want to write the joke that makes you laugh out loud on the subway car. I want to dress beautifully and fall into the rooftop pool and be rescued by a millionaire.

I didn’t know I could write until I started this blog. And at the risk of sounding falsely modest, I can’t really really write. Not like my heroes. On the other hand, I got a bit of a late start. I didn’t try writing until I got sick. I know there ARE a few tricks I wouldn’t mind having up my sleeve. But in a nutshell?

I write to make magic real. To make love real. To make adventure real.

It’s a fantasy. But it’s real to me.

How Does My Writing Process Work?

If there is any method to this madness-or what authors and experienced writers call process- it has escaped me. I believe you need to know what you’re doing to have a process. If I had a process maybe I would be calmer, clearer, more able to look people in the eye without thinking ‘YOU look like the kind of person who squirts whipped cream in the ear of a total stranger.’

And I think that look worries some of those who don’t know me well.

I think of it as a Divine Lightening Bolt from somewhere out in the ether ( I picture this guy).

He occasionally reaches down and fries my circuits. I can’t think of anything but my characters. ‘How did they end up like this? How do I get her out of the raging, storm tossed ocean? Really, Laura?! Someone threw a rock? Seriously? Who fired that shot? Jesus! Everyone STOP IT!’ They fight and argue and quibble and refuse to DO WHAT I WANT! What kind of process is that? I used to think writers who said that were jerks. So, I’m a jerk.

My goal for the new year is to learn a process. It sounds like heaven. No more waking up at 3am and thinking ‘hmmm…if she ran through the woods in a southwesterly direction she’d end up at the cabins. She could HIDE there until….”
and so on.

Please God. Give me a process. And I’m not talking about my hair so don’t get any fancy ideas!

 

This interesting process was begun by the lovely Kate at MaisonBentley. She included in me in this Blog Hop and in return I would LOVE to hear what Nate over at Corvidae in the Fields has to say about his writing.

Since there must be two on this Blog Hop-and I can’t resist….I have to send this Andra Watkins way. She’s published a fantastic novel recently called ‘To Live Forever: An Afterlife Journey of Meriweather Lewis” and she walked 444 miles of the Natchez Trace by herself and is probably busy working on her new novel. But I would love to hear what Andra over at The Accidental Cootchie Mama has to say about her writing.

Little Miss Marker and the Troll

Little Miss Marker. That’s me.

It’s hard not to think about what’s going on inside me. It’s like being on a road and you know, you absolutely know, that there’s a monster, a troll, hiding somewhere. Crunching rocks, spitting, stupid mean, it’s my monster. I can walk slowly or recklessly fast. I can put on the flashlight or walk in the darkness. It doesn’t matter. There’s a monster on the road ahead.

From the Norwegian movie Trollhunter – see it if you can. It’s really good.

I like to think I’m getting better but the fact is that this is a chronic condition. It will never go away. I carry the marker. The fucked up strand of DNA that allowed the beast to incubate. It was the little marker that I lived with all my life. The sign. I lived in ignorance and bliss. Little Miss Marker was there. I didn’t know.

I can see her. Sometimes I picture her so I can destroy her. I can’t ignore the fact of this monster. I know now. She’ll never go away.

Today was so beautiful. The leaves are changing here in the Pacific Northwest. The sky is full of towers of clouds in every shade of soft gray and pale blue, with distant glimpses of white buried deep inside. Grey the colour of the ash of a hot fire. Ponderous moving pillars that tear apart stickily to show a sky that was a blue that isn’t cerulean, it isn’t deep, powder blue, or pink. It’s all that. Hail turned the road white this morning, pinging, then ripping and pounding and, finally, ticking ticking on the car. I drove out of it. It was like an invisible wall. Hail. Then nothing. A dry road ahead. I drove with my windows down, I like that. The feel of the rain and hail blowing into the car. The sound. The wind had picked up and I could feel it, smell it, blowing along the pavement. Sweeps of leaves, the trees were roaring. It sounded like the ocean. A red and gold and green ocean.

And I can’t help thinking that this will all be here next year. But maybe I won’t be. All the things I love will be here and all my past will disappear in a gulp. Some pictures left. Some stories that people tell even though it hurts to remember what happened.
A couple of times, every so often, people will raise a glass and say ‘Here’s to Laura. She was…’ Whatever they’ll say. It doesn’t matter to me. The only thing that matters is ‘was’. She was.

This morning I woke up and I was afraid. I drank tea and read some blogs and answered some emails and made an appointment with the acupuncturist…I stood leaning out my bedroom window, looking at the rain coming down, watching out for the big spider that is living in the corner of the frame. I don’t mind her. She’s just trying to survive. My cat, Mr. Jones, came and sat with me on the window ledge, watching the rain. He was purring. I like the way he smells. He smells like flowers. He doesn’t mind when I bury my face in his fur.

I decided to get out. Drive somewhere. I like driving. I put on Hank Williams and sang along with every track. I know every word to every song. All 24 of them. I went to the Goodwill and bought a sweater and a big plate. We don’t need big plates but I bought it because I liked the fish painted on it. It was only 5$. I went to Sears to pick up a pair of cheap waterproof boots I’d ordered online. They’re too tight but I took them anyway. I don’t know why. I stopped at the outlet grocery store and bought cheese and tin foil. Some organic coconut palm sugar, whatever that is.

Right now I’m sitting in a local dive called Helter Skelter. It’s got a picture of Charles Manson on the marquee and a nicely framed picture of him with the swastika carved into his forehead right inside the door. It’s next to a tattoo parlour. It looks scary but the logo was what made me stop the first time I saw it. I thought ‘They’ve gotta be kidding.’ The owner said the name and the Charles Manson logo keeps out the straight people. The un fun crowd who care about things like that. Ha. He’s right. This is a working class place. Its full of nice blue collar guys. I buy football squares here. Drink a beer with the regulars. Sit and write when I’m alone. Try not to think. Listen to the guys cussing and swearing and laughing about someone almost capsizing their boat last weekend, the problems with the fishing industry, the shipyard and whether it’s hiring, cooking for the kids. Nice, manageable problems. No monsters here.

Except Charlie.

I have to go home. I can’t sit here much longer. The ipad is losing juice and so am I. I like to think I’m going to stay here for a couple or three hours, drinking, talking, writing, but that’s not going to happen. I’m sick. I tire easily. My feet are on fire from neuropathy. I am tired. I have to fight even when I don’t want to. I want peace. Quiet. But I won’t stop fighting. The only thing I have is my rusty bent coat hanger. Like that girl in the movie. Like that post I wrote back when fighting this was easy. I’ve got to get away. Use whatever I can. Escape the monster and run away.

Screw all this. Being afraid of the CT scan, what the blood tests say, whether I’m doing everything I can. I don’t want to admit that even changing the sheets on my bed tires me out. Work is harder than I thought it was going to be. The whole year is shot. This time last year I was so sick. We were moving. It was a nightmare. At least I thought it was. I was wrong though. That wasn’t the nightmare…it was just gathering steam.

Fuck.

Happy Labor Day!

Today was a day to finish painting the new hen house. It’s Labor Day so why not labor, right?

I slapped two coats on it this morning, varnished the inside and took off to the dog beach with Bella and Otis for some dog time.

Both dogs had a good time, and I enjoyed my down time, too.

Now, my only thought is should I put bacon on the burgers or will I end up, as usual, giving it to the pups!

Happy Labor Day everyone!

My Love is Killing Me

‘The Water Lilies’
Monet

I just wanted to see the sights. Just wanted to do something. Just something normal.

Walk around. See a city. Plan my day.

With me there is, I admit, a certain desperation when I do this.
A conscious tenacity. A refusal to admit it might be too much. That I pushed too hard today. But I HAD to.

I can’t help it. I have to see it. I know San Francisco isn’t going anywhere and neither am I…but…I have to see it. It’s my favorite city in the world. I grew up in California. We came here for crazy weekends in my 20’s. I lived here in 1967-The Summer of Love, baby! I learned to throw a frisbee in Golden Gate Park, I can’t tell you how much I love this city.

If you’d seen what I had laid out in front of me. What a delicious fantastic brilliant choice. The America’s Cup is still on. I could sit and listen to the drum circle at Hippie Hill in Golden Gate Park. The San Francisco Botanical Gardens, The Musee Mechanique. The Ansel Adams Museum. I could go to Little Italy, Japan Town, the Tenderloin, Castro, Mission, Drive the Golden Gate, visit Napa and Sonoma, head south to Monterey…do so much, if only I had the stamina. If I could do it…I couldn’t. I just can’t do it. So I picked the ONE thing I love the best.

I went to The Legion of Honor

13th century all the way to modern art.

Picasso

Modigliani

El Greco

Bouguereau’s ‘The Broken Pitcher’

The suicide of Lucretia

Which is so beautiful that I had to serch out a photo on line to do it justice…

Joos Von Cleve ‘The Suicide of Lucretia’

Bugatti ‘s ‘Baboon’

I just couldn’t tell you, I can’t show you…you have to see it.

Obviously I couldn’t photograph any of my favorites properly. The colours GLOW! Centuries pass and they still reach out and grab your eyes.

I’m all worn out and PISSED OFF! Why did I take my one vacation in years and years when I am still so messed up? Why didn’t I wait? Why didn’t I wait until I could really see my lovely beautiful San Francisco?

Why? Because its what you do when you’re in love. You rush off half cocked and eager. Just to show your love. San Francisco…you’re killing me, baby.

But I STILL love you!

Sometimes I Think I Am the Cliff

I forgot my cane.

Don’t you hate it when you get somewhere and you realize you’ve forgotten something. I think, in my head, I thought I wouldn’t need it. Really, it’s a positive thing.

It’s hard to walk without it. I feel as if I might tip over. It’s more for balance than anything. So here I am in downtown Orinda sitting under a very lovely tree but sort of, kind of, unable to walk around.

This is a nice town, Orinda. I’m on a real live vacation. Even if I just sit a lot. But sitting? It’s not something I’m given to. The hardest part of my sickness has been being locked into a position of weakness. Mobility is strength and sitting is so anticlimactic. I can only observe.

So here I sit and wonder. Who am I? What a question to ask, so late in life. It’s something I’ve asked more often since…well, that day. January 11th.

I sometimes think that I am what I observe. ‘I observe myself observing what I observe.’ Nothing more. Is it so bad?

Sometimes I think I am like a rock that has chipped off of the cliff wall that is my mother. A scattered fragment, that’s what we all are, her sons and daughters.

So I sit here, lame, broken pieces badly put together. Not enough glue or not the right kind. Pieces of me, sitting there waiting to be put back in the correct spot. The correct way. Observing my failures, my triumphs. Some days it feels right and other days…I am just a piece of something that has more meaning than I can see. At least right now.

I’m like a deadly progression that has become more of a parade. More or less. So I sit here under this tree with my aching feet and my clinging to a cliff face balance, trying to fit myself back in. Join the parade. Stop the deadly progression. Wave a flag, but not that kind of flag. The kind that’s red. Not the kind that signals danger. No, my flag is just a flag. It says ‘I’m here. Come back, don’t leave me. Wait for me. I’m coming, too.’

I’m like the bull. I don’t know why I charge. I don’t. I just do it. I’m charging at everything that scares me. Even if its a leaf, a cloud, the moon…things that shouldn’t scare me. But I don’t want to miss them. If I go, will I miss them? Will I know? When will the fear stop? When will I know? It’s okay to sit. It’s not my last summer. It’s not my last anything.

That’s what I say to myself.

I’m am the cliff face now. I am the cliff. I cannot be broken, not completely broken.

The Americas Cup!

I can’t believe I’m really here!

My brother drove me right to Pier 23 and dropped me off. I wanted to go by myself because I am very slow on my feet and I have to sit a lot. I didn’t want to have to think about anything but the race. Not about bathroom breaks or who is hungry or where we’ll stand…no. I’ve been surrounded my well wishers and loving family for months and this day I just wanted to be for me. Be Little Miss Independent again. It’s a big thing for me. My brother totally got it.

I went to have a Bloody Mary and sit a moment to savor the rush of the race going crowd.

It was just as I’d imagined. Huge ocean going private yachts.

People from all over the world, speaking 20 different languages.

The crowd gave the Italian supporters a big cheer when the flag went by.

The race was on! It gave me shivers to see them sweep past me and disappear into the fog. We all hoped the fog would burn off before the 1pm race but it didn’t. Still, it was light enough that they didn’t call the race off. We watched from the pier as they vanished into the mist. I had goose bumps!

The turn was almost under the Golden Gate Bridge, which was miles away, but no one left their places, it got quiet as we all stood there, waiting to see which boat came out of the fog and raced towards the next turn, way way out in the Bay. It was the New Zealand boat, the UAE, first by quite a large margin. It made the turn near Alcatraz and began to race towards the next turn. I was cheering as loud as the next person and I didn’t even have a favorite. Yet.

It was awe inspiring to watch them flash out of the fog (sorry about the poor pictures but it was hard to stand still long enough to take them!)

Here’s one of me, waiting to see who was going to appear for the final turn and the win. I was right in front of the buoy to mark the winner!

You can barely see them, but it was UAE in the front making the turn towards us! You should have heard the cheers from the Kiwi’s!

Here are the winners making their victory sail past the crowd!

It was great to see them so close under sail.

The Louis Vuitton yacht going out to greet the winners!

Both yachts after the race.

I was pretty tired out, just from standing so long. I didn’t hang out too long afterwards. Got to the BART station and back to my brothers house. I had a swim and we had a bbq.

What a great day!

Being Kind to Strangers-Day 2

My brother didn’t recognize me.

A long time ago, what feels like a long time ago, last April, I said when my treatment was over I was going to come visit. He lives near San Francisco. He has a swimming pool and an extra guest room. So I waited until I was sure I had some strength and I got a ticket on a Virgin Airlines seat sale. $79 each way. I was so excited. My first vacation since 2005! My first plane trip since 2002.

It was time.

Boy did I hate it. I had to use a cane and a wheelchair to navigate the airport. I had to use a face mask and be pushed to my gate. The flight was delayed by just under 2 hours, it was packed at the gate and there were no seats. I wandered past a person with their belonging piled on a seat and they just ignored me. So I had to ask if I could sit there. The person just picked up all their things and left. That meant that me and myself alone could sit there because no one else wanted to sit by me.

I couldn’t lift my bag over my head and the lady on the phone said to just ask an attendant for help. When I asked if I could get help, the lady at the gate said she would check it and took it away from me. And I’d packed so carefully to accommodate the convenience of not having to check a bag. Darn it! Narrow seats were the least of it, so I decided day 2 of ‘Be Kind to Strangers Day’ was going to be dedicated to not being grumpy to strangers, too.

So I smiled my way through having to say good bye to Mom and Liza miles before the gate and kissed their worried faces, smiled through security checks and the shoe thing, smiled at the x-ray and the guns and crowds at gate B11 and smiled and smiled and smiled by myself sitting with a face mask and gloves and, finally, sunglasses so no one would see me crying.

I smiled at my book I wasn’t reading. I smiled at the man who put his seat back abruptly and smashed my knees. I smiled at the poor fellow next to me who looked like a professional fighter and was far far too big for his seat.

I got to the airport and found a wheelchair waiting for me (thank you Virgin Airlines) and I got wheeled to baggage claim. I collected my carryon bag and sat down to wait. And wait. For quite awhile I waited.

Then I saw my brother walk right by me. Looking. But he wasn’t looking for this person. Laura wasn’t sick. Laura had hair and wasn’t in a wheelchair with a face mask. He was looking for ME. For Laura.

I love my brother. He knew about my illness. He knew what to expect. But still, I’m so glad there is someone in this world that remembers me. Laura. Plain old Laura.
I love that he will walk through an airport looking for ME. The real ME!!! That’s who he was looking for.

And so am I.

Be Kind to Strangers: Day One

It’s all good!

http://www.gofundme.com/3yfbqg

Today was my Be Kind to a Stranger day.

It’s a lot harder than you think. Especially when you look like I do. I look like I have cancer and I have people pushing and shoving to get a chance to be helpful. To be nice to me. To let me in front of them in the supermarket line up.

It got to be a comedy routine.

At Safeway, The bag boy carried my groceries out and wouldn’t even let me take the one with the bread in it.

Another girl who worked there saw me staring into the refrigerated case with weird juice in it. The kind that looks horrible and sounds worse. Kombucha Mushroom Mango Life Restoring Organic Reawaken Revitalize juice with chia seeds. Or something brown. A bad brown. And the label assures you that there is NO SUGAR. It’s ALL Green. It has Benefits. I don’t even have benefits anymore so I was thinking ‘hmmm….’ She offered to get me a case of it from the back. In an effort to be kind, I bought one. Fortunately, they were out of the Kombuca Mushroom flavor….but it’s on order.

Then there was the tiny little lady, about 93, who saw me getting laundry soap and offered to put it in the cart for me. She looked pretty good, though. I almost let her.

I went for a stagger along Winslow Way, our main drag, all 3 blocks of it, and couldn’t find a single person to be kind to. Everyone was perfectly happy and didn’t seem to need any kindness. I sat and drank a weird juice, the chia seed one, which was actually pretty good (97% Kambocha) but had a strange texture, like tiny little balls of jello were in it.

I had nothing to do now that my grocery shopping was done. No one was crying or even looking pensive. Lots of healthy, happy people walking in the sun. Cute kids all over the place eating ice cream cones and not even dropping them so I could get them another one. I briefly considered taking one off a kid and throwing it on the pavement so I could, but decided against it.

I went to the local espresso joint and got mobbed by people trying to be nice to me. Offering me their table, newspaper, water, a ride on a unicorn…what the hell?! I just wanted to help them. Be nice to them. Then it hit me. Oh…

I WAS being nice to them. By being there and letting them be nice to me. It was a strange feeling. Again. It’s not easy letting people help you. It’s a lot easier to help than to be helped. So I took the high road. I took the newspaper too.

http://www.gofundme.com/3yfbqg

Trying to be kind…

New Eyes

The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. — Marcel Proust

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This quote really made me think.

I’ve moved around a lot in my time. No fear. Never that. I had confidence in myself. I knew I’d find work, make friends, move into the cutest little apartment, get the most fun room mates, discover the best things about my new hometown.

It was a voyage of discovery. One I loved.

Then I found a place I wanted to call Home. Real home. Grow old, live there forever with my friends, learn the back roads and the short cuts. Who were the best cooks in town. Who to call when your car was making a funny rattling noise. I wanted to be certain that when that rattling noise that I ignored for weeks finally left me stranded on the highway as dark was coming on, that someone would stop. They’d recognize my car and stop and give me a lift. Someone would drive out and use a beer can and some wire to jerryrig my exhaust back together so I could drive my car again. Girls night out was Friday, karaoke and wing night was Tuesday. I could drive the hell out of winter roads, I knew how to drive on a frozen lake. I did doughnuts and blasted my music. Confidence. Certainty.

I didn’t want to ever leave.

My sister told me that it didn’t matter where I was, I was always going to carry myself with me. Happy or sad.

I didn’t care what she said. I wanted to go. Again. I wanted to be close to my Mom. I wanted to forget the man I’d left. This time it was an escape, though.

And given whats happened over the past few years, I’m glad I escaped. If I’d stayed I would have died on that bathroom floor. I lived alone 50 miles from the nearest hospital. It was winter. January. The roads would have been bad. No speeding ambulance would have come to save me. No emergency surgery the next day. I would have died.

And when my brother in law died in that crash in 2008 that damaged my sister, my beautiful sister, and almost killed his best friend, if I were still there, I wouldn’t have been able to take her away from all those painful memories that were killing her. I was able to say ‘Look where I live. It’s so beautiful. Mom is here. Our brother is here. Family. You aren’t better alone. We are here for you.’

We love each other. We miss Shawn. He loved her so much.

I had to experience such loss to see through my new eyes.

I lost my brother in law. I lost husband. I lost my health. I lost my Fridays and my Tuesdays out with the girls. I lost frozen lakes, hot springs in the snow, fishing and 4 wheel driving. I lost a whole community. I lost my place. It was good I left. It was also bad.

But it’s not too late. It’s never too late.

I never dreamed for a moment that I could find another kind of community here. One that is just as real. Just as kind. Just as fun. Just as eye opening as the one I’d left behind.

Someday, someday I’ll go back there. And I’ll take you with me. Because you are also my community. You live here in my heart. That’s what I like to think. I’ll go home and find my place there again. It’s home because that community I talked about, they’re here for me now. Almost a 1000 miles away, they are here, like you are, donating, sharing my page, encouraging me, praying for me. And the next time…I’ll know what I have. I’ll take my new eyes and I’ll use them.

Canal Flats

I’ll be home someday.

If you can donate to help me get this life back on track, to face my hurdles and start over without a mountain of debt and no hair I’d be so very grateful.

http://www.gofundme.com/3yfbqg

I Did It

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The ‘real’ albeit temporary, me.

I finally had to do it. I had to ask.

A prayer from the heart is gratefully accepted as well.

I’m sorry to say that the past couple of treatments have left me worse than ever BUT…I’m still standing. I’m still here and I’m still fighting.

I am going to go on vacation. Really. I’m going to my brothers house and I’m going to shake this feeling off and I’m going to have fun. See my nieces and nephew.

Try to start to live again. I signed up for a program called go fund me to help me pay my bills. I have lost quite a lot of flexibility financially. What a funny way to put it. I’m SO broke and now, me and the dogs and the cat all eat the same thing. Rice, hamburger and carrots all cooked until edible. Very tasty. I can’t buy dog food with my food stamps so they get to eat people food. The cat is NOT thrilled.

Trying to find support is not easy for me or any sick person. There are a lot of organizations out there, but they are inundated with requests. My voice is not heard.

When I feel a little better I will write a longer post.

Love reading yours.

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