Sorry, bebe. I have the monopoly on that for the next little while, unless I climb into a bathtub with a fifth of tequila and a razor blade first.

But you're not going to do that, because being constantly summoned back from the afterlife so I could yell at you would probably get tiring.

But yeah, I know. I hope things get better for you, and very soon.

I'll be fine. It's cool.

Did she say when she was likely to send you suggestions? And do you feel the need to flail in the interim?

Yes'm. I just feel so ... needy. And whiny. And ridiculous, but oh well.

Huddle in my corner! Me too!

Did she say when she was likely to send you suggestions?

Very Soon. So, probably by end of next week.

And do you feel the need to flail in the interim?

Mebby. I'm going to try and channel the flailing into writing the next GCS lesson, because, oooh, I really should post a new one.

Huddle in my corner! Me too!

Again, I wish we lived closer to each other. We could go out for coffee and freak out at each other. It would be fun.

and I'm freaking out because I feel that nobody will Read Me Ever Again...that what looked like a beginning was really fluke-a-rama and I might as well twiddle my thumbs as go on with any of the crap I'm working on.

New column up today on "How To Succeed As A Failing Writer: Look! Up in the Sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s SUPERPOET!!!!

Enjoy!

Challenge #123 (the first bite) is now closed.

Challenge #124 is maps.

maps

I adore maps. Where I've been, where I could go. Strange little names, Horse Heaven Hills, Roberts Run, Ninevah. Why were those hills so good for horses? Who was Roberts? What 18th century scholar lived there and had the power to name a town?

I look at the maps in my genealogy files. Two families, less than a mile apart, but the streams show the ridge that lay between them. Much easier to marry people five miles away up the road by the river than to struggle over the hill. If you only know the words, you wonder why neighbors don't talk. You need to know the lay of the land to see the barriers between.

Connie, I loved that last line.

Scars

Mine: The knuckles of four fingers. A circular patch on the back of my hand, from the skingraft . A puckered line where they removed a windshield wiper from my arm. A tender lump from being smacked with a falling cymbal at one of your shows.

Yours: The network on your lower torso from the intestinal surgeries, a highway of lines connecting to the kidney removal stuff on your back. Two on your chest, the lung collapse. Your arms, from the dialysis.

Roadmaps of us, of our individual survival. Making love, your map met mine, and we became the territory.

"maps" spelled backwards is "spam."