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If given the choice I would have liked today to be full of cheerful energy, the kind of day when long term plans feel possible and I’m excited to reach for them. Instead I had a day which was pretty much opposite to that. It was a chop wood, carry water day, when I focus only on the small task in front of me. I only consider what comes next when each task is completed. This is kind of sad, because some of the tasks were things which would make me happy on an ordinary day. On a day like this it is important to note the small beautiful things. The clear view all the way across the valley to the western mountains, a huge improvement over the inversion smog. Bright blue sky. A lit candle dripping wax in interesting ways.

Tomorrow will be a different day. Hopefully it will be a day closer to what I would have liked for today.

The fog was thick enough that billboards seemed to appear out of it as brightly lit screens only to evaporate again after we’d moved onward through the whiteness. Kiki and I kept exclaiming at the visual effects of the fog, much to Howard’s annoyance because he was driving and for a split second those exclamations seemed to be cries of alarm. “Stop doing that.” he told us firmly. So I bit my tongue and watched the world turned strange and magical by the miracle of water vapor in the air.

Fog is not a common occurrence in Utah, but then neither is the freezing rain we had yesterday morning that coated every surface with ice so that college students were skating their way to class and the emergency rooms were full of accident victims. “Please just stay home. The ER is full.” tweeted a nurse. The police department made a similar plea asking people to please, please slow down. All that icy rain landed on top of a thick layer of snow which has lingered for weeks with no chance to melt. Then today the world thawed. Snow turned to slush. Ice turned to water. But the ground was too frozen to absorb it and all of the drainage routes were blocked by slush. The water pooled and evaporated filling the air with moisture. With nightfall it became fog.

I grew up in the California Bay Area. We got fog so thick you couldn’t see across the street. Fog always makes me think of San Francisco and the Altamont Pass with all of it’s windmills turned ghostly by fog. I remember sitting in the back seat while my dad tried to navigate home through a fog which only revealed a few feet in front of our van. All of us kids watched the road as hard as Dad did, as if the extra eyes could make more things clear. I stretched high in my seat to see, at the very limit of my seatbelt. searching as hard as I could to keep track of those white dotted lines which indicated that we were still on the road. Signs ghosted by us and we read those too, watching for our exit. It was a long time in coming, that exit.

Sometimes in my life I can see far ahead and I trundle along happily confident in my trip. Other times life is foggy. Lately some things are foggy while others are clear. It is a sort of swirling mist which obscures and clears at random. When things are clear I pick a path, when they are not, I keep going on that path until I find enough clarity to pick again. I wish life fog felt as mysterious and beautiful as weather fog.

We arrived home safely and retreated indoors, only occasionally peering out at the fog from behind glass. The air dropped below freezing, we’ll have frost sculptures for trees in the morning. I’ll have to remember to take my camera out and capture them. Soon the fog will be gone.

Fifteen years ago we moved into this house and I picked a family practice doctor near us. All was well. The doctor was good and his PA was fantastic. We went there for many years. Three years ago the fantastic PA died of pancreatic cancer and our family mourned for his loss, but we still continued to go to the same doctor’s office. Two years ago I called to schedule an appointment for one of my kids and was told I’d have to pay cash because they had a paperwork snafu with the insurance providers. It didn’t cost that much more, I was in a hurry, and finding another doctor for a single appointment seemed like lots of extra work. Then I arrived and was seen by the new PA. The doctor was nowhere around. When I asked, the receptionist said that he was away for a couple of months on a doctors without borders thing. Something didn’t feel right. I wondered about the legality of the PA seeing patients without a doctor in the office. I also wondered what sort of “paperwork snafu” would cause all the insurance providers to drop a doctor at once. When another appointment was necessary two months later, I called. They were still mid-snafu and the doctor was still out. I hung up and picked a different doctor. My new doctor is great. There are several doctors in the same office and I like all of them. So onward we went, though I did feel some sadness for abandoning the family doctor we’d had since my kids were babies.

Today I learned from a neighbor (who also went to that same doctor) exactly what happened. Two years ago his license was suspended because of an inappropriate relationship with a female patient. He wasn’t on a trip for doctors without borders, he was at in-patient facility to treat pornography addiction. When I google his name I can read the public record notes of his disciplinary hearings. He had another doctor checking his work, he had to have chaperons when he met with female patients, he was questioned about how he prescribed some strong pain medications. There was even discussion of how he should handle “flirty” female patients. The conclusion I’ve come to is that my family was never at risk. He really was a good doctor for many years, but then his friend and business partner died. Things changed and for awhile he was not behaving as doctors should. I was right to trust my instincts and jump ship. The disciplinary hearing notes show that he’s putting things back together and trying to learn from the experience. I wish him well. I hope he succeeds. But I’m going to keep going to the new doctors, Thanks.

In my googling I found this resource: It is a list of Utah doctors who have had disciplinary action taken against them. My former doctor is on this list.

“Mr. P says that in ten years of teaching Science Fiction, this is the first time he’s had a class with more girls than boys.” Kiki told me as I drove her home from school. I had been startled to learn that a high school had a Science Fiction Literature class at all, but it does, and Kiki signed up for it. Apparently so did many other girls. Kiki has geeky girl friends who will agonize with her over Avatar The Last Airbender or the latest video game story. I had male friends who would talk these things, but no girls. None of the girls I knew really got it. Or at least they didn’t seem to.

In high school I was in full geek girl stealth mode. I borrowed Esprit sweatshirts from my friends, had slumber parties, went to dances. I enjoyed all of this things, but there was a whole list of things that I also enjoyed only at home. I watched Star Trek and Doctor Who. I played Dungeons and Dragons with my siblings. I read fantasy books. I wonder now how many other geek girls there were out there, also stealthed.

My daughter’s geek girl experience has been different. She and her friends have video game parties. She wears a Halo hat to school. She carried a bag embroidered with dice and the words “Bag of Holding” and got compliments for it instead of ridicule. She has never been teased for any of these things. She never felt like she had to hide these things in order to successfully navigate the social scene at school. It is possible that she is braver than I was, more geeky. However I also think there has been a significant social shift which makes it okay for girls to like these things. This shift is evidenced by the Sci Fi Lit class which now has more girls than boys when ten years ago it was exclusively male.

I’m glad for my daughters that this is so.

I went to bed exhausted last night and woke up cranky this morning. I’ve tried to keep it under wraps, not spit it randomly at the other people in my house, but I have not always succeeded. Things got done, but without focus or a feeling of accomplishment. The evidence I have of competence is the fact that I made dinner, the kids did some chores, the stack of pages ready for editing when I have brain enough, and a patch of “Castle Stone” colored paint in the middle of a dirty white wall. I’ve now passed the point where calling off the project is just as complicated as completing it. So painting is in my future. But hopefully on a day when I can feel less cranky.

Farewell to 2012, you were too complicated to adequately summarize. Though I can’t complain, because while traveling through 2012 was often unpleasant, I like where I am now in comparison to where I was a year ago. The same is true for Howard and the kids. Hard is not necessarily bad. And there is no denying that 2012 had many good things too.

I have no plans for major resolutions or course corrections. I have enough goals in progress that I don’t need to add any more. Instead I’ll just leave with this last sunset of 2012 while snow falls quietly at my house.

Some times I get up early in the morning after having trouble sleeping. Then I do all the laundry, assemble a dozen packages, drive them to the post office, go to the gym, go to the bank, do the accounting, drive my daughter to two different craft stores in search of the perfect mosaic beads, and go to the bank again. After all that I sit down to write, but the words I can think of sound tiresome. So instead I sit down to re-watch episodes of Community.

Today was a day like that.

A day like yesterday teaches me the importance of fluffy fiction. Sometimes the world is hard, dark, unfair, and full of grief. This is when people need to have a break and go somewhere else. I saw The Hobbit yesterday. I snuggled my kids and watched the Wizard of Oz. They’d never seen it before and were surprised that they knew most of the songs and stories without ever having seen the film. In the evening Howard and I watched Men in Black III. Good guys win. Bad guys lose. Small and ordinary things are able to keep great evil at bay. Gandalf gives a speech about it. For the space of the film the world is how we all would like it to be instead of being massively unfair. Escape is temporary, yet the reprieve is valuable. It gives me space to believe and hope again. I am so grateful to the creators of happy fiction.

In whatever order they fall out of my head.

***

It was eleven pm on Wednesday. I was sitting next to Kiki at the kitchen table helping her color in pictures for a school project. She had written, drawn, and lettered an entire picture book as a gift for a kindergartener. It was an assignment for her creative writing class, but also a Christmas service. Kiki had been working on the book for more than a week, ending in that last marathon day where every hour had been spent on the book. All that remained was to color in the line drawings with colored pencils. Earlier in the day Kiki had lamented the lack of a real life flood-fill. I became that tool for her. She would hand me a colored pencil and point me to a section of drawing, then I would color. Kiki would work on the opposite page, filling in the details. It was soothing, like being back in Kindergarten myself. Sliding the pencil across the pages I did not have to worry about all the dozens of to-do items from the day. They were mostly complete, this project was the last thing at the very end of the day. I could let them all go, which was good since my mind was too tired to retain much. So I colored, as instructed, until the book was done.

***

Mid-day on Wednesday I looked down at my nephew–a knee-high pre-verbal human being with big grey eyes. More than once during the day as he toddled around I would look at him and say “You need words little one.” Except he didn’t really. He was very fluent in point and grunt. We all became trained very quickly even with his mother not there to translate. He hung pretty close to me while his three siblings were downstairs watching a show. My own kids were off at school, except for Kiki who had stayed home sick. She was using her sick day to hammer through her picture book project. I’d been assured that this littlest visitor would nap while his mom was gone at her job interview. He had different ideas, most of which revolved around eating my crackers. The early stages of human development are fascinating, because their minds are so open to new stimuli without having any experience to teach wisdom. This little fellow was likely to fall off of chairs or pull things onto his head because he’d not yet learned caution or consequence. So I watched him closely, following him around my kitchen until he was so full of crackers that a nap was acceptable. Then I ran downstairs to work on shipping.

***

The phone rang again. I am the advancement coordinator for our local scout troop. It is not a job I particularly wanted, I do it as a service. When I accepted the job everyone who explained it to me was anxious to assure me that it was not too complicated and that I’d be able to handle it. I listened to all the information and did not understand why they were worried. It really did sound simple to me. And it is, because it is mostly data entry and data tracking. Except, on the night before a court of honor, I have three different scout masters calling me with last minute changes and “can we hurry and get this recorded so the scout can have a badge tonight?” Also I have to go down to the scout office to acquire all the badges and assemble them for the boys. This can take awhile when there are forty merit badges involved. All the paperwork, expense, and effort makes me think thoughts about cost benefit ratios. I understand that the point is to encourage/reward boys while getting them to learn through challenge and new experiences. I attend the court of honor. I watch my own son get his badges. I watch the faces of the scout leaders and the boys. That is when I know that for our troop, the program succeeds in getting adults to connect with boys. All the stress, paperwork, requirements, and strictures succeed in corralling adults into spending time with growing young men. That is where the success lies.

***

After the last picture on the last page was colored, I sent Kiki to bed. It was midnight. I took the book downstairs and stood at my computer to scan the pages. I pressed the book down hard on the sheet of glass to make sure that the image would have no extraneous gray. Page by page her work was preserved in digital form so that I could print out a copy for Kiki to keep. The original would be gifted to a little girl. My feet were warm as I stood, because my friend Mary had responded to a random tweet of mine by sending me the gift of a foot warming pad. I felt the warmth as I rested my head against the lid of the scanner while a bar of light passed across it. My eyes closed and I waited for the sound of the scanner bar returning to rest. Then I turned the page and scanned again.

***

I crawled into bed at 1 am on Thursday morning, carefully setting my alarm for 6:30. I forgot to turn it on. Yet my body snapped awake at 6:50 anyway, trained by months of rolling out of bed at that time. I am often tired in the mornings, but I knew I was facing the sort of day where I was only going to be able to retain a single thought at a time. So I made a list: These are things which matter today. At that early hour I knew anything which was not on the list would not happen that day. The list was my lifeline. Every time I was adrift in fatigue I would look at it and know what I was supposed to do. Help Patch with Homework. Kids off to school. Mail packages. I followed the tasks like a trail of breadcrumbs through the fog. Sleep was on the list. It was the task I was afraid to tackle because I knew that once begun it would want to consume at least three hours. The sleep was necessary but full of not-quite-remembered dreams about things to do.

***

I forgot to put “Pick up kids from school” on the list. I put “Kiki and Link to youth activity” on there. That occurred during the same time frame when I usually pick up kids. I was already twenty minutes late for the pick up when looking at a clock triggered me to remember that I was responsible for retrieving children. They were quite cheerful about it, busy playing a fun game. It is the sort of brain frazzled thing which I usually berate myself for, but berating myself is not on the list, so I can’t muster enough energy to do it.

***

On Wednesday my sister sent me a story. “Help. I need a quick critique.” It was on my list that Thursday morning, so I sat down in the quiet and read. I made notations as I read, thoughts and story structure flowing through my mind as I reacted to the words. I wished that I was not so tired, because while my critique had moments of acuteness, mostly it felt fuzzy. I love it when I can give a highly focused critique.

***

I try to do things by the rules. It saves a lot of trouble, particularly if someone checks up on something I’ve done and I’m able to spread out a paper trail of exactly how I’ve done everything correctly. However, having somebody run that check turns on the portion of my brain which obsesses about possible mistakes and then considers all possible ways to prevent those future possible mistakes. Then I have to figure out how to turn that portion of my brain off again.

***

The kitty curls up into a ball on the chair in my office. It is not the chair I use for work. She has her own chair at Kiki’s art desk. It used to be my chair. Now it is hers. Her habits change depending on the weather. In winter she sleeps indoors for much of the day and wants to pounce on things in the night time hours. I looked at her as I walked past. She was curled into a ball so tight that she resembled a tribble. I slid my hand over her fur. She made a little chirrup noise to acknowledge me, but did not open her eyes. Later she fished a six sided die out from under the edge of the couch and batted it around the room for her own amusement.

***

“My chest hurts. It’s been hurting all day.” Link said. It was not the first time I’d heard the complaint. I don’t like hearing such things because it puts me in the diagnosis zone where I have to decide what merits a trip to the doctor and what does not. Most things don’t. I fed Link some antacids and the problem went away. Time to put some antacids into Link’s backpack. Also, he might want to reconsider his diet which is made primarily of hot dogs and pizza.

***

Gleek needed a sarcophagus for the chicken that they are mummifying at school. Fortunately a plastic box was deemed acceptable. Patch needed to look up information and photographs about the Shoshone Indians. Howard found a stainless steel carabiner mug he knew would be perfect for merchandise and needed permission to spend money on new merch. The internet was aflurry with the controversies of the day, different tempests for different circles of acquaintances, each circle certain that their tempest is critically important. I read the tempests. I have opinions. I have friends on both sides of almost any issue I see. I talk about my thoughts with the people who are close to me, but hold my tongue on the internet. Someday there will be an issue where me taking a stand to declare my thoughts is more important than preventing hurt feelings. Today’s issues are not those. Also today I am too tired to explain and defend. Today I just want there to be less conflict.

***

I put the last of the calendars into a cardboard mailer. I was caught up on shipping for the first time since pre-orders opened in early November. I finally have time to consider the organization of Christmas.

***

It is late again and morning will come early.

This was my day of stopping after going all week long. I slept late. I barely participated in food preparations. I ran a couple of errands. I napped. I processed a dozen store orders. I did some dishes. I ate cookies. These are the sum total accomplishments for my day. My plan for the rest of it is to write some words and then go to bed on time.

In all the spaces between the things I did, I was scraping thoughts out of the corners of my brain. They accumulate there when I do not have time to think about them. Many of the accumulated thoughts are random or silly, the kind of thing I would think about for a minute and then forget. But in my rush even those thoughts get stored for later. This morning my head was filled with swirling thoughts and not at all restful. Somewhere during the day the thoughts slowed down, as if they realized that they do not have to frantically attract my attention. They can be quiet and I will still get to them. I like it when I remember how to be quiet.

The weather turned cold today. We’ve been lingering in the fifties, not typical for December. Even when it rained, the air stayed warm–much to Gleek’s dismay. She is ready for snow. I hope that we do not get the twelve foot snowfall that she keeps speaking about wistfully. She has no idea how inconvenient such and epic snowstorm would be. I think a couple of six inch falls would make her happy. She wants to be able to sled down our hill and build a snow fort. I’ve been fine with the warmer weather and rain. I wish I’d been able to take greater advantage of it to get outdoors and finish weeding some of the flower beds, but the time went to other projects. We’ll have to see whether the rest of the winter smiles upon Gleek or upon my gardening intentions.

I just spent thirty minutes reading through the last month of blog entries. No wonder I’m tired.