Thank you Dr. Moon!

In July, I went to see a neurologist about my migraines with the insane hope that he might help me. I have had migraines for years, at least 15 years and by this time I was taking migraine meds at least once a week and sometimes more. (Many of these walks I take, the trips to the zoo, etc. would not have happened because many days I was simply worn out from the meds or the pain) Sometimes I required so many meds that I had to beg the pharmacist to give me more than my premium #1 healthcare would allow and they had to fool the insurance company into allowing it (Yay! American health insurance!!!!--yup, sarcasm). A low point was when I actually broke down crying when the pharmacist told me it would be $200 dollars for 6 pills if I needed them right then (which I did). It's lovely crying at the grocery store. 

Four months later, I have not been bedridden with one...  So in a final homage to my migraines I will simply post a migraine... (at least I hope they are finally really gone!) 

My head oscillates on my neck- each ending point producing a tiny jolt in the back of my skull. I lean back onto the bench and close my eyes, hoping to ease the ache that is settling in behind my eyes.  My interiors bob.  The pinprick of a thousand needles interferes with the faces of the chorus before me. Lunging into my bag I seek relief before I’m overwhelmed with misery, swallowing like it’s my final gulp of water before succumbing to death, then adjust back and neck so that they align or at least lie in conjunction to each other. My eyelids close out of self-preservation rather than lingering weariness. If I caught it in time…

Time… metronomic and precise, calculated and mathematical. Suddenly suspended. Interminable. Endless. Only slogging on to the next fraction with the reluctance of a child returning home for punishment.  

Tick, the nerve throbbing behind my eye, 

tock, veins pulse behind my left nostril, 

tick, ache at the top of the left eyeball, 

tock, light ray penetrating cornea, 

tick, head seems to expand- hostile takeover of the senses, 

tock.

ti—i-ck…

Sounds, colors and dimensions rotate, echo, and slide off one another into a kaleidoscopic reality that defies attempts to focus. Lights and angling surfaces lose focus, an antagonizing back-drop to my universe of frayed nerves, tumbling intestines and pulsing eyeballs.

I need to get home...

Before Winter came

November's nip has set in. The first snow has fallen and I with my lack of appreciation for the chill in the wind and the first flakes fluttering in the air look longingly backwards to the namesakes of the Romans emperors and no less so that period of days named in celebration of Augustus's defeat of Queen Cleopatra of Egypt. Because even though I love Christmas (as it will soon become apparent to all) I have simply always hated the cold and the older I get, the less tolerance I have for the Jack the Frosty One. So, in nostalgia for those warmer days, let us meander to a warmer time...    

Thirty minutes drive gets me to the foot of the Rocky Mountains

A mother's gift

This story was told to me incompletely by my grandmother (the picture of the doll is not a real likeness but I image that it might have been like it- simple and possibly faceless or just button eyes) but when she was in her 70s perhaps even 80s it was still something she spoke of. I have weaved a story together that may be fiction but contains the realities of how she was raised and what her life was like. I hope you enjoy it...  

"Thou must the doll leave, Evelyn. Thou art too old for puppets now and thou must a bag hold" The man's workworn hand rested heavily on the young girl's shoulder while he eagle-eyed his family's earthly belongings a few feet away.      

"It was a gift from Mama," Beseeching eyes sought the employed eyes well above her own. She train whistles his sleeve in a last ditch effort to drag his gaze down to meet her silent petition. "Please, please, please, let me take her... please, please, papa, pleeeease..." the prayer flutters through the air, an unnoticed gnat flying past his head and off into the clouds. 

The straight-as-an-arrow-back moves purposefully away from his youngest child, pleased that the difficulty of the extra bag was solved without extra charges. He musters his sons and offers the play-by-play of what to do with the luggage, the whos, whats, and wheres given out in short order. The command to move is indicated with a nod and the boys jostle off, tossing bags like balls, laughing and calling to each other, a center ring show for the passengers waiting to board as the stern patriarch overseas, his disapproving glare an attempt to remind them they are God's Chosen not wild bucks fresh from the plains but he remains silent allowing for boyish exuberance- time enough for them to grow up. 

The child stands watching her older brothers, a silent stream flowing down her cheeks. She strangles a sob in her throat, fearful of the sound that will erupt, afraid of drawing attention to her grief. She clings to the doll fiercely as though it were the blurred edges of memory, the fading image of her mother's grip on hers. She plants her feet and studies the platform for possible escape. A cool gust of wind blows through the gates, recalling the bitter Saskatchewan winter they'd just survived. She thrust the doll under her hand-me-down coat in defiant possession of the remnant of her childhood... of her mother. 

The train's deafening call for boarding finally sounds and her brothers and father wave that the rest of the family should follow them aboard where the bags will be divvied up and they will travel for days to the new place in America. The hustle and bustle is at a peak and the young girl is hopeful that her deceit will work. She heads up the stair and buries her head, snuggling her bulky middle so that it is less noticeable. 

"Evelyn," the woman's hand landed on her shoulder as if descending of the heavens. "Thine father hath told thee that the doll must be left. Give it to me." 

"Please Miss... I mean, Mother. He won't notice. I'll hide Miss Margaret and he'll never see her again. Please, can't I just... she was a gift, my moth---" the words faded into murmured nothingness as the child understood futility, the eternal "No" in her eyes. 

"Give it to me." The doll was dislodged from her hiding place next to the child's heart and taken into the woman's lanky fingers. The woman stepped quickly down the steps and glanced around for a quick place to dispose of the ragged toy and spotting nothing close by, she dropped the doll to the ground next to the wheels of the train.

Come one, come all! Christmas Story writing contest!!!

I was going to wait until the day after Thanksgiving but I wanted to give everyone enough time to think about ideas so...

I am hosting a Christmas Story Writing Blogfest!

We'll do this NaWriBloMo style-- tell me you want to participate and I'll link to your blog in my list of blogs. Then on the day you post it I'll feature your blog here, tell people about you, bloddity, bloddity. The judges will be all the participants who will then give their vote here on this blog by voting a 1-5 on the day you are featured (it seems like the easiest way to do it and have a standard way to count the winner) and whoever winds up with the most points wins the prize!  And the prize will be... (drum roll please!!! where is Vanna White when you need her?)
a set of an old TV show that I still make for fans called Key West. It's a great show for writers and if you want to know more about it, then you can see more about it on my other blog KeyWestTV .

So good luck and good writing!