April 28, 2018

Agonizing cramp last night, the huge muscle along the back of the thigh, pain literally unbearable, though one bears it because there is no exit. Anger jostling with agony. You hobble to the kitchen, screaming. You drink it out. God earns his curses as well as his blessings.

Brilliant stainless spring. Had plans which I changed upon seeing the azure air. Dug plots. Planted annuals. Noted that last year’s voluptuous sowing of forget-me-nots bore fruit, and there are almost enough to cover the waste places outside the fence. Talked with my limping neighbor John, who has had at least three of his joints replaced recently. I want to die with all original equipment if I can.

Went to High 5 for coffee, where Act III of Invisible Husbands was handed to me. Blessed a mother and her daughter who were playing “I Spy” and excitedly planning for next year’s entry into first grade. Blessed an ancient couple smiling and going through the line as if visiting a neighborhood café were a pleasure they had neglected for many years, their calm old faces smiling & smiling.

Off in an hour to sing at a brewery. My voice is 85% restored. My knee aches only late at night. Learn to count these things as blessings.

April 27, 2018

Rehearsal less irksome than the week before. B appeared, which I thought was both brave and regrettable. Focused on the good he intends, he doesn’t realize the damage he does.  Still passive-aggressively correcting others, as though no lessons were learned by being epicly wrong.

Joy in feeling my body respond to the new regime. I can’t understand, actually, why it should be working so well.

April 26, 2018

From the North Carolina Literary Review: 

I am pleased to report that final judge Stephanie Powell Watts has selected your story "Corin and Dorinda" for second place in the 2018 Doris Betts Fiction Prize. With your permission, NCLR would like to publish your story in NCLR Online 2019, due out in January. If that is amenable to you, please sign and return the attached publication agreement form. 

We ask you to keep this news of your 2nd place and pending publication confidential until the North Carolina Writers' Network posts the press release, around May 1. We will notify you when the news is public. 

Congratulations! 
Margaret D. Bauer, Editor

“Second Place,” he sighed. It is kind of a peculiar story, so I should be satisfied with that.

Yard Fathers completed my fence while I was gone, and I went this rainy AM and, nevertheless, planted the mulberry Jesse Israel had kept for me, and three roses, and devil’s pokers, and cyclamen for the autumn.  Finished in time for the chill and blessed rain to fallen in torrents upon them all.

Bill Cosby is convicted of rape. Let no man count himself as fortunate until he is in the grave.

April 25, 2018

The Yard Fathers have been working on my new fence for two blustery, bitter wintery days, and so far as I can tell, have completed it. It’s clean and handsome. It’s shorter than the previous one; I will not be protected from the scrutiny of my neighbors on the hill, though I will be from that of people on the street. I liked having three fit young men pass up and down through my yard. I liked their lively little dog, Hank, friendly and curious and aching at each moment for contact and adventure. The yard is a gouged and muddy mess. The cartons of plants which have been piling up on the porch may now be settled. Jesse Israel phoned to say they have a mulberry for me.

During office hours yesterday, G came and talked to me for a long time about art, poetry, and his future. After Irish class, C talked to me a long time about music, art, and his future. In each case I ached with anxiety to say the right thing, hear the thing that was actually meant, to be helpful and understanding and able to aid these young men in steering the right course. I smiled the whole time. I hope they didn’t think I was taking their tribulations lightly; I was merely taking pleasure in their company.

April 24, 2018

Today has been health evaluation day. Over the last few days, sensing myself on the brink of collapse, I’ve tried to change my life. The doctors are not precisely helpful, but useful diagnoses can be cobbled together from bits and pieces that fall out of their mouths. I have decided this: my exhaustion, anemia, itchy skin, excess of phlegm, and dehydration are the result of the drugs which I’ve been taking to calm muscular inflammation. They have damaged my kidneys, throwing my body into crisis mode where it is always trying to make more blood. I stopped all drugs for inflammation and replaced them with cbd oil. It has worked. In three days the muscle cramps have ceased, and for the first time in six months I can talk and sing without elaborate hydration. The pain from arthritis lingers–softened–but the burning sweater of inflammation that used to grip my shoulders is gone. Tylenol remains to me, and I’ll try that on the arthritis tonight.

April 23, 2018

Shakespeare.

I have a deeper voice than most of the guys You Tube puts forward as “the deepest voice in the world.” Some of those Russians beat me. Im what they’re calling an oktavist. I think this is underappreciated.

April 22, 2018

Deep night. Listening to the best rendition of “Summertime”: that of Mahalia Jackson.

A rabbi preached this morning, rather gloriously. DJ and I agreed that he was hot.

Exhausted sleep, four hours after brunch after church. I think I was excising some deep sickness. Woke reborn.