"I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear." Joan Didion

I've been a bit lax/busy this week, drat those vacations that throw you off schedule for a week or so! Upon my return to real life, I was told by several bloggers I'd been given this award. So let me start by thanking you, whoever the two or three of you are. Then let me apologize for not being entirely clear about who the two or three of you are. I'm not completely clear about a lot of things lately. Did I pay the mortgage? Do we have groceries without fur in our fridge? Do I have to be anywhere today? I'm struggling with clear lately. One person left me a comment, telling me she'd given me an award, but I could not open her homepage, no matter how I tried.

Then - getting to the heart of it. I'm flattered. Really. That my crazy, funny, sometimes almost organized a bit, sometimes completely disheveled, difficult, blessed, full to the brim life, produces writing that makes any of you think - well that's simply amazing. What youre' thinking - that might be an entirely different matter! My daughter frequently writes about poop, I seem to write about intimate issues or nudity. You, as a group, are obviously tolerant and easily entertained.

I am not handing out this award to anyone. First of all, I have something like 75 bloggers in my bloglines, that's a guess. I don't read anyone who doesn't make me think, or cry, or laugh, or try harder to be more kind, gracious, loving, giving, thankful, or less judgmental, critical, self-centered, clueless than I am. I have favorites but they are more than five. You know if I read you, because I sometimes get my act together enough to leave you a comment, rather than just doing a fly-by. Blogging blesses me. My blogging birthday is sometime this month, so let's just call it today, and let me tell you it adds something to my life, a lot to my life. Writing to you, reading what you have to say. I'm thankful for that. It has also rubbed off several of the letters on my keyboard, and I'm not completely sure what that says since I bought my computer right after I started blogging...

A few notes here - I haven't written anything lately to make anyone think, but I will, soon. Promise. I've got so much going through this little pea-sized brain, and have been jotting down notes in my journal, on napkins, those little carboard things in magazines, and plan to spit it all out next week. What I've been thinking about. It's big, in my little life. I hope it'll encourage, challenge, convict some of you out there. If I'm feeling it, thinking about it, whatever "it" is, soon as I post about it, I'm always amazed to see how many of you are thinking the same thing, feeling the same way. It must be either the barometric pressure or God, that works that way. I'm going with God, since barometric pressure has to do with Science and I don't really do Science. Just ask Mr. what's his name, my Science teacher in High School.

Second, on a serious note, my 94 year old mother-in-law is critically ill. She's been hospitalized 3 times in 3 weeks, just home today from her latest stay. She has congetive heart failure, has slown down over the past few years in ways that were easy to ignore if they hurt your heart, but now has started having problems with her lungs filling with fluid, and her pulse racing to counteract that. She has always seemed like a grandmother to me, being 20 years older than my own mother. I love her dearly. I've only made her mad twice, we've never "had words", and I call her Mom to show her how I feel about her. She has been grandmother to our three children, the kind who baked cookies, planted a garden, made her own soap, cooked all the time, read books, wore an apron, and was just a bit plump, as grandmothers of that type are supposed to be. Our three adult children are trying to come to terms with the fact that her life is nearing it's end. So I ask for your prayers for my husband, and the rest of our family as the next days, weeks or months could be very difficult. She's in Colorado, 1500 miles away, and my husband is flying out next weekend for a quick visit with her while she's still able to visit. Then we're off to Texas to celebrate the event of the year. So a busy time for us. Just the stuff that makes up a life, but somedays it feels like a lot.

So that's what I'm thinking about. Thanks for a great first year of blogging, thanks for an award saying you are blessed by what I put out here, and thanks for your prayers, ahead of time. One thing I've learned this year, you bloggers are the best. I can count on you to be there. xooxxo

Labels: Girl Talk