Good morning ...

I love Saturday mornings, especially when I haven't had one at home in a few weeks. I'm finally over my head cold, and relishing the ability to smell again.

For breakfast, I christened my new Slytherin-green made-in-England Chatsford teapot (a Christmas gift from Meckhead) with the loose leaf vanilla tea she bought me. It smells wonderful and tastes delightful.

I made maple syrup breakfast sausage this morning, because when I went to the grocery yesterday they were out of regular sausage. I didn't find the flavor very different, but - on returning to my apartment after running to the post office, bank, convenience store and dry cleaners - discovered that it smelled of maple syrup and not greasy meat. That's something.

While running errands Friday night, I discovered The Body Shop has not (as I'd feared) discontinued one of its hair products: beeswax Texturizing Wax. I haven't used it since attending last summer's Parliament of the World's Religions in Barcelona, Spain. When I opened the jar and took a sniff, I was immediately transported to my Mediterranean Seaside hotel, and flooded with memories of that life-changing week.

Speaking of which, one of the new employees at my office used to work for the Parliament. It was a treat to stand at the coffee pot and speak to him, yesterday, about last summer's gathering.

In other news, I finally have the email address for simpatico guy.

Goldfish

I spent the last three days helping my grandparents move off the family farm and into an assisted-living residence.

It was a rather quick decision ... Grandpa came down with pneumonia right after Christmas, went into the hospital, then into rehabilitation. Grandma stayed with my parents while my grandpa recovered. While he was away, my parents realized my grandma couldn't live by herself. So collaboratively they decided that assisted living would be the next step.

When I arrived Friday night, racing the snowstorm into Milwaukee, I found them and their furniture moved into the equivalent of a very luxurious dormitory room. It had a big window, a big bathroom, a refrigerator, microwave, sink, a modest closet and some cabinets.

Grandma and Grandpa actually occupy two of these units, directly across the hall from each other. They've made one into a sitting area, and the other into a room for sleeping.

When I arrived, Grandma was sitting in one of their dining-room chairs in the middle of the living space. Grandpa was in the brown armchair.

They looked completely out of context. I'm used to seeing them against the warm colors and dark wood trim of the farmhouse, with twenty-four acres and a dilapidated barn as a backdrop. Here, they were like cutouts against apartment-wall white. There they were, careworn and storied, inhabiting a room without a soul, without history.

Sure, there was the curio topped the decorative plate depicting the Last Supper, the cedar chest my grandpa bought my grandma for $35 while they were dating, and the dining room table I've never before seen without a tablecloth. But it wasn't the same.

I sat on the floor and popped medicine out of individual pillow-packs into a prescription container. Mom, who was putting pills into the days-of-the-week dispenser, asked Grandpa what time of day he takes his anti-depressants. I didn't know he was taking anti-depressants.

We talked about their goldfish. At the farmhouse, Grandma and Grandpa have ten goldfish in a tank on the kitchen counter, descendents of the goldfish that lived in the pond in my parents' back yard a few summers ago. None have names, except the one who is missing a tail. He's "Stubby," and swims by twisting his whole body back and forth.

My parents asked whether I'd like to care for one of Grandma and Grandpa's goldfish.

"Sure," I said. "I'll take it to work. I'll have a goldfish on my desk like C.J. Cregg from The West Wing. I'll name it 'Pica' and ask my colleagues to feed it while I'm out of town. Can it live over a weekend without food?"

They say goldfish adapt to the size of their environment. A goldfish in a fish bowl will stay small, but one in a pond will grow larger.

My grandparents are like goldfish.

When they lived on the farm, they moved from room to room, albeit, Grandma moved a little slowly with her dodgy hip, and Grandpa's emphysema meant he had to store up energy to get from the kitchen to the bedroom or bathroom. He breathes with the help of an oxygen condenser, and we used to joke about finding Grandpa by following his tail. Grandma used to navigate the steep cellar stairs to get food out of the freezer, used to walk down the driveway to get the mail and the newspaper.

They moved slowly, there. But they fit, and they knew every corner of that house.

This weekend, I watched Grandpa struggle to cross the hall. I helped Grandma find the bathroom. My mom and I wheeled them both down to check their mailbox. We showed them the dining room.

We hung family pictures and paintings in the living room and the bedroom. We hung my great-grandmother's prayer plaque over Grandma's bed. We hung the lady bug tiles my cousin gave my Grandma for Christmas over her bureau.

We stocked the fridge, brought them yellow-and-red tulips in a vase and assembled a baker's rack for the kitchen.

When we left, they seemed a little less out-of-context.

We'll have to plan an estate sale. We'll have to sell the farm.

We have plans to sneak Stubby in as their pet. I have plans to reserve the party room (which has a stove) and bake molasses cookies with Grandma and Grandpa.

I'm convinced the Buddhists have this end-of-life stuff better figured than those of us from other religions. The idea that attachment causes suffering always rings true to me at these times of transition. I'm attached to the farm. When I need a contemplative moment, it's the wide expanse of tilled soil I imagine. I'm attached to the idea of my grandparents as independent, maybe (if I'm honest) invincible. I'm attached to the smell of pesticide in the apple orchard. I'm attached to the illusion of Grandma baking pies, early in the morning.

I'm attached. I'm suffering.

On writing …

(Tonight's workout accompaniment: Franz Ferdinand)

As many of you know, I've started working with a beta-reader on my fan fiction. I received her critiques of my first chapter yesterday.

She had a lot of comments and suggestions for me. Granted, I asked for it. I told her that, while a professional journalist and a poet, this is my first stab at fiction. I told her to help me work on my narrative voice.

Moreover, she was gentle in her delivery of suggested changes and invited comments or questions about her editing. I'm lucky to be working with her, and amazed that she's willing to do this kind of mentorship gratis.

The process had me thinking, however, about the absolutely masochistic nature of writers: We pour our heart and soul into something, turn it over to someone else, invite criticism and then thank our editors for finding our errors and telling us where we might improve.

Is there another profession that requires such grueling self-deprecation? Besides, perhaps, starting one's military service in boot camp?

I'm tired of the ’80s …

(This morning's workout accompaniment: Pine Valley Cosmonauts The Executioner's Last Songs Vol. 3)

Can we please revisit punk (I missed it the first time) or grunge (I still have my flannels ...)?

Woo hoo!

I just heard from my new beta-reader at www.sugarquill.net. She said: "Congratulations! You've been Sorted as a Sugar Quill author!"

Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay!

The last time I was this excited was when I received my acceptance letter to the Missouri School of Journalism.

I will let you all know when my first chapter is available online with a link from this page.

On New Year's Eve ...

I met Kella's identical twin, both physically and personality-wise.

It was almost like celebrating with Kella herself, except her twin is a seminarian and teacher in Chicago.