"This was just like planting a seed and watering it. "
11/16/13 Sat 9:30 am

The Wrimoer felt as though she were getting an earlier start on her writing this morning. She thought she was actually starting later, but then realized that was not true. She had thought she was earlier because she had managed to do a few other things than usually before settling down to the writing. When she looked through her previous days' notes she realized she was getting an earllier start in several ways. It did not just feel like she was getting an earlier start. She really was getting an earlier start. She had even completed her full cycle of walking 2000 steps.

The walking in the house for exercise had fallen by the wayside a bit  as a routine recently as she had gotten walking done just by having to get to the library on foot, or get to the bank on foot. Today she might have to walk somewhere, but she had also gotten the indoor walking done. The Wrimoer felt good about that.

She wondered was this one of the after effects that came from doing this daily writing for the Nanowrimo project? She suspected it was so. There had been effects like this the first time she had done it. That was one of the reasons it had been such a let down when she had finished the project. She had never been able to think up a replacement for the project that had the same qualities about it.

It had to be done on a daily basis, or as close to it as possible. There had to be a goal or something specific one had to reach for during each session. It had to be doable on a near daily basis. It was not something that could be put off too long because it was just not physically possible to catch up. One knew that so well from experience that the motivation to keep up was intrinsic, was internalized.

So why could one not just make up a challenge for oneself and do it? Was it that one had to make the challenge one set for one's self public? She was not convinced about this.

She suspected the whole issue was also connected with writing. She had not wanted to continue with writing about following the diarist/journal writer with no name, not even a noun description given to her. The writing that time had gone too far without a name or a noun put to use to designate the writer - it had been too long without that the Wrimoer had had to continue that way. When the challenge had been completed, she did not know what format to continue writing in.

As with this time, the Wrimoer had been posting each session to a blog she had set up just for the project. She was not willing to just continue by writing in her own voice. Perhaps that was what made the whole project a unique experience for her. She had decided that this time she would have to replace this practice somehow. She did not know how, but she knew it was very important for her to find something to replace it. She could keep posting to a blog or the same blog. Her idea this day had been to set up a new blog and provide links to the two Nanowrimo efforts blogs. That way they would not be completely lost, in limbo land.

She knew she would have to bite the bullet one of these days and share the blog somehow. Just how she wanted to do that was yet unknown.

The timer for her first writing section had been set. She felt that it was already early on for feeling she had nothing more to say, She hoped she would be able to maintain this manner of writing in the possible 15 days that were left for completing the challenge. The day before had been the halfway mark. She had accomplished the word quota for the halfway mark. There was still plenty of writing that needed to be done. It felt different to know that what needed to be spat out was now less than the amount that had already been spat out. She had illusions of thinking she could sit there and keep up the writing pace for double the quota
10:00 am alarm

amount and be finished with the challenge very early. What wishful thinking that was. There were all those other Wrimoers who were way ahead in their word count. She thought she had seen some of them say that they were doing this because they knew there would be days later on in which they would not be able to write. But at least one person had set a much higher goal to complete for the challenge.

The Wrimoer's favorite story was of one Wrimoer who wrote in saying they were quite far behind and fearing there was no hope of getting caught up. Others had seen that the person could catch up. The knew from their own experience that it was possible to write the amount needed. Everyone gave encouragement,. Within just a few days, that Wrimoer had gotten caught up. That was uplifting to read.

The other story was of concern because that person was in almost dire circumstance. One could only sit from the distance and know this person was out there in their dire circumstance, that could well have been of their own making, but that did not matter. One still worried about the person. One also knew that it was that person's private mission/battle/challenge to deal with. Here was a story that took place in real life. Some people just had to have their lives be the story. Was there anything really wrong with that? That was just as much a creative act as the stories taking place on the writing spaces. This person had even mentioned that they were at least writing their story in their head.

The Wrimoer's mother had told her how she was writing her stories in her head? She spoke of questioning whether to use this word or that word. The wrimoer had been amazed to hear this. She could not imagine being able to write in this way - to carry it on in her head and remember it by the wording to the point of being able to edit the wording. She could not imagine being able to do this without actually seeing it.

It was that way with her art too. She never really pictured what she was going to draw or paint, or even what she wanted to. She did not have that kind of vision, she thought. Or perhaps she just had never practiced it. It was a form of committing something to memory. Perhaps she did these things but did not realize she was doing them.

10:15 am

She had taken to writing down the time every time she hit an impasse where she felt she had run out of anything to write. She would feel edgy, look at the time, perhaps sigh about it, and then for want of anything else to write, would write down the time. Then she could write a little about that and hopefully something else would pop into her mind that she could write about.

There had been something she had heard in the news that morning that she had wanted to write about. Now it escaped her - there she thought it came back.

It was a story about a couple where the wife was in the early stages of Alzheimer's. The news program had been following them for three years, and were visiting them for this piece to see how they had been coping. The Wrimoer had been intrigued with the story because of the difference between the attituds of the two people. They themselves spoke of that attitude difference. They were very aware of it. The Wrimoer suspected that that attitude difference could well mean all the difference in the world, but she doubted that anyone was yet studying this aspect. The wife, or rather the couple, were involved in an Alzheimer's outreach program. This program was something to get information out to others, to help them. The wife seemed to be very active and proactive in it. And she knew she was. She spoke of her attitude being that one could not let this 'problem' stop them from living as normal a life as possible. She said specifically that she chose to remain positive about it. That that was a difference between herself and her husband. The husband on the other hand spoke of having to stay realistic about , that there was no cure, and that someone had to be realistic about it. It pained him greatly to watch how some of the others in the group were losing their abilities. One fellow in the group had tried to speak up about the things he wanted the group to do. One heard him in the radio piece as he simply could not find the words to express his thought. It was so much like what the Wrimoer had heard in programs or movies about stutterers. She wondered if it was not more about being suddenly on the spot and that one just froze up not being able to say anything. It had more to do with the tension and panic of the situation than that one could not remember. And if one paid it too much mind, one could easily get stuck there. One had to talk around it, move on. Whatever it

10:30 am alarm

... was would return on its own terms. This was the nature of memory and creativity.

Her own biggest example of this was the experience many years ago in Girl Scouts. It must have been at the beginning of a school year session. For some reason they had all had to stand in a circle and introduce themselves. Or they were sitting in a circle and had to stand up to introduce themselves. She did not remember whether or not it had crossed her mind "What if I could not remember my name when it is my turn?!", but that had been what had happened. It came her turn and suddenly her mind blanked or she started to blurt out the name of the person who had just said their name. It had been a silly and funny occurrence. Yes, she had been able to remember her name after a moment. She had laughed about it. But ever since then, she was reluctant to have to introduce anyone else to anybody because she felt she would draw a blank when the person to be introduced was waiting for their name to be said. These were usually people she knew very well, which would make the situation all that much more awkward. Her way around it was to just tell people to introduce themselves. It was tricky to do this without bringing the focus back on oneself over why one could not provide the introduction oneself.

On the other hand with her art classes, the Wrimoer loved showing off her remembering of names. The groups were generally so good humored over having to be put through these performances. But this was also where and how she practiced this skill. It was a skill to practice. It needed to be reinforced by reviewing the attendance sheets or by the emails one sent out to the groups whereby one was seeing their names as one entered the addresses into the message.

Some names stuck out more than others. She never knew if it was the actual name or the individual that prompted easy memory.

The couple in the radio piece served as a great positive example with the battle of Alzheimers. The Wrimoer saw that the wife, the diagnosed one, was someone who took charge of her life. She was not about to be a victim. She was intent on working with others and saw things in terms of how much she still could do. She saw what needed doing and felt she could do something towards that effort. In this case her particular mission was that word needed to be gotten out to the African American community. Apparently this demographic was  having a higher incidence of Alzheimers. The wife felt they were underserved in the battle against it, or in what could be done to ease the living with it. That was what the wife was focusing on. It struck the Wrimoer, that this woman could well outlive her husband. She had heard how negative he was.

The Wrimoer had been suspecting all along that there were  effects on one's life, on any situation, in taking a 'victim' stance instead of protaganist stance, being someone who was in charge. One need not be in charge of others, but one needed to be in charge of one's self and one's life. She had only to look around her and see the faces and the postures of people that expressed how little they felt in charge of themselves. They seemed to believe the stories that others gave them without questioning whether they were true or not. It seemed that so few people accepted their own authority in any given situation.

10:55 am

The Wrimoer hoped she would get to hear more about this couple over time. It sounded to her like this woman was off to a good start. It had been three years since she had been diagnosed, and she did not sound like she was doing badly at all.

There were a few other inspirational aging stories she had loved over the years, not all on the radio. Here where she lived there was the example of the patriarch of the family where she would be going for Thanksgiving. He was now over 100 years old. She thought her was about to have his 102 birthday

11:00 alarm

A couple years ago she had popped in to visit him to ask him if he could participate in certain celebration. She thought she had better pop in rather than calling him. He was busy doing some heavy yard work - trimming the hedge with a big heavy power hedge trimmer. He had teased her and told her she could do some of the work for him. He had always been a tease, a serious leg puller. His granddaughter had advised her that she not let him give her an answer to her request right off the bat because once he said 'No' it meant No. That was that, one never got another chance. She had messed up on that and had asked her question right away. He had said no right away. Since he had told her she could only have one half hour to visit with him, that her ride should return for her then, they went in the house to chat.


They had jumped around all sorts of topics, so much so that she had never gotten to make an account of all the things he had told her. One of the things that so interested her was that he had long ago given up doing things like addressing groups or being interviewed for the local news. He told her he had become a 'recluse'. That was not that true.

He made rounds in which he visited people.

11:09 a bluejay is calling -
11:12 a - resume

she thought. Whether they were people who were in the hospital, or people from his church community who were going through a housebound spell, she was not sure of. Had they even discussed that? She just remembered he had done that in the past. She had heard that about him.

He told of his main routines or rituals. He did a certain walk every day no matter what the weather. This was also to a certain spot where he had had a kind of healing or spiritual experience many many years ago. He also spent time in study on a daily basis - a reading and contemplation period. In the summer he had three large yards or fields to keep mowed. He always had a lot of work that he did. He did not stop. Neither did it concern him that some day the end would come. She believed he had never handed his own authority over to any other person or institution.

The Wrimoer wished there were more examples like him around. They did not need to be that age to be fine examples of people aging in all their full forces. She could not accept seeing people shrivelling up taking on the role of 'getting old' and therefore one was to old to change, one was too old to learn, one could not help things, one had to accept that these were the things that happened to one as one aged. She did not believe that. She felt that things happened to people for other reasons, but not because they were aging. She knew it was possible to get stronger no matter how old one was. She thought the problems were more a result of a loss of spirit or zest. One could call it a kind of depression. What did life have in store for one if one believed it was all downhill from here? One needed to always have challenges to pit one's self against. Not to 'get stronger' but to test and grow one's boundaries - to expand one's boundaries. That was just the real nature of things she believed.

Now she knew the timer would be ringing in a moment. She was reluctant to look for anything else to write on with that little time left. As she wrote her last few words she hoped she would not get another thought that would set her off and running again. The she would have to set the timer again.

A few minutes before she had had to break away because the bluejay had come hollering at the window. They had not done that for quite awhile now. She made an exception and broke her

11:30a (ok 10 min. alarm)

writing session for just a few minutes to go give the hollering bluejay some peanuts. She wanted to give him the message that if he called he would get a response. She grabbed a handful of peanuts and the dish of leftover dry cat food that she was throwing out to the birds daily. The bluejay seemed to see her from his position in the fir tree outside. He was a young scrawny one. She nodded to him and showed the dish with food on it. She went to the window from which she always threw the food. A sibling joined him out there, and then three crows. She greeted them and then tossed out the food. And returned immediately to her writing, though she returned with a few peanuts for herself to eat.

And now there was nothing left to say. She had set the timer for another 10 minutes. At least she did not do it for another half hour. What happened to wanting to get this writing all out of the way and over with? That would mean piling  extra time on every writing session. Would not this be an obvious occasion for writing extra? Here she had had such a head start.

She was balking though. She also knew that if she did the writing too much on one day, she felt oversaturated with the effort the next day. If there had been too much on one

11:40 am alarm

... day, one needed distance from it the next day. It could be that much harder to get started on it the next day. One had to watch that one was not forcing a thing upon one's self. The challenge or the effort had to stay in a spirit of fun. She needed to remember always, that this was not something she had to do. She was doing it for her own pleasure. her own fulflillment.

She had gone through periods after her day's writing where she felt as if her time had been spent in a wasted way. She had almost felt depressed over having spent time doing the writing. She had not even decided yet whether or not she was enjoying it. Aaahh - that was part of what Hemingway's advice had been. One was not to concern one's self with whether one enjoyed a thing or not. One was to observe a circumstance, to observe one's own reactions and motivations that came up. To study them in effect. This was all part of learning. To see what gave rise to what. It was especially important in writing. He did not even seem to think it was that important that one be writing what one was observing. To him it was just as important to simply be studying what was actually going on. Or so she thought. That was what she was remembering.

It had occurred to the Wrimoer that that Wrimoer with the dire circumstances could be material for a story itself. Had she said this already? She knew that Wrimoer could write her story, but was she going to? Here was something she herself could write. She had thought that she could at least write up some ideas for it, and some questions.

How that Wrimoer landed in the circumstances of first living in a tent, and then living in a van at her mother's house, along with her boyfriend.

How had that Wrimoer broken her hand, which made it too hard for her to write by hand?

How had she come to have a bad foot by which it was too hard to walk to the library which was far away? Had she said she had broken her foot or just that she had a bad foot?

She had managed to get to the library at least to exchange piles of books for new reading materials. How did she get to the library at those times?

Did she just have a very short time at the library so that no writing could really take place there?

She only had a few minutes a day in which to use her mother's phone and check in with social media.

The Wrimoer wondered what she would or could do in the same circumstances. All along she had wanted to brainstorm a bunch of ideas of what one could do to mitigate the circumstances. It seemed that Wrimoer had written or created herself into a corner. She thought it was important to perform some creative act no matter how small on a daily basis. It should also be something that one could see grow over time. It would not take that long to start to see the effort grow.

This was just like planting a seed and watering it. As one tended that little seed and waited for it to push through the ground one did so without knowing when it would show its face. One had to wait until it did it on its own time. But one had to keep watering it while also making sure not to give it too much water. One could not stand watching it all day. One just checked it daily to see that the conditions were ok. Usually one had planted several seeds, not just one. In every batch of seeds, only some would come through. That was just the way of things. And then came the day when the green started to show. Every day it was a bit more. And so it went. From the little seedlings came strong stalks and leaves, and finally buds that turned to flowers and in many cases also fruits and vegetables.

12:10 pm timer rings - now she would stop for the day. She had finished her thoughts  this time instead of being in the middle of an idea when the timer rang
12:11 pm
4034 words ??!! 160 minutes @ 25 wpm Wow!