There's a wool sock on our back porch. It's probably a gift that the cats brought us. I know that Mori really really loves wool to the point where he ruined a brand new cashmere coat a boyfriend bought me by biting a huge hole in it. I ditched the bf and I still have the cat. I guess Mori thought we'd like the wool sock. However it seems to disturb Special K who keeps asking why it's there.

Today I dropped off a box full of books at Bookbuyers, then went to the library and talked to the children's librarians. Neither of them had heard of the New Voices Award, or of Lee & Low Books. Oh, well. I wrote my cover letter today. I also wrote 800 words of The Road to Mandalay. I just wrote some random scenes. I do have the entire novel fleshed out in my head, but I've been stuck on how to make it flow. This way is much more productive.

I've decided I'll aim for 500 words a day. At that rate, I can write 10k (novel length) in 200 days.
Word count for the day: 1050
The Road to Mandalay: 2500. 97500 to go

Last night C talked me out of doing Nanowrimo this year. That's where you write a "novel" in the month of November. Well, it's 50,0000 words, so it's technically a novella. He pointed out to me that now probably wasn't the best time and I could try to do it next year. That satisfied me.

Now some of you are probably thinking I'm insane since you don't know how I find the time to write anyway. And it's a good thing that I'm married to this man who manages to steer away from the ditch. Then I just realised I can have some of the benefits of a nanowrimo right here by blogging about my writing goals and progress.

As I mentioned, I'm writing another children's picture book. It's called Mya Mya Marionette. The deadline for the contest is October 31, so that's the deadline. I'd like to have it done before then so hopefully it gets there before the deluge. I'm shooting for October 15th to have the final draft ready. Just today I finished the second draft. I think I now have all the scenes I want fleshed out and I think the plot, characters and their motivations are clear, at least to me. So now I need to show it to some folks to see if they understand what's going on. It feels short to me, but then I also don't have an incredibly complex amount of information to convey like I did with Greg. So if you want to read it, please let me know.

I've only written two chapters of my novel, The Road to Mandalay which isn't as much as I'd like. And the chapters are short at 1700 words. I need to have at least 2500 words before my writing workshop at the end of October. That's another reason I need to finish up Mya Mya before the deadline.

My nonfiction book on the other hand is 6800 words, so there's progress there and I don't think it's going to be a long book. I also want to write a book proposal and start submitting it before I finish the book. I would actually rather work on my non-fiction book, but the writing workshop isn't about non-fiction.

Oh, I also wrote a 1200 word short science fiction story "Cascade". I'm taking it to the writing workshop.

Well it was certainly helpful to lay this all out here. I do spend a lot of time with my butt in the chair considering that I have two small children, but I wish my output was higher. I'm not sure if that's realistic considering that two of my books are children's picture books, but it would make me feel better. So after I've finished Mya Mya Marionette, I may try a daily word count with being able to borrow/lend within a week. I'll start low at 250 a day. Oh, and I suppose I should write before I blog. Sorry, people. This is over 500 words right here.

Yes, this was very helpful. I do regularly churn out prose here. But here I just write. I don't feel the need to write beautiful tightly crafted prose. I sit butt in chair. I put fingers to keyboard. I think. I type. I do edit some. But I don't have the pile of voices in my head telling me I should write something else. That it's all crap. That I will somehow horribly offend someone because of something I write. That I must censor myself before the words even reach the keyboard.

Instead I know that at least some of you reading this are my friends who know and like me. And if you aren't my friend, at least you read to the end of this. Thanks. So maybe I should pretend I'm blogging. I guess anyone can always read and put down the book. Hrm.

I think a daily word count is the way to go. Thanks nanowrimo and thanks readers. I just made a breakthrough.

I just took off the patch today, because the nausea was getting to the point where I couldn't ignore it and was causing me stress. I don't need stress. On the plus side, I finished my first draft of my children's book for the New Voices Award. I have no clue if they want a story about a Burmese kid, but they're getting one this year.

At Little T CCS OT apt, his OT talked about cutting back to appointments once a month once he learns how to walk, because Little T has "motor planning skills, good cognitive ability and bright eyes." However she did say I should ask to have his speech evaluated, so I can get it a baseline. It's interesting to see how different OTs view Little T. As I blogged the other day, his Stanford OT thinks he lacks motor planning in speech. I tend to agree with the CCS therapist. We'll see. It scares and excites me to see less of CCS. CCS tends to see a lot of kids with cerebal palsy and also needs to save money. We'll see how it goes.

Since taking Topamax, I haven't had vertigo for days. But today I have vertigo and nausea. Joy. I guess I do have migraines or something and it's related to my cycle. I think I'm stressed. Or rather things are going better, so my body is no longer bathed in stress hormones, so it feels worse. I hope that makes sense. I'm not sure how seriously to take my symptoms.

But I feel I must take a moment to pay proper homage to my poor body, which took horrendous abuse almost a year ago. I literally couldn't walk for over six weeks after somehow pushing Little T out. I think it's a minor miracle that I've somehow emerged relatively unscathed. So I veer between not wanting to whine and wanting to make sure that I'm not in fact missing something lurking. When my OB did the ultrasound of my uterus, she mentioned there was fluid under my intestines that might be uncomfortable. Whatever the hell that means. I forgot about it until now.

I also realised that I'm not as good as I thought at identifying when I'm stressed, so I'm writing some of the less obvious signs here

• Forgetting important things like Little T's numerous apts
  
• Feeling doomed
• Crying about "touching moments" on tv for people I don't even care about
  
• Getting frustrated with Special K about things she does all the time like dawdle
  

This too shall pass, I keep telling myself. I get more Buddhist as I get older. The idea of impermanence. I can't hold onto anything.

And so I write. I started writing another children's picture book. I never saw myself as children's picture book writer, but I heard about this contest. I had another idea, so I'm writing another children's picture book. I'm still waiting to hear about my first one.

It turns out this publisher is also a potential publisher for my first book, so that's a good thing if the publisher I submitted the manuscript to doesn't work out. I should have submitted a query letter instead. Ahh, well. Live and learn. I feel I've already learned a lot so far. I'm sure I have a lot more to learn. What an adventure life is!

I sent off my children's picture book. It's the first time I've sent a submission via snail mail. I really love this book. Evidently so do other people. I got some great endorsements. I'm really excited about it. Now I just have to wait and wait and wait to hear back from the publisher. Please wish me luck. My submission "fills a void" "providing a real service to parents everywhere" but it will be in the dreaded slush pile, so I'll need it.

Sorry for the silence. Been working on my writing, specifically my children's book. I got comments that I will put on the jacket cover of the book when it's published. Woo hoo! I say when optimistically, of course. It's almost ready, but I had to buy labels and 9x12 envelopes and format the manuscript, etc. Formatting always takes far more time than you think it should.

I had a friend in college who used to say "Stop the world! I want to get off!" I don't exactly feel that way, but my brain is definitely overloaded.

I just forgot one of Little's T apts. He has a lot of apts, but forgetting one totally is a first for me. I've had some near misses when I remembered minutes before the apt, but never total amnesia before. I'm quite embarassed. I also recognise in some way my brain is overloaded with info, so some of it fell out. Most of them are really good things, but I have a background anxiety that I could get personal bad news. Little T's relapse happened just after we had a joyous Xmas.

So here's a partial brain dump of what's on my mind:

• Potty training Special K - I have a background process, as a geeky ex-boyfriend would say, that tracks when Special K last peed, so we can avoid accidents. Though lately she asks "Can I have a diaper?" I put her on the potty and she performs.



• My brother's wedding on Labour Day - I'm a bridesmaid. I've never been a bridesmaid before. I've never had a good female friend get married with bridesmaids who are friends. I tend to make friends with either folks who are already married, have tons of sisters, or she and/or her SO aren't the marrying kind. I'm worried I'll forget something or somehow inadvertently offend someone.
  
  My dad called me many times over the past couple days about his wedding speech. I did give it some thought since my dad gave a wonderful speech at my wedding. But all I could think of was "Don't say anything embarrassing. Say nice specific things and anecedotes about my brother and his fiancee and what they bring to each other." C had a much better tip "Tell how [the fiancee] became part of the family."



• My children's book - Things are really coming along and I'm really excited about it and the responses I've been getting. But I got a comment that led me to revise it a tiny bit again. So I need to think about it again. I'm almost ready to submit it.



• Little T's eating - He should get more food in him over a longer period of time. He's okay for now, but he's getting bigger and therefore needs more food and we've reached the limit of what he can tolerate at night. So today I started giving him bolus feeds while he sleeps during the day. It's not yet a habit, so I need to keep thinking about it.



• Little T's yeast infection on his arm - I need to track how often it's aired v.s. wrapped.



• My finger - My left ring finger's still in a splint from when I thwacked it against myself. I can't really write. I also need to remember not to wash my entire left hand, but instead the non-splinted fingers. I do go to the doctor and the doctor said I bruised the bone, but to get an x-ray just in case. The x-ray was normal.



• Job ping - Out of the blue, I got a job ping that might interest me. I have a phone interview on Friday. It raises all sorts of questions I don't know how to answer yet. We'll see how it goes.



• SEP aka Someone Else's Problems - A few of my friends have serious problems right now. Unfortunately there's not a lot I can do for any of them, but they percolate in the back of my mind.

I'm getting some lovely comments on my first children's picture book. It's amazing to me. Yes I worked really hard on it until I think it's compelling and I'm excited about it. I really think it needs to be published, so it can help children. But I'm delighted someone else feels the same way. However she's now on vacation for 3 weeks. And I don't want to submit it without some good comments. So to use an old fashioned journalistic term, it's held in obeyance. We used to play this game Scoop, which was made in England in the 50's and "typeform in obeyance" was one of the states your article could be in.

I'm sad to say that based on my research, books about "special needs" kids are rather marginalized and there's only one major publisher that has published books like mine. Good news is that being the case, I don't need an agent. Though of course it bothers me it's a one-shot deal. Some folks have said "Why not publish it yourself?"

Two reasons:

1. I’m looking for realistic but warm and humorous illustrations to reassure parents and children and further explain the complex topics and feelings depicted in my book. Illustrations are the essence of any children's book. I don't know any illustrators who have experience with children's books. I don't know that many illustrators period or any professional ones.


2. I don't have the network or money or experience to get this book into every major hospital in the US or to get into libraries and bookstores. For that I need a publisher. If people don't know about it, they can't read it. And my goal is for it to get read.

I'd love to be wrong, but so far I haven't seen anything that tells me different. Please tell if you know differently.

I'm feeling a bit better today. I feel blessed to have the gift of writing. If writing about my difficult journey, my personal truths helps others, it provides some meaning. We can't choose our gifts or our genetics our bodies or our children. It's part of a complete package.

I'm still scared of having my work published, of being exposed, but everything that's happened to me, to Little T shows me that I can handle it. A rejection slip, someone telling me my writing sucks, or worse, that my writing horribly wounded them can't possibly be worse than last week.

So I put together a mockup of my children's book with some photos borrowed from Google images. The publisher will provide photos or illustrations, but the mockup is for folks who are used to reading a children's picture book with pictures.

If you'd like to see the mockup, please send me an email.

Little T might be going home tomorrow! It depends on if the doctors can establish a therapeutic level of antiobiotics tonight. He gets the antibiotics at 1am and then it takes time for the blood results to come through, so we won't know until tomorrow morning. Knowing how these things go, it could easily get pushed back. When he had RSV, every day we were told he'd go home tomorrow, and a week passed before he went home.

He'll go home on IV antibiotics. That means C has to inject antibiotics into his Broviac. It seems a bit intimidating to me, though C has been taking care of his Broviac for months. When Little T went home from the NICU, the doctors were very adamant that all his drugs be given orally at home, even though he had a Broviac back then too. I guess we've graduated to IV and this means we're veterans now. That makes me feel both pleased and sad. Or maybe they're just desperate for beds.

His new ward is a double ward with two doors that has 4 beds. 3 of the beds house babies including T, and a nurses' station is in the middle, so it's quite noisy. I feel sorry for the lone little girl who's stuck with 3 baby boys, but at least yesterday and today she seemed too sick to care. Little T continues to look great. His blood levels have bounced back, so his white blood cell count and platelets are all normal now.

I've just about finished my piece for Brain, Child. It's grown to 3000 words. As with a lot of my writing, it started out dense and intense at 1500 words and has gradually lightened to something more humorous though still dramatic. It's almost done. I'm happy with it I just need my friend Jenny to read it and comment on it.

I also finally finished a first draft of my children's book. I read it to Special K. She sat on my lap the whole time I read it. That's something, because sometimes she wanders off when I read things on the screen. It flows. I can see illustrations in my mind when I read it. But it still isn't done yet. It doesn't have the life in it that my Brain, Child essay does. I guess I need a bit more distance from this latest hospital round. Though being in the hospital was useful for describing the sounds of the NICU.

Youch I just noticed the time. Good night.