Change. . .

—From CB—

Mostly, I check Facebook every day. It’s different, and the people are mostly alive. I miss humans, but I’m shy. And then last night I had a dream.

No throbbing adventures or righteous assassinations, just a changed POV. For many years, I’ve kept a journal: sometimes including a startlement, like getting invited to dinner or finishing a book, sometimes just “Usual,” or “Gym and coffee, writing, etc.” When I get behind, forgetfulness kicks in. I recall the practice of Louis XVI, who felt the duty to keep a kingly journal but tended toward the minimal: the day the Bastille fell, he wrote “Rien.” Nothing.

That has changed for me. Or it’s about to change. Or we’ll see if it does.

The old phrase, Book of Shadows, occurred to me in my sleep. I’ve always heard that as a Wiccan cliche, some compendium containing some fruity verse to make the weather behave. But now I saw it as something more.

All my books are books of shadows, including the ones I haven’t written. They don’t clear up the weather or make it rain. But each day writes its words on the wall, including misspellings, and forgetting the day means to be like never having lived it. If my job were dropping atomic bombs, I’d remember, like it or not. But that hasn’t been on the worklist lately. Probably, finishing “Chemo” is all that’s there.

Until they tuck me away from the sun, I’ll cast my shadow. No question I’m fading. I’m losing balance, groping for names, forgetting to signal a turn. But still I stand in the sun until it’s time, and write my book of shadows.

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