It was a gray day. Clouds unabated. I had intended to go to Cup for my morning cappuccino. Instead, I picked up a few nonessentials at Canyon Market, collected a macchiato on the way out the door and headed back up the hill to home. Jane arrived, fresh from a walk with our dog Poppy, moments later. I sat outside gazing into my coffee, wondering at the meaning of it all and allowing the feeble morning sun to heat my back. Poppy wandered outside too exhausted, doubtless to sprawl somewhere on the warm redwood deck. 

I’d had enough, backed up and heard the dog scramble to her feet. But not all that effectively. She began licking her leg. Clearly, I had gotten a little too close with my reversing wheelchair. And I didn’t think much of it until later in the day, when Poppy was still licking the leg. Turns out, I had pinched part of a foreleg with a small rear wheel. Jane begin calling pet emergency rooms. And today, a $1400 visit to the veterinarian later, our beloved doggy is back, plastic cone around her head, bandage on the leg. And me feeling very bad.

My first thought: try to be a little less self-absorbed. I put this tendency down, in part, to never having had kids. My thoughts and obsessions can take up a lot of mental space. Sometimes too much. And we have a dog who loves us, wants to be close to us at all times…explaining her propensity to lie down behind my wheelchair wherever I am. No need to brood on this, but worth taking note.

What I am brooding on, of course, is getting published. Or not. And this is no place for mental obsession. This is the place for action. Pull the finger out, as they say in Britain, and get to pre-publication work. That’s life. At 11 years of age I was pre-pube. At 75, I am pre-pub. Two painful stages that one can grow out of, presumably. We’ll see. I’m not the only person who has tried, and failed, then tried again, to find a publisher.

Meanwhile, I think that a daily rant about the COVID-19 phenomenon is extremely good for my health. I just sent a friend an earlier incoherent diatribe published by McSweeney’s several months ago. The piece says nothing very profound, but it says it very angrily and forcefully, which is that people just get the stupid shots. Wear a mask, generally act like there’s an epidemic afoot. 

And I can kvetch about that other thing that is lamentable but completely out of anyone’s control: California rainfall. It has stopped. Quite abruptly. After stormy weather, we seem to be back into stormy drought. The skies turn gray, but not gray enough. My mood darkens, and so does the water deficit. At such moments, Jane assures me, there is nothing to do but enjoy what there is. Which is lots of “good weather”…soon to be followed by a summer of water restrictions but, perhaps, not quite so many fires. Although I’m not so sure about that, either.

And what to look forward to? Something. Tomorrow. The stuff of songs.