Parakeets

A common house pet, the parakeet is actually any number of varieties of small to medium-sized parrots. Although predominately native to Australia, the bird is also found in Africa, Asia and South America. Budgerigars are popular pets around the world due to their small size, low cost, ability to mimic human speech and playful nature.

The most common in the U.S.A. is the Budgerigar (hence the common reference, "budgie"), an Australian genus that is naturally green and yellow with black, scalloped markings on the nape, back and wings. Over time breeders have created a rainbow of blues, whites, yellows and gray. Like most parrot species, budgerigar plumage fluoresces under ultraviolet light.

The color of the area containing the nostrils (cere) differs between the sexes, being royal blue in males, pale brown to white (non-breeding) or brown (breeding) in females, and pink in youth of both sexes (usually of a more even purplish-pink color in young males).

Budgerigars are extremely nomadic birds found in open habitats like scrubland, open woodlands and grasslands. The birds are normally found in small flocks, but can form very large flocks under favorable conditions. The movement of the flocks is tied to the availability of food and water.

The budgerigar has been bred in captivity since the 1850s, and generally lives an average of five to eight years, but life spans of 15–20 years have been reported. The lifespan depends on breed, lineage and health, being highly influenced by exercise and diet.

Budgerigars are intelligent and social animals and enjoy the stimulation of toys and interaction with humans, as well as with other budgerigars. They particularly enjoy chewing material such as wood, especially females. When a budgerigar feels threatened, it will try to perch as high as possible and may make itself appear thin by bringing its feathers close against its body.

Tame budgerigars can be taught to speak, whistle tunes and play with people. While Both males and females sing and can learn to mimic sounds and words and do simple tricks, singing and mimicry are more pronounced and better perfected in males. Males can easily acquire vocabularies ranging between a few dozen to a hundred words, and those kept as only pets generally the best speakers.

Although budgerigars in their natural habitat eat mainly grass seeds, those in captivity feed on dry, sprouted or soaked seeds supplemented with foods such as whole cereals, whole grains, several kinds of flowers and fruits.

They breed best in groups, but are usually fine breeding in pairs. Hearing other parakeets encourages a pair to breed, which is why breeding in groups is more successful. Females lay 4-6 eggs over a period of days and incubate them for 18–21 days. Female Budgerigars only leave their nests for very quick periods once they've begun incubating and are by then almost exclusively fed by their mate (usually at the nest's entrance).

The hatchlings are blind, naked and totally helpless. At around 10 days of age, the chicks' eyes will open, and they will start to develop feather down. Feathers begin around three weeks of age. At this stage of the chicks' development, the male usually has begun to enter the nest to help his female in caring and feeding the chicks. Some budgerigar females, however, totally forbid the male from entering the nest and thus take the full responsibility of rearing the chicks until they leave the nest (or fledge). Young typically fledge around their fifth week of age and are usually completely weaned a week later.

Kissing

Leta liked kissing. She liked it a lot. She also liked the feel of a man near her, next to her. And when she had a few drinks in her, she liked both all the more. Her first husband Ralph was not so affectionate, nor did he like kissing. And, well, he had severe halitosis, which made her also avoid the experience with him.

Yet she still wanted it.

Perhaps, she thought during occasional moments when her current life seemed slow and uneventful, if he had been more affectionate, even if he had liked a kiss here or there, their marriage might have been happier, might have lasted, might have just been more pleasant.

But she had nothing to complain about, not in the least. Having met and subsequently married Albert had been the best decision she made in her life. He, at least, liked to be close to her. Instead of planting himself in a special easy chair, he would sit right beside her on the davenport, his body connecting to hers. Sometimes she could feel his touch, but sometimes not, until one of them shifted, and then the physical contact reasserted itself, and she felt a wave of happiness.

As for kissing, Al seemed to feel as she did. He kissed her first thing in the morning right on the lips, when he left for work, upon his return home, and before they went to sleep on those nights they didn’t make love. He kissed her when the supper they ate together was particularly tasty, which was about five days a week. He kissed her when she finished making him a new shirt. (While he could have purchased his shirts from the local shop, he loved that she made him his very own.) He kissed her good-by and hello any time they were out in public and temporarily parted. One of her friends called them the “kissingest couple she had ever known,” and Leta liked that moniker. She and Ralph were barely noticed, even among their own circle of friends.

And she had always liked to be noticed.

The best part of kissing Albert was how free and public it was. There was none of that puritanical, and in her opinion, false sense of decorum that proclaimed affection between two adults that loved each other was crude or wrong. Their physicality and their frequent reminders of the joy they felt together was healthy and natural.

The first time they kissed Leta recognized that the feelings she had were the right feelings of a woman for a man, that up until then everything had been artificial and stiff. Al’s lips were full and soft. When they met hers, they connected like two pieces of a puzzle that belonged together. With Ralph, she had felt that their touch was always forced, sometimes pressed so hard it hurt. But with Al, all was smooth and easy.

Al had also introduced her to what was called the “French kiss.” While she never would have admitted it to Ralph, Leta had kissed quite a few others before they married—nine that she could count off-hand. While their names had faded with time, the impressions each incident created still lingered. The boy with the strawberry-flavored breath, the boy with the soft hands, the boy who kept his eyes open and so on. Although she had experienced roving hands, she had not, at least until Albert, had another boy include his tongue in a kiss.

What a thrill! It was as if she had been kissing wrong all along and had just learned how to do it the proper way. Of course, the quick kisses she frequently shared with her husband lacked that kind of fervor, and that was fine as long as when they were embracing or in a state of arousal the full kisses occurred.

Albert’s kisses and affection and her two beloved children with her were all Leta needed, she realized, to live the happy life she had always wanted.

Measles

Leta recognized them immediately. She had them, both of her children had them, and now her husband did. Measles. For three days, Bob had been complaining of a fever, and he also exhibited the other signs—cough, runny nose and red eyes. But the two of them figured he was suffering from a slight case of influenza. He had always told her how rarely he was ill, even as a child. But this morning, he felt even worse.

He told her that he had awakened a couple of times in the night with the back of his neck and arms itching. In fact, he woke her with a compulsive sort of scratching that disturbed her sleep. It was early spring, and the light had not yet arrived. She turned on her reading lamp and saw that his cheeks and forehead were covered with tiny red spots, running together.

“Let me see your arms,” she instructed, and he held one out. He was wearing long-sleeved pajamas, so she pulled up the sleeve. The same rash was slowly spreading up from his wrist. “Oh dear,” she said.

“What?” he demanded, choked back a cough and then finished, “What is it?”

“Measles, I think,” she said.

“What? Measles? How?”

“Well, we won’t know until the doctor comes, but you’re not going anywhere. Try not to scratch,” she urged, as she rose from bed.

“I’m hot as hell,” he snarled.

“I know, honey,” she said sympathetically. “But keep yourself wrapped up. I’ll make you some tea.”

Poor Bob, she thought. He had no idea, no experience of such things. Having no children of his own, he never encountered measles, or chicken pox or mumps either, most likely. This was going to be a tough one for him, and this was only the beginning. The illness generally lasted well over a week.

And Leta remembered that only four days earlier her grandson Don had also been complaining of being warm with a runny nose, not that any of the adults in the household had taken much notice. Four-year-olds were always wrestling with some virus or other. But as she waited for the doctor to visit her husband, sipping coffee in the kitchen, as a spring rain slapped against the windows, she felt apprehension for her daughter and grandson.

Two days earlier, they had embarked on an auto trip to visit Vivian’s husband Ed, who was temporarily at an air force base in Maryland. He had been gone for nearly a year, and she missed him terribly. It would already be a challenge to drive so far with a four-year-old in the car, but even more difficult with a whining, sniffling feverish child who only wanted to cuddle. Leta offered to keep Don, but both Vivian and the little boy were insistent that he go. He also missed his father. And what if he got better? Would she want a furious, resentful force of energy in her house for five days?

But he wouldn’t get better. He most likely also had measles, and Leta hated to think about what this meant for the visit.

She did learn, of course, later that afternoon, when Vivian telephoned to check in. Don had the virus and was confined to the hotel. While she gave her mother the news, Vivian’s steady voice cracked a bit. Of course, having already had the illness, she could visit her husband, but not on the base, as they planned. And he, of course, could not visit their son at all. Although Ed also had the measles as a child, he could not endanger the U.S. military during a major war. So all her daughter and son-in-law could do over the several days were having quick lunches or dinners while Don was asleep. And any sort of affection was out of the question.

When they arrived back home, weary and disappointed nearly a week later, Leta provided the sympathy and comfort that only a mother could. And she felt it in her bones. For the first time in her adult life, Vivian simply gave up all control and responsibility to her mother. That night, after child and grandfather were tucked snuggly in bed, mother and daughter sat in the living room. For the first time since before their separation when Vivian was a teenager, Leta sat with her daughter while she cried.

And Leta knew that, at last, she and her daughter were fully reconciled.

World War II, Part Five

Although the living arrangement was a good one, the transition into it was challenging. Actually, it was exhausting. The combination of war, absence of his father and new sleeping arrangement did not sit well with Leta’s three-year-old grandson Don. Every night that first week he and his mother Vivian lived with his grandparents, he awoke in the middle of the night after traumatizing nightmares, screaming at the top of his lungs.

The recurring incidences had left the adults in the household with frazzled nerves. By the time Friday came along, they were all “fit-to-be-tied,” as Leta’s husband Bob said. While Leta was still in the honeymoon phase of having her adult daughter and grandson temporarily living with her, Bob and Vivian were weakened by the little boy’s terror. Having never had a child in the house, Bob was confused and conflicted by his grandson’s behaviors, both by the night terrors which kept him awake long after the boy fell back asleep and the child’s amazing ability to live without memory or consciousness of them during the day. In fact, he was noticeably thrilled to have the rambunctious, loving lad run to greet him with a loud, “Grampa’s home!” every evening after work. But would immediately after crinkle his face in bewilderment that this same happy boy would scream for hours in the night.

And instead of becoming refreshed by living with her mother and stepfather while her husband was serving in the Air Force during World War II, Vivian looked more and more tired. A mother, Leta knew, worries most of all.

Before Vivian and Don moved in, Leta and Bob would visit their corner bar a couple of times a week in the evening to wind down and socialize, so it was no great surprise on Friday evening when he arrived home after the long first week with the invitation for his wife and stepdaughter to join him. However, he had not considered what to do with the little boy. Having no children or grandchildren of his own, he never even thought about Don.

The conversation, however, was short. All three adults needed a little relaxation after their long, hard week, and since he was so small they could take Don with him. While Vivian was uncomfortable with this decision, she accepted, declaring very firmly that no one could sneak Don a sip or two of anything alcoholic, even if done to help him sleep.

The truth was that she needed a little wind-down herself. Her little one’s terror had worn her out.

”We went every Friday,” my father told me. “I remember that they let me have all the root beer I could drink. I used to drink so much I floated home.”

“Did it make you wet the bed?” I asked. “After all, you were only about three or so at the time.”

“Now that I don’t remember,” he said thoughtfully. “I only remember walking a couple of blocks or so from the house and getting that root beer. I sure liked root beer. It was the biggest treat I had in my life so far.”

“And you went every single Friday?”

“Every single Friday.”

“And no one ever gave you anything else?”

“Only root beer.”

“Really? But they were all drinkers, and it wouldn’t have been unusual.”

“Nope, that’s it.”

While little Don would occasionally awake with nightmares after this Friday ritual began, he settled into appropriate sleep, at least for a three-year-old. This enabled his mother to get better rest, when—when she wasn’t worrying about her husband—and his mother and grandmother to grow more familiar and endeared to each other. This reconnection was exactly what Leta had hoped would happen.

THE END

World War II, Part Four

One week after Leta's husband Bob invited her daughter Vivian and grandson Don to move in with them while Vivian’s husband Ed was serving as a radio communications consultant to the Air Force in World War II, Vivian informed them that she accepted the offer.

In anticipation, Leta had already cleaned the second floor of their home from top to bottom. While she herself might not have expected such an outcome, Bob’s gentle persuasiveness was a powerful force, and won the day. Whether Ed raised any objections or not, Leta would never know. Frankly, she didn’t care. Her daughter needed her, and she was there. All of her motherly love was at full throttle with the opportunity.

It was Thursday, and Vivian also shared that she had given notice at both her unsuccessful job as a secretary and current rental arrangement. With their assistance, she and Don would be able to move in that Sunday night. Although it was a bit of a scramble, they succeeded. That night, as Don slept snugly in his own bed in one of the upstairs rooms, mother, stepfather and grown daughter all relaxed in the living room after an eventful two days.

Leta was beaming, but Vivian looked tired. In her head, mother was already concocting ways to alleviate that tiredness, bring some color back to her daughter’s cheeks and perhaps raise a smile out of her. They had already been spending quite a bit of time together—every evening, in fact. At the end of her workday, Vivian would arrive at their home to pick up Don who stayed with his grandmother while his mother was working, eat supper with them and then head home. Now that Vivian and Don had moved in, Leta intended to utilize the already growing intimacy (after over a decade of inconsistency and hesitancy) to heal their severely wounded relationship.

Bob excused himself. He had to work in the morning and needed his rest. He was a line supervisor at a plant that made automobile parts and couldn’t afford to be too worn out on the job the next day.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Leta said after he left them alone.

“Thanks, Mom,” Vivian said. “I appreciate everything you and Bob are doing for us.”

“Of course, you’re my daughter. Don is my grandson.”

“We’ll try to keep out of your way,” Vivian added. “We don’t want to be disruptive.”

Disruptive? Leta thought, and almost responded in such a way as to cause an argument. This was, she realized a fault. She was far too argumentative for her own good. Instead, she took a deep breath and laughed. “I’m looking forward to spending time with you two. Bob’s at work all day. It gets lonely.”

“Well, I at least insist on helping out, cleaning, cooking, any special projects, whatever,” Vivian said.

Again, Leta had to hold back her disagreement. In her mind, she was welcoming a child and a smaller child into her home, and she intended to spoil them. Obviously, Vivian saw their situation differently, so they would both need to adjust. The one thing she knew she absolutely had to do was dedicate herself to strengthening the relationship with her daughter. And she had Bob to help her with that. A more pleasant, easy-going and sensible man she could not have wished for in her much-married life.

However, that first week introduced a challenge that none of them anticipated.

TO BE CONTINUED.

World War II, Part Three

The War--World War II--affected everyone in the United States, even though there was no fighting on U.S. soil after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. On one hand, the War played a significant role in conquering the viciousness of the Great Depression; on the other, it just as equally broke families apart and resulted in much sorrow. Leta felt great compassion for those adversely affected and for the world itself, serving as she could through her church and ladies’ auxiliary. Her husband Bob even enlisted when called to do so in 1942. And he was nearly 50 years old!

However, in spite of the world conflict, Leta was actually filled with happiness.

Her daughter Vivian and delightful grandson Don were living with her while husband and father Ed was serving the Air Force. Although she was actually a force in her own right, Vivian seemed lost without her husband. They had been married nearly six years when Ed went away, leaving Vivian, not only alone, but alone with a three-year-old son, who was quite attached to his father.

Ed’s departure provided a wonderful opportunity for Leta to reconnect with Vivian, after over a decade of a fumbling relationship. While Leta owned the blame, she also realized that circumstance put her, as a woman, in some distressing situations, particularly throughout the Great Depression of the 1930s. The most painful was having to separate from her children when Vivian was only 13. Due to a series of choices that turned out badly, she saw no alternative to leaving Vivian and her son Dale, age 10, in the care of their father and stepmother when she could no longer support them, or even herself.

Vivian accepted the situation, but it tore into the better relationship a mother and daughter should have.  Even into adulthood, Vivian remained aloof.

But with Ed gone, Vivian needed her mother. The first opportunity for Leta to reconnect arose when Vivian took a job as a secretary for some income to support herself and little Don. Leta, whose own husband Bob had a terrific manufacturing job, babysat. Every morning, Vivian would drop off a sleepy little boy, and in the evening she would pick him up. Eventually, Vivian stayed on for supper. That way, she could unwind a bit from her day, and eat a good meal without having to rush home and cook.

Fortunately for their relationship, the job wasn’t working out. Vivian missed her husband and, more immediately, her little one so much that she couldn’t concentrate. At least, that’s what she said. It was hard enough, she noted, that her husband was gone and in dangerous situations. Being absent from her son all day was choking her heart. One evening after several days of Vivian’s sharing her heartache at being away from her young son, Bob made the offer. “Why don’t you and Don live here?” he asked. “With us?”

They had room. Although their house wasn’t particularly large, it was more room than needed by an older couple with no children. In fact, they rarely used the second floor at all, having their bedroom on the first. The two rooms would give both Don and Vivian bedrooms, their own bathroom (a rarity in those days) and as much privacy as Vivian wished.

Leta held her breath while Vivian considered the opportunity. Although she and Bob had discussed such a living arrangement, they had been undecided on when and how to propose it. Leta feared that if she had, her daughter would have rejected it outright. However, coming from Bob, the offer had a different air.

“Let me talk to Ed,” Vivian said at last.

Bob grabbed Leta’s knee under the table. He knew that she was prepared to say something, something that might not have come out of her mouth as delicately as it should. This knee grab was a sign to her that he would remain in charge of the negotiation. She held her tongue.

The truth was that Ed didn’t much like her. Of course, her own behavior didn’t help that. Having been raised by a morally upright, stay-at-home, wifely mother himself, he couldn’t comprehend Leta’s behavior and therefore rejected it. It didn’t help that the first time they met, she had been drinking, which made her overly affectionate. Not that Ed never had a drink, but he was full of moderation, like Vivian. While it made them a good match, it did create a perplexing dynamic between the three of them. However, Ed was incredibly sensible, and he did realize that, for better or worse, she was his wife’s mother, and it behooved him to be at least friendly.

What Leta feared was that in talking to Ed about the living situation, he would forbid it. And Vivian would agree.

TO BE CONTINUED.

World War II, Part Two

Vivian and her three-year-old were sharing a bedroom, and Vivian wouldn’t have it any other way. When they moved in, Leta offered two of the three bedrooms in the house (she and her husband Bob were in the master bedroom)—they could have the entire second floor, but Vivian claimed that sharing with the boy was better. He was having particular difficulty with the absence of his father. In addition, he had somehow developed a terror about the War, even though mother and grandparents tried to shield him from the more upsetting news.

Leta learned of this first hand during her daughter and grandson’s second night in house, when they had all been awakened abruptly by terrified screams. Bob jumped out of bed quickly and started to hyperventilate so much that she thought he might be having a heart attack. He was only 49 years old and in excellent health, as far as they knew, so it was quite startling to see him seem so weak so quickly. But he waved her away.

“Go, go,” he urged. “I’ll be fine.”

And Leta raced out of the room and up the stairs to the Vivian and little Don’s bedroom. By the time she barged in, Don’s screams had lulled to tear-drenched whimpers, and he was clinging to his mother for dear life. She gently rocked him in her arms.

“Shh,” she whispered, “it’s all right. It’s all right. It was just a bad dream. It’s over. You’re fine. We’re all fine.”

Leta stood silently, immobile, in the doorway, watching with an overwhelming sense of admiration and love, as her beautiful daughter cuddled the shaking toddler.

When Vivian looked up, Leta replied with a look of concern.

“He’s all right, Mom,” Vivian said. “It was just a bad dream. Go back to bed.”

But Leta didn’t want to go to bed. She wanted to stay there, as witness, admirer and advocate of her remarkable daughter.

This was a Monday, and Don woke them twice more that week, each instance more horrific than the previous, until they all had frayed nerves. Although no one blamed her or him, Vivian was greatly apologetic. Having his father gone and being in a strange house had unnerved the little guy tremendously. Even talking in whispers about the War seemed to fail; he heard everything, it seemed. By Friday they all needed a drink, even Vivian, who, although she liked beer, rarely had one, so they walked down the street to the corner tavern.

They couldn’t very well leave the toddler at home, so they took him with them. Bob even joked that he might sleep a bit better if they gave him a “sip or six, maybe even a shot of whiskey. That could put him out.”

“It’ll make him throw up,” Leta said, “and then they’ll never let us back into this place again.”

“Not if he throws up at home,” Bob jibed.

“No,” Leta returned immediately, “then I’ll never let you back in the house again…after I make you clean it up.”

“Don is drinking nothing except maybe water,” Vivian said firmly, as she walked with her son’s small hand in hers.

“But I did have something,” Don recalled years later when sharing memories of his grandmother.

“What?” I asked.

“I’ll never forget it. We went every Friday night while we lived with them, my mom and me,” he continued.

“But what did you drink?” I demanded. “You were a three-year-old in a bar.”

I was thinking of my great-grandmother’s enjoyment of bar life and curious about my dad’s connection as a child, and even more curious about my grandmother permitting such a deviant activity. Still, they went to the bar—every Friday night—three adults and one three-year-old boy with an adventurous spirit.

TO BE CONTINUED.

World War II, Part One

Leta was happy. She believed World War II provided her with an opportunity to right some of the wrongs she had done. While she couldn’t go back into the past and change what transpired, she could do her best to improve the present, heal some wounds, and repair the relationship she had with her daughter.

For many years, this relationship had been a rocky one at best. While mother and daughter both loved each other and shared a mutual respect, so much had happened over the past ten years that their connection was cool. Most specifically, her daughter kept her distance. She was respectful of her mother, kind and considerate, but also held onto a kind of wariness. While Leta understood the wariness, she also wanted to attack it with the ferocity of motherly love to defeat and destroy it once and for all.

They had been through quite a bit over the decade, beginning with the formal separation, when circumstance made it impossible for Leta to keep her children with her. The dissolution of her fourth marriage (her third in a four year period) and the misuse of Vivian in it forced her to leave her beloved daughter and son with their father. While this was initially, she hoped, only temporary, she was mistaken. The murder of her beloved second husband Albert Had set off a string of events and transformed her into a woman even she didn’t much like. The Great Depression descending at the same time resulted in her never living with her children again.

During the early and tough separation years, Leta was grateful to her brother Aaron and sister-in-law Florence for their constant support, for even welcoming her into their home when she was unmarried, unemployed, uncontrollable. But what most distressed her was how she had to abandon her children, to turn them over to their father and his abusive, drunken wife, just when they needed her most. As much as she wish she had done differently, even now, 12 years later, she could not wrap her mind around any alternatives.

So she couldn’t change that past. But she could affect the present. And if Leta did anything well, that was live in the present. As the Depression wore on, she met and married her fifth husband Bob. He had good employment in the automotive industry, and even though the hard times affected them, he was still working. This gave them a good life. Things were improving.

After a few years of wandering aimlessly, her son Dale had finally settled down. Bob had gotten him a job where he worked, and he recently married a cheerful young woman, who was totally crazy about him. While Leta’s new daughter-in-law was a bit guarded toward her, they both certainly liked to laugh, and that laughter was very healing to Dale. Plus, newly married, he frequently came to his mother for advice and suggestions. He was rather awkward with women, and far more at ease spending time with his male friends. So he needed a lot of assistance.

Her daughter Vivian provided other challenges. She was a much harder nut to crack. She always was, however, even from a little girl. She had a shred understanding of other people’s motives and could recognize insincerity from a mile away. Leta never believed that her daughter resented her for anything that had happened in her young life, although quite a lot had. Vivian had also steeled her self against possible current and future hurts.

Marrying Ed was the first step, and Leta knew from her second meeting with him that he was as predictable and stoic a man as Vivian could want. However, he also didn’t like his mother-in-law, which increased the strain in the relationship. Where Leta knew Vivian had forgiven and accepted her, Ed would always remember and think that she was not a good mother, and he would hold her past against her. Yet he, too, was respectful and decent. As long as Leta behaved, she would have no problems with him.

While he had not actually enlisted in the Air Force during the War, Ed had been called to put his skills in radio transmission to work for the benefit of the U.S.A and its allies, quite ironic, Leta thought, since he was German. However, off he went, leaving Vivian alone in a small rented house with a less-than-friendly landlord, a small income and a three-year-old boy.

Yes, there was the boy, and Leta adored him—her first grandchild—all laughter, smiles, hugs and kisses with just the right amount of curiosity and orneriness to tickle her deep inside. After discussing it with Bob, who whole-heartedly agreed, Leta asked Vivian if she wanted to move into their house while Ed was away.

Vivian agreed.

TO BE CONTINUED.

Writer's confession

This is a hard time in the writing for me. Several personal and professional activities and anxieties have sprung up that are demanding large chunks of my time and creative energy. I’ve started some new employment. I took a week off to visit my father and stepmother in Las Vegas. And I have been working on a particularly difficult part in the book.

It’s not so much that I have writer’s block, as I have brain overflow—so much to think about and do with many pieces of varying degrees of urgency. Plus, I have a passel of deadlines to meet. (I confess, beautiful and warm sunny days are also distracting.) So I have let the novel and the blog sit somewhat idly for a short spell. Not good.

But not crippling, either, just distracting. However, I still consider, posit, dream and write in my head, even when I am not at the computer or holding paper and pen in hand.

For instance, during the recent Easter visit with my parents, it was interesting to me to speak to my dad about how the novel is transpiring, particularly how pieces of information from different situations and memories get bound together sometimes for dramatic effect. For example, I learned from my mother how my dad proposed marriage to her. I learned from my father how he used to mow my great-grandmother Leta’s lawn in the time period between her marriages to Claud Bassett and Richard Eckman, while he was a student at the University of Toledo and also dating my mother. And I learned from my dad’s youngest cousin how he asked Leta for a loan to purchase a car. Using information from all three, as well as some knowledge and characteristics of the participants, I wrote a fictional version of my father’s marriage proposal more germane to more great-grandmother’s story. When I told my father, he said, “But that’s not how it happened.”

Of course, not exactly, but this is a novel, and my intention is to create a portrait of a person—my great-grandmother—using the fascinating details of her life, and combining, trimming, ordering and elaborating on situations and actions to form a richer story and perspective. Sadly, sometimes the actual can be too detailed, banal or even awkward. Okay, it can be hard to write, too.

Where I am in the novel now (and please note, I do jump around a bit) is in the midst of my great-grandmother Leta’s first divorce. This is from her marriage to my great-grandfather Ralph, the father of her children. It happened in 1922, when divorce was highly uncommon and divorced folks were ostracized, as were their children, which already makes the issue a bit sensitive.

I have a copy of the original divorce filing Leta made, and while it was interesting to read the first time of her claims and charges of neglect and abuse, it has been personally painful to recreate incidents based on her charges. These are my great-grandparents, after all, whom I remember with love. To create scenes of cruelty and maliciousness between them (even acknowledging that the document contains hyperbole) is, at minimum, uncomfortable. So I have been writing it slowly, taking emotional breaks to remind myself that this is a story, and while full of truth, the detail and some of the facts are entirely my own. I am writing about my great-grandparents and not about them at the same time.

The personal infuses the fictional to create a richer experience, and as my dedication (and my self-set deadline) approaches, I will persist. I will make time. I will increase my concentration. After all, the book isn’t going to write itself, now, is it?