Creative Nonfiction Blog by Brenda Gaines Hunter

A Little Concerned

Since both my bath scale and my food scale arrived today, I've decided to go ahead an ease my way into my diet. I've started menu planning and will step into a 1200-1300 a day diet tomorrow. I'm a little concerned because I take meds that cause weight gain and one of them causes a metabolism change. I'll come off one of the meds at the beginning of December. However, I don't feel that I can put off weight loss. I'm eager. (An added incentive is to have the weight off by the time it gets warm again.) I'm at a point with my weight that I reached with my smoking: I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.

I'm Back, Temporarily

I'm beginning to realize that I probably should have built a Web site rather than a blog. Blogs are more labor intensive. They require you to write. That can be a problem when you've reached a point where you just don't have much to say.

This blog gets about twenty hits a day, and one out of about every 50 people leave a comment. I appreciate the comments. For one thing, I can tell I've had a visitor without reading the stats. Secondly, they are kind.

I also need to own up to the fact that I'm just not trying very hard to get "This Is How It Ends" published. The truth is I'm having too much fun during the spring and summer months and am not focused on writing or publishing during those times. What I need to do is attend a writers workshop. (More on that later.)

Things may not get better for a while. During November I'm going to move to a new apartment. My new building is located just across the street. The apartment I'll move to is very similar to the one in which I'm living now. However, the rent is a few hundred dollars a month lower (go figure it) and all utilities will be included (except air conditioning) and I'll have a fantastic view of the golf course of the South Shore Cultural Center and of Lake Michigan. I'm talking ninth floor.

That's the thing about Chicago as opposed to San Francisco (where I used to live). The rents in Chicago are much more variable. Oftentimes there is an easily identifiable reason--downtown skyscraper vs. a gang infested building. But sometimes there really isn't a clear reason. And although Chicago doesn't have rent control, landlords still focus on keeping renters because empty apartments don't bring in rent.

So I'll keep you posted.

Have Been Sick

I was sick all of August and part of July. I was in the hospital for a few days, but still felt a little sick until about a week after I was released. I'm told I have asthma. Whatever it is it does appear to be fully reversible. So it is asthma--not COPD; oxygen saturation 97-98%, FEV1=87%, PEF=500 (I'll let this post act as a record).

I'm wondering, however, if I'm allergic to one of the medicines I was taking--namely the Isoniazid for the TB infection. My symptoms were tightness of chest and difficulty breathing. Strangely I didn't have a cough or sputum. Sounds more like an allergic than it does straightforward asthma to me. Except one thing throws me: I was always more sick at night.

Rambles

I started writing again. The manuscript has no title yet. But it's like I said a year or so ago: I intend to do most of my writing when it is cold outside. The summers are just too nice to waste sitting indoors, especially when the winters are so bad that all you want to do is stay indoors.

I prefer to use a desktop PC. I'll brag a little here and let you know that I have a cube PC, a beautiful specimen, especially since it was built to my specifications. I did buy a Acer Netbook that I'm nuts about, too. It is so much faster than my old notebook computer and much, much lighter. I spent a weekend recently here in the apartment setting up a peer-to-peer network, so that my Netbook could wirelessly log into my Internet account while I'm home. I'm finding that my friends like the arrangement.

Also, I'll have more guests this summer to keep me busy. I have friends that I've known for over twenty years. Both will be here this summer. We'll go to see Jersey Boys, to a dinner theatre, on a haunted Chicago tour, to the Lincoln Park Zoo, to Boys Town, and to a couple of more museums. I planning to see Water Fools later this month. Water Fools is described this way: "Imagine a world where cars drive on water, heads burst into flames and a 12-foot-tall lady glides by on a penny farthing. In this thrilling spectacle, French performance company Ilotopie presents Water Fools. I've been to the Gay Parade, Movies in the Park, Kobe Burgers at Millennium Park, Fondue in Lincoln Park... well, let's say I'm having a blast. So don't expect to hear from me much.

Remembering Mama

It was like this twelve years ago when Mama died. Stars, big ones: Jimmy Stewart and Robert Mitchum died also, and Princess Diana followed soon afterward. Life was one large funeral from July 1st til the middle of September 1997. I really know that time doesn't repeat, that few things ever really repeat, however, I'm jonesing for a time when Jimmy Stewart, Robert Mitchum, Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, Princess Di... and Mama were sharing this world with me. But I'm happy that they have each other. There is more talent in heaven than there is here on earth.

Mama is whom this entire blog is really about--my relationship to Mama, how I became me through Mama. The lenses I use are still mainly the lenses that Mama gave me. Mama used to tell me that if we were all the same, we'd be bored. Difference is what makes this world interesting. It's what makes this world go round. That's why I'm always more than a little sad whenever we lose someone, even people I don't like.

I realize that sometimes people are only here to be with us for a little while, that we are all just passing through, so it's important to take those good times, those wonderful memories of people and hang on to them as tightly as possible. It's also important to remember that heaven needs the young as well as it needs the old.

As the hour approaches when Mama was taken away, I feel an emptiness that no amount of anything will feel. So I'm going to just sit here and feel whatever may come my way. The grief may break its hold on me by tomorrow.

No. I'm Not Dead.

No. I'm not dead. Just a little lost. I'm dealing with health issues right now and am distracted. I want to attend a writer's workshop at the University of Iowa this summer, but I don't know if I'll be able to do so.

I know what my next writing project will be, but I'm at a loss for how to get my work published. Researching publications is time consuming and the information offered is not always accurate. I think what I may need to do is attend a few writer's conferences. I need to network.

I'm a little surprised by the lack of writer's groups in Chicago. I thought Chicago would be more of a literary town than it is. Many American writers are, or were, from the Midwest, and some made Chicago their home.

I've tried starting a writer's group, but after getting a couple of creepy responses, abandoned the idea. Some of the people who answered the ad couldn't even write a sentence in their responses. One said that he would bring his friend, too. They were working on a play and needed help. He, too, couldn't write. Of course, we would never have met at my house.

So I need to discover where the writer's conferences will be held, probably for next year, because this year I need to stay close to home.

SASE

Well, I sent some magazine submissions without enclosing SASEs. Decided all I could do is resubmit.

Identifying Magazines and Journals

I spent the weekend identifying journals and magazines to which I can send excerpts of "This Is How It Ends". I identified five magazines and journals whose editors are reading submissions right now. There are another three that I'll send submissions to once the "reading" periods for those magazines and journals open.

Actually, identifying journals and magazines really is not hat easy. It does help if you've subscribed to or have read a few of their issues. However, I'm not a rich person and there are thousands of magazines and journals. I am starting with the ones that I'm familiar with, but even so I still have to identify which of the three excerpts are I are most appropriate, and I'm not always able to do so.