I have been doing a lot of reading, while on our trip to Oregon to visit my parents and to send the boyz to Camp. When writing is a passion, many things trigger "a good" story, or a good write, but when reading my new favorite author, Jody Picoult's books, "Plain Truth," and "Vanishing Acts," I am especially engergized to write.

The bloody truth of it is that life has plenty of drama and mine is none-the-less draumatic, as this week proves. We drove up from our current temporary living situation in Northern California, partly to escape certain difficult realities and to send our boys to camp on the Oregon Coast. Brian needed to return to Spokane for continued interviews, leaving me with the kids, visiting at my Mom's house. A perfect plan, accomplishing several tasks and desires at the same time, however, as life does...it DOESN'T Comply! I plan to visit with my Dad and Step-Mom while I'm here, knowing she's been struggling with chronic pain and abnormal swelling, and various other symptoms that have left her chair-ridden and taken the normality of life, away.

It's not as if I wasn't informed, or worse, lied to, but somehow seeing is Truth. I could finish that sentence with so many words, but Truth is the best fitting because, I was taken-a-back by the Truth and reality of what ever this is that has ravished my Step-Mom's body. The optimism on the other side of the phone was not there to soften the blow of the reality. Inside I wept.

I've been there the last week of someones life and it sucks. I watched my Father-in-law pass from health, into the oblivion of succombing to cancer. It was tortutourous to watch moments of subtle lucidity, surrounded by mostly an unconsious state. I hadn't had much intimate experience with death, a few losses of people I knew from school, my grandparents had passed, but that was dealing with death, not the process to death.

The realization of illness, ironically, gives a new perspective to life. It makes all the small things that once seemed insignificant, soar to meaning of new heighs. Trinkets that were once given, now become cherished and are a part to a bigger story, a memory that you hold tight.

My Step-Mom and I have a complicated past, one that most families experience when there is a divorce and re-marriage. Even in the best of circumstances, this new person enters with a title, but no relationship and at best, a deshelveled family who may or may not be interested in building a life with this person. My story is one with a protaginist and antagonist, maybe one in the same.

To Be Continued...