This was a vacation day.

That means that I went in at 9 am and left early -- at 2:45 pm.  And many things I'm supposed to have done are undoubtedly still left to do, but I have to make myself step away.  Our vacation days expire at the end of June, and so we take them if we can -- and sometimes we can't.  Who says life is fair?

This evening, a few of us from the Spring's First Person Narrative class at the Loft continued to have our monthly discussion of our ongoing works. They encourage me to work more on Sallie's story, two parts of which have appeared in these posts.  I envy the others who say, "My job is flexible, so I write for two hours every day before I go to work" or "I'm writing 15-30 pages a day."

But instead of turning myself over to writing tonight -- humid, breathless night that it is, with chartreuse light in the sky and tornadoes wreaking havoc in many parts of the state --  I am going to bed early so that I can arise early and go help with Micah's yard sale tomorrow.  We agreed it was peculiar that I wrote and rewrote a story for that class that involved fears of a major oil spill, and then one happened... and tonight we were discussing Kevin M's story about a boy's encounter with a tornado, and tornadoes are all around us.

I'll leave you with a haiku that anchors ideas that have been floating around my brain, hoping to be turned into an "entering in" piece" -- where I invite a character into my soul and let her -- or him -- tell the story.

Lot's wife wept salt tears
at all she walked away from.
Loss followed her steps.