Life Happens by Diane Burton

Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans. ~ John Lennon

I should stencil John Lennon’s quote on the inside of my eyelids. This has not been my best year, writing-wise. Oh, 2018 started great with lots of energy, ideas galore, a plan to release three novels this year. For two weeks, I was going great guns on the fourth Alex O’Hara mystery. Then, for some weird reason (which I won’t go into), I quit that book to finish one that I thought was 75% done. It wasn’t, but I’d committed to it.

Enter the doldrums of 2018. Winter blues, depression. Whatever. I was stalled during the month of February. I wrote but not as much as I could have. With March, spring was in the air. Sort of. For a day or two we had sunshine. Hurray! My energy returned. The finish line was in sight, just 10k words to write. I had the outline done, just needed to go from “telling” to “showing.” And I was looking forward to celebrating Easter with my family.

That’s when Life slapped me up the side of the head and said, “Unh uh.” I woke up one morning with a vicious sore throat and a cough. I guess Life thought I needed to remember all those people who got influenza, even those who’d gotten the shot, those who ended up in the hospital. When family members (Hubs included) had gotten hit with bad colds, I escaped. I couldn’t believe it. How lucky could I get!

My luck ran out. No Easter with the family, not with coughing my head off. Finally, I was bullied (Hubs and daughter) into going to the doctor. Guess what? Doctors take Spring Break, too. Off to Urgent Care, where I was diagnosed with pneumonia. Say what? That explained the lack of energy, difficulty breathing with the least exertion, wanting to sleep all the time.

Along with no physical energy, my creative energy disappeared. Even reading was too hard. So was Facebook and email. Binge-watching Netflix was all I could manage. Life must have thought I needed downtime while one course of antibiotics worked. Recheck at the doctor’s showed an ear and sinus infection. Another course of antibiotics. More downtime. After all that, I am feeling better. I even got to see the grandkids last week. Talk about withdrawal. I hadn't seen them in over two weeks.

The plan to finish my romantic suspense (Number Never Lie) by Easter didn’t happen. That pushed back the release by Mother’s Day even farther. I'm almost afraid to mention a release date. I’m disappointed, but what can I do? Buckle down again. Keep on truckin’.

We make plans, and Life laughs.

Diane Burton combines her love of mystery, adventure, science fiction, and romance into writing romantic fiction. She blogs here on the 16th and 30th of each month. She shares snippets from Numbers Never Lie every weekend on her blog.

Life's Curves by Diane Burton

Last Christmas, life sent my sister a curve. A really bad one. Let me tell you a little about her first. Even though she's retired, she is still a workaholic—always for someone else. Since she has no children of her own, she “adopts” everyone else’s. If one of us is ill or had surgery, she’d drive over (no matter how far) to help. She’s the family conduit—the one who keeps our families connected. When Mom’s Alzheimer’s got to the point where she couldn’t live alone, my sister moved in to take care of her. That’s the kind of person she is. Always ready to help others.

Before she drove from Detroit to Indy for Christmas with our other sister, she’d driven to St. Catherines, Ontario and spent a week helping our dad’s cousin (who’s in her late 80s) sort through 50 years of “stuff.” Then she drove across Michigan to help our daughter celebrate a milestone birthday. Following that, she drove to Cincinnati to celebrate an early Christmas with our brother and his family. Then she went to Indy—pushing herself, even though she was starting to feel bad.

She didn’t just feel bad, she had the flu. Influenza. Yes, she’d gotten a flu shot. Obviously, it didn’t protect her. The flu then went into pneumonia—diagnosed at a Walk In Clinic. They gave her meds but that didn’t help enough. Three days later, she ended up in the hospital. The flu plus pneumonia gave her what the doctor called a “sick” heart. What none of us knew was that the chemo she’d had twenty years before for breast cancer had weakened her heart. The flu plus pneumonia pushed things over the edge. She was so lucky she was at our sister’s and not at home alone. After four months and outfitted with a heart monitor and defibrillator, she finally came home to Michigan.

Weakened yet always wanting to help others, she tried to get back to her old life. She still tires out often, still pushes herself. She even went to St. Louis this summer to help our cousin sort out our aunt’s house after she'd passed away.

So why am I talking about all this now? Yesterday, we celebrated my sister's milestone birthday. In fact, it was a surprise birthday party. With all that she went through last year, when we all worried that she wouldn’t make it, I’m so glad we were able to celebrate another birthday with her. You just never know what curves life will send so (I know this is a cliche) live life to its fullest. Don't worry about what might happen. Live for today.

Diane Burton writes romantic adventure . . . stories that take place on Earth and beyond. She blogs here on the 8th and 30th of each month and on Mondays on her own site: http://dianeburton.blogspot.com/