October 24, 2005 Nafisi sez: "Turning points always seem so sudden and absolute, as if they have come bolt out of the blue. That is not true, of course. A whole slow process goes into their making." (Reading Lolita in Tehran, 176) Well, I’m thinking to one seeming such point that stands out in my mind. It’s the intersection of Locust and Humboldt, Ann driving, when she swerved this way and that, responding to each comment in the tiny world of the inside of the after-bar car, and finally settled (all this within about a second's worth of time) on turning to take Glenn home before taking me home. . . . Remember when I turned thirty? My conceit then was that I was starting a new life. At thirty-one, I told myself I was one year old, and so on. Well, now I'm thirty-five I guess, and it turns out that I am engaged in a new sort of life, but it wasn't the one that I had planned. I mean, of course. It never is. That observation is so obvious as to be offensive. I guess what I'm trying to say is, I am a little bit closer to death now, and so I am a little bit more alive. The video game clock tix on; three, two, one, more health to stay in the game, keep mashing those buttons. It's all come down to THIS moment. Again. My kids are my qualification for being a teacher. Everything else is bean-counting details. Professionally, academically, intellectually, I am hideously unqualified, but- My kids awakened mortality, precious blood, in me. And that blood is what I have to share. 102905 I love this. Falling air. Porch lights coming on slowly, changing the Circle into a firefly sea. Mama upstairs helping the neighbor girls with their hallowe'en hair. I downstairs, doing my homework. Doing my homework. Doing my homework. November 1, 2005 There's worse things you could be than yourself. All my novels are about smoking.