March 1-9 by the Numbers

9: Number of days I ran 3 miles;

9: Number of days I made the 200-mile round trip to visit my mother, who is 92 and fractured her pelvis last week;

6: Number of times my mother said she didn’t want to live anymore;

5: Number of times she said a nurse had stolen her purse;

1: Number of times she said I ruined her life by taking her car;

7: Number of times my ex-husband went to visit my mother;

1: Number of afternoons spent getting acquainted with my daughter’s new cat;

148: Number of pages in rejected manuscript I am revising;

30: Number of proofreader-spotted mistakes I have to fix by March 19 in another manuscript I thought was finished;

0: Number of times I went down to the beach and watched the sunset;

0: Number of nights I cooked a real dinner;

30+: Number of conversations with doctors, nurse practitioners, social workers, case managers, and physical therapists;

2: Number of nights I woke up at 3 am and cried myself back to sleep.