Here it is, December, the year is nearly at an end. Soon, a new one will begin, just as it always has in the past, and will continue to do so in the future. This coming year holds so many unknowns, yet the one that sticks out in my mind is my son, who is a senior in high school, and his graduation. What happens next? It is both exciting and scary to see him approaching this crossroad in life. We, as parents, can only hope we have given him enough training and nurturing to be a upstanding member of society. We can only hope he can achieve what we couldn’t. What parent doesn’t want that for his child?

I look back on this young man’s life, of all the things we have experienced together and all of the things I wanted to experience with him but either didn’t have the time or the resources to accomplish it. I know he would say that he was happy growing up, that he did not feel he didn’t have the things he wanted or needed. Still, I can never shake the feeling that I could have done more, that my job as a parent isn’t over yet, that perhaps, I am not ready to let go, just yet. We always say we will have time to get the things we want to do in life done, and I hope I am right.

As we move through the next few months, finding out if he has been accepted to colleges he applied to, turning 18, possibly going away to college and being away from his home for the first time in his life after graduation, we will walk that path he chooses at this crossroad together. Maybe not always side by side, maybe letting him walk a little ahead of us, but always together. He will always be my little boy…just taller than me…and with more hair.

It’s December…where one chapter ends and another begins.

I’ve been toying with the idea of compiling material for Book 2 in the Willow’s Grove – The Kidnapped Saga, but with sales being rather slow (okay, I personally call it disappointing) and basically non-existent for last month, I’ve put this project on the very back burner…although, I do have enough material to create almost 3 volumes (the current volume 6 on the web would make up all of volume 3, where book 1 was web volumes 1 & 2 and book 2, if made, would be web volumes 3 – 5), but I wanted to see if there is a market for them…do you really want to buy it? So far, Grovers, sales of book 1, as I mentioned, have been slow disappointing so…anyway….on with the poll!

Woke up on Saturday morning and my right wrist felt sore on the lateral side (the side where the pinky finger is) and thought perhaps I slept on it wrong. I usually sleep with my arms above my head, curled up in between the pillows, so I was thinking it was in an odd position for most of the night and it would go away. That day, we had baseball registration and so I spent 4 hours writing names of players on a list and then went home and inked a couple strips. I noticed that as the night progressed, my wrist got more and more sore, and weaker (I could barely pick anything up with my right hand and couldn’t even open a sliding glass door with it)…YIKES! I thought to myself, it’s my right hand…my RIGHT hand! If you haven’t guessed by now, I am right handed, so yes, this was quite a “rut-roh” moment for me. I looked at the spot on my wrist and noticed it was swollen so I slipped on a brace I have and went to sleep with it on.

The next morning, I took the brace off to shower and the wrist felt better. Swelling was down some and the pain was more of a slight ache. Strength was almost back to normal, but not quite there. But, we still had another day of baseball registration to go through, fortunately only 3 hours that day…but I still had two strips to ink! GASP! I tried to write with the brace on, but it was like trying to write while having a cinder block on my hand…wasn’t working. Came home, worried about my self-imposed deadline, but decided to take the rest of the day off…didn’t want to press my luck. Again, I slept with the brace on…just in case.

This morning, woke up, looked down at my hand and OH MY FREAKING JEBUS!…The hand was GONE!….lol…just kidding….when I took the brace off, it still had an ache to it but it was much better. Strength was at 85% and mobility near normal. I inked the two strips and colored them, lettering one and leaving the lettering for Friday’s for tomorrow….didn’t want to press my luck. At least, I will have this week’s strips done with a few days in advance. Makes me want to get a buffer back up to more than a few days or a week. Trouble with that is, since I am writing for a weekly or daily gag strip now with the crew being back on Earth for the time being, I am not writing that far ahead, thus, my buffer usually stays at a week or less. With this recent scare, I thought, too, I better not overwork my sore wrist, whatever is going on, carpel tunnel, sprain, repetitive task syndrome, overwork of a pumpkin carving accident on my 19th birthday…

Rewind 25 years ago, I’m on my front porch, carving a pumpkin, hand slips down the blade of the knife and whoosh, I cut through two fingers on my right hand (ring finger and pinky), requiring reconstructive surgery. Through the healing and rehab, I start practicing writing and drawing with my left hand. I started to get better at it just as the rehab ended and went back to using only my right hand. This weekend made me think that perhaps I should start practicing again with my left hand, yanno’…just in case…never hurts to be ambidextrous.