I’ll be honest, I usually post if I have some literary reason to do so–books to review, movies to grouse about. But I’ve been so swamped with end of the year activities related to my son’s high school graduation and my 15-year-old daughter’s dramatic life (drill team tryouts, formals, boyfriends, hormones, grades, driving, etc… ) that getting some face time with book pages is nothing more than a fond memory. The last movie I saw was in January. Why is it the thing I need most — a fiction vacation courtesy of someone else’s angst and glamour–is farthest away when I’m desperate. I tell you why, its because I’m living in the moment.  That’s probably a good thing as living in the past has been well-documented as a psychiatric condition. And living in the future . .  well that doesn’t work so well for a lady stalled in traffic who still has to wash the laundry, cook the dinner, remember what time the carpool drop offs are, and has a pile of writing deadlines sitting next to her dusty laptop. So do you want to know how I cope? I’m mean this is as close to a state secret as I can share and not be turned in to the FBI’s most wanted list. I dream. When I have those five minutes after my head has hit the pillow and before I go into a snoring coma, I spend a few minutes in my fantasy life. (Men have fantasy football so don’t judge.) I go to my Southern state of mind. Sometimes it’s a rustic cabin on a lonely lake in North Georgia, sometimes its a hip beach cottage next door to some artsy hippies on Amelia Island, sometimes its a chic apartment overlooking Atlanta, but always I’m thin, glamorous and highly successful. Dreaming has the same magic of fiction, its just that I get to star in all the action scenes. So, if you like me, are overwhelmed with  responsibilities, then savor those five minutes at night with your own personal, on-going story starring none other than the most perfect version of you. I’ll bet you, like me, won’t be afraid to zip line across Stone Mountain, or ride bare back through the surf on St. Simon’s, or ski down the double blacks of Vail while being chased by George Clooney. See, already you’re smiling and that–as Martha would say–is a good thing. If you’ll bear with my musings for a few weeks until I can get past graduation, then I’ll get back to reviewing books (could I be indulging in mental avoidance to distract myself from shock that my first baby is graduating? Not touching that one with a ten-foot pole.)

Until next time, sweet dreams.