Recovery

For the first morning in well over a week, I did not awaken to coughing fits as I expelled the mucus contents from my infected lungs. In fact, I'm suffering only from a light wheezing and a little shortness of breath. I reckon I'm over the worst of this stuff.

Looking across toward Middle Prong Wilderness, 2005.

And to think that I was seriously considering a two-day backpack either into the Middle Prong Wilderness or the Linville Gorge Wilderness the day before I got sick. That would have been something--to get hit with pneumonia in the middle of the night on a six-thousand foot peak or two thousand feet down in the bottom of the wildest gorge in the eastern USA.

Linville Gorge, 2008.

Thank goodness we decided to buy the truck last weekend. This year is so far panning out not so good for hiking. I've now missed out on two three-day weekends that would normally have been packed with mountain exploring. I think I'll have to take some extra time to make sure that my lungs have recovered before I start climbing the slopes again.

I did manage to finish one of my novel projects while I've been cooped up here in the house. I wrapped up that project and sent it on to my agent. Now the long waiting game begins. But I have another novel that's past the halfway mark, so I'll be very busy finishing that one up. Then I'll have to decide which plot to tackle next for a novel-length manuscript.

For the past few years I've pretty much abandoned the short story form. It used to be my primary focus and was the lion's share of my output. But I've only written a couple of short stories in the previous twenty-four months. I just don't encounter short story markets the way I used to, and the urge to complete works in that format seems to have faded.

Ah, well.

The ideas are percolating. They always do. The images never stop.

My world.