A Giant step forward

Keeping 12 April alive! A photo of me with wine! and Harvey, the photo taker usually, and Merwin. We're all happy.

Dear Friends and Family,

Last Friday, I heard from the copy editor at the Shakespeare Quarterly that she wanted me to read the next version of my "At Sea" essay and approve any changes we had decided on for the last version and also answer continuing questions. Oh my. I tried getting my essay from their website and just couldn't do it. I asked for Word documents instead, which she send, though in docx, which I have but do not use. For the whole weekend, I could not get it to work for me, but by Monday, I finally figured out how to insert my comments and changes in the doc. Since she wanted it by Tuesday, obviously that was my main work on Tuesday. I had to read my essay once again—and reader, I have to admit, I love it. Will it be accepted by the Shakespeare community? It is conjectural and my conclusions can be denied, especially, I have to say it, by those who do not respect a new idea unless it comes from a "name," not someone who taught at a community college. But to hell with them. My SQ editor never said anything about what she thinks of the essay, but finally in our back and forths, she replied to my hope that the essay would be —I forget what I said exactly maybe appreciated? And she replied that she was sure it would be. That was nice.

Monday was Sonia's next to last day. I don't know how we will manage without her, but I am beginning to think about it. 1) we have a person-to-person problem solving system, via email, with our synagogue and we can ask about a helper to replace Sonia; 2) we can use Fresh Direct instead of shopping, and Dave is very willing to help with shopping also; I can ask our wonderful Margaret, our cleaning person, to work an extra hour to do the wash in between the cleaning. I am most worried about the exercises Sonia does with me. She provides resistance that I need to get the most out of the set of movements we go through together. Also, when I walked yesterday with Laury, who came to visit, I started to tip over—but caught myself. I am not completely ready to walk alone, not every day, because some days I am stronger than others.

My writing group is meeting here today, and I am hoping to be strong enough to get through the evening. I will be reading my BAM Macbeth review, and if it goes well, I will send it to the Shakespeare Newsletter tomorrow.

Work continues: Macbeth for the chapter Laury and I are writing, and always hamletworks.org. Spring flowers continue to delight us. We ate the first asparagus yesterday. The next one was a few inches tall and by now may be over a foot! The rain has stopped, but I think I will do the indoor bicycle today.

To all our friends and family, much love,
Bernice