10 Steps Out of the Sinking Marsh

I can wallow in being overwhelmed and discouraged today with the course of events in this household at this moment but instead I will choose to dot i's and cross t's on my work assignments and:

1. Reread the beginning of "Miriam" (1945) to note the narrator in a tale by talented Truman Capote and start, once again, crafting a short story of my own. (I published a story in Good Housekeeping as a newlywed.) Type and think and click and capture, save it in a folder named SHORT STORY AS OF APRIL 2024 on my MacBook desktop. Begin to polish my pearl, my goal: To do my best to transport you, and me, to another place and time. Done.
2. Think about "A Room of One's Own" (1929), the extended essay by Virginia Woolf and be grateful for the time and space and paying assignments I have. Be thankful for my proficiency and skill set, for a room to claim (two, counting the dining room). "A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction." Done.
3. Be grateful for my health--and my sister's health on her 70th birthday today. Done.
4. Look forward to sharing in the gift she wants most for her birthday--to go the Turtle Back Zoo tomorrow with the girls, see the lions and feed lettuce to the giraffes. You will recall she went on an African safari, a lifelong dream. Done.
5. Plan healthy meals for today. Start with breakfast.
6. Walk to the Post Office to return a package on this sunny day.
7. Start looking into cars we can buy.
8. Shampoo with lovely, lavender-tinted Love shampoo from Davines. Special-occasion suds.
9. Water my candy-cane-striped dahlias. 
10. Pray. For acceptance, for hope, for faith, for guidance under angel wings, for compassion (for myself and others), for love.