June 20, 2003
Checking In

I'm beginning to find the occasional politely-worried message waiting for me when I log on in the evenings.

What's going on? Are you OK? Are David and The Tots alright? Are you ever coming back? (Can I have your domain name if you're not using it anymore?)

This causes me to think that perhaps it's time to emerge from my journaling hiatus, just for a moment: just long enough to reassure anybody who might be concerned [hi mom] that I'm still breathing, and that nothing has exploded or expired or died and turned funny colors around here while I've been away from the cyber world, and that I do plan to return to *FootNotes* eventually. Soon, probably. Next week maybe. Or the week after that. I'm not sure yet.

I only know that it's not going to be this week.

Daughter #2 landed in our Zip Code late last night, for a much-anticipated/oft-postponed/much-ballyhooed visit: her first trip to the Bay Area in nearly three years (and the first time we've seen her since Christmas). Arranging to have this Tot come and visit has been a little bit like trying to yank out that crumbly back molar with a pair of rusty eyebrow tweezers: half the time I'm not even sure where she's living these days, let alone what her *vacation schedule* might be. So I must confess to more than my usual quota of maternal anxiety over how this weekend is going to turn out. So much has happened between the last visit and this one: wars and weddings and rehabs and funerals and at least eleven different phone numbers on the Daughter #2 page of my address book. We're not really the same two people we were in August 2000. Will we get along? What will we do? What will we talk about? Where will we go? What remains the same between us, and what has changed forever?

Will she fly home on Monday night thinking Gawd, my mom and stepdad are cool ... or Gawd, I'm glad to be getting away from those boring old geezers?

It'll all make a heckuva *FootNotes* entry, once I finally do come back. (An entry complete with grainy low-resolution photo documentation, links to significant previous D#2 entries and the requisite self-indulgent *Boo Hoo Moment* after she goes home.) Until then, I'm planning to devote 200% of my time, energy and *attention molecules* to making her visit a success. She deserves no less ... and god knows how long it's going to be before I have another opportunity to do this. 

In the meantime, though, thanks for being patient, and for understanding my need to unplug for awhile, and for checking back and joining the Notify List and dropping the occasional Hey! Get off your big stoopid lazy butt and start WRITING again, forcryingoutloud! messages in my mailbox. Being missed is a very lovely, very gratifying feeling. I promise not to abuse the privilege too much longer.

Talk to you soon.

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