I’m sick … what a baby I am. First morning in new house we spent at the hospital. I made A. take me there, to check it out, get drugs for pneumonia.

We left a 10-year-old house for a geezer — 100 years old. So there are drafts and odd closets and nooks and crannies and all that, it’s great. I christened it, on my sickbed, by finishing off Claire Messud’s fabulous, fabulous book, The Emperor’s Children … tremendous, stunning; I think the Times called it “near perfect” or maybe “perfect”. It was. Unbelievable. (Oh, here I found it; “near-miraculous perfection,” and Meghan O’Rourke was quoting another source but who cares.)

No TV, no phone, no net until Friday. So far no big deal. Though there was snow today and we couldn’t get the school closures. Otherwise, nice. I don’t know what’s happened in the world, except that Chad is being stormed by rebels and they’re saying they’re not. How that slipped into my life, and not the details of TomKat’s wedding romp, I do not know.

More to come. Happy antibiotics!

Lisa Austin doesn’t like to cook turkey.

… also because the pneumonia has overtaken me. I have 37 hours to live and no strength, the hallucinations have set in; they’re about popcorn. Because of all this I’m going to just copy from the Diary of Anais today, Vol VII (1966-1974). She has just begun radiation at Presbyterian Hospital in New York for the cancer that eventually ends her life, and she is sitting in the little room listening to the whir and hum of machines. She imagines they are a film projector, then imagines up vivid scenes for herself to avoid being present. Only Miss Nin could make radiotherapy so pretty:

As I lay there in the bright yellow room, under the huge yellow machine, and it started the loud noise I had been warned about, I closed my eyes and began seeing scenes of beautiful, happy, joyous moments of pleasure. The noise became the exaggerated whirring of a projector.

Scene One:
My phantom lover takes me in his Ford Model A up along Riverside to look at a silver birch tree. He is thin, agile, intensely alive.
My lover and I are driving through the canyons, stop by the Colorado River — and plant a small tree by its shore. We make love on its sand. We make love on the desert.
My lover lands in Acapulco, the early Acapulco. The planes land on the beach. There is no airport. We live in a small house on top of a rock where grand hotels are built now, with a dazzling view.
We drive through the jungles of Mexico.
We visit Chichen-Itza.
We swim.
We build a house.
The six minutes are up.

Tuesday, I am in Cambodia, in the courtyard of the hotel, having coffee, when the elephants walk in. I walk through Angkor Wat. The green of the moss, the white of mildew, the bone-gray roots, the wet and damp stone, the brittle dry stones, the dancers at night, the shower at the end of the show, the dancers in the bus, laughing. The smell of ripe fruit, of stagnant water, jungle — the quietness.
Not one image to discard–all of Cambodia–all of Japan except Tokyo.
The six minutes are up. I was hoping I would not run out of images. Every day, six minutes, for three weeks.

Today: Tahiti–all of Tahiti except one moment–when my lover forced me into an outrigger canoe, and we spilled, and I had to walk to shore on sharp coral.

Cut–return to fiestas–Tahitian fiestas–Mexican fiestas–Moroccan fiestas. Save Morocco for tomorrow!

A. left a message he was having a heart attack; to take care of the kids, he loves us, etc. The dumb houses. Paperwork not done yet for new one. Buyer not rounded up yet for old one. Wait, wait, wait, and with his heart attack now, I’ll be busy. Back to work everyone, nothing to see here. And I want that vodka, Lisa, yes! Right after I’m done with pneumonia.

Our biggest fear is change, Stephen King said so. In his The Paris Review interview:

PR: What do you think it is that we’re afraid of?

SK: What are we afraid of, as humans? Chaos. The outsider. We’re afraid of change, we’re afraid of disruption … we’re afraid that someone’s going to steal our mushrooms in the checkout line.”

Bingo! I’m afraid I won’t be able to find any of my stuff packed in boxes, that I won’t be able to make my new office quite right, that I’ll lose old letters, that I won’t like my new room, that the pool will turn out to be a huge pain to take care of Hal’s reassurances aside. I’m afraid the new Safeway won’t have people I like, the new school will be too small, that I’ll have the nerdiest car. I’m afraid none of the new people will like me, that I won’t like them, that I won’t find the right coffee shop where everyone knows my name. I’m afraid something big will break as soon as we get in. I’m afraid Jr.’s new teacher is too young and that G. won’t talk to anyone for the first two years, I’m afraid I’ll be all by myself because A. will be commuting five hours a day and I’ll never get my book done ever ever.

I’m afraid the spiders there will be bigger and hairier. I’m afraid I won’t like the stove or the shower.

Then again, I was afraid we’d never find Jr.’s coat and we did. I’m afraid I must go.

Finally, the poetry of Donald Rumsfeld set to music.

And … I’m trying to stop freaking out, but I’m freaking out. C. had me “read” yesterday by Beatrice, an infamous psychic. She took my picture in and Beatrice “read” me … which is also freaking me out. I’ve been avoiding C.’s calls because I don’t want to hear what Beatrice said. And there’s no iced tea and I want some but I don’t want to make it because I’m freaking out. It’s just a move. Big deal. I hate moving. I’m freaking out. Where’s Blabby? Someone help!

Steve Nipp loves Curious George. Robert Iger doesn’t.

… Ho-hum, Mondays. I’m never satisifed. First I was annoyed with the hot afternoons because it’s fall and I want to wear my sweaters. Now I’m annoyed with the rain, gloomy gus.

Today is the inspection on the new house and I was mean to Howard about it because it’s happening so fast and because I didn’t put the kids to bed on time and he does all the laundry. Sono spiacente, A.

Okay, I have to drive everyone to all their places now. If you see my wallet anywhere, write me.