Grateful for: A day of mild weather, albeit overcast and gloomy. At least we could get out to our favorite playground.

Listening to: Telemann, Six Sonates en Trios. I really like this CD.

Up Too Early

I woke up this morning a little after 5 with two thoughts in my head: "The month is half over, and I have not had any new composition jobs for the Press." My third thought was "Yikes!" Realizing the first of December is looming fast, I started worrying about how I'm going to make Daniel's tuition payment for next month.

My composition jobs pay pretty well, but I get paid half of the fee when I turn in the master pages and the other half only when the book has been through two or three sets of revises and is finally ready to be converted to PostScript and sent to the plant. Right now I have four jobs in various stages of revision, so until I either get the go-ahead for PostScript for one or more of those jobs or get a new assignment, there will be no big checks coming in.

In the meantime, I can do file translation (converting the generic code to the typesetting codes we use). I get paid only a meager hourly rate for this work--publishing has to be one of the most poorly compensated fields--but it is better than nothing.

I lay in bed brooding for awhile, and then I decided I was wasting valuable time. So I hauled myself out of bed and set to work.

1:25 p.m. I'm writing this at the playground while the kids run around like demented things. Although it is cloudy, it's a lot warmer today than yesterday when we were here. Then, my fingers were almost too chilled to work the keyboard.

Today there are two fathers here with their children. Or are they grandfathers? The men are both older with salt and pepper hair and mustaches, but maybe one or both came to fatherhood late. Tab and I are not exactly spring chickens, either, so I am always reluctant to jump to conclusions.

The playground is much more crowded than usual. There is one group of slightly older, bossy kids who have co-opted the little tower. "This is our castle! Stay out!" they yelled at Stephen and Matthew.

From across the playground, Daniel yelled back, "It's not yours! It belongs to everyone!" Daniel doesn't like anyone else ordering his brothers around; he reserves that privilege for himself.

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