I'm tired...life is very full. I don't often feel well. My memories are very painful. My heart is aching.

Entries here may very well be few and far between for the near future. Nick got home late from work last night and teased as he brought up lauralore.com, his nightly ritual, "Still no update. I see how you are."

"I told you, chances are I'll be giving [blogging] up."

His face became serious, "How does that make you feel? Are you ok with that?"

"I'm not okay with how little time I am able to give to writing, I'm not okay with the quality of my entries." There were times, both during my marriage and my mother's illness, that I needed writing like I needed air...it was my escape from reality, from my front-seat view of suffering, from feeling as though I did not exist.

"I'm perfectly okay," I continued, "with being too busy living life to give any time to the documenting." I began to stutter something else, pleading my case, when Nick interrupted—

"No, I completely agree. When I first met you, you had an entry up every morning at [the same time]. When you were taking care of your mom, you needed it more." It doesn't help, naturally, that I've met my first comment troll and that I'm having to be a momma bear protecting her cubs when words of those I hold dear turn abrasive.

That's lousy, guys, really frigging lousy. I began monitoring comments for that very reason...if Mom were still alive I wouldn't have to, because she'd fight fire with fire and send all you naysayers back to the fiery pits of hell from which you came.

God, I miss that woman. She had the gumption that I lack.

In fact, when Miles first left, she grabbed my shoulders several times and shook me with a surprising vigor, scolding that I was being too nice. In the end, she told me she was proud of me for keeping my dignity, being the bigger person, but she still would've liked to see me spit a nail or two.

And then she laughed, because she knew such a thing would never come to pass, and it made her glad...it would be one of the last times I heard her lovely gurgle of glee.

Anyway...entries will most probably appear here and there, but for the present, the daily posting is officially on stand-by...perhaps when I begin to trust the world again, or, leastwise, the people who waste a couple minutes of their day to read about what's going on in my life, I will return in fine form. I'm just too weary right now.

Mom loved this site, which is why it continued for as long as it did last year, after my world began to crumble in June. Now, my spirit is taking a much needed respite, and I am going to shade my vulnerabilities from the light of day for awhile. Until we meet again...