{"id":19941,"date":"2023-08-23T00:11:53","date_gmt":"2023-08-23T00:11:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/?p=19941"},"modified":"2023-08-22T19:13:08","modified_gmt":"2023-08-22T19:13:08","slug":"just-when-ideas-disappear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/2023\/08\/23\/just-when-ideas-disappear\/","title":{"rendered":"JUST WHEN IDEAS DISAPPEAR"},"content":{"rendered":"

BY JOELLEN COLLINS<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"
JoEllen Collins\u2014a longtime resident of the Wood River Valley\u2014is a teacher, writer, fabric artist, choir member and unabashedly proud grandma known as \u201cBibi Jo.\u201d<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As I write this, I am acutely aware that sometimes procrastination works, and that my fear of needing a topic, usually somewhere floating around in my mind, would vanish when I found two column-worthy topics. These may not be the most important or reading-worthy concepts ever, but both have stuck with me.
\nToday I choose the one that I imagined after an unusual series of negative occurrences on the Monday of this past week.\u00a0Rather than verbally \u201cshare\u201d the lesson learned during those many hours to everyone I encounter, I choose this method of relating the kind of day most of us will experience once in a while.
\nI awoke to the reality that my beloved dog Suki was not healing well from surgery on her bladder or had another problem as the post-operation pee pads and the rug nearby showed stains from overnight bile leakage. I am still trying to find ways to clean the rug and Suki\u2019s tail, also stained by the bile acid.
\nO.K. I got to my writing, not the best, and decided to remain at home and work on the re-publication of two of my novels, a process which has involved finding legitimate book publication or marketing companies.\u00a0I do not want to be rude, but I have learned, very slowly, to work hard to find reputable agents, marketers, publicity agents or anyone who will not take my money and run. I consider myself fairly intelligent and rather attuned to the multitude of lies immediately available on the Internet. I have chosen well but not perfectly, still being occasionally tricked by a mellow voice, but most of the contacts haven\u2019t read my book. Even after several days have passed since first contact, they can\u2019t recall a particular scene or character.
\nNo details here, but the rest of the day was spent trying to deal with too many phone calls and a problem with receiving another call while I am connected already, and then that interrupting call cancels the current call, and I lose that connection. That kind of frustration lasts for hours, along with notices of \u201cundeliverable\u201d packages, and two charges for PayPal (I\u2019ve used them for years) that didn\u2019t go through \u2013 then the prospect of messaging and email times and \u201cchats\u201d that don\u2019t work.
\nAt any rate, exhausted from these frustrations, I started off to my physical therapy appointment, but the elevator stopped after I was behind its closed door. Then a 2-inch space opened, so I could breathe. Our wonderful fire department arrived within a few minutes, and I was released. I was relieved and silly, thinking that I might try this again sometime just to see the likes of them. I missed my PT, of course.
\nHOWEVER, my \u201cbad day\u201d disappeared when I attended our wonderful symphony, relaxing with the performance of this vibrant orchestra, the resonant sounds from a soothing master pianist, and the mellow massage of Sibelius.
\nThus, I\u2019m still a grateful woman, and I got a column out of a bad day!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BY JOELLEN COLLINS As I write this, I am acutely aware that sometimes procrastination works, and that my fear of needing a topic, usually somewhere floating around in my mind, would vanish when I found two column-worthy topics. These may not be the most important or reading-worthy concepts ever, but both have stuck with me. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16827,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","_pvb_checkbox_block_on_post":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,22],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-19941","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-commentary","8":"category-on-lifes-terms"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19941"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19941\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19942,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19941\/revisions\/19942"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}