PB Rippey Writes

Is the doctor in?

I need the sort of writing fever that allows multi-tasking. I need to be able to be ill AND revise a novel and engage the 3 year old and toss the tennis ball for the dog, fold laundry, garden (i.e. yank the dug up pencil plant from the dog’s mouth AGAIN and shove it back in the dirt), boil hot dogs and vacuum beach sand from the mini-van—all, all, all from my sickbed, which bears my impression for about 10 minute increments anyway, whether the Dadda is home to field juice box requests, or not (preferably home, though, in the name of all that is holy, preferably home). I escaped the flu in 2010—only to be struck down by it with accompanying headcold in February, 2011, the cruelest month (but mostly because of my birthday). There should be a gene ingrained in all mothers and writers that doesn’t allow us to get sick. Mothers for obvious reasons. Writers because sick means hulu on the laptop—which means Doc Martin—which means seasons 2 and 3, then frantic Google searches for seasons 4 and 1, which, do you know, can be purchased on Amazon for nominal fees and instantly watched. Brilliant, ‘en it? But then–when all of Doc Martin has been viewed and hulu is meaningless because it’s the darkness before the Oscar’s red carpet frillery, as I lie feverish and askew on too many pillows, the guilt sets in, powerful enough to keep me away from the Oscars en masse, and from Googling Cornish real estate for the windswept house on the cliffs with the view of dazzling, crashing ocean that is MINE MINE MINE in some life. This guilt intensifies as the little bluey icon that is my novel catches my eye on the laptop’s desktop when I accidentally minimize the browser window. And this guilt sets in permanently when my son says, “Mama play trains and lions?”, as I writhe on my sickbed—wait, no. That’s that other guilt. “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” my husband suggests. He never gets sick. He does his Tibetan-ish deep-breathing-with-tongue-stuck-to-roof-of-mouth number, successfully warding off illness. Every. Single. Time. Usually. “You’re sick. Let it pass. Then pick up where you  left off with your writing, revising, mommydom.”  Um—okay!

Thus: February is the cruelest month, but March, tomorrow, is the month of:

D e t e r m i n a t i o n

Right, then! I feel so much better (instead of Bodmin*).

Cheerio, Doc Martin. I can’t believe I won’t see you for a whole year while you film your 5th season, but it’s probably for the best. I will take 4 Advil and call you up on hulu (or Amazon!) in 2012. Until then, I will dream of your scowl. Or—not.

Yours in Cornish pasties, wild surf and Tintagel in the sodding rain (not to mention adventures in potty training),

PB

*Possibly Cornish for insane.