Bill, who's picture I run every now and then on these pages, got a call from the hospital yesterday about the blood test that he'd taken the day before. He'd mentioned he was feeling light headed and wanted to go out and get some breakfast. The hospital said his blood sugar was way too high and he'd better come into the emergency room right away, please, and maybe he'd better not drive himself in or stand too close to the tracks if he was planning on taking BART or stand too close to the traffic in the street if he was planning on taking a bus and, well, maybe he'd better not to take a bus at all because busses don't run on time anymore and you will need to get in here right away please before you fall over and die.**  This message was taken while I was away from my desk, so I read most of it in a note left on my computer keyboard by the other Beth in my section who had volunteered to drive Bill into San Francisco after he got the message from the hospital. Diabetes, they say now later. Classic symptoms.

(**  This is called artistic license and is, well, what can I say?, somewhat exaggerated. I say things like this in real life just to see how the words sound and if anyone will laugh and I've noticed sometimes people are offended. Or flustered. Particularly in business meetings. I've discovered. To the, um, detriment of my reputation as a serious person.)

Bill is one of those guys who doesn't go to the doctor for checkups and only went this time, I suspect, because his wife finally said the hell with it and dragged him in by his ears. Not good to never see a doctor. Particularly if you're feeling dizzy all the time and have to pee every five minutes. Even doctors can detect a pattern in these symptoms. If you're going to skip, best not to skip by entire decades. Maybe a year every now and then if you're younger and have the usual young fart with no brains excuses. Lack of money nailed me for five or six years during my 30's, but even then I was able to find a federally funded free clinic within walking distance of my place on Potrero Hill that paid the cost of my medicines during a time when I considered popping two bucks for a hot dog and a Coke at the Mission Rock Inn to be big time big city entertainment.

"So what's this? A 'go see a doctor' public service announcement?"

Well, this was leading up to something.

"And?

I wrote it out about four times and decided it wasn't any good.

"No good?"

Well, it didn't work. I'm not good enough to write what I wanted to say in just a couple of hours.

"So?"

So maybe I'll write more day to day stuff, like we went out and picked up some Sushi at noon today and the sky was cloudy and the Internet was down at the office this afternoon and I got a little puffed walking up the hill after work because I drove in Monday and Tuesday and we heard they hired a new CIO at the company this morning.

"And people are going to read that?"

Yeah.

"And you're going to write that?

Yeah.

"And this other stuff you were trying to write about and then just gave up: since you can be hit by a bus or bopped by a train on any given morning before breakfast, maybe you should be sure you're doing the things that give you satisfaction right now, the real things that give you satisfaction right now, because tomorrow etc. etc. falling rocks and airplanes that lose power in their motors after dark."

Well, that's what I had trouble writing and it came out pretty much like you've just said only it was longer and more boring. Some of it came to me thinking of Bill this morning and the diabetes and some of it came to me after reading Nancy's entry for today on some musings of the Buddah and an opinion evidently expressed to her by someone who thinks you cannot find god through the writing of a journal. Or was it through the eye of a needle? I get scattered sometimes and I forget. Real people don't spend their time on foolishness that does not possess the express possibility of an IPO, early retirement and thirty column inches in the NY Times with "genius" written in it. Writing a journal, rickety copy and kitty cat photos doesn't really cut it. No IPO potential. No serious intent. No income. And that's OK. That was the thrust. That's what you learn eventually if you pay attention. Do the stuff that plays in the heart. That's me, over there, with a fist full of nickles in a candy shop: The rickety copy kid. With camera.