Fairbanks International Airport...

...has internet access. For the first time in three weeks, I have internet access! I want to shout it from the rooftops. I won't. Even in Alaska, that's considered a little crazy (at least, I assume it would be, even here ~ although thinking about it, maybe not. Still, why risk it? Digressing Pobble...) I'm also assuming our hotel will have internet access, so I will be back up and running sooner rather than later. Just in case, though, I'm squeezing a quick post in while I wait for Lithus's flight.

So what have I been doing the last three or so weeks without internet access? I wish I could tell you I've been writing furiously and productively. While I haven't been completely uncreative, I haven't been nearly as productive as I needed to be. I also haven't been working out, eating well, or curing cancer.

During the days, I have been alone. Do my long time readers remember how much time I used to spend alone? How happy I was that way? And do you realize that from the time Lithus and I arrived in Connecticut for what was supposed to be 10 days before Malaysia back in October, I haven't been alone a single night. So I have been being alone.

I have been coming to grips with October through January. They weren't good. They were so not good that, while I have begun to come to grips with them, I am still not ready to share them. Not even here. And luckily, I have been able to identify the positive stuff that came of that time as well as the negative. However, that was not quite as necessary as admitting the negative because the entire time, I was forcing myself to see the positive, while shoving the negative as far down in my secret soul as it would go. The point is, I am finally coming to grips with it.

Lithus and I have been rediscovering who we are together. We have laughed more in the last three or so than we have since October. And part of what kept us going during last winter was our ability to laugh, so that's saying something.

I have been getting on top of the financial issues that exploded by November and only got worse as time went on. Things aren't resolved yet but they are getting better. Every day, it gets a little better.

I have acknowledged I'm behind the eight ball with the next book. I have even been able to email my editor and say that to her and ask for her advice.

I have been exploring Anchorage. What an incredibly great city. I'm seriously falling in love here. Who would've guessed it?????

I have been writing letters. Most of my addresses are on my email (*cough*Cam and Mrs. Pike *cough*) so some have sat on my bedside table, hoping for a whisper of internet. Some, though, I have in an old-school, pencil and paper address book. And I've been writing letters again.

I have realized all the things I've learned and gotten to a point where I can be grateful for those lessons, even as learning them was so incredibly painful.

I have come to grips with relationships and people who were no longer what and who I had known them to be.

I have been able to find gratitude for new relationships and people I had no idea could be what they have become.

I have been busy. Doing nothing. And doing everything. And sometimes, that's the best busy we can be.

Hopefully, I will have access and will be around online again. Fingers crossed, anyway, because as good as the last few weeks have been, I'm starting to get antsy. You'll know almost as soon as I do. :)

Those are Pobble Thoughts. That and a buck fifty will get you coffee.

addendum: Four hours later. Have made the hotel. Have internet access. :)