November 6, 2001
Hi Rich,

I didn?t sleep long enough again. It?s not that I don?t sleep deeply once I do fall asleep, it?s that I am staying up way too late and then when I get to bed and to sleep it?s after midnight. I get up in the morning to make lunch for the girls?I took that responsibility away from Billy. I don?t know how you?d feel about that but it seems to me he has enough to do to get ready on his own and he?s been doing a fine job of it.

The bad part is that with my staying up late, the kids do too. I?m surprised Kristin can function at all. She won?t go to bed without me and I SHOULD get off the computer and go up with her at ten but I haven?t been able to. I am going to try and get off earlier tonight and get us all into bed at a reasonable hour. Luckily the kids have off for election day.

Last night I went into the Mediums room again and was with C and tnova and some of the other really nice psychic people I?ve met since I wrote to C. T has been having a fireman appear to her for the longest time and last night they finally located a friend he could talk to. Apparently, there was a group of firefighters in the WTC together and this particular one was carrying a woman out when the building came down and they?ve been wanting to contact their families to let them know that they are all right. It was so moving. Then there was a young woman who came through and she wanted to let her family know she was okay, they are having a hard time of it. I remembered there was a graphics arts student at work who lost a cousin at the WTC and they kept going to the city, searching for her.

I asked the two teachers if there is a student here named Janine and they said yes, and I made up a story about a dream I had and they STILL looked at me like I was nuts. It figures. This girl, Janine, isn?t here today.

That song ?Across the Universe? keeps playing through my head. It won?t stop. What does it mean?

How can I get you to communicate with me? I still want to know how you ended up on the floor. I miss you so much, I miss your voice and especially the hugs, the physical contact, the ?skin touching? or whatever it is the WN people call it. I think that?s what makes me reach out to people over the Net that I would not normally correspond with. I am so damn lonely.

I was at the parent-teacher conferences at the high school last night, for Heidi. She is doing so well, she?s got a solid B. I am proud of her and I know you would be, too. I think she will be too hard on herself, dissatisfied because she doesn?t have A?s. The material she is learning is challenging and particularly for the Earth Science, the B she has is very respectable! It?s a Regents class, which is Honors of a sort. I wanted so badly to tell you and it hurt so much to see the other couples walking around talking to teachers. It didn?t bother me so much last year because I could come home and tell you how the kids were doing?and this year, I can only hope that you are up there watching but without hearing from you I can?t tell for sure.

Billy worked so darn hard this last week or two with some other kids on a group project for his Humanities class. I?ve never seen him work so hard and have never seen him so organized as he is this spring. I hope you?re proud of him. He?s really trying.

The one area we are not doing so well is ? weight. I think all of us musta gained at least 20 pounds since you died and that worries me, especially for the sake of the kids. Heidi hates her school picture this year. Last year her picture was so pretty and this year you can really see the weight gain. I need to do something to help us! Heidi fights me at every turn, though, screaming that she?s hungry, she doesn?t care about losing weight ? if you were here, I could talk to you about it and we could work out a plan. I?m thinking for now I?ve just got to throw out all the candy and the fattening stuff and get us back to the gym.

I sent out this really funny post I got off 3fatchicks. It has to do with the 23rd Psalm combined with overeating and I sent it around to all my friends. David responded back and said that he loved holiday eating, that it gets cold in Minnesota and that he doesn?t mind the extra pounds to keep him warm. I realized we hadn?t talked about how we look and so when I wrote back I said I was into walking now so that my clothes don?t ?groweth? so small around me. He wrote back saying he?s 5?8? and weighs 142 pounds but was up to 148 and I thought, my God, he?s so thin, he?d never like me, big as I am. I?m going to write him back and try to be more upfront with how much I weigh and see what he says. I am trying to lose, and if he decides he doesn?t want to write anymore, well, he wasn?t much of a friend to begin with, was he?

See you later, sweetie,
Love,
Me