756 Days, 1 Hour, 24 Minutes, 20.3 Seconds

Midrin. That's the drug she used to take for pain those days when Tylenol didn't work. A half-step before reaching for Percocet. And she remembers one Christmas years ago when there was a small drugstore in her building. The day before she left she brought the prescription in for refill, and they ran out. Her absolute state of desperation, she could not spend the holidays with his family and not have these security pills along. They ended up giving her brand rather than generic, he forking up the difference out of pocket. Back in those days she'd have sold her soul.

756 Days, 1 Hour, 32 Minutes, 29 Seconds

She takes Tylenol for the first time since she's been here. The end of Christmas Day. For the most part it's been a good day. Her husband and his brother talking about how much calmer it is in their father's absence. The toddler a delight. They call the other brother. Football on in the background. They call his father. They call her father. Just the four of them in the house now. He massages her head a bit (as he did their first Christmas here, twenty years ago). She massages his stiff shoulder. She eats cookies, pie, homemade praline ice cream, more cookies. This is probably sugar shock. One more day to go. She opens the Tylenol bottle in her purse and sees that if she takes two now there will only be two left. The old panic sets in.

757 Days, 10 Hours, 3 Minutes, 32 Seconds

Back here again, the broadcaster says as the game comes back after the commercial break. Second quarter, tie game, 14/14. When she was 14 she was relatively happy. The first half of the year, at least. This is at his brother's house. Over half the visit is over. It's the second half that's always been hard for her. Two days, four hours, one minute, and counting. But they'll board before that.

758 Days, 0 Hours, 59 Minutes, 56 Seconds

Another day, another Starbucks. This one on the Strand in Galveston. Her second shot of caffeine for the second day in a row. God help her if she has to go through withdrawal again. But the headaches are under control, she can't wrinkle her forehead, she probably wouldn't suffer at two shots a day forever. They stop for a drink at the hotel in Moody Gardens after viewing the Christmas light show in the rain. Nice lights. Nice lightning. Her husband has his hand out for Tylenol.

759 Days, 7 Hours, 4 Minutes, 37 Seconds

Here she is in Houston. Bush land. One of the red states. And she thinks back to 1992, when her husband turned 50. They'd been together about seven years at the time. All she wanted was to surprise him. Making phone calls to people she'd never talked to alone before. Including this brother in Houston. It was July and the city was about to host the Republican National Convention. He and his wife were halfway out the door. They were going to hit all the big hotels, see their displays of red, white, and blue elephants. That was almost fifteen years ago. Her husband's about to turn 65. Another landmark. His brother's retired. This will be their last Christmas in Houston.

759 Days, 7 Hours, 15 Minutes, 53 Seconds

A man from Houston plans to visit every Starbucks in the country. And her? She's probably been in fifteen different ones in Manhattan, two in Forest Hills, maybe one in Brooklyn. She's been to Starbucks in Glens Falls, Saratoga, Palm Springs, New Orleans, Fort Lauderdale, St. Paul, Amherst, Chicago, Philadelphia, and now Houston. Her husband refuses to go with her. But it's a start.

761 Days, 7 Hours, 15 Minutes, 44 Seconds

sThe blow-up Bush punching bag arrived today. A full seven inches. Except he's not blown up. She tries with the little pump for blowing up pens, which now doesn't even work on pens. She puts it in her mouth. And blows. And blows. She gets it pretty good, but by the time she puts the plug in he's lost it: stands for a minute, then knocked down, he stays down. Especially if hit from the right. Seven inches. She tries holding it closed, carefully, with a very dull scissors. This takes the skill of a mother. Or an intern. Her father in the hospital blowing in bags for the woman who called herself a respiratory therapist. Finally she searches the toolbox for a needle-nose pliers. Or any pliers. The best she can do is what looks like tweezers. But he's blown up now. A day before she leaves for Texas and the family Christmas. By the time she gets back she'll be needing this.

761 Days, 8 Hours, 49 Minutes, 11 Seconds

A little girl dressed as a dreidl walks Columbus Ave. Yesterday on 90th St. near the Catholic school she saw a boy and a girl with reindeer antlers. This year, public schools don't get off until the weekend before Christmas. Not what she remembers. She stops at Garlic Bob's for pizza. Not what she remembers. And she's left her pills home.

761 Days, 11 Hours, 36 Minutes, 30.2 Seconds

U.S. Scraps $877M Anthrax Vaccine Contract. VaxGen keeps missing deadlines. Their tests on humans would prove too risky. This company's had trouble since the start. Should have known better than to trust someone already flubbing tests on an AIDS vaccine. Besides, there's already a vaccine out there. So everyone who might be exposed to anthrax gets six shots over eighteen months. That's not too much to ask, is it? Only one more than you need for rabies. Yet people continue to love dogs and rabbits. Also in today's headlines: our new Secretary of Defense visits Iraq for the first time (at first she thought they meant Bill Gates). Bush admits that, with all the insurgencies, there's been a setback.

765 Days, 11 Hours, 4 Minutes, 6 Seconds

Whenever she thinks of War she thinks of Yom Kippur. The High Holy Days. Today they're just holidays. Thanksgiving. Hanukah. Christmas. Onward Christian Soldiers.

765 Days, 11 Hours, 31 Minutes, 50 Seconds

She wants to know how many soldiers die in summer. Last summer. The summer before that. Any summer. And how many civilians? In Iraq, in July and August, it's often over 120 degrees (that's 48 Celsius, which sounds better). The man at the senior center who was given a toupe as a gift says he lost his hair when he was fighting in Korea. Because of the heat there. Her husband loves the heat. This summer, when they're going to be in Los Angeles, he wants to take a side trip to Palm Springs. Just to be in the desert, to experience that kind of heat. And he wants her to go with him.

765 Days, 12 Hours, 16 Minutes, 4 Seconds

The Internet is everyone's back alley. And she finds several different Bush punching bags (plus one Kerry). Now it's a question of whether or not she wants to take up this much space in their apartment. Whether or not she wants her husband to see this. Whether or not she wants him to know that she's lashing out. But maybe for her house upstate. For the summer.

765 Days, 12 Hours, 23 Minutes, 32 Seconds

There's one picture in their apartment that's been driven into the concrete wall over their kitchen window: a still from White Heat that she gave her husband for Hanukah years ago. James Cagney drives the car, his mother seated next to him, the two of them beaming at each other, while his wife is pushed against the far door, pulling her fur coat tight around her. Or was she his girlfriend? Black and white. This is her husband's second favorite movie.

765 Days, 12 Hours, 42 Minutes, 43 Seconds

During the last election, the novelty store two blocks away had Bush and Kerry punching bags in its window. As a child she had a Dennis the Menace punching bag. She has nothing now. She's trying to cut back on medication. She's trying to lose weight. She wants to pound her fist against the one wall in her apartment which is concrete and so firm (though covered over with paint) she can't even drive in a picture hook. Her pictures are worthless. She thinks, maybe if she looks hard, she'll be able to find the Kerry punching bag in some store's back alley. She doubts that simplistic child's toy would aid in weight loss. Not enough effort to get the blood flowing. Better to pound her head against a wall, and she can no longer blame it on a headache. She wakes this Saturday morning to find herself alone. It's the second night of Hanukah. She has to, she knows, use this time well.

766 Days, 9 Hours, 52 Minutes, 19.8 Seconds

Leaving teaching, her arms filled with Christmas wrapping paper. She puts the bag down on a car so she can zip her jacket, then walk a few steps and see that it's not zipped properly. So she tries to put the bag on the hood of an SUV splattered with bird shit, but it falls off. There's a copy of the Holy Bible, title facing out, above the dashboard, clearly visible through the windshield, all tattered, the pages just hanging loose in it. It looks like those bibles one finds in hotel rooms.

767 Days, 9 Hours, 57 Minutes, 58 Seconds

At the first rest stop on the Parkway, a midget in red shirt and red elf cap fills her gas tank, the tip of his cap window-high. This is New Jersey. There's no self-service here. She's going to see her father, alone, for the first time in years, and not happy about it. She feels small.

768 Days, 9 Hours, 6 Minutes, 44.3 Seconds

Her father's in the hospital again. He left a message on her phone yesterday morning. She was teaching. She was helping a woman with Alzheimer's remember one particular gift she gave a childhood friend. This was in Sweden. This was on a farm. She remains in touch with that friend, but is glad they're not on the farm anymore, it was too much work. From here she moves on to help a former butcher write about the woman who wanted to buy him a toupe as a gift. He said if she loves him she'd love him as he is. Her father had a friend take him to the emergency room. When she finally gets him on the phone late that night he tells her he was in the hospital a few days ago but checked himself out because he wanted to get his will finalized. He probably shouldn't have left. He's had a stroke, a heart attack, high blood pressure. He's certain he'll be in the hospital several weeks. His doctor hasn't been to see him. She probably ought to write down these words.

769 Days, 13 Hours, 28 Minutes, 18 Seconds, Time Approximate

I want to park the car, but that's not a real parking space. I want to pull over, double-park along the curb, but I'd be late. First I think he's one of the most affluent homeless guys I've ever seen, four shopping carts filled with what looks like baskets. Then I see they're drums. Three carts are piled high with what looks like African drums, small bongos, assorted other drums. And in the middle is one cart that looks like a homeless guy's cart. This is on Fifth Ave. around 79th St., right near the museum. As I'm stopped for the light here he's counting them, using his finger to point, counting and recounting them.

769 Days, 13 Hours, 42 Minutes, 10 Seconds

There's a car driving in front of me, a red car with a US Army sticker on it, and also a Kennedy/Johnson bumper sticker just below the rear window. It looks like it's new, doesn't look weathered at all. It just seems so funny to see this, it makes me think how innocent we were then. Of course this same car, turning into 81st St. to go across the park, tries to get past some other cars and ends up blocking traffic in the other direction.

770 Days, 10 Hours, 45 Minutes, 26.7 Seconds

Osama. Obama.