742 days, 1 hour, 29 minutes, 1.2 seconds

She's asked students to write about New Year's resolutions, and expects a lot of poems on dieting at tomorrow's class. Meanwhile, in the headlines, she reads about two pigs so fat they can't fit in the slaughterhouse truck, have to be killed and butchered in their pens. An obese woman in South Africa was stuck in a cave for nearly twelve hours, trapping twenty-three others in front of her, including asthmatic children and a diabetic. And the FDA has just granted Pfizer approval on a drug for obese dogs. She used to own stock in Pfizer.

744 days, 1 hour, 39 minutes, 49 seconds

Even along the Thruway, green grass alternates with brown. She thinks about plants and animals forced from their natural habitats. This weather's played hell with her head the past few days. Up above Woodstock she stops for lunch, and still leaves her jacket in the car. She gets off on 787 and heads toward Troy, then takes Route 40 home, through small towns and farm roads. She looks up and sees the start of a rainbow. Then she notices puddles and what must have been a wet road. A few sprinkles on her windshield. This cloud- and sun-filled dusk is the best light for rainbows, she remembers. Miles later, still a half hour from home, she sees the start of a second rainbow. The start of a promise, most likely.

744 days, 12 hours, 56 minutes, 2 seconds

She wakes at 10:30 to have her husband tell her it's 65 degrees out. Already they've broken the record for today. By the time she checks her email and dresses it's 68. Another blizzard in Colorado. A woman there is selling snow on Ebay. She recalls once, when she was sick, her mother filling an old roasting pan with snow and bringing it inside for her. She remembers once building a fort with some neighbor kids she can't remember the names of, and lobbing snowballs at other kids. Her husband, the second month she knew him, went to her house upstate right before Thanksgiving. There was not a lot of snow, but enough for a snowball, which he threw at her. She didn't know what hit her. And this year there hasn't even been snow up there, just trash dumped in her yard. Still 68 degrees. And she's out of here.

746 days, 8 hours, 49 minutes, 43 seconds

Ring out the old, ring in the new. Fraternal twins in Boston born three minutes yet a year apart. The girl born first, but most likely the boy will be stronger (memories of her six-weeks-younger cousin here – how they played in the abandoned schoolyard, how he smiled). Thoughts of the Bush twins. The competition between all twins. Between all siblings. Between son and father. Some of the most powerful men she's known have sons that are losers.

746 days, 8 hours, 51 minutes, 9 seconds

The clock's still counting down. She thought if she didn't pay attention for a few days, it might go away, just like back in her headache days – if she was focused enough on other things the pain would vanish. The Americans dead in Iraq is up to 3000, a 96 year-old uncle dead in Rhode Island. Dead before the year changed hands, buried after it. Ring out the old … Only her ears ring.

750 Days, 8 Hours, 24 Minutes, 43 Seconds

At Edgar's there are balloons on the backs of chairs. Infants are entranced by them. A passing waitress gets caught up in the string. She's not the one in the party hat. Her Happy New Year tiara is on again off again. Starting the party a little early, but what the hell. Everyone wants the year to end.

750 Days, 11 Hours, 13 Minutes, 37 Seconds

He's on oxygen even at home now. He stopped walking five miles on the Boardwalk each morning over five years ago. No more walking stairs. She recalls, for as long as she can remember, things to go up in the attic piled on the sides of the lower stairs until one of the family was headed up. Her husband screeching about books piled up on the stairs in her country house. See, she told him last time they saw her father, this is what I was taught to do. But he's had the attic cleaned out for years now, nothing much left. And things he can no longer use are no longer stored up there. He can't quite understand why she doesn't want them, so he asks again.

750 Days, 11 Hours, 21 Minutes, 8.5 Seconds

This is her father's clutter. She thinks of four years ago, when he was in the hospital, how it took her over two hours to find two checkbooks. Papers piled up on the twin beds pushed together in his study that used to be her room. More on the desk and even more on the dining room table. The day after he turned 90 he didn't want to meet them for lunch because he still had to work on his taxes. No more extensions left. And the day before he went in the hospital this last time he was so proud that the clutter, on the beds at least, had gotten almost manageable. A week in Shore Memorial and it's all piled up again. Papers slipping through the crack between those two beds. Even if she'd wanted to stay in that house there would be no room for her. But this last time it took her less than ten minutes to find his checkbook.

750 Days, 11 Hours, 49 Minutes, 9 Seconds

The last day of the year. Were this a mayoral election year, they'd be preparing City Hall Park for tomorrow's inauguration. But Bloomberg has two more years left. The same as Bush, she wants to say. But the presidency doesn't change until January 20th. Twenty days from now, she might well give up her New Years resolutions to keep her desk neat and develop better eating habits. Hours before leaving office, Clinton pardoned 140 prisoners, commuting the sentences of another 36. Some were 70s radicals, but none were actual murders. The count of the dead in Iraq is now greater than those killed on 9/11. And it's another 2 years of Bush, not just another 21 days. Her next move should be to turn away from this computer, pick up a stack of papers, and at least look them over.

751 Days, 21 Hours, 22 Minutes, 19 Seconds

She's back in New York. Saddam's dead. At the Waldorf Astoria the 52nd Annual Debutante Ball took place just a few hours ago. Ashley Bush was among them. Another woman is making her debut for the fourth time. New York's on high terror alert. This New Years, they say, don't try to go near Times Square with a large pocketbook. She was only at Times Square for New Years once, when she was twelve years old, with her parents. But she jammed her huge pocketbook with a notebook battery, two books, and other essentials for the Christmas plane trip, coming and going, so now her neck's stiff. And she didn't even turn on the computer. A lot of catching up to do. CBS has decided not to televise the execution. Twelve years ago friends had a fight at a New Years party and he walked out, headed for Times Square, but couldn't get anywhere near it. They married anyway. She was at a friend's wedding that same day, in Chicago. He's dead now also. Just how many times can one be a debutante?

756 Days, 1 Hour, 10 Minutes, 45 Seconds

To everyone in our armed forces stationed overseas, get home safe. Know that we care about you. These words from the football broadcaster. And at that very minute a friend calls to let them know she got home safe: 62 miles in just over an hour, unheard of time for her. It's the third quarter and the Jets just kicked a field goal, the first score of the game. The New Jersey Jets, her husband says. Don't call them New Yorkers. He always roots for whoever's opposing them. Person after person wished her a safe trip home. The fourth quarter starts with a Miami touchdown. The announcer predicts a lot of action this quarter, but it's ten o'clock, so they turn Eyewitness News on.

756 Days, 1 Hour, 16 Minutes, 19 Seconds

Last year, when they drove to Houston, it was his prescription they were waiting for. Leaving a day later than planned, then another two hours, three hours, four hours. Hanging around for the pharmacist who, for all they knew, might have walked out. This was at Duane Reade, the only place in her building now, the closest non-chain pharmacy eight blocks away. The whole world gone to chains – restaurants, video stores, The Gap, K-Mart, Eddie Bauer, Toys R Us. He hates it.

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.