730 days, 11 hours, 4 minutes, 19 seconds

She did dream last night, one of the few lately she remembers, and it was of her computer being hijacked. Something called Road Warrior, an animated white screen in the center of the desktop, indexing all her files. Then, trying to record it this morning, Dragon crashed. On reboot her desktop icons were raised almost off the screen, and Dragon wanted to come up with a C+ runtime screen but never got that far. He tells her Hillary's now officially running for President. He says this election promises to be a battle. She reboots again, everything back in position, re-records her dream. It's shorter now.

730 days, 11 hours, 6 minutes, 34 seconds

He says she's dreaming.

730 days, 11 hours, 18 minutes, 13 seconds

She was awake at 3:15 a.m., unsure whether she'd been asleep for awhile or not. She got up. It looked as if there was fog outside the window. She went to the bathroom, then downstairs to take a muscle relaxant, which she supposes she should have taken before she went to bed. That fog is really snow. She sees it coming down fast outside the kitchen window, maybe a quarter inch accumulation on the ground, even on the sidewalk. There would have been reasons to get dressed, go out and enjoy it, but he was sleeping beside her. She assumed it would still be there in the morning. She assumed a lot of things.

731 days, 10 hours, 30 minutes, 7 seconds

Alone in the exam room waiting for results. With no one here to look at, she picks up Family Circle. "Can This Marriage Be Saved;" a three-page ad with mothers telling how proud they are of their enlisted daughters; a Topomax ad which shows a woman with her fists clenched, wedding band clearly visible on her finger: "Do you worry about migraines even when you're not having one?" No. No, no, no, no, no.

731 days, 11 hours, 0 minutes, 29 seconds

Of all the folders here, hers is one of the thickest. Mammograms once a year, sonograms twice a year since that last cancer, biopsies, wires inserted to mark the spot. The surgeon wouldn't have even been suspicious yet, that's how good this lab is. The technician takes four pictures, picks up all the records, leaves her alone with the machine. She'll be back.

731 days, 11 hours, 20 minutes, 34 seconds

If she wasn't here today she'd be teaching at a senior center. When she started these workshops, over thirty years ago, it was almost but not quite her grandmother's generation, then her mother's. Now they're more or less her contemporaries. Mostly women. Mostly in good health. One man with diabetes. Another man left when he was hit by a car crossing Queens Blvd., came back for awhile, then left again when his son died.

731 days, 11 hours, 32 minutes, 41 seconds

A woman across from her puts her PDA back in her pocketbook and pulls out a compact, pushes her hair back in place, pulls out her PDA again. And she thinks of last night in the theater. A woman beside her pulled out lipstick five minutes into the first act. The smell as bad as perfume. In a dark scene change she crawled over her husband and the friend next to him to get to an empty seat at the end of the aisle. And, actually, she could see better there.

731 days, 11 hours, 37 minutes, 38 seconds

A hot pink cashmere turtleneck with a thick gold necklace. A tailored grey pants suit with a low-cut white lace top. Thick black beads. Three coats with fur collars (one of them purple). She wears jeans and a black top. No jewelry. And she refuses to hide behind the New York Times.

731 days, 11 hours, 46 minutes, 53 seconds

She enters and takes a seat in a room full of women. And one man. This was one of the first places in the country to focus solely on breast diagnosis, her doctor told her, years ago. It took six months to get this appointment. Ten or twelve years ago she recalls sitting here, bored, staring at the women around her, trying to guess for whom this was just routine, who would be called back for further tests. Then she was called back. Today she sits close to the one man.

731 days, 12 hours, 12 minutes, 26 seconds

If she's headed for the doctor's, and she takes a taxi, and the taxi drives across 79th St. through the park, she can see patches of snow on the top of rocks, or icicles hanging down the walls of the transverse.

731 days, 22 hours, 32 minutes, 34 seconds

So okay. It's been a warm winter. But remember, there was snow today. You had to be quick to spot it, but it was snow. And probably just north of the city much of it stayed on the ground. But then she comes home at close to midnight and finds a fly in the apartment. She's not kidding – only one window cracked, and it has a tight screen, but somehow this fly got in. Large, half dead, flying back and forth between her and the computer screen. Finally she traps him against a wicker cabinet in the bathroom. He doesn't even try to get away.

732 days, 8 hours, 33 minutes, 37 seconds

January 18. At three o'clock, when she went out for lunch, the streets were damp. A little drizzle, she assumed. Then she saw rather than felt a drop. Clear. White. Barely visible. By the time she got home it had definitely turned to snow. They've been keeping records for over 150 years, and this is the latest they've ever seen snow in New York City. It won't stick, though. Much too warm out there: 37 degrees at the moment. How can this be snow? It's not rational. Last night it got down to the mid twenties, and on the tv news they were talking about concern for the homeless and volunteers from shelters going out to try and draw them in. It doesn't make sense. This would be normal temperature for any other winter here. So much else to think about: the crime rate's up even in Newark, Bush wants more troops for Iraq, her ring finger's still numb.

733 days, 8 hours, 54 minutes, 1.3 seconds

She sits in the dentist's chair. She bites down. A piece of her molar gone, a larger hole now that he's drilled it. She bites down, making an impression. If you want me to stop, raise your left hand, he'd said. Just like her childhood dentist, long ago. She refused novocaine. Raises her hand. It's not the drill it's the water building up. Water and blood, she sees now. She can see a piece of his reflection if she stares directly at the bottom of his lamp. His eyes looking intently. And how, she wonders, did he even see her hand?

733 days, 9 hours, 40 minutes, 3.6 seconds

666, her father's bank account reads. She got the first statement today. 666. The devil that you know. The Devil that you don't know.

737 days, 11 hours, 42 minutes, 51 seconds

• Jan. 1, 2007: An Indonesian Boeing 737-400 operated by budget carrier Adam Air disappeared from radar screens during a flight from Java to Sulawesi islands. Wreckage was located at sea 10 days later and it now appears that all 102 aboard were killed.
• Sept. 29, 2006: One hundred and fifty-four people are killed when a Boeing 737-800 operated by the low-cost Gol airline crashes in the Amazon rain forest in Brazil's worst plane disaster.
• Oct. 22, 2005: A Nigerian Bellview Airlines Boeing 737-200 airliner with 111 passengers and six crew crashes 20 miles (30 km) north of Lagos, shortly after takeoff. All aboard are killed.
• Sept. 5, 2005: A Mandala Airlines Boeing 737-200 crashes just after takeoff near Medan in Indonesia's northern Sumatra. Altogether 102 people on board and 47 on the ground are killed, but 15 passengers in the tail section survive.
• Aug. 14, 2005 - A Cypriot Boeing 737 operated by Helios Airways crashes about 20 miles (30 km) north of the Greek capital Athens, killing all 121 passengers and crew.

737 more days of Bush's second term in office. Not exactly what she hoped to wake up to, sleeping until almost noon again this morning. She's back in New York City. Safe.

740 days, 8 hours, 26 minutes, 50 seconds

Everything's going wrong today. First her alarm clock set wrong. And now the fire. Smoke, rather. Where there's smoke there's fire. She waits. True, she started this with a fake log, and the instructions say not to mix it with wood, but she did this the other day, and it was fine. There's smoke all over now. And the smoke alarm doesn't go off. She tries opening the damper, sits in the kitchen and watches smoke go up the chimney. She closes the damper a bit, lets more air in from the front. Still nothing but smoke. The whole house filling now. And the smoke alarm leaning back on its haunches, dozing. She adds yet another log, a small one with lots of bark on it. She kneels in front of the fire, using the bellows. Faster and faster and faster. Her husband gave her these bellows as a Christmas gift years ago. Then, all of a sudden, everything catches at once, the flames bursting forth like the fires she's seen only in movies. Right at face level. She closes the door, quick. Stands up. Turns down the damper. There's smoke all over the room now, drifting into her study, probably gunking up this computer. She ought to open a window. Two days ago she ignored the smoke alarm.

740 days, 8 hours, 48 minutes, 24 seconds

"It's putting itself on display," a friend said the first time she looked through the little glass door of the microwave, watching the food turn. Today she watches a frozen block of onion soup melting into the bowl, at first nothing, then slowly sinking in, crookedly, leaning to one edge, the cheese holding its own at the top. Hungry, she munches a cookie while she's watching. Backwards, she knows. And there are croutons she didn't expect in there.

741 days, 1 hour, 50 minutes, 12.8 seconds

and 3753 steps, not counting half a dozen times last night when she got up for a drink, or to go to the bathroom. She might be pouring sugar again. Trying to take it slow, one step at a time, and not panic. One of her teaching commitments canceled for this spring at least. She breathes easier. Lunch with Paul, then up to the Lake George Arts Council to let them see some photos. A possible show. A probable disappointment. No time to build a fire today. She gets up, walks over to turn up the furnace. 3794 steps. If only passing the next two years of Bush could be this methodical.

741 days, 21 hours, 42 minutes, 50 seconds

One more thing she did today – she set up her first pedometer. Walk 7000 steps a day and you will lose weight, Weight Watchers claims. She walks from room to room, trying to up the count. She thinks of all those nights pacing her parents' living room. But she was anorexic then anyway.

741 days, 22 hours, 12 minutes, 10 seconds

In thinking over the little she accomplished today, does it help to say she caught another mouse (the fourth since yesterday)? That she used the treadmill? That she built a fire and kept it going all day? This last is not inconsequential – when she rented, nearly 25 years ago, she spent a full night trying to get a twig to burn. Right around dinnertime, the woodstove and the smoke alarm almost came to blows. And of course her blood's through the roof again. She wants to compare that to smoke going up the chimney. The newly rebuilt chimney. The old blood. And a useless comparison.