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 Each day feels new, and my memory of the one before is faint. I’m learning to adapt. |
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In September 2019, a seizure revealed a lime-sized meningioma pressed against my hippocampus—the part of the brain that governs memory and language. The doctors said it was benign, but benign didn’t mean harmless. Surgery removed the tumor, and three days later I opened my eyes to a new reality. I could walk, I could talk, but when I looked at my wife, her name was gone. I called her Precious—the only word I could find. A failure of memory, yet perhaps the truest name of all. Recovery has been less cure than re-calibration. Memory gaps are frequent. Conversations vanish. I had to relearn how to write, letter by halting letter. My days are scaffold by alarms, notes, and calendars. When people ask how I am, I don’t list symptoms or struggles. I simply say, “Seven Degrees Left of Center.” It’s not an answer—it’s who I’ve become. |
| I wrote a novel. I keep typing that sentence just to make sure it is still true. It is. I finished the first draft of my first novel, and when I read it, I did not cringe. I did not immediately start a mental list of everything wrong with it. I thought, “This is actually pretty good.” That alone feels like a minor miracle. Before the brain injury, I always wanted to be a writer. I talked about it for years. I had ideas, characters, notebooks, and exactly zero finished stories. Wanting was easy. Finishing was theoretical. This time was different. This time, I showed up. I wrote through confusion. I wrote through repetition. I wrote through days where my notes were more reliable than my memory. I did not quit. I did not wander off to start something new when it got hard. I stayed with one story long enough to give it a beginning, a middle, and an end. That matters. The novel is not perfect. It is not done done. But it exists. It has shape. It has momentum. It has characters who survived the journey with me. That is something I have never done before. I am proud of this. Full stop. Does everyone care? Probably not. But I do. And for the first time, that feels like enough. This draft proves I can finish something big, even with the brain I have now. Especially with the brain I have now. I wrote a novel. Then I made coffee, because apparently that is how I celebrate now. |
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Best wishes for 2026, and do please keep us in your loopy loop 
