The time when I broke the rules that I had set

On Wednesday and Thursday I broke a couple of my rules, creating a slump like a sagging mattress in the middle of the week.

Wanting to do a good job on my first story for Healthline.com, I stayed up way too late Wednesday working on it, then ate ice cream, then wrote and rewrote the story in my dreams and woke up feeling terrible. Then tried to work on it some more on Thursday but had to go back to sleep, and didn't do any of the exercise I had planned.

So: Rule number 1, disregarded: Get off the computer at a reasonable hour because working on a computer at night can disrupt sleep. When I had a "real" job at The Republican, I might have taken my work home with me in terms of thinking about it or jotting some thoughts down, but I couldn't lug the computer home with me. Having a laptop is great but the downside is that it can lure you back in at all hours.

Rule number 2, disregarded: Get some exercise every day.

I felt like I had a hangover.

Actually, I had a headache, which is ironic, because my assignment was, "What to do if your teen has a migraine."

On top of all of this, I misunderstood the assignment. I covered all the information that the editor wanted but I didn't understand that the story was supposed to follow an exact format, which you can see from this example that the editor sent me. Instead, I wrote it as I would have written it for the paper, as a personal story-driven narrative. They want to do more personal story-driven narratives, but only if the assignment specifies that format. I stayed up late doing the wrong thing.

She was nice about it, though. She asked me for my bibliography, which I sent immediately, and said she would go over it on Monday and see what we could do about getting it in the format she wanted. This will be a good gig once I have figured out how to write each story according to prescribed formats. It's hard when you have been doing a certain kind of writing for 30 years. If I look at how much I made on the story, it was probably around a penny an hour.

Also, technical problems were making me pull my hair out and do a nervous habit that I have which is picking at the thingies on my hands. I was trying to hyperlink in Word to the websites that I was using. But it would not let me copy and paste. I did what Joe told me, looking up, I can't paste a live URL into my word docs and I tried the solutions...which didn't work. I sent her the text in an email so that I could put in the links.

I thought of making a Genius Bar appointment at the Apple Store but when I wrote in what the problem was, I saw that I can schedule a call. Last time I called, the phone genius solved a problem for me so that is on my list to do before tomorrow, unless George Delisle reads this and figures it out. I miss being at the paper and yelling, "GEORGE!" or walking out back and finding him and being so relieved when he solved my computer problems. I miss those days.

Getting together with Old Repubs

The way it was

Tonight I joined about 25 Old Repubs at the Red Rose Pizzeria in Springfield for a festive evening of storytelling and reconnecting. Old Repubs is the name of the Facebook group of former employees of The Republican, a group also including some hardy current reporters and editors. One of my former colleagues calls us recovering reporters.

Newspaper people tell the best stories. We talked shop – covering what has become of the industry and what it once was – and we told jokes and talked about our lives and our families and the state of the news biz and other things. Many of us lingered long after the meal was done, wanting to stay longer. Many have been gone for a long time, but we didn't miss a beat. We talked about how we miss the camaraderie, which before things started to go downhill could not be beat. We had joked around a lot but worked hard, staying late if we had to make up the time.

I never went back after my relapse in 2007, but, having worked as a reporter at the Springfield paper for more than 25 years, I often still say "we" when referring to the paper.

That is not to say it was all rosy. I still have nightmares about work: I don't have a chair, the light is too dim to see, they want me to work but there are not enough computer terminals to go around, they want me to produce more stories on impossible deadlines. (There never were enough working chairs; someone from the night shift would often take a day shift person's chair when he or she had just gone to the bathroom, and I would often start my day hunting for my chair.)

Recently, I awoke from a nightmare in which it was the last day of work before the paper went out of business, and we were all crying and saying this could not possibly be so and we did not know how to do anything else. I told this to someone tonight and she said that given the rate at which people are taking buyouts, retiring, or being laid off, the dream might be prescient.

When we get together, we lament what has happened to the industry.

Still, sooner or later, someone will say, "We had a good run."

Calling Dana-Farber

A sign that I've been around for a while: I knew many of the hematologists and medical oncologists among the 60 Dana-Farber physicians in Boston Magazine's 2015 "Top Doctors" issue.

Seeing Richard M. Stone on the list took me back to a wild Friday in April, 2003, the day after I received the shocking news that I had leukemia. I had gone to work at The Republican. Friends and family members called all day, determined to disabuse me of the idea that I would just be treated in Springfield. They said I would be crazy if I didn't go to Boston. I said OK, OK, but I didn't know exactly where.

Serendipitously, Diane's sister-in-law, Suzanne Koven, a doctor at Massachusetts General Hospital, gave her a name: Richard Stone, chief of staff and director of Dana-Farber's adult leukemia program. At just about the same time, I had been on the phone with my parents' across-the-hall neighbor, also a physician, who had given me the same name.

Close to 5 p.m., Diane called Dr. Stone's office. Over the years, when the two of us see him around, she whispers what he said when he picked up his own phone.

"Stone here."

What top physician picks up his own phone on a Friday afternoon? Luckily, Dr. Stone did.

He couldn't take me, but one of his associates, Daniel J. DeAngelo, could. I got right through to his secretary, something also amazing when you consider all the times you get a voice mail. She wanted to know my blood counts. They were somewhere in the pile of papers and notebooks strewn around my desk as I tried to finish up my stories. My editors, Mimi and Ray, dug around with me until we pulled the paper out. I don't remember exactly what they were, but they were low.

Dr. DeAngelo's secretary gave me an appointment for Monday. She said to pack my bags, because I wasn't going home for a while. The speed with which this happened still amazes me. Acute myelogenous leukemia is a fast-growing cancer, and I might not be here now if I hadn't gotten into the right hands so quickly.

From the bed to the bike

Julie Chartier and me

Here's a good way to motivate yourself to get moving on a Saturday: Pay $50 for an hour-long a.m. bike ride.

The money was actually a well-spent donation to the Holyoke YMCA though its second annual Cycle-a-Thon. It lasted from 9 to 12:30 and I don't know if anyone rode all that time, but an hour was plenty for me. I had no idea there would be a DJ, a beautiful spread of food and even a T-shirt. I'm glad to support it because the Y has so many good programs and has been a big factor in my regaining my strength.

I felt pokey this week and exchanged emails about it with Melissa, who reassured me that it was normal after two consecutive days of getting your blood sucked out. I rested when I got home Tuesday and then gradually got back into activities, first with yoga, then tennis and after that swimming, which is not as much but feels good when you stop. Activity breeds energy, like a windmill creating  electricity. I have gotten better at knowing when to stop and when to push.

It was strange to go from the blasting music at the Y this morning to the gentle music of yoga afterwards. But I don't like to miss Justine's Saturday morning class at Serenity Yoga. I didn't have much left for Maddie's walk, but we went for a spin, so to speak.

I'm happy to be working with my editor Mimi Rigali again, contributing stories to the Republican's upcoming book on Italian Americans in Western Massachusetts, part of the paper's Our Stories series.

I still have my Mass Confusion tennis towel!

It's interesting how friends cycle through your life, cycling out and often cycling back in.

The nurse told me that sometimes people work during extracorporeal photopheresis. I don't know how they do it with only one hand available.

When exchanging emails with Mimi, I typed without capital letters due to being unable to hit the shift and a character key simultaneously. I wouldn't want to write a whole story like that, but I guess if I was inspired I could do it and tidy up later.

I basically have a three-day week, which is fine because the deadline is a ways away.

After all these years of being away from the newspaper, I still have nightmares about work: no chair, no computer, bad lighting, impossible deadlines, being told I'm not producing enough, all the reporters' desks lined up in a row at the front of the office (with no place to put your stuff) so that the editors could keep an eye on us and we wouldn't goof off.

But last night I had a better dream. I stood outside the paper looking into a room where a small group of employees was singing at a goodbye party for someone who was leaving. I walked in and told (executive editor) Wayne Phaneuf that I missed the camaraderie, which is true. Now in a way I'm working for the paper but without the pressure, sitting at my own table with a chair that is not broken and nobody waiting for me to go to the bathroom so they can steal it away.

Harsh words that I said to myself

Sometimes a critical voice comes into my head, such as this admonition when I walked up the stairs to a Pilates class at the Hampshire Regional YMCA this morning:

"Walk like a normal person."

Somebody was behind me, and I didn't want my slower pace to hold her up. I think I might have even mouthed the words or possibly even mumbled them. In any case I heeded them and walked up more quickly. I doubt it bothered the woman behind me. It was just bothersome to me. Not a problem in Northampton, although they might run you down on the stairs in the New York subway system. I am normal enough on the tennis court. Stairs are the last frontier.

Once in class I did well. I have caught on quickly. I even discovered another vertebrae in my back so that when lying down, I can touch more of my back to the mat, one section at a time.

After Pilates I rode a bike for half an hour, followed by a not too difficult decision on whether to lift weights or head to Woodstar before the Sunday morning crowds arrived. I chose the latter. Usually I bring my Sunday New York Times, but today, much to my annoyance, it was not delivered. I did get a paper: yesterday's, delivered today. I took my laptop instead.

I usually don't mind reading on line, but on Sunday, I like to spread the sections around and save what I want, usually the Book Review, for the next day or so.

I have had delivery issues before and am not alone in this for The Republican as well.

This is difficult for newspapers to control, but if they want to hold on to a loyal and dwindling print readership, they should devote more resources to figuring it out.

Testing and talking, talking and testing

I was injected with radioactive stuff (like that medical term?) at 10 a.m. yesterday and spent the time until 1:30 at the Dam Cafe, where my friend John Stifler, who teaches at UMass, was nice enough to meet me.

We were due for catching up, and he was impressed by this Northampton-like place in Holyoke.

When I went back for the bone scan, the technician said it was routine to do the whole body for a baseline. I said to go ahead but I was afraid, given my history of surprises, that some unexpected places would light up. I don't think they did or else I would have heard about it, but when he did my feet I saw an area on my left foot light up. I'll get the results on Monday.

There is really no such thing as a person being too nice, but I have to say that the technician gave me a headache, talking loudly and nonstop. He told me he is so hyper he doesn't ever need to drink coffee, and it showed. My only escape was when I went into the machine for my body to be scanned and was able to take a quick nap. I like to chat with people who perform these tests, but there are limits.

The test was in Holyoke Medical Center, where I couldn't help but think of Kevin O'Hare, who was public relations director there and music critic for the Republican and also a talented musician in his own right.

He was so much fun to sit across from at the paper, always so cheerful, coming in with a smile. And when I would call the hospital to see if he could find an expert for me to interview, he never failed to thank me for thinking of the hospital (because many times reporters called the larger Baystate Medical Center).

Gone two years ago at 55, a big loss, the best kind of nice.

Creating a happy and productive workplace

I am really glad that I don't do my writing in a place where I am tied to my desk.

My workplace is my home, where I am my own boss and have the flexibility to get the most out of myself with the proper "incentives."

This morning when I was writing my Newsmax post, my eyes could not focus. The continued dry heat in my house was getting to me. Another cup of coffee would not do it, but a quick trip to Tailgate Picnic would. I think I just needed some air. I got a raisin scone and told Anna at the cash register that I was betting that magic elements in the scone would help me write.

It worked. I breezed through the Newsmax post (with help from an extra cup of coffee) and finished editing a piece that I am doing for another client.

Back in my early days at The Republican, the atmosphere allowed for taking revitalizing breaks. When there was actually a downtown in Springfield, I might walk alone or with a co-worker down to the bookstore. Later there was only the Dunkin' Donuts next door, but even a coffee run could do the trick.

Increasingly, the atmosphere there became one of watching everything you do, with time spent recharging viewed as time wasted. I am sure this attitude permeates other workplaces as well.

In another life I am going to work at Google, where, according to the company' website, "Our offices and cafes are designed to encourage interactions between Googlers within and across teams, and to spark conversation about work as well as play."

Its goal in offices and campuses is “to create the happiest, most productive workplace in the world.”

I am doing my best to create my own happy workplace. I am going to walk the dog now and when I come back, I will write the other story on my budget today, a faculty profile for Holyoke Community College's next Career Focus issue.

And if I need another scone, I just might get it.