Five Pages a Day by Peg Kehret Page A

fears, hopes, and ideals into the pages. Because I write about things that matter to me, my own voice speaks from my work even when I write fiction.
    After three days of typing bills, I admitted that I would forever be a writer. My novel had not sold, but at least I had written it. I had done my best, and that was better than not trying. How I use my time is more crucial than how much I earn. From then on I did the work I loved and never again took a “real” job.
    I was fortunate to have this choice. Carl made enough money for our family to live on, and he enthusiastically supported my writing efforts. Even in the years when I published little, he believed in my work and encouraged me.
    Writers need time to experiment with ideas and words, time to concentrate on a manuscript, time to revise, time to daydream. My husband gave me the luxury of time to write.
    I longed to write a second novel for children, but decided I should stick to what I did well. I didn’t want to waste another year on a book that wouldn’t get published.
    The editor of a new magazine called Woman’s World told me she would publish one short story in each issue and asked if I would like to submit something.
    I wrote a story about a young woman who ignores her likable but ordinary boyfriend because she dreams of marrying the star player of the New York Yankees. When I saw “‘Major League Love’ by Peg Kehret” in a national magazine, I bought ten copies and gave them to family and friends.
    I wrote many more stories for Woman’s World and all said “by Peg Kehret.” I also wrote stories and poems for children’s magazines.
    One day I got out the chart that I used to keep track of my submissions and realized that my system might help other writers. I wrote “Something in the Mail Every Friday”—and made my first sale to the Writer . Another of my magazine goals got checked off.
    I never did sell an article to the Reader’s Digest , but when I opened an unexpected letter from them, out dropped a check. They had reprinted one of the verses I had originally sold to the Wall Street Journal .
    I laughed as I crossed off the third and final magazine on my list of goals. It had not happened the way I expected, but that was okay. A sale is a sale!

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    Alzheimer’s Disease
    W hen I was little, I called him Daddy. Later he was Dad. That changed to Father when I was fifteen. It started as a joke, but the joke became an affectionate nickname that stuck, and Art and I called him Father from then on.
    â€œFather” sounds formal and old-fashioned, while my dad was easygoing and full of fun—until he was sixty-two, and diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. This horrible disease robbed him of his memory, his personality, and his ability to care for himself. It changed not only his life, but my mother’s life and the lives of everyone in my family.
    When Father was diagnosed, few people knew anything about Alzheimer’s disease. There were no books to inform families how this devastating illness progresses, so I decided to write one.
    The difficult research absorbed and exhausted me. I spent days in the University of Washington medical library, reading articles intended for doctors. I interviewed doctors who studied the brain, psychiatrists, and families of patients. I visited a hospital that had an entire ward of Alzheimer’s patients, and toured nursing homes. It took me a year.
    When the book was finished, I sent it to the agent who had been unable to sell The Ransom at Blackberry Bridge . She returned the manuscript. She was not interested in a book about a disease she had never heard of, and she didn’t think any publishers would want to read it, either.
    I decided to market it myself. I sent it to a university press, where an editor liked it and asked for some revisions. Encouraged, I plunged into the rewrites.
    Before I finished, an excellent book called The 36