Friday, September 22, 2017

Crossroads




It has happened.

I have finally arrived at a crossroads that I always knew was coming, but never really allowed myself to think about. My neuropathy has progressed to the point that I am being forced into making life changes, and making decisions on what I can and can't do from this point forward. I have finally reached that stage where I'm that guy at Walmart driving the little electric shopping cart. Even with a rolling walker, I can only gp short distances before my legs get unsteady and I have to sit down to avoid the risk of falling.

And now it appears that time has run out on my hands as well.

I have been having trouble with my hands for a long time, yet up until now I've managed to keep adapting my typing style to account for it. But lately, as the neuropathy has further encroached into my fingers and weakened them, it has started affecting my proprioception as well. I cannot tell exactly where they are on the keyboard without looking at them. Combine that with the fact they don't even move in certain directions anymore, and I have come at last to that  point where more drastic changes must be made.

If I am going to continue my career as an author, I am going to have to attempt to learn how to write a novel with speech recognition software. I simply have no choice. I have been researching the topic, and will soon be buying a copy of Dragon Premium 13 and a microphone. It's a bit of an investment (for me, at least) and I truly hope I don't end up wasting my money… mainly because I have no idea if I can teach myself to write this way.

I'm a painfully old and decrepit dog, and I despise new tricks.

But I have to try.

Unfortunately, this means my schedule and timelines have been shot to pieces (not that I was accomplishing much with these hands lately, anyway). But maybe the time spent educating myself will let me get a fresh perspective on my current projects and make them all the better for it. I hope so. A silver lining here and there is always appreciated.


So wish me luck as I sojourn forward to try to keep this thing going, and maybe that luck will translate into another book or two down the road. If not, at least I can console myself that I tried, and that my final body of work didn’t include anything I'm ashamed of. But for now, I'm still seeing what can be done.