Ampersand Gazette #100

Welcome to the Ampersand Gazette, a metaphysical take on some of the news of the day. If you know others like us, who want to create a world that includes and works for everyone, please feel free to share this newsletter. The sign-up is here. And now, on with the latest … 

 

&&&& 

The Law of Ubiquity 

Today’s lead essay has a little bit of a different character from most of them. Everything just fit together a little too well for me to ignore it. 

A hundred years ago, a cavalier City born-and-bred friend of mine decided she wanted to manifest a car. Over the phone one day she announced to me that she planned to create, and I quote, “Wheels.”  

And, as true metaphysical law works, she did. Bicycles. Grocery carts. Little red wagons. A tall, tall unicycle bearing an enthusiastic clown on top. A go-kart race in Central Park. Strollers. Fancy Park Avenue prams. Incumbent bikes. Foldable bikes. Motorbikes. Even scooters. Wheels galore. 

Remember, though? What she wanted was a car. It didn’t take long for her to change her tune from the toss-away casualness of “Wheels” to “a really well-kept used car.” She manifested it, color and all, within less than a week, and drove it for years. 

Well, I don’t have to tell you, not really, that consciousness will out. What’s in your awareness is what shows up. Plain and simple. Without exception.  

There was an essay called The Conversation in this morning’s Times. David Brooks, E. J. Dionne, and Robert Siegel, all OWGs, met to hash out some ideas on our current political situation. 

David Brooks had written elsewhere, “… Trumpism is seeking to amputate the higher elements of the human spirit—learning, compassion, science and the pursuit of justice, and supplant those virtues with greed, retribution, ego and appetite.” 

This has been his theme a lot lately. Mr. Brooks came to God and theology later in his life, and his celebration of the spiritual has been a lot of fun to see. He’s kept his tart, journalistic voice throughout his self- and other-discovery as well.  

It was the word ‘amputate’ that stopped me. 

Now, you wouldn’t think of that word as necessarily having an association with me or for me, but it does. Very recently, in fact. 

I’ve managed a chronic disease, with the help of some magical physicians, for thirty-seven years. It’s a disease whose name strikes fear in the hearts of the noblest of warriors. The classic textbook threat of dissolution of faculties, including, upon occasion, amputations. Yes, plural. 

An unfortunate mid-dark-of-the-night bang of a toe against a piece of unsuspecting furniture, exacerbated by the seam on a slightly-too-tight slipper put me, after two separate hospital stays, into a queue of eager specialists, and on the operating table. 

As of October 7th, I am a double-amputee. The funny thing about it is that all the docs who’ve seen the surgery are as thrilled at my remaining little pink toes as any new parent with a first baby. They’re delighted at what’s left. Wheeeeee, all the way home, so to speak. 

Believe me, it’s a confusing perspective from the viewpoint of the amputee. And, please, don’t misunderstand me. I may as well not be an amputee, for heaven’s sake. The sacrifice of two partial toes on my right foot have not compromised my ability to walk. My balance is fine. There is no way anyone would know unless I either tell or show them. 

But amputate. It sounds so … permanent. And it is. I’ll never get those digits back. The word itself has Latin roots that mean to prune. I’m no gardener, but whenever my grandmother went out to prune her roses, she always walked back in the house feeling accomplished, with a basket full of beauty and incomparable scent. She swore that pruning was what roses thrived on. 

Let’s go back to Mr. Brooks. I don’t think the current climate is about pruning at all. It’s about a confluence of effects, just like my amputee status. Thirty-seven years of disease management came together in a scary few weeks. 

I’ve had two out-patient procedures. Three in-patient hospital stays—one for IV-antibiotics that didn’t do the trick, one for surgical approvals that got me onto that operating table, and one, courtesy of some highly-efficient EMT professionals who, apparently stopped me from bleeding out twice in one night, and thank God for ER nurses who can tell STAT who needs blood transfusions.  

So what I want to ask you to think on today is this: are there things in your life that need pruning? Things that you’ve been casually calling a need for, say, wheels, when what you need is an entirely new system replacement? I bet there are. 

I knew, deep down, that some day I’d have to pay the cost of carrying this illness. That day, those days, have been relentless, and recent, much like our political situation seems these days. The thing, Belovèd, to consider is that you get to diagnose what to prune away, what you wish to thrive and grow, what you want a do-over for. 

There are lots of follow-up thises and thats in terms of my situation. Each one goes a step toward a more perfect union—of my body, heart, mind, and spirit—and that work, that better union, pruning included, is what we were all sent here to do.  

You see, in order to create a more perfect union of these United States, there’s a pre-requisite. We get to perfect our own interior unity first. Get on with it, please. We need you.

Excerpted from The Conversation in The New York Times
October 23, 2025

& 

This is an introduction to one of Anu Garg’s weeks of A.W.A.D.—A-Word-A-Day. I loved how he characterized what different words do … 

Verbs make things happen and nouns make things exist, but adjectives make things matter. They decide whether your day is good, your coffee strong, or your boss unreasonable. They’re opinionated, judgmental, and gloriously subjective, but we wouldn’t have it any other way. 

Language would be dull gray without them. They’re the pigments that let us paint details: a blue sky, a brilliant idea, a bitter truth. Strip them away, and the world collapses into nouns and verbs: objects and actions, but no texture. 

This week, we celebrate those often-small words that tint our thoughts and give sentences flavor, feeling, and flair. 

The word adjective comes to us from Latin adjectivum, literally, that is added (to the noun). So feel free to add them to any nouns, but just like spices, a little goes a long way to bring out the flavor. 

https://wordsmith.org/words/acerbic.html  

Adjectives make things matter. They also tell a reader what matters to the writer. Have a care this week, and listen for your own adjectives. Is it time to spice them up a little? GO for it. And if you can’t find one you like for a particular situation, make one up! 

&

Here’s a universal affirmation. It works every time, for everyone, always and forever …  

Hard to believe I believe this, but I surely do. Otherwise, I wouldn’t even be embodied right now. How’s that for proof?! 

& 

So, I’m an anniversary lover like the best of them, but I never, ever in a million years thought I’d be celebrating a week since I almost bled out. Twice. Well, I am. 

I’ve said for years that death, whenever it visits, makes life crystal clear. And oh, it does. I didn’t die, but it was close. 

And doesn’t it make all those pesky little things in life look like precious easy fun tasks now? Sure. I have to have Gilda the Gumdrop, our little red FIAT 500 inspected. Fab! Let’s check out the brakes that squeak too much, too. 

I have what seems like four hundred and fifty bazillion more doctors’ appointments to make, and keep. So? I’m here to keep them. 

I wanted a piece of cheese after dinner last night, and I had one. Fountains of gratitude. 

And yes, there is some writing news. 

 & 

I’m happy to announce that Impending Decision, the fifth Boots & Boas Romance, is live as an ebook and in print on Amazon. Here’s the cover:

And the series blurb: 

Boots & Boas

Boots & Boas are butch-femme romances based in Boston about
The Butch Brigade, queer buddies seriously committed to their chosen family.
Think “Queer as Folk” meets “Cheers.”
Now, add a parade of scintillating femmes and all the challenges of everyday LGBTQ+ life. 

As well as the book blurb: 

Impending Decision 

A one-note butch. A multi-hyphenate femme. A record-breaking disappointment. 

Jamie Jenkins, Esq. loves the law. In fact, the law is his beloved, his mistress, his one and his only. For efficiency’s sake, Jamie has a deep-seated habit of dating his paralegals. Jayne is no exception. 

Jayne Jordyn Jewell, who in her heart of hearts is a classical jazz singer, has, in fact, been that paralegal for eight years. At work, the two are golden. So good, in fact, that Jamie has paid in full for Jayne to go to law school, and she is mere weeks away from graduating. On the personal front, things are a lot more … tarnished. It takes Jayne a long time to figure out just how neglected she is, and even longer to decide what to do about it. 

She’s approaching a day of serious reckoning when an unexpected relapse sends everything in her world spiraling—downward. Then, whilst she is ill, Jayne is offered the biggest gig of her lifelong singing career. On Christmas Eve, at Club Café, to be the headline entertainment at a private invitation-only party for two of the top music producers in the world. 

Can Jamie get out of his own way to show up for the femme who always, but always shows up for him, or will Jayne be singing her heart out solo, a legal widow for the rest of time? 

You want to make an indie author happy? Choose one of my series, and read all of them. Then review all of them. That’s the way others find books.

& 

Jaq Direct is calling to me. The book is finished, but we need to edit and read it before it’s published. Tony Amato is my favorite editor for lots of reasons, but connecting to the creative patterns of each different writer in his bundle is one of the most important. There are times when I finish a book, and can wait months to edit it. Others, not so much. 

Tony has this surreal ability to be urgent with some of us, and mellow with others. That’s from more than thirty years of experience working with marginalized as well as bestselling authors. He has an uncanny ability to seek, find, recognize, and polish the truth of a writer’s voice.  

Seriously, this is the guy. He’s edited my books for more than 20 years, so I ought to know. Find him here. Oh, and here’s his substack Subscribe here. 

& 

As you can imagine, being mid- multiple plot twists,
I am doing very little reading,
I’m too distracted,
so no book review in this issue, but … 

That’s not really true.
I just did very little research reading. 

Instead, I finished an
Old Favorite: 

Outlander, 

All nine of their big, fat, juicy reliable selves. 

Then I switched to her adjunct
Series, The Lord John Grey Books.
Also yummy, but for very different reasons. 

Diana Gabaldon has inspired me so much
over the years. 

& 

Are you waiting for a sign?
How about this one? 

When I got sprung from the hospital
this time, I spent a little time
visiting with a friend. 

He told me that once this, and this,
and this, and this things
in his life were handled that then
he could relax. 

I didn’t miss a beat. I said,
“You know, don’t you, that whether or when
any of those things happen,
the Peace of God
is still available to you?” 

He said, “Miss Susan, it’s no fair.
How is it that you’re so wise, and so beautiful?” 

Well, I don’t know about that, but,
we laughed together. 

& 

If you are inclined to add your prayers
for my renewed health and well-being,
please let them reflect the notion

that … 

I AM SUPERHEALTHY. 

You know as well as I do that this process
will take as long as it takes no matter how
urgently I want it resolved. 

And remember, 

EVERYTHING ALWAYS WORKS IN MY FAVOR.
AND NOT ONLY MINE.
YOURS, TOO. 

& 

I am, without doubt, certain that And is the secret to all we desire.
Let’s commit to practicing And ever more diligently, shall we? 

Until next time,
Be Ampersand 

&&&&