As soon as I woke up this morning I cleaned my mouth out and settled back into the blankets to return to my friends in their wondrous adventure. I could feel the thinning of the pages in my right hand and knew the end was nearing, both an excitement and disappointment begin to egg at my emotions. I finished the story at quarter to twelve and I've just been itching ever since. The Itch usually comes after moments like that, of finishing some grand and fantastic something. A story, a movie, an idea that has, for a reasonable amount of time, completely consumed me. After ten years of being consumed, I guess I should have expected that this time, the Itch would be unusually difficult to tame. The Itch is a dreadful thing. It doesn't leave pock marks or bug bites on my skin, but dwells inside my mind so that it is difficult to face reality, hard to focus on tasks and mundane activities, and I question everything about my self over and over in my mind. I've never figured out how to quell it, so I usually just let it run its course and tear me apart for hours or a day or two. I took a walk to let it ramble, to think from one limited thought to the next of all things related and unrelated; of the book, the characters, the ending its self, and then my own fetal attempts at writing, the stories I've half-written, the ideas I've borrowed, and a million and one doubts fill me and I know that I could never write anything as brilliant, perhaps because I don't have the energy or originality to do so. I'm impressed and intimated by the novelty of someone else, awed at how the story came to them, so real, so detailed; surely this world must exist somewhere and the secret was leaked for the purpose of the series? Of course it's ridiculous, but a marvelous thought and spectacular compliment to Jo. It's all so believable... Clearly, I cannot concentrate. I'm trying very hard to return to reality, but you know, I never had to work very hard at make-believe. I wonder, will an idea nearly as brilliant ever again arise and bewitch the world again? PS, on a side note, our refrigerator is growling like a cow. I'm sitting near it in the kitchen and it keeps whining and grunting at me. If I weren't such a mature and know-all adult, I'd offer to take it for a walk.