The Notebook Chapter 1

I walk on tiled floors,white in color and speckled with gray.

It has not been the rip‐roaring spectacular I fancied it would be , but neither have I burrowed around with the gophers.

It clicks and groans and spews hot air like a fairy‐tale dragon , and still my body shivers with a cold that will never go away, a cold that has been eighty years in the making.

I hear the muffled sounds of crying in the distance and know exactly who is making those sounds.

The romantics would call this a love story , the cynics would call it a tragedy.

I'm a sight this morning: two shirts,heavy pants, a scarf wrapped twice around my neck and tucked into a thick sweater knitted by my daughter thirty birthdays ago.

I cough, and through squinted eyes I check my watch .

There is always a moment right before I begin to read the story when my mind churns, And I wonder , Will it happen today ? I don't know , for I never know beforehand, and deep down it really doesn't matter .

The path is straight as ever , but now it is strewn with the rocks and gravel that accumulate over a lifetime .

I stand from my seat by the window and shuffle across the room , stopping at the Desk to pick up the notebook I have read a hundred times.

It has not been the rip‐roaring spectacular I fancied it would be , but neither have I burrowed around with the gophers.

They do not seem to notice ; they have become numb to it , but then again, so have I. Afterward I sit in the chair that has come to be shaped like me.

The door has been propped open for me , as it usually is.

It's the possibility that keeps me going, not the guarantee , a sort of wager on my part .

And that leaves me with the belief that miracles , no matter how inexplicable or unbelievable, are real and can occur Without regard to the natural order of things .

It clicks and groans and spews hot air like a fairy‐tale dragon , and still my body shivers with a cold that will never go away, a cold that has been eighty years in the making.

The path is straight as ever , but now it is strewn with the rocks and gravel that accumulate over a lifetime .

It clicks and groans and spews hot air like a fairy‐tale dragon , and still my body shivers with a cold that will never go away, a cold that has been eighty years in the making.

And how, I wonder, will this story end?

I realize the odds, and science, are against me.

The excitement of the morning always upsets her , and today is no exception.

I suppose it has most resembled a blue‐chip stock: fairly stable , more ups than downs , and gradually trending upward over time .

I do not glance through it.

The path is straight as ever , but now it is strewn with the rocks and gravel that accumulate over a lifetime .