I have noticed a difference, one I may have mentioned earlier, but one which is becoming more pronounced in recent months. Given my lab results, my myeloma seems to be slipping back into remission. I am grate­ful for that. But after 11 years of the disease and treatments, my body is wear­ing down. To borrow from Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal, the night brigade has been out there busily taking down the perimeter defenses.

As a result, I have an increased awareness of time slipping through my fingers. I am like a child trying to grasp a handful of water or sand, unable to stop its drain­ing out no matter how tight I hold my fist.

Last Christmas my son and daughter-in-law gave me the gift of writing, including a bound journal with a mag­netic clasp and a silvery, ornate cover. Earlier this year, I started using that journal.

I am not journaling in the traditional sense of noting my thoughts or the events of the day. Instead, I find my­self writing observations of the outdoors: the thin, silvery sliver of a new moon, the Bradford pear in the back­yard holding onto its golden fall coat until the last possible moment, walks earlier this autumn gazing at the sky so intensely blue that it hurt my heart to look at it. This is what I am capturing in my journal: the small moments of time and the world.

We are also in the darkest time of the year with the days growing ever shorter. The tide will turn on the winter solstice, but for now I am acutely aware of the earlier and earlier sunsets. I have noted that in my journal as well.

Hanukkah came early in December this year; the lighting of the candles coincides with sunset. The beauty of Hanukkah is that the 30 or 40 minutes or so spent watching the candles burn down all but guarantees a small, distinctly carved island in time. I am forced, gently and with flickering lights, to slow down, to ease up, to rest. Rabbi Lawrence Kushner said it best: "At the darkest time of year, the tiniest bit of light reminds us that we are all whistling in the dark and hoping, by these rituals of miracles of candlelights and bulbs on ever­greens, we remember the divine presence."

It is all about time. Time and deeply appreciating the time left to me.

Annie Dillard, in Pilgrim At Tinker Creek, wrote "I want to stick my net into time and say 'now' as men plant flags on the ice and snow and say 'here.'" I have been carrying that quote around with me for almost three decades.

My journal notes are my net and my "now." They are my flag and my "here."