"TORTURE" An excerpt from soon to be published book!

A week later, I was on a cruise ship sailing out of New York harbor, remembering Graham's pride as I pondered my own pride at having made it to this long awaited reward. Settled into a balcony chair outside my cabin, I marveled as the ship passed directly in front of the Statue of Liberty – so close, I felt as if I just leaned out long enough over the railing, I could almost touch her. There she stood, seemingly inches in front of me, tall and triumphant in her everlasting pose, while I reposed triumphant in my own glory that I had made it to this point. Ahead heaved the open ocean. Rest.

Extending over the horizon, the ocean swelled and undulated with beckoning blueness, the cerulean sky above sparkled clear with its blueness, while inside me, a disquieting depression rose in its own blueness.

Everything blue.

I didn't belong on a cruise ship. Not yet. I couldn't walk.

Impressively, I made it to the ship's gym first thing every morning. Watching the sunrise over a rippling ocean does make it easier to exercise willingly. On the flip side, my foot hurt and I limped along in pain, barely able to enjoy any activities. After navigating those long hallways to get anywhere I'd be in devastating pain and desperate to return to my cabin. Thus, I spent a majority of my time on my balcony thinking and watching.

The fall foliage never manifested anyway. At each port, I bandaged and braced my ankle and attempted to go out and explore, but by the time I staggered the length of the ship and hobbled down the gangway, my foot swelled, pounding and throbbing, practically begging a return to my balcony. Dejected, I had to turn around and go back before ever making it off the quayside.

In Halifax, I managed to make it to the famed gardens where the resplendent colors of flowers and trees and vistas were worth every painful step. A Canadian landmark, these gardens are surrounded by beautiful iron gates.

In St. John, I hired a taxi for a brief tour of the sights and quickly bonded with the driver, also named John, who ended up driving me around all day showing me his favorite places and wouldn't take any extra money for those extended hours. We went to the Bay of Fundy, his favorite museums and markets, and he delighted in showing me a particular spiral staircase with no supports that remains in place over one hundred years after construction. John told me his stories. (Okay, I give up – why do men want to tell me the stories of their lives?) His confession about his alcoholism and how he reached instant sobriety with the birth of his child moved me.

Otherwise my days were cut short, unable to accomplish what I would start out to do.

Being a sort of V.I.P., and sort of disabled, I disembarked first off the ship back in New York and first into the customs hall where the agent greeting me had yet to adjust his date stamp to October. I waited while he set it, upside down, instead of October 1, he set it to the mistaken date of October 10, and he stamped my passport. I looked down and knowing the date to be October 1, walked off smiling in amusement that the 'homeland security agency' had everything under effective control. I arrived 'back to the future.'

Just Another Lori Story.

Excerpted from the soon to be published : "TORTURE"