What do you do when your livelihood almost crashes.  And I don’t mean a car.  I mean, my freaking computer.  I didn’t get the blue screen of death.  Instead, I got the black screen of impending doom.  The message in white letters that stood out like little explosions read “Searching for Disk Error.”  To say my heart stopped for the minutes it took for the computer to scan itself is an understatement.

With my lips turning blue from lack of oxygen, I waited.  With my finger going numb from lack of use, I waited.  My brain replaying the last moments of every keystroke that would be lost if I had a system failure.  It was like my writer’s life flashing before my very eyes.

Would the readers mind if book three in the Mercy series was scrapped because I didn’t want to write it over?  Was this somehow payback for the cliffhanger I left Waiting for Mercy on, lol?

I needed an Angel of Mercy to save me and my computer because we were both going down.  My system check unperturbed by silent screams.  It took its sweet time scanning the hard drive.  58%.  I needed to breathe.  Air was a distant memory as my vision blurred.  I couldn’t loose everything.  Okay, so I did a back up, like two months ago.  Crap.  I needed to be more diligent.  Life does seem to get in the way.

61%, I claw at my throat hoping against hope that my Dell would live to see another day.

Was the short story of Flynn and Luke saved on the last backup I did????

69%, what the hell was taking so long.  ERROR detected flashed on the screen.  Holy moly!  Sucking in a first breath, I managed to see the message that something was deleted.  But I guess that would fix the system.  Hopefully, everything important was saved.

Time ticked away as I held that last breath.  72%, 83%, 94%.  ERROR!  I can hear the non-existent ringing like a meltdown at a nuclear power plant.  Oh, wait that’s my phone’s ringtone.  I ignore the call, it wouldn’t be important if my computer died.

Taking another breath, the system goes dark.  I missed what happened while I checked my phone.  Dying for a second time, I watch as my system re-boots itself.   Sighing a relief and breathing in precious air that should never be under appreciated.  Never to make the same mistake again, I quickly make a backup on an external hard drive saving everything.

Moral of the story  –  Make a back-up on a regular basis.  I was given a reprieve this time.  But things could have been catastrophic.  Things could have gotten ugly.  I say a silent prayer of thanks and pay it forward by sharing my story with you.  I can laugh about this now…..

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