Theoryland of the Wheel of Time

Dear Everyone,

He has gone where pain and suffering are no more.

Whenever he was able to be at the computer, he checked the blog first thing. Your e-mails REALLY MATTERED to him. He loved them ... and I think in some sense he loved you all.

I never thanked you for all my birthday messages, but I do now. We had a nice party...about a dozen people, ranging in age from 4 months to 82 years, sitting around the dining room table which had been covered with lots of newspaper, picking our own lovely boiled local shrimp, eating corn on the cob and homemade biscuits , and later eating watermelon; a good deal of white wine went down our gullets, too. I should add, no cooking was done by me. My dearest first cousin, also named Harriet (we're both named for her mother), did it all, just about.

It was a happy time. Jim made it so.

He came like the wind, like the wind touched everything, and like the wind was gone.

These are words Jim said to me several books ago, in the weary but always thrilling hours of putting the manuscript to bed, ready to carry to New York in the morning—I remember grabbing a piece of discarded script and scrawling those words up the margin, because they were so beautiful. He was talking about Rand. I of course am not.

I know he touched all of you. Thanks for being there.

Here is his final interview, given to the local newspaper. Notice the date:

Robert Jordan aims to get back on feet

BILL THOMPSON

Thursday, September 13, 2007

Jim Rigney intends to "keep marching to the horizon." Stage One is getting back on his feet.

Known to millions of readers as Robert Jordan, the best-selling author of "The Wheel of Time" fantasy series continues to cross swords with the rare blood disease amyloidosis, a progressive disorder he was first diagnosed with in December 2005 at the Medical University of South Carolina.

Subsequently, the author has been undergoing treatment at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

Rigney reports that with the help of the Mayo Clinic, he is keeping things under control.

ROBERT JORDAN

"My numbers are still good, in the normal range. We will be going back up to the Mayo in about a month and we'll see what the status is. Now I just have to get my foot healed up so I have a chance of getting out of this wheelchair. Strange to think that my foot, of all things, would be giving me the most trouble. It's getting better, but unfortunately the amyloidosis makes healing go very slowly.

"When I get the foot better then I can start on the process of walking again. I hope to do this in another two or three months."

BILL THOMPSON

While there has been no improvement in heart function and no change in his overall prognosis as of June, Rigney says improvement remains possible. And he's determined.

ROBERT JORDAN

"I've got promises to keep."

HARRIET MCDOUGAL RIGNEY

And he did march, guys. He marched toward that horizon until he crossed it, where we cannot follow yet.

The word now, the only possible word, is Onward.

Go for it. With love.

Consider yourselves hugged.
Harriet