I'm trying not to panic.
This is the day I have kind of dreaded. I have tried not to think about it, and yet it happens that because I'm trying so hard not to think of it, my brain goes into overdrive thinking about it.
I went to my doctor for an update on my prescription. Just a normal routine "hey, was in the neighborhood and thought I'd drop in." And get poked and prodded and drained of all my blood. She handed me a sheaf of papers of various things I should do – the boob squash test, the bone density test, the thyroid ultrasound test.
Yeah, the thyroid ultrasound test. The thyroid is a teeny tiny rice-sized grain of something, I don't know what, at the base of your throat. You have to throw your head way back so the ultrasound gizmo can even find the little thyroid. So, mine seems to have nodules. And one of them is "suspicious." This is a diagnostic term that makes my skin crawl. I've had "suspicious squamus cells" before. Suspicious raises the eyebrows of lab techs and they love to scrutinize those suspicious cells and find things. Like cancer.
Oh, I don't have cancer. At least I don't think so. I'm trying to not think about it – you know. Don't think the C-word and what do you get? Everything spells out cancer. The old lady crossing the street looks like Cancer. The kitty on the front porch looks like Cancer. You close your eyelids and they spell out Can-Cer.
So the doc called me today to say the tests came back (and I had lots and lots of tests), especially considering I only just dropped by for a friendly update-my-prescription visit. I am now scheduled for a biopsy. That's a scary word too – almost as bad as the C-word. Biopsy – the B-Word, the "just a little snip" word. In this case, the Ultrasound-Guided-Needle-Biopsy word. In my throat.
I'm trying not to panic.
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2.12.2009
2.05.2009
Be My Valentine
People are asking for love stories and it struck me that I don't have one. How pitiful does THAT sound? I don't have a romantic prince-charming-on-a-white-horse-taking-me-away-from-all-of-this story.
It's sad to think I have gone this far in my life and through the years, I gave up on the Prince Charming dream. I started this path when I was very, very young. My Dad was my Prince Charming and I adored him. Then one day when I was 19, another Prince Charming rode by and swept me off my feet. We married and we had two children, both boys. Seven years later, when our boys were 2 and 3 years old, he became disenchanted and found what he desired in another man.
This was an event that started a heavy soul searching on my part. I look back now and think about how young I was and how innocently I saw things - it was just a given that a princess married her Prince Charming and they lived happily ever after for ever and ever amen.
Then I started dating "real men" and found most of them wanted freedom and several partners - and they avoided having partners with single mothers. (The "package" thing)
For several years I didn’t date. I focused on my boys, my job, our lives. But then HE came along.
When my Significant Other arrived, in a beat-up roaring white ’72 Charger (a steel horse with so much horse power under the hood that it could probably drive itself), he appeared as an overweight, shy, intelligent, awkward auto mechanic. He said he saw me and KNEW that I was his “little red-haired girl.” Just like Charlie Brown. He was smitten. He entered our lives when the boys were 10 and 11, and the same weekend that they had received letters from their Dad, coming out of his closet. To say we were a shell-shocked, ragtag, confused little family was an understatement. And this was absolutely no problem to my future Significant Other. He took them out to his car while he changed the oil, replaced spark plugs, took things apart, got greasy, put things back together, fired up the many-horse power Charger, and generally was an all-male, manly-man, Tim Allen-type guy, even grunting with joy when the motor hummed back to life. The boys were pretty much in awe.
Now, THAT is as romantic as he got. No card. No flowers. No romance. But I fell for him anyway. He was stable. He was committed to just one person – who happened to be me. And he blended in with my boys as naturally as if he were their Dad. His idea of a Valentine Card was to replace the faltering alternator in my car. (Lasts longer than flowers.)
That was 23 years ago. He’s still my Significant Other. He is finally introducing me as HIS significant other, too. Before, for years, I was his girlfriend. I told him that “girlfriend” sounds trivial and IN-significant. I’m not a one-night stand and I’m not temporary. I am not just a fling. I told him that he is my Significant Other because he is important to me; he is a significant part of my life and my happiness. He is my “most important” half of me.
So, that’s my love story. I guess I DO have one after all.
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It's sad to think I have gone this far in my life and through the years, I gave up on the Prince Charming dream. I started this path when I was very, very young. My Dad was my Prince Charming and I adored him. Then one day when I was 19, another Prince Charming rode by and swept me off my feet. We married and we had two children, both boys. Seven years later, when our boys were 2 and 3 years old, he became disenchanted and found what he desired in another man.
This was an event that started a heavy soul searching on my part. I look back now and think about how young I was and how innocently I saw things - it was just a given that a princess married her Prince Charming and they lived happily ever after for ever and ever amen.
Then I started dating "real men" and found most of them wanted freedom and several partners - and they avoided having partners with single mothers. (The "package" thing)
For several years I didn’t date. I focused on my boys, my job, our lives. But then HE came along.
When my Significant Other arrived, in a beat-up roaring white ’72 Charger (a steel horse with so much horse power under the hood that it could probably drive itself), he appeared as an overweight, shy, intelligent, awkward auto mechanic. He said he saw me and KNEW that I was his “little red-haired girl.” Just like Charlie Brown. He was smitten. He entered our lives when the boys were 10 and 11, and the same weekend that they had received letters from their Dad, coming out of his closet. To say we were a shell-shocked, ragtag, confused little family was an understatement. And this was absolutely no problem to my future Significant Other. He took them out to his car while he changed the oil, replaced spark plugs, took things apart, got greasy, put things back together, fired up the many-horse power Charger, and generally was an all-male, manly-man, Tim Allen-type guy, even grunting with joy when the motor hummed back to life. The boys were pretty much in awe.
Now, THAT is as romantic as he got. No card. No flowers. No romance. But I fell for him anyway. He was stable. He was committed to just one person – who happened to be me. And he blended in with my boys as naturally as if he were their Dad. His idea of a Valentine Card was to replace the faltering alternator in my car. (Lasts longer than flowers.)
That was 23 years ago. He’s still my Significant Other. He is finally introducing me as HIS significant other, too. Before, for years, I was his girlfriend. I told him that “girlfriend” sounds trivial and IN-significant. I’m not a one-night stand and I’m not temporary. I am not just a fling. I told him that he is my Significant Other because he is important to me; he is a significant part of my life and my happiness. He is my “most important” half of me.
So, that’s my love story. I guess I DO have one after all.
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2.04.2009
Friend or Foe?
So, I'm driving along the freeway to work, blithley happy in a new day, content in my life, when a commercial comes on for the Baby Fair this weekend, "sponsored by marriage-friendly communities."
Marriage-friendly communities???? What the heck does THAT mean. Are there unfriendly single communities? Are their communities that are NOT friendly with marriage? What about communities like mine that aren't married but aren't single either?
Wait.
Does that mean I have enemies to my unmarriage with my significant other? Like, I can't shop at their stores, can't walk on their sidewalks, I have to get off the bus right at the line where . . . . unmarriage ends and marriage begins. How can I tell? And what does this mean for the unmarried mother – is she prohibited from going to the Baby Fair because the marriage-friendly communities have shunned her, right out of the stone age – gee, maybe they'll throw stones?
Now I've arrived at work all grumpy and cantankerous. And paranoid! All those marriage-friendly communities hissing through their teeth as I walk by.
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Marriage-friendly communities???? What the heck does THAT mean. Are there unfriendly single communities? Are their communities that are NOT friendly with marriage? What about communities like mine that aren't married but aren't single either?
Wait.
Does that mean I have enemies to my unmarriage with my significant other? Like, I can't shop at their stores, can't walk on their sidewalks, I have to get off the bus right at the line where . . . . unmarriage ends and marriage begins. How can I tell? And what does this mean for the unmarried mother – is she prohibited from going to the Baby Fair because the marriage-friendly communities have shunned her, right out of the stone age – gee, maybe they'll throw stones?
Now I've arrived at work all grumpy and cantankerous. And paranoid! All those marriage-friendly communities hissing through their teeth as I walk by.
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2.01.2009
Wrong Write?
Where has penmanship gone? I didn’t feel its loss until I recently received a letter in beautiful calligraphy. It brought back memories of 2nd Grade, learning cursive, bending over my paper, tongue perched over my lip, diligently and intently creating those smooth round letters that flowed together making me feel so very grown up. (smile) And how through the years of school, college, pre-computer era term papers and writing, writing, writing. Writing fast and furious to make the deadline of a final; writing Christmas cards, writing to friends, writing in my journal. And slowly over the years watching my finely honed script degenerating into scratches and marks and almost indecipherable ticks. And today most of my writing is done on a computer at lightning speed, sometimes faster than I can think, putting down words and thoughts before I think they come into my head.
There is a grace and elegance in calligraphy. It culls up a style and poise that seeps through the eyes like comforting elixir. The writer is more thoughtful in his words; they are carefully chosen and a phrase is eloquent and almost musical to the reader.
It’s a shame, really, that we have become so enmeshed in our computers and the wide world of the internet that nearly all our written word is through a keyboard and not through such a skilled artist’s venue as one holding an ink pen.
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There is a grace and elegance in calligraphy. It culls up a style and poise that seeps through the eyes like comforting elixir. The writer is more thoughtful in his words; they are carefully chosen and a phrase is eloquent and almost musical to the reader.
It’s a shame, really, that we have become so enmeshed in our computers and the wide world of the internet that nearly all our written word is through a keyboard and not through such a skilled artist’s venue as one holding an ink pen.
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1.29.2009
Can you get to the point in 55 words exactly????
I found a site that has a little noncompetitive contest (ha!!) that is a 55-word story.
Check here
I thought Huckleberries (see side bar) has such fine (prolific) writers that this would be enjoyable. In fact, the site I found celebrates "55 Flash Fridays". We could do something like 55-word Hump Day Stories. Or something. Here's a couple!
And another if that is too fluffy for you:
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Check here
I thought Huckleberries (see side bar) has such fine (prolific) writers that this would be enjoyable. In fact, the site I found celebrates "55 Flash Fridays". We could do something like 55-word Hump Day Stories. Or something. Here's a couple!
My Excuse (by a 10-year-old girl)
I had my map of the 50 states in 50 different colors with all the correct capitals in florescent ink when this huge, opera singing elephant leapt out of the bushes and blew my map into a puddle and it dissolved right there and that’s why I don’t have my homework done. That’s the truth!
And another if that is too fluffy for you:
The Angel frantically ran past the Pearly Gates, across the gold cobbled stones, and up the golden staircase, screaming “Heaven is ending! Heaven is ending!" Other Angels tried to comfort her but she was beside herself with fear. God finally touched her. “Fear not,” He calmly said. “Heaven is still here. It has not . . . “ phffffft!
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1.28.2009
We are in a Black Hole
Unemployment.
Layoffs upon Layoffs.
I've never seen anything like it. First, yesterday's paper's headline shouted "One day, 40,000 job cuts" for household names like Caterpillar, Home Depot and Sprint Nextel. Then the news bulletin alert on my email stated that Mayor Vernor was planning nine layoffs in the building department, because of lack of new homes being built.
Today, Boeing announced 10,000 layoffs for this year and Starbucks added to that number, 6,000. We are in dire straits, folks. There is not one family that has escaped this cutting jobs theme. My son was laid off two weeks ago, in a small branch office where they laid off 30% of their employees. This morning's news relayed the tragic effects that layoffs can have – a father/husband killed his wife, their five children, and himself because both he and his wife were laid off this week.
It's increasingly worrisome. Add this to the fact that all of us who are working have watched our savings and 401(k)'s take a big hit and our dreams of retiring are looking grim. And what must it be like for those who have retired and are living on a fixed income with a dwindling retirement backup plan?
What is the solution? How can we keep our heads above the panic line?
I am grateful I do have a job, and a job that I enjoy – but what happens when people can't find a job, when Avista keeps raising its rates, when the economy tanks, and bail outs seem to be only for the big multi-millionaire companies and not for the small families, the homeless, the poor, even the middle class. What happens to . . . . me?
.
Layoffs upon Layoffs.
I've never seen anything like it. First, yesterday's paper's headline shouted "One day, 40,000 job cuts" for household names like Caterpillar, Home Depot and Sprint Nextel. Then the news bulletin alert on my email stated that Mayor Vernor was planning nine layoffs in the building department, because of lack of new homes being built.
Today, Boeing announced 10,000 layoffs for this year and Starbucks added to that number, 6,000. We are in dire straits, folks. There is not one family that has escaped this cutting jobs theme. My son was laid off two weeks ago, in a small branch office where they laid off 30% of their employees. This morning's news relayed the tragic effects that layoffs can have – a father/husband killed his wife, their five children, and himself because both he and his wife were laid off this week.
It's increasingly worrisome. Add this to the fact that all of us who are working have watched our savings and 401(k)'s take a big hit and our dreams of retiring are looking grim. And what must it be like for those who have retired and are living on a fixed income with a dwindling retirement backup plan?
What is the solution? How can we keep our heads above the panic line?
I am grateful I do have a job, and a job that I enjoy – but what happens when people can't find a job, when Avista keeps raising its rates, when the economy tanks, and bail outs seem to be only for the big multi-millionaire companies and not for the small families, the homeless, the poor, even the middle class. What happens to . . . . me?
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1.27.2009
Analog Digital Confusion!
It's such a quandary, isn't it? To go digital or stay analog. It's almost like they are saying – get with the new century or sit on your behind and "go dark."
I haven't given this digital conversion a single thought because I have cable. But the ads on tv are glutted with promos for getting a converter box before D Day (Digital Day) or you won't be able to watch tv.
First, this is a government mandated conversion. For your television connection. I think all kinds of conspiracy theories can propagate themselves right in this one little conversion proposal. It's government mandated! It's very "Big Brother is Watching You." I wonder if this means that Big Brother is **really** watching me as I watch Desperate Women. Can Big Brother hear conversations in my house? Is that just too paranoid? Is it really? If the government can mandate how your television is connected, then can it eventually mandate what you watch and when you watch it?
We have been hearing promos for box coupons for months now and the deadline crept closer and closer to reality, even pre-empting a rerun of Boston Legal to go on for an hour about how easy it is to connect your tv to the converter box, when suddenly, now we have an extra four months, until June. What ARE the elderly, the poor, the ones with just a simple television that isn't on cable, going to do???
I did a tiny bit of research on this and in a Q&A:
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I haven't given this digital conversion a single thought because I have cable. But the ads on tv are glutted with promos for getting a converter box before D Day (Digital Day) or you won't be able to watch tv.
First, this is a government mandated conversion. For your television connection. I think all kinds of conspiracy theories can propagate themselves right in this one little conversion proposal. It's government mandated! It's very "Big Brother is Watching You." I wonder if this means that Big Brother is **really** watching me as I watch Desperate Women. Can Big Brother hear conversations in my house? Is that just too paranoid? Is it really? If the government can mandate how your television is connected, then can it eventually mandate what you watch and when you watch it?
We have been hearing promos for box coupons for months now and the deadline crept closer and closer to reality, even pre-empting a rerun of Boston Legal to go on for an hour about how easy it is to connect your tv to the converter box, when suddenly, now we have an extra four months, until June. What ARE the elderly, the poor, the ones with just a simple television that isn't on cable, going to do???
I did a tiny bit of research on this and in a Q&A:
"An important benefit of the switch to all-digital broadcasting is that it will free up parts of the valuable broadcast spectrum for public safety communications (such as police, fire departments, and rescue squads). Also, some of the spectrum will be auctioned to companies that will be able to provide consumers with more advanced wireless services (such as wireless broadband). "
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1.25.2009
Summons
There it was. Those words. You Have Been Summoned. It looked sinister and ominous.
Holy cow! I have been called to jury duty! First time ever! O boy! O boy! (a little dancing, a little high-fiving, a little "framing of my summons" going on.)
I know it is based on my being an adult, licensed driver, home owner, or somehow have an identification card showing I’m, . . . . what? Smart? Objective? Mature? Can I be your peer?
Here I am, almost 60 years old and I’ve been sniveling about NOT being “chosen” for jury duty. Like it was some kind of contest. So typical of my life – first in 4th grade being the last.one.standing to be picked for one of two teams. Now, I am entering close-to-retirement years and I finally got picked for jury duty. They say you have been “randomly” picked – but I know better. They couldn’t find anyone else taller, smarter, prettier, or more athletic and they had to settle for. . . . . . . . .me.
I’m kidding of course. It is a serious duty and my right as a member of the community and I wasn’t being snubbed. Much.
I’ve heard the stories, though, of how utterly boring it is. Very, very few get the high profile cases. The rest are domestic quarrels with your neighbor, shop lifting, bla bla snooze.
So, what should I wear? Can I bring my I-pod? My laptop? Food?
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Holy cow! I have been called to jury duty! First time ever! O boy! O boy! (a little dancing, a little high-fiving, a little "framing of my summons" going on.)
I know it is based on my being an adult, licensed driver, home owner, or somehow have an identification card showing I’m, . . . . what? Smart? Objective? Mature? Can I be your peer?
Here I am, almost 60 years old and I’ve been sniveling about NOT being “chosen” for jury duty. Like it was some kind of contest. So typical of my life – first in 4th grade being the last.one.standing to be picked for one of two teams. Now, I am entering close-to-retirement years and I finally got picked for jury duty. They say you have been “randomly” picked – but I know better. They couldn’t find anyone else taller, smarter, prettier, or more athletic and they had to settle for. . . . . . . . .me.
I’m kidding of course. It is a serious duty and my right as a member of the community and I wasn’t being snubbed. Much.
I’ve heard the stories, though, of how utterly boring it is. Very, very few get the high profile cases. The rest are domestic quarrels with your neighbor, shop lifting, bla bla snooze.
So, what should I wear? Can I bring my I-pod? My laptop? Food?
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1.21.2009
A Mom by Any Other Name
Recently a friend sent an email questionnaire – you know, the fun ones asking you to name your favorite chick flick, the last movie you cried to, your favorite snack. This one asked, "name five names you are known by." So, I faithfully started writing:
Ma
Mom
Mommy
Mom!!!
Sweetie
Jeanie
Donna Jean (my mother)
Mrs. xxx (teachers)
Mrs. xxx (future daughters-in-law)
Mom (present daughter-in-law)
And I realized most of my names are related to some job I hold – parent, spouse, secretary, daughter. Most of my names are my children's names for me, depending on the degree of urgency, each one said incrementally louder than the one before it. They are in their mid-30s now and I do not see them growing out of this name-calling stage any time soon.
I don't think I have lost my identity – you hear women whine all the time that they don't know who they are. I am first and foremost – Mom. It's my favorite job. It's my longest running job – I have never been fired nor laid off and I doubt I will ever have to worry about job security until the day I die – and then it is my children who will have lost their parent / teacher / friend / nurse / fireman / instructor / life coach / driver / all-around rescuer from all things girl, pet, sport, life in general issues. (I haven't quite figured out how to put that down on my resume.)
So, my oldest son was laid off after ten years and the first person he called was:
"Mom!!!!"
I'm meeting him for lunch and I'm wearing all my hats.
.
Ma
Mom
Mommy
Mom!!!
Sweetie
Jeanie
Donna Jean (my mother)
Mrs. xxx (teachers)
Mrs. xxx (future daughters-in-law)
Mom (present daughter-in-law)
And I realized most of my names are related to some job I hold – parent, spouse, secretary, daughter. Most of my names are my children's names for me, depending on the degree of urgency, each one said incrementally louder than the one before it. They are in their mid-30s now and I do not see them growing out of this name-calling stage any time soon.
I don't think I have lost my identity – you hear women whine all the time that they don't know who they are. I am first and foremost – Mom. It's my favorite job. It's my longest running job – I have never been fired nor laid off and I doubt I will ever have to worry about job security until the day I die – and then it is my children who will have lost their parent / teacher / friend / nurse / fireman / instructor / life coach / driver / all-around rescuer from all things girl, pet, sport, life in general issues. (I haven't quite figured out how to put that down on my resume.)
So, my oldest son was laid off after ten years and the first person he called was:
"Mom!!!!"
I'm meeting him for lunch and I'm wearing all my hats.
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1.13.2009
Take a Wild Ride
Buckle that belt
Kiss 2008 a sound Good Bye
And let's take this new year for a great ride
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1.10.2009
Play that avatar!
Recently, my favorite online newspaper, The Spokesman-Review, upgraded their website and now all the blogs allow the users to create “avatars” to represent themselves.
Wikipedia paints an avatar as “. . . a computer user's representation of himself/herself or alter ego” “It is an “object” representing the embodiment of the user. The term "avatar" can also refer to the personality connected with the screen name, or handle, of an Internet user.”
An avatar also is a reincarnation of a Hindu deity! And further is defined as “an embodiment, a bodily manifestation of the Divine."
However, in the blogosphere of Huckleberries, an avatar doesn’t necessarily show a deity as much as it shows the mischievous, whimsical, and playful personality of the individual behind the avatar.
You can be anything you want to be, the stars are the limits. You can be thin, svelte, young, animal, personality, even a symbol. Anything goes.
If I take the concept behind an avatar, then I am assuming that each user is displaying his persona in that little icon. On Huckleberries – unlike any other forum displaying avatars – the individual avatars change sporadically throughout the day, expressing that individual’s mood at that moment: naughty, nice, cantankerous, ornery, quizzical, mysterious. Mine at the moment is pixyish fairy with a subtle mischievousness – in other words, a brat. :) (Tinkerbell) (I did find a naked Tink and gave it about five seconds before I visualized my avatar (and me) being banned forever and ever.)
Actually, when I go through the blogosphere at Huckleberries, I can never quite be sure that doodleface is really Jane Doe, it might be Jack Splat. And with the constant changing of the avatars for one single individual, at any given moment, which seems to be going on with nearly everyone on the blog, I think the whole Huckleberries community is filled up with escapee schizophrenics. And I’m one of them!!!
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Wikipedia paints an avatar as “. . . a computer user's representation of himself/herself or alter ego” “It is an “object” representing the embodiment of the user. The term "avatar" can also refer to the personality connected with the screen name, or handle, of an Internet user.”
An avatar also is a reincarnation of a Hindu deity! And further is defined as “an embodiment, a bodily manifestation of the Divine."
However, in the blogosphere of Huckleberries, an avatar doesn’t necessarily show a deity as much as it shows the mischievous, whimsical, and playful personality of the individual behind the avatar.
You can be anything you want to be, the stars are the limits. You can be thin, svelte, young, animal, personality, even a symbol. Anything goes.
If I take the concept behind an avatar, then I am assuming that each user is displaying his persona in that little icon. On Huckleberries – unlike any other forum displaying avatars – the individual avatars change sporadically throughout the day, expressing that individual’s mood at that moment: naughty, nice, cantankerous, ornery, quizzical, mysterious. Mine at the moment is pixyish fairy with a subtle mischievousness – in other words, a brat. :) (Tinkerbell) (I did find a naked Tink and gave it about five seconds before I visualized my avatar (and me) being banned forever and ever.)Actually, when I go through the blogosphere at Huckleberries, I can never quite be sure that doodleface is really Jane Doe, it might be Jack Splat. And with the constant changing of the avatars for one single individual, at any given moment, which seems to be going on with nearly everyone on the blog, I think the whole Huckleberries community is filled up with escapee schizophrenics. And I’m one of them!!!
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1.06.2009
Puffed Childhood
Cindy Hval's article ("Jot it down") instantly brought back one of many, many happy memories of my children when they were little. We spent endless nights before bedtime all curled up in one rocker while I read to them. I still have that rocker.
When I look back, I see rows and rows of days where we were either in that chair or all three cuddled up on the couch, one on either side of me. They were precious moments where we "bonded" – where we formed a tight circle of love and affection – just the three of us. I miss those days of cuddling. They haven't faded completely out of view for just this last Christmas we were all together with our extended families and I lost count of the times that one son or the other son embraced me as we were all celebrating the holiday.
I remember the day I discovered my babies had sprouted fuzzy angel hair on their legs! O my! Who would have thought that those fat squeezable legs would grow into puberty, into long legged teen boys.
Or the day my youngest drew a tattoo in blue indelible ink on his leg. That was a perfectly good leg, I told him! No marks, no scars, no taints, no blemishes. Perfect! He now sports several real tattoos, on his legs, arms, neck. {sigh}
And the day that we were watching "Puff the Magic Dragon" when they were six and seven years old. As the little boy in the cartoon grew into a man and forgot his magical dragon friend, Puff, my youngest turned to me in astonishment, huge tears spilling over his cheeks, wondering how something could be so sad – and I was thinking at the same time, how does a six year old learn compassion and empathy to the extreme of tears? I hugged him and encouraged him to stay young! Stay innocent! Stay my baby!
He's now 35 years old. But he hasn't forgotten me!
There's always a hug and there's always a "hey, Mom!" of some discovery he wants to share.
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When I look back, I see rows and rows of days where we were either in that chair or all three cuddled up on the couch, one on either side of me. They were precious moments where we "bonded" – where we formed a tight circle of love and affection – just the three of us. I miss those days of cuddling. They haven't faded completely out of view for just this last Christmas we were all together with our extended families and I lost count of the times that one son or the other son embraced me as we were all celebrating the holiday.
I remember the day I discovered my babies had sprouted fuzzy angel hair on their legs! O my! Who would have thought that those fat squeezable legs would grow into puberty, into long legged teen boys.
Or the day my youngest drew a tattoo in blue indelible ink on his leg. That was a perfectly good leg, I told him! No marks, no scars, no taints, no blemishes. Perfect! He now sports several real tattoos, on his legs, arms, neck. {sigh}
And the day that we were watching "Puff the Magic Dragon" when they were six and seven years old. As the little boy in the cartoon grew into a man and forgot his magical dragon friend, Puff, my youngest turned to me in astonishment, huge tears spilling over his cheeks, wondering how something could be so sad – and I was thinking at the same time, how does a six year old learn compassion and empathy to the extreme of tears? I hugged him and encouraged him to stay young! Stay innocent! Stay my baby!
He's now 35 years old. But he hasn't forgotten me!
There's always a hug and there's always a "hey, Mom!" of some discovery he wants to share.
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12.29.2008
The Naked Habit
I admit it, I need help. I need one of those support groups for bad behavior. Something like this:
“Hi, my name is Jeanie, and I’m a procrastinator.”
I live for the future. There is always tomorrow. Scarlett O’Hara has nothing on my abilities to put off today, what can be done tomorrow because tomorrow is always another day.
Until this last couple of weeks. The snow and being snowed in has provided just the opposite of scenarios for planning my daily tasks. The snow has shouted “There is NO tomorrow.”
I have always thought of myself as organized, that everything is prearranged and well thought-out. Case in point: my Christmas cards. I had planned finishing up my Christmas cards on Friday the 18th because my boss would be out of town and I would have free slots of time to label envelopes, fold already printed letters, and write quick notes to everyone.
And then it snowed. It snowed a lot. I had a snow day on Thursday. But I felt content in the knowledge that I still had Friday. After all – this was the first snow day in 35 years. Naturally it would abate enough for me to get to work on Friday and get my cards out.
Friday it was another snow day. And I have been pretty much snow bound ever since, which overlapped into my **prearranged** and **preplanned** vacation, scheduled through to the 5th of the New Year.
Did I learn my lesson? (The lesson to “live in the now” as if there is NO tomorrow) Nope. Sunday was my laundry day – and I live in a house with no laundry services. I was *planning* on going to the Laundromat Sunday but for some reason, that procrastinator gene popped up and said, “Hey! You can get out on the roads today! Why not go shopping! Why do chores! You can do the laundry TOMORROW.”
And this morning I am once again snowed in and the snow isn’t stopping. EVER. It will snow tomorrow, too, but since there is no tomorrow, that means it is going to snow FOREVER.
I have no clean clothes. (I have an abundance of clean underwear because you never know when something unplanned might happen.) No clean jeans, no clean shirts, lots of cotton underwear.
So, uh, I am planning on attending my Procrastinator’s Anonymous meetings in the future but since I’m trying to rehabilitate myself, live in the now, I might not make it. I’d go tonight, but I’m snowed in, so . . .
Tomorrow is another day. Maybe.
“Hi, my name is Jeanie, and I’m a procrastinator.”
I live for the future. There is always tomorrow. Scarlett O’Hara has nothing on my abilities to put off today, what can be done tomorrow because tomorrow is always another day.
Until this last couple of weeks. The snow and being snowed in has provided just the opposite of scenarios for planning my daily tasks. The snow has shouted “There is NO tomorrow.”
I have always thought of myself as organized, that everything is prearranged and well thought-out. Case in point: my Christmas cards. I had planned finishing up my Christmas cards on Friday the 18th because my boss would be out of town and I would have free slots of time to label envelopes, fold already printed letters, and write quick notes to everyone.
And then it snowed. It snowed a lot. I had a snow day on Thursday. But I felt content in the knowledge that I still had Friday. After all – this was the first snow day in 35 years. Naturally it would abate enough for me to get to work on Friday and get my cards out.
Friday it was another snow day. And I have been pretty much snow bound ever since, which overlapped into my **prearranged** and **preplanned** vacation, scheduled through to the 5th of the New Year.
Did I learn my lesson? (The lesson to “live in the now” as if there is NO tomorrow) Nope. Sunday was my laundry day – and I live in a house with no laundry services. I was *planning* on going to the Laundromat Sunday but for some reason, that procrastinator gene popped up and said, “Hey! You can get out on the roads today! Why not go shopping! Why do chores! You can do the laundry TOMORROW.”
And this morning I am once again snowed in and the snow isn’t stopping. EVER. It will snow tomorrow, too, but since there is no tomorrow, that means it is going to snow FOREVER.
I have no clean clothes. (I have an abundance of clean underwear because you never know when something unplanned might happen.) No clean jeans, no clean shirts, lots of cotton underwear.
So, uh, I am planning on attending my Procrastinator’s Anonymous meetings in the future but since I’m trying to rehabilitate myself, live in the now, I might not make it. I’d go tonight, but I’m snowed in, so . . .
Tomorrow is another day. Maybe.
12.27.2008
Resolution
I have such good intentions
Making New Year’s Resolutions
Why is it that my ambitions
Fall short of absolution
.
Making New Year’s Resolutions
Why is it that my ambitions
Fall short of absolution
.
Why I hate 2008 Just a Little
The reason(s) I am really looking forward to a New Year and all these reasons happened in only the last two weeks of 2008:
Wednesday - Fifteen days before New Year’s it snowed two feet; an hour and a half to get home
Thursday - Snowed another foot; first “snow day” from work
Friday - Second “snow” day; screen door sealed shut from two inches of ice on other side; after slipping hot water through door sill and then tossing out rock salt, finally slipped through with coal shovel and pounded on remaining ice; ceiling leaked in living room, soaking and sopping the dry wall until it fell in white chalky gooey globs onto the carpet; climbed up to roof, shoveled and pounded ice
Saturday - Shoveled and shoveled and snow blowed four hours; water leaking at corner of living room ceiling, sending rivulets down behind plate glass mirror; repeat “up on the rooftop”; renter next door called to say furnace was not working; called repairman who said he would get there later (five hours later at 7:30); time and a half, $500 repair; 11:30 out on roof again because center of living room ceiling is dripping (eventually a gallon before finished shoveling
Sunday - Screen door sealed shut again; same routine as before.
Monday - First day of two-week vacation. Uncovered cars (again) of new foot of snow; shoveled and snow blowed the parking area, the neighbor’s parking area, the mail boxes, the paper boxes (another four hours). Haven’t seen mail since Wednesday; paper arrives every other day
Tuesday - Got my one and only Christmas card; back on the roof to shovel because of dripping in the middle of the living room ceiling; furnace next door went out again; picked up small part for furnace;
Wednesday - Christmas Eve – 20 minutes after putting the pies in the oven, the power went out for the entire neighborhood of 2100 houses; discovered the power supply for computer had been fried by the power outage; snowed four inches; plows came by at 11:30 at night and plowed me in.
Thursday - Getting ready for Christmas dinner at son’s; at noon, center of ceiling pouring water like turning on a faucet; spent next hour on ceiling shoveling, pounding, jumping up and down, spreading rock salt; got stuck on berm created the night before; shoveled; became point man for hubby to barrel out of parking spot; point man again half a mile later to get over berm created along Park – looked both ways and said “gun it!” and miraculously made it to clearer passage way of Park.
Friday - New leak on east side of house, back on roof for another hour, shoveling and scraping and taking up asphalt, generally really tired of this; head for Eager Beaver on Evergreen to fix computer; do the gunning of Park again; very heavy, very slow traffic
Saturday - Snowed another four inches; snow blowing walkway working out to parking area. Gee – a whole day without the ceiling leaking somewhere.
Sunday -
Monday -
Tuesday -
Wednesday -
Thursday - New Year’s Day – and hopefully this is a sign that 2009 will be a whole lot better than 2008.
12.24.2008
Hope
I am thinking of many things this Christmas 2008. I have many losses this year and it is more poignant at Christmas – missing my parents, missing the childhood days of traditions at Christmas and the total unbelievable excitement that permeated the air and made all of us giddy.
I miss the infancy of my oldest child, who was born 15 days before Christmas. The birth of Jesus never meant more to me than at that time. I was filled with awe thinking of Mary giving birth in a barn; thinking about the future of her baby and that he would become my Lord. I am remembering holding my new little baby on Christmas Day, dressed in a red and white sleeper with a Santa hat, looking more beautiful than the Gerber baby! I was the envy of the entire world! I think of Christmas as birth, as a new beginning, a fresh start, the dawn of HOPE.
I want to grasp this HOPE and clutch it tight to my chest, let it carry me forward through 2009. This is my goal today, now. To bring this HOPE to the new year like a flaming torch.
.
I miss the infancy of my oldest child, who was born 15 days before Christmas. The birth of Jesus never meant more to me than at that time. I was filled with awe thinking of Mary giving birth in a barn; thinking about the future of her baby and that he would become my Lord. I am remembering holding my new little baby on Christmas Day, dressed in a red and white sleeper with a Santa hat, looking more beautiful than the Gerber baby! I was the envy of the entire world! I think of Christmas as birth, as a new beginning, a fresh start, the dawn of HOPE.
I want to grasp this HOPE and clutch it tight to my chest, let it carry me forward through 2009. This is my goal today, now. To bring this HOPE to the new year like a flaming torch.
.
12.22.2008
Remembering Dad
If I could, if there was some way I could talk to him once again, I would let him know I am thinking of him:
Hey Dad,
I have missed you so much! Your unconditional love for me (your Pumpkin), has guided me all these years without you. I have wanted so much to show off my boys to you; you were such a great influence on them. They loved “Grandpa from the farm” and then when you moved to the Oregon coast, “Grandpa from the beach.”
They’ve grown! One got married! Can you believe it?
Dad, I wish you were here – so many good things about my life are because of you. I want to emulate your goodness, kindness, and compassion. I want to be held to your high standards of professionalism and integrity.
And I want to have the same enthusiasm you did for the little things in life – the short cuts that really weren’t; the home made sling shots that were the best invention for sibling interaction – why call it anything else – we weren’t rivals. No way! We were warriors and soldiers and adventurers, our only “prop” a simple wooden sling shot made from old inner tubes. The fantastically fast six-man toboggan run you made, that got so smoothed out from many rides that we could make a complete loop and never have to get off the toboggan. The igloo made out of the two feet of snow we had in 1964. In 1969 we had another record breaking snow and that’s the last time you ever shouted to the winter gods, “I wish it would snow two feet deep!”
I thought of you the last few days as I spent about eight hours cumulative in shoveling and scraping snow, and finding a place to dump the snow I shoveled. We have had three feet of snow in the last four days! Isn’t that phenomenal? Imagine the igloo palaces you could make!
As I move on and leave you over the Rainbow Bridge, I would really like to crawl in your lap and just lean into you, my comfort and my strength.
God bless you, Dad!
Dedicated to my Dad, Don Rice, Spokane Chronicle Editor, who passed away 15 years ago this week at the age of 67.
.
Hey Dad,
I have missed you so much! Your unconditional love for me (your Pumpkin), has guided me all these years without you. I have wanted so much to show off my boys to you; you were such a great influence on them. They loved “Grandpa from the farm” and then when you moved to the Oregon coast, “Grandpa from the beach.”
They’ve grown! One got married! Can you believe it?
Dad, I wish you were here – so many good things about my life are because of you. I want to emulate your goodness, kindness, and compassion. I want to be held to your high standards of professionalism and integrity.
And I want to have the same enthusiasm you did for the little things in life – the short cuts that really weren’t; the home made sling shots that were the best invention for sibling interaction – why call it anything else – we weren’t rivals. No way! We were warriors and soldiers and adventurers, our only “prop” a simple wooden sling shot made from old inner tubes. The fantastically fast six-man toboggan run you made, that got so smoothed out from many rides that we could make a complete loop and never have to get off the toboggan. The igloo made out of the two feet of snow we had in 1964. In 1969 we had another record breaking snow and that’s the last time you ever shouted to the winter gods, “I wish it would snow two feet deep!”
I thought of you the last few days as I spent about eight hours cumulative in shoveling and scraping snow, and finding a place to dump the snow I shoveled. We have had three feet of snow in the last four days! Isn’t that phenomenal? Imagine the igloo palaces you could make!
As I move on and leave you over the Rainbow Bridge, I would really like to crawl in your lap and just lean into you, my comfort and my strength.
God bless you, Dad!
Dedicated to my Dad, Don Rice, Spokane Chronicle Editor, who passed away 15 years ago this week at the age of 67.
.
12.09.2008
Anticipation
This is the Week of Anticipation. It's seen in every child as they peer through the window at the snow-crested trees, the lights and decorations draping the tree in the living room, the bells ringing on maybe sleighs drawn by horses, adorned with bells and red leather reigns. You can feel the eagerness that sets everyone on the edge of their seats with expectations of dreams and wishes coming true! It is the underlying and tangible Hope of aspirations; the optimism of expectation!
You remember keenly being that child. All good things were coming your way just because it was Christmas! Christmas meant birth. It was a New Beginning topped by a fresh new year so the slate was entirely clean, ready for your footprint. It was perfect bliss! I loved the feeling of Christmas – all the excitement, the delight, the smiles, the exhilaration!
I felt it again driving home Friday night – first when I passed a horse drawn carriage elegantly moving along Lincoln towards Riverfront Park – beautiful, graceful horses slowly dancing down the street. Then I passed a truck carrying a Santa sleigh, totally engulfed in twinkling red and white lights, ready to be the carrier for the Great Saint Nicholas himself! You could taste the thrill in the air, the crispiness of the night, the anticipation of Santa, of holidays, of Christmas, of magic!
Even as an adult, I am transported to a higher version of myself. I feel an expectation within me that is just bursting; I drag all my Christmas sweaters out of storage and eagerly go through each one; which to wear today; which to wear tomorrow. I gather all my dangly, sparkly earrings that are snow flakes, crystal icicles, blinking reindeers, laughing Santas. What to wear first!
This is the Week of Anticipation!
.
You remember keenly being that child. All good things were coming your way just because it was Christmas! Christmas meant birth. It was a New Beginning topped by a fresh new year so the slate was entirely clean, ready for your footprint. It was perfect bliss! I loved the feeling of Christmas – all the excitement, the delight, the smiles, the exhilaration!
I felt it again driving home Friday night – first when I passed a horse drawn carriage elegantly moving along Lincoln towards Riverfront Park – beautiful, graceful horses slowly dancing down the street. Then I passed a truck carrying a Santa sleigh, totally engulfed in twinkling red and white lights, ready to be the carrier for the Great Saint Nicholas himself! You could taste the thrill in the air, the crispiness of the night, the anticipation of Santa, of holidays, of Christmas, of magic!
Even as an adult, I am transported to a higher version of myself. I feel an expectation within me that is just bursting; I drag all my Christmas sweaters out of storage and eagerly go through each one; which to wear today; which to wear tomorrow. I gather all my dangly, sparkly earrings that are snow flakes, crystal icicles, blinking reindeers, laughing Santas. What to wear first!
This is the Week of Anticipation!
.
Boxes and More Boxes
Off The Cuff -- Boxes Galore
I packed up my entire house today in 14 boxes and some bags. It was sad to see my life sitting in my living room, and its only destination is a storage unit/Alexis. From Huckleberries Online here
Other than college days, I have never been able to get all my belongings in just 14 boxes. I have 20 boxes right now filled with collectible glassware that are sitting in my cellar. I have thousands of books that would probably fill 30 boxes. My bedding alone would fill my car! And I save everything because I collect everything.
As soon as I read this quote on Huckleberries, a memory flashed into my mind of the day we moved Grandmom out of her apartment to live in a nursing home. She lived in a one-bedroom assisted living apartment, half the size of my 730 square foot house. She had spices in her cupboard that had petrified, probably purchased in the late 30s. She had piles of new slacks that still had the price tag on them from stores that have been closed for a couple decades.
As I was going through her things, trying to pare it down to what would fit in a side table (or in one box), I kept going over MY things in my mind. I vowed then and there that I was going to whittle down my stuff so that my sons would not be sitting on the floor of my living room surrounded by endless empty little jars of makeup (because they were milk glass and probably collectible); magazines from the 70s; canned food from the 70s; 29,000 pens and pencils; glue sticks that were glueless and sticky notes that had lost their stick; a gazillion balls of yarn and just as many mid-process uncompleted knitting projects; cross word puzzles already filled out. . .
So far, I have only managed to put these things in boxes and store them in closets. I have managed, though, to record them on tape for which I will transcribe them later. It's been several years since I started the tape and stored the boxes. I have a box full of all those travel size soaps and shampoos you get in hotels. I wonder what the shelf life is for generic motel shampoo?
.
12.06.2008
I Know a Short Cut!
“I know a short cut!” my Dad would shout in triumph.
And the rest of the carload – Mom, two brothers, one sister, and me – would, in unison, tremble and shudder. A short cut meant only one thing: Dad was lost and we were doomed.
We frequently went for “Sunday drives” with Mom packing a loaf of bread and peanut butter. Off we would go in the family station wagon, over hill and dale, paved highway traversed by thousands of cars or rocky road never seen by man or machine in centuries. It didn’t matter – it was a short cut.
I remember once traveling up a road that could scarcely be defined as a legal mode of transportation, narrow, barely wide enough for the family wagon. Traversing up and up and zigzagging and back ending and tail whipping to the highest reaches of the earth, the car lumbering and laboring like a breathless elephant, suddenly Dad would decide this wasn’t a road at all and then proceed to back down with the sheer drop to the earth far, far below and a rock face spearing the sky on the other side. Dad would steer the monster behemoth car precariously close to the edge. We’d hold our collective breath, clamp our eyes tight shut, and PRAY!
Twice, we went on “short cuts” through uninhabited frontier and ended up in gullies, formed from some recent flash flooding, so that the “road” disappeared into a black, inky, gooey muddy mire that Dad would bravely plow through because he knew it was only a minor detail – until – well, the wheels stopped turning because they were essentially enveloped in a cement like gunk. We’d all get out and push the car while Dad steered. One of those muddy abysses was at least a mile long surrounded by watery swamps on either side tempting the car as Dad fishtailed, zigged, and zagged and finally landed on firm soil.
Many road trips later, I grew up, moved out, had a couple children, and teamed up with my Significant Other. When the boys were about 10 and 11, Lovey decided he wanted to go for a Sunday drive and look for grouse. We traveled towards Chewelah, all the time he is telling us tales of his grouse hunts with his dad, when he veers the car left to a side road, while exclaiming, “I know a short cut!”
Déjà vu set in. I shuddered. Closed my eyes tight. And PRAYED. We were even in an old classic Dodge station wagon, a big black hulking thing. The road started out paved, then turned to gravel, then turned to a wagon train trail, with grass growing knee-high up the middle of the “road.” And then pretty soon it was only a couple of trails, leading up, up, up into the clouds, the proverbial drop off cliff on MY side, the road getting, if possible, NARROWER, still going up, when we reach a “bump” in the road which made you feel like you were going to launch into outer space – where you couldn’t see where you were going to “land.” And the road immediately started to go down, bumpy and jarring – huge boulders in the way – we jumbled and dumbled our way down when we finally came out onto a forest road that branched in two different directions. Lovey took the left route and we ended up on a highway outside of Ford, Washington.
We found no grouse in this little adventure – however, when we reached the highway (alive), the forest road had a sign: “Grouse Trail Road.”
And that’s my last “short cut.”
.
And the rest of the carload – Mom, two brothers, one sister, and me – would, in unison, tremble and shudder. A short cut meant only one thing: Dad was lost and we were doomed.
We frequently went for “Sunday drives” with Mom packing a loaf of bread and peanut butter. Off we would go in the family station wagon, over hill and dale, paved highway traversed by thousands of cars or rocky road never seen by man or machine in centuries. It didn’t matter – it was a short cut.
I remember once traveling up a road that could scarcely be defined as a legal mode of transportation, narrow, barely wide enough for the family wagon. Traversing up and up and zigzagging and back ending and tail whipping to the highest reaches of the earth, the car lumbering and laboring like a breathless elephant, suddenly Dad would decide this wasn’t a road at all and then proceed to back down with the sheer drop to the earth far, far below and a rock face spearing the sky on the other side. Dad would steer the monster behemoth car precariously close to the edge. We’d hold our collective breath, clamp our eyes tight shut, and PRAY!
Twice, we went on “short cuts” through uninhabited frontier and ended up in gullies, formed from some recent flash flooding, so that the “road” disappeared into a black, inky, gooey muddy mire that Dad would bravely plow through because he knew it was only a minor detail – until – well, the wheels stopped turning because they were essentially enveloped in a cement like gunk. We’d all get out and push the car while Dad steered. One of those muddy abysses was at least a mile long surrounded by watery swamps on either side tempting the car as Dad fishtailed, zigged, and zagged and finally landed on firm soil.
Many road trips later, I grew up, moved out, had a couple children, and teamed up with my Significant Other. When the boys were about 10 and 11, Lovey decided he wanted to go for a Sunday drive and look for grouse. We traveled towards Chewelah, all the time he is telling us tales of his grouse hunts with his dad, when he veers the car left to a side road, while exclaiming, “I know a short cut!”
Déjà vu set in. I shuddered. Closed my eyes tight. And PRAYED. We were even in an old classic Dodge station wagon, a big black hulking thing. The road started out paved, then turned to gravel, then turned to a wagon train trail, with grass growing knee-high up the middle of the “road.” And then pretty soon it was only a couple of trails, leading up, up, up into the clouds, the proverbial drop off cliff on MY side, the road getting, if possible, NARROWER, still going up, when we reach a “bump” in the road which made you feel like you were going to launch into outer space – where you couldn’t see where you were going to “land.” And the road immediately started to go down, bumpy and jarring – huge boulders in the way – we jumbled and dumbled our way down when we finally came out onto a forest road that branched in two different directions. Lovey took the left route and we ended up on a highway outside of Ford, Washington.
We found no grouse in this little adventure – however, when we reached the highway (alive), the forest road had a sign: “Grouse Trail Road.”
And that’s my last “short cut.”
.
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