Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Welcome Daniel!

Daniel.  What a interesting baby he was.  When he arrived twenty-five years ago, little did I know that the “blank slate” theory I’d studied in psychology class was about to be exposed as an absolute farce.  His big sister Aimee was almost two and a half, so I knew the baby ropes.   All things pertaining to babies had been understood and conquered, I figured.  But looking back, an element of Daniel’s personality was evident before Daniel was even born.  Aimee had catapulted around my insides like a gymnast,whereas Daniel rarely moved.  When he did, it was in slow motion.  There were times when I seriously wondered if he was OK in there.
 
Once he entered the wider world, we were treated to a newborn that actually slept!  So, his lethargic incubation period had been a foreshadowing of perks to come!  Score.  Little Aimee hadn’t been much interested in wasting her initial months in dreamland.  

As a baby, Aimee had nursed voraciously; Daniel was as uninterested in nursing as Aimee had been in sleeping.  Aimee was happy to be held by just about anyone, but Daniel didn’t want to be held by others.   He sucked his thumb and clung to a blankie.  Aimee clung to me or her Dad.  We jostled her and tossed her about to keep her entertained.  I remember making dinner with her on my hip, because she was so unhappy when she wasn’t in my arms.  A concept formed in my mind-- Daniel found ways to comfort himself but Aimee demanded to be comforted by others.  Yes, he wasn’t a clone of Aimee--he had his own personality and his own way of doing things.

This fact was highlighted the afternoon Daniel disappeared.  He was less than a year and a half old.  We lived in a flat, so there weren’t many places in which to get lost.  I glanced up from whatever I was doing, and he was just gone.  I looked behind the furniture in the room, checked out the enclosed front porch a few feet away, sped through the dining room, twisting my head this way and that, scoped out the kitchen, and headed down the back hallway to the bathroom and bedrooms.  I can’t tell you how amazed I was to enter little Daniel’s tiny bedroom and find him fast asleep in his crib!  What?  He must have decided in his wee mind, “Hey—I’m tired—think I’ll patter down the hall on my baby feet and climb up into my crib for a nap.”  My astonishment was complete.  That he and his sister were not cut from the same cloth was now crystal clear to this mother.  No wonder he cried when I tried to rock him to sleep.  That method had worked with Aimee because she needed outside stimulation and connection.  As a matter of fact, we tell stories to this day of how hard it was to get her to sleep in her crib.  She would fall asleep with her father holding her and when he tried to unload her into the crib, she’d immediately awaken and start to fuss.  He took to laying her down as if his arms were a forklift—with her riding on top like a “load.”  He’d lean over to put her in her crib, then press his arms down into the mattress and try to gently pull them out before she noticed they were no longer holding her.  It rarely worked.  It was an ongoing battle to get her to sleep alone in her bed.   Daniel didn’t want any of that mess—he just wanted to be left alone when he was tired! Amazing!  As each day passed, the differences between the two became more evident and I realized it was fun getting to know this unique addition to our family.


                       Happy Birthday, Daniel. 

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Golden Rule

It won’t stop raining!  It’s becoming oppressive!  Oh, now I feel guilty.  People in areas close by have lost their homes and I’m feeling “oppressed,” even though our power is on and our basement isn’t even flooded.  What a crazy couple of weeks this has been—an earthquake, a hurricane, flooding, and even a tornado—all these natural disasters have brought boatloads of misery to this area. 
 
While my heart goes out to all who are suffering, I find myself feeling very blessed because we’re not suffering.  Is that wrong?  People from our church have gone out to help those in need.  They have shoveled mud, hauled ruined furniture out of flooded homes, and given money, among other things. They’re going again in a couple of days and I guess I should join them.  It’s hard to sit contentedly, wrapped up in your own warm blessings when you know there are people out there feeling cursed.  And I'm well aware that the next time, the positions could be switched.  So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. Matthew 7:12 (ESV)

Saturday, September 3, 2011

Die, Slugs, Die!

As you may have ascertained from the title, this blog entry will document violent acts committed against one of nature’s most despicable creatures.   It happened this way—The Man and I were working on our never-ending slate project in the backyard.  I was pushing aside the soil next to the porch to do some measuring and what should my eyes behold?  A pile of nasty, wet, slimy slugs, that’s what!  It shouldn’t have surprised me.  I’d noticed lately that something creepy had been chewing holes in the Ajuga’s (a.k.a. Bugleweed) beautiful leaves...I just wasn’t sure what.  


Hope they enjoyed that last meal....

Well now I knew.  So the hunt was on.  I started grabbing those things out with my bare hands, which I can hardly believe as I write this, but it’s true.  And let me tell you something—they are 
D-I-S-G-U-S-T-I-N-G!    Make that, times four.  And they were all over the place!  So I was parting leaves, grabbing slugs, and tossing them onto the cement.  Parting leaves, grabbing slugs, and placing them in direct sunlight, hoping they would fry and never again fill their greedy little tummies (assuming they have tummies) with my leaves!  Then I was parting leaves, grabbing slugs and tossing them onto a dust pan.  When the pan was full and they were trying to crawl over the side, I ran to the back fence and flung them into the woods.  The ones that refused to let go were treated to a smashing on the fence post. 
Well, at some point it came to my attention that I was supposed to be measuring and cutting slate.  So I went into the house to wash the slug goo off my hands.  Did you know that slug goo could easily lubricate the most complex machinery?  Well, I don’t know that for a fact, but it sure seemed to be the case as I tried to wash that gunk off.  It was like trying to wash off Vaseline!  Soap, water, scrub.  Nope—still there.  More soap, water, rub a little harder.  Some came off, but some was still left.  Reach under the sink, pull out the cleaning toothbrush.  Soap, water, scrub with toothbrush.  Ah, it finally came off.  Wow.  That’s potent goo. 
I went back outside to work on the slate.  After a while I found myself strangely drawn to that patch of Ajuga.  What if there are more slugs hiding in there?  I’d better take another look.  So more parting of leaves, more discovered slugs.  This time I used my noggin and plunged a skinny piece of slate in the leaves where the slugs were and guess what?  The stickiness of the goo worked in my favor this time.  They’d stick to it and I’d pull them out, place them gently on the cement and proceed to smash their little bodies with the slate stick!  That sounds horrible, I know, but let me ask you this—if it was so wrong, why did it feel so very right?  Aren’t there such things as justifiable rage and revenge?  After all, these monsters were attempting to chew my plants to the ground!  All I know is, those particular beasts won’t try that again.  Apparently they didn’t know who they were messing with….
    

Friday, September 2, 2011

My New Bling

What a great day!  I took a bike ride this morning.  The sky was blue.  The air was fresh and cool.  It felt good to know I was burning calories like crazy and enjoying myself at the same time!  Upstate New York is pretty beautiful in the summer—there’s no question about it.   A man was opening his garage sale, so I stopped to ask a question about the recent flooding caused by Hurricane Irene, and ended up buying a ridiculous piece of “bling” that I’ll probably never wear, but that I liked.  (Always carry money with you when you ride.  You never know what you’ll happen upon that you desperately need.)  I don’t know what it is about being on a bike on a beautiful day, but it’s just heavenly.  It leaves you feeling so happy and relaxed.  The feeling has lasted the whole day.  
 (Of course, the afternoon nap might have helped a little too….)  

Here’s my fancy new necklace! 


Don't be jealous--I'm sure there are garage sales in your area too! 

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Back Pain

Back pain stinks.  WebMD proclaims, “Back pain affects 80% of Americans at some time in their lives,” so I’m sure most of you have had some experience with it.   Ten years ago I had surgery to remove a fragment that landed on the sciatic nerve after a disc ruptured.  It took a while to heal, but I’ve done pretty well over time.  A few things will still irritate the nerves and muscles, however.  One of those things happened last night.  I sat on a couch in someone’s home for a couple of hours.  That sounds pathetic, doesn’t it?  The problem was my lower back wasn’t supported in the manner to which it has become accustomed.  Today I’m feeling it.  Boy it’s annoying.  And of course, this was a busy day with a lot of driving, shopping, standing in the kitchen cooking, and more driving.  There hasn’t been much time to relax those muscles and now everything in my lower back is annoyed.  The worst part is the pain makes me want to eat chocolate.  As we all know by now, chocolate has soothing properties.  That is until you step on the scale after overindulging in those soothing properties.  Then there’s more irritation and annoyance—they’re just not in the back anymore….

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Dinner Cruise

Saturday
The Man and I worked on tiling the porch today—yeah, we take it slow—so what?  The entire top (about 13’ x 19’) is almost completely tiled.  (I’m not even going to think about grouting and sealing right now….because I don’t want to break down and cry.) Then there’s only the long step that runs the entire length of the 19’ side of the porch, and the short step which runs a few feet on one of the short sides, to tile.  Blah!  We stopped early because we’re going on a dinner cruise tonight—yea!  We’ve been up to Lake George before, but haven’t been “on” Lake George.  Oh wait—I might be lying.  My sister and bro-in-law might have brought us there when they lived this-a-way years ago.  I remember being on a boat when we were visiting--Aimee was just a wee baby.  I’ll have to ask The Man if the boat was on Lake George.  I remember being kind of freaked out having a newborn on a boat.  It seemed risky to me—of course anything short of holding her in my arms 24/7 seemed risky at the time.  (First-baby-over-the-top-protective syndrome.) 

Next Day
I asked, and it’s true!  We were on that same lake with our tiny baby 27 years ago!  WHAT!  How could that be? ------ So we went on the dinner cruise, and it was really nice.  The food was not particularly nice (except the chocolate cake they served for dessert—that was pretty darn yummy), but the “cruise” part was.  And by the way—that’s a big lake.  I was told twice that it’s 32 miles long.  The weather was perfect, not too hot, and not too cold.  They sky was blue and the water was lovely.   It was very relaxing to make our way down the lake while ogling the expensive lake houses.  There was a rather strange component to the night, however.  As we passed by their houses, people would start waving like mad at the boat.  Sometimes they’d be on a terrace or porch; sometimes they’d be on top of their boathouse. I mean it was like THE activity of the evening.  “Yi-ha everbody—here comes dat dar dinner cruise boat—let’s wave like mad at ‘em!”  I mean, really—in this day and age?  Shouldn’t the kids have been inside playing video games or something?  But the waving paled in comparison to the musket shots.  Yep.  Some highly motivated individuals went out and bought themselves some kind of apparatus that made a sound like a revolutionary war musket. (I’m citing old movies for that piece of info.)  Maybe it makes some kind of sense though because there is a fort at the end of the lake and there were a lot of battles fought there.  (But the last time I checked, the people of Lake George were all at peace with one another….)  To top it off, our boat tooted back!  I guess whoever was “tooting” never heard these words of wisdom: “Don’t respond—it will just encourage them.”
The captain came down to say hello to people at one point and I resisted (although it was mighty hard) asking him, “Hey, if you’re down here, who’s piloting this thing?”  He’s got to be asked that every single night.  I just kept myself from being the dork who asked last night.

Anyway—it was a fun time.  It’s good to get away and do something a little different once in a while.  It helps to remember that there’s more see in this world than the piles of slate waiting to be cemented onto our back porch. 


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Back to the Self-Sufficient Days

My dad was raised on a small farm north of Columbus, Ohio.  The farm is still in the family, but no one lives there anymore.  On the property sits a small white farmhouse with a wrap-around porch, and a slate roof, a white barn, a little white chicken coop, a white outhouse, and acres of apple trees.  That’s one way they sustained themselves—selling apples and cider.  The house is pretty tiny—just a small parlor at the front of the house, a middle parlor with a black stove to heat the house, and at the back of the house, a small kitchen with a room for a table and chairs.  At the top of the stairs is an open loft.  It leads to a very small bedroom.  From the middle parlor, a dinky dirt-floor cellar can be accessed.  It has a door that leads out to the backyard. There was no running water in the house when my dad lived there, and there’s no running water now.  The family’s water came from two places:  a pump in the kitchen (cistern water) and another pump outside the back door. My dad lived there with his father, mother, and two brothers.  Town is about four miles away and they didn’t get there very often, according to dad.


It was pretty primitive living, I guess.  We used to visit when I was a kid.  I remember seeing tall corn stalks in a big garden, which my uncles used to plant, off to the side of the house.  There were berry bushes in the wide path that led into the apple orchard.  We were always being warned to watch out for poison ivy when we tried to pick the berries.  The garden was to the left of the house—on the right was a small orchard with plums and peaches.  They were sure delicious.  

Yep, it was no frills living.  So how come it’s starting to look good to me?  Is it because the world seems to be falling apart?  Of course it is.  The extremist in me says, “What?  Find a place to live where you can grow your own food-- have your own water source-- and where there are plenty of trees for fuel?  It’s a no-brainer!”  I wonder how many fairly normal people are thinking along the same lines lately?

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Clean Garage Envy

Clean-Garage Envy.  I have it. Our garage is so packed with stuff that I try to keep the doors closed as much as possible.  Thankfully, we have a van.  It gets parked smack in front of the right side garage door—heaven knows there’s no way it will make it over the threshold to actually rest in the garage.  It’s useful for blockage purposes should the door have to be raised for some reason.  And, when one of the doors has to be opened at night (say, to remove a garbage can), I make sure the lights are off as the door rolls up—there’s no sense in putting a spotlight on the horror.  It’s a little tricky getting back to the light switch (all the way across the garage) after closing the big door in the dark, but fear of ridicule can compel a person to push past her fear of injury.

Many of my friends are the proud owners of clean garages.  “Friends”--may I call them what they truly are—FREAKS!   I look around as we head through their spotless garages on our way to their spotless kitchens, and I am just amazed at the fact that you can actually see their walls!  How does this happen?    How in the world do they manage all their stuff?  Maybe there’s a more basic question to ask.  Do they even have stuff?  Could it be possible that they are completely stuffless?  I start to ponder…

It’s true that our tightly packed garage contains some plain old junk that could/should be thrown away.  But taking a mental tour, I realize that there are a lot of items in our garage that have been instrumental in saving us money over the years.  There are the tools The Man has used to work on our vehicles.   Thousands and thousands of dollars have been saved because of his mechanical ability, no question.  Then there are the chemicals, scrapers, heat gun, and stains, etc. that I’ve used to refinish furniture…that stuff takes up a lot of space in the garage too.   But we have some pretty nice pieces in the house as a result of utilizing those things.  There is an empty box section, created by hoarding the boxes delivered to our home that at one time held things we’d bought online.  Since we sometimes do business on eBay, those boxes come in handy when it’s time to ship out our goods.  (No box expenses for us!)  Then there is the leftover tile, partial bags of grout, and thinset from previous tiling projects.  The Man never wants to run short, or be unable to fix a broken tile should one ever break in the future, (which will never happen because we are tiling maniacs and always butter the back of the tile, use flexible thinset, and make sure the underlayment is adequately rigid!)  Of course you can’t lay tile, without a tile cutter and tools.  If we hired someone to do the tiling, we might not have so much project residue, but we’d have much less cash too.  So, I can’t feel too bad about all that “junk”—it’s earned its keep.

Then there’s the other stuff--the overflow from the kitchen, for example.  But come on—who has room in their kitchen to store one of those counter top turkey roasters?  I mean it’s practically a room in itself!  How about big plastic cake carriers--you going to allow them to hog up prime kitchen real estate?  I think not.  And what about Easter baskets and that obnoxious green grass that you can save in a plastic bag to reuse year after year (if you’re cheap like I am). 
How about the gardening things?  Pots, grass seed, fertilizer, potting soil, tools—they all take up space, but they’re necessary tools for landscaping which has a direct correlation to your place in the neighborhood pecking order.  

Like all normal Americans, we have a plethora of plastic totes housed on big plastic shelves.
Plastic tote 1:  old towels.   They come in handy in a variety of ways.  When some nasty accident happens (think plumbing problems) you want to use your good towels?  I didn’t think so.
Plastic tote 2:   backpacks and bags—those items must be corralled.  I guess we don’t need quite so many now that two of the kids are out of the house—I’ll have to dig through that one when the opportunity presents itself.
Plastic tote 3:  winter hats, gloves, scarves  (We live in the northeast, and I’d like to keep my ears and fingers, thank you.)
Plastic tote 4:  Extra winter coats (some of those could probably go, but I only have so much power to toss things that don’t belong to me)
Plastic tote 5:  Old sports equipment.  (Son #2 says, “It’s the only thing I have in there, so please leave it alone!” What can a mother do?
Plastic tote 6:  Stuff left from daughter.  She says toss it, but I can’t—too many memories. 
Plastic tote 7:   picture frames, foolishly taken down after watching too many real estate shows on HGTV.  (“The pictures make the rooms look cluttered.”)
Plastic tote 8:  Car waxes, cleaners, etc. (Those probably should be gone through—we’re the type of people that get excited about keeping a new car clean and polished—for about two weeks.)

Turning the corner to the back wall, we see wood scraps in the corner.  You never know when you’ll need a piece of wood.  I can’t count the number of times The Man has been trying to make household repair and asks, “Hey, do we have a piece of 2X4 anywhere?”  Yes, indeed, we do!
Now for the big boys:  There are at least 12 tires in that space.  Four left by #1 son.  Four are snow tires, and four are new tires.   (Note to self:  have a tire talk with The Man.)
We also have a big, fat, yet-to-be-used generator, sitting in its box.  We had to get one of those after hearing friends’ nightmare stories of being stuck without power in the middle of the winter.  And who can live without an overflow refrigerator, an extra-large wetvac, a chainsaw, and a drill press?  Now not everyone has a garbage bag of wool from her sister’s sheep (future felting project), like we have— I’ll grant you that.  But most people have painting equipment and leftover paint cans from painting their daughter’s room a deep shade of red that took forever to dry between coats and made the room really dark,  don’t they?  Oh, and what about ladders?  How else do you get up to your roof?
Our garage has an attic too.  It is loaded with all the books our kids read when they were little.  Those aren’t going anywhere—they’ll get pulled down for the future darling grandchildren.  The ones who will one day, love to read with their favorite grandmother.  

Yep, there’s a lot of stuff in there and it could be better organized, and yes, I still envy those clean garages, but after analyzing the situation, I realize most of that stuff has a purpose—Yea!  We’re not just total slobs!  But then there’s the shed….