It's been awhile!
We're still kicking in the big, white house in the country....as I type this I am waiting for the oven timer to tell me the next pan of cookies are done, there's Christmas music playing, the girls and I have been dancing away the afternoon and somewhere...somewhere out there far away, my dad's eyeballs have rolled clean out of his head because of what he's seeing at my house today.
I'll admit that I was having a difficult time finding the holiday spirit until today. Let's face it, there's nothing holy or sacred about a twelve hour shopping marathon. There was too much mayhem and sadness on the news the last ten days for me to find the fun in the holiday. There were too many stories of, "What if that were me.." or "Dear God, why??" And then....then I started to see Christmas through Zoe's eyes. Then I caught a glimpse of Ashley and Brianna dancing to Christmas music in the kitchen, and now I'm hooked. I'm in it with both feet now.
That doesn't mean that I'm not remembering how lucky I am. That I haven't thanked God a million times today alone for giving me the chance to stand in this kitchen, on this day, with these kids and this man. I'm well aware that there are families out there grieving so deeply that words can't possibly express how they hurt. I guess the miracle in all of it is that I can grieve with them and for them, while also immersing myself in the people that I love.
So, the cookies will get baked. The presents will get wrapped. There's a pot roast going, and church tonight and Santa has a pretty strict Christmas Eve rule about bedtime that no one will be brave enough to breach. (Except the present wrapper. She will probably just be going to bed around the time that the first kid is sneaking down the stairs.)
It's Christmas. A really long time ago, a baby was born in a manger. And because of that, I will wake up tomorrow and celebrate His birthday with MY babies. Talk about blessed.
Merry Christmas
Monday, December 24, 2012
Saturday, November 3, 2012
Saturday Randomness
Just to keep you all updated on the utter fantastic-ness (yes, that's a real word.) that is my life, I'd like to share what I've been up to on this beautiful Saturday.
1. Woke up at 5:17am. Walked around the house. Had a glass of orange juice. Read a line or two of a blog that I occasionally like to read. Realized that it was then 5:39am. On Saturday.
2. Crawled back into bed between John and Zoe. Had a tug, push, scootch (also a real word), elbow to the gut, you just 'charlie-horsed' my thigh fight for some space and some blankets.
3. Slept until 9:13am, when I received a text message from my son, asking me to guess what time he woke up this morning.
4. Answered text with, "IDK, Austin. But I can tell you that I was asleep until exactly 30 seconds ago."
5. Discussed Austin and Ashley's breakfast menu choices.
6. Inquired about the lack of bacon in Austin and Ashley's breakfast choices.
7. Made a "Dirty Dancing" reference to Ashley.
8. Had some coffee, despite the fact that I could not properly pronounce the word, coffee. Instead calling it, "coffa". Twice.
9. Started laundry. Check to see if some sort of miracle happened and my broken dryer got fixed. It has been broken for about four months. We've been carting baskets of wet clothes to the laundry mat to dry. It's still broken. This is probably the tenth time I've checked, just to be sure, in case it suddenly decides to start working again. *side note* Please pray for a miracle. Would someone please break into my house and fix the stupid thing already? Also while you are here....my vacuum filters need replaced and there's a leak in the bathtub drain. Many thanks.
10. Rescued a sock from between the washing machine and the broken dryer with the broom. You are welcome, Brianna Abramo. Remember who takes care of you, k?
11. Read a blog that made me contemplate paying for cable. Yes, we live in the dark ages over here. Color me cheap, but I don't wanna pay for the joys of having Zombie children and STILL have nothing good to watch on television. Except...Sons of Anarchy? Maybe....just maybe.....I'm a season behind because Netflix is a butt face like that. There's an Opie thing....I just don't know. Maybe. I mean, I'm bringing home the bacon now. (Turkey bacon, but still.) I could....
12. Just realized I have now made two references to bacon in this post. Perhaps some lunch should be next on my list?
13. Had a pre-Thanksgiving pre-planning conversation with my sister in law. Made plans to do the actually planning pretty soon.
14. That's it, folks. That's all there is. It's 12:03pm, and I'm still in my pajamas.
15. Because I have OCD a little and I can not have 14 things on my list, you get number 15. Nope....nothing. That's all. Be jealous. This IS my dream, and I am living it.
1. Woke up at 5:17am. Walked around the house. Had a glass of orange juice. Read a line or two of a blog that I occasionally like to read. Realized that it was then 5:39am. On Saturday.
2. Crawled back into bed between John and Zoe. Had a tug, push, scootch (also a real word), elbow to the gut, you just 'charlie-horsed' my thigh fight for some space and some blankets.
3. Slept until 9:13am, when I received a text message from my son, asking me to guess what time he woke up this morning.
4. Answered text with, "IDK, Austin. But I can tell you that I was asleep until exactly 30 seconds ago."
5. Discussed Austin and Ashley's breakfast menu choices.
6. Inquired about the lack of bacon in Austin and Ashley's breakfast choices.
7. Made a "Dirty Dancing" reference to Ashley.
8. Had some coffee, despite the fact that I could not properly pronounce the word, coffee. Instead calling it, "coffa". Twice.
9. Started laundry. Check to see if some sort of miracle happened and my broken dryer got fixed. It has been broken for about four months. We've been carting baskets of wet clothes to the laundry mat to dry. It's still broken. This is probably the tenth time I've checked, just to be sure, in case it suddenly decides to start working again. *side note* Please pray for a miracle. Would someone please break into my house and fix the stupid thing already? Also while you are here....my vacuum filters need replaced and there's a leak in the bathtub drain. Many thanks.
10. Rescued a sock from between the washing machine and the broken dryer with the broom. You are welcome, Brianna Abramo. Remember who takes care of you, k?
11. Read a blog that made me contemplate paying for cable. Yes, we live in the dark ages over here. Color me cheap, but I don't wanna pay for the joys of having Zombie children and STILL have nothing good to watch on television. Except...Sons of Anarchy? Maybe....just maybe.....I'm a season behind because Netflix is a butt face like that. There's an Opie thing....I just don't know. Maybe. I mean, I'm bringing home the bacon now. (Turkey bacon, but still.) I could....
12. Just realized I have now made two references to bacon in this post. Perhaps some lunch should be next on my list?
13. Had a pre-Thanksgiving pre-planning conversation with my sister in law. Made plans to do the actually planning pretty soon.
14. That's it, folks. That's all there is. It's 12:03pm, and I'm still in my pajamas.
15. Because I have OCD a little and I can not have 14 things on my list, you get number 15. Nope....nothing. That's all. Be jealous. This IS my dream, and I am living it.
Monday, October 29, 2012
Thanksgiving
So....last week, round about Tuesday, I started to feel pretty crappy. In all honesty, this started a week or two before, but Tuesday I was feeling really, really rotten. I got off work and had chills, congestion, aches. I begged my kids to feed themselves and then I crawled into bed. After I slept for a couple of hours I woke up, just in time to put everyone else to bed and I took some NyQuil and crawled back into bed.
Wednesday morning found me still aching. So I took some DayQuil and took my little self off to work. I made it to five o'clock, but only barely.
John came home, in some kind of fluke....some kind of The Universe Has Decided To Give You A Break....and so I went home, crawled myself into my bed right along with my fever, chills, body aches, and misery and snuggled in for the evening. He left to go back to Kearney at 3am on Thursday morning.
Thursday morning was another round of DayQuil. And another round of "Is Jen going to make it to the end of the day?" I did.
I was so miserable my hair hurt. Every cough was a stab of pain under my right shoulder blade. My back ached. My feet hurt. My neck was killing me. I nearly crawled from my car to my house. I sat down on the kitchen floor and cried.
Ashley came to my rescue. She promptly sent me to bed and brought me chicken noodle soup.
Physically, I was feeling terrible. Mentally, I was at day three of feeling like a crappy mom. John had been home for all of eight hours and I had let him handle everything. All of these FEELINGS brought on a migraine.
But back to bed I went. In a sort of fog, I remember Zoe coming in to do some reading. And then I started to cry, because I was so tired and felt so horrible, I didn't even have the energy to sit up and read with her. And then I started to cough.
The long and the short of it is, I couldn't catch my breath. So I panicked. And I went out to tell the kids that I needed them to call someone to come out and check on me, when I collapsed in the dining room.
The kids called a friend, who made the roughly seven minute drive to my house in what felt, to me, like three minutes. Then they called 911. The details are all still little fuzzy, but all of it ended up with me in the ER.
My brother and sister in law beat the paramedics to my house. My sister and brother in law beat the rescue squad to the hospital. John made the trip from Kearney in record time. I got to find out the answer to whether or not paramedics will loan you their phone in route to the hospital to call your kids. (No.) Also, the ER nurses, while lovely and kind, will not let you use their phone either. In case you were ever wondering.
The diagnosis was iffy, initially. They treated me for dehydration, migraine and a virus that maybe was bronchitis but maybe wasn't, so 'Here's some antibiotics and we'll see what happens'. That changed on Saturday, when the radiologist read the x-rays and said basically, "No, that's pneumonia. Good thing you were already prescribed the correct antibiotics."
I spent the next three days in bed. Asleep, mostly. Crabbing. aching and whining some too. Turns out....I'm going to be fine.
Enough about me. Let's talk about some other people.
My friend Jen, for instance. Who had barely gotten both feet inside her door from work when she got back in her car without hesitating to come out and find out what was happening. Then she stayed with my kids, and my brother's, and handled that end of things.
My brother, who took one look at me and realized that part of the problem was panic. He sat right down next to me and said soothing things and held my hand and explained what was happening and reassured me that the kids were fine. He sensed that I wasn't going to finish the walk from the kitchen to the stretcher outside, so he picked me up and carried me. His wife, who took the kids to a different room and reassured them that I was fine, and then came to the hospital and reassured me that the kids were fine.
My sister, who sat at the hospital, not knowing what was going on, waiting, Who sat at the foot of the hospital bed and listened to what the nurses and doctor were asking me and interpreted what I was trying to tell them. Her husband, who teased and joked and reminded me that yes, I felt crappy, but it was a temporary thing.
The paramedics, who left their families to come take care of me and mine. Who didn't scoff or roll their eyes when I asked to borrow their phones. Who were kind, and soothing, and treated me like I was not at all crazy.
The nurses, who were trying to figure out what was going on with me, which was not easy to do through the fog of my migraine and inability to take a deep breath.
My mom, who came on Friday morning with chicken soup and sat with me. She watched me doze and reminded me to drink my orange juice and take my medicine.
My kids. My fantastic, wonderful, superhero kids. They made the calls, they held my hand, they didn't panic even a little. They handled it. They took care of themselves and each other and me. I couldn't possibly be prouder. They picked up the slack around the house. They let me sleep, they brought me snacks and snuggles. They folded clothes and washed dishes.
My hubby. He didn't even hesitate. He walked into the hospital and told me I was beautiful, even though I was anything but. He carried me out to the car, brought me home and tucked me into bed. He got the kids up for school, and did every single thing that came after that for the next three and a half days. Cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping, pharmacy runs, kid wrangling. He listened to me whine, he rubbed my back and neck. He sat with me. He let me watch what I wanted on t.v. He brought me treats and made me drinks and snacks and dinners. He did it all. And when I thanked him, he asked what I was thanking him for.
I don't even know how to say 'thank you', in a way that conveys what I feel about all of these people. I'm so grateful. When I fell, there were people there to pick me up. Literally and figuratively. I don't know how to show my gratitude for that. I remember, clearly, a time when things were a lot different. I remember being sick and alone. I will always remember it, but I'm going to remember this, too. I'm going to remember when I had a soft place to land and I'm going to be grateful for it, forever.
I am so blessed. I am so grateful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Wednesday morning found me still aching. So I took some DayQuil and took my little self off to work. I made it to five o'clock, but only barely.
John came home, in some kind of fluke....some kind of The Universe Has Decided To Give You A Break....and so I went home, crawled myself into my bed right along with my fever, chills, body aches, and misery and snuggled in for the evening. He left to go back to Kearney at 3am on Thursday morning.
Thursday morning was another round of DayQuil. And another round of "Is Jen going to make it to the end of the day?" I did.
I was so miserable my hair hurt. Every cough was a stab of pain under my right shoulder blade. My back ached. My feet hurt. My neck was killing me. I nearly crawled from my car to my house. I sat down on the kitchen floor and cried.
Ashley came to my rescue. She promptly sent me to bed and brought me chicken noodle soup.
Physically, I was feeling terrible. Mentally, I was at day three of feeling like a crappy mom. John had been home for all of eight hours and I had let him handle everything. All of these FEELINGS brought on a migraine.
But back to bed I went. In a sort of fog, I remember Zoe coming in to do some reading. And then I started to cry, because I was so tired and felt so horrible, I didn't even have the energy to sit up and read with her. And then I started to cough.
The long and the short of it is, I couldn't catch my breath. So I panicked. And I went out to tell the kids that I needed them to call someone to come out and check on me, when I collapsed in the dining room.
The kids called a friend, who made the roughly seven minute drive to my house in what felt, to me, like three minutes. Then they called 911. The details are all still little fuzzy, but all of it ended up with me in the ER.
My brother and sister in law beat the paramedics to my house. My sister and brother in law beat the rescue squad to the hospital. John made the trip from Kearney in record time. I got to find out the answer to whether or not paramedics will loan you their phone in route to the hospital to call your kids. (No.) Also, the ER nurses, while lovely and kind, will not let you use their phone either. In case you were ever wondering.
The diagnosis was iffy, initially. They treated me for dehydration, migraine and a virus that maybe was bronchitis but maybe wasn't, so 'Here's some antibiotics and we'll see what happens'. That changed on Saturday, when the radiologist read the x-rays and said basically, "No, that's pneumonia. Good thing you were already prescribed the correct antibiotics."
I spent the next three days in bed. Asleep, mostly. Crabbing. aching and whining some too. Turns out....I'm going to be fine.
Enough about me. Let's talk about some other people.
My friend Jen, for instance. Who had barely gotten both feet inside her door from work when she got back in her car without hesitating to come out and find out what was happening. Then she stayed with my kids, and my brother's, and handled that end of things.
My brother, who took one look at me and realized that part of the problem was panic. He sat right down next to me and said soothing things and held my hand and explained what was happening and reassured me that the kids were fine. He sensed that I wasn't going to finish the walk from the kitchen to the stretcher outside, so he picked me up and carried me. His wife, who took the kids to a different room and reassured them that I was fine, and then came to the hospital and reassured me that the kids were fine.
My sister, who sat at the hospital, not knowing what was going on, waiting, Who sat at the foot of the hospital bed and listened to what the nurses and doctor were asking me and interpreted what I was trying to tell them. Her husband, who teased and joked and reminded me that yes, I felt crappy, but it was a temporary thing.
The paramedics, who left their families to come take care of me and mine. Who didn't scoff or roll their eyes when I asked to borrow their phones. Who were kind, and soothing, and treated me like I was not at all crazy.
The nurses, who were trying to figure out what was going on with me, which was not easy to do through the fog of my migraine and inability to take a deep breath.
My mom, who came on Friday morning with chicken soup and sat with me. She watched me doze and reminded me to drink my orange juice and take my medicine.
My kids. My fantastic, wonderful, superhero kids. They made the calls, they held my hand, they didn't panic even a little. They handled it. They took care of themselves and each other and me. I couldn't possibly be prouder. They picked up the slack around the house. They let me sleep, they brought me snacks and snuggles. They folded clothes and washed dishes.
My hubby. He didn't even hesitate. He walked into the hospital and told me I was beautiful, even though I was anything but. He carried me out to the car, brought me home and tucked me into bed. He got the kids up for school, and did every single thing that came after that for the next three and a half days. Cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping, pharmacy runs, kid wrangling. He listened to me whine, he rubbed my back and neck. He sat with me. He let me watch what I wanted on t.v. He brought me treats and made me drinks and snacks and dinners. He did it all. And when I thanked him, he asked what I was thanking him for.
I don't even know how to say 'thank you', in a way that conveys what I feel about all of these people. I'm so grateful. When I fell, there were people there to pick me up. Literally and figuratively. I don't know how to show my gratitude for that. I remember, clearly, a time when things were a lot different. I remember being sick and alone. I will always remember it, but I'm going to remember this, too. I'm going to remember when I had a soft place to land and I'm going to be grateful for it, forever.
I am so blessed. I am so grateful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Sunday, October 21, 2012
MAOTIP (Or....How I'm Going To Win Parenting)
Something weird is happening at my house. (Yeah...that's nothing new.) I started a new job a few weeks ago. I love it. I have a reason to get out of my pajamas now. Which, ya know, after almost five years, is a reason to celebrate. I get up earlier, I try to do all the things I was doing before, I just have about 30 less hours in the week with which I can do them. So, I budget my time and I have still found a way to manage to make cold lunches, get laundry done, keep the house clean, make decent dinners, etc.
I won't lie. This was a major concern of mine. With John out of town more often than not, it's up to me to get everything taken care of. These kids of mine.....they're busy. I had a lot of anxiety before I started the job. I worried I would forget things. I was afraid I would come up short and be unable to juggle every one's obligations.
We are living by the calender. Everything that anyone may be planning to do has to go on the calender, or I won't be able to keep track of it. I remind everyone a hundred times a day of what is on the calender. What they are doing, what *I* am doing, when I will be here, when they will be here or there. Much to my delight and surprise...we're doing fine.
Except for this one thing.....I find myself constantly reminding them all to HURRY UP!!! Specifically, this seems to be a problem for Zoe. A really, really big problem. Like...there have been three days this week that her bath has lasted 45 minutes or more. I've begged. I've snapped and yelled. I've gone back to the days of doing all the work of giving her the bath while she sat and thought about whatever a seven year old girl thinks of while her mother dumps a cup of water over her soapy hair and steam rolls out of the mother's ears. I say, "Hurry." She hears, "Please, my Love, slow down, take your time. Ease into your school day and by all means, ignore your harpy of a mother." It simply does not register with her that she needs to keep moving. She's on her own time, Man, stop with all the cramping of her style. It's how she rolls. VERY VERY slowly. So it would get to a critical point, and I would yell, and she would cry. Ffffoooorrrreeevvveeeerrr. Then I would have to spend another precious ten minutes, at least, hugging her and apologizing and explaining. All the while keeping one eye on the clock, because, DUDE! We are never getting out of this house on time EVER EVER EVER again.
But....this morning. This glorious morning. The light bulb went off.
She was in the bath. I was nearly on my knees, begging her to move the process along because she had to eat breakfast, get her hair dried and styled and get her little self to Sunday school. I was THISCLOSE to biting her pretty little head right off when...I thought, "I'm totally going to buy her off."
So, I did.
The deal was, I would set the timer on my phone. If she got rinsed, dried off, out of the bathtub and dressed in 15 minutes, I'd give her fifty cents.
She totally did it.
So....I did it again at breakfast. With her, a Pop Tart and a glass of milk can last up to half an hour. I gave her another 15 minutes. And another fifty cents.
We made it to Sunday school in plenty of time. She even had enough time left to study spelling words and do a few flash cards for Math. It was the first morning in a very long time that I didn't feel even a little like throttling my sweet little girl.
She's made $1.75 today. She's planning on using it to buy things for the animals at the Pet Rescue in Wahoo.
Some may call this bribery. I'm choosing to call it The Mommy-Abramo-On-Time-Incentive-Plan. I'm going to be broke by the time she is able to grasp the concept of time management. But it's so worth it. What I save in blood pressure medicines, I'm giving to lost pets. My purse is lighter, but my child is happier.
And this, my friends, is how I plan to win parenting. With quarters. (or dimes and nickels...whatever.)
I won't lie. This was a major concern of mine. With John out of town more often than not, it's up to me to get everything taken care of. These kids of mine.....they're busy. I had a lot of anxiety before I started the job. I worried I would forget things. I was afraid I would come up short and be unable to juggle every one's obligations.
We are living by the calender. Everything that anyone may be planning to do has to go on the calender, or I won't be able to keep track of it. I remind everyone a hundred times a day of what is on the calender. What they are doing, what *I* am doing, when I will be here, when they will be here or there. Much to my delight and surprise...we're doing fine.
Except for this one thing.....I find myself constantly reminding them all to HURRY UP!!! Specifically, this seems to be a problem for Zoe. A really, really big problem. Like...there have been three days this week that her bath has lasted 45 minutes or more. I've begged. I've snapped and yelled. I've gone back to the days of doing all the work of giving her the bath while she sat and thought about whatever a seven year old girl thinks of while her mother dumps a cup of water over her soapy hair and steam rolls out of the mother's ears. I say, "Hurry." She hears, "Please, my Love, slow down, take your time. Ease into your school day and by all means, ignore your harpy of a mother." It simply does not register with her that she needs to keep moving. She's on her own time, Man, stop with all the cramping of her style. It's how she rolls. VERY VERY slowly. So it would get to a critical point, and I would yell, and she would cry. Ffffoooorrrreeevvveeeerrr. Then I would have to spend another precious ten minutes, at least, hugging her and apologizing and explaining. All the while keeping one eye on the clock, because, DUDE! We are never getting out of this house on time EVER EVER EVER again.
But....this morning. This glorious morning. The light bulb went off.
She was in the bath. I was nearly on my knees, begging her to move the process along because she had to eat breakfast, get her hair dried and styled and get her little self to Sunday school. I was THISCLOSE to biting her pretty little head right off when...I thought, "I'm totally going to buy her off."
So, I did.
The deal was, I would set the timer on my phone. If she got rinsed, dried off, out of the bathtub and dressed in 15 minutes, I'd give her fifty cents.
She totally did it.
So....I did it again at breakfast. With her, a Pop Tart and a glass of milk can last up to half an hour. I gave her another 15 minutes. And another fifty cents.
We made it to Sunday school in plenty of time. She even had enough time left to study spelling words and do a few flash cards for Math. It was the first morning in a very long time that I didn't feel even a little like throttling my sweet little girl.
She's made $1.75 today. She's planning on using it to buy things for the animals at the Pet Rescue in Wahoo.
Some may call this bribery. I'm choosing to call it The Mommy-Abramo-On-Time-Incentive-Plan. I'm going to be broke by the time she is able to grasp the concept of time management. But it's so worth it. What I save in blood pressure medicines, I'm giving to lost pets. My purse is lighter, but my child is happier.
And this, my friends, is how I plan to win parenting. With quarters. (or dimes and nickels...whatever.)
Monday, October 15, 2012
Olfactory Lane
I have always had a very acute sense of smell. My eyesight requires some assistance, my ears are what I consider to be average (a little selective hearing loss), my taste buds work just fine, and at this point in my life, my nerves still work as well as they ever have. But my sense of smell....it's a little overactive. I have woken from a dead sleep to walk around my house sniffing the air to figure out what smells 'off'. I've woken John and insisted that something was on fire. If someone in a five mile radius of our house lights a fire I smell it almost instantly. When Zoe was still in diapers, I could tell she needed changed almost before she could.
I also have a very strong sense of 'smell association'. Scientists say that smell and memory are so closely linked because they are processed in the same area of the brain, the area which also processes emotions. Because we encounter most new odors in our childhood and youth, certain smells have the ability to make an association with a childhood memory. I am a perfect example of this.
Freshly brewed coffee puts me in the kitchen of the house I grew up in, with my Dad at the table. A freshly mowed lawn conjures up a picture of him standing outside the garage of the same house, sharpening mower blades. A baking pie finds me again in that house, at the table watching my step mom make pie crust from scratch, with a gingham apron over her clothes. Oatmeal cookies baking in the oven will transport me to the kitchen of my maternal grandparents, a Tupperware container on the top of a dishwasher, and my Great Aunt Esther standing with her back to me at the stove. My Grandpa Kliment smelled like Old Spice...and he's been gone for nearly ten years. The smell of cow manure puts me at the top of a hay shed where I was not supposed to be, with my brother who was supposed to be watching me, laying on our bellies at the top, watching my uncle feed dairy cattle. The smell of a horse will always bring up a picture of Beauty, a black and white horse who belonged to the same uncle.
Chlorine invokes the old pool in Wahoo, and finds me standing at the edge of the high dive, working up courage. Pine Sol sends me back to the Hinky Dinky deli, with a mop in my hand.
Chocolate chip cookies smell like my kids, and a kitchen in Trenton, where we ate more dough than cookies and laughed so hard our stomachs ached. Depending on which laundry soap I happen to be using, I am either standing in the utility room at my Grandma Cejka's, where in my mind, I watch her iron my grandfather's shirts, or on the front porch of my Grandma Kliment's, following her out the door to the clothes line.
I can not smell Axe body wash and not think of John. That is the reason why, if he leaves for the week on Monday morning, I sleep in his shirts all week while he's gone. Zoe has a blanket (Nankie with the Holes In It) that she's slept with nearly every night of her life, and I have caught myself smelling it during the day if I miss her while she's at school.
They are not always good memory associations. The smell of Jack Daniel's invokes a kind of anxiety I can not explain. The smell of cinnamon Schnapps triggers my gag reflex. The smell of blood makes me recall a crash on a bicycle that sent me over the top of the handlebars and took the skin from my chin, forearms, right hip, knees, and the top of my right foot. Lilies smell like funerals and they make me want to cry.
The same scientists who explain these triggers say that we begin to form these memory associations in the womb. Maybe that's why yesterday during church I smelled my mother. It's not the first time. I think...though I am not at all sure...it's Jovan White Musk.
I don't think there is anyone who could tell me, for sure, that she wore that perfume. She's been gone for almost 33 years. I don't have a single concrete memory of her. For some reason, my brain has formed a link between a woman I do not remember and this particular scent. I wasn't sad. I was comforted. It felt like an arm around my shoulder and a kiss on my forehead. It felt like a little white house in Weston. It felt like acceptance and love. It felt like peace. And no matter the reason, real or imagined, I am so grateful.
I also have a very strong sense of 'smell association'. Scientists say that smell and memory are so closely linked because they are processed in the same area of the brain, the area which also processes emotions. Because we encounter most new odors in our childhood and youth, certain smells have the ability to make an association with a childhood memory. I am a perfect example of this.
Freshly brewed coffee puts me in the kitchen of the house I grew up in, with my Dad at the table. A freshly mowed lawn conjures up a picture of him standing outside the garage of the same house, sharpening mower blades. A baking pie finds me again in that house, at the table watching my step mom make pie crust from scratch, with a gingham apron over her clothes. Oatmeal cookies baking in the oven will transport me to the kitchen of my maternal grandparents, a Tupperware container on the top of a dishwasher, and my Great Aunt Esther standing with her back to me at the stove. My Grandpa Kliment smelled like Old Spice...and he's been gone for nearly ten years. The smell of cow manure puts me at the top of a hay shed where I was not supposed to be, with my brother who was supposed to be watching me, laying on our bellies at the top, watching my uncle feed dairy cattle. The smell of a horse will always bring up a picture of Beauty, a black and white horse who belonged to the same uncle.
Chlorine invokes the old pool in Wahoo, and finds me standing at the edge of the high dive, working up courage. Pine Sol sends me back to the Hinky Dinky deli, with a mop in my hand.
Chocolate chip cookies smell like my kids, and a kitchen in Trenton, where we ate more dough than cookies and laughed so hard our stomachs ached. Depending on which laundry soap I happen to be using, I am either standing in the utility room at my Grandma Cejka's, where in my mind, I watch her iron my grandfather's shirts, or on the front porch of my Grandma Kliment's, following her out the door to the clothes line.
I can not smell Axe body wash and not think of John. That is the reason why, if he leaves for the week on Monday morning, I sleep in his shirts all week while he's gone. Zoe has a blanket (Nankie with the Holes In It) that she's slept with nearly every night of her life, and I have caught myself smelling it during the day if I miss her while she's at school.
They are not always good memory associations. The smell of Jack Daniel's invokes a kind of anxiety I can not explain. The smell of cinnamon Schnapps triggers my gag reflex. The smell of blood makes me recall a crash on a bicycle that sent me over the top of the handlebars and took the skin from my chin, forearms, right hip, knees, and the top of my right foot. Lilies smell like funerals and they make me want to cry.
The same scientists who explain these triggers say that we begin to form these memory associations in the womb. Maybe that's why yesterday during church I smelled my mother. It's not the first time. I think...though I am not at all sure...it's Jovan White Musk.
I don't think there is anyone who could tell me, for sure, that she wore that perfume. She's been gone for almost 33 years. I don't have a single concrete memory of her. For some reason, my brain has formed a link between a woman I do not remember and this particular scent. I wasn't sad. I was comforted. It felt like an arm around my shoulder and a kiss on my forehead. It felt like a little white house in Weston. It felt like acceptance and love. It felt like peace. And no matter the reason, real or imagined, I am so grateful.
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
I Don't Know
There are many, many things I don't know yet. Things I can not seem to find an answer for in a book, or in advice from a friend. I am never more aware of these weaknesses when my kids come up against something and I just don't know the right way to handle it.
I know, with certainty, that I can not fix it all. I can not solve every problem, and even if I could, I wouldn't. They have to learn to handle themselves. They have to realize that some problems are their own to navigate through. I can not do it all. It's difficult to not champion them at every turn. Hard to not become the warrior they need, instead of letting them become their own warrior.
I want them all to learn that some things are not worth getting upset about, and some things are. I struggle with teaching them which is which.
When a kid gets into my car in the afternoon and has had a rotten day because someone made a nasty comment....well, the Mom in me wants to track down the mean girls and.....sit them down for a talk. Or something. But I also want my kids to learn that they can not listen to every nasty comment and let it derail their day. I do not know how to teach them to develop a thicker skin, without developing a harder heart.
I don't know the right way to explain that in 15 years, they will run into one of these mean girls and wonder what in Heaven's name was so important about seeking their acceptance during high school. I know. It's happened to me. Then I think back to my high school days and I remember that I was the same. Searching for acceptance. Devastated by criticism. In some ways, with some people, I'm still that girl. I am still hoping for the approval of a few select people. I don't know if it will ever come.
I don't know how to handle what I don't know. I want the four of them to be good people, I want to teach them to turn the other cheek, but I don't know where the line between 'turn the other cheek' and 'enough is enough already' is located. I don't know.
For now, I suppose, I will try and remind them that *I* accept them. That everyone has bad days and critics. That in the grand scheme of things, a few rude girls in high school will probably be the least of their life's problems. That there are people in the world with far more serious problems than someone not liking them. I want them to learn the lesson in being the one who is criticized, and to remember that feeling before they do the same thing to someone else. I don't know if it will work. I don't know if it will be enough. I don't know if one day they will remember this time and wish I had done something more. I just don't know.
I know, with certainty, that I can not fix it all. I can not solve every problem, and even if I could, I wouldn't. They have to learn to handle themselves. They have to realize that some problems are their own to navigate through. I can not do it all. It's difficult to not champion them at every turn. Hard to not become the warrior they need, instead of letting them become their own warrior.
I want them all to learn that some things are not worth getting upset about, and some things are. I struggle with teaching them which is which.
When a kid gets into my car in the afternoon and has had a rotten day because someone made a nasty comment....well, the Mom in me wants to track down the mean girls and.....sit them down for a talk. Or something. But I also want my kids to learn that they can not listen to every nasty comment and let it derail their day. I do not know how to teach them to develop a thicker skin, without developing a harder heart.
I don't know the right way to explain that in 15 years, they will run into one of these mean girls and wonder what in Heaven's name was so important about seeking their acceptance during high school. I know. It's happened to me. Then I think back to my high school days and I remember that I was the same. Searching for acceptance. Devastated by criticism. In some ways, with some people, I'm still that girl. I am still hoping for the approval of a few select people. I don't know if it will ever come.
I don't know how to handle what I don't know. I want the four of them to be good people, I want to teach them to turn the other cheek, but I don't know where the line between 'turn the other cheek' and 'enough is enough already' is located. I don't know.
For now, I suppose, I will try and remind them that *I* accept them. That everyone has bad days and critics. That in the grand scheme of things, a few rude girls in high school will probably be the least of their life's problems. That there are people in the world with far more serious problems than someone not liking them. I want them to learn the lesson in being the one who is criticized, and to remember that feeling before they do the same thing to someone else. I don't know if it will work. I don't know if it will be enough. I don't know if one day they will remember this time and wish I had done something more. I just don't know.
Saturday, October 6, 2012
"Blog!" They said.
And so I did.
The End.
HAHAHA! You all know me better than that. I'd never pass up an opportunity to use ten words even when five will do. :)
So here it is. My lil' blog. Just remember, you all asked for it!
The name of this blog refers to one of my favorite books. It's by a woman named Pearl Cleage. I read it several years ago, and it's message has never left me. My favorite line of the book says, "What looks like crazy on an ordinary day, looks a lot like love if you catch it in the moonlight." I get it. Or it gets me. It's all about perspective. We've got a lot of crazy here....and a lot of love too. And sometimes, it's really, really hard to tell them apart.
So....shall I tell you the story of how John punched me in the face at 7am this morning?
I started a new job last Wednesday. Monday through Friday I am up by 6am to get the kids ready for school, but because of the utter lack of bathrooms in my house, I had to get up at 5am on Wednesday and Friday. My brain has decided to take all of this early waking as an indication that I will no longer be sleeping in, and therefore I found myself wandering the house at 5am this morning. Fun right? Just what a girl wants to be doing on the one day of the week she can sleep in! I forced myself to crawl back into bed and dozed.
Zoe's room is upstairs now, on the second level of the house, and because the older kids are at their mother's this weekend, she was sleeping in my bed with John and I. I'm hoping she conquers her fear of being alone on a different level of the house sometime before she goes to college, but that's a whole other blog entry.
So there we were, the three of us. Make no mistake, the king size bed matters very little to us. So when I say to you that I 'dozed', what I really mean is I dozed off between elbows to the throat and knees in the stomach. At some point, I must have been at a strange angle, because I started saying 'Ouch! Ouch!' in my sleep. This woke up John, who thought I was having a nightmare, and attempted to wake me. All at once, he went to put a comforting arm around me, and I sat up, right into the side of his knuckles. Then I cried, because I don't care how tough you are, when you take a set of knuckles to the nose at 7am, you WILL cry. My crying woke Zoe, who put an arm around me and said, "Don't worry, Mommy, I am here. Does your nose hurt as bad as your arm did last night when I jumped on it? You will be ok. It's ok if your nose bleeds. It will stop."
So there you go. Good Saturday morning to me. Sleeping is a competitive sport in our house, and I lost. Little Miss "Sleeps Horizontally and May Be Having a Ninja Dream" decided to have some Reese's Puffs and chocolate milk and that is how our day got started.
This is not the first time we have had a Mixed Martial Arts fight while slumbering in my house. Once John dropped and elbow on me and I returned it with a punch to his face....in the same night of sleep. We don't mess around. You wanna steal those covers from me?? You'd better be packin' something more than a midnight snack. That pillow over there? That's my pillow, and I WILL defend it to the death. As soon as there's an Olympic Sleep Fighting Team, the Abramo's are going to make their first million in endorsements from Serta and Everlast.
There you go, folks. My first blog entry. I should tell you that while I love to write....sharing is a lot more difficult for me. Go easy on me. I'm off to stretch and carb up....it's bedtime.
The End.
HAHAHA! You all know me better than that. I'd never pass up an opportunity to use ten words even when five will do. :)
So here it is. My lil' blog. Just remember, you all asked for it!
The name of this blog refers to one of my favorite books. It's by a woman named Pearl Cleage. I read it several years ago, and it's message has never left me. My favorite line of the book says, "What looks like crazy on an ordinary day, looks a lot like love if you catch it in the moonlight." I get it. Or it gets me. It's all about perspective. We've got a lot of crazy here....and a lot of love too. And sometimes, it's really, really hard to tell them apart.
So....shall I tell you the story of how John punched me in the face at 7am this morning?
I started a new job last Wednesday. Monday through Friday I am up by 6am to get the kids ready for school, but because of the utter lack of bathrooms in my house, I had to get up at 5am on Wednesday and Friday. My brain has decided to take all of this early waking as an indication that I will no longer be sleeping in, and therefore I found myself wandering the house at 5am this morning. Fun right? Just what a girl wants to be doing on the one day of the week she can sleep in! I forced myself to crawl back into bed and dozed.
Zoe's room is upstairs now, on the second level of the house, and because the older kids are at their mother's this weekend, she was sleeping in my bed with John and I. I'm hoping she conquers her fear of being alone on a different level of the house sometime before she goes to college, but that's a whole other blog entry.
So there we were, the three of us. Make no mistake, the king size bed matters very little to us. So when I say to you that I 'dozed', what I really mean is I dozed off between elbows to the throat and knees in the stomach. At some point, I must have been at a strange angle, because I started saying 'Ouch! Ouch!' in my sleep. This woke up John, who thought I was having a nightmare, and attempted to wake me. All at once, he went to put a comforting arm around me, and I sat up, right into the side of his knuckles. Then I cried, because I don't care how tough you are, when you take a set of knuckles to the nose at 7am, you WILL cry. My crying woke Zoe, who put an arm around me and said, "Don't worry, Mommy, I am here. Does your nose hurt as bad as your arm did last night when I jumped on it? You will be ok. It's ok if your nose bleeds. It will stop."
So there you go. Good Saturday morning to me. Sleeping is a competitive sport in our house, and I lost. Little Miss "Sleeps Horizontally and May Be Having a Ninja Dream" decided to have some Reese's Puffs and chocolate milk and that is how our day got started.
This is not the first time we have had a Mixed Martial Arts fight while slumbering in my house. Once John dropped and elbow on me and I returned it with a punch to his face....in the same night of sleep. We don't mess around. You wanna steal those covers from me?? You'd better be packin' something more than a midnight snack. That pillow over there? That's my pillow, and I WILL defend it to the death. As soon as there's an Olympic Sleep Fighting Team, the Abramo's are going to make their first million in endorsements from Serta and Everlast.
There you go, folks. My first blog entry. I should tell you that while I love to write....sharing is a lot more difficult for me. Go easy on me. I'm off to stretch and carb up....it's bedtime.
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