The dreams and the reality

Originally published in The Miami News-Record, June 2020

When I was a little girl, I dreamed of being married. As I got older, the vision in my mind only got stronger and more vivid as to what I dreamed it would be like. I’d meet this amazing, dark-haired man and we’d have virtually everything in common. We’d go on picnics and watch movies together. We’d lie in the grass under a tree and have deep conversations about the future. We’d bake cookies together and someone would inevitably throw flour at someone and we would laugh and laugh. We’d have a neat and tidy house, eventually a couple of well-behaved children, and live happily ever after. 

Like, none of that happened. None of it. Okay, well, we’re happy and this seems to be the “ever after” part they mention, so okay, those happened. He doesn’t even have dark hair – he’s a ginger for crying out loud. We have virtually no like interests, we aren’t even politically aligned, and if you turn on a movie, one or both of us will likely fall asleep.  

A friend text me the other day to tell me that her husband had just shown her a pimple he had on his back. She’s 13 years my junior and has been married 10 years to my 27. I had to laugh as I responded with, “I hate to break it to you, but he’s probably gonna offer to show you a hemorrhoid one of these days, probably fairly soon. Get ready.” 

In reality, marriage (and mostly life in general) isn’t the storybook version of “romantic.” It isn’t deep conversations under trees in your perfectly manicured yard, or flirtatious food fights. No, it’s mostly exhausted questions answered with exhausted grunts and I never dared to playfully start a food fight in my kitchen because I knew I’d be the one cleaning it up. The yard has never been manicured – he just sets that mower as low as it’ll go so he won’t have to mow so often. And when the dog tears up the trash you just hope a windy day is on tap so it will all blow away.

It’s the ugly stuff in life you never considered you might encounter that mostly comprises married life. You discover stretch marks and toe fungus, you have morning breath and really bad gas after eating Chinese food, he snores, you snore, the dog snores. Basically, everybody snores. The children are super entertaining and amazing humans, but maybe not the “well-behaved” vision you had in your head. He leaves his little beard hairs on the sink and breadcrumbs on the counter. You have an Amazon shopping problem. 

But when it comes down to it, marriage gives you a person. A person to call your own, a person who commits to being there for it all. A person who has this spot right on their shoulder where your head fits perfectly. A person who, upon hearing the word “turnpike,” immediately launches into a tirade about tolls and maintenance and you laugh even as you roll your eyes because you’ve heard that tirade a gazillion times before. A person who helps you paint even though they might hate painting even more than you do, and you hate it a lot. A person who binge-watches “Cheer” on Netflix with you and gets just as excited as you do when they stick the landing but would never admit to another living soul they did. A person who is a constant, a comfort, occasionally a source of frustration, but so many experiences and memories you can’t fathom going through them with anyone else. 

Sure there are pimples and bad breath and the years bring on gray hair and wrinkles and extra pounds, but by that point you and your person are so entrenched in this weirdly personal thing called marriage you just embrace it for what it is: your very own version of “romance.” 

Get Out of Town!

(Originally published in the Miami News-Record)

Given the fact we have had a slight stay in the usual October busy-ness at work, I had this brilliant plan to take a little quick weekend trip, just Paul and me. I should know that my plans never go as planned. He himmed and hawed as to whether we even *should* go, given Petal is a colicky, angry baby and Wemberly has just learned to walk and is cutting six teeth at once. He felt like we should stick close in case Abby needed us. I felt like I had threatened Dakota with his very life enough to be super helpful that we could safely leave town for a few days. Kady was going to see family down by Stillwater and we didn’t have to worry about finding a place for her to crash and I all but begged him to just relax, let it go, and for crying out loud, GET ME OUT OF TOWN. He relented. I think he finally saw the crazy in my eyes.

Work ran late on Thursday and I started to feel panicky he was even going to stick with the plan, but finally we got out of there. I hadn’t made any reservations or packed due to the fact he’s wishy-washy as all get out, so while I threw clothes in a bag I was scouring the Internet for a motel near Mt. Vernon since we wanted to check out Apple Butter Makin’ Days. Reservation made, bags packed, kisses doled out to grandbabies, we flew down the road. When we got to Seneca he said, “Go ahead and put the address in the GPS and we’ll see how long before we get there.” I pulled up my confirmation email and immediately realized I had made the reservation for Mt. Vernon ILLINOIS. I called Illinois to cancel, couldn’t find a room in Missouri any closer than Monett, but finally got a reservation. It was 8pm. We hadn’t had dinner. I was frustrated. Once we got to Monett I still couldn’t relax because I still had to find a place for us in Branson for the rest of the weekend. Fortunately I found a cabin fairly quickly that boasted seclusion and peaceful wooded serenity. I was sold. I could’ve cost $8,754 a night and I’d have been sold.

The next morning we drove into Mt. Vernon, took one look at the gigantic crowd of folks high on natural fruit sugar by way of inordinate amounts of apple butter, turned our Camry around and headed on to Branson. We shopped, we looked at the leaves, we talked, we laughed, we even held hands as we walked. Okay, really it was more of me dragging him by the hand from The Disney Store to Baby Gap to Osh Kosh and beyond. He was a trooper, though. Around 4 we decided we were tired so we headed out of town toward the cabin. The directions from the owner and the GPS didn’t quite match, but that’s not uncommon.

We ended up at the wrong entrance – the entrance where the fancy, rich owners of the glorious homes nestled in the woods go in. A quick call to the owner and we were back on track and went in thorough the back entrance. Then we got lost inside the resort. A security guard led us to our “secluded” cabin which was actually a duplex in a long row of duplexes. They’ve apparently never seen Hooverton Mountain. We know seclusion. The floor squeaked, there was a strange buzzing hum whenever you ran water, and Saturday morning a track hoe woke us up at 7:03am. But we got an early start to our day of more shopping and ended it with seeing Six, the a capella group.

There’s significantly less crazy in my eyes this week and my Christmas shopping is about 35% done. And if winter will hold off a little longer I can probably convince him another trip is in order. Or I might just shop online. In proper seclusion on the Mountain.

Don't Throw Stones

Originally published in the Miami News-Record on May 22, 2016. 

Five years ago my husband had a kidney stone. And it was a testament of my enduring love for him.  

After two ER visits to two different hospitals he was finally admitted and scheduled for surgery. Paul all but kissed the ER doc when he said he’d get his orders ready to admit him. The plan was to have surgery the next morning where they would go in and…..ahem….retrieve the dastardly stone. Yeah. I’ve had that done myself. It’s as unpleasant as you’re probably imagining.

Bright and early the next day the anesthesiologist came in, visited with us, and gave him some Versed to “relax” him prior to them taking him downstairs to surgery. Paul sat there on the bed and said, “This stuff doesn’t do anything to me. I’m …..fi—“ and then he started snoring. I patted his leg and went back to reading my book. In came two cute little gals from the surgery department, ready to take him away. They managed to wake him up long enough to confirm his identity and were unlocking the wheels on his bed when one said, “Oh no. Mr. Hoover? MR. HOOVER?? Hon, you left your shorts on and we’re going to need you to take those off. MR. HOOVER??” She poked her head around the curtain and said, “Are you Mrs. Hoover? Uhm…can you try to get his shorts off of him? He seems to be pretty out of it.” She held the curtain open so I could see my completely unconscious husband. And his flowered Bermuda shorts just shinin’ there in all their glory. Then they told me they’d give us some privacy and stepped around the curtain.

THEY LEFT ME. I sighed. I patted his cheek, said his name, patted his hand. Nothing. Just snoring. I shook his shoulder. He waved me away. “Honey, you have to wake up and help me get these shorts off of you! Can you help me?” He mumbled, “Well, sure. Why didn’t you just ask?” I heard a giggle on the other side of the curtain. I shot her a death glare she’s probably glad she couldn’t see.

What ensued was pretty much the hardest thing I’ve ever done next to birthing babies. I would give him a command, make a request, he would agree to comply…..then he’d pass out and start snoring again. He was 100% deadweight and absolutely NO HELP. At one point one of the little gals on the other side of the curtain said, “Ma’am? You doin’ okay back there?”  to which I replied, “NO! I am NOT doing okay back here! Could I maybe get some help?” Then they giggled and said, “You’re doing great! Take your time. You’ll get it!” It was at that point I just busted out laughing. And they joined in. And we all had a good ol’ laugh. Which woke up my husband and he drunkenly said a bad word and passed back out again.  

After much wrangling, wrestling, persuading, and borderline accosting my poor husband, the Bermuda shorts were finally removed. By me alone. With no help. I considered a cartwheel, but then decided if I broke a hip and ended up in a different hospital room who would be there to remove any other stubborn articles of clothing if necessary?

The surgery was unsuccessful and a second procedure was scheduled for the next day. When the anesthesiologist came in the second time he said, “I gave him about half of what I did yesterday. Apparently your husband is a lightweight. We’d never seen anyone quite so out of it as he was yesterday.” Then he laughed as he said, “And I heard you had quite a time with his shorts…”

I dug those dadblamed shorts out of his laundry bag and threw them in the biohazard trashcan as soon as they wheeled him off to surgery. He’s mentioned them a time or two and wonders where they went. I’ll never tell. 

Oh, Blessed Slumber

Originally published in the Miami News-Record on March 20, 2016. 

Sleep is defined as “a condition of body and mind such as that which typically recurs for several hours every night, in which the nervous system is relatively inactive, the eyes closed, the postural muscles relaxed, and consciousness practically suspended.”

Unless you’re married.

I love sleep and I am really good at it. I am at a stage in life where I fall asleep, stay asleep, wake up feeling like a Disney Princess – except the closest wildlife out here is possums and armadillos and those guys are really bad at housework. They work nothing at all like the cute singing bluebirds and squirrels in the movies.  But I digress.

12 years ago Paul was in a motorcycle wreck. He was hit by a car. The car won. As a result, he has some issues with his back. A few years post-wreck we bought a Tempurpedic mattress in an attempt to alleviate some of his pain. We even got the ergo frame. That sucker will fold you up like a taco, sit you up like a hospital patient, or stand you on your head. There is no transfer of motion and it forms to your body. For me, it produces Sleep Nirvana. It used to produce the same for Paul, but after years of sedentary work at the casino and now factory work at his new job, his back muscles are staging a mutiny. The heavenly bed puts him through hell these days. Most nights he sleeps in the recliner because it’s the only place he can get comfortable.

Sleep is habit-forming. Not just in its frequency and duration, but also in how we do it. Paul works evenings, I go to bed well before he gets home at Midnight. Most nights he watches TV until 2 or 3 am and falls asleep in the recliner. I only see 3 a.m. if I have to pee. I get up early to see Sam off to vo-tech and start Kady on her schoolwork while we tiptoe around the recliner until mid-morning. It’s not ideal, but it works. On the weekends he tries to go to bed at a normal time and sleep in the bed, but he usually ends back up in the recliner. And typically, I’m glad when he finally goes.

Here’s the thing about my dear, sweet, darling, hard-working husband: he has the boniest knees in the entire history of forever. Oh, to look at him you’d never know he is a freak of nature, but trust me, when he lies down in a bed at night, those knees become lethal weapons. I have dealt with these killer joints of his for 23 years now and I think I have permanent nerve damage to the backs of my legs. 

Because see, not only is he the “big spoon”, he is also incredibly cold-natured. He gets cold, scooches over to me, wraps his big strong arms around me…..then proceeds to jab his killer knee joints into the backs of my legs. I’ve learned to mule kick his legs into submission, but then the other problem arises: I am not cold-natured. I am a 43 year old woman and we are subjected to these things called night sweats. And they ain’t for sissies. So he snuggles in, I think “Aw, this is nice. He loves me and I love him and I forgot how nice this……used….t—OHMYGOSH I AM GOING TO SPONTANEOUSLY COMBUST IF HE DOESN’T STOP TOUCHING ME RIGHT NOW.”

Psalms 4:8 says, “In peace I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, O Lord, will keep me safe.” I love this assurance and maybe that’s why I usually sleep so well. However, even the Lord may have a hard time keeping Paul safe the next time those knees jab me in the backs of the thighs. We are currently in talks of going full Ward and June Cleaver just in case I can’t find a doctor who will comply with my demands of knee softening surgery. We’re thinking a couple of nice twin beds with matching bedspreads. A fan on my side of the room, a heater on his.  

The Doghouse

Originally published in the Miami News-Record on November 29, 2015 

If we were smart and wanted to get creative on our taxes we could probably call ourselves a farm and use our two dogs as “cattle” and write off their food bill. Bolt is our four-year-old German Shepherd. Hero is a not-quite-eight-month-old Husky and Great Pyrenees mix. Bolt weighs in at about 80 pounds. Hero is the size of a 1982 Buick Riviera. We don’t typically worry about anyone messing around our place because the sheer size of the dogs is enough to deter even the most dedicated burglar. Bolt has run more than one person back to their vehicle and a poor unsuspecting dump truck driver who only wanted directions refused to get out of his truck no matter how many times I assured him I had Bolt by the collar.

But poor Bolt has a problem; Bolt is claustrophobic. Poor fella cannot handle small spaces or anything that has a roof any closer than four feet from the top of his head. This strange dog has been this way his entire life. He will lie out IN the snow before he’ll go into a dog house or shelter. He’ll lie under the cars in the summer, but only if his head sticks out. Last winter Paul retrofitted a doghouse that was left here by the previous occupants and opened the entire front of the shelter for him. He did pitifully go inside eventually, but whined the whole time he was in it. I’m not sure he ever even slept while he was in it he was so tense.

Last week Paul decided to build the dogs a big, open doghouse for the upcoming winter. Seeing as how they are huge, it was going to be a BIG dang doghouse. Since Sam is his usual right-hand man for projects but he has vo-tech in the mornings, I volunteered to help. A big project needs a helper, right?  Now, y’all might have figured out by now that my Paul isn’t a talker. For 23 years now our relationship has consisted of me chattering and asking questions and him grunting occasionally or spitting tobacco in order to answer with a one word reply. The building of the doghouse was no different.

“Can I help?” was met with “Ayuh” or “Nah”. Mostly “Nah.”

“Here, let me hold that!” got a head shake followed by a spit then “I got it.”

“Do you need my help?” was answered with, “Not really. Don’t you have something else you could be doing? Something out of my shop?”

“Oh, you dropped your pencil. Let me get that for you!” On that one he just sighed. After he spit.

I eventually decided to clean the shop. I organized some drill bits. Tsk’ed at his lack of organization and told him that come spring I am taking my label maker out there for some serious rearranging and identifying. I threw away a lot of stuff – like 47 empty spray paint cans (What on earth has he been painting??), 13 empty dog food bags, some rusty screws and bolts, and a Sawzall blade that was bent almost 90° and was missing over 80% of the teeth. I squealed every time a cricket jumped at me even though I tried hard not to. I sneezed a lot. I hummed. I chatted happily while he worked, not caring that it was completely one-sided.

I was happy to be out there with him. I wasn’t sure he’d say the same thing when it was all said and done, but later, after the dog house was completed and the boys had placed it on the south side of the shop out of the wind, he kissed me and said, “Thanks for your help today, dear.”

Oh! Be still my heart! He loves spending time with me and apparently thinks I am a GREAT helper! I have SO many projects in mind for this winter! He’ll be thrilled!     

The Flying Checkbook

Originally published in the Miami News-Record, October 4, 2015

I moved out of Mom’s house and straight into Paul’s. That took some getting used to. I had a checking account for awhile prior to getting married, but when your mom buys the groceries and pays the bills, the only money that comes out of your account is gas money and shopping money. Suddenly I was a wife and the adorable checks with Holstein cows on them (we also had matching return address labels!) were being used for things like food, electricity, phone, insurance, and oil for my car that was burning a quart a day. Paul was the only one working and I was having no luck finding a job. Things were tight and kept getting tighter.

One night, I had tried paying the bills and it just wasn’t working. I had always heard the phrase “Robbing Peter to pay Paul," but it finally rang true for me just what that meant and I didn’t see my Paul reaping any benefits of this so-called “pay.” I was frustrated at my inability to find a job to help out, Paul was working long hours to try to help, we were both tired of eating dishes made with canned beef and dehydrated eggs. He walked through the door after a 14-hour day and I unloaded on him. I had been crying and then it turned to flat-out anger. I was complaining and he stood there with this blank look on his face. How dare he?! So I started yelling. Still he stood there looking at me, blinking. Then he shrugged and turned to walk into the living room. And before I knew what came over me, I lobbed the checkbook at him. Now, in my mind, it was going to really make a point. It was going to get his attention and make him see that I was justified in my tirade. Have you ever thrown a checkbook? They just don’t make good missiles. They kind of flutter… and then flop to the ground. I wanted to hit him and hurt him like he had just hurt me by walking away when I needed him to just listen. Instead, the noise of the fluttering checkbook made him turn around. It landed behind him at his heels. He looked at the faux leather case that showcased my neat handwriting and color-coded register entries, looked up at me, looked back down….then yelled, “DID YOU JUST THROW THAT AT ME?”

Oh, it was on, brother and sisters. I stood up prepared to fight. Or run. He threw it back. And even though he threw it much harder and faster than I had, it still only managed a flutter and a flop. And then we both just laughed. What else were we going to do? The bank balance hadn’t changed one penny in all of our screaming and throwing. We were still broke and we were still going to eat canned beef smothered in cheap bottled barbecue sauce for dinner that night.

“A gentle answer deflects anger, but harsh words make tempers flare.” (Proverbs 15:1 NLT)

This past week Paul and I commemorated the 23rd anniversary of meeting and our first date. (Commemorated as in “Hey, 23 years ago today you met me and asked me out.” “Oh yeah? Cool. G’nite, dear.”) There have been times when we’ve spoken more harsh words than gentle answers. There were plenty of times when we simply chose to not speak at all because harsh words were all we had for each other. Not every season of a marriage is full of sunshine and roses. Sometimes it’s full of empty bank accounts, sick kids, tired spouses, and other rotten things. But the times where it’s got some “I believe in you” and “I love you madly even though you’re a slob and apparently physically incapable of replacing an empty toilet paper roll” are the times that keep us going.

Happy 23 years of knowing me, babe. And thanks for asking me to go bowling.

Shifts and Changes

Originally published in the Miami News-Record on August 23, 2015

 Paul quit his job a few weeks ago. It was a scary life event, I have to admit. In the nearly 23 years we’ve been together, he’s had nary a day of unemployment. He committed to being our breadwinner all those years ago and has worked very hard for us over the years. He’s worked in a factory where he was exposed to lead on a daily basis and got a monetary bonus if his blood tested in the “safe” level. (“Here you go sir. You get a bonus for not poisoning yourself stupid this week. Have a nice day.”) He’s worked in an auto garage where temps would hit upwards of 115° in the summer and well below freezing in the winter. He’s mowed many a lawn. And he’s most recently been in a casino where he was miserable. He’s always worked hard for us, even when it wasn’t fun or remotely enjoyable.

So when he called me one day on his lunch break and said, “I think I’m going to quit my job,” I know it took a few minutes for my brain to register what he had said. I said, “Oooooookay….” and even though I was doing a mental freakout like one of those cartoons from that new Disney movie, I added, “I support you.” He didn’t quit that day and I was secretly thankful. And he didn’t quit the next day or even the next week. And I continued being thankful all while I stockpiled groceries and laundry detergent – just in case.

Then the day came when he called me once again on his lunch hour and said, “When I leave today, I’m not coming back,” and I found myself once again saying, “Okay, “ and I took a deep breath and added “and ….. I support you,” all while my little cartoon Panic guy was doing this crazy parcour ninja routine all over my brain in full-on meltdown mode.

I want to be a good wife and a good mom and I would do anything in the world for this crazy clan I call my own. And sometimes being the good wife or mom means just saying, “I love you. I support you. I don’t necessarily understand you, and I’m more than a little freaked out, but I support you.” And then you pray. A lot. “The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much” (James 5:16 KJV). I’m not saying I’m overly righteous, but lately my prayers have been pretty fervent in hopes of availing.

He was only unemployed two weeks before he found a new job that so far he really likes. It’s not day shift, but that’s okay. It’s hard work, but he’s no stranger to it and he’s willing to do it. His first night, he called me on his dinner break to tell me “They’re doing everything they can to make this old fat man sweat!” but he said it feels good to DO something, not sit behind a desk. It was a significant pay cut to start and we have some budget adjusting to do for the next few months, but we can do it. I am a coupon clippin’ fool and my sister guides me in the ancient Way of the Ad-Matches. My mother has sworn that we will not starve and asks me about every other day if I need butter or coffee. (The woman knows what is really important.) My mother-in –law has said she’ll help with bills if we need it. We have a great support system and pretty amazing kids who know that while things might be tight around here for awhile, we’ll be taken care of and that their daddy is a diligent provider for us. Plus, right now they’re digging the fact that we eat cereal or popcorn for dinner several nights a week and we can watch “Doctor Who” and “Downton Abbey” rather than “Cops” until bedtime.

Sometimes change is scary, but I do love a good adventure sometimes. Not too often, but sometimes.     

How Soon We Forget

Originally published in the Miami News-Record, March 29, 2015

I have written about embracing chaos before – in fact, just a few weeks ago if I remember correctly. I love our chaotic evenings around the dining room table playing games or just acting weird while we sit around talking about whatever rabbits we decide to chase.

But I fear my poor husband has no memory of the chaos we used to experience. He’s adapted to (and for the most part enjoys) teen chaos, but has seemingly forgotten the kid brand of chaos.

Case in point, this past week a dear friend from homeschool co-op came over with her six kids. They range from 3 years to 12 years and they are all so stinking adorable I can hardly contain myself when I’m around them. She has five precious little girls and one awesome little dude. They arrived that morning armed with kites, sidewalk chalk, and bubbles and even though it was a bit chilly, we sat outside and visited while they ran around the field chasing kite strings and each other. Immediately my friend’s boy convinced Sam that a piggyback ride was in order. Kady had the two littlest girls – one on her hip, the other by the hand – and they were trying to fill her in on everything that had ever happened in their lives. Or maybe it was a story about a dog or a flower or sunshine, I’m not sure. Whatever the story was, it was very exciting to them and Kady was nodding her head exuberantly.

My friend and I discussed husbands and jobs, college and Obamacare, being debt-free, homeschooling struggles and triumphs, pets, tattoos, and various other topics. We drank coffee and sweet tea with wild abandon. Being a stay-at-home mom means you embrace that grownup time with all the strength in your weary body and you talk until your jaws ache, laugh until your cheeks hurt, and store away the precious experience of another human being speaking to you without picking their nose or asking you to wipe their butt.

As the day wore on, the kites either ripped or got caught up in our hilltop wind gusts and became frustrating to the little ones, the chalk got boring, and the outside lost its exciting allure, so we suddenly found ourselves sitting across from each other on my couches with eight kids in our conversations. Being mommas, we just kept on talking, while the three-year-old army crawled across the back of the sofa from end of the room, around the corner and back again, and never batted an eye. We just cuddled up with whoever wanted a cuddle, tickled whoever wanted to be tickled, and kept on embracing the last snippets of adult conversation before time would once again force us to go back to “real life”. At one point cupcakes were brought out and the icing was promptly licked off by roughly 2/3 of those present. I was gifted a pipe cleaner crown from her oldest girl. Someone farted. Everyone giggled.

My husband walked in the door at 4:00 to see eight kids and two mommas, and promptly went into panic mode. He smiled, said hello, then walked straight to the bedroom. I could smell the fear. He hid in the garage until they left. When he finally peeked back in the house he grinned and said, “I walked in and there were so. many. little. people…..I panicked. Sorry.” I chuckled and gave a brief overview of the day while he sat wide-eyed. “But how do you two just…handle….all of that noise and farting and giggling and crumbs and sticky fingers???”

I patted his hand and said, “Oh honey, ours used to have sticky fingers and could spontaneously generate crumbs when they hadn’t eaten a thing. They were always running and jumping on the furniture. And well, they still fart.” He shook his head, “You moms are something.”

Yes. Yes, we are. 

How Does Your Garden Grow?

From the Miami News-Record, June 22 (with a few extra pics!)

I have never been a gardener, nor been interested in gardening. It has been a long-standing rule around our house that I am not allowed to touch any potted plants or hanging baskets because when I do, they die. I moved to Stillwater at 19 and my mom sent a philodendron because, as she said, “You can’t kill a philodendron. Anyone can grow them.” When I moved back home six weeks later, along with a new collection of Eskimo Joe’s cups and t-shirts, I also brought my poor, dead plant. Last spring I received a hanging basket of beautiful pink flowers. I tried not to touch it, but I also didn’t want someone to think me rude by asking them to keep it away from me and whisk it off to the safety of my car before I had any effect on it. But I politely admired it and carried it myself and ….yeah, it died.

When we moved and I got this idea to plant a garden, my husband said it was a bad idea. He reminded me ever so gently of my plant-killing background. He was sweet about reiterating to me the fact that I do not have a green thumb. Yet I kept insisting, so he just went along with it and started tilling me a garden. He picked up some tomato and pepper plants and I excitedly called my mom from the seed aisle at Walmart because I didn’t know the first thing about what types of seeds to get - you know, because of the whole not-being-able-to-grow-stuff thing. Upon her advice I settled on yellow crookneck squash, okra, cucumbers, zucchini, peaches and cream corn, and green beans, then some jack o’ lantern pumpkin and watermelon seeds for the youngest (who actually does have the ability to grow things). I wanted eggplant and radishes and broccoli and lettuce and all the really tasty and wonderful things garden people grow, but no one here likes broccoli but me. And you can forget about eggplant – no one is actually sure they hate it seeing as how none of them have ever tried it, but they’re all relatively certain they do.

So. Hott.

We planted late because we were garden novices and had no clue what we were doing, but in our ignorance we saved ourselves some work because of the chilly spring freezes that took out a few gardens. Then when things started growing we had week after week of rain and things started looking pretty bleak out there. Enter the usual veggie-loving bugs and we all but threw in the towel. I didn’t check it for about a week, and then to my surprise one night we had pole beans in need of poles because they were attacking each other. After telling them to play nice while I unwound vine after vine, we drove in a few stakes, realizing quickly we needed more than a just “few” stakes. Paul took off for the shop while I pulled weeds. When he came back I could only laugh – he was carrying a cattle panel. Like for a corral. It actually works great and just kind of completes the redneck atmosphere we’ve got going on around our entire place.

Our little garden won’t win any awards, but we’re excited every time we find a new tiny veggie. I didn’t even bother with a scarecrow this year – I just grab my daughter’s pink Red Ryder BB gun and shoot the birds from the back porch window. I’m making a list of all the stuff we did wrong and things I want to try for next year and I’m finding that I actually like this new adventure and don’t mind the dirt and sweat too much. I find a strange peace while pulling weeds (and on evenings I’m particularly frustrated, it makes for a great stress reliever) and am in awe of seeing God’s handiwork firsthand in my little redneck garden with a metal cattle panel right in the middle.

Gardening ain't for sissies - or those who dislike dirty piggies.

Surprise Visits

I grew up with the notion that when you went to visit someone, you called first. It was the polite thing to do, I was told. We never spontaneously dropped in on someone when I was a kid and people didn’t drop in on us. My husband’s family, on the other hand, never calls first. They just show up. I went straight from my momma’s house to my own, so I went straight from forewarned to surprised.

For a young married woman, this was unnerving. I was barely 20 and trying to get my sea legs for homemaking. Then later, for a young mother drowning in diapers, toys, VHS tapes of puppets and animated dragons, and a house that was rarely tidy, this was the seventh level of Hell. I just couldn’t understand why they didn’t just call first and was always flustered and embarrassed we had to move a pile (or two) of laundry from the couch so visitors could sit. I died a little every time we just had to kick a path through Legos, dolls, and Hot Wheels so they could make it to The Couch of Laundry and Hidden Sippy Cups. The porch was always covered in dirty shovels and pails from our latest yard expedition. Wet swimsuits were hung over chairs and the “decorative” antique ladder that was only “decorative” until the new puppy decided to eat the garland of autumn leaves, knock over the pot of mums (that I would’ve killed anyway), and I won’t even mention what he did to the Jack O’Lantern.

Needless to say, I will never end up on the cover of House Beautiful, but if they ever decide to publish one called Cluttered and Disorganized, I am a shoe-in for their spokesperson.

The kids are older now and there aren’t many toys in our house these days. And aside from the classroom (which is always in disarray – because learning is messy) (that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it), the house isn’t as cluttered. Now I welcome the drop-ins.

And I am loving it.

For the first 21 years of our marriage we lived closer to my family – the family of warning calls – and now we are within two miles of pretty much all of Paul’s family – the family of surprises. If we go a day without a visit from someone we start to wonder if everyone has the flu. There is almost always a brother, nephew, or neighbor in the yard and the female counterpart to the guy in the yard can usually be found on a bar stool in my kitchen. Sure, I still have to stack up a pile of bills and receipts and move it from the bar so they can set down their sweet tea, and with two teenagers and a tween there is usually still a pile of laundry or two on the couch, but now that I have stopped worrying about the details I can enjoy the visits so much more. When I was younger I spent the visits silently berating myself for the mess, zoning out of the conversations while busying myself with cleaning up toys – and the conversations continued without me.

So today, at this point in my life, I am just…visiting. And now that I am tuned into the conversations and the precious people in my home I am aware of the goings-on, the news, the updates, and the whole reason they came to our house in the first place – because they love us. They didn’t come to judge my housekeeping skills, my ability (or lack thereof) to keep dust off the bookshelf, or to tsk-tsk at how the kids just tracked grass through the house after their latest water fight in the yard. They didn’t come to see our house; they came to see us. Which would be fine if they hadn’t caught me without makeup or without a bra.

Hey, I’m a work in progress.

A Van-tastrophe

Vehicles are kind of a sensitive subject for a lot of people. You have your Ford people, your Chevy people, your Jeep folks and then, the really amazing ones who are Dodge people. (Yes, we're Dodge people. Why do you ask?) There are some who are brand-loyal and some who drive whatever Consumer Reports says is best. Some drive beaters that are so environmentally unfriendly they are on the EPA's Most Wanted list and some, like my parents, who drive those hybrid ninja cars that make no sound and I never know they've driven up my 1/10 mile driveway until they knock on my door, scaring me to pieces and making me holler "Wait a minute!" while I scurry to find a bra.

Now, before I start this and you all immediately think I'm a whiner, please know that I truly do recognize my blessings. I really do. I know that there are a lot of people out there without homes, much less vehicles, but please indulge me a moment if you will.

When we got married in 1993, myself on the verge of turning 20, I was still driving the car my parents had given me at age 16 - a 1986 Chevy Cavalier that was still sporting the badly crackled paint job, the dent in the rear driver's side door where I crunched into Jerry Friend's pickup bumper in the school parking lot my Senior year and there was literally a brick holding the driver's seat in an upright position. I ran her out of oil once and still she kept on doin' her thing. She was a good car. When it got to the point where I had to put a quart of oil in her every single day, we decided to let her go. A family friend who owned a car lot gave us $2000 trade-in on her and boy, was that generous.

We traded the Cavalier for a 1989 Ford Tempo. A two-door Ford Tempo. And for a Ford, it was a good little car -- until we had our first child in 1996 and crawling in the back seat to buckle in a carrier carseat got real old real quick. We made do until  May 1997, then we drove to Tulsa to the car lot where my cousin worked and he finagled us a decent deal on a 1993 Mercury Sable. It was a spunky little car with a ginormous motor. That motor meant nothing to me, personally, but it was always a topic of conversation with Paul who took great joy in showing people how much space the engine took up under the hood.

In December 2001 we had our third child. The formerly spacious back seat of my car suddenly shrunk. Trying to get a forward-facing car seat, a rear-facing car seat with a base and a booster seat all crammed safely into that car became something requiring just short of an engineering degree. In March 2002, after literal tears from me, we decided we needed a minivan.

It was hard on me. It didn't bother Paul very much at all. Of course not -- he had just traded off the fancy new truck he had driven off the lot with 17 miles on the odometer for a big ol' honkin' Chevy pickup with dual exhaust that would rattle the fillings in your teeth. He wasn't compromising his manliness, his youthfulness, for a.....a....minivan. I found myself at 29 years old, a mother of three and sentenced to an eternal life of carpooling, chauferring and hauling. Granted, I'd have done all those things in a car as well, but there was just such a stigma attached to driving a minivan.

We found a 1998 Chevy Astro Van, a gigantic box of a thing, built on a truck chassis and capable of hauling approximately 742 people. Okay, I kid - it seated eight. I think it could've hauled a regular minivan around in it, strapped next to one of my kids in their carseats. It was a monster and definitely NOT a minivan. It took me about two days to fall desperately, madly in love with that ugly monstrosity. And I drove it until the back door would no longer open, the driver's window would no longer roll down (made ATM's and drive-thru's always fun) and Paul was worried the transmission was going to shift so hard one day we'd leave it behind us on the highway. I mourned the loss of the Astro before it was even gone, because I knew he  meant business. He was bound and determined to get me a new vehicle. I whined. I bulled up. I pouted. I griped. I begged. I pleaded. He wouldn't budge.

Then one day he called me and with an excited tone in his voice told me he had found me a minivan. I was less than happy. I said, "Fine. I'll come drive it, but I refuse to like it. No matter what." It was a shiny red 1999 Dodge Grand Caravan. A little old couple had driven it to and from the grocery store and church (sounds so silly, but it's true!) and it was in immaculate shape. I scoffed at the light tan interior, imagining the McNugget crumbs and melted suckers that would soon adorn it. I grumbled at the leather seats which were cold on my rump. I grumbled more when the salesman flipped the switch to the bun warmers, thus promptly toasting my backside, certain that I would end up with 2nd degree burns when they shorted out. I said I hated the dual sliding doors. I said the Astro only had one, why would I need two? Hmph. We took it home for the weekend to drive it. We ended up selling the Astro over that weekend, so ..... yeah, that next Monday we bought that stupid Caravan.

And now, here I am nearly five years later, pre-emptively mourning the loss of her. She's got new creaks and thumps, the air conditioner/heater is tempermental at best, she's got 160-some-thousand miles on her, she's 12 years old now, she smells like sweaty socks (probably because for some reason the kids like to leave sweaty socks in her overnight when she's all shut up).....I guess it's time. I hadn't fully admitted to Paul it was time, though, until last week. I have been quietly contemplating a new vehicle, mostly because with a new (to me) vehicle also will come a car payment and after three years of being totally debt-free, this causes me stress. Dave Ramsey himself says car payments are unacceptable debt. I know this. But we haven't really stuck to that whole "pay yourself first" thing because heck, we're doing good to tithe, pay the bills and clothe the kids these days, much less set aside any for an impending vehicle purchase. It's totally our fault. We know this. So we'll have a car payment and we'll survive. We just won't like it.

So, the other day, when I saw a brand spankin' new, probably 2011 Grand Caravan in the Walmart parking lot I nearly wet myself in excitement. THAT WAS THE VAN I WANTED! It didn't look like a traditional minivan, heck, it doesn't look like the Grand Caravan I'm driving now. It's lower profile, boxier shaped, looks more like a longer SUV than a van.....I call them SUVans. And I want one. So I parked close to it. Mosied over by it and gave it a look-see. Paul scoffed. And proceded to tell me it was a $40,000 vehicle and I couldn't have it.

SAY WHAT??? For one thing, I was pretty sure it wasn't a $40,000 vehicle and for another, he drove a truck off a lot with SEVENTEEN MILES ON IT, eleven of those put on by us on the test drive! Why CAN'T I have a new vehicle? I've never ever gotten a new one, never even gotten one less than four years old! He drives a 2004 Ram right now that is simply gorgeous and we paid wayyyyyyy too much for because he saw it and he wanted it and he got it.

Well, his laughter just infuriated me on the spot. I ignored him and went on into the store. We shopped. We checked out. We stopped by my Mom's office and I had her look up a 2011 Grand Caravan online.

HA! $26,000, BUCKO!

He grinned and said, "Okay, let's go find one and test drive it."

I crossed my arms and firmly said, "No. I will drive the one I have until parts start falling off of her. And then when the parts do start falling off of her I will just duct tape them back on. Because I'm not getting a new van. Period. I simply refuese."  His reply: "Okay."

Grrr.

Yeah. I showed him.

I turned on the air conditioner yesterday and the sound that came out of the vents was, I'm pretty sure, the van's signal to the mother ship, to beam it up, it's tired and wants to go home. Paul made a funny face, looked sideways at me, grinned and crossed his arms across his chest.

"So......you got any duct tape?"

I so do not find him amusing sometimes.

Lunchtime Reflections

When I was in Junior High we all spoke longingly of the day we could go "uptown" to eat lunch. I can remember from the time we hit 7th grade we all talked about the day we could go off-campus and partake of whatever unhealthy treats awaited us. Some of us loudly proclaimed we would eat candy for lunch because, let's face it, sometimes 7th graders lack imagination when it comes to dietary rebellion. Some of us said we'd only drink soda because after having no choice but white milk from Kindergarten up really builds up a sense of needing to break free in the beverage department I guess. The really rebellious ones had no desire to eat whatsoever - they only wanted off campus so they could either smoke or make out with whatever flavor or the week they were "going with". Looking back, the ones who said they were going to smoke, probably didn't. The make-outers, though, yeah....they probably did already while on campus. They were just tired of having to work so hard to be sneaky.

Freshman year was the magic year we could leave behind the security of the campus that sheltered us for six hours and 15 minutes a day and be free spirits for that 45 minute lunch break. Some of us found a loophole our 8th grade year and discovered that some kind upperclassmen would gladly take your $2.00 and purchase a $1.50 cheeseburger for you and not bring you back one red cent of change and we were totally okay with their profiting from our stupidity. We were just tired of square pizza slices and fish sticks every Friday. We thought we were cool being all sneaky with our contraband off-campus food and scarfing it down while watching for a rogue teacher to come wandering over between the gyms where we were hanging out.

Shortly after the beginning of 7th grade I quit eating school lunches. Every day the line wound up the two flights of stairs that led from the Junior High hall down to the cafeteria below and spilled out into the hall and sometimes into the lobby. Waiting in that line left absolutely no time for me to socialize and my 12 year old self would not give up social time, nuh uh, no way, no how. When I first started skipping school lunches I would instead buy a Diet Coke from the lobby vending machine and a $1 candybar from the Junior High Pep Club sponsor, Mrs. Reid. For $1.50 I got an afternoon's worth of caffeine and sugar and absolutely no nutrition whatsoever. Not long after that, my best friend, DeLisa, somehow talked her mother into preparing she and I a lunch every single day and that kind woman never asked me once for payment. I guarantee you that I never told my mother this fact because she would have been mortified that RoseMary fed her eldest child every day for nearly two years and was never reimbursed. Mortified, I tell you. In fact, if she reads this she may very well call RoseMary up and offer to write her a check.

My Freshman year finally arrived and even though our family qualified for free lunches through the state program for poor, malnourished kids, I would have considered prostitution on a street corner to get money to eat uptown rather than visit that cafeteria (and that would've been something considering that until October of that year I had never been kissed and frankly, found the whole process of mere kissing to be disgusting). Fortunately, every Monday my mother somehow always managed to send me with lunch money for the week, thus saving me from a life of prostitution. My father was in nursing school, we were living off of her meager income as a legal secretary and the money she made cleaning houses on the weekends, so really I don't know how she found an elastic area of the budget to allow for her self-centered 14 year old to eat junk food every day, but she did. She's amazing like that.

I don't remember eating uptown with the aforementioned BFF, DeLisa, that year and I think it had something to do with athletics. I think basketball girls either got out of gym too late to go uptown or had to be in the gym too early the following hour to allow it. Or maybe the coach demanded they put something halfway healthy into their bodies. I don't remember eating uptown with Stacie much either. But Chloe and I, man, we were the queens of tuna sandwiches from the cooler, a bag of Sour Cream and Cheddar Ruffles and a bottle of Coke. Every day, the same thing. The chip flavor didn't change. The soda didn't change. Occasionally, the tuna sandwiches would all be gone by the time we got there and we'd instead get a couple of Blow Pops to substitute for the loss of protein. We managed to eat this feast for $1.72.  Of course, I rolled my eyes to hear my mother freak out about how expensive that was because back in her day, she'd get a sandwich or burger, a bag of Fritos and a bottle of Vess for .52. The times, they had definitely a'changed. They've changed even more. It costs my oldest child $3 or more every day now. *sigh*

Eventually C&R Grocery closed - I think during my Sophomore year - and we turned to eating greasy cheeseburgers from a little burger grill (I think simply called "The Cafe") that took advantage of the opportunity and opened up right across from the gymnasium. They were heavy on mustard and onions and grease would just drip out of the waxed paper pocket they came in. If you were dying of starvation because Typing had just been ever so strenuous that day, you would sometimes bite into the greasy goodness before removing the toothpick, thus injuring your palate. I'm pretty sure every kid at Wyandotte High that year gained 15 pounds because of those burgers. To this day, I can still taste them, though. No really. I mean, literally. Sometimes I belch and I'm like, yep, that one tasted like my Sophomore year.

It had to have been the latter half of my Sophomore year - because I'm sure I was driving by then - that I gained about three hours of infamy because of lunch time at school. We had all gotten our Recommended Daily Allowance of grease and mustard from The Cafe and I was finishing up my Diet Coke (oh, the irony) as the bell rang. I tipped the can back as far as it would be and slugged back the last of what was in the can. Suddenly, I felt a strange sensation on my tongue. And the roof of my mouth. And my throat. I coughed. Then I gagged. I coughed some more. It occured to me what had happened. I stopped walking in the midst of the herd of trampling teenagers and loudly screamed, "I JUST SWALLOWED A TRASH BEE!"

What we called "trash bees" are actually yellow jackets. We called them trash bees because they swarmed those outdoor trash cans like crazy. Apparently they liked mustard and hamburger grease as much as we did. The only thing I can figure out is that one of them had wandered inside my soda can while I talked with my friends, languishing in the saccharine-y delights ensconsed within that aluminum can, and when I tipped back the can, it got caught in the deluge and ..... yeah..... I drank it. It fought the good fight, stinging all the way down, but succumbed to the horror of being eaten alive by a 15 year old. My next class was Home Ec, so I ran in, half laughing, half crying, to Mrs. Johnson and told her I was probably going to die soon and could I be excused to call my mom before I expired? She gave me a cup of ice cubes and sent me to the office where I told the secretary and principal the story, all the while my tongue getting larger and larger, my throat getting narrower and more sore. RoseMary called my mom at work who in turn called the family doctor. He advised getting some Benadryl in me ASAP, told her to have me suck on some ice cubes for the swelling and to alert the staff that if I stopped breathing to call an ambulance. Duh. I don't know where the Benadryl came from, but by the time school let out that day at 3:12 my tongue, while still sore and thick feeling, was no longer resembling something out of a sci-fi movie. From then on, I kept my thumb over the opening of my soda can. So did my friends.

By the time I was a Senior, Butterfield's General Store had opened and our menu veritably exploded with variety!  We could choose from a hamburger, chicken strips, Frito chili pie, a bowl of chili with cheese, fries and tater tots. And the fountain drinks were aplenty! The second the bell rang after our 4th hours class, we would stampede our the doors and head uptown and invade that teeny tiny store. Some local adults in town were usually there when we arrived, sitting at the bar stools, but we didn't care. We didn't have time to sit, we grabbed our food and ran.

One day the store was particuarly full. Cyndi and I were toward the back of the crowd waiting our turn to order. Another kid in our class, Keeling, was particularly snarky that day and apparently I was particularly cranky. He mouthed off to me, I snapped back at him. He responded by calling me a b*tch. I hauled back and slapped him across the face as hard as I possibly could. The whole entire store went instantly silent as the pink hand print blossomed across his cheek. He blinked a couple of times. I fumed in anger and turned around to wait my turn in line. Eventually people started talking again and a few of the "regulars" sitting at the counter chuckled and looked back at me.

Little did I know that would be the first time my husband would lay eyes on me. He was a skinny red-headed 28 year old, I was a short, overly-emotional 18 year old. He was employed and living on his own. I was a Senior, angry with the world and angry that I had to grow up. We wouldn't meet for nearly another year and a half and it would be another year or so after that before he'd tell me he was in the store that day, sitting at the counter with his friend, Dean, impressed at the attitude and anger I displayed as I waylaid the kid who called me a name.

I'm guessing he liked it.

The End of an Era (part 1)

We have three kids, ages 14, 12 and nine. We are way past bottles, diapers, fussy crying all night, temper tantrums (well, sort of--that teenager can drum up some dramatic stomping on occasion), potty training and having to pack up half the house to make a trip to Walmart. Our kids can all go to the bathroom completely unassisted and just last week Abby drove the van for the first time.

I am 38 years old. Paul is 10 years older than me. It won't be long before I leave my 30's behind and Paul waves good-bye to his 40's. We like where we are right now. Our marriage is stronger than it has ever been, our kids are well-adjusted and self-sufficient and we just love life right now. So for the past few years we've talked about doing something permanent to ensure our nights remain full of sleep -- well, at least until Abby starts dating.

I have had three vaginal births. With Abby I had an epidural that took only on one side. I also got a Badge of Honor by way of an episiotomy with her. With Sam we tried the epidural route again, but he came so fast that by the time the anesthesiologist got it in (after FOUR tries) he was here and I wasn't numb until after he was born. With Kady I didn't have so much as a Tylenol. She was born au naturale. Our very pregnant niece and I were texting the other day and I was telling her that natural childbirth was the way to go. She was not convinced and pointed out that after a completely natural childbirth I haven't done it since. She made a point, although not entirely valid. We really hadn't planned on Kady, so SURPRISE! Baby #3 made her appearance without planning aforethought. Since #3 wasn't planned, we didn't plan on a #4 either.

A few years ago I started the ball rolling to have my tubes tied at the Indian Hospital. Then I chickened out because I thought there might be an eensy weensy chance we might possibly want another baby. But you know, like a bolt from the blue one day we both told the other we didn't want any more babies. And there was a peace there. We were totally okay with it. We felt our family was complete.

I didn't relish the thought of having surgery, albeit of the outpatient variety. I asked Paul to get a vasectomy and he wouldn't even discuss it, so I dropped it. Occasionally I'd bring it up again and every time he would shut me down before I even got started. I don't believe in taking the pill (and couldn't if I wanted to because I have Factor V Leiden), so hey, if the guy wanted to use condoms for the rest of his life I was going to be okay with that. I decided I was going to be stubborn on the issue and apparently he felt the same way. Remember I said Kady is nine. That's a lot of prophylaxis, dudes.

Then out of the blue back in May he off-handedly mentioned a vasectomy and asked a few questions. I wanted to do cartwheels, but instead I answered his questions and shut my mouth. Then The Great Kidney Stone Adventure of 2011 happened (parts one and two chronicled there and there). A few weeks after his dismissal from the hospital he had a follow-up appointment with the urologist. He came out of the doctor's office and I looked up to him from my seat in the waiting room. He grinned and handed me a packet of papers with an appointment card paper clipped to the top. It had his name and a date and time and in the nurse's handwriting across the top it said VASECTOMY.

I'm telling you, I heard angels singing.

He scheduled his week's vacation around V-Day, as we call it around the house. The procedure was supposed to be on Friday, he'd recover over the weekend and by Monday be up and ready to get into mischief all over the place. Then last Thursday, the day before, the receptionist called the house. She asked if he still wanted to have his vasectomy. Uhh....yeah. Well, while she was on vacation they had schedule the doctor in surgery for that Friday and she was having to reschedule everyone. I explained that his vacation had been planned around the blessed event, so the earlier she could get him back on the books, the better. So things were bumped back to Monday (yesterday) at 3pm.

.....to be continued.....

Stoner (Part 2)

I made it to the hospital that Thursday morning by about 5 after 7, kissed my swollen and puffy husband's face then settled in with my iPod to partake of free WiFi while we waited for the Surgery nurses, also known to kidney stone patients as Angels of Mercy. Paul told me he had had a bad two hours during the night when the stone was trying to move again and he maxed out on pain meds and commenced to doing the Funky Chicken all over the room. His nighttime nurse was a Godsend and he said he's forever grateful to her. It must've been bad.

It was after 8 when the two gals from surgery came up, got his IV unhooked from the pump, put his cute little bootie socks on his feet and it was just as she pushed the Versed in his veins to make him a little groggy before they took him downstairs they realized he still had his Bermuda shorts on under his gown. (Dude is a little bit modest and said he didn't like his "junk" out there all flappin' in the breeze, so he wore his underwears and Bermudas under his gown. He is just precious.) The girls kind of giggled and said, "We'll step behind the curtain so you can slip everything off." I stepped over to the side of the bed to hold his IV line out of the way and quickly realized my husband was absolutely 100% drunk out of his ever-lovin' MIND already. We're talkin' like two minutes. I gently moved his hands from the zipper where he was trying to repeatedly unzip his already unzipped shorts and kept saying, "Come on, honey. Help me out here." I heard giggling from behind the curtain. I was not amused. Okay, I was kind of amused. I said, "Uhm....girls.....he's plumb goofy, could I get some help?" Just more giggles. So finally after several more minutes of me trying to get him to lift his rump I managed to get the Bermudas off him. I left the underwear for the team of professionals downstairs. I figured they were getting paid the big bucks, let them lift his rump from that point on.

I kissed his forehead and gathered my things from around the room and went down to the surgery waiting room. I checked what was going on around Facebook, glimpsed quickly at Twitter, but it was reading Testify Blog that soothed me and passed the time for me without nerves. About 30 minutes after they took him I saw Dr. Stout come around the corner. He sat down next to me and bluntly said, "I couldn't get it." I love this guy. Most of the time when you see him he looks like Paul Bunyan, usually with a full beard and a lot of hair (on his head and all over his body) and sometimes he wears flannel. In the office. He played the oldest brother, Ruben, in the local little theater's production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat a few weeks ago. He's just an all-around neat guy. So there he was in his surgery scrubs, sitting in the chair next to me like we were old friends catching up, all relaxed and laid back, explaining that the stone was too high, as he had thought it might be, while I sat on the edge of my seat in horror that this ordeal was not over yet. He also said that the kidney they thought was fine and not blocked, was indeed blocked and when he placed the stent....well, I shan't describe it here as he described it to me. Suffice it to say....YUCK and EWWWW. Then he reminded me that he was leaving the following afternoon for Boston and wasn't going to be in town until early the next week. Oh the tears that wanted to spill at that moment.

He said, "I can send him home with that stent in place and we can schedule a lithotripsy (where they bust up the stone with sound waves) for when I get back if that's okay with you." Well, I had no choice, huh? I nodded dumbly and looked at my hands, feeling helpless and worried and knowing that Paul was not going to do well in that scenario. Dr. Stout patted me on the leg and told me I could go on upstairs and wait for Paul there. As I gathered my things, I glanced down at my iPod where the post on Testify I had been reading had quoted the old hymn I recall Tennessee Earnie Ford singing when I was kid, "It Is Well With My Soul". I blinked back the tears, took a deep breath and as I walked the long hallway toward the elevators I prayed. God, you are in control of this. You are the Great Physician and I can't worry any more. You have this. I know it. Paul is in the palm of Your hand and You are in control. It truly is well with my soul.

And I made it to that empty hospital room with a renewed spirit and no worry. And moments after I sat down in that hard-backed chair to await my Prince Charming the room phone rang. The nurse aide came screeching into my room hollering, "ANSWER THAT! ANSWER THAT! IT'S DR. STOUT!" I said hello with trepidition - had something happened to Paul in those few short moments between then and now? I pushed the thought away and listened as Dr. Stout told me he had called Oklahoma City, pleaded the case, arranged for them to send the mobile lithotripsy unit up the following morning and the procedure was scheduled for 8am. There would be no waiting the weekend, no dismissal to home with the stone still there, no having to wonder if another urologist was available in Dr. Stout's absence.

Talk about God's favor!

I took Paul a long time to come around what with him being a sedation lightweight and all and as he had when he had his EGD procedure back in March, he had some temporary amnesia and asked me questions over and over and over. It's cute at first. It gets less cute after you answer the same question for the 27th time. He was groggy and nauseated, in a lot of pain and just generally grumpy when it finally hit him that the stone had not been rolled away, so to speak. He refused to eat that day. He was depressed. Peeing was excruciating for him. Watching him under all of it was excruciating for me. He had a lot of pain medication in him. He was intensely nauseated. They were pumping the IV fluids in him like crazy and there was very little output. He swelled up like a poisoned pup.

I went home that afternoon to get the kids off the bus, let them re-pack their bags for another school night sleepover at Gram's and said I'd take them to Sonic after going to see Daddy. Abby caught me off to the side as soon as we walked in the hospital room and said, "Why does  Daddy look like that? Why is his face so FAT?" That had to be startling and I assured her he was fine, just retaining a lot of fluids, like PMS on steroids. She giggled. They visited with him for awhile, then hunger got the best of them. After kisses good-bye we headed to Sonic. As I puilled in my father called and said the storms headed our way looked bad, to get the kids to shelter and forget Sonic. Yeah.....no. They needed food and Sonic is fast and close to Mom's. We made it to Mom's, flipped on the TV, watching the radar show the storm go around us. Mom and Dad were eating dinner and with the weather iffy I decided not the leave the kids alone. I took that time to put my feet up since they were swollen from sitting in that dang hard backed chair for two days.

Dad dropped Mom off at the house and headed up to see Paul and take him some magazines. I loved on my babies awhile longer, visited with Mom and then headed to the hospital myself. He was in the shower when I got there and seemed to be feeling better, probably knowing the end was near and he was 12 mere hours away from relief. I went home again that night to sleep alone, no Little Joe to protect me from the big, bad coyotes and panthers and bobcats out here in the woods, but I was so exhausted Fitty could've waltzed in and hacked me to bits without me ever knowing.

I was back to the hospital by 7 the next morning, things were very delayed and x-ray didn't come get him until after 8. They had no sooner gotten him in the elevator the anesthesiologist walked in. He looked around with a confused look on his face and said, "Uhm.....your husband? He would be.......where?" When I said x-ray had just taken him he said, "Come on, we'll go catch him" and whisked me off to the surgery elevator. We missed him by moments and waited patiently outside the x-ray room door. The anesthesiologist also laughed when he said he was only giving Paul a half dose of Versed this time since he was hit pretty hard by the full dose the day before. I rolled my eyes and said, "Don't I know. You ought to have been the one trying to take off his shorts while the surgery nurses laughed at you behind a curtain! That's blog material for sure!" He laughed then assured me he would take good care of him and headed for the OR. I got to kiss Paul's face before the other surgery guy (far less giggling from him) whisked him away, I met Dad in the hallway and we waited together this time. The hour and 15 minute wait was made far easier with him being there.

Finally Dr. Stout made his grand appearance with specimen cup in hand. He showed us a stone fragment that had already passed when the stent had been removed. It was about the width of an unsharpened pencil lead. Ow. He said he had also managed to bust up some of the stones that were in the proper position in the left kidney, thus hopefully eliminating a few episodes in the future. I thanked him for all his string-pulling, mad stone removal skillz and wished him safe travels on his road trip to Boston.

And thanked God the ordeal was over. And praised him for his goodness and mercy and healing.

Paul was awake, alert and HUNGRY when he got back to the room this time. The nurse aide brought him a sandwich because it was still and hour and a half until lunch trays would be there. He ate and acted more like himself than he had in four days. And he ate part of the lunch on his tray when it got there. He put on his Sooner pajama pants and OSU hat - he is an enigma, that man - and said he was ready to go HOME.

By 2pm we were heading home with three prescriptions for antibiotics, pain and nausea meds. Our kids were insanely happy we were both there when they got off the bus that time. We were, too.

____________________________

Fast forward to yesterday, one week after dismissal: Paul passsed SIX stones/fragments yesterday. They were all about the size of a match head. He never even knew he'd passed them until he saw them in the urinal. Talk about God's favor again. I can't fathom trying to pass something that size.

Sweet tea has not touched his lips since and he says it never will again. I doubt that. I mean, we live in Oklahoma, for cryin' out loud, that stuff is everywhere. He's been drinking a lot of water and since he heard lemonade helps to etch stones that are already formed, thus reducing them in size, he drinks a LOT of lemonade. Hey, I guess whatever floats his boat. Or his stones.

Stoner (Part 1)

Two weeks ago Paul came about *this close* to rupturing a disk in his back. It was awful. I had just stepped out of the shower when I heard Sam say "She's in the shower. Okay, okay, I'll get her." My 12 year old son with eyes squeezed tightly shut, hand over his closed eyes and while holding the phone as far away from himself as possible slipped the phone through the bathroom door and said, "It's Dad." I grabbed the phone with my dripping hand, said hello and was greeted with the soft, panting voice (no, not that kind of soft, panting voice) of my husband saying, "You've *pant* got to *pant* come out here *pant* and help *pant* me. NOW. *pant*" I said, "Well, I'm dripping wet, I'll be out there as fast as I can! Where are you?" He replied with "*pant* The carport *pant*" and hung up.

I threw my shorts and shirt on while still drippy, squeezed excess water out of my hair and ran out the back door fully expecting to find my husband missing an arm or his leg bent awkwardly out behind him since the last time I had seen him earlier was as he flew down the driveway on a four-wheeler. I wasn't looking forward to what I thought I was going to see. Instead I just found him kind of bent over at the waist beside the lawnmower. He slowly turned his head toward me and said, "I threw out my back." My initial reaction was that I wanted to laugh, but then fortunately I caught myself as I realized he was really hurting. It took about 15 minutes, but we slowly, and I mean slowwwwwwwwwwwly, got him straightened up and I walked him in the house.

Three days of missed work, four chiropractor visits and a metric ton of ibuprofen and he finally felt like a human again.

Fast forward to 2am this past Tuesday morning. A tote fell off the cedar chest at the foot of our bed. I got up, put it back up and crawled back in bed. I had just settled in and felt Paul get up. He said, "My stomach's cramping" and kind of staggered sleepily out of the room. I figured there was nothing I could help him with there and promptly went back to sleep. About 45 minutes later I was awakened to him shaking the bed violently and saying, "Kristin, you've got to get up now and help me. I'm hurtin'. Bad." I grabbed my glasses and followed him to the living room where he took up pacing as he apparently had been doing for the previous 45 minutes while I snoozed away.

It was the dreaded kidney stone.

In 2008 he passed five of the little buggers and he recognized the pain of them moving all too well. Three years ago he was admitted to the hospital and was scheduled for basket retrieval surgery the following morning at 6am only to pass them all a few hours later.

Not so much this time.

I text his boss and told her he would not be coming in and what was going on. I rummaged around in the cabinet until I found the blessed bottle of Vicodin from three years ago knowing they were expired, but also knowing the dude needed some relief. At 5:30 I got up to start my day having not gone back to sleep.

He felt fine during the day that day (Tuesday), achey and sore on the side where the stone was, but not the horrible pain he had felt during the night. He figured the stone had dropped into his bladder and it was just a matter of passing it from there so he got down in the floor to put together a new ceiling fan for our bedroom. The crawling and squatting and bending got the stone moving again and within 30 minutes he was begging to be shot. I instead suggested the emergency room and while he insisted a bullet would've been better, he agreed to the hospital. Mom and Dad couldn't get there quick enough for his taste, so we left the two  younger kids in Abby's care and headed for Vinita, about 25 minutes away. There was a little girl with an ice pack on her arm ahead of us, so Paul took to pacing the floor. When he was finally called back to Triage the nurse and I struck up a conversation which included the game of "Don't I Know You From Somewhere?" and "Man, You Look Awful Familiar". Paul was not amused and kept giving me looks that essentially conveyed that I was heartless and shouldn't be allowed to continue living.

Two shots of Demerol and a shot of Morphine landed him on a heart monitor and oxygen because apparently they were concerned at the amount of drugs they were having to give him to even give him any semblance of relief. After the Morphine he finally quit doing the Funky Chicken all over the bed and settled down enough they could take him to CT where they announced he was the proud owner of a 5mm stone which was in the ureter and was certainly considered "passable". 20 minutes later the doctor came back in and said that upon further perusal of the films the stone was 7mm and right on the border of "passable" and "no way in Hell that baby is coming out on its own." He also announced there were six more stones in the left kidney and three more in the right which means we have the fabulous opportunity of potentially going through this NINE MORE TIMES. By 11pm the doctor was writing dismissal papers and said to drink until his eyeballs floated and if the pain came back and we couldn't control it at home to go to either Grove or Miami hospital because both of those hospitals have urologists and they didn't.

I didn't watch Conner that next day (Wednesday) considering neither of us had slept in two nights and he was still in pain and couldn't stop throwing up. By the time the kids got home he was pacing the floor and cursing, asking for a bullet in between barfing into a trashcan and draping himself over various pieces of furniture. At one point told Kady her voice was so annoying he couldn't stand hearing another thing from her mouth. Fortunately it didn't break her sensitive little heart and she didn't cry. She knew her daddy was hurtin' bad. I told the kids to pack an overnight bag and called Mom and said I was bringing them to her and we were headed to the ER. We dropped them off and he staggered into the ER where fortunately we didn't have to wait long to be triaged and sent to a room. More Morphine and Zofran for the nausea and the doctor said he was sending him home. Paul nearly started crying. He was exhausted from the pain and the vomiting, he was so dehydrated they had to stick him five times (after having stuck him seven the first time in the ER at the other hospital) and he just wanted some relief. I called and texted my best prayer warriors and put them on mercy-prayer detail - we needed favor in the form of a sympathetic ER doc and urologist.

It helps that the local urologist is a stone producer as well.

Another CT scan to see if the stone had moved in the past 24 hours (it hadn't considering it was the size of Manhattan) and the ER doc came in and said, "I can send you home with oral pain meds and we'll see if you pass this thing in a day or two or you can be admitted and Dr. Stout can do a basket retrieval procedure in the morning." We both at the same time said, "Admit!" Dr. Stout, the urologist, came by to see him while he was still in the ER and said the stone was kind of high, but he would try his best to retrieve it. By 8:30 he was being wheeled upstairs to his room where my sweet, exhausted husband just wanted to sleep. I went home around 10:30 that night to sleep and was so tired I just knew that no howling coyotes or even Fitty coming to hack me into itty bitty bits was going to keep me awake.

I finally fell asleep at nearly 1am. I was up by 5 to be back in there by 7 because the surgery was scheduled for 8. I was running on fumes and about eight hours sleep in three nights.



To be continued......

Aaaaaand....we're back

Christmas was hectic and fabulous. We managed to get where we needed to go, see who we needed to see and do all the hullaballoo involved.

New Year's Eve Paul and I ran away to Branson for our 18th anniversary. We certainly did not party like it was 1999 or even 2009. As soon as we hit the motel room we were sprawled out on that big ol' King-sized bed watching a show on NatGeo about the fascinating sting ray trade in Singapore. We were asleep by 11:15 and 2011 slipped right past us without so much as disturbing our exhausted snoring.

The next day we spent the day shopping at the craft stores in Branson, acting like two goofy love birds and enjoyed being together. We came through Joplin, MO, on the way back toward home and were going to see True Grit, but the line at the box office was out to the edge of the sidewalk and Mr. Grumpy Anniversary Pants didn't want to stand outside in the cold to wait our turn. I was kind of pouty and asked him to just drive me through Starbucks so I could spend a ridiculous amount of money on a coffee, something I just don't do very often. I told him to order me a "Grande Caramel Brulee' Latte". He gave me a sideways look and said, "Ooooookay." He rolled the window down and when the chipper voice on the speaker asked what he'd like he said, "Uh, yeah....Gimme a grand-ay goo-lay car-mel hoo-lay lot-tay....or something like that....I think." I busted out laughing and said, "No! A grande caramel brulee' latte!" He again started speaking a hillbilly form of Pig Latin into the speaker again and this time my laughing was so loud the chipper gal taking our order started laughing, too. She finally said through her chuckles, "Sooooo....a caramel latte'?" I said, "Close enough!"

About five miles down the road I offered Paul a drink. Without taking his eyes off the road he said, "Nope. I cain't drink somethin' I cain't even pronounce."

And that is just one of the many reasons why I am so thrilled to have been married to him for the past 18 years.

*********************

The kids got up last Tuesday morning to go back to school after two weeks off.

And Ab got bit by a brown recluse spider while putting on her jeans.

At 6:15, mere minutes after the bite, I called the Nurse Advice Line through their insurance and she said to keep an eye on it and monitor her for breathing difficulty or severe allergic reactions. I then called my mother who freaked me out by saying, "TAKE HER TO THE ER IMMEDIATELY." So then I called the hospital and had them page her PA. I didn't feel so bad because chances are the dude was probably already up by 6:30am anyway, right? He gave me the same info the advice line nurse did which didn't settle well with me. She was feeling fine and only complaining of the bite itching like a mosquito bite. I drove to the school during her lunch hour and checked it and frankly, could hardly see the bite at all, however by 3:45 when she walked in the door off the bus she was chilling, her joints ached and was complaining of severe abdominal pain. I loaded her up and hauled her - and the dead spider in a Dixie cup - to ExpressCare where the PA looked at the bite and very unsympathetically dismissed us and refused to give her antibiotics, steroids or a pat on the back, much less some compassion. I took my crying teenager home, fuming all the way.

She missed school Wednesday, fighting a fever and joint aches the entire day. I got her an appointment with her PA when the bite started looking like a bruise, something the ExpressCare PA said would happen if the bite was going to necrose. I don't like the word necrose, much less the actual act of necrosity....uhm necroseness.....necrosing.....oh, you know what I mean. He looked at the bite and said as far as bites go it looked really good and he felt pretty certain it would not necrose. I asked about a thousand questions, most of them worst-case-scenario and he tried his best to lay them to rest. He assured me repeatedly that antibiotics and steroids are not standard protocol for recluse bites these days and time was what it needed.

And now today, five days after the bite happened, there is a divot the diameter of a pencil lead in the center of the bite and it appears it is indeed going to necrose. She is still easily tired out, still achey and has a nearly continual headache. Her body has reacted so violently to this bite I am very frustrated with the medical community. I'd like to bring both PAs into her room every night and spend the 15 minutes it now takes for her to get ready for bed, let them hold the flashlight while she obsessively checks the bed sheets and pillows for spiders, let them sleep with her because she's so achey she's crying (and Ab is not a cry-er), let them reassure her that yes, she will be able to wear shorts again and no, she will not be a freak of nature with a hole in her leg. Yeah, that's what I'd like to do.


*****************

Yesterday was Kady's first two basketball games of this season. On the way to the gym I gave her my usual pre-game pep talk. I reminded her to dribble low and close, elbows out, head up, be aggressive and tough. She rolled her eyes at me, but listened politely. Then Paul said, "Alright, are you done with your pep talk?" I nodded that I was. He said, "Good. Daddy's turn. Bug, go out there and kick some butt." I broke back in with, "Oh yeah, and K? Most importantly? Play like a Christian. Okay?" Kady grinned from the back seat and said, "Uhm....I'd rather play like Daddy said."

Game one was ugly. The team she is one is comprised of two 3rd graders (she being one of them) and the rest are 2nd graders. It's a very inexperienced team full of teeny tiny little girls who are just learning the game and frankly, having a blast out there. Their coach is a patient woman trying to teach the girls fundamentals and sportsmanship and discipline. Unfortunately, the two teams they played yesterday have fiercely competitive coaches and the girls are downright mean. Our girls were elbowed, scratched, tripped and generally annihilated. Kady got so upset after one girl shoved her friend in the chest then tripped her she was crying hard enough to go into an asthma attack. The assistant coach ushered her off the court and as she disappeared through the doorway I noticed she had her arms over her head. It hit me she can't breathe! I grabbed her inhaler and ran out the gym doors where she was trying desperately to breathe the cold air. After three hits off the inhaler she finally got her air again and went back in. We never managed to score that game.
Game two was uglier. And the fans were uglier than ugly. When Kady made a basket we all cheered. The other team's fans behind us started making fun of us. I asked Mom if it was Christian-like to punch someone and enjoy it. She just patted my leg and said, "Probably not, dear." We managed that one goal the entire game and the other team never got nicer.

I do not understand why you'd want your children to play that way. Granted, at one point I marched over to the bench where my nine-year-old was sitting and said, "Honey, now it's time to get mean. You have to play ugly. Now." I'm not necessarily proud, but since most of the team was crying at that point I felt it had to be done. I don't want these girls to think this is how good sportsmanship goes. I am appalled that parents and coaches think it is acceptable to make fun of seven-, eight- and nine-year-olds on the basketball court AND their parents who are congratulating their children for the small victory of a basket.

I just don't get it.


And I haven't ruled out the punching either. I guess I need to talk to the pastor. And Jesus.