My day at the hospital

Yesterday I spent the whole day at Primary Children's Hospital.  

No worries.  All is well.  It's just that one of my twins is a hemophiliac so he had to meet his new group of docs--his social worker, his physical therapist, his hematologist, etc.   

What a cool place, Primary Children's is!  

I get the same charge walking the halls of a hospital that I get walking the aisles at Borders. They both give me that sense that if I look hard enough, I'll find my grail.  

Plus I'm pretty sure when Gad's not at church he's either at Border's or Primary Children's.

You can feel him there even in the parking garage. When I was searching for a place to park, I looked down one of the rows and there was a Polynesian man motioning to me that there was an empty stall right across from him. Trust a Polynesian to look out for a haole girl like me. I gave him the shaka and did the hula for him, then he did the slap dance and gave me a peace out.

It's cute registering as an outpatient at Primary Children's because there is this little knitting lady who sits behind the desk.  She lives in her own little knitting world, but if you just stand behind the desk and smile at her and giggle a little bit she will eventually see you and realize she's at work and not back at the workshop with Santa and the elves.  

(I've been to knitters anonymous myself so I have a lot of compassion for knitting addicts.)

After we registered we went up to the pediatric hematology/oncology unit to wait and wait and wait our turn.  We read Dogsong by Gary Paulsen and made a dog paper bag puppet and talked about how much my son was going to die if he didn't get a dog soon.  

And then suddenly it was our turn.  The nurse practitioner burst into the room and said "ARE YOU READY TO HAVE SOME FUN?" 

We just blinked and shrugged. 

"BECAUSE WE ARE SERIOUS ABOUT FUN IN UTAH!"  she said as she stuck an otoscope in his ear.

I asked her if she needed a sidekick and she said, "NO, I don't.  This is MY act," so I only said ba dum bum under my breath. 

The physical therapist was next.  She won some hoity toity national awards last year so listened carefully to everything she said.  She recommended an orthopod for my son's limb length discrepancy, which she said was most likely caused by the bleed on the left side of his brain when he was born 12 weeks early.  She said he may need to get his long leg stapled so his short leg can catch up.  

"Couldn't we just paper clip it?" I said.  "Or tape it?  Stapling just sounds so invasive." 

She just stared at me like she was doing a crossword puzzle. 

"Or could we glue it?" I said. "I just bought a whole bunch of glue sticks at Costco."

Okay, she may have won some hoity toity awards from "the man," but she sure isn't very creative. 

That's all I'm sayin. 

After it was over my son and I walked down the long hall of children's artwork and said "OMGOSH!  This one was made by a six year old!"  Then we ate cheeseburgers and fries in the Rainbow Cafe on the first floor and drank little bottles of Coke.  (I hate Coke, but I lub little bottles.)  

Then we talked about cancer and gave air hugs and kisses to all the little kids with baseball caps and face masks that made us wish it wasn't such a wonderful, yet terrible-horrible-no-good-very-bad life all at the same time.  

I'm going to go bake a pie now.

My Whole Nother Story

I almost died last night.

At the hand of a single gourmet candy corn. 

I chewed and inhaled simultaneously and WHAM BAM!  Talk about a death wish!  I haven't choked and gagged and coughed like that since I stuck my head under the sink after spraying for cockroaches.

It was intense.  Especially after my hub started making DEMANDS on me. 

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING!? WHAT IT WRONG WITH YOU!?" He demanded and demanded and demanded until I couldn't even concentrate on choking to death anymore. 

"I'M DYING!  What does it look like I'm doing?"  I wanted to scream, but I couldn't catch my breath so instead I just turned around and slapped him silly. 

Somebody had to be calm and rational!

When you're gagging to death on a gourmet candy corn you'd think your life would pass before you, right?  

Wrong!  It doesn't.  Your head just fills up with questions.  It's like suddenly all the absurdities of life come sharply into focus.  

I started thinking about things like the mysterious package my thirteen-year-old received in the mail from The Penguin Group with nothing inside but a book called SLOB.  

Why would a group of penguins send MY son such a insinuating book? Penguins aren't that tidy either, from what I hear! 

I'm just sayin'. 

Other questions were running through my head too, like why does my hub always wash the dishes with ice cold water, for GAD'S SAKE!?  And why don't birds suddenly appear every time he is near?

And why couldn't I find April in St. George so I could give her a homemade apple pie?  

Okay, I didn't really think about April at all while I was gagging to death, but it's a nice segway into my whole nother story that I didn't get to yesterday. 

I really did go to St. George for the weekend with my hub, my kids and my IL's.  

And I really did find fresh, dirty, sweet vegetables on the side of the road in cute little baskets.

And I really did make a pot of vegetable soup because my IL's LUB LUB LUB soup.

They also LUB LUB LUB apple pie so I really did bake and bake and bake all the way through conference.  

I didn't realize conference was so long but after they said the closing prayer I had baked three apple pies.  

We ate one, and I really did intend to give the other two to Shelle and April after I finished swimming and playing tennis and going to the movies and reading Flannery O'Conner and watching Cash Cab and curling up in a ball on the couch and dozing off. 

By the time I loaded the two pies into the car and drove to the ACE Hardware parking lot to borrow some free Wi-Fi and google map Shelle's house it was kinda late in the evening. I won't tell you exactly where Shelle lives, but I will tell you she lives close to the full moon.  In fact, if you turn left at the full moon, and then right again, and then left, then right, then left, it's just across the street.  

My visit wasn't without incident.  I had to roam around the neighborhood a bit trying to pinpoint the exact location of Shelle's place of residency and I happened to knock on a wrong door or two in the process.  Shelle has very nice neighbors, btw.  As it turns out her house is the pitch black one with no house number among all the other pitch black houses on the street.  

Just as I was about to tap on the front door I noticed a figure in black with a flashlight peering into Shelle's window.  I threw up a quick prayer of gratitude into the universe for putting ME, of all dummies, in a position to protect Shelle from harm or accident, and for giving me five brothers to prepare me for what I was about to do.  

Once I had the intruder body slammed to the ground with his legs securely bent behind him and his feet neatly tucked into his shirt, I shined the flashlight into his face for proper identification purposes.  

"You look familiar," I said.  

Then it hit me.  

It was Mountain Sport Man.

Mountain Sport Man is Shelle's hub who likes to play pranks on Shelle, or "mess" with her, as he put it to me while I was apologizing profusely for accidentally pulling a Nacho Libre on him.

Mountain Sport Man is exactly as Shelle describes him to be. Exactly! Except his name isn't really Mountain Sport Man, if you can believe it!  And her son's name isn't really D-Car and her daughter's name isn't really Peeps. She totally lied about all that.  But I forgave her and we talked and talked and talked until I had to call April and tell her I would have to drop the pie off at her place of occupation the next day on my way out of town.  

HOWEVER, the next day I got a really strong prompting that I should eat that pie myself. I ignored it, but every time I looked at that pie I got the exact same prompting.  Sooooo, I decided to listen to that still small voice and make a batch of chocolate chip cookies for April instead.

HOWEVER, after I made the cookies, every single person in my family got a really strong prompting that they should eat those cookies instead of giving them to April, which left me no other alternative but to fall back on my original plan to give April the pie.

LONG STORY SHORT:  I really did intend to give April that pie. I even sacrificed lunch at In-and-Out Burgers so I could drive around and around and around trying to find April's place of occupation.  But it's a lot harder to find things in the daytime when there is no full moon to guide you.

And it's even harder when your hub calls from In-and-Out Burgers and says, "WHAT? YOU HAVEN'T FOUND IT YET?" And your kids say, "COME PICK US UP!  We're done eating and anyway, it's only a blog friend." 

And so I drove home with my tail between my legs and my pie between the seats as just another good intention paving my road to helk.  

The End 

(P.S. For the record, I didn't even eat the pie.  I gave it to my gigi.)

Enuff Said

Oh my goodness! Oh my goodness! I've been on vacation!

In St. George!

Where it's warm and toasty!

Not that I needed to get away from the below freezing weather here in happy valley--ya'll know me and the cold are like Ben and Jerry--but I really needed to get away from my hub calling me everyday from work to remind me of what I should be taking care of and getting done and making happen.

Being a stay-at-home-mom-slash-writer is not as glamorous as I thought it would be. It's just a fancy way of saying I'm a stay-at-home-secretary, who's having an affair with my boss, while raising his children, and staying up all night to slash-write.

SIGH!

SOOO much to say, SOOO little time to say it. (Not to mention energy).

I had lots of time and energy to say it in St. George, but HELLO! there is no wi-fi in St. George (except at the pawn shop on Dixie Drive and the ACE Hardware parking lot on Bluff Street--but only in the passenger seat) so instead I had to settle for baking apple pies and chocolate chip cookies and making homemade vegetable soup with fresh-outta-the-ground, sweet, dirty vegetables I found on the side of the road in cute little baskets.

I also had to settle for swimming and tennis and the movies and curling up in a little ball on the couch dozing off with visions of apple cinnamon and almond extract and pace makers dancing in my head.

Why pace makers?

I was on vacation with my in-laws, silly, and that's what they talk about. Don't get me wrong, that's not ALL they talk about. They also talk about strokes and heart attacks and colon cancer and rest homes. And yes, those visions were also dancing in my head as I dozed off in a ball on the couch. (This is my world now, peeps!)

It's amazing the epiphanies you can have while you are dozing off in a ball on the couch. I had a sudden realization that my MIL was a yak in her last life because boy can she yakkedy yak your ear drums right out of your head.

If I had one wish for all of you it would be that you could all walk a mile in my slippahs and wake up one morning with my MIL in the bedroom next to you. It's an experience you'll never forget, especially if you wake up slowly and softly like me. She springs to life immediately at top speed and volume. The energizer bunny's got nothing on her.

As soon as you crack open your bedroom door in the morning she will crack open her bedroom door and charge you at full throttle.

GOOD MORNING! GOOD MORNING! GOOD MORNING! she will scream in your face.

I always thought she had an uncanny sixth sense, but yesterday I caught her red handed peeking out from behind her bedroom door with her ears perked just waiting to pretend she and I were exiting our rooms at exactly the same instant.

"Can I help you with something?" she quickly said, with that deer-in-the-headlights look on her face.

Sneaky little energizer bunny!

If you sleep too long she gets tired of perching behind her bedroom door so she will put on her x-ray vision goggles and stand in the hallway. As soon as you sit up she will burst into your room and shout ALOOOOOHHHHAAA! then chuckle like she just said the cutest darn thing in the history of the world.

That's usually when I pull the sheet up to my neck and say, "I'm NOT dressed yet" in my outdoor voice.

That doesn't stop her though. She still carries herself across the thresh hold and begins singing "Good Morning to you . . . good Morning to you . . . we're all in our places, with bright shiny faces . . . " until I put her, and her bright shiny face, in her place with the backside of my pillow.

If you happen to be sleeping on a hide-a-bed in the living room she will revert to her former days as a yak until you pull the covers over your head, at which point she will play peek-a-poo with you and giggle like a clever little school girl.

It's all very adorable and precocious in a Dennis the Menace meets Pippi Longstocking sort of way. Which basically sums up my weekend nicely, actually. (Except add a titch of Walter Mathau in Grumpy Old Men while my boys were fighting in the shower.)

Hey, I got to see Shelle Belle though (and meet her cute family) and I was this close to meeting April.

But that's a whole nother story for a whole nother day (cuz my hub just called).

Enuff said.

It's the Climb

I promised myself I wouldn't post again until I read every blog on my sidebar and cleaned all three of my bathrooms. 

It took me three stinkin' hours.  And that was just to read my sidebar.  I didn't climb into bed until 1 a.m.   

What I discovered by reading my sidebar is that FIRST: Everyone is going to helk in a hand basket since I've been away!  Wolfgang is Disco dancing, Shelle Belle is hallucinating and Val of the South is bottling, for cryin' out loud!  

SECOND:  I have missed A LOT!  Swirl has found her grail, Kute Kasey made the softball team, and KRITTA IS FINALLY PREGNANT!   Wahooo! 

THIRD: There are way too many troubling things happening--the P and the L words are killing me.  (pain and loss)  I feel like baking when I read about all my dear blog friends struggling with the P and the L words!  I wish I could send you all an apple pie, dear blog friends. 

(((AIR HUGS!)))

I, myself have been busy confronting my relationship issues. With my stuff. 

Can't live with it!  Can't live without it! 

That's what she said. 

I missed my stuff so much while we were apart, but now it's just getting on my nerves.  It's always RIGHT THERE trying to confront me.  Soooo confrontational--yet in a passive/aggressive way.  But when I tell it to BACK OFF because I need some ME time, it just gets more passive/aggressive.  

Relationships are so exhausting! Especially if you're an enabler like me.  I allow my stuff to control me, particularly the socks, shoes, coats, hats, gloves, blankets, beanies and backpacks. They walk all over me--treat me like a darn slave.

Sorry, I didn't mean for this to turn into group therapy.  

On a lighter note. I searched my computer files for photos of Gigi when she was young and electric, but I got nothin'.  

No worries.  I will lay my hands on some photographic evidence soon, but in the mean time I did find some other fun photos. 

This is my dad.  It's his birthday today.  

He would have been 66 years old today.  How crazy-weird is that?  Espeically when you think he didn't make it past 36 years old.   

He was just a baby.  I've outlived him by 6 years and I'm the biggest baby alive.  

A few weeks ago I was driving home from my daughter's soccer game against Jordan High. Miley Cyrus was on the radio singing It's the Climb--fo' real--and I was thinking about how sad it is that the Jordan High mascot is a beet digger.  BEET DIGGERS!! Who thought of that? Were all the Falcons and Eagles and Bobcats already taken or something?  but then I started smiling to myself because those beet diggers really have made the best of their lame sauce mascot by making t-shirts that say JUST BEET IT!  

Just then I looked at the mountains and they looked so incredibly . . .  incredible.  I don't remember the mountains in Utah being so bee-U-tiful when I was a kid.  They've aged well, I'll give 'em that. 

So there I was standing all amazed at the amazingness of it all and smiling about the JUST BEET IT shirts and listening to Miley Cyrus telling me about the struggles she's facing and the chances she's taking and suddenly, for a split second, I felt.  I actually felt.  

Which is so to say I had a feeling.  

Do you understand what this means?  There is a crack somewhere in my stone cold heart.  And a feeling got through.  A feeling of compassion.  And love.  And understanding.  And closeness.  

It slipped out as quickly as it slipped in so don't get the wrong idea, but for a moment I felt an air hug from my old man.  And I blew a little kiss back and thought what a bummer it is that he missed out on sooooo much life.  But it wasn't a painful thought, it was just a thought.  And a feeling.  

Thanks Miley.

This is my mom and dad when they were young and in lub.  

This is my favorite shot.  Isn't my mom adorable?  I like to picture her as a happy hippie. 

Speaking of happy . . . on a serious note, I am happy to report that I am happy.  In Utah.  Can you believe it?  

I don't live in Provo, but I do visit Provo often and I am relieved that I no longer feel any pain/sorrow/angst when driving through the old hood. 

What better birthday present to give my dad than that?  I drove my kids past my childhood home last week.

I wanted to give it a big hug.

I wanted to give the whole neighborhood a hug. I was one of those annoying old ladies who thinks the youth of today are interested in the youth of yesterday. I was like "Oooh, oooh, that's where the cookie lady lived. And oooh, that's where Brian Bastian lived--I used to roller skate past his house every day and blow kisses. And oooooh ooooh, that's where I was when I found out that Elvis had died."

My kids were like "YOU WERE ALIVE WHEN ELVIS DIED?"

Then I drove my kids the five blocks to my dad's place.  He lived here in the upstairs apartment after he and my mom separated.

He also died here in this upstairs apartment. 

I wrote a story about it once.  You can read it here.  

But that was a lifetime ago.  Now we are both free of all those gobbley gook emotions that keep us chained to earth.  

LUB YOU DAD!  Happy Birthday.  

Can't wait to see you again.

P.S.  Don't forget to read this post for Kevin and JM on my serious site.