Size 12

You know, after all those months of hobbling around with one messed up foot and then another, and then spending all that time lying on the couch (both times) convalescing, I've gained a few pounds. Blah. I am appalled to know that the last time I weighed this much, I gave birth the next day. That child is now 27 years old, so I can't blame it on post-partum-ness. In fact, I lost all the baby weight and was svelt and slim with no effort until I hit about 41. Then, if I wanted to be slim and trim, I could still do it, but it involved gym memberships and bicycling and lots of work.

What is different now, after living the life of a cripple, is that I'm not merely overweight, but it is all flab and I also have NO stamina---zero, zilch, nada. I walk upstairs at my school to get my students every morning and I'm panting by the time I reach the door. I simply have no get up and go. I know that one loses conditioning much faster than it can be regained. I also realize that it is harder to be energetic and go-go-go when one is still walking very carefully. I really do think about my steps. It is too easy to limp or shuffle along and favor one foot or the other. But when I conciously think about walking heel, toe, put the foot down, lift it up, do it the right way, then, I have a more comfortable pace and I feel the benefit to my leg muscles, back and abs. But, I'm slower than I used to be. CoolGuy likes that. In the past, he'd often urge me to remember that I didn't need to use "teacher walk" when we were out together. He sometimes has to wait for me, lately.

But--in reference to the title of this post...I tried on some new jeans capris in the store tonight. Typically, I wear size 12 jeans. I'm apparently shaped differently than many woman. Size 14 droops off my hips and looks baggy in the derriere. But the waist fits. Size 12 fits like I prefer around the fanny and thighs, but I usually unfasten the button and just pull the zipper up tightly. This spring, however, I pulled out my jeans capris from the drawer--pants I've worn for several years. I got them pulled up over the hips and found that I can't even get the zipper edges to meet, let alone the button! There's no way I can close the zipper...Well, tonight, I tried on some "size 12" and they're very comfy. They're a stretchy model, but even the button closes. Hmmm...I like the way they fit and look---no droopy bagging anywhere. But, size 12?? Seriously?? Are clothing manufacturers fudging it a little bit lately? Actually, I don't care if they are. I like the pants; they fit; I'll take them. If I'm "size 12" ---well, then, I guess I'm size 12. Yeah...riiiigght

Jury Duty

Sorry it's been so long between posts. There are only four and a half days of school left, and that makes every day after school, busy and very valuable---plus people keep scheduling things and I end up getting home really late. Sooo...

We went to visit our grandson for his birthday over Memorial Day weekend, but had to get back to Las Vegas on Monday evening because, of course, it was school the next day. I had an extra little wrinkle, too, it turned out. I'd been issued a summons for jury duty in January that would have required me to appear the day before my scheduled foot surgery. I begged off, citing the pending surgery, but mostly because I didn't want to be out of school any more days than necessary at that point. I had things to do and things to get ready and, even though they'd have given me a pass, I would still have had to show up that day at the courthouse. So, my new jury date was Tuesday, May 29th, and---sure enough---when I called the phone number to see whose badge numbers were being called in, I was on that list.

I drove downtown to the parking garage they'd designated (in the Fremont Center experience) and parked. Then, I hiked the three (huge) blocks to the courthouse to see a line of people that went out the door, down the steps, around the corner and then half way down the next block. We had to go through an airport-like screening procedure. I don't blame them---two years ago, a disgruntled man came to the federal courthouse a couple of blocks south of the county court building. He had hidden a shotgun under his coat, and he just walked in without saying a word, and began shooting. It was crazy!! A security guard was killed, another was wounded, with the gunman himself being killed nearby, as he attempted to run away. So, there is no question that security procedures at Las Vegas courthouses are not academic.

But, I was dismayed to see that there would be a long wait to get inside the building. I hoped they wouldn't be too pesky about my being late for my designated arrival time. However, my little concerns about jury duty were eclipsed by the young woman standing in line behind me. She had a deadline, too--an appearance at 8:00 A.M. in a court--as the defendant. She complained to all around her about the length of the line. She smoked a cigarette. She complained some more. She smoked another cigarette. The line moved steadily, but it was such a long line, that we weren't going to get in that door before the top of the hour. As we were moving up the granite steps, edging ever closer to the door, she got on the phone to someone. It wasn't clear who. It could have been a lawyer. The woman pointed out that she WAS there! She was in line! It was a &%$## long line!! Did she miss her appearance?? OMG!!! How can she have a warrant already?? She was TRYING to be there!! She was stuck in this *&^%*$ line!! OMG!!

Just then, I saw another person with a jury summons in their hand walk through the glass door marked "Staff, Attorneys" so I went up the steps and entered there too. I still had to walk through all the metal detectors, removing my shoes, putting my watch and purse, etc. in the little bin to go through the X-ray machine. But, I didn't have to listen to the distressed rantings of the woman whose life had just gone from bad to worse.

As I stood in the line, I realized that I live a sheltered existence. In my line of work---school teaching--I am rarely in the presence of people who smoke. There are very few people with visible tattoos (except at the end of the day when I supervise the crosswalk and various family members come to pick up their children). And I rarely hear profanity. But, as you observe the variety of people entering the county courthouse, there were some patterns. People are either quite professionally dressed: business suits, with the women wearing heels and deliberately coifed hair, or the people are dressed very casually in commonly seen motifs (sagger pants, wife-beater shirts for guys, and skin tight jeggings, snug, cleavage revealing shirts for the ladies) with an abundance of visible tattoos,  and lots of nervous smoking. Lots. Oh, and conversations using words that will get you recess detention in fourth grade. There were a few scattered folks who were somewhere in between: not dressy, but not quite as casual---most of us clutched a jury summons.

I didn't get chosen for a jury. That's good, because I really didn't want to miss more days of school. I was hoping that I could plead that I really needed to be in my classroom, if I'd had to make a case for it, but, since I wasn't chosen, I just left at the end of the day and I don't have to worry about it for another eighteen months. I  would really like to serve as a juror sometime. I think it would be very interesting. CoolGuy served once in California, in a robbery case. Any other time I've been summoned for jury duty, I had preschool children, and that excused me from having to appear. Someday, I'll get called up again. I'll hope it doesn't happen during the last week of school and then I'll get a chance to stay there and immerse myself in a whole new world.

May 23rd

It's weird how a date can be so important to you. As I wrote this date on my classroom whiteboard yesterday before I left school, I took a moment to consider how it was like writing my own birthday. It is my sister's birthday. I've talked before about her and not always just because it's her day. She died seven years ago, this June. It was unexpected, and quite shocking to us. After all,  she was only 51.

But as her birthday comes around again, three months to the day after mine, I realize that her passing does not remove her from our family. She is as real to us as though it were still possible to pick up the phone and listen to her tell you a silly story about her cats, or hear about the latest knee surgery or, in a  self-deprecating way, tell about some awesome act of neighborly kindness she was involved in lately.

She grew a huge garden every year and gave away most of it. She baked constantly---again---giving away the results to friends in need. (And the need didn't have to be sickness--she knew who felt lonely and sad.) She was grandmother extrordinaire, too, and they didn't have to be her grandchildren. She'd drop in on my grandchildren because she could, and I couldn't. Too far away. If you were her relative in the MTC, you got treats. Her son sent people to visit/stay with her while he was in Korea, because he knew she would take them in and do what was needed--despite the inability to communicate in a common language.

She inherited most of the ills and physical ailments and difficult body structures that the entire gene-pool seemed to offer. But she also inherited all the goodness, hospitality, humor and joie de vivre that was available too. Happy Birthday, Trish!

Here we are in 2004, posing inside the milking side of the barn, where we spent half our lives as teenagers. In the summer, we'd bring out the radio and play rock and roll music till the radio station went off the air at sunset. In the winter, we'd practice our vocabulary words, or memorize scriptures for seminary. In 2004, her husband LaRon, and our other carpentry-skilled brother-in-law, Alan, shored up the frame and roof and we all joined in for a weekend to paint the barn. The next summer, she was gone, and the year after that, our mother left, too. The memories we made that day are way more than priceless. (And, no, we didn't coordinate the pink shirts in advance...isn't it just too cool?)

SummerTime....

...and the thermometer's rising. Fish don't jump here--it's cooler to stay underwater. But, you could easily grow cotton! I'm growing tomatoes and lettuce (which I must go cut tonight because it will definitely not survive the weekend if it's going to be over 100 degrees. I'm also growing basil and geraniums. As long as they get water, those two love hot temperatures. Anyway, I just thought I'd share what my truck instruments were telling me tonight as I drove home from the teacher's union meeting.

It was hot in there, too. As you know, we teachers are the worst people ever, here in Las Vegas, because we wouldn't give back the raises that we received last fall. Which we were entitled to according to our two year old contract. But, no, school districts don't really need teachers, after all. I mean, if they pay us, then how will they afford the salaries for all the people who work in the district office? After all, what is school for? Teaching children? Come on...(Okay, I'll stop now.)

Divine Foods...continued

Oatmeal. Yes, I mean the stuff you cook in a pot on the stove. I'm rather fussy about my oatmeal. There is only one way I like it. First, I boil the water. Then, I add the oatmeal. If you bring the oatmeal to boil with the water, it will be creamy and mushy. That is probably the main reason many people don't even like oatmeal. They've only eaten the creamy, mushy sort. Also, it is important to use Old-fashioned oatmeal--not "Quick-Cooking" or...bleah--instant. I know--I'm being a snob. This is a matter of personal taste, I recognize. However, as nice as it is that one can now buy oatmeal at various fast-food places, the product they serve you is not even close to the oatmeal I love.

Oatmeal is a heritage food. I have a great-grandmother named Agnes Stewart. Born and raised in Scotland, then emigrated to America. However, the version I eat is far removed from the oat porridge that she would have served or eaten. Apparently, oats were the staple of Scotland because the growing conditions there were too cold and damp to make wheat a successful crop. But, oats can grow in a harsh climate--I know--my dad grew them on our farm. Oats are like candy to horses. If you wanted them to come down from the pasture to you (rather than you chasing after them) walk out there with a couple of handfuls of oats in a bucket, and give it shake. They'll trot right over for the treat.

Here's a great quote: "Samuel Johnson referred, disparagingly, to this [that the Scots grew and ate oats in lieu of wheat] in his dictionary definition for oats: "A grain, which in England is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people." His biographer, James Boswell, noted that Lord Elibank was said by Sir Walter Scott to have retorted, "Yes, and where else will you see such horses and such men?"

Plus, oatmeal has been proven to reduce cholesterol, it is a fabulous source of fiber, it helps to lower blood pressure,and it is 100% natural--they grow it, they roll it, and you eat it. It is spectacularly inexpensive. And, truly, it is delicious. Also, you can cook a pot of it, eat some today, and refrigerate the rest for each of the other mornings this week. Simply microwave a small dish of it each day and you can have hot, delicious whole-grain cereal for breakfast every day. You'll be filled with nutrition and energy, frisky as a young colt for the entire morning.

About twice a month, CoolGuy and I will have a supper of oatmeal and toast and fruit. I'm tired, it's late and maybe, we had a big lunch. Then, breakfast for dinner is perfect. CoolGuy likes to add brown sugar and dried cranberries with the milk. I prefer white sugar and milk. But, it is one meal you can paunch yourself with and not feel a bit of regret. My children have introduced me to steel-cut oats. They take a bit longer to cook, but everyone gives them rave reviews. I'll have to try it soon.

My favorite breakfast grain is a versatile cook's helper, too. I add oatmeal to meatloaf as the binder. It is much chewier than breadcrumbs or chunks of bread, and almost tastes like the ground meat itself.  And is there anything better than oatmeal cookies? Unless it is oatmeal cookies with raisins? Or maybe No-Bake cookies made with oatmeal? I love to make and eat granola, too, which is basically raw oatmeal coated with delicious honey, oil and mixed with every nut or dried fruit you wish. Sigh....oatmeal. It's perfect in so many ways.

Thirty-Eight

Today is our wedding anniversary. We were married in 1974. We honeymooned in San Diego. Actually, CoolGuy was stationed in San Diego in the Navy, and we lived there. So after the celebration in Wyoming, we just went back home. But, hey! We did fun things, and lolled around, and ate food, and rode the motorcycle. So it was like a honeymoon. Just another bonus of living in a vacation mecca: you can do all the cool things, then go home and sleep in  your own bed.

Wow...if you want to feel old, then look at the wedding picture on your 38th anniversary...whew.

Six short years later, we'd expanded the family quite a bit, huh? Another wedding---this time, my sister's. (1980)

Four more years went by, we've been married for ten years.

This was at my father's funeral. (1984)

Seven more years...everyone is growing up--except the parents.

We're ageless.  (1991)

Five more years, living across the country....(1996)

We always have to take a photo here...(2004)

Here is it...almost 38 years. Everyone is grown

and yet we're still smiling and standing up

together. (2011)

There are so many more photos. Weddings, missions, grandchildren, beach visits. Moving from state to state, and one of them twice. Funerals and birthdays, graduations and surgeries--we've done lots of all four. We're shooting for fifty years---just to amaze ourselves. Who knew??

Helpful Hint

When wearing light colored pants to school, be very, very careful how you eat your lunch. Yesterday, I was dining on my usual: salad with a sliced hard-boiled egg, chopped turkey, diced avocado and---the piece de resistance: sliced beets dressed with rice vinegar and olive oil, which I pour over the rest of the salad as the dressing...

.....When, (I'm sure you've guessed by now) I dropped a piece of beet. Yes, into my lap. Yes, onto the tan pants I was wearing. AUUGGHH! And it bounced back and forth, so that both legs were quite splattered. AUUUUUGGHH!!!

I spent the rest of lunch scrubbing with baby wipes and water to get the stains to a pale pink from the original rich, deep red . Then, I tried drying the large wet spots, that went the length of my upper legs, by dabbing with a dry towel and fanning with a piece of cardstock, but finally had to go to the cafeteria to monitor lunching students.

So, the moral of the story is: don't take beets in your lunch when you're wearing light colored pants. Or, don't be careless when eating beets for lunch when wearing light colored pants. Or, wear a rain poncho over your light colored pants when eating beets for lunch. Or, something...

Mother's Legacy Fern

Isn't this a lovely fern? And isn't is awesome that I haven't killed it yet? Yes, it is. I have a bad pattern with ferns in the past. However, I have a strong incentive with this particular fern, because it is a piece of the fern that my mother had in her living room, all my life. I got a section of it from my sister after our mother died, and I almost messed it up, like I've done to countless other ferns in my care.

My sister sent me this photo more than 25 years ago. It is a shot of her children and some of my other nieces and nephews, posed in Grandma's living room. I was so busy admiring the babies I hadn't seen yet, and how big everyone had gotten that I overlooked the plant behind them. Besides, that fern was just a fixture in my mother's living room. I rarely gave it a thought. But a friend of mine, seeing the photo on my refrigerator, gasped, "Is that a fern??" and as I looked again, I realized that it dwarfed the children in the picture. It was enormous.

My mother's fern seemed to be low-maintenance. Mama would pour a quart jar of water in it once a week. She'd pick up the occasional fallen brown leaves that would litter the floor. Sometimes, she'd use scissors to snip off a frond that may have been broken by roughhousing, or the occasional errant thrown ball. But I don't recall any misting, or conversations with it, or even any plant food. None of the usual things that one reads that should be done to cause a fern to flourish. It just sat there in front of the west facing window, in the shadow of an enormous pine tree (so the direct sun could never fry it) and it grew and grew. I also remember her taking it outside every five or so years, and removing it from its pot (which, in my childhood, was an old white enamel dishpan) and breaking it all apart. It would become pot-bound, so she'd separate into sections, wrap the sections in newspaper and give them away to friends and relatives. Then, she put a nice chunk of it back into the old metal pot with fresh dirt and replace the greatly diminished plant back on its wooden stool, in front of the window. In a few months, it was filling out and great long swards of it were arching out to tickle little kid's faces once again.

It seemed indestructible, so I was optimistic that, for the first time in my life, I could keep a fern alive. It was looking good for the first few months. But, then it started to droop and turn mostly brown and only a few of the fronds looked like they were going to keep living. I did so want to be able to have this little piece of my mom flourish in my house. So, I took it outdoors, I dumped out whatever dirt was in the pot, I broke off all the dried out and rotten chunks. What I had left was just about three vigorous looking fronds, bravely still trying to grow. I filled my pot with good soil from my compost-amended garden, and re-potted those courageous little bits, and took it back inside to grow on a plant holder, in my west window, that is shaded by a large tree. Then I wrote myself a recurring note on my Outlook calendar so that I never failed to water it every single week.

It worked!! Here (and above) are photographic evidence that even I can grow a fern!!  It is fabulous! It just grows and grows, constantly shooting out new little fiddleheads that unfurl into large graceful fronds that overflow the edges of my pot and dance ever-so-slightly in the breeze from the ceiling fan. It has been several months since I rescued it by never missing a watering turn and just staying away from it except for that. It seems to be just as happy here in my house as it was in my mother's. Every time I look at it, I think of her. So, besides her hardworking hands and work ethic, I also have my mother's fern to remember her by.  Happy Mother's Day!

Desert Adventure

We had an incident last week at school that happened only because it's a desert out there. A student came to me, right after we got in the class room, and lifted up her thumb to show me, as she said, "I reached in my backpack and something poked me." Sure enough, I could see a little mark on her thumb indicating that, indeed, she'd been poked. I wondered what she could have in there that would jab her--an open pin, a compass with a sharp point? Weird. Then, she said, "I thought I saw something move in that pocket." Hmmm...a bug? Well, I told her that we should take her backpack out on the patio at lunch and clean it out. I decided to send her up to the nurse's office for some ice or calamine lotion or whatever. She complained a couple of times later that morning, I put some more calamine lotion on it and had her put a wet paper towel on it to cool down the little bit of redness I could see forming. We were having a crazy day, and I totally forgot the backpack.

The day was mixed up  because we were in the middle of our testing schedule. I had one group of students for the two and a half hours before lunch. We were deeply engaged in a writing activity on the laptop computers. Time flew by and they all went out to play. We ate lunch, we returned to the rooms, they all packed up their backpacks and she went off to math class, without me remembering that I was going to take it outside and dump everything out.

An hour later, we were moving our classes to their "specials" (PE, Art, Music) and I walked out into the hall to see my student, the math teacher and her back pack. The backpack was dumped across the corridor, everything scattered across the floor. At my questioning look, my colleague said, "There was a scorpion in there!!!" That got my attention.

My student had reached down to take something from the open upper pocket and saw the scorpion run across the zipper flap. She screamed, the poor math teacher screamed. A boy knocked it off the backpack, and another boy stomped it into the carpeting until it was just a smear. It was less than two inches long and about the same color as the backpack. But, still!!! A SCORPION!!! We were all quite non-plussed.

I took her up to the nurse to show her the red, swollen thumb. It wasn't that obvious, but now that I knew what had stung her, I realized that for four hours, she'd been telling me her thumb still hurt, and as I examined it more, I could see that it was a little swollen and there was quite a bit of redness. I felt terrible. First, I felt bad that I hadn't checked the backpack immediately. Then, I felt better knowing that at least I'd given her anti-itch cream and a cool, wet towel whenever she asked. I insisted that the nurse call her mother and explain, and give mom the option to take our girl to an Quickcare Clinic after school if she felt it necessary. My student was looking a little worried, but I assured her she would be fine. If she was going to die from that scorpion bite, she'd have been feeling really bad just a short time after the sting, and we would have already called the paramedics, and they would have already saved her. She looked more relieved when I explained it like that.

The next morning, she had a brand new backpack! Her mom threw the old one away, and from now on, the backpack would always hang on a hook and never rest on the floor at their house. She felt that the scorpion may have crawled in at their home, because at school, it was hanging on a chair usually. I hope it was from their house! We already deal with the occasional cockroach and bumble bee; I really don't want scorpions, too. Scorpions!! Good grief!!

The Chickens in the Pool Shed

I got run over by a whole flock of chickens tonight. I'd gone outside to transplant some new geraniums I'd just bought, into my empty pots. I looked over at the pool and realized I ought to put some chlorine tablets in the filters, but didn't find any in the pool shed. However, I did remember that I needed to look in the drawers of a file cabinet out there to see if I could find my oldest son's Boy Scout merit badge sash.

 (Are you seeing the chickens...?) (Okay, I'll explain: my friend, the special ed teacher, sometimes wears a T-shirt that says, "I don't have ADD---Oh Loook!! There's a Chicken....) Well, I didn't find the merit badge sash. I didn't get any chlorine tablets into the pool filter baskets. I didn't even get the geraniums re-potted. Instead, I found a big folder stuffed with type-written pages. The only person who would have typed papers that ended up in that file cabinet was moi. And I found a totally awesome package of old treasures out there.

In the Olden Days, when we didn't own a T.V. and after I put the kids to bed, I'd either sit down to the sewing machine, or the typewriter. I typed a lot of stuff. Not just stories for my sisters, or memoirs for my parents, but I found articles about child-rearing, what I learned (and should have learned) in Young Women, silly stories about my life (some were published in local newspapers), a couple of stories that The Friend didn't want, and three more biker stories that were, sadly, rejected by Easyrider magazine. (I say sadly because they paid me, whereas the local newspapers just printed my stories with the only reward being fleeting glory among my acquaintances.) I also found a really sincere rejection letter from Redbook Magazine, telling me how very much everyone there liked my article, and how it went from editor to editor, but was ultimately not selected, but that I should definitely submit it to another publication because, girl, it was good!! (or words to that effect---for a rejection letter, it was remarkably personal and complimentary.)

I also found notebooks filled, in my formerly exquisite handwriting, with song lyrics and poetry--mostly laments over disappointments of love. I even wrote some of the poems myself. In fact, I still really like a couple of them. Here's one: (I think it's about sarcasm.)

Take Care

Why quarreling?

Why purposely hurt?

Cruel arrows

Flung in fun

Sting

With a slow-but-sure poison.

Love is too close to hate

And our tables are

Too easily turned.

Remember the poem that was printed in the New Era? Here's another poem I wrote on the same topic. I don't know when....it's not dated.

Autumn in Star Valley

Indian summer comes to her
As a long gone lover home at last.
Her bright blush of maple fire
Cooled only by November's blast.

Scarlet and gold, she dresses now
To dance through star bright nights.
Mystical geese making music
That drifts down with the breeze from their heights.

So, anyway...chickens--really interesting, wow, I forgot I even wrote that, chickens.  Maybe I can still go plant the flowers by the porch light.

A Whale Tale

Today is our daughter's birthday!! Happy Birthday to FoxyJ!! She is spending the day with her sister and they are at the beach. It is the chilly, damp Oregon beach, where one doesn't frolic in the surf, but walks along in the mist and admires the shells and the scent and ... c'mon---it's the ocean--how can it be bad?

Actually, she was inspired to go there from an article in Sunset Magazine, a family favorite periodical. The March issue had an story about great places in the west for a weekend getaway, and Depoe Bay was featured.  It's a whale watching destination and I can't think of a better place for her to get away to for a pleasant, brief vacation. And, I really, really hope she can finally see some migrating whales.

We've tried a few times to do that, over the years. We had some wonderful experiences in our attempts, but we didn't get to see a single whale... I don't know how we managed to do that, either. We lived for a total of twenty years right on the coast that is the main migration route for the California gray whale population as they leave Scammons Lagoon each year and head north for their summer homes off the coast of Alaska. We'd go to various viewing locations and watch and watch, but, although we saw a couple of spouts out there, we never saw a whale. One year, we actually took a whale watching boat trip in the Santa Barbara Channel---a location that should have a crossing guard for the baby whales, and yet....that day...no whales. Sigh.

So here's wishing her a happy, happy birthday---filled with spouts and flukes and baleen and barnacles. And lots  and lots of spyhopping!

We were on top of Point Loma in San Diego in a prime whale watching location, but saw only a couple of far-off spouts. However, you can lie down on the painted outline of a gray whale to get an idea of their size. (1983-ish)

This is at the base of Point Loma, in the tide pools and, while you can't really see whales from here, you sure can see a lot of other things that live in the ocean.  (1985)

You can find bones, or coral or rocks or something wonderful....

This is along the coast just south of Monterrey Bay. We'd spent a weekend at the aquarium there, where there are life-sized replicas of whales hanging from the ceiling. Again...none in the wild. (1990)

Now here's a dear old friend of the birthday girl!  Shamu! Her first love...and Dad worked hard at the arcade and won her the giant stuffed Shamu to take home and love forever.   (1991)

Here she is on the bow of the whale watching boat in the Santa Barbara Channel. We went out during Christmas vacation and anticipation was high to, finally, see some migrating whales. We were smack in the middle of the largest marine preserve on the west coast. She stood out there and was rimed with salt and soaked with spray. She reminded me of the way a farm dog leans out over the side of the pick-up truck as he rides down through the fields. Pure joy... (1993)

So, this week as these same two sisters, now grown women, spend some time together on the coast, I hope that they finally get to see some whales. But even if they don't, they'll have a super time anyway, I bet, enjoying one another and the sea.

What's Wrong With This Picture?

NOT A THING!

And do you know why?? Look at the feet...yes, two (count them!)

TWO shoes are being worn. So exciting!

I went to the doctor this afternoon and his verdict is that my surgery was quite successful, the PT has done its job---ergo:  I no longer need to wear the StormTrooper boot every day. However, he suggested I "toss it in the trunk, in case, at the end of a long day, and [I] need to stomp around a grocery store" then, I might want to have it available to relieve my fatigue and any aching.

So tomorrow I'll wear my hiking boots to school because they are my most supportive shoes. And, most of my other shoes don't fit yet anyway--swelling. The swelling will be relieved by two things: walking around without the cast, and compression stockings. Even as the cast protects my foot by keeping it immobile, it also prevents good blood circulation by keeping it immobile. So, the act of walking without the cast will help relieve the swelling, and wearing the compression stockings will also help counteract gravity a little.

Bet you can't even tell which one was the most recent surgery candidate, huh? Bet you're thinking, "Egads, both of those feet look like giant, inflated balloons."  Hmmm, yes they do.  By the end of the day, gravity is just not my friend. So, I'll go now and prop them both up, eat dinner while watching the latest new cop show we've saved on TIVO, and give them a nice rest until tomorrow. (BTW: it's my left foot that was most recently the Recovering Appendage.)



The Mountain of the Lord

I went up to the temple today, and I had such a pleasant time, that I wanted to write about it. First, the parking lot was crammed! There were cars lining the curb all along the temple grounds. I did find a convenient spot, under a shady tree, but why would I consider the many cars a good thing? It always makes me happy to see lots of people at the temple because then I know that the people who've donated their whole day to serving there will be busy. They've given up a Saturday to help others, and I like that there is something constructive to do. Especially today when the weather here is fabulous and the sky is clear and there is just the right amount of breeze. I'm happy that so many others are spending their time in the service of the Lord so that the temple workers will know that their job was worth it.

I also love that everyone is cheerful there. There are plenty of places I go each week where attitudes are not the best. But it is a rare thing to encounter anyone in the temple who is not pleasant, kind and warm. (Note that I said rare...not that I haven't met a cranky soul there. But it is unusual.) People are so funny when you come stumping through the door with a cast on your foot. Old ladies hurry to hold the door for me, when I ought to be holding it for them. Everyone I encounter smiles and several of them say something like "So great of you to come today--wow!" and the point to the foot. Seriously, I've spent so many weeks unable to go because of the non-weight-bearing rule, that it seems like nothing to show up in the boot. After all, I can actually walk! And drive! And the boot is mostly white, so it doesn't stand out too badly.

My interesting day stepped up the pace. As I looked at the name I had received, I saw that it was, in fact, four names long. This sister had been born in Algiers in 1863. Her name was obviously French, and her birthdate was just over thirty years after the area had been conquered by them and become a colonial outpost of France. I've never done temple work for a person whose birthplace was on the African continent and I felt a bit of excitement for this opportunity.

I took a seat in the chapel to wait and realized that there was a serious stir in the room. As each new person would enter, people already seated would crane their heads around. Smiles would break out--discreet greetings would be given. When someone would slide into the bench, someone nearby would reach around for a hug. A lady came back to whisper to a couple sitting in front of me, "We've made room, come up here and sit by your mother." Then, an older woman came through the door, wearing a name tag that indicated that this was her first experience in this part of the temple and most of the people seated in there broke into smiles that were practically audible. They were all so pleased to see her, and to be there to support her and participate in this fine, fine occasion. I watched them all through our session, and saw them later clustered together in the celestial room, wiping tears, exchanging hugs. I don't know a thing about their life stories, but it was obviously a very special day, and their joy made my day even better.

As I left the building, the courtyard was filled with children, teens, and adults all dressed very nicely, with a bright turquoise accent on every outfit, somewhere. A cluster of tiny girls wore identical fluffy dresses of the coordinating color, and it was clear that very soon, a freshly married bride and groom would exit proudly from the side door to join their admirers on the shaded patio built for that purpose. Along the sidewalks were little groups of teens wearing matching t-shirts that proclaimed the theme for their stake's Youth Conference. They were walking the temple grounds and enjoying the fantastic weather as one part of their conference experience. It was like being at the mall: cars pulling up and dropping off passengers. Other people climbing into vans to leave the temple for some other great part of their day. Hugs and kisses, greetings and farewells.

I walked over to my truck and sat inside for a few minutes and watched the hummingbirds flit around the flowered bushes in the parking lot. I saw one bird fly up into the tree that kept me in the shade, and realized there was a minuscule nest on the branch up there. If I hadn't seen the movement, I'd have never been able to identify that tiny bump on the branch as a nest. The eggs are smaller than jellybeans, the nest is about as big as a walnut shell. I finally started up the engine and backed out of my space, leaving behind the busiest place in the neighborhood. But I got to keep the joy, wonder and spirit that filled me for having spent a few hours in the Las Vegas temple.

National Poetry Month

I didn't know we were to celebrate poetry, until I read this blog about it at the beginning of the month. I've been enjoying reading her submissions. Go and read them all.

So, today, I decided I'd post a favorite poem of mine. I first read it in high school. I think I was 14 or 15. At that time, I'd experienced a couple of great, and unrequited, passions. I may have kissed one boy up to that point. I'm pretty sure I didn't understand all the ramifications of this piece then. But I've come to understand it now. And I love the poem even more.

Love is Not All

Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink,

Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;

Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink

And rise and sink and rise and sink again;

Love cannot fill the thickened lung with breath,

Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;

Yet many a man is making friends with death

Even as I speak, for lack of love alone.

It well may be that in a difficult hour,

Pinned down by pain and moaning for release,

Or nagged by want past resolution's power,

I might be driven to sell your love for peace,

Or trade the memory of this night for food.

It well may be. I do not think I would.

Edna St. Vincent Millay

Anniversary

It's been five months this week since I first started wearing the ortho-boot. This time. Sigh... We were headed up to visit our grandchildren at Thanksgiving, and I knew we planned to go to some fun places that would require quite a bit of walking. So I traded the Velcro brace I'd been using to prop up my collapsed foot for the boot, and it's been on there ever since.

CoolGuy had to cut a piece of dense packing foam to put alongside my foot and ankle to prop my foot up straight. When I first put the boot on and tried walking in it, I realized immediately that 1) it really helped relieve the pain, and 2) my bones were crunching against the hard plastic side uncomfortably.  At the time, I was using my old, nearly broken down boot. This model has inflatable bladders that can hold your ankle and leg straight, but those had broken the year before and no longer functioned. When we got home from the visit and I realized how much more support I got with the cast, I ordered a new one on-line and began wearing it when it arrived. The new cast kept me going so I could attend my son's Navy boot camp graduation ceremony and postpone the surgery by 10 days.

Anyway, the exciting thing is: in seven more days...I'm headed to the doctor to have him evaluate the progress in healing and strengthening. I've been going to physical therapy for five weeks now, and I can tell a big difference in my foot. The plan (hope) is that at the end of this appointment, I'll be walking out of the office in two shoes, carrying the ortho-boot in my hand. I'm soooooo looking forward to it. So.

Inaugural Swim of the Season

Announcing: today I went swimming. It was the Official First Day of Swim Season, 2012. Thank you, thank you. The temperature reached 98 degrees on my patio this afternoon. Previous to this record high for the year, I'd been sitting poolside, reading the paper, getting a little sun on my pasty white, flabby, pathetic, scarred feet and legs. It was awfully close to that 98, I realized as the sweat dripped off my face onto the comics. So, I realized that the only solution was to get in the pool for a bit.

I knew it would be fine, because according to the pool thermometer on the heater unit, the water temperature has been steadily climbing from the uninviting 39 degrees it had dipped to sometime in December. Yesterday, I saw that it had reached 73. I've been swimming in the ocean in the summer in water cooler than that.

I stepped down the stairs and pushed off into the center of the pool, and after my initial little gasp, it was GREAT!! I swam back and forth, got out, dried off, laid on the chaise lounge for a bit and got back in when I felt the sweat sliding off my brow again.

So, the summer has officially begun. Or at least the swimming part of it. In one week I visit the foot doctor again. The goal is removal of the boot to be replaced by an actual shoe. (Two shoes, at once!! Imagine that!!) So, life is good.

It's Vegas, Baby

I got home from physical therapy early this evening, and CoolGuy was lying on the couch, napping after his dentist visit. He was watching a food show on television, and called me to the living room to look at a sandwich being served. I love this show. It always makes me need to get in the car and take a road trip to the place being featured and order that fabulous, yummy feast being served to the drooling host.

Then, the next episode featured the most succulent lobster roll we'd seen. We sat there watching these deliciously filled plates leaving a food truck in Minneapolis, and realized how hungry we were. I got up and looked in the freezer, to see if there was something quick and delicious to heat up in the microwave. I mean, I was really hungry, but I was also quite fatigued. "Quick" was the operative word here.

Then, CoolGuy looked across the living room and stated, "Well, we could drive down to Planet Hollywood and eat at Lobster ME."  What? A place, a few miles away, where we could show up and gobble down some lobster? And we live in the desert? Not on the Atlantic coast? Or anywhere near the Atlantic Coast?

That is right. And it was delicious!! We were sated. And then we sat there and laughed about our crazy city. I mean, one could have a food craving, and, without a doubt, that craving could be indulged somewhere along that 3.5 miles of pavement called "The Strip" or somewhere in this bizarre city. It is something I've come to love. We rarely go to Glitter Gulch, but we've learned to enjoy it, now and then. I've talked before about how much I really loathed Las Vegas during all those trips over the twenty years we lived in Southern Cali and drove through here on the annual visit to the Grandmas in Wyoming each summer. But, living here is different.

I would have never have chosen a trip to Las Vegas, for a fun time, up to this point in my life. But, now that I can go down there for a few hours, enjoy a show, or eat at a nice restaurant, or even just watch the Dancing Waters show at Bellagio, and then go home where life is normal again, I'm liking some Las Vegas-y things. It reminds me of the time I realized that people go on vacation to the beach. They rent a condo, and they spend a week. They want restaurants, arcades, bars, a near-by amusement park and other amenities. And various seaside locations advertise all their wonderful thrills to entice people to come and stay. It was only odd to me because the beach was a place where we'd go after lunch and spend a few hours, then go home, shower, eat dinner and go to bed. It wasn't a vacation destination because we lived in a beach town. We could go anytime we wanted.

And, we wanted to all the time. I rode my bike to the beach early every morning, on a neighborhood trail, for years and years. I'd just stand there and admire the surf and listen to the seagulls, then go home to start up the family daily routine. Sometimes, CoolGuy accompanied me and we'd even jump in the ocean for a brief, painfully cold swim. But, I didn't realize until I'd moved far from the beach, that living in a beach town gives you a different relationship with the whole scene than the vacationer. And living in Las Vegas has given me a different relationship with the many entertainment options here.

I'd still never, ever go to a club here to dance. (Well, that's not that weird...I have terrible feet.) But I also wouldn't go even if I had decent feet. I've just never been a club dancing sort of person. But, I no longer loathe the whole Vegas scene, as I previously did. Now, I read about a new restaurant, or I hear about a show, so I hunt around and get myself a "local's discount" and we go on a date.  That's what tonight was all about. CoolGuy asked me out on an impromptu date, and I felt my exhaustion fade away in the excitement of something fun popping up out of nowhere, and so we jumped in the truck and drove down to join the hoards of people who'd planned for months to come here and HAVE FUN, OR ELSE. It's a lot nicer for me to get my fun in smaller doses.

PS:  Just a comment:  When I see the billboard that features a bemused looking man with his shirt partly open, a large bottle of champagne in one hand, and his other hand clasping the long, naked leg of a partially clad woman, with the name of the establishment characterized as a "Gentleman's Club"....I don't think that the fellows who will be influenced by that photo to go to said club would actually be gentlemen. Know what I mean?

Seriously? A Week? That Long?

There have been many things occurring in the week since I last posted and I can't believe that this much time went by without me writing anything down! Now, there's too much! But I'll post some of it here.

Today, again, I LOVE my school. I mean the one where I work. We held the big Pep Rally for our CRT testing which will begin next week. That is the state test that ranks us as a good school...or not. This is the highest-stakes high-stakes testing we endure each year. It's a grind and we work so hard all year to teach our students and we despair when the test comes along and they struggle. But not all of them struggle! We have some very competent students, too. But, the pep rally...

Each year we have a theme and this year it was The Olympics. We've been singing a song called "Push It to the Limit" all year, and we had a very fine rally, indeed. Each of the lower grades adopts an upper grade to support. Our class had to come up with a name of a country for our class, a motto and our flag colors. While I was out with the Franken Foot 2.0, this information needed to be decided. Here's what my students voted for, while I away:

FROMERICA

Capital city: Brokenfootopolis

Motto:  "Break a Leg!"

When my sub came by the house to tell me the results, I laughed very much. What a sense of humor! And they're nine years old! I love them!  Here's our flag:

Each student's name is written on the cast (get it: people sign your cast??) (Took me a minute...) Now is this hilarious or what? It is a giant flag that is probably four by four feet. We love it, and we're all fired up for the Big Test. Too bad the state doesn't get us the results till school is out. But, we have a very stable population and most of our students will back next fall and we can pat them on the back and give them congratulations for the job they're going to do.  





Spring Delights

On our journey to Wyoming this week, I reveled in the evidence of Spring all around us. At the lower altitudes, daffodils and tulips were nearing the end of their glory, but the fruit trees were in full  display. In people's yards the weeping willows and other trees all shone with that particular shade of luminous pale green that lasts for such a short time each year. As we climbed into higher elevations, the only color was the bright orange on the new growth of the wild willows that mark the winding path of the streams and outline the edges of the marshland.

But we knew it was Spring because the range land was speckled with the tiny forms of newborn Angus calves. They could be seen lying curled into a sleepy lump, or gingerly picking their way over the tangles of grass clumps, or vigorously pushing their hungry mouths against the udders of their grazing mothers. They were everywhere. Now and then, some Herefords with their bright white faces shone out among the black bovines, but as we drove along the winding highway that wanders back and forth across three states' boundaries, most often the little awkward legs belonged to infant Angus. Once, as I gazed at the fields of cattle, I saw one mother standing up next to her shiny wet calf whose umbilicus still dangled damply from from its belly.

Another sign of Spring was the freshly plowed furrows stretching in orderly rows that curved up and down following the contours of the western landscape. There is something so inviting to me about a plowed field. Maybe it's the potential. Maybe it's the optimism it represents. A new beginning, another chance to produce and flower and provide. It invokes something deep inside of me that is purely pleasurable. Perhaps, despite all the many, many winters I've spent away from the frozen climate of my childhood, the sight of a plowed field just provokes some deeply ingrained thrill that the frozen time is ended and my psyche cannot avoid that automatic response of joy.

I saw a couple of tractors pulling harrows over dormant looking fields. I used to do that. Our dad would use the manure spreader to distribute the piles that we'd cleaned from the sheds and the barn all winter. It would be scattered over the alfalfa fields and pastures when they were finally free from snow, but not yet greening and growing. Then a 10 or 11 year child could be sent out on a tractor pulling the harrow (a big rake-like implement) to cultivate the earth, digging in the dried manure bits, stirring up the packed dirt, nudging the grass and the hay to start paying attention to the sun and the warm air. It was an almost fool-proof job. You weren't going very fast, you were in a huge field with no obstacles to steer around, and all you had to do was drive up and down and up and down. A couple of times, I turned too sharply and ran the harrow up onto the big rear wheels, but it wasn't that hard to undo that mistake. Driving! All morning!

We arrived in our hometown and another indicator of the season was the small groups of deer hanging around in people's yards in the late afternoon. If you live anywhere near a canyon or a draw you can count on deer showing up to nibble on the bushes and greening grass around your house. We'd seen little groups of pronghorns all along the highway as we traveled through the open range land. They had the small horns of yearling males; the females were probably hiding with their fawns in the sheltered areas near a stream bed or in a small canyon. But the town deer are not so shy. They just amble down from the hills and hang around nibbling on the convenient landscaping around people's houses. For them, the choice is to eat the shrubs, or go hungry, because up in the mountains winter prevails.

Spring isn't a smooth event in the West. The day can start out cloudy and ominous and then blow into a blustery blue-sky day in a few hours. It can be 75 degrees one day and then 38 the next (or just a few hours later!) You can be raking your lawn and enjoying your grape hyacinth on Saturday afternoon only to wake up to four new inches of snow on Sunday. Don't like the weather? Wait an hour---it'll change. But the constants---newborn calves, plowed fields and budding trees---they will always be there, and those are the real harbingers of Spring. Winter finally gives up, and the calves grow, and the leaves come out, and pretty soon, you'll be irrigating those once-brown fields.

Fruit tree in my daughter's Utah yard.

Granddaughter learning the joys of cultivation.

Deer ambling away from my sister-in-law's shrubbery.

His Human Experience Completed

I went a funeral this week. I attended as a family member, sort of, because the man being honored married my widowed mother-in-law thirteen years ago. I've known Doc Perkes my entire life; he having moved into our small town to be a doctor when I was just three years old. My title was taken from a quote that was a favorite of his, and was a theme of the service. "Always remember that we are spiritual beings having a human experience." He and I had a couple of memorable human experiences,  and I'd like to offer my tribute to him for those.

The first time I remember being his patient was when, at 14, I needed a doctor's okay in order to be on my church's volleyball team. This was a slightly traumatic event because, at 14, I was beginning the role of a young woman and had developed the associated parts. But until this appointment, I had managed to avoid any notice of them by others (naively discounting that boys had probably noticed) and was successfully masquerading as a teen-aged farm girl/boy. Well, I mean, I wore a bra, I dealt with the Monthly Visitor, but I never discussed any of it with anyone. Now, here I was in a medical office, dressed only in a little gown, being inspected by a doctor. When the appointment was completed, I received an endorsement of health to participate in volleyball, and I received an evaluation of my over-all physical excellence that I could really understand.

Doc Perkes owned a purebred Hereford ranch. He raised bulls for sale. He knew cattle and breeding and genetics. I, too, understood animal husbandry, and had actually participated in helping cows with the birthing of one or two calves by then. I'd spent many fascinating hours pouring over the breed books from the artificial insemination company used by my dad. You could pick just the right bull to use for each cow to improve our dairy herd. I got it.

So when I heard this evaluation of my overall physical self from Doc Perkes,  I got it: "You Welch girls are built like a strong heifer. You have great bones. When it comes time to have a baby, you'll drop it like a purebred."  A compliment indeed---someone else may have been offended. Not me. I recognized the praise. Turns out, he was dead on, in my case. I did "drop them like a purebred."

My next major encounter with the Doc occurred after I'd been to see him a couple of times with sick children while on vacation visiting our parents in Wyoming. One summer, I had two siblings being married, and so I just went to stay for the summer with my parents. We had three little ones at the time. My dad suggested that, if I'd like to earn some money while staying for those weeks with them, I could hire my youngest sister to babysit, and go to work at the new gun manufacturing plant there in our valley. They made small derringers that fired .22 caliber bullets; but the gun was almost a novelty in that could fit into a mount on a cowboy style belt buckle. Long story short: several weeks later, I ended up accidentally shooting myself in the hand while working in the test-fire shed. It's complicated....

Anyway, I was hustled up to the hospital, in great agony and whisked into the emergency room. The only doctor in our hometown at that point was Doc Perkes. I learned at the funeral that this period, lasting almost eight years, was a severe test for him and his family because of the overwhelming workload. I remember being very calm as I was being prepped for the doctor's arrival, asking if there was any damaged to my wedding ring. This freaked out the nurse who hadn't yet noticed I was wearing a ring---the big hole in my palm had distracted her. Fortunately they were able to remove my ring without having to cut it off--the extreme swelling I experienced came later.

So Doc Perkes arrived, checked the X-ray, trimmed, cleaned, stitched and repaired the damage that the blast had caused to my palm and put me in a large bandage and a cast. I have photos of the bandaged hand, as I stood serenely in my sister's wedding party a few days later, holding a basket of flowers suspended from it.

(And, may I add: I'd given birth three times previous to the gunshot wound, and would gladly give birth any number of times rather than experience another gunshot wound.) (Serious pain--serious.) (And if you've labored to give birth, you know that that experience is not exactly pain free.)

Annnnywaaay....we returned to our home in San Diego the week after my visit to the small town ER, and I went up to the orthopedic clinic there at the Naval Regional Medical Center for an evaluation by the specialists there. Mind you, these are doctors who'd learned on sailors and soldiers who'd fought in Viet Nam combat. So, they knew a bit about trauma injuries. They were very impressed at my repaired hand.

As the doctor examined me, he asked again who'd done the initial treatment. I explained again. There was a disconnect for the orthopedic surgeon. "A general practice doctor? Seriously? Where did you  say this was?"  I went on to point out that Doc Perkes had a lot of experience with traumatic injuries and childbirth. He was really good at repairing wounds. The ortho doctor called in his colleagues and his students and had them check me out and seriously complimented Doc Perkes for his excellent work. It was quite fun to recount this to Doc many years later when he became my almost-relative.

His funeral was a celebration of a life well-lived. One of his goals, as recorded when he was fifteen, was to be a small town country doctor. He achieved that by serving for fifty-five years in that capacity. He was a fine companion for my beloved mother-in-law, and they enjoyed traveling the world, serving their fellow man and presiding over his large, and marvelously talented, family together for the decade-plus they had together. I appreciate the few, but significant, times he impacted my life before I became a sort-of relative, and I just wanted to share my respects.

Their wedding day, September 18, 1999