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Monday, May 09, 2005

mother's day etc.

Well, I'm going to join the ranks of Christian women bloggers who are explaining why they're not blogging as often anymore. My reasons aren't as cool as theirs -- especially Molly; I mean, who can top having a baby as a reason to stay away from the computer? But I do have a little list of reasons. I have a crochet project I'm working on really hard; I am trying to get through Mansfield Park; we're getting to the end of the school year and I'm getting that "you slacker, your children are going to hate you when they're adults because you basically took off the entire months of March and April from any kind of regular sit-down school every year and that meant that they reached the age of 18 barely able to multiply single-digit numbers and now they live in the ghetto and scrounge in trash cans for a living THANKS A WHOLE LOT MOM" kind of panic. I KNOW it's not true, I mean, heck, if I stopped right now they could probably get jobs with, I dunno, the postal service or something. And most importantly, they're growing and blossoming and reading and writing (sometimes even legibly, but don't count on it) and being creative and they're very bright and everything. It's just this kind of opposite-of-spring-fever thing I get every year, don't mind me.

Also, it has been raining again, so I haven't been taking a whole lot of pictures to post, or going for walks. And the biggest reason is that I have a tendency to spend way too much time sitting here in front of this machine, and I need to work on curtailing that to a conscionable level. Don't expect me to disappear (especially because my resolve on this sort of thing is notoriously weak), but don't expect a post every day either, I guess. Which, hey, who's been expecting that lately anyway.

quick Mother's Day summation: I spent the day at home, except for a brief excursion to the library's used book sale, because LT woke up in the wee small hours on Sunday, throwing up. It ended up being a one-off, but we couldn't know that in time to go to church or the family gathering afterward. Plus I was up at 3 a.m., washing sheets and blankets and cuddling my nine-year-old (!!), and that is not conducive to getting up bright and early. It ended up being a pretty nice day, all things considered. We didn't play a family board game like I wanted to (the boys' round of the Star Wars trading card game thing or whatever it's called took longer than they thought it would), but I didn't have to wash dishes or cook, and I DID have ice cream and cookies. Definitely a day for the positive column. :)

Thursday, May 05, 2005

this ought to say "Hallmark" on the back

Last night at Bible study, one of the women approached me and said that as a gift for me after The Event I Swore I Would Not Mention Again, she was going to come over and clean my house for me (she cleans houses for a living). What I wanted to say was "oh, like h*** am I ever going to let a casual friend anywhere NEAR the dirty parts of my house." However, when someone offers you a gift, you're supposed to smile politely and say 'thank you', and then only write the above sentence in your online journal (I think that's what Emily Post says about it), so that's what I did. Am doing. She's coming over at 2:30 today. And my mom is coming over from 1:00 to 2:00 to help me clean in advance of the arrival of the cleaning lady. Now there's one particular cliché I never thought I'd be living out.

Seriously, there are some household things I'm not supposed to be doing yet -- floors, and scrubbing the bathtub -- which really do need to be done pretty badly. But there is a megaton of STUFF that needs to get put away first, and that's what Mom's going to help me with. What a mom. She gives birth to me, lavishes me with love and affection and creative ideas for fun for my entire childhood, puts up with my regrettable attitude during my teenaged years, offers herself on the altar of free babysitting as soon as I provide her with a grandchild, and then, to top it off, comes over on her lunch break to help me clean my house even though I'm thirty years old and really, if I haven't got the discipline to clean my own house, that ought to be my own problem. Wow. This is the stuff of shiny embossed pastel fancy-script $4.50 Mother's Day cards if ever I saw it.

Now you'll have to excuse me; I'd love to write a nice thoughtful post about the parallels between "cleaning for the cleaning lady" and our Christian walk, but I'd better get to work; my mom will be here in three hours and this place is A MESS.

Monday, May 02, 2005

out of practice II

Well, here's how you get me to shut up, I guess. Just get me my own domain and I completely run out of things to say for days on end.

Real life started again today. No sitting in the recliner crocheting for hours. No waking up in the morning and stretching lazily and going back to sleep with my leg stretched over T's. No, T went back to work, and the kids and I had a regular day filled with school and errands and housework and all that. I even cooked dinner, which I hadn't done since April 12th, which has to be some kind of record, right? Laundry, messes, getting the soap out of C's eyes in the bath, getting down the breakfast cereal, shopping for things we're out of -- all these things are once more my responsibility. I wouldn't mind, in fact it would be nice to be getting back into our routine, if it weren't for the fact that we had become accustomed to the luxury of having T home all the time and now he's not, and we just plain MISSED him today. It was almost as bad as the day he had to go back to work after two and a half months off for a broken ankle in the winter of 2002/2003. I'm inclined to make a joke about that being pitiful, but I really don't think it's pitiful, if I didn't like having him around I wouldn't have married him, right?

Also, I have to seriously start watching what I eat again. I gained FIVE POUNDS in the past three weeks, not only because I was sitting around not getting much exercise, but also because I ate like a trencherman the whole time. I think I felt like I had to make up for the three days of either liquid diet or no food at all. And people kept bringing us these fantastic meals, and the meals were so HEARTY and the quantities were so large, and T wanted to make me happy so he would bring me heaping bowls of ice cream with brownies, and anytime I was hungry I would just snack. So if you ever should NEED to gain five pounds in three weeks, (I will try hard not to hate your skinny self and) there's the method right there for you.

Good things about today:

• School. The kids were cooperative and we all really enjoyed ourselves. LT gets to basically skip the chapters in his math book that deal with the multiplication tables, since he learned those last year, so now he's doing geometry and measurement, which C is learning along with him as well as doing two-digit addition. They both have books they're really into right now -- LT is tearing it up in his Hardy Boys series (well, tearing it up for a nine-year-old, at least), and C has one of those old-fashioned school reading textbooks, maybe from the 40's, which she borrowed from my parents yesterday, and she's halfway through it. Every time I hear her read out loud she surprises me with how FAST she's getting better and better at it.
  
• The library. I hadn't been there in weeks. I didn't find any books I wanted (when I'm reading Austen, nothing else has any appeal) but I found a few movies. And it was good to just BE there.
  
• LT discussing Austen adaptations with the librarian.
  
• The rebate from the purchase of The Nikon finally arrived, just in time to pay (pause to push down the wave of white-hot self-loathing trying to overtake me) the fine from my traffic ticket.
  
• I went back to the community chorus and I really enjoyed myself.

Oh, man, I am just SO un-funny tonight. You know the scene in The Phantom Tollbooth when Milo winds up in the Doldrums? And the doldrums kind of slink around and talk slower and slower until Milo is lulled into a state of exhausted apathy? I am that tired.

Saturday, April 23, 2005

my husband. And his friends' baby.

Here, just from yesterday, is a brief partial list of reasons I'd be totally jealous if anyone else was married to my husband:

• He willingly went and bought me, um, girlie stuff at the drugstore.
  
• He made breakfast and lunch, and dished up the food that people brought for dinner, and he did the dishes, as he has every day since I had surgery last week.
  
• HE MADE ME SIT DOWN AND READ JANE AUSTEN. Do I even have to continue?
  
• He was outside at twilight having a strategy-and-sneaking sort of war with the kids and LT's friend, who was over to spend the night for LT's birthday. He was on C's team.
  
• He spent the morning fixing his grandmother's brakes (for free, of course) and just smiled when she was impatient with him about it.
  
• He has extremely sexy arms.
  
• He cleaned the guest apartment because his friends were coming to visit today.
  
• When I went to bed, he stripped the blankets off and then made the bed while I lay in it, which -- especially the cool sheet floating down -- is just the most comfortable thing ever. In a comfort-food sort of way.
  

Speaking of T's friends -- they are the ones with the miracle baby about whom I wrote in my old journal. And here's Little Miss Miracle herself, in all her little babyish glory:

This is the first time The Nikon has been set loose on a baby. It is having a hard time controlling itself, let me just put it that way.

Wednesday, April 13, 2005

the best-laid plans...

Well, here's a list of things I meant to do before I went into the hospital:

1. Get fully caught up on laundry.
   
2. Make the house spotless.
   
3. Find a picture of the kids together to take with me. (one of the few evils of digital photos is that they're seriously less portable, unless you print them, which we can't since our printer hates us.)
   
4. Make a new journal template.

5. Write at least one journal post that wasn't full of whining, so that newcomers to my blog wouldn't run screaming the other way at the first sentence written by a person who gives Cousin Gladys in The Blue Castle a run for her money in the whining department. (Read This Now. This Means You.)
   
6. Go to the library and get some light-but-not-hilarious (because I know from experience that laughing after abdominal surgery is a huge no-no) books to take with me in addition to the stack I've already got going.
   
7. Wash my bathrobe. (this takes a load almost by itself. It's huge and blue and terrycloth.)
   

Now ask me how many of these things I got done. Go ahead, ask.

Maybe the BIG FAT ZERO you just heard has to do with the fact that I spent Monday in Yosemite, Tuesday in the valley doing pre-op stuff, and today working my hiney off (ha! I wish) helping to fell about 20 trees, and pulling brush, and stacking logs. T's dad (the realtor) had a client who wanted some property brushed and cleared a bit before he would agree to buy it, so T's dad hired us to do it. Today was the only day that my dad, T, and I could all work on it. LT and C helped also. I AM SO SORE OH MY GOSH SO SORE AND I CAN'T TAKE ADVIL. At least I'll have morphine tomorrow. That should knock out some muscle soreness pretty effectively, wouldn't you think?

Anyway. Ahem. This was supposed to be a NON-whiny post, wasn't it. Whoops.

Sunday, April 03, 2005

you know you wish he was YOUR dad

Here's what the kids (the 35-year-old, the 8-year-old, and the 5-year-old) spent Saturday afternoon building:

that old dryer just keeps on giving

LT as gunner and C as driver (I think those are the correct technical terms)

inside view. I told them to "look angry." Remind me not to tick LT off, will you?

It was his idea. That should not be surprising to you. :)

--------

Friday, April 01, 2005

I waited to type this until I was relatively certain I could do it without swearing.

Well, I can never again say that I have never received a traffic ticket.

Wow, it made me a lot angrier than I thought it might, to type that. Deep breathing, it's OK, life goes ON, Rachel, it's only a speeding ticket, it's only THE END OF A FOURTEEN-YEAR STREAK OF SMUG DMV BLAMELESSNESS, IT'S NO BIG DEAL, RIGHT??

Really. Um. Wow.

Anyway. I blame it on Verdi. I was listening to the "Anvil Chorus", and...

No, wait, it's all the cardiologist's fault! If I hadn't had to drive down there to return the stupid holter monitor...

Um. Can I blame this on my low iron? no?

Seriously, I decided as soon as I saw the red light in my mirror and looked down to see my speedometer sitting at 65 that I wouldn't make excuses, I would just be straightforward and honest, and be a good testimony, and all that.

That and I thought maybe it would confuse the patrolman so much that he'd forget to write my ticket. But it didn't work. At least I can do the traffic school online.

On the way home, C appointed herself my official backseat driver. "I will keep an eye out for speed limit signs, Mommy, and I will read them to you if I see them, so you will know how fast to go. Because I am a very fast reader." And she did, too. "Mommy, it says 'SPEED LIMIT 45'. Are you going 45?"

Then a car VERY nearly ran over my daughter in the Vons parking lot. I was pushing the cart, and she was walking beside me, as we walked through the lot. The backup lights came on, on the car behind which we were walking, and before we could even trot out of the way, the car bolted backward. I pulled C out of the way just in time, and was still explaining why when the seriously seasoned citizen driving the car pulled backward far enough to finally see us (both wearing bright red sweaters). "I didn't hit her, did I?" Casual as anything. I clenched my teeth and replied, "Not QUITE."

I swear, all I want to do tonight, aside from maybe a nice relaxing sunset walk, is sit here and hork out on chocolate and do something totally boring, free, and harmless. Transcribing mind-numbing audio files about printer technology never sounded so good.

Tuesday, March 29, 2005

frazzly

Today we (the kids and I) had to go to the valley to go shopping. On the drive home, LT (who's far less anxious than he used to be, but who still always worries if one of his parents seems unhappy or sick) asked me if I'd had an OK day, because I seemed a little frazzly. He was certainly right. Here's why.

First, picture a Chatty Cathy-type doll. Very cute, about 45 inches tall, goldeny kind of hair and eyes, freckles. Are you picturing?

OK, now her "chatty" switch is stuck ON, got it?

And she is being SO contrary and confrontational, and she never stops asking for things she wants or arguing when you tell her no until you either punish her or blow your top a bit and yell at her, and even when she's not doing this she is JUST. CONSTANTLY. TALKING.

Now picture spending hours teaching this doll school, or riding with her in the car, or taking her through a series of stores, or cooking her dinner, or reading her a bedtime story, or all of the above, and you have my day.

The worst part is that, in the midst of my frustration, there's a lot of guilt. First, there's guilt that I could ever be annoyed with someone whom I love so wholeheartedly. And then I feel guilty that I don't pay better attention to her -- you know how you swore you would never EVER tune out ANYTHING your kids said, you would hang on every word, until they learned to talk fluently, that is? yeah -- until the annoyance threshold is breached and then I act irritated with her. It's not that we have no pleasant interactions. It's not that I don't completely and totally adore her, because I do. It's just that instead of stopping her demands/arguments right away and being consistent, I start tuning her out and wait until I am seriously irritated before I deal with the situation. It's something I need to work on, and it's a recipe for disaster on a day like today. Or at least, it's a recipe for being "frazzly".

In other news, I am finally working on a transcription job I've been waiting on for two weeks. The guy who hired me for it first gave me the audio files in the wrong format, and then couldn't find the CF card with the correct files, and then got the flu, so it's taken this long to actually have files I can work with. I started transcribing tonight and I'm taking a break right now so that I don't get a life-threatening case of carpal tunnel syndrome. (you are forbidden to notice that I am, um, typing right now. I've BEEN taking a break, I really have.) It's amazing to watch how the Lord provides; last week we got smacked with $320 in extra bills out of a blue sky, and some odds and ends of broken stuff needed fixing, and we had no idea how we'd pay for any of it. Then a guy bought a car part from T -- T had not advertised it for sale, it was just sitting in his garage unwanted -- and then I did a résumé for a guy (who was in my first-grade class) and he paid double my usual rate, and now this job finally came through, and we're going to have enough and to spare. God is truly "able to do exceeding abundantly beyond all we ask or think." yay. :)

Thursday, March 24, 2005

grr.

Real life (in the form of unexpected bills and a very messy house and two stir-crazy kids stuck inside because of the weather) is interfering with my blogging AND with my photography right now. I'll be back around soon, I promise. Assuming I don't go completely batty insane.

Monday, March 21, 2005

Our neighbors

I've mentioned our neighbors in my photo blog (they're the ones with the gorgeous tulips). They're these little old Christian ladies who have lived together their entire adult lives, who ran a Christian camp for kids until just a few years ago. They used to shuttle my dad (and T's dad too) back and forth to Sunday school when they were kids, this is how long these ladies have been loving the Lord and spreading Him around as much as they can. Anyway. One of the ladies has become quite infirm, and needs live-in care. This past weekend the live-in carer apparently went on a drug binge (!!!) and failed to show up from Friday through this morning, when she showed up long enough to quit and grab her stuff, not even willing to help her former patient out of bed. So this weekend T and I have been filling in for the absent nurse in the morning and evening, getting Miss Ruth up from her chair, into the wheelchair, onto the commode, up from the commode, and into her bed in the evenings, and reversing the procedure in the mornings. We do the heavy work while Miss Jan, who is about the size and weight of LT, helps Miss Ruth with the more intimate aspects of her care. It has been quite an experience. (This morning I did the morning procedure without T, since he was at work). We walk away each time with our muscles aching, stretching our backs, so unspeakably grateful for the freedom to simply hop out of bed and go about our day without giving a thought to how we'll do it, pondering the kind of friendship that says: I will offer you my emotional support and friendly affection as long as you need it. I will trust you with my physical and financial well-being. And when we get old, and you can't take care of yourself, I will stand beside you and take care of you and stand up for you and help you in what should be very private moments, and I will strive to keep your dignity intact, and I will do this as long as it takes.

That is agape if I ever saw it. May God grant me the grace to love -- my friends, my family, my husband, my children -- like that.

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