Ahhhh...The rain finally came



"Smiling Rain Cloud" by Tom Meier

So about a week ago Tom brought his "Smiling Rain Cloud" project home from school - it was end-of-the-year-clean-out-the-classroom time.  I was impressed with his work, very impressed; the fine motor skills he had used to create it made me smile - in a similar fashion as his cotton-faced cloud - so I hung it up. 
The week went by - busy and increasingly hot and humid - and summer vacation for the boys finally arrived a couple days ago.  I love this time of year; I love having my boys around all day so that adventures can just happen - we don't have to be so hemmed in by the clock or the calendar when summer vacation arrives.  So rarin' to go we all are, let's get this party started, school's out, school's out, SCHOOL'S OUT!!!  YAAAAHHH!!!!

But then, uh oh... NOOOOOO!!!  This can't be!!!  NOT NOW!!!!  The boys are in their first day of FREEDOM and SUMMER FUN and RANDOMLY TIMED ADVENTURES....  No, no, no, no, no!!

But there was no stopping it, there is never any Stopping It.  That was two days ago. 

"It" is this thing that happens to me when a drastic change in temperature is coming in the next couple days.  And some kind of precipitation, usually lots of it, big old snowstorms or rainstorms or rain soakers are part of the deal too.  I feel it.  I don't need a meteorologist or radar or anything like that to tell me - it's crazy, I know, and it's all in my head.  But then that's where crazy usually is, so it makes sense.  It's a storm's-coming-bomb-in-the-head that blows up and hurts like crazy.  And in just half of my head - so I guess I should be grateful for that that it's not my whole head.  But in the days leading up to the release of all that rain or whatever is about to fall out of the sky, grateful for 1/2 a head not exploding isn't what I am.  Half my face puffs up, the one nostril runs, the one ear hurts like crazy, the back of my head - 1/2 of it only - oweee - the other half wants to run away, and 1/4 of my teeth hurt - the upper half on the exploding side.  I don't know what this is, I don't know if there's a name for it other than crazy-storm-predicting-osis - but it's definitely a thing for me and has been for quite some time.  Maybe it has something to do with a drastic change in atmospheric pressure - I don't know BUT I do know this - the rain finally came about an hour ago and the smile on the cotton-faced cloud hanging in my window is matching mine - once again!!  And so let the adventures begin!!!



Greedy Grandma Syndrome

Greedy grandma and her sweet faraway grandbaby 

Right when I'm done here I'm off to the grocery store - but I've got a couple minutes and some coffee in one of my favorite mugs, and I've got something to say:  I LOVE being Mom but being a Grandma - that's what I'm having a hard time with - a really hard time. 

I suspect most Grandmas who live far from their grandchildren feel the same exact way.  In my case, my heart actually aches on account of this - I mean I can feel it hurting deep inside - that sounds all dramatic and medical and what not - but it's the truth.  Not seeing my only grandbaby and not lifting her up in the swing and giving her a little push or handing her the bananas to put in the grocery cart or changing her or reading her books or baking cookies with her or stomping around in mud after a good rain or dancing with her in the family room on a Wednesday morning just because - not being able to do those and a million other daily things - that's what I'm grumbling about. 

I just absolutely, beyond what may be considered reasonable, love the dailiness and the work and the hands-on-help kind of life.  Being a "visit" Grandma - I don't love that - I'm terrible at it.  Helping babies, toddlers, children, adolescents every day in very useful and simple ways - and some complicated ways too - for the past 31 years that's what I know and love with all my heart.  But this every once in awhile "visit" business where the visits are few and far between and blink-of-an-eye brief - not good, not now - not at 57 years old - maybe at 157 years old.  Maybe.

I'm not positive but that just might put me smack dab in the greedy-middle-aged-lady category: I mean, c'mon - I have six children - four in the grown-on-their-own-out-in-the-world-doing-wonderful-things-serving-those-in-need category and then my two special needs teenagers, Steve and Tom, in the at-home-and-doing-well category  - yet - I want more.  Or rather less - as in less distance, 1000 or so miles ought to do it - between my grandbaby and me.  That way I could scoop that sweet little girl up right now and take her to the grocery store so she could put bananas in the cart and then we'd return to Grandma's house to dance in the family room a bit.  And then, I don't know, maybe we'd even make some cookies.  Hmm...that would be great.

Okay, coffee's gone so off to the store I go.

Til next time, take care and God bless.

Mother's Day Letter

Mother's Day is almost here - only a couple more days to go.  I wished I could've found a nice card or two for my daughter, but I couldn't.  For the life of me I just couldn't find the right one at the store the other day.  My daughter's a Mom in her late 20's married to a wonderful man and together they have a little girl not yet two years old and another baby girl due in July.  I'd dearly love to see her and her sweet little family and spend the entire day with them but they live over a thousand miles away, a 20 hour drive one way.  As distant as that sounds, and it is a ways away, it's not as far away as where they lived before.  That far-flung place was an ocean away plus the 2,000 miles of land one had to cross before even getting to that ocean.  Oh goodness, sometimes it feels as if that little family lives on the moon.  Anyway, back to the card buying escapade.  During my entire search, I saw not a single card in that fully-stocked, overflowing card aisle at the store that fit.

Some of them came sort of close - I even had a couple in the cart, but then there was something that didn't sound right, that didn't ring true, and back they went.  All the cards for daughters who are Moms I examined very closely - this way and that, words, pictures, even the sounds/music of the noisy greeting cards.  But not a single one was right. All the examining and interpreting and mulling took way too long in my son Steve's eyes, my shopping buddy, and everyone else's eyes too who happened by.  So there it is - I just couldn't find a Mother's Day card for my daughter. 

Now this may be a bit awkward for everyone, my daughter, you, me -  but I'm going to do it anyway.  I'm using this blog space today for her Mother's Day greeting from me.  The things I say here are 100% true.  It might not seem like it if you don't know my daughter, but for me to fill you in and give details and specifics about her wouldn't be prudent.  Moms of military daughters learn this.  And sometimes the Moms have to write a greeting letter when the cards at the store don't say the right things! 
  

Dear Daughter, 

Over the years there have been so many times that I've been completely awestruck by you.  And even more times than that I've been inspired by you.  This happens whether you're half way round the world following orders or on a rare visit home, in my kitchen making a batch of amazing cookies.  It matters not, the time or place, you inspire me.  Even though I'm 30 years older than you,  you've taught me, no, no, make that shown me, by your example - never by force or  harsh word - how to live life gracefully and to the fullest.  You've been a beacon guiding me.  You can't help but shine, you shine all the time.  And I see it. 



                                                                       Aug.'13

You, dear girl, have been through impossible situations in your lifetime - impossible from my perspective.  I'll never, ever experience those particular impossible things in my life.  And you've come through with grace and quiet strength. You make it look smooth, easy, somehow.  How do you do that?  Me?  I'd be squawking and flapping and running around in awful circles.  

Your journey, as a civilian and in the military, has looked so unwaveringly graceful to me.  So graceful and so generous.  I've seen from a distance your journey, that road of yours, riddled with potholes, jagged boulders, impossibly steep climbs, no guardrails on the descent, in foreign lands, on American soil.  Your "road" has been washed out at times, completely impassable, yet on you go, you find a way, uncomplainingly, somehow, some way, always.  And something else, seeing to others' troubles before dealing with or even realizing that you are in some sort of peril yourself is as natural as drawing breath to you. It's you.

From my perspective what you've done in life and how you've done it  - with grace and selflessness and humility -  is magical.  You're like a great magician who does impossible things before my very eyes, right in front of me, and I can't now nor will I ever figure it out.  I am in awe of you, I am inspired by you, humbled and forever blessed by you.


Happy Mother's Day Daughter!  Love, Mom

Semper Fi

I haven't written a thing here in the  Family Room for OVER a WEEK!  But I've got excuses... all kinds of excuses!  In short -  Life just kept happening at a break-neck pace around here, one day after the other with no time for writing anything except maybe the grocery lists - of which there were many - one to guide each of my several grocery shopping adventures to accommodate each of the several special eating occasions  - these past eight days. 

It seems that the 8 days that've passed since being here in the Family Room have been like, well, let's see... a tug-of-war?  Or maybe more like a tornado?  Or, I know, like a couple Gigantic Magnets pulling in completely opposite directions.  Whatever it's been like I do know this - these days have been: amazing, sad, scary, heart-wrenching.  And ...they've been filled with laughter, tears, rain, sunburn.  There were birthday celebrations, a prom, Special Olympics Spring Games Track & Field Day, a biopsy, IEP meeting, piano performance, bowling practice, a movie matinee outing, field trips and yesterday. 

Yesterday, the Day I Was Filled With Emptiness.  It was an awful feeling and quite shameful for me to feel that way, but shameful or not, I felt filled with emptiness. Being filled with emptiness sounds dumb and... it is dumb. But that's how I felt - yesterday.   Today in the light of this sun-splashed May First blue sky day, I'm actually embarrassed to think I could EVER feel empty... ever - but I did.  For awhile - a wallowing while. 

And this is why, early yesterday morning, this guy pictured here in an old photo taken a couple years back (the guy in the middle, in uniform) left - for good.  We all knew this day was coming and as it turns out it arrived later than originally scheduled; it's the old "hurry up and wait" aspect of military life this family has come to know.

August 2013 - PLC Graduation

This son's orders (coming a year after his college graduation/commissioning in the Marine Corps) were the reason for his departure yesterday. Shortly after breakfast and after seeing his two youngest brothers off to school for the last time, with his car packed with uniforms, boots, paperwork, his computer and a few meager belongings, he drove away - leaving his full-time civilian job of the past year, his two youngest brothers, his Dad, me, home - for good this time. For a good, long time.  He is now in the category of "our kids who only visit us" (that would be 4 of the 6) and the sub-category of "our kids who only visit us when Uncle Sam approves" (that's been 3 of those 4).

As Mom to 3 military kids, it's been awesome and awful at the same time throughout the years.  And yesterday the shameful, embarrassing, feeling sorry for myself, "awful" completely overshadowed the "awesome"-  with a big, dark, self-serving stupid old shadow.  It was all about the nothingness I heard at 5:00 when he'd normally be coming in the door from work, and then that terrible empty spot I sat across from at the dinner table at 6:00, and later around 9:00 the rotten lack of shenanigans I didn't witness as I readied his younger brothers for bed - it was awful and left me filled with emptiness. 

But today - I got about the business of not wallowing, not being so selfish in my perspective, and not letting "awful" win the day.  How ridiculous - "awful" winning the day.  Honestly, there is just too much awesome in all of this.  My son is doing what he's meant to do, what he's trained for and he's worked for for a long time.  He's serving our country, protecting and defending those of us here at home, putting others before himself, and all the while willing to put himself in harm's way to accomplish that.  So my being all selfish and whatnot?  That's not cool.  I'm done with my wallowing!

Take care all and God bless!
Karen



Semper Fi