Music and life.

I like music.  I really only like music that you can sing with.  In the car today I was listening to Harry Chapin.  The CD that I was listening to had a song Remember When the Music.  It took me down memory lane.  It is about a much easier time.  It mentioned a more joyful time.  It was about a time that we had dreams.  Obviously, when we were all younger. 

It’s true.  As young people we all spent time dreaming about our future.  I’m sure that we all dreamed about traveling, jobs, spouses, kids.  Anything and everything.  We all were dreamers.  Maybe it is a rite of passage to adulthood.

The Harry Chapin CD also had the song Taxi on it.  The song is about, for those of you who don’t know, a taxi driver who picks up a girl he dated in school.  She dreamed of being an actress and he was looking for the sky.  The song ends with the lyrics …” And, here she’s acting happy inside her handsome home, and me I’m flying in my taxi, taking tips and getting stoned.”

A sequel was written to that song with the setting Harry, the taxi driver, is a successful musician and stops to see Sue, the gal.  He finds out that she was separated and working.  They talk about how they have always walked away from each other. 

The two songs talk about the dreams of their youths.  In Taxi, their lives didn’t work out the way they thought they would.   They kept growing and eventually found a place for themselves that enabled them to be content. 

Contentment is in my opinion what allows happiness.  Contentment gives us the ability to stop chasing rainbows and enjoy life and family and everything important in our lives. 

As I said at the beginning of this blog, I like music.  I should say that I like music that I can sing along with.  I’m far too old to listen to what I refer to as “head banging” music. 

Enjoy your day.

Loneliness

Have you ever been lonely?  Have you ever thought about people who are alone and realized how lonely they are at times?

It's sad to me to think about people who just would have their days changed if someone would just say hi to them for just a little while.

It is really depressing to think about people who live alone and have no one to share their day with.  Do they get up every day and have the same routine as every other day?

I am a huge believer in retirement villages.  I'm not referring to a nursing home as much as I am thinking about senior apartments where there are options for association with others.  Options for activities with others.

My father in law very reluctantly moved into such a place.  Under one roof, there were one and two bedroom apartments, assisted living and a nursing home.  It was incredible.  He, after the shock was gone, loved it.  He was able to eat, play cards, and mingle with friends. This housing solution allowed him the ability to have more options in his day than when he lived at home.

You don't have to be old to be lonely.  You don't have to be alone to be lonely.  Being alone is sad.  Imagine being alone and realizing that there is a world around you that doesn't share in your loneliness. Imagine being in a room full of people and being lonely.  It happens.

For some it isn't even a choice.

Maybe what I am trying to say that if we all would make an effort to just say hi to people, we might make a day a tiny bit less lonely.

Spring Cleaning Our Minds

Yesterday I was talking about spring time and my grand parents desire to burn everything from winter.

As I was thinking about that this morning, it occurred to me that maybe it would be a good season to clean our minds out as well.

Everyone has "stuff" in our heads and on our minds that just either stagnates where we are or consumes too much of us. Maybe, we should take some deep breathes and allow this stuff to go away.

I personally carry a tablet with me.  I do this so I can write notes to myself.  I believe that this allows me to not have to carry so much nonsense in my head.

For me personally, if I don't write things down, one of two things happens.  I forget what I wanted to remember or I have trouble shutting my brain off.

Spring cleaning our minds sounds like a good plan to me.

Let's all take some deep breaths and clean out the winter trash.

Spring

Springtime is my second favorite season of the year.  My first choice is summer.  I love the heat of
the summer sun.  I love mowing the grass. 

When I was young,  as I said, I lived in the country, next to my grandparents.  They had a farm.
Every spring, all of the old burnable things that had accumulated through the winter would be taken down to a pasture field and would be burned. 

My grandfather would throw gas on the stuff, which included anything from wood to tires to whatever else was around, and there would be a huge fire.  More times than one, the fire would get out of control and we would have to stomp it out.  That was how my grandparents viewed spring cleaning.

Now if we used that approach we would more than likely be fined.  Again, it was a far simple of times.  But, I know that I, and I suspect most others go through a spring cleaning process.  I don't think that scrubbing the wall and re-staining the hardwood is the approach most of us take.  We don't have time for that stuff anymore. 

What I find myself doing  is unburying the garage.  Putting winter things away and summer things out.  Coats are taken off to the drycleaners.  Getting lawn furniture out and cleaned off.  Basically, welcoming the seasons that invite us to go outdoors and invite the season to unfold and blossom around us. 

Blossoms and birds and life are evolving for our enjoyment every day.  The sun is setting later each day.  Let's all enjoy the newness of the season and enjoy. 

Happy Spring.

Choices

Life is never always good nor bad.  It's a balance of things and what we choose to hold onto that creates what is important.

We all have the option to complicate or simplify our life's.  Everyday that we wake up we have a new day of choices or decisions.  They unravel for us throughout our days, weeks, months and years.  What we choose is ours to decide and ours to live with. 

If we stumble one day, we can succeed the next.  If we make goals and allow people around us to help and to remind us that we are not on a boat alone, we all have a greater chance to succeed.  Help and patience will rarely fail. 

Our presentations when helping is key.  We can't treat one another like children.  We can't belittle people.  Sometimes it is more than difficult.  Sometimes when we try to help, it can be exhausting.  Understanding and patience are needed.  Feeling as though, one person is always the "giver" just creates an unbalance.  In no relationship, regardless of if it's parent and child, siblings, friends or couples, is there only one person giving.  It's impossible.  Life in general is give and take.

What I do believe is that simplicity is always best.  Our ability to keep life simple allows us to be happier in my opinion.  To be able to know who and what is most important is best.  To have the ability to cherish friends and family allows us to stay centered. 

I believe in success.  I believe in second, third or fourth chances.  I don't believe in selfishness.  Selfishness will always cut you short of reaching your goals.

Kids who live far away

It seems to me that when your kids move away and the years pass, it would be logical that you would get used to the hellos and goodbyes.  I can honestly say that I have not. I truly hate it. I miss my son. I miss Katie, his sidekick.



I want everyone to live closer to me.  At least in the same time zone.  When he moved to LA, I really had no desire to go see him.  I missed him, but I was afraid to realize that he had a life out there.  He created a life away from his parents, sister, and brother. 



He lived in LA for I think 5 years before I flew out to see him.  I hated the flight out because for the first time since he lived there, I needed to accept that he was really that far away from me. 

I remember on one of his trips home with Katie, I realized when we dropped them off at the airport, that he was going home.  His home was in LA.  His home in PA was in the past.  I hated it. 



I remember wondering how my grandmother handled 6 sons growing up and being drafted.  She literally had a son leave every year. It had to break her heart every time one left.  I guess when some of them left the area for work, it may have been a relief that they were at least in the same country, without a gun issued to him. Although, one of them lived in Israel for a couple of years.    After he retired, the same son joined the peace corps. 



I want to be selfish and believe that Chris needs me.  The reality is that he is an adult and can manage without me.  I guess we long ago crossed that threshold and now I am the listening ear and occasional advice giver.



All in all, I am happy, and realize that I am fortunate enough to have two of my kids close to me.  Many people don't have that. 

I know that sometime down the road my kids will be helping me.  My daughter is assuming that I will have dementia.  She tells me that she is going to tell me to pack for the beach and put me in a home.  She imagines that I will be spotted in the nursing home.  I will be the person walking through the halls, in a bathing suit and flip flops looking for the beach.  We will have to wait and see.

I do admittedly, wonder if I struggle with this is because I was a young mom.  I don’t know.

Beach

There is never a bad beach day.  I personally find the beach to be one of my favorite places.  The breeze. The water hitting the sand. There is a certain  peacefulness that is only at the beach.

My daughter and I took the girls to Santa Monica today so they could play in the sand and run off some energy, before we leave to go back home in the morning. Our flight is super early.

I suspect that it might be a bit more hectic at LAX because of the Germany terrorist attacks.

The smell of fresh seafood water, the sound of waves, and the feel of  cold sand on our feet is welcoming to me.

The thing about watching the ocean is that it's like snow flakes no two are alike.  The pattern of the waves are different each time.  Each wave is more mesmerizing than the one before.

The only negative about the beach is that for me, it's not an everyday occurrence.  So I visit it as often as I can.  Maybe I would take it for granted if I lived closer.

There is never a bad beach day.  I personally find the beach to be one of my favorite places.  The breeze. The water hitting the sand. There is a certain  peacefulness that is only at the beach.My daughter and I took the girls to Santa Monica today so they could play in the sand and run off some energy, before we leave to go back home in the morning. Our flight is super early. I suspect that it might be a bit more hectic at LAX because of the Germany terrorist attacks.The smell of fresh seafood water, the sound of waves, and the feel of  cold sand on our feet is welcoming to meThe thing about watching the ocean is that it's like snow flakes no two are alike.  The pattern of the waves are different each time.  Each wave is more mesmerizing than the one before.The only negative about the beach is that for me, it's not an everyday occurrence.  So I visit it as often as I can.  Maybe I would take it for granted if I lived closer.

It's been a rough day in the world today. Brussels should be on our minds and the sadness that this world has grown accustomed to will end.

Reach out to our friends. Reach out to our loved ones.

Thoughts and prayers to all.

Flying with kids

Yesterday my daughter and I flew from Pittsburgh to Los Angeles. We had her two kids with us.

This made me observe how life is as a child.

Think about it. When babies are little we get them ready, put them in a seat and take them everywhere. They are clueless. They get put in a car and wala, they are some other place.

As they get older and get more capable they participate.  They are trusted to get shoes and coats.  They still get led around though.

Now let's think about an airport. It's normally a stressful situation. Just needing to be on time and rush them through the security stampede.  People everywhere.  Bags everywhere. Everyone is in a hurry and have no issue running anyone over.

Back to kids.  The poor children don't know what is going on and their entire day is being told to hold hands, walk faster, slow down, take your shoes off, put your shoes on, so on.

Then we get on the plane and know that our goal is not to be "those" people with kids. We all recognize the "looks".  They start when you cross the invisible line to the gate. Some people are fine. Others just are not happy.

We get on the plane with one of two hopes.  The kids fall asleep, or we have packed enough distractions to keep them occupied. With an hour layover in Minnesota, and having to drag the mound of stuff that we thought was neccesary, with enough time to have the older one take a " few walks" on the people mover "ride."

Then the second leg of the trip. Back to the cattle herding orders for the kids until we were situated in our seats. Back to digging into the bag of tricks that were packed.

All in all the kids were great.

I was thinking about adults wrangling the kids and how kids don't know any better than to just go along with it.

I would like to get in the minds of these little kids and know what they are thinking.  Are they even aware of being pulled, pushed, picked up, put down, asked to hurry and asked to slow down.

Cell phone rant

Everyone who knows me, knows that i am addicted to my cell phone.  There is are reason that i am. The first reason is because when my first husband had a heart attack, I didn't have my phone with me.  The second reason is that for some many years I had to be available for my mom and her issues.  My phone was literally part of my hand for a long time. I play on my phone and read random things in public. I look at Facebook and Instagram.  If I am bored, I will look at Pinterest.   If I do get a call or make a call, I do not have entire conversations though. Short, sweet, to the point. Yesterday, I was in a room with many people.  Three people chose to use the time chatting Not important chats, just chatting.  I just put my own phone away and blatantly eavesdrop on everyone's conversations. Here's what I learned.  The woman to my left is having children color coordinated eggs.  Each child will be assigned a color and that is the only color of eggs they can collect.  Someone in their family is copping an attitude and not coming. It seems that he is the renegade of the family and he won't be missed, so the lady beside me agrees and don't have an issue with this.  Her opinion is, "Why put forth the effort and have him be ignored anyway."   To the right of me the woman was coordinating a party. The invitations were mailed yesterday.  Apparently the person she was talking to believes that since the party is memorial day weekend, it's too early to send them out.  The women were still not happy that "the party" isn't sooner.  Someone is going out of town, thus the party was scheduled around that person's schedule. Another woman is meeting her friend at Red Robbin.  She will only have a salad since she is meeting with her book club for dinner.  Someone was talking to a pharmacist.  Apparently, they can't afford the prescribed med for their husband.  And yes… I do know what the script was.  Her husband probably would not like to hear that it was talked about in such an open forum. I am not trying to bore anyone with these conversations.  I am trying to give awareness to how busy we all think we are.  We really can't make these, with the exception of the pharmacy/ patient's wife conversation, calls from home?  Are people so busy that their only time for lengthy conversations is in public settings surrounded by people? Doesn't nearly everyone have a cell, why couldn't they text?

Losing a parent as a child

I had another blog written and then my brain made a good, strong left hand turn.  I heard something on TV that got my wheels spinning.

There was an interview with a young guy who lost a parent at a young age. Many people lose parents at a young age.  Is there a good age to lose a parent?  There are always times that we miss our parent’s after they die.  Losing anyone close to us creates a difference in the landscape of our family.

During the TV interview this young boy said that when his mother died, he knew that his future was going to be different from before she died. He knew that he needed to pick up where she left off.  So this makes me debate in my own mind if this is an extraordinary situation since the interview was with Prince Harry, or if when you lose a parent when you are as young as he was, if this is always going to create more of an influence on your life, more than if you grow up with both parents.

I have three cousins whose dad died in Vietnam.  They were 5,3, and 1.  Were they too young to be influenced by who their dad was?  They didn’t really know their dad because they were young and he was in a war.  I will say that none of them grew up and went into the military.  That’s the only association they had with their dad.  He was a soldier.

In other cases, do kids feel an obligation any more or any less than kids who grow up with their parent’s influence?  I can say that my husband’s dad was in WWII, went to college on the GI Bill.  He was an engineer.  His oldest child, a daughter, is a pharmacist.  The three sons are all in the engineering and physics.  Was this a conscience effort to follow their dad’s career?

Maybe it depends on the family.  Maybe it depends on the kids.  In any case though, I think that when our parents are alive, there is more times than not a desire to please our parents.  I don’t think though that it is a teenager’s motivation.

As I am writing this, I am convincing myself that Prince Harry is an exception to the rule.  I think that because of his role in life to have “causes”.  Princess Diana worked with many causes.  It is logical to maintain the causes that she worked hard to bring attention to.  Isn’t that how the royal family works?

I still am wrestling whether kids have a desire to follow in their parents’ footsteps because they have a common genetic pool that shares similar strengths?  Or is it because they want to make their parents’ proud, or is there even any thoughts involved that involves a parent?  I suppose all of the above is right, depending on the family and child.

Here’s what I am 100% sure of.  Death of a parent changes a child.  How, depends on the age of the child.  In Prince Harry’s situation, his whole life has been in the public’s eye.  He is expected to embrace causes.  He doesn’t have to make career choices.  It’s his heritage.  I find it somewhat impressive that he is continuing the causes of his mom these days instead of going to Vegas and doing inappropriate things.  He’s obviously growing up.

For my cousin’s.  They cherish every piece of their dad that they have.  They remain close to their uncles and aunts on their dad’s side of the family.  They have gotten past their childhood issues without their dad.  They embrace his courage. 

Communication

Have you ever thought about how people communicate?  It’s rather amazing if you think about how our personalities mesh.  How many ways there are to get a point across. 

Both sets of my grandparent’s had very distinct ways to communicate with one another.  My dad’s parents were loud.  They argued every day.  Not because they were mad at each other, that’s just how they communicated. I am not saying that they fought daily.

My mom’s parents communicated, mostly my grandmother did the communicating.  My grandfather mostly nodded and then took a walk, after he did what he wanted. 

My conversations with Bruce were presented far different than with Tim.  Tim is far more passive than Bruce.  I am far more passive than I was in my old life.  Each relationship is unique and takes on a life of its own.

I know people who really don’t seem to be able to get a point across without swearing, screaming, or belittling others.  I understand that we all get frustrated and blow things out of control.  I personally don’t understand why people swear.  Four million words and people use the same ten swear words.  That’s just my view.  I can’t say that I get offended by people’s language too often. 

With my kids and their friends.  It’s kind of funny, because IF they are around me and swear, they immediately apologize.  I have a friend who is my mom’s age, she too, apologizes if she swears around me.

The thing is that how we treat people and how we talk to people does matter.  People deserve respect.  People deserve the right to listen and be listened to.  Shouting and screaming over each other, probably is not the most effective way to motivate a person.

I read a study once on communication.  It revealed that when you communicate by screaming, it is perceived that you are belittling the other person and they stop listening.  So your’ words are useless.

Parenting experts tell parents to get down to the child’s level and calmly talk to the child.   Explain your issue in a mild-mannered way.  Screaming at a child probably accomplishes two things.  First, it intimidates the child.  Secondly, it teaches the child that if they want to be heard, they too should scream.  As adults, we should adopt that strategy.  Again, screaming to one another probably isn’t the most effective way to communicate or get your point on the table

Often, the person being screamed at isn’t aware that they screwed up.  I say this with road rage.  Driving and screaming, honking the horn, sharing the middle finger isn’t productive.  More than likely, the person who was wrong, wasn’t aware that there was an issue to start with.  You are just seen as irrational and half crazy.

I am a note writer.  If I am disappointed, I write notes.  Sometimes long notes. I have been known to write 25page notes.  I feel that if you put things in writing, they can be read and reread.  Then they can be thought about.  It allows me to share my thoughts and put things in perspective in my mind all at the same time.

In my own mind.  Screaming is a form of bullying at times.  It’s the do as I say, not as I do mentality.

Communicating in relationships is a constant key to success.  We have to be kind.  We can’t bully and scream and not produce hurt feelings.  It might sometimes, but believe me, it will eventually shut a person down.  They will always get to the point of eroding your partner.  Finding positive methods to communicate is the best way to go. 

If you want to be respected, you have to show respect.  It’s a fact.

Relax....

Life is tough.  We all need to have a safe place to rest our brains.  We need a place that we aren’t always “on”.  If you think about it, with small children we have “time-outs”.  What is a time out for a child?  It is a place for the child to sit and calm down.  A place where the child can “reset” themselves.

Why are we smart enough to see that small children need to step away for a few minutes and calm down, but when we are adults, we think that we need to constantly need to be in forward motion?  It doesn’t make sense to me.

Wouldn’t it make sense for us to take some time to reset, rest our brains, and breathe?   Do we always have to be on?  We seem to only have two settings.  On and off.  We are sleeping or in forward motion. 

I personally think that if we would all take time to find our safe place spot and rest our brains, that we would be happier.  We probably wouldn’t feel that we need to take anxiety pills, antidepressants, or any other vices.  Please don’t assume that I don’t realize that there are needs for antidepressants, anxiety meds, and other meds to help us. 

When I was little and be at my grandmother’s house, she would always sit and have a cup of coffee, and do the crossword puzzle in the paper.  Both of my grandmother’s would sit quietly and crochet.  My mom would sit and knit.  My mom would do jigsaw puzzles.  In my mind, that was their way of resting their brains.  That was their safe place.  That was a chance for them to shut life off for some time and recharge.

What happened in our life’s to make us believe that we are not deserving of 15 minutes to calm down, a little time to reset ourselves?

I will say that I often get teased by friends because I go to bed early.  First of all, I also get up early.  That’s just how my body clock works.  Sometimes, I do actually go to sleep early.  Other times though, I go upstairs and just hang out on my bed. I read.  I study.  I watch TV.  I do crosswords.  I just am removed from the day. 

I know many people personally who should adopt this.  I think that they would have a less stressful existence.  I think that life might make a bit more sense to them. 

I dare everyone to just steal 15 minutes from their day to escape and reset.  Even if you have to sit in a car and listen to calming music.  ( I don’t think that “head banging” music would lower your stress level.)  I bet at the end of the week, you won’t miss the 105 minutes. 

My point is that we allow this to be a developmental tool for our children.  Our previous generations saw the importance of relaxing.  Why on earth don’t we?

Forgiveness

Here’s a word that we have all experienced probably from a few angles.   Here’s the thing.  Going through the words of I forgive you is easy when you see them or hear them from another person.  Regardless if you want to forgive or are being forgiven, it is easier to agree and to end the spat or forget it rather than allow it to continue.  In the end, it’s another person.  You can just ignore them, if you choose to.

When it is yourself that you have to forgive, you can’t just accept a silent apology.  You can’t just pretend things are ok.  There is a silent process.  It is a process that you can’t kid yourself with.  It is much more difficult. 

Here’s the thing.  We all screw up.  We all do things we regret.  We all punish ourselves.  We all take too long to forgive ourselves.   Our conscience creates an internal turmoil.  We lose sleep or go into a depression.  We fall into whatever vice we have to comfort ourselves.

I have this saying that each of my kids have heard probably 100’s of times.  My friends have heard it many times. 

I say that you can live with anything, when you find the proper perspective to put it in.  I honestly believe that.

As a person, you have many options to deal with things.  You can get mad. You can cry.  You can sit and quietly pout. You can be in denial and pretend nothing happened.  After you go through those things though, you still have to look in the mirror at yourself.  You still have to fix “it”.  You still have to forgive yourself. 

It’s easy to look from the outside and advice people.  To Kill a Mockingbird have a line in it.  Essentially, it says that you can’t judge a person until you walk in their shoes.  Very, very true.  What is needed is a support system.  What isn’t needed are dictators. 

We are all busy.  We are all predestined to be more selfish than we should be.  We all need to prioritize our time.  If we know that we can be a help to someone who we consider important in our life’s.  Help them out.

Maybe all we need to do it talk or allow them to talk.  Maybe they need to know that they aren’t going through life alone. Maybe they need a support system.  Maybe they need a friend.

Let’s help each other forgive ourselves as well as others.

Hands.

Think about a person’s hands.  They have so many tasks to fulfil in a lifetime.  So tiny and delicate as a baby, so rough as an old person. 

I have a picture of my grandfather sitting on his rocking chair, in the kitchen.  It was 1979 and he was holding my oldest son.  The words he was sharing with me at the moment was how tiny and delicate my son’s hands were and how his little fingers were so intricate and fragile.  How true it was.

Fast forward to when my first husband was on life support.  I remember looking at his hands and forearms.  He developed a series of twitches.  His right thumb was the first.  I would go and hold his hand so the twitch wasn’t so obvious.  After Bruce died, my daughter and I went to visit one of Bruce’s brother’s.  I remember looking at his hand and forearm and realizing that it looked exactly like Bruce’s. 

These days, I see my son’s hands, especially my oldest son’s, and I again, see his dad’s.  It’s silly that a hand can create so many memories.   

Fast forward again.   We were at my son’s wedding and for some reason it occurred to me to get pictures of my grandmother, my mom, myself, my daughter, and my oldest granddaughter’s hands.  This group of hands allowed us to spam 96 years.  We saw hands of a 2-year-old through a 96-year-old.  Incredible.

My grandmother was in Hospice and we knew her life was ending, a hospice nurse pulled a couple of us aside and encouraged us to take pictures of her hands.  She believed that this was a good remembrance. I know I have a picture of my mom holding her mom’s hand.

Since then, I have made it a point to take pictures of hands.  When I look at these pictures.  I definitely go back in time.  But when I really look at them, I see a lifetime of growing.

On my Facebook page, I have a background picture of me holding my mom’s hand a day or two prior to her dying.  I obviously see our hands as pictured.  I see so much more though.  I see a mother tenderly holding her babies’ hand.  I see a mom sternly touching her daughter to keep her aligned.  I see a hand a of a very hard worker. I see a grandma’s hand, a great-grandma’s hand.  I see a sister’s hand.  I see a daughter’s hand.

When I look at my own hand.  I see my hands aging.  I remember young girl’s hands trying hard not to hold her mother’s hand crossing a street. I remember a young mother’s hand touching my babies for the first time. I see the hands that have patted her kids’ back’s with great pride and joy. I see the hands who have met her 4 grandchildren for the first times.  I remember touching many people for the last time. 

With my own hands, I will continue to touch and show pride with those I love.  I will continue to use them to greet new people.  I will continue to get them dirty and use them for hard work.  I will continue to be impressed by the powers of them. I too, will continue to write with them.

Hands truly are amazing parts of all of us.

Friends.

We all have friends.  Some people like friends in quantities, others cherish and value their close group of friends.  There are no limits or rules with friends.  Some people seem to go through cycles with their friends, based on where they are at in life or what they need.  Again, friends don’t come with rules.

The important thing about friends is cherishing them for what they bring to the table.  In turn, you always should be aware of what you give them in return. It has to be a mutual relationship.  But, just like in a marriage or any relationship, there is always an ebb and flow. 

We all know either a friend or someone who has a friend who sucks life out of you.  You know the friend that you look at your phone, see who it is and wonder if you have the ability to emotionally talk to them. 

They make you tired just talking to them.  Debby downers.  The only purpose for their call is to gossip, ask questions and complain.  They tell you nothing that is pertinent in your life.  It’s a complete waste of time and totally unnecessary.  At what point in time did we get to this point? 

I remember being a teenager and I would always wait for my mom to be talking to her friend, Marilyn on the phone.  They would sit and chat about nothing and everything for an hour, maybe two. I realize they were simply entertaining one another.  I would use their conversation to my favor.  If I wanted to go someplace or use the car, I would quietly walk in the room and in as quiet of a voice as I could get, I would ask to take the car or ask if I could go someplace.  As soon as she said, “mmmhmmm”, I would say thanks and be out the door.  It worked every time. 

In the end, I knew that I would be allowed to go to the mall or to take the car, whether I asked in a loud voice or quiet voice.  What my mom was more interested in was spending time with her friend on the phone.  They weren’t the suck life out of each other friends.  They were true friends who worked together, supported each other through divorce and death. 

My sons have a number of friends who when they reached high school became interchangeable.  These guys would call the house and just ask for Chris or Greg.  Never one over the other.  Now, my sons are 36 and 34, and these guys are still friends.  We have vacationed with them all.  They all treat my daughter as their own personal little sister.  Most of them were at her wedding.  These guys all flew home for my kid’s dad’s funeral.  That is just a testament to what a good group of guys these are.

Friends are necessary for all of us.  Old friends, new friends, renewed old friends.  That is actually the best part of Facebook to me.  It’s not the ability to look at abused animals, or sad situations. Rather the ability to find old friends and simply see what they are up to and where life has taken them. 

Call or message an old friend and just say hi.

Baby Apparatuses.

I feel bad for new parents these days.  In my opinion often, life is all about marketing.  I have raised three of my own kids.  But, now when I walk into a baby department, I get overwhelmed and confused. What are these contraptions that are baby and nursery must have’s? 

My kids had a baby swing.  If I recall, it would swing for about 20 minutes.  You twisted the crank until it was tight and you were off.  Baby swings these days. (That sentence reminds me of my advancing age.) You have to plug them in. You have choices, a lot of choices.  They swing front to back.  They go in circles.  They go side to side.  They have lights on them.  They have songs on them. When does the child get to sleep in them.  That’s what I used mine for.

The crank wasn’t an inconvenience.  After my first child, he was in charge of winding it up for the others.  So technically it was a developmental tool for the older siblings. 

The swing is just one small example of the apparatus that seems to be necessary items to have when you have a baby.  Sure, many of them are great new assets to make life easier for the parent’s and something that will make life easier.  There are so many things to choose from.  Activity mats.  In my mind an activity mat is a blanket with toys thrown on it. 

Here’s the thing though.  Babies grow so fast.  These must haves are used only a couple or few months in many cases.  Then they are stored for the next baby or put out in neighborhood yard sales, taken to Goodwill or a consignment shop.  I think that is all great.  I have personally gotten baby apparatus from consignment shops and definitely yard sales in my neighborhood.  In our family, many of these things just get passed around as needed.

Where do parents even keep these things?  You almost certainly either need to be a pro at organization, or you have to have a room for the “stuff”. 

I actually, do have a nursery set up in my house.  That was because my oldest granddaughter would stay over starting at about 4 months.  I also watch combinations of grandkids, so a crib made sense.  Having said that I got it on sale for a very good price.  There is a little scratch in it too which got me another discount.  That’s also why it made sense. 

Back to the baby stuff.  I am a firm believer that babies grow too, too fast.  I will never miss a chance to hold my grandbabies.  I will not miss a chance to sit on the floor and play with them.  They are allowed to make a mess on the table with paints and glitter and glue.  It can all be cleaned up. 

Last weekend, my 6-year-old granddaughter informed me that I don’t have any “6-year-old toys”.  After she said that she came upstairs with a box and markers.  She decided that she would make a car to push her brother around in.  Every time she is here we work on some kind of project. 

I think we are trained to always entertain our kids and grandkids with toys, and gadgets.  I can honestly say that I cannot remember one toy I ever owned that was ever more important than time spent with my siblings, cousins, parents, and grandparents. 

I wholeheartedly believe that marketing “things” for our newborns and our kids are robbing us of time spent hands on with our babies and grandparents.  Having said that, I do absolutely see and realize some of the things for babies are quite nice and does make life much easier.  So please don’t take away that I am anti-baby-apparatus and gadgets.  What I am saying is that everything isn’t needed for the short period of time babies would use it.

Creature of habits.

I really am a creature of habit.  I like my routine.  Especially when it comes to computers, gadgets, and phones.  I like to look at my phone and know where everything is. 

I got a new computer in October and I still am trying to get comfortable with the layout of Windows 10.

I was eligible for a new phone a while back, but tried hard not to get a new one.  My phone was having problems.  I looked at it one day and I was on military time.  I fixed it back to regular time.  The next day, I was on military time again.  A feature that I liked best was the ability to speak a text message.  I went to do that one day and I had smiley faces where the speaker prompt was.  I lost that battle.

We were going away a couple of weeks ago and I decided that I just needed to bite the bullet and get a new phone.  Everyone is always saying to get an Apple.  I walked into the store with Apple on my mind and I walked out with an order in for the new Galaxy  7S. 

I know that Apple products are incredible and there are sweet little bells and whistles with them.  It occurred to me that I don’t have any desire to learn a completely new phone. 

The phone is just now released and I got mine mailed to me on Tuesday.  I opened it yesterday, looked at it, and decided that today was as good as any day to inconvenience myself and downloading stuff and entering usernames and passwords and trying to familiarize myself with the layout of the new phone.

Last night, 6 hours later and I was still irritated over the whole thing.  I can’t find the cloud to get my pictures. I can’t remember my Gmail password.  It seems that I wrote all of my passwords down with my usernames, with that exception. 

I am supposed to be able to open it with my fingerprint.  I haven’t accomplished that yet.  However, in the grand scheme of things, I guess I’m doing ok.  I only had to call a support tech one time. I learned two things in the call.  First, I was congratulated for being a Verizon customer for 10 years to the day yesterday.  That got me nothing.  If I was still at the Verizon store when I learned that is was my 10-year anniversary, I absolutely would have left with a new car charger or something.  I would have shamed the manager into something.  I did learn that you shouldn’t charge the phone all night because it shortens the life of a battery. 

I was thinking about my old phone on my way home and was realizing all of the texts that were on it.  Texts about my mom and grandmother and trips to the hospital.  Random pictures that were texted to me.  Oh well.  Time to move on. 

For the record, I will be complaining for a few weeks about this phone. 

My mom…. Part two.

The last thing I wrote about my mom was that she was in a coma for 6 days after a stroke.

Let’s start by saying six days is a long time to watch someone in a coma and wonder if there is going to be a positive or negative ending.  It was a long, long week. 

Thursday afternoon she woke up.  The stroke affected her right side.  Her speech, her swallowing.  This terrified me.  My mom was an amputee……. An above RIGHT knee amputee.  What was this going to do to her?  A right side deficiency along with a loss of a limb on the right side sounded like a disastrous situation to me.  Was she going to be wheelchair bound?  Was she able to regain a level of strength that would allow her to use her prosthetic leg?  These were all questions that needed to be answered.

My mom proved to be quite the fighter.  She worked hard to regain the strength in her right side to the point that she could use her prosthetic leg and a walker.  She also tried to regain as much of her speech as possible.  Although, that remained to be a telltale sign of her stroke. 

Oddly, when my mom was holding any of her great-grandchildren on her lap, she could have a perfect conversation and sing, and yes she would occasionally hum to them.  It was a treat to see and hear.

When my mom had any level of discomfort or pain, or there was a lot of commotion, she couldn’t convey her thoughts.  In most cases, she would simply repeat whatever she heard last.  This, mind you, did create laughs often.  My daughter walked into her room one day and my mom was watching Pretty Woman.  As soon as she saw Meg, she repeated one of the hooker comments from the movie to Meg. 

When she returned to live with me, I do believe that she sent me on at least one scavenger hunt a day.  For example, she’d want me to wash her hair and she would be pointing to the kitchen cabinets, where the crackers were kept.  I did get pretty good.  I could normally figure out what she needed in three tries.  She was a trooper though. 

I remember the day that she moved in with me after her stroke.  I remember being on the front porch and watching the ambulance make the turn down our street.  I was in a complete panic.  I wholeheartedly knew that I was in way over my head.  I was afraid that I was making a huge mistake.  I wasn’t a caregiver. 

The reality was that I recognized that my mom and I traded roles.  I became my mom’s mom.  Wow.  I knew it happened.  I knew why it happened.  I just didn’t know when it happened.  A side note from my mom.  When I became a parent to my mom, the most important thing for me was to never allow her to feel as though I would ever belittle her or treat her like a child, or with any disrespect.  I wanted her to maintain her dignity in every possible way.

It didn’t take long for us to fall into a schedule.  It was very hard at first.  My mom was a large woman.  When she was in a nursing home they had multiple people to help her up.  In a nursing home, physical therapy happened.  They certainly don’t work on patient stamina.  At one point I tore a muscle in my arm. At the last minute, decided she couldn’t stand up and went the opposite direction than I thought she was going to go.  We all lived though.

At home, I did.  A therapist would come a few times a week and help her.  In time she could walk a fair distance with a walker to her wheelchair.  It was somewhat of a game.  When she wasn’t feeling well, she’d just walk so far and look at me and say, “Go get it.”  When she said that.  She was not taking another step.

We survived falls.  We survived accidents.  That was a leap for me.  Cleaning my mom after an accident.  It happened.  I survived.  She survived.  A few times my daughter was here with my mom and she, too, survived. 

We all got into a routine.  I had a business in my basement.  I would be down there and would hear her, sweeping the floors from her wheelchair.  She would often go to the front door and open it, and watch the outside world from her wheelchair.  We would take her out and sit on the porch with her and have lunch.  I think she was happy.

I will write more about my mom soon.

My brain is going in a lot of directions this morning in blog-land.  Let’s see where this goes.

Relationships. 

Relationships always are a work in motion.  What you put into a relationship is what you get out of it.  I have been fortunate in round two.  During my first marriage, there were always issues.  I’m not going to say that stubbornness wasn’t a downfall for both of us.  I won’t say that age and maturity weren’t factors.  There were many things that were part of my first marriage that probably influenced us negatively.  In the end, death was the thing that inevitably ended the marriage.  We both seemed to hold onto it despite everything. 

When someone dies, at least in my case, there was a process of getting rid of all of the negatives and remembering the positives.  Whatever happened, happened.  I, nor can anyone, rewrite the past. 

My second marriage is a treat.  I think that it is much easier, as I have said before.  We have life experience under our belts.  I am by no means trying to make anyone believe that I live in the perfect relationship.  I am not that naïve.  I am not trying to fool anyone, including myself.  We have issues. We all have issues.

Here’s the thing that I believe we have to realize and accept.  Every day is a new day in a relationship.  Sometimes, we have to take turns to be the forgiver versus the forgiven.  No one is always going to be right always.  Just like no one is going to be wrong.  There are always going to be outside stresses.  It’s impossible not to have this happen.  Sometimes, one person over the other has to carry the relationship for extended times.

The important thing is to always know that you are loved and appreciated.  It’s imperative to remember every day that you are with someone who loves you and who is your best friend.  Even when you think you are way on opposite ends, that is the person that you are with is who you always want in your corner.  This is the person who knows you best and loves you unconditionally.

There are always going to be rough spots.  There are always going to be days that you have to forgive extra.  Days that you have to work to remember why you love this person.  Days that you need to look past the negativity, realizing it is just a rough spot. 

There are many, many musicians and song writers who make their living with love songs.  I personally like listening to love songs.  For me, they are a pleasant reminder of what is important in my life.  My husband, my kids, my family and friends.  These are the people in my life who I hold dearly in my heart and love unconditionally.  Sometimes, it’s not easy. 

I am opinionated.  When I think I see something wrong, I want to fix it.  I have to respect that not everyone wants me to share my thoughts and opinions with what I see as logical. 

What I guess I want to say is that even when life gets tough, it is a true blessing to know that you have someone in your corner to count on.  Someone who loves you. Someone who is part of you.  Someone who as Barbra Streisand and Blake Shelton sing, I’d Want it to be You.  Someone you can count on every minute of every day.

So let’s all try to put our poison pens and sharp tongues aside and appreciate the love that we have.  Let’s all realize that no one is more or less perfect than anyone else.  Fairy tales aren’t real, but happiness doesn’t have to be a fairytale.  Happiness can just be knowing that you are with your best friend.  A person that makes you accountable for whatever.  A person who will travel to the end of the rainbow with you because they know that you are partners and you are better as a team than you are apart.

So, be happy.  Be patient.  Reflect on the positives.  Simply, love and appreciate each other.

We all know that kids are sponges.  I find the 4 different personalities of my grandkids.  I have 3 granddaughters and 1 grandson.  6, 2 ½ and 9 months old.  My grandson is 14 months old.

On the surface there are obvious traits between all of them.  One amazing thing to me is the innate ability for Jack to see a ball and immediately throw it.  When he picks up a car or truck he knows that he is to immediately roll it and make engine noises.  The girls seem to be more nurturing for the most part.

The amazing thing to me is how I see my kids so vividly in my grandkids.  For example, Lily (6) is a mini Megan (my daughter).  Caroline looks like her dad, but about 10 times a day when she is with me, I observe my oldest son Chris.  Jack is extremely laid back, just as his dad was and is.  Maisie, the baby, the verdict is still out on.  She is crawling and standing now.  Give her a month and I’m sure I will see the inherent traits from the previous generation. 

Lily and Jack…….

I have been out of town and yesterday, for a while I had Jack and Lily.  Lily informed me that I need to go buy some big girl toys.  There seems to be nothing for her to do here. 

I take great pride in entertaining these grandkids of mine.  I have everything they need when they stay.  Apparently, I need to update my stash of toys though.  I told Lily that I would give her a tub to take home and she could thin her own toys out and bring some to my house.  She didn’t disagree.  She didn’t seem too on board either though.

We were able to manage without age appropriate toys.  We hid an apple and played hot and cold to find it.  We made chicken for dinner.  She made a cheesecake for her dad.  We made a candle (with granulated wax) for her mom.  She managed to survive the day!

Jack did his ordinary play.  He managed to open and close a screen door about 50 times.  He felt pretty accomplished with that.  He got upset when he climbed into the stove drawer and couldn’t close it while he was in it.  He also got a stack of cups and knocked them around.

At the end of the day.  They were happy with a trip to Dairy Queen for Lily on the way home.  Jack sleeps as soon as you snug him in a car seat.  

When we got them home, Lily showed her parent’s her gifts to them.  When Jack woke up, he refused to be held by either his mom or dad.  He clearly is a Teetah’s (me) boy.  Just like Lily and Caroline.  They would cry upon leaving me. 

We had to play a few rounds of hide and seek for him so that he could be distracted.  He, Lily and his dad were playing with a series of little balls. 

Caroline and Maisie…….

Caroline is extremely bright and strong-willed.  While I was out of town, Megan had one of our cars.  She told me that at one point, Caroline decided that she was going to bring it back to my house.  Megan had to suggest that she eat dinner and rest before she made the drive out.  That apparently worked. 

She, Caroline, also told her mom that I told her that wine was yummy.  After, I thought about where that would have come from, it occurred to me that I have little, throw away wine glasses and I gave her ice water (she doesn’t like to drink water) in it and told her it was a fancy, yummy drink.  Oops.

Maisie is busy making the stride from crawling to standing and soon walking.  Caroline skipped the crawling phase.  I think Maisie is going to keep it short.  She seems to want to stand.  It won't be long before she's on the run.

Here’s my point to all of this.  Grandkids are great.  I love spending time with them.  I am grateful that I am a young grandparent.  It takes a lot of energy.  I am able to revisit my kid’s childhoods through the grandkids.  I am able to spend the time that I didn’t have to spend with my own kids.   I get to see Tim (Timpa) with them.  Since I never saw Tim with his own kids or my own young kids, it’s nice to see how he maneuvers and interacts with them.

Boys and girls naturally have instincts of their own sex.  Boys= noise, trucks, balls.  Girls=dolls, pretend kitchens, etc.  Now don’t blast me and say boys can play with dolls and kitchens and girls can play with ball, and trucks.  I know that and encourage it.  My observation was with very young kids and their tendencies. 

At the end of the day.  I don’t believe that it’s about the toys.  It is all about making the kids feel that they are the most important part of your’ day.  Spending time with them and hoping they learn a trick or two along the way.  And regarding Lily, realizing that she is not a little child anymore.  She’s a big girl who needs big girl toys.

Side note.  I did find her dad’s and uncle’s Play Station 2 and hooked it up for her!

If you don’t like stress and unhappy people, don’t hang out in an airport.  Most everyone is in a hurry.  Most everyone has to hurry up and wait.  It’s just the nature of the beast.  

First of all, the scales kill me for bags.  We had a checked bag.  It started out 3 pounds over.  I’m not sure how this works.  I am always over going home.  Here’s why it doesn’t make sense for me.  I send some of our clothes home via mail.  I started this a few years ago.  I either get to where we are going and realized I packed way too many things, so I just mail them home.  Or, I mail our dirty clothes home. 

It never fails.  How can I possibly send boxes of clothes home, not buy a thing and end up over?  We are used to it now and we know the key things to take out to get us at the allowed weight.  Problem solved.  I don’t understand how it consistently happens, but we fix it and move on with the day. 

Last night I flew home from Vegas.  We got to the airport early.  We went into a restaurant to relax before our flight.  It was a red eye, so we knew it was going to be a long night for us.  There was a couple sitting in the restaurant beside us.  The man went to the bathroom and when he came back he was irritated. It seemed that he was called an inappropriate name in the bathroom.  His wife asked what he did and he said that he walked in the handicap stall.  Apparently, someone didn’t like that he wasn’t handicapped and used that stall.

Here’s what I know.  I always use the handicap bathroom in airports.  It’s the only way you can drag your bags with you and fit into a stall.  If you have a carry on and a purse and try to go into a regular bathroom, your’ legs better be 5 feet long. There is straddling involved.  I doubt that this guy and I are the only two people in the world who does that. 

Truth be told……. I have also used the family bathroom for the same reason.

My biggest pet peeve in an airport is loading the plane.  Think back to grade school field trips that required a school bus.  We were always instructed to fill the bus from back to front.  It was time productive. 

An airplane is the equivalence to a school bus.  It is a big thing that moves you from one place to another.  But with a plane normally you have a lot of extra stuff to load.  But instead of the loading zones make sense and begin in the back of the plane, there is no rhyme nor reason to how the zones are set up.  There is no order to the process.  People are standing and waiting, eyeballing their seat rows, while people are loading their things in the overhead compartments. 

It makes no sense to me at all.  Why can school teachers realize the intelligence of an orderly loading process, but computers or other intelligent people haven’t visited that as a more logical way to load a plane?

I’m in Vegas.  Tim had some meetings here. I get to go to sit by a pool for a few days.

They say what’s in Vegas stays in Vegas.  This is not going to stay in Vegas.  I'm going to share a story.  I spent my day yesterday by the pool.  It was a beautiful day to spend the day at the pool.  I love sunshine. 

I am perfectly fine striking up a conversation with people that I don’t know.  I do it all of the time.  I can sit and chat with anyone.  Not ever a big deal.  So some older man, who was probably in his late 70’s decides to strike up a conversation with me and the two people beside me.  I assume he thought we were together. 

He asked the typical stuff, where are you from?  What brings us to Vegas?  He chatted about playing football in the “olden days”. The conversation went onto discuss the Steelers, and southern Florida.  He tried to chat about my zodiac sign.  He told me first that he lived in southern Florida.  Three minutes later, he said that he lived in San Diego.  Maybe he just wasn’t sure. 

 He was hoping apparently that I had a “lucky sign”.  I don’t pay attention to zodiac stuff, so that didn’t go too far. He told me first that he lived in southern Florida.  Three minutes later, he said that he lived in San Diego.  Maybe he just wasn’t sure.   

 He was a nice guy.  After about 15 minutes, he seemed to get to a point of comfortableness.  He asked me if I was interested in going and watching him play some kind of gambling game.  He assured me that I would be his good luck charm. 

I told him that I was very satisfied sitting in my spot in the sunshine.  He asked me what he was supposed to do for luck.  I quickly said that I heard someone say that they rubbed the butt of a horse statue and they had great success.  He looked at me and again suggested me being his good luck charm.  I again suggested he rub the horse’s butt for luck.

The nice old man gave me some nice conversation. So all was good.  What occurred to me was the wide cast of characters that surrounded me.  Some people were extremely fake from their eye brows down.  Others just there to hang out and enjoy the sun.  That was at the pool.

If you have never been in a casino in Vegas, take a GPS.  They are nuts.  You walk around and everything looks the same.  Slot machines by the hundreds.  They all look the same.  The last time I was in Vegas, I literally watched a couple put entire shifts in everyday at slot machines.  Same couple, same two slot machines.  I cannot wrap my head around this.  What could possibly possess adults to sit and push buttons for hours? 

People ask me if I gamble.  No. No. No. I don’t ever gamble.  I go for the sun and this time I went to a Celine Dion concert.  It was my first concert ever.  I thoroughly enjoyed it. 

Tim was done with his work meetings today, and asked me if I wanted to go to another show.  Nothing really caught my interest, so we walked around for a while.  The cast of characters was more impressive on the street than it was in my little world at the pool.