Why winter is bad...

biscuits...

Well, I guess to be more accurate - COLD is the problem, but that leads to biscuits.  Trust me.

Let me elaborate.

As it has been for many - this 2013/ 2014 winter has been filled with snow, ice & cold.  I do my best, like many, to gamely ignore my creaking joints and keep spirits up through arthritic aches.

But, I get cold.  Miserably cold.  I know this is, in essence, a first world problem.  I am deeply grateful that I have first world solutions for my cold too...

About twice a winter we go to an indoor heated pool to steam out our bodies... but that is not where the biscuits come in.  So here is how that happens:

While on the Emergency Back-Up French Toast Supply Snow Storm Grocery Run (Yes, I know that is a long name - like a bad fantasy novel gnome), I see canned biscuits.

"Gee.  I should get a can of those.  We can do them on the wood burning stove if we loose power.  Especially if I get Smoky Links to go with them." [Naturally this conversation is usually internal... usually.] And so a can of biscuits ends up in my fridge.

This in and of itself is "bad enough", because usually we do not ever actually need those biscuits, so they sit in my fridge until they explode or we fry them up into doughnuts one weekend.  But this is not the depth of Bad that biscuits has brought me to...

We are on the 4th "snowed in" event (in 2 months) this day.  The fire is cranking, I made spaghetti to try to warm up the house. Not sufficient.  Baking warms things up.

Ah... the can of biscuits.

What would I eat with a warm biscuit?  Clearly I must melt some butter.  Honey is an especially good pairing with fresh hot biscuits.  Honey butter?  That's not outside the realm of possible.  Jelly?  Oh, but jelly IS good on biscuits!

What does my fridge & cabinets have to offer today?

I found the can of biscuits. Good.  They are in the oven.

I found the butter.  There is an open 1/2 a stick.  I'll use that.  I really should lay low on the butter.

I found the last jar of jelly.  REALLY?!? We are down to a last jar?! That is practically unheard of.  I must have cleaned out the fridge too well last time.  Oh, despair!  The jar is nearly empty...  There's a just hardly one spoonful...

There is honey in the cabinet.  A Cranberry Honey we found from a local market last year.  I'll just pour some of that in the butter and get that started in the microwave...

The juice is on the table as I turn away from the microwave.  We have worked very hard to have Healthy Juice - we buy cases of V8 Fusion - specifically the Cranberry-Blackberry actually.

Hmm... Cranberry AND Blackberry.  That honey was cranberry flavor... we ONLY have blackberry jelly at our house... I wonder if I can put that spoonful of jelly in the honey butter too?...  It melts, right?

So I add the jelly to the hot honey butter and it all makes this just beautiful sauce like stuff that tastes pretty darn fabulous.  As a matter of fact, it tastes so fabulous that I think I will get a not quite done biscuit out right now and test my sauce...

And so it is that I ate gooey half-baked biscuits in honey-jelly-butter in order to get warm.

And that is just bad.

In an incredibly awesome way!  I have to say that I was warm enough after 4 biscuits to actually offer some to my husband...

WINTER MUST END.

a weeked with my husband...

So the truth is that my husband and I do not really have "domestic" bliss... in fact we are both wretched house keepers. We actually come from long lines of hoarders (mine are even more honorable than his) and tasks tend to get left until someone looks at them and thinks "ACK! well I guess no one else is gonna do this"

Our relationship is built on shared experiences, not really shared space...

So when my 1st weekend OFF in 4 months arrived, we started discussing what to do with our day.  Naturally, there is LOTS to do around the house, and we just need to do it... but instead we decided to "adventurate" (this is the verb we have invented for our family "adventure therapy" excursions).

Let's just drive, sweetheart...
OK. I have not been to Western Maryland, like Cumberland. Let's go there.
OK, sounds good.  So should we take stuff? I mean the worst case scenario is that we drive so far we decide to stay...
No, the worst that can happen is that we die in a fiery car crash.
(!!! what? - this from the man who has berated me for YEARS for being overly negative)
Um, well, I wasn't gonna go that far, hon.  I was just thinking we should pack sleeping bags and clothes in case we decide to camp or something...
Oh, yeah, that's a good idea.

So we found a change of clothes, and our sleeping bags, even remembered dog food, and got in the truck to go...

First we got a car wash, then we stopped by the Chocolate Bar, but it wasn't open yet (10:30 am), so we went across the shopping center to the organic store and got chips made from hummus and pinto beans.  We went up to I-70, and headed West.  Then this sign said "take I-68 to Ohio and points west", so we took I-68.   I sang along to the radio at the top of my lungs.  My husband tried to find a map, eventually found one on his phone that said I-68 doesn't really go to Ohio.  We tried to decided if we had ever been on this road before, worked through some old memories, decided that we must have been here once, but we had no memory of it.  

And then we got hungry.  As approached Cumberland, MD, we saw a sign for "The Crabby Pig" - BBQ and crabs - we are IN!  So we got off the interstate - and proceeded to be totally lost.  It was apparently the wrong exit.  We found the hospital, and then we found "town", and we saw a walking mall type area, and we crossed lots of RR tracks, and finally my husband's GPS put us back on the freeway on a one way entrance, and then took us off at the next exit in this convoluted tangle of ramps. And the restaurant was at the end of the ramp - but parking was not.  For those of you who live in Autism households, you can imagine the level of anxiety and snappiness that is building in our vehicle...  My husband is on the edge of flipping out...  I found an empty gravel lot pretty quick and parked there (even though it was totally unmarked and under an overpass), and we went to eat.

Turns out the Q was AWESOME, and hubby enjoyed his fish.  Dog enjoyed our bones and shells. And every waitress in the place keeps stepping outside and staring at something beyond the building... Finally our waitress tells us there is a concert tonight on the waterfront.  Apparently the guy is good, has even worked with Martina McBride.  And the concert is free.  We decided that our joints would enjoy being out of the car, so we will see...

We walked a tad along the canal (C&O) walk, found the Western Maryland Railroad Station (a part of a national park there - that is also the start of the a biking/ hiking trail that goes from Cumberland to Harper's Ferry). There is TONS of cool stuff to do there, and we talked about bringing the kids back, or bringing the scout groups there.  We found some lollygag spots, and appreciated them.  After a bit, we finally negotiated to go to that walking mall we had seen.

With no directions except the signs on the road to guide us (and the zillion flyers he picked up at the national park), we walked downtown Cumberland.  Turns out the town is very interesting.  We found the walking area, and the buildings are incredible.  Clearly old RR money, lots of desperately intricate 19th century efforts of Conspicuous Consumption mixed with some early 20th century attempts at modernity.  They are trying to revive and use these spaces for thriving art community.  All the little empty spaces between building and on corners are "parklets", with fountains and benches and greenery.  So cute!  We found one of the top ten yarn shops in the nation! It was COOL.  I need to go back and take classes (already plotting how I can do that).  Found a woodworker who makes wooden mushrooms with secret compartments - each one one-of-a-kind and named.  When you purchase one, you get to choose a name for the next one.  We got Iris for our daughter, and named Leilani for someone else's treasure.  We finally decided to stay in town and try that concert, so we walked to a hotel that the brochure said would take dogs, and got their last room.  I've never had a dog on the 6th floor before.

We moved the truck to the hotel, and then played on our computers a little (free WiFi!), and then decided to go get food.  We found a "grill" on that walking mall, and their drink special: hurricanes!!  So we had a few.  This is the first outing in which neither of us have needed to drive since college.  The dinner was delicious.  Hurricanes make my husband happy, and we laughed a lot, just got giggly.  I was even able to accept his admonishment that I was getting loud gracefully (because I have finally accepted that I AM loud, and that not everyone is OK with it).  We finally got to the concert.  The guy was good, and they had chairs out, enough for everyone.  And after the first set (that we saw) my husband fell asleep on me.  SO we went back to the hotel, where I tried to initiate a conversation while he watched football - but apparently I started snoring between sentences.

The next morning we had no headaches (yeah!) and found Roy Rogers.  I absolutely love the Chorizo Burrito - it was Perfect! and then we drove around the city for 30 minutes trying to find the on ramp.  We finally found the interstate, and went 2 exits.  The waitress had also suggested that we check out Rocky Gap State Park (and casino).  The park is absolutely fabulous, again we plotted coming back with the kids or a scout group.  We walked thru the casino and ate on their veranda.

I was seriously considering renting a canoe or a paddle board.  My husband looked at me and said, "You are so beautiful here, around the water.  It is truly your element."  

After some soup, we decided to explore the rest of the lake.  We drove every road we could find, followed signs to lookouts and pavilions and amphitheaters.  We finally found the camp ground, and it has an aviary!  we left no nook undiscovered!  We looked inside the yurt and the cabins, drove by every campsite (all 200), checked out the beach, found a fresh water oyster shell, saw skunk and bird tracks, watched minnows, saw a water bird hunting the shoreline, watched the dog drink from the clear lake, heard the wedding across the lake, checked out the nature center (got lots of good ideas!), met other dogs...

And then we decided to turn the other way in the road out, not towards the interstate.  Within 2 minutes we were in PA.  Hmmm... so we kept driving, knowing that eventually we'd hit something... but it seemed it might be a long time... and then a man on a bicycle was approaching, so we slowed down and ... spoke to a stranger (I'm sure you are aghast... I talk to strangers all the time, but Lord forbid my Aspie husband ask for directions!)  After all, the guy was in Sunday Khakis and a button down shirt (oohhhhh, dangerous)... 

Sir, we are lost.  Could you tell us where this road goes?
Well it eventually hits E______.  Where are you headed?
We live in Virginia, but we are up for some adventure...
Well, down in the middle of the cove you will see a white church.  If you turn right there it will take you Flintstone and the interstate.
Thank you so much, have a great day!

My husband then checked his GPS to be sure the complete stranger did not mislead us... we joked about roving bands of mountain men, and his ridiculous lack of faith in good country people... and we found the interstate.  And even adventured on the Historic National Road, until it merged with the interstate.

We stopped at Sideling Hill to see a geological wonder (old rocks when they dynomighted out the interstate)  It looks like the hill is glowering on the freeway.

We then went to West Virginia and checked out Capapon State Park.

We drove every inch of road in that park (well, except for the section to the golf club house), and checked out the cabins and shelters, and playgrounds, and... well, everything.  It was started by the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) in he late 30's, but WWII started before it was finished.  So we found a road that went to the summit of the park - 4 states are visible on clear days.  It a rather rough gravel road, so kinda slow going.  So slow that a squirrel tried to stop us.  He just sat in the middle of the road, staring us down... the truck passed right over him and he darted out between the tires!   Goob!

We then came home and washed some dishes, started some laundry, and did made a token effort towards domestic bliss...

We really are excellent procrastinators!

Renewing my Vows

ok - so there is a cute side to this story:  We knew it was our 15th anniversary this year, so In January as we looked at the Annual Calendar (yes, I plan that far ahead), we started looking through our wedding pictures.  My young (6 yo) daughter says:

Where am I?

Well, honey, you weren't born yet. You aren't in these pictures.

But I am part of this family!!! I should be in these pictures!!

So, we talked about it, and decided that renewing our vows would not only be an economical way to celebrate 15 years, it would also be let her be in our wedding pictures.

We set a date near our actual anniversary, and we decided to keep it low key, we worked that day, we put it in a Facebook event without actual invitations, talked to some people about it, and just went about our year.  We decided that THIS time, we would write our own vows (no officiant = less cost) - I kinda challenged him to do that the first time, but he declined, so I was proud to see him agree  to that.

Life went on.  I thought long and hard about what I wanted and needed to say to him.  I spent most of the year really happy & content with where we are as a couple, as friends - a place I really have not been before very often.  I wrote soliloquies in my head, Great Odes to love and to my husband and to our history... and knew they were just too much to say.  The week of the ceremony, I FINALLY started writing all these ideas down, to condense them into something that was hearable... 

Here's some of the things I came up with:

1) A mother puts up with the man because she loves the boy.  A wife puts up with the boyishness because she loves the man.  This has been poignant this year as my mother-in-law ails.  She now calls our son by my husband's name.  And I have watched my son grow a lot this year.  He has ASTOUNDED us with his understanding of people and human dynamics.  He is approaching puberty and I need to prepare myself...  I compared the way in which I love my son to the way I look at my husband, and tried to see how my mother-in-law sees my husband...  and I came up with this Truth.  I did NOT mention it in my vows BTW.

2) My son said to me out of the blue on a car ride this spring, "Don't worry Mom, your secret is safe with me."  Oh Crap, I think.  What the heck have I done that is so bad?!  "Um, what secret is that, honey?"  "That you and Daddy fight."  That's it?!  Thank goodness...
"Sweetheart - it is no secret that your daddy & I fight.  ALL people disagree and misunderstand each other.  The point is not that we should never fight, it's that we say we are sorry, that we forgive each other, and we try to fix when we hurt each other."  It became important to me to acknowledge that we HAVE struggled to keep this relationship, to build it through time - it HAS been a LONG hard road, with a good share of doubters.  I wanted to be sure that whatever I said in my vows acknowledged that LOVE is a VERB, and we have to actively choose it.  What I wanted to say was:
"There were times I couldn't help but love you, and there were times that I wanted to love you, and there were times I wished I loved you, and there were times I decided to love you... but through any of it - I always LOVED you.  I am looking forward to seeing how I will love you in the future."  But then I thought about how the ending could be taken to be sexually suggestive, so I decided it might be a little too irreverent to say all that...

4) I started retelling all our stories, our history, to coworkers & family, to myself.  The time we met, the prolonged unromantic story of our engagement, the years it took me to forgive him for thoughtless words spoken when he first met my family, the time I told him he HAD to go on a vacation away from me, the times I felt judged by him, the time he walked across DC on 9/11 to find me, the winter before the kids that was dark and suicidal for me, my journey to redefining intuition and God, the times he pushed me, the times he carried me, the times I pushed back, the times I asked too much, the times we forgave each other for being too young...  I realized:

It takes a lot of woman to love a man like him.  And it takes a LOT of man to love a woman like me.

So that is what I told him.

I said other stuff too. I don't actually remember the exact words, but it made him tear up (the only time I have seen him do so) - so I am grateful that the Holy Spirit gave me the words he needed to hear!

Here's what I didn't tell him (well not until 2 weeks later - 'cuz I can't keep secrets to SAVE MY LIFE)

The inside of our rings are engraved with the words we used to sign our letters to each other during our 3 years of distance relationship.  He always signed his letters, "Love Always" - so that is what my ring says.  I always signed his letters, "Yours Alone" - so that is what his says.  As I thought about what to say, I thought about those rings, those words - and I couldn't bring myself to repeat them in the ceremony, because I haven't lived up to them.

Not because I have EVER given my body to another!  The truth is that he is and has always been the only man who's touch has not disgusted or frightened me.  I am a touchy-feely person, but the sexual touch is totally different!  I hug, but I cannot bring myself to kiss another person.

Did I share my heart?  Yes, and no.  Not that I gave my heart to another man, but that I continue to ALWAYS give my heart to my students, my coworkers, my friends, my family.  It has been a point of argument for us MANY times, because he feels my loyalty to others trumps my loyalty to him.  We both work TOO HARD, and spend way to much time on work.  As kids came, and there were even more pulls on my time (and his), and this became clearer, and easier to handle because we both saw that we NEEDED to share that loyalty and love.  

There was a time in the not distant past that I said to him, "I am a mother first, an instrument of God's will second, and your wife when and if I have time."  I finally reached a point that I felt his demands on me compromised my ability to teach, to make a difference in the world around me.  I decided that I had heard the Call, that I was being directed to move down a particular work path, that the Kids needed to see "mom's work" as a sibling and be prepared to share me with my commitments to others.  Not only would I be doing what I was Divinely Made To Do, but they would learn a good work ethic.

This issue with saying "yours alone" was not that I had given me to someone besides him - it is that I realized I had RECLAIMED part of myself FOR ME!  And I was not gonna be giving that back!  I am NOT "his alone", because I am mine too.

At first I felt I had violated my promises, but then thought about that "it takes lots of man" thing - I am a VERY VERY intense person.  He does not deserve to be saddled with all that intensity all the time.  Even I have trouble living with my intensity all the time!  And I did tell him all this just last night, because he deserves to know that I am True to him while I am True to me too.  I will continue to love him and honor our life together - as it was meant to be.  We teach each other.  And I will continue to love others too.  'Cuz that is what God made me to do.  I have to.

Lost Him... again...

So we lost our son... for a little while... again...
NOT like "he was dead"!!!! Hopefully that won't happen [... again]!

No, I mean that we... misplaced... him... in a snow storm...

Here's the scoop:

Lots of media coverage, BIG storm coming, LOTS of snow.  Facebook posts by local friends are all talking about Al Roker sightings around town.  We are at the "epicenter"... awesome.

Snow starts late at night, wake up the next morning and it's still coming, easily have a foot...
Husband/ Daddy gamely goes outside to shovel out the heating unit, and even let me sleep in...
I wake to hear sister crying in frustration because she cannot find her rain boots... I am guessing she wants to go "help" Daddy, so I urge her to look harder...
Daddy shovels a place for the dog as well as the heater, and comes back in for a warm shower.  Daughter is putting on boots...
Power flickers...
"Quick!, everybody pee! Before we lose power!" [We are on a well]
I call Son...
no response...
Daddy has jumped in shower, daughter has peed...
"Where is Son?"...
Daughter: "Outside"
"WHAT!?" Daddy & I , simultaneously...
I rush to find boots, Daddy rushes to get out of shower, I put my head out the door and call name...
no response...
I get myself outside, I call his name again. I see tracks leading to Dog's Spot and to the truck.  What did Daddy need out of the truck?
The truck door opens...

Son is in truck! "WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?  Come in here!"
"In a minute.  I am looking for something"...
!?!?! within a minute there is an inch of snow piled IN my truck where he's left the door open!  AAGGG!!!
Sludge thru snow...
"What!?  What are you looking for? Why don't you come in?"
"I have lost my shoe"
!?!?! dude! THERE IS SNOW IN MY TRUCK!!!!
"Get on my shoulders. I am done"
I sludge back to the house in 14 inches of snow with 60 lb boy slipping off my back...

20 minutes later: "Here's my Star Wars Lego robot!"

24 hours later: Daddy found the shoe in the 20 inches of snow next to the truck...

Remember that commercial for plastics that said, "It will be a miracle is he lives til..."
Plastic is NOT gonna fix this, man...

Good kids

some days, I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO frustrated....

and some days I remember to just watch and be AMAZED....

I have Good Kids!

Like yesterday:

We had brunch at Panera - we were commuting home from Maryland to Virginia and after getting stuck in city traffic we HAD to eat, so we went to Panera.  My kids polished off 5 meals with me...1 bowl of soup, 3 cups of soup, 2 sandwiches, 1 salad and 1 quiche.  This particular Panera was near a Big Mall and a County Government Center - they were the ONLY children in the restaurant (home schooling seems to be less prevelant in these uber urban areas - I guess they get the services they need/ want), and while there was some "contact sport" involved in the salad eating, sandwiches are supposed to have fingers, and the use of spoon was superior!  As I sat surrounded by urban professionals and uptown moms, I was very proud of my children comporting themselves approriately and decoriously.  You know, we ARE pretty cool...

Later that evening, after Girl Scout meeting, as we completed our "eternal hang out at the library" day, I momentarily misplaced my son, and found him in the bathroom, with poop all over his hands and the toilet.  He has developed some.... unorthodox.... methods for coping with constipation mechanically.  Naturally I found the librarian and asked for extra paper towels and sanitary wipes.  Thankfully it was near the end of the library's operating day and I did not have a big audience to deal with this just fabulous activity.  The library staff was nicely appreciative.  You know, we ARE pretty gross...

Once again, I am reminded that ALL lives are an amazing combination of Tradgedy and Triumph, of Greatness and Horrificness... the ups come with the downs and the downs come with the ups...

The lesson seems to be: Ride the waves, man...  Just BE where you are, 'cuz you're gonna be someplace else soon. 

It also is that everything takes 5 times longer than you think it should....suck it up.

Sometimes I am am so proud of all we are, as a family...

And sometimes I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO frustrated...

Lost tooth #3

We lost a tooth his week!

And, as usual, it was not just an event, but a Happening!

The tooth has been lose for nearly a week, he has been telling me daily about it, showing me the great wiggliness periodically through out each day.  And every day he has asked me for a pair of tweezers...
"What do you need tweezers for, hon?"
"To grab my tooth. It needs to come out."
"Hmmm, I am not sure that is the best way to get it out."
(voice escalating, body tightening, meltdown starting) "But it HAS to come out!!!!"

So I would get a pair of tweezers and "try" to get a hold of it, but it didn't come out.

"Sweetheart, it will come out when it is ready.  If it still hurts when I pull it is not ready to come out yet. Just wait."

And he would (as long as I had tried to pull it).

The sensory piece of dealing with the lose tooth is clearly overwhelming, and this is our third!  He has not eaten as much this week, he has been chewing more this week - constantly with a ball of a drinking straw (our redirection of choice) moving around his mouth.  All the shirts this week have had a faint blood stain on the collar from chewing & pulling.  Clearly if he is asking daily, it is bothering him.  And, ultimately he did pretty well.  He really DID practice some patience (in context for him).

And sure enough, when I needed to take him to a friend for the day (while I worked), she suggested that he eat an apple (which is a damn good idea, I might add, and I feel rather like a dufus for not suggesting it myself), and within half an hour I get a text that the tooth was out.  He was, of course, prepared for this event since we had sent a snack sized ziploc bag in his pocket to bring it home in if it came out.  He put the bag in his back pack to come home, just like he should.  With all that angst, all went perfectly.

And you think the story ends there... (picture my smirk)

But, no, alas, in true Big Dragon Mama style, the story gets complicated from there...

I went to pick them up, and I riffled through the backpack, checking for all our belongings, while talking of course, so I halfway went through the list, we had our workbooks, and our chewing straws, and the toys we brought, so we left. 

We went to Kmart, because I still wanted to see about acquisitioning a prize from the tooth fairy.  Our tooth fairy refrains from money usually since the first tooth brought forward a strange truth.  When he lost his first tooth, I was apprehensive, because I had NOT front loaded thoroughly, I had NOT had (or taken) the time to talk about tooth fairy or no tooth fairy, or dentist or ANYTHING.  He just came home from school with a tooth in a bag.  Soooo, knowing there would be some Asperger's sensitivities here about procedure, I asked...
"I see you have lost your tooth.  What is supposed to happen to it?"
"Oh, you put it under your pillow.'
"Why would you do that?"
"That is where the Tooth Fairy finds it, Mom" (duh)
"Hmm, and then what? Does it stay there?"
"No, Mom!  She comes and gets it."
"And is that it?"
"No, Mom!  she leaves you money."
HERE COMES MY ERROR:
"Oh, how much money does she leave?"
"Fifteen dollars and fifteen cents."
MENTAL NOTE:  WTF!!!!!!!!! - I waited a few moments to catch my breath. How the HELL was I gonna get out of this?!  We all know that the level of detail is not to be argued with an Aspie - I would have to find $15.15 that night! Time for a NEW tactic...
"Umm, does she only leave money?"
"Oh no, sometimes she leaves prizes."
"Oh, that is nice." [THANK GOD]
So we went to Kmart to get a prize.  And I found a Lego moon rover on clearance, so I snuck it in (he was VERY distracted by the Star Wars sticker book).  I had told him he couldn't have Legos yet (til he learns to put away). So I hoped it would be cool and throw him off track. And we went home.

But when we got there and emptied the backpack, we did NOT find the tooth.  I called the sitter/ friend. Do you see it? No, I saw him put it in his pocket. I checked his pants, did it fall out in your couch?  No, I am checking the couch now, but I do not see it.  Has any of your family run across it today? No, we have not seen it.  Just leave him a note from the tooth fairy saying that if he finds it later mom will keep it as a souvenir.  Ok, we will do something.

I put the kids in the bath and went about tooth-fairy-ing.  I wrote a note with my left hand:
Dear Son,
I know you lost a tooth today, and that you cannot find it.  I will send my fairy helpers to go look for it, but here is a prize anyhow for all the hard work you did to lose that tooth. Good Job! Great Patience!
Love, The Tooth Fairy
I wrapped the note around the Legos and put it under the pillow - on his bed.

After the shower, he got in my bed.  I asked him what he was going to do about the tooth fairy.  He said he didn't know, so I suggested he write her a note.

AND HE DID!!!! Here's the AWESOME PART!!!: my fine-motor reluctant Aspie, who argues with me for half an hour to complete 7 words on a workbook page WROTE THE TOOTH FAIRY A NOTE!!!!!!  His sister gave him a Strawberry Shortcake pad and pen, and he commenced to wrote a note:
Dear T.F.
I lost my tooth.  Will you please look for it. Sincerely yours. F. M. T. Y.
He did write ON THE LINES and hyphenated when he ran out of room and had to go to the next line!! He did ask me to write "sincerely", and he told me FMTY means "from me, to you".  AND HE DREW A HEART AT THE END OF THE NOTE!!!!  

I am SOOOOOOOOOO PROUD!

He put the note in my bed. But, honey, this is not your bed, how will the tooth fairy find the note? She will look and see that I am over here. But honey, what if she thinks it's my tooth? She won't. I think you should try to put the note under the pillow in your bed [where I have already hidden the blagnabbit gift! Go find it!]  3 times he started for that room, for that bed, but he stopped himself every time and argued with me further that the note needed to be in my bed.  I got up to go to the bathroom and heard him in his room, heard something drop.  I come out of the bathroom to find the Lego and note separated and just laying in the hall.  He was so intent on not letting his note be under the pillow on that bed that he did not acknowledge what was under there, he just wanted it out.
"Honey, what is this paper? I don't want to slip on it"
"I don't know." reading... "it is a note, from the Tooth Fairy!"
"Well, what does it say?"
"I don't know. I can't read it" [remember the left hand writing?]
I read it out loud. He looks at the floor dazed.
"Did it actually have a prize with it?"
"Oh, yes! It is right here on the floor."
He picks it up, I take his precious note, put it on my shelf and sit with him.
"Where is my note?"
"From the Tooth Fairy?"
"No!, the one I wrote"
"Oh, I saved it."
"NO!, it HAS to be under a pillow"
So it went under my pillow.  And he opened his Very First Lego and put it together according to the directions. GREAT - more finger skills!

We went to bed.  He woke up the next morning and his sister asked to see his prize. He proudly showed his Lego, and re-read her the note. And said, "Yes, Fairy Helpers..."

This would be an excellent end to the story, but there is one corollary:
The friend/ sitter told me yesterday that she found the tooth, because he had come into her dream and paced the place in her house where it was and kept saying, "my tooth".  When she woke up it was exactly where he had showed her in the dream.  She calls it "dream walking".  I asked him much later in the evening if he had visited her in his sleep and helped her find the tooth [which she gave to me, but I did not tell him], and he said, "no, it was Fairy Helpers"...

Names of Roads

All roads have names.

Seems pretty straight forward, but my head just keeps repeating it.  That means there is a lesson there eluding my consciousness. So I keep repeating until the rest comes.

All roads have names.

We got lost yesterday, my husband & I.  We exited the freeway because it was jammed up, no progress, and we just headed west until we hit a road we knew.  We ended up trekking along the north side of the Potomac River: from Maryland, to West Virginia and finally back to Virginia.  It started at an area of BIG BIG houses, clearly from BIG BIG money.  Like Italian Villa big, or Country Estate big... statuary in the driveways, fountains with beautiful landscaping, 3 story homes with cottages out back, giant gates with uninviting/ privacy fences.  That changed into farm country - the real country estates.  It was clearly "horse country" - still big money.  The barns were huge and numerous, horse trails criss-crossed the road, long white or black fences, with dressage rings and jumping gates seen often.  We passed a big sign for a horse rescue farm.  Then we got into real farm country. The houses got smaller, more modest, the machinery was more evident, the signs hand painted for eggs, or veggies, or hay...

And all along there were so many interesting road names.

All roads have names...

Some of the names indicated direction.  We were on a "pike" for a while that sported the names of the towns it passed through.  We knew we were on the "main drag" because the signs showing the upcoming towns matched the name of the road we were on.  I was struck at how some roads are named for the places they connect.

All roads have names...

Some names were meant to inspire.  Especially in that area with big money, there were roads named for famous places, or for artists. They gave you an idea of what you would find there, like the lakeside estates, or still grottoes.  It was all about what was "out there" that was fabulous, whether man or nature made.  I was struck at how the some roads are named for where we want them to go.

All roads have names...

Many names indicated possession/ ownership.  Especially as we got into the old farm country, the road names started reflecting family surnames, or someone's mill or farm.  One road was named for a colored barn.  Another was named for the store at the end.  I was struck at how some roads and named for who got there first, or stayed the longest.

All roads have names...

A few roads were very clear explanations.  The names labeled how they were built or when they were built, or what purpose they served.  Petit Way and New Design Road seemed pretty clear to me.  I was struck at how some roads are named for their novelty.

All roads have names...

What is the name of MY road?


CONTINUED PONDERING: So if the road is the journey, how do we know what the journey is for? Isn't the purpose of naming the road to let you know about the journey?  So roads are named for their destinations, the stuff they pass, or the nature of the road itself.... but not all 3 of those.  

So maybe, if I am only looking at the end (whether it's where it really goes or where I want it to go) I can't really see the stuff along the road, or the road itself... and then If I am busy looking at the stuff along the road, I'm not really paying attention to where I am going, or what the road conditions are... and maybe if I am focused on the very nature of the road I will miss the stuff along it and never know if I  arrive.  
MAYBE I need to decide what I am willing to miss, not just what I am willing to look for...
MAYBE the road changes names.   Perhaps as I travel along it what I need from and for the road changes. 
MAYBE there are times in my life when I need to concentrate on where I am going, and other times when I need to look around as I travel, and other times when I need to observe the wonder of the road itself.
And MAYBE the road doesn't actually change, I do.  Or maybe, we change together...

On Weird

Several blogs have brought "weirdness" to the discussion.  I am thinking that is a bandwagon I can definitely ride, maybe even provide the rousing chorus that keeps it rolling :)

These are the odd things, the unique things, the weird things that define me... some of them are the things that lead me to believe I am Asperger's, but I have come to learn that ALL of them are the things that convince me that God made me to be ME, and no one else, so that I am equipped to fill the niche He has made for me.  I could have come to that conviction in self-defense, true, but my experience has shown me that there is a core singularity that defies my best efforts to train it differently... a weirdness that is inherent to me.

For me, definition is all about context.  Know that I come from a long and honorable line of crazy people.  My father worked 30+ years as a police officer in Los Angeles (as if THAT isn't crazy!) and I learned that law enforcement/ first responder people have a pretty crazy sense of funny.  Lots of practical jokes, lots of finding the absurd in tragedy (I think it is what allows them to compartmentalize and deal with the gross realities they see).  Things like kidnapping the station dog and dying him pink, or putting old perfume in the windshield washer jets and turning them to face out, or the gross stuff, like finding the dismembered reproductive organ of a train-pedestrian victim ready for action ("It must have been a GOOD dream").  There were LOTS of stories. But they didn't come from no where.  My dad and uncle nearly killed their uncle when they put popcaps in his cigarettes - they were lit while he was laying down, so he lost all his chest hair.

Of course he came by that naturally.  My grandmother (his mother) once ran out of gas 3 times in one day.  First she called her husband, and he brought her 1 gallon and told her to go to the gas station. She forgot, so about 20 minutes later she called her father, who brought her one gallon of gas and told her to go directly to the gas station.  She got sidetracked.  Within the next hour she called her brother.  By that time the men had spread the word and they didn't take her gas, they went and picked up the kids....  She also loved BRIGHT color.  In my father's childhood apartment she painted their basement kitchen "day-glow orange" as my father called it.  The fire department came 3 times because neighbors reported a house fire seen through the basement windows.  I was VERY worried about what she would wear to my wedding.  Her tastes were.... eclectic.  She knew I wanted her to dress "conservatively", so she went and bought a fuzzy pink suit... yes, eye-lash fabric in pale baby pink in a well tailored suit.  It was pretty horrific.  I convinced her that I did not want her to feel so repressed, so she wore a pale blue sun dress with florescent green shoes. (Feet aren't in pictures.)

And the stories about my uncle.. whooo-heee.  Looking back, it is CLEAR that he is ADHD at least.  He is VERY social, but he is very..... salty?  A living TMI, if you know what I mean. And he taught us how to cheat at cards.

My mother's family is somewhat more refined, but after my grandmother's death we found that to be more farce than reality.  My mother has her own issues.  I will not dwell on them, because I am not really at peace with them, but I can tell stories about her family! :)  Both her parents were chemists, on the Manhattan Project.  My grandmother was a chemist on the Manhattan Project.  She convinced a small town banker in Georgia to give her a personal loan for a college degree in the 1930's.   She was a pilot in the 30's and 40's.  My grandfather forced her to meet him by setting her sweater on fire in the lab.  They were well known in their circle of academics as the destination for luaus and happy hours.  And his family... we just found a genealogy record in my grandmother's stuff recording that my grandfather's father's family had been so tight-knit that they had a secret family language, and spouses were not allowed to learn it.

Clearly the oddness, the weird goes back FAAAAAAR here.  I tell you, if you want to know weird, do genealogy!  Some other highlights are that we are related to the famous "cattle rustler" Rob Roy McGregor, and to Captain John Smith of Jamestown (by marriage), and my parents are 34th cousins.  There was a man who had a wife in 3 different counties, spelled his name differently in each county, named the first born son in all three families after himself.

So, I am weird too.  I was identified "gifted" in 2nd grade (when we moved out of a Montessori school).  I was in a magnet school, with other "gifted" kids, but that did NOT make me normal by comparison!  I spent almost every recess sitting out, doing all the written work I just could NOT get done in class.  This happened right through grade school.  Middle school is tough, but for me the "weird" felt right. I was BIG into Girl Scouting (my best friend called it our "church meeting" so other kids wouldn't think she was weird).  I got into the Academic Decathlon.  That is exactly what it sounds like... TONS of studying to take a Saturday to go take 8 multiple choices tests, perform a judged speech and do a game-show-type quiz.  I thought it was AWESOME, but soon discovered that most others did not.  I loved it.  I did that right through High School. It got even un-cooler (until the other kids realized how good it looked on a college application).

Our family life was "weird".  My dad worked the graveyard shift most of his life.  He slept all day while we were at school (we had to play outside quietly after-school), and we all had dinner together at 8:30 pm.  My friends in high school were appalled that I had to be home for an 8:30 dinner... but eventually they all just started joining us for dinner, so it must have been a "good weird".  The sitting all together, the having a blessing, the discussing world history, the raucous jokes (usually at my expense since I was the blonde - that is my prescribed role in the play, with the knowledge that I was a Master rope splicer in the regional Girl Scout competition and had a 4.0+ GPA.  You know, I was gullible - too literal - and they apparently thought it was amusing to watch me turn colors when I got worked up about something), and the awesome international fare my mom has mastered. (She was in her sorority's Gourmet Cooking Club.)

And then there is our family hobby: Cowboy Action Shooting.  Hear of that?  Check out SASS - the Single Action Shooting Society.  It is a global sport of target shooting with historic firearms.  Basically we dress up and play cowboys.  Everyone is a character - no real names.  For a historical re-enactment group, it's pretty open.  People are actual characters (Annie Oakley), or fictional characters (Snidely), or farcical characters (Flint Westwood), and everything in between.  We started going to these events when I was 5.  I won a marble spitting contest at 5 years old.  In high school I had a scholarship interview the weekend of a big shoot - so I went in my 1880's bustle gown - a replica from a historic pattern, in a color suited to me, of course, made by my mother & I.  I bet they thought THAT was weird.  The stories there are eeennnndddllleeessss.... trust me.  Re-enactors OWN history, even when they are being flippant about it; it become an obsession.  And yes, my obsession is history.  Usually clothing and children's games, but I tend to get into most anything - looking for connections with my family's past.

And then I grew up and got weirder.  I mean I tell myself all the time that I am going through all the life events that everybody else does, but it's pretty obvious my path is solely my own...  I splatter painted my kitchen cabinets (love it!).  I have a serious fabric habit.  My favorite color is plaid!  I prefer dinner foods, even for breakfast.  Bell peppers and celery make me burp for hours, but I can eat a curry with no problem.  I had a hard time adjusting to layers of clothes when I moved to the colder East Coast (I feel like a snow man when I am in more than 2 layers - like I have no joints), so I tend to shed clothing more than some people are used to.  I think it is safe to say I have absolutely no modesty (there is a story there about my grandmother too!  The first time my mother ever saw her future mother-in-law, my grandmother was running naked through the forest. True.)  I have followed an odd career path that has led me to exactly where I need to be... using unconventional methods to teach an Asperger's son at home.  At the age of 35 I became a lifeguard and a challenge course facilitator - jobs for college kids.  My joints do not take to it well all days.

There are other peculiarities.  I am probably the worst house-keeper known to man (at least according to my mother & husband).  I can't eat til I have been awake for at least 1 hour or I get sick.  Unless I am deathly ill, I can't sleep through the night, never have.  I cannot STAND closed toed shoes - wool socks & sandals all winter.  I wear my underwear inside out so the seam will not bother me (actually my best friend noticed that one on a Girl Scout camping trip).  I talk to my dog empathically (I know that is hard to prove, but I don't have to - he doesn't make you have to pee when he wants you to wake up.)  I have some pretty odd ideas about the space-time continuum and how God permeates it.

Yes. I AM WEIRD.  The secret is to OWN IT.  Be odd, be strange, be unconventional, be unexpected.  If you own it, people don't question it, they RESPECT it.  As long as you are honest and act from a place of love, weird is GOOD, probably divinely created.


And this isn't ALL of it!.. there is more about it in the next post...
If I could figure out how to do the links in the text, I would. I will get that done later - I promise...

STORY TIME

Bear with me, lots of background:

My family is basically Southern... East Tennessee to be exact, though my mother's side has some really great pretensions of Greatness in Georgia.  My parents relocated to Southern California shortly before my birth, for reasons still not entirely clear to me, though I understand they involved my paternal grandmother and politics (of both personal and national natures).  So I grew up in Orange County, CA… and NOT like in current reality TV shows.  We lived between Disneyland and Knott's Berry Farm, an area that is ethnically diverse, full of WWII era track homes, solidly middle income, with working class leanings, and the most conservative county in the state... kind of an urban country people kind of place. 

Our Southern Identity was important to us.  My parents made SURE we replied "ma'am" and "sir" (which was ridiculed as we got older), and help our selves to a high moral and social standard of honor.  An important part of that Southern heritage is that my mom can COOK.  Our house practiced True Southern Hospitality and was a frequent destination for co-workers of my father, sorority sisters of my mother, all our friends as kids, and sometimes the odd loose ends (like the Czechs that came for a cowboy shoot with no hotel room, or the old lady and her grandson from Scotland who had been mis-informed by Disneyland about what was included in "all-inclusive", or the poor guy walking the street who was just trying to sell us a newspaper...).  Ours was a hospitable household.

The core of hospitality is FOOD.  There is no question that my mother was/is a very talented cook, and she could make all kinds of wonderful things, but Southern Hospitality is not just about content, it is about format.  As I got older and saw how other families lived, that format became more obvious... and it clearly was a good thing, or my friends wouldn't be there for dinner every other night! (‘cuz they could have come for leftovers after school, but they came for dinner.)

Now "dinner" was/ is a charged word at our house/ my parents' house.  It conotates all that subcontext of appropriate grooming & dress, poised dining skill, and polite conversation.  We ate with gusto, but we stayed at the table for the social aspects of dinner.  As I understand it, this is a dying practice in the world today... certainly my family (as in now, 2 kids + husband) practices it far less frequently than I did as a kid. 

Part of the peculiarity of dinner at my house was it's time.  The family down the street from us had dinner at 5:30, every day. At our house dinner was at 8 pm.  When I grew up, I learned how very Spanish that was of us (in timing, not in food volume), but it occurred for us as a function of my father's job.  My father was a Police Officer, for 30+ years, and a night owl by nature, so he chose to work the graveyard shift for nearly 25 of those years.  My father left for work at around 9 pm, returned around 7 am the next morning and slept while we were at school all day (we had to be very quiet after school).  The noise level at our house picked up around 6- 7 pm (sunset) and then came the commotion of dinner, followed by the ceremony of dinner, and then dad left and we cleaned...

Now an 8'o'clock dinner is pretty hard on a kid who gets lunch at 12, so my family refined the practice of the "hold-me-over" snack.  After school (3-4 pm) we got a snack, sometimes hors d'oeuvre type things, sometimes leftovers (in high school), sometimes popsicles, but a snack.  Effectively, I ate 4 meals a day growing - up: breakfast, lunch, hold-me-over, and dinner.

Fast forward:  my parents are now deservedly retired, and I have the habit of using their flexibility of hours to heavily supplement the management of my homeschooled spectrum children.  Old habits die hard, and my mother does not even consider cooking dinner until it is dark outside, and my father routinely has a "hold-me-over" in the late after noon (a late tea time/ happy hour-ish), especially when the grandkids are visiting - since my Asperger's kid is a grazer (has been since BIRTH - the lactation expert in the hospital told me he'd eat that way the r-e-s-t  o-f  h-i-s  l-i-f-e...  nursing had a steep learning curve for me) and eats like a hobbit - every 3.5 hours.  Now, my Asperger's kid has added hold-me-over to his vocabulary.

EXAMPLE:  4:30 pm- I have just cooked rice & pork chops - 7 yo looks at it and says, "No thank you Mom, I am going to have a hold-me-over instead" as he is holding the container of leftover Chinese rice.

EXAMPLE:  1:30-ish pm - I have just put the dishes in the dishwasher from lunch, gone upstairs to relieve myself, and return to the kitchen to find him at the table with a Tupperware of cold tortilla soup - "How do you like my hold-me-over, Mom?"

EXAMPLE:  I am in the computer room checking on all the support pages for even more info and insight into Asperger's while the kids are playing Wii, when I hear a very stealthy opening of the cupboard.  Wait for it... a strong odor wafts in to me..."Child, What are you eating?"  " It's OK Mom, I am just having this packet of tuna fish for a hold-me-over"

Today I called my father and thanked him heartily for increasing my child's vocabulary.