Reflections on a Sad and Lonely Man

** Names and identifying details have been changed to preserve the privacy of everyone involved. **

This is a cautionary tale of how to not live your life...

Last week the friend of a friend had a heart attack and died while he was in the midst of diabetes-related dialysis treatment.  Let's call the newly deceased John and our mutual friend Rachel.  Because John has very little family anywhere, and none within several hundred miles of where he lived, he'd asked Rachel to act on his behalf if he were ever too incapacitated to do it himself.  That was several years ago and until his sudden and unexpected death, she'd never been called on to make decisions of this import for him or anyone else.  And it's been hard!

She's had to negotiate to get the body released from the hospital, get the funeral home to cremate his body (his expressed wish) with only a weak promise of payment (no life insurance), cancel his apartment lease and utilities, and, today, clean out his few worldly belongings and put them in storage until his family can come and claim what they want.  Rachel told me John left behind one big basket of clothes and "they are dirty and not in good shape at all" so she's going to just throw them all away.  Later in our conversation, she added: "I think he had more socks than any other clothes."  Rachel listed a couch, love seat, bookcase, 4 end tables, a coffee table, 2 kitchen chairs, a folding table, a 3-drawer filing cabinet, an electric wheelchair, and a hospital bed as the rest of his possessions.  "That's it.  That's all he had in his life.  No papers.  No clutter.  No nothing."  For food, she said he had several packages of Ramen and a few Mom's Meals in the freezer.  (Mom's Meals are pre-packaged frozen meals delivered directly to elderly and disabled folks as one of the options they can choose from for community supports.)

On the one hand, I'm awestruck at the simplicity in which John survived.  Not having many possessions to care for is appealing in some ways.  At the same time, it makes me terribly sad that a life, any life, can be summed up this way.  And, yes, I am painfully aware of the implications it holds for me and the loneliness I often feel.

Rachel feels guilty for not being a better friend and spending more time with him and making sure he had food and nice things.  But John chose to let his disability isolate him.  He chose to keep his social circle very small.  And since the only picture I've ever seen has him glaring like he's about to snap the photo taker's head off... I can only surmise he spent a lot of time lonely and angry.  Loneliness can do that to you - you don't want people around you and at the same time resent them for not being there, for having lives of their own, for seeking happiness without you.  Loneliness can do a number on your emotional health that doesn't make sense unless you've personally experienced the depths of that dark sadness.

So my caution is this:  Take a moment to reflect on your life and how you want to be remembered.  Is a short list of temporal things in bad repair enough?  What legacy do you want to leave behind?

What I Love About Winter

Accuweather's 10-day forecast for Mount Savage, MD
on Dec 30, 2017

Has your skin turned blue... are you frozen through and through?  Oh, baby, it's cold outside! But I'm trying to stay positive this chilly night before New Year’s Eve and find some things to make winter seem more like an old friend than such an evil intruder throwing a wrench into whatever I have planned.

What I love most about winter:

Sweats are fashionable

Hot cocoa

Crockpots full of simmering soup

Guessing at animal footprints after fresh snowfall

A crackling fire in the fireplace

Fuzzy socks

Little kids stuffed into puffy coats 'til they can barely walk
Snuggly puppies
Electric blanket (or electric mattress pad so it's warm from below)
Ice cold water from the tap
Chicken pot pie
Fluffy bathrobes
Hot spiced cider
Looking at seed catalogs & dreaming of spring gardens
Watching kids sled down a hillside
Colorful birds flitting about in bare tree branches
Lasagna
The way falling snow makes it look like you're inside a snowglobe
Catching snowflakes on your tongue
Steaming bowls of chili
Being covered in the afghan you're crocheting
Daydreaming about a Hawaiian vacation
Dogs with crazy sweaters
Slathering butter on bread right from the oven
Videos of dogs learning to walk in their new booties
Binge watching Hallmark movies
Rolling the "r" when you say brrrrr...
Cute boots (and cute hats and mittens and scarves, too)
All kinds of apple desserts
Fondling the Christmas decorations as  you  put them away


And probably my very favorite... Complaining about the cold!

Life Goes On

There are times in your life when those words are exactly the truth you don't want to hear. While there are other times we mourn something or someone lost, I bet you, like me, think first of those excruciatingly and exquisitely painful first days after a loved one has passed away. You feel so much like something inside of you is gone. Irreplaceable and irrecoverable.  Yet, the world keeps turning on its trip around the sun. Grass grows. People go on about their business. And one day you find yourself awestruck that... life goes on.

Photo credit to her Daddy, Rory Feek.

I had that experience this morning. It was this simple picture of a little girl with a great big smile shared on the Joey+Rory Facebook page. She reminded me, in this moment her Daddy captured and shared with the world, of another little girl with an equally infectious smile and zest for living.  But it was his caption that while he could usually see more of her Momma today he saw himself that made me catch my breath.  The little girl in the photo is Indy. The other girl, the only child of a couple I knew in Georgia, is Kaydee. Most often when I see a picture of Kaydee, I think she looks like her Daddy but every now and again her expression is purely a reflection of her Mother. There was one just this past week that kept me staring and remembering the ultimate kindness, generosity, and cheerful words of a friend gone before we ever got to know each other nearly well enough.

You see, besides the huge grins and amazing spirit these girls have in common, Indy and Kaydee both lost their Mothers to breast cancer in the last year. I don't know a whole lot about the kind of cancer that took Joey Feek but the one that stole away Kaydee's sweet Momma is an insidious and stealthy killer for which there is no cure. Her cancer was one that masquerades as a host of other diseases making it easy to overlook and misdiagnose. One of the Atlanta television stations recently did a feature story on Inflammatory Breast Cancer that explains there's no lump or tumor to show up on a mammogram, only a reddish patch that looks a lot like a heat rash and the grim truth, that while treatment can slow it down, this cancer kills 100% of the time.

While we mourn the loss of their Mommas and marvel at the resiliency and acceptance of little girls like Indy and Kaydee, we find that truly life goes on.

With or without you, life goes on.

Note to self:  Choose to participate. Accept what is, work to fix what needs fixing, find your zest... Find your smile. Do it every single day.

5 Minutes You'll Never Get Back

Last night as we were getting settled in bed Gizmo decided he needed to snuggle. He may be all sorts of wonderful but a snuggle dog Gizmo is not... He just doesn't have that soft, squishy, comfortable-to-cuddle-on-your-lap kind of body and he doesn't usually even try but every now and then he decides you are in desperate need of a dose of his kind of lovin' and heaven help you, there's not a darn thing you can do about it. You will be Gizzered!

Gizmo, November 11, 2016

Last night was my lucky night...

He took a mighty leap at my side and ended up clinging for dear life with his front legs wrapped over the top of my head and the rest of his body hanging down past my shoulder. His embrace felt more like being trapped in the clenches of a love sick baboon than something pleasant, but I love my little dude so I endured it. Jack was sound asleep and snoring by my other knee already folded into as neat a little ball as a 100-lb Doberman can get which is, actually, surprisingly compact. And in that moment, for no apparent reason whatsoever, I got the giggles. Like out of control, could not stop, shrieking-at-the-top-of-my-lungs kind of giggles proving once again that I am awfully easy to keep entertained. Anyway, I laughed so hard there were tears running down my face. I was gasping for breath and probably turning blue from lack of oxygen. I laughed so hard I almost threw up. Lightning was so worried! He kept stomping round and round and over the top of me, crushing a lung in the process, and sniffing at my face. His expression was utter confusion about what was wrong with me. I guess I don't indulge in a good hard laugh often enough... I guess that needs to change!

Jack, November 11, 2016

After I finally got myself under control, and Gizmo off of me, I decided I was hungry and deserved a snack for surviving such a most excellent workout. I've been very good and didn't even buy any easy-grab-and-snack-junky stuff on the last grocery run so I had to resort to one of my Mom's standby munchies: buttered saltines. Yeah, I know. Ew! Could there be a food that tastes more like cardboard? And butter "just greases it up so it slides better," as she used to say. My Mom buttered everything. Everything. Even pepperoni pizza. But I digress... We were snacking on crackers (which I don't even like except with chili and then it's more like I have a little chili with my bowl of crushed up crackers) and Lightning burps like a third grader in a school yard contest. I swear if he knew how, that was a burp where he could have got the whole alphabet out. He looked as surprised by it as I was!

Lightning, November 11, 2016

To celebrate his utter lack of good manners and top the evening off, I took on the challenge of getting all 3 boys to howl at the moon with me. Not an easy fete! It's like they know howling is a talent that they missed the heavenly line up to get for this lifetime so it takes some serious effort to get an "owoooooo" going. And they still sound more like strangling goats than anything... Is it sad that I have a better howl than my dog? True story!

If you're still reading you've either laughed with me at least once or I just succeeded in wasting 5 minutes of your life that you've got no chance of ever getting back.  Either way...

Thanks for sharing in my bit of ridiculousness!!

A House of God

Organize yourselves; prepare every needful thing,

and establish a house, even a house of prayer, a house of fasting,

a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory,

a house of order, a house of God;

D&C 109:8

This is the scripture I'm using as a guide in managing my home during my 2015 rebuilding year and beyond.  It was revelation given to commence building the Kirtland Temple in late 1832/early 1833.  And since home is the only place on earth that can be considered as sacred as the Temple, I think it's good pretty darned good advice for making home into sacred ground.

The Kirtland Temple, Kirtland Ohio USA
Photo courtesy of Russ' Photo Journal.  View more pictures here:
http://russ-photojournal.blogspot.com/2010/07/kirtland-temple.html

I've been thinking a lot about what the phrase "home as sacred ground" means.  Some days I will just read through this verse and see which words catch my attention and other times I'll follow those thoughts and see if they lead me to personal inspiration about how to apply the advice.  One thing that got my attention early on in that thought process was that all of keywords are verbs; they direct the reader to take an action.

Organize, Prepare, Establish, Pray,

Fast, Faith, Learn, Glory, Order

But how do you do this?

From the footnotes in my scriptures, study notes jotted in the margins from past religion classes and Sunday School, more study now, prayer, and lots of thought I've come up with the following list of specific actions I can take in my own home.

• Manage finances to meet current needs and plan for the future.  Work to free myself from being a slave to debt.
• Magnify my Church callings within the home.  Show respect for those called to authority positions, do my Visiting Teaching, welcome my Visiting and Home Teachers into my home as treasured guests, hold Family Home Evening, hold family prayer and scripture study.  (Those last 3 need some tweaking since it's just me... but you get the idea.)
• Keep a clean and orderly house.
• Come and go in the name of the Lord.  Pray for peace and safety for guests and family.
• Have uplifted hands always.  Go about doing good and looking for ways to help my fellow man.
• Cease lustful desires.  Learn to be happy with what I've got, because it's really quite a lot!
• Stock my home with good books and other media.  Refuse to let the bad stuff in.
• Have food storage on hand as we've been asked to do for decades now.
• Get to know my neighbors better and seek ways to serve them.  Let my actions teach them the gospel.
• Read from the scriptures daily.
• Display pictures of the Savior, Temples and scripture quotes in each room of my home as visual reminders of what I hold most important.
• Play uplifting music.
• Pay tithes and offerings.
• Pray over everything.
• Be a good citizen.  Be involved in the community.  Make my values known.  Make them count.
• Attend Church and Temple services.

In some ways that seems like a daunting "To Do" list doesn't it?  And, yet, in others it's just plain common sense for any Christian who is truly living what they believe... things we should all be doing already.

Maybe that's the problem.  These are all things that sound good and right and worthwhile.  But it is just so hard to fit everything in with jobs and family and everyone having a different schedule and there's never enough money to satisfy what everyone thinks they need.  And pretty soon all that stuff that sounded so good on Sunday isn't getting done in the hubbub of daily life.

Guilty, here.  2013 and 2014 saw my finances spiral out of control.  Yes, I had "help" digging that pit but it's still a deep hole that I allowed myself into by placing trust in the wrong person.  And I haven't done a real good job with those other things in any recent time frame, either.  It's way past time for me to get myself together and get it done.  And trust me... if I can do it, so can you!!

And I'm going to do it!  No more excuses here.

Join me in the challenge?

Welcome To My Home

I wrote a short poem today.  Well, actually bits and pieces of it have been floating around in my head for a couple of weeks, but today is the day I got all the parts down on paper and decided it said what I wanted it to say.  And actually I'm kind of proud of it!  One of my great grandfathers was a superb poet and I always wanted to have inherited a latent poetry gene...  Maybe I got lucky and that wish came true?

Welcome To My Home

Welcome to my humble little home!

It’s not fancy, just some sticks and stone.

It’s known poverty and a bit of wealth,

And sheltered me through sickness and in health.

I've filled it with thoughts and people and things I love

As I begged for God’s blessings from above.

I’ve tried to learn from the bad to simply enjoy the good

And found it’s not about could, or should, or would…

But taking whatsoever I do have and sharing,

That is the best way to show my caring.

So come on in - you're fine just as you are

Friends always welcome from both near and far!!

My plan is to print it in a pretty font and put it in a $1 store frame that I've decorated with flowers and ribbons and such to make a rectangular wreath for my front door.  I think it's the perfect accompaniment to my 2015 goals, don't you?

2015: The Year of ME

Does it seem a little early for the New Year's Resolution/goal setting blog posts to begin?  Yeah, probably.  Guess, I'm just a little out of sync...

I posted this a day or so ago on Facebook, both to my own page and the blog page, as my personal theme for 2015.  Then I started thinking about how it might be taken as a threat and added a little extra explanation.

Photo credit to  https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheMotivatedType

In the coming year, I am going to continue to tell my story.  There are people who may not like how they are portrayed.  I'm still going to tell my story... MY story.  And if anyone is worried about their part in it then maybe they should have treated me better when they had the chance.  I'm not going to lie just so they can feel good about themselves or skip over events that are very formative to who I want to become.  A lot of horrible things happened in 2013 and 2014 and I learned so much.  While some of it is completely unexpected, I feel like God is going to use it somehow.  Really curious about how... But if telling it can help even one other person, then my story needs to be told.

Photo credit to the blog at FreePeople.com

The explanation I added talked a little about the New Beginnings program held each year for the Young Women in my Church where girls turning 12 are introduced to the program and the goals and achievements of the teens already participating are showcased. Impressive goals achieved in addition to school, extracurricular activities and often a part-time job. (You can satisfy your curiosity and learn more HERE.)  And that's what I want to do. Use the idea of New Beginnings to set some big goals and focus on fixing what's broken in me... trusting that every ending is followed by a new beginning.

Epic endings deserve equally epic beginnings.  And with that said 2015 is going to be the year I rebuild me!

In order of importance, but not likely achievement, here's what I want next year to look like:

• I have a date set to get me back to the Temple.
• I have my own home that is clean, safe and comfortable.
• Food in the cupboard has replaced worry about the next meal.
• I have a way to support myself.
• I have a reliable vehicle.
• My debts are being appropriately addressed.
• I have access to quality medical and dental care.
• My dogs are healthy and happy and have food and adequate veterinary care.
• I'm able to pay back, pay forward and offer meaningful service as was offered me in my need.
• I'm gardening and crafting and collecting antique silver again.
• I'm drawing and writing and making cooking an adventure again.
• I'm entertaining in my home and going places to meet new people again.
• I'm involved in my community.

Photo credit: Rose Hill Design Studio on Etsy

It goes back to my deep need for stability and security.  I'm not a person that thrives on the edge... Adventures are wonderful as long as there is a safe haven to come home to afterward.  I've come to realize just how much I need that to feel like I can relax and be happy.  It's doing the simple things in life that I know to be right.  Right for me.

And who better to do that for me than ME?

The Fry Cutter Incident

Since Derek and I are in the midst of splitting but are still sharing the house this may seem a little like sour pickles to be posting stuff about him.  Oh well... I can live with that.  Besides I want to preserve these memories as much as a reminder of how miserable he made me sometimes so I don't ever make this mistake again as for the comic relief that a life stranger than fiction can sometimes provide.

A couple of nights ago we had an incident involving a french fry cutter.

You know I'm a die-hard Idahoan in my heart and nothing but fresh cut potatoes make real french fries... those over-processed garbage things from the freezer aisle are not real.  They are plastic fries.  And we do not eat plastic at my house.

Mine isn't this fancy but it works the same way.  It's
just a $10 "As Seen on TV" jobbie from Walmart.
The cutter pictured is from Rawsie.

A little before bedtime Derek poked his head in my office and asked me where the fry cutter was.  I went down and pulled it out of the cupboard because that was just easier than trying to explain...  Never thinking that he needed remedial fry cutting lessons, I went upstairs and did my thing and got ready for bed.

Around 2 am some loud banging from the kitchen woke me up.  Followed by a little cussing...  While I was still trying to decide if I should get up and see what he was doing or let it go, he came and poked his head in my door and said "I broke the fry cutter."

I was incredulous and asked "how?"  I don't know if he answered or not since even in my half asleep state I was thinking "how the H. E. Double-Toothpicks does one break a fry cutter?" but I followed him back down to the kitchen to see what mess he'd left for me this time.

Sure enough.  Remedial lessons should have been given.

The insanely obvious take it out of the box, set it on the counter, lift the top, put your potato inside and push the top down... I guess was somewhat less than obvious to him.  He took the whole thing apart.  Even parts I didn't know came apart!  And then jammed the top down over the base an inch farther than it should go and without the blade inside.  And it was stuck together.  I mean stuck!!

I tried pulling it apart and wedging a knife between the parts to get some leverage to wiggle them apart.  A table knife, not a sharp one.  I may be reckless but I'm not stupid!  Before I could get any movement, he took it away from me.  Just grabbed it out of my hands... same as the time he grabbed the new breaker thingy out of my hands and electrocuted himself on the breaker box because he took too much of it apart and touched an exposed wire.

Heaven forbid that I might know just the tiniest bit about what I'm doing...

Anyway, he still couldn't get it apart.  And he started wailing about the lack of assembly instructions on the side of the box.  I was miffed because he grabbed it out of my hands.  And he was angry and frustrated because he wanted fries and couldn't make them.

Yes, I said "couldn't."

Go ahead.  Roll your eyes.  I did as I said I'd just cut them with a knife and figure out the cutter in the morning.  So he hands me a big butcher knife.  The biggest one out of the drawer.  Like I'm gonna clean up potatoes and slice them into french fries with a gargantuan knife meant to hack a side of beef into all those different cuts?  Right...

I asked for a smaller knife.  And he handed me the next one down.  Again, too big for the job.  But... I took it and did what I needed to.  Nicked my thumb and it bled all over the kitchen.  I wrapped a clean dishcloth around it and cut his fries and then went and put a bandaid on my owie and crawled back in bed.

No thank you was proffered.  No inquiry if the cut was bad enough to need attention.  Nothing.  How rude, right?

The next morning it took me less than 10 minutes to work the fry cutter pieces apart.  It really didn't need all the cussing and pounding and wailing in the night.  So, yes I am going to refer to him as "dumber than a fry cutter" from here on out.  Maybe only in my imagination, but still!

Pirkle Truck or... Purple Truck?

After my round of screw ups I wrote about nearly two weeks ago, I've only had one more big one that had the potential to be life threatening crazy.  Lots of small stuff, but thankfully only this one last biggie!

Picture by Linda Deal on http://fineartamerica.com/

Coming home from my therapist's office right after we'd talked about the dog fight and the knife I saw a purple semi truck and found it so distracting that I started turning the steering wheel to drive head on into it...  My mind wasn't, however, completely blank like in the previous incidents.  I was remembering Myrtle Olsen and a phone conversation I overheard, anyway I heard her side of it, at the drive-in restaurant she owned in Shelley, ID when I was a kid.  Now this was back in the days before everyone carried cell phones and trucking companies depended on GPS tracking to know where their trucks (and drivers) were at every possible second... and a dispatcher for Pirkle Transport had called Olsen's Drive-In, knowing that the driver she was trying to reach with an urgent message about his load, frequently stopped there.  For at least half an hour Mrs. Olsen, getting ever more frustrated and angry at the disruption, insisted there was no purple truck parked outside.

Simple misunderstanding, I'm sure.  "Pirkle truck" does sound very much like "purple truck."

But still... that little flash of memory had me headed toward plowing right through his grill.  And that was disturbing enough that I had to pull off on the next road and get myself together to finish driving home.  I was truly scared that my mindlessness was going to cause real bodily harm, or even death, to someone.  Maybe even me.

These are the kind of things that make driving exhausting!  I feel like I have to keep an iron grip on the steering wheel and have a constant stream of self-talk reminding me to keep my eyes on the road and not on trees, junk, road kill, advertising signs or whatever might be off to the side.

My therapist, his name is Tom and I guess I should start calling him that because it's easier to type and... it is his name... Tom thinks I'm still over-thinking about mindlessly letting the dogs out in the yard together and causing that huge bloody fight and that's making me read too much into a simple mistake.  He said more experiences that turn out ok along with time and self-permission to simmer down the hyper-vigilance about it will show me that it's ok to forgive, forget and move on with life.  I hope so!  It would be so nice for something to feel normal and right again.

Help! I'm Screwing Up Again

I wrote a little bit here about a painful episode in my current life where everything came crashing down around me all at the same time and my psyche couldn't take it any longer.  I sought out help.

That's still not a fully comfortable thing for me to admit.

I'm glad I did it but there's still a little part of me that wants to hold back talking much about it because of the lingering stigma of needing help with mental health issues.  Today I'm going to try and step out of that doubt and talk about therapy a bit.  I'm still seeing the therapist a couple of times a month.  And this last time he reminded me that I haven't been doing so well at keeping up my end of things...

Photo credit: http://www.dailyhiit.com/

I haven't been writing, specifically, so he gave me two assignments to write out before our next appointment.  One is what I'm calling a 'Screw Up Journal" (and no he doesn't like the title, I'm to find something more positive) detailing all the stuff I'm forgetting so that there's a record to help determine if it's just the one big screw up leading to the next and the next and on to the next one after that OR if there's a more serious underlying cause.  The other is an essay about what a happy life would look like to me.   We had talked about stability, which was seriously lacking for a long time, being key but things are somewhat more stable now and I'm still not ok.  I know what's missing:  security is the other half of the equation.  And security is still elusive.  Why must it be so very elusive?

SOME OF THE ENTRIES IN MY SCREW UP JOURNAL

About 10 days ago, my lack of focus/concentration/attention caused an incident that was very dangerous.  Potentially lethal even.  It scared me in many ways.

With absolutely nothing on my mind, truly just a total blank, I let all of the dogs out into the yard at the same time.  They don't get along.  They fight.  That's why we keep them separated and have for many months.  All along I thought I was protecting Lightning from Thunder, but... what I'm really doing is protecting Thunder from Gizmo.

Gizmo attacked.  Then Lightning and Jack jumped in.  And between the 3 of them they took Thunder down viciously.  I had to break them up or they would have killed him.  In the process I was bit at least twice, scratched and badly bruised up.  Somehow I managed to get Lightning into a headlock and restrain him with my right arm while beating Gizmo with his spiked collar that had slipped off over his head as hard as I could swing with my left.  That gave Thunder enough of a break to get out of the middle of it.  I drug Lightning and Gizmo into the house still snarling and thrashing.

All 5 of us were bloody messes.

Luckily all the wounds ended up being small enough that I could care for them at home - no trip to the vet for stitches (and explanations!).  And thankfully I kind of switched into an emergency management mindset and did what had to be done before I sat down and bawled for 3 days.

The tears were partly because my actions put my baby in harm's way and got him hurt.  All of them hurt, really.  That's a huge amount of mental anguish!  And they were partly because I was shaken to the core and crying is how I deal with stress in pretty much any situation.  I don't necessarily feel great appreciation for that feature of my personality... but that's how I've always been.  Stress me out and a river starts flowing from my instantly red and swollen eyeballs.  And still another part of the tears came from fear... Fear of disappointing Derek and fear of having him see me as the utter failure of a human being that I felt like.

The next day, I tried to unsheath a knife that was not sheathed.  The particular angle of the blade in my hand didn't cut... but it had the potential of leaving a deep slice across my entire palm.

The day after that I walked away and totally forgot until the smell got to me that I had food cooking on the stovetop.  Yup, this Idaho girl burned the potatoes... literally.

These 3 incidents we discussed in the session along with the thought that I was feeling like a danger to myself and others.  That's the 'why' behind keeping a record.  Did the one big screw up have me so stressed out and worrying about screwing up that I subconsciously sabotaged myself into the others?  Or is there something more messed up going on inside my brain?

Sadly, my run of screw ups continues.

Coming home from my therapy session last Friday I nearly drove head on into a semi-truck.  It was purple.  And that distracted me from keeping my eyes, and mind, on the road.

Yesterday I nearly cut down the blackberries and tried to replant the poison ivy because I doubted my identification of which was which.  The leaves are somewhat similar in appearance but not in how your skin reacts to contact with them!

I hope we can fix this before someone is seriously hurt or, God forbid, dies from my mindlessness...

Coffee, Science and Judgment

August 1, 2014

Photo credit: http://kristentorrestoro.myadventures.org/?
filename=a-cup-of-coffee-and-air-miles

I’ve never fancied myself as a scientifically minded person, but I do like to know how stuff works.  And when I really want to know I will ask questions of every person who I think might have some possible insight.  I will ask and ask and ask, probably to the point of making an annoyance of myself.  That’s how I found out why coffee makes ibuprofen work better for my knee pain.

When I’m hurting badly and ibuprofen and/or acetaminophen just don’t touch it on their own, taking 800 mg (4 tablets) of ibuprofen with a mug of coffee brings the pain down to a bearable level.  Yes, I do know 800 mg is more than the recommended dose on the over-the-counter label but it’s less than you get with 1 prescription Advil.  And since I don’t do it every day my nurse friends tell me it’s a pretty safe dose.  For years now I’ve known that it worked but I didn’t know why.  And the “why” part bugged me.

Many years ago I worked with a man who had a prescription from his dentist for a cup of coffee every morning with whatever painkiller he was taking for otherwise untreatable tooth/jaw pain.  I rolled my eyes and thought he just liked coffee and needed the prescription to excuse it and keep his Temple Recommend so his wife wouldn’t kill him.  (He was, and I presume still is, LDS and drinking coffee is against the dietary code for Mormons in much the same way that Jews don’t eat pork.  As I understand it, the reasons are a little different but that a dietary code exists is similar.  For Mormons it’s a test of obedience while Jews are avoiding contact with an ‘unclean,’ and therefore harmful, substance -- for example, fat, naturally high sodium content, parasites and other diseases that would be readily transmittable because our body chemistry is so similar to swine that medical science can, today, use their organs for transplants in humans.)  I really didn’t give it much more thought until several years and a couple of jobs later when I found myself with a raging headache and a full afternoon of flashy PowerPoint presentations in a dark room ahead of me.  My boss handed me a couple of Advil and sternly told me to go get a cup of coffee and put my head down for 15 minutes.  Her persuasive powers finally prevailed…  And my headache went away.

I assumed it was the caffeine giving the painkiller a boost.  So, being Mormon myself, I tried to replicate the effect with other beverages.  I tried hot chocolate, Dr. Pepper, energy drinks, even caffeinated bottled water.  It didn’t work.  I got the energy bump but there was absolutely no effect on pain.

Ten years of asking everyone I met with any sort of science background and Googling it nigh to death… and I finally have my answer.  I met someone who knew and the patience to explain it in terms I understand.   FINALLY I know how it works!!

Caffeine is a nervous system stimulant.  That’s why you wake up or get the little energy bump from consuming it.  But caffeine is not the only stimulant in coffee.  The oil of the coffee bean contains bioflavonoids that specifically stimulate blood flow.  More blood, and consequently more of the painkilling and anti-inflammatory compounds in the ibuprofen, is delivered to the site of pain.  And that’s what gives the relief.

I really kind of love logical, tidy, simple answers like that!

The physician who explained this to me cautioned that the increase in blood flow is generally considered medically insignificant.  And, like any medication, the effect (pain relief in this case) doesn’t happen for every person who tries it.  But there is a growing body of documentation that for a certain segment of the population it is effective so maybe it’s more significant that medicine recognizes today.  And that is good enough for me.  There’s no guilt about having the occasional mug of coffee now that I know there is sound scientific reasoning behind my claim that it’s doing something positive in my body.  And I guess if I end up needing a prescription to justify it I can get past feeling so utterly silly asking…

Funny how sometimes it takes years for God to show you that your rash judgment of someone was way off base isn’t it?  Maybe that co-worker from years ago liked the pain relief more than the coffee.  I shouldn’t have assumed anything about his habits or motives.  I would do well to love more and judge less!

A (Short) Rant

July 29, 2014

Every woman knows that there is a time (probably lots of times over the course of relationship) when your man does something that just annoys you to the point of wanting to pull your hair out. It doesn’t mean you don’t love him with everything you have, just that there is something he does that so totally gets under your skin it makes you crazy angry for a little while. I’m going to tell you about one of those things that Derek does because I just don’t think I can pull off stark raving and bald… and writing IS part of my therapy.

First, know that I love him. This is just a rant because I’m annoyed with him right now and not that I’ve waivered in my feelings toward him. Even when he’s a complete screw up, he’s my screw up. Nothing I’m about to say changes the fact that I love him and am committed to our relationship. I just need to say my piece so I can process it and move on.

Who throws dirty clothes on top of clean, folded, ready to put away things sitting in the laundry basket?

Yup. That would be my Derek.

I can bust my hump taking care of dogs, cleaning the house, doing laundry, cooking meals and whatever else happens to be part of that day’s To Do List. And sometimes between knee pain and depression issues that daily routine leaves me exhausted. You would think, as a loving partner, he could notice and take that stack of clean folded t-shirts and put them in a drawer three steps away before undressing himself. But apparently you’d be wrong!

Whatever clothes he’s worn that day just get tossed on top of the clean stuff.

When I complain and/or ask him why, he shrugs and says “that’s how my Mom raised me.” I think it makes me even more upset that he throws her under the bus for his bad habits. Whether it’s true or not that she raised him to be a slob is an issue to be hashed out between them. My point is there’s a time you must recognize you are an adult and the only one responsible for your actions. And if your parents didn’t teach you to take care of your possessions, then it’s time to learn how and change for your own sake and future prosperity.

Yesterday I took dirty socks away from Thunder 5 different times. I’m not overstating to be dramatic! Thunder drug 5 sweaty, nasty, dirty socks from somewhere in the bedroom out to the living room to use as chew toys. Sometimes he eats them. Both Thunder and Lightning have, in the past, strained mightily to poop intact socks with the terry cloth-like loops from being inside out still recognizable. Despite the jokes we made about scouring out the colon it just can’t be healthy for them. Dirty clothes, and especially the stray socks, tossed here and there drive me nuts!

And it’s not just clothes that are strewn everywhere. Dishes, tools, shoes, car care stuff… I swear my man leaves a trail of chaos everywhere he steps. Yes, sometimes he makes me absolutely crazy! But Derek is mine. And I love him!

Rant over.

Let It Go

July 27, 2014

This morning my friend, Heidi, sent me a text message asking how my day was going. Honestly, it’s ok. I’m a little tired from overdoing yesterday and kind of dragging my butt my there’s no real problems. I answered and inquired of her well-being. She replied that she was currently trying to kill a spider in her car, that she’s afraid of them and surely as soon as she started driving again it would jump out at her. I had to laugh because I am so much the other extreme. Whenever there’s an unusual bug I’m all “Oooooo let’s catch it in a bottle so I can get a good look!” Then I Google it and figure out what it is and if it’s not poisonous or otherwise the sort of thing you don’t want around I let it go.

(That doesn’t mean, however, that I won’t do the jig of utter panic if a spider or even a big ant (and we have some that are huge!) starts to crawl on my leg or arm or… It’s a time I can lay down some moves that might remind you of a spastic ninja!)

What I’ve found is that most of these little creatures are pretty fascinating. There is such diversity and creativity in God’s handiwork! And it always gives me a new way to look at things and imagine creating it myself. That need to create and the creativity to imagine and do it is what I think is our divine spark – the little piece of our Heavenly Father that we carry within us.

Curiosity and creativity are good things!

A few months ago I found a scorpion in the house. Derek was gone to work (he always seems to have a job with insane hours) and I’d come upstairs, either just getting up for the day or on one of those potty runs that happens when I drink too much water too close to bedtime, and the dogs came up with me. With the dim light of very early morning, or maybe it was the carport light shining in the door window, I saw the black spot on the kitchen floor just about the same time the dogs did. Of course, my “what the heck?” translated to each of them as “Yummy yummy morsel if I can be the first to grab this special and unexpected treat!!” and all three got stung on the nose as they took a sniff behind the one who’d just dropped it. By then I was thinking that it looked a lot like a scorpion… and grabbing for an old pesto bottle (I save the Bertolli ones because I have designs of storing herbs and spice mixes in them). All the years I lived in those Western deserts you’d think of as a natural habitat for scorpions I never saw a single one. Move to lush, green, almost tropical Georgia which doesn’t impress me as the place that kind of creature would be at home and there it is… my first encounter with this specific arachnid.

Google told me that it was, indeed, right at home here. The black little fella is known as a Georgia Devil. They are native only to the low mountains of northern Georgia. The pain equivalent of its sting is like that of a yellow jacket (not desirable but not end of the world as we know it kind of painful either) and they will only sting a person or pet if provoked. While he looked plenty provoked down in the bottle and I’m sure would have happily stung me repeatedly if he could, Google said these scorpions spend most of their lives eating other spiders and noxious bugs from around a house’s foundation and in the garden. I thought it was really interesting so I left the bottle where Derek could see it when he came home. He wasn’t nearly so impressed by my newfound knowledge or the little treasure on the counter but indulged my Mother Earth instincts and took it out to the edge of the woods and let it go.

I’m trying to use that example in the rest of my life and just let the little problems go like most of the strange bugs and lizards and whatnot I find in the yard (and occasionally inside). I need to focus my energy on the few things I can control and work on building more positives into daily routines. Besides, so many little problems only look scary until they are solved with a bit of faith, curiosity and applied creativity. And when the little ones are taken care of, big problems don’t seem quite so insurmountable either.

Home Again

July 25, 2014

Toward the beginning of July, I told Derek I needed to go to the Emergency Room and seek out some help because I had a problem that was out of hand.  He yelled at me the whole way there for letting it go, but we had no money for me to go to the doctor in May and get my levothyroxine prescription renewed.  I knew I needed it, I knew where to get the care… I just had no funds available to pay for either the doctor’s visit or prescription and we all know that doctors and drug stores want their money upfront so I put it off hoping that things might turn around for us in the near term.  They didn’t.

At the ER I explained the situation with the medication and that between feeling like crap physically and mentally (lack of thyroid hormone also effects mental abilities) and being in crisis financially, socially, spiritually, and emotionally I was extremely depressed and had laid in bed that morning (and a few others I didn’t mention) wishing I could die and be free of all the pain and stress.  Never mind that I had no real intent, no plan and no way to carry it out if I did form a plan… that statement got me 4 days in a psychiatric unit for observation as a suicide threat.  Immediately I had to surrender everything I had with me:  clothing, underwear, shoes, purse, cell phone.  Everything.  Security came to inventory the contents of my purse. (Mental note:  Always keep your purse clean!  They looked at EVERY old grocery list, Church program, card, bill, note and receipt I’d mindlessly stuffed in there for months.)  And then they ran the metal detector wand over me front and back to make sure I didn’t have any weaponry on (or in) me.  I got one chance to let my family and friends know where I was… just 1 call on my own phone before it was confiscated.

Basically I was a prisoner.

I had 3 roommates while I was held in the psych unit.  Weirdly one shared my birthday and another shared my first name and last initial.  Odds of one seem huge, but both of those events?  The statistic has to be astronomical!

Most of the people there were just as normal as you and me.  Everyone had been crushed under their own problems, yes… but they were not the psychotic blubbering idiots of Hollywood’s imagination.  Most were friendly, smiling and concerned with helping me understand what was expected to fit into the routine.  There was a lot of singing and some of the most amazing gospel voices I’ve ever heard, on the radio or off.  Several people had college degrees and to help fill the long boring days I got into some discussions on topics like philosophy, myth, religions, botany, chemistry, food, and travel.  The thing I found most annoying was the television.  It was on 14+ hours a day.  It was loud and no restrictions on what was playing meant often there were violent movies filled with destruction, bloodshed and bad language.  Ironic for the setting isn’t it?

While the TV annoyed me, there were really only two things that I found particularly distressing.  One was that the atmosphere and protocols (especially men doing night-time bed checks on female occupied rooms) tripped flashbacks of being raped in the hospital following my tonsillectomy many years ago.  And that would set off a panic attack and send my blood pressure through the roof (imagine that!  Being in a constant fight or flight state of high anxiety is supposed to make me calm and happy?) so then they’d force more drugs on me.  It seemed like patients were (over)medicated for staff convenience because it’s so much easier to treat symptoms than solve problems.  The other thing that I found upsetting is that, like me, most of patients were being released (often against their expressed wishes and with open beds in long-term programs) into the very same environment that landed them in inpatient psychiatric care in the first place.

I guess there are really three things that bother me…  When I was released, the social worker instructed Derek to remove his gun from the home.  It’s in a locked case, with the trigger also locked, he has full control of both keys and there is no ammunition for it here.  Even if I could get through all those hurdles, I don’t know how to load or fire it.  It’s perfectly safe.  It still had to be removed as a condition of my release.  Yet no one questioned the drawer full of very sharp knives in the kitchen.  Or that there’s rope downstairs and my entire back yard is densely wooded.  No, that’s neither formation of a plan (I don’t like pain and I imagine both of those would not only ultimately fail, but hurt immensely in the attempt) nor a political statement.  I say it only to point out the hypocritical idiocy of our nation’s mental health care system.

Ok, maybe it is a little bit of a statement about gun rights because if I actually wanted to hurt myself, or someone else, I could find a way to do it.  Taking the gun out of the house was pointless.

Thinking about it, there are more things I could complain about but I’m ready to just put that chapter behind me, move on and figure out how to have a happy and productive life.  Now I’ve been home and doing some outpatient counseling for about three weeks.  There’s good and bad to that:

• My doggies still love me! And seem even more in tune with how I’m feeling on any particular day. On rough days they are happy to give extra snuggles and napping on the upstairs (guest room) bed is a special treat we’ve been indulging in most days.
• Derek has a new job. He started exactly 1 week after I came home. It’s the job he says he was born to do. And I have to admit I’ve never seen him quite so charged up about work. He’s selling cars, both new and used, at Carl Black GMC over in Roswell. The commute is a painful 80 minutes if there’s no traffic and he has good luck finding traffic lights green. But the upside is that he has the potential to earn a very good income. He actually sold his first car halfway through training AND after one of the other salesmen backed into it while he was doing paperwork with the customer. Impressive to close that one, huh?
• His long commute and longer work day leave me alone basically 23 hours every day. After being gone for 16 hours, he drags himself first to the shower then rummages for a bite to eat before going straight to bed. With no car of my own currently and a still small circle of local friends that puts me right back into the situation of isolation and loneliness that was a major factor in the depression to begin with.
• My finances are a mess. With no resources left, I’ve defaulted on my massive credit card debt. My once really great credit rating is now trashed. Every time the phone rings with a number I don’t recognize I feel a mixture of despair, panic and extreme anxiety. When Derek tells me he’s got a plan to deal with the credit problems, it helps me feel a little less like a total loser… until the next time the phone rings anyway.
• My Church family is helping by paying some essential bills (rent and utilities) and providing food until Derek is receiving regular paychecks. I’m more grateful than ever for the resources and forethought that went into the LDS Church’s private welfare system. I never imagined that I would have to use it and still say that being on the receiving end is not nearly as comfortable as giving. I always knew that Church Welfare was expansive and complete but I have a whole new perspective on it now. In all honesty, the meals I’ve made and eaten during the last two weeks are the most nutritious and varied in the past 2 years because of the amount and quality of fruits, vegetables and lean meats that were included.
• To help distract me from the loneliness, combat depression and help me focus while my brain chemistry stabilizes and adjusts to the medications I have a very detailed daily “To Do” list. Some days it exhausts me and other times I’m bored and catch myself staring off into space with not a single thought in my head. It’s slow going, but I am accomplishing at least the basic activities of daily living consistently, working my way through getting the whole house truly clean and creating a healthy and whole me.
• I’m taking the levothyroxine again and a low dose of Celexa was added to the daily regime. I’m hoping in a few months I can be off that one. I know I’ll never get off the levothyroxine (the need for it was something done to me while I was unconscious and couldn’t say no) but my firm intention is absolutely nothing more. I’m just not good at drugs.
• As a way to help re-achieve some level of self-sufficiency, I’m going to start an Etsy shop. For starters, I’m crocheting headbands to keep your ears warm in the cold, granny square potholders, sock-style baby booties and Christmas stockings for both people and their pampered dogs. My hope is to launch it mid-September with those few items and as I can get the materials to do it I will add to the offerings.

Even the Laundry

Photo credit: Womanhood with Purpose Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/womanhoodwithpurpose/posts
/672428669502707

There's a Facebook group that I follow called A Farm Wife where the administrator posts each day something she calls "Celebrating the Daily Ordinary" where a little thing we may be taking for granted is called out with gratitude.  One day it might be indoor plumbing, or that we have vacuums (instead of having to tie straw to a stick to sweep out our kitchen) or readily available electricity coming into our homes to power lights, appliances and entertaining toys.  You know, the things it's easy to overlook because they are just part of the everyday ordinary stuff of life.

Laundry needs to be celebrated, too!  Did you know that taking care of the laundry is even something God asks of His people?  Take a look at Exodus 19:10-11.

"And the Lord said unto Moses, Go unto the people, and sanctify them to day and to morrow, and let them wash their clothes,

And be ready against the third day: for the third day the Lord will come down in the sight of all the people upon mount Sinai."

I think it's interesting that Moses was asked to tell the people to sanctify themselves (cleanse the inner man) AND to wash their clothes (cleanse the outer man as well) in preparation for meeting the Lord.  In Church, and sometimes just in life generally, we spend a lot of time talking about the status of the inner man and about how concerned God is with the condition of our heart... as in how well we loved and cared for our fellow man... but we shy away from discussions about taking care of ourselves feeling like that is being selfish and unGodly.

But... if you take a literal look at the Lord's words in Mark 12:29-30 when He was asked about the greatest of all the commandments, He says:

"And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.

And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these."

Love thy neighbour AS THYSELF.

Part of loving yourself is taking care of your body, your home, your clothing... whatever your physical surroundings may be.  And God just told us that it's important to Him.  Very very important!

As a child I was taught a song to remind me not only about when to do them but that they were important details to take care of each week:

Saturday is a special day.

It's the day we get ready for Sunday:

We clean the house, and we shop at the store

So we won't have to work until Monday.

We brush our clothes and we shine our shoes

And we call it our get the work done day.

Then we trim our nails and we shampoo our hair

So we can be ready for Sunday.

(words and music by Rita Robinson, 1920-2011)

We always sang it 'wash our clothes' instead of brush them but the point is, we got things done during the week, and especially on Saturday, to be ready to spend Sunday - our Sabbath - with the Lord.  Isn't it wonderful to think about all our mundane daily tasks this way?  Doesn't it help to elevate them and give the things we do in the home a more proper importance?  We are doing them to prepare for our time communing with the Lord and being refreshed and re-energized by Him.

Something to think about... celebrate the ordinary daily things in life.  And do them, even the laundry, with enthusiasm!

Oh Martha...

Martha, Martha, Martha...

(I bet in your mind you said that like the old Brady Bunch lament of Marsha, Marsha, Marsha... I know I did!)

Thanks to 5MinutesforMom.com for the image/
screenshot of Martha Stewart's interview segment.
You can listen to it here, if you'd like.

Dear Martha,

I'm a blogger.  Of sorts.  Not a very famous one, but I do write and share blog posts all the same.  And you're right...  I'm not a trained editor.  I'm just an average person trying to make my way in the world as best I can.  I claim no special expertise in anything but being me.

I don't have the privilege of hiring expert decorators when I furnish my home.  I pick out the furniture and paint and accessories myself because they are things I like.  Usually a room comes together in layers over a long period of time not in a matter of days like a professional would do it.  And mostly I think I do a pretty decent job.  My colors match, or anyway coordinate, pretty good.  The furniture is comfortable and usually the decorations come with interesting stories.  It's enough that my family and friends and I are happy to be in the room.  And for me that's the point of having it - sharing it with other people who are just as real and average as me.  None of us care, truthfully, that the decor will never be featured in Better Homes & Gardens or on an HGTV segment.

And I don't have formal training as a chef from some hoity toity culinary institute.  While I sort of covet those amazing knife skills I'd gain with that kind of training, I wouldn't trade the lessons in running a kitchen I received from my mom to get them.  And I've never poisoned anyone with what I've fed them!  In fact, I get a lot of compliments on my cooking.  Lots of my average people family and friends seem to think I cook quite well.  And on those occasions when I don't?  Well, they have no problems telling me that either.  You see, the test kitchen that's meaningful to me is my own family dinner table.

And you know what?  The last art class I took was [a deep departure from my Business major] Fashion Illustration in college probably a good 20 years ago.  So I guess it's safe to say I have no real expertise with arts and crafts either.  But mind blowingly... I do them!  And quite often successfully enough that I want to share a picture, sans any training in photography, as sort of a brag about it with my friends.

I also did not attend Divinity School, so I can't claim any special religious expertise beyond daily communion with my Father in Heaven and time spent in the scriptures.  I have no degree in Psychology so advice and commentary on the human condition fall outside my realm of expertise, too.

And to go even further, I have no special training in writing.  Sure, I got good grades in my public school English classes (composition and grammar and sentence structure were part of basic English back in the day) but that's pretty much where it ended.  I just happen to like words.  I like how they feel rolling off my tongue, or I guess fingertips since I'm sitting here typing this out.

I guess this leaves me pretty unqualified to write a blog where such topics are discussed!  But I do it anyway.

And I'm not going to stop.

Doing and writing and sharing about my life make me happy.  It keeps me sane.  Or maybe I should say, it keeps me less insane.  Blogging is my therapy; my release from everything that would become a demon to torment my nights.  And if that's not ok with you Martha, I can live with it.

There was a time when I looked at you as a role model; someone to emulate and study because of your own uncommon rise to success.  You were a fashion model and then a stock broker by trade, correct?  Ironic how that worked out...  I don't seem to remember reading where you found the expertise to start your catering business or to build it into the empire that is Martha Stewart Living.  Where did you get to be an expert about decorating or cooking or crafting or how to compose an enticing photo?  When did you get the training to be an editor or social media guru?  I'm wondering if perhaps you're no expert either?

And that's an oddly comforting thought.

Blackjack, Second of His Name

Realizing that I've mentioned it but never actually properly introduced the newest member of our family...  how about we fix that?  Meet Blackjack!

Jack for short.

Jack and a few toys (in varying stages of being shredded).

Or sometimes Jacky.  Or Jackjack.  And he's Jack-a-Lacka-Wing-Wong (in a goofy sort of sing-song voice) when I'm being silly...

He's a black and tan Doberman Pinscher who was being sold at bargain basement clearance price on eBay.  The breeder was ready to breed another of their dogs and needed the pen where this little guy was living.   He was the last puppy left from a previous litter and he had to go.  So they cut his price in half and put his picture on eBay where Derek found it and as they say, the rest is history.

Our little Jack is a name-sake for the dog Derek's family had when he was a child, another large black and tan Doberman.  And though his sister says we 'have to' get his ears done to keep the name, I think it's stuck on him by now.  With the floppy ears she says he looks like a hound... and she sings Elvis to him:  "You ain't nuttin' but a hound dawg!"

Jack is a good-natured little guy who loves to cuddle and kiss.  Kisses can be a dangerous proposition, though.  He still isn't convinced that teeth are not a part of kissing.

We feel pretty lucky to have him since he's such a perfect fit personality-wise with our other boys.  He jumps in and plays along with them, and fights his way to the front of the treats line, like he doesn't realize he's only about 1/3 their size yet.  Just give him a few months and he'll catch up.

And just like the others, he will eat anything I give him!  ANYTHING!!  Bananas, peanut butter and pumpkin puree are the currently favored treats. Somehow to me that stuff doesn't sound very dog-like but the drool streaming out their mouths would convince you they find it to be pretty darned tasty bites.

He sounds like a mooing cow when he moans in his sleep!  He's outgrown it now, but Lightning did that as a baby and I L.O.V.E.D. it so much!  So that Jack does it, too... well, it just melts my heart.

Today, Jack discovered that he fits into places the bigger dogs don't anymore.  He crawled under the futon downstairs and started nipping at feet as Thunder and Lightning and Gizmo would dart up to play with him.  One time he caught Thunder's back foot and so he stepped up onto the futon and then Jack nipped his opposite front foot and he put it up on the ottoman... with the next nip, Thunder shot straight up in the air and straddled the space in between the futon and ottoman.  It was so funny!!

We met Jack's parents when we picked him up and estimate he's going to be another huge dog based on their sizes.  And researching some other stuff Derek uncovered an interesting factoid about these very large Dobermans that neither of us knew before.  When a male's weight exceeds 100 pounds, he's referred to as a Warlock.  These Warlocks came into being in the 1970's in Europe when Dobermans' were just coming into fashion as guard dogs and there wasn't enough breeding stock to meet the demand for puppies.  Some were bred with Great Danes... and today's big boys are a throwback to those Dobie/Dane bloodlines.

Why I Prep

This is a picture making the rounds on Facebook and in email.  I find it both humorous and terrifying.  A friend shared it with this commentary:

"I share the concern that we have given our executive branch far too much power to declare war, take away citizen's rights and spy on us. Reagan invaded Grenada and we said nothing and every President has taken it further. None more so than when George Bush used our fear to con us into willing[ly] giv[ing] up our rights with the so called "Patriot Act."  Obama has gone even further: declaring the right to kill americans with unmanned drones with no trial, no legal evidence and no public awareness or scrutiny."

While this friend and I frequently find ourselves on opposite ends of the political spectrum, we agree that it seems that all recent U.S. Presidents have taken on the challenge to one-up their predecessor on the abuse of our Constitutional rights.  And it's gone pretty much unchallenged because we've been so preoccupied with the details of whatever current scandals are going on and topics like gun control, the real intent of Islam, abortion, and gay marriage.  We, the American people, have got so tied up in details we have completely missed the big picture.  I shudder to even consider what life will look like when our next President pulls this trick out of his sleeve and removes even more of our rights.  Sometimes I even wonder if we're approaching a point where emotions run so high between those who support the cause of the current administration and those who oppose it that it tips our nation into revolution.

Conspiracy theory much?  Maybe.  But it is something I find truly frightening to consider!

And almost as scary is the thought of what daily life might look like in a post-revolution America. While I truly hope that we can mend our differences and pull back from the brink, I think it's prudent to prepare for a very different future than the present I'm now enjoying.  Kind of that old maxim of "Prepare for the worst and then hope for the best."

I think we get a glimpse of that post-revolution style of daily living whenever there is a natural disaster.  And in complete honesty, I think Mother Nature will dish out something disruptive long before our government declares war on its own people.  Think back to Katrina and some of the other big hurricanes... the devastation that was left behind, the lives disrupted and the primitive nature of living conditions for days, weeks and even months for many people.  No one is immune to experiencing a natural disaster.  They happen everywhere and so it makes good sense to be prepared for the days following a cataclysmic event.

Just this past week, Colorado saw unprecedented rainfall.  Here are comments shared by friends living there:

"Frightening what the News is reporting about missing people.  Started in the tens, went to a hundred and now it's hundreds and hundreds.  Doesn't mean they are gone, just that families have not heard from these people.  I pray they are safe and accounted for in this statewide disaster."  Todd Kinzle, Lakewood CO

Shortly after this, he posted about a hailstorm in Denver leaving things looking like it had snowed.

Photo courtesy of 9news.com on 9/6/13

"It is really mind boggling how many things shut down in our fragile system of living and what we rely on... in town... [near] where I live (I live outside of town) there is a 'no flush' order for the city sewer system.  It goes to show you how important back up sanitation plans are... no matter where you live!"  Jodi Webster, Sterling CO

Jodi expands her comment with this:

"...the city cannot use its sewer system and schools are closed due to no water and the no flush order.  People cannot get in or out [of this part of the state] except through Nebraska, but at least we weren't hit quite like the Denver area!"

The folks there who had the foresight to have a few days worth of food on hand, some bottled water, alternate ways to keep warm and maybe a camp toilet...  I bet they are thinking themselves pretty fortunate.  And this is why, despite the poo-pooing about doomsday I get from some friends and family, I have 72-hour kits and a well stocked pantry.  It's also why:

• We are buying a generator as soon as finances allow.
• I'm studying solar power and hoping within the year to have enough panels in place to run [at least] some of our household appliances.
• I garden and keep working on my skills.
• I study wildcrafting and learn how to identify both edible and poisonous plants, insects and small animals in my area.
• We bought a house with a wood-burning fireplace.
• I use medicinal herbs and simple OTC remedies whenever possible.
• We have guns and strongly support gun rights.
• I make and use natural cleaners in the home.
• I'm learning about chickens and thinking of adding them to our yard for eggs, meat and fertilizer.
• We are buying cast iron cookware that could be used outdoors.
• The grill always has a full tank of propane.
• I'm going to get a tent, sleeping bags and a camp toilet even if we never go camping.

Have I done enough to be a full-on prepper?  No.  But I think I've done a pretty good job getting started.

Roscoe: A Sad Ending

I told a little fib.  Actually… some folks might call my deception kind of a whopper.  Sorry.  Whether my reasons are ultimately judged as good or bad, there was a reason for keeping it a secret.

A few weeks ago I talked about a Pit Bull puppy getting adopted from the Fulton County Animal Shelter.  That part is true.  But I purposely mislead everyone about where Jerry aka Tiger and more recently aka Gizmo actually lives.  Let me come clean:  Gizmo is ours.  And he is a joy!  A complete cuddle puppy who loves nothing more than naptime wrapped in my arms… and licking peanutbutter off a spoon.  That's pretty awesome stuff, too!  Gizmo should be the poster puppy for why you would consider a shelter adoption!!

The shelter's intake photo for Tycoon/Roscoe
taken appx August 10, 2013.

The same day we brought him home, we brought home another dog… a smallish 2-3 year old Rottweiler the shelter tagged as Tycoon.  Tycoon, or whatever his real name is, had an entire lifetime that was filled with mistreatment from all that we pieced together.  He was starved – you could lay fingers between his ribs – and had small open sores on his face and front paws.  We know he had broken toes at some point because his nails stick up in rather odd directions.  He was in such bad shape that the shelter’s vet wouldn't neuter him, a requirement for adoption, because she didn't feel like he would survive the anesthesia from the surgery so Tycoon came home with us as a foster dog to get healthy first.

For the first 3-4 days, I wanted nothing more than to send him back!  He velcroed himself to my leg and just made me crazy.  I couldn't take a step without tripping over him.  Literally!!  He was like a stone attached tightly to my ankle.  He just stoically sat there unwilling to even blink and completely oblivious to the danger he was putting both of us in if I fell!  He wouldn't take an independent step away from me unless… he saw an opportunity to hump the puppy… or poop on the floor.

Roscoe the evening of September 11, 2013

We were grateful that it seemed like his behavior mellowed as he observed and interacted with the other dogs.  It was almost like he watched them to learn how to be a dog.  He played very (almost uncomfortably) intensely but thinking lack of testosterone would make him a bit more docile, we started calling him Roscoe and made plans to complete the adoption following his surgery on September 12.  He'd put on enough weight, got a real shine to his coat and you could even see the beginnings of muscles rippling over his chest.  All in all - a pretty dramatic turn-around!

Sadly, however, Roscoe isn't going to remain part of family.

He came home from the neutering intent that he, and only he, could be the center of ALL attention and he was ready to violently enforce his new ‘rule.’  Within 24 hours, he'd been in several altercations with Thunder… and initially we thought Thunder was the instigator because of his posturing for dominance in the past... but the bloody gashes on Thunder looked more like defensive wounds and he was the one left crying.  Then he attacked Gizmo, unprovoked, while we watched.  A little bit later, he lunged and bit my arm as I reached past him to give one of the other dogs a treat - a near nightly custom on our way up to bed.  And then while Derek was getting everyone calmed down again…  Derek sat on the next to bottom step of the stairs and was petting Roscoe’s head and speaking to him softly.  Thunder walked up, sniffed at Roscoe from behind and sat down on Derek’s other side to get petted, too.  As soon as Derek reached to pat Thunder’s head with his other hand, Roscoe went crazy.  He was snarling, slobbering, and snapping in a frightful display... Somehow Derek got Thunder behind him and into the hall bathroom while pushing Roscoe back with his foot.  He got bit.  A nasty looking puncture on the bottom/side of his foot that we're still watching for infection.

My left forearm the evening of 9/13... my 'reward' for giving treats and a bit of band-aid
scum (1 of my 2 allergies - I will get a nasty weepy rash if I leave it on longer).
The main gash is fairly deep and bled steady for almost 12 hours.

Once Roscoe was leashed outside and the wounds were all cleaned and bandaged, we sat down to talk and made the very difficult decision to surrender Roscoe back to the shelter.  He presented a greater danger than we are prepared to take on...  It isn't fair for the other dogs to live in fear of when he's going to snap and attack them.  It isn't fair that we worry about coming home to a wounded, or dead, dog every time we leave the house.  It isn't fair to wonder when we are going to have an issue with animal control thinking our dogs are being abused because of his attacks.  It isn't fair to worry about him escaping the yard and hurting a neighbor's pet - or worse, their child.  And it surely isn't fair to live with the pain of being bitten repeatedly and not knowing when his bite would do significant damage to one of our own limbs.

With broken hearts and many tears we took him back to the shelter on Saturday morning.  We told them everything.  We told them about his initial behavior issues, his growing intensity as he got healthier, our hopes that neutering would calm him down, about his violence on returning home...  It just felt like the day couldn't get any worse.  And then a staff member at the shelter gave us a lecture saying that his behavior was all our fault; that we'd cared for him wrong and broke a commitment to give him a forever home no matter what.  Basically, she said we were terrible, horrible, evil people who had no business ever owning a pet.

Wow!  That hurts.

Even knowing it's absolutely not true, it still hurts.  I know what happened in my home.  I know how he was treated, loved and wanted.  But I guess offering the same treatment and a good measure of safety to our other pets and ourselves isn't enough in their eyes.  I'm sure when I get past being stunned, I'll get angry and complain to their director and whatever part of county government oversees the animal shelters in Atlanta.  But right now, I'm just grieving.

Will we try again for a 4th dog?  Oh yes... Derek has already searched out a breeder with a black and tan Doberman puppy, the last of the litter and available for a bargain price to free up their breeding pen.  May the Good Lord help me!!  Another puppy to potty train...