Entry for December 31, 2006

Goodbye 2006, you taught me well

I learned how to let go, how to love, how to be frugal, how to juggle, how to lean into a curve, how to find colors, how to spend foolishly, how to be 45, how to share, how to keep calm when the rocks start falling, how to say goodbye, how to merchant, how to dance, how to giggle, coo, speak baby talk, and how to step aside. I learned when to butt in, when not to gossip, when to ask for advise, when to ignore, when to trust, when to say I’m sorry, when to stand my ground, when to talk out loud and when to say goodbye. I learned who I trust, who I love, who I am, who I admire, who cares for me, who makes me happy, and who loves me. I learned what to do in a crisis, what to look for in a pinch, what to say to a neurosurgeon, what spices to add to banana bread, what to do to create a smile. I learned where the eagles fly, where the best deals are, where the laughter lives, and where my heart belongs.

through the year, I smile.....

love me later... tj

"I Ah - Ah!"

I got a phone call today. It was my daughter. She said, "Here momma, someone wants to talk to you." Then I heard the sweetest little voice saying, "I Ah-Ah" The more I laughed and cooed at him the louder he shouted, "I AH-AH!" He'd giggle and carry on, then as clearly as his mouthed cell phone garbled voice would carry it he'd loudly proclaim, "I AH-AH!" It was the best conversation a YaYa could hear from her baby grandson. "Hi YaYa." My daughter finally got the slurpy phone back in her control and told me he had woke up saying I ah-ah, when she showed him my photohe got excited sayng it louder ... hence the phone call. All I could say to him was, "I miss you too Booger."

and I smile...

love me later ... tj

December 25, 2006

Here it is Christmas Day. I’m not going anywhere. I’ve got no dinner planned. No one is coming to visit. I’ve gotten phone calls this morning from my people. This truly is the most wonderful time of the year. This is the first day in over a week that there is no place to be. No dinner to go to, no children to play with. I am sore, and tired and so happy.

I had Christmas early with my daughter and her family. Then the rest of the grandkids came. I had a neighborhood (which is the town) party. I held our family party - all the cousins and Aunts and Uncles. Iwent to two work parties, one very intimate, and one very loud and rambunctious. At one point during the week, I tiptoed downstairs to get a drink of water, and I counted 11 bodies in my home. Now, this is not a biggie until you know my home. Tiny. It was wonderful. We baked sugar cookies and decorated them. We made dinners and breakfasts, I worked as little as possible and when I did work, I took assortments of my people to work with me.

I wrapped presents and somewhere in there Santa snuck off with my truck to have a CD Stereo System installed as a Christmas surprise for me. I opened the faceplate this morning, confused as to what it was. Then it hit me and I ran out in my pj’s and coat to listen to a CD. It was a truck Christmas for me. My son, daughter and Santa Claus hooked my truck up with the goodies I said I wanted. It will sport a lighted hitch plate. I have air fresheners, bungee cords, straps, tire gauges and key chains.

I went to mom’s last night. Christmas eve is her night. My son and his fiancé were there. We ate King Crab Legs and steaks. We laughed and ate and opened a mountain of presents. I opened a 1950's style turntable, so today I plan on listening to my albums that I saved from my teen years, a little Pink Floyd, some old Bob Seger, Aroesmith’s Toys in the Attic. I was giggling. I love the sound of an album playing, The scratchy white noises, the sounds. So different from a CD.

The best memory in this recent Christmas season was with my dad and my baby grandson. My dad played Santa Claus for years and years. He would do schools and churches and an occasional town party. He would visit the homes of dear friends on Christmas Eve. He put his suit away when he got ill a few years back and I haven’t seen Santa Daddy in half a decade. Becca wanted a photo with Santa and my Boog. To get one we would need to travel to Kalamazoo, Jackson, or Fort Wayne. Any one of the malls would have one. Instead she called the North Pole hotline and asked Santa Claus is there were any helper’s nearby. He pointed to my daddy. Daddy dug out his suit and put it on, transforming himself into a jolly old St. Nick. We took a zillion photos and laughed and cried and couldn’t get enough of the sweet surprise. My first photos of my own children with Santa are of my Santa Daddy. Now some 23 years later, I have my grandson on Santa Daddy’s knee. The best. We got photos of all the grandkids, even the dog got a photo with Santa Daddy. Sweet, precious and priceless are the photos and the memories.

The night we went to get photos made at the Rite Aid, it was a girl’s only adventure. My daughter, my soon to be daughter-in-law, and myself took off in the truck. We headed off and in the twilight of the evening, we ran into a heard of deer. I hit one, and two hit me. A small dent is all the truck sustained. Another Christmas accident, but we were all okay and the only deer that was injured that night was the one I hit. The rest ran off. There were about 8-10 crossing the road, in the rainy twilight. It scared the girls. We bonded with a story of Christmas past for the years to come. My son bought me critter whistles for my truck. I just shook my head and realized that maybe we need to get a new truck. That truck seems to draw chance events to it. Not bad luck, I can’t even consider it bad. In the events that took place we are all safe and sound. The truck didn’t even sustain anywhere near the damages it should have.

So hear I sit, in the calmness of Christmas Day. The house is quiet. I am going to read and listen to some old time rock and roll. I am washed in the love of my family and friends. I rejoice on this holiest of days. Our Lord Christ’s birthday. I know the love of God. I know it in the memories I hold of this season.

To all a very Merry Christmas, It is my hope that you have loved ones surrounding you, and you too feel the love of Jesus Christ this season.

And I smile ...

love me later ~ tj

Entry for December 21, 2006

His first Christmas. My best Christmas.

and how I smile ...

love me later ... tj

The Christmas Rock

Friday - December 15, 2006

I was so excited. My daughter was coming to spend a week for the holidays! With her were her husband and her son. My fiancé and I took the trip up north 5 hours away to get them and bring them home for the holidays. Oh, my word this is what I have needed to make my holidays perfect! We traveled in his truck. The back seat would be a tight fit for the kids, but we would manage. We set off a little later than I had hoped. I had a few last minute details I needed to attend to. So after the bows were placed just so, and the floors vacuumed extra well, the cookies put out on the table, off we go. I'm a notorious car sleeper, so I packed my blankets and my music and Wally took off. I couldn't stand it. Every 45 minutes or so my sweet daughter would call asking, "Where are you now? Drive FASTER!" I understood her sentiment perfectly! How I wanted, needed, yearned to be there with her. We got there without much toodo. It was perfect driving weather, clear and dry, not too much traffic. We got there and she ran to me and I swung her up and held her tight. We laughed through our tears of joy and love. Three months was a long time to be apart. We sat and talked for a bit with her in-laws while the menfolk loaded up the truck. We were off again in the twilight of the evening. We stopped on the way home frequently, the baby wasn't feeling good. He had a cold so we stopped for decongestant. The kids were hungry so we stopped for a late dinner. The baby being in the car we stopped once or twice for a smake and diaper change. We laughed and talked and laughed some more. The time was flying by even with all the stopping, I felt joy and peace and so damned happy.

That is until 12:30 that night. We had just junctioned onto I-69 off I-96 a bit north of Lansing and still over an hour away from home. I was talking with her husband. I was leaning toward the middle of the seat with my head between the seats. My back was to the window. Her hubby was leaning toward the middle with his head stuck between the seats talking with me. Out of nowhere my daughter let out a blood curdling scream and throws herself over the baby. In slow motion in my head, but a nanosecond in real time, I reached toward my daughter then turned toward the window. Glass was flying inward, ricocheting and bouncing off everything. The noise was horrendous. The wind and glass was spraying everywhere. Wally was calm and sure as he pulled the truck off the freeway. We took stock of each other. Wally ran around the truck and grabbed me and turned me toward hin, "Are you okay? Dear God, are you okay?" Were we all okay? What in the world happened? Oh my word, what is happening?

I grabbed the cell phone and dialed 911. I was trembling, the woman heard me asking, shouting, if the baby was okay. The words wouldn't come. .. . "I don't know what happened. No, I don’t know where we are. .. . Send the police, I think someone shot at the truck . .. . No I'm not sure. .. ." Wally took the phone from me, I was trembling to hard to talk. I wanted to see my daughter and the baby. I knew her husband was okay, he had jogged up the side of the freeway to see the mile marker. He couldn't find it. He came back to the truck and then ran off again, back the way we had came. Wally talked with the 911 operator. I started wiping glass out of the truck seats, but had no luck without gloves. My daughter wanted her husband to come back. He wasn't gone long. He wanted to see the sign on the overpass we had just gone under, so we could tell the police exactly where we were. It wasn't marked. What he did see brought on the tears that hadn't come. He saw 2 boys, almost grown huddling under the viaduct. Then he saw the rock in the road. He gave chase for a moment and thought better of it. If these people would throw a rock at us moving 75 miles an hour in the pitch of night, what would they do to him if he caught him? These two had come down from the overpass to huddle together and watch the mayhem they had created. To see if the moving target they hit carried a bloody massacre with it. He came back and as he got closer we saw he was carrying an objet. It took both hands to hold it. It was the rock.

We calmed down as we waited for the police to appear. Wally cleared out the truck of glass, he had found some gloves in the truck. We discussed the situation. Someone had aimed a rock, thrown it and damn the consequences on the target. Unbelievable as it was, it happened there on the freeway to us. We hugged each other and kept patting the baby who only cried once when his momma screamed. We closed my blanket into the door to stave off the wind as best we could from the baby, and 50 minutes after it happened got back on the road. The police never showed up.

We stopped at the next rest area to change the baby's clothes. There were shards of glass all over his clothes. We adults took off our clothes and shook them off. I emptied my shoes and watched glass fall out, hearing it ping on the tile floor. We got back in the truck after hugging each other once more and drove the rest of the way home.

The rock had first hit the mirror on the truck, shattering it. Then it bounced up onto the window , exploding it as well. Three inches to the right and it would have come through the windshield. We got the window replaced Monday morning.

Late at night, I close my eyes and I see the mayhem that could have occurred. I open my heart and I see the hand of God reaching out and swatting a rock out of the path of destruction, leaving just enough chaos for us to realize the love we have. For the love of God we are safe at home enjoying the holidays and truly giving worship to the Lord Christ's birth.

The rock sits under our Christmas tree.

It is a very Merry Christmas.

And I am smiling.....

love me later...tj

Entry for December 03, 2006

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas. My mom came over today and marked my calendar with the dates that I need to set aside to do all the things that we do at Christmas time. She filled in 7 days before Christmas. The entire week before! In that week my daughter is coming home with my Boog, Wally's grandson and granddaughter are coming for a few days. and I have 2 jobs to work. One job has a night taken up with a Christmas Pageant the babies put on for their parents. I'm laughing just thinking about it. Parties and dinners every night, except cookie night. The night that I put on there to make cookies with the grandkids. Oh, then there's the day that we have to make a 12 hour journey to take those grandkids and kids home. Yikes! Oh yes, it's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas. The only day that isn't taken is Christmas day. Daddy asked me if I was going to cook Christmas dinner ... I told him if he wanted me to I would for him. He laughed when I told him it might be bologna sammiches and tomato soup. I'd put lettuce on them and make them fancy. Red soup, greenery on the sammiches, works for me! This time of year only comes once a year. I am blessed to have both of my parents, our children, our grandchildren, friends and family to share it all with...

...and I am smiling

love me later~tj

Drinking From My Saucer

Drinking From My Saucer

.

I've never made a fortune

and it's probably too late now,

But I don't worry about that much,

I'm happy anyhow.

And as I go along life's way,

I'm reaping better than I sow,

I'm drinking from my saucer

'Cause my cup has overflowed.

.

Haven't got a lot of riches

and sometimes the going's tough,

But I've got loving ones around me

and that makes me rich enough.

I thank God for his blessings

and the mercies He's bestowed,

I'm drinking from my saucer

'Cause my cup has overflowed.

.

O, Remember times when things went wrong;

My faith wore somewhat thin.

But all at once the dark clouds broke

and sun peeped through again.

So Lord, help me not to gripe

about the tough rows that I've hoed,

I'm drinking from my saucer

'Cause my cup has overflowed.

.

If God gives me strength and courage

When the way grows steep and rough,

I'll not ask for other blessings,

I'm already blessed enough.

And may I never be too busy

to help others bear their loads,

Then I'll keep drinking from my saucer

'Cause my cup has overflowed.

-Author Unknown

and I smile...

love me later~ tj