We had it all planned for the next day.  Daddy took off work, for once I had no holiday rounds, we’d been building it up for weeks, and it was finally going to be the day our four year old got to see Santa!  Since Thanksgiving I’d been threatening to email his elves if she was naughty.  And then just before midnight she started begging me to help her and was literally writhing in pain.  Trying not to lose it, I calmly asked her what was wrong.  She wailed it was her ear.  It did not look red but when I went to touch it she screamed so loud it even woke my husband.  My girl is tough; REALLY tough.  So I knew something was seriously wrong and figured it might be a bad ear infection.  I called the emergency hotline and the kind nurse asked me the standard litany of terrifying questions as I tried not to wig out.  I had given her Children’s Tylenol three hours prior so it was decided I was allowed to give her Children’s Advil as well.  It was also arranged that we would see the nurse first thing in the morning.  My little one fell into a fitful sleep on my chest as I held her and prayed for her to feel better.  Turns out she not only had fluid in both ears but one was so full there was a danger of it bursting.  Trying not to flip, I asked if a busted ear drum would damage her hearing and how long it would be before we knew.  She is on antibiotics and I was told she should start to feel better in about three days.  Then she threw up four times and they said it was not uncommon because of the incredible pain and pressure she was experiencing.  She asked if she could go to school but could barely hold her eyes open.  So I took her home and let her sleep through some of the pain for most of the day.  When I told her we wouldn’t be seeing Santa (we’d actually missed our chance) she started crying.  I told her Santa wanted her to feel better and that we’d be going next week for sure.  We asked if she’d like to go to her favorite Tex Mex place instead as she struggled against more tears.  Once we got there and she greeted everyone in English and Spanish (they’ve all known her since she was an infant) she started to feel a little bit better.  At least she was able to eat.  When we got home she hugged me and said it was the best day ever.  The best day ever?!  I was running on two hours’ sleep, cleaned up vomit several times, and greatly disappointed my only child.  And yet, she was happy.  Then I thought to myself with no small amount of chagrin that we were all three together, we all got to spend time with each other, and we were all OK.  Out of the mouths of babes …  I close this post with the timeless words of Dr. Seuss:

“And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow,
stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons.
It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags.
And he puzzled and puzzled ’till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before.
What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store.
What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.”

I’ll bet you’re thinking, “she posted a pic of her dryer?!”  How boring.  I did this for several reasons.  First, the top of the dryer has not seen the light of day for more than a year.  The cats are all mad because they’d come to think of it as some type of lounge area.  Second, it reminds me how blessed we are to have them.  I remember dreading Saturdays growing up because we had to load up all our dirty clothes and take them to the laundromat.  Back then there were really no video games except in arcades and kids were actually required to do work.  Daddy had a big thing of quarters and I would watch Mama’s face turn as red as her hair because there was no air conditioning.  Frankly, it was Hell.  I would safely label it the worst part of my childhood.  And then there was the dreaded steamer.  It made that awful place seem 10,000 degrees hotter.  When we first got married and I got to live in the only house I’ve ever known, we had to buy a refrigerator, washer and dryer.  I was SO excited.  This was when they first started making colors and, being a budding techie, I got the best brand for the best deal.  Two loves of mine:  getting high tech stuff and getting great deals.  And yet I still DETEST laundry.  How easily I have forgotten our station wagon slipping and sliding in the ice to get to the washateria only to wait for an hour because all the machines were taken and the humiliation of having other people see your unmentionables.  Now all I have to do is empty a hamper downstairs and any time I want I can have clean clothes.  What a blessing!  I DON’T want to take it for granted; I DON’T want to forget how hard things were for my parents and yet how happy they always made me.  And I DON’T want our little girl to be oblivious to the suffering, plights and misfortunes of others.  There is a false sense of arrogance that comes with money, in my opinion.  After all, if they have more money they are “better,” are they not?  More successful.  Smarter.  A harder worker.  And yet all of that is false.  Look at people in other countries still washing their clothes in polluted rivers.  We are ALL so blessed.  I always want to remember that and not take even the most mundane things for granted.  My father taught me never to envy, but always to aspire:  to aspire through personal growth and to always do my best.  Hooray for those who find it calming and therapeutic, however I still cannot bring myself to iron.  I buy “travel” and “wrinkle free” clothes and linens for that very reason.  I shall end with the words of a woman whom I have always greatly admired.  Erma Bombeck said her second favorite household chore was ironing.  “My first being hitting my head on the top bunk until I faint.”  I could not agree more.

French essayist Joseph Joubert said that imagination is the eye of the soul.  As I look around the house I see toys strewn about.  Rather than grumbling, I often take pictures of the little vignettes before putting them back where they live.  I have found treasures gifted to me in places ranging from our bed, the stairs, our hallway, the sofa, our kitchen, the porch, and my office just to name a few.  Most are from our daughter, but often the wolfies and the gatos carefully place their lovies where we will discover them as well.  They are reminders to me that I live in a home where love abounds.  I find tea cups on my desk, wet squeaky skunk toys under the covers deposited by the wolfies, and bits of string on our formal dining room table “hunted” by the cats.  Sometimes I have to scold one group or the other from “loving” toys that are not theirs, but for the most part everyone knows what belongs to whom.  Our new toilet is not just a device better for the environment — it’s a rocket ship.  One flush and we are transported through the bathroom skylight to the moon.  We get to eat chocolate every day and there is always a party to which I am invited.  My dressing room is a hair salon where I get served wine from my perfume bottle.  Chalk markings on the sidewalk rival the most mystical of Egyptian hieroglyphs.  Bananas are telephones, underpants become hats, and purses hold “special tickets” to secret events and places.  I have regained my imagination through my child’s eyes and have gotten a glimpse into her sweet, smart, funny, beautiful soul.  I have to go now; we need to walk Pluto and then have our afternoon tea with the wolfies.  There may even be a trip or two to the moon.  😉

Cigars:  on Indian reservations they call tobacco the red man’s revenge.  And yet ironically, my Choctaw Grandmother died from causes probably related to smoking cigarettes.  My daddy smoked cigars and pipes until the mid ’70’s when I showed him the PSAs that smoking can cause lung cancer.  I was the only kid in Kindergarten with a King Edward’s cigar box as a pencil box.  And yet as an adult I confess a love for cigars.  They are a treat to be savored, versus a daily indulgence.  I have gone from Churchills to robusotos though so I have reduced my smoking length considerably.  I do not want to write too much to glorify them; I’m just saying … one every now and then I think is OK.  Abraham Lincoln once said, “It has been my experience that folks who have no vices, have very few virtues.”  I am refraining from indulging after this post.  My next cigar will probably be New Year’s Eve.  Until then I have my little humidor and when I open it, for an instant, the years slip away and I am back sitting on my daddy’s lap.  His hands were so huge and so red.  I can still remember the heavenly smell of his tobacco.  And for a single split second I have him back.

You can call them thrift stores on the lower echelon, resale a step up, next I suppose is “vintage”, consignment a notch above that, and finally antique shops if you want to feel you’re on the high end of used things.  Really they’re all a mixed bag and there could be a treasure priceless only to the finder in any of them.  Some places can be funky and some can just smell funky.  Some I find depressing and others I find interesting to check out.  I try to reuse, reduce and recycle so it makes me feel good patronizing them.  Also, I try to shop local and they’re mostly Mom and Pop establishments wherever you go.  One man’s trash really is another man’s treasure.  American designer Kelly Wearstler said that “everything is inspired by history”, so that is why she loves vintage and antiques.  I have always loved history and consider it a passion of mine; not only “great” history, but the “little” histories of things and individuals perhaps forgotten.  About two years ago on bulk trash day I noticed a neighbor down the street had set out a heart shaped wicker chair.  It immediately caught my eye.  So I pulled over and went to inspect it.  It was only a little unraveled mostly on the back leg.  I thought it gave it a bit of character.  So I popped my trunk and squirreled it away, putting it on our front porch as a sign of welcome.  My little girl sat in that chair on her first day of preschool.  She posed next to it her first day of preschool this year as well.  On a whim today I walked into a resale shop not on the fancy end of the spectrum.  As I made my way around glass ashtrays and dressers I discovered the twin to my little white wicker chair!  I could not believe it!  Upon closer inspection I realized it had no arms, but otherwise it is identical and looked so lonely sitting there in between all that heavy furniture.  I knew I had to take it home.  Next Halloween Mr. Bones, our skeleton, can still resume his usual post in the chair with arms, but maybe one of my black cat decorations can claim the other.  For now the Libra in me is content with the symmetry on our front porch.  The romantic in me is happy that two lonely hearts have found their match.  And the treasure hunter in me is content with a priceless find.

My husband cannot understand what the deal is with Christmas cards.  Every year he sees me hunched over grumbling and asks why I bother.  I bother because ours is a “busy” world where handwritten cards of any sort are a rarity, and even birthday cards can barely be purchased and signed.  But at Christmas cards fly through the post harkening back to another era.  There are the braggy ones, the store-bought ones, the “look at my 10,000 family members” ones, or (like me for years) the “look at my animals” ones, but they are paper tokens that signify someone remembered you nonetheless.  My mother was big on cards.  Even in her last years I took her to the Hallmark store to buy her Christmas cards.  She always bought cardinal ones; they were her favorite bird and I can never see them without thinking of her and her beautiful red hair.  We would pass her cards around Autumn Leaves and she gave them to everyone — from the nurses to the grouch.  What a joy it was to watch.  It was humbling, as it was the only card many ever received.  It showed they were thought of and not just old and forgotten.  Today I came across her last card simply signed, “Love Mama” and it was painfully bittersweet.  To see something she wrote is so precious to me, particularly as she got very self-conscious about her handwriting.  And now when I can no longer see her tiny, freckled hands and I am struggling to get through the second Christmas without her, miraculously she went and did what she always did … she sent me a card.

“Somehow not only for Christmas but all the long year through, the joy that you give to others is the joy that comes back to you.  And the more you spend in blessing the poor and lonely and sad, the more of your heart’s possessing returns to make you glad.” ~ American Fireside Poet John Greenleaf Whittier

Other than animals, I’d say growing up my best friends were books.  Both of my parents loved to read.  Daddy read Dale Carnegie and Mama read murder mysteries.  My guilty pleasure has always been historical romance.  Burk prefers biographies.  Maris loves all her books, especially Anatole the mouse and Madeline.  Our family is not satisfied with merely browsing in a bookstore.  We all get drawn into its literary delights; the dichotomy of time standing still and yet time being transported.

“Oh, I just want what we all want:  a comfortable couch, a nice beverage, a weekend of no distractions and a book that will stop time, lift me out of my quotidian existence and alter my thinking forever.” ~ Elizabeth Gilbert, “Eat, Pray, Love”

Reluctantly the time had come to leave but we each walked away clutching our newest finds.  For Burk it was “Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates”, for me it was “Mary, The Most Powerful Woman in the World”, and Maris got the most darling book called “In the Forest”.  My parents taught me books were to be cherished and that is what we are instilling in our daughter.  Books are treasure troves in and of themselves; they are knowledge, they are escape, they are recollections, they are adventure, they are history and so much more.  As much as I adore my iPhone and have great concern over the conservation of trees, I hope there will always be books to hold and to smell.  There is a comfort in the rustle of a turning page, the soft “whump” when a book closes, and its reassuring weight as it slips out of sleepy hands and onto a chest.  Even the cats love scratching a cheek or two on its edges.  Each of our bookshelves will now have a new gem to house.  And with that I shall close this chapter in my blog and crack open my book.

There is a certain store my entire family has never been able to resist.  In the past four years I cannot recall a time we have ever come out having spent less than $200.  They always have something practical, seasonal, or just plain fun.  We have bought just about everything in there at some point — small appliances, diapers, books, electronics, luggage, toys, cards, decorations; you name it.  Today I went in for a Christmas CD to play during my daughter’s class party.  That’s it.  I put my blinders on and moved with determined purpose.  Peeking out from an aisle as I made my way to the back were two pretty little tops that beckoned.  Then I saw they had new pajamas and mine are shot.  Deciding I was starting to get caught as if it were the La Brea Tar Pits, I got myself out of there.  I found the CD and began striding toward the front like an arrow determined not to veer in either direction.  On the way back to the front a great looking bookshelf broke my focus.  My husband has needed a bigger, more sturdy one for ages.  American essayist Charles Dudley Warner said the excellence of a gift lies in its appropriateness rather than its value.  I really hope Burk will like it.  And so I rolled out with one small bag and one big box totaling $220.21.  Right on Target.  😉

Photographs:  some people pose for them and some duck shyly away.  Another passion my mother instilled in me was a great import upon taking pictures.  When I was little she’d dress me up every year and we would go down to Sears to have my portrait made.  She hung them all in our living room and through the years they made a giant, conglomerative square.  We could not start riding rides at Six Flags until my mother had gotten our pictures taken first.  Oh the interminable wait!  My uncle loved cameras and gave me my very own when I was seven.  I was so proud of it.  It had a carrying case and even a space to store flip flashes.  Of course, as the current keeper of memories, I now make our little girl wait while I get a picture of us.  I hope she will appreciate it one day, too.  I remember Uncle Johnny saying to me to take pictures of things that are important.  I suppose that definition lies within the eye of the beholder.  Renowned photographer Ansel Adams said you don’t take a photograph, you make it.  The most gratifying for me has been being in other countries watching family members switch places to try to have at least one picture of themselves taken by an iconic monument.  I always like to walk up with a respectful smile and hold my hand out for the camera, indicating they should all get in the picture.  The surprise and sheer delight on their faces never fails to make my heart soar.  It transcends barriers of race, religion and culture and it is indescribable to watch as they all light up and nod their thanks afterward.  It is also lovely and much appreciated when they reciprocate!  The commonality of our collective desire unites us.  And so we spend a brief blink of time with each other; a convergence of two worlds sharing the same moment.  It has been my experience both sides leave the better for it.  I have always wanted a family of my own to take barefoot pictures with in the grass.  I have only a few family portraits with my parents and that was thanks to church directories.  I guess that’s why I chose to put our annual family pictures at the top of my site.  They say good things come to those who wait.  They certainly do.

Not bad for mundane trips to Home Depot and Whole Foods!  When I was in college I remember my mother saying she wished I still went to the grocery store with her because she said she always got free things and help out with her bags.  Now I get it.  My little one winds up with some kind of sweet gift or gesture from strangers almost wherever we go.  I do not want her to be spoiled or take things for granted.  She always says thank you and I make sure she adds “ma’am” or “sir”.  I really love it when she thanks someone in Spanish because of the sheer look of slight shock and delight on their face.  I speak French so that will be her second language.  Since we live in Texas she’ll get enough Spanish on her own just as I have.  But I digress.  I had to go in Home Depot for light bulbs and we saw this older lady wearing a lot of pink and carrying a purse shaped like a car.  She had a huge plastic flashing ring, a light up necklace and even her hat lit up!  I snapped the pic before she’d turned everything on; I had no idea.  Anyway, I remarked to Maris the lady was wearing her favorite color and the next thing we know she is getting a brand new ring just like the one the woman was wearing — huge, round and flashing.  Maris was so thrilled and it was such a kind thing to do.  It really made our day.  I found myself wanting to be like that woman when I’m her age — full of joie de vivre and with a kind, generous, and youthful spirit.  Later on we went to Whole Foods.  As we were waiting in line to check out Maris asked if she could have one of the tiny pieces of chocolate they have as samples, but they were all out.  The sweet man behind the register heard our conversation and gave me an entire chocolate truffle to give to Maris for when we left.  He didn’t want any credit for it.  I made sure Maris knew it came from him and her eyes lit up as she told him, “Thank you, Sir” in both English and Spanish.  Another act of kindness from someone who didn’t have to notice or make the time to bother.  My Daddy said to always go the extra mile.  I want to instill that in our daughter.  My hope is that she will continue to grow in grace, strength and beauty.  Achukma hoke.

“For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others; for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness; and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone.” ~ Actress and Humanitarian Audrey Hepburn