Sparks and Butterflies...

But aside from that, she's still completely normal

Break interupted by flames

By Leave a Comment

So – I’m on an internet break til the kids start school next week. Except that my area had a fire start yesterday, and now it’s kind of scary.

So. Yes, we’re ok. Our home is safe. I’m not sure I can say the same for some friends and parents of friends, but they’re safe for now.

It’s called the Station Fire. Anyway – here are some pics. I thought I would get this up now, ’cause we just lost our internet connection (I’m on my wireless laptop card now) and we could also lose power at any moment, we’ve been warned.

My home is getting hit hard by ash. And it’s surreal. There’s ash, yes, but most of it is the size of my thumbnail, and a lot of them are leaves. You can see the veins and everything.

Anyway – yes, we’re OK. Unless it starts getting windy and embers start to fly, or the the other mountain parallel goes up (that’s the one we’re by) we’re ok. Here are some pictures I took earlier today… However, what the photos don’t show is that the flames have now crested that mountain and are half way down this side now. I’m no photographer though, and can’t take good night shots.

If the power does go down, I’ll be reserving my laptop juice for finding information, but I will twitter and such if necessary.

A Parenting Mistake?

By 3 Comments

I have this little nightlight in the bathroom Poe gave me as a little Mother’s Day Gift. It’s a silver sun with a little blue drop crystal over the light. Pretty. Sparkly. Very me – hence the gift.

I was cleaning up today, and noticed that the crystal was just sort of there – leaning on the light instead of hanging. I took it, figuring maybe a cat brushed too hard against it and broke the metal groove it hung on. It was sitting on the table and Logan saw it, he said, “I don’t want to be sneaky anymore. I know how that broke. Joseph did it.” In other words, we’ve been on him about being sneaky, and he figured he’d get brownie points by ratting out his brother.

I called in Joseph and asked if he knew how it broke. Tears ensue, but he didn’t lie. He wanted to crystal for a necklace. He’s a bit of a horder and collector. Frankly, Logan’s room looks like a monastery room, whereas Joseph’s room looks like he’s already lived two decades, and all the stuff one might collect therein. Logan’s not a collector. Anyway – Joseph has trouble not taking something that’s not his, but he’s been making a lot of progress lately and put it back as best he could, “because it was wrong to take it.”

So. I make jewelry. Did you know that? I don’t sell it or anything, ’cause I don’t think I’m good enough at it, and don’t have the money to buy true good quality findings. But, I do have some stuff on hand that I make for myself. I had Joseph sit there while I fixed the nightlight. And then had him pick some beads and I made him a “manly” necklace.

Basically, I wanted him to know that wanting nice things that strike your eye is fine – it’s HOW you get it that matters.

Did I make a parenting mistake in making him a necklace? I don’t know if I taught the right lesson. That’s not rhetorical – I really want to know.

State of Michele

By 2 Comments

I really don’t have a lot of time to write in my OWN blog, as I have other commitments, school starting, my business, my father, and home renovations going on. I am hear though. I’m reading your blogs, I’m reading your tweets… I’m just not talking back right now.

As for dad… They tried to take out his cancer locally, and they couldn’t. It’s too deep. They are going to put him under general and take out a portion of his arm. They’re trying to work out the OR schedule. I still don’t know what kind of cancer it is… And I think my parents are confused. So, I asked them to have the doctor PRINT it out for me. They don’t seem to care what kind – but I CARE. RESEARCH people! It’s good for you and keeps you from being taken, keeps you informed and involved in your own care rather than the therapy happening TO you. Luckilly they have a pushy daughter, and I will get to the bottom of it. They can’t complain. They raised me.

Home renovations continue. The hallway is done (painted and pictures hung, and some narrow furniture.) The bedroom is half done. I still have to clean out under the bed, and then we wait, because I have to buy some things. And well – purchases need to wait. We’ve run out of the small house fund I had set up prior to Poe’s losing his job, but other stuff, paid for by my parents as the owners are happening. As I type, I’m playing guard duty while a window is being ripped out behind me. I have to guard against our indoor cats escaping. But with all the sawing and banging, I just don’t think that’s going to happen.

My kids start school in a week and a half, and so that’ll be a month learning a new routine. They’ll both be on new schedules, and this will be the first year of going to school medicated for Joseph, plus a longer day. Logan will be on the big playground and PE and stuff, plus a longer schedule. And of course, harder homework all around. I can’t believe the summer is almost gone.

So, I know I’m not especially prolific. I’m barely holding it together, truth-be-told. I have some physical stuff going on, practical stuff going on, emotional stuff going on… Really? I’m a basket case, but it’s all internal, and I just can’t afford to externalize it right now. I think I’m the glue holding everything together at the moment, and so I simply can’t lose it. Yet.

Cancer Strikes

By 4 Comments

A while ago, my father had a bad fall in his garage. He went to pick something up from the ground, and lost his balance and toppled. My father is a big man. 6′ and a good 250. And yes, he was a linebacker in high school. In trying to break his fall he dislocated his shoulder, cut his arm, and bashed his head. Cat scans and x-rays later, his shoulder was set, his head cleaned up, and his arm bandaged. It was more of a terrible scrap, so it couldn’t be stitched. He healed for the most part. Had to have some physical therapy for his shoulder. His arm healed for the most part.

When his arm healed over, it had a bit of a bump. It looked like scar tissue. But then the bump grew. It was almost like the cut underneath was infected, so he played with it, but there was nothing in it. So he left it alone. The bump became larger and larger, and eventually, a middle sort of pitted and scabbed over. It was the size of a half dollar. A circle of scar tissue with a scab in the middle. He finally came over and had me take a good look at it. I told him to make a dermatology appointment immediately. My thought was a condition I heard of in which the body’s skin cells sort of just keep going and keep making scar tissue, even when it’s healed. Like I said, it was about a half dollar in diameter and a good half inch high.

Unlike any time before, my dad actually took my advice. He went to the doctor yesterday.

Yesterday afternoon we were in our kid pool, and my dad came ambling over from his backyard. He sat down and explained that he probably had cancer.

Skin cancer. Probably carcinoma but the doctor isn’t sure if it’s carcinoma or melanoma. It has invaded all layers of skin. They took a biopsy, (they also removed another portion on his arm) and sent it for testing. We’ll know more after the tests come back in two weeks. That portion of his arm will have to be removed surgically, but before they do it, they want to know the kind of cancer they’re looking at. Then they’ll find out the stage, and do tests to see if it’s metastasized.

My mom has dealt with skin cancer for years. But with her, it has a particular look to it, so she knows immediately what it is, and it is promptly removed. That’s it. It doesn’t permeate her skin, and there are no other symptoms or treatments. With my dad, though? It might be bad. There are cancers that attack sores and injuries that aren’t healing properly, and that’s what they think we’re dealing with here.

And so, we wait.

My mother is throwing me for a loop though. She actually said to my dad that he was in denial. His reply was, how can he be in denial when they’re not even sure what exactly he has yet? And then she said, “it’s a good thing you didn’t get into that pool with that cancer.” Like what? He’s going to spread it like the plague or something? I think she’s just reacting, because my mother is much more intelligent than that and has dealt with cancer in many forms with many relatives including her parents – not to mention her own. So, I haven’t talked to her about it yet. I’m waiting for her to calm down a bit, so I don’t have to deal with her saying something stupid. Because she’ll blame him in some way. She always does. It’s how they operate.

And so we wait for the tests. We wait to see what we’re dealing with. And then we’ll wait to see how much of his arm they take (because Poe will probably have to take over physical work on both houses for him.) We’ll see what he’s left with. We’ll see how far it has spread. We’ll figure out what’s next.

We’ve come a long way, my dad and me. We haven’t really gotten along for a lot of reasons I’ve never and will never mention on my blog. But over the years that we’ve lived next door we’ve gotten closer. He’s not close to his sons, or his other grandchildren, so he’s incredibly close with the boys. He’s not a very friendly man, in that he doesn’t do anything to expand the relationships he’s got – mom’s the social director of the family. Which means, when he wants/needs to talk to someone he comes to me. The very fact that he searched us out to tell me to my face and not hiding behind my mother, and then just talking to us about it… We’ve come a long long way.

So, we wait. And again, our decision to stay here and help them until they’re gone is validated. I’m needed here. And I thank God that my husband gets that – not only gets that but participates.

Recent Comments