Tis The Season

       For Football!
       I think yesterday, maybe earlier, there were TV's and radios set on football games at our house. Even if you were in another room, you could hear a game being played. We all had Ipads out looking up schedules, times, channels, lighting delays! We are a family of freaks and geeks for football.
      Hart was at the Auburn Game, and so was the new SEC Nation crew. I text him early!! to remind him to go see 'My' Timmy Tebow, and let him know we love him. All during that game, we had reports, play by play of what he saw, and what we saw on TV, to let him know if the call was right, or how long his rain delay may last. My cousins and friends were at the doomed Florida Game, who knows when that will get replayed. We watched Georgia, FSU, LSU, maybe some Mississippi State, Georgia Tech, honestly it was a football blur. It was Saturday football glory, even Lucy the Lab, looked concerned when we had to ask each other, if she had her supper?? All the team color garb comes out, and the smack talk about each coach and team member. My husband even watches Princeton and other unknown schools play, we allow his thinking outside the SEC box. Penn something, U Mass, ( I only thought they had basketball!) even Rutgers, I think has a team.
     Lucky for all we are good, at multifunctional working. We ate, shopped, read a book(me during the Georgia Game) pulled some weeds, washed clothes, walked Lucy, normal Saturday family duties. The difference is it was all done during half times, and a tight schedule. I feel very lucky to  have TV's in all rooms of the house, yes that is true, and I feel no shame! I grew up when TV was the end all, be all and it still has a place (many places) of honor in mi casa. In fact the big TV in the basement has been out for three weeks, and it makes me nervous. Bill says, "No one goes down there to use it!" ( that was after my rant about why there was no urgency to get it fixed quick, or buy a new one) Me, " Lucy and I use it on Mondays, and in the winter I like to paint down there, and......there has to be one!" "When people stay over, they need a TV!"
Bill, " Well there sure are other TV's all over the house, want me to put one down there?"
    Me again, " No, then that room would be minus a TV?" " Just roll with me!" "Husband of 34 years."
   Its Football Season, and we have to be ready. ( Note I have tennis on as I type!) in the kitchen, its wonderful!
   Thank you Homer for teaching me all about sports, and Mary for teaching me, to take my dolls with me everywhere! Knowledge of sports and taking care of babies, two traits that stayed with me.
        Go Gators, War Eagle, Go Tech, and I guess Princeton! for my one and only! Go U Mass for Brian and NYU, Keith I seriously don't think they had sports, did they?? I know you play a mean game of billiards!
  Tis the Season !

Remember, You Have To Be The Sun, Not The Wind

      As far back as I can remember, I have been a force of nature. More like a hurricane, instead of a light breeze. When all along I just wanted to be The Sun!!
     Even as a little tot, I was told, to stop  being so hard-headed and sensitive. A rare combo of traits, that have stayed with me for life. I told my parents, at a very young age, to try and enlighten them, that my stubborn streak was because I wanted answers. I truthfully did not want to have them pull their hair out, I just wanted to know why? You could punish me, but I wanted to state my case, and it was 1952. Children did not have an opinion, or the right to question. So I learned to read early, and find my own answers.
    After I held my breath until I passed out!! on a few occasions. I just wanted to know why I had to come in from outside, it made no sense!
   Being overly sensitive, I call passionate about life. Everything hurt my feelings, things bothered me, I cried often and buckets full. If a plant died, I would weep for days, when I just needed someone to buy me another one, or explain nature. My dresses itched, with all the petticoats and I would remove them, no one should have to wear these things! My skin was sensitive too! Lassie caused many a sleepless night of angst, I just wore my heart on my sleeve and it was pumping! Mom worried and Dad just said to ignore her! ( that being me) I was the first born princess, and I thought they should recognize this on a daily basis. But life being what it is, became busy with babies, and daddy working hard. They were both in their early twenties, God Bless them! ( mom worked hard too, no dryer, no microwave, no air conditioner and you had to cut up a chicken!! which is a deal breaker for me!)
    I adjusted and lived a life of being on a pedestal with Homer, (daddy) having one foot on it, to take me down a peg or two, when needed.
     I am explaining this to you, the reader, so you can appreciate my blog more!
     Yesterday, I was headed to the art supply store, and I had the window of the car down. The weather is just beautiful. I felt tears well up in my eyes, so I pulled over. How can August be almost over, How can I bottle up the smell of this fresh cut grass? I wonder if there is a way to put smells and sunshine in a jar and open it in the winter? Boo hoo ing, snot coming down my face, hysterical. You see now, how I still ask so many questions!! I inhale and exhale, and thank God for this beautiful day, and get my self together. Then I laugh at what I must have looked like in the Art Store. They were really kind to me, and asked if I needed help, in a strong tone!
   I returned home, and remembered again that day, it was Ward's birthday, and my emotions are a little raw.
 ( Honestly they are like this everyday! Ask my family!) So I sat still and thought of wonderful memories of my precious boy, who was hard headed and soooooo sensitive, and cut off the tags of his shirts because they bothered him. I smiled and then felt like I could feel the grief flowing all over my body, I could feel each of my cells in my body. So I went to sit in the sun.
    I will be the vessel of Wards memories, I will be the Sun even in Winter. I will just be me, and that is enough.
   August, another good year, thank you 

Shift Work

   Right now, the second shift has the grands at the pool. Uma ( another one of my names) and Grandpa Bill,are home picking  up the pieces and trying to squeeze in a nap. Emma will be home soon, she is the third shift, and then we gather as a tribe . Kicking and screaming all the way.
   There is nothing easy about children, but you do have moments of jubilation.
   Today I am reminded of where I was thirty years ago, and I have let Hart know hourly what I was doing!
   He turns thirty today, and he needs to be know all details each year, of his birth story.
   My mom was with us in Pennsylvania, I was sick and she had all shifts at the time. We went to the doctor, and she said , " You have pneumonia and are in labor, so we have a problem!" I think I told mom to drive me to the railroad tracks and just let me end it, Quickly! but that could have just been the fever. The doctor sent me home on giant doses of antibiotics with the hopes that it would kick in before the kid. You realize I had a three year old, in tow also.Better yet, my mom did. A three year old, that only loved his mom and her hair! We made it home, and I hit the bed, yelling at mom from my prone position, " Call Bill, this is not working, I have a scheduled C-section, why am I going through all this labor, again!! So Dr. Bill rushed home and to Trenton, New Jersey we flew. The doctor said, " You are four centimeters and you cant breathe, want to try natural?"  Me talking, gasping for air, " You have five minutes to numb me, and cut this baby out of me, and tie my tubes!" She laughed, " Oh Bonnie, you are so funny." When my husband said, " Now you have four minutes, doctor before her head starts spinning!" ( why do they always use the Exorcist reference?) She took out this huge baby boy, and we called him William Hartley Baron, or Hart to all that love him. Then the pulmonary people came to deal with me, I was a sick mom. Plus I get a psychosis in hospitals and start to see things! The man that came to do some respiratory therapy on me in the wee hours, I called the nurse to get him out! I could blow on that tube with out a teacher, and he looks like a ghost to me! ( that little tid-bit I kept to myself. Then later when my breast were as big as a football stadium, Nurse Ratchett wants to do a honey enema on me, promising me that it would not hurt, but failing to tell me how hard it is to wipe honey off your...........for days on end, after a c-section.( I think it was honey-molasses, have you ever)
  Well all the shifts took care of me,and I was off for home, to give mom a break ( by now she and Ward are sick) Hart was a perfect child, slept hours on end, and I never put him down. Now I had two boys in my lap and in my heart forever. He grew up to be a fun teenager, and smart  young man. AND now, he has a shift with the grand kids. A long shift.....and a reminder from me. There will always be shift work in your life, you will not like some of it, but give it your best. AND anytime you want to see my scar where your big head came through, just ask!
         Love,
           Mom

You Are Going To Need A Bigger Boat

    Each and all Saturdays, I repeat this phrase, "You are going to need a bigger boat!" from the horror movie, Jaws.
    My life is big and full, and all my joints ache! ( what is this process our bodies go through, where we begin to make noise with each movement!) ( and you know I am tracking each step!)
    August is the month I had my babies, and its my birthday, and its wicked hot. August is my happy place.
    My Hart, who is my heart, celebrates his 30th birthday next week. August is a time of reflection of thirty years with this big boy. I think he was 97 percent perfect, and that is all I will say! (not true!)
   I often would wake him up, because he loved to sleep, and I wanted to look at him more!
   His laughter is hysterical, no in-between. He makes me laugh, still.
   I love you Hartley Baron, more than The Beatles. 8-21-84)
   My Ward would have been 33 (8-26-81) this summer. Of course I think about what he has missed, but I concentrate on what he left us. The stories are endless......he was a character. He was a genius, that went to the edge. When I delivered him, via c-section and 26 hrs of labor,  I thought, " Oh God, I love him way too much!" It was a miracle, this having babies, and him being my first, I was insane with love! I held him for two years in a row, and maybe more!! I wish I could hold him right now, and in a way, I can. I love you more each day Ward. You were a gift to us, that we unwrap on the hour. Happy Birthday.
  Then there was Emma, born 9-18-88, but came to us 8-4-89 on a plane from India. So she came into our family also in this glorious month of August. A wisp of a child, very frail and sick, but I knew she was ours. I looked into her charcoal eyes and said, " Your are home." I had my girl, who turned into the star that she is today. Happy Adoption day Emma Lea.
  The August babies were added to two stepsons, whom I met in August. While attending a weekend course at Princeton, in Echocardiography, I met Bill Baron, and Keith age 7, and Brian age 6. Now you see why I have repeated for many Saturdays I NEED A BIGGER BOAT! Now Keith is 41 and Brian 40, they went on this marriage journey with me, and we started a family together. They are mine, with every beat of my heart.
    This Saturday is no different, the waves of crazy busy are high and I struggle to get over them. I do it with joy. Small victories around each corner, and a heart full of love.
    August, you have charmed me, for yet another year.
   

A New Wood Salad Bowl And Summer Tomatoes

     Do not let the title throw you, this is a serious subject.
     When I heard about the comic actor, Robin Williams death by suicide, I stopped breathing.
      The first thing I thought about, was my salad for supper! That was enough to keep me going for a few more days! It was beautiful and delicious, and a reason for living. You see I too, suffer from depression, and I work hard to find joy in all things. Never in my 62 years of living, have I felt the need to check out, but I cannot know Robin Williams heart.
       Suicide is nothing but questions, how bad does it get? To leave your family, never hear music again, taste food, smell summer. Mental illness, and addiction was his beast of burden. Mr. W was living a life of high octane, explosions of genius, comedy and drama, and a dark side that decided, no more.
       I wish someone had just been with him, to maybe talk him out of it. They were probably all talked out. I have been there also, with a child with mental illness. He had money and doctors, but at 3 in the am, we are all alone. Maybe he was just finished, he did have a big life, by all accounts. I just think he had a really bad day, and those days you have to work harder. Mr. W you were a crazy man, and in the south we love CRAZY. We recognize it in most family members and relatives, with friends and neighbors thrown into the looney bin bowl. I am just sorry that your crazy was destructive. Crazy Genius, Crazy fool, the line is so fine.You were gifted, and that you shared with us all. We do not understand, and that is OK, we send you into the universe with much love.

       In the movie Good Will Hunting, your character said, " It's the imperfections, that's the good stuff."
and in The Fisher Kings, " Its important to think. It's what separates us from the lentils!"

      You, my friend, are perfectly imperfect, like the rest of us.
       Thank you for giving us so much, and always making me think.
      

I Bit My Fit, or My Fit, Bit

   My family has me hooked up, against my will.
   Yes, I asked for a Fit Bit, for my birthday(which continues)but...
    Now I am drowning in cords, with another thing to charge. Technology is work, and cords. I have a cord basket! They have their own basket! Its too much.
    I like my Fit Bit, who doesn't like to know how many steps you take in a day? I don't love it, but my new arm jewelry is tracking my every move. I just have to click another App/button/thing to see my stepping history. I have yet to do whatever it takes to do the sleep, exercise, food intake thing, its too much like a job, and I have retired.
   Let's just all take a long walk to the park and back. Done, without the twitching, thinking I have to find my cell phone to do something, god I hope it doesn't have a password!
     All of this venting, is not the blog, just venting!
     The real reason for this little ditty is my August reading list.( How many times can I say, I love August! Let me count the ways!Thank you Elizabeth Barrett Browning 1806-1861, best poem ever)
  Now if I can reel all this in...
       The Mockingbird Next Door, Life With Harper Lee- Marja Mills
       Why I Wake Early- Mary Oliver ( thank you Dani-girl)
       A Thousand Mornings-Mary Oliver
        I am Having So Much Fun Here Without You-Courtney Mann( could be Maum???cant read my writing, and Iam not getting up to look it up, the Fit Bit would be happy, but not me, and I win!!)
       Away- Amy Bloom( did not like her last book, but will give her another try)
       Lay It On My Heart-Angela Pneuman
An amazing group for August. Painting has consumed me all summer, however reading grounds me, so I find time.
       I have almost finished the Harper Lee book, and I believe that she never wrote another book, because of heat and humidity and not AC!! Her sister Alice and she, don't believe in technology or air conditioning! I think Ms. Lee may be a tad touched, as we say in the deep, a little unhinged!
     I am not convinced she even wrote "To Kill A Mockingbird" and I did not particularly like it.
     Nelle(she likes to be called Nelle!) said that she never wrote another book because of all the fame.
    That just seems weak to me, and southern women are not weak.
    You write a classic, best seller, prize winning book and never write another sentence!!! Honey you should have kept writing, dictate it to someone, if you hate to type. Sit back and sip on some sweet tea, and embrace your talent crazy Nelle! The tales you could tell, its not right. Things are a wee bit off in Alabama, at your house and I want to know details! Who ever heard of such, never write another book, they have pills for that!!!
    OK, need to step away from the computer and count my steps.
    Hope August is good to you, get a Fit Bit and get moving right over to your favorite reading spot!

   PSSS
    Phone just rang, Nurse on the line, asking me how I feel after my recent colonoscopy?
   Me- "Well I have had a migraine headache fore two day, but my hiney hole is good to go!"
   Nurse-" Now isn't that the sweetest thing!"
   Me- Now that is Southern, Harper Lee you could have written that!!!

Does This Come With Instructions?

    There seems to be so much turmoil in the world today and the Ebola virus is headed to Atlanta.
    These are my thoughts in the wee hours of the morning...something or someone is stirring the pot too much! Its August, how can I celebrate in my fullness, when so many others hurt.
     Does this life come with ANY instructions?
     There was a quote in the Bible of Oprah Magazine, that read as follows:
                        Pay Attention
                        Be Astonished
                        Tell About It
                                    -Mary Oliver-
     I love this, life is work, happiness is work, caring about the world is work. You have to show UP! and not be afraid to tell your story. Being Astonished, is easy, every hour, are you not blown away by something?
Horror is Gaza, Fear in Israel, my front yard this morning after the rain!
    I look out my front door early every morning, to check my plants, so Georgia beautiful.
    I pat the dog and Bill on the head, thanking them for just being present!
    I sip coffee like a person going to the electric chair, savoring each drop. Coffee is magic!
    Watch the news, and pray for what? I want peace, and people are so full of hate. I think I may have to write someone, but I don't think they are on the receiving end. The CDC is a whole other prayer list, they have dropped the ball of diseases lately on the CDC floor. Ebola should have stayed where it was and the research people flown over the hot spot! Yet how do we learn, we have to study closely the beast. I just want people to Pay Attention, Jesus and His friends in the holy arena, something is off ! Big Time OFF!
    Tell About It, we are so overly connected, and its a wonderful thing. The balance is the work in progress.
     You know I will tell all, but I need to remember to leave room for the unexpected. Extra room, for secrets, in the vault material, and overload of just my hoopla! Words weigh nothing on the page, but they hold so much worth. They can be heavy as an anvil, of a soft whisper. I do try to Tell It All with a hint of holding back.
    I am in the middle of my birthday celebration, ( July and August) and it continues to be amazing.
    Yesterday I saw the new James Brown movie, and fell out! I had to hold my hands in the air, many times, my ankles were sore, with the shoe tapping. He was an uneducated work of art, Georgia Pine Woods genius, remarkable story and I was a part of it! ( you know I think I know these people personally, or am related!) I love James Brown.
    Today is lunch with the Atlanta kids, and Hubs, Boston Bunch comes down the end of August and New Hampshire crew soon, I hope. There will be more presents, food and love. There will be conversations about world events, that I think should be talked about and stories describing bowel habits! It seems to always end up in that area!
    There are no instructions, we fly on a wing and a prayer. Or Homer's quote, " Four hours at a time! You think you can handle more than that! No one can, Four hours max! Did you hear me, four hours!" " There are no instructions!" " It's just life, period!"
    Thanks daddy for telling it all, making me pay attention and always being astonished.
    Mom, thank you for loading up the bathroom with religious reading material, all of our lives. I loved it, the others.....that is another story!
    August is hot and humid, and my favorite, live it! Love each other, and tell your story.