Friday, May 27, 2016

When It Hurts


When I was about 10 years old, I was running up the stairs to my bedroom when my ankle rolled and gave way. Over the sound of my body thudding down each and every step, was a very distinctive and sickening “popping” noise that sent chills down my spine and a searing pain up through my leg.

Crumpled at the bottom of the stairs in a heap, I laid there bawling my eyes out. My mother — who had been walking up the stairs in front of me — leaned over the railing from the floor above me and told me to stop crying and get up.

I can’t remember exactly what I said, but I do know that the conversation ended with my mother turning her back on me to go pack (they were going out of town), and me crawling up the rest of the stairs to my room.

You see this wasn’t the first time that I had hurt my ankle, and quite frankly I think that my mother was just tired of me complaining about being hurt. But I did hurt, and I hurt almost all the time. Not even just my ankle, but every single part of me.

This is actually The Girl Child pouting about who even knows what (so dramatic, the little girls!) but this is basically an accurate picture of how I felt most days.

Later that night, my parents dropped me and my brothers off at my grandparent’s house, where we would be staying for the weekend while my parent’s went on a short getaway. As I hobbled through the doorway, my grandpa asked me what was wrong. “Oh you know her” my parents both chided, “always the drama queen that one.”

Choking back tears from both humiliation and pain, I made my way to the living room where I sat down until it was decided by my parents that I just needed to walk it off. And by walk it off, they meant jump rope. I was given a jump rope and all but shoved outside where adult faces were pressed against the window and I was told that I could come back in after I jumped rope for a while. My grandpa, assuming that my parents were right and I just needed to "walk it off," was cheering me on.

So I jumped.

Wednesday, May 18, 2016

It's That Time Again, Welcome To "Conversations I Didn't Think I Would Be Having This Week!"


I don't know about you, but I'm just not really sure if I even know what "normal" is anymore. I think it used to be some kind of goal that I was striving for, but at some point I gave up and settled comfortably into this:

Monday:

I was getting ready for work and out of the corner of my eye, I caught site of The Girl Child staring at me.

Me: "What?"

Her: "Are you sad that you only have like 30 more years of living left?"

Me: Stares at her in what must have been a shocked and somewhat annoyed looking expression.

Her: "What? I didn't say I was happy about it either."

Tuesday:

The route that we take to get to daycare has us go over a bridge and through an intersection. At the intersection the north/south street has a stop sign on either side, and the east/west street (the bridge) does not. So if you are coming off or going onto the bridge you don't have to stop, but if you are driving on the cross street you do.

Until now.

Friday, May 13, 2016

Newsflash: Bad Things Happen


“Alright” the doctor said, flipping through the test results that the nurse had just handed him. “Hum. Ok” he muttered to himself as I tried not to jump out of the chair and rip the results from his hands.

I mean really now, read a little faster and tell me what the hell is going on.

“Ok” he repeated, this time finally looking up at me and closing the chart. “As you remember, a few months ago your son had surgery to repair a defect in his inner ear, caused by a problem from a surgery he had on both ears two years prior.”

“Yes, I remember” I replied, anxious to move the conversation away from what I already knew to what I was waiting for him to tell me.

“And if you remember, the surgery had not been a success and we were planning on giving it another go around once we let the ear heal for a little bit.”

Waiting for a different surgery last year

“Yea, I know,” I related, “and then he had those problems with his kidneys and had to have an unexpected surgical procedure done, and I’m finally circling back around to take care of this.”

“Well,” the doctor sighed, “it appears as if he failed the hearing test, and at this point the surgery that he is going to need is above what I can do, so I’m going to have to send you to another specialist.”

Wednesday, May 4, 2016

Things That Make You Ask "Why?" Part 11

It's been much too long since we've done one of these posts!! And since it's the middle of the week and we are halfway from the fun of the previous weekend and still have a few more days until we make it to the next one, now seems like the perfect time for a good chuckle. So without further ado, I bring you another addition of "Things That Make You Ask Why?"

All photos are courtesy of my cellphone and the strange life I lead.

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Why is this guy breaking the law?


Because it's illegal to have nuts hanging from your car. I know this because while sitting behind this car at the gas station, I Googled truck nuts to see if they really were nuts or if I just had a dirty mind.

They are real, and also really illegal. Huh.

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And speaking of trucks, what is this? Why would a truck need a sign like this? Am I unaware that truck pushing is an actual problem that truck companies have to deal with? Pushing them where? Out of the way when they drive too slowly? I mean I just... I don't get it.


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