Birthday Bonanza Part II

 
Last week’s blog left off with more promised October birthday recognitions. My sister-in-law’s birthday is sandwiched between mine and Rachel, my daughter’s birthday. Becky and my brother, Rick, celebrated forty years of marriage and three great kids and their spouses. She is a lovely, loyal, family-oriented woman who loves deeply and unselfishly. 

My daughter entered this world forty-seven years ago. My ex-husband completed his jump school as a paratrooper stationed in North Carolina. We packed our large Olds 88 with Eric, twenty-two months, my very pregnant tummy, and all our earthly goods and said tearful goodbyes to my parents, who we lived with in Illinois. Driving across the country, I looked in the back seat at Eric. He was wedged in his car seat between boxes in the back seat that threatened to engulf him. He traveled like a trooper with books and snacks to keep him occupied. 

We settled into a tiny two-bedroom trailer in a dumpy trailer park outside the base town. We had no friends or family. The round of doctors appointments, commissary shopping and base hospital orientation before the baby’s birth was dizzying. 

 I sat down, tired from unpacking, and Eric would come up to my tummy and pat me, saying, “My baby?”

“Yes, Eric. Do you want a sister or brother?” 

His hazel-brown eyes looked up, “A sisser, mommy. Ergie (how he pronounced his name) want a sisser.”

“So do I, Eric. Her name is Rachel.” I intuitively knew I was having a little girl. Ultrasound to determine the baby’s sex wasn’t commonly used until the 1980s.

He clapped his hands, danced around and sang, “I have a sisser. Ergie have a sisser!”

My ex tried to talk me into his mom coming to help, not my mom. Even though his mom was a lovely woman, I dug my heels in, and we fought. As I slammed the front door and walked the length of the dark gravel drive past the other lit trailers, I cried and told God I wanted to go home–to the familiar and supportive home we had left. I knew it wasn’t possible. I returned to the trailer, and he apologized and dropped his insistence for his mom to help. My mom flew out a week after Rachel was born.

Labor began in the middle of a Saturday night a week before my due date. We waited until morning and left Eric with a neighbor lady, sweet Weltha, whom we met when we moved in. After settling into the delivery room, the labor pains were closer together and grew intense but centered exclusively in my back. Even during excruciating back labor, the military nursing staff would not allow me out of bed. They caught me kneeling on the bed with my belly down to alleviate most of the pain. That was not authorized! Birthing experiences are vastly different now, thank the Lord. 

Relieved to be told it was time to push, I hee-hee-hee’d my way to greet our new daughter. She was perfect, healthy, whole and crying lustily with life.

At home, Rachel spent her waking hours in her infant seat. Eric was a rambunctious toddler. He tried to crawl into the seat with her and patted her face roughly.

“Be gentle, Eric. She’s a tiny baby.” I said nervously. I didn’t anticipate bringing home a second child would increase my work and worries. 

“My baby sisser, momma. Rae-rae, my baby!” he shouted proudly. The nickname Rae-rae suited her and stuck. She was and is our little ray of sunshine.

I look back with a long view to Rachel’s grade school years, turbulent teens and early adulthood giving birth to her two children. How can she be a grandma to one-year-old Levi, her son’s son? Impossible to grab hold of the fleeting passage of time. I am reminded to count my blessings from God, count them one by one, as the song says. The fourth verse is meaningful, adding hope to the beautiful and challenging times throughout the years. May these words give you hope as you look back.

“So, amid the conflict, whether great or small,

Do not be discouraged, God is over all;

Count your many blessings, angels will attend,

Help and comfort give you to your journey’s end.

Count your blessings, name them one by one; 

Count your blessings, see what God hath done.”

Composer, Johnson Oatman (1897)

Birthday Bonanza

 October is my birthday month, and my husband, daughter-in-law, great-grandson, grandson, sister-in-law and daughter’s birthdays too. We are in excellent company during this autumn season of change. 

October starts with my husband’s birthday, which is always low-key. Not a person to call attention to himself or enter fully into a celebration, I saw his slight upturn of a smile when our church’s small group sang ‘Happy Birthday, and he blew out the candle on his Reese’s Pieces cupcake. He entered in wholeheartedly as he ate his cupcake.

Our precious daughter-in-law, Liz, wife to Andy and mom to Liam, was the next day. After she immigrated from the Philippines to become our son’s wife and we spent a little time with her, I knew she was a precious soul, a jewel of a woman. I remember a week before their wedding when we shopped for wedding accouterments. She was unfamiliar with our American wedding traditions, so she listened politely and intently to my suggestions. After a lovely mother-daughter time at Hobby Lobby, we chatted over coffee. 

“I have something to ask you,” Liz said hesitantly. I braced myself for a difficult question, imagining it was something negative about Andy or our family.

“In the Philippines, we call our parents-in-law mom and dad. May I call you mom and dad now?” Looking at me with her expressive brown eyes, I looked back at her with tears stinging my eyes. 

“Of…of course,” I stammered. “I would be honored if you called me mom. And I can’t imagine Andy’s dad having any problem with being called dad.” 

Unknown to Liz, my tears came because past relationships with our ex-daughters-in-laws ended abruptly or were difficult. Over four years later, my affection and respect for Liz have not diminished but have grown stronger.

We celebrated the first birthday of our first great-grandson, Levi, by sending a message with a cute gif on Facebook Messenger, mailing a birthday card and enjoying the pictures posted on Facebook from his party. So big, so fast…how does that happen?

Liam, Andy and Liz’s son, turned three-years-old days before my birthday. We video-chatted without him because he was napping longer than usual. The medication for his fever and ear infection made him sleepy, and when he joined our video, he cried on his mom’s shoulder.

But then he stopped when he heard our voices, raised his head and gave us his thousand-watt Liam smile. So many people love that little boy with a smile that eclipses any sadness in a human heart, especially his grandma’s.

I woke up with sadness on the morning of the last year in my sixties (now you know how old I am). No event had precipitated this mood, just a general malaise. 

Not two cups of coffee could shake me out of it, nor reading the beloved words of Jesus, “Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me.” (John 14:1)

The mood dissipated as the day went on. Thankfulness rose in me as I thought about all my blessings in October, all the family born to us, enriching our lives together–even when we are all miles apart. My only sister-in-law's and only daughter’s birthdays are yet to come. 

I think there is a Birthday Bonanza Part II scheduled for next week.

It's a Red Chicken Day

 Our 15,673 days of marriage have changed the love of my life into a spoon-clicking cereal eater jumping on my last nerve. Before you hop on a rabbit trail to figure out how long we’ve been married, it’s about forty-three years. Our hope hangs on finished home construction by the end of the year. We’ve served sixteen of eighteen post-retirement months in a rented warehouse with an attached three-room apartment. It’s nice, but not the home we desire. 

My Dear Hubby (DH) and I had a fascinating conversation about Einstein’s theory of relativity to answer the question, “Why is time slowing down the closer we get to move-in day?”  Einstein’s theory, as an illustration, breaks down. Let me try another one.

Logically, we know we will move into our new home soon. Month by month, we watch the building progress through every construction phase. But we feel time slowing down. DH thought of the illustration of a donkey with a carrot in front of its nose. No matter how fast or slow time goes, our unfinished home is the carrot, and I am the grumpy donkey. Time creeps along. I know we will move in very soon, but during the last few months of construction, time feels like it is dragging. 

Despite my grumpy inner donkey, I found joy in an unexpected place. On the narrow road into our future subdivision, we drive past a mini-farm with a llama, two goats, a peacock and a variety of chickens in a small enclosure; black, brown, white and red chickens. I enjoy checking out the animals as they move in and out of the shelter near the back of the enclosure. On a grumpy donkey day, a running ruby-red chicken caught my attention. It was the only animal running lickety-split after the other chickens and underneath the llama. The joy I felt seeing the running red chicken put me in a good mood. 

DH asked what I was laughing about as he turned the corner. 

“I’m having a red chicken day!” He must have thought I had lost my mind.

What does a running red chicken have with impatience to move into our new home? 

No, I don’t want to keep chickens on our acreage. But I do want to find the funny joys in life. Be like a chicken, not a grumpy donkey and be blessed with a running red chicken day.

                    A Rhode Island Red Chicken

Not Too Early For a Christmas Memory

 A Christmas Gift In Disguise

    

Light snow falls in central Illinois throughout the day, delighting children and adults alike with the promise of snow angels and downhill sled runs. Our family of five counts twenty-four days until Christmas by opening the small windows on our paper advent calendar. Each window contained a short Bible verse about Jesus, the coming Messiah. Excitement builds among our grade school children as they list all the toys they want to get from Santa. Our ten-year-old son, Eric, anticipates performing the lead character in a play at church. During the last several weeks, he has memorized his lines and attended play practice. 

“Mom, my stomach hurts, and I’m hot,” Eric tells me about one week before the play. 

“Back to bed with you. I’ll get the aspirin and fix your toast. Does that sound good?” 

“Maybe it’s a 24-hour flu bug,” John, my husband, says hopefully.

I think aloud, “I hope so because Eric has been working hard on his part, and he would be so disappointed to miss the play.”

The following day, Eric broke out in spots over most of his body and our other two younger children, Rachel and Andy, started with fevers and stomach aches. Chickenpox, again!

“It can’t be,” I puzzle over the fact that all three had chickenpox during the summer, light cases that didn’t make them as sick as they are now. Their pediatrician confirms they can have chickenpox twice and must be quarantined two days past Christmas.

Christmas is canceled. No children’s play, no visits with Grandma and Grandpa and no Christmas Eve church service, our extended family’s holiday highlight. No playing in the snow and school Christmas parties for the kids. Everyone is in a disappointing funk. 

 Little itchy, red dots spread all over their bodies, worse than their summer bout. I scrambled to buy enough soothing anti-itch lotion and baking soda for their baths to alleviate their itchiness. Poor Rachel has pox covering the inside of her mouth. She eats cold foods and ice cream for several days as the illness continues. 

Nevertheless, their sickness may have canceled all the Christmas fun festivities, but all the pre-Christmas rush, stress and seasonal crankiness disappear. Instead, we got out the puzzles, played a gazillion board and card games, and watched movies. The children’s healthy recovery becomes our primary focus.  

The Lord Jesus’s appearance in our world came under challenging circumstances. No fanfare fit for a king, no clean palace with servants but a dirty stable and animal trough for a bed. His parents welcomed his miraculous birth with wonder and gratitude to God. The disruption of chickenpox blessed our family with precious time together away from the holiday hustle and bustle. As the snow melted with a promise of a white Christmas in the forecast, my disappointment transformed into gratitude to God for our children’s recovery and precious family time, a Christmas gift in disguise.

Becoming Country

 Relocating from Wisconsin to east-central Tennessee awakened my inner country girl. It’s all Pat and John’s fault. They introduced me to line dancing and horse riding. Line dancing wasn’t intimidating because I am a dancer and pick up steps fast. The music and exercise help me stay active and joyful. But I have not been on a horse since I was a teen.

“You’re too old, fat, and weak to ride,” I told myself. “You won’t be able to pull yourself up in the saddle, and you’ll probably fall when you dismount.” 

But Pat and John encouraged me to try. Pat and John’s Mafia-named horses, Doc, Romeo, Ted, and Vito, are stabled at their thirty-acre homestead. Last week’s blog pictured me on Doc with a huge smile. Doc is John’s Tennessee Walking Horse. He caught my attention from the four horses, and when John told me I could ride Doc, I was thrilled! 

It took two tries and a stool to mount, but I rode around the fenced enclosure after Pat's knowledgeable instruction. Thirty minutes on Doc went fast, but I dismounted on wobbly legs without falling. Stiffness plagued me the next day, but I was ready to ride again.

Instead, Pat texted our church friends asking for help to run fence. Initially, I thought running fence was riding the horses along the fence, rather than moving fencing, as in manual labor. Once Pat told me what they needed, I volunteered willingly. Frankly, I suspected I would just be underfoot since I had never run fence before.

The fall weather was cool and brilliant with sunshine, a perfect day to enjoy the outdoors and relief from summer’s humid heat. Invigorated and determined to rise, once again, above the challenge of my senior-aged body, I dressed in work clothes, boots and gloves. 

The fence portions that needed moving to form an open area were fastened to steel rods with rusted metal wire. The first few wires I untwisted were awkward until I could leverage the pliers against the steel rods. Even with a pinched finger and a stab of a barbed wire, I loved every minute of working outdoors and helping our friends. 

As Pat and I worked down the 150-foot length of fencing, we swapped concerns for friends and loved ones and a bit of gossip. Pat saw me eyeing her old tractor.

“When we finish the fence, you can drive the tractor.” 

I jumped at getting behind the wheel and driving around the field, waving at Pat like a kid.

I could hear my inside kid saying, "Hey mom, look at me drive the tractor! Am I doing good?"

She laughed at me and took pictures and a video–like a mom proud of her child succeeding at an unfamiliar task. What a great friend!

We took a break over Little Debbie pumpkin cookies and coffee at the house, ending our time together with a prayer for the concerns we raised and the precious family we have in each other. Tennessee keeps giving us surprising gifts of friendship and opportunities to be country people. 

Today, my John is helping Pat’s John with the next steps in running fence. Pat sent me the video of John’s joy on the back of John’s big tractor, losing his hat in the wind. 

 Becoming real country people takes more than one morning of outdoor work or thirty minutes riding a horse. Pat and John’s giving, fun-loving nature, which includes all their family and friends, is foundational to becoming country.

Our church small group (silly picture version) - John and Pat on the floor in the middle!