Decompression

Posted on by
Reply

I took Friday and Saturday to relax a bit and decompress from the crazy week. Although it had only been a few days since we had received word of my mom’s prognosis, it seemed a lot longer. I decided that I would take Friday to get the oil changed in our car and get a haircut as well as talking to the nursing home staff to discuss mom’s care and figuring out the car situation for my next trip to Massachusetts even though I was pretty sure that I would be taking Alise’s car on Sunday.

Saturday was a beautiful day. I canceled my class and spent most of the day playing outside with the kids while Robyn worked. We went for a nice walk around the neighborhood. I was surprised when I got a call in the morning from my brother Mike who I’ve not actually spoken with in over 15 years. When I saw his name come up on the caller ID, I had a feeling that our conversation would be weird and awkward but we quickly fell into a comfortable discussion of mom’s condition and onto other things in our lives like his kids and my kids and our work and even our father. It was a really nice talk and we made an agreement to stay in touch before we hung up.

Yesterday was Difficult

Posted on by
Reply

My mother was admitted to the ICU on the Saturday, September 24th while I was in Charlotte and has been there ever since while the doctors have been trying various treatments to support her oxygen levels. Nothing has worked. I’ve been assuming that this visit would be like all the others over the last couple years – a few days in the hospital and then she’d come home.

Mom’s doctors had a frank and honest discussion with her yesterday (and called me yesterday afternoon to discuss it as well) and said that her prognosis is not good. They are doing all they can to keep her oxygen levels up to where she can breathe but they cannot continue that level of oxygen outside of an ICU environment and her oxygen saturation will continue to drop over time due to the her decreasing lung and heart function. They suggested that we look into some type of hospice care because doing what they’re doing in the ICU is exposing her to other problems like infections and pneumonia. She is alert and actually feels relatively good so this makes deciding these things very difficult. Debbie has been very helpful in navigating these waters and had really been there for me.

We’re going to be heading to MA tomorrow to visit and help her make the necessary decisions. I’m not sure what the coming days and weeks will hold.

9/11 – Ten Years Have Passed

Posted on by
Reply

It’s been almost 10 years since I first wrote this post. It was the day after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and the country was in shock as we all tried to sort out our feelings and figure out what this would mean to our future.

The hopes of finding many survivors amidst the rubble of the twin towers were not yet dashed. We didn’t know how long it would be before anything besides fighter aircraft would fly overhead in the cool, blue skies. No one had any idea that we would soon be afraid to open our mail for fear of being infected by the Anthrax virus. No troops had yet been deployed to Afghanistan to begin the search for those who had perpetrated the attacks. And no one was talking publicly yet about the “weapons of mass destruction” being developed by Saddam Hussein.

We knew that we were under attack. This is all we knew.

I haven’t watched these videos since the week or so after 9/11. The thing that strikes me when I watch them now is the complete surprise of the witnesses when the first aircraft hit the tower and then their sheer terror at the impact of the second plane. The screams are jarring. It’s the screams and the utter disbelief of the witnesses that most strongly bring back the feelings of that day which, for most Americans, have greatly subsided over the last decade. Yeah, it’s hard to watch these again but I think it’s worth the mental discomfort.

First Day of Summer

Posted on by
Reply

Today is the first day of summer for 2011. The neighborhood kids are done with school and the weather has been beautiful. I was reminded of my summer routine when I was about 13 or 14 years old before I began working at Ed & Art’s Video and my days were totally free to do whatever I wanted.

My mom worked at the Cozy Nook restaurant (or whatever it was called at that time) and she used to wake up really early to leave the house by 5am to open the restaurant and get things moving for the other early risers who needed their coffee and breakfast. My sister, if she had stayed at home, was also out of the house long before I woke up around 8 or 9 o’clock so the house was quiet and I pretty much had it to myself. I read whatever it was that I was reading (most likely a Stephen King novel or an Elfquest comic) for a while while laying in bed. Then I would get up and take a “shower”. I have that in quotes because our showers were taken in our bathtub that didn’t have a shower head. Instead, we connected a hose that ended in a sprinkler head to the shower faucet. In order to make this work, we would have to kneel in the tub and spray ourselves with the hose. I didn’t think it was odd at the time….

After I showered, I would usually take the dog for a walk and then go back to the house and watch TV for a while. Re-runs of “Alice“, “One Day at a Time” and game shows were my favorites at that time. For a while, my mom ended her workday at 11am so she would often come home with breakfast for me. This is probably where my love for corn muffins came from. There was something special about one of those rectangular muffins, sliced in half and cooked on a greasy diner grill and loaded with butter. Mmmmmm. My other favorite was a “Western” sandwich with no green peppers. Both of these foods probably contributed to my unhealthy weight but they were delicious.

Now that breakfast was done the whole day lay before me like an open book. Most days probably consisted of hanging out with my friend Christian and/or my cousin Scott depending on who was around. Bike riding, playing “army”, playing Dungeons & Dragons, going to the movies, swimming, hanging around with the other kids in the neighborhood…whatever kept us busy in the days before video games and cell phones ruled teens’ lives. We would often go outside at lunch time and not come back into the house until after dark. Man, those were the days!

The Big Four-Oh!

Posted on by
Reply

I turned 40 last month.

When I type that out it seems much more serious than I had anticipated. I was not very worried about turning 40 and there wasn’t much to-do (at least, not from me!) about it this year. I was looking forward to my birthday, actually. I knew it was a “big one” as far as milestones go and, to be quite honest, I was just hoping to get a nice gift. Little did I know that Robyn was planning something behind my back for the last few months. Every time it came up, she would just say something like “So, what do YOU want to do?” or “I am so bad. I don’t have anything planned.” All the while, I was telling myself that it was no big deal – just another year. But inside, I think I was hoping that there were at least some plans brewing. Oh, she was quite sneaky!

Thinking back on the whole thing, I should have known something was up because there was a “cluster” of unusual happenings. The Saturday before my birthday Robyn was (supposedly) scheduled to work. On those days, my mother-in-law and Harvey come to watch our kids and I take one of their cars to class while Robyn takes our car to work. On that Saturday, Harvey wasn’t coming because he had “something to do” so Alise came alone and I took her car to class. We had a nice training session with a rare Saturday appearance by Jason and Doug who usually do not attend on weekends – but they said that they had to leave a little early from class to do something later in the day. After training I hung out and chatted with Max and Sal and then went to Quick Chek to get a drink. I didn’t rush home by any means. After I pulled into our empty driveway Chloe and Gabriel were trying to get my attention by shouting out of our windows to me. I just waved and grabbed my stuff and got the mail. It was a rainy, dreary Saturday and I wasn’t looking forward to being stuck in the house of the rest of the weekend. Walking inside and putting my training stuff away, the kids were still trying to get my attention and I noticed that Harvey’s coat, hat and shoes were in our living room but I didn’t think much about it because Alise had mentioned that they were thinking of going to Atlantic City later in the day to see his nephew’s band perform. I assumed that he had come by our place to pick her up in order to save time but I didn’t think to ask where his car was.

As I walked up the stairs, Chloe was saying “Daddy, come up! Come up! We have something to show you!”

As I got near the top of the stairs I could see some kind of decoration on the little table between our chairs and I began to think that something was going on.

A little further and I saw a camera pointing up over the back of one of the chairs and I knew it was Jay and that I would turn to see others there too.

So, just watch the video and see for yourself:

From my face, you can probably see that I was pretty surprised.

Okay, now I know something is going on....

Robyn did an excellent job of keeping things under wraps until the party. This is something I did not think she would be able to do without the kids knowing and with all the other stuff she does so it really contributed to me not expecting anything on that day. Great job, babe! I had a really fun time at the party and was happy to see so many people there including Jason and Doug who had, of course, left class early to beat me home for the surprise!

In addition to being a great day of fun this was an interesting lesson in how our minds can work to fill in the blanks of unusual circumstances to create order from random changes to our environment. Or maybe I just unconsciously pushed these little clues out of the way because I really was hoping for a party? It’s hard to say but I was definitely unaware of all the planning and scheming going on around me. It’s a good thing that it was all being done by people who love me!

40 and Still Rockin'

Big Kids’ Beds

Posted on by
Reply

Yesterday, the kids’ new beds were delivered. Robyn and I have been talking about moving them up to bigger, more comfortable beds but we have been putting it off due to the size of their room. We mulled over getting bunk beds (too high) and captain beds with storage drawers underneath (too pricey) and every layout variation (not that there are a lot of options for the size of their room!) we could think of. Since I got a nice bonus this year and we got our good tax refund we decided that this was the time to make the move.

Finally, we serendipitously found a great solution in a newspaper ad – box spring mattresses with drawers built in! They were not much more expensive than standard box springs and they are normal size so we don’t have to deal with them taking up more room than they need to. Of course, Robyn found a great deal and we bought them and all the necessary items to go along with them. We paid for the delivery and set up and everything went quite smoothly – even getting their old convertible cribs into the attic for storage:

crib in attic

How to store a crib in the attic

We were able to Freecycle a ton of stuff and throw a lot of other old toys and puzzles away to make room and tidy up before the delivery. It took all of about 15 minutes for the guys to set up the bed frames, bring up the mattresses and box springs, stack them on top of each other, dispose of the plastic and shipping stuff and head out. Well worth the delivery fee and $20 tip (I can’t let those guys leave empty handed…maybe I should have asked if they needed an some old toys or cribs?). Robyn set about prettying things up with sheets, pillows and comforters and we were finished by about 3pm!

new beds

Big Kids' Room

The kids’ first night didn’t go as well as we might have hoped. They were so excited about the beds and screwed up by changing sides of the room and the whole new situation that they had a hard time falling asleep. When I got home from running a few errands (Chili’s for mom and dad!) around 9:30, Robyn told me that the boy had just fallen asleep! Yikes!

Sidenote: Apparently, I am unable to eat an entire Chili’s hamburger with fries anymore. I was so stuffed after that meal that I was uncomfortable and then woke up this morning with heartburn, which I never have! I think I’ll have to cut those things in half next time!

Tonight was not much better. We had an early Spring snowstorm today that left us with a few inches of snow and about an inch of hale around dinner time. On top of that, we saw a few flashes of lightning and heard some thunder as the kids were going to bed. I sat with them for a while and Chloe drifted off. Gabriel, however, gave us a hard time. We tried to be sensitive but firm and he finally went to sleep around 9pm.

Another milestone down!

kids in bed

Ready for their first night in big kids' beds

Goodbye Discovery

Posted on by
Reply

The kids and I took a few minutes out during the bedtime ritual the other night to gaze up and watch the Space Shuttle Discovery’s last visible flyover of our area. It was followed about two minutes (and about 500 miles!) later by the ISS. This is the second time that Chloe and Gabriel saw the ISS – the first time was the night of their 4th birthday party. They seemed to be a bit more interested tonight – probably because they understand a little bit about planets and space (thanks to Chloe’s new favorite TV show called “Bubble Guppies”). After the flyover we spent about 30 minutes looking at photos of the shuttle and space station. Their excitement and amazement when I told them there were astronauts who were sleeping and eating and working up there was so obvious and they wanted to know more.

The next afternoon I watched STS-133 come to an end as Discovery landed safely at Kennedy Space Center for the last time.

Space Shuttle Discovery touches down for the last time on March 9, 2011

The moment was bittersweet for me because it seemed just as my children were old enough to show an interest in manned space exploration we in the US are on the verge of cutting our manned programs to a minimum due to a lack of clear direction.

I am not one of those people who ask “why are we spending billions on space exploration when we have so many problems here in our own country?” but I can understand why some have that opinion – they think that manned space exploration has no tangible benefit to our lives here on Earth. They don’t realize that without the past programs they wouldn’t have their GPS, home water filters, laptop and cell phone batteries and a lot of other things that we now take for granted. If space exploration doesn’t get the kind of attention is deserves, I think a lot of kids who would have been motivated to study science won’t take it up and that’s only going to push our country further back in the pack of nations who do have active space programs.

NASA will continue to make advances and there is a lot of potential in the private companies who are taking up the challenges of getting people and cargo into orbit and eventually to the Moon but it’s very sad to me that we don’t have a clear path for the continuation of manned space exploration.

Our World In Space

Posted on by
Reply

About 6 weeks ago, I ran across an interesting blog while looking looking for information about the restoration of the original filming model of the Nostromo that was made for Alien back in the late 70s. This site had three very in-depth posts with fantastic photographs of the model before and during reconstruction along with links to several other sites with even more information. The Nostromo is an iconic design for me as I’m sure it is for many other sci-fi fans and people who were fans of the first Alien film. It doesn’t look like any star ship that appeared in movies before Alien and I think the design (along with the designs from Star Wars) set the tone for how spacecraft should look – gritty, dirty and functional with a bit of mystery thrown in. After getting completely distracted by this stuff for about 2 and a half hours, I decided to take a look around the site for more items of interest.

As I looked through the more recent posts on this blog, I found this post and was struck by the artwork I saw.

cover art for Our World In Space

This painting jangled some memory from deep inside my mind and after a few moments I remembered where I had seen that image before. As a youngster, I was a voracious reader (or at least “looker” since I would often just look at the pictures and paintings in books) and visited our town’s public library every week. There were some books that I borrowed over and over again because some aspect of them just attracted me. This was the cover to one of those books. I distinctly remember looking at this book and drawing pictures based on the illustrations in it when I was a kid. I had to have my own copy!

I searched around a bit and ran across a listing on Amazon for a used copy. The price – 17 cents! Shipping was a few dollars but I snapped it up and placed the order. About a week later the book arrived and I eagerly flipped through the pages. Each fabulous illustration sparked a memory and I recalled the wonder and excitement that they brought to me as a child.

Finished Outliers

Posted on by
Reply

OutliersOutliers by Malcolm Gladwell
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Although the premise of this book – pointing out that those of us who have “made something of ourselves” do not arrive at their positions solely through their own hard work and determination – sounds completely revolutionary, I came to realize that I didn’t really believe that in the first place. I think we all know deep down inside that the time and place of our birth, the circumstances into which we are born (financial, cultural, etc) as well as plain dumb luck are involved in how far we may go in life.

One of the most interesting “discoveries” for me in this book was the point that it seems to take about 10,000 hours of practice to truly master any skill. Whether it’s ice hockey, computer programming or piloting an aircraft these things all require study and practice to get it right and to rise to the level of mastering that skill. The author points out that, although many of the people profiled in the book were born into circumstances that gave them a head-start, it was the drive, ability and availability to spend great amounts of time focusing on their particular skill that allowed them to achieve. Like many of the other reviewers, this is one of the main points that I’ll take away from the book.

I would recommend Outliers to just about anyone. There are certainly many “ah-hah” moments in the text that kept me interested and thinking.

View all my reviews