Life. It's how it goes...

This morning I woke up late. It was too cold to kick the covers off. So I thought.
I fell asleep in the middle of a project last night that had a deadline. I had to clean up the laundry room so the maintenance man could look at the boiler. I had to throw some make up on to cover my mass of blemishes and find my sports bra so I could go to the gym and burn off some calories. I had to help my husband find a movie online for his class so he could write his paper this morning. I had to get the kids to school and as usual, we were running behind. I had to walk the kids a mile to the classroom, one running away, one lagging too far behind and neither paying an ounce of attention to me.
I had to get them each to their respective schools and classrooms and bargain with one to let me leave. I had to act like a silly fool outside the pre-school so that Cody would start his day off laughing, and 5 other kids too apparently. I had to skip the gym and run home to make sure that Mike was able to find what he needed. To make sure I had things squared away for maintenance.
I had all these things to do but I was dying to do something for me. I just wanted to run out and snap a few pics of the amazing frost that was stuck to everything this morning. Frost and sunshine are far too much for a camera girl to resist. I also have not taken the dog for a free run in months. I'm awful I know. I just found this great spot a couple weeks ago and it's perfect for us. A bit too close to the road for my liking, but just due to the noise. I can always do with out noise.
Ugly camera hung around my neck, 2 pair of socks and arctic ready boots, too thin pants for this temperature and some ski gloves that are useless against the cold and one anxious dog I set off on my way. Only a couple miles down the road, anger the 20 people behind me for seemingly stopping in the middle of the road for no reason to turn into a spot most likely miss the whole time they live here.
As soon as I put the car in park, Oz knew just where we were and was going nuts for me to let her out. WHY am I so cruel and make her wait for me to put on gloves and scarves and hats etc...?
As soon as I opened the hatch, she was off like a rocket. I so love taking her out where she can run free. She's terrible on a leash and something about being loose in the woods brings out her inner puppy. It's like watching your kids have the time of their life. You can't help but smile.
It took all of 5 minutes for me to realize how terrible the gloves were and about 10 to be steadily belittling myself for not grabbing some of those hand warmer packs.
The forest floor is covered in frost, all the thick grasses laid over from the weight. The most beautiful thing today is the spiderwebs all covered in this very heavy frost. The sun shines through the trees and bounces light off the frost covering every tiny needle on the evergreens, the webs hanging from every branch and leaf every way you turn. Walking through the deeper woods, the floor literally sounds like hollow flooring. I am always scared I'm going to fall through. Oscar and I crunched our way through the woods and out to a small clearing which surprisingly still had snow all over it. It's a tough spot for much sun to get in and while the snow has melted everywhere else, this is one spot I'm sure I will be able to find it for several days yet.
I forget how huge the trees are here sometimes until you get to the random clearing and have them standing against the back drop of bright blue sky.
I love this. I love all the nature, the stillness aside from the random bounding of a black streak racing by. No people or horns blowing, no alarms blaring, no tv show yelling or phones ringing. No checking to see who's updated facebook or what my horoscope is for the day. Just...nature. Just what God put there for us to see. Just what I fear losing, what I pray we, as humans, can protect and keep for generations to see. What a shame for anyone to miss this.
Here I am, while others are rushing to work, yelling at their kids, trying to find something to eat or get warm for just a few minutes. While others in the world are in a hospital waiting for the last breath, off in a desert dodging bullets and wondering what on earth they are doing there. While others are walking the street doing things they never dreamed they would, to buy things they never dreamed they'd touch, wondering who on earth they are. While others take a right hook square on the cheek for talking back or not cooking dinner fast enough. While others pray for forgiveness, food or fortune. Health or time or love or peace.
Here I am. Here I am, cold but able to seek warmth when I wish. Fed, housed, not beaten or shot at. Here I am, taking a simple stroll with my camera in the woods with my dog. Here I am, soaking up the beauty that is laid out before me like a gift. How blessed I am to witness it. How blessed I am to see it, to take the time to look at it, soak it up and know how blessed I am.
What good is a blessing if you are too dense to even know you got it?
I walked a bit more, getting colder and colder and wondering how long it takes a normal person to get frostbite as it seems half an hour is all it would take for me. I walked more thinking about the people that come here and do nothing more than complain and they drive right by this daily.
They drive by these towering trees that are spread out far enough to have open space under the canopy. Where the light streams through the branches and warms you but for a single second. Where you feel that...maybe something higher is patting you on the head. "Job well done. Thank you for looking at the picture I painted for you. I'm glad you like it"
I saw plants I've never seen before, colors you can't put in a box, animal tracks and little evergreens fighting for their place against the giants, but standing strong nonetheless.
As we neared another clearing, this one very large, my breath caught. Oh my...am I really standing here? I walked up on a small hill and looked all around. There is so much open space here that everything is wide open and draped over it all, a thick white layer of frost. The sun bearing over the tops of the monstrous tree behind me, the rays pour over onto this opening. From this hill, I can see nothing more than this simple white clearing, lumpy with the heavy grasses covered in winter. Surrounding that, a glowing multitude of trees. The land rolls with them as far as I can see, the tops tickled with the sun light and a blue haze all around the edges from the cold of the day.
I am in awe.
I am standing on a knoll, in a field in England on a frozen December morning admiring the gift laid before me. I am frozen and my feet and hands are literally aching, but who could care? I could literally sit here for hours and just stare. I wish I had my book with me so I could write about it as I look at it. I try to take a panorama but guess what?
The damn camera battery just died.

Fundraising Frenzy Pt. 1 Winner!!!!

Thank you all SO much!!!!!

Fundraising Frenzy!!! Help Emma!

I'm running the first of a series of fundraisers for Emma, please refer to my biz blog Get Real , for full details and...PLEASE PASS IT ON!!! :)
Cheers!

Friday. Faves. HOPE.

Friday. Faves. HOPE.

For Emma.

hope.

It is what I have. Sometimes it is all that we can have. When things seem their bleakest, when it seems the light at the end of the tunnel has surely burnt out ages ago, what else can we do but hope? Hope someone finds a new damn bulb right?
I am hoping for a bulb. I am praying for a bulb. I am BEGGING for a bulb.
What on earth am I yammering on about? Emma of course. I don't know if it is because I am so far away that I feel so consumed by it sometimes. I don't really know. I surely can't imagine being in their shoes, day in and day out. Appointment after appointment, therapy after therapy. One kid to dr's and therapists and treatments, one to school and dance class and another on the hip always. Life? How is there time for anything beyond that? Every momentary flicker of light that you glimpse. Every caught breath, every raised eyebrow that is about to deliver news be it good, bad or inconclusive. How can one live with this? Have you ever been sitting in a waiting room while a loved one is in surgery or something and you hold your breath each time a lab coat or pair of scrubs comes nearby? Imagine that nearly DAILY. I cannot. Unfortunately, there are many people that know it all too well. That exist around this very thing. Over and over and over.
I only get updates via Facebook, sometimes the blog and once in awhile I get Jayne on email or chat. Each time I get an update, I feel queasy. Sometimes, I am seriously physically ill. My heart seems to freeze mid-beat, my stomach does a roll and then a good hard twist..."no, it's supposed to go the OTHER way. It's supposed to stop now. It's supposed to be 'that thing that she had when she was little', not getting worse! Why???." Isn't that the age old question? Why does she get to have those months where she's playing soccer and dancing and laughing with her sister and cuddling her baby brother and we all collectively seem to breathe a sigh of relief, there is but a tiny pinch in the back of our minds. However, we have so much HOPE that sometimes it even seems safe to think that maybe, just maybe...

Then. Then there's the way it is going.
I will admit that after her first surgery, I was skeptical but certainly hopeful and even relaxed too much at the idea that it was truly just a 'thing' and they were so lucky and blessed and that was it. You can never fully expect it to just go away though, but you can kind of almost hope it's totally true. After her second surgery though, my gosh how could we doubt it? Complete strangers got tears in their eyes when I told the story. When I told of how difficult it was for her coming back out of the first surgery and how the second one she nearly jumped off the operating table singing and dancing when they were done. She's a miracle. She is a miracle, there is no doubt of that.
After this last bit of surgery, we'll go ahead and call it two more because hey she was operated on twice so let's give her the credit she deserves here. After this last one, you can see...I have seen something in photos that is just not quite right. She's not been well at all since she left this time. She's been back in the hospital and back for loads more testing. They don't know what is causing her odd symptoms and frankly, she is exhausted and just not herself. I don't even have to get that from anyone, you can see it in a photo from five thousand miles away.
Well, to update you all, there's more. They've now found a new tumor in a new place. General vicinity of the others, but all together a new tumor. Now...oh really it's still so hard to process, but now they say that it is also in her spinal fluid. This is untreatable. They will not do more surgery. It is chemo-resistant and they cannot radiate her anymore. This is just in her head, not even including what they are seeing in her spine.
I saw the words, "the prognosis is not good".
Making this assumption as it were, to see them, straight from the source, typed out for all eternity. What the hell can I say? The only thing I can say is pray more, pray harder, hope like hell, hope like there is no tomorrow that something, ANYTHING comes up and cures her. Something. Now the dr's are set that what they saw on the scan was cancer in her spine and wanted to cancel her spinal tap today, but someone else said that it could be an infection (which WOULD make sense with the symptoms she's had since leaving the hospital). The dr's disagree but thankfully my darling friends insisted she have it anyway. So at the moment the greatest hope is that the Dr's are wrong and said person is correct. That would be something to dance around in the street over. We can be pissed later that it was not caught sooner, whatever, but if that is the case, then dear God please let it be and let it go away so we can focus on the original issue at hand.
That smile, those sparkly eyes. Those are enough to kick the shit out of this cancer. I just know it. Let alone the love and strength that are all holding this little girl up. There is so much behind her, I can feel it, I envision Emma standing there seemingly alone. David and Goliath as it were, she against this cancer and the cancer coughs out an evil laugh thinking it has won, but in the last minute, the shadows clear and it is horrified to see hundreds of people linked arm in arm, chests bowed out, so strong and unmoving that cancer sees it has no chance at all. This love and strength behind this little girl is no force to be reckoned with and this cancer wheels around squealing, tail between legs. That is that.
That is what has to happen.

My little boy. He has been so concerned about Emma all this time. I know he can hardly remember her, but he does a bit. He's definitely heard about her a lot, he's always asked about her. It's odd to me sometimes what all he really absorbs and the times and ways that he recollects things. It was odd because just YESTERDAY, we got on the subject of diseases. He's asked a few times before, and I have tried to explain what Emma has to a degree but certainly don't want to freak him out too much either. He does understand that it is very serious and he worries about her.
So as it is, a boy was out from Cody's school for chicken pox. The boys were really interested in this and telling me they had it too. (ha! nice try). So I went in to explaining that they've had vaccinations for it, but in the UK they do not have vaccinations. After a fairly lame job at explaining what vaccinations were, with a random jab at some of the silly vaccinations there are that could have been better used for other things, we got on the subject of diseases in general.
Kade, bless his heart, then says that "Emma went out for a walk, and she came upon a bush and she ate some wild blueberries but they were poisonous and that is how she got the cancer. So if she just doesn't go to the bush and eat the berries she won't have the cancer anymore. So we just have to tell her not to eat wild blueberries."
How precious is that? So I tried to explain that it was not from blueberries, that some diseases were simple and we could just get over it. Some diseases have medicines that you can take to make them go away or keep them from bothering us, but some diseases just can't be 'taken away' just yet and it's very sad."
I always find it interesting because, while we DO talk about Emma, we don't do it all the time to be honest. Not with them anyway. So this conversation coming out of the blue was touching in an odd way.
When prior to that he told me to go buy something at the store for Emma and mail it to her b/c it would take her cancer away. Just out of the blue. So as he's getting older he's grasping it a bit more, but of course not like we do. How nice it would be, to look at things from a 5 year old's perspective in the face of something so damn bad. Sorry, but there's just not good enough vocabulary in my head tonight.
So tonight I did get a moment to visit with Jayne via web-chat (sadly it's far better reception than the phone) and the boys were all up in my rear and basically took over the laptop. Jayne showed us Emma sleeping on the couch at the hospital and Kade asked if she was all better and Cody asked if they lived there. Well, it probably does seem that way.
At bedtime, Kade mentioned something about drawing (he draws at bedtime EVERY night) and then he asked if we could pray for Emma. Now, as you  may or may not know, we're not really all that religious and honestly the only time (yes I ought to be ashamed) I've taught my children to get on their knees and clasp their hands was for Emma during her second surgery a year ago. So Kade asked if we could and I told him he NEVER had to ask to say a prayer, just do it! He wanted to just do it with me and him and his 2 animals.
So he says:
"Dear God, please come and take all of Emma's cancer away from her. Please let her get to run and play and hang out to do all the things that she has to do. Our Men."

So then when my face dried up and I could compose myself, he told me a story about God and a King and then Daddy and Cody came in so we all held hands and he said another prayer for Emma all on his own. This time it was to bring her to Texas (haha) and let her get all better. 

I feel so useless over here. I just wish I could get clocked upside the head with the answer. Or if I have, I wish I'd see it. I'm a doer, I'm not a watcher, a waiter, a whatever. This is not my forte so not having the fix it answer or at least swooping in to DO something physically...what do we do?

I ask again, what else can we do but hope? 

So I hope, I pray, I beg, I plead...please help us find the answer. Please make her better. Please...please let the world get involved. Help us find the way to make September as gold as October is pink. Please bring awareness to this disease and how little resources there are, how little funding and research actually goes into childhood cancer. The ONLY treatments are just smaller doses of adult treatments. It just does not work. 

hope.  

Anxious and Antsy

That should be my name today. It is going to be a long day. I can't stand not being there. I just can't. I can't stand not being THE person. When did I become that person? I don't know, but I've just come to the realization that is the exact reason why days like today drive me out of my freaking head.
I'm SUPPOSED to be there. Not for ME, for them. To do things, to be a shoulder, a bitch, a gopher, a pillow, a punching bag...gosh whatever. SOMETHING.
Not just an anxious freaky mess 5 thousand miles away. I actually wish I had a tail today because at least I could give myself some purpose. I'd be better off running in circles chasing my tail. I'm not a sitter by'er and watcher. I'm a doer, a there'er, a something. Not a waiting nail biter.
All senses on high alert, wound up tighter than an eight day clock. I wait. I watch. I refresh my facebook page 9874 times. I was not able to do the one thing I felt strongly compelled to do today, but hopefully I can make that happen on Friday. I DID buy a gift today. I should go to the post office then and mail it... that would be doing something. Yes, jittering my way through the line at the post office with my package, well...let's see just how fast I get tossed in jail for appearing suspicious?
I did not do the gym today b/c Cody was NOT up to school so I didn't want to get in there and not get his call if he was having a cow to come home. I wish I were better at running, it'd be a damn good day to run till I puke. Oscar sure wouldn't mind either, she looks like she's been contemplating chewing my foot off in my sleep for not taking her for walks or to the field since we took her away from her giant backyard. She just whines and gives me the evil eye.
Well, all that said, yammering on my blog about not much of anything isn't really working either. Today would be a good day to visit another nearby country....oh yeah, it sure would.

Alas, please keep your prayer lines open and keep them coming, I sincerely believe in them. Love to all and if you don't have the Emma Updates, well...I'll update anyway because I have nothing else of any importance to do right now beyond waiting..... if patience is a virtue well, I never claimed to be very virtuous anyway did I?

uuuuuggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!

Beautiful in, Beautiful out, Beautiful everywhere.

My boy. He is, indeed, beautiful. Every way there is to be beautiful. I have had a smidge of difficulty with Kade lately. Then we got a report from his teacher and I was pretty shocked to say the least at how he has been behaving at school. Granted, they are only going on their 2nd FULL week of school just now and it's a much larger school than his last, I was still seriously shocked by his behavior.
So, yes that leaves me doing my usual. Fretting like crazy, worrying, worrying, worrying. Wondering what all I should have done, need to do or am doing different, wrong, better, worse. My big thing is, and has been for ages is that as much as I offer up and condone a VERY open door, open mouth, whatever you want to call it policy in our home. I have a tight-lipped son. How does that happen really? I mean, okay if he were 16 and in that parent hating phase or something, sure... but FIVE???
It goes a little something like this;
"Hey dude, how was school today?"
"Fine." 
"well, what did you do?"
"I don't know, stuff..."
"Well, like what? Did you draw? Did you read? Play outside?"
"I don't remember."
"Really? We're still walking off the school ground, you seriously don't recall anything beyond the past 40 seconds?"
"Mom? Can we not talk right now? I'm busy walking."

Yeah.... it really goes like that. How the HELL am I going to communicate with THIS kid when he's perfected that line of crap for 10 more years? I'm doomed! He loves to tell some long, drawn out, insanely detailed stories though. As far as my attention span will allow, I definitely listen in intently. However, sometimes it's hard. It's very difficult to know where the middle is, or the end, or even if this is a 10 minute story or if I should get comfortable and just forget making dinner.
Well, as I mentioned, we got some not so awesome feedback from his teacher. Unfortunately they did not offer up the information until questioned about something we thought nothing of really, just wanted to KNOW about and are then handed this gem. How he was extremely naughty. I'm still so shocked by his behavior that I literally cannot picture it in my mind with Kade. If it were ME telling him not to do this, sure. A teacher though? No way! However this all took place on Friday and we did not get the story until Monday. Rather than him being grounded all weekend for acting like an (yes I will word nicely) undisciplined neanderthal child he got to jump on the bouncy castle in our backyard ALL weekend. Partake in games and playing and even a trip to the driving range. Yeah. Had we known, well...he'd have been enjoying all of this through his bedroom window or in his imagination.
As it stands though, there is much work to be done. Many changes to be made. Whatever it takes, to make my beautiful boy see, that he just has to do things a little bit different. To make sure, that he loves himself just as he is NO MATTER WHAT. He's a beautiful, intelligent, insanely creative child...who lives in another world 99.8% of the time.

Tonight, in an attempt to prolong his bedtime, he calls me up to his room. There are certain criteria that have to be met to get me back in for any sort of visit once the initial lights out. There had been silence for quite some time, me thinking they were both toast. Apparently only Co was out and Kade had simply been visiting his other planet. He calls me up and says he's scared. Of everything as it turns out. Who the hell gets off easy with a monster in the closet? Just consider yourself lucky if that is all you have to contend with! It was just a ploy to avoid sleep, which he was in desperate need of. Then he wants to talk. My boy, the night owl. Wants nothing to do with anyone but in his own time. I can't fathom someone like that. ;) (me, me, me!). So we talk about school, but he doesn't want to talk about school, he wants to talk about jets. After a detail description of every jet he's ever seen, and then a crrrrrazy detailed description of his birthday party and every toy he wants...he moves on to "let's talk about you Mom".
Is he going to be the ladies man of the century or what?
Well sure, that's good but wait... he's better than that.
"Okay buddy, what would you like to talk about about Mommy?"
"Oh...about how beautiful you are. You know, you have cool rock n' roll hair and you wear rock n' roll clothes. That's beautiful. I like rock n' roll clothes because I wear rock n' roll clothes too. I wish I could wear rock n' roll clothes all day long."
I love the moment that I can revel in the naivete of childhood admiration. I can be at my nastiest, no make up, holey yucky clothes, frizzy hair in a bun and they look at me and say, "you are beautiful Mommy". At my worst, they still think I'm the best. What on earth can be better than my kids?

Nothing I say.
My beautiful boys with their beautiful minds inside their beautiful heads above their beautiful faces  above their beautiful hearts.... however can I share enough gratitude without sounding downright cocky? How did I get so lucky? What did I do? Whatever it is, whatever I did to strike it rich to deserve them, I'd do it again 100 times. For all the headaches, the gray hairs and wrinkles I've had and that are yet to come...Thank you. Thank God for my boys.
Thank you, thank you, thank you...
I can't say enough how much I'm so lucky to get to feel their short arms squish me around my neck, their sticky hands grabbing onto mine for support or comfort, their still somewhat slobbery kisses on soft puckery little kid lips... what a blessing.
I don't know how else to show my gratitude than to wake up each day, thankful that I get yet another day with them. I get to get frustrated with them for making us late, for spilling something, for ignoring me...for whatever.
They are mine and I am so glad of that and I hate that sometimes it takes a kick in the ass to remind me that there is no greater thing I can do in my life than appreciate them for who they are. Appreciate their childishness, for however fleeting of a moment it is here.
So, from this moment I vow to.... CHILL THE F**K OUT. (there I kept it sort of pg-13).

As it is, if you are the praying type...tomorrow Emma is back in for surgery #3. Being that it is the 3rd time in the same place and previous things have not worked and it's apparently growing much more rapidly (since it was clear in June and now already the same size as it was last year) there are some new treatments they are looking at doing. This is all very delicate, OBVIOUSLY, due to the location and nature of this cancer. So as she goes in, let us all pray for the third time to truly be her charm. At the same time, my friend Deb who's fought one helluva fight with cancer since '07 seems to be nearing the end. She's a personality that just wins you over the first time you shake her hand, a beautiful smile, twinkly eyes and an aura that just grabs you. Pray that her pain is relieved and that somehow her last wish is granted and her son Riley is taken care of. Pray that they can still have a few lucid moments and that no matter what, she is at peace.

On that note...
Count your blessings and be thankful for them. Hug someone today...