Whimsical - Homeschool Blogger

I'm seriously thinkin'

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:08:00 -0500

I need a retractable bosom.

I'm ready to leave for church,

I stop to check my hair in the mirror and

My eyes zero in on a long wet streak

down the front of my dress...

Coffee!

My friend calls, "Are you about ready to leave?"

"Yeah, heading towards the door -- see you in five."

As I graba my keys my gaze drops

past my chin to the shelf below

where evidence of my colorful breakfast clings to my tee...

How manay times in a day, in a week,

does gravaity win its duel with my mouth

[when my foot isn't in it ? ]

Ah, maybe a retractable is not the answer...

I see One who has none,

on that tummy bulging farther down,

decorations of catsup,

or chocolate ice cream shows its grimy grunge

when worn instead of eaten.

My Suzie Song

Mon, 6 Jul 2009 18:40:00 -0500

I've been gone a long time. During that time I aquired another grand daughter, Autum Jewel... and my faithful companion of 14 years, Granger, died a very slow death.

As he began his decline my son and daughter decided I should have a puppy to help me through the transition. I had Granger for comfort when Max died [also at 14...]. It seemed like a good idea.

Kitten went to a friend of a relative of a friend and got her. Suzie. When we met I was not impressed. I didn't want her. My heart was cold. But I took her home and fumed because she was not house trained. She'd tease Granger, who could barely stand, barely see and hated her guts. He'd snarl at her and she'd run around in circles of estactic joy. I'd yell at her to leave him alone and she'd prance about in happy anticipation. She invited him to play. He told her to get off the planet.

She'd try to entice him into a boisterous game of tag by racing around him in circles and knocking him off his feeble legs. I ranted. I raved. Why did she have to come here! My daughter tried to find someone to take her. I felt guilty. It wasn't her fault. The timing was all wrong. I felt very old and Granger suited me. She was obviously young and an obviously a misfit.

She chewed the limbs off my mock orange bushes down to a nub. She trashed the yard with found items that no one else had noticed. She chewed and chewed and chewed. It rained and she would tear into the house and through the rooms with muddy feet. She claimed the upstairs hall as her toilet. Somehow she managed to get up there and leave a smelly pile... I would get down on my knees and scrub and fume. Suzie had to go! She was a nuisance, a stress inducer, too much trouble!

Though he fought to stay alive with every ounce of his being, Granger finally took his last breath. In determined pragmatism I had been digging his grave for three days. I used my new tiller to break up the ground so I could shovel the dirt out. The Georgia red clay was demonic. I struggled and struggled as long as I could each day, my back screaming in pain as I tugged the little Mantis up out of the hole. Somehow two, then three feet seemed a insurmountable distance...

I wrapped him in the rug I had croocheted years ago with stripes of fabric left from clothing I had made for Kitten. It was a favorite haven for him to sprawl upon when the tile was too cool for his ole bones. It was faded from so many washings but he didn't know or care. It was "his". It wrapped around him well as I lifted his dead weight into the wheel barrow to transport him to his resting place. As I lowered him into the hole in a sad stuggle of physical inaptitude the skies opened and pounded upon us. My tears were unnoticed by the surrounding forsythia bushes and honeysuckle vine as I lifted the heavy wet dirt with the shovel. I barely covered him and had to stop. My girly muscles failed me. Later I returned to add more dirt and later still.

I felt my years keenly when I trudged into the house in my rain wet clothes. Suzie would greet me with excitment each time as though I had come especially to play with her. I ran my hands though her long

white fur, so thick and soft... she tried to chew my fingers. I tried to hug her but she wanted to wrestle...

I wanted to weep but she had come to play. I felt alone and betrayed. She was no comfort at all.

As time went by I continued to pick up mysterious bits and pieces of plastic, paper, metal all over the court yard, and mopped muddy tracks once again and vaccuumed up that long white hair, my resentment grew. I made dire threats. She had to go. She was a pest. She was a trial..

She was not my dog!

My son came over one afternoon to put up a trampoline in the backyard for the Kittens sons. He fussed over Suzie. She was estactic. He worked with her a few minute, teaching her to sit. He called her Sweetie... She wiggled with adoration.

I felt so ashamed. I had been angry with her and she was just being a puppy. My attitude was totally out of line. I knew I had to make the change. It was hard. She was so destructive. And she did not want to cuddle.

We placed a baby gate across the bottom of the stairs to keep her from going up there. Mostly is worked. We have to move it each time we want to go up or come down. One evening I started to move it and Suzie shoved her body between me and it, turning me somehow so that I fell down upon it. I knew immediately something was wrong with my hand. I pulled it up from behind me and my little finger was canted at an odd angle. |/

I ran to LT H crying, I'm broken! He scoffed. Naw, it's just out of joint. He grabbed my tiny little bone and jerked. I did strongly dislike him with great intensitivety. I screemed. Loudly.

Suzie thought this was all great fun. Yes, my finger was back in line but it hurt furiously. For a week. I kept saying it was broken. Finally, to shut me up, LT took me to a clinic and had it exrayed. It was broken. Suzie did it.

So. This has become the home of Suzie. She chews. She digs. She tracks in mud like the expert she is... She also sheds prodigiously. I put that cream between her shoulder blades but fleas romp about her body anyway. i comb her daily and collect great clumps of hair and tiny black fleas.

Will it ever end. I doubt it. Suzie has come to play. Oh, she will grow and no longer be a puppy . ..

But she smiles. It makes one wonder..........

Miss Meg

PS: sorry no pictures yet -- I thought I had congered but I am still pre -K. mm

Go Fig-gerrr...

Wed, 3 Sep 2008 14:09:00 -0500

We will be married 42 years the 26^th of this month. Thirty [and a half] of those years have been lived in this house. Before we moved in, In the twilight hours [well before the final papers were signed] LT planted a fig tree in the courtyard ...

Over the years the fig tree has grown in concert with the three 75 feet tall Water Oaks in the front yard. I have chopped it to the ground three times in preparation of moving it to another location. It has remained unmoved and grew back bushier than ever each time. So I procrastinate ~~a little~~ a lot.

I wanted to move it away from the house because it is a messy tree. Not that it does anything -- but the birds...... When the figs ripened I have battled with them just to get a few ...and yet had plenty to share. Then as people moved away - from our house and theirs- I realized. LT planted the tree but I, only I, ate the fruit. My last fig-eating buddy died eight or nine years ago a month before her 102^nd birthday. ...she told me that the leaves were good for drawin’ boils. No one has knocked on the door for that information. Yet. It may come in handy someday.

All other neighbors of the 70-80's have fled to other states, subdivisons, and downsized houses. The now-occupants are of a different persuasion. They are not outdoors-standing-around-chatting people and are friendly mostly with the people who live within their own house behind triple-locked doors – or people from somewhere else who park in the driveway and rush into the house, locking the door behind them. They don’t want any of my figs. [ And look uneasy when I say, Good Morning or Hi, how ya doin’...]

And too, this year with two lively kittens romping about the courtyard the birds have passed on their share and flown on down the road. Some ill mannered squirrels have sampled a few – leaving hunks of rotting fruit on the ground! [tsk..tsk.]

I came upon a chameleon a week ago. At first I only saw his pink little tongue and beady eye }shudder{ as he melded with the bright green of surrounding fig leaves. He had devoured that helpless little fig leaving only a strip of skin dangling from the stem... surely an evil creature.

Meanwhile, I have been eating a few though out each day for the last month but the increase in number has caused some disquiet to my tummy’s thoughts.

So we come to today, with a bowl full of fat juicy figs bursting joyfully through their skins; I turn to my collection of cookbooks... 42 years... Nada.

Not a fig in the bunch! [Should I curse them at the roots that they should die? WWJD]

~sigh~ when we get back from the plumbing supply house I will get on the Internet and see what I can find "out there". Fig cake, fig cobbler, fig jam... Help me Lord.

Miss Meg

Update on Kit

Sun, 3 Aug 2008 18:58:00 -0500

I have been slack. There are many excuses but all very weak... how many minutes would it take to tell All the news they seek! But, never-the-less, I appologize that I have just let days slip into one another in a haze of nothingness when you all were so wonderful to pray for us during that first tense time of fear. Now I'll get to it., [finally!]

The Kitten still harbors the blood clot in her left leg. The last MRI showed that it covers her whole leg; located 4 inches below her groin and ending at her ankle. The shot of blood thinner she gets every day has apparently made it a thinner blood clot... While we very much want it to be gone! it continues to abide with determination.

Baby girl is extremely healthy and is given high marks from all 20-something doctors who have an interest in this endevor. [Well, maybe not 20 but more than enough]! She has been given an arrival date of November 22 - which is the date my son's daughter was due four years ago! Emma Grace came by emergency C at 28 weeks on September 1st, weighing only 2 pounds 6 ounces. Miss Baby Girl shows no signs of any kind of problems or distress and we do not expect her to be wearing key chain ornaments as slippers as Little Miss Emma did. The Dr. is, however, planning to induce Kit before that date so that they will be in complete control. She has warned them that they'd better be alert because she has always come early. Too, they mention wonderful things like the possiblity of stroke or bleeding to death -- not at all the kind of people I'd want to invite to my birthday party!

What a positive outlook they spout! But our hope is not in medical skill - our hope is in the Name of the Lord...

Son Three will be 2 in October. He is now of the opinion that he rules the world and we are here but to serve him. His life is soon to be quite different. As much of a challange he, swift of feet and fling of hands, is to us now, methinks this coming season is going to be one of much prayer and tears [his]. I'm not too concerned as I know I am bigger than he is and I really don't care if he doesn't like it that I am boss. So when I have him I am confindent in my position of Grammy.

~sigh~ I am praying that my daughter will be physically strong enough to take on the battle of baby and "king". This little guy is not going to give up the throne without a fight.

Mr is working but the financial boat sails in choppy waters. But peace reigns inside as we know Who provides.

Thank you for your loving concern. You are the greatest.

Miss Meg

Woes not whimsical

Sat, 17 May 2008 16:14:00 -0500

This has been a rough week in Grammy-land.

My parenting style is not my daughter's and it is frustrating.

I'm not saying her way is wrong but just that my way is right.

My daughter is suppose to be on bedrest for three weeks while a wicked blood clot dissolves itself.

However, she is also required to be hauled to various doctors' offices - me as chauffeur. [ I can't

believe I spelled that right! I looked it up and it was right -- how very distracting! I am in the thros

of forgetting so much I feel I should telephone someone to help me celebrate... ]

back to the ranch;

Driving is at the top of my dislike list. Yes, I have one, I just don't brag about it.

We also have to hunt for these offices as they are tucked away in brand new conclaves of medical and

law office building. Endless rows, up and down hills, round and round... whew!

Oh, there may be something else lurking in there but mostly it's m and l''s.

We were out all day yesterday confined to tiny waiting rooms while Kitten was back in the innereds --

being probed. She also had to fill out a ga-zillion pages of forms.

Long story short: Her husband's company folded. He doesn't have a job. The Company Insurance runs

out at the end of this month [two weeks] and all the medical types want to get on that horse and ride it for

it's worth. June 1st she will have to go onto Medicaid. This is because the situation is so serious

that she can't be without medical attention. The situation is that she developed a massive blood clot in

her left leg. At one point she was rushed to Critical Care as a part of it was moving toward the heart.

They had her on blood thinner in the hospital but her pregnancy prevented them from the usual

treatment which would have easily resolved the problem. They refused to let her leave the hospital

without medication [ two shots a day in her abdoman @ $138 per shot] and they had no money to pay

for it and the insurance refused to cover it. She was able to go home because a local pharmacy

donated enough to cover a few days but since then it has been dicy. She's suppose to do this

for seven [yes 7] months... when her husband does get a new job his insurance won't cover her pg...

She is 35 and considered a pg risk anyway but with the blood clot it is now very serious. Her ob/gyn

informed her that they will not allow her to go full term but induce early to be in full confrol. She painted a

gloomy picture of Kit bleeding to death and things like that.

However... a day before Kit was put into the hospital [did I mention she had an MRI the week before and

they missed the clot?] I was in Bible Study and a lady called out as we were breaking up, Does anyone

in here have someone in your family that is expecting a baby? She then proceeded to say that as we

were praying she "saw" at preborn baby being held in huge hands. She said that she was sure that

those were God's hands and that He was telling someone that this child would be kept safe. !!!

Isn't that just WOW? She doesn't know my daughter and I am just an acquaintence so she did not know

anything that was going on. In fact only two ladies were aware of Kit's situation - and at that time we had

no idea of it's seriousness. Kit was pretty much convinced her leg bone was cracked and that's why her

foot was swelling and cold. They couldn't tell that from an MRI and no one would x-ray her. Both my

friends looked at me and said that's for Kit.

I think this whole thing is in His hands and what the devil ment for evil He will turn to good.

If you would, please pray for Kit's health and her husbands employment. God is good all the time!

Miss Meg

It's March almost gone

Fri, 28 Mar 2008 14:35:00 -0500

I plead guilty to reading again. I log on every day and read this blog, ten more blogs, that article, another twenty blogs, my emails... some how weeks shoot by and I haven't even said hi y'all.

As usual I am knee deep in what is happening over at my dd's -- it's so much more interesting over there, but that news will come later.

Here, we have made some headway on the forever-project of house remodeling [started in 1990 ]. Bookshelves are now built in on either side of the stone fireplace and the crown molding is up in the den.

~sigh~ guess who gets to paint them? Right.

This painting project gets shoved to the head of the line since it is on the main level and could be an object of outside eyeballs. Will the bath ever get finished? Good question. It is stalled on the tile surround of the bathtub. We are not talking about that.

Mean while, I cleverly manage to avoid painting walls , refinishing other stuff, sewing curtains and slipcovers to read about other's exciting lives on their blogs. Wow, the adventures and baking and crafting! How do they find time to write...

Okay, I can't wait any longer. My kitten is PG again. She called to share the black line news with me. Then she had to explain the black lines... That's the good part. The "other" has to do with public school. You all will be so proud to be schooling at home.

Right after the Winter Break [aka Christmas] the whole gang over there, came down with strep throat -- even babyness. Boy, were they sick. Then all got up and running and one by one were felled by some vicious flu monster [couldn't have been just a bug]. Almost as soon as they recovered the were re-infected with strep.... Eleven days missed from "that place".

Comes a surprise note from someone "not a teacher". She wrote that son two had 8 unexcused absences, which was truency... DD could be taken to court and someone from social services come to inspect their home... In shock the Kitten tried to call the school but was unable to contact the not teacher. She wrote back a note stating that she had written the excuses for both sons on the computer and as they were ill the same time for the same reasons she had merely changed the names of child and teacher. If they would check son one's records they would see that he was absent the exact same times as son two. She had sent a note covering the days absent, ie: Tuesday thry Friday and not one note for each day... each time. There was no complaint concerning son one... what's up with that???

She has not recieved any further communication and the police have not come banging on the door. So.

Then Son One committed a felony. On the school bus he had been trying to fly an airplane [he made folding a sheet of paper] out one of the open windows. He finally succeeded.

He was sited for littering.

Then a couple of days ago he found a balloon in his pocket and he blew it up.

It burst.

The driver reported him and he was hauled into the office again. They called Mama to talk to him. She asked him if he knew what he had done wrong... No.

She explained that the driver may have thought it was gun fire or that a tire had blown out and it scared her. She asked him if there was anything he could do about it he said he could appologize. So he did -- he also brought a note home from the principle saying that if he "committed a third offense he would not be able to ride the bus".

What a shame. Not to be bullied by a kid who thinks it's such fun to get him in a choke hold... or tear up his home work... This child is in his room at school and also on the bus and lives in the neighbor...

Months ago Kitten talked to the bus driver about this and recently she called the office. Now we wonder if bus driver might not be miffed with son one...

Dad says they will be homeschooling next year. ......Unless offense three happens. Then it will be sooner. Can we all screech Praise The Lord! [and pass the ammunition]

The Kitten had Confided to Father that unless Daddy agreed to homeschooling then there was no way it could happen.

She now thinks God has erected a 90 foot high billboard with the message of:

GET THOSE BOYS OUT OF THERE!!!

Miss Meg

Sat. 8 A.M.

Tue, 19 Feb 2008 15:15:00 -0600

This morning I was laying on the kitchen floor [by choice] with my new Neutral Blond hair -that some how looks Red - spilling in a soft Cloud around my puzzled head.

Often while seated at the Un-large round table at the end of the den [adjacent to the kitchen] I have noted a missing Hunk. Not of the male persuasion but in the Toe-Kick of a section of the lower Cabinets...

Hithertofore, I have resolutely ignored the gaping Black Square Hole; Because I am Lazy and Old and did not want to lay upon said Floor to get an Up Close and Personal Look at something I knew :

1] I would not Appreciate,

2] I would have to do something About, and

3] I would not have the Knowledge, Skill or Tool to take care of it.

It = problem.

What my eyes saw Up Close and Personal, was the vertical sides of 2 cabinet units placed side-by-side. ll Apparently it was not appropriate to build the Toe-Kick [so named by an English Male with Big Feet he was unable to control] across the Front of the cabinets because then there would be no Recess for Toes to Kick into...

Just curious: do people actually Stand so Close to a lower cabinet that their Toes would Curl Up if that 2-inch Recess wasn’t there?

As I lay on the floor inspecting the Excessively large cuts on Both sides of the Cabinet walls, I concluded that surely the Carpenter [insert laugh here] did not expect the cabinets to expand when full – because the units were fastened Smack Dab together and the Too-large L cuts were on the Inside...

My guess is that it would have taken a 4-year college degree to accomplish the feat of cutting a Closely Fitted Notch that didn’t leave a 3/4 inch Cap on Each Side ] ll [ . How unthinking of me – Bobby Carpenter has a 2 year Music degree. In Composition.

Luckily I keep the First Aide Box in the kitchen [where in My Life it is most often needed]. Howsome soever I see the Patches are that odd pinky -tan color known as "flesh". My cabinets are white... I have never seen a flesh covered set of bones in that pinky-tan. ...I think I might be a little frightened.

There’s a poem proclaiming Only God Can Make A Tree. Methinks He is the only One Who can make Real Flesh Colors.

Thrill A Minute Thursday

Thu, 7 Feb 2008 20:10:00 -0600

Today I went out to the mailbox hoping to get a bill.

Of Course I had been painting walls --and who changes

clothes to go to the mailbox?. Other than my next

door neighbor who has the gift of shopping and has

four closets full of super clothes from Goodwill

-- usually with price tags intact.

So I strolled out, wearing Classic Beige -- I know,

I know - who would have thought Miss Meg and beige

lived in the same house....

I didn't pick it.

Anyway, quit interrupting,

I'm at the end of the drive and a truck pulls up

in front of me. It's an old buddy I used to chat with

often when Dog and I made the round-the-block trip

every morning. He was so pleased to see me wearing paint

on the end of my nose.

As he quizzed me, another oldie - but goodie-- came rounding

the corner being dragged by a unfamiluar pup.

We called out greetings as she lurched by.

Now I haven't seen these people in months and the day

I venture forth attired in beige splattered sweats

there they are!!

As I trudged back to the house my next door

neighbor, the fashion plate, yelled

"Nice outfit!"

and then

"I need you to put a zipper in one of my jackets --

I can't find my foot."

I'm such a lovely person. I didn't tell her

to check her mouth or anything ugly like that...

Sometimes my niceness is just amazing to me.

Disconnected

Sat, 19 Jan 2008 20:21:00 -0600

The Long Time Husband took apart my computer and replaced everything but the case -- all the things that "show", like keyboard, monitor and printe, are the same.

So it doesn't look like I got anything new. He started telling me how much different parts cost and I told him,

" No -- that doesn't count. It was all free."

"What!" he yelped.

"You had everything "on hand" for something else you were doing for yourself. You changed your plan and used something else ... did something else.

So this didn't cost you anything..."

He kept saying, "How can you say that!"

Easy. It was all free.

Say I bought myself some material a few months ago and never used it; went out and got something else and then decided not to use that either and got another... then you needed a shirt and I had the material on hand so I made it up for you -- it would have been free, 'cause I didn't go out and buy it to make you a shirt. I already had the material. It was free.

He is so strange. He didn't get it.

He is still insisting he spent a bunch of money on me!

Can you believe that?

And, to boot, he also had my computer strewn out on a table for two days and I was totally disconnected from 90% of my communication/entertainment.

It took me four days of reading to catch up!!

While out of commission, I actually grouted tile, mudded some drywall, repaired a pair of his slacks [ I think he has developed a spatial problem 'cause he keeps trying to squeeze into places far smaller than he is...] , took apart the top of a dress to alter, dusted and vacuum [ug] and tidied up some untidy places.

Boy, I was so glad to get that computer back so I could sit and read about other people doing things!

I just missed a God moment!

Fri, 11 Jan 2008 08:46:00 -0600


	Last week my sister told me that our sister in law had been ill with pnumonia during Christmas week. Our relationship has been broken since my brother died - one of those "she thought I thought" things. Well, the thought crossed my mind that I should send her a 'Get Well' card and try again... make the first step in reconcilation. I got the card, wrote the note, got out my address book but the page with her address was missing. I figured I must have thrown it away after several tries of contacting her that had been met coldly [I was justified, I thougt- one hand can't clap! right?]. I thought I'd just get her address the next time I talked to my sister as they had shared a bond she and I had never managed. Well, I have talked with my sister several times since and never once thought of the address. She called this morning to tell me Betty had died last night -- not from the pnumonia but when she was hospitalized they found cancer! No details were given about anything -- funeral arrangements, etc. I did send flowers this afternoon... I regret I hadn't mailed the card last week - she may have never thought of me over these past years at all; but it would have been better if she had known there were no hard feelings from our family. None of us had any of the hostile feelings she expressed to my sister. When I told my sister it was untrue she replied, "I'm not going to get into it." There was really nothing to "get into"... We made attempts to contact her, at first she was rather cool and distant, then ignored our calls and cards... So we let it drop. Our lives went on , never crossing her path in any way -- it was like she never existed. It;s too late now, I missed it -I know it was God was nudging me because she has not come to mind in a long time. My desire is to learn from this and when I have a "thought" to do something like that I will not be stopped by an little hindrance!