Hero

This post has been churning inside of me for a while, but just this morning I was sorting through the clothes-to-donate pile and found Dan's old vest. When I say vest, I'm speaking of the bullet-proof type, not of the J.Crew type. Can you imagine Dan in a sweater vest? Ok I've got the giggles now...

Just looking at that thing made my heart do a little thump and then I caught the pungent odor and the memories came flooding back. I know, you're already wanting to close this and URP, but I beg just a few more minutes of your time.

Meet Dan.

Last year Dan was working his off-duty job at a local grocery store, where the most exciting event of the night is the usual beer run attempt or someone mouthing off to the little greeter woman at the front door when she yells at the mom towing 14 kids that she can't take the car-cart into the parking lot. Yeah, I know---Yawn. He makes the most of this job and was working this extra shift two nights a week as we were going through some difficulties financially due to the fact that we were about to lose our business. Suddenly he heard a thud and someone do a little shriek and looked over at the self-service line and an older gentleman was laying on the ground. Dan ran over, calling for the fire department on his way, and found the man not breathing. The whole store was frozen as he began chest compressions while they were waiting for the paramedics. Minutes went by and if you've ever done chest compressions (which I hope you haven't had to do) it is exhausting, so you know he was hot and sweaty and working to save the man. When the firemen arrived, they carted him off and a bunch of Dan's superiors arrived to check out the scene. The man unfortunately didn't make it and as he relayed the story to me, I assured him that he did everything possible and his stormy facial expression told of feelings he wasn't conveying to me. I gave him a hug and let it go hoping he wasn't feeling guilty.

A couple days later I came home from work and was greeted with a strange smell. The pungent odor of a permanent marker. Not a Sharpie. The ones that are made of metal that can make your nose hairs singe? Yeah those ones. I walked upstairs to find Dan using the marker all over his outer carrier on his vest, literally coloring on it. I was shocked and was holding my nose saying that he's probably killing all of our brain cells and asked him what on earth he was doing! He said sheepishly that he had tried to dye his vest earlier in the day and it didn't work so he was trying this and he grinned at his ingenuity and held it up and said that it was working. I asked him why he was doing that and he got a guilty look on his face.

He told me the rest of the story of that night at the store.

As they were loading up the old man into the ambulance, a Lieutenant came into the store to see what had happened. He looked at Dan, sweaty and exhausted from trying to save the man for about 10 minutes, and the Lieutenant walked over to Dan's Sergent and told him to let Dan know that his outer vest was beginning to fade from the sun and it looked shabby and he needed to get a new one. And then he left. My mouth dropped open. Dan said he knew we didn't have the money until his uniform allowance came in as the vests are almost a thousand dollars (we were barely making it as it was) and that was a few months away, so he would just have to do something to make the one he had look better. I was stunned. Stunned at the audacity of the Lieutenant. Stunned that my husband was going to WEAR that vest as it smelled to high heaven. And humbled by his devotion. Every two weeks I came home to that smell for about 5 months until we could afford his new vest.
Even typing this out it brings tears to my eyes thinking about it. As I'm typing this, he's upstairs snuggling a crying Kale as he stepped on a toy and squished his toe. I can hear the loud smack of a smooch he's delivering to said toe.

My hero.

Junkie

I have decided that I am an information junkie. I read constantly and when I don't know something, I'm researching it.

Case in point: when I was pregnant, I read just about every book (well maybe not EVERY one) and watched TLC non-stop. My favorite show was special delivery where the babies and (sometimes) the mom were high risk. Dan would shake his head at me and tell my how ridiculous it was, but it made perfect sense to me. If they can save THAT baby with the heart defect and only a 2% chance of surviving, then mine will be juuuuuust fine. I watched c-section after c-section, amazed and un-alarmed, second only to the amount of HOME births that I saw on both the internet and again TLC (preggos, if you don't have TLC, you need to get it). I was fascinated and prepared. Nothing like that combo to make you sleep well at night.

Case in point Numero Dos: My boss went to the Queen Creek Olive Mill over the weekend and knew I was interested in the it, so she brought back an pamphlet about the mill. I Oooohed and Aaahhed over it and read it front to back as it explained the process. Did you know they cold press the olives and that healthy olives are not Black!? Right. Neither did I, but now I do.

Did you know that you can look up your recent searches on Google? (looked that up to find that out, too) So I just did and on August 23rd (a random date I just picked) I searched for 18 things from 8:43AM until about noon. Just random things. Is that strange? I'm beginning to wonder about me a bit. I want to know a little about a lot, so I'm informed about important and also random things. If I'm being reeeally honest, I want to know more than a little. I am not a scholarly person and don't enjoy school (although I'm a current student..blah) but relish knowledge.

If only I could major in Trivial Pursuit...

Tonight I'm marveling at how much I've gotten done today. Worked, picked up the boys from my mom's house, threw in laundry, wrote part of a paper, bathed the boys, sat with the boys through old school Donald Duck, and did some reading. I've had so much time tonight, that I've let my mind wander toward the next few months...Kale's birthday, Halloween, Logan's birthday, Thanksgiving, then Christmas. This may just be the last night in the next five months that I will have a minute to breath....hmmm....a bit daunting. In thinking about holidays, specifically Halloween as it's the first one to arrive, something very important struck me. I simply had to write.

New mom's especially--get a pen and jot this down--you will not remember this and it really could be detrimental. Ready? OK.

Your child's first Halloween costume may just set the tone for his life.

Give it a minute and let it sink in.

Case in point: Logan my little monkey. Sweet, silly loves to climb, hang and screech in laughter. He is lovable and sensitve and once he did even eat poo (dog poo--accidentally of course), and I know you were thinking it because you too saw that naughty little chimp wipe his bootie and lick it then fall off the tree.

Now to Kale: My little Chili Pepper. Kale is as hot and spicy as they come. He lives with the passion that so many of us lack. His intensity far exceeds a simple bell or poblano....he's a habanero in every way. He makes me melt when he take his little chubby hand and touches my cheek so gently in the early morning, and gets my blood boiling when he looks me dead in the eye and gives "May-theee" (Mason, our dog) his spaghetti dinner as I'm warning him not to even think about it.

So the moral is this: stick with honey bees and little lambs and leave the peeees in the pod and the adorable devil on the rack.

Just in case.

A happy little tune

You know what I love best about having kids? That you never ever know what will happen on any given day.

Like today.

Today, my baby...my BABY boy (is it sinking in that I'm in a bit of denial here?) did a pee pee in the potty. Well to be precise, it was FOUR pee pees in the potty. All in about 20 minutes of time. Lately, I've been trying to remember how potty training worked with Logan. Ahh yes. I remember now. The infamous Skittles on the top of the toilet. Pee in the potty--get a Skittle. That means every little squirt --and let me just say that Logan figured that out within about 2 minutes. And we peed. Every little squirt. And OH how we devoured those Skittles happily. A couple bags of Skittles versus a box of diapers. Yeah...no contest. So I've been thinking we should begin to introduce Kale to the wonderful diaper-less world. Sounds fairly simple.

As I'm thinking about this I remembered a bag of gummi bears that have been sitting on my fridge for a couple days and thought "hey what the heck, lets give it a go" and asked Kale if he would like to pee pee in the potty. He said "NO FANK YOU" and firmly met my gaze. I said "Kale if you go pee pee on the potty Mama will give you a gummi bear--wanna try?" A firm and loud "NO FANK YOU, Mama."

Sigh...At least he's getting the whole "manners" thing down.

Then Logan said "If Kale does a pee pee can I have one, too?" Ding Ding Ding! "ABSOLUTELY" is my response. And a little cheerleader was born. Next thing I know, Logan has two large packs of new undies that Kale received for Christmas (thanks Aunt Crystal) from Kale's room and he's brought them into the bathroom and has opened them telling Kale how COOL big boy undies are. And that when he pee pees on the potty (lordy, I'm already sick of typing out pee pee) he gets to wear cool super hero and YO GABBA GABBA (the WORST show on television, yet the kids LOVE IT) undies. Kale is so very unimpressed. We get Kale on the potty and he is now screaming "NO FANK YOU" so loudly I'm thinking we may be on the verge of ruining our chances of ever getting him to go, and we hear a little sound. The melodious sound of the pee pee song. (oh did I forget to mention we have a SINGING potty? You pee, it sings. Ingenious.) And Logan and I burst into cheers. Dan runs in and we all do a HUGE dance for Kale, who now is almost about to cry cuz the cheering scared the dickens out of him. He recovered fairly quickly and held out a hand for his reward. Kale got two gummi bears and Logan got one. Then Logan encouraged him to try again. And again. And again. I gave them a few minutes of guy time as I needed to finish picking up the living room and heard this from around the corner.
Logan: Kale, you need to do more pee pees so you can wear these super cool undies. And we get more gummi's. You want more gummies?
Kale: No
Logan: I'll get my stool. (I hear rustling) Ok, Kale I'll sit here and you sit on the potty and we can talk so you go pee pee. I know! We can talk about camping. Do you want to go camping, Kale?
Kale: No
Logan: If you do a pee pee we can get more gummi bears. You want more gummi's?
Kale: (in his loudest, most serious voice) NOOOOOOOOO FANK YOU WHOA-GEEEEEEE.
And immediately another SONG emerges from the potty. It really is a magical potty. And we heard the song two more times after that.
So tomorrow my plan is to work that potty til it loses its proverbial voice. And if I have a little goober who won't make it sing I guess I'll just deal. Such is life, I guess. Would I have it any other way?

No FANK you.