Laugh Twice and Call Me in the Morning!

 

Yes, I know. My posts are sad, dreary and depressing. There is no denying that our family has had a bit more of our share of difficult things to deal with. Oh well. No pity party today. No pity party most days.

So why share all this depressing stuff? Well, that's what's happening. How could it be my blog if I didn't share my stuff. While I share with you my thoughts, fears, my life, I also like to share the fun.  I'm not moping around ALL of the time. I laugh a lot. Really, I do!

Laughter really IS the best medicine.

Those of you who know me well know that I love to laugh. I laugh often and I have been told on a few (ahem!) occasions that my laugh is loud and weird. I like to think it is amusing and distinctive. If my laugh is weird then that gives you just that much more to laugh about. I'm here to entertain.

So, here are a few things that make me laugh:

 Here's another one!

 

 

We took this photo when we were in Utah, last Christmas. Yum!

 

Can't you just hear them saying these lines? Thanks, LaSchel, for the calendar!

 

 Rick and I got to go on an amazing work-related trip to NYC last Feb. We were put in an incredible suite in the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. This was the panel on the wall next to the heated toilet seat. Yes, the warmed water did oscillate!

 

When I say it, I just can't do it 'Joey justice' 

 

I used to have fingerprints of little people on the backseat windows. Now I have these!

 

 

Recently, I heard a saying... A laugh is a smile that has exploded. I'm glad not all explosions are bad.



 

 

Sorry, Charlie Brown.

Grieving is hard. It's like a pus-filled wound. At times, it seems to be getting better and healing. Then, out of nowhere, it flares up, becomes painful and you can't stop thinking about it. The only way to make it go away is to pay attention to it, clean out all of the yucky stuff and wait for it to heal.

Good Grief!

Lots of wounds right now. The wound of Lauren's issues is different than my other ones. It's active, constantly being picked at and reopened. Let's just say, "That's gonna leave a mark". Oh yea.

My others.... I have names for them: Dad, Mom and Hilary.

We've been so worried about Lauren that I haven't really had down time to grieve Dad. I miss him very much! I miss his beaming smile, the shape of his eyebrows when he would try to be cranky with me but I wouldn't take the bait. I miss that distinctive voice, with the accent that many try to mimic. Everyone says Rick does the best 'Joe' voice and I believe them, but I just didn't hear it. I only heard the voice of my daddy.

I miss him so much that at times I just want to walk around, telling strangers "My dad died. He's gone. My dad passed away in July. Did you know my dad is gone?". It's like I want people to hurt as much as I do. It's weird, I know. I was driving on I-45 and saw a man holding a cigarette out the window. His hand looked like Dad's hand. Not his face, not the car, just that left hand. I didn't want to take my exit. I wanted to follow Dad's hand.

I took my correct exit.

When we packed up my dad's assisted-living,Susie and I divided the remaining items between us. One of the things I ended up with was an almost-full Kleenex box. I bought it for him on July 2nd, when I did the last grocery shopping for him at the Kroger on Echo Lane and I-10. The color of the box doesn't match my house, but when I put it on my bathroom counter I could smell something familiar. My dad's cologne. Over the past few months I've used a tissue or two. Once I realized that the box was getting empty I stopped using them, choosing to go to another room to get a Kleenex. At times, I would instantly grab one from that box and then regret that I had done it. Silly, I know. But, grief is silly and messy and makes you savor one last Kleenex in a box.

The box is empty now. I'll throw it away.... soon. When I'm ready. Ouch. My booboo hurts.

I went to that same grocery store for the first time a few weeks ago. I went to pick up things for dinner, after getting Josh from school. It was hard to not put my usual purchases in the basket: feta cheese, endives, grapes, Stella beer, grape tomatoes, dates, pita bread, juice, etc. As I turned down aisles I saw images of Dad on an electric shopping cart and the 2 of us trying to figure out how to steer it. I chuckled to myself when I got to the magazine aisle where I got Dad stuck. Like Austin Powers driving that golf cart in his movie. Move 2 inches forward, turn as much as possible, reverse. Repeat. Remembering was funny and sad all at the same time.

My wound really hurts. Makes me think of my mom kissing my bruises to make the pain go away.

Thinking about Dad makes me miss Mom as well. I'm a 47 year old orphan. I have no parents. It just doesn't feel right. It's just wrong.

My ouchie, named Hilary is really flaring up. It's coming up on a year since my smart, giggly, talented, stubborn, beautiful, techno geek friend disappeared from our lives. Last Thanksgiving was her last holiday. A year ago this weekend, she had a great time with family, including her brother. She posted about seeing the new Muppet movie. Which makes me think of Zach singing The Rainbow Connection, which makes my throat hurt and my eyes burn.

A year ago, Sunday, I picked up Zoe from cheer practice and got dinner for her and Hilary at Panera Bread. I bought gingerbread man cookies. Hilary ate some of her soup bread bowl and about half of the cookie, while we watched her recordings on DVR. She fell asleep and I just watched her. She opened her eyes and we talked some more.

It's like I'm playing the DVR version of the last week of November and the first week of December of 2011 in my head. It makes me cry. But I can't turn it off. It hurts and feels good all at the same time, kind of like rubbing that canker sore on your tongue with your teeth. You just can't help it.

Sorry, this post is kinda gross. I must have been a surgeon's daughter! :)

I guess this is how I clean out my Hilary wound. It's the path to healing.

I guess Lucy was right. Good grief!






 

PATHETIC -----> PATH

Was writing in my journal today...so much crap going on. My dad's death is actually one of the easier things to deal with right now!

Things are worse than ever with Lauren. Don't want to get into details. I'm scared out of my mind. I wrote "PATHETIC" , in all caps, to describe my raw feelings about life right now. The first thing that jumped right out at me was "PATH". 

Wow. It took me back. Surprised me. Made me hold my breath for a minute.

PATH

That's not a negative thing. Here I am having a word/feelings dump in my journal and, low and behold, something positive rises to the top.

PATH

I call that God. So many people on this planet call it so many other things... luck, Jehovah, karma, Allah, Divine intervention, shit happens. Doesn't matter to me just as long as I recognize it. 

I have struggled so much with my faith for the past few years. I have learned a lot, like... just because I am a Christian doesn't mean life will be rosy, in fact it's destined for challenges, to mold me, have me learn and grow, give me opportunities to practice what I believe, in spite of how I feel. Learned that a church is just a building filled with human beings, all of whom, like me, make mistakes and sometimes don't act with as kind, respectful and loving of a nature as I would have hoped for. To be hurt, rejected and treated badly by some people in my church of 22 years, the only church home I've ever had, has been very painful. But, it made me see more clearly the church family that is not part of that group, the amazing qualities in them that keep them separated from the others and how to be more like them. Taught me to let go of anger and grudges, of expectations I had of others that were not mine to have. It has made my faith in God stronger, much to my surprise.  

So many times, thousands of times, I have prayed for L & J to be helped, to have some of/all of their burdens lifted, to have them blessed with peace, grace, gentleness of spirit, body and mind, and soul. I pray for their total healing, just in case God decides to pull another Lazarus or Red Sea. How can I not. I'm a mom desperate to help my children!

PATH

I know many of our prayers have been answered by bringing loved ones and friends, physicians, support people, those able to give love, support, guidance, expertise into our lives. 

However, I still feel like our family keeps drawing one of the short straws in life. Not all of them, I know. Just more than our fair share. Sorry but I'm just gonna be honest here. Aren't you tired of finding out the crap that keeps happening in our family? Aren't you just a bit, or more than a bit, afraid to ask us how we're doing? Tired of seeing me cry? ME TOO!

So, when I feel like you and I have had enough of our pity party I retreat. I stop answering the phone. I don't reach out to people. I stay home, in my pj's, and sleep or watch mindless tv to keep me from thinking about the mess that is our life. Rick tells me all the time how grateful he is to be able to go to work, to get away, to rejuvenate, to be in a normal setting where things mostly go well, with people who typically follow the rules of social graces. I am so happy for him to have this. I am so grateful he has such a wonderful job that allows me to not have to work and be able to focus on each crisis. I am envious at the same time.

A silver lining in my Dad's passing, is that now I will have more time to focus on what I need to do to take better care of myself and move on to the next phase of my life. Thank God I can still see the positives. 

PATH



PATHETIC = PATH? Depends on what I want to do. I surely do not plan on giving up. I don't want to live at 6422 Pathetic Place all my life. So, I've been presented with a path. What type? I don't know. Where is it going? Have no clue. Am I going down it? You betcha. 

Walk and Talk like an Egyptian

He looked like he was sleeping. A bit pale, a bit cold. I pulled the covers up to his shoulders to keep him warm, and crawled into bed next to him. One last time cuddling with my dad.

My dad always had this habit of falling asleep in his chair, with the remote in one hand, mug of hot tea in the other, and that certain look of his mouth as he began to snore. Susie and I would watch how close his tea would get to being spilled as he relaxed. Most of the time, he managed to hold it together.

Today, he let go. Finally.

I put my hand on his chest. There was no heartbeat, no breathing, not even a tremble. Obviously, its not natural to feel that stillness, that quiet, in a person. But, this was my dad and somehow it just worked. It was like magic. I pictured his heart beating, not in his body, but in his rising spirit, the spirit now as one, at peace, with my mom.

I lay there next to him for a while and cried. Then, Susie, David, Rick and I joined hands with Dad and prayed for the wonderful news of Dad and Mom being together again. I really bawled when David spoke. This "at times too serious" engineer brother-in-law of mine wept as he spoke of my dad and what he meant to him. I'm not surprised. We all know the mushy David is in there. Every word spoken by the 4 of us was just perfect, including the giggles at things remembered, me sneezing in the middle of it, and the funeral director knocking on the door saying they were ready for Dad. The only thing missing was a dog throwing up in the background. My dad would have rolled his eyes in frustration or he might have joined in on the silliness with one of his funny faces. Holy moments can be found everywhere!

During the past few months, Dad has been teaching me this phrase in Arabic. It phonetically sounds like 'Sabah hanoor alal bahnoor', with that ckah noise that comes from the back of your throat (like you're coughing up a hair ball) in just the right places. I learned to say it just right but he wouldn't tell me what it meant! I wondered if he had taught me a bad word and asked him all the time to translate. He just smiled and shook his head. He was happy to hear Arabic being said back to him.

My cousin told me it means 'Good morning, sunshine!'. I bet my dad heard that today as he began his new life in Heaven.

On Friday night, as I stayed with him, he became restless around 4:00 am. He was determined to get out of bed because he had an appendectomy to do. I tried to coax him to lie back down but he told me the anesthesiologist was ready for him. He had an appendectomy to perform. He talked about making a lateral incision in the lower right quadrant, thru the muscle. He told Susie she could scrub in. He talked about anesthesia and analgesia. Susie had to explain that part to me. He said he would do purse-like suturing, so that there would be minimal scaring.

You always return to what you knew first and what you know best!

As family talked today, we realized Dad assisted in saving the lives of 4 family members. He helped my cousin Jana get emergency surgery when the doctors didn't know/wouldn't do further examination to see what was wrong with her. He ordered bloodwork,on a hunch, on my cousin Michelle, and found out she had leukemia. Another cousin's 3 day old baby, Tony, was screaming and not feeding well. He quickly rushed Nevine's newborn into emergency surgery for a strangulated hernia and did a bowel resection. Then, after Rick's heart valve surgery, complications arose on the way home from the hospital. I called the doctor and they said it was probably a reaction to moving around more than usual. I called Dad, he and my Uncle Raouf(an ob/gyn) came over,
diagnosed Rick with severe tachycardia and other heart rhythm problems. Next thing I knew, they picked Rick up, put him in our car, wrapped their arms around him, and cradled his head, while I drove and they yelled in Arabic to any car that dared get in my way.

By the end of this week all 4 of these people, along with everyone else who loved Dad, will gather to say goodbye. What a legacy he has left for us!

I was crying as I started writing this post. I didn't want it to be tomorrow because I didn't want to start my first day without him. Well, it is now after midnight, a new day has begun and I have survived. I get a lot of my strength from my dad. I'll go on, doing the next right thing, each day.

So, in case I don't talk to you tomorrow morning, oops... I mean THIS morning, Sabah hanoor alal bahnoor!

My dad...

He's dying...

He's more than ready. He's been ready since Sept. 27, 2010, the day my mom passed away. All he ever wanted was to be with my mom... and for them to be happy. That happiness eluded my mom, consequently leaving my dad in the same position. He'll get his wish very soon.

It's been so hard to watch Dad decline. He stares at his hand, the one he did surgery with, the one he saved lives with... only to see that he hasn't been able to even hold a fork since his 4 strokes in early '07. Gone is the independence, the spouse, many friends, the house, the garden, the car, the dog that he cannot care for (Maggie lives with us now). Everything my dad owns is in his small apartment in the assisted living part of The Forum.

Books, magazines, a tv, a plant, a few clothes, meals in the dining room cannot sustain a man. When the body fails, dignity flies out the window and the life spirit dries up, what are you left with? Not a whole lot.

Susie and I have put everything we could into being there for Dad. We wouldn't have it any other way. Dealing with his frustrations, his loneliness, his 3-5 calls per day every day and watching the man who scooped you up as a child fade away is not for the weak. He is SO worth it!

Memories of your hand being so little, and his so big, that all you could hold was his pinky. Memories of falling asleep in the car (well, almost asleep) and knowing that he was going to pick you up in his arms and carry you to bed. Walking you down the aisle, holding your new baby, loving your husband like a son, saying what a fine person you've become and he's proud to be your dad.

Now it's Depends, smoothies because it hurts for him to swallow food, bed changes and morphine drops.

As I've stayed beside him all day today (Susie took yesterday's shift). I have heard him moan a lot. It made me think.... he's had morphine, he says he has no pain... So why all the moaning. I saw the same with my mom and with Hilary, although morphine doesn't do the trick when you're dealing with the cancer monster.

Still, they've all moaned. Made me think... Dying is hard. Letting go is hard. Maybe as you take a step down this new, brightly-lit path and although you feel warm gushy love up ahead your heart moans every time you turn around to look backwards. Leaving behind your loved ones, blue sky, green trees, sounds of a river flowing, hearing a child laugh...all hard. Even if you know where you're going and who will be waiting on the other side, leaving behind all you've ever known is tough business. That would be enough to make me moan.

I don't know how much time he has left. Days.... A week or two...

So here I'll stay, soaking up every ounce of him I can... every freckle, how he furrows his brow, his ear-to-ear smile, how he can still pinch with his toes, his silly voices, him mumbling in Arabic (because you return to what you knew first), the image of me holding his hand, the smell of his cologne, how I probably need to clip his fingernails one last time. ONE LAST TIME!

I'm bracing myself. Calm on the outside, shaking like a leaf on the inside. I've said everything I needed and wanted to say. We both KNOW what a special bond we have.

Parting is but sweet sorrow.

Love you, Dad!!

Love, Bethy

Where is that remote???

It's time now for THE RAINEY DAYS OF OUR LIVES....we apologize for the interruption of shows.....beyond our control.....system overload


So, on the last few episodes of A Rainey Kind of Day (the Drama channel, daily at 5:00 pm CST, 6:00 pm Eastern, 3:00 pm on the West Coast) Josh was in Utah, Beth and Rick were talking of Lauren going to a program in California and and life was in a lulled, low key turmoil.


Most of you saw the previews on Facebook of upcoming episodes, I'm sure. Lauren left for the OPI program in CA, around the 3rd week of Feb. and Beth and Rick had a month to themselves. Our lead characters did not go jetting off for trips, well, only one to NYC, they did not go out to lavish dinners or party it up with friends. No, they crawled into bed and licked.... Oh, you naughty people. This is not an R rated kind of drama!!! No, they licked their wounds and enjoyed the stillness of their home.



It had been a long time since the house on Sunrise Glen had seen such peace. The rooms no longer echoed with the sounds of slamming doors, disrespectful behavior or tears. The couple enjoyed the quietness and the freedom from worry for the first time in several years. (think back to seasons 1-4)


By the end of March, Josh was ready to return to his homeland. He set his bearded jaw, grabbed his shoe lace-less shoes and jumped back into life. He had never lived at home without his older sister, so a new normal started to emerge. There were dinners for 3, along with nice talks, and therapeutic conversations. School started back up, family therapy resumed and the Raineys felt hope and happiness return to their lives.


However, there was a familiar villain in town. CAMERA 1... Dramatic close up with that spooky music....ACTION! He's hiding around corners and lurking in the back seat of the cars. The Raineys had seen this stalker before. They filed a retraining order (home contracts)and brought in the SWAT team (the Tarnow Center) to rid their lives from this frequent visitor.


DRAMATIC PAUSE.........followed by a message brought to you by the makers of Starbucks, Wellbutrin and dark chocolate.



So, recap... Josh left, Beth cried, Rick hugged Beth, Lauren left, Beth cried, Rick hugged Beth, Beth and Rick rested, Josh returned, and the villain (known well on the
Drama channel as mental illness) was spotted back into the neighborhood. The family knew he never really left in the first place. The Raineys though he might have moved a couple of houses down, but no. That other familiar face turned out to be... DU DU DUUUUUH!...the villain's twin brother, Depression. He looked quite different because he had had a face transplant by Dr. Drake Remoray, and had his hair colored by his stepSister-in-law's half cousin's best friend, named Kitty Von Kat!!!!



As the sands of time drop slowly from the hour glass, the family buckles up, puts on their steeled-toe combat boots and heads into battle, with a crowd of Canuks and Texans waving flags in support.


So.... These are the Rainey Days of Our Lives! Tune in tomorrow to see God Knows Best, the longest running show on cable channel 47 (available all day, every day, in every time zone)!



That's a wrap

72!

So, I said I would write about marriage, Rainey style. We've been married for over 23 years now, and it definitely has not been easy. In fact, at times I wasn't sure we would make it. And, at the same time, it's been THE BEST relationship I've ever had with another human being and I wouldn't trade it for the world!

When Rick and I met, I was a very different person then. My family can attest to this. It was 1984, my sophomore year of college at UT in Austin. I was not as shy as I was my freshman year but I was still very timid about life and my part in it.

Rick was handsome, funny, charming, did I mention handsome and funny? Yes, I laughed a little too hard at his humor, but sometimes it was because I didn't even understand the reference or joke. I wasn't dumb, just quite sheltered. We'd only been in the US for 2 years, and before that my hometown of Parry Sound, Canada was 5,000 population, we had 3 channels with an antenna/rotar, and our movie theatre played 1 movie for 2 weeks, before the next one came.

Rick introduced me to all kinds of music, like Chicago, U2, etc, more than just the stuff on MTV, back when MTV played music! I saw movies like Clockwork Orange (um, quite shocking for me), Alfred Hitchcock films, the Maltese Falcon, Blade Runner and more. Of course I loved music and movies but my repertoire was more of a pop culture thing.

I learned to better understand and like baseball, have watched every Jim Carrey movie out there (multiple times {SIGH}) and love to eat at James Coney Island and Chik-fil-la all because of this "boy"!

I think the biggest thing Rick did for me was give me confidence. Confidence that I was worth loving, that I had good thoughts, that I was someone worth knowing and listening to. I was severely lacking in these areas and Rick gave me a great gift. In fact he may have created a monster!! I actually still struggle with confidence, but many of you wouldn't know it. Right? Go ahead, it's okay to agree. I know!

I think, in a way, we've switched places. He was the outgoing, funny, social one and I was more reserved, afraid to let people know who I was, very concerned about what people thought of me. Now, I don't mean we've done a complete reversal. I just happen to be the more outgoing, positive, outspoken one and Rick is more reserved. He's not quite sure how i manage to stike up a conversation with people in public and come away knowing that the lady in line at the grocery store has a child with Asperger's, the salesperson at Macy's has a friend whose daughter went to school with Josh or that the pest control guy used to live in the neighborhood of the school I taught in and his neighbor's kid was in my class and is now in college! I know. I'm weird.

Somehow, throughout all of our trials, tribulations, crises, ups and downs, we've managed to stay together. The odds aren't in our favor. Did you know that approx. 80% of marriages fail if just one of the children has a serious mental illness? After all we've gone through, I think it's a miracle were still together.

Thank God for Carol & Steve LaBonte, Dr. Roche and Dr. Tarnow. Because of these fine professionals we've learned to communicate, understand each other and deal better with each others' weaknesses. We've taught each other a lot! I think Rick may have learned more than he ever wanted to know! There's this look that comes over his face, where his eyes glaze over, mouth has this funny tilt to it and I realize that if I don't stop and explain, or just plain stop, he may start to drool.

Or, there are the times when I'm frustrated and have learned, most of the time, to not bite Rick's head off. Like when he can't find something in the pantry. I say "It's on the 3rd shelf from the bottom, on the left side, between the rice and the Mac n' Cheese," and he still can't find it. I walk over, point to it and he swears he looked there.

I think the most important thing about staying married is that you BOTH want the marriage to work more than you want to be right. When we argue and I know I'm wrong I want to apologize, well, most of the time, because I would rather be on the same page with Rick than stand my ground. Not easy, just simple. Put WE ahead of ME.

72. Never had the number 72 tell more about people than during the past few months. Rick and I no longer have to share our anniversary with Kim Kardashian and her newest ex. The number 72, in relation to the number of DAYS they were married, tells us a lot about their character, doesn't it?

How about 72 years! That's almost how long Rick's grandparents, Mema and Papa, have been married. We heard an interesting story about what went on with them on Christmas Day.

So, Papa makes these awesome sweet, hot pickles. He makes them, Mema puts them in jars and they were giving them to some people for presents. Apparently, a few days before Christmas, Papa dropped a jar of pickles, cleaned it up the best he could, being 94 yrs old AND being a man. A day or two later, Mema, who's 90, steps on something sticky, aaaaaand, she's off.....

She's mad that Papa didn't clean it up to her satisfaction, that a jar broke in the first place and that now she's convinced that when Papa broke the other jar, glass shards flew all over and that now there's glass in the sealed pickles jars, on a shelf 5 feet off the ground. Ah, yep! Don't ask! Just trust me that she really believed there was glass in the other unopened pickle jars.

Apparently, this arguement occurs at home, then continues during Christmas dinner and picks up where they left off back at their home later that evening. Rick's uncle gets a frantic phone call from Mema, saying she's locked herself in the bathroom because Papa has gone crazy. Randy heads over and is greeted at the door by Papa, in his jammies, having no clue what's going on. Randy got Mema out of the bathroom, she said they were arguing about the pickles and that Papa couldn't take Mema's nagging any more and he wanted a divorce. Going on 72 years of marriage and he wanted a divorce! Randy worked his magic, as he always does, Papa agreed to calm down and stop scaring Mema, so she wouldn't have to hide in the bathroom, and Mema agreed to not nag Papa so much. They kissed and all was well!

72. It can tell you a lot. I hope we make it to 72. We just might!

Love you, Ricky. You stud-muffin, you!