Dreams of Fantasy, Echoes of Reality

I was hoping to be done and have the house listed by today, but no. I had a helper lined up Tuesday to paint the front door and finish a few other final touch up paint jobs. However, my help bailed on me. Those projects took me a good part of the day, so no work got done on the cleaning. So, at 8 a.m. yesterday, I marched into Nicky's room and got to work.

Have you ever just worked and worked for days on end and you look around wondering why it doesn't look like it? That was how I was feeling earlier this week. I have been doing big paint projects and decluttering. I have my paint staging area in my living room, my donation pile for the Salvation Army, moving boxes and empty tubs to pack things into and our day to day pile up all going on in the same place. I make a trip to the Salvation Army and three days later there is another large pile. I had an epiphany Tuesday night. I need to go get the bedrooms done. I won't make piles in there, so once done, they will stay done. I will feel like progress has been made.

That is why I attacked the kids rooms yesterday. I am tired and so worn out from all the going up and down the step ladder, crawling along the floor for baseboards and whatnot. So, my pace wasn't spectacular, but I worked steadily. Even with the three hour break in the middle to run errands and have lunch with a friend. Nicky's room is 100% done. Katey's is about 1/2 an hour away from 100%. Once Ned got home from work last night, we ran another load of items to the storage unit. These were big things that required two people to load in and out of the car. I bought a hand truck last week, and that has been the best thing ever, but it still won't lift the items into the back of my van for me. ;)

With all that work yesterday, I forgot to start dinner before Ned was home and we were headed out. It was six in the evening at that point. We ran off to Panera for dinner after unloading the van into storage. When we got home, the kids needed baths and to get ready for bed. Ned removed stickers from their furniture for me and I folded the laundry I had been working on. When the kids were in bed, Ned started ironing some of his shirts and I finished up the laundry. Sometime around 9:30, I sat on the bed to chat with him and the next thing I know he was waking me up! lol

At lunchtime the kids are going to Nana's for a couple of days. That will take about 3 hours out of my day and I realized I don't want to wear myself completely out today. Tonight is the first night in the nearly full year I have been doing karate that Ned and I will get to train together in class. I am so excited about that. He's never really gotten to watch me train.

The house is getting there. I can see that it's getting there, I'm just tired and ready for it to be done already. I think I shall get Katey's room completed before I need to pack bags for the kids. We're leaving in about an hour and a half.

Ta Ta for now my lovelies!

Jeni and I are going to start using pen_edit_repeat again to jump start some creative writing. I was supposed to post a prompt on Sunday. Being gone most of the day, I completely spaced it. Normally, prompts will go up sometime on Sundays and we have all week until Saturday evening to get something posted. Tuesday isn't too bad, so I decided this could be a short run, warm up and posted a prompt over there earlier. lol

I went back and read some of my Idol entries for this past year and I really enjoyed quite a few of them. However, I am supposed to be working right now, so i better get back to that.

Well, Nicky kindly shared his crud. Poor Katey and I have been miserable since Sunday. I woke up Sunday and my face hurt. You know it's going to be bad when your teeth hurt. I had the migraine from hell and a low grade fever all day. I spent the day curled up on the love seat napping on and off. Katey didn't start complaining her head hurt until later that evening. She has had a lot higher fever on and off, but today we both seem to be doing better. Ned stayed home from work yesterday to take care of us all. He's wonderful. My migraine released me sometime yesterday afternoon. I still had/have an on and off low grade fever, but I can function now.

Today may be spent mostly on the couch also. I am still feeling like I could curl up and sleep at any point. (I am falling asleep at my computer while trying to type this) Nicky's off to school after being out for three days and Ned has gone to work. It's just Katey and I hanging out today.

I was trying to get some work done today, but I am randomly locked out of the system I need. I am now waiting for my boss to get me reset. I have been a little slow in the work this week, because Nicky is sick. Poor guy woke up at 2:30 am, 4 and 5:30 on Thursday morning complaining of tummy pain and leg cramps. He didn't have a fever or ever throw up and seemed fine when he got up, so I sent him to school. The nurse called 30 minutes later. I decided he really must be sick when he slept from 12:30 to 3:30 yesterday afternoon and then from 4:30 until 8:00 am this morning. Nicky never naps. I really expected to be up at 3 am since he went to sleep so early. I can't believe he slept through the night like that. It worked for me though since I was so tired from being up and down with him the night before.

We did an awesome thing for Christmas this year. My family decided to get a beach house in the Outer Banks of North Carolina for the week of Christmas. The house was split 5 ways and my parents paid more than their share. This meant we ended up with an awesome 3000 sq ft house in Rodanthe that was 50 ft from the ocean. There is no way we could afford this house in the summer season. Here is a link to the listing Sea Horse Rodanthe It wasn't even our year to spend Christmas with my family, but Ned said if they were going to the beach, we weren't just going to visit a day or two, we were going to be there too!

Greeting the sun from the deck off the living room!



We got a small real tree and strung cranberries. Mom made a bow for the top and we made decorations from red and green beads and pipe cleaner. Mom folded doilies into fans and flowers. We actually removed the tinsel the day after we put it on. It detracted from the simple beauty of the tree.



We got creative when we hung the stockings by the fire with care!



The kids Christmas day!

“Are we good?”

“Of course. I just had to put things in perspective.” I paste a smile on my face.

“What do you mean, perspective?”

She sounds irritated.

“I realize you didn’t mean to hurt me.” I say soothingly.

“Well of course I didn’t mean to hurt you! I wouldn’t do something like that.”

Now she sounds indignant. Funny how she feels she can be the indignant one here.

“I explained what happened. It was an accident. I don’t know why you’re so sensitive.”

The insult cut deep, but I was determined to keep the smile pasted on my face. A simple apology would have been nice. It always comes back to me somehow. Me and my flaws. It’s never about her.

“Like I was saying,” I start again, “I understand it was an accident.”

“Well, at least I’ve gotten that through to you. So, we’re good here right?” She looks at her watch. “I’ve got somewhere to be tonight.”

“Sure, we’re good.” I sigh as she turns and heads for the door.

“Great! I’ll call you later. Maybe we can do something without you overreacting next time.”

I stare at the door as it closes. How could she believe that everything was alright? How could I have thought things would be different?

I won’t cry. I have no tears left.


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This is my entry for LJ Idol: S9 Week 23. The topic this week was The Fiction of the Fix.

“Good morning to you!”

The off key, cheerful singing startled me from my sleep. I groaned as I pulled the pillow over my head.

“Good morning to you!”

I pulled the covers over me also. No matter what I did, I was unable to tune out the cheerful song set to the tune of happy birthday.

“Good morning dearest daughter, good morning to you!”

“Mom, you can’t sing, stop trying.” I flung the pillow at her. “I’m not a teenager anymore. You have to stop inflicting that song on me.”

My mother just laughed. She had been singing that song to wake us up ever since my sisters and I were small. I’m thirty-four years old and a new mother in my own right. This was my house and my mother was still singing that out of tune song to me.

“Rise and shine daughter dearest. I let you get a whole nights sleep. Nicky is sleeping and will be ready for a bottle soon. I am going to take a nap.”

Mom had come down from New York to help us out with the new baby. I’d ended up having a c-section and I was going to take all the help I could get.

“Go to bed and maybe I will sing to you later.”

“I’m not sure my ears could take it.” She laughed as she left.

I smiled. My whole life we had felt tortured by this song. My sisters and I had hated it as children. My mother has the typed of voice that will carry clearly across a large, loud space. There were four of us girls, in two or three different rooms, she was tying to wake each morning. Her voice was always loud and very off key.

I think we were teenagers when she told us that her mother used to sing the same thing to her and her siblings when they were young. We couldn’t understand how she could torture us the same way. Especially, when she knew who awful it was. I chuckled to myself as I remembered how dramatic my sisters and I were as teenagers.

Nicky’s bottle was nearly ready when I heard him stirring. I walked over and picked him gently up out of the bassinet. I still can’t believe the emotions this little bundle of joy has brought me.

As he blinks up at me I smile and in a quiet, lullaby tone, I sing;

“Good morning to you.
Good morning to you.
Good morning dearest Nicky,
Good morning to you.”

It was tradition after all.


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This is my entry for LJ Idol: S9 Week 21. The topic this week was The Music Made Me Do It.

an effortless spark
rage shudders between the two
forgiveness is found


unforeseen attack
suppressed temper manifests
touched by the amends




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This is my entry for LJ Idol: S9 Week 19. The topic this week was Kindling.

“I would like to biopsy one of your spots to make sure that we are actually dealing with hives.”

The way my dermatologist stressed the word hives, made my blood run cold. I had been dealing with Urticaria, as the doctors called it, for several years. The problem had started small. In 2002, I developed a spot in the middle of my forearm that was an itchy red ring. Honestly, I thought I had contracted ringworm somehow. Within a few hours, the sharply ridged ring had given way to a completely raised circle that itched terribly. The next day, it was gone.

After that, I didn’t think much of it until two more showed up, in the same area, a week later. For about six weeks, I dealt with this itchy rash that would come and go and was spreading to my torso. I went to a doctor on a particularly bad day. He told me I had hives and scheduled me to see a dermatologist who couldn’t see me for another four months. The next week, they were gone. I never followed up.

It was 2005 before they came back again. For three years I dealt with the slow ramp up from once or twice occasionally to looking like a diseased person every single day. My arms, torso and legs were so covered in itchy hives constantly, that it became a way of life for me. It was crazy. People who didn’t know, would see my arms and ask what was wrong with me in a shocked voice as they would step away.

At different times, I took Claritin, Allegra and Zyrtec. I took combinations of several of the drugs. Nothing helped. If it was particularly bad, a Benadryl would take the edge off at night so that I could sleep. I couldn’t live on Benadryl, so I only took it occasionally. By spring of 2008, I had had enough. I saw my physician, an allergist and finally, a dermatologist. I wanted answers.

“Oh my goodness, Kelly!” My mother sounded anxious that evening after calling her to talk about my appointment. “What does the dermatologist think it would be besides hives. A biopsy, that sounds big.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“How could you not ask?” She was dismayed.

“Honestly, Mom, I don’t even want to know.”


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This is my entry for LJ Idol: S9 Week 17. This week’s topic was [“Scare Quotes”]. I never really got my answers. The biopsy came back hives. By the fall 2008, after a house fire and quitting my job they faded away. I believe they are stress related. They came back in November 2009 and they are only just faded away this spring. The first batch were 6 weeks, second, 3 1/2 years, third over 5 years.

The fat buck grazed quietly in the sparse patch of grass. The afternoon sun beat down upon its speckled hide; perfect for hiding in the deep shadows of a forest. The sand panther stalked the deer with slow patient steps. She carefully maneuvered herself closer to her prey. She was a magnificent specimen of the largest and most ferocious panther in the lands. Her tan hide blended well in the desert and grasslands that surrounded her. Fully grown she would stand nearly as tall as a small horse. Though she had not reached her full maturity, she was strong and quick. Inexperience had not hindered her at all with this deer. He seemed to be completely unaware of the predator stalking him through the broken, washed out landscape. The buck moved towards a rock formation on the edge of the cliff.

In a deadly rush the panther broke from cover. Terrified, the buck leaped upon the boulders. Too late he realized his mistake. The sand panther had the buck trapped at the edge of the cliff. Muscles bunching smoothly, the powerful panther sprang onto the boulders after the buck. In a desperate attempt to avoid the carnivore behind him, the buck leaped off the cliff. Startled, the panther looked after her disappearing prey. Suddenly, the boulders supporting the panther gave way and she was flung from the cliff. The young panther yowled in terror as she fell to her death.

At the base of the cliff thirty feet below, a woman of middle years stood nervously next to a young man. They watched as the buck jumped and the panther fell.

The woman gasped in fear as she watched the panther’s descent.

"Don't worry Canara. She’ll be fine. The air cradle will hold." The young man said. He was tall and lanky. He was at that awkward stage of life when he is neither a boy nor a man.

The panicked roar of the panther slowly changed to a high-pitched scream as the panther's form blurred. A teenage girl was left in its place. As the girl neared the ground, a cushion of air caught and cradled her. She was lowered gently to the ground at her mother's feet.

"Naya!" her mother cried. "Are you all right? Are you hurt at all?" Canara knelt down to gather her daughter into her arms.

Slowly Naya's terror turned to realization. She wasn't dead. Her mother was crying as she held Naya close.

"Oomph, Mom, I am fine. Loosen up. You're going to break my back." Laughing, Naya wriggled out of her mother’s grip and stood up.

"I'm not trying to break your back, but I may strangle you. It has been a week since you became a sand panther. Laron and I had to resort to dangerous measures to turn you."

Startled, Naya looked from her mother to Laron. He was grinning at her. "A week? Truly?"

"Yes, your mother had to actually rely on my wizardry this time. As a sand panther you were quite difficult to pin down. I think that was the best illusion I have ever done." He said proudly.

"Illusion?" Naya asked.

"The deer and the rocks on the edge of the cliff." Laron winked at her. “There was a wooden platform extending from the cliff. I created the illusion to hide it. I rigged it to collapse with your full weight.”

"I could smell the deer. It seemed so real."

"As I said, my best illusion ever." Laron crowed in delight. "It took me all week to work out the fine details."

Naya looked up at the cliff she had just stood upon. She shivered slightly when she realized how far she had fallen. She looked at her mother. Worry was clear upon her face.

"How did it become a week?" she asked.

"Of all the cats in the world to choose from you wanted to be a sand panther. What is there for a sand panther to fear? It has no natural predators. Even humans fear such a large fearsome creature. If I had known what you were doing, I would have talked you out of it. Laron told me your plans only after you had changed."

Naya cringed at the reproach in her mother voice. She had known what her mother would think of the sand panther. That was why she had not told her. As a young woman newly turned sixteen, Naya felt that her mother just worried overmuch. For the first time in her life, Naya understood and accepted the true danger she had put herself in. To lose her mind and herself was an overwhelming fear.

"Really, Naya, it took your mom and I three days just to make sure you didn't escape the training area. Then we had to figure out how to terrify a sand panther. Everything we tried just didn't work. You were too cunning. The cliff was really a last ditch effort." Laron explained.

"I am sorry mother. I just didn’t think this through."

"Yes. I think, maybe, I have not told you enough of our history. You are at a disadvantage not having grown up among the clan. You are not able to learn from other people’s mistakes besides your own. You’ve watched me your whole life, and it seemed so simple.” Canara sighed. “Why must it always be the biggest, the best with you? First the great Seraphi Eagle, now this. At least with the eagle I knew what you were doing. That is probably why you did not tell me this time. You thought I gave you such a hard time about the eagle. You just did not understand the danger involved. You are playing with forces you do not fully comprehend."

Canara watched as her daughter's joy of learning a new form slowly faded. Her face became somber. Canara watched as Naya’s understanding tempered her excitement. Her daughter was growing up. Naya would be a wise levelheaded woman someday who would know her own strengths and weakness very well. That was the legacy Canara would leave her.

***
Naya woke up slowly. The patch of shade she had found under a stunted oak a few hours ago had moved. Her paws were quite warm as they baked in the sun. It was mid-afternoon and the prairie was quiet around her. The dream that awakened her had been very vivid. She had not thought about that day when she was sixteen for quite some time. She had learned from the experience. Planning was the key. In the past ten years she had used that lesson wisely.


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This is my entry for LJ Idol: S9 Week 15. This week’s topic was “Chekhov's Gun”.

Have you ever had a run in with a wild animal and walked away with the knowledge that may have been one of the coolest things you will ever see? I had that experience in Kansas in 1993.

I was hanging out at the large horse barn that I spent all my time at. There were about ten geldings in a pasture and they were racing round and round the pasture. This was pretty unusual. For one thing, the pasture was quite large. On a normal basis you might have one or two horses running about and kicking up there heels, but not usually the entire herd. Running the length of the pasture was usually enough for a frisky horse to feel like he got the kinks out.

I decided to find out what was going on, so I climbed the fence to get a good look at the entire pasture. At first, I didn't see anything that would get all the horses really racing like that. Then, from the trees along the right of the pasture a cougar emerged into the open. Now, the farm was just outside the city of Wichita. The tree line that the cougar emerged from was a small 20-30 foot wide buffer between the farm and a suburb full of houses and the farm land the barn was situated on.

The cougar watched the racing herd for a moment and then it broke into a run and dashed across the length of the pasture. The horses, finally seeing what had agitated them, startled badly and swerved towards me. The cougar did not give chase. It jumped the fence and disappeared over a hill into the farm land. I had not been expecting to see a cougar. It was a brief, but wild and crazy experience.

That was not my only encounter with a cougar. It just happened to be the only encounter with the animal in the wild. Fast forward several years to Waycross, Georgia. Obediah's Okefenok is an 1800's restored homestead in the Okefenokee Swamp. There are a lot of exhibits as well as a small zoo of local animals. In 1997, the homestead had a cougar by the name of Danny Boy.

I knew about this cougar as I was working part-time at the chamber of commerce. The ladies I worked with were talking about Danny Boy's handlers bringing him out to an event that happened in town. One of the ladies was there with them and was able to pet the cougar. I was enamored of the idea of petting a cougar. Cougars are one of my three favorite animals and had been before I saw the wild one in Kansas.

A few weeks later, my grandparents came to visit. I ended up taking them to Obediah's Okefenok. It was a neat little tourist place. I hadn't been before. When we came upon Danny Boy's large chain link enclosure, I remembered the conversation from work. There was no one around besides us. So, I got bold.

There was about ten feet of shrub and flowers planted between the enclosure and the path we were following. Danny Boy was pacing slowly along the fence nearest us. I carefully picked my way through the vegetation and squatted down alongside the fence. Danny Boy came up to the fence next to me and stopped. I was sitting right at his shoulder. Our heads were at a similar height. He turned his head to the side to look at me for a moment and then focused on something off in the distance in the direction he was facing. I took a deep breath for courage and stuck my fingers through the fence and scratched his shoulder.

It was surreal. There I was, scratching a huge cougar through a chain link fence while my timid grandmother was having a heart attack behind me. Danny Boy seemed to enjoy it. He leaned heavily into my hand and shifted position so that my hand was further up his neck. I talked to him gently, but noticed he was becoming agitated. A low rumble started in his throat and he tail started twitching furiously. Even though he didn't seem to be focused on me, I decided I had been there long enough.

It was at that moment that I heard the rowdy boys that were coming closer to us. I wasn't able to see them as they were still around a bend in the path, so I quickly retreated back to my grandparents position. I didn't want to be caught where I wasn't supposed to be and I certainly didn't want to give the teenage boys any ideas. The noise they were making was really agitating Danny Boy. My grandmother was relieved to have me back on the path. I think she was shocked I would do something so crazy.

I was pretty surprised with myself also. I would like to think that certain factors aligned themselves neatly so that I could take a chance and pet a cougar. Had there been anyone else in eye sight it wouldn't have happened. If I hadn't overheard the conversation at work, the idea would never have occurred to me when I actually saw Danny Boy. Had the enclosure been roped off better from the public I would not have considered the idea that snuck up on me.

I look back years later and say, 'I did that'.