Winter Musings

There is nothing more inviting than fresh snow on a cold winter's day. Something about snow brings out the kid in everyone and brings back memories of childhood and youth: playing in the snow, building a snowman, rushing downhill on a sled (or a saucer or inner tube).

I remember when I was a teenager, probably 17 or 18 years old. I took my best friend, my brother and one of his friends up into the mountains of Southern California for a sledding expedition. My car was an old Renault, which had the trunk in the front and the engine in the back. Unfortunately, one of the sleds was too long to fit in the trunk and, because the trunk was in the front, we couldn't leave it propped open. So, we forced the sled into the middle of the car between the passengers in the front and back seats. It was a bit cozy, but it worked. The other sled and the saucer fit into the trunk quite nicely.

Once we arrived at our destination--Wrightwood, California--we found a place to park and then ventured into the woods to find a great place to go sledding. We found an old creek bed that wound down the side of the hill, and it was filled with enough snow to make sledding absolutely perfect--almost. The problem was that near the bottom of the hill, the creek bed made a slight curve around a tree before continuing its descent. The trick was to negotiate the curve and miss the tree.

We spent a couple of hours sledding and had a wonderful time, until my last run. I was in the saucer, which is difficult to control and tends to spin in a circle while traveling downhill. I missed the curve and slammed into the tree backward. We decided to call it a day and carried all of our sledding equipment back to the car.

Enjoying a white Christmas this year was a highlight of the holiday season. It isn't often that we have a truly white Christmas--this year was the exception with nearly seven inches of beautiful, white powder.

The snow makes everything appear clean, fresh and pure. There is nothing more relaxing than sitting in front of a cozy fire, wrapped in a blanket, reading a book, and watching the snowflakes drop from heaven on a beautiful winter day. There is nothing more invigorating than bundling up in warm clothes and stepping into the cold with a snow shovel in hand and cleaning off the driveway and sidewalk.

Snow...I LOVE it!

Tubes and Wires and Needles, Oh My!

Tubes that deliver life-giving oxygen. Needles that supply nutrients and antibiotics. Wires that provide access to immediate care. All of these are necessary to the recovery process following surgery, and all of these can become very overwhelming. This is my recent experience following unicompartmental knee arthroplasty, a fancy term for a partial knee replacement.

For the first 24 hours, my blood pressure was checked every 15 minutes--no sleep for me! I also had a negative reaction to the antibiotics that were used, resulting in hives and a severe rash. Unfortunately, they couldn't administer Benadryl to counteract the reaction because my blood pressure was too low.

Day two in the hospital was much better: my blood pressure returned to normal range and I was able to eat sitting up. I was also able to get up out of bed with assistance to take the few steps to the restroom. I attended a physical therapy group class with others who had been through knee or hip replacement surgery. It was a fun group with a lot of laughter, inspite of the pain that everyone had endured. Everyone's goal was to earn three stars--one (1) star indicated that you had to have staff assistance to get out of bed, two (2) stars meant that your spouse or other family member or friend could help you get up, and three (3) stars meant that you were able to maneuver on your own, within limits.

On day three, I had earned my three stars and was looking forward to going home. That was only the beginning. Once arriving at home, it became very apparent that normal functions took ten times longer than normal, such as showering, dressing and walking from the bed to the bathroom. It also meant that physical therapy (or physical "torture" as I like to refer to it) would begin. (My favorite part is the ice pack applied to the knee after the physical torture session is completed.)

As I reflected on the last few days, I realized that my relationship with God is very much like tubes and wires and needles. He provides me with oxygen, life-sustaining nutrients and immediate access to Him through one simple package: The Bible. All I have to do is accept what He has provided and I have eternal life. I might even have a few stars for my crown. Each day is a step forward, gaining strength in my knowledge of Jesus Christ as Saviour. While it can be a slow process, I can enjoy each step of the way, knowing that I have eternity to look forward to.

Tubes, wires and needles = life support. God = life support. Can there be any doubt?

Rejoice with Thanksgiving

"Let all things now living a song of thanksgiving to God, the Creator, triumphantly raise." In 1920, Katherine Davis used a Welsh melody to create the song, "Let All Things Now Living". The song is based on a verse in the Bible, First Chronicles 16:23 (KJV): "Sing unto the Lord, all the earth; show forth from day to day his salvation." The song ends with, "'Til all things now living unite in Thanksgiving to God in the highest, hosanna and praise."

What better time to think of the blessings we have received than during the Thanksgiving season. Yes, we should be thankful ALL of the time, but more emphasis is put on thankfulness by most people during this time of the year.

What am I thankful for? There are so many things for which I am grateful: a loving husband, wonderful children, a beautiful grandchild, a warm and cozy home, a job that I love, cars that run, food on the table, and so many more blessings.

When I start to grumble about my health and the fact that as I get older, my body starts to disintegrate, I look around me and see so many others who are hurting so much more than I. A friend at work is battling cancer while another co-worker recently lost her mother. There are so many people who are losing their jobs and others who have to decide between paying the rent and putting food on the table and paying for medical care.

I am truly blessed indeed. Life is not a picnic in the park or a walk through a bed of roses, but with God on my side or, rather, me on God's side, I can overcome the obstacles.

"O Lord, my God, I will give thanks unto thee for ever." (Psalm 30:12, KJV) "Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord, Jesus Christ." (First Corinthians 15:57, KJV)

The Music in Me

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that I would miss my piano. When I passed it on to my eldest, I hadn't been playing it very much because I was always busy doing other things. I also wondered how I ever found time to play it in the first place because I know that I used to play it quite frequently, even when the girls were small. Just over a year ago, I decided to give it to Becky, knowing that she would enjoy having it around.

Piano withdrawal--that's what I call it. I would find myself wandering into the living room where the piano used to sit and wishing that it was still sitting there. For some unexplainable reason, I now had LOTS of time to play and no piano to play.

Last Friday, my darling husband took me out to lunch and during the meal, he suggested that we buy a gift--a BIG gift--for ourselves for Christmas/Anniversay/Birthdays for the next year. I'm pretty sure that I had a puzzled look on my face because I truly did not know what he was talking about. He finally elaborated and said that we could probably afford to buy the digital piano at Costco for ourselves. Wow! I was like a little child bouncing in the seat at the prospect of getting a really nice Christmas present. My response went something like this: "Can we go get it today? Can we? Huh? Can we? Please? Pretty Please? We can go home and get the other car and pick it up today. Can we?" Pretty pathetic, eh?

Hubby dear just smiled, paid for our meal, drove us home to get the other car, and headed to Costco. End of story....almost. After we got the boxes home--yes, that's right, boxes--we had to put the stand together. It looks like a real piano, but it has many different sounds and functions, all of which I have not yet figured out. I have been playing the piano for three days now, every chance I get! I LOVE it!!!!! Yep, the music is in me once again!

More Oddities

Since I do not seem to be able to arrange the photos where I want them to be, I decided to post the next photo in a separate blog.

I found this tree in a WalMart parking lot in Arizona. It was rather interesting to see the way it was growing. During the Christmas season, I'm sure that someone will be upset when they can't find a parking space and then find this tree occupying a space!

Oddities

A few months ago, I boarded a plane and flew to Arizona with my boss on a business trip which, I must say, was anything but boring! Our first day there, after a full day of work, we were sitting at a red light and were rear-ended by another driver. Ouch! Our rental car was crunched and had to be replaced. That alone was an adventure I hope to never repeat!

The temperature while were there was over 100 degrees every day, and that was in September. While the main reason for the trip was business-related, there were a few opportunities to take photos.

This is a saguaro cactus that we saw on the side of the road near the freeway. It looks as though it was trying to figure out which way to grow but couldn't make up its mind. (Did you know that saguaro cacti are 18-24 inches in diameter, can grow 15-50 feet tall and can live as long as 200 years?)

Noise

Today I had a rare opportunity to venture onto the roof of our building to conduct an audit of the HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning) systems, of which there are 90+ units on the roof of our facility. I had to randomly select 2 or 3 units to look into, checking the belts, filters, condensation pans and the coils. Did I really know what I was doing? Well, sort of. One of the maintenance workers explained where everything was so I could become familiar with the units.

The most exciting part of this adventure is that I could see for miles and miles out across the valley, almost totally surrounded by mountains covered in snow. Venturing close to the edge of the building--but not too close--I was able to look down and see what was going on at ground level. It was awesome! As I watched co-workers moving around at the base of the building, I realized that they could not hear me because the machinery down below was too loud, but I could hear them when they called up to us on the roof.

It made me think about how God must feel as He watches us go about our daily activities. He looks down on us and tries to communicate, but we may be surrounded by too much "noise": activities, work and other distractions that take our attention off of Him, and then we can't hear Him. Thankfully, He can hear us when we call out to Him, regardless of how much noise is around us. We have to step away from the noise and then we can hear Him and give Him our full attention.

Dawn Before the Storm

I'm not usually prone to getting up early on Sabbath mornings, but I developed a nasty cold overnight and couldn't breathe by early morning. So I decided to get up before dawn, open all of the curtains and blinds, grab a hot drink, pop in a CD for soft background music, and sit in my comfy chair to watch the sun come up.

The morning was pitch black when I first looked out. The stars were twinkling and then slowly began to fade as dawn approached. Then came that eery gray-ness that comes just before dawn. Unfortunately, it is still gray because the sun is hidden behind a sky full of clouds. So much for my early morning sunrise!

When I think about it, watching for the sunrise is more than just seeing the sun. It's sitting in the stillness of the early morning and enjoying all the sights and sounds: a cat meowing outside the window, leaves falling from the trees and creating a wonderland of color in the grass, and the quietness of the morning (except for the occasional "meow" of the cat).

I think I have a better understanding of the phrase, "dawn before the storm" (or "calm before the storm") after attempting to watch the sunrise today. Dawn is a peaceful, quiet time; a time for reflection and prayer. Then comes the storm. It can be a literal storm, or just the normal activities that begin to take control over the course of our day. The storm doesn't last forever--it just occupies a portion of our time. And then comes the end of the day, when the storm has abated and quiet rules again. We need both in our lives: the dawn to refresh and the storm that follows and helps us to appreciate the dawn.

Since I didn't get to see a sunrise this morning, I thought I would post a photo that I took in Arizona in September.

Bone Dry

"Dry as a bone" or "bone dry" means that something is completely dry. That's the way that my brain feels: completely dry. I can't really think of anything to write, yet I want to write. So I though I would bore you with a mini-history lesson.

The phrase "bone dry" was first coined by a clergyman by the name of Robert Forby in 1830. The phrase is found in the glossary of his book entitled, The Vocabulary Of East Anglia; An Attempt To Record The Vulgar Tongue Of The Twin Sister Counties, Norfolk And Suffolk, As It Existed And Still Exists; With Proof Of Its Antiquity From Etymology And Authority.

Now, I have absolutely no idea what his book is about. I just thought the title was interesting. So I decided to try to glean additional information about his book. It appears to be a book of memoirs and, quite frankly, wasn't very interesting. But in the preface, there is a list of Norfolk words (whatever that means) that, according to the person who wrote the preface, do not appear in Forby's vocabulary. Here are just a few of them:

• blob - to shake
• buffled - baffled, disappointed
• chig-chig - a call of invitation to pigs
• diddle - to move the hand quickly in and out of the water
• kittle - to bring forth young (especially in rabbits)
• ligger - a rude foot bridge
• trip - few sheep

Interesting, eh? Since I am feeling quite buffled right now at my lack of brain stimulus, I believe that I will blob the dust off of my slippers and venture into another room to do some reading, or maybe hop on the exercise bike. G'night, y'all!

Ah, To Be A Kid Again!

There is nothing quite like the experience of visiting a children's museum with a two-year-old. Every experience is new and refreshing and, no matter how old you are, the kid in you can be expressed without inhibitions.

I recently had the opportunity to do this very thing, and I must say that I enjoyed being a kid myself. We enjoyed exploring a child-sized cafe, complete with kitchen utensils, phony food, and recipes. We ventured into the construction room, where hard hats and hammers were the primary tools, along with golf tees for nails and foam boards for wood. There was even a real fire truck and a small boat that were ready to be boarded for a trip into make-believe land.

A number of costumes were available for a toddler to wear to become a princess, an Indian, or even a penguin. There was a stage for performing and instruments of all types. The children can watch themselves perform on a closed-circuit television. It's quite hilarious to watch a two-year-old dance around in a penguin costume!

For the more scientifically-inclined, there was a wind exhibit with miniature wind turbine generators, a raised water display with miniature boats and levees, and a place to mix water and mud. What child could resist the opportunity to play with shovels full of mud?!

If you've never had the opportunity to visit a children's museum, you should. The one we visited is located in Walla Walla, Washington and, while it is small compared to the children's museum in Denver, Colorado, it had a greater variety of activities for all ages.

Jesus says, in Matthew 18:3, "Except ye become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven." While He was not speaking of actually becoming children, He was referring to the childlike innocence and thirst for knowledge that children have. A child is open to learning experiences and we, as Christians, should also be thirsting for knowledge. The traits of character highly treasured in the kingdom of heaven are simple trust and loving obedience.

Ah, to be a child again!

American Ingenuity

There comes a time in everyone's life when the odd things are what make us ecstatic. Recently, my boss and I (yes, another "work" tale), were given a new door to our office. Now, you would have to understand what the old door was like. The door was solid steel and had a fire rating of 4 hours. There were no windows, and it was impossible to unlock the door--it was permanently locked--entry was with a key only. The key was the size of a small car and weighed nearly as much. (Okay, I exaggerate, but it was huge and was on our key rings with 11 other keys.) If someone wanted to come in, we had to constantly get up and open the door. We even put signs on the door to let people know whether or not we were there.

Eventually, I got tired of getting up and down to open the door all the time, so I designed a doorstop. I took one hanging folder and folded it in half and then folded it a couple more times, and then folded it again. Then I wrapped it repeatedly with about 40 rubber bands. When I stuck it under the door, the door stayed open. Voila....a doorstop!

Our new door is pretty exciting. It has a window, albeit only 5" wide by 24" high, but it is a window. Not only are we able to unlock the door so that people can enter, we can actually SEE who is coming in. It was truly exciting....until we discovered that the manufacturer put the window in backwards. The screws to remove the window were on the outside. Hmmm, that means that someone could remove the screws, take out the window, reach in and open the door.

Never fear, however! Our Maintenance gurus came to the rescue and put in screws that cannot be removed unless you have a special tool.

Good ol' American ingenuity: creating doorstops from hanging folders and screws that can't be removed! Wow! Isn't America great!

Love/Hate Relationship with Computers

My boss and I were the lucky recipients of a new color printer a couple of months ago. Our old color printer was a little HP Photosmart that printed one page every three minutes, if you were lucky. The new color printer will print ten times that amount. It's about three times the size of the old printer and the ink cartridges are the size of an encyclopedia. There are four cartridges (black, yellow, cyan and magenta), and they cost about $100 each.

After our computer guy got the computer hooked up to the printer, we tried it and it worked. The problem was that it would ONLY print in color, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but we didn't really NEED everything in color and we need to conserve the colored ink. So I went in and changed the settings on my computer so that my printing would be black/white or grayscale until I told it otherwise. While I was finally able to print in black/white or grayscale, I now couldn't get anything to print in color. (And you wonder why I hate computers!) I tried to change the setting back to what they originally were, but the computer wouldn't acknowledge any of the changes. Fortunately, the computer guy at work is awesome and he was able to fix it.

Computers--it's a love/hate relationship!

New Experiences

They say that you should try new things, but as I get older, I find that new experiences in unfamiliar territory can actually be somewhat frightening. "You should start a blog," said my daughter. "What's a blog?" says I.

I discovered that "blog" is actually computer-eze for "web log", which is actually a fancy name for diary. Ah, it's like writing everything down on a computer for the world to see instead of in a dairy on paper that has to be burned in the fireplace because you don't want anyone else to read it. I can do that!

After three months of thinking about it, I finally took the first step to starting a blog. I logged on to the computer! Then I followed the simple instructions given to me by my daughter, and this will now be my third attempt to get it to work because I keep getting error messages. Hence the reason that I hesitate to try new things, ESPECIALLY anything technological!

But, I can do this. Now I can write down all of my thoughts for everyone to read instead of just sharing them with the cat, who is old and deaf and doesn't hear me anyway. So here is your first installment of The Mom's Perspective. Stay tuned for future updates!