Oddly related tidbits.....

Jamie got her first bath in a 13 X 9" aluminum cake pan.

My Dad flew in from North Carolina to see Jamie quite soon after she was born. I left Jamie with our neighbor ( who eventually did daycare for us) & drove down to pick him up. His flight was delayed because of weather. I was paged in the airport. I was told to call Cigdem. I called her and she said "Daaaaaaaaaling. Your faaaaathaa is in
Chicaaaaago & won't get in for 4 - 5 hours". My breasts were engorged. I drove all the way back home, breast fed Jamie & drove all the way back to the cities just in time to pick Dad up.

We didn't have a dresser for Jamie's clothes so I folded them neatly and put them in neat little rows on the floor. It wasn't long & Dan's Dad brought one over for us to use. It was missing a handle and had some Christmas ribbon threaded through it for a pull handle. I think it was green.

I used cloth diapers ( disposable diapers were just coming out) but didn't have a washer and drier. Laundry mats definitely are on my suckage list.

It was in a laundry mat that I learned that sterile - izable glass baby bottles were way over rated. Jamie threw hers one time in one & it shattered into a million pieces.It was quite embarrassing. Plastic bottles after that.

The baby.

Jaime. No. Jamie. Why, Dan? Because " Jaime " isn't spelled correctly. If it is going to be Jamie, then it should be spelled like Jamie...J A M I E. OK. Jamie.

Dan had called his Dad at about 9 am on January 30, 1978 and told him that we were at the hospital & that I was in labor. At the time his Dad was sure that it was false labor & that I would be back home soon. Of course he had had 9 children himself & my due date (last he heard) was end of March so of course that was a logical conclusion.

My labor was, well, labor. There are certain things that I remember about each of my children's births (and one miscarriage) that distinguish one from the other, but in all honesty, the HARD part, the part they call LABOR is all the same for me & there is no memory for it. For Jamie's birth, I remember the end so I'll START there:

When they wheeled me into the delivery room they asked if I wanted the mirrors adjusted so that I could watch her birth. I said "No" because at that point I just wanted her OUT. It was about 2 pm. I pushed once & the doctor told me to push again & I did, with all my might which at 21 years old and in excellent physical condition was substantial. Her head POPPED out & I tore pretty badly. I didn't FEEL that until later. It hurt.

There was commotion down there. The nurses had their masks on but there was lots of eye language between them. The doctor had to stand up and he chastised them for the stool that was behind him. A second later & Jamie was out. I remember I picked up my head, looked at the doctor and said, "April 1st, ehhh doc.?"

Between the nurses attitude & my questioning the whole when I was due up to two weeks before she was born ( and he pushed her due date AHEAD a week because I DARED to question his estimated March date) I pretty much was done with this guy. I took Jamie to her 6 week appt. ( because it was paid for) and never went back.

She was a beautiful baby. Perfect. Dan & I marveled at the wonder of it all for a few hours alone before we called his Dad back.

The third installment in a few days : includes bringing her home and a very special moment when we found out that she was born on someone else's very special birthday.

33 years ago today

I chiseled out my own hole for ice fishing on Pearl Lake. I was pregnant with Jamie but according to the doctor I had months to go before she was due. My water broke the following morning at 2 am after I had gone to the bathroom and returned to bed.

I poked Dan & said, "Dan, my water broke, we have to go to the hospital" to which he replied "ugh, blah, sigh " and proceeded to roll over ( away from the wet spot) and fall back asleep.

Adrenalin set in. I called the hospital, explained that I was early but that my water had broken. The nurses said, "Yes, you need to get your things ready and come to the hospital now". But wait, I thought, after I had hung up. I don't have ANYTHING ready!!!

While Dan lay blissfully sleeping and I let him because I knew I would need his support while having what I thought might be a premature baby, I frantically proceeded to rummage through every cubbard, closet, door, trunk, pie safe, dresser that we had , emptying each of its contents across the floor of the top story of a small house we rented on Pearl Lake. I was in a frenzie doing God knows what trying to make an assemblage of a kit to take to the hospital I guess. And in between I would stop, try to get in touch with my body & count contractions. I don't think I ever really got through a whole set, I was too damn restless.

Finally at about 5 am I woke Dan up and said, "Dan, we need to go to the hospital. My water broke". He near jumped out of his skin this time. There was no hesitation, just a wipe his eyes, scramble to the garage and get in the car and lets get going.

When we got to the hospital, the nurses on that shift were waiting and quite relieved to see us. They were about to go off shift I think and remember, I had called at 2 am. It was about 5:30 now. There was no such thing as caller ID so they had no way of seeing what was happening ( crazy woman dumping contents of all storage areas on floor).

When I told them that my doctor had said that my due date was April 1st, they went to get a different nurse. When she came in she took one look at me, measured my belly from pubic bone to breast & said, "this looks like a full term baby to me!!". Dan breathed a sigh of relief & so did I, but in reality I think that I knew all along that I was pregnant. Sure, there were two false urine tests early on but especially toward the end of my pregnancy I was convinced I had been pregnant all along. When I went off the pill in April and got pregnant, I weighed all of a whopping 115 pounds. When Jamie was born she was 6 pounds 13 ounces. There wasn't much more room left, man.

More later on her birth, the doctor, the reaction of the nurses to this doctor & the elation of having a brand spanking knew baby girl all to ourselves for a few hours.

Flash!

I really miss my motorcycles.

Ever since the daylight hours have been getting longer I have had the itch to ride. When I drive into the garage I glance at both rides every day now. I think that this year I will walk the baby ..the 250, through the snow & ice to the pavement. Last year I had to wait close to an extra week waiting for our driveway to melt.

I'm finished with winter. Phoenix in March!

Flash

THIS is ridiculous.

Do you watch Kare 11 news in the morning? I do. They have a bit piece called "Word of the Day". Viewers suggest a word and then it is defined on air. Often times I have never heard of the word. Many are interesting. You should watch it. I'll confess that I look more forward to Pete Busch's comments on the Word of the Day than the word itself. Pete immediately follows the W of the D with the local traffic & inevitably has a comment about the word that is a complete misinterpretation of it. For example, today's word was "proscribe" & Pete had to say something about subscribing to a prescription or something of that nature. The best part is that once he gets Kim Insley laughing, which is not easy, Tim McNiff literally will lay his head down on the news desk & periodically has to wipe a tear from is eye. Pete Busch makes me smile.

Ridiculous: waking up at 3:30 am on a day you could sleep in.

Flash.

What a difference 15 minutes makes!!!!

Today I didn't leave the house until 7:25. That is 15 minutes later than normal. I noticed a couple of differences in my commute because of this difference:

1) There were exactly three more houses on my route that had their lights on in the house. Are they sleeping when i normally drive by?

2) The traffic is much more congested. I had to alter my route so that I wouldn't have to try to take a left onto Cooper Avenue without a stop sign or stop light.

That is all. I was most surprised that 15 minutes made the difference between three households being up and about.

Flash. I like the snow today.

Franklin & David. A regular story.

This is rather rough, but I want to share this rather rough picture of two of my favorite people on earth : Franklin & David.

Franklin and David are Dan's bachelor uncles. They live on the 'home place' next to the Meyer school house. Frankin is older than David, David just retired this past year at 65 yrs. old. Franklin has been retired for awhile. He worked at Hard Drives all his working life. David is rather gifted at fixing things and so worked as a mechanic at Arnold's equipment and more recently & for 15 years or so at a variety of photo copying companies, the last being Minnesota Copy. He must have liked the people there because he hosted a get together at the farm place a few years ago for them & knowing David means that you know that was a striking statement. It takes years to get to know David & many more to gain his trust & more yet for him to warm up to you. It is no wonder he is a bachelor. Franklin is a bachelor because he is just plain weird, painfully shy but a real lover :)

On to the story....

The week after Dan & I returned from visiting my parents in IA, Dan, Franklin & David headed up to Grand Rapids close to where they hunt to pick up the summer sausage they had made at a butcher shop from some of their deer trimmings.
They had to stop at the shack & pulled "near a ton" of snow off of the roof of it. I'll have to dig up some pictures of the shack. Believe it or not, it was a part of Dan's & my Honeymoon...... THAT we'll just let go.

Last week, Dan & I went over to visit them. Dan wanted to tell Dave & Franklin that he had been catching sunfish on Stump Lake ( we have been eating fresh fish a couple of times a week now) , & that they were about 3-4 to a pound. This is a typical piece of information that I receive and treasure on a daily basis from Dan.

On the way over Dan explained to me "if you are picky, you can catch 3 to a pound, but you really don't gain much. Once they are filleted out you get about the same amount of fish". This conversation will become important to this story later.

When we came driving into the yard Franklin was outside & it was pouring down rain. So we stood in the rain for just a bit , Dan & Franklin exchanged pleasantries, & soon Franklin waved from me toward the house and said "go on in, David is in the house". So in I went. When I entered the all brick, built in 1901 house built by his Grandfather, David was leaning over a piece of wood that he had cut to fit in the windowsill for his plants. He roughly tosses an African Violet in front of me on top of an old oil burner to show me what the shelf was for.

About that time Franklin & Dan came into the house & soon after we all sat down by the dining room table. David put a clipboard in front of me and handed me a pencil. On the paper was written "Ryan Harden, Jamie, Connor & Grace". I didn't have my glasses on but I could tell that he had spelled Haraden wrong so I pointed that out to him, he just kind of grunted & proceeded to talk to Dan about wanting to keep up with the family tree. Dan & I bantered back & forth about when Jamie was married, the birth dates of the kids etc.. with the expectation being fairly clear to me that I was to do the recording. But let me tell you that the damn pencil he gave me was as dull as a pencil can get. It took some restraint on my part not to say something about that, but I knew that such a trivial comment had the potential to completely destroy what I anticipated to be a pleasant visit. So I just left it at that.

By the time I looked up from smearing out all the dates, there were 4 bottles of liquor on the table in front of us , all delivered by Franklin & sitting there along with 4 empty unmatched small glasses.

I wasn't quite as clear as to the proper etiquite in this situation & everyone was just kind of sitting there looking through this vast array of bottle of booze so I said, "I guess I could go for a beer and a bump!". At which time Franklin hopped up , got us each a beer & then it was a regular pour fest full of discourse about who made what booze ( it was all home brew) , how this turned out, maybe next year a little less sugar would be best etc. etc. I guess they were just waiting to see if I was all in for a beer & a bump extravaganza ( duh).

Ok. my story writing is about exhausted ..oh. the important piece of info... so while we are all enjoying a beer and a bump & I commented on David's rhubarb wine ( " pretty good, a little sharp") Dan is talking rather loudly to Franklin who can't hear very well. While they are talking I turned to David & relayed the conversation word for word that Dan & I had had in the car on the way over : "if you are picky, you can catch 3 to a pound, but you really don't gain much, once they are filleted out you get about the same amount of fish". and told David that I knew that was an important piece of information & he just smiled.

It does not escape David that the world has about stopped at his place but is going faster & faster all around them. I'm not so sure that Franklin gets that.

Ta da!!! Dave and Franklin. God love them