Susan’s Journal

Click here to listen to “3×5″ by John Mayer.

Jango helped me stumble across this song, and it kills me. It absolutely is the story of me. Let me share some of the lyrics with you…

I’m writing you to catch you up on places I’ve been…
So I write this blog; though I’d like it to be daily, it often doesn’t end up that way. Life gets in the way.

And you have this letter… you probably got excited, but there’s nothing else inside it…
You read these posts sometimes, and you try to get the flavor of where I’ve been in my day by my words, though not always by my photos…

didn’t have a camera by my side this time… hoping I would see the world through both my eyes
Time and time again, at softball games, at school plays, at the playground… I have to force myself to put the camera down and see the world through my two eyes, not “living life through the lens” as I often do.

maybe I will tell you all about it when I’m in the mood to lose my way with words…
So when I’m in the mood to write a blog post, when I cut my fingernails short so I can type fast, and when I can taste on my tongue the colors of the photos in my mind, I’ll share those stories and mental-photographs with you through colorful words.

today skies are painted colors of a cowboy cliche’… and its strange how clouds that look like mountains in the sky are next to mountains anyway…
but let me say you should have seen that sunrise with your own eyes… it brought me back to life…
Haven’t you ever seen a scene that was completely natural, clouds… or sky… or a tree… and you think, I could paint that, but no one would believe me… it looks so un-natural in a bizarre sort of way… of course those are the moments you never have your camera with you to take a picture. Somehow those moments remind me that God is in control–not me.

You’ll be with me next time I go outside, no more 3×5’s…
Haven’t you ever wanted to take a person to a place instead of sharing a photograph with them? I’ve done it… and was somewhat disappointed. That person doesn’t “get it”–because they don’t have the million of mental pictures and memories that I do, of how wonderful a place it used to be… before Hurricane Katrina.

Today I finally overcame tryin’ to fit the world inside a picture frame…
The days when I did put my camera down, the days when I could SCREAM my support at my daughter’s softball game because I wasn’t taking movies and didn’t want to pick up that crazy audio, those were the greatest days. Even when I miss a moment when someone says, “Did you get that on tape?” When I can say no, and smile, that makes it completely worth it.

Well, there will certainly be more 3×5’s from me… but there will be moments in-between without them, photographs in my memory that you’ll never get to see.

As usual on a Sunday with the kids away, I volunteered all day at the church. One of the camera guys I volunteer with ambled towards the media center with a noticeable change to his gait. “What’s up with you?” I asked. Apparently he had been in an accident on his motorcycle. It’s totaled, he said. A guy in a pickup from out of state made a last-minute decision on the 635 HOV lane and changed lanes quickly, sideswiping him and sending him flying. He said the guy was instantly out of the pickup, kneeling at his side, holding his hand, very visibly extremely remorseful. An FBI agent was right behind the accident and took over, contacting 911 and somewhat-stabilizing him. He didn’t break a single bone–very lucky–but he’s in evident pain from a badly twisted ankle. My prayers go out to him and his family.

They’re not the only ones my prayers go out to, though… there was a very bad accident just blocks away from our church at about 11am, right when morning services from churches around the area were letting out. For unknown reasons, a pontiac flew through a red light, hit a curb, hit a fire hydrant, went airborne, broadsided a minivan, sent it into a roll, landed on top of a pickup truck, and slid into another car. In the minivan, all five passengers died, three of them children. The flying pontiac driver lived, but according to the news is in critical condition. “He probably won’t live,” another fellow I volunteer at the church with said. He’s friends with all the police officers that take care of our church, and there was some comment about his “brains hanging out.” This isn’t a Hannibal Lecter movie folks–this is real. Horribly real. The person who’s pickup truck got, well, landed on, lived… with some injuries. The car that got slid into, they are okay–but their car got covered with flying debris. Another guy I volunteer with showed up a little late for rehearsal, visibly upset and moved. The car that got slid into was his friends. They were fine, but had two kids that were very shaken–one about ten had seen everything happen. They had to leave their car at the scene and come back to get it four hours later. I remember him saying something about one of his friends in the car saying something about “a baby in the road,” and then I later read about it in the article above.

I’m just stunned, and these two accidents have weighed heavily in my mind the past 24 hours. You never know when the last few minutes of your life are. Seriously–live every second to the fullest. Do your best work… and then some.

“Dylan types so fast!” Grammy said to me today. She had apparently sat behind him while he was on the computer recently. I got him on the phone, and asked him if he wanted to chat in a little while, and he said okay. We talked about Pokemon, we talked about lunch. Then he said an abrupt “bye,” and I asked if I could chat with Rain. She got on the computer, and I chatted with her for a minute (they user Grammy’s AOL account). She asked me to call her on the phone instead; she’s not as much into the online chat thing as Dylan is.

They got their box of clothes in the mail, Dylan told me. Instead of having Grammy lug a suitcase with her, I had shipped the kids’ scooters and a bunch of clothes in a big box. Since you have to pay to bring a bag on the plane anyways now, it didn’t make much of a difference cost-wise. In the meantime, Grammy took them shopping, picking out a couple new outfits for them.

I can’t wait to go to Maine and be with them! I guess the weather hasn’t been perfect, but I don’t care–it’s a sunny day in my world wherever they are.

I went on another mini-hike Thursday morning around 6am. This time I took about 200 pictures as I walked, and turned them into the little video that’s the image for this post. I was fearful of rain, though, with the dark skies and the rumbling, so I didn’t walk more than an hour. It’s a good darn thing, too, because about half an hour after I got home, it started to pour.

I got the lawn mower fixed a few days ago. It wasn’t running right about a year ago, and Scott had his handyman fix it. It worked fine for a few months, then he took it and dumped his girlfriend’s (well, girlfriend at the time, now his wife)’s lawnmower on me. I told him I didn’t want her lawn mower, and told him to bring my mower back. It worked fine for about a month, then I couldn’t get it to start. So I paid to have it fixed right, and they gave it a tune-up too… now it’s like a brand new mower. It’s almost a miracle after the times I’ve fought with it. I pull the string, and VVVVRROOOOOMM it starts right up. Of course, I haven’t mowed the lawn with it yet But I will–probably tomorrow morning.

The kids are off to Maine now. I type that sentence, then I just sit here for a long time. I love this house, but it’s so huge and empty and lonely without the giggles of kidlets. I’ve been calling them on the phone on my way to and from work, since it’s an hour and a half of time to kill anyways, and they chatter with me about the things they’ve done that day. We went shopping at the thrift store. I’m playing on my Nintendo. I cooked brownies, and Popop said they were really good. We went down to the pool. All these fun, wonderful things that they’re doing; and I’ll get to do them with them in 13 days. I can’t wait to hold them in my arms again. In the meantime, I’ve figured out it’s best to take things one day at a time. I know it sounds like such a huge cliche; but it’s really true. This evening, I had a girlfriend call me on the phone. We talked for a few minutes, and she asked me if I was going to the barbecue on Friday. I stopped walking and kind of stood there in a stupor for a minute, thinking. Friday? I just really couldn’t get from A to B on that one. I wake up in the morning, put the doggies outside, either go to work/set up at home/skip that part, then look at what’s on the possible agenda for that day and decide if I’m doing it. Tonight I could have gone to this dance lessing class with some friends, but I just… didn’t make it. I had thought about going to the gym instead; but I ate a light dinner, and then made a new video (this last one in the Galveston trip series), and then what did I do? I fell asleep in the recliner for an hour. Then Leia barked at someone walking by, and I got up, walked over to the couch, then fell asleep there for two more hours. I guess I was just really worn out from recent events. So you see, I’m just kind of taking things as they come. Night y’all.

I had written this post out once, but it was not good to read. I’m going to try to rewrite it here… in one-liners, a way that I’ve blogged in the past when I’m trying to make myself write something but am having a hard time with what exactly to say.

Grammy flew in from Maine last weekend.
We had a fun week with her here.
She helped Rain cook an awesome ham dinner.
The kids spent a lot of time in the sprinkler and playing with water guns.
I picked up Rain while Scott took Dylan to his baseball party.
Rain and I just layed around the living room together.
It was wonderful and perfect.
I got to take Rain to her last softball game.
Scott got married last week.
I found out in an email.
We haven’t even been divorced two months.
The kids flew up to Maine with Grammy.
They play on the beach and ride rides there.
I will go up to Maine for a week in July.
I’ll get to see a bunch of my friends the Sunday after the 4th, for a meetup.
Let me know if you want to join us.
The kids will come home with me .

So I just thought of a good story to tell after all.

Dylan got a Wall-E poster from one of his neighborhood buddies for his birthday. He wanted it hung in his room, and I said okay; but between the two kids, we couldn’t figure out in who’s room or where the box of tacks was. Dylan’s head drooped, his shoulders sagged, and I was instantly filled with that puff-up of love that wants me to do anything I can to make my Dylan smile. “Go brush your teeth, and I’ll sort this out,” I said to him. He drudged off to the bathroom, and I set to work. He had two other posters on his wall, each with four tacks; so I robbed those two of their bottom two pins, leaving the posters hanging by the top ones (which was fine). I smoothed out the giant Wall-E poster on the wall and carefully pushed the four clear tacks through its corners. It was right next to his mirror, right at the foot of his bed, so he could look at it as he fell asleep. He came back into the room after brushing his teeth, and I said “There you go,” motioning towards the poster. He walked up to it, stood there beneath it for a moment, and I swear it was a wonderful sweet Kodak moment, with his head cocked a little to the right. Then he abruptly turned around, walked right towards me, wrapped his arms around my middle tight tight, and looked up with this wonderful smile on his face.

That wonderful smile… those cuddle-moments with My Rain… these children of mine are the reason I’m alive. They are everything to me. I love them so much.

I have dozens of stories that I have wanted to tell you over the past couple weeks; but I have been so swamped between work and the kidlets and cleaning the house, that blogging has taken a back seat. It’s sad, because I like how I can go back to old blog posts and read stories that have happened… but if they don’t get written down, they’re gone forever. So this Friday, the post might be a little mish-mosh… so enjoy. Maybe I’ll incorporate Chris Brogan’s forever intelligent idea and put in subtitles He’s so cool! Have you seen him rock? lol

The foul-out.
So normally a foul-out would be when you’re in a baseball league, that if you get a certain number of fouls (usually four, I believe) you’re out. This title is intentionally misleading, however; and you’ll understand in a minute.

Let me take you there: The game is tied, there’s two outs. There are runners on first and second. We are the “away” team. If we make this last out, we will go into extra innings to try to win. Our team (to my knowledge, anyways) hasn’t won a game all season. CRACK! The ball is hit, and it dribbles up the first base line, right at Rain, who’s playing first. She fumbles a bit, gets herself positioned on first base, reaches for the ball, but it’s just out of reach of her right hand, and fumble-fumble-fumble and the girl tramples her to first base. AW DARN! We all think–until the umpire yells “FOUL.” In all our excitement, half of us hadn’t noticed that the ball she was reaching for had dribbled just to the right of the white line and into foul territory. Kind of comical.

Dylan’s practice.
I was at work late Wednesday because of reasons I won’t discuss here. It sent me screaming down the tollway (which I usually reserve for when I’m late getting the kids), calling daycare and asking them to get the kids ready, and peeling off the highway and into my town. I herded the kids into the car, ran inside (I really had to pee), and screamed back across town to the baseball field. Dylan was about half an hour late, but it seemed to be okay. I made him wear shorts this time, and it seemed to help a whole lot–he wasn’t turning beat-red like last practice. Rain sat on the blanket, as you see here in the photo, and watched an episode of CSI. A little sister of another baseball boy cozied up next to her and took one of the earbuds to listen to the show, and I thought to myself… I hope it’s okay with her parents if she watches CSI… but I didn’t say anything. The evening ended with a wonderful hot dog outside at one of the tables at Sonic.

Stars in the back of his head.
As I picked up the kids from daycare Thursday, I ran into the mom of another boy on his baseball team. She had brought her kidlets to our daycare for that lingering few days of the week after school got out. Hey, I can bring Dylan to his game, she said… and I was very thankful for her offer. I had to take Rain to her softball batting practice, and of course, it was fun for Dylan to hang out with his friend for a while. Then Rain and I had a fun little mommy-daughter-bite-to-eat at Panda Express. Then I got to watch her bat three different times at the batting cages with her coach. Then we went to Dylan’s game.

Whenever Dylan gets a hit at one of his baseball games–that is, when he hits the ball and actually makes it to first base (he’s been called out on the way a dozen times), he gets a star on the back of his helmet. It’s something the coaches on his team do for the boys, and I think it’s an awesome idea. This past game, Dylan got a new star on his helmet, which makes about ten now. As the applause for the whole team died down, I held his helmet up to his coach, as Dylan sat on the ground below me with his snack and drink in his lap. “Do you know how many hits he got last year?” I asked the coach. How many, he said… and I held up one finger. “One, coach. He’s done so much better–you guys have been such a huge help to him.” He smiled, slapped his knee, and said he was proud of DK. His team calls him DK because there’s two Dylans. Because of the DK, Rainlin calls him “Donkey Kong.”

Frog hunting.
My friend Chris (not Brogan, the other Chris) made a vlog post recently about looking for frogs. I have been out frog-hunting myself, but not by sticking my hands (and my CAMERA! Check out his video) in the water… but by just walking along the paths behind my house and seeking them out. Or rather, the doggies when I walk them, they seek them out.

The first time I did this in the past week, it was about 9pm at night, so relatively dark. I didn’t have frogs on the brain–rather, I was playing with my GPS, watching it make the little orange trail as I walked. All of the sudden, Leia lunged after something in the dark, almost pulling my arm out of the socket. It made me a tiny bit nervous, because I am a female, it was dark, and I was alone… but there was no dog, no person–just, apparently, a frog. She sniffed his butt when she found him, and he hopped, and she sniffed him again. It was cute. A few minutes farther down the path, it was Luke sniffing a froggie butt, and lunging as it hopped away. He doesn’t pull as hard as Leia does–assuming because he’s a leg shorter than she is. Another few feet down the path, I saw a white object, and as I approached I realized it was a froggie, spread-eagle, upside down with his white belly and legs facing up. Somebody already got to that one, I thought. The dogs didn’t pay any attention to it.

The second night was similar, but the dead froggie was gone–either eaten by someone, or picked up by the kid-in-the-golfcart that patrols the park during the day.

The third night I asked the kids if they wanted to go on a frog hunt, and they squealed and ran for their flashlights. The first two-thirds of the path was unproductive, and Rain commented that at least they got to go out in the dark with their flashlights, which was fun–and it was incredibly windy. I figured somehow that the frogs didn’t like the wind; was that a dumb thing to think? Then suddenly Leia stopped dead in her tracks, and Dylan shined his flashlight right on a big fat frog. He was apparently “playing dead,” sitting squished up in a circle not moving… I nudged him with my finger, and he moved. Leia chased him a couple hops, then the kids squealed and giggled and chased him a couple hops, and then I told them to leave him be, let’s find another one. We did, and I goaded the kids to pick him up. They didn’t want to. He hopped, and he peed, and then I picked him up, and he was still a little frog-pee-wet, so I shook him a little gently to get the pee off him, and the kids cracked up–”Mommy shook the piss out of a frog.” I know, not PC, but incredibly funny.

Conclusion.
So in retrospect, this crazily busy week has been incredibly fun. I always have such a blast when I’m with the kids. I still even have about five vlog posts from Galveston that I haven’t made yet! I have one that I’ve tried to post to blip two or three times and it keeps crapping out… so I have to figure out why. Heh… yeah… sometime when I have time. I have priorities, and they’re 7 and 9 years old.

6am… Breakfast together is important to me. I handed the kids Speed Racer puzzle books to poke through while they ate.

7am… Today’s the last day of school!

8am… There were really pretty clouds on the drive in to work this morning.

9am… I’m at work. It’s beautiful outside.

10am… I have at least an hour of conference calls every day.

11am… mmm, healthy lunch.

12pm… Kind of funny, that wonderfully healthy lunch, and we have a health fair at work today

1pm… Out the window from work are these beautiful and surely expensive houses…

2pm… I actually gave blood for the first time in my life today.

3pm… I got pulled into yet another meeting today.

4pm… The drive home isn’t nearly as pretty as the drive to work… and I’m in a rush.

5pm… Traffic always stops right here because all the yuppies live in the town that’s just over that ramp.

6pm… Rainlin watches CSI on the portable DVD player while Dylan has practice.

7pm… Dylan drinks like a camel while he’s at baseball practice.