Not sure of the authenticity of this e-mail but what a wonderful message to us all!

This was written by a Metro Denver Hospice physician ....

I just had one of the most amazing experiences of my life, and wanted to share it with my family and dearest friends: I was driving home from a meeting this evening about 5, stuck in traffic on Colorado Blvd., and the car started to choke and splutter and die - I barely managed to coast, cursing, into a gas station, glad only that I would not be blocking traffic and would have a somewhat warm spot to wait for the tow truck. It wouldn't even turn over. Before I could make the call, I saw a woman walking out of the "quickie mart" building, and it looked like she slipped on some ice and fell into a gas pump, so I got out to see if she was okay. When I got there, it looked more like she had been overcome by sobs than that she had fallen; she was a young woman who looked really haggard with dark circles under her eyes. She dropped something as I helped her up, and I picked it up to give it to her. It was a nickel.

At that moment, everything came into focus for me: the crying woman, the ancient Suburban crammed full of stuff with 3 kids in the back (1 in a car seat), and the gas pump reading $4.95. I asked her if she was okay and if she needed help, and she just kept saying "I don't want my kids to see me crying," so we stood on the other side of the pump from her car. She said she was driving to California and that things were very hard for her right now. So I asked, "And you were praying?" That made her back away from me a little, but I assured her I was not a crazy person and said, "He heard you, and He sent me."

I took out my card and swiped it through the card reader on the pump so she could fill up her car completely, and while it was fueling walked to the next door McDonald's and bought 2 big bags of food, some gift certificates for more, and a big cup of coffee. She gave the food to the kids in the car, who attacked it like wolves, and we stood by the pump eating fries and talking a little. She told me her name, and that she lived in Kansas City. Her boyfriend left 2 months ago and she had not been able to make ends meet. She knew she wouldn't have money to pay rent Jan 1, and finally in desperation had finally called her parents, with whom she had not spoken in about 5 years. They lived in California and said she could come live with them and try to get on her feet there. So she packed up everything she owned in the car. She told the kids they were going to California for Christmas, but not that they were going to live there. I gave her my gloves, a little hug and said a quick prayer with her for safety on the road. As I was walking over to my car, she said, "So, are you like an angel or something?" This definitely made me cry. I said, "Sweetie, at this time of year Angels are really busy, so sometimes God uses regular people." It was so incredible to be a part of someone else's miracle. And of course, you guessed it, when I got in my car it started right away and got me home with no problem. I'll put it in the shop tomorrow to check, but I suspect the mechanic won't find anything wrong.

Sometimes the angels fly close enough to you that you can hear the flutter of their wings...

Psalms 55:22 "Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved."

The reason my son is moving his family to Ohio is because his stint in the Marine Corps will soon be over. My daughter-in-law is from the Columbus area, and it was the area in Ohio with the most jobs. It was natural, then, that on our trip "home" we would talk about the Marines.

My son had mentioned being in the reserves, so I asked his wife about it, and she said he had decided against it. The reason was that he could not keep his current MOS(method of service), and any other one might land him in Iraq.

I know it is bad of me, but I was glad to hear that. When my son was in boot camp, it seemed like I ran into a lot of Marine moms. One that I talked to said that her son had been in Iraq during Desert Storm. I asked her how she lived with it, and she said she didn't think she had a full night's sleep the whole time her son was away.

My son graduated from boot camp 9/7/01 in a relatively peaceful world, or so we thought. That all changed four days later. When we went to war, my daughter-in-law was worried because the other Marine wives had told her that Iraq would be another Viet Nam. I tried to reassure her, tell her that certainly we as a country are in this to win. I still believe in what I said: I just think that maybe we underestimated the task. Just like with the Geneva Convention or other rules, the rules of war only work if everyone follows them, and while we as a civilized country try to do so (prison incidents aside), I think we naively assume that the rest of the world does too. And they don't.

I have heard people say that the United States should have anticipated something bad happening on 9/11. After all, we call 9-1-1 for emergencies, don't we? But while I see a vague connection, I don't see how any civilized nation could have foreseen such a horrendous act of terrorism, just like we couldn't believe that concentration camps existed and we have a hard time with child abuse. Decent people don't do such things. Unfortunately, people do them.

I have great respect for our armed forces, no matter what their method of service is or where they are deployed. I am sure I don't understand the sacrifices that military families make like a military family does, but I do realize that there is a sacrifice, that they give up their personal freedom and, really, the freedom of their families for the sake of a higher good. Having said that, though, I am glad that my son's period of sacrifice is nearing an end. I am his mom, and I will worry about him and about his family, but maybe, since God is good, I will not have to worry about his being in a war zone.

And, even though I tend to get teary about patriotism, my son's military service has changed me. I understand better now what life was like for my dad when he went into the Navy shortly after he married my mom. I understand that being away from your family is a big sacrifice. I had a cousin who died in Viet Nam, and I have seen his name on the memorial wall in Washington, but it is my son's service that has given his sacrifice meaning. I don't think another Veteran's or Memorial Day will go by for me without my remembering the faces of the servicemen and their families that I have met in the last four years. And I will not hesitate to share hugs, or maybe tears, as moms, dads and relatives share their stories about their enlisted sons and daughters. My prayers go out to all the families that have lost someone they love while that person was serving our country. I am well aware that their loss could have been my own.

It was a long weekend and one from which I needed to recuperate, but my sons' family is now moved to Columbus, OH. I enjoyed the road trip from VA to OH with my daughter-in-law and the babies. I am still smiling from some of the things the two year old came up with.

One reason I am thankful for the trip is that it gave me a chance to talk to my daughter-in-law about the difference between knowing your church and knowing Jesus. She had already thought about this issue because, when describing an older woman that she knows who professes Christianity, my daughter-in-law stated that the woman was not who she thought of when she thought of a Christian woman.

I think this is important because, even if it is unconscious at this point, it is evident that my daughter-in-law has an opinion about who a Christian woman should be. I did too when I was her age. I used Proverbs 31 as my standard. She does not yet know the Bible enough to pick that, I don't think, but it is obvious that she is growing.

Family.org - CitizenLink - FNIF News - Social Security's Woes Mirror Family Breakdown

This certainly gives one food for thought. I have never seriously given thought to our government's caring how many children we had. China's? Yes. But not ours. And that Social Security's benefits reinforce the traditinal family? I don't know about that, either. I have run into too many kids who got SSI checks and were given free reign with them at a very young age. Certainly that is not what the government had in mind.

It is no coincidence that today, when I did something I have never done before and went home after my first student so that I could avoid sharing germs, I met my prayer partner at the mall. It is no coincidence that, even though, I did not want to share germs, I needed to walk to loosen things up. It is no coincidence that the student who brought my prayer partner and me together, who has been doing well this school year, has just begun having problems.And needing prayer. My prayer partner and I have often played phone tag. But not this time.

It is no coincidence that, on the approach of my fiftieth birthday, I heard from a friend with whom I had lost contact. She is seventeen days older than I am. She sent a Christmas card and then an invitation to the birthday bash her mom gave her even though she didn't want it. Then she wrote to tell me how the party had gone and that she would keep in touch.

It is no coincidence that my husband received a call from his deceased brother's wife announcing the impending marriage of his nephew. His brother died in a tragic accident when this boy, Jay, was three. Twenty years ago. Through what we believed was some faulty counseling, his mom decided to break contact with his dad's side of the family. Until now.

It was no coincidence when my cousin, with whom I had not had contact in thirty years, found letters and pictures I had sent to her mom and wrote to me. We have been in touch for more than five years now, for which I am especially glad. Our moms were only three years apart in age, and we have a lot of childhood memories of the same situations.


What is it that makes people reach out at times of change in their lives? I don't claim to know, but I do know this much:

It is no coincidence.

TIME.com: What Larry Summers Got Right -- Feb. 28, 2005


Larry Summers and the Gender Gap

I think there is a lot of truth to this article. Personally, although I am probably not the most liberated of women in the eyes of society, I would not want a high pressure job, and I have said so publicly more than once. Why? Because if it came to a choice between my job and my family, I would routinely pick family. And I would not want to face the never-ending conflict such a choice would produce within me. Since I was raised to believe that any job worth doing was worth doing well, I would feel badly no matter what I shorted, no matter whether it was right or not.

I watch my children face this, too. My son wants to work forty hours and be home with his boys. But can he do it and still provide all the material goods he wants to provide? His wife, I think, would like to stay home with the boys, but she comes from a family of working women who look at her as "less"(whatever that means) if she doesn't work. So she has made the choice to work at the moment. One of her sons is two and a half, almost. The other is eight weeks old.

My daughter is in no better shape. Since she is recently divorced, she has to work if she wants her own life. She is thinking about going back to school because she needs to support herself, but she also really wants a family. Will she have time to even look around if she works sixty hours a week and goes to school too?

I do think that, to a certain extent, women are more genetically drawn to childrearing and the care of the family. Having said that, though, I am thankful to see the men of my son's generation who appear to be more in touch with family needs as a group than were their fathers or grandfathers.

In a society as geographically separated as ours, if the family is to be nurtured, someone has to take responsibility. I think that our government is the best to be had on this planet, but I still don't want them to have the final say on what happens with ANY of my family. The government has done fine with issuing edicts about the education of our children without taking into account that lack of parenting will ALWAYS affect performance. Lack of nurture affects everything, really.

If we are all to work sixty-eighty hour weeks, to whom is the nurturing left?

ContraCostaTimes.com | 02/23/2005 | Judge extends family's battle over life support

More on Terri Schaivo

I just wonder who will win this time.

MSN Money - Luxuries you can live without -- and should

My husband and I have explored this idea quite a bit lately. We were the last ones in our rural community to get a microwave, and we certainly didn't have the premium model. However, it was soon hard to live without.

Having been raised by the "Depression babies," both of us were used to the "use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without" philosophy, and it served us well in early marriage. Later, though, we too became caught up in the "gotta haves."

Now that we are looking toward retirement, we are rethinking our strategies. For instance, neither of us anticipated that medical expenses would eat up so much of our income or that insurance would cover less and less. I don't know if we have to go back to early marriage, when we ate out once a payday (that would be really hard since retirees get paid once a month), but we probably should eat out less, for both financial and health reasons. Secondly, I did not anticipate the conflict between wanting to help our adult children so badly versus letting them be adults. It is a hard line for me personally to draw. I don't need $200 jeans, and my grandsons probably don't need all of the clothes or toys that catch my eye, but it is a struggle for me not to buy them.

Some of the happiest times of my life were when my husband and I did without to achieve long-term goals: paying off the house and vehicles, for instance. I think that, for us, we need to establish long-term goals again, and we are working on it. Is that the reason society has come to this point? That, in general, people don't have long-term goals?

I always thought it would be easier. Or maybe, truth be told, I didn't think about it at all.

There is a good article on destressing in the new READER'S DIGEST. It says to live in the now. I know this. I just have problems putting it into practice, remembering, as that ad on Christian radio says, that I am NOT the CEO of the universe.

My husband and I had several long talks about his over the long weekend, and not all of them were friendly. Stupidly, we thought we would bypass something that most couples our age have gone through, the "What Nows." We built a life together, we built a house together, we raised our children and they somehow managed to survive through college. What now?

I think it is easier for my husband because, with this job, he has what he always wanted. He has carried on the family tradition and is a third generation railroad supervisor. He has "made it." I question, though, whether I have.

This is probably not a fair assessment. I think because my mom became ill in her early forties, I really never made plans beyond that time in my live, and I did everything I planned up until that time. I feel like I have been "on call" in a sense since we moved here, running to and fro to meet the needs of this family member or that one. I don't resent it; I just wonder who I am, exactly, when they don't need me.

My husband says this is the time to pursue my writing, that he is not worried about medical issues like I am. OK. Live in the now. But I haven't had anything to say fiction-wise for quite a while, and although I find blogging to be quite cathartic, its audience is limited. I have a limited interest in marketing, so what exactly is the point?

If my over-arching goal is to serve the Lord, while I admit that is laudable and what it should be, I have found that such a goal, at least most of the time, does not involve long-range planning. That means that I have to give up knowing what will happen next. I am frustrated because, like Eve, I sort of want to orchestrate it, to make it better.

But if I am constantly looking for better, I will miss what is. I know this. I will miss looking into my newest grandson's eyes and wondering what he knows as he stares back into mine. I will miss the excitement I feel when my autistic student connects with what we are doing for the sum total of three seconds, and I will miss feeling the hope that next time he will connect for ten. I will miss the open-mouthed awe that I felt when my husband and I toured the West and the utter contentment I feel when he wraps his arms around me and kisses my forehead. I will miss....

Matthew 6:34 says, "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own."

Can I make the decision to REALLY do that? How much will my life change if I do?

Since I landed in special education, I have worked with a lot of people who really care. I wouldn't say that they care more than regular ed teachers, but I do think they care differently. Since their class sizes are smaller (although in Indiana not remarkably so), they spend a lot of time honing in on the needs of their individual students. I know regular ed teachers do this too, but I don't think you can be as effective evaluating over one hundred students as you can at evaluating ten. Or thirty. And I haven't noticed that caring for that ten, or thirty, is any easier on the special ed teachers than the caring for over a hundred is on the regular ed.

This is why I was so moved when I sat in a conference the other day and heard a special ed person say, "At least it was this conference. I've been having nightmares about that other conference." Another teacher and I exchanged glances and nods of agreement at that. We all have been having nightmares over "that other" conference.

The reason for our nightmares is not really the kindergarten boy whose needs the conference will address, although we are certainly concerned about him. It is his mother, and the fact that she doesn't seem to see him for who he really is. I know....do any parents see their children as they really are? But this is different, although unfortunately not unusual. The student in question is a dear little boy who has both visual and developmental problems. He was placed in a general education kindergarten, and he has made great strides. He has more social skill and more self-help skills. He knows the days of the week and the months of the year and some other things that can be learned by rote. But he doesn't really have academic skills. They are developing; they just aren't there yet, and since this young man's development IS delayed, we don't really know how many of them will develop, or when.

All of his teachers have high hopes that this young man will someday be functionally literate. He turns six this month and cannot recognize any of his letters or his numbers or recite the spelling of his name. Part of this is certainly due to his vision problems, but not all of it is, and this is something that his poor mom just can't seem to grasp. She is firmly convinced that he knows the kindergarten vocabulary words that she has so lovingly put on flashcards for him, and she told me yesterday that she is sure he is at a first grade level in math. The other teachers and I agonize over helping her see her son for who he is. One of them told me today that the mom thinks if she just prays hard enough, he will "get better." That makes me so sad.

I believe in prayer; don't get me wrong. If God wants to make this boy "normal"(whatever that is), I know He is capable of doing so. But where is the boy in the meantime. He can't open all of the food in his lunchbox without help, although he is getting better. He doesn't put things in his backpack without prompting, and although he has been in the same classroom for six months now, he gets turned around trying to find his way to his room.

His teachers, of which I am one, think that his first grade needs would be better met in a Life Skills classroom where he could receive one-on-one attention in a relatively (as compared to the "regular" elementary classroom) uncluttered environment. His mom worries that such a placement will put him behind and make him different.

I am sure she knows things that are special about her son, but I wish she could see what we see. That he cares about her sooooo much! That he ALWAYS tries, no matter what we ask him to do. I wonder if she smiles at his humor the way we do. That boy makes puns! He has said to me that he doesn't like bees, but he makes sure to tell me that it is not the letter B that he doesn't like, but the "buzz-buzz" kind. I wonder she sees how hard he tries or only that he doesn't succeed.

I am not the mother of a handicapped child, and although I can theorize, I don't really know how I would have reacted if I had been. I am not sitting in judgment of this young man's family. I just wish I could find a way to help them appreciate their son the way we all deserve to be appreciated.

Just as he is.

In my never-ending battle with excessive worry (something with which I think 99.9% of women and 95% of men struggle), I mentioned to a casual friend at work that I was jealous of her wonderful health coverage. She responded that she was jealous that I had two grandchildren.

Just when I think I have it together!

Matthew 6:19-20 (New International Version)

19“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal

My father was commenting the other day that children cost you money. And time. And a little bit of sanity. He said this as he was looking into buying a savings bond for his youngest great-grandson, my youngest grandson, Tony. In the next breath he mentioned, though, how much children give you. I know that, even as my almost-eighty-year-old father comments on this, he thinks of the holidays when the house that held six of us fairly comfortably bursts at the seams with his progeny. Such gatherings fill him, I think, with a sense of wonder.

When my son, Tony's dad, was a baby, we used to play a game: SO BIG. How we and countless parents before us did this was to ask the baby how big he was and then stretch his little arms as high as they would go as we responded with, "Tony's SOOO big!" The babies I played with in this way always responded with delight, just as my father does, just as my husband and I do, when we look at our extended family.

Yes, our children have cost us money. And, although they are really good as children go, they have caused us to worry and to shed some tears. But just as my husband's and my hearts grew as we learned to love each other, so our children have opened them even more. Our daughter-in-law, the babies, our nephew's new wife...we have room. And the hope that fills our hearts as we watch who our children and grandchildren are becoming opens us up even more.

So my dad is right. Having children, taking chances, being vulnerable to hurt carries with it a price. But there is also a reward. And just as I hope little Tony will smile when I play with him, I smile as I think of how all the risk allowed my heart to grow....

....so big.

Articles like this just go to show you that if things look too good to be true, they probably are. I like the Humira (TNF inhibitor like Remicade) because it says the drug allows MORE NORMAL living.

My life isn't like it was before RA since I take Remicade, but it is far better than it was!







PharmaLive: FDA Sends Letter to Centocor Over Remicade Aid

I am all for Valentine's Day, really I am, but I was still surprised by what I saw today.

Since I travel, I get to see a lot of schools, and at one of the most rural, the office was pretty much hidden by the balloons and flowers that had been delivered. I walked out with one of the secretaries and commented to her that, judging by the office display, her school must have the most popular teachers in central Indiana. "Oh, no, " she replied, "those aren't for the teachers. At least most of them aren't. They are for the kids."

What" For the kids? In a K-5 elementary? Why is that necessary? I am sure the secretaries have better things to do with their time than to either deliver the balloons/flowers themselves or call the students down to get them. And I am really hoping that the kids who received the balloons get picked up at the end of the day. I have always thought I would hate to be a bus driver, responsible for the safety of all those kids who sit BEHIND me. How safe would the bus be with bouquets of balloons floating around? And are elementary students mature enough NOT to let them float? What about bursting them?

At my next elementary, I could hardly find a parking place. Why? Because so many of the parents/grandparents were arriving to help with class parties. This, I thought, was a much better deal. I'm sure having a lot of parents can be a disruption to an elementary teacher, but on the other hand, the extra pairs of hands have to be a blessing. Having stayed past my allotted time to help on occasion, I know that to be the case.

If kids are getting balloons and things like them delivered to elementary school, what is there for them to look forward to in high school or even later? Wouldn't it be better to keep things simple and, if you can, show the kids that you care by being there for them? My teaching and parenting experience has been that children appreciate the little things.

Like your time.

My church participates in a community program called Kids' Hope that pairs mentors with needy kids. I wanted to help, but since I work full-time at this time and could not mentor, I am a prayer partner with a mentor.

In my particular school district, more than half of the kids can't perform at grade level, so a program of this type is sorely needed. Many of the parents mean well; they just don't know how to help their children either academically or socially.

The little girl for whom I pray is named Erica. She repeated first grade last year, but this year she is on track and even sometimes ahead of the game, so we know the program is of benefit to her. Does it benefit the mentor? I'd say so; this lady's only grandchild lives over an hour away, so they don't see each other very often. Her face just glowed as she told me that her student greeted her with "Hi, Mom!" when she saw her last week.

It is hard to believe that just one visit a week could make such a difference in the life of a child. Wouldn't it be nice if more people thought the way the volunteers in this program do? After all, in the words of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, "If you bungle raising your children, nothing else much matters in life."

I watched my daughter-in-law hurt today. She was asked to do something that was really not her responsibility, and she looked out for her sons instead, but it cost her. She felt guilty because she wasn't there for someone that she loves.

I know the feeling,and although I have found it easier to take a stand the older that I get, I haven't been able to get past the feeling of guilt. Where does one draw the line between appropriate help and that which is not?

I don't know, and I agonize every time I am faced with that decision. I wished, today, that I could have offered my daughter-in-law an easy answer. I am proud of her, though, for establishing her priorities. She took a big step in defining the woman that she is.

I know that to someone who doesn't take this drug, my posting on it seems pointless, but to me it represented the difference between needing my handicapped parking sticker all of the time and a cane to go with it and working full time. The prospect of Remicade's bankrupting my husband and depleting our retirement savings makes me sick if I stop to think about it. My doctor recently increased the amount of Remicade that I get every eight weeks, and the other day the insurance statement for the bill arrived:$5700 and some change, for which my husband and I are responsible for a little over $1700.

now I know that currently I have a $1000 deductible that is to be paid from a pool by my school corporation. They mess up the billing and charge me for twenty percent of it about every other billing, and it always makes my heart stop. The bookkeeper at the infusion center where I receive my infusion says they do it to delay paying. He bills it the same every time. In the fall, my husband's insurance will necessitate our paying twenty percent of every bill, which wouldn't be so bad were it not for the fact that the increase in medicine has not brought about the drastic improvement I had hoped for. I can still move, though, and I am thankful.

My sister, who is a vegetarian and in good health, has remarked more than once on the "poisons" that I put in my body. I admit that she is right. But fifty isn't looking as old as it did once, and I want to have a life.

I wish the money didn't factor into it so much.



Biotech drugs' future: Hard to afford, copy

Since the church season of Lent has now started, I have been seeing signs that churches are reshowing Mel Gibson's THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST. I was hesitant to see that movie, but I am glad that I went for a lot of reasons, one of them being that it made me think of Jesus's sacrifice a little differently.

There has never been a time in my life when I was not aware of the presence of God. Needless to say, that awareness made me VERY uncomfortable when I was doing something that I should not have been doing, but most of the time it has been a comfort. No matter what, the Father is there.

I was fortunate in my growing years in that I had a father that would have done anything for me. He is not perfect by any means, but he would have and has sacrificed for all of his children. Because of that, I don't have the image that a lot of people claim to have about God, that He sits on the throne with a flowing white beard ready to raise the hand of judgment against them. As a matter of fact, I DO remember the last time my earthly father "raised his hand" against me, and I richly deserved it. I was eleven, and I knew I was pushing buttons. I just couldn't seem to stop myself.

Having that knowledge, the scene in which Christ cries out that God has forsaken Him said a lot to me. I have talked in previous posts about loving my husband enough to let him die first (like it's up to me!) and spare him the pain of being left. But of course I don't know when or if that is going to happen. Jesus KNEW, and He chose to die, to be separated from His Father anyway. I can't imagine how that felt. I know how much God's presence is a part of my being, and He had to have been a part of Christ's a thousandfold more and then some. The fact that Jesus was willing to be separated from the Father FOR ME says more about His sacrifice than anything else.

There is a song by a Christian group, Barlow Girl, that speaks poignantly about this very idea, and I don't think I can say it any better than they did in closing:

I cried out with no reply
And I can't feel You by my side
So I'll hold tight to what I know
You're here and I"m never alone

--from "Never Alone" by Barlow Girl
http://www.azlyrics.com/barlowgirl/neveralone.html

Surely Jesus, both man and God, held on to those exact feelings just like I do.




I have heard the lyrics on the radio a lot, and I bought the CD for my daughter.

Desperation makes different people do different things, but I still find it hard to believe that a woman could give birth and then allow her child to be thrown into the street like so much refuse.

I feel fortunate that I live in Indiana, where a woman who gives birth to an unwanted child may leave her child at a police station, fire station or hospital without fear of repercussion. Florida has a similar law. Was the mom just unaware? Was she afraid of or overpowered by the man she was with? Only God knows, and thankfully He and the woman who stopped looked out for that little boy.





a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6952633/">MSNBC - Newborn boy survives being thrown from car

I am all for welfare reform, but is this where the United States is headed? It could be, you know, since our Supreme Court has started citing foreign law as a basis for their opinions!

Desperate women will do desperate things to feed their children. How sad that they can be forced into these things by their governments.



Family.org - CitizenLink - FNIF News - Women on Welfare Required to Work in Brothels

I went to service my kindergartener today, and one of the little girls in his class came up and laid her head on my shoulder. It was obvious that she did not feel well, and she ended up in my lap. What is a teacher to do? I offered to take her to the nurse.

Turns out she was sent home with a fever of 102 yesterday, and today her temperature was 103.2. Poor baby! The secretaries were upset that her father had sent her because they told him she had to be fever-free for twenty-four hours, but he works and didn't have anyplace else for her.

What is teaching about if it isn't to advocate for the child if there isn't someone else to do it? Will teachers advocate for my grandsons?

Whatever will I do without this job next year?

As a not-so-young teacher entering my first Language Arts classroom, I was ready to teach secondary skills. I had all the classes, all the methods. Imagine my surprise when a good seventy percent of my parochial school students were reading and writing well below grade level. So much for private school hype. I could have taught junior high skills regardless and left many of them at sea, but I chose to meet them where they were. It was a lot harder on me, but it was the right thing to do. As it turns out, that was one of the easier battles of my teaching career.

The other day I went to pick up my kindergarten student, and people started whispering and standing back from me. Turns out he had been sent home with lice. Live lice. According to the school nurse, his mom had been battling them for some weeks now. I shuddered. Then I went to the school nurse and had her check my head.

When I was growing up I had no experience with lice, and I didn't know anyone who did. My mom told stories. She had lice once, and after my grandmother doused her head with kerosene, she cut off Mom's long blonde curls. The point of this story? Don't wear other people's hats or hair ties. It really wasn't an issue, though, and I don't remember the school nurse ever coming in and doing head checks like they do now.

When my daughter and her head full of naturally curly hair were in third grade, she started scratching her head a lot. Since it was always a battle to get the brush through the curls, I thought she had dry scalp and her hair just needed a good brushing. Clueless, I had her bring her brush to me and bend her head over. I was going to start at the nape of her neck where she itched. Live lice fell out on my shirt and I freaked. Happily my mom was still alive, and she told me to wash everything my daughter had been in contact with, to check my son's head, and to ask the pharmacist what they recommended. He recommended calling the doctor and getting a prescription shampoo. We did that, and my daughter sat not so patiently on our front porch as I picked nits, both old and new, out of her hair. It took a couple of days to be sure I got them all, and I got a real appreciation for the term "nit-picking."

We did fine after that until I taught at the parochial school. My fourth year there, the junior high started first, and we had games and movies to welcome them back. Since I taught both seventh and eighth grades, I got hugs from my returning students. AND I got lice. Once the school nurse investigated, she ended up closing the school. Surprisingly, the infestation appeared to have started with the older students. Their parents shampooed, but they apparently didn't know about the cleaning and nit-picking they had to do. Our school made the city newspaper and the local news, much to the chagrin of the principal, but as it turns out the neighboring schools had infestations as well. They just didn't close down and draw attention to themselves.

Since then, I have been pretty careful. I have long hair,so I tie it back when I have to work closely with my younger and or handicapped students. They need hand-over-hand attention, and you have to work from behind them so the movements feel natural. Hence my apprehension with the kindergartener the other day.

Having said all that, though, if I am to do my job the way it needs to be done, I MUST get close to my students. Lice is just a risk of that. I had to get over the drooling of some of my other students,too. They can't help it, but since the medicine I take for rheumatoid arthritis suppresses my immune system, their drooling is a risk for me. Now finally, as an adult, I am almost obsessive about washing my hands. I scrub under my fingernails, and I go all the way through the ABC song to make sure I have washed long enough.

Some parents know about the continual schooling teachers need. Some realize that we take more flack from parents than your average citizen would consider humanly possible. But I wonder how many have even considered that their child's cough or their child's lice represents a hazard? I wonder how many would care.

I can't think of a single topic to blog about.

Today was a weird day. I only have one of my rural students on Tuesdays and Fridays, and this is the third day I haven't had him because of delays. He is in preschool, so it won't really hurt him, and his teacher does things similar to what I do with him anyway, but it opened up a big whole in my day, so I looked forward to getting to my office and doing some paperwork in preparation for a conference.

But it was not to be. I share my office with a speech pathologist and one of the school psychs. The psych shows up unannounced a lot, and when she wants to test, I can't use the office. So today, I took my mileage forms and went down to the teachers' lounge.

Which was set up for a Mardi Gras breakfast. All that food! Whatever you want to say about teachers, they sure do know how to eat. Maybe it is to relieve the stress. At my particular school, more than 50% of the sixth graders came in reading below grade level, and next year the projected numbers are more than 60%. Since NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND, those numbers affect all disciplines, and they make everyone nervous.

We were talking about that in the lounge, about how different it is for teachers now. Statistics say that new teachers last for five years or less and leave the field because of the stress. It isn't that the "old" teachers don't have stress, I don't think. I think it is that we were raised in an environment where we were taught to suck it up and deal, and the younger teachers think they have more control than that. I hope they are right. It takes an idealist to be a teacher. You have to see the future when you are looking at the present, and sometimes the present doesn't look all that hot.


Around lunch I went to my next school, where I eat with my kindergarten student. I have another student at that school too. He is MI and has visual impairment as well. The MI teacher has both my boys, and we discussed the older one's conference, which will take place on Thursday. He is going on to middle school where he will go to a resource room for Reading and Math. The rest of the time he will be "out there" with the rest of the kids. He can only read at the first or second grade level, so his teacher feels that there is no reason to order large print books for him. He couldn't read them anyway. But can he understand sixth grade concepts? What will we do, find his textbook on tape? Put his textbook on tape? I don't even think it is available, and it is a state-wide adoption.

The other student had forkable food and was able to passably use a fork, although he could not supply its name when I showed it to him. He will be six this month, and it is nice to see him make progess in his own way. I actually heard him use the word match in the proper context! I think that is a tribute to the genuine love he receives from his service providers (counting me, there are ten).

On to tracking with my CP student. He has spastic quadriplegic CP and lacks a lot of muscle control, the muscles in his eyes included. His eyes alternately suppress, which means that they go in and out of focus. Can you imagine trying to read that way? He is a dear little boy, and I don't know if what we are doing helps him, but he needs all the help he can get.

Finally, I tried out the new doc. He treated me like a person, and I think my husband will actually go to him, so that is a step in the right direction. I like it when doctors explain things. I've always been weird that way, I guess. I like to be treated as if I have a brain. Doesn't everybody?

My husband and I walked at the mall, and now I am on to my final responsibility, which is this blog. I am beginning to really appreciate it. If I look at my day in print, I think maybe I accomplished something after all!

My cousin called an hour ago. I knew when I answered the phone why she called. Her mom, my mother's youngest sister, has been in a nursing home for the past five years or so with Alzheimer's they think. Anyway. She died today. She was seventy-six, the youngest of seven children. Her oldest brother and sister are the only ones left now, and they are well into their eighties.

My cousin has been grieving for her mom since long before she entered the nursing home. My aunt's husband made the decision to put her in a home two states and five hours away, back where she grew up. My cousin would rather have been with her, but what could she do? She was not the primary caregiver.

I know my cousin has hurt over the years, in part because her siblings had limited contact with my aunt. One of them even lives in the town where her nursing home is. My cousin did not understand why they didn't have the same need to see her, to brush her hair, to make sure the doctor was doing all he could for her.

My cousin does not feel that my aunt would have wanted a viewing. She and my aunt had discussions about that back when my aunt could discuss such things. She is frustrated now because her siblings want and will have one, and I admire her mature stance; they have to do what they have to do. She was there when my aunt was alive and it counted.

She talked about going through my aunt's things and finding her autograph book. My mother's signature is in there. So is their brother Johnny's who left this earth before any of his sisters. His was a gentle spirit as I remember. She talked about something my aunt wrote, about growing up during WWII and coming to Washington, DC. About seeing Clark Gable in the flesh. About the way things were. I am glad she can see such things and remember the person her mom was. Aunt Pat will be alive as long as my cousin remembers her that way.

I did not know my aunt well, in part because of the physical distance between us, but I do know this: she was there. She cared about my mother when my mother was ill, and she was the only one of her siblings that visited her. While she was alive. When it mattered.

I wish there were some magic words I could say to make things better for my cousin, but since I have lost my own mother, I know that there are none. When you love someone, you miss them when they are no longer there. She has been missing her mom for a long time now. I guess this just put a period on the end of it. She doesn't have to visit the nursing home. She will remember my aunt as she drives down the road where they both lived for a while. As she remembers things they did together. As she touches her mother's picture. I know it will be hard for her, but my cousin did what she could while her mom was alive.

She was there.

***In loving memory of Patricia Nuzum Prentice 7/14/1928-2/7/2005*************

The prospect of changing family doctors is nerve-wracking. We were spoiled in Ohio, I guess. Our doctor was from Canada, and sometimes he would see patients until 10PM. Here, if you find a doctor who is in past four, you are lucky.

The doctor in Ohio also treated my husband and me as people, not just case studies. Here is an example. Nine years ago, I had a thyroidectomy. My goiter was older than some of the junior high students I taught, and although my thyroid hormones had never become unbalanced as I had been told they would, the goiter's size was becoming a problem. It looked like the horror stories in my fourth grade health book.

Nobody told me that there were emotional consequences for your body while your thyroid hormones were being rebalanced. The surgery was in early June, and by the end of the summer, because the endocrinologist balanced my hormones in increments, I was a mess. The surgeon had told me that in essence I had no thyroid, so the medical reason for upping the synthroid so slowly escaped me. Anyway, it just happened that my mom had died in February of that same year, but the depression that followed her death was NOTHING compared to the one without the thyroid. I really was having suicidal thoughts, and the fact that I knew there was a physiological reason for them didn't help a bit. Late one night,when I was desperate, I made an appointment with Dr. Kamp. I couldn't help it; when he walked in, I asked him to drug me or commit me. What he did was to swing a chair around, sit down on it, and tell me to talk to him. That and the fact that the man always asked about all the rest of the family whenever one of us went to see him earned him my respect. And my trust.

Then we moved to Indiana. No reasonable hours. Oh well. I could live with that if I were a person. I lost hope of being one just before I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. When I told my family doctor that I couldn't bend my left index finger, he said, "Sure you can. It just hurts," and proceeded to bend it for me. Had it been left to him, because my RA is seronegative, I would never have been diagnosed, and all of the research says that early treatment is critical.

He wasn't any better with my husband. Neither of us have ever been skinny, and since we are middle-aged, there are very few diets we haven't tried. We came to the conclusion long ago that our problem was portion control. Nevertheless, we are both rather defensive about our weight, and when my husband was diagnosed with high blood pressure, he was so defensive and depressed I doubt I could have gotten him to the doctor at all had it not been a condition for his returning to work (at least those railroad health tests are worth something). The family doctor lectured him for thirty-five minutes about his weight, and I can tell you he did not listen for more than thirty seconds. We have both heard it all beforeand although we work at it, most of the time we find it cause to pat one another on the back if we haven't GAINED weight.

Last fall, we had enough, so don't ask me why it took until February to act. The old family doctor had gone on to the big city (Indianapolis), and we were left with the new partner. At first glance he seemed OK, but by the second visit he was telling us results for tests we had that we had never been informed of or, if we had, the results were normal and he was telling us that they were not. Now I know that doctors are busy people, but so are we, and if they are going to make us take medicine, I would rather they paid attention to what OUR test results were. Whether that doctor was having a bad day or the office had recorded our results incorrectly I don't know, but it seemed time to change.

I asked around and finally found a doctor that people who have lived here for a while like and he is actually taking new patients. So tomorrow is the big day. Of course my husband sent me in first, to test the waters. I know doctors find it annoying when you have researched your own health condition, but especially with something like rheumatoid which, it has been pointed out, can shave a decade off my life expectancy, I think it would be irresponsible NOT to research. And I want to find out why the old doc was threatening my husband with cholesterol-lowering drugs when his overall cholesterol is 179. Sure, the numbers for HDL and LDL don't quite balance out like they do in the textbooks, but don't you need to take the patient as an individual? Although my husband feels duty-bound to whine about the dietary changes we have made, he really has been a good sport. We have pretty much cut out salt. I bake the meat he takes in his lunch; lunchmeat and processed foods are a rarity. And we are working on ridding ourselves of the transfats and upping the exercise.

The librarian at one of the buildings I work in said that her doctor (female and no longer taking patients) congratulates her patients if they lose weight but does not harass them. That makes sense to me, especially since the guidelines have been revised downward and if your patient is middle-aged and has never met them, chances are ......

So tomorrow is the big day. Let's hope we have found someone with a calling to medicine, and that the calling is more than dollar signs.

I don't know if it is just in what I read or not, but I have seen a LOT of articles about what happens to men who have a mid-life crisis and I don't remember seeing any about what happens to women. I think the assessments are right; men get to a certain age and figure out that they might not actually conquer all the parts of the world they set out to conquer, and so they compensate, some in wise ways and some not so wise.

I don't think women have fewer crises. I just think we react differently to figuring out that most of the world is NOT under our control. I can remember not so long ago (eight years) being so angry at one of my family members that, even four shots of whiskey in ten minutes later, I could not breathe. But you know what? All of that anger didn't change a thing. And over time, the behavior of that person hasn't permanently changed, either. I did.

I learned that the people that I love are, unfortunately, no more perfect than I am. And I love them anyway. I learned that the things they do that drive me crazy and sometimes could put them in jail or the morgue don't stop happening by the sheer force of MY will. And I learned that such things don't make those people less of a person or less of a Christian. They just make that person weak.

I know I am not the only one who has looked in the mirror in a defining moment and said to myself, "Look what you have been capable of. Be careful. If you could do this, you could do worse." That was not a moment that I particularly like to remember, but it does help me when I remember it. I don't think that there is much in this world that, given the right circumstances, I am not capable of. But having been in a bad place, I try to be alert enough that I don't end up back there or even in some place worse.

I don't know that I would define this as a crisis. I didn't, by the sheer force of my will, change all I wanted to change about my world. Much of the time, however, I am aware that MY actions are the ones for which I will be held accountable in the end. That realization is specific to each circumstance, certainly, but maybe knowing that you did all that you could and this is the best you get for it is just part of growing up. You don't quit trying. You just realize that you aren't the only one involved.

Since my husband and I are early risers and both of us hate grocery shopping, I offered to run to the store while he stayed home and took care of some chores.

Central Indiana had fog yesterday morning, but it wasn't anything like this morning! I was on the main drag, the bypass, and I couldn't see street lights until I was within fifty feet of them. The reduced visibility didn't seem to make anyone drive more safely until I was out on the state route, though.

When I was growing up, I don't think I ever saw "pea soup" like this, and I was jealous of those country kids who lived I didn't know where and got delays or cancellations because of it. When I married, though, we raised our children in a rural school district, and I got a real appreciation for fog. It changes sound and often feels like you are driving in a tunnel.

I am looking forward to the sunshine and the snow melting, so this is just a side effect. We never did get a January thaw

Since I am an itinerant teacher, I travel a lot. One of my school districts is more than ten miles away, so I was surprised but not disappointed to find out that it was closed due to this morning's fog. My children attended rural schools, and my husband and I always felt that it was better for them to make up their days than it was for the bus to take chances.

My husband's assistant called in to say it was too foggy for him to drive. I am less approving of this because of the many years my husband drove through unsafe conditions to get to work. If he was going to call in, it did not make sense for him to drive twenty five of the sixty five miles to his headquarters and then turn around.

The other school district is rural, but they did not have a delay. However, when I got there to work with my student, I found that he had been sent home with lice. I am paranoid enough that I did have the school nurse check my head. Evidently this little guy's family has been battling lice for a while now. His teacher was incensed that the mother had not told her, and I understand the teacher's concern. She does have fifteen other students. Having experience with lice, though, I felt I should inform his teacher that the mother might not have thought keeping the news to herself was irresponsible. Lice have been around a long time, but I don't know anyone who doesn't get embarrassed about having them.

At least this is not my husband's weekend to be on call. The sun is shining. The snow is melting. Maybe next Friday I won't think that it rolled around six days too late!

I know I don't understand all the ins and outs of adding links here, but I thought this editorial was worth a read. It doesn't pay for us or our president to go around with our heads in the sand, no matter where your party loyalty lies. The President IS right; we must save Social Security or at least change the way we look at it. FDR only intended it to be used as a foundation







Editorials - Marion Chronicle Tribune - www.chronicle-tribune.com

I read Exodus 33 during my quiet time this morning, and once again the whole story really touched me. I guess I should begin by saying that, although I have my quiet time in order to know God better, I am seldom able to keep my mind on what I am reading. I almost wish I did not know what stream of consciousness writing was because I know that is the state I am in when I have quiet time. The reading is two or three chapters, and I can't seem to keep my mind on what I am reading that long.

Anyway, contrast that with Moses. I have a lot of curiosity about Moses. He didn't really get to know God until he was old, but I see a lot of references where the King James, at least, refers to them as friends. That is the case with this reading. Moses comes down from the mountain with the commandments written by the finger of God, and he is hurt and dismayed to see what his people have done (that being created the golden calf). God tells Moses to take the people and leave, but that He (God) will not go with them because He might destroy them. He says this to Moses face-to-face the Bible says, the way a man would talk to his friend.The reason that gets to me is because that is the reason that I have a quiet time, to meet with God face-to-face. To know Him as a friend would. Most of the time I fall far short of that, and I am sure that He must be very disappointed with me.

Nevertheless, I think that the pursuing of God is something worth continuing. Look at what happened with Moses. I take liberties here with paraphrasing, but basically he says to God, "If You don't go with us, what's the point?" And God is quick to tell Moses that His (God's) presence will go with the people after all. Why? Because He is pleased with Moses and knows him by name.

Moses is bold enough after that to ask that God reveal His glory. Pretty bold statement from a man to his god, but not from a man to his Friend. And God honors the request, although He hides Moses in the cleft of a rock so that Moses sees only His back. No one, He says, can see His face and live. I am not a great Bible scholar, but it seems to me that Moses was the only person mentioned who was lucky enough to see God in this way.

I guess that is why I think that quiet time is worthwhile. I read my Bible because I want to know God better. And even though my contact with Him is imperfect at best, I believe that He honors the effort and that the Holy Spirit allows something, at least, to get through. That is why sometimes I recall bits of Scripture or Bible stories and suddenly see their relevance to my life.

Sort of like seeing God's hindquarters. But someday I will see His glory.

I Corinthians 13:12 Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror;then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

My husband and I are working on getting fit. We read recently in READER'S DIGEST that you have to injure your muscles to make them stronger, which means that you have to at least break a sweat, so that has been our goal with our nightly walks in the mall.

Tonight we left after a healthy meal of cream of vegetable soup, soup made with skim milk, not half and half like the recipe called for. He was going slower than usual, and finally he said he wanted to sit and I should do the second lap by myself. That is unlike him, so I waited. Finally he said that for some reason the soup had gone down wrong and he was afraid he was going to be sick.

I did go on, but I worried the whole way around. You see, yesterday one of my husband's men called to say his wife had been rushed by ambulance to Fort Wayne because of chest pains. She had a quadruple bypass two years ago at the age of forty-five. Now she is coming home, but she has had three stents inserted. Needless to say, her husband is taking the rest of the week off.

We have reached the age where losing your spouse is not a very distant possibility but becomes ever more possible with each passing day. As I walked, I tried to take comfort in the fact that he had not been sweating. I didn't think he was pale, but he wears hats and was wearing a red one, so it is hard to tell. Certainly if it were anything serious, I would have known. I wouldn't come back to his bench to find someone giving him CPR, would I?

I know. I worry too much. And it isn't just me. Not very long ago a supervisor with whom my husband works got a call in the middle of the day that his wife, also named Becky and about my age, had had a stroke. My husband, who has called me at work three times in the four years I have had this job, called me at work. To hear my voice. To make sure his Becky was OK, at least for now.

I don't know if I like knowing that I will not live forever on this earth. I mean, I have always known it, but the fact is somehow more real now. One of my favorite authors, Madeleine L'Engle, wrote in one of her books that you should love your spouse enough to let them die first. When my mother died, I grabbed my husband and point blank told him that I DIDN'T love him that much. But as I have watched my father suffer through the loneliness of being a widower, I know that I would do anything to spare my husband that. It isn't up to me anyway. I just hope I remember making that mental decision if the time comes when I have to face losing him.

What do I want to do with my life?

The people who love me have heard this too many times, so I choose to opine on my blog.

When I took the job as a teacher of the visually impaired, I did actually intend to take the courses to keep it. I was sort of disappointed that the state of Indiana did not offer the courses. Well, they did once, at Butler University. My director was very excited, and I did sign up. Too bad I was the only one in the state that did. Of course the classes were cancelled.

THEN Ball State started offering the courses, but I couldn't take them because I am not already certified in Special Ed. I can see their point. Sort of. However, very few people in their right minds would take an itinerant job for any length of time, so why not grandfather in the people who are already working the job and change the requirements for newcomers?

My third year in the job, the state said it was the last time they would issue me a limited license, and that was only because the school district couldn't find anyone else. I really expected the job to end at the end of last year, especially since the local schools are intent upon dissolving the special ed coop. The Friday before school started, therefore, I was in a little bit of a panic. It had been more than twenty years since school started without my having a job in one of them, and at that point I had not even been successful in getting my name on the sub list. Lo and behold....I got a phone call. Would I take the job one more year? I could work it as teacher of service with my current license, and the only certified VI teacher in this part of the state could be teacher of record. Not the best solution, but the only one available. It seems my job had been advertised since May with no takers. Of course not! In this state, at least, no one is being freshly certified in VI.

It is surprising to me how much more laid back I am on the job this year. I don't mean that I am shirking my responsibility. I know the job, certification or no, well enough to do it well, and I care about the kids, so I do my best. But I really find it annoying that things have to end just when I DO know the job! And since I don't want to go back to school to get certified in special ed, what am I going to do with all of the things I have learned? You have to admit that visual impairment involves some pretty specialized knowledge.

I do worry about my kids once I leave. I guess that is part of the dilemma for me. I care about kids, and I care about their educations. A lot of the time, though, I think our established systems of education are nothing more than a farce. And although it would provide income and keep me busy, I DON"T want to substitute.

I will be fifty in thirty one days. What shall I be when I grow up?