Life with teens/tweens -- I was warned!

It seems like only yesterday I was cleaning up egg yolks from the kitchen floor with Sloan....and now he is 11.  And it seems like only yesterday I was combatting possums with Emma.....and now she is 13!  Where did the time go?  (If you have no idea what I am talking about, see prior posts.)


Back then, it was both children and animals creating havoc.  Now it's not so much the animals.  It's the children, including mouths and attitudes!  I was warned about this age!  Kind of like I was told about pregnancy and childbirth.  The truth is that no one can explain these milestones to the degree that you can experience them.  For example, no one thought to tell me that after childbirth, my feet would increase two shoe sizes and I would have no shoes to wear home from the hospital.  I mean, who thinks of those details?  I can tell you that when I talk to expectant mothers, I do not tell them about the labor, the birth, the weight gain, the morning sickness, or the complete and utter exhaustion following delivery (which really never stops).  I tell them to get some new shoes to wear home!  So with the teen/tween years, I was told by others about the disrespect, the eye rolling, the hormones, and the chaos, but it didn't impact me as much as actually living with these little aliens!  Who came and took my children away?


Emma is now 5'8" and Sloan is 5'3" -- though he will argue with that measurement.  He swears he is as tall as me.  Only one more inch, baby!  But I will just keep buying higher heels!  Now when I discipline them -- which is often -- I make them sit down.  I can put on the mad mama face and shake my finger at them, and it has a much better effect than when I am looking up at them. 


As an example, I was out of town earlier this week traveling for business.  I pulled into the driveway mid-afternoon, before the kids got home from school, and saw Little Bear, our oldest cat who is no longer "little", walking across the front yard.  This is the cat that I left inside who should have remained inside.  I opened the front door and Raven greeted me.  Raven is our lab; I left her outside and she should have remained outside.  I walked to the back of the house.  The back door was standing wide open.  For those of you who have followed my posts, this gives you a good idea of how animals end up in my house!  I next walked through the house to make sure nothing was missing.  It was not.  If anyone had wanted to take anything from the house, they would have fallen over all of the Christmas decorations that I haven't finished putting up any way.  No one had broken into the house.  Instead, Sloan had come over while I was out of town to play his video game.  Keep in mind, he was supposed to come feed the animals.  He not only didn't feed the animals, he left the back door unlocked.  I don't think I have ever mentioned this, but Raven is a sweet dog but not very bright.  She does not engage in typical lab-like activities such as fetching.  She could care less about balls or sticks.  The one thing she knows how to do is to open the back door.  It is quite easy.  She just puts a paw on the handle and it opens. I have no idea how long the back door was open, how many bugs/birds/animals got into my house or how much heat was pumped into my backyard. Sloan got the mad mama face and the discipline of doing extra chores.


So in addition to some of this behavior (which has somewhat continued from their childhood), there are the mouths!  They know everything, much more than their mama of course, because I am from the "pioneer days."  I guess that is at least a step up from the Paleolithic era.  But still.....  One of them asked me one day if we had spoons when I was a child.  Seriously??!!  I'm pretty sure they got a swat for that, and it actually deserved a wooden spoon!  I am told multiple times a week that I am "weird" (usually with a little smile) but then I remind them that they are my offspring, so the weirdness will be inherited.  Good luck, my future son- and daughter-in-law!  I can no longer kiss them in public which is a little sad, so I tackle them when I get them home and hold them down to smother them with kisses.  Problem is, they can typically break the hold.....they are growing up.  About all I can do now is say a little prayer.  Well, and possibly lock them down in the basement for the next 5 years.....

And now the Dirt....in honor of Domestic Violence Awareness Month

I can't let October come to an end without emphasizing the importance of domestic violence awareness.  This is not just some general PSA.  At one time, years ago, I was a public relations manager working with a company that did -- and still does -- have initiatives in place to bring awareness to domestic violence, with the goal of ending this scourge .  I worked on projects supporting this initiative, never thinking that I could be a victim.  That was always "somebody else."   I could never imagine that I could let myself into a relationship like that, yet I did.....


I met him at church.  How is that for ironic?  This drop-dead handsome man came and sat beside me during one of the services.  He chatted with me before the service started, saying he had noticed me around church, he was going through a divorce, and he just wanted to get to know me.  Before the service ended, he handed me a piece of paper with his name and number on it and asked me to call him.  Well, even as handsome as he was, with everything I had going on in my life (children and animals and such), it was several days before I called him.  He was on the side of the road, fixing his flat tire with his sleeping child in the back of the car.  Of course, this prompted images of a man that could fix things and take care of his family at the same time.  A sweet vision.  He was going out of town but said he would call me when he got back so we could go out.


Well, that started it.  It was non-stop from there.  He called from Beaufort, saying he was coming back early so that we could go out.  We met at a local restaurant.  I had a glass of wine.  He had a water.  We got to know each other.  I learned he was from NY and was going through his second divorce.  He had been a model with the Ford Modeling Agency.  He had two kids, from two separate wives.    He had been a bartender at Studio 54 back during "the day."  He remodeled homes.  He had lives in Florida.  I was mesmerized.  He had such a different background from me -- so exotic, at least from that first description.  From that point on, which was in December, we started seeing each other often. 


In March of the following year, a friend of mine from high school invited us to come visit her in Florida.  I hadn't seen her in awhile, so I was looking forward to catching up.  For purposes of this blog, I will call this guy JA2 (which will be familiar to any of you who have been reading my blogs).  JA2 drove the entire trip to Florida.  When we got there, my friend offered us drinks.  JA2 took full advantage of the alcohol.  To this point, I had never known him to drink heavily.  We looked at photos and caught up from the past few months.  Once we all went up to our rooms to go to bed, JA2 started screaming at me about one of the guys who was in one of the photos with me.  He wanted to know why I hadn't told him about this past boyfriend.  I was in total shock.  First, I honestly had forgotten I had dated the guy.  Second, really, what did it matter and why was he this upset?  I was curled up in a ball on the bed, not knowing what to do, through this verbal tirade.  He called me every name in the book, things nobody else EVER would have said to me.  At some point -- when I realized my friend or her husband was not hearing or was not interfering with what was going on -- I told JA2 that I was going to call a taxi and have them take me to the airport.  He then begged meo stay.  This went on and on for probably a couple of hours.  Eventually, he went to sleep and I went to sleep and I wondered what on earth I had gotten myself into.  The next morning, he apologized, saying he hadn't had anything to eat and had drank too much.  He then apologized to my friend and her husband, who both said they had the TV on in their room and hadn't heard a word.  I intended to come back to Greenville and break off the relationship.


I do not remember what all he did to charm his way back into my good graces, but he did, and this became a pattern.  He asked me to marry him in May, only five months after we met.  This should have set off some alarms, just as the Florida trip should have.  I told him I would think about it, as his divorce was still not final and I still had concerns about his behavior, specifically his jealousy.


I won't go into all of the details (as that is a book, not a blog), but throughout the courtship and eventual marriage, the abuse escalated from the verbal abuse that started in Florida, to physical abuse that included fractured ribs on two occasions, a torn ligament in one finger and bruises that were too many to count, though they were always concentrated in areas covered by clothing.  Typically, this involved heavy drinking on his part, followed by accusations that were completely paranoia-induced, then I would attempt to leave the house.  He usually grabbed my keys and/or cell phones, so I was reduced to going to the local elementary school playground or somewhere else I could hide until he passed out and I could come home.  I cannot begin to express the humiliation I felt.  I had worked hard to pay for this house and to renovate it and to work in the yard -- to make it my own.  It was my place of refuge after my ex-husband left me with my two small children years ago.  I paid all of the bills.  Yet JA2 was forcing me out of that house because I knew he would hurt me if I stayed.  At times, I was able to get my keys and get to my mom's house, or get my purse and get to a hotel.  I even stayed in a shelter, and it was awful.  I kept coming back home, though, and he kept apologizing and promising to get help.


We went to counseling.  He told me that I had promised to be married to him until death do us part.  My ex-husband (JA1) was trying to use anything as leverage to cut his child support (my kids were not home during any of these episodes by the way).  My lawyer told me that in order to divorce JA2, I would need to move out with the kids -- from my own home that I owned and was paying for, including all of the bills.  None of this seemed right.  I don't think God intended for marriage to include abuse.  I don't think it's right that I should have to leave my home when my current husband is abusive.  I thought he should leave.  It was not an easy situation.


I had called the police on a couple of occasions and ended up dropping charges.  In one case, JA2 agreed to take anger management classes.  Obviously they didn't work.  He didn't change.


Finally, in January 2013, I had a business trip to NJ.  Business trips did not go over well with JA2 at all.  As a matter of fact, my work didn't go over well with him.  He didn't think I should wear makeup to work.  He didn't think I should meet with my boss ever in an office without someone else present.  He thought that if he was feeling sad (typically about our relationship), I should stay home with him or else work was "more important than our relationship."  It was a no-win situation.  Regardless, I had to go on this trip.  I had a late flight back to Greenville.  I called him from the airport and he told me that he was on a website that showed cameras in airports and he could see me --he could see me talking to someone.  I knew this was not true, as I had not spoken to a soul in that airport.  It was just strange, but typical with him.  I got to Greenville around 10 pm and on the drive home from the airport, I called him.  I could tell he had been drinking, just from his voice.  I asked him if we could have calmness that night, as I was SO tired from the trip.  I asked if he had been drinking.  His response was that I was just going to ruin the night.  "Why do you always have to do that?" he said.


When I got home, he met me at the door, with two glasses of wine.  I was carrying three bags into the house and asked if he could help me.    I took one sip of wine and then he started in on me with the verbal assaults.  I told him I was going to check into a hotel, as I was exhausted.  As I was opening the door, he slammed it violently and knocked me on the floor.  He sat on top of me and grabbed my head, banging it repeatedly on the floor.  He got my purse and dumped all of the contents on me.  He tore up everything in it he could get his hands on.  He tore open a bag of potato chips that I had bought in the airport restaurant and emptied it on my face.  He tore up my key ring and threw keys all over the room.  He got my car charger and stretched the cord, acting like he was going to choke me with it.  I was scared to death but had this hymn running through my head the whole time.  I was blocking out everything he was saying but wondering if I was going to make it through this night.  At some point, he got off of me.  I tried repeatedly to get out of the house, either through the front or back doors.  I tried to stay in the front of the house, in the dining room where there are no curtains where somebody could possibly see what was going on.  Eventually, hours later, I was able to find my car key and run out of the house, with no shoes on, to my car.  I had my phone as well, so I called 911 and a police officer met me in a parking lot down the street.  AH2 was arrested that night around 1 am (and was also charged with resisting arrest as well as CDV -- criminal domestic violence), and that night marks the end of my communications with him. 


While he was in jail, I had him served with divorce papers.  As a condition of his bond, he was ordered not to come within 200 feet of me.  It has been nearly two years, and yet his trial has not taken place.  It most likely will not be scheduled until next January, two years after that horrible night, one of many.


It is because of this story -- and so, so many others that occurred with JA2 that only I know about (because he was too drunk to remember and I told no one else what was going on) -- that I want to encourage everyone I know to understand that domestic violence is out there.  It does not discriminate based on race, education, socio-economics, or any other factor.  It is there and is prominent especially in SC, 2nd in the nation for deaths related to domestic violence.  It is a big topic in October, but we can't just focus on it one month of the year.  Men should never hit women.  Nor should they squeeze, choke, intimidate, or verbally abuse women.  Women should not be in fear of men who are supposed to love them.  Domestic violence should not happen to anyone.  Period. 

When a Pheasant Can Fly Through Your Window, it is not Energy Efficient

This may sound crazy to those who know my kids, but when Sloan was in fourth grade and Emma was in fifth, I decided to let them stay home by themselves starting the month before school ended.  That was going to be the trial to see if they could stay by themselves for the summer.  They had to sign this agreement:

We, Emma and Sloan Skelton, agree that staying at home by ourselves is a privilege and a responsibility.  We agree that the results of this trial will determine whether we are able to stay home by ourselves during summer vacation or whether we will go to the YMCA Day Camp for the summer. 

We agree that we will walk directly home from school and will never invite friends over while we are unattended.  We agree that we will not talk to strangers or ride with strangers.  We agree that we will always take our house keys to school.  We agree to always keep our cell phone handy so that we can call our parents if needed and they can call us.  We agree that as soon as we get home, we will immediately do our homework without interruption.  We also agree that when we are finished with homework, we will do chores in the house which will include the following:

S
weep and/or mop hardwood floors

Load dishwasher if needed
Clean kitchen counter
Clean bedrooms
Vacuum rugs if needed
Any other chores as designated by your parents

After – and ONLY after – homework is done and chores are completed, can we watch TV or get on the computer, or we can also go outside in the backyard to play.  Only parent-approved websites are permitted on electronics (YouTube is not allowed without supervision).  Time on electronics, including TV, computer, cell phones, and iPods, is limited to one hour during this time.  At no time will we ever answer the door when we are home alone.

We agree that we will honor these agreements by signing this document.  We know that honesty and integrity guides us in all that we do and in all that we agree to do.  We agree that if we do not abide by these agreements, we will forfeit our right to stay home unattended during the summer.

 

They agreed to sign the agreement and did very well in abiding by the terms.  I would call them or they would call me once they got home from school.  So we got to that last week of school that is pretty much useless in that the kids go 1/2 days for about a week and really do nothing, and all of the parents' work schedules are all jacked up trying to accommodate the Greenville County School schedule.




Emma called me one of those days and I was on a conference call at work.  As soon as it was over, I called her back and asked the usual questions, "How was your day at school?  What did you do?"  Before I could get the entire second question out of my mouth, Emma said, "Mom, we need to get to the point here."  I was shocked, literally, with my jaw dropped open.  How dare she speak to me like that?  So I said, "Exactly what is the point?"  She tried to explain the "point" as I struggled to hear, as Sloan was screaming in the background.  She said, "Mom, there is some kind of bird in the house.  It looks like a turkey bird.  It is under the dining room table.  At first we thought you had gotten a chicken and then we saw that the window in the living room was busted out."  (Now, just to explain, I have been wanting chickens for at least a year now.  How great would it be to have fresh eggs for breakfast?  But I can assure you, I had not purchased any chickens, and if I had, I would not have allowed them to walk around in my house.)  Sloan, wanting to get in on the action, grabbed the phone from Emma's hand, and said, "Mom, you are not gonna believe this bird.  I will send you a pic of it." 




So I told him to send me a picture and told them to leave the bird alone and I would be there soon.  Emma said they had also called their dad (because they were with him that night) and he was on the way.




In a matter of minutes,  their dad, JA1, called and said this was some strange bird that was in the house, but that he was taking the kids and I could take care of the bird.  I said, "Whoooahhhhh.  Can't you do something with the bird?"  In typical JA1 fashion, he said he could get the laundry basket and put it on top of the bird.  I was not looking forward to coming home to a Tide-smelling turkey-bird that was clamoring to get out of a laundry basket, so I asked if he could get one of the kids to go get the dog kennel and put it in there.  He agreed.




Even though he agreed, I had no idea what to expect when I got home.  This is what I came home to:

Well, that and and lots of broken glass in the living room from the window that the pheasant flew through!  I did not capture that in a photo.  Just too much going on at the time.  My first thought was that somebody in the neighborhood had lost a beautiful pet bird, so I posted the picture on our neighborhood website.  Other than comments about how pretty the bird was, I got nothing.  My dad had also left me a message in the meantime.  He said, "Angie, I came by your house today and you either bought a chicken or your parakeet has been eating a lot."  It was actually hilarious, especially in hindsight, because he and Emma had been on the same page.  They both thought I had bought a chicken.  Only my father had not seen the glass.  He REALLY thought I had gone out and bought a bird that I was allowing to wander through my house!

I started going door to door in my neighborhood.  This was really weird.  One of my neighbors looked up the bird and realized it was a male golden pheasant!  I truly did not know what to do with the thing.  Finally, I carried it down to the basement (still in the dog kennel) and thought I'd let it wander around down there until I found out where it was supposed to be.  All kinds of thoughts were going through my head, like what kind of noises does this bird make in the middle of the night?  It is going to jolt me awake with some shrieking sound?  It was at this point that I decided to call the wildlife hotline.  It is an IVR.  There are options for all kinds of wildlife -- deer, snakes, etc., but absolutely nothing for a golden pheasant!!  I took my chance and selected one of the options, thinking nobody is going to call me back (note that I had left a message on this same hotline once before when Sloan "mistakenly" shot a bluebird and never got a call back.)  Within 5 minutes, somebody called me back.  She said that ironically, she and her daughter had been in Travelers Rest the previous week and saw a female pheasant walking on the side of the road.  They were both amazed because these birds aren't indigenous to SC at all!  So she was quite surprised when she got my call.  Her thought was that maybe somebody was hauling them to a lodge for pheasant hunting and some of them escaped.  She was curious to see my male pheasant and agreed to take him to her.  I was nervous walking down the basement steps, thinking I would have to corral the thing back into the dog kennel, but he had not moved.  Apparently I scared him as much as he scared me!

I took him to the wildlife rescue person in Travelers Rest and was completely amazed once she got him out of the cage and I could see how absolutely beautiful this bird was!  So many gorgeous colors on one bird that somehow flew into my house!  Simply amazing.....  She was going to try to find a home for him or just keep him herself.  I couldn't blame her, especially once I saw how majestic this bird was.

I drove back home thinking, is there some message here?  I mean, why would a bird just fly into a random window in a random house?  My first thought was that maybe I should go buy lottery tickets.  Actually I think I did, and of course, nothing came of it.  I did an Internet search (because, of course, everything on the Internet is true!) and below are "pheasant messages":

Using your gifts to get what you want.

Knowing when to express yourself and when to refrain from doing so.

Being aware of when to protect yourself and your loved ones.

Being creative, productive, and tapping into the passions that burn within you.

So I am still trying to figure out the gifts and the creativity piece, and knowing when to hold my tongue is apparently very important as well.  In the meantime, my dad fixed my window (though the local hardware store guy thinks he is crazy because who would believe that a pheasant caused all of this?) and I am just thinking how lucky I am that I got to share my house with a golden pheasant.  Oh yes, and then I really did get my windows replaced......



SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSeriously?

When Sloan entered fourth grade, he was lucky enough to have a teacher that loved science, biology and animals.  She had various animals in her room in aquariums -- fish, lizards, snakes, frogs, etc.-- magnets for little boys.  Sloan was mesmerized by the snakes and begged me to have one of his own.  Of course, I balked.  No way would I have a snake in this house.  We had enough animals and I am not too keen on snakes.  For weeks, he asked, all the while telling me how it would be "educational" for him, which he knew to be a catch phrase for me.  He promised he would pay for the snake all by himself and would earn enough money to pay to feed the snake.  Nope, I was not going to give in. 


Then JA2 enters the picture and sides with the boy because he had a snake himself at one point and it was very "cool." 


So between the two of them, they located three coeds in Clemson on Craigslist who realized after they purchased two baby corn snakes, they would not be able to keep them in their apartment unless they paid a pet deposit.  They had to unload the snakes, along with the aquarium, the light, and everything required to keep a snake.  I'm still not sure how the three girls ended up with two snakes but they were willing to part with it all for $60 which was the equivalent of Sloan's savings in his piggy bank.


After witnessing the coeds handle the snakes, Sloan handle the snakes, and even Emma handle the snakes, I gave in.   Heck it was a good deal and I am all about good deals.  Plus Sloan PROMISED me he would take care of them all by himself and would earn money to pay for their food.  (Somebody please slap me the next time I believe that line!)  I even touched one of them and they were not nearly as slimy as I thought they would be.


I will have to admit that I enjoyed watching the snakes once we got them home.  They were only maybe 10" long, so they weren't that intimidating.  Watching them eat thawed baby mice was quite interesting too; as long as we weren't feeding them live mice, I was fine with that.  So Sloan was true to his word -- for maybe three weeks.  Then he got bored with them.  I had to remind him to feed them, remind him to handle them, remind him to change their light from daytime to nighttime.  Ugggg.  Lesson learned, again, by a mama after the fact.


So at some point, I had to go to Atlanta for a few days for work.  The ONLY responsibility I left for my son and his dad, my ex, was to come by the house once a week and take care of the animals, primarily the snakes.  On my second day out of town, I got a voicemail from my ex that went something like this, "Can you call me as soon as you get this message?  We have a minor emergency we need to discuss."  I heard that message and really thought long and hard about whether to even call back.  The last time he left a message like this was when "my son" had peed in his bathroom when he was a toddler and started a small fire.  These are not calls you look forward to returning.


After promising myself that I would have a glass of wine at the end of the conversation to at least provide an incentive, I made the call back to the ex.  He said that he and Sloan came by the house to check on the snakes.  They had come by previously (which I thought was the day before but later learned it was TWO days before) and fed the snakes.  For those of you who have never owned multiple reptiles, one thing to remember here is that they cannot be fed together.  They have separate feeding environments, which are basically plastic containers that stack on top of each other.      Apparently two days is too long, at least in my house, to keep snakes in their feeding containers, as they were knocked over and the tops opened, reportedly by a curious kitty cat.  My ex assured me that they looked for the snakes and could not find them, so they were both absolutely positive that the cat ate them both.  All I could think of was that neither this man nor his son can spot mayonnaise in front of them in the refrigerator -- how could they have really looked for these snakes?  Plus this was my ex who could probably care less if snakes are crawling around in my house!


I went through the next day of work, with thoughts of snakes running through my mind all day, along with the dread of walking into the house after driving 2 hours back from Atlanta.  Once I got home, though, I walked in the house, parked my luggage in the living room, yelled out to the children that I was home, and immediately walked to Sloan's room and started looking under the bed, in the closet, in his bookshelves, in his clothes, everywhere, to see if I could find snakes.  Meanwhile, Sloan yells out, while watching some TV program that was apparently very spellbinding, "Mom, chill out!  The cat ate the snakes."  That may have made him feel better, but it most definitely did not make me feel better.  My cat likes to play with moles in the front yard but does not EAT the moles.  So I figured the snakes were either limping along (do snakes limp?) after being a play toy for my cat, had escaped my cat, or were behind some major appliance mummifying.  Disregarding Sloan's reassurances, I tore the house apart, on a mission to find the snakes or some remnants of snakes.  I found NOTHING. 


For the next month, I could not get in bed without checking under the covers.  I would not get up at night in the dark without turning on the light first.  (How terrifying would it be to step on a snake in your bare feet??).  I would not stick my hand in a drawer or a closet without looking around first.  I had my own safety checklist to avoid snakes.  And it wasn't the thought of the snakes themselves that scared me as much as it was the thought of the snakes surprising me and giving me a heart attack! 


After that month and no snakes, I focused on smelling.  Surely they would have died and would be decomposing somewhere.  But besides the smells of a 9 year old boy, there were no other bad smells in the house.  Again, NOTHING.


For those of you who are sssssssssssssseriously scared of snakes, there is not a good ending to this story.  I never found the snakes, dead or alive.  To this day, I don't know what happened to them.  What I do know is this:  I will never own snakes again, nor any other reptile.  Ever.  I promise.  Not even if Sloan begs and agrees to pay with his own money.  Never, ever........ 

It's a Bird, It's a Plane, It's a SHARK???

Here is another Emma/Sloan "incident" that dates back to 2012, which is when I wrote this (somewhat revised):

 

Last week at work was pretty much devoted to preparation for our Deep Dive meeting which was scheduled from 9-2 on Friday.  Friday morning, I woke up the kids with a “good morning, hope you slept well, and I need your help getting ready and getting out of the house this morning” talk.  In other words, I cannot keep reminding you to brush your teeth, brush your hair, put your clothes on, make your beds, feed the cat, feed the birds, etc.  My goal was to get out of the house by 7:30.  It was a rushed morning because, no matter how much I lecture, Sloan is just easily distracted.  If he spots his Nerf gun while he is putting on his shoes, well the Nerf gun will take priority.  So we are finishing up with breakfast by around 7:15 and I give them the countdown – 15 minutes and we have to leave.  Brush teeth, get bookbags, get jackets.  I go back to my bedroom to brush my teeth and finish getting ready and after about 5 or so minutes, I hear them calling, "We need your help.”  I yell from the back of the house, “GET READY TO GO.”  After a few seconds, I hear again, “We NEED your help.”  This time, I can tell something is wrong.  So both JA2 (who had become my husband by then -- refer to a prior post for definition of "JA2") and I run to the front of the house where the screaming is coming from.  The kids are both outside in the driveway and Emma is holding her remote for her AirSwimmer.  In case you don’t know what an AirSwimmer is, it is a 4-5’ long helium filled shark.  She is frantically jerking on the controls and looking upward to a very small fish in the sky.  I completely LOSE it.  Not only were they told to do everything they can to help us get out on time but they had both been told that they could not bring this shark outside unless a parent was present.  Emma had gotten the present from Santa Claus and had only played with it one or two days inside.  (Which meant I couldn’t say, “EMMA, I PAID $70 FOR THAT THING.”)  The neighbors probably are going to report me to DSS because I was yelling at the top of my voice from the porch for them to GET INSIDE NOW.  And I probably made several threats. 

 

So by that time, I am ranting and raving about how disobedient they had been and TODAY, of all days, why did they decide to do this?  Emma is in the bathroom crying and then doesn’t want to come out because her eyes are swollen up and she doesn’t want to go to school that day.  Sloan just keeps saying, “I am so sorry, mommy.”  And JA2 is out riding the streets with the AirSwimmer remote trying to get within range of the doggone shark.  He asked several people in the neighborhood if they saw the swimming shark and at least one of them asked if he had been drinking that morning.    He said he saw it in a nose dive so it has to be in someone’s backyard and I can just imagine the look on their face……

 

So I am at a loss on whether to try to find the thing because I did spend money on it or just let it go because Emma does not deserve a flying shark.  I am also debating whether to put up a sign in the neighborhood – you know under the Missing Cat sign – advertising we have a Missing Flying Shark.  Just wondering how many prank calls I will get.

 

So if you see a shark flying by or hear of someone who has found one in their backyard, please let me know.  Until then, both kids are on restrictions……..

Monkey Business



Okay so I am trying to keep all of these stories in order but I could possibly skip some here or there that I will need to come back to later!  The reason I started keeping track of these was because I was forgetting them or forgetting details...and it has only gotten worse with age or possibly due to having minor nervous breakdowns throughout the years!  :)

So this one, as you can guess, goes back to the "monkey story" I referred to in my last post.  Here is what happened back in the 2012 timeframe......

As I am getting ready to literally walk out the door to go to work, I realized that Sloan was not in the house.  Emma was in her room and said she would look for Sloan.  She found him in the front yard with his bow and arrow and a stuffed monkey duct taped to the tree (see above picture).   I went into the house, got my phone and came outside to take a picture because nobody would believe this unless they saw it (well maybe some of you would considering you know my kids).  Sloan walked up behind me and asked why I was taking a picture and I explained to him that it was for the state mental hospital records because he was going to be picked up this afternoon.  I also explained to him that it was not a good idea to shoot in the direction of the street when kids were walking down the street to get to school – and his aim is not the best with a skinny tree and a small monkey.  I turned to walk back in the house and realized he had walked out and shut the door behind him -- the door that automatically locks.  So I made him check every door and every window to see if we could get back into the house.  We could not.  So I sent the kids to school, walking by themselves which is something they have always wanted to do but I would never let them, while I figured out how to get inside.  Meanwhile, I am sure that Sloan is telling Emma he is going to do this again tomorrow so they can walk to school by themselves tomorrow……

 

I eventually got in touch with my mother who was over on my side of town for a dermatologist’s appointment.  She has an extra key, so she came by and let me in.  So this is how I started my day.  And the monkey stayed duct taped to the tree in my front yard for several days.  I guess I should be thankful that Sloan found a stuffed monkey rather than the kitty cat!  AGGGGGGGGGG!!!!!!!



So let's start with some background, leading up to my 8/13 post.  This leads me to believe I am not going to be a regular blogger by the way.  It has taken me this long to log back in!  So here we go, back to the early days with the kids (to be continued).....

How can you ever doubt there is a God when you have a child?  From the moment of conception until birth – and beyond – it is all a miracle.  No way did all of these molecules just magically come together and create these beings that are so perfect and wonderfully adapted to a mother’s body and care.  From that moment on, there is a bond between a mother and child that is unlike any other.

 

Almost immediately, children’s personalities begin to develop.   Emma was a sweet child but went through a bout of colic that nearly drove me insane and definitely drove me to tears many nights.  Nothing would stop the crying except to breast feed her for hours at a time, literally.  She would start crying at around 5 and continue until 10 pm, like clockwork.  I couldn’t hand her to her father for calming because he obviously did not have the tools necessary to do the job, nor did he have the patience if he had the tools!   At about 12 weeks, the colic stopped finally and she went about her perfect little baby life.  She was a cherished child, because her dad and I had tried for so long to get pregnant and did not think we could have a baby.  After multiple inseminations and in vitro fertilizations, I had begun to fill out adoption papers, desperate for a baby.  We tried one last in vitro, using 5 fertilized eggs.  Gulp…  We had run out of money and I had run out of emotional fortitude to continue the ongoing doctor’s visits and shots.  But hallelujah, that last in vitro worked and nine months later, our precious Emma was born!

 

At my postnatal checkup, I had a very important question for my doctor – “What happened to my breasts?”  He stammered around for an answer, which I found very confusing because surely he had been asked this question before.    A baby is born and the life is completely sucked out of the mother’s breasts!   After giving me some serious doctor answer that went something like, “Well pregnancy affects women many different ways….blah, blah, blah”, he had his own question for me which was “What kind of birth control can I prescribe for you?”  I laughed (though the last laugh turned out to be on me) and told him that after trying for at least three years to get pregnant with my daughter, with the help of many different fertility methods, I was not worried about birth control.

 

Turns out, Emma’s birth must have “cleared me out” as I heard from several people, because when Emma was six months old, I got pregnant ON MY OWN!  Well, actually with a little help from my husband.  But no doctor’s offices, no shots, no blood being drawn!  Emma was going to have a little brother, and he was most anxious to make his entrance into the world, as he arrived three weeks early!  When I was in labor, the nurse was telling the corniest jokes to keep me from thinking about the labor pains, and I swear when Sloan was born, he immediately started laughing.  What a great way to come into this life – early and laughing!

 

The laughter never stops completely because there is so much life, so much adventure, and so much utter craziness in this house.  Laughter is central, but for some reason, animals have played a starring role, along with the children. 

 

As of right now, we have had interactions with a baby possum, a golden pheasant, a couple of corn snakes, a stuffed monkey, an ant colony, a flying shark, a nasty rat, multiple parakeets, dogs and cats, oh and don’t forget the occasional jackass.  It is a veritable zoo in this house.

 

I guess the first of those animals was/is the husband and father as the “jackass.”  From here on out, he will be referred to as JA1, leading the reader to rightfully assume there are more jackasses to follow.  So anyway, right before Emma turned 2 and when Sloan was 9 months old, he informed me that he had found his “soul mate” and wanted a divorce.   It’s funny, but not really funny – ironic – that I thought that’s what I was to him.  I mean we were married, loved each other, had gone through years of trying to have children and finally had them!  Yet now, when I thought we had it all, it all crumbled around me.   I had no husband, no job, and no financial security, yet I did have two beautiful children, a home, a supportive family, a loving God, a great church and the faith that I could get through this storm.

 

Faith intertwined with laughter was the antidote for those times.  I remember one day, after I had gotten a temp job and was at work, I got a voicemail message from my then-ex husband asking me to call him because of something “my son” had done.  By this time, Sloan was a nearly two years old.  Turns out, he had gotten out of bed that morning and was watching cartoons and drinking chocolate milk when he realized he needed to go pee pee.  He walked to the bathroom and without turning the light on, went to pee.  He missed the toilet, which was the start of a long and illustrious career of missing the toilet, and hit the electrical outlet at the base of the toilet.  As a side note, my ex lived in an old house with old wiring.  Sloan started an electrical fire in the bathroom, so everything that was plugged up was ruined.  Of course, my first question was if my little boy’s “wee wee” was okay! (Isn’t there some kind of “arcing” that can take place and electrocute??)  Oh no, my ex assured me that Sloan was perfectly fine but in trouble for causing a mess in his bathroom.  My only thought was…..why didn’t I think of this sooner?  I would have had him peeing all over the ex’s house!  And when I told my friends at work, my son’s new nickname became “Sparky!”

 

Not only did he create mischief at JA1’s house, but he did his fair share at mine!  Those terrible twos!  The day before Easter, the kids participated in an Easter egg hunt and games at a nearby church.  It was great.  They had fun and also heard the Easter story about Jesus, not the bunny.  The next day, as I was getting ready for church, I left the kids in the den watching cartoons.  While Emma watched Dora the Explorer, Sloan was doing his own exploring….in the refrigerator!  He tossed – no he threw – eggs all over the kitchen.  He got the idea from the egg toss at the church!  When I came into the kitchen, he was standing beside the counter with yolk and egg shells all over his face, not really sure what all the fuss was about.  Dora was apparently so exciting that Emma did not even notice the flying eggs in the adjoining room.  Sloan and I went through an entire roll of paper towels cleaning the eggs off the floor.  After the eggs were cleaned up, I went into my bathroom to finish getting ready and there was Sloan, drinking water out of the toilet with my shaving cream top!  Amazingly, he never got sick and we actually made it to church on time.  And by that time, I was in serious need of some sermonizing…..

 

Emma did not let Sloan have all the “fun” though.  She was not quite the mischief maker that Sloan was, but had her “Emma” adventures, some through no fault of her own.  When she was around six years old, I was putting her to bed.  I had elaborate bedtime rituals for both kids, usually involving much singing and some tossing of children (note that no eggs were ever tossed after the Easter episode).  Favorite songs included Jesus Loves Me, The Itsy Bitsy Spider (which included hand reenactments on each child’s naked back), Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog, and whatever song was last on the radio that day.  After going through the bedtime ritual with Sloan,  I came into Emma’s room to put her to bed.  As I took one of the pillows off the bed, I saw what I thought was a stuffed animal underneath it.  Then it moved!!!  It was not a stuffed animal.  It was a LIVE BABY POSSUM.  Under my baby’s pillow!!  We both screamed, and as we screamed, it jumped off the bed, and we jumped on the bed simultaneously.   Sloan, of course not wanting to miss out on any excitement, came running into the room and asked what was going on.  Immediately, I told him to jump on the bed with us!  So we were all standing on Emma’s twin bed, not exactly sure what to do.  I am sure the possum was under the bed, just as scared as we were.  After a few minutes of pure chaos, I told them we would all jump off and run quickly to the door.  On the count of three, we did, without a possum in pursuit.  I closed both doors to the room, and just to be safe (and because there is not one even floor, door or window in my house), I stuffed towels under both doors.

 

Emma slept with me that night, rather peacefully actually after experiencing a possum in her bed.  I called my then-boyfriend (who eventually will be referred to as JA2), and he said he had been doing some work in the basement that day and had the door open which is most likely how the possum entered the house.  He said that he would take care of the possum the next day.  I did not ask questions, as I did not really want to know details…..

 

So the next day, we were having one of those “difficult” mornings where I could not get the kids to cooperate.  So I hit on a great idea.  They were still very curious about the possum because, according to Emma, it was just so “cute,” so I told them that if they got ready in the next five minutes, we would go into her bedroom and see if we could take a peek.  These are the lengths a working mom will go to so she can get her children out the door on time!  Armed with a broom, I cracked open the door, and the kids and I peeked in very quietly.  Nothing.  So I tiptoed in and very gently lifted the pillow with the end of the broom.  He was there, under the pillow, comfy as he could be.  I will have to admit, he did look cute from the head up and from a distance away.  So there.  Kids were ready for daycare, we saw the possum, the boyfriend was coming to take care of him, and we could leave.  Oh yes and then I needed to come home and disinfect the entire room.

 

I got home from work that day to find the possum in a cage on the deck.  At that point I realized how very un-cute he was!  He had this long, curly, rat-like tail and a nasty hiss!   That creature had been in my baby’s bed!   So JA2, who actually was not a JA all the time, took him out to some field far away and released him, and that was the end of the possum story.

 

As an aside, we do not live in the country.  We actually live in the City of Greenville close to downtown.  Though we are in an urban area, we have a fairly large lot.  I love it because the back of the yard is my little secret forest.  There are large pines and a path that I created for my “timeout” area.  It is so serene, possibly because of its history.   This goes back to the time right after JA1 left and I was a single mom living in this house that needed a lot of work, including yard work.   The back of the yard was a mess, with English Ivy, briars and downed trees preventing me from even walking in some areas of the yard.  My dad and I worked outside when the children were with their father.  We pulled ivy up like it was a rug.  It was back-breaking work that took months.  One day as I was working outside by myself, I came across some bricks that were buried just under the surface.  They were old bricks, laid out symmetrically, forming a triangle.  They were beautiful old bricks, so I dug them up, intending to use them as a patio or to line a path.  I also dug up a couple of old gate posts, planning to use them at the entrance to my path.  Interestingly, an old stone wall lines the back of my yard.  Other than digging in the triangle formed by the bricks hoping to find some buried treasure (and finding none), I gave these things no real thought.

 

One Sunday, though, as I was working in the yard -- and in hindsight, probably should have gone to church -- I did give these items some more thought.  I had come into the house to get a drink and to rest for a minute when I heard a knock on my front door.  It was my next door neighbor who was also, shame-on-him, working in his yard on Sunday morning.  He was cutting a large tree that had fallen long ago.  His question to me when I opened the door was, “Do you know if somebody was buried in my backyard?”  Well, at that point, I KNEW I should have gone to church.  I immediately asked if he was talking about a pet or some type of animal.  No, he wanted to know if a person had been buried in the back yard.  In my mind, at some point, I am sure I would have been happy to bury JA1 in the back yard, but no, I am too much of a rule-follower to ever do such a thing.  Plus I knew I could never live with myself. 

 

Turns out, when the tree rolled after my neighbor cut off a section of it, he had unearthed a tombstone.  It was a legitimate tombstone along with the footstone and had a name and date on it from the late 1800’s.   It was both very cool and very scary at the same time.  Immediately I thought – oh heck, I will never be able to put in a pool.  But I also thought, I wonder who lived here and who died here.  Needless to say, he stopped sawing and I stopped digging.  The next day, he started doing some investigating.  He learned that both his and my backyard were at one point a family cemetery.  He then had someone come over with a ground-penetrating radar device so he would know exactly what he was dealing with.  According to those results, there was some type of “objects” buried in the ground.     His options were to either dig further and to designate the area as historical and notify the family, or to do nothing.  Seeing that he was planning on moving in the near future and this could impact the sale of the home, he decided to do nothing.   When he left, he took the gravestone with him.  If there is anyone buried in my backyard, they seem to be at rest, though perhaps they are somehow at work in all the mischief that takes place in this house.  In any event, the soil is dark and rich and absolutely wonderful for growing plants and flowers.

 

It is possible, because of my deep back yard, that I just have more room for critters and more opportunities for them to interact with my family.  One of those interactions occurred not too long after the possum episode.  An interesting point here is that there appears to be a coincidence with Sloan and toilets and mishaps. 

 

As Sloan was lifting the toilet lid to pee, a very large, nasty rat jumped out.  Again, this resulted in much screaming from both Sloan and me.   I ran into the bathroom, grabbing a broom as I went, and both he and I stood on the toilet seat.  Yes it is possible for two people to stand on a toilet seat when you are scared that your toe will be eaten off by a large, wet rat.   I do not even know what Emma was doing at the time, but she was smart enough to stay out of the bathroom.  Plus, I do not think the toilet seat would have held a third person anyway.  To this day, I do not know what happened to that rat.  I just know that we did not use that bathroom for several days afterwards and Sloan always looks first before he pees.

 

Dull moments were few and far between during those early years.  I went back to work at my previous company which not only kept me busy but also allowed me “adult” time and the familiarity of good friends who were able to provide a dose of sanity.  Karma – that exotic-sounding word that rolls off the tongue so much better than “he got what was coming to him” – was alive and well.  JA1 had moved into a house with his “soul mate” before we ever got divorced, adding insult to injury.  After a couple of years, his “soul mate” moved out of his house and off to Arizona, leaving him alone and trying to navigate the difficult waters of being a real single parent.

 

Early on as a parent, I realized one of the great benefits to being a parent is to now be able to do the things you wanted to do as a child but never did -- or did so long ago that you forgot!  These children were a built-in excuse for me to climb in McDonald’s PlayPlace tunnels, jump on trampolines, stand on my head, lie in the front yard on a blanket and look at the stars, and adopt multiple, diverse pets.  Initially, we started out with a white lab named Cotton.  JA1 and I had purchased Cotton before the children were born.  He was a great dog; he was loving, gentle, and obedient.  He was infatuated with balls and, no matter how tired he was, perked up immediately when he saw or heard a bouncing ball or when anyone even said the word “ball.”  He performed several tricks, one of which was fetching the newspaper.  This was great especially when it was cold outside or when I was too lazy to put on something presentable to wear outside.  The only problem is that occasionally he brought in the neighbor’s paper, so then I had to go get dressed anyway so I could go out and replace the paper.  Cotton didn’t care because by then he was on his sixth peeing spot.  He weighed in at around 115 and was massive compared to the kids, but he was a big teddy bear with them, gently taking food out of their hands without one tooth grazing them.

 

Meanwhile, the kids were in daycare and learning about nature and the various animals, including birds, insects, fish, reptiles and mammals.  We started small in expanding the children’s knowledge of animals at the house – both in size as well as upkeep.  We had two Beta fish, one for each child.  I don’t remember their exact names, but they were definitely named, and Sloan started then and proceeded throughout the years in naming pets with boring human names, such as Fred, Bob, Harry and Bill.  After a couple of months, we realized that not only was at least one name boring, but the fish were not that exciting themselves.    We then upped the ante and brought in an ant farm.  When I was a child, I created a worm farm which consisted of a shoe box, dirt and worms dug up from the yard.  I have no idea what possessed me to collect worms but it was a short-term fixation; I think it lasted about three days.  Now, the ant farm I purchased for the kids was nothing like my hand-made worm farm.  It was a nice plexiglass container that was narrow enough that you could see the ants burrowing through this cool, blue gel.  It was both fascinating and educational.  The ants were shipped separately and were frozen, so they had to be refrigerated to thaw out.  Sci-fi and the possibility of cryogenics in humans sprang to my mind while the kids were just in a hurry to get them thawed!     Once the ants were thawed and in the container, we spent hours over the course of the next several weeks watching them.  Sloan insisted on bringing them to the table while we ate and keeping them in his room at night.   

 

One morning, as we were, as always, hurriedly trying to get out the door, Sloan picked up the ant farm and, in his haste, dropped the container.  The top flew off and ants went in all directions.  My thoughts were a jumble.  Do I step on the ants?  Do I gather the ants since they are “pets” and I have paid for them?  How quickly will the ants get in the pantry?  How much of a bond does Sloan have with these ants?  What is that child thinking?  During these moments, when the thoughts run so quickly, I am not really sure if it is just the multi-tasking, high functioning brain of a female or schizophrenia kicking in, and do not really know when one stops and the other starts.  Regardless, something had to be done about the ants scurrying around the kitchen.  I stomped some that were getting too close to cabinets and captured others that I could sweep into a dustpan.  I eventually gathered about half of them so that now our ant farm was a mixture of ants, gel and dust from the floor.  The ant habitat was not nearly as pretty or as sanitary, but the ants were alive though somewhat shaken.  Ultimately, the dust and dirt from my kitchen floor sadly brought upon the demise of the entire colony.    

The benefit of being a boring fish with a boring name is you are more likely to live, swimming around in your little fish bowl for your little fish life.  So the Beta’s lived, the ants died, and then JA2 brought home a gorgeous old bird cage that somebody took to the dump.  I loved this bird cage, with the peeling paint that somehow combined with a sense of elegance.  Yet it just seemed so lonely without any inhabitants.  My grandmother, who died when I was only seven, kept birds in a cage in her foyer.  So ultimately, I simply had to get birds for that cage.  It was one of those sentimental acts, similar to purchasing the blue hydrangeas like she had in her yard that took me back in time to those young years and gave me a sense of comfort and love.  We went to the pet store and purchased three parakeets – Harry, (shoot, I cannot remember the name!) and Blue Belle.  Initially, the kids planned to “handle” their parakeets regularly, and they made a great effort to do so, however, parakeets required more discipline, time and patience than what the kids were willing to offer at that time.  Sloan was closest to his parakeet, Harry, than Emma was to hers, because he spent more time with him.  Harry would sit on his arm, his finger, and even his head.  Meanwhile, Emma would hold hers in her hand, he would poop on her, and she would immediately put him back into the cage.  Eventually, the kids just fed them and left them to their own devices in the cage.  They were beautiful and chirped happily throughout the day.

 

One summer, we took a vacation to the beach with JA2 and his daughter, and this is when we expanded our pet collection to felines!  I have never been a “cat person” but on this particular trip, we were swimming at a friend’s  condo when JA2 went in to get us some drinks.  He came back out holding a tiny gray kitten.  This was unusual because he was allergic to cats!  He said that there was a box of kittens in the restaurant that had been rescued from a farmer who had intended to kill the kittens.  Apparently this had been his method of birth control for quite some time.  It was a teeny cat, only a few weeks old, so I questioned JA2 about both his allergies and his sanity.  Either was a valid question.  He was amazed that he wasn’t sneezing around this kitten.  Well, several factors could have played a role in this:  (a) the kitten was so tiny it probably was not generating much dander, (b) the kitten was too young to have dander and (3) he was holding it beside an ocean breeze so if it did have any dander, it was affecting somebody down the beach.  I was not crazy about bringing a cat home but the kids were ecstatic, each saying they would personally take care of it, including cleaning the litter box.  I lost that battle, so we were off to Greenville with instructions on bottle feeding a kitten and the kids arguing about whose turn it was to hold the kitten and what the kitten would be named.  In the end, we named the kitten Storm which was a good depiction of the back seat of the car on that five hour drive home.