Jan2

Growing Up April Fresh and Squeaky Clean

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Growing Up April Fresh and Squeaky Clean

 

My mom is the Chuck Norris of clean. Two completely random and separate interactions with my dear sisters reminded me of the ultra-shiny-hand-washed-hung-dry-neatly-pressed-streak-free bond we share.  In a recent conversation about Santa’s reindeer with my sister, Kim, (this is not even close to being in the top 100 of strange conversations we have had) we discovered that we both grew up feeling sorry for the reindeer Comet.  We were operating under the assumption that all the other reindeer had been given cool names and he was named after an ordinary household cleanser.   Neither could relate a fanciful flying reindeer to a spectacular celestial light streaking through the night sky.  We both, however, could relate to the extraordinary things Mom could do with an ordinary household cleanser. A few days following our reindeer conversation, my younger sister, Emily, posted this Facebook status:

facebook

 

It seemed fitting that I should pay homage to the pint-sized woman who can scrub an entire house from top to bottom, do seven loads of laundry (a load consists of washed dried folded/hung/pressed and put away) and put a streak-free shine on Mr. Clean’s bald head all before his feet hit the floor in the morning.  Lessons we have learned from Mother Judy:  mom

1.       “A little bit of sprayin’ and a whole lot of wipin’”  Mom’s motto she applied to little hands trying to be helpers and then later to big hands just doing a half-assed job on assigned chores.  Pledge furniture polish was the easiest to overuse, but the phrase was also regularly applied to Windex, SoftScrub, shoe polish, Spot Shot, and a variety of multipurpose cleaners.  Approximately 99.9% (see addendum below) of all household cleaning chores carried out by her offspring were subsequently deemed “pretty good” and then totally redone by the Queen of Clean.

2.      Clean with the spirit of a ninja warrior.  All members of our family have been subjected to the svelte ways of Mom in motion.  While enjoying an ice-cold beverage, one must only lose physical/visual contact with the glass for a split second for her to strike.  In the time required to blink, the glass has been dumped, rinsed, and tucked into the dishwasher.  The ninja technique also is applied to bowls of cereal, half-eaten sandwiches, partially read newspapers and unmade beds left unattended for early morning trips to the bathroom.

3.      Mom and a toothbrush are a force to be reckoned with.  Many tough jobs have been tackled by mom and a toothbrush.  Grout, tiles, floors, stoves, etc. have been subjected to her fury against the grime.  However, one cannot fully grasp the mightiness of Mom welding this seemingly harmless tool, except those of us who have stood before her having failed the “oral hygiene inspection”.  The kind, docile creature transforms into a self-appointed Cavity Creep assassin.  Having to endure a tooth-brushing session at the hands of this well-meaning fanatic is comparable to what I imagine it would be like to have your mouth (teeth, gums, and tongue) scrubbed thoroughly with a Brillo-pad.

4.      A dusty car might as well be a rusty car.  My car is an extension of my family’s hectic life and usually contains all of or a combination of the following:  basketballs, socks, sweatshirts, electronics, snacks, lip gloss, bottled water, crumbs, textbooks, book bags, golf clubs, work stuff, and hair and makeup accessories.  My mom’s car contains floor mats and a garage door opener.  Not only is the inside of her car in showroom condition, but should a layer of dust accumulate on the outside of the car, she takes the time to “dust” the body of the vehicle.  Riding in my car makes my mom nervous.

5.      If it cannot be cleaned, it must be destroyed.  The large ranch-style home we lived in when my little sister Emily was born had very nice dark brown carpeting.  Although the carpeting had been recently installed by the previous owners of the house and was in tip-top shape, it was a source of loathing for Mom.  While most people would appreciate a floor covering that didn’t readily show dirt, this trait was an unforgivable flaw in her eyes.  No amount of cleaning, scrubbing, or vacuuming would squelch Mom’s distrust of what the brown carpeting was hiding.  Plans to replace the carpet were put-off by my step-dad and Mom’s patience was wearing thin.  As growing babies do, Emily began scooting around on the floor to explore the world around her and that was a game changer.  Emily’s tiny white socks were dingy where she had scooted on the floor. The tiny defiled socks were proof positive that Mom’s suspicions were not unfounded and she took matters into her own hands-literally.  Early on a Saturday morning, I awoke to quite a commotion.  Mom, with a crowbar, box cutter and her tiny little hands was ripping the carpet up, leaving only the purple padding.  While making her feel MUCH better, the stunt ended in a lengthy stalemate with my step-dad.  Several weeks passed in the pristine house with the purple padding on the floor, before my step-dad relented and had new carpeting installed.

Clean facts worthy of sharing:

  • Mom was chastised by her beloved dog’s veterinarian for giving the pooch a bath EVERY SINGLE DAY!  (Please see photo of the dog’s reaction when she retrieves his tub from the laundry room)

    IMG_5872

    Hopper hiding at bath time.

  • When lice broke out in my sister’s elementary class, she washed the girl’s hair with the medicated shampoo so many times that her scalp started to crack and bleed.  Bedding was burned.
  • The obsession with cleaning often spills out in how Mom communicates.  Actual quote:  “I don’t think he is the shiniest tool in the shed.”
  • While bathing us, Mom used to put our shoestrings in the bathtub with us.  The only things worse than dirty shoestrings were dirty shoes.  She polished white tennis shoes each night.
  • Mom’s doomsday preparation list would include:  bleach, SpotShot, Windex, a dust mop and a broom.

Unfortunately, for Mom, her OCD cleaning gene is recessive…very recessive.  She had three chances to see her affinity for the super clean manifest itself in the lives of her offspring and none of us have it.  We seem to have picked up some of her habits and at times we get a little cranky when the laundry piles up or we fall behind on the household chores. However, I can (and do) go to bed with the throw pillows in disarray and the kitchen floor un-swept.  After cooking a delicious meal, Kim can have a martini before the kitchen is clean and is perfectly content to allow someone else to clean it, while she has a martini.  Emily’s movements can often be tracked from the time she enters the house by the things she leaves along the way…shoes…purse….scarf and I am 100% certain she has never dusted the outside of her car.

I used to stress over thinking Mom was going to be disappointed in me, if she discovered toothpaste not rinsed out of the sinks or that the load of clothes I have in the washer has to be washed again because I forgot to put it in the dryer (yesterday or possibly the day before that).  How could this super woman who can clean, work, teach, workout, and meet the needs of so many people around her feel anything other than shame in having a daughter like me???  It would be just like my pint-sized dynamo of a mother to give me an out; to magnify my perceived domestic shortcomings as strengths which she lacked.  In fact, that is exactly what she did.

It wasn’t long after the birth of my youngest child that I attended a mother-daughter dinner, where my mom was the speaker for the evening.  As a dynamic speaker and teacher in women’s Christian ministry, I was prepared for an uplifting and powerful message from Mom.  I was not expecting to hear her share the following story with the audience:

I am so lucky to have my oldest daughter, Karri, here with me tonight.  I am even luckier to have her as my daughter.  It is hard to believe that she is a mother of three children now and she is an amazing mom.  (I am now thinking, where is she going with this?  I sometimes suck on Sophi’s pacifier when she drops it on the ground and stick it back in her mouth.  There is nothing amazing about that).  In fact, I wish that I could have been more like the mom she is when she was growing up.  She became a mother when she was fairly young.  I remember one particular day when I stopped by her little rental house and I went in the front door and there were toys scattered all over the living room.  I continued through the house and on the kitchen table there were two bowls where she and my granddaughter, Riley, had eaten cereal. (Great, she is up there on that stage telling them what a lousy housekeeper I am).  The laundry room had several piles of clothes needing to be laundered.  Where do you think I found her?  She was in the backyard, sitting in a tiny sandbox building sandcastles with her daughter.  You see, ladies, there will always be things to pick up, laundry that needs washed and dishes to do, but there are only so many moments in which we can build sand castles. I wish I had built more sandcastles. 

Addendum:  After consulting with my sisters, I was informed that my estimate of 99.9% of the chores were redone by Mom is incorrect and the actual amount was 110%.

 

01/01/2013Spending New Year's Day stripping wallpaper and cleaning in Emily's new home.

01/01/2013
Spending New Year’s Day stripping wallpaper and cleaning in Emily’s new home.

Working and rockin' her skinny jeans

Working and rockin’ her skinny jeans

Nov19

Birthday Guest Blog-from my baby sister, Emily

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Birthday Guest Blog-from my baby sister, Emily

As you all know by now, my sister Karri received all the wordsmith genes in the family. I do believe that she has passed them on to her daughter Sophi, too (and possibly Evan, although no word on whether he has actually sat down long enough to put pen to paper to test the gene out). That being said, by the time it got to the third daughter, there was very little of the writing gene left, so please bear with me as I try to pay tribute to my oldest sister on her birthday.

My mom often tells the following story to describe her three daughters. If she drew a line in the sand and specifically told the three of us not to cross it, my response as the rule following baby would be to avoid crossing, approaching, looking at or thinking about the line. Kim, the middle daughter, who often lives in her own reality, would respond, “what line?” Oh but Karri, the first born, she would see the line and while looking you directly in the eye do whatever it took to cross it. Whether it be hopping, jumping, tiptoeing or nose-diving, she’s crossing it, line be darned. Even if awaiting her on the other side was a pit of gnarly crocodiles, she got over it. But you see, that is what makes Karri so great (albeit aggravating at times). Her tenacity to achieve whatever she has set her mind is a force not easily stopped. We have all seen it in her parenting. She would do anything, ANYTHING, for her three kids or Kevin and even her furry four-legged pals. And I know that she would stop at nothing for me, too.
I have often wondered what I would do if in a freak rule breaking accident I were to get arrested. Who would I call? Karri. In a heartbeat. Now she may not have the bail money, but she’d beg, borrow or steal to get me out. I remember one specific instance in the 5th grade, my parents were out of town and someone at school had spread a nasty rumor at me. My 12 year old heart was crushed (as 12 year old hearts so easily are). I thought of calling no one else but Karri. She talked me through the situation and even volunteered to call the rumor spreader and her mother. Now, even then I had known Karri long enough to know that my innocent private school friends and their parents were not prepared to deal with the fury of Karri-scorned, so I declined, but I will never forget that she was there for me then and countless other times. That’s another thing about Karri, not matter what she has going on, she will take the time to help you out. Like the time she “edited” my graduate school admissions essay the night before it was due. I’m sure she did this in between working full time, coaching Sophi or Evan in some kind of sport or watching Riley cheer at a football game.
Some of my earliest memories include time with Karri. I was born when Karri was 16 and I am sure she got the privilege of babysitting more often than she wanted. On several occasions people thought that I was her baby, not her baby sister. One day she had me in her cart at Wal-Mart and someone told her how cute her little girl was. She thanked the woman but told her that I was her baby sister. Then I pulled a move that I am sure I learned from her. I couldn’t have been more than three at the time, but I quickly responded, “Hey can I have this sucker, MOM?” Of course the people thought Karri was completely full of it and couldn’t believe she would call her baby her little sister. I believe this was my way of payback for her tricking me into eating the candles off my birthday cake when I was two. I also remember going over to her house after she had moved out and being allowed to do things mom would NEVER have let happen in our house. For one thing, our mom was extremely picky about what I ate. I never remember one time in my entire life eating Kraft mac and cheese at my mom’s. But when I went to Karri’s, not only did I get to eat mac and cheese, I was allowed to stand on a stool over the hot stove and stir the tasty treat (had Judy known this at the time it would have been enough for her to faint). Karri’s house was a place where fun could be had and messes could be made. I loved going there.
Looking up to Karri my entire life, I have learned many things. She may not always take the easy road, but she a unique way of finding joy along the path. If you have been around Karri at all you know that her quick wit keeps everyone around her laughing. She always puts others before herself and would do anything she could if she knew it would help someone else.
So here’s to you Karri on your birthday. I love you so much and wouldn’t trade you for any other big sister in the entire world.

Emily and Me

 

Nov12

Impact Moments

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Impact Moments

Baby Riley

The majority of moments allotted to me thus far have passed without greatly influencing the overall direction of my life or altering the composition of my heart.   There are, however, those moments impacting with such force the reverberation pulses in every moment thereafter. Some are positive in nature, other seemingly devastating, but all are life-changing.   November 12, 2014, marks the 23nd  anniversary of one of the most powerful impact moments of my life…the day my daughter, Riley, was born.

As a nineteen year old college student with a propensity for making poor life choices, discovering I was pregnant certainly didn’t seem like a positive impact moment.  I was terrified.  I was aware of my less than stellar track record for taking care of myself, which made me feel completely sorry for the Tic-Tac-sized fetus attached to the wall of my uterus.  I wasn’t even good at playing house when I was little and got into trouble for cutting the piggy-tails off my sister’s dolls.  There was no way I was going to be able to take care of an actual human baby!  I was screwed, but not nearly as screwed as the little he or she inside of me for drawing the short straw and getting me for a mother.

Smiley Riley

The next 8 months I read everything I could get my hands on regarding prenatal care, breastfeeding, childbirth and parenting.  I followed the doctor’s orders to the letter and set my sights on giving this baby a better mother than the person I had been up to this point.  As my due date approached, I had started to worry about the pain of actually having the baby.  I asked my mom if it hurt to have a baby and she said, “I will tell you exactly what your grandma told me when I asked her that question when I was pregnant with you.  She said: would it hurt to shit a square wagon wheel?”  The wisdom passed down through the generations of women in my family is priceless and, as I was about to learn, amazingly accurate.

Milestones

Because I was not covered under my parent’s insurance for maternity service, I saw the doctors through the local Health Department.  During my 24 week checkup I was informed that I would either have to pay $400.00 before my next visit or sign a waiver declining the use of an epidural.  The amount of emotional and financial headaches I had caused my parents over my 19 years on the planet loomed in the back of my mind, but so did my grandma’s square wagon wheel analogy.  In the end, I couldn’t ask my parents for the money and I signed the waiver, which seemed like a very, very considerate gesture on my part.  In hindsight, however, it was a VERY, VERY, incredibly STUPID move on my part.

Riley and Daddy (and the Devil dog)

Where do mommies-to-be go, when they can’t stand the thought of being pregnant one more second?  They walk (waddle) around Wal-Mart, of course.  I think Wal-Mart might even hold breakout sessions at the OB/GYN conferences around the nation encouraging doctors to advise women that strolling the aisles at Wal-Mart is scientifically proven to induce labor.  In my case, that is exactly what happened.  I was with my best friend, Cheri, and we were walking through the store.  She absently put her hand on stomach and she said, “Oh my God! You are having a contraction!”  My stomach was tight, but it didn’t hurt so it wasn’t computing with me.  I said, “No I’m not.”  She insisted, “Yes you are!  That’s exactly what my Aunt Tina’s belly felt like when she had a contraction.”  Since her Aunt Tina had just had a baby a few months earlier, I figured she knew more than I did about birthin’ babies.  As it turns out   Cheri was spot on with her diagnosis-I was in labor and ol’ Grandma also hit the nail on the head- it hurts like hell to shit a square wagon wheel!!!!

Monkey Moment

After laboring more than sixteen hours I had finally achieved a whopping 4 on the dilatation scale.  The lady who was laboring on the other side of the curtain (OMG…they actually used to put two women in labor in the same room) had arrived a few hours after me and was already dilated to an 8.  I was exhausted and hurting and I yelled, “Are you kidding? I hate that bitch?”  My sweet angelic mother promptly poked her head around the curtain and said, “I am sorry.  She is so tired she doesn’t mean it.”  I loudly clarified, “YES I DO MEAN IT!”  A few hours later, I hadn’t progressed much further and the contractions were excruciating.  During the quiet moments between contractions, my mom asked my nurse to please see about getting me an epidural.  I wanted to explain my noble decision of waiving the epidural, but I was beyond fatigued and the nurse had to explain to Mom the epidural “fee upfront” policy.  My mother started frantically looking around for her purse, “I will write you a check.  Just get the kid an epidural!!”  My mom’s attempts to circumvent hospital policy were politely denied and she cried at my bedside through each contraction.

First Grade

My labor was approaching its 29th hour and my stubborn cervix finally made it to the required 10 centimeters and I was cleared for transfer to the delivery room.  I actually passed my former labor room roommate pushing her baby in the hallway as I was being wheeled to the delivery room.  She was fortunate I was too physically and emotionally tapped out to verbally accost her.  If I had any preconceived notions that things were going to soon be over, I was wrong.  I pushed and pushed and pushed and pushed.  The clock was ticking ever closer to midnight and my mom was determined that I was going to have my baby before November 12th became November 13th.  November 12th is Mom’s Birthday.  An intern assisting my doctor with the delivery tried to show pictures of his kids to one of the nurses and he ventured too close to me and I grabbed him by the tie and said, “Everyone in the hospital has seen those f@#@king pictures.  Put them away!!”  Between contractions I decided to take off my oxygen mask, remove the monitors strapped around my enormous belly and tried to climb off the table announcing, “I can’t do this anymore.  I am going home.”   My mom grabbed me by the arm and demanded, “You get up on this bed and you have this baby right now!!  It’s almost not my Birthday anymore!!”  And so it was; I pushed and pushed and the doctor and the intern pulled and pulled and at 11:51pm on her grandma’s birthday, our Riley was born.

Dance

The first time I held her was an impact moment of epic proportions.  The 8 pounds and 2 ounces of bald, cone-headed, swollen baby held the key to my heart.  I was smitten. She has been uniquely Riley from that moment forward and a source of immeasurable joy in my life.   It is hard to believe that 22 years have passed since the day Riley came into my life and I can’t begin to quantify the blessing being her mother has brought to my life.  Here are just a few of the things I love about Riley and some of the things I have learned by being her mom:

  • She was bald for so long everyone thought she was a boy.  I started to pray that she would get hair and when she finally did get hair, it was carrot orange, with a mind of its own.  I learned that I need to be very specific when I pray.  Riley has AWESOME hair now!!!  Her crazy hair days were worth it.
  • Riley has an innate nature to see people’s needs and meet them. This was apparent at a very young age, when she came home from third grade and asked if we could get some shoes for a little girl in her class.  She said the girl always takes her shoes off under her desk and Riley had asked her why and the girl told her that the shoes were too small and hurt her feet.  In addition, Riley asked her teacher not to tell the girl where the shoes came from because she didn’t want to embarrass her.  I would love to say this was something that I had taught her, but it is something she has always had inside her and a beautiful part of who she is.
  • She loves things that sparkle, makeup, clothes, 80s music, and naps.
  • She often doesn’t get the joke, but when she does, laughs the longest.  She has an awesome laugh.
  • She is smart, capable, and fiercely independent.  She struggles with making up her mind, but when she does….better get out of the way!
  • When she was nine, she tried to convince me that she shouldn’t eat in the school cafeteria: “They serve artificial corn.  It doesn’t come from a can or a cob.”
  •  She is the official grammar police of the universe.

On the day she was born, if I had taken every hope I had for her future, it would hardly measure up to the young woman she has grown up to be.  Thank you, Riley, for being the daughter that surpassed everything my heart could desire.  I love you infinity.

Riley Landing after Skydiving

Riley

Nov9

Spirit

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Spirit

It was at first light
I saw Spirit move through the trees
A silhouette of strength and beauty
Framed by the autumn leaves

Through the fields to nowhere,
Unbridled Spirit ran
Free as her back had never known
The weight of saddle nor of man

Spirit’s song I heard
Though not a word was spoken
My glimpse of grand splendor
Watching Spirit run– pure and unbroken.

Spirit running

Nov5

Full Disclosure–Not Quite

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Full Disclosure–Not Quite

One of my best friends, Leslie, was trying to talk me into running a 5K with her this weekend and since I haven’t been running much in recent months, I was resistant to the idea.  During the course of her appeal, she used the phrase ‘in the spirit of full disclosure’ when revealing details of the event that she knew wouldn’t entice me to participate.  I always appreciate Leslie’s tendency to give me all the facts, even when she knows they may push me in another direction.  Against my better judgment, I agreed to run.  When you are as out of shape as I am, not to mention the slowest living land mammal on the planet, even a short race like a 5K provides a lot of time to think.  I began to ponder the very reason I was trying to pound out 3 miles and some change with no preparation, when my brain got tripped up on the ‘in the spirit of full disclosure’ phrase that Les had tossed me a few days prior.    Trying to distract myself from my current situation, I began silently deliberating the concept of ‘full disclosure’.

It was at a very young age that I came to terms with the harsh reality that lying wasn’t going to be tolerated by my parents.  Punishment for lying was swift and severe and thus, I learned to compensate.  I almost always gave the unaltered facts, but I routinely eliminated the pesky details that I knew would interfere with my parent’s overall perception of a situation.   I often needed an accomplice, and this was almost always my younger sister, Kim.  I rarely asked her to lie for me; I just encouraged her not to talk.  I wasn’t above lying, but lying was complicated and often exhausting.  She was seven and I was ten, the first time she fully understood her role.

               Atari® game system had finally found its way into our living and I had asked for one thing for Christmas-FROGGER. It was about a month before Christmas and I began to use the 45 minutes Kim and I were home alone after school to explore the forbidden areas of our house for our gifts.  It didn’t take long until I discovered a neatly wrapped box in the far corner of a high shelf in my parent’s closet. Even though the identity of the box was hidden under Christmas paper, I knew instantly that I had struck amphibian video game gold. Unwrapping one end of the box, I slid it out of the paper cocoon and headed for the game console.  Kim watched as I attempted to guide my little frog across the busy highway, over the logs in the swift river to the safety of the lily pad.  We laughed when the frog was reduced to the state-of-the-art graphic red “X”, when I failed to avoid getting the little guy out of the way of a car.  When it was getting close to the time for Mom to come home, I put the game back in its box, slid it into the wrapping paper, carefully wrapped the end and returned it to its hiding place in the closet.

Kim was worried that we would get caught and be in trouble.  I told her, “If Mom comes home and asks you ‘Did Karri find the FROGGER game in my closet and play it?’ you can tell her I did.  Otherwise, just don’t say anything.”  We repeated the scenario of unwrapping-playing-rewrapping for the next several weeks without incident.  Occasionally, I would even let her have a turn, just to reinforce that we were on the same team and to ensure that she had been a willing participant if things were to go awry.  Christmas morning arrived and I excitedly received the gift in a state of excitement that was only worthy of a complete surprise.  My parents were astounded at my uncanny ability to safely beat level after level of the game, but after weeks of practice, I had gotten pretty good.  Mom watched and said, “I cannot believe how good you are at this!  It’s amazing!”  I held my breath and I looked at Kim and let the silence of our secret hang for a moment between us.  I knew the spirit of full disclosure was fully behind us, when she reached for the joystick and asked, “Can I try?”

When we reached our teenage years, Kim was starting to see through some of my BS tactics and because I was often a total bitch of a big sister to her, she started to become a hostile accomplice.  There were other times when she would keep silent until I pushed her to the breaking point and she would gladly toss me right under the bus.  One such instance actually involved a bus- the school bus, which I LOATHED.  As a freshman in high school, I suddenly became completely repulsed by the very idea of riding the bus to school.  It was totally uncool and I would intentionally miss the bus, so that my parents were forced to drive me to school.  Each morning became a battle of wits and wills to get me on the bus.  It became a source of such contention that I was regularly being punished for not catching the bus and my attitude became increasingly sour.

My mom and step-dad were, needless to say, astounded when one morning they found me up, clothes on, hair curled, and ready and willing to head out and meet the bus!  My delightful attitude in resigning myself to utilizing the public school transportation was a welcome change.  Day after day, I would be up and ready and making no complaints.  Once they were convinced that it was not a fluke, they started expressing their gratitude.  “Karri we really appreciate you not making a federal case out of riding the bus” and “You must be growing up, because you finally understand how much it helps us out when you ride the bus to school”.   One evening my grandma was eating dinner with us.  She had been witness to some of the bus battles and Mom proudly bragged about my “new attitude” about riding the bus.  There we all were at the table, with Mom gushing about how nice it was to have stress-free mornings since I had turned over a new leaf.  Grandma even chimed in about being glad that I was helping my mom out by being sweet about riding the bus.  I was soaking up the accolades, when Kim had finally had enough, “She is not riding the bus because you want her to and because it helps you!!!  It has nothing to do with being good, or sweet or anything like that!  The ONLY reason that she gets up and ready and catches the bus is because she discovered that the hot junior football player that lives down the road rides the bus!!!”   My little sister–busting me out in the spirit of full disclosure.

A couple of years later, my step-dad asked a business associate/friend of his to give me part-time job as a checker in his grocery store.  I reluctantly complied with the new job requirement and went after school and Saturdays to fulfill my checker obligations.  A few months passed and I managed to learn the difference between a russet potato and a baker’s brown.  I was polite, mostly punctual, and liked earning a little of my own money.  All was fine and well until one Saturday afternoon a group of my friends stopped by to offer me the extra ticket they had to a Cardinal baseball game.  I asked the manager if I could take off and go to the game and he said I couldn’t.  So I quit.  I went to the game and had a blast.  Two weeks later my step dad came home three kinds of pissed off at me. He had casually inquired from his friend how I was doing on the job and was informed that I had quit two weeks prior.  My boss–busting me out in the spirit of full disclosure.

It has been a long-time coming for me to fully embrace the spirit of full disclosure.  Understanding the damages that relationships can incur under the auspices of revealing only the details which are easy to swallow has been a motivating factor in the way I choose to interact with others.  There are many qualities in myself that I wish I could hide, many choices I have made that I wish I could omit and I am confident there are many more mistakes I am going to make.  Striving to be my authentic self is something that has made my life fuller and my relationships stronger.  Remembering what a brat I was is a reminder to ask my children VERY specific questions.

NOTE: Thanks to Leslie, I finished the race.  Like an ironic revelation in the spirit of full disclosure, it revealed that I am pathetically out of shape.  Thanks, Les!

Carla, Leslie, and Me

Oct28

The Fear of God

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The Fear of God

Me a few years before “scared straight”–Church Edition

There is little debate that my internal struggles with a higher power have been numerous and I have little shame in blaming it on the seed that was planted in my mind at a very early age.  Even if intentions are well-meaning, the very act of introducing the idea of a supreme-being into a brain wired such as mine and the results are going to be messy, at best.  There is supposedly a healthy balance of respect, fear and love that spiritual maturity brings about.  However, as a child with a very active imagination growing up in church, my soul got snagged on fear.  This fear has haunted me in my own sad form of spiritual arrested development.

The entire first decade of my life, there were a couple of constants: If the doors to the church were open for services, my family was in attendance; The radio was always tuned to country music; and my mom never left the house without her bed being made and everything in its place. To this day, my sister and I can sing most of the words to a plethora of hymns and classic country and western songs (I am pretty sure that we could muster up a minimum of two verses of Just As I Am and all the words to Lucille by Kenny Rogers).  Basically, attending church was an integral part of my childhood.  Unfortunately for my well-intentioned parents, I was rarely an easy child.  My spiritual snag made Sundays literally hell on my parents as they wrestled, chased and beat my butt for resisting Sunday services.  It was even the theme for one of my high school poetry assignments:

 Fearing God

Now I lay be down to sleep,

I pray the Lord my soul to keep

A child of God I want to be

But Sunday church was not for me.

I kicked and screamed and was damn near beat,

But every Sunday I took my seat.

 

Alleluia and Amazing Grace,

Songs of love in a scary place

I hid my face tried not to look,

The preacher man is waving the book

I closed my eyes and I covered my ears

I tried to be brave, ignoring my fears

 

Fire, brim stone and eternal damnation

Lost souls missing out on salvation

Spending forever in a fiery lake

Is all too much for my mind to take

Please let him talk of the Promised Land

Milk and Honey I understand.

 

His message then took that sinister turn

My face grows hot and starts to burn

His words are out and I can take no more

I run down the aisle and out the door

My Daddy’s wrath is what I should’ve feared most

 But this child was scared to death of the Holy Ghost

Me (yellow shirt), Kim, and my Grandma (she didn’t make her bed every day).

It would be one thing if my fearing the Holy Ghost was the extent of my spiritual hang-ups, but that’s seldom how things go in my world.  The Thief in the Night, was a 70s Christian based movie that literally scared the bejesus out of me. The movie was shown to the congregation of our church and I was probably 8 or 9.  The film was about the rapture and basically showed normal people going about their everyday lives and without warning, one would just disappear.  I believe Kirk Cameron made a movie based on the same premise, but I am not absolutely certain about more modern versions, as the original screwed with me enough for an entire lifetime.   I would wake up from dreaming that I was walking home from school with my sister and all of a sudden she would be sucked up to heaven and my dirty rotten unready self would be standing there staring at a puddle of melting butter on the sidewalk.  Note:  I don’t have any idea why my sister would be carrying butter with her on the way home from school, but for whatever reason God always left me behind with a stick of melted lard.

               Years later, when I was a sophomore in high school I came home from school one day and found nobody at home.  This was not totally unusual except for one terrifying fact:  MY MOTHER’S BED WAS UNMADE!!!  I stood there looking at that unmade bed and waves of nausea began to wash over me and I thought I was going to be sick.  Never, in my sixteen years of existence on this planet had I EVER seen my mom’s bed unmade!  My mom is completely OCD in the clean and tidy department.  She makes Mr. Clean look like a slob!  My mind did a mental checklist of possible reasons my mom’s bed would be unmade at three-thirty in the afternoon and after justifying that even if a loved one had been in a serious accident, the clean-freak would have at least made a hasty attempt to put her bed linens in order.  That’s when I knew that The Thief in the Night movie had come to pass and I had been left behind.  I was shaking as the gravity of my situation began to sink in and l ran to the window to see if I could spot any other careless souls that failed to make the cut.  I was terrified.

My beautiful mom.

A few hours later my mom and the rest of my family returned home.  They had left when my aunt had suddenly gotten ill and mom had rushed out to take her to the hospital.  Of course, they all got a big kick out of my crazy notion that I had been ‘left behind’.  Looking back, it really wasn’t me that was the crazy one.  Who let’s young children watch movies where people just disappear without warning???  Then there is the even bigger question:  WHO, OF SOUND MIND, MAKES HER BED 7 DAYS A WEEK, 365 DAYS A YEAR???!!  It is pretty clear that when your teenage daughter thinks the only reason that her mother’s bed would be unmade is the coming of the rapture, there is a lot of room for someone to learn to R-E-L-A-X, don’t you think?  After all, aren’t we just going to mess it up again when we go to bed?

FUN FACTS ABOUT THIS STORY:

  1.  After completing this post, I found the movie, “Thief in the Night” on YouTube.  There is a scene in the movie where a little girl goes to the neighbor’s house to borrow a stick of butter for her mom who is baking something.  The next thing you see is her doll and a melting stick of butter on the driveway!!! Freaky!!!!!
  2. It is my firm belief that in the past 24 years since the fateful day my mother left the house without making her bed, she has maintained a perfect 100% bed-making record.
  3. The pattern of my bed-making has no rhyme or reason what-so-ever and is completely random.  Some days I make it and some days I don’t.  My philosophy:  I don’t want to scare my children.
Oct22

Sometimes You Just Gotta Let Them Jump

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Sometimes You Just Gotta Let Them Jump

Evan and Kevin-Summer 2007

My children are lucky to have such a wonderful man for their daddy.  He loves them immensely, is involved in their activities, and will put a boot in an ass, if and when any of them need it (only one of our children has actually required a boot in the ass on a regular basis, but I will not disclose which one).  The girls describe their dad as ‘magnificent’ (gag).   When I asked the girls how they would describe me, they unanimously agreed on ‘crazy’.  Note: I wonder when the last time Mr. Magnificent did their laundry or ran forgotten homework to school?  When Evan was little, he and Kevin had a special club called the “Cool Cat Club” and no girls were allowed, not even a mom who happened to be a girl.

During the summer of 2007 we had planned a trip to Bull Shoals Lake with my sister and her family.  Due to my sister working weekend option at the hospital, we decided to let the men (the men being my husband, Kevin, and her hubby, Danny) take the boat and the some of the kiddos down on Saturday and we would drive the 4 and half hours after my sister got off work Sunday evening.  The guys took my niece, Lilly, who was 5, our son, Evan, who was 11 and our youngest daughter, Sophi, who was 8 years old.  My sister, Kim, and I would bring our oldest daughter, Riley and her BFF, Jackie and my two-year old niece, Olivia.

A day and a half after the men and their share of the kids ventured out, Kim and our charges took off for the lake.  There is no easy way to get to Bull Shoals, Arkansas.  The roads for the most part are two-lane highways that snake through the Ozark Mountains.  Because of its proximity to absolutely nothing, there is limited cellular service at, on, or around the lake and five years ago, there were even less spots with reception.  Because we couldn’t reach them by phone, we were operating under the assumption that our husbands were slowly puttering slowly around the lake with our precious cargo, obeying every safety precaution and avoiding any perceivable danger.  It was after midnight when we arrived at the condo and it appeared that the guys had, in fact, taken excellent care of the kids.  They were all sleeping soundly and aside from red faces and shoulders from lack of diligent sunscreen applications, everyone was in one piece.

The next day we all loaded up and launched the boat for a day of fun on the lake.  The day was absolutely gorgeous.  The sun was hot and bright and the lake was buzzing with boats and jet skis and the kids were anxious to start tubing.  They loved the giant inner tube that is towed behind the boat making for an exciting ride.  I was surprised when Sophi wanted to postpone the tubing and says, “Daddy, first let’s show Mom the rocks we jumped off yesterday!”  I think Kevin may have pretended that the wind noise from the boat was drowning out her request, but she persisted, “Daddy, please? She will like it.”

Kevin said, “Mom doesn’t want to see the rocks.  Let’s ride the tube!”

Evan chimes in, “Mom, these rocks are huge.  You have to seem them. You won’t believe it. Come on, Dad, let’s show them!”

In my sweet little mom brain, I am picturing a small boulder sticking out of the water near the edge of one of the coves with my sweet little dumplings climbing up and jumping safely into the arms of my husband into about five feet of water.  As my children continued to describe the events that transpired the previous day, the picture in my mind began to shift.

Evan:   “It is sooooo high to makes you feel like you are falling forever.”

What??  Okay, now I want to see the “rocks”.  I was very curious about their adventure.  “Did Daddy catch you when you jumped off the rocks?”  I asked, still clinging to the safe image I had conjured up earlier.

“No way!  Even Dad can’t touch there!  It is sooooo deep!” Sophi answered accurately.

“Uncle Danny and Dad stayed in the boat with Lilly and watched us,” Evan added.

After exploring a few coves that didn’t have the infamous ‘rocks’ Evan points out a landmark he remembered and we made our way toward the back of the cove.  “There they are, Mom!  Look!  People are jumping off of them!”  I follow my son’s finger pointed across the cove and my heart dropped into my stomach. The ‘rocks’ were not rocks at all, they were CLIFFS!  Natural stone platforms carved out of the bluffs positioned 15 feet, 20 feet, 30 feet over the water!!!  My babies did NOT jump off those!!!!  .  HOLY MARY MOTHER OF GOD, MY KIDS WENT CLIFF JUMPING!!!!!

As soon as Danny killed the engine, Evan and Sophi bailed over the side of the boat and started swimming toward the rock bluffs.  I looked at Kevin and gave him the “how could you let our children jump off a 30 foot cliff into 75 feet of water” look, for which he mistook for my, “aren’t our kids total bad-asses” look!!!  I watched in nervous disbelief as they scrambled up the steep slope and stood staring down at the water below.  With just a moment of hesitation Evan leaped off the edge of the cliff and disappeared into the aquatic darkness, his life jacket bringing him swiftly to the surface.  We all cheered and he lifted his hands in celebration as he bobbed in the water like a cork.  “Go Sophi,” he shouted to his sister as she was still peering over the edge. She looked so tiny standing there.  I wanted to shout for her to go back down the side of the bluff that she didn’t have to jump if she was scared. Just as I was about to verbally rescue her, she plunged off her perch squealing through her rapid descent. Riley and Jackie soon joined in the escapades and everyone escaped without any major injuries.  (Jackie had a little mishap on one of her landings, but we have agreed never to speak of it, so I won’t).

Evan-Getting Ready to JUMP

Watching my young children leap off the cliffs into the deep unknown waters below was a mixed bag of emotions for me.  As a mother, I often resist the urge to attempt to put my kids in a bubble and protect them from the world.  It’s a feeling I have experienced often:  Riley’s first day of kindergarten, the first time Evan dug in at the plate to bat in little league, the first time Sophi climbed on the block at her first swim meet.  There are times the feeling just stirs in my stomach and whispers in the recesses of my mind.  Other times it punches me in the gut and screams bloody murder.  One of the hardest things a mother has to learn to do is let go; finding the balance between keeping them safe and letting them live.  For me, being a parent isn’t usually black and white; there is that infinite grey area where my kids have to explore and as they grow older that area seems to keep expanding.  The area where they can feel the wind in their face, taste the salt of the oceans, and open doors to their own tomorrows.  I won’t always be here to make sure their life jackets bring them safely back to the surface, but my hope is they each know the depth of my love is infinite, definite and forever after.

Sophi’s Jump

Oct5

My Chupacabra-Loving, Catawampus Mother-Guest Blog Spot by Sophi Thurman

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My Chupacabra-Loving, Catawampus Mother-Guest Blog Spot by Sophi Thurman

Last night I was asked by my 13 year-old daughter, Sophi, to edit a paper she had written for her 8th grade Integrated Studies Literacy class.   Not only did I discover that she had written about me, but she had managed to capture her amazing ability to love me in spite of my quirkiness.  Never before have I felt so honored at being called an embarrassing goofball.   Copied and pasted in her own words, I am proud to share with you:

Sophi Thurman

October 4, 2012

IS-Literacy

 

 

My Chupacabra-Loving, Catawampus Mother

 

You could say the Thurman’s aren’t the typical family.  You could ask anyone who’s really spent time with us.  Actually, there’ve been countless times the words “the Thurman’s need a TV show” have been uttered.  Then Honey Boo Boo came and we’ve decided we can’t compare to that.  The crazy pageant queen has even been honored a Honey Boo Boo night, where we all gather in the living room and watch the redneck adventures.  I think the real reason of the Thurman’s Honey Boo Boo night, is to have one day a week when we can all sit down and feel better about our catawampus ways.

Catawampus is one my mother’s favorite words (she pronounces it CATTY-WOMPUS, and I find much more enjoyable to say it that way).  It’s everything it sounds like and suits my mom perfectly.  Not a day goes by that you won’t hear her say “catawampus this” or “catawampus that” or “that was all catawampus”!  Maybe on the day she finds something on chupacabras, a mythical creature from Texas that she is a die-hard believer in.  One time she even, “saw one in the road, I swear!”  My mother is also terribly afraid of coyotes.  We’ve recently moved to a farm and like to go visit, Festus, the donkey or take walks to Uncle Bob’s.  Sometimes if we hear a coyote, I will run ahead of her just to hear her say, “Sophi, stop!  Don’t leave me! Please wait!  I’m going to die, oh my GOD!”  But all these quirks and catawampus things about my mom are what I love most about her.  She teaches me that being yourself, which might be a little weird, is OK.  She reminds me that if you friends don’t like you the way you are, they’re not real friends.

When you think about Karri Thurman, the first things you would think of are all her embarrassing and funny (mostly embarrassing) moments.  The way my mom tells stories will make you remember them forever.  She is even better at writing them.  Sometimes it can even be annoying at how much she gets into her stories.  She still thinks of my dog as a retired FBI agent who is best friends with a pigeon that speaks Portuguese.  One day I even found him with a toy spy kit from the Dollar Store.  So, my mom decided to start a blog to share all these stories.  She titled it, “Heavy Sighs and Smiles”, referring to the signature sigh she lets out when she is frustrated.  The smiles are for the occasions when we all take joy in laughing at mom.

One of everyone’s favorite moments of Mom (which I am still waiting to read a blog about) is when she was hanging off the boat by her bikini bottoms.  We were at the lake with friends and tied up to several boats that consisted of strangers or people barely known to us.  My mother tried to get into the water without anyone noticing, but ended up slipping on the wet ladder.  My mom was caught on the ladder by her bikini bottoms, face down in the water and her rear-end showing to some deeply disturbed people.  Most of them laughed it off with giggles while my mom dangled there until a brave soul came and unhooked her.  The bikini bottoms looked as if a wild animal had gotten ahold of them, and tying knots where they had torn didn’t help much.  It was obvious to everyone that my red-faced, awkward laughing mom needed a new pair of pants.

Instead of acting like she wasn’t my mom, or never talking to her again out of sheer embarrassment, I decided to learn from her.  Because even she laughed it off rather than never showing her face again.  Strength is one of the most important lessons she has taught me.  If you’re hurt, don’t baby it; If you don’t want to do it, do it anyway.  My brother has terrible anxiety and she has been there every step of the way.  My mom has stayed strong for him, for her and for the whole family.  Even when she snaps and breaks, she is letting me know that letting someone else be strong for a change, is perfectly alright too.

To me, a mother full of love and care and guidance, maybe not so much grace, is what a girl needs most.  Everyone needs someone to teach you right from wrong, even though she makes mistakes every day.  A girl needs someone to be proud of them, but not super proud of them, because they are always pushing you and always wanting you to do your best.  I also believe that everyone needs a crazy sports mom that gets a little catawampus on the sidelines.  My mom happens to fit all of these roles and still has time to love me eight times around the world and back.  Karri Thurman, who some call crazy, most call hilarious, and all call catawampus, only has a few lucky ones that get to call her Mom.  She means so much to us, to me, and I wouldn’t trade anything for all those embarrassing moments, or breakdowns, or all her catawampus ways, because those make her who she is, and that’s exactly what I love.

Sep30

Baby She Was Born to Run

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Baby She Was Born to Run

Two years after my son was born I had finally clawed my way back to being as close to ‘normal’ as I ever get.  I had emerged from under an enormous cloud of depression, lost my baby weight and was working out regularly.  In a nutshell, I wasn’t crying when the macaroni boiled over and my jeans fit.  Life was good.  I had a healthy handsome toddler and an amazing 8 year old.  Who could want more?  My husband!!! It is usually me that comes up with harebrained ideas and he is the voice of reason.   I agreed to start trying for a baby in a year or so (stall tactic).   Three weeks later I was pregnant.

Sophi was born on a cold rainy January afternoon.  Being the only of my three kids born under the grace of an epidural her arrival seemed nearly tranquil.  In fact, the labor nurse had given strict instructions for me to alert her if I felt the urge to ‘push’.  She was quite perturbed when she learned that I felt like I might need to go to the bathroom and she discovered I was completely dilated.  She scolded, “This is your third baby, I told you to tell me if you felt the urge to push.” I quickly retorted, “This is my first epidural.  The last time I felt the urge to push it felt like someone was driving a train through my ass—-.  I currently feel like there is a slight chance I might have to poop.  Can you see where there might be some confusion?”  A short time later, my bonus baby, Sophi, arrived.

 

Sophi entered the world wide-eyed, blinking and taking in everything around her.   Three weeks early, she weighed in at 8 pounds and 8 ½ ounces and was just over 21 inches long.  She seemed perfect in just about every way, except for her foot.  It was apparent that she had been lying in utero with her foot folded against her leg, which made it look permanently contorted.  I tried in vain to reassure my husband that her soft rubbery newborn bones would find their way back to their original design.   He, however, was convinced that she would wobble when she walked and perhaps would never run.  As she grew from baby to toddler, it became obvious just how wrong he was.  This girl was born to run.

My first experience with Sophi giving me the slip happened on her first and only trip to the Dixie Stampede in Branson, MO.  Only 18 months old, Sophi was delighted with all the sights and sounds of the colossal plantation-style venue, but she was enthralled with the doves.  The doves were caged at the far end of the horse stables and like their equine neighbors, were part of the dinner show.   Unlike the horses, the doves played a very minute part in the grand production, but for Sophi they were the main attraction.  She resisted leaving the dove cage to make our way to the main entrance to get our tickets and be seated for the show.  As we waited in the lobby area, she saw her opportunity and seized it.  She let go of my hand and darted out the door as a small group of people were entering.  I yelled for her to stop and tried to push my way through the blue-haired gaggle that had enabled her escape.  She loped surefootedly the entire length of the stable row, bobbing and weaving through the jungle of legs.  Clumsily, I trailed her; thwarted by the people and my panic, yelling out as I gave chase, “Someone grab that baby!  She’s mine”.  Evidently, I thought clarifying my maternal status would make my crazy request seem plausible.  The onlookers continued to look on and Sophi continued to run.  When I finally caught up to her, she was hanging on the chicken wire smiling at the stupid doves like she had found the Holy Grail.

The following summer, at the ripe ole age of 2 ½, Sophi made another run for it and this time she ran barefoot on a busy street.  I was making cookies and had sent her older sister and her friend next door to borrow an egg.  They were already out the door and Sophi asked to go along and I said she could.  Instead of following, Sophi had other plans.  Just as I was about to pop the first batch of cookies into the oven the phone rang.  Here is the conversation:

Me:      Hello?

Caller:  Is this Karri?

Me:      Yes it is.

Caller:  This is Theresa, the nurse at the elementary school.  Um…we have Sophi here

Me:  WHAT??!!  You have Sophi where?  What?!?

Caller: I am working summer school at the intermediate building.  A man saw her running up the street.  He followed her on his motorcycle.  He made sure she made it inside the school.

Me:  OH MY GOD!  I will be right there!!!

Earlier in the day, Sophi had not been allowed to walk the two and half blocks up the busy street to the schoolyard to play with the older girls.  Unbeknownst to me, she had decided to make the trip solo!!  I arrived at the school to find her perched on the counter in the office, obviously proud that she had reached her destination.  Fortunately, she was safe and sound and my relief was soon replaced with utter embarrassment at my parenting faux pas!  My toddler had run over two blocks barefoot and made new friends, before I even realized she was gone.  It was apparent that I was no longer eligible for the Mother of the Year award.

Fiercely independent, boldly brave, and with an affinity for motion, Sophi continues to be a girl on the go.  Although her early running adventures kept me hopping, she has found positive ways to channel her endorphin-driven tendencies.  She competed in her first (mini) tri-Athlon when she was 9 years old, emerging as course champion in a field of 125.  She currently holds the all-time school record for the 1 mile run and a handful of school cross country records as well.  I am very proud of my little runaway and I am thankful that I don’t have to chase her anymore, because everyone knows that I never have been able to catch her!

Note to Sophi:  It doesn’t matter how you finish, just that you finish.  My wish for you is that you will always have the desire to chase down your dreams and never quit running until you have made them your own.