Showing posts with label My Random Musings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label My Random Musings. Show all posts

Saturday, June 29, 2019

A Glimpse of White Privilege

 

Good Morning, friends.  Because I've been so busy writing for work, my blog has been neglected.  I figured it was time to dust off the cobwebs and give it some tender loving care.  And how better than to take on the very politically and emotionally charged topic of white privilege? You know me, always ready to delve into the deep waters.


The truth is that I have stayed clear of politics on this blog, quite purposely. This blog is about Skiffdom and my thoughts while living in our chaos.  That fact has not changed; this is not a political blog.  This very Skiff experience led me to a deep understanding of what white privilege is and how my family benefits from it.

I have to be honest. I used to scoff at the idea of white privilege. It wasn't that I was purposely racist. I just looked at my life and couldn't understand how anyone would consider it privileged. I was raised in poverty, where we didn't always know where our next meal would come from. My Dad worked harder than anyone I have ever met, but with a family of ten, there just wasn't enough to go around. Our pastor would often show up at our house with groceries because he knew we needed them, even if we didn't talk about it.

 Our clothes were second-hand hand-me-downs, shoes were worn-out,  and the furniture was given to us. This is not a complaint. Our house was always full of people, yet my parents somehow managed to turn a widow's mite into enough to feed whoever was there. They gave to others even out of our need. But I would not ever apply the word privileged to my childhood.


I was bullied in school because I was always different from those around me.  My mom once said I was born old. I just came into the world older than my years. My friends were in their late twenties and thirties when I was still a teenager.  I was the girl that stayed after class to pick up all the spitballs the rest of the class had spat at me while the teacher was in the hallway, the girl who matured physically too young, the one who spent her time reading a book instead of playing with the other kids. 

 I definitely wasn't privileged.  My whiteness didn't stop the bullies, keep food on the table, or stop me from being abused by others. It didn't keep me safe or warm or make me feel secure. How is that privilege, I wondered?


Once married, my whiteness didn't protect me from having kids with autism, it didn't make my marriage a good one, and it didn't keep the mental illnesses from wreaking havoc in my children's and my husband's brains. It didn't keep food on our table, a roof over our heads, our house heated, or any number of other things that we lost or went without. In fact, my experience was much more like that of many of my black friends than that of my white friends.  So, where was my privilege?

My friends, I apologize from the depths of my soul. I was so blind to the privilege until an experience in December tore the blinders from my eyes in a most dramatic and heart-wrenching fashion. Is there any other way in Skiffdom? LOL

It was a typical day in Skiffdom.  I was picking the twins up from one of their last high school days before Christmas break when my phone began to blow up. I couldn't answer one call before another number was beeping in. When I finally could pick up without my phone disconnecting, it was a police officer. He told me there had been an incident with my youngest son at the bank two blocks from our house. My son was fine. How long would it take me to get there?  I was at the high school less than a mile from my house and had been gone less than 15 minutes. When I left, everything was fine. What could have happened in that short amount of time? Why was my son at the bank? He didn't answer my questions. He just told me to get there as quickly as possible.


 I got the story from the police and my older son later on. It seems in the 15 minutes I was gone, he and his oldest brother had gotten into an argument about who had to bring out the dog. My youngest, who was closing in on a manic episode, just snapped. He ran out of the house barefoot in a total meltdown and into the bank a block from our house, ranting and waving his pocket knife around (why I don't know, he has no memory of doing any of this, so I can't get answers from him).


After the relief that he was safe, I ran over to my son and hugged him; while hugging him, my first thought was, "Thank God he isn't black, or someone would have shot him for sure." At that instant, my blinders fell away, and I completely understood white privilege. White privilege isn't that my life has been easy. It isn't that I have money or even opportunity. White privilege is the fact that my mentally ill, autistic son went into a bank, with a small pocket knife, in a meltdown and came out alive. White privilege is that underneath all my excuses and reasoning, in a moment when my soul was stripped bare, I knew that the only reason he was sitting on that curb and not in an ambulance or a body bag was that he had white skin.

This is Texas. I can guarantee you any number of people in that bank were armed, besides the bank security and the police. And I could hug my son and get him the mental help he needed.  I knew my good friend, who has two autistic boys who are more severe than my son, would almost certainly have been unable to do the same had it been one of her boys in the same situation. The difference would only have been the color of their skin. That breaks me in ways I can't even begin to put into words.


This is how broken our society is. This is white privilege. Now that I see it, I will do everything in my power to make sure it changes.  To my friends of color, I can only beg your forgiveness for my years of blind ignorance. I am so sorry.

Tuesday, April 9, 2019

A Glimpse of Vanilla

 

Hello, my friends.  I'm back!! A lot has happened over the past year (thus sporadic posting). I've written and released a novel and a children's book. I'm writing a second novel and have another children's book in the final stages of illustration and editing. There have also been a lot of personal mountains to climb, which I will address in future posts. But in my first post back, I have something slightly more scandalous on my mind.  Here is your warning; things are about to get hilariously hot and spicy. So if you are easily embarrassed or don't want to laugh out loud in the office, stop reading now!

 I like peppermint ice cream. I love peppermint ice cream smothered in hot fudge, with whipped cream and a cherry on top. And hell yes, I want sprinkles too!! The more whipped cream, hot fudge, cherries, and sprinkles, the better. I'll sit down and devour every sinful bite, savoring each lick of the spoon. Yes, I love a good sundae.


But there are days when I only want a good, old-fashioned vanilla cone, just one scoop of vanilla on a plain Jane sugar cone. No, I don't want a waffle cone. No, I don't want to mess with sprinkles. No, I don't want a second scoop of your hand-made horchata cinnamon flavor. Yes, I do know that there are 3.5 million flavor combinations available. But damn it, I just want a simple, no fuss, no muss, vanilla ice cream cone.


I'm like this with a lot of things. Some days I just want a plain sugar cookie or a good old-fashioned McDonald's cheeseburger. Sometimes I want to wear my old comfortable tennis shoes with my most comfortable pair of worn-out jeans. And sometimes I like plain, vanilla, no-frills sex! There I said it. Yes, I know toys are fun. Swinging from the ceiling in chains and leather is exciting. But some days, I don't want the hassle. Some days I'm tired, and I want comfort above adventure. And hell, some days I just want to close my eyes, think of the Queen and get it over with (and I'm not even British).


I feel like, as a culture, we have decided that everything in life needs to be a unique and exciting experience. We even want our coffee to be a unicorn (looking at you, Starbucks Unicorn Frap). Every day has to be a holiday and every holiday has to be an over-the-top celebration.

When I was a kid, we wore green on St Patrick's day and ate corned beef. That's it. There were no leprechaun traps, green milk-covered Lucky Charms, or piles of golden chocolate coins to be found at the end of a glitter-dusted rainbow. You wore green so that you didn't get pinched and maybe, if lucky, colored a four-leaf clover color-by-number worksheet at school. Then you went home—The End. Mom was not up until four in the morning, hanging rainbows, setting leprechaun traps, or coloring your milk green. And that was okay because you enjoyed not getting pinched and color-by-number worksheets. But I digress.


I am blessed to run an online group for women where we talk about sex and all kinds of scandalous things. The group was started by a dear friend, Emily Dixon, after she wrote a revolutionary book, Scandalous: Things Good Christian Girls Don't Talk About -But Probably Should (you can find the book 
here). If you are a woman and want an incredible, supportive group of hundreds of women, you should check us out on Facebook (sorry, guys, this is a women-only group). However, the group can get pretty Scandalous at times. So be forewarned.

 I bring this up because I am fortunate enough to interact with hundreds of women daily. And I have noticed that plain Jane vanilla sex is no longer considered okay. Every sexual encounter should be a combination of the Kama Sutra and a porn movie.


I was lucky enough to be the mother of young children before this was a thing. I mean, sure, my husband and I had some exciting sex. But we didn't have a fully outfitted BDSM dungeon in our basement.  I didn't have to worry about my anal beads and our babies' amber teething beads getting mixed up (full disclosure: my kids didn't have teething beads either. Nope, it was good, old-fashioned, BPA-loaded plastic teething rings for them). I wasn't rushing to take down the sex swing to hang the Johnny Jumper.

More than swinging from the ceiling, I remember falling into bed dead, exhausted from a day of keeping those tiny humans alive and bathed.  We had sex (obviously, we have five kids), and we even had some excellent, hot and heavy, toys-included sex. But we also enjoyed a lot of plain vanilla sex because that was all we had the energy for. Because sometimes it's about the comfort, not the thrill.  Sometimes you are just in the mood to have a quick vanilla ice cream cone. And that is okay! It's normal. It's even healthy. Not every day is Christmas; that's what makes Christmas special.
Also, if you need help keeping those anal beads and the teething beads organized, this could be for you:

I'm here to help.  Much love, Kristine

Saturday, March 28, 2015

The Cult of the Shoe

The sun was high over head and blazing down on the dusty man that stood alone in the great desert land.  He wiped his sweaty brow with an old blue bandanna, passed on to him by his grandfather.  Tossing the shovel aside, he grabbed a bottle of triple filtered water.  He hadn't started this project alone, in the beginning there had been many out here with him digging in the heat and dirt.  But as the weeks passed with little to nothing to show for the hours of sweat and back breaking labor they had all abandoned him.  His research grant had been revoked, the ancient land of Texas was just a myth they said.  Still he labored on, his grandfather had told him the stories, passed down to him by his grandfather, who had heard them from his grandfather, and so on.  Texas had once been a vibrant land, full of legendary heroes of old, known as cowboys. his ancestors had been among these "cowboy" peoples.   Not much was known of these heroes of old, less was known of their beliefs and customs.   Once again he wiped his brow, wet the bandanna with some of the water from the bottle and ran it over the back of his neck.  Today was the day, he was sure of it.  Today he would find proof that an ancient thriving civilization once existed where now there was nothing but dust and sand, scorched by the searing sun.    He looked over the grid he'd laid out months ago, he randomly picked a section toward the upper left corner.  He hadn't really spent much time in that quadrant.   He picked up the shovel and began the exhausting task of digging.  

The sun had worked it's way across the sky and was setting when his shovel struck something hard....another rock no doubt.  Still he tossed aside the shovel and began the painstaking process of brushing away loose dirt.  One must always be cautious,he never knew when what looked to be a worthless rock would actually be the treasured artifact that would prove his theory.  As he brushed aside the sand and dirt he began to get excited, this was no ordinary rock!  The shape was oddly oblong and smooth.  It was definitely man made!  The sun was setting but he dared not stop.  He powered up the solar generator and lights illuminated the dig site.  Another two hours passed before he was able to work the object free.  It appeared to be an ancient shoe of sorts that had petrified and turned to rock.    The details were preserved almost perfectly, he could make out the crisscross design of ancient laces.  Tears flowed freely down his cheeks as he tenderly cradled the treasure.  Here was the validation he had been looking for, no more would he be the laughing stock of the archaeological community.  His tears turned to laughter and he danced alone under the moon lit sky.

Ten years passed quickly by.  No longer was he a madman digging alone in the desert.  Now he was the world's leading expert on ancient Texas.  Now others did the hard work of digging in the heat and he supervised their work and studied each and every treasure unearthed.  The shoe had led to the discovery of an entire town that had been buried under the sands of time.  Foundations of houses and businesses had been excavated, pieces of pottery, plastics, metals and bone had all been cataloged and studied.  Bits and pieces of a long lost civilizations began to come together to form a glimpse of how the ancients lived and worked.  It appeared they were nomadic, living in one town and commuting to another in some kind of rudimentary machine for work. Over-sized concrete and asphalt roads had been discovered, miles upon miles of them.  It was inconceivable to think of how these primitive ancients had built such a large infrastructure, given their limited tools and education.   Large, rusted metal stars were found scattered throughout the dig,   It seemed nearly every house in the town had at least one of these stars.  There were even concrete stars embedded in the roadwork.  These cowboys had worshiped the night sky it had been concluded.  What an amazing insight into their culture.     
 Still one piece of the puzzle nagged at the man.  That one shoe that had led to the discovery of an entire town had also led to many more shoes, all in the same area, arranged sporadically around what had been a small lake.  There were shoes of all different sizes, that had been purposefully coated in mud and left.  The mud had preserved the shoes, petrifying them; a bit of good fortune for the man and his colleagues.   The man puzzled over this cult of shoe worshipers.  Why had there been only left shoes?  Why so many different sized shoes? Was this the way they memorialized their dead?  What was the significance of the lake?  So many questions whose answers had been swallowed up by the sands of time.

Present Day
Paul limped home, mud covering his left leg to the knee. He ripped his pants and lost his shoe in the pond, again.    Mom was going to be mad, again.  She said if he lost another shoe this month he was going to have to wear his slippers to school, he hadn't told her he'd already lost one of those in the mud too.  





This story came to me one day after Paul came home for the gazillionth time covered in mud and missing his left shoe. Yes it's always just his one shoe.  Don't ask me why, I have given up trying to figure out the answer.  I hope you enjoyed this glimpse into my crazy brain.  I can't help it, my mind turns everything into a story. 

Monday, March 23, 2015

The Silent Tree

Silence, like a deep dark fog descended.
It slithered, unfaltering through every branch of the family tree;
intangible, unseen, and lethal.
Early one stormy morning, it slithered along the forest floor, until it came upon the great tree.
It  wrapped itself tightly around the trunk of family business, unnoticed in the midst of the torrential storm that blew through the forest
Slowly, intractably it began to weave it's serpentine body along every branch and twig
until the tree, once beautiful and vibrant, green and lush, the envy of the surrounding forest,
stood alone; the leaves hanging brown and limp on the branches, the bark faded and peeling,
even the sap, the lifeblood of the entire organism, had turned thick and black
Over the years the forest had receded from the once great tree, the other trees looking for healthier company.
Yet, the largest leaf on the infested, dying tree still looked around declaring
"Look how beautiful we are.  We are the tallest, healthiest, strongest tree in the forest."  Then all the other leaves would smile and wave their agreement in the wind, pretending not to notice how their dried, brown flesh no longer made a sound.
Occasionally a leaf could take no more and would fall to the ground, making a soft crashing sound as it fell to the dead forest floor.
The oldest leaf would angrily climb down the tree, reprimand the dying leaf for making a fuss, and then drag it back to it's rightful branch, using super glue and twine to hold it in place
The leaf stayed in place, though completely disconnected from the twig that once fed it.
All the other leaves refused to notice, after all one did not speak of such things
 The silence squeezed tighter still, and the unspoken  heartache, the secrets long buried, covered the tree in a sludge so thick that it would drip off the branches to the decimated forest floor
and the tree, already suffocating, could not breathe a sound.
The tree slowly petrified, turning living flesh into soulless rock.
The deafening sound of  silence had won and the leaves wept bitter tears, that none could see or hear.








Saturday, October 18, 2014

A Ho-Bath Gone Wrong

Warning: The following blog post is for the ladies; it will make you laugh and cry and probably pee your pants a little. Depends are advised past this point. To my readers of the male variety, this blog post will contain references to personal hygiene products and tender lady parts; continue reading at your own discretion.

This is the story of a mom; a miserable mom; a miserable mom, with miserable kids; a miserable mom, with miserable kids, in a hurry; a miserable mom, with miserable kids, in a hurry, in desperate need of a shower.  This is the story of "The Ho-Bath Gone Wrong".
This is the OPPOSITE of a Ho-Bath
It was a beautiful June morning in north Texas........Okay that's a lie.  It was a hot, humid. sticky, miserable morning in north Texas.  At nine am the temperature was already 99 degrees and it was climbing fast.  Normally, I am the freak that  LOVES this kind of weather but two major things were wrong with this particular day: 1) It was unusually humid.  I love heat; I revel in heat but I hate humidity.  I can't breathe, my joints ache and worse of all my hair looks like a pile of writhing snakes, it's all kinds of curly hair drama.
2) More importantly, our air conditioner was broken.  By broken, I mean it had turned my entryway into a swimming pool with large bits of ceiling plaster floating in it (our AC unit is upstairs, above said entryway).     Gallons of water had come spewing from the ceiling.  My husband (bless his heart) determined that he and Google were up to this particular repair challenge.  I love my husband; he can do magical things with a computer, he can make them stand up and dance.  He however, is not a plumber or an A/C repair type guy.  Knowing this, I called for an estimate on what the repair was going to cost, despite his well intention-ed assertions that he "would fix this".  The quote wasn't pretty, in fact it was bleak.   I decided that maybe he and Google were up to this challenge after all; mistake 1.

 So the house was a cozy 105, swampy degrees. This was day five of  no A/C in the north Texas summer (also known as Satan's Thermostat).
If I was miserable, the boys were more miserable.  If I was cranky (and I was), the boys were MORE cranky.  We had done every single day trip I could think of in the past five days; lake trips, water park trips, wild life refuge trips, ice cream trips.  The house was trashed because we were only home long enough to eat dinner, shower and sleep on the mattresses we had scattered around the living room downstairs; heat rises, you know.  Suddenly an inspiration struck, I would bring the boys to the movies! Movie theaters are cool, movie theaters are quiet,  movie theaters entertain the boys so I don't have to.
" Dear God in Heaven, Thank you for creating movie theaters. AMEN."  I sent a quick prayer of thanksgiving for this sanity saving miracle, as I feverishly looked up movie times on my phone.  I needed the first showing of any appropriate movie I could find. I didn't care if it was The Smurfs 2 on an endless loop (I was  that desperate!).  I found a movie that the boys wanted to see and it started in exactly 50 minutes.  Now 50 minutes doesn't sound like a time crunch. However,when you factor the movie theater is twenty minutes away on a good traffic day but good traffic days had ceased to exist since they decided to do construction on every single highway, byway and side road between our house and the theater, it meant we would be lucky to make it in time if we left immediately.  This presented a true crisis.  Remember, how I mentioned it was a swampy 105 degrees in our house?  It was in the best interest of the general public that I have a shower but there was no time for even a quick shower.  But if I skipped a shower I may be considered a bio-hazard and put into bio-hazard unit for detoxification......I would have to make time for a Ho-Bath, not ideal, but a functional compromise between public safety and my sanity.  I ran up stairs where the temperature is a blistering 115 degrees, or something close to it.  I rushed through my bedroom, taking time only to grab the essentials: clean clothes, deodorant, perfume, body spray.  I purposely ignore the thousand loud "MooooooM!!!!!!!!"'s I  hear.  I try to ignore the thumps and the crashes and pray "Dear God, let them survive five minutes while I get ready!  PLEASE"   I hear my bedroom door open as I am turning on the water in my bathroom sink and stripping down for my less than ideal toilette.  "DO NOT COME IN HERE!!! I"M NAKED!! GET DRESSED, put shoes on and get along for five freaking minutes!!"  Nice mom, pleasant mom, somewhat together mom, has been replaced by a naked, raving lunatic with snakey hair and smelly arm pits.  This is not the day to mess with me!  I splash water on all the important parts, keeping an eye on the bathroom door (the lock hasn't worked in ages, we really need to fix that).  Still keeping a wary eye on the bathroom door I reach for the feminine hygiene wipes I keep under the bathroom sink. " Thank you God for inventing these public shaming savers." I whisper as I rip open the package, still looking at the door.
Then I set about my task at hand, hurriedly but thoroughly cleansing the most offending areas.  The arm pits and under boob area complete with no issue I reach for a second wipe and go to work on my lady parts, thoroughly cleaning with no real thought to finesse.  Then all the sudden it hit, this terrible burning.  My hoo-ha was suddenly being burned alive by the fires of hell.  I let out a scream, that was heard all the way down in the Devil's lair.  My ears were ringing, my eyes were stinging, I stumble over to the bathtub and turn on the cold water and sit down.  It is to no avail, Satan and all his demons were still burning the living daylights out of my tender flower.   I confessed all my sins, I pleaded with God to make it stop, I promised to live a perfect life, to never swear again, to never, yell at my precious, hellion, children again, just please GOD MAKE THE BURNING STOP!!!!!!!!
I hop out of the bathtub and dry my tears with a towel, then I see it, laying on top of the first hygiene wipe package was a second, much smaller package, one that under normal circumstances I would never confuse for a ho-bath wipe.  There sitting on my sink, plain as a day, was an open alcohol swab.  I had just thoroughly scrubbed my sweet lady parts with an alcohol swab!!!!!!
I toweled off, applied all my deodorant, body spray and perfume,all the while ignoring the hell fires that persisted in my nether regions. I quickly dressed, loaded the boys into the truck and headed to the movies, the burning slowly, so slowly, fading away.  The boys enjoyed the movie and the rest of the world continued on as if nothing had happened.  But my world had changed, never again would I be able to look at a feminine hygiene cleansing wipe without feeling the echoes of the flames of hell licking at my lady parts.

Saturday, February 8, 2014

A Glimpse of Acceptance

Come my friends, pull up a chair, while I bend your ear about things unclear
Things of import, things of faith, things of beauty and things of grace
This world, of mine, so precious and dear, I wish to share
Now that you are here
I've waited a while, so let us begin
Here is my story, my friends and kin

That little poem pretty much sums up the way I see this blog.  It is my virtual living room and you are my guests.  I am a story teller, a weaver of tales and my life has given me plenty of thread to weave with.  I'm never sure what each story tapestry will look like as I begin.  I pick out a few threads and just begin to tell you the story that those particular threads are a part of.  I am always surprised what the finished product is. For this reason,  people often have a hard time defining my blog.  Is it about motherhood? Autism? A personal diary? A creative venture, perhaps?  Yes, to all those and so much more.  This blog is a series of glimpses into my life, my family, my heart and my head.  No one glimpse is enough to tell the whole story but if you step back and view all the glimpses as a whole, the tapestry of me will emerge.
I say this to clarify for some of my newer guests.  You are all welcome, I am enjoying our conversations together.

The story I have to tell today is one that is still developing.  The threads are still a bit tangled and I am still working out the knots to see my way clear to the beauty inside.  So bare with me, as I may travel a few rabbit trails, or even get hung up on a brier or two.

I have been very honest about our autism story , if you will.  It has been a huge, life changing, beautiful journey.  I am blessed beyond measure by the boys God has entrusted me with.  However  even in great blessing there can be great heartache.  The trick is to feel the heartache, accept it's reality and move on to the beauty God has.
I have alluded to the rough year my oldest son had in 2013, without giving the details.  For you to understand, I am going to give more specifics.  Paul has always struggled with high levels of anxiety directly connected with both the Asperger's and his giftedness.  In February of 2013, he had an appendectomy.  
This started  full year of spiraling anxiety (though for a long time we didn't know that was what was going on).  He spent months in pain, laying in one position on the sofa, after the surgery.  We sought out specialist after specialist, made repeated runs to the ER, had every test imaginable, only to be told they could find nothing wrong.  We had to remove him from school because he would have major pain attacks almost as soon he got there.  Over the summer he seemed to improve so we decided to give school another try.  We are so blessed to have a middle school that more than worked with us.  They twisted themselves into a pretzel to accommodate Paul but in the end he still could not handle it.  A month after enrolling him I was once again unenrolling him.  It was October, this journey had started at the end of February and Paul was continuing to shrink his world.  He now confined himself to one spot, on our sofa.  His pain-free, safe zone.  Our doctor said Paul needed to be medicated for his anxiety and sent us to a Psychiatrist.  After three and a half months and two medications, Paul is doing much better.  As a matter of fact he is slowly working his way back into school! This is fabulous news.  I cannot tell you how incredible it is to see my goofy Paul coming back after a year of him being completely paralyzed by his anxiety.
Seeing how well this had worked for Paul, we decided to bring Jamie.  As Jamie has entered the pre-teen years he has become much more difficult to deal with.  He still does not correlate his action to consequences and still has a very big problem with any sort of boundary to contain his compulsive behaviors  I wanted to get a another professional opinion.
The Psychiatrist sat with Jamie and I for an hour and twenty minutes.  Jamie did most the talking and she mostly observed and asked questions.  Jamie then left the room and she and I had a long talk.  I expressed my concern about his lack of development in several key areas.  Jamie is so advanced in other areas and has been in therapy since he was about 3.  Most of the time people think I'm crazy when I express concern that Jamie may never be able to live independently.  I think a large part of me wanted to hear a professional tell me I was an overly concerned mom and everything was going to be fine. That isn't the conversation that occurred however.
Instead the doctor confirmed that there were significant developmental concerns that she could see and that unless Jamie built some of these bridges over the next few years, I was correct in thinking he would not live independently.  She also said that his major splintering (he is highly advanced in some areas and has major deficits in others) further complicated the situation.  She was not negative at all and I thought I was prepared for this news, after all I had seen it coming.  Instead hearing my intuition confirmed, broke my heart all over again.
Friends please don't tell me that the doctor can be wrong and that he still has more years of growing and maturing to do.  I know this.  We have already overcome such monumental hurdles that we were told impossible to overcome when it comes to Jamie.  I am not giving up but you need to hear my heart here, this news just about crushed me.  Even I need a moment to feel my feelings, to scream out "This sucks!" before moving on to the business of fighting and forging and finding beauty.  
It sucked that my beautiful, talented, sweet child may not be able to drive or live independently or go away to college. It sucked enough that I broke down in tears in front of a random stranger who was kind to me.  Talk about embarrassing!!  It sucked enough that all I wanted to do was curl up into a ball and cry for two days,  I didn't because life doesn't stop just because your world is falling apart.  
I called my two best friends and they listened to my heart and didn't judge me.  I cried and then I accepted it and began to move on.  This is life folks.  All the time people ask me how in the world I handle five boys, four of whom have ASD, a husband on the spectrum, both my husband and I having lifelong diseases and all the other stuff our daily life entails.  Here it is folks.  Here is the secret.  You grieve, you cry, and then you accept.  Once you accept God's plan, the why of it all doesn't matter nearly as much as the how. How is this going to work?  How are we going to plan for this or that?  In finding the how, you find the beauty of God's perfect plan, his complete provision and his amazing grace  This may read like a Pollyanna reality but it's not.  I have hard days, my heartbreaks.  I know it isn't easy, believe you me.  But in fixing my eyes on what is and not on what I wish was, I have found peace, I have found grace, and yes I have found amazing beauty.         

Saturday, January 18, 2014

Too Fat and Back- a glimpse of my journey of acceptance and healing

Hello friends!!!!  It has been way too long.  I have taken a break from my writing to focus on a few things that I was working through.  My mamma always said if you can't say anything nice then don't say anything at all.  Sage advice that I have followed these last few months.  I must say I have missed you all so very much.  I cannot let so much time elapse between our chats again.

Warning- this is going to be a very personal blog, maybe the most currently personal I've ever posted.  I would ask that you understand that this is my story, which I have hesitated in writing for the past year and a half.  My counselor told me that when I was ready to share, I should; that this would be healing not only for me but for others out there who have walked a similar path.  This is written not to wound but to heal.  Unfortunately, others have been a part of this journey (for good or ill); I will try my best to protect them but I will no longer be shamed into silence.

A year and half ago I wrote a blog about being fat ( read here http://www.glimpsesofskiff.com/2012/10/a-glimpse-of-being-fat.html).   I thought after that blog that I had exercised my fat demons. I thought I was whole.  I was wrong.
The church I wrote about, we did leave.  The story of why is long and convoluted.  It involved a lot of hurt and brokenness for both my husband and I.  We had loved our church and the people we worshiped with.  We weren't planning on leaving but a circumstance arose that put me in a position where I could either stay silent about something I felt was very wrong or I could address it (with the appropriate people).  I, being the meek and mild mannered person that I am, tried to address it.  My thoughts on the subject were not appreciated, as I was told in no uncertain terms.  In the midst of this, heart wrenching conversation, someone I loved and respected very much, looked at me and said  "The only thing I see when I look at you is your weight".  Of all the things said that night, that crushed my spirit.  I had been fat shamed straight out of God's house and it took me over a year to be able to go back.
The person who said that to me, did me a HUGE favor (I'm not even being sarcastic).  What was said as an off the cuff, hurtful, barb, eventually drove me into counseling.  My whole life I have lived life ashamed of my body, ashamed of who I am on the outside.  I tried every diet imaginable, to no avail.  I prayed, fasted, exercised, tried to starve myself (I make a lousy anorexic, it just wouldn't take), tried to make myself throw up (it seems I have very little in the way of a gag reflex, so I failed at bulimia too), I even tried diet pills.  I berated myself and was berated by others.
The stories of what made me hate myself are numerous.  Once as a young girl, I was wearing a spaghetti strapped shirt as we went out to dinner with friends (a BIG treat in a large family with limited funds).  I was excited and thought I looked pretty cute.  While eating someone looked over at me and told me my arms were too fat.  I shouldn't wear shirts without sleeves. On my eleventh or twelfth birthday'  I was told that I was too fat to have a birthday cake; they were just looking out for me you know.  I was made to weigh myself and record my weight on a chart in our bathroom,every week, an utter humiliation for a teenage girl, already struggling with self image issues.  Grandparents, parents, friends, family and strangers all reminded me that I was a sub-par woman because I weighed too much.  I was even told that I would never get married because though I had a pretty face, I was too fat .  No man would want me; if by chance I was lucky enough that one would, he would be old and fat and just looking for someone to take care of him.
I tell these stories, not to make others look bad, or to make people feel sorry for me.  I tell them simply to give background on why that last comment, made in the bastion of the only place I had ever felt truly accepted (the church) cut so very deeply.
After a few months break, we tried to go back to church but every time we did, all I could think was that I was so fat these new people obviously were judging me and wouldn't really want me in their congregation.
It got so bad that I finally went into counseling.
young me
Let's be honest, there are a lot of things in my life that I needed counseling for.  But the one thing that became very clear was that I was deeply damaged.  I could not accept that others could love me because I felt so unworthy of their love.  My weight had literally become the barometer by which I gauged my acceptability to the world. Over several months, I slowly began to work through my issues.  I came to begin to accept and even embrace the woman God created me to be, no matter what numbers on the scale read.  I began to shop for fashionable clothes and to buy jewelry and make-up for myself.  Before I had always felt guilty if I did those things because I didn't deserve them in my mind.  I always made those things a reward I I lost ten or twenty or thirty pounds, because anything pleasurable or nice was dependent on if the scale said I earned it.   I was depressed because I could never, ever be thin enough to earn all the things I needed (forget wanted, I went for two years with a coat that was basically in tatters because I refused to buy a new one until I lost more weight). I even refused to go to MD's because I was so ashamed of what the scale said.  Once when I was 8 months pregnant with my last son, I had to go for an unscheduled appointment at the OB/GYN (we thought I was going into labor).  My normal doctor wasn't in so I got one of her partners.  He was in the hall reading my chart and looked up at the nurse and said "You seriously want me to check on her and she weighs this?!?"  I was mortified.  He didn't know I had heard him, so I smiled and politely spread my legs; knowing the whole time what he thought of me as he examined me in my most vulnerable of positions.  I haven't been back to the gynecologist since my son was born over nine years ago.  This week I scheduled my first appointment.  This is a huge step in the healing that has happened in me over the past year.
As I have learned to love the woman I am, an amazing thing has happened, I've become stronger and healthier.  I have made changes to my diet, not with the focus of losing weight, but with a focus on my over all health.  As I've made these changes the numbers on the scale have been steadily falling.  The amazing thing is that this fact is so very secondary to me.  Other people are more excited about the weight loss then I am.  To me it is the fact I was able to scale the cliff (okay more of a steep ledge) to go fossil hunting with my boys that is the bigger deal.  The fact I now have energy and creativity to make my home into the home I want my boys to love and treasure is HUGE.  The fact that I now can enjoy the holidays with my family instead of being nearly comatose from the amount of pain I am in from preparing for them, is the most treasured huge deal.
My focus has changed.  I like me, regardless of the scale.  I hope one day others who can only see my weight can come to appreciate the amazing person I am but if not, that's okay.  I am no longer shamed by their prejudice and ignorance.  I am fine with who I am and I really do like the me I see in the mirror.  I look pretty darn cute with my hair done up and my red lipstick on.  I look just as cute in my pj's with wrinkle cream on my face because who I am doesn't change because of what I'm wearing or what I weigh.  Who I am is a child of the most high God and he finds me beautiful.
Me now


Monday, July 29, 2013

Here I Raise my Ebenezer

Today, as I was sitting in my closet sorting clothes, the events of the past year hit me like a ton of bricks.  So many things have happened, so many things have changed, so many struggles, and so many huge blessings.  Almost like a silent movie, image after image, played in a steady stream, through my minds eye.  I started to tear up at the enormity of it all and I knew I needed to document it, to set it all down in writing,as an ebenezer of God's amazing, divine grace.  An ebenezer is a commemoration of divine assistance according to Miriam Webster's Dictionary.  In the Bible, Samuel had called on Israel to repent of their sins.  Their enemies, the Philestines, heard of this huge gathering Israelites , and decided to use it as an opportunity to attack.  But God showed Himself great and powerful and won the Israelites a great and wondrous victory.  "Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and called the name of it Ebenezer, saying, Hitherto the Lord has helped us."  I Samuel 7:12 This blog is my personal Ebenezer, my banner staked in the ground, saying "By God's grace and God's grace alone, we have overcome."

It all started August of 2012, when we very unexpectedly had to leave our church, a church we were very involved in and loved.  I am not going into the details of the how's and why's on this blog, simply because that is superfluous to the point.  The point is, I was shattered and broken-hearted.  I am not a new Christian; I have seen my fair share of craziness and pain in the church.  After all the church is made up of us crazy, fallible humans.  For some reason, this particular thing, broke my heart as nothing in my previous church experience had.  We tried to get back into church but the more we visited different churches the more heart broken I became.  The church I loved, the church I grew up in and wanted my children to experience, the community of strong, faith filled Believer's, Sunday night and Wednesday night services, Sunday school, and real genuine heart-felt worship, no longer seemed to exist.  Instead we kept coming across what seemed to be a great big production of church; lots of lights, sermons timed down to the minute, worship that was hard to differentiate from a concert, children's church that entertained more than it taught.  I wept many, many tears of heart break and disillusionment.  I was not disillusioned in Christ, but my heart-broke for his bride.
Along with the heart break of losing our church, came the hurt and pain of lost relationships.  We live in a small town and that leaves very little room for healing.  Rumors fly, people speculate and the pain is compounded.

Time stops for no man and soon I was swept up in back to school madness, Holiday preparations, birthday parties, and all the extra planning, shopping, trimmings and trappings that go along with that.  In the midst of it all, I started having some serious health issues.  Because of some of the medications I am on, there was serious concern that it could be my heart.  I was admitted into the hospital over night, had many, many appointments and tests,and was ultimately blessed it was not my heart but another serious condition I had already been diagnosed with, rearing it's ugly head.  Blessedly, a change up in medication resolved most of the symptoms.
 Then it was Christmas.  What a fun, blessed day.  Things seemed to be working themselves out.  I was still heart broken but I had my wonderful family.

Then the bottom fell out again.  On December 27th my husband decided to make breakfast (he loves to cook big breakfast).  He put a pot of oil on the stove and left it on high, forgetting about it for a few minutes.  The pan burst into flames, not little flames but flames hot and high enough they melted parts of our hood above the stove. The fire was rapidly burning out of control, and our fire extinguisher would not work (lesson to be learned here folks:check the pressure in your fire extinguishers regularly.).  I was busily getting the boys out of the house and starting to call 911.  My husband, meanwhile, bravely carried the flaming pan of oil out of our house, so that we didn't lose the house.  It could have been way worse but he he did receive 3rd degree burns on his hand from the radiant heat of the pot.  He is a computer programmer, which of course uses his hands, so he was out of work on disability for six weeks.
We were so blessed his hand healed well, and did not become infected.  He has a nasty scar but of all the things that could have happened we are so blessed that was the extent of the damage (that and the need for a new stove, but I'm not complaining.  I love my new stove;)

During his six weeks of disability, my husband decided it was time to start looking for a new job.  He was blessed with an awesome job but they were downsizing.  His job was relatively secure but the downsizing had created a very stressful work environment.  
A week after he returned to work, our oldest son awoke in agonizing pain.  I rushed him to the hospital.  He had to have an appendectomy.  The surgery seemed to go well, so they released him the next day.  Unfortunately, we were back in the hospital the next day.  Paul had an incision site infection.  He was placed on antibiotics.  The infection healed but Paul was still in incredible pain.  He was stuck in one position on the sofa for nearly four months.  We went to doctor after doctor, had test after test, and yet no one could tell us why he was in such pain.  Paul's school was incredibly understanding and bent over backwards to work with us.  In the end, we had to homeschool him the last month of school.  He simply could not be there more than twenty minutes before the pain had him immobilized.
While all this was happening, my husband was still job hunting.  He had many, many offers and interviews but none were what he was looking for.  He was still working in a very stressful job and had the added stresses of looking for a job and a son who was in chronic pain.

Everything was closing in on me.  The incident at the church had raised hurts and pains from my past that needed to be dealt with.  The stresses of our marriage were coming to a head, not to mention the everyday stresses of being the mom of five boys, four of whom are on the autistic spectrum, and having an autoimmune disease myself.  I was a mess!  I put myself in therapy.  It was the absolute best decision I have ever made for myself!!  I cannot tell you how much this has revolutionized my life. I. AM. NOT. THE SAME PERSON!! 
I am blessed with a qualified, Christian therapist.  She challenges me, listens to me and prays with me.  

Then God moved!  Well to be honest, I believe He started moving with me going into therapy.  My husband found the perfect job he had been looking for.  He fits there perfectly and is challenged (boredom is one of the things that drives my husband bonkers).  He has found friends there.  I have never seen him this at peace in a job.
Both of our vehicles died within a month of each other.  We were kind of freaked out at how we were going to handle this but God made a way.  We bought two new vehicles, one brand new and the other had only 11,000 miles on it,  in a week!!  I cannot tell you what a blessing it is to have safe, reliable vehicles.  Not only are they reliable, they have all the extra's that I never imagined we would actually have, things like leather seats, seat warmers, remote starters, navigation.........the list goes on and on.  When God gives a gift, it is above and beyond what we could ever imagine.
Suddenly there is so much more peace in our home.  My boys have started maturing in ways that I had honestly started to give up on.  We have been able to go on several mini-vacations this summer.  In the past, this just wasn't an option both financially and because our boys just couldn't handle it.  Autism and change, even fun change, don't mix well.  It is awesome to see my boys growing and maturing.
Paul has finally started healing.  Most days he spends pain free, though he does still have the occasional pain attack.  The doctors never really discovered what caused all the pain and distress.  Many, many people have lifted him up in prayer.  I believe God has heard those prayers and is healing him.  Sometimes healing doesn't happen in our time, quickly and instantly.  Instead God uses the process to develop our character and spiritual walk.  I have seen both develop greatly in Paul through this process.

One last huge change is happening.  We are moving. That's right, the kingdom of Skiff is moving into a new castle.  We have been in this house for five and half years (longer than I have lived any place in my entire life) but it is time to move.  This is a very good thing for us.  I'll have more details concerning this in a later blog.

I finally feel healed enough to start church hunting again.  We have yet to find the place where we fit (our boys special needs makes this a little more difficult).  However, I finally, for the first time in a year, feel ready and EXCITED to find our new church home, our tribe if you will.

This past year has been hard, difficult, heart wrenchingly painful at times but that isn't what stands out the most when I look back.  What I see shining through all of it is God's amazing grace and provision.  This is my Ebenezer, my testimony of God's continuing victory on our behalf.   I'm going to end with the second verse of one of my favorite hymns, Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing by Robert Robinson

Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy help I'm come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.
Jesus sought me when a stranger,
Wandering from the fold of God;
He, to rescue me from danger,
Interposed His precious blood.


Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Have Truck Will Travel -Part 2

Finally we crossed the border into New Mexico!!! There was much rejoicing in the Skiffmobile 2.0, or as the boys call it, The Zebra. 
We drove into downtown Hobbs, and though it was quite artsy and fun, NOTHING was open.  Now, we had driven all the way to New Mexico with the promise of food for these boys.  Let me tell you, we were gonna find food come hell or high water!!  We drove around and finally found the food district (as I like to call it).  There were restaurants galore: steak houses, Mexican, Seafood, chicken, Chinese, and so many more.  So where did we eat, after driving ALL day from just outside of Ft Worth, TX all the way to exotic Hobbs, New Mexico, you ask?  We ate at Burger King of course.  That's right, 444 miles, 6 hours of driving, to eat at Burger King....with a play place! WhooHoo!!!  We Skiff's know how to live the high life.  As we were dining on our gourmet Burger King, my husband was barely coherent, he was so exhausted.  I could tell that there was no way he was up to driving back home.  I could have driven for a while but once it had gotten dark we'd be out of luck because I have terrible night vision.  Basically I would have been able to drive us back into the shinnery (the scrubland) and we'd have been stuck for the night, with all the lovely creatures that live out there.  Coyotes do not make great camping partners, in my humble opinion.  There was no choice, we needed a hotel for the night.  Hubby is blessed with a pretty flexible job so he was able to call into work for Monday without any major issues.  It helps that he goes in early and works late almost every day.  Lucky for us Hobbs had a plethora of choices in the hotel department.  We found a great hotel at a reasonable price, loaded all the kids back into the Zebra and headed to our suite for the night.  The boys had been stuck in a vehicle for two days straight at this point.  There was no way they were going to sit calmly in a hotel room.  They were literally bouncing off the walls (as in Benny was running into one wall, turning around and running into the other)!  We decided that the only way we would have a modicum of peace was to head over to Walmart, our clothier of choice on these impromptu Skiff getaways, pick up some swimsuits and other basic necessities and then spend the evening in the pool and the hot tub at the hotel.  Bliss would once again reign supreme.
In true Skiff style, we stepped out of the hotel to find a dust storm raging.  Never in my life have I seen anything like it.  There was fine dust blowing everywhere, so thick it was hard to see a few feet in front of you.  The wind whipped the dirt and sand at you like tiny bullets.  It coated the roof of your mouth and got into your eyes and nose.  Nasty, nasty stuff.  We made it to Walmart only to see the parking lot strewn with carts, blowing every which way.   Hubby parked where it would be unlikely for the truck to be hit by anything and we made our way through the store.  After digging through the racks and finding everyone's correct size  we headed to the front to check out.  As is the Walmart way, there were only a few registers open, with lines that nearly wrapped around the store, each moving at a snail's pace.  We were all hot and tired and cranky and just wanted to get into the dang pool already!!  Hubby and the boys went out to the truck whilst I waited in the Walmart line, like the seasoned pro I am.  FINALLY, it was my turn to check out.  I swiped my card and asked to get cash over because I need to do laundry at the hotel.  We had no extra clothing on this obviously well thought out and planned vacation.  After all, when we had left on Saturday we were only planning on going to the Peach Festival.......which shall be spoken of no more of in Skiffland.  So let it be written, so let it be done!
I told her I needed my cash back in two fives and a ten.  She said "I'm sorry ma'am we only give cash back in twenty dollar increments."  "I understand.  Can you give me a ten and two fives?" I asked.  "No ma'am.  As I said, we can only give out cash in twenty dollar increments."  Fine whatever.  I'll take the twenty.  Ain't nobody got time to school you on basic math right now! I think (Note I DID NOT SAY THIS, I simply thought it.  I'll repent later.  No one's perfect y'all).  I thanked her for my twenty and finally made it back to the truck.

We managed to get back to the hotel while the dust storm still swirled around us.  We wrangled everyone into their swimsuits and down to the pool.  It was worth every freakin' minute at Walmart, let me tell you!  The spa was pure bliss.  Hubby just laid back and completely unwound.  The kids all swam and swam and swam.  Then the most amazing thing happened: Jamie got into the spa.  Water has always been one of the things that calms Jamie when he is getting worked up.  After two days in the car he was very worked up.  On a scale of 1-10, Jamie was probably at a 9.The moment he stepped into the spa he completely relaxed like nothing I have ever seen.  He was a completely different kid after a few minutes.  Forget a pool, I told hubby, we need to get a hot tub!!
After everyone showered, I gathered up all the laundry and headed to the handy dandy hotel laundry facility. I took out the  $20 bill that the Walmart cashier had so graciously insisted on giving me.  But alas, the hotel change machine only took ones and fives.  I wish I had thought to ask the Walmart cashier for fives, oh wait I had! sigh.  I headed downstairs to ask the receptionist for change for the twenty.  "I'm so sorry." she said, not all that apologetically "I've had three people pay in cash and now I don't have anything smaller than a fifty.  I'm sure the Walmart down the street will give you change."  I thanked her and headed upstairs to beat my head on a wall. I dug through every pocket in my purse and my husband's wallet and came up with two fives!  Thank you Jesus!!!!! I had two loads to do because all my Peach Festival nasty clothes had to be washed in their own special load.  After buying soap for each load I was going to be short $1.75.......ugh.  I threw the nasty load into the washer and headed out to the truck to find $1.75 in quarters because there was no way, no how, that I was going to head back to that stupid Walmart for change!!! Had we been in the old Skiffmobile this would have been an easy task but this was Skiffmobile 2.0, a far superior vehicle in every way but there wasn't loose change floating around under seats!  I found one quarter.  I still needed $1.50.  I was so tired.  I REALLY didn't want to be on a quarter scavenger hunt, I just wanted to curl up and go to sleep!  I found .50 in my purse front pocket.  Now I was short only $1.00.  It might as well have been a million!!  My nasty load was done and low and behold I found a dollar in the pocket of my freshly washed capris.   "PLEASE take this slightly wet, crumpled dollar." I silently begged the change machine.  It took it with no problem!  There was singing, there was dancing, there may have been a tear or two shed!!  Miracles do happen, even in hotel laundry rooms.  Finally around 1am , I piled my weary body into bed.  I slept soundly knowing all the laundry was clean!
The next morning we awoke to a monsoon, a literal monsoon!  It turns out in New Mexico the dust storms (also called a haboobs, according to the hotel staff) are often followed by a week long monsoon! 
The boys and hubby went downstairs for breakfast and I took the opportunity for a leisurely shower.  I actually took the time to put on my make-up BEFORE going to breakfast!!!  That right there is the true sign of a vacation in my book folks!  
By the time I made it down for breakfast most of the boys were already done eating.  I got to hang out with Sam and Jamie for a while and received all kinds of compliments on their behavior.  Proud mommy moments!  Then I was alone, at the breakfast table, with my coffee, texting with my sister friend.  Oh the luxury!!!!
It was time to hit the road.  The monsoon followed us the whole trip home.  We stopped a few times for meals, gas and bathroom breaks but mostly we were pushing to get home.  A gas station, somwhere in west Texas, had cool hand made memorabilia like wiggly snakes,  carved wooden horned toads, and bobble head armadillos.  The boys, who were driving us crazy in the truck by this point, picked out some souvenirs and quieted down for a while.  We pushed on, making pretty good time despite the rain. The rain was coming down in sheets, when we hit Fort Worth, at rush hour, in tons of construction.  As we were stuck in traffic, on an over pass, I got sick, again!!   Luckily, we were able to get off the road in downtown Fort Worth and I made it to a restroom.  I have decided Fort Worth doesn't like me and just  makes me sick.  It was an unexpected detour but my husband, who is a city guy at heart, really enjoyed seeing the city.  Then we were back on the highway again!  The construction made for an impossibly complicated trip.  None of the exits were signed well and traffic was at a stand still.  Once we made it to Grapevine, TX we decided to just get off the road, go to the mall food court for dinner and wait out traffic.  The kids had an absolute blast.  They each ordered what they wanted for dinner and then we went to the Legoland Discovery Center store.  Sam, my Lego maniac, was in absolute heaven.  They spent some money they had earned and it was time for the last, blessedly uneventful,leg of our trip.
The Bass Performing Arts Center, Fort Worth, TX
So what started out as a simple day trip to The Peach Festival, ended up with an 888 mile drive, two hotel stays, EMT's being called, the need for Depends, vomit, three desperate wardrobe changes  a dust storm, a monsoon, an amazingly heroic hubby, ghost towns, gas adventures, laundry mishaps, fun, laughter, beautiful scenery and  family memories that will always be treasured.  This is the Skiff life.  This is my life and I wouldn't trade it for the world!!!

Have Truck Will Travel-part 1

Have Truck, Will Travel.
 Starring Ms Kristine Skiff as "Mom"
Anna, TX,  a random Saturday morning in July, The Skiff House, headquarters of a woman called Mom.

I started my Saturday as any other lazy Saturday morning, scrolling down my Facebook feed.  I felt restless, itching to get out and do something different with the kids.  Suddenly, the answer presented itself, right there in my Facebook feed (never doubt the power of FB;)  My friend Whitney says her family was heading to the Peach Festival in Weatherford, TX, a mere hour and a half drive from The Skiff House.  I love peaches, the boys love festivals, the hubby loves driving the new truck; this was providence.
We ran a few errands and were on the road by eleven. The excitement in the truck was almost palpable.  It was going to be a fabulous day for Team Skiff.  By one pm we were parked and shuttled over to The Peach Festival.  It was hot but hey, this is TX, July is always hot.  I made sure everyone was wearing hats and sunblock and we started looking for the food!  It was an hour past lunch time and my boys were positive they were going to die from hunger any second.  

We didn't get many pictures at the Peach Festival but here is one
The lines surrounding the food trucks were massive.  I sent my husband and most of the boys to sit down at the shaded table while Sam and I waited in line, in 107 degree heat, on asphalt, in front of the the fryers and grills on the food trucks for forty five minutes.  We have a big family so our orders always take a while to make, add that to the hoards of hungry Peach Festival devotees and I knew we were in for a wait.  As the food came up, I sent Sam back to the table with it.  By the time he and I sat down we were both a little over heated.  Nothing a few minutes of sitting in the shade drinking lemonade won't cure, I foolishly thought.  After everyone finished eating, we started making our way through the festival, stopping first at a misting station for everyone to cool off.   Instead of cooling off  I started to feel pretty sick.  I looked over at my husband and told him I was sorry but I had to go.  We started making our way back to the shuttle stop, with every step I was feeling worse.  Suddenly, I was overcome with chills.  I knew this was really bad.  I looked up at my husband and said "I have to sit down NOW"   He kind of helped me/ shoved me into an alleyway out of the sun.  As I was sliding down to the ground all the noises faded away and my world turned black.  I don't think I was out for more than a few seconds. When I came to, I remember someone asking me if I was okay and calling for the paramedics.  My husband started dumping icy lemonade over my head (hey it's what we had).  The paramedics were there in under two minutes.  About this time Sam started feeling sick as well.  They loaded Sam and I up onto a golf cart and drove us to their cool down room.  I have to give a huge shout out to the Weatherford EMT's.  They were AWESOME!!  They piled ice cold rags on us, gave us cold water and allowed my husband to bring the truck to the cool down station so we wouldn't have to go back into the heat. 
*I am going to apologize in advance for the TMI but there really is no way to relay the rest of this part of our trip without the gory details.* Back to the story.  So, when I passed out it seems I had lost control over my bodily functions ( I'll allow you to use your imagination on exactly what that means;).  This was not immediately apparent to me because a) I had lemonade dumped all over me and b) I wasn't all that coherent for a while.  Once I was back in truck, it was very clear what had happened.  I needed to clean up and change my clothes and it couldn't happen fast enough.  As we pulled out, on the corner, was a plus sized consignment shop that was actually open.  If you are a plus sized woman you know what a miracle this is.  If not just take my word for it.....this was like manna from heaven level miraculous.  I bought the first loose fitting dress my size I could find, cleaned myself up in their private bathroom (Thank you small business owner!!) and we were off.  My husband kept trying to get Gatorade into me but my stomach was still pretty upset.  Ten minutes into our trip back I vomited all over my brand new truck!  It was terrible.  We were on a highway, with no where to pull over and nothing for me to 'aim' at.  My second outfit of the day was a completely gross mess.  The passenger side of my new truck was disgusting.  I was embarrassed and sick and in tears.  I looked at my husband and he said "That's it. We're getting a hotel for the night."  I have the most A-FREAKIN-MAZING husband.   The next exit just happened to have several hotels with suites, another miracle in my book (again we have a large family so we have to have a suite.....unless you have a large family you probably don't know what a pain in the neck it is to find lodging that fits your family).

My husband dropped us off at the hotel and went shopping for clothes for me for the first time in our 14 years of marriage!!!  I took a blessedly cool shower and wrapped myself in a hotel bedspread until he returned (yes I know that is DISGUSTING but it was a heck of a lot less disgusting than sitting around covered in vomit).  It is such a pain to shop for me, I usually just take a day and go by myself.   Not only did he find my right size, what he picked out was really cute and comfortable.  I may send him shopping for me more often;)  At this point he is already a super hero in my book but the next thing he did  made him the best man to ever walk the face of this earth other than Jesus......for real!!  He bought cleaning supplies and cleaned up my puke mess in the truck!!!!  I never asked or expected him to do that.  This is what true love looks like my friends.  Not only did he clean it but he cleaned it so well the truck looks brand new again! 

After I got showered it became apparent that the a/c units in our room were not going to cool the rooms off and the TV was broken so we had to change hotel rooms.  While we waited for the new room to cool off we brought the kids out for dinner (by this time it was after 8pm).  We ate dinner at Wendy's and let the boys get ice cream (they had been real troopers through all the craziness).  My hubby decided to bring the older two boys to a movie after dinner.  Unfortunately the days events had proven too much for Paul and he was starting to freak out.  So instead of going to the loud theater he went back to the hotel room with the younger boys and I.  Sam and hubby had a great father/son night at a blow em'up alien move, in a theater with a huge screen and reclining chairs.  The rest of the boys turned on the Food Network and fell asleep (my boys LOVE the food network.....it is comical how much.  Now at dinner they say things like "Mom, I can smell that you used oregano in the sauce." or "Mom I think you over seasoned the pasta" or "The onions you put in the roast really added to the overall flavor"  It is hilarious!)


The next morning dawned rainy and cool ( it was lovely)!  Sam and I were both feeling much better after a good nights rest. We ate the hot breakfast provided by the hotel (my guys very favorite part of any hotel stay).  We loaded up into the nice clean truck and were about to head home when hubby said "You know this is the farthest west we've been at the start of a trip.  We should try to redeem yesterday a bit by driving a little further west and having lunch."  What a great idea,  I agreed.  So we set out in the cool, rainy morning. We chatted, we laughed, we listened to music, we listened to Your's Truly, Johnny Dollar (the old time radio show).  The farther west we drove the more the landscape changed. Suddenly we were looking at more scrub and cacti.  Looming ahead of us were some amazing mesas.  The kids were antsy so we stopped at a rest stop and let them run free for a few moment.  What treasured moments of pure bliss.  Here are some pictures taken at the rest stop.
The boys walking off some energy

Boys and Trees:)

Alex discovering a black widow spider in the background

Paul reacting to the spider news

Alex and Benny


The Cacti (Jamie's favorite part)
Alex found a black widow spider, so we all loaded back up into the truck and continued on, each passing mile taking us farther west then we'd ever been.  Around 1 pm we reached Abilene and decided to stop for lunch.  Paul got upset and we couldn't figure out why. He just kept saying "I'm not going to eat because we're in the panhandle.  I'll just wait until we're home."  After much urging and prompting he finally blurted out, through tears mind you "I'm not going to eat in the panhandle because their meat won't be irradiated!"  Sam helpfully added "He's afraid he's going to get tapeworms!"  Both hubby and I tried to hold back our laughter as I explained that the panhandle of Texas was still a part of Texas and therefore their meat was still governed by the same laws as our meat at home.  He had no need to worry, his meat would be irradiated to his hearts content and he was in no danger of the horrors of tape worms.  After a few moments of convincing, Paul decided he would risk eating some chicken fingers at Dairy Queen.  He is still alive and tapeworm free so it is safe to assume that Abilene has well irradiated, tapeworm free meat.;) This very comical interlude was brought to you by Asperger's (the out of date diagnosis that is never out of fashion in Skiffdom).

We started looking for fun attractions around Abilene for the kids.  The plan was to do something fun and then head back home.  You know what they say about plans and Skiffs, they are like oil and water, they just don't mix. ;)  We narrowed down our options to a few cool local attractions and loaded back into the truck.  Paul spotted a GameStop across the street and still had lots of Birthday money burning a hole in his pocket.  We figured he could buy himself a new game for his 3-DS that would keep his mind off the meat irradiation process for the remainder of the trip.
Once he and hubby loaded back into the truck hubby looked at me and said "I really don't want to stop.  I just want to keep driving west."  "Ummmm, alright....sounds like fun" I said, while inside thinking "But you have to work tomorrow."
So we continue on our westward  drive.  After a bit we decide to stop for drinks.  I went inside the store, leaving hubby alone with Google maps, this turned out to be an error in judgement on my part.  After waiting in line loaded down with water bottles, I returned to the truck to find a very excited husband.  "Guess what?" he says.  "What?" I respond warily.  "We are only THREE hours away from the New Mexico border!!!"  "Wow.  I didn't realize we were so close" I say.  "I think we should drive to Hobbs New Mexico for dinner! We've never been to New Mexico!"  He says enthusiastically.  "It sounds fun but you have to work tomorrow and we would still have to drive home." I said reasonably.  "It's only a six hour dive back home.  I'll be fine." said the man.  "If you're sure."  I conceded.  And that was it.  We were back on the road, heading farther west.  The scenery became dramatically different.  There were miles and miles of wind mills in and around Sweetwater, TX.  I have seen wind farms before but nothing on this scale.  It was amazing.

The windmills faded away and then there were beautiful mesas all around us and miles upon miles of open scrubland.   I can not begin to describe the beauty of the wildness.  I love when nature is so big that I am reminded how very small I am.  We stopped on the side of the road a took some pictures while some of my boys watered the ditch (sometimes having all boys has it's perks;).  After we all piled back into the truck my husband looked over at me and said a little worriedly "I only have fifty seven miles left in the gas tank."   "It will be fine.  I saw a sign a little ways back for a town called Gail.  It is only another ten miles or so up the road.  We should be fine."  I offered helpfully (everyone should be blessed with such an observant wife;)  He breathed a sigh of relief and we continued on our merry way, admiring the beauty of God's handiwork.  Here are few pictures from our stop.  They in no way capture the sheer vastness of the open wilderness.  BEAUTIFUL!

We arrived in Gail, which was more like twenty miles up the road, and immediately started looking for a gas station.  We didn't see any but there was a nice size school sitting back from the road so I knew it must be a good sized town.  After a few minutes of gas station hunting we had found none, nada, nothing.  We turned around in the parking lot of that beautiful, good sized school.  This was when a sense of dread settled over me.  The sign read: Borden COUNTY School.  Grades Pre-K-12.  One school, for all the students, in all grades, in the entire county?!?  ?Yeah, we might be in trouble.  Just then we spotted a County Sheriff's SUV.  I convinced my husband to wave it down.  After all, who better to ask where to find gas than a member of law enforcement?  The Sheriff's Deputy pulled over next to us and rolled down his window.  "How can I help y'all?" He asked.  If you have ever seen the show Longmire, think of the Branch Connolly character and you will have a good idea of what this officer looked like.  He was definitely Longmire-esque sexy, in a cowboy cop kinda way....( hey even my husband saw the resemblance).  "Could you tell us where is the nearest gas station?"  My husband asked.  The sexy, Longmire-esque cop looks at us like "Why in the world would you need gasoline?"  Out loud he asks "What direction are y'all headed?"  I point west and say "That way."  He says "Yeah the next place that sells gasoline will be LaMesa."  "About how far is that?" I ask.  "Round about thirty miles."  We thank him nicely and he drove off.  Hubby looks at me and says "I have 38 miles left in the tank."  Now I was more than a bit worried but I put on a brave face as we started driving toward LaMesa, also know as The Gasoline Oasis, in Skiff folklore.
The boys were really antsy by this point and needing another bathroom break. The truck was dinging at us every two minutes to remind us that it needed fuel ( our truck has nagging down to a science, let me tell you!).  Hubby was getting pretty tired and was very worried about the gas situation.  This was no longer bliss.
Early on in our trip, my husband had said he wanted to know how far one tank of gas would get us in the new truck.  Well, we now know the answer to that very intriguing question.  One tank of gas will get us from Love's gas station in Anna, TX to the Stripes gas station in LaMesa, TX......exactly.  The truck was sputtering when we finally pulled into the station but we had made it!!  Some quick potty breaks and a full tank later we were back on our way to New Mexico.......Yay!  This is when we realized we had not taken the time zone change into our calculations when we had decided to New Mexico trip it.  Yeah, we still had another hour before we made it to New Mexico.  
At this point there was no point in turning around, we were soooooo close.  


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