Three-Part Birthday Party

On September 1st I celebrated 62 years of life.

This is what happens when you don't have a plan. I knew my birthday was coming up, of course, but since it fell on a Thursday this year and my job is extremely stressful right now, I had just a vague thought that we'd celebrate the following Sunday, on Labor Day weekend, when we all gathered for our weekly family dinner. I didn't mention it to anyone, though. After all, it was still a week away.

So when we got together for family dinner on the Sunday before my birthday, the stage was set for confusion. Dylan and Jake arrived first. While we waited for Sarah and Chris to get here, Dylan and I chatted in the living room, and then Jake came from the direction of the kitchen to join us. I was asking if I could use my old Wii game system to watch a new Netflix series that looked interesting, called Stranger Things. (I usually just have the Netflix DVDs sent to me.)

Dylan reminded me that I had run the vacuum over the Wii cord awhile back, severing it. "Oh yeah, dang," I said. We discussed the possibility of finding a new cord for my old system and how expensive that might be. He said what I really needed was a Roku. Huh? A what? So they spent awhile explaining this new technology to me.

Meanwhile, Jake kept whispering something to Dylan. Finally, Dylan said, "We need to run to the store." I asked why. "We're going to get dessert," he said. I pointed into the kitchen. "There's a box of brownies on the counter we can bake," I told him. "Do you have frosting?" Hmm. "No, probably not," I admitted. "Then we're going to get frosting," he said, and they took off before Sarah and Chris even arrived.

Now, I'm no dummy. It's four days before my birthday, so I figure their antics are somehow related. Sure enough, they return with a can of frosting and a gift bag.

These four cards started the party ball rolling.

It turned out that Jake had noticed the four birthday cards I'd set up on the kitchen table, and he thought that meant we were having my party that day and they'd just forgotten! In reality, I just love birthday cards, and as they arrive I put them out where I can enjoy them for a week or two.

Once we realized the misunderstanding, we convened a brief family council and decided to go ahead and have a small celebration. We would continue it when my birthday finally came on Thursday, by going out to dinner together. Meanwhile, I could open my gift from Dylan and Jake. I didn't want to wait to see what they ran out to get me!

You've probably already guessed it. Yes, they bought me a Roku for my television! Dylan got it all set up for me so I can now watch all these free channels (most of which I'll probably never use, but it's the thought that counts). And, I confess, I watched all eight episodes of Stranger Things in just four nights!

After an ear-splitting rendition of "Happy Birthday," we had frosted brownies 

and ice cream on Sunday, August 28th, four days before my birthday. 

The unexpected nature of the party caught me wearing ratty clothes and no makeup.

My eyes sort of disappear without mascara, thanks to my blonde lashes...

The party continued on Thursday night, my actual birthday. In this photo are

my new Roku from Dylan and Jake; a rose and candy from my friend Wyndie;

and the hand-quilted pillow from my friend Debbie, along with two unopened gift bags.

You'll note that Mark re-gifted Dylan and Jake's gift bag...

After we were all done with our various jobs on Thursday, we all met here at my house around 6:00 to open the rest of my gifts before we headed up the mountain to our favorite Mexican restaurant, El Rancho. As always, my children were thoughtful and generous with me on my big day.

A new Willow Tree figurine from my sweet Sarah!

This one of a mother and daughter is called "Close to Me."

Sarah gave me another beautiful Willow Tree figure for my collection. This one is particularly sweet since it depicts a mother and daughter. The card that came with it (from the artist, Susan Lordi) states, "Apart or together, always close to me." It's especially meaningful because Sarah has become one of my very best friends. She is always there for me, no questions asked.

Beautiful from all angles!

Mark chose this wind chime for me. 

Mark has had it in his mind for a long time that he wanted to get me a new wind chime to add to the collection on my front porch. I simply love the random music of chimes on a breezy day. So Jake took Mark shopping on Thursday, which is why I came home to an empty house that day and had a couple of quiet hours alone. They said they searched three different stores before they finally found wind chimes.

The lovely pink rose from my friend Wyndie

(plus two bags of sugar-free chocolates).

The rose makes my kitchen smell luscious!

The number of birthday cards increased...lots of lovely sparklies this year!

It was about 7:00 when we finally got to El Rancho. While we waited for our food to arrive, I texted with my older son Jacob, who had earlier texted me a happy birthday wish and explained that his phone service was out or he would have called. He also told me my gift was in the mail.

I took a group picture (below) to send in a text to Jacob, telling him that I wished he and Danielle were here with us, but then Dylan took my cell phone and started snapping unflattering, ridiculously close closeups of our faces, or parts of faces, and then texted them all to Jacob at once, which tied my phone up for a bit. Next, he spent 10 minutes secretly filming Sarah eating tortilla chips, and then we all laughed hysterically (except Sarah) when he played it back in time-lapse mode. There's never a dull moment with my baby boy around!

Everyone poses for this picture I sent to Jacob in Utah. (Jake looks mad 

because he's jealous that Jacob got to see Mark Hamill at Comic Con that day!)

Mark and Mary at our end of the table in El Rancho.

But wait! It's not over yet! After we'd finished dinner and the waitresses had brought me my free deep-fried ice cream (which I shared with everyone), taken my picture in a sombrero, and sang happy birthday, Dylan asked, "So are we going back to your house for cake and ice cream?" We all groaned. It's rare that you leave El Rancho without being stuffed to the gills.

So we decided that this coming Sunday, three days after my birthday, we will have a third celebration featuring my homemade chocolate chip cheesecake and homemade ice cream. Both are sugar-free, but they are delicious family favorites. I think we'll grill burgers, too. It will be Labor Day weekend, after all!

Technology can be so fun! I know that no one at Google knows me,

yet it's strangely pleasing to have your name pop up on their search bar!

At the end of the day, after everyone had gone home and Mark had gone to bed, I got a phone call from my dad around 10:00. We had a great, long talk, and that just ended the day on a good note. It's hard to believe that he'll be eighty-two on Sunday! His birthday is three days after mine, on September 4th. He was still nineteen years old for three more days when I came into the world, just a baby himself when he became a dad. So his big day is up next!

And it's so cool to find all these birthday greetings

from friends on your Facebook page!

Even my students remembered to wish me happy birthday at school,

and some even sang to me, on Thursday. One sweet freshman girl

brought me this note and a sunflower on Friday.

Freshman Names

Sometime around 2002, there were a whole bunch of mommies and daddies who dreamed up some really interesting names for their adorable little newborns. And a whole bunch of those little ones are now freshmen in my English classes!

I've been in education for 37 years now, and I can't remember ever being faced with a roster of names like those that greeted me at the start of this new school year. Many of them I wasn't even sure how to pronounce.

Biblical names are always popular, but this year there were some I'd never seen outside the pages of the Bible. I now know, for sure, how to pronounce Esau and Nehemiah. And then there are those British names you read in Agatha Christie novels but never actually hear in real life, like Cyril. I always thought it was SEER-uhl. Turns out it's SIR-uhl, at least at my student's house. And then there's Cipriano. Thank goodness he told me he likes to be called C.J.

In one class, both Zonte and Jonte were enrolled. No, not twins, not brothers, not even related. Other boys' names include Khijhel and Taliesin. Taliesin likes to be called "T." He said he was named after Frank Lloyd Wright's famous school of architecture, Taliesin West, here in Scottsdale, Arizona, but his parents chose an original pronunciation: tuh-LEE-she-uhn.

The girls' names, of course, are usually the most creative, and this year is no exception. We have Deiah, Noelia, Kwamie, Exianne, Chantea, and Exxianne. My spell-check does not recognize any of these names, and neither did I at the start of the year.

Once I retire and become a full-time writer, I just might be looking for some original names to give my characters. I think the ones I noted in this post might just have some possibilities!

Dinner with Debbie

Lovely early birthday presents from my friend!

August 26, 2016

Toward the end of every summer, my sweet friend Debbie insists on taking me out to a birthday lunch before she returns to her home in the Valley for the winter. And she never fails to bring me a thoughtful gift, often made with her own two hands.

Last night we met at Native Grill for dinner--fish and chips for me and a burger for her, all yummy--and I was able to convince her to let me turn the tables for once, allowing me to pay for her dinner since I'm not nearly as good a friend as Debbie is! Her birthday is just four weeks after mine, but by the end of September I'm so caught up in the stress of work and planning for our annual first-week-of-October family vacation that I usually miss her birthday altogether or just send a card, since she's already returned to the Valley by then.

So, this year, she brought me a big bag of beautiful gifts and I treated her to dinner as a very-early birthday gift! I hope she knows how precious she is and how much her friendship means to me!

One of the handmade table runners Debbie gave me for my birthday last year

adorns the top of the tall dresser in my bedroom, a perfect match for my bear quilt!

Debbie is a master quilter, a hobby to which she gives much love and time. One of her gifts was a quilted throw-pillow in our high school's colors, purple and gold. It just so happens that Debbie and I met at Blue Ridge High when I came here as a first-year teacher in 1990 and she was an established instructional aide; a few years later she had earned her own teaching degree and moved with her husband, George, to the Valley where she taught at Mesa High until she retired a few years ago.

I love the pillow! It will be a bright spot in a dark living room filled with the very brown furniture picked out by my second husband (which was delivered just three days after we split up, leaving me stuck paying for the stuff he just had to have...but I'm not bitter...ha!). Debbie also gave me a rose candle that actually smells like real roses! And the glittery card (I love glitter) is adorable.

Thank you, Debbie! (I know you're reading this!) You are an amazing woman, a wonderful friend, and a talented seamstress. I look forward to many more years of long heartfelt talks, tasty meals shared, and meaningful friendship. Love you!

The Apples Are Blushing

Our little apples are starting to take on a red blush!

August 21, 2016

The other day I glanced out the front window, curious about how our tiny green apples were doing, and I noticed there were pale red patches peeking out from among the green leaves. I wanted to go have a closer look but, as usual, the busy activities of life intruded on my immediate plans. Thus, it wasn't until this morning that I went out to have a closer look. Sure enough, our little apples are taking on a fine blush here and there.

A nice, healthy cluster of apples!

The apples our tree first produced, unexpectedly, five years ago mostly ended up rotting in the grass because I hadn't known it was an apple tree. Nonetheless, we were able to rescue a few and give them a try. As I remember them, they were quite sweet and tasty despite their small size. This year, I expect to harvest and enjoy many more of these little gems!

Blue Ridge High School as seen from the air around 6:00 a.m.

August 10, 2016

And here's a bonus photo, captured from the sky by Chris Paxman. Chris is a photographer with his own studio, as well as the photography teacher at our high school, who inspired Dylan in his quest to ultimately become a professional photographer himself. (And Chris is also my doctor's son. That's small-town life for you.) 

It's a great shot of our whole, widespread campus, including the soccer, football, and baseball fields. My classroom is located in the East Campus, the big building at the front on the right side, where the English and social studies classes are located, along with art and two science classrooms. This picture also captures a great slice of our mountain beyond the campus, the beautiful evergreen-carpeted place we call home!

Empty Nest Perks

The big entertainment center in my tiny living room after July's deep-cleaning.

(Yes, the Christmas lights Dylan put up in December are still there. I decided

to leave them until next Christmas, then give them to him for his own home.)

By 8:00 this morning, I had cleaned out and reorganized my kitchen cupboards, pantry, and refrigerator. I'd also washed up last night's dishes, planned my meals for the coming week, and made a shopping list for today's shopping trip. I love when my day starts out productively!

I have way too much furniture crammed into my small home!

I actually take tons of these pictures after deep-cleaning each year so I can

update my home inventory for insurance purposes. But handy for blogging!

There are still a few items on my to-do list, of course. A couple of bills to pay, a letter to write, the previously mentioned shopping, two loads of laundry to wash/dry/put away, my bangs to trim, a decision to be made regarding for whom I will cast my vote in the upcoming primary election. The thing that amazes me is that the reorganizing of my kitchen was not on my to-do list, yet I had plenty of time to do it.

New items on my shelves: My son Jacob gave me the lovely figurine

for Mothers Day. Her banner is printed with the word "Teacher." 

Also on Mother's Day, my new son-in-law Jake gave me the sweet plaque.

It proclaims, "Children are born with wings, teachers help them to fly."

I'm discovering there are some very nice perks to having an empty nest. In July, after my long 6-week respiratory illness and the stress of being under threat of evacuation for the Cedar Fire, I was finally able to finish deep-cleaning my house. And guess what? It's still clean! It's very freeing to know that for the remainder of this year the only mundane cleaning tasks needing to be done will be occasional dusting and vacuuming. Everything else is optional.

More graceful Willow Tree figures adorn the shelves.

All but two were gifts from my sweet Sarah.

Other tasks are likewise simplified. Mark washes his own work clothes (his Denny's shirts are so saturated with airborne cooking grease that the smell of them makes me queasy), but I add his regular clothes to mine just so I'll have full loads to wash, and it still only makes two loads per week. That's if I'm not also washing bedding, of course. 

The bottom shelf holds part of my Japanese art collection, collected

during the two years I worked in a Japanese factory in Anaheim.

Above that, I rearranged my castle shelf, which made more room and...

With just two people to feed, both of whom are working and away from home a lot, there are far fewer dishes to be washed. Except, of course, after our weekly family dinner on Sundays, which usually generates a lot of dishes. (Keep in mind, I still don't have a dishwasher, so it's all done by hand.) Mark helps out with dishes on his days off. He also cleans the bathrooms, takes care of car stuff, and keeps his own room tidy. He even makes his bed before he leaves for work every morning.

...allowed me to fill an empty shelf in Mark's room, mentioned in an earlier post.

Shopping no longer means hauling in and putting away twenty or more bags of supplies. Nowadays, we usually have less than ten bags of goods when we get home from Walmart, which we can bring inside in a single trip. I admit, I do most of the putting away, although Mark helps when asked. I have a system that no one else seems to understand!

Everything in my house has a memory attached to it.

Jacob sent me the wooden bear hanging while he was serving his mission

in northern California. My former stepson Ryan and his wife Shera 

gave me the Family Rules for Christmas the year they stayed with us.

As I've said before, I would never trade a moment of the years I spent raising my children. In fact, I wish I'd worried less about keeping a clean house and focused more on simply enjoying my little ones, because those years disappear much too quickly.

In first grade, my kids each did a little booklet about their families. One page featured a fill-in: "My dad likes to ____. My mom likes to _____." Over the years, without fail, all three of my children wrote, "My dad likes to go fishing. My mom likes to clean house." I didn't love cleaning house! It just seemed so necessary. I think I was a little afraid someone would come and take away my greatest treasures--my children--if my house weren't spotless enough.

I love family pictures so much that there's no more wall space!

The photo and bronzed baby shoes on the desk are mine. I was two.

In the end, I think everything turned out okay. We still managed to build enough precious memories that our family is very close. We all have our own lives now, but we still love being together as often as we can manage it.

Family photos line every inch of my short hall, on both sides!

However, now is my season for a quiet, clean home and more time to tackle long-postponed tasks, as well as to savor getting back to the projects and hobbies I abandoned long ago in favor of building a family. It was the best decision I ever made, but now is the time for Sarah, Jacob, and Dylan to build their own families while I reinvent myself. And I'm going to love watching it all unfold!

Lasts

The aisles of Walmart last month.

One day last month I was walking through Walmart when I noticed the annual back-to-school displays hovering above aisle upon aisle of school supplies. It hit me like an electric shock that, for the first time since 1994, I wouldn't be buying pencils, notebooks, calculators, or backpacks for anyone this year. Twenty-two years of providing for my children's education was now a thing of the past. In some ways it was a nice "You did it, Mom!" moment. In other ways, it made me a little sad.

My final beginning-of-the-year district-wide assembly for all faculty.

(Dr. D's Blue Ridge High Drumline performing for the teachers.)

Thursday, July 28, 2016

When we are young, we measure life by all the "Firsts" that mark the milestones of our accomplishments. I'm starting to realize that I've entered the season of my life where many of those markers will be "Lasts." Some will be planned, like this, my final school year before retirement. Some will be unexpected. Some may not even be recognized. Some will be highly anticipated. Others may be dreaded or, worse yet, mourned.

My last Blue Ridge student planner/handbook.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not rolling over and calling life quits. I have lots of "Firsts" still planned. I think often of all the places I want to travel after retirement, places I've never seen but always wanted to visit. I look forward with longing to the day I finally get to cuddle my first grandchild. I fully intend to complete my first novel and have it published. Life still holds the promise of new adventures, and I hope to be around for another twenty years or so to enjoy them.

The last time my name will be included in the faculty listing of the student planner.

(I served on the committee that developed our Mission Statement about 20 years ago.)

Perhaps knowing that something is, or could be, the last time you'll ever do it or experience it is a good thing. Perhaps that's the key to making sure you find a way to enjoy rather than endure the difficult times, as well as a reminder to savor the uplifting, interesting, and joyful moments.

The last time my name will be included in the Master Schedule.

I've already been asked by both the principal and the assistant principal if I would consider postponing retirement to return for another year. Or two. When I mentioned on the first day of school that this will be my last year at Blue Ridge, upperclassmen in my two non-freshman classes pleaded with me to "Just stay until I graduate, then you can leave!" I've had several students stop me in the hall or come by my classroom to tell me they wished I were going to be their English teacher again this year. All of these things warm my heart, but it's time to start a new chapter in my life. Some new Firsts to mingle with the Lasts.

My last time to set up family photos and mementos on the shelf behind my desk

to remind me that I also have an amazing life outside the classroom.

My last time to prepare my classroom for a new bunch of students,

mostly brand-new freshmen, to arrive on the first day of school.

My last time to leave start-of-the-year notes and copy orders, for things

like my class syllabus and permission slips, on the desk of my aide, Joe.

The last year I'll watch students' Lexile reading scores make huge gains

as we work together on the Read 180 program (this is the Reading Station).

The last first-day-of-school assembly I'll attend with the whole student body.

(So funny not to see Dylan's face in the crowd for the first time in five years.)

Wednesday, August 3, 2016

And so begins my twenty-seventh year at Blue Ridge High School, my thirty-seventh year as an educator, and my last chance to experience all the ups and downs of doing my part to make a positive difference in the lives of the hundred-thirty-plus students entrusted to my care for an hour of each school day. It will definitely be the last...and it's all good.

And the last "Freshman Friday Transition Games" I'll ever attend.

Freshmen only, participating in activities to familiarize them with our campus,

and culminating in a barbecue lunch served to them by their teachers.

Grateful for a Gun

In the hands of ordinary citizens, guns do save lives.

Here I am, going along in my comfortable oblivion, living my life as if everything is fine and dandy, never suspecting there was a night not so long ago when my son was fighting for his life. And then I was blindsided while we were in Utah when Jacob finally shared an experience from about six months ago.

"I didn't tell you when it happened, Mom, " he told me, "because I didn't want you to worry." No mother ever wants to hear a story that begins with those words.

Last year before moving to Utah, Jacob bought a pistol. He felt strongly about the need for self-defense, especially now that he's a family man. While I wholeheartedly support the right to bear arms without being burdened by ridiculous regulations, guns still make me nervous, and I wasn't too thrilled for my boy to be carrying one. He has had a moderate amount of experience with firearms, but I kept reminding him to take some gun courses to gain just a little more expertise.

His wife was about as thrilled as I was. She, too, was nervous around guns and wasn't comfortable having one so close at hand. Besides, as she told him often, "It's a waste of money."

And then, late one dark winter night, Jacob came out of a store to discover he'd locked his keys in his car. In a poorly-lit, vacant corner of the parking lot, he spent quite some time jimmying the lock, but he finally got the door open. Right at that moment, he realized there was someone behind him, and he felt a gun pressed against the back of his head.

"Give me everything you've got," said a tense male voice. Jacob said that, during the experience, it seemed obvious that the guy was affected by drugs of some kind.

Terrified for his life, Jacob told the man that he'd give him whatever he could find in the car, and he started fumbling around inside the vehicle. In his mind, though, he was focused on finding his gun, which was between the seats. 

Here's where those tender mercies come in. Danielle verified for us that Jacob had stopped carrying his gun sometime before this incident and left it at home over a long period of time. That very morning, however, he'd felt impressed to take the gun with him. Thankfully, he'd obeyed that quiet voice.

Once he had the pistol in his hand, he started to back out of the car. Whether the other man saw Jacob's gun or not no one knows, but Jacob felt something that told him the thug was starting to pull the trigger. Jacob whirled and fired, hitting the man in the hand. The injured hood ran off into the darkness.

"Did he drop the gun?" I asked, wide-eyed.

"Yes," Jacob answered, "and a couple of fingers, too."

He went on to describe the gun lying on the ground, with one finger still on the trigger and the other nearby. Both were still twitching. Ugh.

He immediately called 911 and police officers quickly arrived. The criminal was nowhere to be found, but they soon caught him when he checked into a hospital. I guess having two fingers blown off isn't something you can ignore. Jacob said he was told later that the fingers were too chewed up by the bullet to be reattached.

There were no charges against Jacob since it was a clear-cut case of self-defense. However, the officers warned Jacob that the thug who'd threatened him could accuse him of attempted murder and create months or years of legal hassles. Jacob was surprised when they told him it's usually better in self-defense cases to kill the person who's trying to hurt you.

Luckily, in this case, the gunman did not try to press charges. With his disembodied finger still on the trigger, I suppose it would be hard to convince a jury that he'd meant no harm. Since there was no trial and Jacob was never called upon to testify, this criminal must have accepted a plea deal. Jacob was told that he is now serving ten years in prison.

So there I was, sitting in our resort condo, a little shocked and trying to digest what Jacob had just shared. Then I asked, "So, did you intend to shoot him in the hand?" I was wondering if my son had suddenly become a sharpshooter.

Jacob laughed. "Mom, I just pointed the gun and fired. I was shaking so bad, all I wanted was to scare him off!" 

Needless to say, Danielle's opinion of owning a gun has undergone a drastic change. Far from being a waste of money, she completely believes it saved her husband's life that night. I agree.

There will be liberals out there who say the gunman might not have intended to shoot my son, that he would have simply taken whatever Jacob gave him and left, that the presence of Jacob's gun only aggravated the situation. As if that makes any difference to me. If someone threatens another person's life with any kind of weapon, they deserve to die. Especially when the person they threaten is my child. And nothing anyone says will ever change my opinion.

A gun in the right hands is a blessing. And I am very grateful for the gun in my son's hand that night and the still, small voice that urged him to take it with him that day. I know it saved his life...and perhaps even the lives of others this thug hadn't yet met.

It's Blooming Apples!

July 23, 2016: We have apples!

I'm singing this to the tune of "Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree":

"Oh, I looked out the window and what did I see?

Little green apples on the ugly apple tree!"

The apples on the west side of the tree seem to be

slightly larger and more plentiful.

Literally, I looked out the window yesterday and saw the apples for the first time. When Mark comes home from work, he closes the living room curtains before relaxing in the recliner. He hates a brightly-lit room almost as much as I hate a darkened room. When he fell asleep in front of the TV, I woke him and reminded him that Dr. Ata said no more sleeping in the recliner. He has to nap in his bed with his bi-pap machine and mask on, because his apnea is so bad that it's contributing to the heart issues.

Once Mark had retired to his room, I immediately reopened my curtains to let the light in. And there they were, gorgeous green globes dangling from the branches. I grabbed my camera and ran outside to take pictures. When Mark got up an hour later, he paused by the window, then looked at me in surprise. "There are apples on the tree," he said. I think it's funny that we both noticed them at the same time. Did they just pop out of nowhere overnight?

However, the east side has quite a few apples, too.

The last time we had apples was in the Fall of 2011. That's when I first found out it was an apple tree and not just a big ugly bush that was growing through our chain link fence. When we bought the house in 1993, it was just a short, scrappy little shrub with nothing remarkable about it, not even pretty flowers like our lilac bush. Sometimes I even thought about chopping it down. Back in October 2011, I wrote this blog post about how I came to learn of its true nature (click on the link below if you'd like to read about it):

Unexpected Apple Tree

I only called it an "ugly" apple tree because

it still looks more like a bush than a tree.

Later that following winter, my then-husband pruned away the lower branches in an attempt to make it more tree than bush and to promote more apples in the upper branches during coming years. It hasn't worked. We haven't had a single apple since that one little crop in 2011, five years ago. There are always apple blossoms, but never apples. Sometimes a hard freeze will destroy the blossoms, so we know there will be no apples, but other times we have no idea why. 

This spring, though, my tree was covered with apple blossoms, which in turn were covered with busy, pollinating bees. That is a very good thing. We did get a few more frosts this spring, but the blossoms seemed to survive, and I wrote about it in April here:  Apple Trees and BR Games

Thus, I've been hopeful that we'd finally see those sweet little red apples this fall, and it looks as if our patience will be rewarded! Now I just need to learn how to prune an apple tree properly...

Round Three

Mark was back in the hospital yesterday, July 22, 2016.

Sooo... Mark had an ablation to fix his atrial fibrillation at Banner University Medical Center in Phoenix on July 11. Everything went well, and when we left the hospital the following day his heart was finally beating normally. The Phoenix cardiologist, Dr. Bahu (a specialist in ablation procedures), told us to make a follow-up appointment with Mark's local cardiologist, Dr. Ata, in 2-3 weeks. We could wait 4 months before we saw Dr. Bahu in Phoenix again.

I called Dr. Ata's office and left a message on Wednesday morning, July 13. That's the day after we'd returned from Phoenix, as well as the day before we left for Utah. Since they didn't call me back that same day, we went off on our five-day trip and forgot about scheduling Mark's follow-up. When we returned home late Monday night, I found three messages on the phone from Dr. Ata's office. Still, I waited to call them back until Mark went back to work on Wednesday so I could see what his work schedule would be for the coming week. Unfortunately, Denny's only schedules their employees a week at a time. Mark finds out on Monday what his schedule will be from Wednesday to the following Tuesday. It really sucks for planning events ahead of time.

I finally called Dr. Ata's office again after Mark came home from work on Wednesday afternoon, July 20. Between Mark's work schedule, the fact that I will return to work next Thursday, July 28, and the last-minute nature of my call, the receptionist and I were having a hard time finding an appointment time that we could get to without missing more work. While we were trying to figure it out, I asked Mark again, "Your only day off this week will be Friday?" Hearing this, the receptionist said excitedly, "Wait, I do have an opening on Friday morning!" I pointed out that Friday would be only 11 days after Mark's ablation rather than the two- to three-week period Dr. Bahu had specified, but she said that would be fine. So, 10:50 on Friday it is!

I only mention all of this to demonstrate how things sometimes work together in strange, complex, and often difficult ways to produce the blessings we didn't even know we needed. Mark felt perfectly fine when we arrived at Dr. Ata's office at 10:50 yesterday. It was perhaps twenty minutes later that they took us into an examination room and the nurse stuck a device on the end of Mark's finger before updating his medical history. Half an hour later, everything was in an uproar and Mark was in the emergency room. If we had waited another week or two for his appointment, who knows what might have happened?

After the nurse took Mark's medical history, she looked at the little monitor on his finger and her eyes got wide. She moved the device to a different finger, saying, "I hope that's not right." She waited a few seconds, checked again, then stepped out in the hall and called to someone to bring Dr. Ata to us right away. When she walked out for a minute to get the EKG machine, Mark looked at the device and said, "Is 172 bad?" Then my eyes got big. I'd never known of anyone having a heart rate of 172!

The nurse returned and ran the EKG, then she stepped out in the hall to speak privately to Dr. Ata, who had just arrived. When he came into the room, he gravely asked Mark how he felt. Mark said he felt fine, and the doctor looked totally stunned. "Really? Are you sure?" he pressed. Mark insisted he felt perfectly normal. Then Dr. Ata explained that Mark's pulse was up to 174 and his EKG showed that he had an atrial flutter. I didn't know what that was, so he briefly explained that it was similar to and related to atrial fibrillation, and was every bit as dangerous, so I needed to drive Mark across the street to the emergency room right away.

Dr. Ata alerted the hospital that we were on our way, so when we walked into the ER they immediately put him into a wheelchair and took him back while I stayed to fill out paperwork. Then I joined him in room 1. The emergency room physician, Dr. Whiting, also asked Mark how he was feeling. Mark shrugged and gave a little laugh, saying, "I feel fine." Dr. Whiting was just as shocked as Dr. Ata. He told Mark that, with his heart rate that high, he should feel like he just finished running a marathon.

Dr. Whiting and a team of nurses (including sweet, young Brooke Larson, who once went on a snowboarding date with my younger son) set about getting Mark's pulse down below 100 beats per minute. It took a while, but they were able to accomplish getting it down and keeping it down. By then, an hour or so had passed and Dr. Ata came in to check on him. He had consulted by phone with Dr. Bahu and now, with Mark's pulse under control, they were ready to try a cardiac conversion, where they shock the heart back into a normal rhythm. Just like on TV shows where the EMTs whip out the paddles and charge the machine, shouting "Clear!" before the unconscious patient shudders convulsively on the gurney.

Except this time they shaved the middle of Mark's only-mildly-hairy chest and stuck an adhesive pad in the bare patch and another one on his back. Then they gave him a mild sedative to put him to sleep for a very short time. As the room filled with people--two doctors and about five nurses--I kept waiting for them to wheel Mark away to an operating room. When I finally realized they were going to do it right here, I thought that surely someone was going to send me out in the hall to wait. They didn't. I sat there watching, partly fascinated and partly horrified that they were apparently going to let me watch.

There was a humorous delay when Dr. Ata tried to apply the electric shock but the machine didn't work, and one of the nurses tried to show him what he was doing wrong but it didn't work for her either, and everyone laughed when she realized she'd forgotten to plug in the machine. Then, the next thing I knew, Dr. Ata had the machine charged, he pressed the button, and Mark's body jerked about an inch straight off the gurney while both his arms flew straight up toward the ceiling, dislodging a couple of the heart monitor wires attached to his chest. Mark, who'd been lightly snoring before the shock, opened his eyes when his body jerked, but when it was over he closed them again and continued snoring. He doesn't remember any of it.

It certainly was less dramatic than it appears on TV shows, but it was nonetheless shocking to see. It's also pretty miraculous what medical science can do. Mark's heart went right back to a normal sinus rhythm and held it--at least until we left the hospital. He never feels symptoms of his heart issues, which is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because Mark experiences no pain or worry, but a curse because there is nothing to signal that a problem exists.

After about four hours in the hospital, Mark was recovered and they released him to go home, with yet another new prescription. I told him he's got his own in-home pharmacy. Between his heart issues and spinal stenosis pain, he takes six pills every morning, nine at bedtime, and two more during the day. 

Today Mark was back at work and tells me he feels really good. Hopefully that means he is still in a normal rhythm. However, Dr. Ata and Dr. Whiting both expressed their belief that Mark may be that one-in-four patient who requires a second ablation procedure. With the atrial flutter, his heart was not circulating blood properly and it caused the out-of-control heart rate. The doctors concur that a second ablation would resolve the issue for good, because the flutter is easier to ablate than the fibrillation. Mark is less than thrilled with the idea, though.

For now, we'll hope for the best. It is possible that this shock was all he needed to get his heart back on track for good. This was actually Mark's third cardio-conversion. The first didn't work at all and the second worked for about a week before Mark's heart reverted to a-fib, but maybe third time's the charm?  We'll see Dr. Ata in a week or so and move forward from there... Meanwhile, wish Mark luck!

The Long Drive Home

Typical terrain along our drive as we came into southern Utah.

July 18, 2016

Our five-day visit to Utah ended on Monday, and we prepared ourselves for the dreaded ten-hour drive back to our homes in Arizona. At least this time we had two cars, with Dylan and Jake in the Buick LaCrosse Dylan had purchased from his brother, Jacob. Although my Chevy Traverse has three rows of seats, it was still pretty tight having five large people and all our luggage crunched together for the drive into Utah.

We checked out of the resort right at noon on Monday and drove away by 12:15 Utah time (or 11:15 Arizona time). With two fuel stops and two meal stops along the way, we pulled into my driveway in Arizona a little before 11:00 p.m. Arizona time (or midnight in Utah). I think the actual driving time was about ten hours, perhaps 30 to 45 minutes longer than it would normally have taken, thanks to some surprises as we drove through the vast Navajo Reservation.

Our stop at a gas station in Price, Utah.

We had filled the tanks of both cars in Midvale on Saturday after our visit with Jacob and Danielle. Despite having driven to Salt Lake City and back the following day, our tanks seemed full enough to get us quite a long way before we needed to fuel up again. And they did. Turns out we both got fairly good gas mileage (my Traverse gets 22-23 miles per gallon on the highway), because both of our cars had more than a quarter-tank left when we finally stopped to fill up in Price, Utah, more than an hour and about 250 miles later.

We had our picnic lunch at Kane Springs Rest Stop again.

Then we drove on for two and a half hours more before we paused at the same rest stop where we had lunched on our way to Midway on Thursday, four days earlier. This time, instead of tuna salad on French rolls, our picnic lunch was deli sandwiches of smoked turkey, ham, and provolone on nutty multi-grain bread, with leftover homemade potato salad.

Back on the road, looking through my bug-spattered windshield.

It was about 4:15 when we got back on the road headed south and, except for a few ridiculously slow tractor-trailers in no-pass zones, it was mostly smooth sailing with bright blue skies and fluffy white clouds.

This is Recapture Reservoir, just north of Blanding, Utah.

We can see there's a huge storm ahead of us.

Then, about an hour from the rest stop, we began to see dark storm clouds gathering ahead of us, with heavy downpours of rain visible, stretching from the low clouds down to the horizon below. Within fifteen minutes, the rain was pouring on us, too. It was intermittently heavy, then drizzly, then heavy, but it was continuous until after we'd passed through Bluff, Utah, and over the San Juan River, approaching the Utah-Arizona border. Finally, the rain seemed to fizzle out by the time we'd crossed back into our home state at the northern edge of the Navajo Nation.

We hit the rain showers a few miles before the small town of Bluff, Utah.

Bluff is the first town you come to when you enter the Navajo Nation

on highway 191 from the north, while you're still in Utah.

The rain lightens up as we enter Bluff, getting closer to the Arizona border.

Driving across the San Juan River, a green oasis in the middle of high desert.

Once we'd passed through the storm, we expected clear sailing ahead.

Our first 80 miles into the Navajo Nation were clear and bright.

Our first hour and a half past the storm and into the Navajo Reservation was beautiful. There was a good, stiff wind buffeting the car, but the sky was brilliant blue, and puffy white clouds scudded by overhead. There was very little traffic, and that part of the highway had recently been redone, so the asphalt was smooth under the tires and we flew along at almost 75 mph. I even commented to Mark that we'd be home in no time if only the rest of the trip were this smooth. I guess I must have jinxed us.

Then heavy dust storms began to blow across the highway.

Around 7:00... Okay, the whole time thing becomes pretty weird at this point, because we are now in Arizona and Arizona does not do Daylight Savings Time. Unless you are in the Navajo Nation, which does do Daylight Savings, even though it's in Arizona. Probably because part of the reservation is in Utah and New Mexico, both being states that do practice Daylight Savings, although I think it's pretty silly since probably more than 95% of the reservation's land mass is in Arizona... Anyway.

So around 7:00 (or 8:00 if you're Navajo or Utahan), the wind becomes really strong and tumbleweeds begin rolling across the road in front of us. First one, then a few, and then dozens. The sky turns dark, and ahead of us the landscape becomes blurred under the heavy brown veil of sandstorms blowing over the high desert toward the highway. Soon the highway, and our cars, are engulfed in the gritty stream of blowing dust.

Luckily, this was nothing like the haboobs in the Phoenix area, which are so thick that there is zero visibility and you must stop to wait for the dust storm to pass. Our visibility was reduced, yes, so we had to slow down, but we were able to continue moving.

This was my final picture, because after this we were all too scared to take our

eyes off the road. After the dust, the rain clouds rolled in and the deluge began.

That is, we had some visibility until the downpour began. Oh. My. Gosh. I've driven in heavy rains a time or two during my life, but this put them all to shame. Behind me, in the Buick LaCrosse, Dylan and Jake were terrified, having never seen rain like this before, let alone driven in it. Jake was so freaked out that he tried to call his mother to tell her he loved her--just in case--and was upset to find there was no phone reception.

I couldn't even pull over because we were in the middle of nowhere, and pulling off the road could very well have meant getting the cars stuck in the mud or a ditch, or even hitting a barbed-wire fence or a cow that I couldn't see through the heavy sheets of rain. So we pressed forward at about 20 mph while I desperately kept my eyes on the road stripes, which sometimes disappeared under the waves but were usually all I could see, other than the blurred lights of oncoming cars, also driving very slowly.

And it wasn't just the rain. Lightning was flashing all around us. And I mean all around us, 360 degrees, plus sheet lightning directly overhead. The rain was so loud that we could barely hear the blasts and rolls of thunder, but the lightning still left bright images on our retinas and lit up the sky far longer than I'd ever seen lightning do before.

It was an extremely stressful stretch of our journey and it lasted more than half an hour. When we finally reached the town of Chinle, I thought we'd stop and wait out the storm there, maybe go ahead and have dinner at the Chinle Burger King. Then we saw that the lights of the town had gone out and crews were working to restore power, so we drove on through. Thankfully, though the rain continued, it wasn't so heavy by this point and we continued on without further incident to the Burger King in the Navajo town of Ganado. We stopped there and had dinner about 8:00 (or 9:00).

Our only concern when we left Burger King was whether to take Indian Route 15 through the tiny town of Greasewood, a shortcut that chops about half an hour off the trip. I remembered when we'd used that route four days earlier that there were signs warning "Flash Flood Zone." We'd just been through the type of rain that creates flash floods, and I hated to get all that way just to be stopped by flooding, then have to turn around and take the longer route anyway. 

I asked a worker at Burger King about it. She told us that no one puts up barriers when it floods, and no one puts up warning signs at the turn-off to that road. Great. So we took a chance and, thankfully, there were no floods in those low-lying areas when we drove through.

It was a little before 11:00 p.m. Arizona time when we finally arrived back at my house. However, we didn't arrive without a nice dose of irony first. As I've mentioned earlier, Dylan's new LaCrosse had a damaged taillight from being rear-ended by another car while Jacob owned it. We had gone to great lengths to make the taillight safe enough for the trip, so it would at least light up after dark, although the brake light and turn signal on that left side didn't work. Dylan has plans to get it repaired; we just needed to get the car safely home to Arizona.

Irony. Jacob and his mother-in-law Julie had driven the car all over their town for a few days without issues before we picked it up. We drove almost 600 miles for 10 hours, passing a few law enforcement officers along the way, and never had a problem. Then, when we were literally two blocks from my house, we passed a sheriff's deputy on the opposite side of the road. We'd barely passed him when he was on Dylan like white on rice. I'd told Julie that deputies and police officers in our neck of the woods have no tolerance for defective equipment, and I wasn't even kidding. Fortunately, the officer only gave Dylan a warning and told him not to drive the car until the light is repaired.

It was a comical ending to our long trip, but we were all glad to be home again. Sarah jumped into her Jeep and rushed home to see her hubby Chris and their dog Diego and guinea pig Frodo. She had to be at work by 9:00 the next morning. Dylan also had to be at work by 9:00 and Jake had a morning meeting at work, so they hopped into their old Buick Century (leaving the LaCrosse in my driveway) and headed to their apartment. As for me, I got everything unpacked and put away before I retired for the night.

It's true what they say: There's no place like home. And there's no bed quite as comfortable as my own!