R.I.P. Fred

So, now that the trauma of watching a needle come at my eye and being told to stay very, very still or dire consequences would ensue.  I'm now lesion free!

I showed up at the plastic surgeon's office expecting ritzy....and it was.....not like the ritzy you see on the Housewives of whatever city, but better than your average doctor's office.  I went up to the receptionist to sign in and.......found out I was there one day too early.  I'm not sure how that happened.....but I got it in my head the appointment was Tuesday and it was actually on Wednesday.  Red faced me.

The doctor actually had no patients at that time, so they chose to see me then rather than the next day...hip hip hooray for me.  I had a vision test.  Then my head was put into many unflattering positions in order to get several good pictures of my buddy, Fred.  The doc came in and looked at Fred and then did a visual of all my lids to make sure Fred didn't have a lesion party going on.  They were fairly concerned about my cancer history, so decided better safe than sorry.  I had 3 choices.  If I could hold very, very still I could do my Fred-ectomy then, or I could schedule an appointment at the hospital, or I could schedule in the office for a different day.  Hey...in for a penny, in for a pound....let's do this.

So, they took me back to a "surgical room".  (It looked a lot like the room where my dentist does his dental procedures but with way brighter lights.  I sat back in the chair and they sterilized my face....that sounds so cool.  They actually washed it.  The nurse dropped some numbing drops into my eye which she told me would sting really bad at first like I had gotten shampoo in my eye.  I had actually just done that very thing a few weeks ago and the pain was miserable....so I was waiting for that.  There was a tiny bit of stinging but nothing like the shampoo......hey they are just making everything out to be more than it is so it won't feel so bad.  That numbing shot should be like nothing.....maybe like the dentist.

Ummmm yea, the shot.....nothing like the dentist and it's a good thing I have good manners because I would have liked to have started shouting out cuss words.....not at the doc....at the universe in general.  Holy mother of all that is holy...that hurt.  I truly wonder if doing the procedure without that shot would hurt nearly as bad.  A flick of the laser later and Fred and I were separated forever.  Now I'm trying to not touch my eye and applying my antibiotic cream. 

Fred is off to the lab to make sure he isn't skin cancer in disguise.  I'm considering telling people who don't know me very well that Fred was actually my twin in-utero but I ate him and the only thing left to remember Fred by was my eye lesion and now he's gone.  R.I.P. Fred.

You'll Never Guess What I'm Doing Tomorrow....

I'm off to the plastic surgeon.  I love how that sounds.  It seems so dramatic.  I could be getting a nose job or a tummy tuck or new boobs (or a badly needed boob lift,) or something rejuvenated.  But.....sigh....nothing so dramatic. I thought I'd be seeing a dermatologist not a plastic surgeon.  I have what is being referred to as a lower eyelid lesion removed.  I call it my friend since it has been with me for as long as I can remember.  This "thing" has had the audacity to grow slightly and sprout eyelashes......hey it's just as much part of me as the one under chin hair that I can never find until it's an inch long.  So, it's now "suspicious".  Doesn't that sound fun?  I have now reached the age where "suspicious" growths need to be removed from my body.

I have also reached the age where straining my back now takes the help of muscle spasm medicine and prescription strength naproxen plus a week to feel better.  My husband has now forbade me to move furniture all by my lonesome (uh...yeah....like I'm going to wait for him to get home and then feel like helping me.)  The good old days where a handful of ibuprofen, a good night's sleep, and a hot shower was the cure.

I'm also eagerly awaiting new glasses so I can tell the difference between an "rn" vs. "m"  or  an "rr" vs. "m".  No matter the font or font size I choose, it is getting harder and harder to tell the difference.  (Even though I've typed it here, all by myself, I'm having trouble telling the difference.)

I have become something for my children to laugh at and mock....and myself...it's too funny and sad at the same time not to laugh.  Watch out boys......diapers may be next!

This is it

My oldest child is racing towards adulthood.  He's 15 this year.  Soon summers will be taken over by girlfriends, jobs, school, or the real world.  There's not much time left with this one.  For 5 years this child and his father have chatted about biking up on of our trails that heads north about 90 miles.  It's this far off dream......one I challenged both of them to commit to this summer.  So, I'm off planning and they are off  talking about training.

This will be a two day biking trip with oldest and father for sure, dog for part of the trip, youngest hasn't decided if it sounds like fun yet.....mom in the chase vehicle  (there are only 2 things left in my life that cause me guaranteed knee pain.....bike riding and jump roping.....thankfully jump roping seldom enters my realm and as for bike riding, it's good for the males to have something to do together.)  My job is to have the phone, plenty of food and drink and the dog when he needs to recover, plus the stuff for one night of camping and for simple bike repairs.  (Husband thought it'd be great to get half way, have me pick them up and bring them home and then drive them to the half way point the next day to continue on.......oldest child called him a wuss.)

This is the year we're off to make memories....before the oldest gets his driver's license.  No big trips planned just lots of inexpensive family fun entertainment that can easily accommodate an extra friend or two.  It's time to hit the kite festival we always have talked about visiting.  Time to hit the every weekend of the summer bounty of downtown festivals.  Hitting the farmers market to make dinner that night.  Going to the beach on the spur of the moment.  Bowling, mini golfing, walking down to the Dairy Queen, visiting the mall and museums on hot days instead of staying home, cornhole tournaments and badmitten in the backyard.  Memories are made of laughter, mistakes everyone was part of, and the horrible things that come up in life that we got through together.  Real life for him is just around the corner.

It's Graham Family Chore-A-Palooza

Mainly I just love saying chore-a palooza.....it was originally chore-a-thon, but I think chore-a-palooza is MUCH cooler.

Any hoo......after much negotiation last night.....which involved when exactly this chore thing would begin (after lunch....so the two sleepy heads could sleep in a bit), how long work would be expected (mom wanted 3 hours, youngest wanted 1 hour, dad decided 2 hours), and how chores would be divided up (a master list with pick a chore from the list strongly vetoing draw a chore out of a bowl.) 

This afternoon the my "extra" chore list will drop considerably.  Those things I should be able to get done because I'm a stay at home mom who reads and eats candy all day.  Those things that can't get done because I am picking up the same person's glass for the 300th time in a row and washing that shirt that I darn well know didn't get warn because it's still folded.  It's spring chore-a-palooza which led the very smart youngest lad to figure out there would probably be a summer chore-a-palooza, etc, etc, etc.  Such a smart young man.

The laddies are just upset because I decided (thanks to my aunt) that how to wash a dish and scrub a bathroom should be on their list of domestic skills before they leave for college.  While it seems to be perfectly all right for mom to clean up the toilet in the one and only bathroom that 3 males use, it is decidedly gross to ask the laddies to clean up after themselves.  (Husband and I came to the agreement long, long ago that if I cleaned the toilet he would scrub the shower....a much appreciated and well tolerated agreement.)

The goal is that this summer I can do some of those "chores" that I actually enjoy but never get to do because of the 20 jillion loads of laundry that never seem to get finished and somebody needs underwear, the hunt for dust mites that set off  3 persons' asthma and 1 person's allergies, etc, etc. etc.  This summer I would like to work in the flower beds and take time to nurture the flowers instead of planting something and letting Darwin's theories take over.  This summer I'd like to turn the basement into something semi-organized instead of  "the dumping ground".  I'd like to pamper my bedroom a little bit back into the retreat it was when we first re-freshed it, instead of it being the last piece of real estate to get touched.  I'd also like to turn my porch back into my summer get-away rather than it being the storage place for all toys the males think are too valuable to live else-where (although since 2 bikes were stolen out of our garage last summer, I guess they have a certain point.)

Today I cause my pre-teen and my teenager pain.  Today I expect HELP  and  WORK.  The two dirtiest words in the kiddos vocabulary. 

Happy May Day!

Cancer Will Always Be In My Life

This has been sort of a bittersweet time for me since spring break.  I hadn't really realized why I was feeling this way until youngest asked something about what was going to be happening at his school....his bird unit, I believe.  I thought about it and I didn't have an answer.  I thought harder and still couldn't come up with one.  Then I thought about why I couldn't really remember what was going on.  It hit me then......it was 3 years ago.  3 years ago when my grandfather was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died.  3 years ago when I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer and had 2 surgeries and multiple tests beforehand trying to figure out what was going on. 

Unless it was a huge deal, it didn't make it through that fog.  I missed an entire semester of my children's lives.  And the summer following.  6 months of my life.  I don't think about cancer every day or even every month anymore but there are times it comes up and slaps me in the face.....usually during my 6 month checkups (especially if that involves an ultrasound) but the rest of the time it's just back there....in my past.  It's in my face now.  3 years ago I was telling the boys I had cancer.  3 years ago I was meeting with a surgeon.  Soon it will be 3 years ago I underwent surgery #1. 

I guess I thought I was all over it.  It happened.  It's over.  I'm discovering that I'm not mad anymore.  I do look back with regret.  Regret that cancer took even one day away from my family. 

Staying Dry

We've spent the last week trying to stay dry and navigate around the flood waters.  We're up pretty high and the last time our neighborhood flooded was in 1904, but when they tell you you're going to reach those 100 year flood levels....you take notice. 

The first notice we took was on Thursday.  I took youngest lad off to school and hit water over the road 3 times....once up to the middle-ish of my tires.  When we got to school the creek looked more like a river and the chickens were definitely getting their feet wet.  The two drainage ponds were at the limits of their banks.  Hmmm.....Thursday is errand day.  This meant that my main way to the grocery store was flooded, which meant the back way was probably flooded.  Oh....I'll go the out of the way route but will still get there.  I got home to listen to the news and get showered (it was a busy morning).  Just as I was finishing my shower I heard the route I was planning to go was closed.  I'll just go to the one west of us.....my main route is closed, but I can take a detour.....oh crap, that's closed.  So, I called the husband to find out how the roads were on the way to take oldest to school.  The main roads were water covered but I could probably get to the store quite a bit east of us by jumping on the highway. 

I knew we personally were not in any danger, but getting anywhere was going to be the issue.  Also, came the warnings about power and clean water along with a plea to try to keep waste water to a minimum.  This did get me to haul up the camping lanterns and oldest filled many containers with water.....just in case. 

We managed to get out of town on the weekend for a family celebration.  Getting back in was a little more interesting.  Several bridges had been closed down while we were gone, but we got back to our house safe and sound.  Hopefully we won't have to deal with this ever again and I'm so glad we don't live right on the river.