From the purge - what is a thing-a-ma-bob?

In seventh grade English class, we were given the assignment of writing a paragraph answering the question, "What is a thing-a-ma-bob," and we were to draw a picture of it. I don't remember why this was a topic. I only remember coming home and telling my mother the assignment. 

She thought it was stupid. My mother, who was once an English and P.E. teacher, very rarely agreed with us that school assignments were ridiculous, but this one annoyed her. While I was busy writing my paper, she too wrote an essay.

She was very proud of her paper and wanted me to turn it in with my own writing. I refused. 

She told me to do it. 

I argued. 

She pushed. 

I cried. 

She got mad, and as always where my mother was concerned, I caved. I took the paper to school, my stomach churning, and wondered how I would get it to the teacher without her noticing. It turned out much easier than expected. 

The teacher, whose name I do remember, but will refer to her as Mrs. Y, had us read our paper aloud at the front of the room, so I put my mother's essay behind mine so that after I was done reading mine, I laid them both down in the pile. Relieved, home free, I returned to my seat the task accomplished. Unfortunately, it didn't end there.

We had also had to draw a picture, and suddenly Mrs. Y remembered that we had not shown those. Back she went through the papers, reading our names and holding up the pictures. 

When she came to my mother's paper, the name read, "Anonymous." My mother had wanted to put, "What's her name," but vetoed that on the final draft. Mrs. Y asked whose paper this belonged to, and when no one responded, she went nuts. 

She was so mad. She kept reading the paper silently, then threatened the author with all sorts of punishment for using "inappropriate words." I was horrified. I could not come clean in front of the class because I was embarrassed, and the woman was furious. She finally moved on but said that if the author didn't fess up by the end of the school day, he or she would face expulsion. I was scared to death.

I was a shy kid back in the day, and very quiet in school unless around my friends. This whole incident had me so worried I'm lucky I didn't vomit in class. When English ended, I waited for the room to clear out, gathering my belongings slowly, and went up to Mrs. Y. 

I started crying and told her my mother had written the paper, that she was an English teacher and that my mother had thought the assignment funny, and that she made me turn it in as a joke. 

The poor woman had no idea what to do. Now that I'm an adult and have spent time teaching in a classroom as a substitute teacher, I can feel for her, but back then, she was not a favorite. I was shaking and sobbing, and she stood there, probably thinking in her head, "What the hell kind of a mother is this kid's parent?" Outwardly, she gave a fake laugh and told me it was a fine paper.

That should have been the end of things, but that night happened to be our Open House. Of course, my mother was pissed at the teacher's response to her paper. She made my dad go into the classroom, walk up to the teacher, and introduce himself as "Anonymous' husband." 

In Mrs. Y's defense, she did laugh. She laughed and laughed, and when my mother entered the room, she told my mom how much she had enjoyed the paper, and the next day when the document was returned to me, she had written, "I must say, this is most imaginative and descriptive. The vocabulary is "out of this world!" I think this was a clever idea!" 

The vocabulary was all made up, but honestly, what was Mrs. Y suppose to do?

I do have to say that after the incident, Mrs. Y treated me better than she had ever treated me before. A few years later, my mother ran into her at the grocery where she had her newborn baby with her, and when my mother peeked into the stroller, she told Mrs. Y, "She looks just like E.T." 

Thank god I had graduated by that time! (Oh, and I apparently did not keep my own written paragraph on a thing-a-ma-bob)

Here then, is Anonymous' English 7-1 paper written on my birthday in November 1976.

A Thing-a-Ma-Bob

A "thing-a-ma-bob" is a very important part of a wha-cha-ma-call-it. Without it, the stabisat on your framminger will not lucrete. What's-his-name- told me about the time his "thing-a-ma-bob misfractionated and shoofited his do-hikey, leftending him with a prolooped asprite. Mestron accondrys deponate on a "thing-a-ma-bob" a lot. - © C.Mason 1976

Autumn Leaves in March

Cold weather in Florida for the past four months has our trees and yards discombobulated. They don't know what season it is, and their timing is off. Our yards are brown, and our trees are losing leaves like it's Fall season instead of Spring. Because today was such a beautiful day, one we haven't had in so long, the girls came home after school, and we raked the leaves covering our yard.

When I was a child, raking leaves was a blast. We took the raked piles and jumped into them. We made obstacle courses with several collections of leaves, and after we tired with the piles, we spread them all over the yard into floor plans of houses. One year we got so into building leaf houses that we raked up the leaves in our neighbor's yards, bagged them, and carried them into my yard where we dumped them to build bigger and better houses. My father told the story for years.

Russ: "They raked all the neighbors' yards and brought those leaves into mine!"

Raking leaves as an adult is not as fun as I remember. The girls wanted a big enough pile for jumping into, and I obliged with their help. By the time we had the extensive collection raked, my arms and shoulder muscles were sore, and I had red blisters on my hands.

Still, it was worth it to see them having fun. Even the dog joined in the fun. I then suggested we rake the pile in front of the swing, and then had to that grand idea into a reality.

They climbed the swing and jumped into the leaves, and they laughed while I stood and watched them doing the very activity I had once enjoyed.

And all was right with the world.

More Pics from my photo box

My brother doesn't read my blog, but because he was in the same box of photos that Kelly I went through I decided to post them. I have more pictures of him stored in another box of things I took from my house in IN, but that is a bigger project that I'm not willing to tackle at this point in my life.

Here are some pictures of my brother, Rusty:


I don't have a memory of this picture, but I thought it was a funny one. This had to be a set up by my father who loved to pull jokes. Look at that poor kid's face!









A typical picture of my brother. Like Kelly, he is one for posing when a camera is pointed at him. This is taken at the family farm in Indiana. I have no idea who this car belongs to, but if I had to guess I would say it belonged to my cousin Darryl.







This is a typical Mason photo. I can't tell you how many pictures have been taken at this kitchen table. (I could do a blog just on pictures in our kitchen.) Look how I'm hiding my face with a glass. Look how fake Rusty's face is. I'm not sure what we are cooking up with salad dressing, Karo syrup, powdered sugar, and carnation milk though...





I love my little sticker in the corner that reads, "No explanation needed". This looks like it was taken out in front of the house in IN. I have no idea what was happening at the time, but as I said before Rusty was (and still is) always one for posing for the camera.

It did remind me of the time he did something wrong and my mother wanted to spank him. Instead Rusty took off running through the house with my mother chasing him. All the windows were open in the house and Rusty was screaming, "Help! Help me! She's going to kill me!"

He ended up in his room curled in a corner of the bottom of his bunk bed where my mother couldn't reach him. But it didn't matter because by that time she was laughing.

Too many mojitos

Saturday night I had tons of dreams, one right after the other, crazy and full of excitement as my dreams tend to be. The dreams took place in places of my past, and I figured this was because of my reminiscing through my old blogs, keepsakes and photos, and not because of the alcohol I had consumed that night.

One of the last dreams I had that I remembered took place in Pennsylvania at my friends' house. In the dream, I was walking people through it. I think I knew who the people were in the dream, but if I saw them I didn't remember them after awakening. I was taking them through my friends' Kim and Steph's, house and giving them a play by play of how well I knew this house. I pointed out things of interest and we then ended up in the upstairs hall bathroom which is right at the top of the stairs to the left of the master bedroom.

We crowed into the bathroom, and I said something about this bathroom bringing back lots of memories for me.

Me: "For example. Once when I was staying here with Kim and Steph they showed me where the towels were (I turn around and open the linen closet behind the door to show them) and then they told me to not freak out if some night I open this to get a towel and I see a black cat. Their cat Bo liked to hide out in the linen closet. Well, you can imagine what happened, right? One night I came in here to take a shower, opened the closet, and freaked out because there was the cat sitting on the towels, his eyes glowing in the dark."

Now the thing about all of this is that it really happened. That is a true story that my dream self was relating to these dream people. The cat's name was Bo and that is here sleeping below on the couch.

Back in my dream, my real self realized that this story that my dream self was telling these dream people was real and that there also another cat bathroom story that had really happened.

So then the other story came out, only I'm not sure my dream self related it out loud. I actually think that my real self just thought about that story in my head while in my dream. Are you following?

That story was about the time that I entered the bathroom in the middle of the night to use the toilet. I walked into the bathroom to find their other cat, Muffin, standing on top of the counter, leaning into the sink, her head turned upside to catch water drips from the faucet. She scared me to death.


That's Muffin below.


The rest of the dream involved me discussing how well I knew this house and at some point, I turned to find a staircase leading down into the basement.

In the dream, the staircase was in the same place that the bathtub should've been had we been in the real bathroom. In reality, the basement stairs are off the kitchen.

But this was a dream, so I descended the stairs halfway and peered into the basement, which looked like it did the last time I saw the basement in real time about two years ago. I said something about these stairs being new and then I came back into the bathroom and decided to lead the dream people into the next bathroom.

The next bathroom I took them into was the master bathroom, and I talk about the time I had to use the shower in the master bathroom because we had to be somewhere and all of us couldn't wait to take turns. In the dream, I leaned my head out of the hall bathroom to peer into the master bedroom and I saw my maternal grandparents lying sideways on the Smith's bed talking to one another.

At this point, my real self entered the dream as if directing and had a discussion along the lines of:

1. My grandparents are both dead.
2. My grandparents have never, ever, to my knowledge, been to the Smiths' house

My dream self and my real director self wondered why my grandparents were lying in someone else's bed, and my dream self decided that taking strangers into a room where two people were lying in bed having a discussion wasn't a good idea.

Then I woke up having no idea the answer to any of the questions this dream gave to me.

I did, however, have to go to the bathroom.

Heading down memory lane....

Yesterday's blog got me thinking about my Grandfather, Earl. He wasn't much of a talker. When I was little I remember him up and outside the farm letting us feed the hogs. Mostly though I remember him as he was in the last years of his life; sitting in a recliner.

He was a quiet man. I can remember coming into his farmhouse and sitting in the second recliner next to his talking to him for a few minutes. He would ask me questions about how I was and what was going on at school. Nothing earth-shaking, but comforting all the same.

There are two really good memories that I have of him. The first was at my Aunt Lorene's house (left in the picture next to her brothers, my Uncle Cockeye and my father, Russ) for one of her big holiday dinners.

All the women were in the kitchen cooking and talking. The men were in the living room watching football, the kids were either inside or outside playing games. My Aunt Lorene called everyone to the table and those in the living room started getting up to head into the kitchen. I was the last person in that line and as I stood waiting to get into the crowded kitchen I heard this little voice calling, "Cara. Hey, Cara."

I looked around the room but didn't see anything.

"Cara. Here...down here."

I was standing in the doorway between the kitchen and living room, and I turned to my right and looked down. The recliner had fallen backwards with my grandfather in it. He was reclined with his head and upper body on the floor and his legs straight up in the air. I was horrified. My first real concern for an elderly person.

Not so for my grandfather. He chuckled and said, "Do you think you could help an old man up out of this predicament?"

Turns out everyone just walked right past him on their way to the grub. I frantically yelled for my father who came and laughingly helped my grandfather up and into the kitchen.

The second great memory I have of my Grandpa is my favorite.

I was probably ten, my brother seven. We were visiting him at his farm. It was morning and we were at the kitchen table eating breakfast while my father stood at the stove cooking. Both my brother and I had glasses of fresh goat's milk in glasses before our plates.

I barely tolerated regular pasteurized cow's milk so warm milk straight from the udder of a farm goat was enough to cross my eyes permanently. Yuck.

I finished everything but the milk. My brother and I asked to be excused, but when my father turned around and saw that I hadn't touched my milk he shook his head. "Drink your milk!" he said in his big booming voice.

I whined.

Dad yelled, "Drink your milk."

I whined some more.

Dad responded with, "You are not going anywhere until you drink that damn milk!"

He turned back to the stove, and I sadly stared at the yucky goat's milk. Suddenly, without one word spoken, my grandfather reached over, picked up my milk, drank it all, and put it back where it had been. He then returned to his breakfast as if nothing had happened.

I sat there stunned, not knowing what to do. What the what had just happened? I was a straight-laced kid who rarely did the wrong thing and this totally threw me off kilter.

Then my father turned around, saw that the milk was gone smiled happily and excused me from the table.

Still, I sat there unsure what to do. I looked over at my grandfather as if to see what that was and he gave me a slow wink. Our little secret that wink said.

We never discussed it, and I never told anyone the story until years later after he had died.

From the keepsake box - My Grandfather, Earl Mason

Another thing from my Keepsake Box. Written on this in my mother's handwriting it says, "Cara---this is yours". 

I know it was typed on my old typewriter. Funny I don't remember doing this or when it was written, but it was obviously a school assignment. I don't remember the things in it about my grandfather. Guess that is why it is good to write things down. Not very well written and the punctuation is horrible, but I found it interesting enough to post.

Earl Mason, born 1894, first worked at Mine #17 west of Dugger, IN. He left there to work at old Oak Grove, located east of Cass. Mine #17 put in joy loaders, which had replaced the pick and shovel. When they conveyed coal into small cars, Earl went back to #17 to work. Oak Grove moved to just north of Dugger and was called New Oak Grove. Some members of his family started this mine so he went to work there. One morning they were drilling on the face of solid coal, and red water started to run through. They had mined into old Kielly, this resulted in the closing of this mine.

Before machinery most of the mining was hand work--holes were drilled into seams of coal, a powder was put into cartridges with a long fuse and forced into openings with a tamping bar with a brass head and steel would hit a sulfur ball and the spark would cause an explosion. Often the fuse was lit with carbide lights, which were worn on the miners' heads. Often the lights ignited with gas which was then put out with a handful of slack.

Mr. Mason remembers trains with miners coming from Linton. Many area men walked to work in freezing rain, their clothing frozen when they arrived. There were different shifts and with so many mines the men walking across the countryside at night with their carbide lamps on their heads looked like fireflies.

Some of the mines had blockhouses built near the mine for families to live in. The mines at this time had no bathing facilities and the miners' clothing and faces would be black. They bathed at home in wash tubs and their clothes were scrubbed on washboards by hand. Many of these families would have friends or relatives from other countries living with them, often ten or twelve people in a small dwelling. They would save money to send for their families back home. Here, many nationalities were working together.

In the early thirties, a wagon mine was sunk on Mr. Mason's farm. There were mines worked underground with most of the coal sold to individuals for home heating and usually customers would come to the mine with a wagon or small truck, saving delivery costs. Also the initial cost of the coal was much less. There were many of these across the area.

Mr. Mason worked at Littly Betty Strip mine for several years. He had a daughter, Lorene, and two sons, Lloyd and Russell. Another son, James (Juke) died December 18, 1978.

Innocence

More stuff from my "Keepsake" box. Five things that ran through my mind when clicking on this picture to enlarge it.

1. I can't believe we were ever this young.
2. Check out the gun in Rusty's hand. Wouldn't be allowed in a photo booth with that today!
3. My poor buck teeth. Thank god for braces.
4. In picture #1 I see Darcy in my face. She purses her lips like that too.
5. Even back then I had the "deer caught in headlights" look.

Keepsakes

Today while construction was going on in my living room I hid out in my office and decided to clean out files. The first one that I went through was a file titled, Keepsakes. The file was full of great stuff.

1. Funeral notices - A way of remembering.


2. A Betty Crocker Easy Bake Kit Baking Book from my childhood. This is interesting to me because we were not allowed to have an Easy Bake oven as my mother thought that stupid. "We have an oven in our kitchen!" So we would buy the kit and bake the stuff in our kitchen oven.


3. My bridal registry from Burdines, a store no longer in business.


4. A Purple Pride sticker - Go Aces!


5. A crossword puzzle that I made for Kelly years ago. It was a puzzle about soap operas, and I did it by hand. It turned out so well (in my mind) that I made her send it back to me after she filled it out.


6. A Master Mix pad of paper with my father's picture at the bottom.


7. Letters from Tom when he traveled to France


8. Various cards from people telling me how wonderful I was/am to them.


9. A paper on how the word, "f**k" is the greatest word in the English Language. This was sent to my mother by our friend Karl. I wish I could print it on this blog because I'm telling you it is the funniest f**king paper.


10. An envelope of Keepsakes that my mother kept of mine and then handed over to me a few years ago. In this envelope was the following:

• Three wills that I left at various times, although there are no dates. Here is one of them: "I, Cara, leave $100 dollars to my brother, Rusty, and he better not spend it all at the bowling place. I also leave $200 for my Sugar Daddy. I also leave my nightlight to Helen and Ray. To my brother, I also leave him Cat and Teddy to take care of them. To my friend, Laura, I leave $200 dollars. To Michelle, I leave my Barbie dolls. To Robby, I leave my jumping robes. To Barry, I leave $2.00. And the rest goes to my mother."


• An envelope with hair from my first haircut in 1966. It was done by my Great Aunt Margaret and her daughter, Suzy in St. Augustine, FL. This hair now proves (to Kelly) that my hair was NOT red like my girls.


• A Lincoln-Kennedy uncirculated penny, a 1776-1976 silver dollar, and two $2.00 uncirculated bills


• A poem I wrote


• A birthday card I made for my mother that says on the front, "Happy Birthday Mom! May this birthday be the best yet, for the older you grow the sweeter you get. (hint, hint)"


• Letter to Santa Claus from 1971 that says in neat printing on big lined paper, " Dear Santa Claus. Please bring our toys to Grandpa Renaker's house. I want Timey Tell and silly putty in my stocking for Christmas. My brother wants a talking G.I. Joe and silly putty in his stocking. Love, Cara"

• A bunch of papers, newspaper articles, and writings that I must post later.

Seven years ago

Today is the anniversary of the death of my father. As I do every year at this time, I tell my daughters about my father.  I like to recall memories and recant some stories and just let them know that I did have a father. The month of March is a bit hard leading up to this day, but once the day has passed, I feel that it is okay to let go.

Today I am in Boston on vacation. Today I didn't really sit down at the dinner table and start talking about my father. I mentioned it earlier in the day while driving to downtown Boston, and my elder daughter giggled at the story of how much she used to follow my father around the house. That was about it. Instead, I kept the memories and the stories inside.

It isn't easy to talk about with others. My mother has a different view of my father, my brother isn't into having these types of discussions, and my husband really doesn't know what to say. It truly is a personal event and not one that can be explained to those who have never experienced it.

I miss you, Dad. I miss the funny remarks you would utter during a serious conversation that would break the tension and lead everyone down a different conversation path.

I miss your laugh that would end up in a cough.

I miss your big chest and your gigantic hugs.

I miss the way you could make others laugh....especially me.

I hate you never got to see Madison grow and that you never met Darcy, who is you in so many ways.

Life continues without you, but I still think of you in so many ways.

Today is one of them.

What Floridians do for spring break

I sit working on my new blog, comfy within the confines of the warm house in Arlington, MA. The computer desk faces two large windows that look out into the snow-covered backyard where my oldest daughter likes to spend quiet time. She was born in Florida, but there is Hoosier blood running through her veins.

She loves the snow. She is oblivious to the chill. She sits in the frozen snow on her knees as she carves out snow hearts and builds tiny snowmen she names "Snowie." Yesterday she went out at dusk dressed only in her clothes, her earmuffs, and gloves. She "forgot" her coat.

We never forgot our coats, mainly because our parents were determined to keep us outside in the snow for hours. We were shoved feet first into outfits that covered us from head to toe. We could hardly move in our snow outfits, and heaven forbid if we had to pee. When you went out in the snow in Pennsylvania or Indiana, you were out until you couldn't feel your feet, your fingers, or your nose. Then, and only then, were you allowed back inside the house.

I forget what it is like to enjoy the snow. Once you hit driving age, snow becomes something you dread. It's a chore to scrape it off your windshield and to start up your vehicle to warm-up enough to keep it moving down the ice-covered roads. Yesterday when I accompanied my daughter outside in the snow, I was putting up a good front for her, but as we stomped our way through the frozen backyard, I could feel myself loosing up.

I helped her build a snowman and told her stories of how my father helped us make faces on our snowmen using spray paint. We tried to create a snow fort, but the snow has been here for days and is no longer soft and fluffy. To build, you must first kick in the snow with your boots to loosen it. The time of rolling the snow over and over until you have a big ball has passed. Instead, our snowman was one piece with a flat hat, two sticks for arms, rocks for eyes and a nose, and a twig for a mouth. I forgot that my head was cold. I enjoyed myself. But not half as much as I enjoy watching my daughter make her own snow memories.

Sucking up

Today my brother called me, and during our conversation, he let me know he has been reading my blog.

Rusty: "My wife is making me read your website."

He told me he expected a daily entry since he was now reading. I was on my cell phone in the middle of the library, and he was somewhere in Indiana. Thus, I could not bow down before him and promise to get right on that.

There are three years, three months, and fourteen days between the two of us. I have always been the eldest. Rusty has always been the one in charge. Had the birth years been reversed, the roles would still be the same.

The first memory of my brother was the day he came home from the hospital. I have a vague memory of leaning over the front seat of the car and staring at this tiny bundle in my mother's arms.

That's it, and honestly, it could be I only know this from a picture and not from my memory. After all, I have very few memories of our days in Pennsylvania or North Carolina. My memories of my childhood begin in Indiana.

My brother was a cute kid. My favorite time with him was when we would swim at the pool at the country club. His little eyelashes would fan out and clump together to make these little stars above his eyes. He would swim up to me and hold on to me and bat his short star lashes at me, and I would melt. He was so cute. That is pretty much the only sweet memory I have of him.

Most of the time, my brother was a tormentor. He would pick on me. He would make fun of me. He would hit me. He loved to hit me with his fist on the side of my arm. To this day, I can pretty much still take that punch.

He would also poke me in my side. He would do it so much and so often that anytime he would circle me, I would jerk. I am ashamed to say that even today I still protectively cover my side when he comes near me. This, of course, makes him feel superior, and it's pretty much the way of our relationship.

There were times I'm sure when we got along. I remember playing board games with him. We had a vast neighborhood full of kids, and we played games inside and out. But most of the time, we fought. We would disagree about everything and everyone and end up fighting. It was a typical brother/sister relationship.

I was very proud of my brother. He was one of those kids that excelled in athletics. There was not a sport he couldn't do. Every single one he tried, he was heavily sought after by coaches.

He finally settled on golf. People would always pat my shoulder and ask me if I was jealous of him or felt left out. I remember being surprised people thought this of me because the answer was no.

I was never jealous of his athletic ability or his successes. I was very proud of him, and there were things he excelled in and things where I excelled. We weren't in a competition, and no matter how I tried to explain this to people, they believed what they wanted.

As we grew older, I desperately wanted a relationship with my brother. I loaned him the money to go on his first date with the woman he later married. And that date occurred on my birthday! Which goes to show you the way of our relationship. I had a birthday. He left to go on a date.  Okay, okay, in all fairness, he did come to my birthday dinner.

 I'm not sure, looking back on it now, what I  wanted. A relationship where we sat down and conversed honestly, maybe? One where he didn't constantly tell me what to do or how I was wrong?
We grew into adulthood and drifted into those lives. We saw each other when I came to Indiana and, later, after the children arrived, he would visit me. We talk on the phone now and then, and we email. He, of course, has no memory of abusing me when we were younger. I'm not sure what his memories are, but I think he wears a halo in them.

The last time my brother visited, he and I went out alone to pick up some dinner. He asked me about myself. How was I doing? What was I feeling?

In the course of the conversation, I told him my biggest fear was something happening to my husband and how I worry I'd never be able to support my children since I hadn't worked full-time in several years. He looked at me in disbelieve.

Rusty: "I can not believe you would worry about that. If something like that ever happened, I would take care of you. You're my sister. We're family. I will always take care of you if you need me."

Yep, that day when I peered over the front seat into those brown eyes, I stared at someone who would love me. No matter how little we see each other or how many times we poke and prod each other,and no matter how much we yell at each other, we're connected. We're family.

Plus, now that I know he's forced to read this blog, I thought I should schmooze him a bit.

It's a Beautiful Morning

In the mornings on school days, I love to wake my children by climbing into their beds and snuggling with them. Because they both go to school at different times, I can do this with both of them equally. I wake Madison first. I kiss her soft cheeks, and she puts her arms around my neck, and we lie there quietly talking.

I awaken Darcy next. I slip under her covers and kiss her little cheeks that smell of sleep, and she lets me while she sucks on her thumb. Eventually, she will roll over as if just awakening, see that it is me in bed with her, and she will throw her arms around me and squeeze.

It is one of the highlights of parenting and a fantastic way to start my day. I am determined to continue it as long as I can before they become too old for their mother to climb into bed with them.

I don't remember much about how my parents awakened me until I was a teenager. Then my father would usually do the honors as he was always up first.

My father was a morning person. He would awaken and roll right out of bed whistling. He started his day with a shower and a shave, and he whistled and sang the entire time he was doing it. I found it quite annoying as I was not a morning person. When my father would enter my room to wake me, he would flip on my light and sing loudly, "Wake up sunshine! Oh, what a beautiful morning...."

Now, as many of you know, I have a thing about lights, and this would irritate me to no end. I would snarl and yell, climb out of bed, and turn the light back off. Then, proving how I was the damn boss, I would jump back into bed. 

It never fazed my father. He would laugh, disappear, wait a minute, and then flip the light back on.

Finally, one day he asked me how I wanted him to wake me in the morning. I said softly and gently with minimal noise. 

Me: "Kiss me and quietly say, 'Good Morning, Cara, it is time to wake up."

The next day I felt a gentle touch on my shoulder and a kiss on my cheek.

Him: "Cara, it's time to wake up."

Me: "See, Dad, that is much better."

I stretched and yawned and felt at peace. My father smiled, whispered it was 7:30 AM, turned and tiptoed toward the door. When he got to the threshold, he flipped on my light and sang, "It's a beautiful morning!"

I will admit that I laughed.

Now that story is a favorite of my daughters. I like to tell it when they whimper while I snuggle with them. It is my way of saying I understand their feelings and that I'm gently easing them into the day.

Of course, that is not to say that someday I won't flip on their lights and sing to them. I am my father's daughter, after all.

By the dawn's early light

My husband says I have a weird thing when it comes to lights. I'm either "turn out the lights," or I'm, "turn on the lights," depending on the scenario. 

For example, when I'm driving at night, I need street lights. This might be a night vision problem that needs addressing, but I also need a light on when I watch television. Not while in the theater, only while watching tv at home. Why sit in the dark? I don't like it. 

Our living room doesn't have any overhead lights, only a lamp. There are no windows in that room, and the lamp doesn't put out much of a glow. I tried adding lighting with a halogen bulb, and if I have both turned on along with the lights in the dining room, I can manage to see when I iron, sew, read, and watch television. It drives my husband batty. He thinks its too much electricity.

On the other hand, I don't like the light. I love night lights, however. I grew up with night lights. We had them in the bathroom, in our bedroom and in the hallway growing up. Nightlights are like little guides showing you the way. 

The first gift Tom ever got me was a night light he bought for use in his bathroom. I was touched. That same night light is now in use in our master bathroom today. It is on when I shower, and when I brush my teeth and when I go through my nightly routine. I don't ever turn on the light at night in my bathroom. Showering by night light is quite soothing and relaxing.

I also don't turn lights on in the morning. I dress in the dark. Do my hair in the dark. I look great in the dark. Only on rainy mornings do I turn on the night light to put in my contacts. My husband, however, flips on the light every time he enters the bathroom. I'm surprised he isn't blind by now as bright as that thing is when you come in from complete darkness. My father used to wake me for school by turning on my bedroom light. It was so unnecessary. He knew though that I'd get out of bed to turn it off, and he counted that as a plus, I guess. 

I am quite good at navigating in the dark. In Indiana, I moved from one room to the other in the night without tripping. I never used lights because we had the nightlights for guidance and because I could see very well in the dark despite not consuming many carrots. In Florida, I do the same, only turning on lights in areas where there might be creepy, crawling cockroaches. It is quite a contradiction to my no lights in the night routine. But I'm afraid that is a dilemma that most likely will not get solved anytime soon. 

I do not like lights on when I sleep. As a child, I had a night light. As an adult, I like it dark. My bedroom is a cave. I have blinds and curtains on my windows. My clock radio has a red amber light that puts out a glow with just enough light to tell the time. My husband's CD clock player has an obnoxious bright, green, neon light with 3 different settings: bright, suntan, and burn your eyes out. It is always pointed at me. He also has the baby monitor pointed my way. It has a red, laser light that is like an eyeball staring at me. I use a stuffed dog to block out the glows from his nightstand. 

I've never really thought about this "weirdness" as my husband calls it. I like lights at times and I dislike them at other times. All perfectly normal, I think. My favorite lights? Christmas tree colored lights. As a kid, I loved crawling under the tree to read. Maybe Tom will join me there this year. Get an understanding. I'll ask him. 

Girl Scouting

Madison and I had her first Girl Scouts meeting. Actually, it's for Daisy Girl Scouts. Daisy Scouts is a troop for Kindergarteners, and it focuses on having fun through socializing. I thought it would be good for Madison to socialize with students outside of the private school she goes to, and well, her friend Brianna is doing it, and Krista is always good at trying to include us in other activities. Mostly I see Daisy Scouts as a bunch of arts and crafts, singing of songs, and helping people.  

Daisy Girl Scouts do NOT sell cookies or do fundraising. Thank God.

I was a Brownie and then a Girl Scout. It was something my mother had me do because she loved her time as a scout. 

Connie: "I lived for scouts."

I did not live for scouting, but I don't want to foist my feelings on to Madison, and I suggested we give scouts a try although it isn't high on Madison's list. 

I have few memories of Brownies. My memories of Girl Scouts includes my mother as a troop leader and one of the girls in the troop, her name was Whitney, telling the other girls that my mother was a meanie, and she didn't let us have any fun. Whitney ignored me from that moment on until we ended up in the same homeroom in High School. I asked her if she remembered that at all. She didn't.

Other memories of Girl Scouts included camping where my mother was the swimming instructor for our swimming badges, and we swam in a lake and slept in cabins, and selling Girl Scout cookies. My father was a salesman, and so selling was something my brother and I learned at his knee. Our goal every year was to sell enough cookies to get the reward the scouts offered. I remember it usually being a poster of some kind. I was a decent seller of cookies, I think. 

I still have my Girl Scout sash and patches and pins. I have my book, my hat, and my scout pouch with camping paraphernalia like a knife and fork. I'm picturing Madison one day using all of it. 

I have opted not to be a Daisy troop leader.  I have signed up for "bringing the Daisy snacks."