In the beginning

It started with my grandmother, Pearl – the child of a peripatetic father who dragged his family from coast to coast in search of both jobs and the next perfect location. (shown here ca 1920)
A belief in a ‘geographic cure’ apparently runs deep in our genes! 

My grandmother loved the ocean and while she professed a fondness for the Pacific and “would tolerate the Gulf, if forced”, it was the Atlantic Ocean that captured her heart.

When she and my grandfather married in 1922, they honeymooned on a small island off the coast of New Jersey and the rest, as they say, is history.

They both worked hard, lived in small rental apartments, saved every dime and, in 1924, the year before my mother (their only child) was born, they bought a house in Beach Haven, New Jersey, on Long Beach Island (LBI).

By choice, the house was 'right smack dab' in the middle of the island - two blocks from the bay and two blocks from the ocean.
My prudent grandparents weren't taking any chances with hurricanes and flooding.
I can still hear them recount times during storms when the bay and the Atlantic met right in front of the house, inflicting damage, but being spared the full brunt of the weather.

(Shown here is aftermath from 'the hurricane of '44 which destroyed the towns boardwalk)

Memories of summers in the sun, windswept dunes in fall and the moodiness of foggy spring walks at the oceans edge are encrypted in my bones – all thanks to them.

Looking at pictures spanning decades this weekend made me appreciate what a rich legacy I was given.

I can’t imagine what my life would have been without this island as backdrop.
It served as safety net, refuge, solace and the one constant in times of change and turbulence – in other words, HOME.

So much has changed – yet I know, with certainty, that the ocean will be there when I return later this month.

Tides going in and out; waves pounding the shore in a rhythm I’ve always likened to the earths heart beat.

It’s the final resting place of my great grandmother, my grandparents and my father.

It will be a final tribute to my mother to return her to our roots - back to the source – and reunite her with the people she loved the most.

Bittersweet but fitting.

It’s time.

This is why they hate us, people!

Have you seen coverage about the citizens in Bellingham, WA who are sick of "all those damn Canadians" crossing the border – and shopping at ‘their’ Costco?

Hordes of them... snatching up all the bargain milk, school supplies and cheap foreign goods…
such an annoying influx that some folks are actually calling for ‘American only’ shopping hours.

Isn’t it nice to know that we no longer have to travel abroad to be “Ugly Americans” –
we can now apparently do it from the convenience of our own homes!

I’m just waiting for one of those idiots to propose a fence at the border, border patrol and beefed up federal agents to monitor the situation.

Obviously the thought of thanking the Canucks for spending money in this country and pumping  up our tanking economy, never crossed their tiny minds.

Good grief!

Need we say more?

My formula for living is quite simple.
I get up in the morning and I go to bed at night.
In between, I occupy myself as best I can. ~
Cary Grant

A formula that works as well as any other - and perhaps better than most.

With that in mind, kiddo, let me make one thing clear:

it doesn't particularly matter, to me, what lies you spew.

We get paid whether you tell the truth or not.

Truth is - you're our very own personal reality show.

We'll write it down - and try not to laugh as we do - but, before the police get here and have you go through the same drill, you might want to think about tweaking your stories.

Here's what they won't believe - 'cause we didn't either!
(A sampling from the past weeks cases)

* that your boyfriend, the registered sex offender (and yeah, we totally believe that was all a mistake and he was 'unjustly charged') had a seizure while holding your not quite 1 week old baby and he dropped her onto a carpeted floor... and THAT'S why she has multiple skull fractures, bleeds in her head and is in the process of dying.

Good thing you saved the receipt from Burger King and can prove you weren't in the trailer.
I get that 'cabin fever' - after 5 days of being a mother - (when you didn't even know you were pregnant to begin with) made you want to 'dine out'! (BTW: not everybody saves fast food receipts - at least not people who don't need to establish an alibi!)

PS... you might want to work up a tear or two to make the story more believable.
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* we are right there with ya, sistah; don't you hate it when your child gets an ingestion of cocaine - and you don't even KNOW anyone who does drugs?

And, of course, it's perfectly normal to take your toddler at 1AM, go for a drive 2 blocks over and park in front of an abandoned house "to enjoy the weather" for 2 hours.

I've seen the zone maps of the USA -and you're right ...the weather over on that block is definitely preferable to the climate on YOUR street!

I'm sure the cop who found you passed out in the front seat and the baby not breathing in the back seat completely misread the situation... it was an urban camp-out!

I hear those are really big this year!

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*I agree; I understand you're upset "because 'Jane Doe' isn't a very trendy name", but that's really not the primary issue here; let's try to stay focused.

Your darling daughter was given that name because the 'crack ho' you left her with in the motel was so bombed off her ass, she didn't know your name, your babys' name or her own name, for that matter.

When one of her drunken 'johns' called 911 to complain she "didn't give good enough head and he wanted his money back or he'd beat her bloody", police responding to the scene couldn't find an unimpaired/responsible adult, noticed how skinny your girl was - which only made the loop marks stand out more - and they brought her to the ER with no idea who she belonged to.

On a side note: your baby also gave a decidedly urban rendition of 'the Princess story'... we were reading Cinderella and, when she saw a picture of the stepmother pointing at the floor, telling Cinderella to clean, your baby said "She's mad; she's telling her to sit the fuck down or she'll beat her ass".

Not sure that's what Walt Disney had in mind, but it's fit for the Brothers Grimm.

Can't get an existence more Grimm than that!

PS...no, you don't get 'extra points' that you remembered where you left her and showed up before the room rate expired!

Can y'all see why folks in the ER don't need to read fiction, watch daytime TV or read the Enquirer?

We get all the 'reality' we need merely by showing up at work!

Weekend randomness

Having fun with my new toy...

now there's no excuse for not getting in my 10,000 steps every day!
For the past four days, I was getting in more than 12,000.
Can't say I wasn't semi-glad when Pearl seemed to be limping a little today which made me decide to take it a bit slower - at least while I'm walking her.

Do dogs take four times as many steps as humans since they have four feet?
If there's such a thing as 'dog distance', no wonder she needs a break - a day of rest!
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I treated myself to a new picture frame from Story People - and the story feels perfect for all my recent ruminations about 'parents'.

Getting ready to go back East at the end of the month has got me thinking.

I believe we are born to the parents we are for very specific reasons.
They have things to teach us... for good or ill and, if we're lucky, pay attention and work hard, we may actually learn them.
We may even eventually thank them!

Truly hope that, with time, my kids will feel as magnanimous towards me and their dad - and forgive us all of our mistakes!
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I've been looking through photo albums (remember those?) and have been haunted by memories and ghosts from the past!

Recently saw a picture of my nephew holding his new daughter - 

then ran across this photo of my sister, his mother.

OMG - some genes are pretty damn strong!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Found some artwork of my kids amidst all the pictures.

My favorite was this one of GI Joe's; done when he was in preschool (age 3)...

When asked to tell me about it, he said "It's the wild thing that lives inside me".

Anyone NOT a believer in Rorschach tests??
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Was asked by my sister in law to help her by finishing this piece of embroidery...will take it with me on vacation and see if my eyes hold out!

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Finally picked up my camera again and went outside for some play time.
Had absolutely NO motivation when it was consistently over 100 degrees!

Only the morning glories have survived the heat well; love how their throats seem to glow!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
And, last but not least, to the person in charge of buying stickers for the ER, I came across this on the parking lot at the mall...

can we buy these, PLEASE!!

Thanks; we needed that.

Several of us in the ER had no idea how sorely we needed some comic relief - until it was provided to us today by so called 'adults'.

The reality of seeing back to back abuse cases, frequently in double digits a day, have had us questioning both our sanity and WHY we ever went into Pediatrics in the first place.

We asked and God provided.

Our first clue came this morning when, from the safety of the Triage desk, we saw two women, as in moms with their children headed to a doctors appointment, screaming and hollering as precursors to fisticuffs and baseball bats outside in the parking lot - over a frickkin parking space.

Really women; it's not the Hunger games and the last grain of rice; it's asphalt... and there's plenty more where that space between the yellow lines came from.
In fact, from where we stood, we could see half a dozen spaces available - even closer - if they'd have stopped running their mouths, gotten back in their cars and driven a few more feet one lane over!

OUR Security guards were getting the beat down from them when they tried to break it up, so local police were called and two squad cars later, 'peace' was restored.

Just when we thought free entertainment couldn't get any better, within a few hours, we were proven wrong!

A woman came running into the ER having shot herself in the leg while she was driving!
She was smart enough to steer into the nearest ER - but apparently NOT smart enough to make sure the lock was on her gun.

Don't you hate it when you reach for your cell phone and you shoot yourself instead??

BTW, an additional caveat about always wearing clean underwear in case you're in an accident -
be sure to clean out your purse and the trunk of your car regularly if you don't want your business displayed on a counter top in an ER.
My, my, my... someone will have 'splaining to do when they get home on bond tonight!

And you can bet everyone of us who witnessed the debacle is checking her purse even as I speak!

At least with kids, there's the fantasy that our intervention can help their lives head in a better direction...

Adults?
Not so much!

So, again, thanks; we needed that!

Just sign us,
Happy to hang with the little people!

Anne Lamott nails it! Again!

I can't help but believe that people who gun down other people in movie theaters and temples or who burn down their places of worship must have shitty diets.

Maybe instead of gun control, we need processed food control.
The old "garbage in, garbage out" school of rationalization.

I can't account, in any other way, for the rampant fear of others and senseless violence filling  our country lately.

Honestly, folks; get out of your small cramped heads!

Grab a camera, go out in the world, find beauty every day in small things and cultivate a sense of gratitude and wonder.

The fact that all this violence is being done so often in Gods name must make Him want to drink gin straight out of the cat dish!

(The girl has a way with words that I LOVE!)

It wasn't her first time at the rodeo,

so her surprise surprised me.

HELLLOOO, did you really think lying was the best way to play it?

For someone raised in the foster care system, you'd think you would have a clue how this was going to go down.

And spewing lie after lie was not it - it only guaranteed your kids would get removed.

And, for the record, YES, lies of omission ARE just as bad as deliberate lies.
Both kinds are intended to obscure the truth and divert people away from it; people who are, after all, only trying to find out what happened to your son.

What I don't understand is WHY you chose to protect your 'sister' and her boyfriend rather than your baby?
(And, again with the need to clarify definitions, someone you met in a group foster home, is NOT your sister.)

Why couldn't you have just said "He was with a very good friend; she's like a sister to me"?

Now the story you're asking us to believe is that you weren't even in town for the four days before he came to the hospital - that you merely came back from Chicago to find him vomiting (from a liver laceration), his body covered with bruises (including the distinct pattern of shoe tread on his back) and a leg broken from someone stomping on it?

Sister, if you knew YOU didn't do it, WHY did you wait until the police threatened to arrest you before you started throwing those other people under the bus?

As far as I'm concerned, YOU should be right alongside them in the jail cell.

I also can't help but wonder WHEN prosecutors are going to get serious and start charging mothers with failure to protect and obstruction of justice when they try to deliberately screw up an investigation.

MY best bet?

While the court will keep this kid in state custody at the hearing today, he'll be back with his mom before he's out of his spica cast and his liver enzymes return to normal.

It's not MY first time at the rodeo either; that doesn't make the kick in the head any less painful.

keep on keeping on...

Loved this quote from the new show "Political Animals", starring Sigourney Weaver; thought it deserved its own 'poster'.

Sometimes, it really is just ... chicken.

Whatever happened to - "sticks and stones may break my bones..." or "I'm rubber and you're glue..."
Are we really going to allow ourselves to be reduced to the level of 3 year olds - over a sandwich?

Apparently, some are.

This is America, people.
Folks can say what they want ... hateful, ignorant, biased, mean spirited, small minded statements to some = truthful, inspired, factual and obvious statements to others.

I neither want nor need to know the religious beliefs of every CEO/COO of every business I step into.
I don't need to surround myself with only like-minded souls and people who see the universe on the same terms I do.

Neither do I want nor need to hear about it endlessly every-time I turn on the TV.

Disagree with a public or corporate figureheads philosophy? 

Stop your money from going in to his pockets.

Enough already!

Magic of Picmonkey

Thanks to photo editing, I can take the image of a business, two minutes and

Voila!!

                                                              The perfect commentary!!

Overload

Q: How can you tell when you may have overdone it watching Olympic coverage?

A: When you're walking down the hall in the hospital, see this chart...

and wonder what time the event starts!!

scenes from a KC weekend

Love that, in the midst of all the 'art', there's the sampler I made for him!

With the reminder:

The journey has always been about laughing together, loving each other,

seeking adventure, believing in our dreams and making a difference...

but sometimes we forget.