I've had a way too busy day, so I'm going to go simple today and post a picture of Jason and me a couple of years ago before I had my hair cut, taken in December 2013. I was going to use this on a Christmas card but forgot. Or I think I forgot. I forget. But now you can see it. :)

Christmas cheer American Gothic style...sort of. Thanks for the idea, Grant Wood. Cheers!

Many years ago, on a Thanksgiving Day when I had to work the holiday at Children’s in Chicago, it was no ordinary day. While two of my sisters and a brother-in-law were visiting from out of town and home with Jason, holding off dinner until I got home after 3:30 p.m., I was in the NICU with a newborn baby who was dying. Her father was at her bedside, but her mother was in another hospital, trying to recover from a difficult delivery. Her baby had been swept from her side and transported to Children’s in hopes of being saved. The baby’s father was driving back and forth between the two hospitals, trying to hold his family together.

​Thanksgiving 1992, I was on bedrest and couldn’t go anywhere. My parents and siblings were going to make food and come over and see Jason and me, and we were all going to have dinner in our little apartment together. But then they all came down with the flu. I remember my dad ringing the doorbell, standing back to avoid spreading any germs, and handing over a sack of food to Jason without coming in. He was the most upright of all of them, so he was designated to come over and bring what they’d managed to cook up so we wouldn’t go without a Thanksgiving meal. We propped a camera on a chair and took this picture of the two of us. I was starting to really balloon at that point. Just a week later I went into the hospital to stay until the kids were born in late January.

This morning when I went through the garage to go swim, I noticed a wet trail from the freezer disappearing beneath the car. This can never be a good sign. I called to Spencer and asked him to investigate because I needed to leave and I couldn’t cope with the problem. We opened up the freezer and found all the food in it thawing. Spencer took over for me so I could leave, and he dealt with getting the food—what would fit—transferred into the freezer in the kitchen. At least we’re already thawing the turkey for Thursday. It reminds me of a thanksgiving when we didn’t even have a freezer of our own.

​This morning I’m going to the dentist. Fortunately, it’s not for a long visit. I don’t like long visits to the dentist. Those mean that you’re probably in for a scraping, if not a shot or two. I already did that a couple of weeks ago. I needed a groove that had developed along my gumline filled in so it wouldn’t bother my root so much. But it left me with a rough spot that needs polishing. I’m tired of constantly tonguing it, checking to see if it’s still rough. It is. I need it buffed off.

Staying up late last night watching the election, I got a lot less sleep than usual. And waking up this morning, I’m reading and hearing many different responses and emotions expressed across social media and news outlets. And it all gives me pause. I’m pondering myself, wondering what all of the results might mean in the days to come.

It’s a big week. In the three days since Sunday, we’re having two major events that can literally put us at increased risk for heart attack, stroke, and car accidents.

​Today is election day. I just want it to be over, even if I am not going to be happy with the results. It just needs to end. The phone calls need to dry up. The constant news, the commercials, the fighting! For the sake of all of us. 

Last night, if my hair wasn’t already white, it would have turned white. The nail-biting seventh game of the World Series nearly did me in. I don’t do sports, but I do do the Cubs. It started back in the ’80s when Jason introduced me to baseball. He’s been a life-long Twins fan, and he can quote their statistics like he’s a sports almanac (as well as trivia about most any team or popular sport). But besides Kirby Puckett, I never really got hooked on the Twins. But the Cubs? I knew all the players. I have a pink Cubs hat, covered in Cubs pins. On 8/8/88 when they put up the lights for the first night game, we watched the monumental game (a controversial addition because die-hard fans didn’t want to adulterate and commercialize the old stadium). I have a Cubs jacket. I remember Cubs games. If anyone mentions Harry Carey, I not only know who you’re talking about, but I can hear his voice echoing in my head singing at the Seventh-Inning Stretch. And last night, I decided, once I lived through the ordeal, that once every 108 years is enough for me. I also realized that I don’t even like sports. I don’t want to watch them, I don’t want to follow them. It’s too stressful. I just don’t want my team to lose the World Series. The process was not enjoyable. Sadly, I couldn’t have fun along the way because it was too precarious. Now that they’ve won, I don’t need to ever look again. I’m putting my hat and coat back in the closet. It’s too much stress to worry about.

Today I’m half was through Cheri’s 366 Days of Blogging. For six months STRAIGHT I’ve written and posted every single day. And now I have six months ahead of me of writing and posting Every. Single. Day. I’ve gotten to the apex of my mountain and now I get to start going back down the other side. Or something like that. But rather than check off days in the count, like I learned in the hospital to do, I count up days.