Dashed Dreams?



When I was little I wanted to be a dolphin trainer.  Research on the subject brought me to the harsh realization that you have to go to Texas A&M for this, and your chances of ever touching an actual dolphin are slim.  More than likely you get your degree in Marine Biology then work in a local aquarium and get to be in charge of a catfish exhibit.  Did you know that most water-bound mammal trainers at Sea World don’t even get to start that gig until they’re into their forties?  I looked into Zoology as well, but the odds are the same.  Start out in a gift shop, work your way to the petting farm, then onto a bona-fide zoo animal.  I ruled Zoology out as well.  With my luck I would be assigned to train a gibbon or something, and I freaking haaaaate monkeys (anyone seen the movie “Monkeyshines”?)



Onto college, where Texas Tech graciously accepted me despite my mediocre SAT scores.  I decided to go into advertising; I thought I would really enjoy it.  Producing commercials and creating slogans seemed fun.  I did enjoy all my Mass Communication classes until a little booger called Mass Comm Law came up in my schedule.  Seriously, it was as if the professor was speaking Russian.  I tried my hardest, but that class was not good for my GPA. By the time my junior year rolled around, I learned that being in advertising was not only tough to break into, but not very lucrative coming fresh out of college.  I was minoring in speech, and my favorite class I ever took was International Speech Communications. What could I do with that? Teach!  I changed my major to Education, took a undesirable amount of summer school and eventually graduated.  I loved majoring in Education.  I went from copyright case law studies to reading Charlotte's Web and creating a diorama about it.  Teaching gave me the opportunity to get a job with good insurance where I could exercise my creativity and knowledge with kids who adored me!  Win!  I was winning for nine years when I thought it was time for another change...



I decided to be a stay at home mom.  I quickly found out this job is BORING!  And thankless.  And unpaid.  People, don't give me the rhetoric about it being the best job in the world.  It isn't.  I wouldn't trade this career though (except maybe for the one where my friend has where she gets to hang out in professional baseball locker rooms and interview players).  This is my mission now and I am locked in.  This one is for two other little people, not me.  Believe me, I know it won't last forever, so I am room-mothering it up while I can.

So, dreams dashed?  Nah, they just shifted.  I still am an animal nerd.  I drag Chad and the kids to Sea World, and I make them watch Animal Planet.  I love Ranger Rick magazines, and my friends always send pictures of roadkill that they can’t identify because they know I’ll know what it is (most of the time anyway – the insides of most animals look the same when they’re smashed to a pulp).  

A few years ago I even rode that dolphin.  It was awesome!! I wanted to post a picture but my printer is on scanner strike.

Lana vs. Pants

My mom is the coolest person I know.  She babysits whenever,takes care of my dogs when we are out of town, and gives me her Kohls cash when she earns it.  She is unintentionally funny, loves the Beach Boys, and would do anything for someone she loves.  (If she doesn't love you I hope you have a good place to hide.)

While she is a mathematical genius, she isn't the quickest to pick up on a joke.  This often makes her the butt of said joke, and she is way too easy to tease.  Once in Las Vegas we went to the hotel pool, and I noticed her swimsuit was on backwards.  After I pointed this out (rather loudly), all the other patrons were laughing, and my dad tells everyone she is really drunk (she doesn't drink).  Flustered from the harassment of her family members, she slips and falls in the pool.  It could not have been timed better.  What does Lana do?She doesn't get mad!  She paddles around the pool and laughs about it.  My dad and I will get ours one day...

Lana also has several quirky habits: 

She collects reading glasses. Actually, I think she just buys a new pair every time she can't find her current pair.  She probably has 100 pairs of reading glasses.  They can be found everywhere except on her face.

She hums and makes up silly songs. One might go..."Tess is the best, my noodle toddle goo..." The odd thing is that she might sing the same gibberish song the next week, which means it makes total sense to her.  

Those of you who know my mom know she frequently mispronounces things.  Parmesan cheese is "ParMEEzeeun," shrimp is "sremp",  a  rendezvous  is a "rendevozz", and Mexican food is "Messican".  (To my hispanic friends: she means no harm by this...the muscles in her mouth will literally not allow her to pronounce this word correctly.)

However, the biggest quirky habit (and most distressing) is that Lana really doesn't like wearing pants that much.  The doorbell rings... "Hang on I have to put on some pants!" Working at the computer...no pants.  Watching TV...no pants.  Babysitting my kids...we come home to see her pants on the floor.  We are used to it.  Chad doesn't even enter the house without shouting,  "Lana, we're home, put on your pants." My kids even have asked why Gan Gan is never wearing them.

Mom won't be offended by this blog entry.  She will laugh at herself. This is the most important thing my mother has taught me - never to take yourself too seriously.  Besides, she probably doesn't even know I have a blog and won't find it unless it shows up when Googling Barbra Streisand.  Love you, Lana!!

Pregnancy take 2

The birth of Tess...

When I got pregnant with Tess we were one month away from being done having
babies.  Halle came only after a long, hard road of infertility - several
shots, tests, surgeries, and an emotional roller before I finally got
pregnant.  Once we had our perfectly healthy little girl, my thoughts turned
from nesting to how to afford both a wedding and a trip to Europe for Chad
and me before we die.  We had multiple discussions about having a second
one, and even began "not NOT trying."  But, I really wasn't investing the
same amount of thought and mental preparation for the second child.  

We had been "not NOT trying" for a little while with no success, and we
decided to give it 6more months before we accepted our fate as a
single-child family.  Low and behold, one night of fun in month 5 I
got knocked up (just about two weeks after I ordered my brand new size 26
skinny jeans I wanted for my birthday).  Excited, yes, but also feeling some
"oh crap, here I go again."  While we had become ok with the possibly having
an only child, the thought of Halle having a sibling thrilled me.  Chad
couldn't wait to hold his precious new son, someone to teach how to hunt,
fish, throw a ball and pass down his heirlooms to (if he had any heirlooms).


As the pregnancy progressed we decided to take a "gender predictor" pee
test.  Green for a boy and yellow for a girl.  Well this particular sample
of my urine could not have turned the test specimen more green.  Score for
Chad (man time), but WTF am I going to with a boy?  A few weeks later, the
sonogram confirmed that we were, in fact, actually having a girl.  $19.99
down the toilet for the "98% positive" gender test.  Chad became oddly
quiet, and went through some sort of strange male grieving process for a
week.  I don't think he thought he could stand 3 more years of diaper
changes where one has to "clean between the folds"...Nevertheless he quickly
came out of his funk and is now a fabulous girl dad (he even paints
toenails).  

As for myself, I took this pregnancy like a free pass to an all you can eat
buffet for nine months.  6 waffles?  Bring it.  In fact, bring 8.  Chad said
he was going to throw me a party if I reached two hundo.  I gave it the old
college try but fell about 13 pounds short. Looking back, I think I deserve
some sort of consolation prize.  I might even go get some cupcakes a bottle
of wine to celebrate what could have been.

Being pregnant and unreasonably large in the summer sucks. Whoever tells you
the "clothes are cuter and blah blah blah" obviously didn't have to take
their older child to the pool every day.  Talk about a shot to the old ego.
My swimsuit resembled an ugly cocktail dress, and I floated in the water as
effortlessly as a fishing bobber.  I finally forced my poor doctor to induce
me two weeks early. (I bet I could have had that party if I  would have
waited to let nature take its course.)  Oh well, I was done!! 

Now the birth part...my first birthing experience was so easy I slept
through most of my drug-induced labor. I would wake up, watch a bit of
passions, eat a popsicle and go back to sleep.  I think the real reason they
had to use a vacuum to get Halle out was because I was in la-la land and
really not into pushing much.  (Good epidural.)  I can't say the same about
my epidural with Tess. It was nothing like the calm experience with Halle.
Only part of the spinal cord took the epidural, so I felt everything on my
left side - not awesome.  It feels exactly like what I imagine being sawed
in half would feel like.  It was OK though, the anesthesiologist apologized
the next morning and explained that sometimes the shot only hits one strand
of the spinal cord leaving the other half functioning. "Oh you are sorry,
that's cool. BTW we are only paying half of your bill, k??" 

So to wrap it up: two beautiful girls, two totally different pregnancies,
births, looks, and personalities.  In fact, with Tess, Chad may have gotten
a bit of that son he always wanted anyway.  She can kick like Hope Solo,
thinks she wants to drink "whispey" with Daddy, loves to play golf, and
really wants to go shoot a pig (she also loves clothes, make up, dolls, and
is a tad vain - still has the girly side, too).  Life with two is fun.
Totally worth it.  Glad we did it. I never have gotten those new skinny
jeans (in that size anyway), and now we have two weddings to worry about.
The trip to Europe is postponed indefinitely.  At least we are pretty sure
Tess won't go to college...she is not much for authority, or listening in
general.  Maybe Halle will support her one day when she is a starving artist drawing butts.... (see fb)

Tooth Fairy

Nobody has time for this!! All you parents know that by the time the kids are asleep you are playing rock paper scissors or some other game with much higher stakes to see who has to go slip money under the pillow and retrieve the tooth.  In our house, the tooth fairy is someone who sometimes forgets altogether.

When Halle lost her first tooth, we were so excited. What a special moment! The tooth fairy left 5 bucks, and tooth went into the safe (congratulations, robbers).  Next tooth, a fiver and the tooth goes in an envelope in the top of the closet. Third tooth?  Forgot!  Hid three bucks under the bed and told her she must have knocked it under there.  Fourth tooth?  Seriously, I am over it.  I went to bed, and Chad slipped a buck under the pillow.  The next morning I am left to explain why the tooth fairy has become  such a cheap bastard.  I went with "the harder it is to get the tooth out, the more money you get." 

Halle is no dummy, and one of her friends has already told her the tooth fairy isn't real. She asked me if this was the truth, and I choked.  I wasn't expecting the question, and quite frankly, I couldn't care much less if my kid believes in fairies or not.  My response was a cool " What do you think?"  as I casually ate my roast beef dinner.  She then says, "If tinker bell is fake then so is the tooth fairy."  I retorted with the old "If don't believe, you don't receive!" I am quite sure Halle didn’t give a big fat rip since she probably figured the next thing left under her pillow was likely going to be an I.O.U....

Teeth keep falling, and we keep waffling.  Whatever is in the wallet winds up under the pillow.  Poor Tess, she hasn't lost one yet. We may tell her that teeth just end up in the garbage disposal and then go buy a Gatorade - one with a squeezy top for sore mouths that have just lost teeth.  Besides, aren't the horrible thoughts of a life-sized rabbit hiding plastic eggs in your backyard and an elderly fat man coming down your chimney enough for a child to digest anyway?

The Duke and The Doctor

This is one of my guilty listening pleasures.  (The guiltiest one I have is
John Tesh.  His helpful hints are ahhhhmazing!!)  

I used to hate the Duke and the Doctor, but now that my little one is in
school every day until noon, it has really grown on me. I actually pulled
into a health & wellness store during regular programming to see if they
carried "Vitalogic" products. The Duke and the Doctor say any reputable
health food store does, but this particular one did not. 

I often find myself listening to a caller and immediately identifying with
his/her symptoms. "Yes, that's it! That is what I have!"  It goes off like
an alarm clock in my body.  Of course, the Duke and the Doctor remain calm
and tell them to knock off the meds and take Vitalogic XYZ.... This vitamin
regimen must be the shiznit because they recommend it for everything from
dementia to cancer. Apparently I have both, plus arthritis, the plague, and
PTSD from war.  

So, this Christmas I am asking for the entire Vitalogic regimen.  As I
listen to the program, I think "maybe I will become a picture of health;
maybe I will run a marathon!!!" But these thoughts of health are quickly
fleeting when the next radio program comes on...Ag Talk...and all I want is
a 100% beef hamburger.

Nemeses

We all have them. Not the human kind, but the kind that put a small dent in
your day.  Here are some of mine....

Cantaloupes - I buy these every time I go to the grocery store.  I buy the
whole ones due to the fact that one already cut up costs a billion dollars.
The problem is, I don't ever cut them up.  On the off chance that Chad gets
a wild hair and cuts one up, my kids enjoy a healthy dose of vitamin C.  I
am afraid of slicing food with large knives ever since I cut my thumb with a
bagel slicer.  My intentions are good, however most weekends I throw out a
squishy, untouched cantaloupe.

Ants- How do they survive like this?  I can hunt down the queen hill,
destroy it, and they have 10 new hills the next day.  Tenacious boogers.
Hate 'em.  This goes for flies and mosquitoes too, but I have been unable to
pinpoint their "nests" or whatever they have.

Acorns- Where do these suddenly come from?  Not only are they hell on my
feet when I'm trying to take a stroll through my otherwise soft grass, but
they will grow tiny little oaks all over my yard in the spring.  Also, they
make my dogs fat.  To combat my acorn infestation, I have taken to vacuuming
my yard with a shop vac.  This is soooo gratifying.  Listening to the acorns
get sucked up the tube and dumping out gallons of them in the trash is like
therapy. I have successfully dumped 5 full shop vacs full so far...

Single socks- Seriously.  Where does the other one go?  It makes no sense.
Only after a significant grace period do I throw the single away.
Sometimes the match shows up the next day stuck inside a pillowcase.

Horror movie trailers- Stop it! You are scaring my kids.  And me.  I don't
care to see a possessed child crawling across the ceiling during the
commercial break of Glee.

Leg hair- I shave twice a day sometimes.  My friends call it obsessive, I
call it not getting stuck to my sheets at night.  This is a Henley thing.
We have lots of body hair.  Thank goodness I am blonde(ish).  If I were
dark-haired I could make money at the fair sideshow. 

I am sure I have many more but at the risk of sounding like a lunatic I will
stop here.

Beanie Babies

Way back in 1992, I began a collection of Beanie Babies. I am guessing this habit lasted way longer that it should have because I currently own roughly 150 beanie babies. I even remember the horrified look on Chad's face one Christmas when my mother surprised me with several decorated on the tree. This was probably in college and should have been his cue to run. 

Now, to be fair, these things were supposed to be worth a million dollars by now. Ty had really cornered the stuffed animal market and threatened to retire each Beanie yearly. I looked them up on eBay a few years back only to be crestfallen that my plethora of beanies was worth about 50 bucks. I even had good ones like the Princess Diana bear. This saddened me. I hadn't gotten into the market quick enough to own "Tabasco" the bull before the real Tabasco copyright sued Ty and they had to rename him Snort. That one was worth some clams.  Nevertheless, I was banking on these things funding a large portion of my retirement.

Anyway, I did what any good mother who just realized her Beanies were not going to pay for a lake house would do - I gave them to my kids. I watched in horror as they gleefully pulled the plastic protected tag off each and every one of them. They play vet, zoo, school, and who knows what else with these things. I am glad they enjoy them, but I am going to be one sad mofo if the Beanie Baby market ever rebounds...