Under Pressure

I feel rather depressed. This cold is wearing on me. I felt fine for the most part, but today I awoke with such pressure in my sinus under my left eye that bending over was agony. Originally I was going to spend the day cleaning, doing laundery and putting htings back in the garage. I had even suggested we go swimming, or to the library. Instead, I took some medicine and slept on the couch for hours while the girls watched Harry Potter (1 and 2).


I am blessed with my girls. Rhayn is so helpful when I am ill, and it feels like I have been ill a lot lately. (Its really just one cold, that drags on and on.) Rhayn made us all hot tea and she cooked macaroni and cheese for lunch (I helped a little, pouring the pasta into the colander.) She helped Gwennie and emptied the dishwasher. She kept asking me if I needed anything.


If my brain weren't in a haze from spending the day sleeping and filled with pressure, I would probably have more profound words about how awesome Rhayn is. Alas I don't. She is a wonderful girl, and I am often amazed by her.

oh moon time,
you come
with cramps
and ruin my day.
you swoop into
the house
with a vengeance.
what will i do
when
you visit
the girls, too?

Missing you

fear fills every pore,

much like sweat drips down my back,

but it won't wash off.

Memorial Day Weekend

Memorial Day weekend was a lovely weekend, weather-wise. Friday was cool, cloudy and idyllic. On Saturday we headed to my parents house after I put the garage (more or less) back together. I spent the evening at Hairball's house, and we watched the DaVinci Code. I really want to read the book now, but will not let myself until I finish Pride and Prejudice.

Sunday was spent at my parents, talking and enjoying the morning. Then we made a plan for Memorial Day. We decided to go to the lake. I have to say, I really dislike swimming. But going to the lake is rather nice. We sit on the edge, and the kids play in the water. We eat crappy food and talk.

We had to get up really early to run to the store to buy a few things (food, sun block, etc.) since we didn't bring the right kind of clothes for swimming. It felt like we wandered the store for hours, but it wasn't that long, it was really that my mom and I were not fully awake. Then we came home and started packing up. My parents have a red canoe, well its more of an orange color now, since its faded from the sun. We used to take it with us when I was younger. Sometimes we had it strapped to our ugly yellow, banana boat suburban, followed by an even uglier camper trailer. We were styling back then.

This trip, the orangish-red canoe was strapped to the top of a lovely faded red Ford Explorer. Nice. We made it most of the way to the lake when my dad realized that he had forgotten the oars. A canoe is useless without them. My brother, JVA and his wife turned around to run back to a store to buy some.

When we got to Canyon Lake, we found that you need a "Tonto Pass" to park in the parking lot. Only they don't sell them at the lake, you have to drive back out of the area or 2 miles past the lake to Torilla Flats to get a pass. Ugh. It felt like we were doomed to have a bad time. We finally bought passes and parked, but most of the tables and shade were taken up by large families. We found a corner and set up our stuff.

Uncle JVA took the girls (and his dog, Bella, a chocolate lab) out in the canoe. The girls were so excited, and loved being out there. He paddled them all over, then Brie helped him take them farther. Later my mom and dad took the little girls to a different part of the lake. They could have spent the whole day in the canoe.

JVA paddled Rhayn out to the jumping rock, where she climbed up and happily jumped off. (Much to her mama's fear.) Then she climbed up again, and whoosh! right into the lake.

The kids were getting hungry, so my dad set up the little grill he had. He and Rhayn grilled up the hot dogs. Everyone sat in the shade and ate.

After lunch the kids went back in the lake. This time hanging out near the shore line, sitting on rocks.

It was a long day, but quite pleasant. No one was sunburnt, or hurt in any way. We had a near perfect day.

Things I think about too much

• Not hearing from Will for a couple of days
• Not hearing from Will for a week
• Heights
• Not knowing where my kids are
• Forgetting my phone at home (so that no one can contact me)
  
• Spending a weekend without my phone
• Coming home and only having 4 missed calls- none from my husband
  
• Knowing that I need to stop worrying, but not being able to
  
• Mirrors at night, in a dark room
  
• Ghost stories when you are camping, especially that one about the campers
  
• Thinking too much about not hearing from him for over a week, because that just makes my mind over analyze it, and start the "worst case scenario, when will the Uniformed Officers show up?" thoughts.
  
• The end of the school year, and realizing that my kid is going to be a third! grader! in the fall.
  
• Gwennie will be four in the fall. GAH! How did that happen?
• Knowing I will never have another baby.
• But mostly why haven't I heard from Will?
  

Memories

What is it Mama?!

Her love of the horse started early.


First time on a horse.

Mostly finished project.

A good friend is moving this summer (pout) and was selling some things. I looked through the list and noticed that she listed 2 heavy duty shelves, from Costco. Since I had planned to purchase some of these anyway, it made more sense to buy hers. The only problem was, the disaster area known as a garage is where I want to put them. I needed to tackle organizing it a little.

Its never been bad enough that we couldn't park in it, luckily we have an "extended garage" (an extra 6 feet in width.) However we have so much junk from unfinished projects and unorganized tools and such that there are piles of crap on every surface and you can rarely find what you are looking for. (Tool wise- I have a couple of those same shelves in there already that are fairly organized. I mean I can see if I need to buy toilet paper or dish soap.) It has also never been painted. Oh, sure they textured the walls, but never painted, not even a thin layer of super crappy, un-washable flat, white paint. Nice huh? 6 years of looking at this every time I park.

The finish our homebuilders did, drywall, with texture, no paint. Grrr.

When Will left, one of the projects I wanted to finish was the garage. I longed to have an organized and nice looking (read as painted) garage. But there were so many other projects and it kept falling so low on the list. Then it got hot. Our house faces east- the garage faces east, so in the morning the sun beats into the garage with a ferocity. It is too hot to be in there when its already 90 by 9am.

The weather changed this week, a storm blew in, and cooled us down. The sun didn't come out from behind the clouds, so even though I was struggling with a not to severe cold, I began moving the large items in the garage around. The biggest problem was picking a color. It couldn't be a girlie color, but I didn't want to paint it tan, either. Then it hit me, gray. A nice light gray would be perfect. I picked one from Behr, but ended up at Lowe's (they don't sell Behr there) and found a similar color called "Tsunami Sky" by Valspar. I also noticed a huge "Mail-In Rebate! $5 off a gallon and $20 off of 5 gallons of Valspar Paint" sign. It clinched it and I asked the paint mixer if he thought semi-gloss would be good in a garage. Also asked him if 5 gallons would be the right amount for a 2 car garage that had never been painted. He said that if it had been previously painted, then 3 gallons would have been his suggestion, but 5 was a better idea.

After that, I went home, put on my "painting duds" and got to work. Gwennie is awesome. She will hang out near me, or play nicely in the house while I get work done. She does get into things but not as much as Rhayn did at her age. I was able to get 2 coats on the wall that the shelves were in front of (as I had decided that painting the garage was at least a three part project, north side, south side and ceiling.) The biggest challenge on that side was painting around the water heater. Let me say, it was hard, really hard. But its done and I am pretty sure I got all of it.

The water heater of doom, or the hardest part, so far to paint.

The next day I moved all of Will's man toys from the other wall before getting started on that side. I also had to vacuum up sawdust, lots and lots of sawdust. Painting that side took just as long as the other side, but only because it involved the front wall. I left the garage to dry overnight.

This morning I woke up and put everything back in place. I moved things that I felt needed a new home, and really tried to lump together items that were similar. (Like all of the things that are used to fix cars, oil, filters, brake pads, etc.) There are a few items that I need to sell, and a few more items that I have no idea what to do with.

Will's not being home makes it difficult to go through and get rid of stuff that he doesn't need or won't use any more. Personally I would get rid of the 6 dozen or so empty glass beer bottles that he one collected to brew his own beer. As long as we've been together he never had brewed any to the best of my recollection. It is worth hanging on to all of those bottles? What about the hardware that was used to build the patio cover? The only reason I didn't get rid of that was because he has to fix it when he gets home and he wants to build a faux balcony, so he may need many of those little metal pieces. He always seems to buy at least 50% more than he needs. I understood it way back when there were no home improvement stores near us, but why not take the unused items back to Home Depot/Lowe's? Instead of holding on to them? I suppose I am guilty of the same thing.

I am exhausted from this project and it is only about three fourths of the way done. The ceiling paint job may have to wait until fall. Because painting in an oven is not fun.

Salsa Verde

First off, many people may think that salsa verde is simply salsa made with green tomatoes. This is not the case- it requires a tomatillo, or husk tomato. In the southwest these are easy to come by and are actually sold in most grocery stores. My Fry's grocery store always has them.

Ingredients:

• 1 pound of tomatillos
• 1 medium sized yellow onion
• 1 jalapeno
• 2 (or more) cloves of garlic- minced or put through a garlic press.
  
• 1/4 cup coarsely chopped cilantro
• 1 lime's worth of juice
• salt
  

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Remove the papery skin from the tomatillos (and say it with me- toh-MAH-tee-yo)
Rinse the tomatillos, then quarter them (or cut into similarly sized chunks.) Place tomatillo chunks on a pan that has been lightly greased.
Slice the onion, or dice in large chunks. It doesn't matter because it is going in the food processor later. Sprinkle the onion on the baking tray with the tomatillo. I tried not roasting the onion, but felt it overpowered the tomatillo flavor. You may prefer it that way, in that case- ignore what I said. Do not sprinkle the onion on the pan. Instead put it into the food processor.
*This is one option- take the jalepeno and slice it in half. Remove the innards if you want the salsa verde to be milder or leave them in for spicier. Then coarsely chop the jalapeno. I put half of the jalapeno on the baking pan and reserved the other half to put in the salsa fresh. (For depth of flavor.)
*Another option would be to roast all of the jalapeno or even to let it all remain fresh. In that case, put in into the food processor.

Place the pan into the preheated oven and roast until fruit are brown and soft. (Or if you want a more roasted flavor- leave in until the tomatillos are charred in some spots.) Like this:
Dump all of the roasted items in the food processor. At this point I also put in the remaining fresh jalapeno, garlic, lime juice, cilantro and about 1/2 teaspoon of salt.

Combine, until of good consistancy. It should look something like this:

It willl be hot, so put the salsa verde into a jar and place in the refrigerator. Or use it for enchiladas, or what ever else you would use salsa for.

Enjoy!

Nuggets of Wisdom from a 22 year old.

In my ill state I began trying to organize my garage. What was I thinking? I guess feeling like an elephant is sitting on my chest makes me think "Lets get dusty! And move large objects!" But I did as much as I could today. I moved the shelves away from the wall, and will start painting soon. Its going to be nice enough out for the next few days that being in the garage will not feel like death. If I wait, it will not happen until much later, like late fall.

While I was moving things around, I found a box of journals, and drawings. Its mostly from right around when I met Will and we were dating. There was a lot of self doubt and self loathing in there. I feel bad for the 22 year old me, she wasn't a very pleasant or happy person. Its no wonder Will and I didn't get along perfectly. He probably saw my potential and I fell so short of it in every aspect. Instead of being his equal, I was a spoiled little brat. I don't understand why he dated me in the first place, and really I don't understand why he married me, either. But that is a topic for another day.

I found this little nugget of words written exactly one year before I became a mom.

march 6, 2000 i wish i could let you into my mind for a moment. so you could see how much you mean to me. i wish you could see yourself through my eyes. if i could find the words that told you what i think, how i think. what it is that makes these emotions so hard to describe through words? why can i find a word to describe sunsets, jerks on the road, the pesky gunk under my mails, but the words to tell you how i feel delude me.

Delude me? What is that? I am sure there was a different word I meant, but I wrote delude. And I either wrote in all capitals or all lower case. I now write in some mixture of the two (when I hand write something.)

a few weeks before that-
feb 19, 2000 i am so afraid to let go. i am afraid of how much pain i could be caused. i push everyone away. i know i do. i hurt those i care the most about. i try to smile, to not let my fears show. i try to enjoy each day. its hard to do this when all i see is how much i could be hurt. why can't i live in the now, be happy with what i have? things really aren't that bad in fact my life seems to be going ok for the moment (for the moment!) i am waiting for the turning point when everything goes to shit. its going to happen soon, i can feel it. nothing can stay good for long.

This was written within a month of meeting Will. I was so afraid of letting myself love him. Loving people had always caused me pain in the past. I did let go, sort of. I let myself feel love towards him, but didn't let him fully into me. I still struggle with this. The same issues that I have always had. It all comes back to two words-

Faith and Trust.

Without those, there is nothing.

My head a balloon
someone sitting on my chest,
this cold really stinks.

Can someone pass me a tissue?

This morning long before the sun rose, a faucet was turned on my nose.
This morning as I made the girls breakfast, the pressure was building.
This morning when I went to the grocery store I was able to suppress sneezes for the time I was in the store.
This morning I realized I caught Gwennie's dumb cold.
And this evening? I am miserable.

The Price of Music.

After a fairly leisurely morning filled with fried eggs, toast and vacuuming; my friend, the girls and I went out shopping. Piano shopping to be exact. We went to one store that I had found through Craig's List. However we weren't too impressed. There was only one decent piano close to my price range. We weren't extremely discouraged, since we still had a few stores to go. But it was lunch time. We had Cheesecake Factory, complete with two slices of cheesecake split between the four of us. Two slices of cheesecake which we didn't even finish I might add. Then we headed to one store that must have closed or moved, but there was still one store to visit.

We headed to Mesa. Milano's has a piano store across the street from the store we all went to a million times as youth because we were in band. We walked in, and only saw one piano close to my price range. Feeling quite disappointed, we checked that one out. I mentioned something about "under a thousand dollars" and a salesman came up, and said "We are cleaning up this Acrosonic over here, its only $695 and honestly in much better condition than the one you are looking at."

We walked over, and my friend, whom I brought along for company but mostly because she is a wonderful musician, began to tickle the ivories. She glided her musical fingers up and down the keys and proclaimed it a better piano than the one at the first store. She opened it up, and looked at the pads, and said they were better than the piano at the first store. Then I played it a little, and told them I wanted it. The wood was a lovely rich, dark color and would go in our house well. The shape was interesting, it is more of a desk shape and was made in the 1950s. They told me the bench would be sent in to be reupholstered in a brown vinyl the next week, and I said, "No, thanks, I can do that myself." I can pick out a fabric that will look nice in the room it will live in, and get rid of the mauve fabric that currently covers the bench.

I was led up to the front desk to fill out paper work. Then they asked "When would you like it delivered? Today? Monday?"
Jaw dropping, "Today would be great."
"How about between 4 and 4:30? (It was 3)"
"Well I need to drive home and drop my friend off, but that should work."
"It will be about a half hour before we load it up, then we will be off."
"Awesome."

My friend offered to give Rhayn some piano lessons, including music theory, so we walked across the street to Milano's proper and she picked out some beginning piano books. Rhayn carried the books excitedly back to the car and looked at them all of the way home.

We dropped my friend off, and went home. I vacuumed up the space which would soon be home to our new piano and we waited.

At about five, the guy called and delivered her. I showed him her new home, and he put her there. Then Rhayn (who was hiding upstairs and wanted to come down the stairs as if it were Christmas morning to see a hippo hero standing there, oh wait, I mean a piano) walked down the stairs exclaiming her joy.

Every few minutes I hear lovely "music" coming up the stairs. And the rich, happy sound that I remember from my childhood fills our house. I don't think I have ever spent money on anything that made me so very happy.

The Daddy Dream

She slips from the bed, eyes bleary from sleep. "Let's go get Daddy," she says, pausing then continues on, "he's here."
"No sweetie, he is still gone."
"I felt him in bed with us."
"Oh honey," I whisper, tears forming in my eyes.
"I know he is here."
"Come here Gwennie, let me hold you." Her small body climbs into my lap, and holds me tightly.
"I had a dream about Daddy was home?" she asks her blue eyes peering into mine as I attempt, unsuccessfully to hold back the flood of tears.
"Yes, and it was a good one, huh? We really miss our Daddy, and can't wait for him to come home."

Its these simple things that hurt the most. I can put most of the feelings out of my mind easily, and pretend to be fine. But when the girls express sadness and longing for their Daddy, that is when my heart breaks in two, because its the one thing I can not give them.

In the past few days Gwennie has made some monumental leaps in development.

She drew her very first picture. She has been scribbling circles and lines but never made them into anything. Then on Tuesday, while Rhayn was at gymnastics class, she sat and drew a sun. (I will post a picture of it later.) It was drawn in pink highlighter, but beautiful nonetheless. I asked her what it was, and she said, matter-of-factly "Its a sun, a pink one." After which my heart melted into a pool of love.

Today we went to the pool, and although at first she was cautious of the water and being out in it, she soon found her footing. She played in the water, with her friends, for an hour. An hour that I didn't need to be right on top of her. It. was. awesome.

Visiting a Plastic Surgeon

This morning we all awoke early to drive to a doctors appointment for Rhayn. You see, every year or so, we go to the CRS clinic to be checked by either an ENT, a speech pathologist, a plastic surgeon or a few other doctors on her "team". When Rhayn was born she had a cleft palate that required surgery when she was six months old. Her surgery coincided with one of the worst days in American history, so if you haven't been reading this blog very long- please follow this link to read about that day.

We arrived the full thirty minutes early that we were supposed to. Since we only go every so often, we usually have to fill out financial forms in order to be seen. Only we arrived at seven, and the financial folk don't get in until 7:45. Excellent. We sat, when we could have stayed in bed until the normal time and not gotten up and out of the house by 6:30.

During our wait period, I read the girls the sixth book in the Magic Treehouse series (they had a bin of books that said "Take one home!" so we picked one to read while waiting, and I grabbed a 50 cent copy of Around the World in 80 Days.) I was able to read the entire Magic Treehouse aloud to the girls while we waited, which was rather nice.

The financial appointment was silly. I just had to sign a paper saying that we will be billed 100% of the AHCCCS cost. Then we were sent on our way to see Rhayn's plastic surgeon. The surgeon looked in her mouth, the speech pathologist listened to her count to seventy, and we were on our way. Everything is growing as it should, her palate looks awesome. She will go back in two years to be checked again, but until then, its like it never even happened.

After the appointment, I took the girls for breakfast. We had had a bowl of cereal at home, but that was nearly three hours before. When we were seated at the diner, the table behind us was talking loudly. REALLY loudly, and the guy was telling his mates a story about a couple who were fighting in court about custody of a child. Not a big deal, until he started going into details about the bloody pictures on the guys wall, and how the mom was a cutter and the things they were saying in court. Rhayn got up to go to the restroom (yes, I let her go alone IF I can see the restroom or if I feel like its ok, she is 8.) I turned around and asked the table if they could speak more quietly because I didn't think my kids needed to listen to their story, no matter how interesting it was.

This is a big deal for me. I am not one to confront people. I am shy and scared and usually let things like this slide off my back, well I panic inside and think of all the things I should be saying while just letting it all go. But I didn't want them listening to this. It was a terrible story. I was sure Rhayn would ask me about it later, especially if the man kept talking at his ever increasing volume. I was glad I asked them to be quiet. It made our breakfast pleasant.

I am sure I have said this before, but it bears repeating this deployment has made me stronger. I am more sure of myself than I was before, because I know I can do this. I have to do this. I don't have someone else to take care of me. And I really needed that strength.

More May Gardening

Flowers picked by Rhayn from our garden. A lovely surprise on the counter.

This morning after school drop off, Gwennie and I ran into Lowe's to get a few things. We bought 1/2 gph drip heads for some of the plants. I think that the 2gph ones I had were over watering the drought tolerant plants. In the garden section I found some sun shade fabric. I figured with a few of the posts we had in the yard I could fashion a sort of shade for my dear little plants.

About a half an hour and thirty dollars later, I had this.

While I was putting it up, I noticed that even with the heat, many of the seeds I had planted were sprouting. I have one watermelon, a few pumpkins, and corn. (Its the red sweet corn variety.) Also the eggplant that was transplanted is blooming. I must have just gone out there yesterday at the worst possible time. This morning everything feels renewed and fresh. And once again I am looking at a lovely garden.

Watermelon sprout.

Eggplant bloom.

Red sweet corn, not in the raised bed garden, these are growing next to it (notice the concrete block wall to the left.) I was hoping that the garden would help shade them when they are tiny and they would help shade the garden when they are bigger.

Unfortunately this heat has kept most of my plants from growing. I am now looking at ways to shade the garden in hopes that it will allow some of them to sprout. I guess the ten degrees above normal temps are just too much.

Sigh, its too much for me, too. 90 I can handle, 100? meh.

Mother's Day

Blah. I have always disliked this holiday. I feel like I can never do the "right thing" for my own mom. Now that I am the mom, I feel like it is just an excuse to buy crap. That being said, this year was decent.

On Friday I received a Fed-Ex package from a jewelry company. I didn't even think (or notice at first that it was a jewelry company) and opened it. Inside was a lovely blue topaz pendant. One that I had in fact looked at because it was featured on Ben's Bargains. I will admit that for a moment, I thought that it would be really nice to buy it. But dismissed it quickly because I have necklaces and it was frivilous. So upon opening the velvety black box and seeing the pendant, I felt a swell of, I don't know how to describe it, joy maybe? But not really. It was just a really nice feeling.

Saturday we went to my parents house. We watched Rhayn's cousins' school performance. I was able to talk my awesome cousin (Hairball) into going to see Star Trek with me. It was awesome, by the way. I loved it, and can not stop thinking about it. The Trekkie in me was pleased with it.

We woke up Sunday at my parents house, and I spent some time talking to my brother Ender. He was visiting with his wife (whom my children love and have missed incredibly.) We had a lesiurly morning talking with my parents and brother. Then we came home.

Rhayn had gone to a church activity day last Wednesday. They had made something for the moms, and were instructed to hide it away until Mother's Day. She did. She was so excited to give it to me, too. Her enthusiasm was worth everything, and totally made my heart swell with pride in this sweet girl I am raising. Even if we are working on the lying issues. When we got home, she ran upstairs to drag out the gift, and asked me if I was ready to open it. I sat on the couch. It was a pair of gloves, stuffed and with ribbons tied on the fingers. It sounds strange, but it looks really neat hanging on the patio and blowing in the wind. She told me that she picked thegloves (gardening gloves) out because she knows I like yellow and caterpillers. Yes on both accounts. She was really thoughtful about it, chosing what I would like, and not just what she would like. This is so grown up of her, in the past gifts that she has given me were always something she liked, for instance a ring that is really sparkly. The stone is lovely, and I did like it, but it really was more something she liked that me.

Then again, I think that Will choses gifts the same way. He buys me clothes that he feels will look good on me, clothes that he wants to see on me. He is usually correct, but they aren't usually items I would buy. He does listen and I think I appreciate that most of all.

Time in the backyard.

I apologize for not being around. I had to work through my depression, and then it got really hot, which doesn't help my depression. I finished my garden on Wednesday. Gwennie and I planted an armenian cucumber plant (back left of picture) as well as an eggplant (back right of picture). Then we planted seeds; watermelon, pumpkin, corn and nasturtium. I transplanted the basil, majoram and dill I had started in my kitchen as well. All of the plants are all doing well so far, but today is projected to have a high of 104, so we'll see if they whither in the heat.

My sunflowers (right in picture above) bloomed, and they are not the skyscrapers I thought they would be, instead they are an autumn sunflower, bright irange-red, that I planted last year that never really grew past seedlings.

I made a swing with things I had in the garage. Gwennie has been obsessed with swinging lately, asking if we can go to pick up Rhayn early so that I can push her on the swing. Our tree is only about five years old, and not huge. I told Rhayn she can't climb it until the trunk is the size of daddy's muscular thigh. (The tree is not yet even as thick as my not so muscular thigh.) I found a fairly think branch, attached my makeshift swing and stood on it. I figured that if I coudl stand on it, and bounce a little, without it breaking, then Gwennie could swing on it.

She loves her swing. She will sit on it, and just go back and forth for long periods of time. It is really cute. See?

If my skin were a color, it would be green right now. No, not because I have spent so much time in my garden digging in the earth. It would be green with envy. I feel so jealous of everyone. Jealous because their partner is home with them. Jealous because they are having babies. Jealous because things at their house work and aren't breaking. Jealous.

This deployment drags on and on. I just can't seem to get out of this funk at the moment, this loneliness.

I can't even begin to explain how lonely it feels, because part of it is that the relationships I am envious of, are nothing like what Will and I have. They are more like what I want us to have. But as with anything, our marriage needs work. We have both lived side by side but not always together for so long. And now we aren't even side by side.

There are very few things in life that I want very much, one of them is to have the kind of relationship with Will where I can tell him anything, and never question that he will love me through it. I want him to feel the same way towards me. I want us to be best friends and automatically turn to each other before anyone else. But we don't. Most of all, I want to feel comfortable crying on his shoulder.

It hurts to admit that we havevery little of that. I have spent so much of this deployment looking at our marriage through rose-colored glasses, remembering only the good parts, pretending the bad parts never existed. But reality has sunk in.

We had a disagreement via email. Stupid and petty. But I have spent the past three days feeling like I was punched in the stomach. It is over a misunderstanding, as usual. It is really silly, words not used properly, teasing not taken as teasing. And I don't even know if it has upset him at all. I, on the other hand, keep going over it. Over and over and over. Like a bad movie that keeps playing in my head. I want it to stop but that button is broken. I want him to call, to email, to tell me its alright. If he was home, I would be sitting here, anxiously waiting for him to let me know that he really isn't mad. (This is usually done by some strategic bottom slapping or grabbing, I miss that.) If he was home, we would talk, maybe not very much, but a little then we would do what married folk do when they make up. And it would be awesome.

Instead I sit here, worrying. Stressing. Probably getting ready to break out in another "heat rash". I feel dumb for worrying so much, and causing my body stress that it doesn't need. But I can't help it. He has been gone pretty much for over a year now (with trainings and whatnot) and I miss him. I miss knowing he is in his office or downstairs. I miss having someone to talk to at night. I miss family dinners, because lately its been a struggle not to curl up into a ball crying at night, so the girls and I watch sitcoms (Frasier) because it makes dinner tolerable. I hate that I have turned to that. It is so easy when he is home to sit as a family at the table, to talk, to unload the day together. I don't want to sit at the dining room table without him, because it feels empty.

These days I feel that I am going through the daily motions, but not really living. Its just not a good way to be.

May Gardening

You know that old saying "April showers bring May flowers"? What if it didn't rain at all in April? Ok, maybe it did, one day. Does that mean no flowers in May? Not really. All of the saguaros are in bloom at the moment. After a lot of work since Thursday I finally have part of my garden almost ready for planting. I kept changing my mind on where it should be. Finally deciding that the best place is the original location. I thought I should move it, because eventually, in ten years, that location will have a tree shading it. But that isn't really a bad thing, and besides, in ten years... will we still be in this house? The second location (that I actually had put up the retaining wall in, you know, back in February,) wasn't set up with a drip line. It kept me up at night trying to figure out if it was worth calling the landscaper to put in a drip line. In the end, I decided against spending the money.

Now another issue is that there are plants already growing in my garden. I have eight tomatoes, a poblano, some cilantro, sunflowers, and a pineapple sage. I didn't want to disturb these plants. The tomatoes are blooming and some are beginning to bear fruit. I chose to make the raised bed garden only about half the original size. Maybe I was feeling overwhelmed by moving all of that soil and the price of it.

Friday morning I started moving the concrete blocks. It was only in the 80s and cloudy so after picking up Rhaynnon from school, I finished the retaining wall. Then started digging the dirt out. I used our ever useful pond form as a place to put the dirt. I wanted to dig it down about six inches deeper. Luckily this area has been on a drip line so the soil wasn't baked hard clay like other places in the yard. It really only took my a few hours to get it dug out.

The next step was to put the cardboard down. This is supposed to help the soil retain moisture, and it will also compost in time. I had seen somewhere that you could also put shredded paper in compost so I did that as well. (No way anyone will find out my sensitive information since it will be composted into the garden!)

After that layer I dumped the partially composted material from my compost bins. This was covered by the dirt in the pond form. Next came the topsoil we purchased from Lowe's. This is nearly 12 cubic feet and I think it needs about 6 more. Oh well, that will have to wait until tomorrow, today I am exhausted!

I planted a snail vine (or corkscrew vine) that should, within a few weeks cover these and shade the air conditioner. I will have to stay on top of it, or it could take over the whole yard and grow into the a/c unit. They grow fast and are invasive. However they are green and do not require a lot of water (in my experience, being an underwaterer, I haven't killed too many of them!)

Finally, a picture of a fig. I love figs. The smell from the leaves makes me think of my Grandpa, and I have always wanted one. This year I am hoping that we will get a few ripe figs. The tree is covered in green ones, and the girls have been instructed to NOT pick them. Aren't they beautiful?