The house I grew up in- part one

My best friend from my teen years and beyond let me know the house I grew up in is up for sale. She mentioned there were some renovations done and the sellers want 1.3 million for the split level on just under 2 acres in Baltimore County.

I started thinking about the house on my way home from work. My parents sold it when I was in my twenties. All the kids were gone and it was a big house for them. I was not sad when they sold it because  I had such good memories of it. Thinking about the house on the drive home tonight made me nostalgic though.

I was born ten days after it was finished. It was the only family house I ever knew. It was in the woods so you always thought it was dark earlier than it really was but it was cool in the summer. Here are some memories, in no particular order.

The roof was slate for many years. We used to climb up on the roof over the garage by standing on a rain barrel and pulling our selves up. Those slate tiles made great tiny table tops in our forest forts. My dad would get angry with us for pulling the roof apart. Now as a home owner, I understand that. The garage roof was the only place we had sun and the neighbors could not see us.  We would lay out our towels and sun bathe slathered in baby oil and holding our double albums, covered with tin foil, under our chins.

There was a rope swing on a tree near the garage. If you were feeling daring, you could toss the knotted rope up to the person on the garage and they could swing from the garage. The tingly feeling you felt jumping onto the knot and swinging far into the woods, felt like freedom. The garage roof was also collector of frisbees and other things we managed to throw up there. My bedroom window opened up to the garage roof for many years when I was little. It was the smallest room in the house but I did not mind. I did climb out the window onto the roof from time to time to take in the night sky. Maybe that is why when I got older, my room was switched to another without an escape route.

The garage could fit two cars, a push mower, a cider press, four bicycles, a wheelbarrow, tools, and other odds and ends. We used the wooden garage door as an agreeable tennis partner, who never called you out. There were ball prints all over that double door.

We had a basketball net hung from the roof. It was lower than regulation height so everyone loved to play at our house. Endless games of H-O-R-S-E until it grew dark and kids had to scatter running home for dinner or bedtime. As my brother got older, we put up a regulation height one but it was not as much fun. It seems too hard and much more serious.

My parents were Amway distributors when I was growing up so you will never hear me diss Amway. It put me and my brother through private colleges. There was a stocked closet with various products. I liked the convenience of heading to the garage to raid the stock if I needed shampoo or toothpaste.

The door from the house to the garage was always sticky growing up. I remember when I was 6 or 7, I was having trouble getting the door open. In my childish frustration, I yelled, not so childishly,"This damn door won't open!" I was sent to bed without supper. My brother snuck me a tangerine. Well, maybe I asked him to sneak me one, but I had dinner.

The house was a split level. The back door was really the lower door and it opened to a mud room when the dog stayed when she was wet, or bad or we needed her out of the way. Some years later, our chinchillas lived in a cage there. There was a closet for coats and cubbies filled with mismatched mittens and ice skates. The 5x10 mud room had four doors. One to outside, one to the garage, one to the downstairs office and one to the family room.

Our family room had a wall of built in book shelves. My father's huge record collection and stereo were on the built ins, along with the World Book encyclopedias, the Child Craft book collection, story books, old year books and the odd decorative item to fill in the spaces. The built ins had a counter with cabinets underneath that had sliding doors. They were great for hiding in. We used to sit on the counter with our ears up to the stereo speaker listening to the Moody Blues, Peter, Paul and Mary, Jon Baez, Judy Collins or the Pink Panther soundtrack. The doors into the room opened in so we were hidden behind the doors when we sat on the counter. There was an exposed brick wall along one side with a raised brick hearth in front of a fireplace. Another wall was all full length with windows and a sliding glass door that opened onto a patio. This could be pretty creepy when you were home alone. The rest of the room was open to the kitchen so it was a natural gathering place.

 One night, he dog started to have puppies on one of the sofa. It was okay, they were naugahyde, so a quick wipe with a damp rag, cleaned them right up. My brother and Iwere tasked with the couch wipe down.  We used to write out names on them with the wet sponge. It made it more fun.

We used to do gymnastics in our leotards in the family room until my oldest sister scraped up her leg on the brick hearth, after that, we used the living room. I remember sitting on the floor of the family room playing as firemen ran by  to put out a dryer fire. I remember my mother going to the hospital to have my brother. I think I watched the moon walk from there.  I bet on Secretariat during a Preakness party my parents had. After school, I arrived home to watch the coverage after Reagan was shot. I played my favorite records for friends there and snuck in to watch my sister's Young Life meetings there.

I learned to cook in the kitchen with light blue formica counters. I made apple pic from scratch when I was in elementary school. My mother taught me how to make meatloaf and cut up a whole chicken (that never quite stuck). We learned how to make our lunch for school when we were in first grade. For twelve years I had PB&J, a piece of fruit and maybe a cookie in my lunch. I got a shock from the electric fry pan cooking something, but was convinced for years that someone really grabbed my shoulders and shook me instead of the shock.

 We had a long spice cabinet on the top of the island. I loved reorganizing the spiced alphabetically. I would do that without being asked. We had a pantry with bags for onions and potatoes. Fresca and Tab were on the floor. Cereal was were the kids could reach it. Peanut butter was the next shelf up, baking stuff the next higher. Booze and sweets my parents wanted to stash for themselves were on the top. One year my parents bought a side of beef. The full size freezer, was full of a half a steer, wrapped parts in white paper with hard to read type identifying the parts.

Jobs were divided up in the kitchen. The younger ones emptied the dishwasher which sometimes meant climbing up onto the counter to put the glasses away. One sister washed the pots and pans and the other did the dishes that went in the dishwasher. We graduated jobs as my sisters went off to college.

There was a desk by the telephone. Pads of paper with notes from calls my mom had taken and doodles that she had drawn while on the phone remind me of my notes now from meeting at work. Even when the area was remodeled, the desk moved in the room and we added mail cubbies that collected more junk than they were useful. The phone remained on the wall with a long cord that could stretch as far as a teenage girl could get it to.

NEXT: Dining room, laundry, spare room and the party basement.

Smudgie the Cat

My fiance, Darren and I lived south of town, in a small rent house, very close to our neighbors on either side. On one side was an exterminator who was not fond of cats. I swore to Darren that he was responsible for death of one of our cats. It was a trauma, the vet said, usually from a fall, or was it really a throw?

This is where Smudgie's story began with us. She crawled through a hole in the fence into our yard from the evil exterminator's. This cute little ball of white fur stood out among the fall leaves. We had to rescue her from certain death. Darren began to feed her. We named her Smudge because despite the fact that she was mostly white, she had a black smudge of fur on the top of her head. She had no idea it was there.

 I wanted to bring her inside the house because it was winter and pretty chilly out. We both worked on getting her in. She was shy and it was difficult to even get close to her outside. Lucky for us, she liked out other cats.  Somehow we got her in the house. Mostly she hid,. She was the ghost cat. We forgot we had her at times. Which was good because our landlord didn't know we had any cats. It was easy to lie to him if WE never saw her.

We moved to our dream house in the country. She went with us, along with the four other cats (our landlord was unaware of) and our dog. We decided the kitties would all be indoor cats to keep them safe from coyotes,  that is until one began spraying and he got reassigned outdoors.

He disappeared some months later.

 Fast forward eleven years, I am divorced living in a smaller home on 6 acres near Bastrop. The cats from long ago are all now deceased, except Smudgie. After our move, she still preferred to hide under the bed. The fear was intensified by the move. A stray cat, who came with my new house, moved in. She loved him. He was a Big Ol' Tom cat, who she would come out sit near. He made her feel secure. Then a kitten joined our household. A silly orange thing who surprise attacked whoever passed by him. She hated him.

Mostly, Smudgie stayed aloof, coming out only at night to sleep beside me. She woke me up in the morning, before dawn's light,      staring at me,     willing me to pet her. She would not leave until she was weary of me. Eventually, my son got the same treatment. She started to venture out into the rest of the house when the dogs were outside. Smudgie was actually getting social in her old age.

Then Smudgie got sick. I took her to the vet and their results were inconclusive. They recommended that I have an ultrasound done on her. . . I declined. After spending $500 to hear their results were inconclusive, I could not afford another chunk of change for an ultrasound.  Suppose something WAS wrong with her insides, would I pay even more to have the vet open up the old girl and an attempt to fix the problem? No, I simply could not afford that.

 I took her home and she seemed to rally. She was keeping food down and gaining weight. Then right before our vacation, she got worse. I sent her to the vet while we were away, half expecting her not to make it. She did make it. In fact she rallied again, but not for long.

She stopped eating. She stayed close to the water dishes that I had placed everywhere around the house for her. She would not even drink the tuna juice I drained from the can. I knew the end was near.

Every morning I would ask my son, trying not to sound serious, "did you see Smudgie? Is she still alive?"

She wanted to go outside. Even inside cats went outside to die when their time was near, or so I had read.  It was tempting. I could just see her getting carried off by a hawk, who would be terribly disappointed by the lack of meat on her.

She hung in there. I could hear her labored breathing at times but she still managed to purr when I groomed her.

 And of course it would be a holiday weekend when SHE chose to go. Weekends and holidays are the times pets always seem to get sick at my house. I knew she ready to die but the vet was closed. She would have to leave of her own accord.

 Labor day morning, my son came into my room to see if I was awake.

"Good morning sweetie, is Smudgie out there?" I asked. I thought I had heard her meow in the wee hours but when I looked for her in the dark, I did not see her.

He checked and found her stretched out on the living room rug.
"She is just lying there, Mom, kind of staring into space."
 "Is she breathing?"
 "I am not sure."
 I got up and went to look. She was not breathing. She had died all stretched out with her eyes open and front teeth exposed in a death snarl. Now I had to see if rigor mortis had set in.

I hated touching dead animals. The fear of feeling them stiff as a board was scary and unnatural to me. I got some rags and managed to pick her up to put her in the box I had made for her coffin. A coffin that was meant for a small curled up kitty.

I put her in the box back feet first. Her head and front paws stuck out.

My son looked at her open eyes and slightly open mouth. "She's kinda freaking me out, Mom."

I put a rag over her face and set the box on the dining room table.

I needed to find a longer box. I wandered around the house and the garage,  but nothing seemed to be big enough. In my son's room, I found a large unopened Lego box.
Presenting it to my son, I asked "How's this for her coffin?"
 "uh Mom, there are Legos in there."
 "Yeah, but we can dump them out." He crinkled his nose and shook his head.

Off I went in search of another solution.

As I passed the lifeless Smudgie, still sticking out of her box on the dining room table, I asked no one in particular, why she could not have died smaller, like in a little ball.

 I asked Jake what he thought of a funeral pyre. We had a large burn pile in the pasture and it could work. After explaining what a pyre was, he looked at me as if I had snapped, crinkled his nose, again, and shook his head.

I sighed and left the room.

Reflecting on this, perhaps having a funeral pyre for a cat on the anniversary of the horrible Bastrop complex fires was a bad idea. I could see the headlines now: 2012 LABOR DAY FIRE SOURCE FOUND.  The locals would gossip, "some crazy lady was having a funeral pyre for her cat. "At least there was not a burn ban.

 Out in the shed I found an empty feed bag. That might just work. The plastic, and paper composition would keep the predators out and the smell in.  I got the body from the table and slowly slid her into the bag. Not very dignified but it would have to do.

Now I had a grave to dig.

I needed to soak the rock hard, parched earth first. It was 100 degrees outside and she was not going to stay in the house anymore. What would I do with her body in the meantime?

Out in the garage I looked around. The deep freeze!! Maybe it was inspiration from having just seen the movie "Bernie" where Jack Black's character puts a body in the freezer in the garage. All I knew was,  that it would work for now.

 A hour later, the ground pliable, the grave dug, and head stones found. We were ready for a kitty funeral as soon as the temperature dipped below triple digits. My son was grieving between video games and did not to have friends over. He did not want to cry in front of anyone but me.

"Mom, where is Smudgie?" he asked after lunch

"In Heaven." I answered, knowing this was not really what he was asking.

 "No, Mom, where is her body?."

 I paused, deciding not to lie. "In the deep freeze with the ice cream."  I will know I scarred him for life, if he never wants to eat ice cream again.

We had our quick funeral and covered her well so critters would not dig her up.

Fifteen minutes later, my son really wanted another cat to fill the void. I told him we needed to wait just a bit to let her know how special and irreplaceable she was.

"In fact," I said, " let's go celebrate her life with a bowl of chocolate mint chip,           
now that we can get to it."

Be Good to Others

You never know how what you do in life will affect others. I try to keep that in mind and hope that I am treating others with the same respect and open mindedness thatI would like others to meet me with.

 A few days ago, a colleague came to me begging that I re-shoot her photo that goes with her column in the paper. She told a story of how a store clerk had recognized her from her head shot but then later chased her down out of the store with the advice that she get a new photo taken. Yikes. Honest but harsh. I understood completely though. I am never satisfied with photos of me. Maybe because I look more tired than I think I ought to, or have a more wrinkles than I would like but I am super critical. So when I shoot head shots of people, I look at them. I sit them down and look at their face. I have them turn slowly from side to side until I see the best angle. I tell them what I am doing but it makes a difference. I always shoot standing on a small ladder to. the subject is the looking up and the lines are smoother that way. I borrow techniques from Irving Penn "say Thursday" instead of "cheese". Kate moss always thinks of having her chin on a ledge to help her not smash her chin into her neck when she poses. I worked with my colleague as I had done with many women in the office before her. She loved the result. She loved it so much she brought me a thank you gift and that was not expected or necessary. I just want people to love how they look and been seen how others really see them, not how a quick posed stiff snapshot makes them look. Afther the shoot, I got to thinking about all of this and I said to my friend across the pod, "you never really know how what you do affects others until you die do you?" "Not unless they tell you." And that is valuable too.

 If someone touches your life, let them know. My friend from elementary to high school told me that the hours I spent talking on the phone to him when we were growing up meant so much to him because his parents were divorcing and it helped to have someone to talk to. I had no idea until he told me this a few months ago, 30 years later.

 A student let me know that my class touched her and made her see things in a different way. Her note telling me this, after I had a hard week dealing with life, gave me strength and purpose. For her to care enough to write that note was important to me and made a difference.

 I know people always say let your family know how much you love them and care but expand that to friends, colleagues and even acquaintances. Treat others how you want to be treated and forgive those who cause you minor inconveniences. That is all.

the Release

Have you ever just let loose and cried in the car? Feeling particularly stressed with life, I sobbed on the way into work this morning. I didn't get any sleep last night because my A/C went out and the house was 90 degrees. Outside was not much better but at least there was a breeze. If my house were in a more private area and if I did not mind the sound of mosquitoes buzzing in my ear, I would have slept outside in my hammock. So lack of sleep, impending pricey A/C repair, missing my son who is away for two weeks and being responsible for caring for other peoples pets added up to the need for a release. At 8 am, drinking is not an option for me. I began to cry. I was careful to drive just out of view of the drivers next to me. At stop lights I would stay out of direct view, mostly. Then I had to stop. First car in line. As I waited for the car to go by I saw folks looking at me. Two guys in a truck went by and the passenger stared with a look that seemed to say "what do you have to cry about?" The woman waiting for the light on the other side of the street looked at me sympathetically and shook her head as if she had experienced a morning like that as well. I was crying for being divorced, jealous of those who have a partner to share burdens like this with. Someone who can hold them and whisper "it will be all right." I was crying for my son who I miss as much as he misses me. He calls every night in tears telling me how homesick he is. I was crying about being in pain and not being able to do the physical activities I like to do and the work I need to do. Crying for the B.S. that I would have to deal with at work that I did not feel like facing. Things were a little better when I got to work. The AC repair guy I wanted called me and ended up fixing the problem. I was able to face the folks at work who I was fearing. I will credit lack of sleep for my disinterested tolerance. I will still miss my kid but will watch some Phineas and Ferb to feel like he is there with me. As for the lack of a partner to share my life, I just need to get over it and enjoy this stage of my life. but truth be told, I still would like to share it.

taking it in

Been trying to shoot more lately. The camera used to be with me all the time. It still is I just choose not to bring it out sometimes. There are times when I need to experience something and not document it. My brain won't let me do both.

Yesterday I took the camera into Smithville Texas to visit the shop of my friend. She makes and sells vegan/organic lotions, oils, candles, soaps, incense and tons more. I used to not think much of incense but hers is making me change my mind. I rediscovered rose lotion. She has the normal "sandlewood" but then the abnormal "dirt' fragrance as well. Worth a visit to Devonshire Organics on second street in Smithville, TX. You will leave smelling much better than when you came in.

Lists

I have noticed that when my life seems out of control, I have a tendency to make lists, obsessively.

Things to sell:
1. Western saddle
2. Wedding dress
3. old computer
4. several old cameras
5. media pins (from my collection that is a huge dust gatherer)

Somehow it makes my life seem more organized and together, even if I never even follow the list.

To do today:
1. buy dog food
2. bank
3. car registration
4. paint bedroom
5. steam clean carpets

The lists can even get outrageously ambitious on the "to do" side of things. I know I can't paint the bedroom in a day but it is on the list and it is a project that I intend to complete.

Home improvement list:
1. fix wall cracks
2. repave driveway
3. weed gardens
4. stain the floor of the porch
5. paint the trim on the feed shed

The home improvement list is much longer than 5 things. I would love to be able to have the house "sell ready" should the need arise. I understand that is unrealistic but at the same time it is a goal. Unfortunately most of those goals cost some serious money.

People I would like to find again:
1. Nicky Tebbutt from Tenby, Wales
2. Eric Strauss from Sigma Chi at SU
3. Peter Hilgartner, my partner in crime in my college Russian class
4. Miss Collison, my fave 4th grade teacher
5. myself

I am curious what kind of life these people have had and what they are doing now. Nothing special about that. Everyone is curious about people that were once important to us, whether they knew it or not.

Things I want to learn:
1. play the drums
2. canter piaf
3. another language fluently (Spanish would be the most practical)
4. how to propagate plants successfully
5. patience

I hesitate to say "learn before I die". That just seems like it gives you time to procrastinate. Only God knows this, I guess. I am kind of waiting for my son to get older. Then he will be interested in things other than having mom entertain him. Hopefully I will not be driving him to those other interests but likely I will. maybe we can combine our interests.

Places I want to go:
1. Belize
2. Wales (again, all over)
3. Portugal
4. Australia
5. New Zealand
6. Colorado (to show my son)
7. Pecos Wilderness (again)
8. The Pacific northwest
9. Iceland

All of those on horseback preferably. I better get crackin because I know there are even more places I would like to go but I cannot think of them off hand. Wish I could vacation swap with people in all of these places so all I would have to pay for is airfare.

Somehow, my life seems calmer now.

connecting with the past

Many friends talk about the fun they have had connecting with friends from the past on Facebook. It works for me. I am not a letter writer or a phone person. Without the computer, it would be tough for me to keep up with all the great people I have met over the years.

I have found my first best friend, Katie. Our families used to vacation in Ocean City together. I have memories or the beach and the house we stayed in. We lived a hilly woodsy trail away from each other. She had a hill near her house that I was convinced showed the curve of the earth. It was so perfect. We would sled on it in the winter and roll down it in the summer. We played in the stream that was near her house and decided our motto for playing in the woods was "never trust leaves!" Usually leaves hid the water underneath and if you were not careful you would get very wet feet. We dug out the trunk of a fallen tree and made a fort. Yes, Mrs. Blanchard, that is where that Indian blanket went.

I never moved growing up, so my friends from elementary school, continued to be my friends in junior high and high school. I just seemed to add more as the schools got bigger. I was always a drama queen in school, meaning, I loved to be on stage pretending to be someone else. The teachers used to let us act out "Welcome Back Kotter" episodes in 6th grade. Looking back it must have cracked them up. I looked forward to the chance when I would get to audition for the sixth grade operetta. We did "Snow Queen".

But I digress, I really was thinking about Facebook and forgiveness. Many friends have spoken of being contacted by people who were bullies in school. The wounds run deep. Forgive and "Friend"? or IGNORE. "Friend" and then let them know how it made you feel when they picked on you? So many choices.

I am sure I must have hurt feelings in school. Before Facebook,one boy told me I ripped the Valentine he gave me up in front of him in elementary school. I did not remember this, but I am sorry. I want to say sorry to everyone who's feeling I may have hurt. I was young, insecure and not particularly aware.

Facebook brings back so many memories, good and bad.

I am older and much more forgetful now but I remember those people I was not comfortable around because I thought they would be quick to point out my shortcomings. They probably did not even care. I tried not to be around them very much to avoid being hurt. I admired everyone who was good at math. I lost it around geometry. I wondered if everyone felt as lost in French as I did, even though I had been taking it for 5 years. I think I always felt that anything before college did not matter very much in the way of how it shaped your life. I wish I had studied more, that part DID matter. Funny how most of my connections from the past are high school. Are my high school memories stronger even though they are older? Could be because I don't remember last names of my college chums that I have not connected with them. College was a bit of a blur.

I enjoy the connections I have made with friends and acquaintances from the past. I see that we have so much more in common as we grow older. It does not matter what part of the country we live in. In some way we all connect through our jobs, families, sense of humor and I am thankful for that. I love when my local friends interact with my oldest friends without ever having met face to face. The world grows smaller every day and hopefully better through our friendships.