If you know me in real life. You know one indisputable fact. I am a graceful gazelle of poise and dignity. Balanchine wishes he choreographed something as elegant me lumbering around with one kid on piggy back, 6 shopping bags, both kids backpacks in my teeth, one shoe on and wearing a tee shirt with holes and stains. This is not a new development. I've always been a beacon of art in motion.
There are running jokes in my family about me falling down stairs all the time. There were running jokes at the barn I grew up in about me falling off horses all the time. The day after I got my drivers license at 16, I had a car accident in front of my house at a stop sign. (Don't ask.Just imagine something stupid and that was probably it) I've lost track of the number of times I've had to get random stitches on my face or jacked up my ankles playing some game in inappropriate footwear..
I float through the air with a greatest of ease. So imagine my surprise when I fell off the ( swing set) trapeze.
I was 8, I broke my arm. Badly. It was a compound fracture and it made the hand look like it wasn't part of my body. Just off to the side with a a good 4 or so inches of bone on the outside when it should have been inside.
I was screaming so loud that my brothers heard a block away and immediately ran home. Which I don't think they had ever run home at the 1st sign of trouble ever. They would normally come home at the 5th or 6th sign of trouble and really only because they were hungry.
As a parent now, I realize there are different types of screams. I'm a little hurt and but I really need some attention. I'm hurt and I need first aid. I'm hurt and we need to go to a doctor. And finally I'm hurt and I just cut a major artery with my own bone.
It was probably 10-15 mins between when I fell and to my shoe less Dad carries me into the St Johns ER.
I don't really remember too much from then to the operating recovery room. But Mom, Grandmother and Aunt Mary showed up. I manipulated my aunt into giving me her ballet shows which I have been begging her for. Again a graceful gazelle, who is not above hustling to get something I wanted out of someone while extremely hopped up on pain meds.
I woke up in the recovery room choking on the breathing tube and wrapped up in blankets like a mummy. I wanted my Mom.
I had another surgery a couple of days later because my arm was not getting with the program. Then I ended up being in the hospital for 2 weeks. In addition to having an super duper injury I had a super duper rare infection from the dirt that entered the wound.
Alls well that ends well because I still had lots of kid growth plates and it healed well. If it was 5 years later, I would have a deformed arm but I still had the small child elastic bones that rolled with it.
Here is how I define good mothering. She had 3 other pain in the ass little kids at home. (we were sort of high maintenance and liable to set things on fire or bring home stray dogs)
My Dad had gone down to Biloxi, Mississippi a few days into my hospital stay. National Guard training what have yous yadda yada.
My Mom slept ever night of that 2 weeks on a budget rate love seat right in my hospital room. Every Nurse check. Every weird x-ray or blood draw they did to try to figure out why I was still running a big fever while on all the antibiotics. She was there. It never even occurred to me that she wouldn't be. That's what being someones mother means to me. You sit there and you don't leave until you are damn certain things are ok.
Everytime I get frustrated with my Mom, I cast back into the murky misty water colored memories.
She sat with me when I almost lost my hand for 2 weeks because I was reckless on a toy trapeze.
She sat with me for several weeks when I had my babies far away from home and I asked her to beacuse I was terrified.
Every time I have asked her to she showed and sat with me.
I can at the very least sit there and not leave until I am damn certain she is ok.
We can make fun of the weirdest and best musical of all time. Cats!!!
 |
| Me right now. I've been wearing this shirt for 3 days. |
I float through the air with a greatest of ease. So imagine my surprise when I fell off the ( swing set) trapeze.
I was 8, I broke my arm. Badly. It was a compound fracture and it made the hand look like it wasn't part of my body. Just off to the side with a a good 4 or so inches of bone on the outside when it should have been inside.
I was screaming so loud that my brothers heard a block away and immediately ran home. Which I don't think they had ever run home at the 1st sign of trouble ever. They would normally come home at the 5th or 6th sign of trouble and really only because they were hungry.
As a parent now, I realize there are different types of screams. I'm a little hurt and but I really need some attention. I'm hurt and I need first aid. I'm hurt and we need to go to a doctor. And finally I'm hurt and I just cut a major artery with my own bone.
It was probably 10-15 mins between when I fell and to my shoe less Dad carries me into the St Johns ER.
I don't really remember too much from then to the operating recovery room. But Mom, Grandmother and Aunt Mary showed up. I manipulated my aunt into giving me her ballet shows which I have been begging her for. Again a graceful gazelle, who is not above hustling to get something I wanted out of someone while extremely hopped up on pain meds.
I woke up in the recovery room choking on the breathing tube and wrapped up in blankets like a mummy. I wanted my Mom.
 |
| You have to watch out for the thin wirey ones. |
Alls well that ends well because I still had lots of kid growth plates and it healed well. If it was 5 years later, I would have a deformed arm but I still had the small child elastic bones that rolled with it.
 |
| That little divet is my 30 year old scar. |
Here is how I define good mothering. She had 3 other pain in the ass little kids at home. (we were sort of high maintenance and liable to set things on fire or bring home stray dogs)
 |
| Don't corner her with that grandson. She will turn that crayon into a shiv. |
My Dad had gone down to Biloxi, Mississippi a few days into my hospital stay. National Guard training what have yous yadda yada.
My Mom slept ever night of that 2 weeks on a budget rate love seat right in my hospital room. Every Nurse check. Every weird x-ray or blood draw they did to try to figure out why I was still running a big fever while on all the antibiotics. She was there. It never even occurred to me that she wouldn't be. That's what being someones mother means to me. You sit there and you don't leave until you are damn certain things are ok.
 |
| pile on |
Everytime I get frustrated with my Mom, I cast back into the murky misty water colored memories.
She sat with me when I almost lost my hand for 2 weeks because I was reckless on a toy trapeze.
She sat with me for several weeks when I had my babies far away from home and I asked her to beacuse I was terrified.
Every time I have asked her to she showed and sat with me.
I can at the very least sit there and not leave until I am damn certain she is ok.
We can make fun of the weirdest and best musical of all time. Cats!!!
♡♡♡
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