Easter week

Easter has never been the most fun holiday in our house. When I was little my grandfather went in for a routine operation was allergic to the anesthesia, went comatose and died on Easter Sunday.  It was fitting for him because he was a minister.  When I was fifteen my best friend died of a brain aneurysm in her sleep Easter week. I was supposed to spend the night at her house the night she died, but my grandmother was having surgery in the same hospital where my grandpa died  in the same week.  I went to see her instead.  God completely spared me from waking up to a dead girl.  It was the first dead body I had ever seen and I had nightmares for months and had to sleep with my brother. I got most of her stuff on top of that. Three years ago we were going to have Easter at our house.  I went up to give Steve the nursery pager in church so I could go home to finish prepping and I felt a gush of fluid. I was 14 weeks pregnant with Benjamin and was hemorrhaging.I ran to the bathroom at church screaming for people to get out of the stall because I thought there was something I could do.  No church bathroom is more crowded than on Easter Sunday. We rushed to the hospital where the sound of that heartbeat was the best sound I have ever heard in my life. We found out it was a boy that day and I entered into the next trimester on pelvic rest. We went home from the hospital where I wasn't suppose to move and had an earthquake. Two years ago Easter week I was on a board of directors at the school both of my parents worked at, and I had to make the decision along with others to close the school basically firing both my parents.  That was so hard. On  good Friday my husband had an emergency appendectomy. This week my dog almost died and just heard some rough things friends were going through and deal with the utter inability to help them. Tonight as I was sending my hubby off to work I hugged him laid my hand on him and prayed for safety as I always am on edge when he leaves for work. The point is not to focus and dwell on every bad thing that has happened.  Not everybody lived but Benjamin is certainly an active boy, my husband is fine and so is Max.  God allowed hurt and pain to ensue as he does to all of us, but there was also healing and redemption in that.  So as much as I do secretly dread Easter every year I know this is certain. The week is bad, but Sunday is indeed coming.

Parties, pinatas,and parents

On the way to a birthday party today I asked the boys what the rules were for birthday parties.  One of them replied "Don't punch the birthday girl in the face"! OK yes that is a great rule, but not really along the lines of what I was thinking. I wished I had known more of birthday party etiquette growing up or at least applied it.  Most of my friends growing up were of another culture and you basically brought a present, ate until you threw up and went home.  My first American party ( I mean in terms of present, games, cake, candles and singing) that I remember we played a game where you tried to drop a clothes pin in a jar from a chair.  I didn't get it.  I thought the clothes pin went on your nose.  I didn't win that one. Granted I think I was three years old at the time. Fast forward about 18 years and I was "friends" with a guy my senior year of college. He invited me to his 21st birthday party and so I went. They had a tradition in their family that no matter how old you were you got a pinata.  It was my turn to hit the pinata so they blindfolded me and I went at it.  I hit that thing so hard over and over.  As I was finishing my turn I heard everyone yelling "stop".  Well during my turn they had yelled stop a lot sooner and I had failed to hear them.  His mom came in to tap my shoulder to tell me to stop and it turns out I was hitting her over and over again.  If there was ever a hole I wanted to climb in it was at that moment in time. She had welts all over her arms. That entire family was so sweet and assured me that is was all right, but I felt horrible. It didn't help that the next day she had bruises all over her arms. I didn't end up with that guy in the end, but the guy I did end up with gave me three sons that I adore. So when my son responded "don't punch the birthday girl in the face" he is years ahead of me!

Dead dogs

Growing up I was not a dog lover.  No one in my family had dogs, partially because my dad was allergic and when I was little I was chased by a German Shepherd .My dad lifted me up and he bit my dad.  I really thought the only good dog was a dead dog, but if anyone has been to my house I have obviously gotten over that fear! I married a dog lover.  In fact not too long ago his parents had 7 huge dogs, I mean one was 180 pounds.  I told him if I had met him when they had all those dogs I would have never gone back. When we bought our house my husband wanted a dog. All right honey.  We went to the rescue and got two dogs. One went back because of a dog fight in which my husband's leg was a casualty, but we kept our senior citizen Jojo.  We later did get another dog from a military family that had to move. Her name was Baby. She was blind and had the most annoying bark, but stayed with me all the time. I grew to love these dogs deeply and sobbed when they died. In fact when one of them was dying Ben was a baby and both him and Jonathan were extra needy that night and I was so irritated at them for interrupting the last moments I had with her.  Somehow we intended to bury the ashes but did not.  Last month we found the ashes again and decided to bury them together under the tree they sat side by side every day.  Since Jonathan remembered the dog Baby so we had a little memorial.  We dumped the ashes somberly and all of the sudden like a cannonball Ben jumped into the air and landed in the hole full of ashes sending most of the ashes flying and Ben covered in our dead dog's ashes.  We too got ash on us.  We just stood there mortified looking at each other. Hence to say that funeral was finished.

My in-laws have also lost many dogs over the years and, most recently, every time the boys would visit.  The first time we went up for fourth a July and one died.  The second one died over the winter and Jonathan happen to be the one to find the body  He knew somehow he was dead and went downstairs and said very matter-of-fact, "Reggie's dead". This week as we were visiting we hadn't seen one of the dogs in a while and Jonathan asked, "Where's Machka? Is she dead?"  I think we may have caused some permanent damage to that one.