You Capture - Light

Beth's You Capture subject this week is light. I wanted to take a picture with beautiful sunlight but by the time I was thinking 'You Capture' there was no beautiful sunlight - only clouds. So I went with the obvious. These pictures might be lights rather than light but they will help light the dark scroogie front of our house.

And this picture is of a light and all the lights that help make it beautiful.

And these decorators definitely know how to light up the neighborhood.

Which is especially apparent went you get up close. This guy is bigger than their house and could light up the neighborhood all by himself!

For more light and I'll bet more Christmas light, visit Beth at I Should Be Folding Laundry.

The Good The Bad and The Ugly

My first granddaughter, Amber, and mother to our three great grandchildren had her stitches removed Monday that were put in when the worrisome tumor was removed from the back of her head. When the doctor went in, he thought he was removing a pilar cyst and that was good news for everybody but when he removed it, he knew it was something else and sent it off to be biopsied.

Yesterday we found out it was a neurofibroma, a benign nerve sheath tumor in the peripheral nervous system. The key word for us here is benign. Thank you, God.

That's the good.

I had my follow up appointment with my plastic surgeon last week. He feels sure there are at least precancerous cells left. He explained that if he removed a cancerous cyst from my back, he would cut fairly generously taking a little more than he needed to just to be sure to get it all. This is made possible by the fact that there's plenty of stretchy skin there making it easy to close the wound. However, when he's removing a cyst from the tip of a nose, he needs to remove as little as possible because there's no extra skin to stretch in order to close the wound.

So....in January we'll do another round of chemo cream. And possibly another surgery.

That's the bad.

Right now I'm continuing with the 'Scar Away Silicone Pads and massage to try to minimize the scarring. Unfortunately my nose is still somewhat lumpy and bumpy. And the chemo cream will make it lump, bumpy, and fire red.

That's the ugly.

But again. It could be worse. I'm going into the holidays with a feeling of relief. The two special prayers I've prayed lately are that Amber's tumor would be benign and that Dave would get home safely from Afghanistan. And a couple of days ago, Dave wrote that he could be home as early as January 3rd instead of February 6th as we originally thought which could be very conducive to an answer to my second special prayer.

So that's more good.

Last Sunday I started the dreaded cold symptoms that I knew were coming when Mr. Right got sick. But I started taking Zicam and so far I really believe it's helped. So that's more bad.... but it could be worse.

And I don't have more ugly except for the weight I keep gaining.

There! Now I'm updated. And the good news is that there's a lot more good than bad or ugly.

Double Yolker

42 years ago we lived in Alamogordo, New Mexico the only town close to Holloman AFB where Mr. Right was stationed. It was hard being almost 1500 miles from home and it became even more challenging when we were over the top with excitement to be expecting our first child. And it was hard for my parents too.

So Mom got an idea. She did a little research and found a small town - but not too small - approximately midway between their house in rural LaPorte, IN and our house in Alamogordo. Then Mom and Dad called and said we should meet in this little town. That way we could have a little visit and neither of us would have to drive 1500 miles.

So we did it. Mom and Dad had a camper on the back of their pick-up truck and Mr. Right and I had a VW. We agreed to meet at whatever gas station we came to in Stroud. Remember this was before cell phones or emails or instant messaging. Once we each started out early that morning we were inaccessible to each other until we all arrived at our destination.

So late that evening we drove into the first gas station we came to in Stroud and a few minutes later so did Mom and Dad. We all spent the night in that little camper and it might sound weird but it's one of my best memories. It was so good to see them and so worth the long drive.

In the morning, as she always did, my mom got up and started making breakfast. When she cracked open one of the eggs it had a double yolk. She was quite tickled as soon as she saw it and said this meant that we would have twins. Of course our firstborn was a singleton but eventually we had identical twin boys and I always remembered that double yolker that prophesied twins for us.

Several years ago I cracked open a double yolker. I was really tickled when I saw it and thought to myself that one of my children would have twins. As it turned out Beth carried her identical twin boys for nineteen weeks before they died in utero. It was a tragic and heart breaking time for our entire family but James and Jake will always be a part of our family. They'll always be loved and we all look forward to the day when they'll be with us again.

Yesterday, I cooked breakfast for Mr. Right. That's pretty unusual for me since usually I dig out a Hostess cupcake for him or some donuts left over from the last time someone visited; but this weekend he had a toothache and thought scrambled eggs would be something he could handle.

I cracked open the first two eggs and they were 'normal' but when I cracked the third I laughed out loud. Then I showed them to Mr. Right and he laughed too. Because look what we saw:

Now I'm not saying that someone in the family is going to have twins. I'm just saying to any of you kids who are reading this and would like to have twins, you better go ahead and get pregnant now. I mean some of you don't even have 4 kids yet. What?

Does It All Start With A Common Cold?

Last year, right after Thanksgiving, I got a really bad cold. I didn't suffer long before I visited my doctor who prescribed an antibiotic. Then I got worse. And a new antibiotic. Then Christmas arrived and I wasn't any better. In fact I was even worse. During Christmas week when I'd normally be in seventh heaven because our family was together, I was sick. And went to the doctor again. I think my kidneys were failing or something because the doctor said that the antibiotic that I was on could affect the kidneys.

I don't remember getting completely well after Christmas but in the very early Spring I went ahead with the shoulder surgery that seemed necessary at the time. And oh my, what did I do? It was so much worse than I thought it would be and I thought I'd never regain the mobility that I'd enjoyed or the small pain that I thought needed correcting. After months of physical therapy and then home physical therapy, I've seen steady but slow improvement.

Then I was diagnosed with skin cancer on my nose - not the deadly kind but any kind on the tip of your nose is a challenge. We started with a chemo cream the effects of which are terrible, then a biopsy, more chemo cream, excision of the tumor, a lingering unattractive bump, more chemo cream this coming January and then possibly another surgery to address the bump.

Healthwise it's been a difficult and challenging year. I've exacerbated the problem by gaining 30 pounds and feeling completely unmotivated to do anything about it.

And it all started with a cold after Thanksgiving last year.

Now things are looking up for me. I'm walking about a mile and a third a few times a week - it's not much but I really believe that staying active is the key and I'm increasing the time and effort I expend by just a little every week.

I'm hopeful that I've completed a year-long bad health cycle of some kind and that the coming year and hopefully all those to follow will be better.

But after Thanksgiving this year....... Mr. Right got a cold and a cough that seems to go on and on. He thinks it's a little better and he's somewhat reassured because he got a pneumonia shot last Fall so that's good.

But now he's got a really bad toothache.

Oh no. Does it all start with a common cold?

You Capture - Chilly

Beth's You Capture subject this week is Chilly. That sounded easy enough when I first read it but as our snowless, iceless, week wore on I started to realize I had to look for less obvious 'chilly'.

So I looked in the koi pond first. When the pond starts to freeze the fish begin to hibernate. They kind of lay on the bottom - not doing anything but, I guess, sleeping. And prior to that, when it gets 'chilly', they start practicing. Here they are - feeling chilly, getting ready for winter.

And then there was this vacant house. You can tell it's chilly by the bare branches and the fact that it's vacant.

My hydrangea blooms are chilly too.

And the fruit on the ornamental trees in back? Definitely chilly.

These lonely leaves are chilly.

But what could be more chilly than a boy in a refrigerator. Of course it's not all that chilly because it's not plugged in - but the idea is there. He's just chillin' in his new refrigerator.

For more You Capture Chilly pictures, visit Beth at I Should Be Folding Laundry.

Pearl Harbor

This morning I received a 'forward email' from a friend. Normally I'm not good with these forwards. I peruse them, enjoy the ones I want, ignore the others, and never ever pass them on.

But this one is really special because it says a lot about my sons and every member of our armed forces. Here it is. Read it and then I'll tell you why I say that.

Remember Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941 - Seventy Years Ago Today.

Here is another story about Pearl Harbor you might not have heard before.

A Unique Story About Pearl Harbor - Pearl Harbor Mistakes - A Very different and interesting conclusion of the December 7th attack on Pearl Harbor. Read on....

Tour boats ferry people out to the USS Arizona Memorial in Hawaii every thirty minutes. We just missed a ferry and had to wait so I went into a small gift shop to kill time and in the gift shop, I purchased a small book entitled, "Reflection on Pearl Harbor" by Admiral Chester Nimitz. It said:

Sunday, December 7th, 1941 -- Admiral Chester Nimitz was attending a concert in Washington D.C. when he was paged and told there was a phone call for him. When he answered the phone, it was President Franklin Delano Roosevelt who told Admiral Nimitz that he (Nimitz) would now be the Commander of the Pacific Fleet. Admiral Nimitz flew to Hawaii to assume command of the Pacific Fleet and landed at Pearl Harbor on Christmas Eve, 1941.

There was such a spirit of despair, dejection, and defeat -- you would have thought the Japanese had already won the war.

Christmas Day, 1941 -- Adm. Nimitz was given a boat tour of the destruction wrought on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese. Big sunken battleships and navy vessels cluttered the waters everywhere he looked. As the tour boat returned to dock, the young helmsman of the boat asked, "Well Admiral, what do you think after seeing all this destruction?"

Admiral Nimitz' reply shocked everyone within the sound of his voice.

He said, "The Japanese made three of the biggest mistakes an attack force could ever make, or God was taking care of America. Which do you think it was?"

Shocked and surprised, the young helmsman asked, "What do you mean by saying the Japanese made the three biggest mistakes an attack force ever made?"

Nimitz explained:

Mistake number one: the Japanese attacked on Sunday morning. Nine out of every ten crewmen of those ships were ashore on leave. If those same ships had been lured to sea and then sunk--we would have lost 38,000 men instead of 3,800.

Mistake number two: when the Japanese saw all those battleships lined in a row, they got so carried away sinking them, that they never once bombed our dry docks opposite those ships. If they had destroyed our dry docks, we would have had to tow every one of those damaged ships to America to be repaired. As it is now the ships are in shallow water and can be raised. One tug can pull them over to the dry docks and we can have them repaired and at sea in the time we could have towed them to America. And I already have crews ashore anxious to man those ships.

Mistake number three: Every drop of fuel in the Pacific theater of war is on top of the ground in storage tanks five miles away over that hill. One attack plane could have strafed those tanks and destroyed our fuel supply.

That's why I say the Japanese made three of the biggest mistakes an attack force could make, or God was taking care of America.

I've never forgotten what I read in that little book. It is still an inspiration as I reflect upon it.

In jest, I might suggest that because Admiral Nimitz was a Texan, born and raised in Fredricksburge, Texas, he was a born optimist. But any way you look at it-- Admiral Nimitz was able to see a silver lining in a situation and circumstance where everyone else saw only despair and defeat.

President Roosevelt had chosen the right man for the job. We desperately needed a leader that could see silver linings in the midst of the clouds of dejection, despair, and defeat.

There is a reason that our national motto is, "IN GOD WE TRUST".

I liked this 'forward' and I found it very interesting but I don't entirely agree with it. When President Roosevelt appointed Admiral Nimitz to be Commander of the Pacific Fleet, he wasn't just appointing an optimist or someone who could see the 'silver lining'. He was appointing a member of the United States Armed Forces. He was appointing a man with character, intelligence, and courage. And this man's character and intelligence were honed by the training he received as a member of our Armed Forces.

It wasn't so much that he was an optimist. His key attribute was that he was a strategist who looked at a situation and saw it's many facets - not just the obvious. And he learned this strength, this distinctness of perception through his training with our armed forces. The same training that all our troops in every branch of service receive and which is second to none. And that, my friends, is truly God's blessing.

Yes, there is a reason that our national motto is, "IN GOD WE TRUST".

You Capture - People

Beth's You Capture subject this week is People. That seemed really perfect to me because this is one of the weeks of the year where you're bound to see a lot of people which reminds me that I should have gotten a shot of the crowds that were out on Black Friday. But, I didn't. I took lots of pictures of the kids and the grandkids and great grandkids but those cameos weren't exactly what I was hoping to capture. Then I saw it. Two people getting acquainted. Oh, they'd met before but they'd never really sat down and talked so when they did, I was there with my camera.

Clara had had a very busy day. There was so much commotion, so many people, and so many odd sounds and smells; but she did her best to take it all in stride. Then, just when she thought she was going to go home, this Grandpa character comes and sits down next to her and starts talking - in a high, pleasant voice.

She really didn't know what to think at first.

But soon she started to warm up to him.

After all, she had a few things to say too including a few laughs and smiles.

And soon her skepticism passed and she enjoyed his company.

Until suddenly - she'd had enough and she felt shy - but she still held his hand.

So my You Capture submission today isn't so much about picture quality as it is about content. And what's better than Grandpa and Clara getting to know each other.

For some other interesting people and takes on 'people' visit Beth at I Should Be Folding Laundry.