Category: Blog (Page 22 of 101)

It’s hard to listen to the dire possibilities of stroke, paralysis, mental retardation, even death, even when you know it’s required by the doctor’s insurance company.
It’s easier when people rally around you, offering hope the doctor didn’t.

It’s hard to watch your daughter be wheeled off tearful at the thought of what surely sounds and feels like her imminent and sure demise.
It’s easier when caring folks offer their stories of hearing the worst and experiencing the best.

It’s hard to know that the surgeons and anesthesiologist are exhausted and hungry and still working on your daughter.
It’s easier when they text then talk to you almost giddy with excitement for how well the hard stuff went.

It’s hard not knowing what’s going on.
It’s easer when you have a brother-in-law (who’s an anesthesiologist and involved in the day’s events) sends frequent updates, sometimes using exclamation points.

It’s hard when your brain, in an effort to prepare you, lapses into thoughts of worst case scenarios.
It’s easier when family and friends text and call and come sit with you at the hospital and send funny videos, offering much-needed distraction for your brain.

It’s hard to watch your mother sit through a 13+ hour day, knowing she didn’t sleep the night before because she is hard of hearing and was afraid she’d not hear the alarm and oversleep.
It’s easier when she accepts a seat when offered; when she walks around (and finds her way back); when her friends and siblings eagerly await her call then keep her on the phone talking a while; when you see the relief on her face as she kisses the forehead of the granddaughter at the end of this grueling day.

It’s hard to hear your husband doubt his helpfulness.
It’s easier when he takes over the cooking (among so many other things) so that we can eat well and eat at home.

It’s hard to think of your loved one – and any other hospital patient, for that matter, because they’re all somebody’s loved one – being a number, a slab, a car note.
It’s easier when the hospital staffers smile warmly, ask if there’s anything they can do, and give you the impression they have all the time in the world to spend on you (when you know they don’t).

It’s hard when your son lives far away and you need and want him here beside you, holding your hand like only he can do.
It’s easier when your son tells you he’s keeping his phone within reach all day and will answer it no matter what (and does);
when your Other Son Thomas shows up to sit with you at the hospital
and your Other Son Whit stays in touch with upbeat, supportive messages.

It’s hard not knowing how, if, and how much your new daughter-in-law wants to be involved in her husband’s family . . . a hard thing made harder with distance.
It’s easier when she sends beautiful flowers to her sister-in-law that somehow, miraculously, find us in one of the many waiting rooms we camped out in.

It’s hard to keep thoughts of permanent vocal damage at bay when your daughter is a professional singer and actress who underwent surgery involving her throat.
It’s easier when she talks to you after surgery, the inevitable hoarseness fading after only a few hours (even though you know you’re not out of the woods yet, that there still could be changes in her voice).

It’s hard hearing your daughter apologize for being so much trouble.
It’s easier knowing that she’s actually giving you a chance to feel like a mother again, to feel needed, to feel protective, to feel appreciated.

It’s hard being fearful, knowing that if you don’t stop, you run the risk of having something to be fearful about.
It’s easier when family members (even those you don’t see nearly often enough) rally round you with expressions of love like only family can provide.

It’s hard making your potentially distressing news, your occasional anger and dissatisfaction, your uncertainties public.
It’s easier when you receive private messages telling you the memories your posts enkindle for them, not all of the memories necessarily good, but the act of remembering, worthwhile.

It’s hard when you see your daughter with tubes and drains and monitors.
It’s easier knowing that this is the beginning of recovery.

It’s hard when there’s nothing you can do.
It’s easier when you busy your hands stitching something.

It’s hard when your daughter is undergoing major procedures and surgery.
It’s hard made easier when there are thousands of people sitting with you, cheering for her, holding everyone involved close, sending light and prayers and positive thoughts and healing energy, and Reiki, and pure, unadulterated love.

It’s hard living in the land of doubt and not knowing and pain, both physical and emotional.
It’s easier when there’s a huge vat of gratitude being constantly refilled with appreciation for the goodness, caring, and loving support of people, some of whom you’ll never meet in person.

Thank y’all for all you did yesterday. We couldn’t’ve made it through without you.
And now, let the healing begin.

~~~~~~~

Today’s story, #28 in the intended 100, is about having fear and anxiety strap you into an emotional roller coaster . . . and having the love, caring, skill, and training of thousands be the attendant who stops the ride and lets you off.

We moved back into the house with my Grandmother and Granddaddy so we could help him take care of her. I sat at the kitchen table and watched him feed her – one forkful at a time – before he fed himself. Being only four or five years old and too young to know what else to do, I sat beside stoke-riddled Grandmother mimicking her vacant look on my face and a washcloth over my hands that remained neatly folded in my lap just like hers so at least she would know she wasn’t alone.

When she went into the hospital to get relief from the bad headaches. Daddy drove me to the hospital in Newnan on his way to work where I spent the day at Mother’s side, then he picked me up on his way home.

When he was diagnosed with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis and later Juvenile Diabetes, I dove in to learn everything I could about both chronic diseases, calling labs as far away as Ireland to get information about cures in the making. When he has lasik surgery (a more complicated kind of lasik because he’s a skydiver), I flew to Denver to be his chauffeur and his eyes for a few days.

When she was hit by the car while crossing the street on her way to cheerleading practice, people said “Call me”, “Let me know”, “Keep me posted”, so I took a roll of quarters to the hospital and set up a phone tree and worked the pay phone.

When his second wife went on one of her trips and left him quite ill and near immobile, I moved into his house to stay with him, picking him up when he fell, sitting him on the screened-in porch while I silently (so he wouldn’t be embarrassed at his daughter-in-law doing such a thing) cleaned the result of his explosive diarrhea, cooking for us, reading to him, listening to his hard-to-come-by stories, taking him for a ride over to beautiful Lake Lure on a sunny day when he felt like getting out.

When Daddy went into the hospital for the last time, I stayed by his side, taking notes in my journal, soaking him in, loving him quietly, and releasing him reluctantly.

I don’t know where or how it started – maybe I was born this way, maybe I learned at the hand of example, maybe I’m fulfilling a contract I forged with these people in a prior life. Was it nature or nurture? Who knows? Does it matter? I make a good caregiver and a fine patient advocate. I know how to be on-the-ready and available. My Bones guide me, whispering what I need to hear, what I need to do, and their whisperings come through loud and clear because all else falls away. There is only the person in need.

Tomorrow I ask your loving support – support for Alison, for my family, for the medical teams tending to Alison, and for myself – as I sit beside my daughter who will have surgery that’s similar to last the surgery she underwent last year – similar but different, more complicated. Much more complicated.

Communicating is caring.
Feeding is caring.
Praying is caring.
Holding is caring.
And caring is a healing life force.

For those who say “I’m praying, and I won’t stop till you tell me to”, and do
For those who ask “What can I do?” and mean it
For those who say “I will be there to wait with you” and show up
For those who text or call to say “I’m thinking about y’all” and do
For those who message “I am there with you” and are . . .
Thank you.
Two words that aren’t nearly enough, but they’ll have to do for now.

~~~~~~~

I’ll be posting updates through the day tomorrow over on Facebook. When it comes to goodness, there really is strength in numbers, so thank you for being part of that – for holding us close as we weather tomorrow.

Dianna and I have been friends from the cradle. Not that our parents had enough money or space for a cradle, you understand, it’s just a term to let you know that we’ve been friends from the get-go. Her family would come over every Sunday afternoon, and while our parents played badminton, Dianna and I played school. I was the teacher, she, the student. Like any good teacher, I always prepared ahead, turning game boards into bulletin boards and newspapers into folders to hold handouts and homework.

It’s a wonder I lived to tell you about this.

One summer our parents shipped us off Dianna and I went to Camp Inagahe. The good news is: we got there early enough (try before the staff woke up early, thanks to eager parents) that we got our pick of top bunks. Right beside each other. The bad news is that the top half of every wall in the cabin was screen . . . which means that when it rained – and in Georgia summers, it rains every afternoon like clockwork – our beds got soaked.

The bad news is that the camp made us drink milk. About a gallon and a half of milk at every meal. Two gallons for breakfast. Now I don’t like milk, and Dianna doesn’t either, though she was smart enough to tell the camp staff that she’s allergic to milk. They didn’t care. They made her drink it anyway, so she had no choice but to get sick and wind up in the nurse’s office. Being her best friend, there was no way I was letting her stay on that cot in the nurse’s office by herself, so we spent the entire afternoon – including our favorite time of day : arts and crafts – there. The good news is they didn’t make either of us drink milk any more after that.

The good news is that arts and crafts came around every day, and our favorite craft of all was to take some of those thin colorful plastic strips and weave them into lanyards. The bad news is that we made so many lanyards – enough to give one to everybody on our Christmas gift list – we used up the entire allotment of thin colorful plastic strips and had to switch to building bookends and bowls and skyscrapers and wallets and stuff from popsicle sticks.

The good news is that mail call came every afternoon right between lunch and free time. The bad news is that Dianna is the only one who got mail, and boy oh boy did she get mail. That girl got her own mail delivery truck. It took three – nay, sixteen – mail carriers to tote the boxes and bags of Dianna’s mail over to her bunk. The first day of mail call, the staffer distributing the mail lost her voice from calling out Dianna’s name so many times. The good news is that Dianna (sometimes, when she was in a particularly good mood) (or when I paid her with my cookie from lunch) let me read her mail because the bad news is: I didn’t get envelopes with my name on them.

Nary a one.

Why, you ask?

It seem my mother talked to her friend, Helen G. after dropping us off at camp, and Helen told Mother that when her boy Jimmy went to camp (now bear in mind that Jimmy is waaaayyyy older than me. He’s so much older than me that he still doesn’t speak to me when he sees me.), it made him homesick to get mail.

I’m not kidding.

Because Jimmy was such a wimp and got homesick when he got cards and letters at camp, I didn’t get so much as a postcard. Not even a smoke signal. Next time you see my mother, maybe you want to ask her what she has to say for herself.

~~~~~~~

Yep, I’m still at it – penning 100 stories in 100 days. Thanks for reading along. If you want them delivered to your e-mailbox – and it’s okay because Jimmy no longer gets homesick when he gets mail or email – just mash the black “right this way” button in the orange strip at the top of the screen, enter your email, hit the send button, and there you go. It’s all free, too, except for about two minute soft your time.

Egg painting amid the home-grown bounty du jour

close up of the egg painting by Gigi Hackford
that came home with me from Fairhope, Alabama several years ago
~~~~~~~

There was a mystery about her, the sister who lived with her brother in the white country house up the hill and around the corner from us. Decades later when I learned of Emily Dickinson, I saw the neighbor woman’s face and wished for hidden poems that would stand the test of time. When I became acquainted with Boo Radley in To Kill a Mockingbird, I saw the neighbor woman’s face and hoped for a good story . . . and maybe a little something in a knothole (I checked every one between our house and hers). When Nancy Drew and I became friends, I imagined us sleuthing around and digging up the back story on the neighbor woman. I wanted her to be somebody Big and Important, this neighbor woman. But the facts were not promising:

She was a woman who lived in the house with her brother.
She was a woman who, by my calculations, had a vocabulary of about 17 words.
She was a woman who never left the house.
She was a woman who scared me as much as she intrigued me.
She was a woman whose very presence turned my shoes into concrete blocks every time my mother gave me a quarter and told me to run down the road to her house and buy a dozen eggs.

The old white country house smelled like it had long ago given up on personal hygiene, which is probably understandable given that the brother left only to farm his land across the road, and the sister never left for anything. And as far as I know, few people besides me ever went in. It was dark inside the house – even on the sunniest days – like the house had withdrawn from the world a long time ago. When we needed eggs, my plan to stay on the porch and have her deliver the eggs to me there seldom worked.

I knocked (doorbells were for city houses) on the screen door. Without saying anything like “Coming” or “I’m on my way” or “Hold on just a minute”, the neighbor woman would come to the door, flip up the latch, open the door about six inches, and nod her head towards the interior of the house which I translated – correctly, I think – as “Hey Jeanne! Don’t you look adorable? Did your grandmother get you that dress? How’s your mama and them? Come on in the house.”

But I could be wrong cause she never uttered so much as a syllable.

At this point, I stepped inside the dark, smelly house staying as close to the door as possible, holding out my hand up with the quarter in my palm for her to see, and making a mental note to write a note next time saying “My mother would like a dozen eggs, please” so I wouldn’t have to try to find my voice which always hid in my little toe at times like this.

Without so much as a grunt, she’d turn towards the kitchen, throwing her arm around in a half circle that meant “come with me”. Off to the kitchen we’d go, which felt more like going further and further into a cave, and before we reached the kitchen, I couldn’t see a single thing and was following her by the sound of her steps alone. Even in the dark house, she would go right to the white, rounded refrigerator, pull the silver handle out and down, open the door, and get out a bowl of eggs. She counted out 12 eggs, put them in a brown paper bag, folded the top of the bag down once, and handed it to me. Then back to the screen door and out I went. If memory serves, the entire transaction taking about 46 hours and 17 minutes from the time I stepped up on her porch till I left with the bag of eggs, and the word count hung onto zero like it was going out of style.

I made my way back down the red dirt road, walked through our back door into the well-lit kitchen, sat the bag of eggs down on the kitchen table, and went straight back out to my favorite tree to whom I could tell everything that nobody else would tolerate.

I hear she’s dead now, the neighbor woman, and I don’t mind telling you that I felt somewhat vindicated when, as an adult, I heard that she was bad to throw a tantrum over nothing. I’m just glad I always made it home with a sack full of unbroken eggs. Though I guess if they had broken somewhere along the way, a quick-thinking girl like myself might’ve been in for an afternoon’s worth of fun while pretending to be Officer Don and leading a game of ooey-gooey. Without the Hostess Twinkie Cakes for prizes, of course.

~~~~~~~

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Here we see Little Jeanne in her Easter finery with her cousin Stacy in his Easter finery on their way to Grandmother Ballard’s kitchen where we would line up with the other twelve grandchildren and be divided into Hiders and Hunters. We were placed into one of these two groups by Grandmother at her sole discretion. Nobody knew her criteria – shoot, I think she just lined us up and decided on the spot, not bothering with any rules or reasons.

At first, the Hiders hid eggs in places nobody – not even the cousin who grew up to be a detective – would ever think to look. By the time they got to the last few hundred eggs, though, they were running out of steam, so they dropped eggs beside the post that held Grandmother’s clothesline, stuck them in tire wells, and tucked them in the knot holes in the rough seasoned-gray boards of the smokehouse. Even without an admonition, everybody – Hiders and Hunters alike – was respectful of Grandmother’s prized flowers, never putting the colorful blooms in jeopardy by hiding eggs too close or trampling flowers in the frenzied hunting zeal.

We didn’t have prize eggs – it was all about quantity. She who found the most eggs, won The Prize. The non-existent, self-proclaimed Prize. Grandmother could not abide nicknames, and she had nothing for fancy Easter eggs, either. There would be no golden eggs, no silver eggs, no chocolate eggs hidden by or for her grandchildren. We were not that kind of family. No siree. We dyed our eggs, thank you very much, pressing every cup in the house into service, sometimes using white crayons to write secret messages on the shell that became visible when we dropped the egg in the colorful dye solution. Oh yes, we were your basic garden variety all-natural Easter egg decorators, and we wore the vinegar smell to prove it.

Here’s a post-hunt snap of Jeanne and Stacy, and as anybody can see, Stacy is blatantly coveting my bounty. I can’t blame him. Not only did I have a bigger basket, I needed it.

In the years since this photo was snapped, folks have looked at it and let things like “My, my, my. You sure are a bossy little thing.” or “What a bossy little girl you were.” fall out of their mouths. “I’m not bossy,” I tell them, “I just know what y’all ought to be doing.” (Plus I’m pretty sure there were more eggs to be found when this photo was taken, so I kinda’ resented the interruption and needed to get back at out in the hunt. I mean, really, what would Stacy do without me?)

I think you can see why The Engineer and I immediately thought of the so-called bossy photo of me yesterday when I happened upon this photo in the antique store:

It makes me quite sad to come across boxes of old family photos in antique stores, and I can’t tell you how hard it is for me to leave them behind when I exit. Yesterday, though, the lightbulb went off and at last I conjured the justification that cleared the way for me to adopt two photos. What is it, you ask? One word: collecting. You are now reading the words of a proud collector of Bossy Girl photos. I started on the spot yesterday and have two in my collection so far.

Three if you count the one of me.

The Engineer prefers the term “confident” over “bossy”, but I think we’re talking in synonyms.

~~~~~~~

I’m penning 100 stories in 100 days, and if you’d like to read along, be sure to mash the “right this way” button in the orange strip at the top of the screen and follow the directions for your free subscription. Starting the first of next week, subscribers will get a back stage pass as I include not only the stories, but contextual info about the stories, writer’s notes, and who knows what else. I sure do thank y’all for being here and reading.

About a year after The Engineer retired . . .
The Artist: I need weekends again.
I need something to look forward to.
I need surprise.
The Engineer: Something to look forward to and surprise are two different things.

We’re still working that out.

Today we had both: something to look forward to and surprise.
How?
On the spur of the moment, we decided to go on a treasure hunt
in search of a birthday present for Our Boy.
So while The Engineer put his shoes on, drank his green tea, took his tablets, let the dog out, used the bathroom, locked the doors, fetched his wallet and the keys, donned his watch, looked for then found his glasses, started the truck, stopped the truck to go back inside and look for his phone, come back and start the truck again,
I got to look forward to the outing
And I tell you what: the entire day was filled with one surprise after another.

There was a seasoned house
A storied house.
An abandoned house.
I have abandonment issues
which is to say that I adore abandoned houses.
I really, really do.
(Note that The Engineer stopped for me to snap photos.
He’s considerate and accommodating and supportive like that.)

There was a barn
with a rusting vintage Ford pickup truck.
I have rust issues, too.
And vintage vehicle issues.
Yep, I love rust and vintage cars and trucks.
A lot.

We saw corn

as high as an elephant’s eye

which annoyed The Engineer

because my beautiful crows
ate every corn seed he planted this year.
Every single one.

We saw generosity

with a cute-as-a-button hand painted sign.

We saw plenty of beautiful mountains
and plenty of beautiful clouds
but no rain, thank goodness.

We saw evidence of nature’s reclamation,
one of my favorite themes ever.

We saw hearts

And one heart impaled on a shadow.
Think about that story for a minute.

I thought this would make a fine stroller for The Engineer.
I offered to tie his feet onto the rails with colorful ribbons
Then attach a rope for me to use as I pulled him around.
The Engineer was not all that amused.

I was smitten with this bride doll.

And for reasons I can’t explain
wedding photos hold my imagination captive.

The Artist, showing The Engineer this photo: Who does this remind you of?
In a rare display of unanimity, The Engineer said “Amy.”
(She’s our niece.)
He got that one right
cause I thought so, too
even though, if the inscription is to be believed,
this is a photo of Joan
taken in 1938
for her Grandpa.

We came upon a Revolving Tree Stand
that rotates via a foot control.
Wonder if fitbit would give me step credit?
It brought back memories of
aluminum Christmas trees
and hand cranked homemade ice cream makers.

Okay, I staged this shot
because I thought it made a nice grouping.
Flashcards + Blockheads.
Get it?

I swooned at the sight of
this yummy door hardware
and I meant to ask about the price before we left
because I have something I want to do with these things,
but alas, I forgot.
Shoot.

We watched a bee eat his lunch

and spent a few minutes admiring this quilt.

Oh, how I wish I had floor space for this.
Why?
Because it would help me with my new plan:
One Thing At A Time.

The Artist: What is she holding?
The Engineer: Moonshine.

I thought these would come in mighty hands
when beckoning The Engineer in from his bees and the garden.

The Artist: I want one. Need a sleeping porch first, though.
The Engineer: You’d break your leg the first time you tried to get out of it.
The Artist: No I wouldn’t ’cause
I wouldn’t be able to sleep at all for fear of rolling over and falling out.
The Engineer: Still want one?
The Artist: Yes. And I still need a sleeping porch first.

This is The Daily Dahlia I posted over on Facebook.
It’s from our garden.

Today was Someday.

~~~~~~~

1. I’m penning 100 stories in 100 days. Thank you for reading along.
2. To leave a comment here on the blog, click on the title of the post. You’ll be whisked to a new page, and there you can scroll down and leave a comment. You don’t have to create an account – you can comment as a guest. Happens all the time.
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5. Again, thank you for reading.

Back then, when they no longer wanted something, folks around home just wrapped it up, slapped a tag on it, and stuck it up under the Christmas tree. But one fine Saturday, some newcomer hosted a yard sale, and let me tell you: that’s about the most fun I ever had shopping with my mother, something that has everything to do with the fact that she shelled out 25-cents for a set of one and a half maracas. I danced all over that overgrown yard to the rhythm of my own making, and though it might not seem possible, things got even better on the way to the car.

“Y’all want a cat?” the man of the house asked me, nodding in the direction of the fat feline he was holding up under his right arm like a football.

We lived on a dirt road on the outskirts of the county – so far on the outskirts that when zip codes came into being, they gave us the zip code from the neighboring county – and at that particular point in time, our animal census was down considerably. We had only 16 cats, 12 dogs, 3 horses, 27 pigs, and about 228 rabbits (We’d only had the rabbits about a little less than a week.), so I think you can understand why I stopped dead in my tracks, looked at my mother, and asked, “Can we, mama?”

“Can we what?” my mother asked while turning her arm this way and that, admiring the way the sun made her new bracelet sparkle.

“Take the kitty home,” I said.

“Un huh, sure,” she said. From her tone of voice, I could tell she was distracted, but she said Yes, and that’s all that mattered.

“Goodie!” I shouted and started shaking my 1.5 maracas for all they were worth. (Which, as we know, was 25-cents, but that’s not really the point.)

“All righty then,” said the man still holding the cat we were about to adopt. “Y’all go ahead to your car, and I’ll meet you there with the cat direkly.” Looking back on it, we might should’ve picked up on something when he delivered the cat to us with a brown paper bag tied around its head with a piece of string.

He handed me the cat, slammed the car door shut, and the minute – the very minute, I tell you – when Mother cranked that car is when that cat commenced to running laps around the inside of the car windows while making that screeching sound cats are bad to make when they are decidedly not happy. Around and around and around the cat went – at what I would call breakneck speed – while Mother and I sat there kinda’ stunned, for lack of a better word. Mother forgot all about her new bracelet as we watched with our mouths open so wide, it’s a wonder that cat didn’t run right on up into one of ’em. Eventually I had the good idea to roll down my window, and sure enough, the next time the cat came around – whoosh – out he went. I’ll bet he didn’t slow down at all till he hit the state line.

Maybe not even then.

To this day I keep an eye out for feral cats descended from that rather memorable kitty. You know how I’ll know ’em? They’ll be the cats with bags on their heads.

I hear it’s a dominant gene thing.

~~~~~~~

Now listen here, y’all: I’m writing 100 stories in 100 days, and if you want to, you can click on the title of the story, get whisked to a new page, then scroll down to the bottom of the story and drop off a comment. Or maybe you want to say something over on facebook. And hey, if you want to get the stories delivered right to your very e-mailbox for free, just mash the “right this way” button in the orange strip at the top of the screen, and follow the directions. One more thing: if you see a cat sporting a paper bag, promise you’ll send me a picture.

As A Child:

When I got in trouble at school, I got in twice as much trouble at home. And to make it even worse, I got in trouble all the way home because Back Then, everybody helped turn out a fine, upstanding member of society. I remembered how embarrassed I was that everybody and their mother knew I’d misbehaved, and I walked the straight and narrow from then on.

When I ate too much ice cream, my stomach hurt, so the next time I went Day’s Drug Store, I only ordered 5 scoops.

When I said something mean to somebody, I couldn’t go to sleep that night, so learned to count to ten.

When I overspent my 50-cents a week allowance, I had to do without until next Allowance Pay Day, so I learned to plan ahead and budget my allowance.

When I didn’t clean my plate, little children in China starved.

When I played close to the lawn mower, I got hit by rocks.

When I crossed my eyes, I ran the risk of them staying like that.

When I ran my hand through the candle flame, I got burned, so I made a point of not doing that again.

When I didn’t study for a test, I made a bad grade, so I learned to keep a calendar – a study schedule – and abide by it.

When I said a bad word, I got my mouth washed out with soap.

When I ate a plate of French fries, my skirts wouldn’t zip up . . . so I learned to eat only half a plate.

When I threw my childhood dirty clothes on the floor and left them there instead of putting them in the laundry hamper, I ran out of clean cloths, and before long, I learned to put the clothes in the hamper.

When I knocked on the hornet’s nest with a stick, I got stung.

As An Adult:

When I didn’t pay the phone bill, my phone was turned off, so I developed a system to make sure that didn’t happen again.

When I washed my car, it rained.

When I didn’t return library books on time, the librarian looked over her glasses at me and announced my fine total on the intercom, so I made sure to return or renew them from then on.

When I didn’t feed the cats, they sat on my face while I slept.

When I left the house without makeup on, I ran into everybody I knew.

Today:

I went in a store to purchase one of those long-necked lighters you used for candles and grills, and I had to show my driver’s license. Yes, really. Shoot, anybody who looks at me can tell I’m old enough to play with fire.

Once upon a time, consequences were our best teachers. Still could be if we’d let them.