I changed my settings again

I am still learning on this blog thingy; I have decided to allow comments from non-blog personnel, although I will be "moderating" them: which means the comments won't appear unless I have reviewed them and found them worthy. That way, we hopefully won't get any more "Loved your site; check out how to order free earth-moving equipment" comments.

I still have the "word verification" active, too, to make sure that only live people can comment to the site.

Woo hoo!! Have a great day.

Family photos; holiday musings

Well, we recently celebrated Thanksgiving (imagine!), and Paul came up with this great shot (that's him, in the "headless" jacket). He ducked his head into the jacket, and squirreled his arms in, as well, using them to prop up his jacket to look like "shoulders." What a nut!

Daddy and Joanna were playing hide and seek, and Daddy accidentally dislodged my wedding veil from its hiding place in my closet. Joanna promptly seized upon it as a wonderful dress-up accessory. Especially with her white dress, it conjures thoughts that I am WAY not ready to face right now!! But it will be a really sweet picture to add to a wedding album some day, won't it?

On a more "serious" note, even with all of the craziness in our world - political, cultural, you name it - there are still many blessings to be thankful for at this time of year. The beauty of the autumn never fails to lift my spirit, even as it raises my allergen levels.... To all of my wonderful family members, friends who feel like family, and people who have helped me grow even against my will, I thank God for you this day. May God richly bless you for all the joys you have shown me. Happy Thanksgiving!

I've moved!

Well, I have officially moved out of the state of Tennessee and into the state of SHOCK!!

According to the ultrasound that I had on Tuesday morning, I am fourteen weeks pregnant. This is after thinking TWICE during this pregnancy that I was going to miscarry. Once was a "self-assessment" thing, when all my "symptoms" disappeared. Then, after eleven weeks and no miscarriage, I went to the doctor, which showed that the pregnancy hormone (hcg) was dropping: a sure sign of miscarriage.... or it would be in the FIRST ten weeks. But it is SUPPOSED to taper off at about the eleventh week.... The doctor just didn't believe me when I told him when my last period had been. And you know, that bugs me. I track my cycle anyway, but - honestly - don't doctors think a woman can recognize whether or not she's BLEEDING??? Well, whatever.

I hope that I am not offending any well-wishers by my subdued response to their enthusiasm, on hearing news of the pregnancy. I have had too many times of getting excited about being pregnant, only to be let down by miscarriage. It will take a while for my brain to really accept that this one might REALLY take, really. Jitter, jitter.

So, if I seem a litttle more dazed and confused than normal (which will be a difficult distinction, I realize), now you know why. And if I don't, well... um. What was I saying? :^)

Word verification turned on

A day of highs and lows

I participated in three vastly different "baby" experiences today.

The first was bringing a baby shower gift to a friend's daughter; the daughter is expecting her first child in December. A very sweet girl.

The second was a Baptism for the baby of my brother-in-law and his wife. Little Rebecca Marie was quite a good sport about all that water, not to mention the oil on her head!

The third was a very sad affair, however. Last week, a friend of mine lost her baby. She was only eight days away from her delivery date. Today was the funeral. The family is relatively new to our parish, so not many people attended the funeral. And I suppose that there are some people out there who cannot understand why someone would want a funeral for a baby that had not technically been "born." But I understood.

I was not exactly envious - since I certainly did not wish my friend ill - but I do wish that I, too, had been able to have some "closure" in my miscarriages. I am told that I am the process of miscarriage number four, and I can tell you that it hurts to lose that little life that you thought you were going to get to cuddle and talk to and fuss over. Even if you never met them, never saw them, never touched them - it hurts. And to lose such a life only days before you thought you were going to meet her,... it breaks my heart to think about the pain this little family is going through.

I say "in the process" of a miscarriage because the actual bleeding part of the miscarrieage has not occurred yet. I have just been told that my pregnancy hormones have dropped by about 50% in the last two weeks, which doesn't happen if you're still pregnant. So I get to wait, knowing that I am not going to keep my baby, and not able to do anything about it, apparently. Maybe that's part of what was bugging me last night, too: the un-avoidable-ness of death.

No matter how short or how long I live, one day I will die. And there is NOTHING that I can do to change that. The only thing I can do is change my mindset on death (as in, acceptance or terror). I *do* believe in a resurrected life; I just don't want to have to die to achieve it!! Ah, well.

At least I saw the balance of life today; that although there is sorrow at death, there is also great joy in new life. It was good to see.

Early morning missive - the tension of being human

I guess my brain figured that since it couldn't go for deep sleep, deep thoughts would do just as well. This is usually the time of night when I wake up (ostensibly because I am thirsty, or need to go to the bathroom, etc.) and end up thinking about what will happen to me when I die.

The whole idea of the state of my soul being fixed FOREVER simply terrifies me. Even the thought of eternal happiness just freaks me out - it's so FOREVER!!! We humans spend all of our lives in a universe of constant change, and when we die we are suddenly thrust into a realm of changelessness. The only way I can cope is to talk to Jesus (I wouldn't want to call what I tell Him prayer, exactly), and say things like, "Well, Lord, I suppose I just have to trust You, huh? But all I'm saying is, You had BETTER be there!!!" Sometimes, when I tell other people about this feeling, they murmur some platitude like "well, you just need more faith. I am conifdent of what will happen after I die." And I think to myself, "That's because you've never REALLY let yourself think about it!!"

I suppose the truth is – if I’m really honest – the reason I get scared is because I know that I have let God down – in so, so many ways. And, yes, I know that He is always willing to forgive, of course - but still... there are those stories in the Gospel about the people who come up to the gate and are told “I never knew you” - and it comes as a complete shock to the person in question. Am I one of those unsuspecting souls?

How many times have I opened my big mouth and said what I shouldn’t have? Or worse yet, how many times have I been silent when I know I should have spoken out? I feel like if I think about these things too much, I’ll go crazy; and yet, I can’t just *not* think about them, because that would be self-defeating as well. It is indeed a narrow path that one must walk – faith is a razor’s edge between presumption and despair. Get too over-confident, and you no longer have “faith,” you have – well, I don’t know what to call it. But St. Paul said something like “if you see something too clearly, how can you call what you have faith?” And then, of course, giving in to the “try not to think about it” attitude isn’t faith, either (or so it seems to me). And anyway, that theory wouldn’t work for me: I’m going to think about these things.

It’s a quandary. And I know that – this side of heaven – I am not going to figure it out. And that frustrates me, especially in my American mindset of “I want it now so why shouldn't I have it now?” But I feel better for having written it down, anyway. Sleep tight! :^)

Answering the "Is God Male" Question

So, I was thinking, do you think that God sends these periodic spells of warmer weather in an effort to get women to shave their legs more often during the winter months? Could this be the definitive proof that God is male that we have been searching for? :^)

Where have all the paranoids gone?

Tomorrow will be Nevember 6, 2005, or - as is sometimes abbreviated - 11-6-05. After the new millenium began, I remember getting paranoid e-mails on a regular basis along the lines of "Today is 03-03-03, and this phenomenon won't happen again for another two gazillion years." Of course, the next year, the same frenzy erupted over 04-04-04, not to mention on 01-02-03 and 06-05-04 and such-like. So I'm just surprised that no one has sent some vaguely menacing e-mail around about how "Eleven minus six equals five!! AUGH!! Run for your lives!!"

But speaking of, when my son was five years old we went to Destin for our summer vacation, and Paul was playing in the water. He was doing the usual walk up to the water as the waves recede, and then try to outrun them as they come ashore. When each wave came, he would yell, "Run for your lives!" But the really cute part was when he would walk back out, and say, "Whew! Walk for your lives...." To me, listening to the great things my kids think of to say is one of the major rewards of parenting.

Joanna strikes again

I got a new ring today (a whopping $0.50 investment!), and Joanna calls it my "finger necklace." I love her little mind!!

Very thought-provoking meditation

One of my very favorite websites is Catholic Exchange, which has articles on topics relating to the Catholic faith and daily life. These articles range from movie reviews, to pro-life issues, to tall tales. There was a meditational article today (by Robert Greving) on the effects of walking through a cemetery, and it was very moving. One of the more thought-provoking quotes:

When I see the tombstone of a man who died at my age, or 40, or
30, I think, “Was he ready?” Then I think, “Am I?”

There were others, but they are a little longer (although the entire article is less than two pages). A good read.

Woo Hoo! We have paragraph-age!

My wonderful husband Mark helped me find the setting for "comverting line breaks."

So, NOW, if I type a new paragraph, it shows up!! Ta da!

View Earth from Space

I found a cool website that lets you view the earth from any of the many satellites that are floating above our atmosphere.

It was really awe-inspiring to see the earth from so many different directions.

Another thought! I'm all tingly

I send out daily quotes to my e-mail buddies, and I was indexing some past entries (can you say, "compulsive"?), and came across this one by Leon J. Suprenant, Jr., from the "Catholic Exchange" website":

Many who consider themselves Catholics believe they are justified in rejecting those teachings they don't agree with. Often there is an inadequate understanding of the Church's teaching, and unfortunately the Church's teaching on issues such as contraception or homosexuality is caricatured in the media. Yet, even the most honest and well-researched disagreement with the Church on an issue of faith or morals is problematic, because it involves replacing God's laws with our own private judgment.

This led me to think of another quote by Fr. Joseph Tagg, from a mini-retreat he gave:

We cannot trust our own understanding: one of the most crucial decisions of life
is to do something we do not understand SIMPLY BECAUSE GOD ASKS IT.

And it occurred to me that these two thoughts are related. When I first saw the quote from Fr. Tagg, I thought that it was in response to "doing" something that one didn't want to do, but if it is taken to mean "believing" something one didn't want to believe, that makes it a lot more powerful. Just think about how much more grace would be flowing through our world if people were obedient in this fashion. Wow.

And, by the way, I did use paragraphs on this entry, and typed them in on the actual "post" page instead of cutting and pasting. Let's see if my paragraphs finally show up! It's weird; when I hit "preview," the paragraph settings are there, but when I click "publish post" they disappear... Spooooooky!

It's a Romer thing, apple-parently

Several weeks ago, my daughter (who is three years old) asked where we going one morning. I told her that we were headed to Bible Study, but I guess I didn't enunciate properly, because she got this big grin and said, "APPLE study? Yummy!!" She was really quite disappointed when I corrected her (although we did bring applesauce for a snack).

I thought that was just her cute little three-year-old brain substituting a more familiar word for a less familiar word, until this morning. I was on my way to Mass (and, yes, that IS a capital "M" - little "m" mass is a metric unit; big "M" Mass is the Lord's Sacrifice re-presented for the faithful.... but I digress), and I stopped at a red light next to a truck. I saw the lettering on the side and thought, "Well, there's someone who has found an industry niche - 'Apple Warehouse.' Oh, wait! That's 'APPLIANCE Warehouse' - oops!!"

So, it must be a Romer thing, this apple fixation that we have. Hmmmm..