He always smelled like mixed nuts. He drizzled olive oil on top of his spaghetti. He wrote me short letters on his old typewriter and used to send me dollar bills "for some ice cream" when I was in college. He played the flute beautifully and looked manly doing it. He and my dad and brother have the same exact walk. He was always proud of us all and I love that I knew that even at a young age.
He always called me Jo.
He was left-handed and wrote with a hook that created a horrible chicken scratch -- but I can spot his writing a mile away. He laughed easily at us kids and took joy in simple things -- like the cafeteria at his retirement village that he loved. He volunteered constantly at his church -- doing financial things and helping with music. I remember him building things -- measuring and marking things with a pencil he'd sharpened with a knife. He took great joy in my brother and me and our activities.
He was pretty hip to the new and different ways we lived and the choices we've made. But we couldn't get him to do email no matter how many times Dad tried.
He played golf every week until just a few years ago, but continued to play tennis twice a week with other men young enough to be his children. Three weeks ago, at 96 years of age, he fell out on the court and broke his hip.
We've talked a lot in the last days about what might happen. What if the hip doesn't heal well? Is this the beginning of the end? He's in such great shape for his age that we began worrying that he would spiral downhill but possibly live for a long time uncomfortable and immobile. He would've hated that.
He fell asleep Sunday night and when the nurse went to check on him at 4am, he had passed away. We probably won't know the exact cause of death -- blood clot or heart attack, most likely. But we are thrilled. I know that seems strange. But after the initial tears yesterday, all I could be was thankful. Thankful he didn't suffer for a long time. Thankful he was living fully to the end. And thankful for my memories of him, my last grandparent.
Because of this strange military life, he never met Quinn or Kira or got to know my kids well. And for that I'm very sad.
He had so many great stories to tell about the war and life "way back when." And I mourn the loss of those stories. Kept thinking I should get a tape recorder to document them, like the one about him AWOL to get to my dad's birth. But I never did.
He loved us. And I'm sorry my kids won't get to experience that.
But wow, I'm so, so happy and proud that he blazed on to the end. I've spent a lot of time over the last 24 hours thinking about my own life and whether my current path will lead me to the same kind of glorious end. I think I may need to make a few changes.
Maybe more nuts, olive oil and tennis.
We'll miss you til we see you again, Pop.
Today was a long. LONG. day.
Last year, I decided at the last desperate second that we HAD to have a nativity set that the kids could play with. I thought it would help with the telling of Jesus' birth. But then I Googled and became totally overwhelmed with all the millions of choices!
I began a search today again. A little more calmly. And specifically looking for unique sets and/or sets that could be added to each year... Here are the ones I found. Let me know what you think!
Willow Tree Set (probably the best for adding pieces to)
Nambe Set (I have some of the dining pieces already -- love the lines)
Modern Set (crazy fun!)
VOTE! VOTE!!
Don't blink. Or you'll miss it. The whole thing. Or so it seems today.
She decided that sitting was an entirely appropriate thing to do today. Wow.
And proud, too.
Cutie-pie's military spouse designers: Dress from Mindy, leggings by Angie, amber necklace for teething pain from Kristine at Chisai Bums.
Her hang out area these days is this play-yard that Merrilee got for Jake back in the day. LOVE the stuff that lasts...
Love the perfect hand pose in this last shot...
That's my growing girl...
So, whenever someone tells me my kids look like me, I always have the same response. I crinkle up my eyes and say, "You haven't met my husband, have you." It has always seemed that Brent won most of the gene battles in our offspring.
But a few weeks back, Mom sent me some old pictures and as I've been going through them, I keep coming across shots where I think, "That's Quinn!" or whatever... I'll be sharing some of them over the next weeks.
Here's the first. A profile shot of me and Kira at about the same age... just a few weeks old... And don't ya just LOVE Dad's sideburns??
And then Quinn and I -- a bit older...
So what do you think of my attempt to prove I'm my children's mother?
My son complements me.
It's the most adorable, wonderful thing ever. We'll be driving to school and suddenly he'll say, "Mom, I like your dress -- it's very pretty." Or some other equally fabulous thing. He does it randomly, without a nudge from his dad or anyone else. It's lovely.
But he did something a few weeks ago that still has me a little floored. I don't completely understand exactly whether he meant to do what he did or whether it was accidental or what. But how 'bout if I just tell you and then you can decide.
On Pastor & Connie's last week with us at church (they've moved to Australia to pastor a church closer to their kids), Pastor had all the kids come up and he gave them each a marble which symbolized God's love for them. He then asked them to look out into the audience and find someone that they wanted to pass God's love on to. He said that God would show them who might especially need to receive that marble today. He asked them to take a minute and then to go and give their marbles away.
I was sitting with Kira (Brent was working) on of the first couple rows. I expected him to come and bring it to me as that's what had happened the last time Pastor had done the marble illustration. But he didn't. He walked past me without so much as a glance and continued down the aisle. I was nursing at the time so when I realized that not only was he walking towards the back, but out the door into the foyer, I must have looked a little panicked. One of my friends saw my expression and mouthed that she'd go see what he was doing. A few minutes later she came back in and whispered that he told her he was going up into the balcony to give his marble away.
And sure enough, I looked up and just caught a glimpse of him leaving the balcony, having missed the "giving." When he came back to his seat I asked who he'd given it to and he didn't really answer but said he had given it away.
After church, Suichi (one of our Japanese members who is married to an American) came up and thanked Jake profusely for coming up to the balcony to see them. Evidently Jake had given the marble to his wife, Barbara.
Jake doesn't really know Barbara except from just seeing her at church. I don't know why he wanted her to have the marble.
Maybe God wanted her to have it.
Thankfully, he's my husband.
Four hours ago, Brent officially became a college student. Again.
He's begun an online Bachelor's in Photography from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. We're hoping he'll be able to transfer most of his general education classwork from PUC (back-in-the-day) and possibly be able to finish this degree over the next couple of years. The classes are just 5.5 weeks long and so he should be able to take 8 or so each year.
He's so excited (and nervous). And so am I.
This has been a long time coming. He spent most of his time at PUC working on either a Psychology degree or a Math degree (which, as you can imagine, have NOTHING to do with each other credit-wise) or the Maybe-I-Just-Won't-Go-To-Class-Today degree. So basically, he's starting from scratch and the question is: what do you want to be when you grow up?
For years this discussion usually centered around what the "smartest" thing would be for him to take (job-wise) or the "fastest" thing (credit-wise). But with the economy as it is, we decided over the summer that we're probably going to stay in the military and finish out his 20 years (8 years from now).
I think that decision really freed Brent to be able to actually think about what he might want to do... and maybe even (GASP) what might be FUN...
We stumbled on this online program about 8 weeks ago. It took about 5 weeks for him to get really, really excited about it. Enough to actually fill out the application and begin the process. We spent much of this last week working on financial aid paperwork and scanning and emailing documents back and forth to the school. We managed to get everything together so that he was able to start today's class!!!
It's been exciting poking around his online environment and he's already made his first slightly "fatherly" comment to a student who chose to have her first posting in the class be a criticism of the teacher's spelling (UNREAL).
We'll keep you posted on all the excitement!
Oh, and I daresay there may be one person more excited than either of us. Brent's mom. Over the course of just 8 weeks, both of her sons (at 38 & 40) have gone back to college. WOOHOO. A happy HAPPY mother. :)
So I have one huge big... ok, so I have this little fear. A phobia of princesses. Little girls who insist on putting on one of their 47 princess outfits each day and fall on the floor in a pile of tears if they are told no. Girls who, at age 3, argue with their mothers about whether an outfit matches or not. Girls who prance and pose and turn their brothers into frogs. I'm flat out terrified of them.
Mostly because I wasn't much of one myself.
I'm not saying I didn't like pretty dresses and getting my haircut (by someone other than my mom -- do not EVEN get me started on some of those terrifying haircuts and disastrous perms) (You can kill me later, Mom). In fact, when my mom recently went through my grandmother's photo albums she came across some pictures I haven't seen in a long time. Here I am posing in my Christmas dress.
And there was another dress a few years later made by Mom or Grammy (?) and I remember every detail of its Laura Ashley-like qualities. And I remember like it was yesterday coming downstairs dressed in it for the first time. My Dad said, "You look very pretty in blue."
One of those lines that stays with you forever.
But I don't think I would ever have qualified as a "princess" and am sort of proud of that. So when my Mom sent this dress for Kira that she'd created with some help from Old Navy (she added the Tutu), I had many competing thoughts:
First... KAAAA-UTE!!!! And with those striped babylegs I've got??? AAAA-DORABLE.
But then second... Oh My Gosh. A tutu. At 4 months. You've got to be kidding me. She can't wear that!!!
And then after a few minutes of compromising thought... Well... it IS black and white. So, I think she can wear it. If it was pink, I'd just have to draw the line there.
So after all that debate, what do you think? Cute or Princess?
**Warning for my father not to fall off his chair when reading the following...
I'm only writing this here because maybe maybe MAYBE it will make me actually do this thing.
Brent has been talking about training for a mini-triathlon. Working on running and biking and swimming. He even bought new fancy shoes yesterday.
So today I asked him about the training schedules he'd been looking at. He said it was a little discouraging because they all BEGAN with "run for 30 minutes." Well, embarrassingly, that's not something either of us are in good enough shape to do. He said he needs a plan to start slower than that.
Couch to 5k popped into my head. I'm not sure where I even heard that term. But I Googled it and sure enough: A nine-week plan to get even a couch potato running a 5k. And then I thought, hmmm... I wonder... so I flipped over to iTunes, and sure enough -- an app for the iTouch that lets you play your music while a voiceover tells you when to run and when to walk and when to run again for each step-by-step workout.
We downloaded to both of our iTouch (because by now I'd gotten mildly interested) and put shoes on our feet and helmets on the boys and the girl in her stroller and off to the track we went. Jake rode his bike most of the time. Quinn ran a lot and rode the Skuut a little (his legs aren't quite long enough to do it easily yet). And Brent and I did our "thing."
It worked ridiculously well and we both looked at each other afterwards and said, "That was easy." I'm not sure we'll be saying the same in a few weeks. But we'll try to keep you posted.
I will SO laugh if I actually run the New Year's 5k.
Did I mention that I hate running?
Recent Comments
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Leigh said:
Oh no honey! LOL! I'm so sorry! They are really adorable though, does that count?? read more
on The Real Nightmare Before Christmas -
Leigh said:
I can see you in all of your babies. :-) They do favor you, though I'm sure it is hard... read more
on An Attempt
Wow, sounds like a neat man. Thanks for sharing! read more
on Pop -- October 24, 1913 - November 30, 2009