A Day in the Life

What this looks like.

Day 2 (Which, for us, was Thursday)

3:00--We're all wide awake, proving that jet lag is very real and very obnoxious. The boys giggle in their bed. We toss and turn in ours. A man stands outside our room talking loudly in Hebrew.

5:00-- After insisting that we all stay in bed and at least "rest" we get up.

5:50-- We check out of our Tel Aviv hotel and call a cab. We've arrived a day early and it is now time to go meet our group at the airport.

5:55-- Our cab arrives to take us to the train because a cab plus the train is only like 100 shekels but taking a cab straight there is 230. The trunk is tiny so we end up with large amounts of luggage in our laps.

6:55-- The train arrives. We try to board. It's crazy busy and we're throwing luggage on and tossing kids in and Troy realizes he's not going to make it. So he dashes down to another door. The boys and I are unsure as to whether or not he got on. The boys insist he didn't. I'm hopeful he did.

7:05-- The doors open. Within three seconds Troy is standing there yelling, "I'm here!" He grabs bags and kids and we're off.

9:00-- We've collected our group. Bags have been loaded on to the tour bus.

9:30-- We head to Tel Aviv. We're very close to our hotel. I wonder why I didn't have the bus pick us up as it drove by. After Tel Aviv we visit Joppa. Yes, as in, "JONAH, GO TO NINEVAH!" "Um, no, God. I would rather catch a boat from Joppa to ANYWHERE ELSE." That Joppa. We explore.

11:15-- We go to Caesarea Maritime which is one of my most favorite places ever because it is beautiful and there are ruins of a theatre and a swimming pool. We explore.

1:15-- Lunch. Chicken salad on pita bread. Mediterranean pasta salad. Cucumbers. Yum.

2:25-- Aquaduct ruins.

2:30-- Begin driving to Mt. Carmel.

3:15-- We explore various places at Mt. Carmel before heading to our hotel.

5:00-- We arrive at our hotel, a kibbutz on the Sea of Galilee. It's beautiful. We settle in and take the boys to the pool.

6:45-- Dinner.

8:00-- The boys are sound asleep.

9:30-- Troy and I are sound asleep. (Although I will spend most of the night wide awake attempting to breathe and fight the 101 degree fever I start running.

6:20-- Alarm goes off. I still have the head cold but not the fever so I hop out of bed, ready to face an eleven hour day of touring Israel.

Our Flight

Oh how I've been trying to get a moment to write about this trip. But there has been THE HEAD COLD FROM HELL and also THE VERY BAD INTERNET CONNECTION.

First things first. I totally puked three times on an international flight. But let's back up.

I woke up on Tuesday morning with the still nagging sore throat and decided I should take myself to urgent care to make sure I didn't have strep because I did not want to find an Israeli doctor and I also did not want to infect an entire batch of international travelers. Turns out the strep test was negative. Approximately twenty minutes later, we were on our way to the airport.

By that night, as we ate dinner at JFK, my throat was no good very bad awful. I was glad I had visited the doctor for my 120 dollar peace of mind. We boarded the international leg of our flight. It took off. We watched movies. They served a meal. Because everyone needs second dinner.

I ate some pasta and a few crackers and cheese. When we'd finished eating, I situated Garrett on the floor with blankets and Matthew and I curled up on three seats. Troy was across the aisle. Garrett and Matthew quickly fell asleep. I did not so much. I thought about how my throat hurt like I was attempting to be a champion sword swallower. I thought about how my ears hurt and my head hurt and my body hurt and I was freezing. Or I was burning. And I was probably running a fever.

Then I thought about how my stomach was feeling upset. A little.

A lot.

I couldn't do the two things I always do when my stomach starts to hurt which are...
1. Lay on it
2. Guzzle Pepto Bismal.

So instead, I found myself, hours in to an international flight, kneeling on the floor of the restroom, clutching the sides of the toilet, hurling the contents of my guts. DO YOU PEOPLE KNOW WHAT HAPPENS TO THE FLOOR OF A BATHROOM DURING AN INTERNATIONAL FLIGHT? It gets covered with pee that does not belong to me. Not that I would want to kneel in my own, because I would not but it is exponentially better than someone else's. AND DO YOU PEOPLE KNOW WHAT HAPPENS TO THE TOILET ON AN INTERNATIONAL FLIGHT? It gets covered with other people's pee. And the trash can overflows with paper towels and all manner of guck. Yet, there I was, practically curled up on the floor like it was my bed. WHICH IT WAS NOT BECAUSE EW!

And I threw up.

Not a half hour later, I threw up again.

Then again.

Until I stopped throwing up and I just wished I could and I wanted to die right there suspended halfway between the United States and Israel. But I didn't.

I just kept on living.

It is important to note that my children were rockstars during our travel. I kind of knew they would be because they're really awesome like that. They're good travelers. I'd packed toys and candy and all manner of fun things to bribe them with along the way and I never used any of it. They were that good.

We finally landed. We made it off the plane, through baggage, and to the passport line with me darting into bathrooms along the way to try to throw up more because I wanted to. I needed to. But I could not.

In the passport line I curled into a tiny ball on the ground. No joke. I'm kind of surprised they let me in to their country given that I might very well have been bringing the BLACK PLAGUE right in. We made it through the line and through customs and all the way outside the airport and into Israel which Garrett declared, "Looks just like our country." And in all reality, he's mostly right.

We waited for a train.

I fell asleep on the ground. In a ball.

I thought I would never feel well again.

But then a crazy thing happened, my stomach just stopped hurting.

All was good.

Except that the ear, throat, head thing turned into the WORST HEAD COLD OF MAYBE EVER IN MY LIFE and I am still suffering through that. But I will take suffering through a head cold any day over hurling the contents of my guts into an international toilet.

Today I...

Today I...

Cleaned three bathrooms
Volunteered in Garrett's classroom
Filled the van up with gas because no one wants to come home to an empty tank
Picked up Matthew from preschool
Entered all of our passport information into the Delta website
Cleaned the kitchen
Printed four boarding passes for SLC-JFK
Worked with Matthew on his shapes, letters, and numbers
Cleaned two bedrooms and a playroom
Made Matthew lunch
Printed four boarding passes for JFK-TLV
Chatted with a friend for a half hour
Cleaned the family room
And the living room
Made lunch for tomorrow
Made dinner for the family
Picked Garrett up from school
Made an appointment with an orthopedist for when we return

(not in that order)

(partial list)

My husband...

Took Matthew to school
Went to the office
Mowed the lawns
Helped Garrett with a bunch of his independent study work for tomorrow and Wednesday
Visited the bank
Went back to the church for a meeting

So it was a busy day.

But I think we're ready.

Our flight leaves SLC at 11:15. We fly to JFK, have a three hour layover, and then head to Tel Aviv. We're supposed to land in the afternoon on Wednesday, which will be early, early morning to us.

I'm hoping that my next blog will come from halfway around the world.

See you then.

Three Sleeps

My house is covered in luggage.

The boys are packed.

Troy is mostly packed which is a shock to end all shocks and I didn't even ask him to do it. He just pulled out his bag and started filling it up. Several days ago. I'm not sure what's gotten into him.

I'm mostly packed.

I have snacks packed for those days when I am the boys are sick of lamb. And chickpeas.

I have treats for the exhausting 20+ hours it is going to take us to get there.

Our passports are packed because we definitely wouldn't make it very far without them.

The camera batteries are all charged. For all the cameras. Which is a total of four.

The boys are counting down "sleeps" and are down to three.

Holy Land, here we come.

Superhero

My poor kids have the severe misfortune of being raised by a woman in possession of a theatre degree and a man with a degree in youth ministry.

We hear the words "spirit day" and "dress like a superhero" and we go a little crazy.

We think outside the box.

We dress our kid like this.

He gets all into it at home.

 We pose him, sure, but he enjoys it. Stares at himself in the mirror, even.

Then we get to school and he wants to button the shirt back up, take off the glasses, and pretend it isn't spirit day. Who does this child belong to? A younger version of my husband. My father. I don't know but it isn't me.

At least he'll put the costume on. I think he left the outfit intact long enough for everyone to see it.

If nothing else, all the parents loved it.

My theatre degree is buried in a drawer somewhere, fading and collecting dust. I honestly cannot tell you, at this exact moment, where, on earth, that 85,000 dollar piece of paper is. What I know is that I'm using every inch of that baby to raise these boys.

What I Want

It's a dreary shade of fall outside my window.

I'm wearing jeans, a long sleeve shirt and a sweater.

I'm wishing for the days, just a month or two ago, when tank tops and shorts were the clothing items of choice.

Within an eighteen hour period, two different people posted this to my Facebook timeline.

Apparently I am rather transparent about my disdain for winter. And my love of flip flops.

I know there isn't snow on the ground yet but Old Man Winter won't stay away for long. So for the next six or seven months, my flip flops will stare mournfully at me from their rack on the back of the door.

Scary Dreams

Last night was a first.

Up until now, Matthew had never, I repeat NEVER, ever, come into our room in the middle of the night. Not when he was first learning how to sleep in a big boy bed, not when his airway was being mostly blocked by tonsils and adenoids, not ever.

His big brother is a different story. That kid's going to be wandering into our room in the middle of the night and begging to sleep on our floor when he's thirty. I'm sure of it.

Last night, my youngest boy had a scary dream. He traipsed into my room, stood on my side of the bed and asked if he could get in. We have a rule about that sort of thing. It starts with ABSOLUTELY and ends with NOT. But that's because his brother would spaghetti arm octopus his way all around the bed until his father and I were no longer even in it if we'd let him. And it would happen every night. This, like I said, was a first.

Also, I was barely awake and kind of thought I was dreaming the entire thing. Dream Mommy is so much nicer than Fully Awake Mommy. I pulled the boy up onto my torso. I was stretched out on my back and he nestled his head down onto my chest, his legs finding spaces to nest between and around mine. He instantly fell back asleep.

So did I, apparently, because, for the next two hours, I proceeded to have dreams where my diaphragm was compromised and I found myself unable to fully inhale. I'd wake up enough to realize that this was happening in real life but not enough to do anything about it. After a couple hours of inadequate air intake, I woke up to find him awake and staring at me. "Do you want to sleep on my floor?" I asked, hoping beyond all measure that the answer would be yes.

He nodded, climbed out of bed, laid on top of a long, decorative pillow, and fell right back to sleep. I covered him with a fuzzy green blanket and promptly resumed slumber.

This morning I asked him what his scary dream was about. It involved robots with heads that popped off. This was, I guess, terrifying. "Doesn't that sound so super scary?" he asked me.

"Not to me," I said honestly. "To me that just sounds funny."

Hamill-ton

I have a confession to make. I have the ability to be fully engaged in a conversation--listening, speaking, comprehending--while still hearing at least one other conversation happening near me. What this means is that, if you've spent time around me, I've probably heard one of your conversations without you knowing it. I'm not trying to eavesdrop, my brain just picks it up. So don't say bad things about me, unless you want me to hear.

Yesterday I was at a day retreat. As I was mingling with the women, I found myself talking to a woman who was raised in Hawaii. This led to us talking about Oahu and Kauai and Maui and surfing and Bethany Hamilton. I relayed the story about my seven-year-old surf obsessed child waiting in line for hours and hours to get Bethany's autograph.

On the other side of the table, at barely more than a whisper, a woman said to her friend, "Her son wanted meet that old ice skater?"

My attention was focused on the woman from Hawaii, who was in the middle of saying something, so I didn't want to shift my attention to this other woman, but I almost laughed out loud.

Bethany Hamilton. Dorothy Hamill. What's the difference?

Aside from a couple of decades, frozen water versus salt water, and blades versus boards.

Now I have the funniest image in my head of my seven-year-old son begging me to sit in line waiting for the autograph of a figure skater who is older than his grandmother.

Friday Six

1. It is cold here. As in, high of 51 on only the 4th of October. As in, snow in the mountains. Brrr. I'm gonna fix up my husband's resume real nice like and send it to Florida. And Mexico. And the South Pacific.

2. My son climbed into the car after preschool and announced, "You never kiss my chubby cheek anymore." If you think I didn't remedy that problem right away, you're wrong.

3. Israel in eleven days. Let the packing anxiety begin. Oh, who am I am kidding? The packing anxiety began about two months ago. It just wasn't until today that I realized we don't have enough underwear to go without laundry services for almost two weeks.

4. I really love my son's first grade teacher. Yesterday I went on a field trip with them. Garrett didn't realize that they still had an a hour and a half of class when we got back. My typically stoic child had a meltdown in the classroom. He was clinging to me and sobbing. I pulled him in to the hallway and tried to get him to settle down. Eventually, his teacher came and knelt down next to me. "What can I do to help?" she asked calmly. We were able to transition him from my side and she guided a sniffling seven-year-old into the room.

5. Said child is weird because, apparently, he was just fine and dandy after that. I don't get him.

6. I am speaking tomorrow at a women's retreat. After that, regular posting will likely resume.

Weenie

I dreamed a dream the other night.

I was exhausted from a solid day and a half of running a women's retreat, listening to them share their hearts and their tears with me, battling a strange stomach ailment, worshiping with all I had, and failing to sleep much at all that first night.

So on Saturday night I dreamed a dream.

Earlier in the evening, my friend showed me a picture of her wiener dog. That's going to be important in about twelve seconds.

I went to bed at 1:00 am on Saturday night. My voice was already showing signs of years of smoking despite the fact that I've never taken so much as a puff. Or a drag. Or whatever you call it when you smoke a cigarette once. Because. No. But the point is that my voice was done and I was exhausted.

Still, I couldn't turn my brain off because of all the CRAZY MIRACULOUS that God had done in that place that day. The victory was for my friend but God had used my mouth to speak words and used the speaker's mouth to say THE SAME WORDS at a different time and stuff like that just does not happen all the time. And when it does it's as if God is saying, "TAKE NOTICE!" So I was letting my mind dwell on the praiseworthy which is all fine and good but, at some point, it really needed to dwell on some rapid eye movement sleep.

Eventually I fell asleep because eventually I woke up and remembered that I'd dreamed a dream.

There was a little old man. He was little. And old. And very slow. He asked me to help him burglarize some dude who appeared to be in his mid to late thirties. Although, I only ever saw the younger guy sleeping so it's hard to say just how old he was. Why is it that our dream selves are perfectly willing to go along with completely cockamamie plans? 

Because of course I was willing to hop into the passenger seat of the little old man's car--which was my first mistake because he was probably pushing 90 and should have had his license revoked--and be an accomplice. 

The little old man and I crept quietly in to the younger dude's second story apartment building. I collected all the prescription meds while the little old man procured the victim's wiener dog. Next thing I know, I'm riding around town with a lap full of drugs and a dog at my feet. That's when I started to second guess my actions. Up until that point, I was perfectly fine committing crimes but, suddenly, I was overcome with gripping guilt. I looked down at the dog and felt so terribly sorry for his owner. I looked at the little old man and felt so sad for this lonely criminal. There, in the passenger seat, I wrestled with what to do. 

Then I woke up.

And when I told the story I accidentally said, "I'm sure I dreamed it because Cory sent Christina a picture of the weenie." 

It took me a couple of seconds to realize that I needed to clarify that the picture was actually of a dog.

Maybe our retreat needs a disclaimer. What happens at the women's retreat stays at the women's retreat.

Selfies

I just found this series of "selfies" that Garrett took of himself back in July. Before he got a haircut. Before he lost his top two teeth.

I think they should make an appearance on his wedding slide show. Don't you?

This kid.

He cracks me up.

He melts my heart.

He's growing up too fast.

Also, he's weird.

Manure

When the Little Buddy was a bit smaller, he ate dirt. He ate kind of a lot of dirt. I mentioned it to the pediatrician. He didn't seem overly concerned. Later, it reached unfortunate levels and we began rationing the amount of time he could play outside. Because, see, every time he went out he ran straight to a muddy part of the yard and shoveled in as many fistfuls as he could before I scooped him up. He was tiny. His language was at a minimum. Still, when I asked if he could play outside without eating dirt he said yes even though the answer was a clear no. Then, when I asked him why he was doing it, the answer was a slightly less clear, "Ah dunno!"

He grew out of it.

A few days ago, we discovered an unattractive shade of dirt lipstick smeared around his mouth. His daddy talked to him about not eating dirt. I'm not sure why, but we didn't think much about it.

This afternoon he was playing in the yard. He came in with dirt in the corners of his mouth. Concerned about what is going on in his little life to make him turn to a lifestyle that will, one day, land him on an episode of My Strange Addiction, I decided to get to the bottom of it.

"Show me where you got the dirt," I told him, so calmly that I was actually pretty proud of my parenting skills.

He marched me right over to his old stomping grounds, the part of our yard that we've attempted to grow a garden in but mostly to no avail. We didn't even try this year. "Right there." He pointed to the dark dirt. The dirt that we bought last year when we were hardcore about getting our garden to grow. The dirt that isn't really dirt at all but is, in fact, steer manure. BECAUSE OF COURSE IT IS.

It's alarming how often I use my theatre degree in my every day life. I mean, really. Everyone should have to take extensive acting training before becoming a mother. Because listen! I didn't freak out AT ALL when I realized that my kid had been eating bovine excrement. I mean, I wanted to. I wanted to scream and stick my finger down his throat right then and there but I refrained. And people say dramatic training is worthless. Ha.

"Okay. How much did you eat?"

"That much," he said. "Right there." He pointed to a tiny mound of dark dirt. "That's where I spit it out."

"Wait," I said. HOLD THE PHONE. "Did you swallow any?"

"No," he shook his head.

"You didn't put any in your tummy?"

"No. Only my mouth."

"Why?" I asked. "Why did you put it in your mouth?"

He sighed as though our conversation was boring him to tears. "I was making a castle for the ants."

WHY DON'T THESE LITTLE HUMANS COME WITH A MANUAL? I mean, really. If I could just open up his guidebook and turn to the chapter that explains the correlation between putting feces in the mouth and making castles, I'd be golden.

Instead I just stammered, "What?"

"Mommy! See that! That's a castle FOR THE ANTS. I made them a castle to play in. Like at the beach."

The utter confusion was slowly being replaced by a dawning of enlightenment. "Okay and you put it in your mouth because..." I trailed off. He blinked his big chocolate eyes at me.

"I had to make it wet and sticky to build it right," he explained with a tone that said, Lady, everyone knows that dry sand does not a castle make. The wet stuff is where it's at. Come on! You're from California. YOU SHOULD KNOW.

"Alright," I sighed. I took his little hand and we walked back toward the house. Once inside, I bent down to his level, wiped his lips and told him not to do that anymore. "Matthew, that wasn't dirt you put in your mouth. It was manure."

"What's manure?" he questioned.

"Poop," I said bluntly. He seemed moderately disturbed.

I wish I could make this stuff up. In fact, in this case, I wish I HAD MADE THIS STUFF UP. Unfortunately, it's just another day. Because these boys--they really are made of snips and snails and puppy dog tails. And, if it's true that we are what we eat (or, at least, put into our mouths), apparently also steer manure.

I'm Broken and Busy!

My life is kerAz right now. In fact, I had to put Physical Therapy on my to-do list just for the pleasure of crossing it off. Which I haven't done yet. Because it's not until tomorrow. By the way, I'm going to physical therapy because once upon a time I was a swimmer and apparently this is a death trap for shoulders. It's entirely possible that I have a labral tear that could require surgery. Or maybe not. Only time and a possible MRI that may or may not offer conclusive results will tell. The real kicker is that I don't even remember doing anything to it this time. I just woke up about a month ago in immense and intense pain. Word on the street--and by street I mean physical therapy office--is that swimmer's develop tight muscles across their backs and around the shoulder blade area but the front of the shoulder becomes loose and sloppy after years of repetitive motion. Thus, it is prone to injury. Especially when the (ex)swimmer gets old. And, apparently, in this case, old means 32.

But that's not why my life is crazy (kerAz!).

I'm trying to get ready to host a women's retreat for 46!

That's a lot of estrogen in one place.

So I'm remembering details and cleaning my house (which is ridiculous because I have three males in the house and when I say, "Women's retreat!" they hear, "Pizza on the carpet during Sports Center!" and "We don't have to make our beds!" and "Showering optional!") and still working, volunteering, teaching Bible study, and preparing to speak at another retreat the following weekend.

And that is why my blogging has been bad.

Bad. Bad blogger. Right here.

I, like, totally get it if you're moving on to someone who posts with regularity. Although, I do promise to be back more regularly in a week or two.

Fanny Packs

Today I spoke at an event here in Salt Lake.

I told a story about how, when I was eight, I thought fanny packs were actually fanny pats.

As in, I thought it was some portable cushion for bony rear ends.

At the end I discussed the fact that once I figured out that it was actually fanny pack, I came to love mine. Because it was the 80's and I was eight and fanny packs were cool. I actually said that.

Then, when the event was over, a dear woman stood up.

Wearing a fanny pack.

I'm not even kidding.

She is a refugee from Russia. Is it wrong for me to hope that the language barrier prevented her from being offended?

Friendship

I just recently read Amy Grant's book Mosaic and don't even act surprised. Actually, go ahead and act surprised but only over the fact that it was written several years ago and I only just now read it.

I also just watched one of the Beth Moore DVDs in the David series. The one where she talks about friendship. It's not the one where she's wearing a gold and brown frock that almost made me spit my lunch on my laptop screen and did, in fact, prompt me to call my mother immediately to DISCUSS. There's just no in between with her. Either I love her outfit so very much that I want to move to Houston, strike up a relationship with Mrs. Wanda Elizabeth Moore herself, and then ask to borrow her clothing or I dislike it so much that I almost have to close my eyes in order to get past what she's wearing and into the heart of what she's saying.

But these two very separate things led me to start thinking about relationships. Because in Amy Grant's book she writes short vignettes and a lot of them are about things like, "We had a girls weekend at a cabin and we stayed in our pajamas until the mid afternoon sharing and laughing and drinking coffee.*" Or, "The news was so devastating that I climbed into bed with my friend and we just laid there together and cried.*" And Beth was talking about patterning our relationships after the way Christ did. She said we should have three close friends. The kind you tell everything to. The kind you stay in your pajamas until the mid afternoon with. The kind you climb into bed with to cry when the world is devastating. The rule is, they have to be CLOSE friends--as in, not living in another state.

I think I used to have that.

In fact, I know I did.

High school was like that.

And college.

I have good friends now. There are women from my past that I consider life long friends. But I'd have to fly halfway across the country to climb into bed with them and, even then, it would have to be the very most interesting situation in order to dictate, "HEY, GET INTO THE BED AND START TO CRY!" Although that has more to do with the fact that my synapses don't fire correctly. I can receive the most devastating news--the kind that will leave me crying in my own bed for days on end--but if I receive it in front of people, I'll probably shrug it off and everyone will think I'm an unfeeling stone. There's a bizarre disconnect between my heart and my tear ducts. (Seriously, I remember vividly the few times I've gone and lost it in front of people.) Then there's the fact that I'd likely stand awkwardly next to the bed, reach out my arm, pat my friend and tell her, "There, there." And everyone would just wind up feeling intensely uncomfortable.

But my whole rambling point is that I think most of us, as estrogen filled womenfolk, desire the nearness of a few friends. We want to be able to cry or laugh or get each other in a powerful and real way.

Maybe it's the nature of ministry that prevents this in my own life. I have to be incredibly careful who I share certain things with because our position within our church body is unique.

Or maybe it's my Wear-My-Heart-on-My-Sleeve-but-Also-Remain-Kinda-Private-About-Stuff personality that lends itself to a lot of friendly acquaintances but not a lot of climb into someone's bed to cry with them deep friendships.

Maybe it's the fact that ministry typically equals shallow roots. Because I just never know when the church will want to go in a different direction. Or when the Lord will say, "Getta move on." And then I'll have to start all over again with close personal friends that I can actually have face to face interaction with. You just can't cry (read: try to cry) with someone over email.

I am so thankful for the friends in my life. The ones that get my humor or, at least, laugh anyway. The ones who genuinely care about me, pray for me, love me. But is there more? And I have some really good friends. But is there something deeper that I'm missing?

If the answer is yes, I suppose I should start filling out some applications.


*Not actual quotes