Return of the Claw

Watch your peanut M&M's. I've been released back into the wild by my hand doctor. He feels that I am healthy enough to forage for sustenance and care for my young outside the cage. This may be a week or two premature but then, he knows I am on steroids for the RA which means...

I CAN DO ANYTHING!! Except - remember anything for 5 minutes or get my internet connection up.

Sorry for the silence. My tech king is working on the internet problems. The steroids are working on getting my hand to move. And my muse is stirring from her late Fall hibernation just in time for the Solstice service.

Come on out and hang with us Sunday night at 6:00 PM for the First UU Solstice celebration. We will be observing the timeless equinoxian shifting from dark to light in that natty First UU/Rev. Alane fashion for which we are known. (Think ritual + band + Ukrainian soloist + good company. Wear your urban druid rock star outfit.) The service will be followed by a trip to the labyrinth in Northside. (Add comfy shoes and warm coat to previously described outfit.)

Hey, look at you! You are more centered, hip, and happy by having read this. Now fork over the M&M's. Mama has mouths to feed.

Fear, Agony, and Facebook

FEAR
Two kids in the Miles household - very different makes and models. A boy and a girl. An extrovert and an introvert. A TV addict and a lover of all things costume. (No, wait - there are three of us in the house that fit that costume affinity.) My point - they are different in almost every way, except...

Night terrors. Age 3 and one half onset of shrieking and howling in the night. And hers just began this week when, naturally, my lovely cousin finally agreed to come for a visit. After multiple nights of yowling, Lovely Cousin is now sleeping in empty house next door vacated by grandma who is now a nursing home resident and no I do not want to talk about my grief over that. What was I saying?

Oh yeah. Night terrors. Every night this week has been interrupted by a full body scream about bugs. It would be funny if she weren't sobbing, trembling, and shutting her little fists into balls. We bring her into our bed where she lies ramrod straight and deathly still but awake fearing that if she moves the bugs will get her. It makes me cry. It makes my lovely cousin cry. My husband is not crying. He says that his tear ducts have been welded shut by a lack of sleep. In hopefully unrelated news - she is composing amazing punk lyrics in her waking hours.

In our sleep-deprived ramblings my cousin and I have been discussing the nature of fear. Baby girl's terror aroused in my cousin her own deep fears: "She's going to get a raging fever and start vomiting and then we will all be sick by Friday." And also touched on mine: "What if this isn't a stage? What if her brain is wired in such a way that she is always fearful? How will my husband bear it because I WILL LEARN to sleep through it..."

I lead a rebuilding after divorce group. The night we talked about fear we were all stumped. In so many ways we have learned to reduce fear to anxiety in our lives. When faced with real fear we are caught off guard. This is one of the issues I teach in community grief workshops- fear is sublimated in our lives in so many ways that we are often ill-equipped to experience it when it inevitably comes. If I ever sleep again I will talk to my little punkin some more about fear.

AGONY
I am a one woman economic effort to keep physical therapists gainfully employed in 2008. I am now in hand therapy. Hand therapy looks tres Zen. We sit at little desks in a circle facing each other. Each patient removes whatever brace they have and we begin these small movements. I am slowly crumpling a towel. The patient on my right is gently rolling a ball six inches forward and back. The patient on my left is removing marbles from a giant blob of Silly Putty. It is so quiet and would be relaxing if...

WE WEREN'T ALL HOLDING BACK OUR SCREAMS!!!!

Do not fall. Do not dislocate fingers. Do not sprain your wrist. Do not break your fingers. Do not immobilize a non-broken finger when you have rheumatoid arthritis thus causing it to swell up like a big toe and barely move and no I do not want to talk about the myriad bad words that run through my mind when I try to chop vegetables. Hmmm. Lost my train of thought again.

Ah, yes, agony. There is a reason why so many of the torture scenes in spy movies involve fingers.

FACEBOOK

I just found the chat feature on facebook. Goodbye, cruel world - I will never surface again. In 40 minutes I traded parenting laughs with a congregant, invited a friend to church on Sunday, made a date to visit a graveyard in honor of a lost friend, and planned a Sunday service at the Charlottesville church.

I would write more but I need to go back on Facebook to find a cure for night terrors and a remedy for hand pain. While chatting on Facebook I may also talk a wee bit about the fact that sleep deprivation makes everything larger than life including the attractiveness of Hugh Laurie's stubble and the smell of curry lingering in my kitchen and the fear of going to sleep from which I now am suffering because I am tired of being jolted from my dreams of singing ska duets with Billy Ray Hatley on the White House lawn wearing footie pajamas with a feathered headdress awake into the eardrum piercing wails of my sobbing precious tot and no I do not want to talk about my grief that I have never sung a duet with Billy in waking life.

I wonder if he's on Facebook...

Don't Cry for Me Blog-en-tina

In the ongoing saga of ridiculous things I do...I went to Mississippi only 10 days after my nasty finger destruction. Supposedly I was there to help with the rebuilding effort (my second trip) and to lead my merry band of UUs. I was only marginally successful but the crew was amazing. Not only did they caulk, grout, hammer, measure, cut, fit, support, mop, cook and saw on the job, but they helped keep me healthy enough to do some work, too. Or they reminded me to take my pain meds when I would sit down in the middle of somewhere, hold my hand above my head, and mumble, "Uh oh."

This time we brought our own carpenter to help speed the process along. When he was not leading the crew and helping the construction manager...

He peeled my shrimp for me. Yes. It was great!

(This is the point where I suddenly lose my sympathetic audience.)

Unplanned Blog Vacation

Sorry to have been gone so long. I fell before Halloween and broke two fingers, dislocated 4 or 5 knuckles, sprained my wrist and hurt my shoulder. Typing is very hard.

This photo is of the first cast. Subsequent casts immobilized those fingers that are greenish blue.

I am healing up nicely. Will type some haiku-inspired entries soon.

Yeah, That's Dirt

This must be the simplest and most delightful product I've seen at any funeral convention. It's dirt. That's all. Well, almost all. It is dirt from Ireland that has been processed and approved, and brought to America (an otherwise illegal process) so that you can sprinkle some on your beloved pappy's grave.

How cool is that? Simple, economical (about $10), the real deal, and it has a sweet, sentimental quality. I spoke with an adorable, great big guy named Pat from Ireland whom I understood in intervals. (Did you know farm could be pronounced "fair-em"?) Pat and his cronies had this cool idea, and being an agriculturally trained lad he got it done. This is their first week in full-on business.

The auld sod itself comes in bags and in cardboard tubes that look like small Scotch cases. These gents are going to make a mint. At least I can say I knew them when. Check them out online and should you not have a pappy who wants the Emerald Isle to come to him, it can also be used to grow shamrocks, as birthday gifts for the Irel-lovers in your life, or just to sprinkle about when you need a little Ireland.

I know what you are thinking... hmmm... I have a sudden craving for Ireland. Me, too.