If You Have An Iritant on your Hands, Don't Rub Your Eyes. Unless Of Course You Want Your Entire Face to Fall Off, and Then Do.

A few months ago, I read in the newspaper that the scent of peppermint oil sends pesky little mice running away from the source and, therefore, into the outdoors. Now, like most country dwellers, I'm constantly looking for ways to outsmart for little bastards. You have to get up early and stay up late, my friends.
So I swung by the local drug store and picked up a tee tiny bottle, which, by the way, was like $20 per freakin' ounce. I also got some cotton balls to douse it on. Then I jumped in the car, tossed the bank-busting bottle of peppermint oil into the backseat of my car with about 45 other items I've been searching for the last six months and went on about my merry way.
As I did my bi-annual car cleaning this morning, I spotted the supposed mouse repellent. Holy shit, I had forgotten all about that stuff! Rushing in the house, my excitement woke my husband from his semi-nap as I soaked a handful of cotton balls and stuffed them under furniture and by the front door.
And then, with absolutely no awareness of the torture I was about to inflict upon myself, I rubbed my left eye. I'm sure you probably already figured this, but it turns about that highly concentrated peppermint oil burns when you touch it to your vulnerable eyeball. It burns with the fire of 10,000 chlamydia infections, as though you've just used a heaping bowl of onion salsa to wash a splinter of your eye. It was pure misery.
With my eyelid squeezed tightly, I hustled to the sink and washed my hands. After all, I didn't want to further this brutal assault. I grabbed a paper towel, ran water onto it and then attempted to wash this rain of hell out of it. Turns out, either I didn't get all the peppermint oil off of my hand or I still had some lingering upon my eyeball. Whatever happened, the swiping of my left eye drew the unbearable pain to the other eye. Not only that, my cheeks were set ablaze. My skin was splotchy red.
My husband, who was sitting in his lazy boy enjoying the spectacle, proved to be less useful than a lump on a particularly useless log. Basically, he was like George Bush in the middle of this financial crisis. As I handed him two wet wipes, he shrugged his shoulders and told me he just didn't know what he should do. And I was all, Seriously, Dude, Rub that sweet relief on my eyeballs. Rowdy maintained that he didn't think that would help as he spouted of other suggestions without taking his attention from whatever bullshit sporting event he was watching.
After I realized my husband would be absolutely no assistance, I ran to our bedroom, flipped on the fan by my bed and pushed my face against it. The gentle breeze was almost instant relief, like an epidural after 6 hours of hard labor. Yes, that's right, I'm comparing the peppermint oil incident to child birth. Yes, I've been through child birth. It's totally the same. Let it go.
After 20 minutes of bellyaching, the hurt finally faded away. That damn peppermint oil better pay off. If I see one mouse in this house this winter, I might freak out and pour peppermint oil in his beady little eyes. Bastards.

Ode To My Allergies

Ode to my allergies,
my snotty, mucus-packed misery,
my achy head,
my eyes are red,
this Sudafed fueled catastrophe.

I'm going to sleep!

Playing Chase

All little children love the parental interactive games, i.e. peek-a-boo, hide-and-go-seek, etc. Typically it doesn't matter who is playing with them or which of the games it is, if they can reel in a willing participant, their hearts are content.
While my boys get excited just to play, as I said, they both have always had their favorite adult-included games. Ridge's is bucking bulls, a never-ending living room rodeo with Ridge as the cowboy. Guess who gets to be the bull?
While Rolan loves this horseplay, the sport of his heart has always been chase. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that pleases him more than someone, anyone, running after him. As he is dashing down the hall or wherever else the game may be taking place, he periodically looks over his shoulder to see if his playmate is still in pursuit. If they are, his eyes burst to half dollars and a deep giggle bellows into his lungs. He is off again.
He loves this so much that he has, in fact, learned to tease my mom's dog Harley with food to incite a good game of chase. I didn't realize he had started doing this until we were at Mom's for the Fourth of July, her birthday. From the corner of my eye, I spotted Rolan extending a piece of bread to Harley's nose, shaking it back and forth. Just as I was thinking, "That's sweet. He's feeding his buddy Harley," Rolan yanked the food back into his torso, turned on a pivot and sped toward the other side of the yard. To his delight, Harley took the bait, running just a few steps behind Rolan for a minute or two. Each time Harley would finally tire of the game, Rolan would tear a little bite of bread of his slice and toss it to Harley. The was, of course, just enough to reignite Harley's interest in the bread, thus opening him up for another round of play. Once again, Rolan would wave the bread in Harley's face, jerk it from him as though he should be saying, "SIKE!" Knowing how much Rolan loves chase, I was really impressed with his ingenuity. I would've played chase with him myself, but I was too busy celebrating our country's independence the way our Founding Father's intended. Of course, Anneheuser Busch was sold to some Belgium brewing company, so I don't know how I will commemorate the holiday next year.
Harley hasn't been the only prey in Rolan's game. Hell, he's been doing the same thing at our house for a long time. He keeps his little eyes constantly peeled for some possession forbidden from his touch to be within his reach. Once it is, he snatches it up, making sure his actions are deliberate enough for you to see that he has it. For the most part, he takes the same path each time: as soon as he knows that you see him, he spins off toward the hall, looking over his shoulder gleefully, eagerly hoping that you've taken the bait and then hustles into our bedroom and scurries behind our headboard. The space between the wall and our headboard is small enough that only he and his brother can fit between it. He knows if he makes it back there, his beloved game of chase can be prolonged for quite some time.
Rolan has had some wrecks in the pursuit of this game, although none has been quite as brutal as his collision Saturday night. Rowdy came in from a long, laboring day in the punishing Oklahoma heat Saturday evening, ready to kick back in his recliner and soak up some of the holy air conditioning in the house. I had just pulled supper from the oven and stove: corn flake chicken, Brussels Sprouts Aug Shonda and mashed potatoes. The boys were ready to eat, too, so all three dug in.
After the meal was reduced to lowly crumbs, Rowdy asked if we could walk down to the pins and assist him for just a second. Predictably, the boys were bouncing up and down, squealing, "I want to go! I want to go!"
And I like helping Rowdy. I'm not always the best help since, honestly, I don't know what the hell is going on as far as ranching is concerned, but I like helping, nonetheless. Rowdy works 7 days a week, so if my bumbling assistance is any help, I'm willing to give it.
So, we headed out in the golden Oklahoma evening, warm and marshy as fresh bread pudding in a window seal. I love this time of day in the summertime, or at least I tolerate it. In fact, it is the only time I willingly leave my home until, like, November.
Rowdy needed to put a bale of hay out in the south cable pins, a big lot with two smaller pins within it. He and Ridge jumped into the tractor while Rolan and I opened the gate. As the two of us were waiting for the two of them, Rolan looked for ways to entertain himself and, of course, the old, trusty, stand-by game of chase was his first instinct. At first we teetered around the amputated bed of a truck long since retired. I would stand at one end, staring at a giggling Rolan on the polar opposite side of the antique metal, and then dart over one of the edges. With each sudden move, Rolan would succumb to a deep, rolling laughter.
And then a large telephone pole standing out one foot from the fence caught his eye. He has a real knack for locating these types of areas, big enough for him to maneuver in out and of like a flounder in a fish bowl bolting through plastic rocks and reef, but small enough that no adult can venture behind it to grab him. Really, it's perfect. This is a true instance when being two-years-old is an advantage.
He ran to the upright pole, going back and forth, back and forth for several seconds. His bright face could've illuminated a dark room. As I was playing along, taking in the images of his joy, he grew brave to entice me further into his sport of chase. He inched out from behind the pole, locking his eyes into mine, purposely tempting me to come closer to him. Slowly, I crept over. When he was near my reach, he sprung back toward the pole, looking over his shoulder to enjoy his cleaver victory. Just as he turned his head back toward the pole, he was upon it. His nose collided violently the sturdy piece of round wood, his body slammed into the solid earth. All the excitement he was consumed with just seconds before was vanished, replaced with sharp pain and shrill screams.
Without missing a single beat, I scooped my two-year-old son up from soil. This isn't the first accident resulting from his beloved chase, but his reaction is typically the same. It can be described with only two words: heart break. As any scorned lover can testify, betrayal by the object of your affection is a stinging blow. Perhaps that description seems a bit melodramatic to you, but that is seriously the best way I would describe it. I know that a big part of his tears are shred for the physical anguish of crashing face first with a telephone pole, but as his mother, I also know that a big bulk of them were because he was suddenly yanked from the warm, fuzzy feeling he gets from chase into semi-consciousness on the ground.
After I gave Rolan a few minutes of undivided pampering, he was fully recovered. In fact, we spent the entire walk home from the pins, you guessed it, playing chase.

It's a New Day

Tuesday, July 14

After the first post from my long hiatus this week, I'm sure you don't believe me when I say that I'm about to get back on schedule. I know I promised cuss words. They are coming, I swear. If you've found your way to my blog, chances are good that you like 'em. SHIT! HELL! DAMN! I hope that will tie you over.
Although Mom was definitely still sore, she went home from the hospital on Friday. Albeit slowly, she was getting around. However, her recovery took a turn for the worst on Saturday and she was re-admitted to the hospital. Her tummy was extended as though she was several months pregnant, throbbing and tight from an unexplained blockage. Her skin wrapped firmly around her slim frame. To say she was uncomfortable is an understatement.
As excruciating as threading that plastic tube up through her nose, then looping it back through her nasal cavity and down her throat into her stomach was, Mom more than willingly accepted this treatment if it were a means to an end. Of course, this is not a natural path, so one of the many unsavory side effects was a bloody wound at its entrance. Her throat is now raw and her ears and teeth hurt. But, a full container of murky green bile, a sickly Everglade swamp broth, pumped out of her body within five minutes. Another followed within three hours and, by the end of two days, the nose tube had produced nearly six.
The relentless tormenting pang in her abdomen has steadily remained, at times being worse than the day after the surgery. Of course, each inch of her body that laid in the treacherous path of the nose tube was an avenue of agony. Days and days of laying bed left her back stiff and strained. It's been difficult for me to watch my mother in this endless bounty of pain, but it has been even harder for her to live it.
Each time I've left the hospital, the situation has been in utter disarray when I returned. I'm certain that's a coincidence, but that is the truth, coincidence or not. So, for that reason, I insisted on staying when they re-admitted her early Saturday evening. Cousin Stephanie fetched me a cot and other amenities. She proved quite useful since she was practically reared within the Great Plains Regional Medical Center. Now, if you know me well, you are probably surprised that I'm not belly-aching about the sleeping situation. I am, after all, more attached to my knock off Sleep Number bed than I am to the Bud Light. And you know how I love the Bud Light. Interestingly enough, I woke up Sunday morning bouncing from the spring-riddled cot, undoubtedly the first one ever made and recently stolen from torture chamber in Estonia. I expected to be stove up like an arthritic octagon, but oddly, my body was flowing freely like a trickling creek. Either way, I'm sure my concern for Mom has given me the energy of that drum-beating bunny with the jolted adrenaline of a skydiver. I am fully aware that Mom's care runs smoother when I'm there, so I push forward without even realizing that I am. I
cannot explain it, but I am invigorated by, well, just being needed.
Sometime around noon yesterday, Mom started perking up. Just two hours before that, I remember thinking that she seemed to be making no noticeable progress and then almost instantly, new life was somehow breathed into her body. I had been at the hospital, living in the cot in the corner, for almost three days. As much as I hated leaving, I missed by man and my boys. Oh, while it's on my mind, I need to brag on Rowdy. An appendectomy veteran himself, Rowdy recalls the wicked misery of his own vicious surgery. Plus, Mom likes my company, I suppose, and I fall slightly in the control freak category. He and his mother Glenda have been tremendous in caring for the boys so I can care for my mother. I am never, ever away from Ridge and Rolan, so their absence is tough enough for me. If I had to fret over their welfare in the midst of this, I would feel like a rag doll, torn at the arms in two different, but equally urgent directions. So, kudos to my hero, my man, my Rowdy. At times I forget that a marriage is basically a team and, during this horrific week, I wouldn't want anybody else taking the world on with me.
Though craving kisses from my children was drawing me home like a moth to a faint copper fire, I knew if I didn't return soon Mount Laundry, whose summit is impossible to conquer under regular circumstances, would overtake my ceiling. Around Hacienda Little, socks are mystic fibers, capable of total evaporation literally in front of your eyes. Regardless of the small fortune I spent on these woolly undergarments, I have to keep these bitches constantly washing for Ridge and Rolan to have some barrier between their soft feet and their muggy boots. With Mom's slow, but steady improvement yesterday afternoon, I headed north to baby cuddling and spin cycles.
Of course, I knew I would come back to the hospital today, so I stayed up late tackling the ominous pile of our filthy wardrobes. When I called the nurses' station at 2 am, one of my favorite nurses, Merrilee, told me that Mom wasn't sleeping much. As much as I feared for what this day might hold, I remained optimistic. I never would've imagined this outcome.
Because my little sister broke her hand on Saturday, she had an appointment with the bone guy, Dr. Ahn, to schedule her surgery to repair the vertical break. That fun will go down tomorrow, time unknown at this moment. Anyways, Katie was over here, so I knew she would stay with Mom until I tidied my cluttered home into relative hospitality. But then Katie got here. The dreadful tube had been removed from Mom's nose yesterday, but the physician was informing Mom that it might be installed again to combat the problem in her belly. As a surgeon who receives rave review from all my surgical nursing friends, I was impressed that he admitted that he really wasn't sure what exactly was our nagging culprit. He ordered a cat scan, but also said that he would probably perform a surgical procedure called a laproscope to better pin down the menace. When I told my friend Miranda, a surgical RN, that the doc would be doing this procedure, she informed me that this was a big surgery. The incisions from Mom's first operation would be reopened.
With my step dad, grandmother, aunt and bandaged sister with me in the waiting room, we all watched as the surgical nurse Dawn, a true testament to her profession, rolled Mom away, back behind the double doors and into the cold, sterile world of surgery.
After an hour or so in the waiting room, most of which was spent absorbing the cleaver charm of our grandmother, Dr. Horrileno came out of the operating room. Apparently her intestine had a small kink, just like a ornery water hose, and an unexplained hematoma on her left side was the cause to our obstacles. He cleaned this up, straightened out her kink and patched her back up.

Wednesday, July 15


We got her settled back into the mauve and taupe room that now seems to be our home. Although the nurses hooked Mom's morphine pump back up, they also gave her an extra shot of pain and sleeping medicine to lure her weary body to rest. God knows she needs it. From the unrelenting grips of agony, Mom stole about two hours of sleep. At about 2 am, the partial numbness wore off and Mom was up again for a bit. For two more hours, she hit the morphine pump every 15 minutes, which is what it's timed for, so that it could build up for more slumber. At 4, the nurses pumped one more round of the good stuff, which under normal circumstances I would be totally jealous of, and that put her out for another two hours. Four hours of choppy sleep typically wouldn't be something to celebrate, but it is by far the most Mom has gotten since this mess started a week ago.
As I said before, last night's procedure basically reopened her original wounds, so we know that today and tomorrow will be essentially the same as the first two days after her appendix was removed. But, with the intestine straightened out, we also are confident that by Friday, she should be sailing through the healing process. She finally sees the light at the end of the tunnel, which until today seemed like an unreachable desert abyss. Of course there will be pain as her body mends, but she now has a revitalized hope that was all but extinguished yesterday. To me, that's the most exciting recovery from yesterday's procedure. With each day that brought no new progress and often ushered in regression, I was starting to see my mom resign almost to defeat. It was truly heart-breaking.
I pulled her shades open this morning and the amber dawn cascaded into the room, across my cot and onto her face. It's a new day.