Facie’s Ramblings

This afternoon while at the pool, J told me to put out my arms as she was going to jump into them. I obliged for some reason, but quickly regretted it, as her weight put quite a strain on my back. I grimaced in pain, which made J feel bad, and she immediately said, "I don't want to get older. I just want to stay like this," amid tears. She then went on to say that she does not want to grow up and that she wants to always live with us. I told her, as I have before, that of course she can always live with us, but I also said that when she is a teen, she probably won't want to be near us. Then she will go on to college and have fun and again won't think home is so great. Eventually she may find someone to marry, and she will want to be with that person. And she may one day have kids and will love them as much as I love her and they will be whom she wants to be with. Her response to this? "But when I have kids, you'll be dead." Sheesh, girl, it's n...

I have been in a weird place lately. Over the past week or two, I have nearly "written" several posts in my head and pretty much finished one while at the park Thursday. The ramblings lent themselves to names such as the following: "If I actually publish this post, I am pretty sure some friends will be calling me with great concern" "Where is my happy place"  "I can't cry hard enough" "Missing person" "Paralyzed by fear"  As for the first title, well, it is probably obvious that when that post was swirling around my head, I was pretty down. Fortunately, that post never came to fruition. Later, things looked up and something got me smiling again. But, alas, something else had me singing the blues before too long. It could have been another struggle with Jordan (that happens a lot lately, and I am quite sure a post will eventually come of it). Perhaps Brian and I were arguing about Jordan (yeah, it's a problem) o...

Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Yesterday, Bri, J, and I went to Kennywood to celebrate J's excellent grades this year. The last time I was at Kennywood was in 2000, when the Aero 360 first opened. I won a contest on the now-defunct B94 and was one of the first few people to try out that new ride. Even though my body started rejecting spinning/turning movements back in the late 1990s, I managed to employ mind over matter for that experience. The last time I had spent an entire day at Kennywood was back in 1994 or 1995, when Bri and I were just dating and had gone with one of my friends from high school and her boyfriend. Back then, I could ride all things that spin, twist, turn, or loop. The good ole days! We started off our morning on the Phantom's Revenge, which is a super-fast coaster (85 mph) with some twists, but fortunately no loops. In hindsight, it was probably not the best way to begin a day at Kennywood for someone li...

Those of you who know Amy of Callapitter probably are aware of the hands-on design meeting for Kate and Peter's Treehouse this Thursday. If not or if you are interested in learning about the meeting and the project, check out the link here . For this particular meeting, the planners are interested in the input of children since they will be the ones using this park. And because Frick Park, where this space will be located, is one of Jordan's favorite parks, I thought it might be a good idea for the two of us to attend. Plus I just want to support Amy, for all that she has been through. Jordan did not know Kate and Peter; they were in different classes while in Beulah. For that reason and because, as I have mentioned in several posts, Jordan has struggled with death in the past, I never bothered to tell her about them. Until now. I figured if I was going to take her to this meeting, I should probably give her a heads up. Otherwise, she would be asking questions there and mig...

As you may already know, I am pretty much a helicopter parent. There are a number of reasons for this, including that I had overprotective parents and that I am the parent of only one child. I am really trying to be less insane about my hovering, and reading the Free-Range Kids blog has helped. However, I have to comment, in true helicopter parenting style, on one of their/its recent blog posts. The abridged version of this post is that a free-range mom (FRM) wanted her 9 year old kid to walk home alone from his friend's house two blocks away, something the kid wanted to do as well. The helicopter mom (HM), however, refused to let said boy do so, and had a woman who was visiting her home (a woman FRM knew) drive FRM's kid home. FRM wants to know what to do/say next time as HM disregarded her wishes. Here are my thoughts, some of which I included in a comment on the FRK's site: We are free to raise our kids as we wish. The FRM can tell HM that she wants her kid to walk...

Every couple of months, I go through this panic. I worry that we will run out of money and will be forced to start living off our savings. I have said that it is coming, but unfortunately, it is now pretty close. I guess the good news is that Brian seems to be on board with our giving no one Christmas presents this year. :-) I met a friend for lunch yesterday and I told her one of the hardest aspects about the job search and even networking in general is the people who have offered to help but never really did. I neither asked for nor expected anyone to find a job for me. Rather, I thought that the nice former client, former coworker, friend, friend of a friend, etc., might reply to an email I sent. The email might have been a simple question, such as do you know anyone at _______ or can you tell me if your company is hiring or looking for freelance help. Perhaps slightly more work for said non-responder would be an email address for an HR person or a request to use their name (not t...

One of my favorite quotes is by George W. Bush. He said this near the end of a speech during which he declared war on Afghanistan. I was at the very first game every played at Heinz Field (delayed several weeks because of 9/11), and we got to listen to this during halftime. My mentioning this quote is not to say that I thought Bush was a great president, because I did not. This post isn't even about Bush. It is about how this quote relates to my tough week of subbing. We will not tire, we will not falter, and we will not fail. I subbed for the same class two days this week and was very tired by the end of the day Tuesday. In some ways, I felt like a failure. I had trouble controlling a few kids in the class. It was almost beyond my comprehension that I would have to tell some of them over and over again to be quiet. I get that it is late in the year. These kids are young and full of energy. I don't necessarily blame them for talking when they should not. But I should not ha...

I admire people who know exactly what they want to do. Maybe it is a long-term plan, but they know that someday they will get there. Or perhaps they have known since they were kids that this is what they were going to do, and they ended up doing it (this pretty much describes my brothers). But me? I am still searching my soul, just as I have been doing, whether consciously or not, for years. The substitute teaching thing is going okay. Most days I think this is what I want to do. I still want to make a difference, leave someone's (several someones, really) life better than it was before I came along. But I have some moments when the kids are so incredibly disrespectful that I think there is no way I can do this full time. At the very least, I am glad that I don't get called more than three days a week, because sometimes even two days feels like five. Seriously. And on days like yesterday, when I have nary a lesson plan to follow and I am forced to make it up as I am going a...

This Christmas turned out to be one of our more eventful ones. It started off with no electricity when we arrived at Brian's mom's house early that afternoon and ended with a power surge in our neighborhood soon after we arrived home later that evening. Brian, Jordan, and I were sitting at the dining room table at about 8 p.m. when the lights went out. While Brian went downstairs to check the circuit breaker, the lights came back on, accompanied by a popping sound, complete with light bulbs popping out over our heads! A lovely burning smell ensued, and, alas, our dinner became inedible thanks to the bits of light bulbs scattered across the table. Within moments, I could hear people talking outside, and I noticed many houses were dark. I went outside to talk to some neighborhoods, and a couple minutes later, two fire trucks were on the scene. Apparently a transformer/wires (no idea exactly) were burnt. All in all, it made for an exciting, electrifying evening. I was pretty freak...

That is the sound of a clock ticking. Or perhaps my heart, but that might be more like a pounding. My kid is going to be six this week, and for some reason that freaks me out. My kid will be heading to first grade next week, and that fills me with worry and apprehension. This might have something do with my freaking out about Jordan turning six. Not only do I not have a job, there are no prospects in sight. And I still have no clue what I want to do anyway. Oh, and people have really disappointed me lately. I am feeling a little better about Jordan academically, since I wrote my last post. But I still worry about Jordan being in the cafeteria the first morning (I have to drop her off at the door and say good bye), meeting new people (there won't be any kids from her kindergarten class), focusing all day long, figuring out her lunch money, and carrying a tray. The list goes on and on. And these worries, as small as they probably seem to most of you, really, truly keep me up at night...

Yesterday, I went to a local park with Jordan, as I have done quite often over the past four weeks. It was a beautiful day, although I felt a little sad as I had spent some time earlier watching TV coverage of the procession of the three slain Pittsburgh police officers through the streets of the city. Probably an hour into our time there, I saw a police car drive up. At first, I wondered if it was because I had emailed the mayor just the day before, asking, among other things, if police patrolled the park. On several visits to the park, I had noticed people young and old alike sitting in cars for long periods of time. I am not entirely sure what any of them were doing; I just know each time, it left me unsettled. When a second police car pulled up, and an officer got out with a police dog and started walking down the hill, I figured this was more than just a patrol. I waited until two young adults finished talking to one of the officers, and I asked them what was going on. Apparently,...