Heather Rae Scott

Dear Santa,
I’ve been a good mom all year. I’ve fed, cleaned, and cuddled
my two children on demand, visited the doctor’s office more
than my doctor, sold sixty-two cases of candy bars to raise
money to plant a shade tree on the school playground and
figured out how to attach nine patches onto my daughter’s
girl scout sash with staples and a glue gun.

I was hoping you could spread my list out over several
Christmases, since I had to write this letter with my son’s
red crayon, on the back of a receipt in the laundry room
between cycles, and who knows when I’ll find anymore free
time in the next 18 years.

Here are my Christmas wishes:

I’d like a pair of legs that don’t ache after a day of chasing
kids (in any color, except purple, which I already have) and
arms that don’t flap in the breeze, but are strong enough to
carry a screaming toddler out of the candy aisle in the
grocery store. I’d also like a waist, since I lost mine
somewhere in the seventh month of my last pregnancy.

If you’re hauling big ticket items this year, I’d like a car
with fingerprint resistant windows and a radio that only
plays adult music; a television that doesn’t broadcast any
programs containing talking animals, and a refrigerator
with a secret compartment behind the crisper where I
can hide to talk on the phone.

On the practical side, I could use a talking daughter doll
that says, “Yes, Mommy” to boost my parental confidence,
along with one potty-trained toddler, two kids who don’t
fight, and three pairs of jeans that will zip all the way up
without the use of power tools. I could also use a
recording of Tibetan monks chanting, “Don’t eat in the
living room” and “Take your hands off your brother”,
because my voice seems to be just out of my children’s
hearing range and can only be heard by the dog.

And please don’t forget the Playdoh Travel Pak, the
hottest stocking stuffer this year for mothers of
preschoolers. It comes in three fluorescent colors and is
guaranteed to crumble on any carpet making the In-law’s
house seem just like mine.

If it’s too late to find any of these products, I’d settle for
enough time to brush my teeth and comb my hair in the
same morning, or the luxury of eating food warmer than
room temperature without it being served in a Styrofoam
container. If you don’t mind I could also use a few
Christmas miracles to brighten the holiday season.
Would it be too much trouble to declare ketchup a
vegetable? It will clear my conscience immensely.

It would be helpful if you could coerce my children to help
around the house without demanding payment as if they
were the bosses of an organized crime family; or if my
toddler didn’t look so cute sneaking downstairs to eat
contraband ice cream in his pajamas at midnight.

Well, Santa, the buzzer on the dryer is ringing and my
son saw my feet under the laundry room door. I think he
wants his crayon back.

Have a safe trip and remember to leave your wet boots by
the chimney and come in and dry off by the fire so you
don’t catch cold. Help yourself to cookies on the table, but
don’t eat too many or leave crumbs on the carpet.

Yours always…..
Mom

PS: One more thing…you can cancel all my requests if
you can keep my children young enough to believe in
Santa.

We’ve been at this hospital for 4 hours now. My two youngest children are with me and they’ve been :innocent1_tb:. My Grandma just went into surgery about ten minutes ago. How ridiculous is this? It also took me about that long to figure out how to use the hospital’s wifi. :dunce_tb: She’s having a minor surgery to clean up the nerves around her spine–the sciatic. I’ll update when I know anything more.

Update:
The doctor made a tiny incision, cleaned up the nerve and sent her to recovery. We finally saw her after five. She was extremely feisty, wanting her pain medicine. She was going to punch the anesthesiologist in the face because he had to do more than one IV. Of course, it’s all his fault that she’s almost 83 and has bad veins. She was demanding pain medicine, and wanting to know if the nurse had to go to another state to get it. At 9pm when I called her to tell her I was home, it was 20 questions. At 10:30pm she was looking for her hearing aids and was complaining that the morphine wasn’t doing a damned thing for her pain and she couldn’t sleep. So, yes, Bubba, she was acting like McSquizzy.

Metaphorically speaking.

It’s always strange to me how pieces of a puzzle fit together in real life. A very good friend of mine had a dream about me. She lives out of state and she had to email me the dream to see if perhaps it meant anything to me. She said there were garbage bags littering my yard and my kitchen. And not the kind of trash that has flies buzzing around them. The rest of my house was spotless. When she attempted to try and clean up some of the bags, she was told to leave them that I had to clean them up. They were my burden to bear.

A week later, I talked to my aunt and she was talking about an article she wrote for her Writer’s group on how her mind works. She shared it with me and in a nutshell she has file cabinets in which she has different colors for different things in her life. Happiness, shame, disappointment, anger, frustration. I decided that the garbage bags were my own messed up system of storing things. You see, I think I’m one of the most disorganized people on this planet. I put things in places that are ‘safe’. They’re safe because it takes me forever to find the damned thing again. So, for someone to have an analogy of me with garbage bags doesn’t surprise me. That she knows me that well does. Of course there was more to this dream of hers and I don’t know what you believe. Call me crazy, but I believe in spirits and a very wise man who knows me well came to her. I don’t think she’s the only one he’s used to get me to open my eyes and as Bubba says, “smell the coffee”. His opening up about my Pap and quoting from something I didn’t remember writing…if you do the math, two and two truly add up to four. My Pap is trying to tell me something.

Everyday, I add something more to the garbage bags. This week was no exception. So where do you start? Unlike my aunt who can open, move and even slam the drawers shut of her file cabinets, I have this mess. Memories, frustration, anger, happiness, all jumbled into bags. What if the happy things are buried beneath shame? What if I open up a bag of memories that I closed years ago and don’t want to face again? Or what if that fear keeps me from discovering something good that I’d long forgotten?

And how do you organize your brain?

I know several of them contain a gamut of emotions dealing with my real father and his family. There’s anger for being denied my God-given right to be his daughter. Anger because he has a new family. Frustration that he’s never fully wanted me and my family to be a part of his. Disappointment in myself for letting him more times than he deserved. Shame because if he called tomorrow and needed something, I’d probably do it for him. There’s not much happiness in this bag of sperm-donor memories. But there’s regret and every other negative emotion associated with it. Frustration because in opening that bag, I gave him power again.

Happiness is in the bags containing my children. There’s also pride and accomplishment.
They’re mixed in with other things containing memories of my ex-husband and his family. But I try not to give them much thought. And there are still more bags to conquer. To toss out things that don’t work for me–that never did–and to replace them with new memories, only hopefully I can have a pretty, color coded file room.

In all of this…self-discovery, a story blossomed. It’s not one of the ones I should be writing, it’s something new that will not shut up in my head. It’s like a movie–pieces of this story fitting together like the pieces of a puzzle. It’s one that I can take these memories and give them a new home. It’s not going to be an easy story to write, but it’s one that isn’t going to give me peace until I do.

How about you? File cabinets or garbage bags?

Question: Are you a die-hard crazed Pittsburgh Steelers fan?
Answer: Why yes, yes I am.
Question: How crazed?
Answer: Extremely. I have proof.

Today’s forecast: Thursday – Snow showers likely. Snow accumulation less than an inch. Highs in the mid 30s. West winds 10 to 15 mph. Chance of snow 70 percent.

Thursday Night – Snow showers. Snow accumulation 2 to 4 inches. Lows in the mid 20s. West winds around 15 mph. Chance of snow 80 percent.

:stuck: I knew this was going to happen to us! But you know what? It’s okay. I’m going to the game and when it snows at Heinz Field–these are the bestest games ever. :yahoo: I may freeze, but totally worth it.

Sing it with me now: Here we go, Steelers! Here we go! Who dey? We dey! :football:

With some help from Dee, we’re going to figure out a theme for me–new one that loads quicker and is easier on the eyeballs. So if things change and go back, it’s not your computer, it’s us tweaking.

All my troubles seemed so far away, now it looks as if they’re here to stay, oh I believe in yesterday…

Yesterday, I took my GMa back to the Orthopedic Surgeon in Pittsburgh. Her laminectomy is scheduled for December 1st. She didn’t even hear him. She heard two small holes, cleaning up the nerve, surgery about an hour long. She didn’t hear that this would not be the cure all for her back and knee pain. But whatever, I’m done. Honestly, I feel this is a plea for attention and her oldest son fed into it yesterday. But again, whatever. I’m not giving her my opinion on the matter anymore. Why is it when elders reach about eighty do they revert back to children who “know it all”?

Today, I’m not answering my phone. I’m leaving for a bit to get something done with my hair. Of course the dog, who we renamed Odie isn’t going to like it that I’m leaving him, but he needs to see that when I leave, I come back very shortly. Can’t leave him out of the kennel because he tries to chew his way out the front door. I tested him yesterday when I went for my morning coffee and he failed. But things are going good here with our new addition. Although he’s my dog. We’re hoping he gets out of that just a little–at least I am. My youngest is getting a little irritated that if he finally gets him on his lap and I move…so does Odie.

Also working on changing things around on the blog. Looking for a new theme–something wider, something with a little less graphics, something that doesn’t take forEVER to load.

Have a great day!

Yesterday, I didn’t have the internet. Major server break in our area. So, I spent most of the day cleaning and puppy-proofing our house just in case Mark finally agreed on letting us get a dog. You see, he has OCD and our house isn’t real big, so shedding dogs drive him bonkers. He grew up on a farm where the dogs lived in the barn, not in the house. Our youngest has been begging relentlessly for a puppy. His final stand was, “If the President’s girls can have a puppy, why can’t I?” You see, we’ve been talking to them about this election, how important, how historical and about equality. The boy is smart. He wanted his equal rights. He’s ten now, doncha know?

My friend JoJo had a puppy. A ten-month old Shi-tzu, Lhaso Apso. I’d met him, I’d seen pictures. He needed a home. I told her to let me think about it and figure out a way to broach the subject with the man. Surprisingly, the man said yes. So, we now have a puppy. My oldest son acted all blase’ about him, but I saw on his Myspace that he happens to think Odee is freaking awesome.

I didn’t get much sleep last night. Odee and I ended up together on the couch, but I’m not mad. Just tired. He’s a sweetheart and once he gets used to us, we’ll reap the benefits. My youngest was showing him off today at the bus stop and he couldn’t wait to go to school to tell everyone he finally got his wish. He got his puppy and that makes the sleepless night totally worth it.

Thanks, JoJo!

School nurse calls me this morning to inform me that my daughter has hurt her knee in gym class. :gah: She says it’s swollen and it’s burning and tingling. Call PCP enroute to school asking what I should do. Any other time they’d want me to take her to the ER. Not today. Today, we have to go see the Ped and then decide our best action. She didn’t fall on it that she remembers, but there’s discoloration. Have no idea what she did and neither does she. Wish us luck.

UPDATE:
The gurl has a condition/disease called Osgood-Schlatter. It is believed that Osgood-Schlatter disease results from the pull of the large powerful muscles in the front of the thigh (called the quadriceps). The quadriceps join with the patellar tendons, which run through the knee and into the tibia, to connect the muscles to the knee. When the quadriceps contract, the patellar tendons can start to pull away from the shin bone, causing pain.
Basically, she grew too fast over the summer and has to rest it a little bit. No gym for a week and we go from there.

My GMa used to call my youngest a bonny wee laddie. Today, the baby that wasn’t is ten. Let me explain.

Mark and I are both divorced. He has a daughter from his previous marriage and I have two from mine. I had a lot of female problems. Cervical cancer, Endo, Fibroids, Adhesions and Cysts. In October of 1997, they removed the majority of my left ovary–it was damaged from a big Cyst. He scraped the Endo off the right and left and removed adhesions. At my follow-up, he explained to me that things didn’t look so good in there and the probabilty of me having another baby without fertility drugs were slim to none. The right ovary was functional, but the tubes and stuff were jacked up from the Endo. Mark and I were okay with that. We were only a year in in our relationship, plus, between the two of us, we had three kids.

The week of Valentine’s Day 1998. One of the ladies in the bakery of our local grocery store stopped me and said she had a dream Mark and I were having twins. Of course, I giggled and said, “So not happening.” I think that was on a Monday. Tuesday, I got to thinking about it and realized Mother Nature hadn’t visited me.

I always knew when I was pregnant. Even if I was in huge denial, I knew. I told Mark I suspected I was he said, “Noooo. You can’t be.”

I ended up buying a pregnancy test anyhow when I went to the store–the cheapest I could and took it that night. What are the chances? I thought as I peed on the stick. In twenty seconds, the line turned blue. Okay, I’ll wait the three minutes. It just kept getting darker and darker…blue. I started bawling. Took the stick to Mark and he still didn’t believe it. Called my Dr. the next day and I had to go for an emergency Ultrasound. There was no way that baby was where it needed to be if in fact I was pregnant. Lil man was right where he needed to be.

He also cleared up a few things, like why Becky’s son ( who was nursed )always wanted a bottle when he was with me at eight weeks old…. :duh:

I won’t say it was an easy pregnancy, because it wasn’t. He gave us a couple of good scares when I went into pre-term labor and he was way too tiny. But we made it. He made it. Almost a year to the day of my surgery.  And he’s been a blessing ever since.

This is my favorite picture of him.

Happy Birthday, Buddy!

:duh: I’ve been having trouble with my ISP. At first it was the remnants of Ike, but then it never got better. I’d try and post a blog or reply to one and I’d hit post and I’d get an error page that said I wasn’t connected to the internet. I dumped an entire glass of tea on my one cordless phone, bought new ones and they didn’t work. I returned them and bought new ones and they were a wee bit better but not by much. I finally broke down and called the phone company.

Two nice men came out and the first thing they saw was the wire bundled outside from the phone line that used to run from our bedroom until we redid the back porch and when Mark pulled the siding off the phone line came with it. He never undid the wire from the box, so this wire was still live. I looked at him like he was high until he cut off the corroded part, put his machine up to it and sure enough, there was a dial tone. He told me he was surprised I had any service at all. One problem solved and into the house we went.

In my defense, the other phone jack is in the living room behind my Entertainment center. I have to run filters on my phone lines for the DSL. When I hooked up the new cordless phones, I neglected to get the plug in the right hole– :censored:–hence my dropping the internet every five minutes. Yes, I am a dork.

In other news, the Steelers are playing the Ravens tonight on Monday Night Football. If the Steelers lose, we’ll never hear the end of it from one of our neighbor’s who is from Baltimore. Goooooo Steelers!
:football: