Cheese in My Hair

I have alot of stuff  huh!  I bet some of you have just as much, maybe even more.  There was a time when everywhere I went I carried all this stuff with me, all the time!  The interesting thing is, even though it is hard to get around when you are loaded down this way, it can also be useful. If you stack  it just right, it’s easy to hide behind.  I used to use it to protect  myself from things that were thrown my way, like criticism or rejection.  Have any of you ever been made fun of or left out of something you really wanted to be a part of?  Maybe you didn’t even try to be included because you just knew if people knew you, really knew you, or about things you have done, they wouldn’t want to include you.  Yep, it’s much safer hiding behind this stuff! 

There is all kinds of stuff here.  I have Anger; it’s ok to be angry when someone deserves it isn’t it?  How dare they,talk about me, or criticize my child!  Wrap up in that at night and see how warm you stay.  There’s Jealousy; you know what I’m talking about; so and so doesn’t really deserve that big ol’ new house.  I bet they got it by cheating people in their business!  What about Guilt?  All the woulda, coulda, shoulda’s in your life?  Then there’s Hurt, Defeat, and Resentment.  Some of us have had the misfortune of experiencing  Addictions in our life, and  that can lead to Shame.   There’s  Depression and we all have Selfishness and Painful Childhood experiences.  Yes we all have or have had baggage that we tend to pile up around us. The downside is, it can be hard to see around all this junk and it really wears you out carrying it around all the time. 

The worst part is, that if you have enough of it, it’s hard to tell where you leave off and where the baggage begins.  It becomes your identity and when that happens you have to dress it up the best way you can to make it presentable.  You know as long as everything looks good on the outside no-one notices how bad it is on the inside.  No one except God.  God knows what is behind the cover up. 

I have always heard what doesn’t kill you can only make you stronger.  For me that is true.  The upside to my baggage was that experiencing the things that at one time were a burden that I carried around, helped to develop strength and experience that I have used many times since.  Because of things that have happened in my life, I have been able to be a better wife, mother and friend.  It has enabled me to give hope and advice to someone else going through the same things I had based on my experience instead of my opinion.  

My name is Annette Bagley-Martin and 18 years ago God made me aware of how I was hiding behind the baggage in my life and I came out of hiding, and surrendered my life to him.   Please don’t confuse my salvation with the fact that I am a member of a church.  Attending church will no more make you a Christian than living in America makes you an American.  

To become a Christian you must realize and admit that you are a sinner, ask God to forgive you and save you, accept the gift of salvation that God has for you.  This gift came in the form of Jesus Christ, God’s son who died on the cross, shed his blood for each and every one of us, and that includes YOU.  The only condition is that we believe in Him and what He has done for us, accept this for what it is, a gift freely given.  It is there for the taking!  This is what saves you, not religion, or church membership.  His love for you is why He is the one who will help you to stop carrying around the burden of your baggage, and be strengthened by the things you have experienced. 

Jesus says in Matthew 11:28-30 ~“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Are you burdened by all the baggage you are carrying around?

Today I received an email from my youngest child’s teacher informing me that yet again she had failed to turn in her work.  It seems that she was yet again given an opportunity over the weekend to finish a packet of homework and present me with a note to sign, acknowledging the fact my child’s current grade in her class is a 7.

Nope, that was not a typo, her grade is a 7.  How exactly does one manage to get a grade of 7 you ask?  Well, what it takes is for you to turn in only 1 assignment the two weeks following progress reports.  You have a fresh slate so all grades received are new opportunities to excel, or not as the case may be.  The time period in question is for March 15th thru March 26th.  It seems she has only turned in one homework assignment, which she received a 100 on.  All other assignments had apparently gone up in smoke.

When my child came rolling in this afternoon I asked her what was going on, and why was I just now hearing about it.  She replied that yes, she was given an opportunity to complete the homework over the weekend, but other things came up and she never got around to doing it or mentioning it.   Is it just me or does anybody else have a child like this?  I had to then shake off the feeling of deja vu.  My oldest was famous for her utter and complete denial that school=homework assignments.  Come to think of it, I believe this transformation happened in middle school, and this is our youngests first year in middle school.  Coincidence?   I don’t think so.  What is it about middle school that causes kids, or at least my kids, to all of a sudden lose their minds?  What is so puzzling to me is both of my children are great.  They are bright and funny and seem to have a fairly decent grip on things, so what is up?

When I received the email from the teacher alerting me to this gross act of negligence on my child’s part, the first thing that ran through my mind was; Today is the 29th, has she turned in nothing at all for the last two weeks?!  If so, why am I just now receiving an email today, on the eve of a scheduled parent-teacher conference! I did respond to the teacher asking exactly that, she replied by saying she had been sending home notes.  I then advised her to cut out the middle man (my child) and from this point forward kindly contact me directly as her current form of notification lacked a certain reliability.

What does tomorrow bring with the Parent-Teacher conference ahead?  Idaknow….my goal is to find a way to get my child back on track and keep her there, she still has 6 more years of school to go!  I do know this, after having a long conversation with my child and re-reading the teachers email, the deadline for the makeup of missing assignments was class time today.  Thankfully she had already completed most of them and had not turned them in.  Why not?  Abby say’s its because when she tries to, the teacher tells her to hold onto it until the next day.  Has she not met the child?  I’m thinking she should take the assignment and run!  This is the kid that barely makes it out of her room, down the hall and into the truck with everything she started off with when headed to school!  I think tomorrow shall prove enlightening for all involved.

Sidebar:  This evening while I was in line at the grocery store, her teacher was two people behind me, I said hello good to see ya, she gave me a tired smile and nodded.  When I looked up again she had disappeared, I guess she musta forgot something………

“If we do not plant knowledge when young, it will give us no shade when we are old.”       ~ Lord Chesterfield

This is the quote the teacher has on her emails, I like it, not convinced of it, but I like the idea of it……

I received the following email today from my mother-in-law.  Many of you may have seen this before.  If I have, I don’t recall it, but today as I read it, it really made me stop and think.   I like to believe that I am not like some of the people mentioned below.  I sincerely don’t believe that I am, but  I was glad for the opportunity to take “inventory” as I believe we all need to do that every now and again.

I am a lover of desserts, my favorites being pies and then cakes after that.  Not a big fan of the cookie but I will eat plain oatmeal (hold dem raisins) or peanut butter cookies till they are gone.  You would think that I would be quite the baker since I have such a sweet tooth, but I’m not.  I believe it’s because baking requires a certain exactness that I just don’t posses.  I’m more of a barbequer.  A dash of this a splash of that, shake some of this on top an vuala!  Soups on!!!

I have noticed that my kids love when there is an occasion to bake a cake around here because they love to cover the thing in sprinkles.  Yuck!  You would think sprinkles would taste better, wouldn’t you?  To me, they don’t taste like nuthing and just get in the way of the whole cake experience.  You gotchyer creamy frosting, soft moist cake and then some nut shakes sprinkles on top.  There you go, little bitty colored balls that get stuck in between your teeth and make you feel like your having cake at the beach and sand has gotten all up in your plate.  None for me thanks!

Nope, not a fan of the sprinkle.

Tonight as I was talking on the phone with my friend Kim, I hear my oldest daughter Alex getting onto her baby, Roxie.  For those of you that are unfamiliar,  Roxie is my grandogter.   She is rather homely but is the sweetest dog you could ever meet.  It is a good thing she is so sweet because she only recently quit wetting her invisible pants every time she got the least bit excited.  Ray was ready to ship her off, and has only recently come around to liking her as much as we do.

The reason Alex was having a fit was because it seems Roxie was enjoying Alex’s leather flip flop for dessert this evening.  She was very upset and came stalking into the living room where I was, thrust the half chewed flip flop in my line of vision and said, “You see this?!”  My response was, that would be one of the many reasons why you should keep your stuff put away.  If had thought it would have lit a fire under her to pick her stuff up I would have tossed her junk in Roxie’s bowl a long time ago.

We are  really quite lucky.  Except for the occasional poodle bomb when we have been totally oblivious to the potty dance she is doing by the door, the only thing we really have to contend with is the mountain of fluff she extracts from all of her toys.  It’s a good thing she was never cast as Toto on the Wizard of Oz as the scarecrow would have never stood a chance around her.

Animals sure can be weird.  We had a CheeWaaWaa once that loved to eat toothbrushes.  How did such a short dog get a hold of an item typically found well out of their reach?  Good question!  To this day no one can tell me why it is their toothbrushes were not in the holders above the sink.  I never had mine come up missing.  Why?  Because I kept it put away, that’s why.  My kids never seemed to be able to empty their overnight bags when they came home from sleepovers and the dog would sniff their toothbrushes out like a pig rooting for truffles.  Actually this dog would eat crayons as well and just about any candy the kids left lower than 4 foot off the ground.  She was actually SuperDog and was able to leap tall furniture in a single bound.  She could make her way up most obstacles to get at what she wanted if she so desired.

I once alked into my office and found our cat not only eating my lunch that I had stepped momentarily away from, but she was also knocking every other bite off into the floor to the dog.  Now that’s teamwork.  I had gotten totally distracted and the birds pitching a  fit was what actually brought be back to that end of the house.  I couldn’t decide if they were trying to get the cat to give them some too or if they just wanted to get the two of them in trouble.  It can be quite the zoo around here at times!

I have a girlfriend who’s dog liked to eat panties.  I know, ewwww.  But it is what it is, so there ya go.  It’s bad enough my daughter’s manage to abscond with all of my stuff, I’m sure glad the dog isn’t rooting through my drawers for well, drawers to snack on.

I’m actually kinda glad the dog ate her flip flop.  Maybe now she will understand how I felt when I saw her wearing my Senior jersey from high school and she had cut the neck cut out of it cause she “thought it looked better that way”.  Well what goes around comes around baby!

Have you ever noticed that with somethings we learn valuable lessons right away and with others we remain eternally optimistic and will tend to make the same mistake over and over again.  Benjamin Franklin has been noted as saying that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results.  If that is the case, I know a couple of insane folk personally.

Today, after warming up a bowl of potato soup, I shook in so much white pepper I could see it on my food.  I wasn’t thinking clearly as to what the impact of this would be to my taste buds but was made glaringly aware two spoonfuls into my meal.   In the spirit of being helpful and allowing my own lapse of judgment  to serve as a warning to others, I sent out an all call to my facebook friends to share their “Never Ever” experiences with me,  so that I in turn may share them with you all.

I will start off with two that I can testify to personally and are very much worth heeding to:

1) Never tear the protective cardboard seal from a brand new shaker of cayenne pepper with your teeth.  No matter how careful you are you will get this product on your lips and the resulting sharp intake of breath from the burning sensation will cause you to inhale just enough of the product to restrict airflow.  Trust me, don’t try this at home.

2) When suffering from a cold and chest congestion, if you choose to daub a little Vicks Vap-O-Rub on your nose, DO NOT (I cannot stress this enough) do not, when using the facility blow said nose and then in the spirit of conservation fold the tissue over to wipe with.  You will never, never, never be able to completely cover over the portion with Vicks and let’s suffice it to say, once it’s there, the damage is done.

Here is some sage advise from my friends who were generous enough to contribute to this post:

Never Ever:

Stacey ~ Spit in the wind. You should also never put the  Dr. Pepper bottle you have been spitting tobacco juice in right next to the Dr. Pepper bottle your drinking out of  because when driving down the road and talking on the cell phone at the same time you could become distracted and confuse the two……

Lisa ~ Ask anyone the question “When is your baby due?” Unless of course they are wearing one of those shirts with the arrow that points downward with the words baby above…then again it might still be risky.

Michelle ~ Ask a pregnant woman, “Are you having twins?” This happened to Michelle while grocery shopping, she was only having the one child and her weight gain was at a minimum.

David ~ Wear a towel around you neck, cape fashion while claiming to be batman, while in a bar. I have to admit, I wasn’t too sure about this one until I got to the “while in a bar” portion of the statement, then it all began to make sense.  LOL David!

Terry ~ Tell anybody what you were thinking about while you step out of the shower. This one sent my mind pin-balling in a million directions, so let’s just leave it lie.  =)

Ray ~ Stick a pencil in the spark plug hole of a motorcycle to see how deep it is. Apparently this action will cause your parental unit to invent new cuss words as the more common ones just won’t suffice.

Amanda ~ Get a mouthful of realllly hot soup in public, because the very next thing you do will be wrong. Watch out folks!  She’s fittin to spew!

Cindy ~ Agree to bring home the class pet (rabbit) that the teacher no longer wants or believe the pest control guy when he says he will be there between 10 and 12. I think we should lump the cable and phone guy into that last statement as well, don’t ya’ll?

Thank you again to all of my wonderful contributors I am forever grateful.

Today when I ran by the grocery story for a few things I got a craving for a potted meat sandwich.  Now, the other folks in my house will say “ewwww gross” but it is a warm reminder of my childhood.

I feel like my children have been deprived because they don’t know how good a mayonnaise sandwich is for an after school snack, they’ve spent more time watching TV than digging holes to China and they don’t know the feeling of contentment you have while standing up on the middle of the bench seat of a pickup, arms stretched out and leaned up against your daddy, while riding down the streets of Atlanta.

When I was coming up, fast food was a luxury indulged upon only if you were out of state on vacation.  Birthday cakes came from bakeries only when mama was too sick to bake one and at that she had to be nigh unto death before she would let that happen and I not only shared a room with my sister, but also a double bed until I was 16!

I rode hundreds of miles on a bicycle without wearing a helmet.  I’ve climbed to the top of many a crab apple tree to shake it so we could eat green fruit off  the ground without more than a cursory glance and swipe on our shirts.  We drank warm water out of water hoses and played in the woods blocks from home without every worrying about ner do wells.

I didn’t get a car until I had a job cause until then I didn’t need one, the “school bus came by the house every day for free”.   I wasn’t even allowed to get my license until I knew how to drive a straight shift, change a tire and the oil of my vehicle.  Having a car to drive was a privilege not a right.

My children do not understand the excitement of the words “Chitty, Chitty Bang, Bang or The Grinch Who Stole Christmas is coming on TV tonight!!”  Because you can now buy the movie and watch it anytime you like.   I think that should have never been allowed (sigh).

They have never  saved stick gum wrappers to make chains with and wouldn’t know how to play a game of jacks if a gun was held to their heads. They have never heard of Flubber, the Acme Co.  or the  many uses of their famous black hole.

I am glad they enjoy catching lightening bugs in jars to make lanterns to use while camping out on the trampoline.  But I hate that my oldest prefers the tanning bed to laying out on a lawn chair underneath the water sprinkler.

It’s a shame they never learned how to avoid burning their fingers at a young age by playing with a creepy crawler machine, maybe Abby wouldn’t be so afraid of burning herself using the oven.   They would rather pop popcorn in the microwave that make Jiffy Pop.  They prefer a blizzard from Dairy Queen over a Coke float from home and they prefer Chinese take out over hand pattied burgers.

Yep, I am certain, they are deprived.

We all know that the current unemployment rate for Douglas County, Georgia hovers around the 11% mark.  What you may not realize is the Thrifty Nickel, that wonderful free paper found by the exit doors of most grocery stores,  has a virtual treasure trove of positions up for grabs in their employment section.  Here are a few of the most notable:

TELEMINISTERS  Good money for the joy of serving the Lord!  TRINITY MINISTRIES XXX-XXX-XXXX

Teleministers?  I know what a Telemarketer is, what the heck is a Teleminister?  Do they have conference calls on Sundays instead of regular church services?   If you are a missionary from a Teleministrey do you minister to people in your targeted region via satellite?  I don’t know about this one….What do ya’ll think this is?

SURROGATE MOTHER’S  needed!  The Rewards are more than financial.  Women Needed, 21-43 w/healthy pregnancy history.  Call X-XXX-XXX-XXXX

What do they mean the rewards are more than financial?  I have to believe the person that wrote this add has never been pregnant!  I myself would only be a surrogate mother for my sister and at that it would be difficult in and of itself.  What is rewarding about morning/evening sickness, hemorrhoids, stretch marks  and breast milk that will spray like a thumb over a water hose while your in the shower?  Personally, I feel  the reward is in being the parent.  If you can’t keep the kid, what’s the point?  Don’t let them fool you, when it comes to being a surrogate, the reward is purely financial.  Beware, this is a classic case of the ol’ bait-n-switch!

$200 AND MORE COLLECTING CAR TAG INFO:  Get paid to write down license numbers.  Call XXX-XXX-XXXX it’s FREE

Why, why and WHY!!!  What exactly are they doing with this collected information? Shouldn’t the authorities check this out?

$1,960 WEEKLY  mailing an amazing postcard from home.  Free info packet: X-XXX-XXX-XXXX

Just how many of these amazing postcards do you have to mail?  Who provides the postage?  In the event I’m an underachiever, how much do just the so-so postcards pay?

NURSING ASSISTANT training in 3 weeks.  State certified. Patient care, EKG, phlebotomy also offered.  XXX-XXX-XXXX

I want to know right now what medical facilities are hiring nursing assistants with only 3 weeks training from a school that is advertising in the Thrifty Nickel!  Is this an Obamacare Training Program???  Inquiring minds want to know…wait, that’s another paper altogether…

MOVIE EXTRAS to stand in the backgrounds for a major film production.  Experience not required! All looks needed! Earn up to $150 per day!  XXX-XXX-XXXX

Sign me up!  Where else can you get $150 a day for loitering?

Well, there you go!  Can’t find something in the more traditional trades?  Check out the Thrifty Nickel,  available at grocery store checkouts everywhere!

Today, I went to return a movie to the redbox and as luck would have it, just as I pulled into the Walgreen’s parking lot where the box was located, it came a downpour.  I saw where the person before me had pulled alongside the sidewalk and they were just finishing up and getting back into their car.  I also noticed if you parked by the sidewalk, it created a logjam of traffic as this was the outbound lane for traffic leaving the drugstore.   I decided the chances of me getting all that wet were minimal so I would just pull into a parking space.   After all, there was an overhang above the sidewalk and how long could it take to push a couple of buttons on a touchscreen anyways?  Well, it can take longer than you think if the last person to use the screen left it on the Spanish translation and in the middle of searching for a movie.

I park my truck so I’m not causing any problems and puddle jump my way to the sidewalk.  Once there I immediately notice that the lovely overhang has a steady stream of water that is pouring straight from the roof directly in front of the redbox.  There is a little red curtain that hangs over the screen to protect it from the elements, so here I am body pressed as close to the redbox as possible to avoid a cold, wet shower from the waterfall from above, little red curtain flung over my head like a photographer behind one of those old fashioned cameras.  Imagine my surprise when I couldn’t make heads or tails of what was on the screen.

You see, if I were a regular user of redbox, I mighta had a clue, but seeing as this was only my second time, I was left standing there wondering why the stupid thing didn’t just default back to English once the last person had finished using it.  I felt that there had been plenty of time for it to default back as I watched them drive away while I rummaged around in my purse for the movie and my debit card since I couldn’t remember if I needed it or not to make a return.

I stood there with water running down my back thinking how grateful I was that I chose to put on jeans and a sweatshirt instead of making the mad dash out in my lounging clothes (which I am prone to do).   I was also wondering  why it was the few drops of Mexican blood I posses do not allow me to translate the gibberish on the screen.  What is even funnier is that earlier today my youngest daughter was testing Ray and I with some homemade Spanish flashcards that her sister had made last semester for her Spanish class.

I decided after that little pop quiz there was no logic to the Spanish language anyway as the word for blonde was rubio.  Rubio?  My pea brain was telling  me that rubio should mean red.  So here I am looking to see if there is any word that remotely looks like the word back, inside the shape of an arrow pointing to the left so I can just punch it till I get to the main screen, where hopefully it will ask me if I want to see my options in Spanish or English.  No such luck, just little rojo (red) rectangles with words that escape me.

Just as when searching for car keys, the last button I pushed (or place I look) is the correct one and I move back 4 or 5 screens to where I can switch that sucker over to English and two touchscreen pushes later I have returned my movie.  I’m relieved to be over that ordeal and I back out from behind that little red curtain and get the lovely sensation of  wet all weather fabric dragging up the back of my head car wash style.  I have to believe I would have had an easier go at it if it had been written in Ebonics/Ubonics!

A thought I had once back in my truck was; wasn’t the movie in English?  If so,  why did they need the screen to be in Spanish to pick the movie out?  Were they not fixin’ to watch an entire movie in English?   Maybe when you choose your selection in Spanish, the movie comes in Spanish?  I have looked all over their website and there is no mention of it so what the heck!  I am a huge advocate of  if your in America speak American, but as with anywhere else, dat be alota different translations as well.  You got your Southern American, Yankee American, Mid-West American, West Coast American etc and so forth.

The solution?  Well, when it comes to redbox, how about they have one of their little rojo rectangles with the picture of a house on it so that I know that will take me to the “home” screen where I can then tell it I am American and I no speakee Spanish!

I consider today to be one of, if not the best days that I have experienced this year.   Funny thing is, today was spent at the memorial service of a young man, well, middle aged like myself, but a man who to me, seemed forever young at heart.    While filled with an underlying solemness, the day shined with a sun as bright as his smile, was filled with music that was sung with a love that ran deeper than the ocean and stirred memories that were once long forgotten.

I did not know him as well as some of the  others, but we experienced a friendship vicariously through stories told by my husband and his friends who did indeed know him well.  Don’t get me wrong, we had met, even conversed, we just never ran with the same folks in school.  Like a lot of the people there today, life took us in different directions  and the years between crossing paths flew by, but be assured, when chance brought you together again with him, the clock rolled back and it is was as if no time had passed at all.

Two words spoken today during the memorial, “I Reckon”, really struck a cord in my heart.  A few meanings of the word reckon are anticipate, consider or count on.  These words were spoken in conjunction with Romans 8:18;  For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.  This passage can be used to describe our dear friend as he finished out his last days here as his physical body was failing, at the time it was terribly hard but compared to his glorified body he now has, well there is no comparison.   It also is a reminder to us that while here, we will suffer and at times it will seem unbearable but it is oh so temporary, so don’t lose heart.

On this bright an shiny day, surrounded by friends and feeling the love that brings people together at times such as these, it is a comfort that I have that assurance that I will one day see him and many others that have gone before me again.  But you know what?  I reckon I am just selfish enough, that I would like it a whole lot better if we could all just grow old together and then  just all go at the same time!

James Edward “Jimbo” Vest      April 4, 1964 ~ March 15, 2010

Something to To Think About:

If you are not certain that when you leave this earth where you will spend eternity get it settled.  Don’t wait, if you have no one you can talk to then you can contact me.  (My contact information is on my main blog page.)  Don’t let pride, prejudice or feelings of unworthiness hold you back.  There ain’t a one of us worthy of the gift of salvation, but you know what? It is given freely to all and is there for the taking.